● 01.10.23

Gemini version available ♊︎

● Links 10/01/2023: EasyOS Dunfell-series 4.5.5, CoolerMaster’s MasterPlus Liberated

Posted in News Roundup at 8:01 am by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

GNU/Linux

Desktop/Laptop

• In today’s world of computer technology, there is a constant battle between graphical user interface (GUI) and command line tools. While GUI tools are often easier to use and have a more intuitive user experience, they can fall short when it comes to more complex tasks. This article will explore why mastering the command line is essential for any computer user, explaining the benefits of using a command line over GUI tools and demonstrating why GUI tools are not enough for certain tasks. By the end, readers will have a better understanding of why command line tools are an important part of their computing experience.

• Automating repetitive tasks with command line tools

• Command line tools can be especially beneficial for Linux administrators because of their ability to automate repetitive tasks, which can save time and reduce the risk of errors. This can be especially useful in situations where tasks need to be performed on a regular basis or on multiple systems. In contrast, graphical user interface (GUI) tools may not have the same level of automation capabilities, requiring users to manually perform tasks each time they are needed.

• This is just one example of the many benefits that command line tools can offer over GUI tools in Linux. While GUI tools may be more user-friendly and easier to learn, command line tools offer a level of power and flexibility that can be essential for tasks such as system administration, data manipulation, and automation.

Applications

• The nuts and bolts of Linux seem destined to be increasingly hidden away from the desktop user. The continuing development of popular desktop environments offering attractive interfaces and fancy features shows no sign of abatement. However intuitive and slick desktop environments become, there is little prospect that the faithful terminal will be consigned to the recycle bin in the near future. There is simply too much power at the hands of a terminal for many experienced Linux users.

• Users that want to exploit the full power of the terminal may benefit from using a terminal multiplexer. This type of application can be considered to be a text version of a graphical window manager. It enables users to run multiple text programs simultaneously, as well as offering features that allow users to switch seamlessly between these programs in operation. Terminal multiplexers also allow multiple computers to make simultaneous connections.

• Document Scanner app is a commercial paper document scanner app that many had to upgrade from the free version with limited options to the full feature paid one. Yet, many do not have the slightest idea that there is an open source free alternative app that does the same.

• Open Note Scanner is a free mobile scanner app for Android devices that enables you to scan documents, paper, cards, handwritten notes, art, or even your shopping receipts. Then do all the heavy lifting for you as automatically adjust the image aspect, contrast and save it in a high quality PDF format. It also supports the automatic scan of preformatted pages with QR Code and action indicators. PDF file with the pages are available on the application website, in the releases section.

• [...]

• Software licensed under the GPL version 3 available in GPLv3.TXT and online.

Instructionals/Technical

• The `lsusb` command is a utility in Linux that allows users to list the USB (Universal Serial Bus) devices connected to the system. It is a part of the “usbutils” package, which provides utilities to display information about USB buses in the system and the devices connected to them.

• Linux provides tons of command-line utilities to perform various tasks. However, with the passage of time, some of these tools have become outdated and replaced by other alternative command-line tools.

• In this guide, we will highlight 6 deprecated Linux commands and alternative tools that you should be using instead. Most of these commands are networking utilities that are provided by the net-tools package which has not been under active maintenance for quite a while now.

• In this tutorial, we will show you how to install TeamSpeak Client on Ubuntu 22.04 LTS. For those of you who didn’t know, TeamSpeak is a proprietary, cross-platform voice-over-Internet Protocol (VoIP) application that is used for communication in online gaming, education, and business. Its main idea is to allow people to communicate on a channel, similar to other conferencing apps like Zoom, Google Meet, Skype, Slack, Microsoft Teams, etc. TeamSpeak allows users to communicate with each other using voice and text chat, and it includes a range of features, including support for multiple channels, file sharing, and voice activity detection.

• This article assumes you have at least basic knowledge of Linux, know how to use the shell, and most importantly, you host your site on your own VPS. The installation is quite simple and assumes you are running in the root account, if not you may need to add ‘sudo‘ to the commands to get root privileges. I will show you the step-by-step installation of the TeamSpeak voice-over-Internet Protocol (VoIP) on Ubuntu 22.04 (Jammy Jellyfish). You can follow the same instructions for Ubuntu 22.04 and any other Debian-based distribution like Linux Mint, Elementary OS, Pop!_OS, and more as well.

