thelinuxexperiment

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#Linux #OpenSource #TechNews

00:00 Intro 00:47 Sponsor: Thunderbird 01:40 Microsoft has to open Windows 03:22 FSF calls to the EU for more open source 05:06 AMD is teasing some FOSS work around AI 06:36 Peertube's roadmap looks pretty awesome 08:21 Desktop Environment news 10:47 Kernel 6.7 is full of good stuff 12:39 Gaming: Deck OLED, SteamOS update, Wine on Wayland 15:40 Sponsor: Get a PC made to run Linux 16:36 Outro

Microsoft has to open Windows

https://www.theverge.com/2023/11/16/23963579/microsoft-windows-11-eu-digital-markets-act-feature-changes

FSF calls to the EU for more open source

https://fsfe.org/activities/upcyclingandroid/openletter.en.html

AMD is teasing some FOSS work around AI

https://www.phoronix.com/news/AMD-Advancing-AI-Open

Peertube's roadmap looks pretty awesome

https://framablog.org/2023/11/14/lets-regain-ground-on-the-toxic-web-framasofts-2023-report/

Desktop environment news

https://pointieststick.com/2023/11/17/this-week-in-kde-panel-intellihide-and-wayland-presentation-time/

https://thisweek.gnome.org/posts/2023/11/twig-122/

Kernel 6.7 is full of good stuff

https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2023/11/linux-6-6-kernel-confirms-long-term-support

https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-6.7-rc1

https://www.phoronix.com/news/Linux-6.7-USB-Thunderbolt

https://www.phoronix.com/review/bcachefs-linux-67

Gaming: Deck OLED, SteamOS update, Wine on Wayland

https://9to5linux.com/steam-deck-oled-is-now-available-to-order-with-hdr-display-and-bigger-battery

https://www.phoronix.com/news/SteamOS-3.5.5

https://www.phoronix.com/news/Wine-Wayland-HiDPI-Merged

https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/11/wine-820-brings-directmusic-improvements-and-preparations-for-wine-90/

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#Linux #Flatpak #Snap #AppImage

00:00 Intro 00:47 Sponsor: Proton VPN 02:17 Quick summary of formats 05:52 Performance benchmarks 08:52 Sandboxing 11:41 Missing Features 15:24 Parting Thoughts 16:59 Sponsor: Get a PC made to run Linux 18:00 Support the channel

So, what we call "packages" are debs, for Debian and Ubuntu based distros, and RPMs for Red Hat and SUSE based distros. These packages can contain libraries, or apps, and all libraries are shared between applications.

We then have Flatpaks, which are distro-agnostic. Flatpaks are sandboxed, and while they share a lot of libraries through runtimes, they can use more space over time.

Snaps are basically the same concept as flatpaks, made by Ubuntu. There are a few technical differences with flatpaks, the big one being that Snaps are suitable for graphical apps, and for command line programs.

AppImages are a more portable format: the whole app is shipped inside a single file, with most, if not all of its libraries. This means you can copy/paste apps from a system to another, and they run on any distro that has access to FUSE2.

Now, let's look at some performance comparison between different packaging formats. I ran all these tests on the same Ubuntu 23.04 VM, with 16 gigs of RAM, 4 cores of my 13th gen i7 13700h.

Judging from the results, we can see that all packaging formats take longer to start than basic deb packages. It's especially visible with heavy apps that need to do some setup when they first open, like LibreOffice or GIMP. But we also notice that on subsequent openings of an app, all packaging formats are pretty close.

I ran the Speedometer test in all 4 versions of Firefox: the snap performs worse for jetstream, but much better for Speedometer, while flatpak performs on par for SPeedometer, but worse for jetstream. Deb packages perform well for jetstream, but worse for speedometer., and the Appimage is generally just a good performer.

A sandboxed application runs in its own environment, with very few ways to access things outside of that sandbox. This is similar to how web browsers run each tab in a separate process.

