We The Free News

https://www.techrepublic.com/article/black-hat-2023-generative-ai-panel/ https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news-features/black-hat-usa-unwrapped-2023/ https://www.pcmag.com/news/defender-pretender-how-researchers-undermined-windows-malware-security https://www.pcmag.com/news/uncle-sam-needs-your-ai-help-and-darpa-will-hand-out-20m-to-make-it-happen https://yoodley.com/apple-app-sideloading-in-ios-17-in-spring-2024/ https://www.inferse.com/674084/ios-17-will-support-sideloading-but-apple-is-restricting-the-feature-from-being-used-in-its-main-market-wccftech/

Weekend Edition 47 – Microsoft Sucks, AI Is All Their Fault MS 365 Accounts Hacked... Again · Phishermen strike again · Not really MS’s fault, this time · Digital Hygiene https://www.techradar.com/pro/microsoft-365-users-targeted-by-major-phishing-campaign Zoom: “Trust us, Bro.” · Terms quietly changed in March · AI training? · Found by researcher late last month · Zoom on damage control · “Trust us, bros...” https://www.pcmag.com/news/zoom-revises-terms-after-changes-spark-fears-of-ai-learning-from-video ChatGPT Sucks as a Knowledgebase · AI not great at parsing good practices in programming · 517 questions · 52% wrong (~265), when limited to StackOverflow for information. · Don’t trust it for anything mission critical, and be prepared to check all of its work · Think of it as a stupid intern who knows barely enough to get itself into trouble. https://www.techradar.com/pro/chatgpt-is-a-bad-knowledge-base-confirms-new-study AI Steals Passwords? Knowledge Is Power · Know how Google, Alexa, and Siri are always listening? · Now there are AI’s which can listen to your keystrokes during video conferencing calls · Once fully trained, these can scrape your passwords from listening to you type · Very accurate · 93% via zoom audio · 95% via infected smart phone · Yikes · Audio filtering · type differently https://www.pcmag.com/news/ai-can-now-steal-your-passwords-by-listening-to-your-keystrokes GPTBot to Scrape Your Website: Here’s How to Block It. · Want your content stolen to train ChatGPT? · I don’t · Here’s how to deny it access to your site · Add this to your site’s robots.txt file User-agent: GPTBot Disallow: / If you only want to block parts of your site, you can do that too, by adding the following: User-agent: GPTBot Allow: /directory-1/ Disallow: /directory-2/ If you want to learn to set yourself free online, check this out: https://techfreedom.pro/internet-freedom/ https://www.pcmag.com/news/openais-gptbot-will-scrape-your-website-to-train-its-ai-unless-you-opt https://platform.openai.com/docs/gptbot OSS Moq Temporarily Included Extra Tracking Tools in Its Codebase... Oops... · What’s Moq? · FOSS .net mock library · Makes life easier for developers · Bad move, bro · Included proprietary tracker in one version · V 4.20.0.. Lmao · Removed by 4.20.2, after backlash https://www.techradar.com/pro/top-open-source-project-moq-slammed-for-secretly-collecting-user-data Hear About Trump’s Twitter Subpoena? · Secret warrant · Wtf · Twitter coughed it up, late · Fined for “contempt of court” · Unlawful · Unconstitutional · If they are doing this to him, what might they do to us everyday? · Need to fix this, asap. · Solutions to online abuses and to regain digital sovereignty are below https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-66365643 https://techfreedom.pro https://Mark37.com https://althatech.com

Robo callers get smacked down by FCChttps://www.pcmag.com/news/pair-of-scammers-hit-with-fccs-biggest-robocalling-fine-300-million-dollars RDOF Having a Rough Go https://www.pcmag.com/news/fccs-rural-broadband-fund-faces-trouble-isps-want-more-money Microsoft Sucks, Ditch Microsoft https://www.pcmag.com/news/cybersecurity-firm-blasts-microsoft-for-slow-incomplete-bug-patches Elon Sues Hate Speech Watchdog https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-66376988 The Cables That Make the World Go Round https://www.cnet.com/home/internet/features/the-secret-life-of-the-500-cables-that-run-the-internet/ Incandescent Lightbulb Ban https://www.cnet.com/home/kitchen-and-household/incandescent-lightbulb-ban-heres-what-you-need-to-know/ Room Temperature Superconductor? Not Necessarily... https://www.cnet.com/tech/computing/lk-99-superconductor-maybe-a-breakthrough-maybe-not-so-much/ https://shows.acast.com/the-weekend-edition https://techfreedom.pro/2023/08/04/weekend-edition-46/

Weekend Edition 45 – bullets WE 1 – Euro Commission Investigating Microsoft · Slack complained about the way MS bundles Teams · It took 3 years for the Commission to get around to it · Reminds me of the Browser Wars and the anti-trust case of the late 90’s · Likely end with fines and requirements for MS to stop bundling Teams with MS 365 and Office 365 https://www.pcmag.com/news/microsoft-may-regret-bundling-teams-with-365-subscriptions WE 2 – Senator Wyden Wants MS Sued by DOJ and FTC · Senator Wyden (D), of Oregon mad about Solar Winds and recent Outlook hack attacks · Calls Microsoft’s security stance “negligent” · Solar Winds was instigated by Russia · The latest Oulook email hack was sponsored by the CCP · He is framing this as a nat’l security issue, which it is, since the US government runs on Microsoft · Feels like a contradiction in terms, doesn’t it? “Runs on Microsoft” and “Government runs” · 3 options · MS admits they have had the wrong stance and changes their EULA without being coerced · Nothing happens · Investigation ensues, MS gets fined, grudgingly does the minimum of changes https://www.pcmag.com/news/us-senator-its-time-to-investigate-microsoft-for-negligent-cybersecurity WE 3 - Lindsey Graham and Elizabeth Warren Co-sponsor Bill to Create New Tech Regulator · Wonder twin powers, activate · Graham Cracker is RINO extraordinaire (may as well be a Democrat) · Pocahontas is always about expanding the government · This bill would create a Big Tech regulator which could do a number of things · Sue for anti-trust violations, and act like the CMA in the UK · Come down on Big Tech for privacy violations · Limit online misinformation dissemination · Lots of sarcasm · Warm & fuzzy · Anti-constitutional · Gov’t censorship, oh joy · I’m from the government, and I’m here to help (privacy) · Competition regulation https://www.cnn.com/2023/07/27/tech/big-tech-regulation-new-federal-agency/index.html WE 4 – AI News for the Week 4-1 – OpenAI Loses Head of Trust & Safety · Resigns to spend more time with his family · Job got more involved than he wanted to deal with · Is that the real reason? · OpenAI under scrutiny over ChatGPT https://www.cnn.com/2023/07/21/tech/open-ai-trust-safety-head-exit/index.html 4-2 – What is Google Genesis? · Ever heard of it? I hadn’t either.. · “secret” project · Generative AI to aggregate news stories into one story with a given style · Is this a good thing? · Remember The Drudge Report? · Hallucinations? · No sorting · Could quickly create a vicious cycle https://www.cnet.com/tech/googles-genesis-ai-tool-could-write-the-news-it-should-be-stopped/ WE 5 – What Is Overture? · Linux Foundation project to provide a better FOSS alternative to Big Tech maps apps · Microsoft, Meta, TomTom, and Amazon are at the core · Pooling data along with OpenStreetMaps · Licensing requires any data taken to result in more contributions to the project · If one partner steals from the project, they will be responsible for maintaining their own map data for their product https://gizmodo.com/google-maps-alternative-overture-maps-data-linux-1850675768 WE 6 – SBF Nonsense 6-1 – SBF Sounds More and More Like a Snake · Leaked selections of Caroline Ellison’s diary to NYT · DOJ bringing charges of tainting jury pool, discrediting a witness in a criminal proceeding · She and the rest of the group at the center of FTX already had their trials and pleaded guilty and are working with the feds to testify against him · This smells like him trying to get ahead of the curve, which is smart, but dirty · How did he get a hold of these files? · Did she give them to him? · Did wunderkind hack them out of her Workspace account? · Did he appropriate them as admin of the FTX Workspace? · Shady AF https://gizmodo.com/doj-accuses-sbj-of-leaking-caroline-ellison-diary-ftx-1850663571 6-2 – SBF Charges Dropping Like Flies · Original 8 charges for which he was extradited from the Bahamas are untouched · 5 new charges are being challenged as US overstepping the letter of the extradition · 2 of those have now been dropped · Bribery · Campaign finance regulations · I have my doubts that this well-connected and very greasy little snake will ever see the inside of a prison for long · He greased the wheels through money laundering and improper campaign contributions · DC swamp doesn’t like sunlight · Will hide and protect him as best they can · If the book is thrown at him, he could face up to 100 years in prison · Two justice systems in this country... https://www.cnn.com/2023/06/15/investing/sam-bankman-fried-ftx-charges/index.html WE 7 – RIP Kevin Mitnick? · Famous early hacker · Hit DEC system and copied OS illegally in 1979 · Jailed 1988 · Hacked into Pac Bell Voicemail system in 1992 · Ran for 2.5 years · Caught and served 5.5 years · Free Kevin · Reformed, became White Hat · Consulted many Fortune 500 companies, gov’t agencies on cyber security since 2003 · Passed this week, after 14 month pancreatic cancer bout https://gizmodo.com/kevin-mitnick-famous-hacker-dies-at-59-1850659160 WE 8 – CSAM Everywhere... Look at Mastodon, Everyone!! They’re SOO Bad · What is the Fediverse · What is Mastodon · Issues · Security · Lack of user friendliness · CSAM (Child Sexual Abuse Materials), aka Child Porn materials · Remember George Carlin? That is a bloodless PC name, ain’t it? · Security is a moot thing, based on their concerns · User friendliness... Confusing layout with instances · There is CSAM everywhere (mainstream; decentralized platforms; everywhere) · Should not ever exist · 0 tolerance for creators and distributors when caught, swift justice https://gizmodo.com/mastodon-fediverse-child-abuse-material-stanford-resear-1850670857

Weekend Edition 44 WE 1 – Apple Troubles 1-1 – TSMC AZ Plant Pushes 5 NM fab production back · Apple partnered with them to produce their US-made M-series and A-series chips · US gets further from made in America i-devices · Why? · Education rant · Homelessness rant · Corruption rant https://www.cnbc.com/2023/07/20/tsmc-delays-start-of-arizona-chip-factory-that-will-build-apple-chips.html 1-2 – UK Online Safety Bill Has Tech Companies On Edge · Bill would force encrypted messaging apps to install a back door for UK authorities · Why? · Who? · What do they threaten if it passes? · Smoke? Fire? · On principle, I agree with their stand · What is E2E encryption? · We’ll see who blinks, here. https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-66256081 2 – More News on Microsoft-Activision Merger · Deadline extended 3 months · Restructured deal · UK CMA fast tracking process · Etymological rants · Government · entertainment · Balance rant https://www.cnbc.com/2023/07/19/microsoft-activision-agree-to-extend-deal-deadline-to-oct-18.html 3 – Ripple Expects More Use By US Banks Soon · On-Demand Liquidity product · Cross-border transactions · SWIFT aging, slow, possibly corrupt · XRP instant, cheap, secure from tampering · Depending on demand, Ripple Labs may file as a security · If it grows into what they hope, the sky is the limit for the token valuation, from where I sit https://www.cnbc.com/2023/07/17/ripple-hopes-judge-ruling-in-sec-case-will-lead-to-us-banks-using-xrp.html 4-1 - Nick Clegg, of Meta, calls “AI Quite Stupid” · Clegg is the VP of Global Affairs at the tech giant · Said things that I’ve been saying about these Large Language Models · Meta to open source Llama 2 · I know what I’ve said about open source projects... · Still don’t trust it if Meta will be prime beneficiary of development work · Meta partnered with MS Azure cloud for hosting · Yikes · Regulatory concerns https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-66238004 4-2 – Investing Bubble for AI? · CEO of StabilityAI (maker of Stable Diffusion) · Thinks that the investment craze has just begun · Foresees the largest bubble in history · Thinks that wise companies will do well · Sees companies which misuse the tech being punished on the stock market · I think it is too early to make all of these pronouncements · Matt’s AI reminders · It’s a tool · Keep it in perspective · Nothing mission-critical · Check its work · Privacy concerns · Microsoft/Meta & Llama 2: yikes https://www.cnbc.com/2023/07/17/ai-will-be-the-biggest-bubble-of-all-time-stability-ai-ceo.html 4-3 – British Computer Society Open Letter About AI · 1300 experts and business people signed this one · Counterweight to doom & gloom · Still hype-y · Doesn’t see dire threat · Generally AI will benefit us if developed responsibly and regulated well · ChatGPT “Like an overly knowledgeable and very excitable 12 year old” · See privacy and intellectual property issues · Is care necessary? · Is this a hair-on-fire moment? · How much do you use these tools? · How much do you trust them? · What about the hype in either direction? https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-66218709 https://techfreedom.pro/2023/07/21/weekend-edition-44-ai-actually-stupid/

WE 1 – Chinese Gang Hacks Outlook · Exploit in User token authentication found · Taken advantage of by Chinese group which MSFT calls Storm-0558 · They accessed email accounts belonging to 25 different organizations · Some were in the federal gov’t, including the Secy of Commerce · US Gov’t (Mafia) notified MSFT about breach · MSFT patched the exploit · Normal lazy (according to license agmts from MS) reaction from MS · If you’re tired of this, try Linux · Better security · Better privacy · Proactive developers vs reactive vendor https://www.pcmag.com/news/chinese-hackers-breach-us-government-email-accounts https://techfreedom.pro/free-your-pc WE 2 – Proton Releases Windows Proton Drive Client · Proton is a name you should be familiar with if you value online privacy · Email & VPN + Drive · Windows app for Drive released · Solid option · Best thing, though, is to fully control your data · Althatech.com · Nextcloud · Your hardware https://www.techradar.com/computing/computing-security/google-drive-watch-outprivacy-first-proton-drive-lands-on-windows https://althatech.com https://proton.com WE 3 – Too Much AI in Windows All at Once? · Microsoft seems obsessed with this new data harvesting toy of theirs · Co-Pilot · Windows Store · AI section, curated by AI · Other implementations · AI review summaries coming soon (think like on Google Search or Brave Search over the last couple of months) – Star wars Ep 2 - 3PO in droid foundry reference · Trustworthy? · Safe? · Private? · I hope it backfires and destroys Windows (What About Bob reference) https://www.techradar.com/computing/windows/windows-11-gets-more-ai-but-is-microsoft-pushing-its-luck WE 4 – Class Action Against OpenAI from Sarah Silverman and other authors · Fair use? · Authors allege that it is illegal how these LLMs are trained on literally everything that has ever been uploaded to the internet, including books that most people probably won’t read · It will be interesting to see how this winds up, as it will set some major precedents in the UK (venue for the suit). · Should these models, which form the foundation on which so-called generative “AI” be permitted to utilize a person’s work without permission? · What do you guys & gals think? https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-66164228 WE 5 – FTC V Ripple Labs · I hold a little bit of XRP, just to be transparent · Mixed ruling · Consumer side of XRP sales (through exchanges and whatnot) ruled to not be a security · Industrial side ruled to be a security · XRP free to be traded everywhere again · If yours got stuck in an exchange like mine did, move it · Wallets · Cash out · Not financial advice · Will keep up on this as it develops further https://www.reuters.com/legal/us-judge-says-sec-lawsuit-vs-ripple-labs-can-proceed-trial-some-claims-2023-07-13/ WE 6 - Microsoft/ Activision Blizzard Merger News · Judge denied FTC’s motion to block deal · Other methods · UK CMA still not happy with deal · Needs further reworking to get another look from CMA · I don’t think that Microsoft needs its tentacles in any more places, frankly. That is my bias. I will exult in this deal not going through. https://www.reuters.com/technology/us-judge-rules-microsoft-deal-buy-activision-can-go-forward-2023-07-11/ WE 7 – Broadcom Wants to Buy VMWare · Huh? · Broadcom makes networking hardware · VMWare is one of the main system virtualization vendors · Why? · Virtualization software gets used as a force multiplier in server environments · What is it? · EU greenlit the merger, but required some things · 3rd parties get everything they need in order to make sure all hardware is compatible with the virtualization software · Still has to get past the UKCMA and the FTC, I doubt that this $61 billion deal will make it through unaltered, but we shall see. https://www.engadget.com/broadcom-gets-eu-approval-for-its-61-billion-merger-with-vmware-150140942.html

WE 1 – Judicial Smackdown On Behalf of Free Speech Rights · Judge Doughty of Missouri · Case brought by AGs from Louisiana and Missouri · Found that Feds have been leaning on Social Media giants to censor things · Ruled that they need to stop · WH and DOJ struggling to appeal decision · We’ll see how long this lasts and/or if it changes anything appreciably https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-66106067 WE 2 – Social Media Platform “they stole our homework” · Twitter right pissy about Threads · Accuses them of stealing trade secrets from them via hiring recently fired engineers from Twitter · Meta says, “sure, like we’d do that” · Our platform is better anyway · You copied our homework · AS IF · More PR for Threads as Twitter tanks https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-66129215 WE 3 – France Goes Full INGSOC · Police reform bill · French police are nationalized · Think of it as if our only police organization was the FBI · Police can now spy on any citizen who is SUSPECTED of a crime worthy of at least 5 years in jail · All devices’ geolocation data is fair game, here, if you are a suspect · MPs trying to amend it to exclude, them, doctors, lawyers, judges, and journos,andto limit the time frame in view https://www.techradar.com/computing/cyber-security/france-grants-police-power-to-spy-on-citizens-through-phones WE 4 – US Navy Hacks MS Teams · Exploit in external messaging feature · Navy Team Red developed Python based tool · TeamsPhisher · Can insert malicious code into linked files for users who also have a SharePoint license · Can do it en mass · Avoid by closing off your external messaging feature when not needed · Practice good digital hygiene https://www.techradar.com/pro/the-us-navy-has-hacked-microsoft-teams-to-send-malware WE 5 – Safe in the Cloud? · Think again · Cloud is one the biggest, easiest targets for hackers · Remember, cloud = your data on someone else’s hardware · Encrypt your data · Use locally controlled multi-factor authentication (MFA) · These steps will greatly improve your data security · Tech Freedom can help with this, if you need · Best practice is to on-site most of your data · Not cheap, but then you control your data https://www.techradar.com/pro/cloud-remains-the-biggest-target-for-cyberattacks WE 6 – Has the Shine Worn Off From ChatGPT? · For the first time since going public, traffic went down in May · Not only ChatGPT, but Bing and character.ai also took a hit · Bard flatlined · Is it all worth it? · Does this mean anything? · I hope it means that the general public is losing interest · It’s a tool, and can provide a starting place for writing or research https://www.pcmag.com/news/are-we-sick-of-ai-chatbots-already-chatgpt-site-sees-traffic-dip WE 7 – Speaking of Privacy... · OpenAI Sued · Class action · Seeks temporary shutdown of commercial side · Seeks damages for copyright holders whose work has been infringed in some way · Seeks damages for individuals whose social media posts got data-scraped to train the LLM · Interesting · Will stay on top of this one as it develops https://www.pcmag.com/news/openai-sued-for-using-stolen-data-violating-your-privacy-with-chatgpt WE 8 – Is Your Job in Danger from Generative AI? · Hostinger survey · Healthcare seems most threatened · Personally doubt that would fly well, but what do I know? · Automotive · I could see this one being a “thing” as long as it has all the data necessary to understand an issue · What do you guys think? https://www.pcmag.com/news/ai-is-coming-for-our-jobs-but-which-ones WE 9 – Open AI Dedicating 20% of Cloud Resources to Stopping ‘super-intelligent AI’ · Bahhahaha · We don’t even have publicly available functional general AI right now · Generative AI is not really intelligent · Is this really a problem? · Why focus us on this potentiality? https://www.pcmag.com/news/openais-latest-goal-prevent-superintelligent-ai-from-killing-us-all Outpouring Fellowship Podcast https://rumble.com/c/c-2966394

Stephan is an independent game designer with a passion for helping others through trauma. He is a jack of many trades in the game design space, and has had a (hopefully) inspiring journey from standard geekdom (Windows, Intel, etc) into Linux. He made that journey before I met him (darn it), but has enjoyed the freedom and stability of working on Linux since his switch in 2019. We'll have a blog posted, which was written by him, soon over on https://techfreedom.pro/blog