• Are you tired of constantly having to reboot your servers to fix issues or apply updates? You’re not alone. Server maintenance and uptime can be a tricky balance, and the decision of when to reboot a server comes with trade-offs. In this article, we’ll take a deep dive into the reasons why servers may need to be rebooted, the potential consequences of not rebooting, and the different approaches to server maintenance and uptime.

• We’ll also explore tools and techniques that can minimize the need for reboots. Whether you’re a sysadmin, a developer, or a manager, this article will give you a better understanding of the complexities of server maintenance and uptime and help you make informed decisions about when to reboot your servers.

• Understanding Linux file permissions (how to find them, read them, and change them) is an important part of maintaining and securing your systems.

• Dolibarr is an open-source ERP and CRM system written in PHP.

• Varnish Cache is an open-source, powerful, and one of the most popular HTTP accelerators used by over 3.4 million websites.

• The Rust programming language has been adopted by hundreds of big companies in production environments.

• Discover how Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform’s CIP collection allows industrial device automation through YAML configuration files.

• Vnstat is a network traffic monitoring tool that you can use to monitor how much bandwidth you are using. If you ever wanted to track the bandwidth usage on desktop then vnstat is the right choice to keep track of bandwidth. This console based app is lightweight, very easy to install and use.

• In this tutorial you will learn how to install Vnstat on Linux mint via terminal and Software Manager.

• Telegram is a perfect cross-platform alternative to Whatsapp. It is a cloud-based chatting app that keeps giving tough competition to other similar applications. It was developed by Pavel Durov and Nikolai Durov, Russian entrepreneurs.

• This instant messaging app, apart from chatting also allows sending of photos, videos, documents, and other types of media content. But this is not the reason behind the popularity of Telegram instant its cloud-based technology and focus on the security & privacy of users.

• To protect the user’s identity and maintain their privacy, Telegram offers end-to-end server-client encryption. So, that hackers won’t be able to read the chats. Further, users can initiate Secret Chats on Telegram that can’t be forwarded and even has self-destruct timer for messages and media.

• What is a snap? Snap has been introduced as a package management method by Canonical developers, the people behind the popular Ubuntu Linux systems. We can install and use the SNAP on various types of Linux distros such as Redhat, Ubuntu, CentOS, Elementary, Debian, Linux Mint, Manjaro, and more…

• It is similar to a container with all the files and libraries of an application, and each application is completely independent. So the advantage of using the snap package is that it solves the dependency problem between applications, making it easier to manage between applications. Thus, we can install any Lincu software or packages available in the SNAP repository on any supported Linux distro regardless of its origin, I mean it doesn’t matter what it is. RPM-based or.Deb.

• The w command is a built-in Linux utility that is capable of listing the usernames of all the users that are currently logged-in, locally or remotely.

• In the output, you can view the information of all the logged-in users, like their username, where they are logged-in from, when they are logged-in, and their activity.

• In this article, you will learn how to use the w command, including its options (with examples).

• The logname command gives you the username of the currently logged-in user by reading the “/var/run/utmp” file, which is identical to the whoami command with one difference.

• Stick with this article to learn the difference between the logname and whoami commands, the usage of the logname command, and how to use it in shell scripts.

• When I boot up my Linux Mint machine, I am greeted with a login screen, and when I press the enter key to complete the login process, I found a simple error message that clearly states, “Unable to launch “cinnamon-session-cinnamon” X session — “cinnamon-session-cinnamon” not found; falling back to the default session.”

• In Linux systems, effective user management is an essential yet challenging task for administrators. Within Linux, all local user information is stored at the path /etc/passwd, with each row representing a single user that contains their name, user ID, directory, and login details.

• Several different methods are available to list these users in Linux, and in this tutorial, we will cover some of the popular ones utilizing the command line terminal.

• The whoami (concatenated of the strings “who,” “am,”, “i” as whoami) is a Linux command line utility that prints the username associated with the current effective user ID.

• It comes in handy, especially while writing the shell script, like fetching the username within the script or executing the script for a specific user like root.

• In this article, you will learn the usage of the whoami command, how to use it in shell scripts, and its alternative commands.

• When users report that their Chromebook is running slow, we recommend they update Chrome OS to the latest version. Google regularly releases update patches that include performance fixes and new features, so it’s important to stay up-to-date. Keeping an update pending for many days is strongly discouraged, as these updates also help keep your Chromebook secure. Additionally, if you happen to use Linux on your Chromebook, it’s also important to keep it updated to the latest version. So if you want to learn how to update your Chromebook, refer to our guide for detailed instructions.

