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Welcome to another issue of the Brave GNU World, more or less "late-live" from the LinuxTag in Karlsruhe, Germany, since there was no time before LT to get working on it.

歡迎來到另一期的《勇敢 GNU 世界》，或多或少是自「在德國 Karlsruhe 的 LinuxTag」來晚了，因為在 LT 可以接續它之前已經沒了時間。

e-Government -- sometimes referred to as e-Democracy -- is one of today's more controversial subjects. A large number of lobbies are looking into this topic. The European Commission has launched a special working group; some trade unions, like Ver.di [5] in Germany, have even organized congresses on e-Democracy, and the IT industry looks forward to increased revenue in future [6].

電子化政府（e-Government） -- 有時候是被稱做為電子化民主（e-Democracy） -- 是今天較為引發爭論的主題中的一個。許多的遊說團體正在注意著這個議題。歐洲委員會已經發起了一個特別的工作組；一些貿易聯盟，像是在德國的 Ver.di [5] 甚至已經組織了關於電子化民主的會議，而資訊科技產業則希望能夠在未來增加收益 [6] 。

Generally speaking e-Democracy is designed to make government's working processes more flexible and transparent, reducing costs and increasing efficiency, and improving accessibility to the general public. One topic under the e-Democracy umbrella is e-Voting, and this is what the Sede Project [7] deals with.

一般來說，電子化民主是設計用來使政府的工作時程更有彈產和透明、降低花費並且增加效率，同時增進一般公眾的可參與度（accessibility）。電子投票，是在電子化民主傘下的一個議題，而這正是 Sede 計畫 [7] 所處理的。

安全民主（Sede ；簡單、安全的投票程式）

Sede [7] is an acronym for "Secure Democracy". The goal of the project's initiator, Jos Boersema, is to create simple, but secure electronic voting mechanisms, that ensure the voter's anonymity and at the same time allow results to be validated, thus avoiding fraud.

Sede [7] 是「安全民主」（Secure Democracy）的首字母縮寫語。計畫發起人 Jos Boersema 的目標在於創造出簡單，但是安全的選舉投票機制，以確保選舉人的「不記名」，同時允許結果是有效的，從而避免詐欺。

The mechanism is fairly simple. Each voter receives a unique ballot code. The ballot code has an arbitrary length and is generated randomly to help prevent manipulation. Sede mails virtual ballot papers, including the ballot code, to the voters before the election. The voters can then use their email clients to return their votes to the voting server.

這機制蠻簡單的。每一個投票人會收到一個獨一的選票號碼。這選票號碼有個任意長度，並且是被隨機地製作出，以幫助避免操縱選舉。 Sede 寄出包括了選票號碼的虛擬選票紙郵件，在選舉之前給投票人。這投票人可以接著使用他們的電子郵件客戶端來回覆他們的選票給投票伺服器。

The voting server collects the votes and filters out duplicate and invalid votes. Each voter can then check her vote online to ensure that her vote has been counted correctly.

投票伺服器收集了選票，並且過濾掉重複以及無效的選票，每一個投票人可以接著檢查她的線上選票，以確保她的選票已經被正確地計算進去。

Voters can add comments and statements, and the ballot forms can be adjusted to comply with voter preferences. As an addition, Sede supports proportional representation.

投票人可以增加評論和陳述，並且選票表格可以被調整，以符合投票人的喜好。作為一種附加功能， Sede 支援了比例代表〔機制〕。

The idea behind this project occurred to the author in November 2002, while looking into how a system based on a ballot form code might work. After some teething trouble the program proved its value and has been the subject of concentrated development activities ever since.

在這個計畫背後的想法，是作者在二零零二年十一月時所想到的，當時是在注意奠基於在一個選票表格號碼的系統如何能夠作業。在經過一些初期的困難之後，這程式證明了它的價值，並且在那之後已經成為了集中式開發活動的主題。

The project was written in C and Z shell script and is a free software program released under the GNU General Public License (GPL). Sede is a modular program that allows the use of other protocols instead of email. However, it still lacks a graphical front-end for Web access.

這計畫是以 C 和 Z 外殼腳本所撰寫而成，並且是個在 GNU General Public License (GPL) 下發行的自由軟體。 Sede 是一個模組化的程式，那允許了除了電子郵件以外的其它協定的使用。然而，它仍然缺乏了一個供網頁存取〔使用〕的圖形化前端。

As already mentioned in issue 25 of Brave GNU World, this project is somewhat controversial. Many people question the security of this kind of mechanism and its implementation. Also, some people would prefer mechanisms of this kind not to be implemented at all.