Regular packages aren't sandboxed by default: basically it means that you should only install these packages from sources you trust: either your distro's repos, or well vetted third party repos.

As per Flatpaks, they're all sandboxed. The sandbox isn't 100% bulletproof, nothing is, but it does limit what the app can access. This is all managed through app permissions, much like what you'd find in Android or iOS apps.

Snaps can be sandboxed, but the sandbox isn't mandatory: developers can decide to not use it, although this triggers a manual review of the snap app when it's uploaded to the Snap Store, to check if it does anything weird. As per AppImages, they don't have a sandbox natively.

Now let's see what's missing in terms of features. Regular packages can access everything, so there are no missing features there.

Flatpaks and snaps have more restrictions. The main missing piece is native messaging support: this is what lets an app communicate with another, and one main use case is for password managers: currently, no web browser packaged as flatpak or snap can interact with a third party password manager reliably.

Support for the system theme is also not perfect for snaps and flatpaks, or for AppImages.

As per various problems with these packaging formats, you also have the size of packages: while Snaps and Flatpaks do share libraries between apps, they don't share as much as regular packages, which means they can take up more space.

Snaps also have the added problem that they mount each app in its own virtual filesystem, that is decompressed on the fly: this can clutter your mount points, which can be annoying if you need to manage these regularly. The Snap Store backend is also proprietary, and it's centralized.

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Murena 2 campaign (not sponsored, no affiliate commission): https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/murena/murena-2-switch-your-privacy-on

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#privacy #google #android

00:00 Intro 01:08 The Phone: Murena 2 02:36 Specifications 05:17 eOS on the Murena 2 10:46 Price and availability 13:03 Sponsor: Get a PC made to run Linux 14:08 Support the channel

This isn't the completely finalized design, so the back of the phone, and the protection that came in the box aren't completely final and might change a little.

The very point of the Murena 2 is to offer a privacy focused phone: it comes with /e/ OS, and it has a privacy switch to disconnect the cameras and microphone, and another switch to completely shut off any connectivity the phone has. The first switch, for the camera and mic is a physical one: it completely shuts off the connection to the camera and the mic.

The connectivity switch is purely software, and will just turn on airplane mode and will mute your phone, so it's more a "big do not disturb" mode than a privacy switch.

It comes with a mediatek CPU, with 4 performance cores at 2.1Ghz and 4 efficiency cores at 2 Ghz, it has 8 gigs of RAM, 128 gigs of storage, plus a micro SD slot. It supports dual SIM, and the OLED screen is 6.43 inches and a resolution of 1080x2400, plus a hole punch cut out for the selfie camera, which is 25 megapixels.

On the back, you get 3 camera lenses, one is the standard lens, at 64 megapixels, one is an ultrawide, at 13 MP and one is a telephoto lens at 5 Megapixels.

It has a 4000 milliamp hour battery, with support for high speed charging at 18W, it supports Wifi ac and bluetooth 4.2, and it's 4G, not 5G.

They also say they have a 6 out of 10 on repairability, and they'll offer spare parts and schematics for easy repair. They'll provide 5 years of support for the software at least.

On the Murena 2, /e/ OS runs OK. It's not perfectly smooth, animations can sometimes jitter a bit, but generally, the experience is what you'd expect from a mid range Android smartphone: it's not high refresh rate, buttery smoothness, but it's definitely not annoying. In some apps, you'll definitely notice stutters, like in the App Lounge when scrolling, but navigating the phone is good enough, and video playback and games run well.

Haptics don't seem to be perfectly configured yet, as typing on the keyboard provides a very tiny sort of clicky rattle instead of a nice vibration, and going back using gestures also doesn't feel super tactile, but that's probably because it's a pre production model.

The 2 privacy switches work perfectly, with the one on the right toggling airplane mode and do not disturb, and the one on the left shutting down the camera and the mic, both have a little LED as well to indicate that these switches are on, although handling of that could be improved, as launching the camera app with the privacy toggle on, will spit out an error, instead of a smoother message indicating your privacy toggle is on.