Distributions and Operating Systems

Reviews

• There is joy in trying out a freshly baked Linux distro. And it’s time to have a first distro review of the Vanilla OS.

• Vanilla OS is a new and unique Linux distribution that has been under development for a year or more. After considerable testing in closed beta, the team announced the maiden release of Vanilla OS 22.10 “Kinetic”. It’s based on Ubuntu and its release cycle. Hence the code name “Kinetic”, following the release of Kinetic Kudu in October.

• This review mainly targets this first release. Let’s dig in while I can give you an idea of the essence of this distribution.

New Releases

• Version 4.5.4 was released on January 4, and there has only been one bug-fix since then; however, I decided to release 4.5.5 as woofQ and EasyOS will be undergoing fundamental structural changes, for which it is better to start a new Series — that will be the Kirkstone-series.

• Hence, 4.5.5 is intended to be the last release of the Dunfell-series.

• The “fundamental structural change” is mostly about international language support, and the previous couple of blog posts are about the start of that — those changes are not in 4.5.5.

Fedora Family / IBM

• Hello and welcome to another installment of the Fedora Messaging Notification (FMN) Replacement blog! It’s been about a month since our last update, and I hope that time was as productive for you as it was for us. We’ve been like Santa’s elves working tirelessly to deliver presents for all the good Fedora users out there.

• CIOs are facing no shortage of big challenges in the year ahead – from the Great Resignation, to economic and supply chain issues, to ongoing pandemic-related burnout, and more. While these issues are all complex, there’s one thing that can help IT leaders – and their teams – tackle the unknowns ahead and adapt to changing priorities and obstacles in their way: Resilience.

• CIOs hoping to build more resilience on their IT teams should focus more on the people elements of culture rather than on the technology, says Shabnoor Shah, principal open leadership global lead and executive coach at Red Hat.

• [...]

• A new Ebook explores the key aspects that make up resilience IT culture – as well as the five common obstacles that may be standing in the way. Learn the link between resilience and digital transformation success, how to recruit and retain resilient IT talent, and how CIOs can set the tone for their teams.

• Every year has challenges that impact IT strategy and priorities. Some can be identified and planned for at the start of the year, while others can materialize anytime. As an IT leader, investing in outside-in learning and dialing your active listening skills to identify the signals of the upcoming year’s risks and opportunities is essential.

• [...]

• Cybersecurity challenges include a 33 percent increase in ransomware attacks in 2022, and CISOs have ongoing challenges combatting malware, phishing attacks, and security threats related to hybrid work.

Canonical/Ubuntu Family

• In a previous post, I explained how we made our Ubuntu image 15 times smaller by chiselling a specific slice of Ubuntu for .NET developers.

Devices/Embedded

• reComputer J4012 is a mini PC or “Edge AI computer” based on the new NVIDIA Jetson Orin NX, a cost-down version of the Jetson AGX Orin, delivering up to 100 TOPS modern AI performance.

• The mini PC is based on the Jetson Orin NX 16GB, comes with a 128GB M.2 SSD preloaded with the NVIDIA JetPack SDK and offers Gigabit Ethernet, four USB 3.2 ports, and HDMI 2.1 output. Wireless connectivity could be added through the system’s M.2 Key E socket.

• We’ve previously written about several system-on-modules and SBCs based on Renesas RZ/G2L or RZ/V2L Cortex-A55/M33 processors such as Geniatech “AHAURA” RS-G2L100 and “AKITIO” RS-V2L100 single board computers, Forlinx FET-G2LD-C system-on-module, and SolidRun RZ/G2LC SOM and devkit.

• But most of those are hard to buy, and you need to contact the company, discuss your project, etc… before purchase, except for the SolidRun Renesas RZ/G2LC Evaluation Kit going for $249. Another option is the MistyWest MistySOM module offered for $112 and up on GroupGets with either Renesas RZ/G2L or RZ/V2L processor, as well as an optional carrier board.

Open Hardware/Modding

• Cytron Make Feather AIoT S3 is an ESP32-S3 board compatible with the Adafruit Feather form factor and suitable for makers and STEM education with features like LEDs for GPIOs, a buzzer, expansion headers and connectors, and support for CircuitPython & Arduino.

• The WiFi and Bluetooth LE IoT board also supports LiPo and Li-Ion batteries, includes a USB Type-C port for power/charging and programming, and a few buttons. It’s suitable for machine learning thanks to the vector extensions found in the ESP32-S3 microcontroller.

