News archive
Release notes, packaging news and development updates from the KMyFirewall project. The newest entries appear first.
Donatas Glodenis provides KMyFirewall 1.1.1 and patched kdesudo packages for Ubuntu and Kubuntu. Thanks for his support.
Greetings,
Chris
The release is also available from the SourceForge project files.
As reported by Donatas Gloden, the installation process in version 1.1.0 is seriously broken. It does not install a valid script.
If you are using version 1.1.0, update to version 1.1.1, which was released on SourceForge.
See the download page for the current source archive.
With great thanks to Donatas Glodenis, here is a better fix for the kdesu option issue. These are the instructions from his email.
The kdesudo version 2.1, available for the coming version of Ubuntu Hardy Heron 8.4, already has the t option implemented. You can build your own kdesudo package for gutsy by following these steps.
wget http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/k/kdesudo/kdesudo_2.1‑0ubuntu1.dsc
wget http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/k/kdesudo/kdesudo_2.1.orig.tar.gz
wget http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/k/kdesudo/kdesudo_2.1‑0ubuntu1.diff.gz
dpkg‑source ‑x kdesudo_2.1‑0ubuntu1.dsc
cd kdesudo‑2.1/
sudo apt‑get build‑dep kdesudo
dpkg‑buildpackage ‑rfakeroot ‑uc ‑b
cd ../
sudo dpkg ‑i kdesudo*.debThe apt source for KMyFirewall and the patched kdesudo was published at http://dg.lapas.info/share/paketai/ubuntu‑gutsy/.
Greetings,
Chris
It has been a while since the last release, almost two years. Sorry for the slow progress until now, but I hope the new KMyFirewall 1.1.0 release will excuse the long waiting.
This release includes many new features, including multi target configuration and remote installation, and fixes all known bugs. The document format changed a little, but the release was kept compatible with rulesets created using version 1.0.x where possible.
With KMyFirewall 1.1.0 you can define so called Targets in the MyNetwork View. These are the computers you manage using KMyFirewall. After configuring a Target with an IP address and SSH port, set it as the active target and edit its ruleset as you did for localhost. The only requirement is that the target allows SSH connections and has a bash shell installed.
With the help of KDE KIO technology you can install, run and show the configuration on the remote host, as you did on localhost. All communication between KMyFirewall and the target is encrypted using SSH.
Because of the trouble the previous undo and redo implementation caused, it was redesigned. The engine is now faster, more reliable and easier to use as a developer.
This solves one of the most annoying problems of the Generic Interface. In the KMyFirewall settings dialog you can now define your own protocols. If an important protocol is still missing, create it and send it to the project so it can be added for the next release. A future release may implement a KHotNewStuff service for online updates of the protocol library.
The auto configuration capabilities moved to a small bash script, so they can also be used for remote targets. If your system is not detected correctly, send your configuration to the project so it can be added to the auto configuration script.
Have fun managing your firewalls using KMyFirewall 1.1.0. Feedback and bug reports are welcome.
Greetings,
Chris
Several emails and bug reports described a problem where KMyFirewall fails to start, run or install on Ubuntu and Kubuntu, and the generated scripts fail with an invalid option error from kdesu.
After searching for the issue, the cause appears to be that Ubuntu silently uses kdesudo instead of the KDE default kdesu. The workaround is to undo that switch.
ls ‑la /usr/bin/kdesu
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 7 2008‑01‑06 16:15 /usr/bin/kdesu ‑> kdesudo
# The kdesu file is a link to kdesudo. Change it back.
sudo ‑i
rm /usr/bin/kdesu
ln ‑s /usr/bin/kdesu.distrib /usr/bin/kdesuSee also the later post about a better kdesudo workaround.
Today I received an email from the Linux Magazine editor, informing me about an article they published about KMyFirewall in the February issue of the English version, which is available for download.
If you are interested in reading it, use the link below and enjoy.
Read the Linux Magazine article
So long, and thanks for all the fish.
I am very happy to announce the first update release for KMyFirewall 1.0. Some bugs are fixed and it is now possible to create installation packages for the generated ruleset.
Thanks to everyone who sent bug reports. I hope most of the major issues are solved now.
I am very happy to announce the availability of the newly designed KMyFirewall homepage.
The design and implementation were done by Anton Frennevi, who also designed a new icon set for KMyFirewall. Unfortunately, he will not have more time to work with us, so a very big thank you to him.
See the credits page for the people behind the project.
Since the last stable release, KMyFirewall has been completely rewritten to be more flexible and easier to use.
Most parts of the application were rewritten with a plugin framework that allows new IPTables rule option editors to be written within a few hours, depending on the complexity of the options. This lets contributors implement the growing number of IPTables rule options without understanding the whole application.
The backend that generates the IPTables rules was extended to allow registration of new rule options by defining them in an XML description file. The application handbook explains how to write such plugins.
Many emails complained about the complexity of KMyFirewall and the limited possibilities of the wizard, so the wizard was removed and a completely new interface was implemented.
Because the new interface works on an abstract description of the generated rules, the plugin structure allows script compilers that support other firewalling backends than netfilter and iptables. To support a new toolkit, a compiler and an installer plugin are required. Currently only the iptables and Linux compiler and installer are implemented.
The new Generic Interface is operating system and toolkit independent. The IPTables Interface is an improved version of the well known KMyFirewall GUI and is tightly bound to the netfilter and iptables toolkit, so it can only be used with Linux.
For security related applications, a developer must decide whether to build a tool for expert users, such as experienced system administrators, or a tool that everybody can handle. Instead of merging both requirements into one interface, they were separated so each user group gets the features it needs.
The documentation was updated with a small howto about writing KMyFirewall plugins. Anyone with basic knowledge of C++ and KDE programming should be able to implement rule option plugins without problems.
If you are interested in writing a config dialog for a missing iptables option, read the developer guide and the page about rule option plugins.
SuSE 9.2 rpms were uploaded, with thanks to Marcus for contributing them.
APT users could install from the following repository:
ftp://ftp.gwdg.de/pub/linux/suse/apt SuSE/9.2‑i386 suser‑tuxThe documentation was updated with a new section describing the plugin framework. If you are a developer and like to code on KMyFirewall, you are welcome to join the project.
The file format used to save rulesets changed. Rulesets created with KMyFirewall before 1.0beta1 will not work.
During the last year KMyFirewall was completely rewritten to be more flexible and easier to use.
Most parts of the application were rewritten with a plugin framework that allows new IPTables rule option editors to be written within a few hours. The backend that generates the IPTables rules was extended to allow new rule options to be registered in an XML description file.
The wizard was removed and a completely new interface was implemented. The interface works on an abstract description of the generated rules, so the plugin structure allows script compilers that support other firewalling backends than netfilter and iptables.
The Generic Interface is operating system and toolkit independent. The IPTables Interface is tightly bound to netfilter and iptables and can only be used with Linux.
Instead of merging the needs of expert users and beginners into one interface, they were separated so each group gets the features it needs.
Rockersoft built new packages for KMyFirewall and the download links were updated. A big thank you also goes to Raphael Lechner for contributing Debian testing and unstable packages.
Fedora Core packages:
kmyfirewall‑0.9.6.2‑4.rockerssoft.fc2.i386.rpmkmyfirewall‑0.9.6.2‑3.rockerssoft.fc1.i386.rpmDebian testing and unstable:
kmyfirewall_0.9.6.2_i386.debThis is a small bugfix release that fixes the following problems.
The download page keeps the current documented release and build instructions: Download KMyFirewall 1.1.1.