Ahoy Pirates,

Our next PPI board meeting will take place on 18.11.2025, 14:00 UTC / 15:00 CET.

All official PPI proceedings, Board meetings included, are open to the public. Feel free to stop by. We’ll be happy to have you.

Where:jitsi.pirati.cz/PPI-Board

Agenda: Pad: https://etherpad.pp-international.net/p/ppi-board-meeting-2025-08-05-vnly0cj

All of our meetings are posted to our calendar: pp-international.net/calendar/

We look forward to seeing visitors.

Thank you for your support,

The Board of PPI

pp-international.net/2025/11/p…

PPI’s main delegate at the United Nations Office of Geneva, Mr. Carlos Polo, attended events of the Environmental Programme (UNEP) this August. We attach some pictures of his visit, and we offer some comments about the efforts of our organization in helping to shape environmental policy.

The UNEP oordinates environmental work across the UN, but it is not the only organization. The UN has now created the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Each organization deals with separate environmenal issues and hosts its own conferences that include negotiations between nations and sometimes ask for statements and opinions of NGOs like our own. Currently the UNFCCC is hosting the COP conference in Brazil.

Carlos was able to observe the UNEP negotiations, but as we are not a nation (aka Party) we do not have a voice. Furthermore, we are not yet members of any of these conventions. PPI needs to establish more direct activities that promote environmental protection so that we can be accepted as members of these organizations, in addition to the Economic and Social Affairs Committee (ECOSOC) where we are already members.

We are hoping to make a bigger impact on international environmental governance. As an NGO, our abilities are limited. NGOs often watch from the back of the room. Our speaking time is scarce. The actual negotiation where the decisions are made take place behind closed doors, and we are simply able to only provide statements at the conference or as a published policy statement. One additional opportunity is that we can host side events. We have discussed cohosting a side even with other NGOs. If anyone is interested in collaborating, please contact us.

board@pp-international.net

Donations

pp-international.net/donations…

pp-international.net/2025/11/g…

There are many applications out there that use more than one window, with every modern-day platform and GUI toolkit offering the means for said application to position each of its windows exactly where it wants, and to restore these exactly in the configuration and location where the user saved it for that particular session. All toolkits but one, that is, for the Wayland project keeps shooting down proposals. Most recently merge request #264 for the ext-zones protocol by [Matthias Klumpp] as it descended into a 600+ comments spree.

This follows on an attempt two years prior with MR#247, which was rejected despite laying out sound reasons why the session protocol of Wayland does not cover many situations. In the breakdown video of the new ext-zones protocol discussion by [Brodie Robertson] the sheer absurdity of this whole situation becomes apparent, especially since KDE and others are already working around the Wayland project with their own extensions such as via KWin, which is being used commercially in e.g. the automotive world.

In a January 2024 blog post [Matthias] lays out many of his reasonings and views regarding the topic, with a focus on Linux desktop application usage from a scientific application perspective. When porting a Windows-, X11- or MacOS application to Wayland runs into compatibility issues that may necessitate a complete rewrite or dropping of features, the developer is more likely to stick to X11, to not port to Linux at all, or to use what eventually will amount to Wayland forks that patch around these missing API features.

Meanwhile X11 is definitely getting very long in the tooth, yet without it being a clean drop-in replacement it leaves many developers and end-users less than impressed. Perhaps the Wayland project should focus more on the needs of developers and end-users, and less about what it deems to be the One True Way?

youtube.com/embed/_MS8pSj-DLo?…

hackaday.com/2025/11/11/waylan…

Over on the [Behind The Code with Gerry] YouTube channel our hacker [Gerry] shows us how to emulate a 74LS48 BCD-to-7-segment decoder/driver using an Altera CPLD Logic Chip From 1998.

This is very much a das blinkenlights kind of project. The goal is to get a 7-segment display to count from 0 to 9, and that’s it. [Gerry] has a 74LS193 Up/Down Binary Counter, a 74LS42 BCD to Decimal Decoder, and some 74LS00 NAND gates, but he “doesn’t have” an 74LS48 to drive the 7-segment display so he emulates one with an old Altera CPLD model EPM7064SLC44 which dates back to the late nineties. A CPLD is a Complex Programmable Logic Device which is a kind of precursor to FPGA technology.

This fun video runs for nearly one hour and there are all sorts of twists and turns. The clock is made from a 555 timer. The Altera USB Blaster is used to program the CPLD via JTAG. But before he can do that he has to re-enable JTAG on his CPLD because JTAG LOCKOUT has been used on his secondhand chip. JTAG LOCKOUT is something you can do so that you can use the various JTAG pins for other purposes in your design, at the cost of no longer being about to access via JTAG! Fortunately [Gerry] has the right equipment to do a full reset of his chip and thus reinstate JTAG support.

Just as he’s nearly finished his project he manages to short out and destroy his CPLD by dropping a wire into the wall power socket! Talk about unlucky! He has to go back to the drawing board with a similar model. And in the end he realizes he used the the 7447 (common anode) but actually needed the 7448 (common cathode), so he has to fix that up too. All in all it’s fun to see what was state-of-the-art back in 1998. If you’re interested in such things you might like to read Not Ready For FPGAs? Try A CPLD.

youtube.com/embed/0WAaH37rmEk?…

hackaday.com/2025/11/11/emulat…