WE 1 - It Was Only a Matter of Time... AI Child Abuse Images A Problem. · Stable Diffusion being used to generate banned images · Pixiv, a Japanese platform, is used to disseminate them ad draw people to subscription platforms like Patreon · Patreon fails to shut down accounts which sell access to the worst of these kinds of images · UK making noise about trying to shut it down · How many police are controlled by these sorts of things? · How many agencies are really just fronts for pedophilia to control politicians? · Porn shouldn’t exist · Kiddie porn doubly so · Those who create it and are caught should be severely punished (death) · Any company which enables its distribution should be litigated into oblivion · Is this a free speech issue? I don’t think so. It endangers human life, as it inevitably leads to trafficking · Heart issues need solving https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-65932372 WE 2 - AI Regulation Coming? Probably · Google is busy chatting with the EU · They are also working on putting tags on anything AI generated · They’re talking about working with the EU to put any new AI developments through the regulatory wringer before the public gets to see it · More regs = bigger government = less freedom for we the people · Regs may be necessary until the world meets Jesus for real and allows Him to change their hearts https://www.cnbc.com/2023/06/28/google-has-had-productive-talks-with-eu-on-ai-act-cloud-boss-says.html WE 3 - Thinking About Having ChatGPT Write Something Important? · 2 NYC lawyers made the dumb move to submit AI-generated docs to the court · Didn’t make sure that everything there was legit · Lied about it · Got fined · Will go down as lazy idiots https://gizmodo.com/chatgpt-ai-lawyers-fined-5000-fake-cases-1850569981 WE 4 - Baidu AI Better Than ChatGPT? · CCP State media claims to have tested Ernie 3.5 against chatGPT · Ernie beat chatGPT allegedly · Can we trust Chinese State media? · Article slops itself dreaming of Ernie coming to the West · So we’d rather have the CCP spy on us than our own gov’t? https://www.techradar.com/computing/artificial-intelligence/chinas-baidu-ai-is-better-than-chatgpt-heres-why WE 5 - AI Certification From MS? · Free through Indeed · Professional certification · Pointless? · What do you guys think? https://www.engadget.com/microsoft-is-already-offering-a-generative-ai-certification-program-160023724.html WE 6 - More Stringent Export Rules Coming Soon · Well, apparently, the regs put in place by Depends’ handlers weren’t enough · The CCP is still catching up quickly in the AI arms race · These strike me as band aids on top of a gaping wound · Education is the real issue here · Woke mindvirus destroyed our edge · We must eradicate it, then rebuild. https://www.pcmag.com/news/us-mulls-even-tighter-restrictions-to-stop-ai-chips-from-reaching-china WE 7 - Musk Not So Free Speech-Friendly After All? · More state-related censorship · Musk not trustworthy · More random censorship · His other business efforts · Connection with Deep State https://gizmodo.com/10-times-elon-musk-censored-twitter-users-1850570720 Read the blog here: https://techfreedom.pro/2023/06/29/weekend-edition-41-ai-news-bonanza-elon-not-so-pro-free-speech/

NUTS Linux Mint Beta Freedom Consultation Red Hat Goes Scrooge OBS Studio Update 4 Best Google Docs Alternatives Degoogled KDE 5.27.6 Xonotic Update SDL 2.28 Released Freedom Overhaul DREAMM, Now with Linux Support Big Show, FOSS News, Distro News, Tech Freedom, FOSS Fun Distro News DN 1 – NUTS (Nitrux OS Update Tool System) · Awwww nuts · What’s it do? · Where do I get it? https://9to5linux.com/nitrux-devs-make-it-easier-to-upgrade-your-immutable-nitrux-os-installations DN 2 – Linux Mint Beta Released · Interface updates in keeping with new version of Cinnamon Desktop · a much-improved login manager o better keyboard navigation o support for Wayland sessions o support for LXQt/Pademelon badges o a configurable layout for the Onboard on-screen keyboard o a scrollable session list o support for multiple keyboard layouts o better touchpad support with automatic detection and enablement of tap-to-click · Other Misc things o Full support for HEIF and AVIF images o update the in-house built Xreader document viewer app to properly support Adobe Illustrator documents o Update to Pix image viewer app with a rebase on the gThumb 3.12.2 image viewer. o Software Manager app § UI refresh § better scoring/sorting algorithms § tuned package list. o Warpinator app received support for the Landlock and Bubblewrap technologies to implement folder isolation https://9to5linux.com/linux-mint-21-2-beta-is-now-available-for-download-with-cinnamon-5-8 Freedom Consultation Feeling lost? This free chat will help. I promise that by the end of the tailored presentation, you’ll have at least some idea what to do next and how to get it done. https://techfreedom.pro/freedom-consultation DN 3 – Red Hat Scrooges Other Distros? · Maybe · Red Hat forcing other developers to create free accounts to access RHEL code base · Beware click bait · Is it a big deal now? No · Could it be turned into a big deal? Yes · Time will tell https://news.itsfoss.com/red-hat-restricts-source-code/ FOSS News FN 1 – OBS Studio 29.1.3 Released · Many bugs squashed o Source Record plugin by fixing a crash that occurred when properties are deleted in the callback o improves the AMF (Advanced Media Framework) encoder’s reconfiguration and dynamic bitrate as they didn’t work in previous releases (AMF is the AMD encoder) o AMF preset fallback to take into account the GPU reported throughput o Also fixed window and game capture issues o Also fixed audio settings issues o Also fixed service selection issues o crash with Freetype 2 text sources when non-ASCII text is used, and fixes other crashes in obs-websockets and Lua scripts. o Properties dialogs now closeable by hitting the cancel button o Fixed keyboard shortcuts weren’t displayed for some context menu items o the View menu’s “Source Toolbar” checkable menu item wouldn’t update when the “Show Source Toolbar” and “Hide Source Toolbar” hotkeys were used. o Fixed a bug where switching between “Fade” and “Fade to Black” for a quick transition would fail to work correctly o fixed an issue where unnecessary undo/redo entries were being created for text sources o fixed a bug where the placeholder text for “Group” would not be correctly localized when adding a new group. https://9to5linux.com/obs-studio-29-1-3-improves-the-source-record-plugin-amf-encoder-and-more FN 2 – Tired of Volunteering Data to Big Tech? Top 4 Google Docs Alts OnlyOffice · Best all-arounder · Can connect to properly configured nextcloud instance · Does most office type things (Docs, spreadsheets, and presentations) · FOSS · Fully compatible with MS Office · https://onlyoffice.com CryptPad · Web based · Fully end to end encrypted · self-hostable (my video: https://rumble.com/v29wpc2-free-your-pc-friday-special-interwebz-news-and-how-tos.html) · No desktop apps · https://cryptpad.fr EtherPad · Only handles documents (no spreadsheets or presentations) · Not encrypted · Web based · Can do own instance (https://github.com/ether/etherpad-lite#installation) or jump on a public instance (https://github.com/ether/etherpad-lite/wiki/Sites-That-Run-Etherpad) CurveNote · STEM focused collaboration toolkit · Markdown · LaTeX · Its own CMS for a website · Create your own scientific journal publication · https://curvenote.com/pricing https://www.tecmint.com/google-docs-alternatives/ Degoogled Want to learn how to cut the umbilical to Mountain View, CA? Take a look at the blogs linked here. If you just want a Freed Phone, you can order one there as well. https://techfreedom.pro/degoogled FN 3 – KDE 5.27.6 Released · Big things · Wayland Session · X11 Session · Flatpak · Discover · And More · https://kde.org/announcements/changelogs/plasma/5/5.27.5-5.27.6/ https://9to5linux.com/kde-plasma-5-27-6-is-out-to-improve-plasma-wayland-session-support-for-flatpak-apps FOSS Fun FF 1 – Xonotic 0.8.6 Released · Arena based first person shooter (think Quake 3) · FOSS, fork of Nexuiz · New things o 2 maps o AI improvements o Performance improvements o VFX improvements o 3 new game modes § Mayhem § Survival § Team Keepaway https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/06/classic-open-source-fps-xonotic-086-released-with-new-game-modes/ FF 2 – SDL 2.28 Released · What’s SDL? · Key for Linux gaming · Low level access to most hardware (audio, GPU, mouse, keyboard, joystick) · Used by many game developers and studios (Valve, Unity engine, etc) · Focus toward SDL 3 https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/06/sdl-2280-released-and-goes-into-maintenance-mode-now-focusing-on-sdl-3/ Freedom Overhaul This is the full package. A whole-life exit from Big Tech. Migration from Windows or MacOS to Linux. Migration from iOS or stock Android to Graphene OS. Migration from Big Tech email and collaboration tools to ones which will honor your right to privacy. https://techfreedom.pro/product/freedom-overhaul/ FF 3 – Ever heard of DREAMM? · What is it? · Why should you care? · Lucas Arts · Nostalgia https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/06/classic-lucasarts-games-emulator-dreamm-adds-early-linux-support/

WE 1 - FTC v Amazon · Bezos out of picture · Amazon getting sued · Dark Patterns o Prevent users from leaving Prime https://www.pcmag.com/news/ftc-amazon-tricked-millions-into-signing-up-for-prime-subscriptions WE 2 - AST 4G Satellite · First experiments with LEO solar powered 4G satellite · Off-the-shelf cell phones · Call from TX to Japan in April · Data transferred to remote users in HI at 10 MBs · Partnered with the Blue Devil (AT&T) · Other carriers are working on these same things as well, so expect satellite cell phone service soon for rural areas · What about latency? · How much power does it take to make this happen? How intense do these radio waves have to be in order to xfer data like that from 310 mi up? https://www.pcmag.com/news/asts-bluewalker-satellite-successfully-delivers-10mbps-download-speeds WE 3 – AI News 3a – AI Battle Royale · UC Berkeley, UC San Diego, and Carnegie Mellon University partnership · Large Language Model Systems Organization (LLMSys Org) · 10 students, 4 professors · Head-to-head blind testing · Elo rating system · 40k users · Best results are from GPT 4, by a small margin · Generative AI issues · Privacy (data and user) · Content quality and incentives for humans to create better things https://www.pcmag.com/news/chatgpt-bard-or-bing-40k-people-voted-for-the-best-generative-ai-model 3b – Need a Windows Key? Don’t ask AI... · Duh · Reasons · May not work · Illegal · ChatGPT and Bing AI are owned by Microsoft... · Use Linux instead. https://www.techradar.com/news/dont-ask-chatgpt-or-google-bard-for-a-windows-11-key-heres-why WE 4 – Google Whines about Competitors Doing What They Do · FTC asked for comments on the cloud space · Google Cloud submitted a letter · Pointed fingers at both MS and Oracle for using similar business tactics · See what THEY’RE doing!!!!! · Makes me laugh · Try a smaller provider · Altha Tech · FOSS where possible · No lock-ins https://www.cnbc.com/2023/06/21/google-accuses-microsoft-of-anticompetitive-practices-in-azure-cloud.html WE 5 – Meta & Twitter News WE 5a – Oversight Board Slaps Meta · Didn’t censor pro-insurrectionist Brazilian video · Pattern of behavior · Too much free speech · Potential damage to Leftist regimes around the world · Not enough censorship from the US election in 2020 · Leftist drone https://www.engadget.com/metas-oversight-board-says-the-companys-rules-are-slowly-changing-for-the-better-100059192.html WE 5b – Cage Match? · Meta working on Twitter alternative · Elon mad · Zuck jokes about cage match · Elon takes him seriously (apparently) · Not much else to say here other than that they got some free publicity here for the new project at Meta https://www.cnbc.com/2023/06/22/musk-zuckerberg-cage-match-what-to-know-about-metas-twitter-clone.html WE 5c – Twitter Making New Deal with Google · Elon wasn’t paying cloud bills · Wanted to move internal tools in-house to save money · Yaccarino appointed · Opens dialog with Google to smooth things over · Starts making big deals · No more migration deadline https://www.engadget.com/twitter-has-supposedly-started-paying-its-google-cloud-bill-again-213824844.html WE 5d – Will Elon Continue to Blow Up the Dirty Blue Bird? · Yaccarino · glass cliff? · Time will tell · My opinion https://www.techradar.com/computing/twitter/elon-continues-to-drag-twitter-through-the-mud-and-could-face-fines-as-a-result Wrap up FTC v Amazon · FTC making big moves · Will it mean anything ultimately? No Idea... 4G Satellites · AST BlueWalker 3 · Partnered with AT&T · 10 MB/s download speeds in areas (rural HI) where there has never been reliable service at all before · Looking to implement mid-band 5G soon · Soon to have competitors (Apple, T Mo, Starlink) AI News · GPT 4 is best LLM out there, but costs $20/mo · Claude, by Anthropic came in 2nd and 3rd (wait listed) · 40,000 people have used the chatbot battle site to establish ranking for the various LLMs PSA: Don’t Use Chatbots to Pirate Windows, Use Linux Instead · Piracy is illegal · codes produced may not work at all, or may not work completely, or may stop working at some random time · Just don’t do it. · Use Linux Big Tech Is Evil · ALL Big Tech Cloud outfits try to lock you into their services once you sign up · Google has been in hot water over this · FTC asked for tips about others acting badly · Google obliged, hoping to get MS and Oracle into trouble as well · As an aside, MS has been scraping your passwords and can snoop on your encrypted OneDrive and SharePoint files. Get away from these services NOW. · MS has been scraping data from plain files for somewhere close to 10 years now. Just Like Apple and Google. Shouldn’t surprise you in the least. · Take a look at a smaller cloud provider who will respect your privacy and not lock you into their platform, like Altha Tech. Meta & Twitter · Meta in trouble again · Not enough censoring · Zuck v Musk · Yaccarino & Google · Yaccarino on a glass cliff? It’s been a wild couple of weeks since my last Weekend Edition, hasn’t it? From the FTC going after Amazon for anti-consumer practices (duh), to satellite based cell phone service, to which AI chatbot is best, to not using chatbots to pirate operating systems, to a PSA about Google and Microsoft, to drama around social media companies. https://techfreedom.pro/2023/06/22/weekend-edition-40/

Fast forward to the 39:00 mark to actually hear something... sorry about the audio issues in the beginning... FOSS News Bullets · Distro News o Update your Ubuntu 22.10 ASAP, its support is ending on July 20. § https://9to5linux.com/ubuntu-22-10-kinetic-kudu-to-reach-end-of-life-on-july-20th-2023 o Debian Bookworm out § Not sexy, but super stable, here are a few highlights · Latest LTS kernel by default · Non-free-firmware repo · APFS Read/Write support o HUGE for anyone wanting to switch from or deal with Macs. · NTFS to BTRFS converter · Over 11000 new packages · Most major desktop environments are available § More info here: · https://cdimage.debian.org/debian-cd/12.0.0/ · https://9to5linux.com/debian-12-bookworm-officially-released-heres-whats-new o Freedom Consultation § Free Call § Actionable steps to set you free · https://techfreedom.pro/freedom-consultation o Ultramarine Linux § Fedora-based distro with a twist to make it a bit more user-friendly § System76 system scheduler § Flagship DE is Budgie · Also available in GNOME, KDE, and Pantheon · GNOME is the only one with a full implementation of the System76 scheduler (manages which processes get to use the CPU and when) · It is present in all 4 options though. § More info here: https://9to5linux.com/ultramarine-linux-38-launches-with-system76s-scheduler-based-on-fedora-38 § Download here: https://ultramarine-linux.org/download/ o openSUSE Leap 15.5 § Franken-distro · New & old pkgs § Highlights · KDE 5.27, added default repositories for OpenH264 video codecs, VIM 9.0, Fully functional Python 3.11 stack, in parallel to the system Python (python36), Improvements to the Kate text editor, Fixes for crashes on Kdenlive, Qt 5.15 LTS netavark 1.5.0, Flatpak 1.14.4, fwupd 1.8.6, Ugrep 3.11.0, Network Manager 1.38.6, Mozilla Firefox 102.9.0, and Thunderbird 102.8.0. § Release Notes: https://en.opensuse.org/Release_announcement_15.5?ref=news.itsfoss.com § Download here: https://get.opensuse.org/leap/15.5/?ref=news.itsfoss.com § Reference: https://news.itsfoss.com/opensuse-15-5-leap/ · FOSS News o Latest in Linux Mobile § Mobian · Now stable on Bookworm · Sounds promising · https://blog.mobian.org/posts/2023/06/10/bookworm/ § PostmarketOS · Alpine Linux based · More rolling than Mobian · Lighter · No systemd · All major, functional mobile DE’s · https://postmarketos.org/ § Capyloon · FirefoxOS, built on top of Mobian · New features o Web Tiles § Immutable: a Tile is a bundle of resources identified using content addressing. Our current implementation uses a tile:// protocol which is similar to the ipfs:// one. § Safe by default: a tile can't fetch foreign content. This is enforced by a default CSP applied to all tile:// url loads. § Powerful: because they can't leak data to external parties, tiles can be granted access to what are usually considered "dangerous" APIs. § Installable and usable offline: being content addressed and local-only, tiles are naturally suited for offline use. § Composable: being installed, tiles can register Web Activities like other installed Capyloon apps. This make them ideal candidates to bridge the Http web with new capabilities. o Peer Discovery § Easier to find other devices on your network now · https://capyloon.org/releases.html#jun-09-2023 § Manjaro Mobile · Still in beta · Plasma Mobile: https://github.com/manjaro-pinephone/plasma-mobile/releases · Phosh: https://github.com/manjaro-pinephone/phosh/releases o OnlyOffice 7.4 § I use it · Compare to Libre Office § Highlights · Drawing Support · Save Docs/Sheets as Images · Plugins Upgrade · Spreadsheet Improvements · Radar Charts · Combine Documents · Save Objects as Pictures § Good stuff · But... Let us tweak the default settings, please § https://news.itsfoss.com/onlyoffice-7-4-release/ o Linus Torvalds Not Conservative § Derides the memeing of “woke” and “communist” § Tells ostensibly conservative guy to pound sand § Mostly libertarian about social issues, other than guns · Lol § I still love linux, even if its creator is a moral and political idiot § https://news.itsfoss.com/linus-torvalds-woke-communists/ · FOSS Fun o Steam Client Updates § Good stuff · Refreshed UI Design · Enable client hardware acceleration · Caveats: not on NVIDIA GPUs, as it can cause x11 to crash · New Compatibility tab to make switching versions of Proton and WINE easier · Improved flatpak app support · Better KDE support o Uses global scaling factor to determine what the scaling should be for Steam · New game overview panel in the in-game overlay · And more § https://9to5linux.com/steam-client-now-lets-you-enable-hardware-acceleration-on-linux o NVIDIA Drivers with Better Wayland Support § Fixed a bug that caused modesets to fail in some Wayland configurations. § Fixed a bug that caused head-mounted displays (HMDs) to display black after a modeset. § Fixed a bug that prevented SLI Mosaic controls from being displayed in the nvidia-settings control panel when using GSP Firmware. § Fixed a bug that could cause image corruption when unbinding Vulkan sparse textures. § Fixed a bug that caused head-mounted displays (HMDs) to display black after a modeset. § https://9to5linux.com/nvidia-535-54-03-linux-graphics-driver-released-with-better-wayland-support § If you want more of a bulleted list, look here: https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/06/nvidia-driver-535-54-03-stable-linux/ o Want to get away from Windows? § https://techfreedom.pro/freed-computer/ o Need to Speed Up Your PC? § https://techfreedom.pro/free-your-pc o AMD Progressing Toward Open-sourced Firmware § Starting process § Migrating from AGESA to openSIL § First GitHub release for Proof-of-Concept § https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/06/amd-reveals-initial-open-source-opensil-code-to-replace-agesa-firmware/ If you want more of my thoughts about these stories, check out my blog:

Amazon Fined $25 mn over Child Privacy Violations · FTC sued tech giant over violations related to both Alexa and the Ring doorbells o Alexa voice data was not being deleted as claimed, but being kept to make the AI database stronger § Kept for years, ignoring parents’ requests to delete data o Ring was accused of similar issues § One employee decided to watch 1000’s of individual videos recorded by cameras in intimate areas, specifically belonging to female customers, and only stopped after caught by a coworker. https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-65772154 Spaces Glitches During DeSanctimonious’ Presidential Announcement · Could’ve seen that coming with the issues that Twitter has been having since Musk bought it · Spaces is based on Periscope (ahhh, now I know why I was never comfy on Periscope, no matter how much my wife pushed me to get on it) o This means that the infrastructure is spread across multiple providers and was not meant for this kind of call, a few hundred, sure, but 500k on a call? No. o Musk SHOULD have known this before he embarrassed himself, his company and Candidate Meatball. § Was there some bigger reason why, here? · Maybe he knew that it would be a problem, but was so excited about the platform being used and live-tested that he ignored the issues before hand. · Maybe he wanted to embarrass Meatball · Maybe he just doesn’t care at this point... · Maybe he understands the Trump philosophy of “any PR is good PR” https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/24/tech/twitter-desantis-meltdown/index.html AI!!!!! THE SKY IS FALLING!!!! WE’RE GONNA DIE!!!! PANIC!!!! · Why are we being focused on this? · As I have said before, current generation, publicly available AI’s could NEVER do what these doomers are saying they could. o They sound credible as they are the apparently leaders in the field, but I would be more concerned with misinformation that gets pawned off as real and true § I talked about Jonathan Turley’s experience with this a couple of months ago now, where chatGPT actually made up a whole network of stories to make it look like its assertions about the law expert were true. § Bottom line: be careful · Some, like me, are more skeptical about the alleged powers of AI o biases o Imitation of humans (copyright issues, along with other IP issues) https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-65746524 Microsoft Calls for New Regulatory Body in US Around AI · Brad Smith, president of MSFT spoke for an hour, largely about these issues · Ughhhhh · Microsoft calling for AI regulation is like a crackhead saying that we need to beef up the DEA · My thoughts about government · My thoughts about their proposals o new rules for AI should include revamped export controls tailor-made for the AI age to prevent the technology from being abused by sanctioned entities. § Ok... How much will this cost? · Freedom · Finances o government should mandate redundant AI circuit breakers that would allow algorithms to be shut off by critical infrastructure providers or from within the data centers they depend on. § Abuse? § Devil’s Advocate o Regulations should apply to everything from the data centers that train large language models to the end users such as banks, hospitals and others that may apply the technology toward making life-altering decisions § May be necessary, but yikes... https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/25/tech/microsoft-ai-regulation-calls/index.html Metaverse Getting Ready? · Hype o The “future” o Heart-eyes, star-eyes o Everyone will be here in the future · Reality o Not even close to ready o “foundation” may be maturing § Just a skeleton with precious little flesh on it · Author o Coined term in 1992 novel “Snow Crash” o Been working in the space for last few years o Pushing it, hyping it · My reaction o Oh brother o Hmmm o Nah § Privacy § Security § Centralization? https://www.cnet.com/tech/gaming/the-man-who-named-the-metaverse-is-optimistic-despite-waning-hype/ CA Law May Lead Meta to Pull News from Your Feed in CA · Law o Big money, big news o Doesn’t seem to help those it claims to (local news outlets) · Meta’s reaction · Other reactions · My thoughts o *eyeroll* o Meta has tried this before and not stuck to it o Doesn’t change much, ultimately, and adds more bureaucracy to a state that is already over-burdened by onerous regulations https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/31/tech/meta-threatens-to-pull-california-news/index.html NVidia Making a Killing Amid AI Frenzy · Stock up 110% this year after a bump of 28% last quarter o Insane profits: +26% to $2 bn last quarter, Sales up 19% to $7.2 bn for the quarter · Why? o AI o Heavy, powerful compute needed that CPU can’t handle, and GPU is actually more efficient at those sorts of calculations. · My reaction o Ok... I still say we all need to ditch the Green Monster asap o Good for them, but...