如同已經在《勇敢 GNU 世界》第二十五期中所提到的，這計畫有幾分引發爭論。許多人質疑這一種機制以及它的實作品的安全。另外，一些人寧可這種機制從來也不要被實作出來。

As Jos' sees it, the problem is that many attempts have been made to complete imitate paper based ballot procedures using computer techniques. Of course the advantage here is that these programs do not actually leverage the potential of electronic data processing.

就 Jos 〔的觀點〕來看它，問題在於許多的嚐試被做成，使用電腦科技來完全地模仿以紙面作為基礎的選票。當然這裡的優勢在於，這些程式並不真的使電子資料處理的潛力更容易〔進行〕。

Non-voters are another important aspect. If an intruder managed to sniff the system's email messages, and discover the voter codes of non-voters, the intruder could exploit these codes.

「非投票人」是另一個重要的觀點。如果一個侵入者設法「嗅」出了系統的電子郵件訊息，並且發現了非投票人的投票人號碼，這侵入者可能會利用這些號碼。

The anonymity relies on there being no way to link voter codes to specific email addresses. But there can be no guarantee of this, as email messages are transferred across the Internet. An attacker could create a database of email addresses and voter codes, by sniffing the ballot documents on delivery.

「不記名」〔的確保〕依賴於沒有辦法來，連接投票人號碼到特定的電子郵件位址。但對此並沒有任何保證，因為電子郵件訊息是經由互聯網被傳送的。一個攻擊者可以經由「嗅一嗅在傳送中的選票文件」，來創造出一個電子郵件以及投票人號碼的資料庫。

Thus, the success of the project depends to a great extent on the implementation of the individual components. Of course, feedback mechanisms and email encryption could improve security drastically.

因此，這計畫的成功，相當大的程度是依賴於「個別元件的實作」上。當然，反饋機制和電子郵件加密可以徹底地增加安全性。

After all, paper-based methods also have some weaknesses, as some elections in highly developed western countries shown. In recent times we have seen that checks by volunteer civil helpers can do nothing about that.

畢竟，以紙面作為基礎的方法也有著一些弱點，如同一些在高度開發的西方國家中所顯示的〔那樣〕。在最近的幾次，我們已經看到了，由自願的公民幫助者所完成的檢查，對那〔缺點〕實在做不了什麼。

Notwithstanding any potential weaknesses, the Sede Project is definitely an interesting contribution to the technical discussion taking place in this field.

儘管存在任何可能的弱點， Sede 計畫對於在這個領域中正在進行的技術討論而言，肯定是一個有趣的計畫。

Future development plans envisage enhancing the program to provide a compact and stable solution, and getting down to some serious debugging shortly. The next thing on the developers' list is encryption support and creating packages for various Linux distributions.

未來的開發打算，預想著增進這個程式，以提供一個簡潔並且穩定的方案，並且立刻認真地處理一些嚴肅的調試除錯〔問題〕。在開發員列表中的下一件事是「加密支援」以及為許多的 Linux 散佈件創造套件。

As usual, the project could do with some help to get all that work done. Jos welcomes feedback, and more help.

如同往常，這計畫可以在一些幫助之下把所有的工作完成。 Jos 歡迎反饋以及更多的幫助。

線上投票：合理，或全無道理？

But before going further into implementing online voting, it is warranted to think some more about whether online voting is (un)desirable.

不過在更進一步到實作線上投票之前，「思索著一些有關於線上投票是否是值得〔或不值得〕要的問題」是合理的。

People who advocate this new technology are convinced that it will allow quicker and more efficient elections. On its own merit, this would certainly not change the quality of the process of democratic decision making, although some objectors claim that computer votes would not be taken as seriously.

擁護這項新科技的人們，深信它將會允許更快、而且更有效的選舉。在它自己的標準上，這肯定不會改變「作出民主決定」的品質，雖然一些反對者宣稱：電腦選票將不會被認真的對待。

Things start getting really interesting when the promoters of a more direct form of democracy state that online voting would allow more elections to take place, and thus provide the people with more control over government.

當「一個更為直接形式的民主」的提倡者陳述道：線上投票將會允許舉辦更多選舉，並且因此提供了人們對於政府更多的控制。事情開始變得真的很有趣。

This increases the danger of permanent election campaigns, and as experience shows, good politics and election campaigns do not typically go hand in hand. Especially necessary but unpopular decisions will probably not be made.

這增加了「永遠有選舉活動」的危險，正如同經驗所顯示的：「好的政治」和「選舉訴求」向來並不攜手共渡的。特別是必須但卻不受歡迎的決定，將很有可能不會被做出。

It always takes a while to go through coalition talks and take over the offices of government. This is why some people are in favor of having local elections at the same time as national elections.