Mobile Systems/Mobile Applications

• Shooting games are a classic genre in the world of video games and have been popular since the early days of gaming. In recent years, the popularity of mobile gaming has increased significantly, and as a result, there are now numerous offline shooting games available for Android devices. These games range from fast-paced first-person shooters to more tactical and strategic games. In this tutorial, we will explore the 10 best offline shooting games for Android. These games are all available for free, although some may have in-app purchases or ads.

Free, Libre, and Open Source Software

• Most gaming/peripheral software suits are either proprietary or not officially available for Linux.

• As a result, we must constantly look for open-source tools to configure our hardware to get native functionality.

• The likes of Piper, OpenRGB, Solaar, etc. come in handy in these situations.

• But, sometimes, even these are not enough.

• Luckily, CoolerMaster has decided to release an open-source version of its MasterPlus software that aims to work with its coolers and non-CoolerMaster coolers.

Events

• The call for papers for openSUSE Conference 2023 is open!

• The openSUSE Conference 2023 is scheduled to take place May 26 to May 28. The call for papers will close on April 9, which leaves 89 days to submit a talk.

• The conference already has two sponsors with Fedora and SUSE. Companies interested in sponsoring the event can view sponsorship information on the project’s wiki page.

• Almost the entire engineering team of Bootlin attended the Embedded Linux Conference Europe 2022 in Dublin mid-september, an important event for Bootlin as it helps everyone in the team stay up to date with the latest developments in the Embedded Linux ecosystem, and connect with members of the community.

Web Browsers/Web Servers

Mozilla

• Every day, more than 50 million people play among millions of user-created games on Roblox. With a massive global audience and an ocean of games, there are vastly different ways users like to interact with Roblox. This is where the customization power of browser extensions can shine. If you’re a Roblox player or creator, you might be intrigued to explore some of these innovative extensions built just for Roblox users on Firefox.

SaaS/Back End/Databases

• After a successful 2022 edition, we are excited to announce that pgDay Paris is back for 2023 – live and in person on March 23! We’ve had so much interest that this year, we’re planning two tracks of talks and are proposing various half-day training sessions on March 22.

• Strings are one of the most common data types you will use in MySQL. Many users insert and read strings in their databases without thinking too much about them. This article aims to give you a bit of a deep dive into how MySQL stores and displays your string variables so that you can have better control over your data.

• You can break strings into two categories: binary and nonbinary. You probably think about nonbinary strings most of the time. Nonbinary strings have character sets and collations. Binary strings, on the other hand, store things such as MP3 files or images. Even if you store a word in a binary string, such as song, it is not stored in the same way as in a nonbinary string.

Productivity Software/LibreOffice/Calligra

• Rafael Lima continued polishing dark mode features and improved scrolling and zooming in the Basic code editor. He also improved help for ScriptForge

FSFE

• In January’s Newsletter: Dortmund embraces Free Software, and Belgium is working to ensure Router Freedom. A cryptographer analyzes IT security. A digital health ecosystem licenses files with the REUSE tool. We are looking for an office coordinator. We look forward to seeing you in FOSDEM and I Love Free Software events.

• [...]

• The combination of two ideas, universal access to healthcare and Free Software, gives us GNU Health. Created by GNU Solidario, a non-profit dealing with technology and social medicine, GNU Health is a community-driven Free Software project. While visiting schools in Latin America twenty years ago, the founder, Dr. Luis Falcón, realised that technology needs to support social changes.

• To make the licensing clear, the project has recently adopted the REUSE specification 3.0 in its components Hospital Management System (both server and client) and Thalamus (the message server for the GH Federation). Luis presented the project and the process of the REUSE implementation in a video interview.

• Presentation of the digital health ecosystem GNUHealth by founder Dr. Luis Falcón. Becoming REUSE compliant was simple, says Luis in the interview, also available in in our Peertube instance.

Programming/Development

• If you’re following our Youtube channel you might have heard me talking about QVarLengthArray.

• If you’re not… you should follow us! But let me give you a quick recap.

Leftovers

Science

• In conclusion, “lesser screen times, fewer distractions” just thanks to smart watches is likely to remain wishful thinking. It is much more important and necessary to demand the one thing without which no glasses or watches could decently be called “smart”, that is: full interoperability between all watches and all glasses, regardless of who makes them.