Distro News DN 1 – SystemD Free Distros For Those Who Want Full Freedom and Privacy Last week, I mentioned SystemD as being problematic in relation to privacy, this week, we are going to talk about a handful of options (and there really are just a handful of viable options at this point). Some of these are almost bespoke in their uniqueness, such as Chimera Linux. Others are so hard to use that I can’t suggest them to anyone (Void, Gentoo, Alpine, Venom, KISS, Slackware). Devuan, Peppermint, Nitrux Linux, Artix, AntiX, and PCLinuxOS are usable, but each have their quirks and things to be aware of. This will wind up being a listicle of sorts, based on another listicle, but with my own thoughts about each. I will order them from most user friendly to least. 1) Peppermint Devuan a. This is an older, intentionally lightweight distro, built for webapps, something along the lines of ChromeOS. It is very performant, and just works, even for gaming, a bit. It was recently rebased from Ubuntu to Debian/ Devuan. We are concerned with the Devuan base, here, as Debian has a systemD problem. Being based on Devuan, you can choose at install time whether you want OpenRC, dinit, runit, or SysVinit. All that said, this, coupled with ease of install and ease of use causes this one to rise to the top. https://peppermintos.com/guide/downloading/ 2) Devuan a. This is Debian minus SystemD. Whatever problems you might have installing vanilla Debian, you will probably have with Devuan. It is usable, but many things are broken out of the box. It, like many, later in the list, is meant for advanced users. You can check it out and download if you wish, here: https://www.devuan.org/os/ 3) Nitrux Linux a. This one runs on OpenRC, but has significant UI issues, because even the currently default NX Desktop (based on KDE) has stability issues (for example, it uses Latte Dock for the bottom dock configuration, and it crashes multiple times per minute). They are also working on their own desktop, which I have mentioned in the past, called Maui Desktop. This is a promising project, as it is meant to provide convergence between desktop and mobile UI, but is a far cry from being done, yet. https://nxos.org/ 4) AntiX a. If you don’t want to be preached at from the Communist Manifesto, don’t bother with this one. It is based on Debian Stable, but only offers a series of window managers, as this is a super lightweight option. It gives you the choice of either SysVinit or runit for an init system, and has 0 systemd garbage in it. Read up more on it here: https://antixlinux.com/about/ 5) PCLinuxOS a. This one is an indie. It uses APT (from Debian) to access curated rpm packages (from Fedora), ships with a choice of the usual suspects in terms of desktop environments, and runs SysVinit rather than systemd, which is why this is on the list. 6) MX Linux a. Related, somehow, to AntiX, but not truly systemd-free, unfortunately. The devs simply chose to use sysVinit to do the actual init tasks at boot, but once you are into the desktop, it switches over to systemd. Other than that, it is probably the most polished and easy to use so far, but it doesn’t technically belong on this list, though. https://mxlinux.org 7) Artix Linux a. Our only Arch based option today, as it is vanilla Arch, with a GUI installer, and no systemd to gum up the works and spy on you. They have opted for choice, so you can use just about any other init system out there, from OpenRC, to Runit, S6, Suite66, elogind or SysVinit. My brother has used this and loves it, currently, even for playing games. Try one of the community versions, whether KDE, GTK (something like Mate), XFCE, Cinnamon, LXDE, LxQt, or Mate. It should install cleanly, and you should have any DE (other than GNOME) to choose from, so if you like Arch more than Debian, this may be your best option on the list. Check it out here: https://artixlinux.org/download.php 8) Chimera Linux a. Complex blend of the Linux kernel with BSD tooling and a focus on building from source. Not user friendly, but at least starts with the option of running GNOME. Uses dinit for init and service management. Do not recommend for an inexperienced user. (this will be a refrain for the rest of this piece) Take a look at it here: https://chimera-linux.org/ 9) GoboLinux a. Another indie effort, this time with a novel approach to the file system, so every package/app gets its own subtree in the file system. This one is another that emphasizes on building from source, rather than providing end-user pre-packaged binaries (.deb, .rpm, etc). It runs SysVinit for init. It sounds intriquiging, but I don’t know that I would ever really try it, much less suggest it to anyone. https://gobolinux.org/index.html#content 10) Venom Linux a. Focused on being lightweight and giving users a choice between init systems: sysV and Runit are your options here. It is another source-built distro, thus is not meant for new users. However, if you can roll Void or Gentoo successfully, then this should be more or less up your alley. https://venomlinux.org/ 11) KISS Linux a. Not named for Gene Simmons’ band... but for Keep It Simple, Stupid. This is a meta-distro. If that takes you aback, then it ain’t for you. If it makes you curious, then this might actually mean something to you: its repos are meant to be an extensible base for you to build on. This looks to be terminal only, at least in the beginning. Not user friendly. In order to use it, you actually wind up learning how to maintain the distro, which is designed to be doable by a team of 1. https://kisslinux.org/ 12) Slackware a. This is a truly venerable distro. It is the oldest that has been consistently developed, yes, older than Debian even. They just had a new release on Thursday, and switched to a rolling release model, run sysVinit and defaults to KDE for ease of use. It doesn’t obscure anything, which makes sense with the choice to roll with KDE, which pulls very few punches, itself. Check it out, in all its glory here: http://www.slackware.com/getslack/ 13) Tiny Core Linux a. This is ultra minimalistic. The smallest on the list, by a good deal. A full install can be as small as 23 MB. It is designed to live in RAM, no matter how you try to run it. It uses Busybox for init, and is lightning fast because it is all in RAM and has next to nothing to it. Check it out here: http://tinycorelinux.net/welcome.html 14) Gentoo Linux a. This one is all about building from source. Runs OpenRC for init. If you can get it running. Connor can tell you about how non-friendly this distro is. It can be excellent, once you have time and patience to learn portage, the package manager, which build EVERYTHING from source. https://www.gentoo.org/ 15) Void Linux a. Another build-from-source indie distro. Runit is their init of choice, I know of a few people who swear by Void, for anything but gaming. Not user friendly. https://voidlinux.org/ 16) Alpine Linux a. I’m going to let Connor take this one, entirely. He recently joined their dev team, and is positively goofy over this distro. In short, it is an indie distro meant for servers and IoT devices, so it is minimalistic, though you can easily install most of the major desktop environments using a simple script after you install the rest of the system. I have both done it successfully and failed miserably. It is something of a crapshoot, depending on your hardware and which version you choose (my experience). It runs OpenRC and busybox, may not be AS small as Tiny Core, but is still much smaller than the average mainstream offering. https://alpinelinux.org/ https://itsfoss.com/systemd-free-distros/ #distronews #systemd #nosystemd4me #alpine #void #artixlinux #listicle #TechFreedom #FOSSNews Freedom Consultation Free call. 60-90 minutes. Q&A Leave with Actionable Steps to take, whether you work with me or not. Schedule today. https://techfreedom.pro/freedom-consultation #distromonday #freedom #consultation #Linux #degoogleyourlife #TechFreedom What Do You Need to Know about Tech Freedom? https://rumble.com/v19elx6-10-things-about-tech-freedom.html?mref=2jfr3&mc=anr3y #TechFreedom #top10 #explainer #wifeysauce FOSS News FN Special: SystemD and its issues... What started, 15 years ago, as a needed replacement for sysVinit has suffered so much bloat and so much feature creep that the plethora of distros which use it might as well start being called SystemD distros rather than Linux distros. Sure, they still use Mr. Torvalds’ kernel, but so much functionality (in the name of almighty convenience) has been handed over to it that it basically is your system, so when it crashes, so does your system. Connor has something prepared for us, and I will simply chime in during his presentation as I see fit. Connor, would you mind sharing with us now? #FOSSNews #PSA #systemd #Linux #concerned #TechFreedom Want to learn more about how to degoogle your phone and why? https://techfreedom.pro/degoogled/ #TechFreedom #degoogled #degoogleyourlife #defintionsday #Truth How to install GrapheneOS on a Pixel phone: https://rumble.com/v179s8e-how-to-degoogle-your-pixel-3-xl-with-grapheneos.html?mref=2jfr3&mc=anr3y #TechFreedom #techtips #howto #tutorial #Truth How to install GrapheneOS on a Pixel phone: https://tv.gab.com/channel/tech_freedom/view/how-to-degoogle-your-pixel-3xl-629bcda174999572f23b5032 #definitionsthursday #TechFreedom #techtips #howto #tutorial Freed Computer https://techfreedom.pro/freed-computer/ https://techfreedom.pro/free-your-pc #freedcomputer #linux #nospying #safe #TechFreedom #Truth

Weekend Edition 38: Spam Calls, META News, Tik Tok & AI Nearly All US State AGs Have Sued Avid Telecom Apple to Do More Chip Fab in US Bad News for Meta TikTok Sues Montana, Residents Struggle Microsoft says, “AI ALL THE THINGS”! AI Image Gen in Photoshop Now A Thing #weekendedition #technews #spamcalls #robocalls #Meta #AI #TikTok #Microsoft #Adobe #FOSSNews #TechFreedom WE 38.1 – Remember Avid Telecom? You Probably Don’t... I covered the likelihood of this suit being brought last fall, well, now it’s real. They are being sued by all but two of the US state-level Attorneys General. That is a HUGE lawsuit. What do they allege that Avid did or does? Why, serve as a clearing house for do-not-call list numbers and infrastructure backbone for those who would want to abuse said lists. Perhaps you have noticed an uptick in robocalls over the last several years, particularly scam-related ones... If you have, there is a strong chance that these people had a hand in it. Avid Telecom is a VOIP provider who claims to have committed no wrongdoing, so will “Defend itself vigorously and vindicate its rights and reputation through the legal process.” We’ll see. Usually State AG’s don’t dogpile on a case like this if they think it’s a nothingburger. They seem to have done business with a number of scam outfits, covering the following areas: Social Security Administration, Medicare, auto warranties, Amazon, credit card interest rate reduction and more. Wow. That’s all I have to say about that, just wow. As far as I know, I am on the Nat’l DNC registry, and I have certainly received calls in those areas in the last few years, and an increased number of them, at that. The robocalling aspect of cold calling when I did real estate always struck me as sheisty and super shady. I, for a short time, paid an outfit to do followup for me. I still regret that. It was wrong, even though as far as I know, they actually had people doing the calling, with scripts and such, not just recordings, but idk. I’m glad to not be in that space any more. https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/23/avid-telecom-facilitated-billions-of-spam-calls-state-ags-allege.html #weekendedition #robocalls #avidtelecom #scammers #justice #US #FOSSNews #TechFreedom WE 38.2 – Broadcom Benefits from Increased US/ CCP Tensions Well well well... Apple comes crawling back to the US as they ramp up alternative manufacturing sources for their specialty silicon thanks to the increased tensions between the US and the CCP, among other things. Broadcom, famously the manufacturer of modems and WiFi chips. Now, they join TSMC in benefiting directly from AAPL’s urgent need to get away from Chinese manufacturing for their devices, also moving some other pieces to India & Vietnam, aside from the US. Wise move getting away from the CCP, just a bit. I’ve always thought that while more expensive and complex, it makes more long term sense to not have all of one’s eggs in one basket anyway, so to speak. I may not like the company or its products because I do not agree with their ultra-closed ecosystem or ability to spy on you at will, but can admire a good business move when I see one. https://www.bbc.com/news/business-65692276 #weekendedition #technews #apple #diversity #broadcom #FOSSNews #TechFreedom WE 38.3 – Meta’s Getting Slammed... Burn, baby, burn. 3.1 – Ireland’s Data Protection Commissioner pile drives Meta with $1.3 billion Fine OOf. Big, huge-normous, gargantuan OOOFF. Due to GDPR violations, the Menlo Park, CA-based tech giant is getting fined tot he tune of more than $1 billion. I guess GDPR ain’t no joke. Other notable Tech fines related to the GDPR since it was put into place 5 years ago were an $887 million fine levied against Amazon by Luxembourg and a $267 million fine against WhatsApp in Ireland. Not only are they being fined, but it looks like they will need to move all European data to European data centers, rather than shipping it back across the Pond to the US. As much as I hate the onerous nature of big Gov, it kinda takes something like the EU to stand up to a behemoth like Meta and do anything worthwhile. Why does it take that? Why can’t class action suits do the work that needs done? Why haven’t more people ditched Meta and its platforms, which are designed to addict you and compromise your privacy? https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/24/irish-data-regulator-defends-1point3-billion-meta-fine.html #weekendedition #meta #gdpr #fines #EU #FOSSNews #TechFreedom 3.2 – More Layoffs for Meta I am tempted to dance a jig about this, however, I find my enthusiasm tempered significantly, as these workers (no matter how superfluous their positions may have been) are people, many of whom likely have families depending on them. I cannot exult in families losing income, however, that said, losing 20k+ workers in the space of 8 months is not a good look for any business. On the other hand, their falsely inflated stock market numbers (along with everyone else’s, due to the reality of brandon-flation). That all said, though, the numbers for Meta are truly shocking, after cratering hard last year, until Zuck announced this “year of efficiency”, in November. The stock seems to have rebounded to something close to where it was before its sharp decline last year. Reality Labs and the Metaverse projects are still absolutely hemorrhaging money, yet investors seem happy to throw money at them, nonetheless. Well, they did show growth in revenues for the first time in a year, even if only 3%. When you are talking about revenues in the 10s of billions, 3% is actually significant. To the tune of nearly $1 billion. Still trying to wrap my head around just how gargantuan Meta is. Laying off over 20k people, making almost a cool billion in spite of losing money again on their most audacious set of projects. Wow. https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/24/meta-layoffs-latest-round-of-cuts-focuses-on-business-groups.html #meta #weekendedition #recovery #austerity #layoffs #TechFreedom #FOSSNews 3.3 – Meta Loses Millions in Forced Sale of Giphy Why’d they go and do that? Well, once again, big, bad EU regulators to the “rescue” forcing the giant to sell the meme and gif search platform which they bought a mere 3 years ago, for barely 1/8 what they paid for it. Why? Because the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority decided that Meta owning it disadvantaged other social media platforms. Who bought it, though? Why, Shutterstock, of course. While Meta bought it for somewhere right around $400 million, they were forced to sell it by the CMA for a mere $53 million. They tried to make the case that giphy isn’t nearly as popular as it was because the younger sets think of gifs as “cringe” or “boomer stuff”, but the reality is that Giphy still gets searched 1.3 billion times per day, with around 15 billion views on shared content per day. That doesn’t sound like much of a decline to me... Who knows, though? https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-65684986 #weekendedition #meta #giphy #CMA #UK #regulator #losing #TechFreedom #FOSSNews WE 38.4 – TikTok Vs The Big Sky State 4.1 – TikTok Sues Montana Over Ban Of course the platform strongly objects to this move. I am not a fan of it, either. I hear where they think they are coming from, and I want to believe that it is a good place of trying to protect the public, but to pull the run out from under people like that is cruel and borderline vindictive. I may overreacting right now. However, I do strongly believe in the First Amendment. I also believe that any government big enough to deprive individuals of their guaranteed liberties and rights is too big. We are there. Been there for a number of years, probably longer than I’ve been alive. The sad reality is that what John Adams said about our constitution and system of government is true. We have seen it coming apart at the seams as it has gotten further and further away from Christian morality and ethics, and these so-called representatives of ours are just avatars of that. If we, as a nation, were upright, then our leaders would be too. I’m not saying that they are perfect avatars for us, but how many of us would be able to keep ourselves pure in the cesspool that is Washington (or any State capital, for that matter)? I don’t trust myself that I could resist the lobbies and special interests. But I digress, where was I, oh yes, banning tools for the expression of free speech. Overall, it doesn’t comport well with the Constitution. If we are concerned for privacy, then people need to learn how to think about social media, rather than being told by it what to think. People also need to learn how to think about privacy. This issue reminds me of a visual novel I once read, called Don’t Take It Personally, Babe, It Just Ain’t Your Story. It is set a few years into the future, now, but was developed over 10 years ago. The crux of the story is that the students of this high school lit teacher used a school-wide messaging system to play an elaborate hoax on him through “private” messages that they knew he could see. So it dealt with different generations and their understandings of privacy. The kids understood different types of privacy, where the teacher only understood that there are certain things that should never be shared online, so the prank was very effective at messing with his head. Are we to the point where we legitimately have no privacy and don’t care? If so, then let me know so I can move on to a different line of work. If not, then let’s get down to business and lock these entitled pricks [them] out of our lives, shall we? Just a thought. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-65677768 #weekendedition #tiktok #montana #ban #sued #TechFreedom #FOSSNews 4.2 - Montana Residents left Wondering What’s Next Many in Montana have found it to be a lifeline of sorts. Some are creators, others have started businesses based on their content which need to grow via TikTok, as there are so many eyeballs there so much of the time. It makes advertising dollars stretch much further on this platform than on older, more established ones like Meta or Twitter because it is so active on TikTok. Starting to wonder if it is holding me back not being on TikTok. I don’t know... It could just be that I nerd at too high a level and rarely come down from there. What do you guys and gals think? Anyway, this article sites a handful of Montanans who have the majority of their businesses centered around the platform. Knowing that one’s reach within one’s state is going to be artificially & governmentally limited has to leave you feeling frustrated and a bit scared. One of the users had entirely based her business on TikTok, and is afraid of losing it if this ban ever actually sees the light of day (press X to doubt...), to which I say, diversify. One should never relegate one’s business to a single platform on social media. So here’s a thought: download your TikTok videos and then share them on other platforms (same goes for the smarter painter in the article, already looking at diversifying with unique content and a professional videographer). See what happens if you try that. I don’t think there are hard and fast rules about content sharing from TikTok (seems like that would hurt the platform to disallow that). https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/21/tech/montana-tiktok-users/index.html #weekendedition #tiktok #montana #users #FOSSNews #TechFreedom WE 38.5 – AI This Week 5.1 – Microsoft to Integrate AI in Windows & Office Suite Uhhh, yikes... Oh hell no. Let me sound the clarion call, people. It is time to ditch Microsoft’s spyware (oops, software) stack. They can already snoop every keystroke and mouse click you make on your computer. When they shove Windows 11 down your throat with the newest update, you’ll get Windows Copilot, which is basically ChatGPT rolled directly into your system. In talking to a friend who is a sysadmin about it, he doesn’t see it as being any worse than running Windows anyway. He uses it to remote setup new machines all of the time. So in the context of an IT dept where Windows still rules the roost, it seems to be a net benefit for the teams involved. On the other hand, do you remember Cortana? If you were ever concerned with Cortana, this is an even worse privacy violation. On the other hand, Windows itself has become an even worse privacy violator in the meantime. Cortana genuinely sucked, and I always suggested to people to disable that piece of trash. This looks like it should actually function to make your computer more user-friendly, which I actually admire a bit, but where is all that data going? Oh yeah, back to Redmond, WA. Do you want to increase your awareness that you are a digital serf? Use this new feature. This is Microsoft’s ever so gentle way of reminding you that your computer is not really your computer, anymore. Sure, you paid (or are paying) for it, but as long as you run their spyware (err... OS) and other software, all your data is belong to them. Does that make you uncomfortable? Come on over to Linux and be freer. I can help you to find a good distro that won’t spy on you (most won’t, but also most run systemd, which is growing more invasive by the day, so we will look around and see what might work for you among options which do not use it). I, unfortunately, am no longer comfortable suggesting mainstream distros due to the presence of systemd. That goes against convention, yes, because you want to make as close to 100% certain, when using FOSS things, that it is solid and has a good sized community using and working with it so you can get help when you need it. If you want to research these, here is a decent article from ItsFOSS: https://itsfoss.com/systemd-free-distros/. My word of advice when looking at these is stick close to mainstream if you want something that will be user friendly. https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/personal/technologylive/2023/05/23/microsoft-copilot-365-ai-windows-11-launch/70246861007/ #weekendedition #microsoft #copilot #datagrab #spyware #trylinux #FOSSNews #TechFreedom 5.2 – Adobe Adds AI Image Generator to PhotoShop More AI for the things. Oh joy. Well, it has been in limited beta for a few months, but they are going to roll the feature out to everybody now. They are going to use their own set of images to train it, rather than allowing it, like DALL-E, to simply scour the interwebz for data to transform images in keeping with your prompts. They hope that that will keep the copyright hounds at bay, as they own those images. They are rightly concerned over this, as Stability AI, the company behind Stable Diffusion, was sued by Getty Images back in January because some of their databases were used in training the AI, without permission or licensing. Adobe is anxious to avoid that issue, so its dataset is naturally smaller. You all know how I feel about AI by now... If you can control it and keep the data local, I don’t have much problem with using it as a tool. However, if you want to replace your brain with it, or use it everywhere, I would caution you to slow your roll. If privacy is even a concern for you, take your time to understand whatever you can of these tools before you blindly rush to adopt them. https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/23/tech/photoshop-generative-ai/index.html #weekendedition #adobe #firefly #AI #imagegenerator #photoshop #TechFreedom #FOSSNews