〔交接時的〕聯合對話以及掌控政府部門總是需要一點時間。這就是為什麼有些人較為屬意地方選舉和國家選舉在同一時間舉辦。

Unfortunately, there is another reason to assume that more elections will not automatically improve the quality of democracy:

不幸的是，有另外一個理由認為，更多的選舉將不會自動地改進民主的品質：

The votes themselves are not the most important aspect of an election. Every vote is preceded by an opinion and decision finding process in which the likely effects are examined and the long-term questions are considered.

選票它們本身，並不是一場選舉中最重要的觀點。每一張選票〔圈出〕之前，都有著一個意見與決定的尋找過程，在其中，可能的效應被檢驗了，並且長期的問題〔也〕有被思考過了。

A vote will only reap a qualitatively good result if every single voter has participated in that process before making a decision -- and that takes time.

一場選舉，只有在當如果每一個個別的選民，已經參與到那做出決定之前的過程，才會獲得有品質的好結果 -- 而那需要花去時間。

But even today we find that professional politicians can often not participate in all decision finding processes they would have to be part of, even though they are usually only responsible for specific ressorts and generally have very long working days.

但是即使在今天，我們發現到專業的政客可以總是不參與到「他們應該身為其中一部份的」所有決定尋找過程，即使他們通常只有對特定的選區負責，並且一般而言有著非常長的工作天數【任期】。

Consequently, in a direct democracy it would be impossible for every single voter to go through a process of intensive reflection, even if the whole population were to do nothing else but think about politics. Thus, decisions are often based on an extremely superficial appreciation of a scenario, and this can be strongly influenced by rhetorical trickery. All of this impacts the quality of the decision made.

結果造成，在一個直接民主中，讓每一個投票人通過審慎思考的過程像是不可能的，即使整個人口不做任何事而只是思考政治也是一樣。因此，決定通常奠基於對於某個劇本的極端膚淺的評價所作出，而這可以很強力地被花言巧語的詭計所影響。這些所有都衝擊了決定作出的品質。

All of these considerations imply that more elections increase the tendency to more superficial short-term decisions. It would seem better to change the system in a way that allows politicians to actually participate in the decision finding processes they are responsible for.

所有這些考慮都暗示著更多的選舉，會增加更為膚淺的短期決定的傾向。看起來最好把這個系統改變成「允許政客參與到他們所負責的決定尋找過程中」的一種方式。

However, finding a way of achieving that has very little to do with the question as to whether online voting is a good thing or nonsense, so let's get back to computer business, more specifically to the often maligned subject of backups.

然而，尋找一個達到那項目標的方式，對於線上投票是件好事或是全無道理的問題，並沒有多少可做的，所以讓我們回到電腦的事情上，特別針對通常是有害主題的：「備份」。

儲存備份（Storebackup）

Storebackup [8] by Heinz-Josef Claes stores data on hard disks; either locally, or on a remote computer using NFS. This allows you to create backups quickly and simply without investing in additional hardware.

由 Heinz-Josef Claes 所完成的 Storebackup [8] 將資料儲存在硬碟；不管是在本地，或是在一個使用了 NFS 的遠端電腦上。這允許了你快速而且簡單地建立備份，而不必投資在額外的硬體上。

Although tape backups provide an extremely secure solution (particularly if you keep the tapes in a safe in another building), hard disk backups do speed up and simplify the process of restoring your data.

雖然磁帶備份提供了一個極為安全的解決方案（特別是如果你將磁帶保存在另一棟建築物的保險櫃裡面），硬碟備份確實加快並且簡化了回復你的資料的過程。

Storebackup first saw the light of day about three years ago; at the time Heinz-Josef was regularly on the road with a laptop and on the lookout for a backup system that did not require too much in the line of resources and could use a parallel Zip drive with a low data transfer rate. This is why the program is designed to use as little hard disk space as possible and to simplify the process of restoring your data.

Storebackup 首先在大約三年前問世；那段時期 Heinz-Josef 經常在路上有一台膝上型，並且在尋找一個在資源上需求不大的備份系統，並且可以使用一個有著低傳輸率的平行埠 Zip 機。這就是為什麼這程式被設計來使用儘可能小的硬碟空間，並且簡化回復你的資料的過程。

Storebackup uses hardlinks to ensure that identical files are only written to the backup disk once -- even across independent backup sets. Additionally, this approach leverages the benefits of incremental and full backups.

Storebackup 使用了硬連接以保證相同的檔案只會被寫到備份碟中一次 -- 即使是經由〔個別〕獨立的備份集。除此之外，這一個作法也使漸近式以及完全的備份變得容易。

After completing an initial backup, any subsequent jobs only require the resources needed for an incremental backup. Despite this fact, each backup set includes the whole filesystem tree with all its files. Thus, when users need to restore data, there is no need to go through an arduous search procedures just to find a specific file.