Proprietary

• The new glitch in Windows 11 blocks some apps from being installed when using provisioning packages, Microsoft says.

Transparency/Investigative Reporting

• A series of petitions before the Kerala HC sought the removal of court orders from the Indian Kanoon website by claiming the ‘right to be forgotten’. Indian Kanoon argued that ‘the right to be forgotten’ is not absolute and that it is inconsistent with the principle of open courts. The Kerala HC ruled in the favour of Indian Kanoon and struck a balance between the right to privacy and the right to freedom of information by holding that the ‘right to be forgotten’ cannot be exercised in criminal law cases and current/recent cases. Though it could be exercised on a case-to-case basis with respect to matrimonial/family cases etc.

• [...]

• India Kanoon is a popular open-access search engine that was launched in 2008. Court orders from the website of the Supreme Court, High Courts, district courts and tribunals are automatically uploaded on the Indian Kanoon website. Indian Kanoon reproduces these orders verbatim, after redacting personally identifiable details of victims of sexual violence. No other modifications or edits are made to the court order. India Kanoon’s case removal policy is available here.

• Several petitioners filed writ petitions before the Kerala HC, seeking the removal of their individual court records online based on a purported right to be forgotten. Of these, two were matrimonial matters and the rest were criminal matters. Indian Kanoon was impleaded as a party in the case as the petitioners sought deletion of these court records from Indian Kanoon’s database as well.

• Indian Kanoon argued that a right to be forgotten cannot extend to court records. Placing reliance on the Supreme Court’s ruling in R. Rajagopal v. State of Tamil Nadu, Indian Kanoon argued that court records are public documents and that a right to privacy cannot be used to prevent their publication. Further, the only circumstances in which the publication of a court order can be prevented are if the court specifically issues such an order or if there is a statutory prohibition against the publication of certain types of orders. For example, Section 228A of the Indian Penal Code prohibits the disclosure of the identities of victims of sexual violence, and Indian Kanoon removes any personally identifiable information of such victims from the court orders it publishes on its website.

Finance

• What is important is to understand the REAL reasons why this happens. I’m sure that many will instinctively answer “I just have NO TIME to do that stuff! Not after being away from home 40 / 50 hours a week just to stay a working poor!”

• [...]

• One big reason why most of us can’t apply the tips above is that everything with a chip inside is unrepairable at home, or anywhere else. Even without that chip wasn’t really necessary in the first place You may need hard to find tools just to diagnose a fault in your “smart” fridge, TV or dishwasher, and just to find that it’s cheaper to buy a new one.

• [...]

• Learning to use a table saw and finding the money to buy it is relatively easy and probably still affordable for most people in western societies.

• But goods like sewing machines or power tools, let alone vegetable gardens or table saws… are simply not affordable, even if they came for free, when the only place to store them when idle (that is, almost always 99.999% of the time) is the same one, tiny cabinet that is already full of clothes, shoes or suitcases (more on this below).

• And even if one had access to enough money for a house with an extra room or closet, spending it just to play carpenter or tailor once per decade would hardly make sense, would it now? (*)

• [...]

• Here in Rome, the number of people who can afford a weekend in Paris, or a week snorkeling in Sharm El Sheik is way, way higher than that of those who can afford any toolshed where they could build or fix their own furniture with their own tools. And from what I hear, it’s pretty much the same in most of the western world.

Monopolies

Copyrights

• ChatGPT has been the talk of the town in recent times as a very interactive chatbot powered by AI. Launched back in November 2022, it has caused quite a ruckus in the tech world.

• Developed by OpenAI as a language model, it interacts with users as if it were having a conversation with them. It can answer follow-up questions, reject inappropriate questions and even admit mistakes!

• But, as with many things AI, this has also raised a few eyebrows

Gemini* and Gopher

Personal

• When we moved about six months ago we were looking forward to being closer to places we want and need to go. We like to ride our bikes, ebikes and walk so this was a big part of our decision to move where we did. Well after six months I can say that I’m loving it.

• Another year is gone and a lot of pebcaks good and bad happened and are going to happen again!

• A good pebcak is the new “Pebcak [DOT] Club” domain has been activated and the capsule transferred on it… A bad one is I already paid for “GeminiSpace [DOT] Club” till 2025… ^^”

• Gemini (Primer) links can be opened using Gemini software. It’s like the World Wide Web but a lot lighter. Share in other sites/networks: These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. Permalink  Send this to a friend

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