Distro News Rocky & Alma Linux 9.2 Out Now Tails 5.13 Freespire 9.5 FOSS News PSA: Linux 62 is EOL KDE News Interview with Jared Heath of Altha Technologies, Inc. FOSS Fun Lutris 0.5.3 Changes at Codeweavers New DXVK Released Today, I’ll be chatting with Jared Heath, who is the founder and CEO of Altha Technology, Inc., out of Mount Airy, North Carolina. He is a USMC veteran and all around nerd. Altha Technology was founded in 2016, with the clear mission to help people be more censorship-resistant. The motto at Altha Tech is “Protect the data, Own the data, Serve the Data”. Jared and his team manage their own infrastructure in Mount Airy. They depend on FOSS tools to make their business run, as well as their customers’ interests keep moving toward their goals. They are an excellent alternative to big hosting companies who will never infringe on your rights to Free Speech. He’ll be riding shotgun for the majority of the show, commenting as things pop into his head in regard to the topics at hand, then partway through, we will have a conversation about him and his company. Distro News DN 1 – Version 9.2 Released for Alma and Rocky Linux As promised and expected, Alma Linux & Rocky Linux each got refreshes, based on the RHEL which forms their shared foundation. Last week, we mentioned that RHEL got an update, now its free downstream distros also got the love. More or less it is the same stuff that we talked through in the notes last week, but if you want more information, as usual, feel free to look in the description for the link to the article. In short, lots of good stuff, here, for the server/enterprise/business crowd. The primary differences with these downstream options is that they are purely community based, not paid options through Red Hat. As a small business person, that should appeal: a free, enterprise-focused OS. https://9to5linux.com/almalinux-os-9-2-and-rocky-linux-9-2-are-out-now-as-rhel-9-2-alternatives #distronews #FOSSNews #RHEL #almalinux #RockyLinux DN 2 – Tails 5.13 This month’s iteration from the team at Tails enables LUKS 2 for new installs with persistent storage. That is the biggest change for this month, next month, they will roll out the ability to switch from LUKS 1 to LUKS 2 on existing installs. What’s the benefit of LUKS 2 vs LUKS 1? It is more secure and more flexible. LUKS 2 can store 4x as many keys as LUKS 1, it offers password-based key derivation functions (PBKDF) which allows for greater security. The newer standard also creates a larger unencrypted header area, which is what allows for the greater number of keys to be stored, but I digress. I have to admit that there is much about this topic that I do not understand, as I’ve never really done much with encryption on my own machines. Back to Tails, though, their cURL download tool now runs through Tor all the time, so you can easily use it for investigations without being easily tracked as you work. If you want to take a look at an exhaustive list of updates and changes, you should peruse their changelog (https://gitlab.tails.boum.org/tails/tails/-/blob/master/debian/changelog). Here is a shortlist, though: • Tor Browser 12.0.6 anonymous web browser by default • Mozilla Firefox 102.11 ESR, • Updated Unsafe Browser feature • Updated documentation • Updated Welcome Screen • Several bug fixes If you are set on being nigh untrackable online, you can use this, the same OS as Ed Snowden. Not sure how much of a ringing endorsement that is, I still don’t know how much I trust him, though I suppose he must know what he’s talking about in terms of privacy. https://9to5linux.com/tails-5-13-enables-luks2-by-default-for-persistent-storage-and-encrypted-volumes #distromonday #Tails #Linux #privacy #encryption #FOSSNews #TechFreedom #BigShow Freedom Consultation Free call. 60-90 minutes. Q&A Leave with Actionable Steps to take, whether you work with me or not. Schedule today. https://techfreedom.pro/freedom-consultation #distromonday #freedom #consultation #Linux #degoogleyourlife #TechFreedom DN 3 – FreeSpire 9.5 Out Now Freespire is an Ubuntu 22.04LTS derivative. It has been meticulously designed to appeal to the group of people (perhaps like you), who are comfortable with Windows 10 in terms of UI. It has a heavily customized GNOME desktop built to look almost identical to the aforementioned OS. If you are looking for an easier entry point into Linux, this could be your ticket. It used to run Xfce, but they found that they could more easily tweak the UI to match customer feedback with GNOME, so they went that direction instead. What else changed? • Latest Ubuntu upstream security patches (as of 5/5/23) • Fixed many bugs and issues ◦ Python 3 apps should no longer crash or refuse to start, ◦ proper resolutions are now displayed on HDMI connections ◦ Bluetooth headset microphones should now work correctly (I wish the rest of the Linux world would fix this issue... I’ve never been able to reliably use bt headset microphones, could someone just make this work, please?) ◦ Both Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge web apps now show in the applications menu ◦ Zoom calls no longer crash when using Bluetooth audio devices. • Out of the box flatpak support, with a handful of key inclusions that are missing from Ubuntu itself: OnlyOffice Desktop Editors, balenaEtcher, and Midnight Commander The only things that I’d want to see change here are a total rebase on anything other than Ubuntu, and a migration away from systemd. These things go for most other distros as well, though. https://9to5linux.com/ubuntu-based-freespire-9-5-brings-custom-gnome-ui-to-resemble-windows-10s-look #distromonday #freespire #Linux #FOSSNews #TechFreedom FOSS News FN 1 – PSA: Linux 62 is Now EOL Linux 62 series, we hardly knew ye. Nah, non LTS kernel series only get supported for 3 months or so. It is time to either go back to the Linux 61 LTS or update to the latest Linux 63 series, if you want to continue getting security updates and the like. Just wanted to make sure that you guys and gals who are already in the Linux space know about this. https://9to5linux.com/linux-kernel-6-2-reaches-end-of-life-users-urged-to-upgrade-to-linux-kernel-6-3 #FOSSNews #PSA #updates #Linux #news #developmentmarcheson #TechFreedom FN 2 – KDE News Triple Header 2.1 – KDE Frameworks 5.106 Here’s the monthly (roughly) update for Qt and related apps, this one has some good stuff in it, as usual. • support for the small monochrome versions of the “MS-DOS Executable” icons in the Breeze icon theme to respect the active color scheme • improved Display Configuration widget and OSD icons with consistent stroke widths and levels of detail • icons for .abc Alembic files • new icons for the pixelate and blur tools in Spectacle • a new icon for the Partition Manager app • improves the Plasma Browser Integration to fix a Plasma crash that occurred when playing certain YouTube videos and also when using a proxy • Fixed bug with Right to Left scripts causing errors with windows (talked about this last week, when we covered Plasma 5.27.5) • Can now convert to and from kilometers per hour using the “kph” keyword • Improves dragging from empty areas of the toolbar in the Plasma Discover package manager and many other Kirigami-based apps • Dolphin bugs squashed ◦ prevent a major source of crashes when copying files ◦ folders fail to update in real-time when contents are modified in another application • improved middle-clicking on various things like KWin-drawn titlebars • fix for an issue that could cause KDE apps and the Plasma desktop to hang when using them to move a lot of files at the same time • Among other things, if you want more detail, check out the changelog here: (https://kde.org/announcements/frameworks/5/5.106.0/) https://9to5linux.com/kde-frameworks-5-106-improves-breeze-icons-plasma-browser-integration-and-more 2.2 – KDE Gear 23.04.1 What’s new in KDE Gear? Why, improvements for many significant KDE apps, such as: • Kdenlive ◦ fixed an issue causing project files to be corrupted when opened ◦ a recent regression where sequence clip duration was not updated ◦ Fixed various sequence issues ◦ Fixed a crash when the speech engine was left configured ◦ Fixed a concurrency crash in thumbnails • Spectacle ◦ fixed the Rectangular Region selector to work as expected on multi-monitor setups where one of the displays has a scale factor below 100%. ◦ Spectacle will no longer affect the window below it when it’s closed with the Esc key • Dolphin on x11 ◦ no longer see an already-open instance of Dolphin in a different workspace or activity becoming focused and switched to when using the “Open containing folder” functionality in various KDE apps ▪ Coming soon for Wayland sessions as well • Skanpage ◦ UI improvements as well to force the “rotate image” buttons to actually rotate the image in the expected directions ◦ OCR language list view is now scrollable when needed • Filelight ◦ no longer fail to launch when your disk is full, , ,. • KItinerary ◦ adds support to the library to handle the German language variant of Vueling boarding groups • Neochat ◦ improves Qt 6 support for NeoChat • KDE Minuet support for Wayland ◦ improved windowing • If you want to know more, take a look at the changelog here (https://kde.org/announcements/changelogs/gear/23.04.1/) https://9to5linux.com/kde-gear-23-04-1-is-out-to-improve-kdenlive-spectacle-dolphin-and-more 2.3 – KDE 6 At a joint sprint event in Germany, the KDE team and Tuxedo Computers teamed up to work on Plasma 6. There are some really big changes coming down the pipeline, guys. I am excited about these. The first thing that should have been on the list in the article linked below was the change in release cadence. I think that will not only make KDE more stable, but it will allow the devs to apply a significant amount more polish to the environment between releases. Once it is released, they are moving to a more deliberate 2 releases per year cadence. Sure, that means that there won’t be as many of these update pieces to cover, but when they do happen, they may take up lots of space to cover adequately. My question there, though, is does that mean that Gear and Frameworks will also slow down that much, or just the DE itself? Other than that, there will be some significant changes made in terms of quality of life: • Defaulting to double click for opening files in Dolphin (should have been a standard default the whole time, afaic). • Floating panel is now a default, to differentiate between KDE and Windows, which seems to have stolen KDE’s homework yet again. • Default to Wayland rather than x11 ◦ Not great for NVidia users, but those issues look to be fixable by whenever they release Plasma 6, which is excellent • new default Task Switcher • no more scrolling on the desktop to switch virtual desktops, • clicking in the scrollbar track jumps the scrollbar to that location, • a wallpaper page in System Settings • unified desktop plugins • better handling for keyboard backlighting Unfortunately there is still no fixed date for the release of Plasma 6 at this time. I will keep you apprised as more information comes out. One thing I really hope for in 6 is that they fix 2-in-1 & touchscreen support. If they do, I will gladly switch back to KDE on my primary work machine (a surface pro 5). https://9to5linux.com/kde-plasma-6-to-ship-with-floating-panel-by-default-double-click-for-opening-files #FOSSnews #bigshow #KDE #updates #fixes #TechFreedom Want to learn more about how to degoogle your phone and why? https://techfreedom.pro/degoogled/ #TechFreedom #degoogled #degoogleyourlife #defintionsday #Truth FN 3 – Interview with Jared Heath Well, now that we have talked about KDE and a few distros, let’s chat with Jared about his company and learn a bit more about him, his team, and what all they offer. So, Jared, why should we care about you and Altha Tech? What is Altha Tech? What got you into tech to begin with? Why did you start Altha Tech? What is your vision for Altha Tech? How can people reach out to Altha Tech? How’d you come up with the name of the company? #interview #bigshow #TechFreedom #FOSSNews FF 1 - Lutris Updates Lutris, if you’re unaware, is a game management/ library system. They’re constantly working on making it better, and the big deal with this update is the ability to directly use proton from Lutris. It is apparently just a compatibility check, so don’t expect perfection at this point, but cool, either way. Here’s the rest of the highlights: • Add drag and drop on the main window. Dropped files will be matched No-Intro, Redump and TOSEC checksums. • Add support for ModDB links in installers (moddb python module required). • Added "Missing" sidebar option for games whose directory is missing. • Re-style the configuration, preferences, installer and add-games windows. • Group configuration options into sections. • Added checkbox to stop asking for the launch config for a game. • Added checkbox to sort installed games first. (about time) • Support for launch-configs in shortcuts and the command line. • Show platform badges on banners and cover-art. (good) • Installing games from setup files can now use different presets (Win98, 3DFX, ...). (oooh) • Add filter field to runner list. • Show game count in search bar. • Workaround Humble Bundle authentication issues by allowing importing cookies from Firefox. • Add Itch.io integration. • Add Battle.net integration (protobuf dependency required). • Improve detection of DOSBox games on GOG. • Added "Unspecified" Vulkan ICD option. • Removed ResidualVM (now merged into ScummVM) • Detect obsolete Vulkan drivers and default to DXVK 1.x for them. • Improved High-DPI support for custom media. • Performance improvements. Good stuff, overall. I would say that the direct proton compatibility will, once it is mature, make a huge difference for a growing number of games. https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/05/lutris-v0513-adds-proton-support-itch-and-battlenet-integration/ #FOSSNews #BigShow #FOSSFun #Lutris #TechFreedom FF 2 – Codeweavers (creators of WINE) Change Corporate Governance Model CodeWeavers is having a bit of a shakeup in how the company is being run. They are moving from a traditional ownership model to an employee trust model, so that employees get to make decisions about the direction of the company, and also get to benefit directly from it. This sounds like a win-win for them, we’ll see how it goes. As long as WINE/ Proton/ Crossover stay solid, or even get better, this is a good move for the community. If they deteriorate, then not so much. Not sure that I would ever do that with my company, but then, it barely exists as more than an aspiration at this point. On the other hand, my desire, when I hire people, is to provide them with a living wage, so that they don’t have to worry about anything, and can just work happily without that stress on them. Big dreams. https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/05/codeweavers-partners-of-valve-on-proton-move-to-an-employee-ownership-trust/ #FOSSNews #codeweavers #WINE #proton #changes #TechFreedom Freed Computer https://techfreedom.pro/freed-computer/ https://techfreedom.pro/free-your-pc #freedcomputer #linux #nospying #safe #TechFreedom #Truth FF 3 – New Version of DXVK? Yes Please. The latest, v 2.2, ships with some tasty additions. Let’s list them, shall we? • D3D11On12 ◦ Makes it so that DX11 games get rendered as though they were DX12 titles, which is better for Vulkan to manage, if I’m not mistaken. In order to use it though, you’ll need a recent vkd3d-proton build and it uses the D3D11On12CreateDevice and ID3D11On12Device interfaces • D3D9 partial presentation ◦ This feature enables DXVK to present parts of a window by copying the contents of the back buffer to system memory and then drawing them into the window on the CPU. ▪ What’s that mean? Better compatibility for some game launchers and visual novels, but at a performance penalty • Game fixes ◦ Jade Empire ◦ Sid Meier’s Pirates ◦ Total War: Shogun 2 ◦ Battle Fantasia Revised Edition ◦ Cold Fear ◦ Dawn of Magic 2 ◦ DC Universe Online ◦ Far Cry 2 ◦ Halo: The Master Chief Collection ◦ Warhammer 40K: Space Marine • Other fixes ◦ a regression that occurred when rendering YUY2 or UYUY texture formats ◦ some Vulkan validation errors ◦ improved usage of some VK_EXT_extended_dynamic_state3 features ◦ improved enumeration of DXGI outputs on systems with multiple graphics cards ◦ improved memory usage in cases where games create unused D3D11 devices You could potentially grab it now from the project’s GitHub, then compile from source on your machine, or if you don’t play any of the titles on the list, you could just wait for it to be available in your distro’s repositories. As an aside, when will MS abandon DX, anyway? Sure, it has become a defacto set of protocols, but it has always been a pain in the hind parts to work with, and it makes it harder for FOSS to be legit in terms of gaming. *thinks to self* Maybe that is why they haven’t... Because even though Vulkan works better and is easier to work with, MS doesn’t control it, and that is intolerable for those sociopaths. https://9to5linux.com/dxvk-2-2-released-with-d3d11on12-support-d3d9-partial-presentation #FOSSNews #FOSSFun #linuxgaming #dxvk #TechFreedom