在完成了第一次備份之後，任何接續的工作只需要給一次漸近式備份所需要的資源。除了這項事實，每一次備份集都包括了「具有它的所有檔案」的整個檔案系統樹。因此，當使用者需要回復資料時，並不需要經由一個費力的搜尋程序，只是為了找到一個特定的檔案。

As both the backup and restore procedures keep file permissions, a file manager can be used to restore some files. One disadvantage of using hardlinks is the fact that some assistance from the administrator is required at times. If multiple users have identical files, they may be unable to restore a file, as their file permissions do not allow this.

由於備份和回復這兩個程序保持了檔案的權限，一個檔案管理器可以被用來回復一些檔案。使用硬連接的一個劣勢是：「來自於管理員的一些協助有時候是必須的」的事實。如果多個使用者擁有完全相同的檔案，他們可能因為「他們的檔案權限的不允許」而無法回復一個檔案。

The individual backup steps are performed in parallel. For example, the program calculates MD5 checksums to identify identical files. Each user can also specify a pattern that Storebackup will use to select files for compression. The processes of creating hardlinks and copying large files also takes place simultaneously. To utilize multiprocessor systems more efficiently, copying and compression can also be performed in parallel.

個別的備份步驟是被平行地實行。舉例來說，程式計算 MD5 checksums 以辨識出完全相同的檔案。每一個使用者也可以指定一個樣式，而 Storebackup 將會使用來選擇要壓縮的檔案。創造硬連接以及複製大型檔案的過程也同時地進行。為了更有效率地應用多處理器系統，複製以及壓縮也可以平行地實行。

The Storebackup Project includes analysis and restore tools, as well as a tool for managing individual backup sets, and deleting older backups. Furthermore, Storebackup generates useful logfiles.

Storebackup 計畫包括了分析以及回復工具，還有管理個別備份集、以及刪除較舊的備份的工具。此外， Storebackup 也製作了有用的日誌檔案。

The program was written in Perl and released under the GPL. A Debian package is available besides the source code, however, the package status is Testing and Unstable at the time of writing.

這程式是以 Perl 撰寫而成，並且在 GPL 下發行。除了源碼之外，一個 Debian 套件也可以取得，然而，在寫作的此時，套件的狀態是「測試中、不穩定」。

The project has already seen some production use. In many cases, it greatly simplifies users' tasks, such as the case of an employee required to edit quite sizeable spreadsheets and unfortunate tendency to destroy the spreadsheets at regular intervals. After switching to Storebackup, the time required to restore the spreadsheets dropped From two hours right down to two minutes.

這計畫已經看到了一些生產性的使用。在許多例子中，它極大地簡化了使用者的任務，像是這個案例：一位雇員需要編輯相當大的試算表，但有「在規律的間隔毀掉試算表」的不幸傾向。在切換到 Storebackup 之後，需要用來回復試算表的時間，從兩小時縮減到了兩分鐘。

When asked how he had achieved this, the administrator joked that he had been watching the employee quite closely and logging her activities. The employee only calmed down again after the admin had explained the real reason to her and was apparently able to laugh about the issue some time later.

當被問到他如何能夠做到這樣時，管理員開玩笑說：他已經有較為密集地看顧著這位雇員，並對她的活動作出日誌。這雇員在管理員對她解釋真正原因之後，心情已經平復下來，並且顯然可以在一段時間之後，對這事一笑置之了。

Heinz-Josef plans to improve the routines for deleting old backups in future versions. He also plans to add a direct link between the analysis of a backup (when was the file modified? Is there an identical file somewhere?) and the restore process.

Heinz-Josef 打算要在未來的版本中改進刪除舊備份的副程式。他也打算要增加一個介於「一個備份的分析」（什麼時候檔案最後被修改？是否在哪裡有個完全相同的檔案嗎？）和「回復過程」的直接連接。

The other enhancements in the pipeline are "luxury items": backing up files, that are not directories, files, named pipes, symbolic or hard links.

另外在管線上的增進是「豪華項目」：備份檔案、那不是目錄、檔案、命名了的管線、符號或硬連接。

Heinz-Josef would appreciate some help with the documentation. All the programs have a fairly advance help function, but there are no manpages available at present, for example.

Heinz-Josef 將會感謝在文件上的一些幫助。所有的程式都有著頗為進階的幫助函數，但，舉例來說，在此時並沒有 manpages 可以取得。

就這樣

So, that's all for this issue. As usual, I would appreciate feedback, questions, comments, and suggestions about interesting projects and new developments to the usual address [1].

所以，那就是本期的全部了。如同往常，我將〔非常〕感謝關於有趣計畫以及新發展的反饋、問題、意見、以及建議，〔能夠〕送到通常的位址 [1] 。