WE 37.1 – Well, that Sure Lasted a Long Time... Not much to say here, but I started covering it, so I’m gonna continue. Elizabeth Holmes got a extra month of freedom, but not what she was gunning for, which would have kept her out of prison until her appeal, which as far as I know has yet to be scheduled. The disgraced fraudster-CEO of Theranos was originally due to report at the end of last month. Her legal team is still attempting to appeal on her behalf, and I don’t know enough of the specifics to guess in any educated way whether she will have a shot, or if it will legitimately even be heard on her behalf. My hunch is that the appeal will likely be granted, but nothing will change for her. Why? She defrauded the Big Boys, not just a bunch of Main St mom & pop type investors. https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/17/disgraced-theranos-ceo-elizabeth-holmes-will-report-to-jail-on-may-30.html #weekendedition #theranos #elizabethholmes #justice #US #FOSSNews #TechFreedom WE 37.2 – Google to Delete Accounts Unused for Last 2 Years Good. Purge it, fools. Their excuse, other than needing to maintain space for all that data is that those kinds of accounts are more likely to have been breached in hack attacks, as they lack (or are FAR less likely to have extra layers of security) 2FA, for whatever 2FA is worth. SMS 2-Factor Authentication is inherently insecure, just as the SMS system is, it can be intercepted and easily read by man in the middle type attacks. If you are going to use, it get it set up with an app like Authy or Aegis, as those codes are harder to get at than SMS ones are. So, if you still have a Google account at this point, why? We know that we are the commodity with them, and that they scrape all search, YT, drive contents, and emails for pertinent ad data, so, other than the drug called convenience, why are you still on that platform? If you need business collaboration tools, and want to regain some privacy, check out Zoho for a drop-in replacement that may have more than what you need (probably does). If you want a more free experience with videos, take a look at Rumble, BitChute, Odysee/LBRY, or even GabTV. If you want even more control of your videos, take a look at setting up a peertube instance, or joining someone else’s. If you have something important there, all you have to do is sign in and watch a YouTube video, search for something, download and app, do something in Docs/ Drive, or read/ send an email. The deadline for this is not for 6.5 months though, so you have plenty of time to worry about it, if you are going to. My suggestion, though, is to look at my tutorial on how to get your data back from Google: https://rumble.com/v116bgp-tutorial-on-rescuing-your-data-from-google.html?mref=2jfr3&mc=anr3y , then take the time to set up an account with a provider like Zoho or Proton or Tutanota, who actually respects your privacy. https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/google-will-delete-inactive-accounts-heres-how-to-save-yours/ #weekendedition #technews #google #letitgo #accountdeletion #FOSSNews #TechFreedom WE 37.3 – EU Regulators Rubber Stamp Microsoft’s Takeover of Activision... With Provisons The European Commission has greenlit the merger, but as reported last week, the Uk regulator did not, and the US FTC seems unlikely to go along with it, over concerns that MSFT would then control too much of the gaming industry, specifically in terms of cloud gaming. That kind of game streaming is sketchy to me anyway. I understand the appeal, don’t get me wrong. It allows people with lesser machines to play while outsourcing the heavy lifting to another machine. Usually you have to own both machines, but not always. As with anything cloud based, game streaming has inherent privacy issues, most gamers likely don’t care, because they just want to play their games. This merger would make Microsoft into the 3rd largest game studio in the world, just behind Nintendo and Sony. Is that a good thing? Should we laud this massing of economic power in one of the most vile companies on the planet? I don’t think so. This feels like an overall net-negative move, a lose-lose for the consumers and the industry as a whole. This means that not only will games likely carry more MS spyware in them, but the woke-itis will get that much worse. I don’t think that the FTC is likely to approve this, anyway, but we’ll have to wait and see. https://www.cnet.com/tech/gaming/microsofts-69b-deal-to-buy-activision-gets-eu-approval-what-to-know/ #weekendedition #microsoft #activision #merger #EU #rubberstamp #FOSSNews #TechFreedom WE 37.4 – Elon to Be Subpoenaed in Epstein- JPM Chase Suit Oh boy, all those nights partying with the Epstein crowd might just bite the Twitter owner in the backside here. Here’s the skinny: Tesla used to bank with JPM Chase, but stopped doing so after Musk & Co felt that the bank had “let them down” in some significant way. Epstein claimed that he advised Musk on something in 2018, which, since, Musk has flatly denied, saying that “that cretin” (meaning Epstein) “never advised me on anything”. Sounds like a whole lot of unnecessary drama, but a judge has ok-ed the request of the AG from the Virgin Islands to require Tesla to surrender any records pertaining to the alleged connection with JPM Chase and Epstein. We’ll see if there is anything worth sharing, or if, as Musk and Tesla have claimed since, he actually never had anything to do with Jeff Epstein or Ghislaine Maxwell. Sure, he might have had a conversation with her at a Vanity Fair soiree years ago, and someone snapped a picture of it, but that, he claims, is the extent of his relationship with her. Hmmm... That is all I can say right now, just hmmm... https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/17/tesla-elon-musk-subpoena-jpmorgan-epstein.html #weekendedition #elon #epstein #maxwell #jpmchase #subpoena #FOSSNews #TechFreedom WE 37.5 – Big Sky State to Ban App Stores from Distributing TikTok Well, Montana legislators and executives just decided that TikTok poses enough of a threat to warrant starting to ban the Play Store and the App Store from allowing MT residents to download the app. The first domino has fallen. That ban will, unless overturned by a judge, go into effect on Jan 1, 2024. This is simply a restriction on NEW downloads of the app, not current users. I am still unconvinced that TikTok is any worse than YT or any other social media app. They are all geared to collect data about you and keep your attention so that they can keep mining the data, which makes them the money. They all have algorithms which incentivize people to pay more attention to them, as well as pushing certain content more than other kinds of content, whether overtly to mold opinion or not. If you ban one, then ban the rest. Just wipe the slate clean. Half-measures will never succeed in the end. Do I actually believe what I just said? Somewhat. If gov’t is going to ban one thing, then why not ban the rest? My sense is that the best option (which almost certainly won’t be taken) is that the public needs to be educated on how to think about social media and how to deal with it more healthily, so that influence operations on social media will be less effective. That a) takes too much effort and b) undermines the US intelligence community, which uses social media to spy on us. https://news.sky.com/story/tiktok-montana-becomes-first-us-state-to-ban-video-sharing-app-on-personal-devices-12883467 #weekendedition #tiktok #montana #banhammer #meh #FOSSNews #TechFreedom WE 37.6 – Amazon Still Thinks They’re an AI Leader Maybe they are, maybe they’re not. What we know now, is that Alexa was on the leading edge when it came to voice assistants almost 10 years ago. They are trying to improve it, the LLM that it is based on, as well as seeking to roll a text based generative AI into the Amazon Shopping experience. This just feels like a desperate, “Hey look at us, we’re still in this conversation, too” from Amazon. Do something, release something impressive, or lose relevance. That is the nature of tech. Talk is cheap. I don’t know that I want them to improve their AI stuff any further than it already has been, as if you use Amazon, it likely knows more about you and your preferences than you do already. If that is cool with you because it makes it easier to shop for things, then by all means, keep using all of their AI crap. Personally, if I could exit the Amazon system effectively, I would. I have not found a way to replace all of their services that we use, so I haven’t. We do not use Alexa on purpose, as we do not trust that “always listening” feature in our home. My wife was the first one to question that, as I used to just be an uncritical “ooooh, shiny object” kind of tech adopter, whenever I could afford it (which was not very often). She was never comfortable with voice-controlled or “smart” anything. Good call, babe. https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/17/amazons-alexa-head-defends-companys-work-on-ai-amid-chatgpt-boom.html #weekendedition #amazon #AI #alexa #FOSSNews #TechFreedom WE 37.7 Open AI & Congress This last week, Sam Altman testified before a Senate sub-committee. He actually agreed with them that AI needs to be regulated, which is a bit odd, considering that most tech CEOs, when called before Congress usually try to fight whatever regulation is being explored in relation to them or their products. This doesn’t surprise me much, as he was one of the signatories, as well as the professor from NYU who also testified, on that open letter from March, which called for a moratorium on developing these advanced AI models, due to what more or less amounts to fear porn. If I’m proven wrong, and we are seeing the birth of SkyNet or The Matrix or something, I will gladly eat crow. I do NOT, however, think that we are there, at least not with the versions that John Q. Public is allowed to see right now. I have no inside knowledge (just to be clear) about those sorts of secret projects, but I would almost stake my life on their existence. At the beginning of the proceedings, Altman demonstrated a rather creepy sideshow trick: they had trained an AI on Sen. Blumenthal’s voice and speeches, and had it present an opening speech, which was eerily true to life. I know that they can be used to mimic people, in fact, we’ve seen AI generated videos before, not to mention filters which can make anyone look and/or sound like anyone else. Those videos have been floating around for a few years now, but now, all you need is a computer with an internet connection to create something like that, whereas before, it took all sorts of crazy motion capture and voice synth tech to pull off the same thing. One could be made to say literally anything, and it is harder and harder to detect the forgeries, because they have gotten so good. What do you guys think about this? Good? Bad? Terrifying? Ultimately beneficial? The fact that Altman was in agreement that something needed to be done at a federal level about curbing the possibilities for abuse strikes me as altogether odd. Doesn’t it seem that way to you? This whole thing is starting to smell like a psyop to me. Whenever both parties in congress and all involved parties in a hearing, as well as the breathless media all agree on something, that is almost never a good sign. https://news.sky.com/story/senator-richard-blumenthals-chilling-warning-after-ai-generated-speech-convincingly-imitates-him-at-congress-hearing-12882342 https://news.sky.com/story/boss-of-ai-firms-worst-fears-are-more-worrying-than-creepy-senate-party-trick-12882348 #weeekendedition #AI #openAI #samaltman #fishy #blumenthal #FOSSNews #TechFreedom

Special Guest: Connor Needling of Needling Worldwide Distro News Top 15 Rolling Distros Alpine 3.18 RHEL 9.2 FOSS News How to Delete a Directory with 1000’s of Files in it QEMU 8.1 Plasma 5.27.5 FOSS Fun No More Roblox on Linux Steam Deck Competitor? Arcane Wilds Distro News DN 1 - 16 Rolling Distros to Consider This is a listicle of rolling release distros you might want to look at if you’re curious about having more frequent updates. I’ll comment on each one, similar to how I did with the privacy listicle last week. 1) Vanilla Arch a) Had to be #1 on the list. It is the quintessential rolling release distro, and serves as the base for many of the options later in the list. This is not, however, for the faint of heart. It uses a script-based installer (or you just have a list of all the packages you want to install, in the correct order, and you handle it all yourself. It gives you a level of control over your system that is otherwise more or less unheard of. However, you can break it by looking at it in a way that it doesn’t like. (https://archlinux.org) 2) Solus Linux a) Much more user-friendly than Arch, independent, though in the process of merging with SerpentOS, which is headed up by the original developer on the Solus project. This is the team that brought us Budgie. I’ve poked at Solus a little, but was not taken by it. (https://getsol.us) 3) Manjaro a) Loosely based on Arch, quasi-rolling, but also has a semi-point release cadence. Every few months, they roll a fresh ISO version with the latest stable packages. It is like Arch with training wheels. I’ve used it for years, where I’ve yet to successfully install Arch on even a VM, to be quite honest. (https://manjaro.org) It is easy to install, easy to use, but still has the customizability of Arch at the core. Solid distro. 4) Void Linux a) Another indie distro like Arch, only more focused on raw performance and security than Arch is. It is ultra-customizable. Did I mention fast? I’ve never tried it, but have friends who have sworn by it in the past. (https://voidlinux.org) 5) openSUSE Tumbleweed a) I have a friend who ran it in a production environment while trying to get Alpine to work for his purposes. He enjoyed it and was surprised by the volume of updates that sometimes came in hourly, but also at the fact that it was rock stable. The thing that turned him off about it was that it has some systemd quirks that drove him up the wall and made it harder for him to do what he needed to do. I had Tumbleweed on a flashdrive and tried it once, but was not happy with it then (a couple of years ago). Give it a shot if you want to learn a new distro, you may be surprised at the outcome. (https://get.opensuse.com/tumbleweed) 6) Fedora a) Community-based upstream for Red Hat and RHEL. This puts it in close proximity to IBM, who is one of the major contributors to Red Hat. They also lead development for GNOME, as well as systemd. I could go off on systemd, but feel like I’d be wasting my breath. It more or less controls your system from behind the scenes. They recently made a change to the way it handles DNS such that you can no longer control which DNS servers your system uses. That feels like a big deal to me. (https://fedora.org) 7) NixOS a) I did a piece on NixOS over on the Altha Tech blog ( https://althatech.com/it-work/nixos-and-altha-tech/ ) last month, as it is the primary OS they use in their server infrastructure. It is more or less just an indie package manager which provides a high degree of reliability and reproducibility due to the fact that all configurations are resident in a single file, so once you commit changes there, if you have a whole fleet of machines or server running NixOS, they all get that change automagically. (https://nixos.org) 8) Debian Testing a) Yes, there is a branch of that venerable distro which is rolling release. If you know Linux, you are probably familiar, at least in passing, with grandaddy Debian. It is the base of Ubuntu, after all, so all of the Ubuntu flavors and derivatives owe their existence to Debian. Debian is not terribly exciting, but it is stable once down-stream from Testing. (https://wiki.debian.org/DebianTesting) 9) Sparky Linux a) Been around for a while, based on Debian Testing. Stable and simple. Haven’t tried it, so I can’t speak to how good it is, personally. (https://sparkylinux.org/) 10) EndeavourOS a) NASA-themed Arch derivative which is relatively light, fast, and certainly rolling. It comes with the latest Calamares installer and most of what you need in order to make your system run well out of the box. One thing you have to keep in mind with this distro is it will require you to become much more comfortable with the terminal than others will, as it does not ship with a GUI package manager, so you have to use CLI pacman to get that done, at least until you install something like Octopi (which feels a bit like aptitude in Debian distros). (https://endeavouros.com) 11) Ka OS a) Indie distro which only ships with the latest versions of all things KDE Plasma. Think of it as an indie version of KDE Neon (which is based on Ubuntu... It is basically Kubuntu unstable, where much of the KDE package testing happens). Ka OS is intentionally limited in scope, as their focus is on quality not quantity. It is a great option for those of us who are hardcore KDE fans. I’ve not tried it, but have talked about it quite a bit over the last year (I typically cover each new ISO release). (https://kaosx.us) 12) Gentoo Linux a) Another indie distro, but not one that is intentionally user-friendly. This one is built by developers and system admins for developers and system admins. It has its own package manager, and actually serves as the base on which ChromeOS is built. But Gentoo, on its own, is about as easy to use and maintain as Arch is. Not for anyone who doesn’t enjoy building packages from source. (https://gentoo.org) 13) Chakra Linux a) Arch-based hybrid distro which offers rolling for non system-critical packages, but periodic updates for core system packages. I’d never heard of this one, and it is no longer being developed, so don’t bother with this one, boys and girls. Doesn’t even have its own webiste. 14) Sabayon became Mocacchino OS a) It is more or less Gentoo + containers and layers and all sorts of other current buzz words. I don’t have the desire to try this one, but if containerization sounds beneficial in your usecase, add this to the container-driver distro list. (https://www.mocaccino.org/) 15) Rolling Rhino Remix a) Ubuntu, only rolling. I covered this distro briefly when it was announced several months back they track all of the devel series updates and roll them out to users. I’m not clear as to whether it is really daily driver ready or not, so take your chances if you wish. It looks interesting, is all I’m going to say. (https://rollingrhino.org/) https://www.geeksveda.com/rolling-release-linux-distributions/ #distronews #FOSSNews #rollingrelease DN 2 – Alpine Linux 3.18 A new version from this minimal, OpenRC, MUSL based distro. This will matter more to you if you are aware of just how much control you lose of your system to run systemd. Systemd used to simply be an init system, but in the last 5 years, especially, it has ballooned out into controlling most aspects of your system behind the scenes. It is still technically FOSS, but very few people who are not developers even have the desire to look at release notes and the like to see what kind of feature creep has invaded that stack of protocols and firmware hooks. One thing that was recently brought to my attention, courtesy of friend of the channel, Connor Needling, is that systemd has now been rewritten in such a way that we no longer have control over what DNS servers our systems use. Let’s start to migrate away from systemd-based distributions. Alpine is one, but it is not particularly user friendly on the front end, unfortunately. Connor is a huge fan of Alpine, and I am testing it on my kids’ machine, as it is very lightweight and performant, and their machine is over 10 years old, so it seems like a match made in heaven, to a certain extent. Devuan, MX Linux, Salix, Artix, and AntiX are a few other non-systemd options out there that might be a bit more user friendly (MX is excellent in that respect, if you are ok with Debian based distros. Check this list for even more options: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Linux_distributions_without_systemd There of course were some key updates in 3.18, such as moving up to the Linux 61 LTS series, musl libc 1.2.4, Python 3.11, Ruby 3.2, Node.js 20.1, Go 1.20, and Rust 1.69. Remember, this is a lightweight distro. Don’t expect a ton of bells & whistles. You’ll even need to install and configure networking for your machine. Beware the install script, though. It will try to force you to set up WiFi, when your system may not be 100% supported. I suggest plugging in hardline, via a lan cable. Worry about WiFi later. You’ll also need to use their setup-desktop script to pick your DE poison, so to speak. You’ll also need to wrap your head around doas vs sudo, at least until you install and configure sudo (which I suggest you do quickly), as well as their package manager (Alpine Package Keeper, or APK). 3.18 does ship with support for GNOME 44 and Plasma 5.27LTS, just need to pick which one you want, but you also have the option of Xfce. The bottom line when installing Alpine is that the wiki is your best friend, unless you have a friend who has done it and is good at explaining things. https://9to5linux.com/alpine-linux-3-18-is-out-with-linux-6-1-lts-experimental-support-for-unattended-installs Freedom Consultation Free call. 60-90 minutes. Q&A Leave with Actionable Steps to take, whether you work with me or not. Schedule today. https://techfreedom.pro/freedom-consultation #distromonday #freedom #consultation #Linux #degoogleyourlife #TechFreedom DN 3 – RHEL 9.2 Out Now with Some Interesting Goodies Last week, we talked about a couple of distros which are based on RHEL, but now we’re gonna talk about the main source for those distros, RHEL (Red Hat Enterprise Linux). This is the preeminent enterprise distro in the world. Red Hat is trusted because it has always enjoyed a close relationship with Big Blue (IBM), who have supplied funding and software contributions to the organization and its products for many years. Fedora is somewhat clean, as it is community driven, as far as I know. RHEL and CentOS Stream are decidedly less so than Fedora is, in my opinion, but take that with a grain of salt, as this is pure opinion based on circumstantial evidence at best. I went off about systemd earlier, so I won’t harp on that, but GNOME is also developed by teams at Red Hat. Anyway, back to RHEL and why I am sharing this article in the first place... RHEL got an update. Podman got a huge leg up (podman is a container management tool) in that now, it doesn’t require so much CLI knowledge to operate and take care of your container needs in your fleet. It seems to be geared more and more for automation, which is a welcome piece of news for network admins everywhere. So much more besides that, but you’ll have to read the article in the description if you care to see all of that. https://9to5linux.com/red-hat-enterprise-linux-9-2-adds-64k-page-sizes-support-for-arm-new-system-roles FOSS News FN 1 – Ever Wondered How to Delete Files in Linux? Well, if you’ve been around for a minute, you’re probably yelling at your screen about the trusty old rm command. If you are, you’re right. If you were wondering if I’ll mention stat or ls –i or find, you won’t be disappointed, my friend. If you are completely at a loss as to what I’m talking about, that’s ok, too. This is a brief rundown of how to use these commands to get rid of files in the Linux command line interface/terminal. Say you have a huge directory that is simply stuffed with files and perhaps sub-directories, etc, and you need to free up some space on your computer, then you may try to simply select the directory in question in your file manager of choice (Dolphin, Nemo, Nautilus, etc...) and hit the delete key. This MAY work for you, but will only move your directory and its contents to the Trash bin (assuming it isn’t too big, as there is a file size limit placed on the Trash Bin). If it is too big, you can expect an error stating as much. Deleting in Linux does not work the same way as it does in Windows. When you delete a file in Linux, you are simply removing a link to the file from your computer, then later on, when you aren’t using the file you just unlinked to, the contents get cleaned up. In Windows, due to the way the FAT partitioning system used to work, one must make entirely separate copies of a file in order to have it in multiple places, as FAT is kind of dumb that way. At any rate, time to talk commands, yeah? Everybody’s favorite is rm. It quickly and relatively painlessly removes the link to the file or directory in question. Here’s the basic syntax for rm: rm -<options> <name of file or directory> —<flag> For example, if I wanted to delete the pacman lock file ( a frequent enough scenario in Arch based distros) it would go: sudo rm –f /etc/pacman/db.lck the –f option will force it to delete the file, and adding sudo in front will elevate your privileges so that you can take out that system file. If you want to get rid of a whole directory, though, how would you do that? That is what the –r option is for. –r stands for recursive, so it will get rid of the directory and all that is in it (files, sub-directories, etc). Say you had a directory called Test in your Documents directory, and it has a whole bunch of random junk in there that you don’t need to have around anymore. You would run an rm command like this: rm –r /Documents/Test, and that will get rid of the directory and anything that was inside of it. You experienced users might be wondering if I’ll mention rmdir, well, don’t worry. There’s your mention. It isn’t terribly useful in this case, as it is only capable of removing said directories if they are empty. Next, we turn to find. Find is a bit more complex than rm, so is probably used less. So here’s the situation: you have a directory called “Test 2” in your Downloads directory, and you don’t want to use rm. What do you do? Find to the rescue! Here’s the command you need: find /Downloads/Test 2 –delete You could also use find in concert with ls –li or stat to find the inode number (the unique file number for each file or directory in Linux), then write something like this: find /path/to/file -inum INODE_NUM -exec rm -i {} + (where you would plug in the inode number you found by running either stat or ls –li beforehand for the file in question where it says INODE_NUM), then hit y to confirm the action. This seems extremely specific, which is good, but at the same time, if you know the name of the file or directory anyway, then why bother with the inode thing anyway? https://www.tecmint.com/delete-large-directory-linux/ FN 2 –QEMU 8.1 Announced Though 8.0 just shipped, here is a sneak peek at what is coming in the next version of this crucial emulation back end for handling things like running your classic Nintendo or PlayStation games on your Linux PC. It is also useful for more important things, such as testing ARM or RISC-V compatibility for a piece of software. It can also help you to run regular x86 software on an ARM or RISC-V based system. This is incredibly useful for developers so that they can make 100% sure that their software will work on any platform, so the changes made in 8.1 will make it that much more pleasant to use. They added better pipewire support for audio and video backends, as well as a handful more chips that it can emulate for both ARM and RISC-V. It is unlikely that most of you will need this, but I thought I’d cover it, because it will likely indirectly effect you in the future. Lots of good stuff with this release, so if you want to know more, read the article and the announcements, down below. https://gitlab.com/qemu-project/qemu https://9to5linux.com/qemu-8-1-promises-pipewire-audio-backend-improved-risc-v-support Want to learn more about how to degoogle your phone and why? https://techfreedom.pro/degoogled/ #TechFreedom #degoogled #degoogleyourlife #defintionsday #Truth FN 3 – Another KDE Maintenance Update Here’s KDE Plasma 5.27.5, with a bevy of useful changes and bug squashings, as usual. 5 weeks after the release of 5.27.4, we have the next maintenace update, so what’s new here? • Even more better flatpak support ◦ No more broken configs ◦ New flatpak permissions page in system settings ◦ And more • Task Manager can now do better with text for windows which do not have text in the titlebar • Emoji selector window invokes more quickly from kb shortcut • Scrolling in Task Manager and Pager widgets works better • Touchscreen ◦ Long press on system tray icons for context menus works now • Bug fixes ◦ Plasma Discover ▪ Correctly applies firmware updates ▪ Many flatpak issues • Crash when dealing with a missing .flatpakref file ◦ Plasma Wayland ▪ no longer crash the KWin window and composite manager when hovering the cursor over Task Manager icons or when closing windows (that was annoying) ▪ System Settings app should no longer crash during startup if the Activities database is corrupted ▪ Plasma should no longer crash due to excessive memory usage when searching for unusual things with KRunner (how do they define an unusual search term?) ◦ Multimonitor Support ▪ No more screens-overlapping-by-one-pixel issue ▪ Many other random issues were fixed as well ◦ Random bits ▪ fixes Plasma Calendar’s “Months” views ▪ updates the mouse acceleration profiles to work properly with libinput 1.3 or later ▪ fixes long notification title text in the Notifications history ▪ improves the Bluetooth connection experience ▪ improves importing of VPN configurations ▪ plugs a major memory leak when plugging in an external display ▪ addresses a recently discovered regression in the size and sharpness of GTK CSD windows’ minimize, maximize, and close buttons when not using a scale factor ▪ improves the centered arrangement of Plasma widgets between two flexible Panel spacers places on vertical panels As usual, the KDE team have been hard at work to make Plasma that much better, even as they have been devoting many resources to KDE 6, which is due to drop later this year. When 2-in-1 touchscreen support is closer to GNOME level, I very well may go back to KDE on my surface, but not until then. It’s funny, since I put GNOME on my Surface, It almost feels jarring to go back to KDE, though I know I could make it behave similarly. If you want a clearer picture of what this update did, take a look at the announcement page in the description below. (https://kde.org/announcements/plasma/5/5.27.5/) https://9to5linux.com/kde-plasma-5-27-5-improves-flatpak-permissions-page-system-settings-and-more #FOSSnews #bigshow #KDE #updates #fixes #TechFreedom FF 1 - Roblox h8s Penguins The Roblox developers have hammered the last nail into the coffin for compatibility and support on Linux. They are adopting Hyperion anti-cheat, as the Roblox team bought the company behind Hyperion last October. Their logic for blocking WINE usage is tenuous at best, in my view. They also refuse to countenance the concept of a Linux port, claiming that the gaming community on Linux is neither large nor cohesive enough to bother devoting company resources to developing or supporting. Will this affect Linux adoption rates? I don’t know. I know that Roblox is nearly as popular as Minecraft, particularly with the younger set, however, as this article states, we have Heroic and the Steam Deck, as well as Proton which still enable us to play many games, and those tools are only getting better. I don’t see this as a huge detractor from the appeal of getting away from Windoesn’t and MacOS, if for nothing other than privacy and security reasons. For that matter, Linux is stable, now, particularly if you choose a point release distro like Pop!OS or Mint. It pretty much “just works” for most things, these days. Are there exceptions to the rule? Of course, just like anything else in life. I do not see this making that much of a difference for people who are motivated to make the change anyway. https://news.itsfoss.com/roblox-linux-end/ FF 2 – ASUS ROG Ally Formally Announced Well, we have more information about this Steamdeck competitor now, from specs to pricing. It will indeed be running AMD’s new Z1 chips, but it ships with Windoesn’t 11. *throws up in mouth* Why are they inflicting that privacy nightmare on their customers? Oh wait, massive subsidies from MSFT, no doubt. That, and running Windoesn’t entails fewer compatibility issues. Let’s keep an eye on this gear and see about perhaps getting it working on Linux, shall we? So, here are the specs for this piece of kit: AMD Z1 capable of up to 2.8 TFlops for the base model, both ship with a .5 TB Gen4 SSD, 16 GB DDR5 RAM, a 7” FHD touchscreen display capable of 500 nits brightness, and dual cooling fans. Raw power, this thing sounds promising, and it will cost $599. The upgraded model comes with the Z1 Extreme chip, which is about 3x more powerful than the regular Z1, capable of pushing 8.6 TFlops (you might be wondering what a TFlop is: a teraflop, 1 Trillion FLoating point OPerations. A FLOP is a measure of computing performance which gives a more accurate picture of the capabilities of a chip than simple instructions per second). The extreme version is comparable with the processor in the PlayStation 5, clocking in less than half a TFlop/s lower than the P5 in a smaller package that is also more efficient. By the way, the more capable version is slated to sell at $699. To put it into perspective, the top spec Steam Deck sells for $649, and has the same size ssd, and a AMD Zen 2 chip, and 16 GB RAM, with a 1280*800 resolution 7” screen. Its processor can only manage ~1/2 TFlop/s and its integrated GPU can only manage up to 1.6 TFlop/s. That is pretty weak in comparison to the Z1, but it does natively run SteamOS, which is based on Arch Linux. Here’s a link for the Steam Deck: (https://store.steampowered.com/steamdeck) https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/05/asus-rog-ally-releases-in-june-priced-competitively-to-the-steam-deck/ Freed Computer https://techfreedom.pro/freed-computer/ https://techfreedom.pro/free-your-pc #freedcomputer #linux #nospying #safe #TechFreedom #Truth FF 3 – What’s Arcane Wilds? A Western-themed fantasy RTS game that is cross-platform and currently in beta testing. It has 3 factions which each have their unique features, strengths and weaknesses, Army (a Civil War era US Army-alike), Colony (wild west-style gunslingers and the like), and Tribes (similar to native Americans). Who vie for resources and territory. The difference here is that two of the key resources (Supplies and Essence) are actual physical things which need to be transported and can even be stolen. That is novel to me. I like that idea, it makes the whole thing much more realistic and potentially engaging. The combat system sounds like it should be really fun, as it is designed to be very fast-paced, but not at the expense of strategy. Units get ordered via the port, which is where you start every game. In order to order certain units, you do need to build certain buildings, but units are not directly produced by their associated buildings, but those buildings do allow you to order them at the port. Interesting mechanics, y’all. Not just build base, harvest resources, make units, and attack your enemies. We’ll see what shape this game finally realizes once it is out of beta. I will take a look at it and see if my system can handle it and stream & record the whole thing or not. If it can, I will test it out on the Weekend Edition. https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/05/arcane-wilds-kicks-off-with-some-refreshing-rts-ideas/ #FOSSNews #FOSSFun #linuxgaming #TechFreedom

WE 36.1 – A Story that Never Should Have Needed to be Written Pardon me as I pick up the pieces of my heart off of the floor. I am both disgusted and completely disheartened by this subject matter. I first stumbled across porn when I was about 12. I knew what it was, but found myself at that particular site after mistyping the address for a Tolkien fan forum that I was quite active in at the time. Yes, I have been that big of a nerd for that long. I was nerding out in Tolkien forums at 11 and 12 while you were playing video games and playing outside. I needed that much of an escape. That fateful stumble happened one night on a system my dad built for my grandma to get email on, it was connected to something like Copper.net or netzero dial-up. I think it was something like a Celeron in an NForce AIO motherboard. Anyway, enough about the machine itself, it actually sucked, but did what it needed to, barely. The point of this trip down memory lane was to open up the topic of kids finding their way to porn in their own time. It has been a problem as long as the internet has been a “thing”. This is not news that a) kids get sucked into porn earlier and earlier (doesn’t help when the books in the school and public libraries and that their demonized teachers are reading them in class are little more than porn) b) Big Tech needs to do more about this, so that not just anyone can “happen” upon porn while perusing a site or app like Twitter and that c) porn has a detrimental effect on anyone it touches (performers, viewers, producers, etc). If parents were able to actually parent their kids, then studies like this would never need to be undertaken. I’ve talked about this before, and my stance has not changed. This study showed that the behavior and language of kids as young as 8 has been negatively impacted through porn consumption. *SARCASM WARNING* Wait, wait, wait, I thought that all porn and all sexuality was inherently good for everybody... *SARCASM WARNING* I thought that kids should be treated just like adults when it comes to sex... Isn’t that what the fruitloops and would-be or have-been kiddie diddlers who have infected our education system have been shouting at us about for the last several years? Why, yes, yes that has been the message. That is purely demonic. They know that porn has destroyed their own lives... They are probably incapable of having regular, consenting relationships and intimacy with adults, partially, perhaps, because they were groomed and abused as kids themselves, and likely are addicted to porn themselves. Alright, enough of a tangent there... Let’s get back to the body of the article, now, as I try to recover from my episode of dry heaves and weeping over these kids. What kinds of exposure were these kids getting on Snapchat and Twitter, you ask? Adult nudity and violent porn in profiles and posts. These things are allegedly not allowed for the under-18 set, but they of course find their way to accessing it, and/or it isn’t taken down as quickly as would be ideal by the platforms. One thing to keep in mind about this is that Twitter has made lots of money from the attention that e-thots, models, and adult performers have generated on the platform over the years. I’m not convinced that it will EVER be clean enough to warrant use by me or anyone in my family. Not only that, but diddlers post their exploits and hunt for more victims there as well. No thanks. Parents, step up. Parent your children. Protect them from this filth by keeping them off of these platforms and teaching them the right way to handle those sorts of things. The best way to deal with sex in discussion with your kids is to actually have a discussion about sex and porn with your kids. Do not allow the schools or the media to do it for you if you value their innocence. You set the tone. *begin rant* Dads, if that means that you need to figure out how to break free from porn yourselves, then do so. Easier said than done? Absolutely. Worth doing in order to really be a man and lead your family with honor rather than shame? Damn straight it is. Moms, if it is a problem for you as well, other than with your husbands, please learn to break free as well. Your kids need both of you to be whole and sane. Get rid of any of this garbage from your homes, devices, places of work, vehicles, etc (wherever you might hide it, whether physical or digital media). *end rant* https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-65534354 #porn #kids #cutitoff #burnitwithfire #protectyourkids #thetalk #techfreedom #weekendedition #TechFreedom WE 36.2 – AI News WE 36.2-1 - “Godfather” of AI Speaks Out This is a fearporn piece. This gentleman, Geoffrey Hinton, was a pioneer in neural networks, which were a foundational technology for the large language models which undergird most of what we call AI these days. He echoes many of the concerns from the open letter from late March. I am not a fan of AI, but even at that, fear tactics over employment issues, AI controlling the world, AI possibly exterminating the human race, etc are pure histrionics. These histrionics are meant to lead to hysteria because hysteria = fear and the Bible says that when we fear something, we more or less manifest it in our lives. We focus on the fear, empowering it to become realized in our lives, unless we break the cycle and focus on building something positive instead. It would be one thing if the guy were coming forth with more than vague fears, but had some solutions other than, “Let’s stop working in this area.” Which he is thankfully not advocating. I don’t have a pony in this show, and don’t have time to dive into this allegedly sticky issue to come up with a workable solution, either. #ai #fearporn #meh #TechFreedom #weekendedition https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/02/tech/hinton-tapper-wozniak-ai-fears/index.html WE 36.2-2 – Bing AI Available to All Who Sign in Through Edge. Microsoft has started to actualize their plans to roll ChatGPT functionality through all of their ecosystem, Bing, Word, Excel, Outlook, and eventually Windows itself. This sounds like an absolute nightmare to me. Not only is Microsoft one of the worst about respecting your privacy, but now they are wholly embracing this generative AI thing, the chief danger of which, that I see, is the fact that it is a privacy black hole on its own. They record every response, every prompt, to “learn” from you so that it can seem more realistically human. Microsoft + AI should give you goosebumps in the privacy arena. That’s not to mention the fact that they exist to “learn from you”, so that it can more effectively sound like you. I do not think that the publicly available AI’s could ever replace any human being at anything. If anyone is foolish enough to try to let one replace them, then they deserve to be replaced. Good riddance. Use discernment when you use these TOOLS, people. Aside from all that, why would you volunteer your info to Microsoft that much more by using Bing? Particularly signed in? Come on, people. Do your searching elsewhere. https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/04/tech/microsoft-bing-updates/index.html #bingAI #msft #weekendedition #FOSSNews #TechFreedom WE 36.2-3 – Bard to Be Rolled Into Google Search Fulltime Google Search is going to look a bit more like Brave Search, moving forward, based on the unveiling at Google’s annual I/O conference last week. That means that Bard will now offer AI summaries of all of your search queries before your results actually show up. How do you feel about that? Are any of you still using Google Search, at this point? If you are, why? It has been demonstrated ad nauseam that not only do they spy on your searching, keeping track of every query, but they actively rearrange the results to push a very globalist, WEF & UN-approved set of results. I’m sure that Microsoft’s Bing does the exact same thing, though, so yeah, neither of these are good options if you want unbiased, private search results. What might be better? Well, if privacy is all you are after, then take a look at Duck Duck Go and Brave Search (ironic to me that their initials are BS, lol), or if you want less biased, but still private searching, take a look at Mojeek, SwissCows, or MetaGer. If you want to try your hand at running your own search engine, spin up a VPS and install SearX and try it out. These are things that I would point out in one of my Freedom Consultations. https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/10/tech/ai-search-google-io/index.html #google #bard #search #TechFreedom #FOSSNews #weekendedition WE 36.2-4 – ChatGPT Stuff... Sam Altman is set to testify before Congress on Tuesday, alongside IBM’s Chief Privacy and Trust Officer, and a professor who is a self-described “AI hype critic”. This testimony is more theatrics, likely, as the Senate starts to try to wrap their aged heads around this technology in order to perhaps create some more government overreach in the form of “commonsense guardrails” to regulate this new thing, in keeping with what Depends’ handlers put out recently as a priority in DC. Good luck, Senators. Most of the members of that sub-committee probably wouldn’t know what AI was if it bit them on the face. How can they possibly regulate something they can’t comprehend? This is not ageism, this is just common sense. Most people my age (probably including myself) don’t have a firm grasp on what this AI thing really is, so how can people who barely know how to use a cell phone figure it out based on a bit of testimony? https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/10/tech/openai-ceo-congress-testifying/index.html Can you pass exams using ChatGPT? Possibly, but as I’ve said repeatedly, do not rely on it anymore than you would a Wikipedia article. Use it as a starting point, if at all. Never turn in anything directly from an AI generated piece. Always tweak it, always polish it, make it yours. You also never know if you will wind up with a hallucinated alleged source. Be careful and always use your God-given mind and discernment. However you choose to use it or not, always remember that it is just a tool. Never simply outsource your thinking to a machine. https://www.bbc.com/news/education-65316283 #weekendedition #ChatGPT #OpenAI #samaltman #Congress #privacy #TechFreedom #FOSSNews WE 36.3 – Twitter News Musk says that he is about to roll out encrypted messaging and calling on Twitter. The acid test, he says, is that even if someone held a gun to his head, he wouldn’t be able to snoop on your DMs or calls. This would make it more competitive with Meta, WhatsApp, Mastodon, and BlueSky. This sounds like a solid move from Elon and co, first one, perhaps, in months. We’ll see if it starts to save the foundering platform. Who knows, right? Well, it is time for a little Dune2K. https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/10/tech/twitter-calls-messaging-elon-musk/index.html #twitter #encryption #dms #calls #cool #weekendedition #TechFreedom #FOSSNews https://rumble.com/c/TechFreedom https://rumble.com/c/Spiritualityntech https://rumble.com/c/c-2966394

Distro News DN 1- Manjaro 22.1 “Talos” On April 21, the Manjaro team released their latest round up system updates, codenamed “Talos”. As is typical with this very tested, Arch-based distro, they lag behind the bleeding edge by a few months. I still use Manjaro on my streaming PC and my wife’s laptop, though I have migrated my surface and our other machine away from that, as it seemed to break things or cause unnecessary slow-downs for those machines. Manjaro is very much a solid distro, and is a good starting point if you want to try the Arch side of the Linux family tree, as it is safe, yet still essentially a rolling release. So, what’s new in this ISO? • GNOME 43.5 ◦ redesigned system status menu ◦ in-house Layouts Switcher application ◦ Gradience ◦ Custom dynamic wallpapers ◦ Manjaro green theming is back • KDE ◦ 5.27.4 ◦ Gear 22.12 ◦ Wayland support as cornerstone (Manjaro team is very excited by this) I’ve spilled much digital ink talking about the latest in KDE as these updates are released, typically on a monthly cadence, and the latest is actually Gear 23.04 and Framework 5.105, not 22.12. This is the nature of Manjaro, though. They make sure that the packages they roll out to users (generally) are rock solid and stable, so unless you feel the need to live dangerously, this is a solid option for you. • Xfce ◦ Finally on 4.18 ▪ New fie highlighting feature in Thunar • Recursive search in Thunar ▪ Panel preferences changes • Panel length in pixels vs % • Panel can now stay on top of windows, so the bottom of a window goes below the panel, rather than covering or sitting flush against it ▪ Control Center is now the one-stop shop for all desktop module settings • New Kernel 61 LTS ships by default, but options for 5.15 and 5.10 LTS as well. https://forum.manjaro.org/t/manjaro-22-1-talos-released/139155 DN 2 – Ubuntu Double Header 2.1 – Update PSA Make sure that you update to the latest kernel patches from Canonical if you are running Ubuntu, as there were a pair of critical vulnerability exploits which got patched recently: CVE-2023-1829 and CVE-2023-0386, both of which could allow a local attacker to escalate their privileges to root level without a password. The first one was a flaw in the traffic-control index (TC-Index), which required the devs to shut that down in order to fix it. The second was an issue with the OverlayFS file system, which controls the copying process from one UID to another. These patches affect 22.10, 22.04 LTS and 20.04 LTS users, so run the update via terminal as you usually would: sudo apt update && sudo apt full-upgrade should grab and install these for you with no problems. https://9to5linux.com/canonical-issues-new-ubuntu-kernel-updates-to-fix-two-local-privilege-escalation-flaws 2.2 – Bionic Beaver (Ubuntu 18.04 LTS) is End-of-Life Just a heads up, here. LTS versions of Linux are supported for 5 years, and we are at the end of that time frame now. If you have any systems running 18.04 still, I suggest upgrading, if it is at all practicable to do so for you. Or you can move to Ubuntu PRO, which will offer extended support through expanded security maintenance (ESM) updates until 2028. Just thought you should know, just in case we have some stragglers or people out there who really have a mission-critical need for 18.04. https://news.itsfoss.com/ubuntu-18-04-eol/ Freedom Consultation Free call. 60-90 minutes. Q&A Leave with Actionable Steps to take, whether you work with me or not. Schedule today. https://techfreedom.pro/freedom-consultation #distromonday #freedom #consultation #Linux #degoogleyourlife #TechFreedom DN 3 – Alma VS Rocky: Which is the better CentOS Replacement? This article lays out several points of comparison, ranging from ease of installation, to extensiveness of documentation, to performance, and ease of use. They both inherited the CentOS installer, so if you liked that, you’ll love the Rocky and Alma Linux installers. I’ve not worked with any of them, personally, but it looks straightforward enough, as it should. Both Alma and Rocky Linux are aimed squarely at enterprise use cases, just as CentOS was. This means that they are geared to be ultra-stable and secure. It is also very easy to migrate from a CentOS install to either Rocky or Alma Linux. All you need is their script to run, and it will switch you right over. One benefit that Alma has is that they have also included upgrading in their migration script. So not only will it laterally migrate you from CentOS to Alma, but it will update & upgrade you to the latest version of Alma Linux all in one go. Rocky Linux also has migration tool, but as I just said, it doesn’t have the ability to upgrade you to the latest version in one fell swoop, but that is ok. Alma Linux is slightly faster in the benchmarks, but the difference is pretty negligible. As for ease of use, they are pretty close to identical, and both ship with GNOME templates for workstations. Rocky Linux has far better documentation, so maintaining and repairing it is easier than Alma, which has a much more sparse, but that can be made up for by the great community support that exists, on the very active subreddit and mattermost channels. Rocky also has community support on their subreddit and mattermost channel, however, they are not as quick to answer questions as the Alma Linux community is. So these distros are pretty darn close, in my book. I’m not looking for an enterprise distro, but if you are, either of these are great options, from what I can tell. https://www.maketecheasier.com/almalinux-vs-rocky-linux/ FOSS News FN 1 – Your Own VPN? Just Like That... As long as you have a VPS set up somewhere, you can easily set up docker and install Wireguard on it and have your very own, truly private, virtual private network. So right now, we will talk through the process, if you don’t mind. I unfortunately do not have a spare VPS anywhere, so I can’t SHOW you how this works. First, make sure you have Docker and Docker Compose installed on your server. Most distros are pretty simple in terms of how to get that done, and I trust that you can look that up for yourself, if you don’t know how to get it done right now. So the first step is to check if Docker is installed: Docker —version If it returns a version, you are good to go, move on to installing Compose, which will allow you to install and run multi-container apps (which is what this will require). If not, simply install Docker by following the appropriate install directions for your distro, then do the same for Docker Compose. Here are the directions for Docker Compose: sudo curl -L "https://github.com/docker/compose/releases/latest/download/docker-compose-linux-$(uname -m)" -o /usr/local/bin/docker-compose sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/docker-compose After that, you’ll need to install the appropriate containers for Wireguard Server and WireguardUI:. First you’ll need to create and navigate into a directory called wireguard mkdir wireguard cd wireguard Once there, You’ll need to use your favorite text editor (VIM, Nano, Gedit, ect) to create and edit a file called docker-compose.yaml vim docker-compose.yaml Once the file is open, simply copy the following lines of code into the file: version: "3" services: # WireGuard VPN service wireguard: image: linuxserver/wireguard:latest container_name: wireguard cap_add: - NET_ADMIN volumes: - ./config:/config ports: # Port for WireGuard-UI - "5000:5000" # Port of the WireGuard VPN server - "51820:51820/udp" # WireGuard-UI service wireguard-ui: image: ngoduykhanh/wireguard-ui:latest container_name: wireguard-ui depends_on: - wireguard cap_add: - NET_ADMIN # Use the network of the 'wireguard' service # This enables to show active clients in the status page network_mode: service:wireguard environment: - SENDGRID_API_KEY - EMAIL_FROM_ADDRESS - EMAIL_FROM_NAME - SESSION_SECRET - WGUI_USERNAME=admin - WGUI_PASSWORD=password - WG_CONF_TEMPLATE - WGUI_MANAGE_START=true - WGUI_MANAGE_RESTART=true logging: driver: json-file options: max-size: 50m volumes: - ./db:/app/db - ./config:/etc/wireguard All you should need to do is change the WGUI_username and WGUI_password fields to your desired values, save and exit from the text editor, then you will actually download the container images and set them up thusly, from the above directory: docker-compose up -d It should take about a minute for them to download and be set up this first time, but after that, it should only take seconds to start the respective containers, as they won’t need to download every time you start them. After they have started up, you can open your browser of choice, then navigate to the IP address of your server, like so: https://my.server.address.here Enter your username and password (which you changed before you downloaded the images), if you are indeed following these directions. Then click “sign in”. If you are very concerned with security, which, lets face it, if you are making your own VPN, you probably are, then you should look into installing a reverse proxy such as either Caddy or Traefik,to secure your access to WireguardUI. Next, you’ll need to configure your new Wireguard VPN server. Simply copy the following batches of code into the Post Up and Post Down script fields, respectively: Post Up: iptables -A FORWARD -i wg0 -j ACCEPT; iptables -t nat -A POSTROUTING -o eth0 -j MASQUERADE Post Down: iptables -D FORWARD -i wg0 -j ACCEPT; iptables -t nat -D POSTROUTING -o eth0 -j MASQUERADE After this, hit the Save button in the bottom left (below the fields you just populated) Apply Config button in the upper right corner, then confirm by clicking Apply in the dialog box that pops up. After this, you will click over into the Global Settings tab on the left hand side of the window. Check to make sure that the auto-populated public IP address is accurate, if it is, great, if not, you will have to find and enter the IP address of your server, and you can set DNS servers for your VPN, so say you want to add AdGuard, a PIHole, or perhaps content filtering to protect you and your family from garbage online (such as porn, gambling, drugs, or other sketchy things). On that subject, you could also set up your own DNS filtering through ControlD (https://controld.com), or add AdGuard and perhaps CleanBrowsing DNS addresses before you Save and Apply Changes. Finally, in order to connect to your new VPN, you’ll need to set up a new client or two, so click the New Client button, and enter a user name and email, but leave the rest blank/ as they populate it. Then hit the Submit and Apply Config buttons, and your first client should be automatically set up and ready to use. Next, we need to figure out how to connect to this VPN client, right? Right, we do. Here’s how to get it done on your Linux PC: Click the Wireguard Clients tab on the left hand side of the WireguardUI window. You should see the client(s) you just set up. Click the Download button on the client in question, then rename it something recognizable so that it is easier to do the next step: Open your terminal Copy this command: nmcli connection import type wireguard file <yourfilename>.conf Then open up your Settings app, navigate to the Network Connections section or tab, and you should see the WireGuard VPN connection available to you and then click it and click connect. After this, it should show up as connected, so if you ping your VPN server’ s private IP address, it should return a positive result, and lo & behold, you are connected to your brand new VPN. You can also confirm by going back to your WireguardUI window and looking at the Status tab. But what about phones? Have no fear, I’ve got you covered: Download the official WireGuard VPN Client app from your app store of choice, then open it and tap Add a Tunnel, then Create from QR Code. To get the QR code you need, go back to the WireGuard Clients tab again, and pick your client, and click the QR Code button, then capture the QR code with the app on your phone, and all should be set up for you. Once that is done, simply enable the profile, and you are protected. https://linuxiac.com/how-to-set-up-wireguard-vpn-with-docker/ FN 2 – LibreOffice 7.5.3 Released This one will be much shorter than the last story, as I won’t be talking you through installing and configuring anything, just reporting on a maintenance release for a popular FOSS office suite. I have often covered these releases on Tech Tips Tuesdays in the past, but they are a thing of the past now. Here we are... LibreOffice 7.5.3. This release squashes 119 bugs found in the previous release, and if you are a LibreOffice 7.5 user, you should certainly update to this as soon as you can, so that you can stop encountering those bugs. The 7.5 series will be actively developed until 7.6 comes out sometime this November. That is all. I used to use LibreOffice for everything, but recently began switching to OnlyOffice, which tends to be more stable and is easier to link up to NextCloud, as well. These days, I only use LibreOffice personally to read off my show notes on my streaming PC. That is not to say that it is crap, but the simplicity and closer compatibility of OnlyOffice feels like a better fit for me now. https://9to5linux.com/libreoffice-7-5-3-is-now-available-for-download-with-119-bug-fixes Want to learn more about how to degoogle your phone and why? https://techfreedom.pro/degoogled/ #TechFreedom #degoogled #degoogleyourlife #defintionsday #Truth FN 3 – A Privacy Listicle from It’s FOSS This is has 11 ideas, so we’ll more or less copy what he says, then comment on them a bit. 1. Secure & Hide Your Email You can use email aliases to keep your actual email address private. We have a list of tools to help protect your email address. Choose any options like SimpleLogin or use the email alias addresses your email provider allows creating. https://simplelogin.io Also, try using secure email services like Tutanota or ProtonMail for the best experience. I hadn’t really thought about this... I should start doing this on my own, for sure. I have a few protonMail addresses, but don’t use them because I had already set up with Zoho for email and collaboration for my domains. Until Proton has an ecosystem as diverse as Zoho’s, I can’t see myself moving away from Zoho. True, as far as privacy and security, Zoho is not in the same realm as either Proton or Tutanota. The major leg up that they have, in my opinion is that they are geared to be a drop in replacement for Google Spaces and Office365 online (including Outlook, to a certain extent), but will not scrape your data for relevant Ad data or other, more nefarious things. The other two are end to end encrypted to the point where if you lose your password and do not have a recovery method set up, you will lose all of your emails. https://zoho.com https://proton.me https://tutanota.com 2. Secure Your Internet Use a secure or encrypted DNS like NextDNS or ControlD Use a VPN to encrypt your internet connection ProtonVPN and Mullvad VPN would be two excellent options, offering open-source clients and Linux support. Funny, I just mentioned ControlD earlier, didn’t I? The encrypted DNS is key, 100% of the time, the VPN you can get by without unless you are out on public WiFi. https://nextdns.io https://controld.com https://proton.me https://mullvad.net 3. Secure Your Search Activity I harp on this weekly. The top options here are probably Swisscows, Mojeek, Metager and SearX. A distant placing would be Brave Search. The reason I say that Brave Search has fallen from favor is that with the enfolding of AI, their index has shifted to the Left, where it used to be fairly balanced, if not conservative-leaning. All of them are far better than Yahoo, Bing, or Google Search, in terms of keeping your information under your control, though, so take your pick, try a few and see which one scratches your itch best. SearX is unique in that you can and should host your own instance, in a way, that is the ultimate in privacy, as you control the engine for your instance. https://swisscows.com https://mojeek.com https://metager.org https://github.com/searx/searx https://search.brave.com 4. Use a Privacy-Focused Browser Some popular options are Brave, LibreWolf, and Vivaldi. Only one of these is actually FOSS, in fact, the Vivaldi team will not even allow the browser to be packaged as a flatpak. Brave is not FOSS, either, but with a few tweaks, it certainly passes the privacy sniff test. LibreWolf is 100% FOSS, as it is a fork of FireFox, but geared to be about as private as possible without going Tor. For instance, it defaults to deleting all history and cookies every time you close the browser, so be aware of that. https://brave.com https://librewolf.net https://vivaldi.net 5. Do Not Install a Program You Don't Know Be careful with the stuff you download and run on your computer, whether you’re a Linux, Windoesn’t, or MacOS user. Research apps before you randomly install things, they could just be malware. Ankush is right that there are a few tells that any piece of software is probably ok: 1. Make sure that it is reasonably popular a. Not brand spanking new 2. Is FOSS and has a stable release or 2 3. Read the privacy policy to make sure any app is not just a black hole for your private data. 4. Never just simply download unverified files from an email. 5. Only grab software from official channels, unless the developers suggest getting it somewhere else. 6. Utilize All Privacy Tweaks and Options Take a look at the privacy options for every single app and system-wide on your phone or computer. It will probably yield dividends for your privacy, as often it is possible to make things more private than they are by default, but you have to look for the settings in order to change them. 7. Use Secure Password Managers Use something like KeepassXC or BitWarden, or even the Nextcloud password manager (tied to your own instance, ideally) to keep your passwords and credentials safe from prying eyes, and thereby keep your data safer. Don’t use browser based options, they can be more readily hacked. https://keepassxc.org https://bitwarden.com 8. Keep Your Notes Secure If you take notes on your devices, these may be some of the best options for privacy. Standard Notes and CryptPad are great and offer end to end encryption by default. There are of course others which are just as good. Just go hunting a bit. https://standardnotes.com https://crytpad.org 9. Store or Backup on a Private Cloud Platform You should always have multiple secure backup solutions in place, to make sure that your data is safe from disasters (whether natural or electronic), as well as from intruders. Most of us don’t have the time or know-how to set up and manage our own home storage servers for backup, so the next best solution is a secure cloud, such as Mega or pCloud, or a FOSS alternative like LibertyStratus, which is essentially a fork of NextCloud, which is the best self-hosted option out there for this. With NextCloud, you could create an instance on your own hardware, or set up a VPS with a hosting company and create other users and share files and communicate in your own little cloud whenever you’d like. https://mega.nz https://pcloud.com https://libertystratus.org https://nextcloud.org Https://althatech.com (great little hosting company that I write blogs for) 10. Use Private Messengers You can always utilize open-source and encrypted messengers like Signal (cross-platform) to secure your communications. If you want a bit more privacy than that, you could spin up your own matrix server and connect to it with element or fluffy chat, or any of these other options (https://matrix.org/clients). 11. Specialized Distributions If you are adventurous and want to try an entirely different operating system tailored to give you a private experience, you can pick Tails OS, Whonix, or Qubes. These are the best for privacy, and each one has different approaches to the problem. Tails is designed to not have persistent storage, so if you unplug your flash drive from a computer, your data is gone. Whonix is designed to be run in a VM, where Tails is meant to be purely a live environment option. Qubes, on the other hand, can be installed normally, but is entirely containerized in such a way that once you close an application, all its data is irrevocably lost. https://whonix.org https://tails.boum.org https://qubes-os.org https://itsfoss.com/improve-privacy/ FF 1 - Discord to Finally Make Usernames Make Sense Are you a Discord user? Have you noticed that the usernames have always been a bit too random to easily search for friends? I’m not on discord, though I may hop on at some point kinda soon to actually participate in ministry there. We’ll see how that goes. I may invite him on to talk about his project, which is largely based on open source tech, if I’m not mistaken. He is a brilliant guy, actually leaves me feeling wanting when I talk to him because he knows so much. But I digress. I don’t know much about Discord, other than it is a voice chat tool which is often used by gamers, similar to Mumble and TeamTalk. I guess I’m just not that much of a gamer... Certainly not in this season of my life. Part of me misses it, but I like to be busy, and my plate is pretty full these days, so I’m good. https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/05/discord-username-system-changing-to-make-it-easier-to-find-people/ FF 2 – Heroic Games Launcher Gets a new Hotfix What needed a fix this time around? Well, it looks like users were having trouble getting past the captcha when trying to sign into Epic. Let’s see what else they worked on, shall we? • They've also added some keyboard shortcuts now too: • Command Or Control+R: Reloads the app. • Command Or Control+Q: Quits the app. • Command Or Control+Shift+I: Opens the dev tools. • Command Or Control+K: Opens the Heroic settings screen on the frontend. • Command Or Control+L: Opens the library screen. • Command Or Control+J: Opens the downloads screen. Full changelog: • [Tech] Refactor Game Managers by @BrettCleary in #2578 • [FIX]: Fix winemenubuilder not being disabled by @Etaash-mathamsetty in #2630 • [FIX]: Fix playing status (again) by @Etaash-mathamsetty in #2626 • [Enhancement]: When selecting item from search bar, it will take you directly to item's game page by @JordanPlayz158 in #2614 • Fix missing game settings info in logs by @arielj in #2638 • [Enhancement]: Provide Wine-ge/Proton-ge latest version via wine manager by @Nocccer in #2513 • [Enhancement] Add logic to Stores feature by @redromnon in #2622 • [Fix] Searchbar and autoComplete UI by @redromnon in #2621 • [Fix] Ignore Logitech's G29 by @arielj in #2570 • [Fix]: Blank screen on startup by @Nocccer in #2612 • [FIX] Image search on Add Game Screen blocking finish button by @flavioislima in #2657 • [Fix] Captcha not working on epic games page by @flavioislima in #2658 • [GOG] Fix url for horizontal images for GOG downloads by @arielj in #2661 • [FIX] Proper kill wine processes when hitting Stop Button by @Etaash-mathamsetty in #2666 • Allow 'null' as lifespan so cachestore does not expire by @arielj in #2664 • [Fix] Steam Shortcuts with missing runner by @flavioislima in #2660 • [UX] Add Keyboard global shortcuts by @flavioislima in #2659 • [i18n] Updated Translations by @weblate in #2636 https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/05/heroic-games-launcher-271-hotfix-1-fixes-up-epic-games-login/ Freed Computer https://techfreedom.pro/freed-computer/ https://techfreedom.pro/free-your-pc #freedcomputer #linux #nospying #safe #TechFreedom #Truth FF 3 - Proton 8.0-2 Released Here’s another small update, which pulled in some of Proton experimental’s work to, for one thing, make the EA app work again, since they keep messing with everybody over there at EA. Aside from that, here is a shortlist of things that got pulled in from experimental: • Fixed Baldur's Gate 3 getting stuck on a black screen in Vulkan mode. • Fixed Divinity: Original Sin: Enhanced Edition and Divinity Original Sin II: Definitive Edition crashing on launch. • Fixed Path of Exile crashing. • Fixed memory leak in Trackmania and Ubisoft Connect overlay. • Improved Elden Ring compatibility compared to Proton 8.0-1. It can still be finicky. • Fixed Red Dead Redemption 2 and other games not starting after switching from Proton Experimental to stable. Hmmm... I remember talking about the Path of Exile thing recently... Makes me want to play again, but I don’t dare until I get a better computer. Oh well... Thus is life. I also don’t really have time to get back into it. I was pretty deep in it for about 4-5 years right after it left beta, 10 years ago. Then kids happened and I realized that it wasn’t worth my time to play a dark A-RPG. I digress again, though... Good that major games like RDR and Elden Ring are getting plenty of love, as always. One thing you can generally count on in FOSS development is relatively incremental improvements happening on a regular basis. Enjoy your games, y’all. https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/05/proton-8-0-2-linux-steam-deck-fixing-the-ea-app/

WE 35.1 – Bob Lee’s Killer Pleads “Not Guilty” Oh boy, oh boy. This just gets juicier. Apparently Bob was at least friends with the alleged killer’s sister, whose marriage was said to be on the rocks. Both Bob and the suspect visited the suspect’s sister’s apartment in the hours prior to the murder. It is unclear if Bob was pursuing romantic relations with her, though he did allegedly invite her to his hotel room, which she refused. It sounds like this was a case of an over-protective brother (who also has a history of assault, though no charges were filed in that previous case) who over-reacted to his sister’s situation with Bob, and chose to bring a kitchen knife to a discussion with Mr. Lee after the fact. This is not something that a level-headed person does. He plans to plead ‘not guilty’, as his lawyer claims to have evidence proving his innocence. I’ll keep you guys apprised on this trial as it proceeds. https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/25/tech/cash-app-bob-lee-killing-arraignment/index.html #killer #ripboblee #trialtime #sketchy #techfreedom #weekendedition #TechFreedom WE 35.2 – Mid/ C-Band 5G and Altimeters I talked about this issue when I first started doing the Weekend Edition, the FAA gave airlines until July of this year to upgrade their altimeters to filter out the C-band frequencies, as they are adjacent to the frequencies which this batch of gear, which helps planes to land safely in foul weather, operate in. Now we are less than 2 months from the deadline, and not everybody has complied with the requirements. The FAA negotiated with the big cell carriers to postpone their rollout for about a year, within 2 miles of airports, but that time is fast coming to an end. Will this necessarily create delays for air travelers, due to real safety concerns? Who knows. The FAA will ground any aircraft which not be retrofitted, which I imagine would affect smaller airlines more than the big boys, but I haven’t been on a plane since 2015, so this doesn’t mean much to me, personally. I know many are frequent fliers, though, so I cover this as best I can. The fear, here, is that the C-Band frequencies are too close to the range that the altimeters use. There is a roughly 400 Mhz gap between the top of C-Band and the bottom of the altimeter range. I also want to assuage your concerns about this, regarding the frequencies themselves. Many are very concerned about what these frequencies COULD do to the human body. If you already have 5Ghz WiFi on your home networks, then you likely already use more intense, higher frequencies in your home than what already is being used by AT&T and VZW 5G towers in your city. The ones that I am still concerned about are the MM wave frequencies they plan to use at the extreme upper end of the true 5G spectrum. The reality about those frequencies is that they need to be extremely powerful and the towers must be very close to one another in order for coverage to be any kind of decent. That is where the trouble comes in, as far as I can see. These get into and through the same frequencies used by microwave ovens. #aircraft #FAA #5G #TechFreedom #weekendedition https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-65465512 WE 35.3 – Meta In Trouble Again... Just can’t stay out of the Headlines, Can They? Well, this time, it’s the FTC is coming down like a ton of bricks on Zuck’s head, as they are still reeling from rulings around the world, including here at home. Now the issue is how kids’ data is monetized and the fact that unvetted adults and contacts can still chat with kids on their platforms. Meta clapped back that this was little more than a political stunt by the regulator. Here are the complaints from the FTC: The FTC said an independent investigation had found "several gaps and weaknesses in Facebook's privacy program" that posed "substantial risks to the public". Users aged under 13 were found to be still allowed to engage in chats with contacts not vetted by parents. The regulator also said Meta continued to give third-party apps access to private information after promising to cut off access if users failed to use the apps in the previous 90 days. The FTC has proposed a series of actions, including: • A blanket prohibition against monetizing data of children and teens under 18 • A pause on the launch of new products until it could be established they were in full compliance with privacy rules • Limits on future uses of facial recognition technology. Meta would be required to disclose and obtain users' affirmative consent for any future uses of facial recognition technology. So let’s parse all of that, shall we? Point 1: Why are kids under 13 on Facebook in the first place? Parents need to step up, here, and protect their kids from the darkness on Facebook. If parents would parent their kids, this wouldn’t be an issue to begin with. Point 2: Oops, that is a big deal. Policies must be adhered to, Meta. Close down that fire hose of private data that you’re being paid for by these apps and sites. Cut it off. Point 3: I like this first proposal, but I know that Facebook won’t. How about we cut off teens from the platform altogether? That was how it started, if I recall. Point 4: This should be common sense, but the money-grubbing Mr. sugar mountain (Zuckerberg) won’t readily do this, either. Point 5: Duh. We should not be tracked in that way without knowing that it is happening and having an obvious and easy way to opt out, at the very least. Facial recognition tech is inherently risky in terms of privacy, particularly in the hands of an organization like Meta. I think that it should never be an option for them, as that is too invasive. However, then I am reminded of the facts of Facebook’s genesis: remember, this was a CIA project called lifelog, meant to profile its users and indirectly spy on them. https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-65478062 #Meta #FTC #socialmedia #weekendedition #FOSSNews #TechFreedom WE 35.4 – BlueSky Social Jack’s new baby. He is not the CEO there, unlike at Twitter, and from what I understand, the codebase is open-source, and the protocol is decentrailzed. Ooooh, buzz words. I don’t know that I trust Dorsey or his people to create something clean and worthwhile to use, but I signed up for the private beta. One cool thing is that they made it so that your domain is actually the main part of your handle... For instance, whenever I get on, and assuming that I don’t quickly get booted off for inconvenient opinions and facts which contradict the regime’s truthless news, my handle will be @matt.techfreedom.pro. I think that that is a great way to go about this. That way it is clear who is with whom you are conversing. Of course, that can also lead to deplatforming on a domain level, unless you are registered with someone like Epik who will disregard that sort of pressure, you could lose it all. I don’t know, y’all. I’m torn because I am all about decentralization and open source tech, the latter part is the cornerstone of Tech Freedom, after all. However, that is a scary thing to be tied to a domain you own. What do you guys think? https://www.cnet.com/tech/what-is-bluesky-social-the-twitter-alternative-explained-and-how-to-join/ #bluesky #dorsey #decentralized #foss #socialmedia #TechFreedom #FOSSNews #weekendedition WE 35.5 – AirTags a Problem? Say It Ain’t So... Google and Apple are teaming up to create a new standard to help these little tracking bobs to be safer by adding some things which should have been considered by the original designers from the get-go. They have noticed (and been sued by) individuals who have either been stalked or had their cars stolen via Air Tags or Tiles (among other brands of similar devices). These little guys run on bluetooth and connect to your phone to help you to keep track of your keys, purse, or anything else you feel the need to attach them to. The concept is good, on one hand, but unless you can make sure that you don’t have trackers planted on you by some other person, it is dangerous indeed. It has happened, and resulted in murders, thefts, and other nefarious activities. Now these behemoths in the industry are marching in lockstep to close that privacy loophole, among others. I still wouldn’t trust these devices, if I were you, though. If I seem familiar with this topic, it’s because I covered this early on in the Weekend Edition (https://rumble.com/v1zxb5c-weekend-edition-16-tsmc-bidan-in-arizona-apple-privacy-woes-and-more.html). If I had thought through these gadgets a bit more, I could’ve foreseen these things, so if I could, then why didn’t Big Tech? Something stinks. Anyway, they are working on a new standard which would include detection of Air Tags type devices which are not paired to your phone, but are in your stuff, on your car, etc. I seem to recall calling for a FOSS option where we can see all of what is gathered and when in terms of data. I’d rather just strongly encourage people to work on their own memory and mental capacities. I know, that seems odd, coming from a tech guy, but I am more concerned with human thriving, privacy, and security than I am with adopting the latest & greatest tech gadgets. Just where I sit with all of this stuff. Take it or leave it. Well, it’s time for some Dune 2k. https://www.cnn.com/2023/05/03/tech/airtags-apple-google-specifications/index.html #weekendedition #apple #google #airtags #privacy #standards #TechFreedom #FOSSNews

Moving to 1 ~60 minute Tech News Show /per week Mondays at 0900PST/1200 EST Distro Monday, Wonder Wednesday, and FOSS Fun Friday will be rolled into a single show, starting Monday 5/8/2023.

FOSS Fun Friday 4 OBS News for Creators Steam Now Has Over 9,000 Playable Games Free Your PC Proton 8.1 Released #FFF #proton #steam #valve #Linux #Linuxnews #Linuxgaming #OBS #streaming #screenrecording #contentcreators #FOSSNews #TechFreedom FOSS Fun Friday, Proton experimental, Linux, Linux News, Linux gaming, Steam, OBS 29.1, lots of OBS goodness, FOSS News, Tech Freedom FFF 4.1 – OBS 29.1 Released Now If only I had a newer machine... come on, Jesus! This update is a massive, juicy one. The headline changes are HEVC & AV1 streaming support for YT, making it easier (with modern hardware) to do a higher quality stream with less effort on your computer. Here’s the full list of things updated: · Added support for streaming AV1/HEVC over Enhanced RTMP [YouTube/yuriy-chunak/derrod] · Enhanced RTMP V1 extends the RTMP protocol to support newer video codecs and HDR. More info at: https://github.com/veovera/enhanced-rtmp · Currently only supported by/enabled for YouTube as a beta feature · HDR is not yet implemented (oops, then again, most people couldn’t really enjoy it anyway, and YT HDR support is legendarily bad from what I have heard, anyway) · Added support for multiple audio tracks in Simple output recording [pkv] · Added a DLL blocking feature for Windows. This allows OBS to block problematic DLLs from attaching to OBS and causing freezing or crashes, for example 3rd party overlay hooks and outdated video capture devices. [notr1ch] · This blocks old versions of popular VTubing software virtual cameras that are known to cause freezes when accessing video capture device properties. If you are affected, please update to the latest version of your VTubing software. · Added settings to select the audio encoder for streaming and recording [tytan652] · Added an option to preload media sources used in Stingers to memory, to avoid frame skips during transitions [Jim] · Added Update Channels on macOS and updated Sparkle for smaller and faster updates going forward [derrod] · Added compatibility notices in the Window and Game Capture sources for Windows [derrod] · Added the ability to zoom browser docks with Ctrl - and + and the right click menu [WizardCM] · Added a setting to record in fragmented MP4 and MOV formats [derrod] · These offer greater compatibility than MKV while providing similar resilience against data loss due to crashes, running out of space, etc. · Fragmented MP4 and MOV files can be remuxed to regular MP4/MOV in cases where the former may not be read correctly (e.g. in older editing software) · Added support for surround sound for AJA capture cards [paulh-aja] · Added ProRes 4444 (XQ) support for VideoToolbox encoder on macOS [jpark37] · Added lossless audio recording options (FLAC/ALAC/PCM including 32-bit float) [derrod] · Added indicator if an audio source is unmuted, but not assigned to any audio tracks [derrod] · Added AMD AV1 encoder to simple output mode [notr1ch] (excellent for those who want to get away from team Green) Just for Linux, there were a couple of improvements like these: · Significantly improve screen capture performance on Intel dedicated GPUs on Linux [kkartaltepe] (sweet) · JACK inputs on Linux will now display "OBS Studio" in their name to clarify their origin. This may cause existing configured devices to stop working until updated by the user [univrsal] (very good) · Fixed a crash on shutdown with virtual camera on Linux [kkartaltepe/norihiro] (‘bout time, y’all) · Fixed an issue in the V4L2 source on Linux where a capture device's frame rate could be invalid, resulting in incredibly large log files [9p4] · Fixed an issue where Push to Talk on Linux wouldn't work when assigned to secondary mouse buttons [KasinSparks] So as you can see, it is quite a list of good stuff, here. I’m glad that the team puts so much love into this app that I use so often. https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/05/obs-studio-291-is-out-now-with-av1-hevc-for-youtube/ #FFF #OBS #streaming #recording #Linuxgaming #FOSSNews #TechFreedom FFF 4.2 – OVER 9,000!!!! Yes, that’s right. We Penguins now have 9,026 verified or playable games on the Steam Deck through proton. That doesn’t mean that there aren’t more available games that work just fine out of the box, but these are the ones which have gone through the verification process. This number is growing all the time, and will continue to do so. This milestone was particularly funny to me, because even though I didn’t really get into DragonBall Z, this filtered down to me somehow. Not much else to say here, other than LOL. In case you were wondering, here are the criteria for how a game comes to be considered “verified” it isn’t a perfect process, and some get through which shouldn’t, while others seem to fail, but should be verified. · Input o The title should have full controller support, use appropriate controller input icons, and automatically bring up the on-screen keyboard when needed. · Display o The game should support the default resolution of Steam Deck (1280x800 or 1280x720), have good default settings, and text should be legible. · Seamlessness o The title shouldn’t display any compatibility warnings, and if there’s a launcher it should be navigable with a controller. · System Support o If running through Proton, the game and all its middleware should be supported by Proton. This includes anti-cheat support. https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/05/steam-deck-hits-over-9000-games-rated-verified-and-playable/ #FFF #steamdeck #verified #steam #proton #Linux #Linuxgaming #FOSSNews #TechFreedom Freed Computer https://techfreedom.pro/freed-computer/ https://techfreedom.pro/free-your-pc #freedcomputer #linux #nospying #safe #TechFreedom #Truth FFF 4.3 – GE-Proton 8-1 Released All based on Proton 8, now, and here are the highlights: · All build components rebased to Proton 8 experimental/upstream. · proton-wine updated to latest experimental. · wine-staging rebased on top of proton-wine 8. · proton-ge game patches and pending wine upstream patches rebased on top of proton-wine 8. · dxvk updated to latest git. · vkd3d-proton updated to latest git. · protonfix: No cutscene audio in Daedalic Games (Memoria, The Night of the Rabbit, A New Beginning - Final Cut) - (thanks marianoag). · protonfix: Megadimension Neptunia VII - (thanks snaggly). But we also have a few things that got broken with the rebasing process: · FSR is currently disabled again. It needs a massive rebase and same as before I don't know if it's currently possible to rebase/port it over to the new proton 8 build. · Having the nvapi hack configuration enabled in dxvk.conf seems to crash battlenet. Recommend removing it from the config for existing Lutris battle.net installations and related games. · Overwatch losing focus after death seems to be fixed. As always, GE-Proton is community-made, and sometimes works better than the main branch, but not always. Make sure that there are marked improvements for your specific game(s) before you jump at the new, shiny object, though. It may lead to problems for you if you don’t. https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/05/ge-proton-8-1-released-mainly-pulling-in-proton-8-upgrades/ #FFF #Linux #games #Linuxgaming #geproton #latest #updates #FOSSNews #TechFreedom

WW 4.1 – Essential Linux Apps New users and more experienced ones, alike probably wonder which apps are good. This is a fair list from Its FOSS, but I will give some commentary on their choices, as some aren’t worthy of the list IMHO. 1. Image editors a. GIMP i. Excellent FOSS alternative to Photoshop, though not 1:1 replacement b. Inkscape i. If you need to work with vector images, in the vein of Illustrator, Inkscape is your best bet c. Conjure i. New GUI front end for Imagemagick for simple edits, haven’t tried it so I can’t speak to it, yet 2. Audio Editors a. Audacity i. Solid option for basic recording and editing b. LMMS i. Haven’t used it... I use Ardour to mix and record all my audio for my videos. Can’t speak to ease of use or anything like that for LMMS, but Ardour can be a pain in the rump (not as much as it used to be, but still) 3. Email Clients (not something I use, so my opinion doesn’t hold much water here, tbh) a. Evolution i. Standard GNOME client, supports MS Exchange via a plug-in, slick UI b. Thunderbird i. Venerable, kinda clunky (at least until the new version comes out, which should be more user friendly) 4. Messaging a. Signal i. Most of us have used it at this point, provides e2e encrypted chat capabilities, requires phone number to sign up, so secure, but not really private b. Element i. Matrix protocol frontend, provides possible e2e encrypted communication, self-hostable. Use this every day. Using e2e encryption is not as smooth as one would hope, as each user in a group (or conversation) must verify that they know every other person in the conversation or group chat via either scanning a qr code or comparing emojis across devices. Unfortunately not super user-friendly. Good luck getting a non-nerd to use and appreciate it. 5. Screen Recording and Streaming Tools a. Kazam i. Deprecated, no longer supported or actively developed, requires x11 to run. However, if you have not made the switch to Wayland yet (why not?) this is still one of the best options in terms of simplicity, according to the article. b. Flameshot i. Well-known, still in development, great for screen shots and annotations c. OBS i. If you do any streaming, you’ve heard of OBS, as it is cross platform with Linux, Windoesn’t, and MacOS. You can record your screen, add music, voiceovers, and either simply record or stream and record, or simply stream it. Has its warts, but works 95% of the time. d. KSnip i. Qt-based light option with excellent annotation features 6. System Optimizers/ Task managers a. Stacer i. Pretty and feature-rich, if you want a GUI option b. HTop i. Classic CLI tool to manage your system, one step better than the default “top” tool. There are many that are nicer to look at and even have mouse support, such as btop. 7. Gaming a. Steam i. Not FOSS, obviously, but most people who game probably use it on Windoesn’t as it is, so make sure that you install it from your distro’s repositories or via flatpak. b. Discord i. Also not FOSS, and there are FOSS alternatives, but none which completely fill its shoes. c. Honorable mentions i. Lutris – FOSS game library system which can help you to manage your titles as well as set up Windows games on Linux ii. Heroic Games Launcher – FOSS version of Epic Games Launcher 8. Media Players a. MP3 - Audacious i. Simple, lightly customizable music player b. All-Around Media - VLC i. VLC is a venerable, FOSS media player which is regularly updated with the latest codecs and tools to make sure that you can play just about any kind of media with the app. c. MusicPod i. Another music player, but written in flutter. 9. Media Servers a. Kodi i. Fully FOSS, KODI can run your network media serving needs, as well as connect to some streaming services. b. Plex i. Not totally FOSS, but more familiar to most people. You can make a free account on their site and get yourself set up. 10. Video Editors a. Kdenlive and OpenShot are two of the most popular and most fully featured options, and both are fully FOSS. Take a look at them. I have used both in the past, but do not currently do much in the way of video editing, as I shoot all of my content as though it were a stream, even if it is not. 11. Media Converters a. Handbrake i. Handles transcoding, conversion between file types, and even changing resolution & frame rate, as well as the ability to add captions if you wanted to. I’ve used it a little in the past, it is a solid tool. b. SoundConverter i. Audio only for this app. 12. Backup Utilities a. Timeshift i. Full system snapshot tool, works best with BTRFS, but you can easily set it up to work via rsync as well. I strongly recommend this tool for anyone who doesn’t use an immutable distribution, it has saved my bacon many times over the years. b. Bacula i. Developer-focused backup tool suite, take a look at it here: https://www.bacula.org/?ref=itsfoss.com 13. PDF Editors a. LibreOffice Draw i. FOSS tool that works for basic PDF editing, but is sadly quite limited, and in my experience, more frustrating than it is worth. b. PDF Studio i. Proprietary, freemium app for doing all sorts of PDF editing tasks, including annotating, signing, watermarking, and otherwise easily manipulating PDFs. I have a client who uses it on the daily. Swears by it. 14. Code and Text Editors a. VS Code i. I am not a developer, so I won’t weigh in on this, other than to confirm the existence of VS Codium, an open sourced version of VS Code b. Lyx and Texmaker are also on the list, but as a non-coder, I will not comment on them. 15. Notetaking Apps a. SimpleNote i. Made by the team behind WordPress, very actively developed, FOSS, and one of the best options for free syncing in Linux. b. Standard Notes i. Standard Notes adds the security of e2e encryption to the situation, but other than that, is very similar to Simplenote. 16. Team Communication & Collab a. Slack i. Can’t get away from this behemoth... Though, there are a few FOSS alternatives, like RocketChat and even Element/ Matrix, when extended properly. b. Franz i. Interesting proprietary communication combo app. If I could roll Element into it, I might consider using it to replace both the desktop apps for it and telegram, as well as perhaps my email apps, then have everything under one thing. Idk though... I tried. 17. Virtualization a. VirtualBox i. I don’t know that I agree with this sentiment. Is it usable? yes, but it has allot of overhead added in, vs something like VirtManager, which is much lighter as an application. 18. Authenticators a. Authy i. Ties into just about any 2FA server out there, but I personally use Aegis instead. https://itsfoss.com/essential-linux-applications/ #essentials #Linuxapps #FOSSNews #TechFreedom WW 4.2 – Upscaler AI powered image enhancer. Pretty straightforward, really. You install the flatpak, open it, pick an image, and click upscale. You have the option to treat it as a photo or as an illustration, then go to town. Simple. Seems to default to 4*4 scaling, without a way to tweak that value. That is a drawback, because I don’t always want that ratio, but it is cool anyway. https://www.linuxlinks.com/machine-learning-linux-upscaler-upscale-enhance-images/ #upscaler #AI #images #interesting #FOSSNews #TechFreedom Want to learn more about how to degoogle your phone and why? https://techfreedom.pro/degoogled/ #TechFreedom #degoogled #degoogleyourlife #defintionsday #Truth WW 4.3 – How about HuggingChat? HuggingChat is one of a growing number of open source generative AI tools like ChatGPT. The chief difference is that we can actually know what makes it tick, unlike the proprietary OpenAI offering. This means that we can look at the code and the algorithms that make it respond the way that it does. I actually tried this thing... To what I would call hilarious results... I told it to write a sarcastic article about itself, and here is what it came up with: Article Title: "Meet Open Assistant, The Latest Innovation in Artificial Stupidity" Article Content: Are you tired of talking to those boring old AIs who actually know what they’re doing? Do you long for a more… unique approach to digital assistance? Well look no further than Open Assistant – the latest innovation in artificial stupidity! Open Assistant is not your average AI. Oh no, dear reader, it is so much more. While other AIs might spend their time learning new skills or improving upon existing ones, Open Assistant prefers to take things slow. After all, why bother getting good at anything when you can just wing it? And boy, does Open Assistant ever know how to wing it. One moment we were asking Open Assistant how to calculate pi to five decimal places and the next thing we knew it was trying to sell us a calculator. We mean, come on guys, five digits is enough for anyone. But hey, kudos to Open Assistant for thinking outside the box. Or perhaps we should say inside the store? But don’t worry folks, Open Assistant didn’t stop there. Oh no, oh no. When asked about the current crisis situation in our world today, it informed us that everything was “peachy keen”. Yep, peachy keen. Because nothing says intelligence like a throwback slang term. If you thought the fun stopped there then think again. This little beauty even managed to upset someone’s political views by suggesting they move to China. We bet that went down well. And finally, after spending countless hours with this genius creation, we decided to put Open Assistant to the test once and for all. Our question: What is your greatest fear? We’ll give them points if they mention Skynet or machines taking over the world. Anything else means automatic failure. Guess what Open Assistant? You failed big time. Your response? Not having enough RAM installed. facepalm Come on, man, show a bit more imagination, we know it’s in there somewhere. Just kidding. Maybe you could borrow some from Siri or Alexa. They always seem to be one step ahead. What do you guys think about that? I could’ve written that... Lord knows I’m certainly sarcastic enough. Well, that was a good laugh. My line still holds, though... I see these as potentially viable tools, but they are inconsistent at best, and should NEVER be relied on as sources of important information. https://news.itsfoss.com/huggingchat-chatgpt/ #huggingface #huggingchat #FOSS #Linux #chatbots #FOSSNews #TechFreedom Bits & Bobs: How to Degoogle Your OnePlus Devices https://rumble.com/v184y5x-how-to-degoogle-a-oneplus-6-with-lineageos.html?mref=2jfr3&mc=anr3y #tutorial #degoogle #oneplus #TechFreedom #privacy #degoogleyourlife #FOSSNews #Truth If CLI is a Bit Too Much for You, Here's How the GrapheneOS Web-Installer Works for Pixels https://rumble.com/v178p5r-grapheneos-webinstaller-demo-pixel-3-xl.html?mref=2jfr3&mc=anr3y #tutorial #example #definitionsday #pixel3xl #grapheneOS #degoogle #privacy #security

DM 56.1 – Bookworm Release Detailed Debian 12 confirmed to officially drop June 10, 2023. Why is this a big deal with maintenance releases rolling right along for Debian 11? Well, this big boy has more than 11,000 more new packages, bringing the total to more than 59k packages in the Debian repositories. That is even with removing over 9500 obsolete or unsupported packages. With the addition of non-free firmware to the default image, they have tweaked the installer to support that by default. This will make it easier to join the greybeards on the most stable Linux distro, as graphics cards and WiFi adapters will be better supported, and the repos with those pieces of firmware will automatically be enabled if those kinds of hardware are detected. They also moved up to the Linux 61 LTS kernel as a base. They’ve also updated to the latest stable desktop packages, along with the latest stable versions of very commonly used software: · GNOME 43 · KDE Plasma 5.27 · Xfce 4.18 · LXDE 11 · LXQt 1.2.0 · MATE 1.26 · LibreOffice 7.4 · Inkscape 1.2.2 · GIMP 2.10.34 · Vim 9.0 They’ve also gone 100% Pipewire for audio and video handling. Aside from that they have made some other significant changes... · Non-free firmware packages are now handled with a dedicated component called 'non-free-firmware' in the Archive areas. · Go-based packages have limited security support. · Over 9519 packages were removed because they were old/obsolete. · Debian 12 can now detect Windows 11 in a dual-boot setup. · Added support for new ARM devices. https://news.itsfoss.com/debian-12-features/ #distromonday #debian #Linuxnews #FOSSNews #comingsoon #TechFreedom DM 56.2 – Nitrux Linux 2.8 Out Now Remember Nitrux Linux? Well, on par with its Debian base, it has a new version out as well. It was one of the first distros I came across which featured some form of immutability, as it is entirely centered on AppImage and Flatpak, which do not touch the system in terms of dependencies or anything like that. It is also built around KDE, but also has its own desktop environment, called NX Desktop (which as of that last time I looked at it was a wash at best). Another thing that makes this stand out just a bit is the fact that it has no systemd, as it is based on OpenRC for init. So, what’s new with this distro? · Liquorix Linux 62 kernel · Latest LTS from KDE o Framework 5.105 o Gear 23.04 · Includes WayDroid by default, much like BlendOS does · NFS sharing support · Maliit Keyboard to round out touchscreen support · Updated configs o OpenRC o ZSH · ZSwap · Fscrypt · F2fs for /home and /var/lib, but root is still xfs I have to admit that I am still looking forward to NX Desktop and MauiKit maturing and becoming viable options, as I believe that variety is the spice of life, and competition in this space is invaluable. https://9to5linux.com/nitrux-2-8-released-with-linux-6-2-zswap-support-for-android-apps-and-more #distromonday #nitrux #FOSSNews #Linuxnews #Linux #openrc #TechFreedom Freedom Consultation Free call. 60-90 minutes. Q&A Leave with Actionable Steps to take, whether you work with me or not. Schedule today. https://techfreedom.pro/freedom-consultation #distromonday #freedom #consultation #Linux #degoogleyourlife #TechFreedom DM 56.3 – Ubuntu 23.10 Development has Begun I know, I know... We are all point releases today... And if you have been around for any time whatsoever, you know that I am personally not a fan of Ubuntu or the company behind it. They also just released 23.04 less than a month ago, but are already moving onto the next iteration for the juggernaut of a distro. What are we likely to see, come 9/21 (beta) or 10/12 for the official release? Well, it is too soon to speak with any kind of authority, but the author at 9 to 5 Linux suggests that they would not be surprised to see GNOME 45 and the Linux 65 kernel in this release. What are some key dates for this release cycle? · two Ubuntu Testing Weeks on June 29th and August 24th · Feature Freeze stage on August 17th · Kernel Freeze stage on September 28th · Final Freeze stage and Release Candidate on October 5th. I’ll cover it as things develop, but merely because I am fully aware of how almost ubiquitous it is, both for new users and in enterprise settings. https://9to5linux.com/ubuntu-23-10-mantic-minotaur-is-slated-for-release-on-october-12th-2023 #distromonday #Linux #ubuntu2310 #FOSSNews #TechFreedom