Testing the phone further, the screen is really nice and bright, with very vivid colors, it feels pretty damn nice to use, but that's probably because it's OLED.

The cameras are pretty basic, the telephoto had a very hard time focusing on anything for me, but the other 2 worked fine, although you won't find the same kind of post processing you'll get on most Android phones, so your pictures might not look as sharp or well balanced as on, say, a Pixel or even a Samsung A series phone. The front facing camera, though, is pretty solid, and produces nice pictures all things considered.

The speakers are decent enough for a phone, they won't blow you away or anything, but they get pretty loud without distorting too much or at all. They are bottom firing, there's no "stereo" speaker using the earpiece of the phone. The microphone isn't great though, your vocal messages and phone calls won't sound extremely crisp.

With the kickstarter, the phone is 399€, without it, it will be 499€.

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#internet #ads #marketingdigital

00:00 Intro 00:44 Sponsor: Learn how to deal with ransomware attacks 01:32 The ad-based internet 04:08 Twitter: anything but the kitchen sink 05:46 Reddit: shooting themselves in the foot 07:14 Youtube: nickel and diming 08:58 Alternative platforms won't save us 11:43 Three possible outcomes 14:41 The Ad Based internet is on its way out 15:13 Sponsor: Get a PC that was made to run Linux 16:02 Support the channel

Google has shown that with enough scale, just running ads on a website is enough to keep the content free of charge. But of course, as with everything where money is involved, it went way too far. This limited the ad revenue, and so websites decided to add more ads.

To compound that, ads started paying less and less, so websites started chasing profits by making the internet worse for everyone.

Twitter's revenue is 89% ads. It has existed for more than 10 years, and has never made any money. So even at that scale, ads are just not working to sustain a company.

All the changes Musk is making to Twitter, like firing most of the workforce, charging for the API, limiting the number of tweets, Twitter Blue, it's all to try and turn a profit. So, the experience of Twitter is now ten times worse, because ads don't work.

Now let's look at Reddit. Reddit is about as popular as Twitter. And Reddit isn't profitable either. They're kept afloat by raising money from investors. And so Reddit charges for their API now. Reddit made their site worse for everyone: the regular users, and also everyone browsing the internet and landing on reddit to see a "this subreddit is private" message, making any web search ultra inefficient.

And we can also look at Youtube. Youtube is HUGE. And it's hard to know if youtube is profitable or not. The consensus seems to be that it is, but the actions of youtube seem to indicate that maybe it's not THAT profitable. For example, youtube seems to be planning some moves against adblockers. Youtube is also taking steps against third party frontends, like Invidious. They wouldn't do stuff like that if profit growth was awesome.

I love alternative platforms, but they'll probably never replace the giant ones: they don't offer a business model for people to create content on them.

As a user, you probably don't care about that. And the person running the instance of said platform maybe is ready to fund it out of pocket, but the people creating the content on these platforms? They're not making money from them.

And so as ad-based internet models start dying off, I have a feeling we're going to be faced with 3 options

First, the big platforms survive as-is with the ads, you can still have ads on your own website, but the platforms will start keeping more and more of the ad revenue.

This is where we're heading now. People are tired of ads and their privacy invasion, and the over abundance of them, but platforms seem to think this is the way to go.

Second option, the big platforms and websites evolve to another model, like paywalling everything behind a paid subscriptions like Youtube Premium.

It would basically kill off an entire portion of the internet, but it probably wouldn't be the worst portion to lose.

Third option, the big platforms and the internet as a whole can't find a new model to replace ad based ones, and big platforms and big websites die off. Content creation becomes a hobby mostly.

This is probably the best outcome for the internet as a whole, as it would probably kill off most clickbait, disinformation, AI generated crap. We would have far less things to read and watch, but a lot of if would be higher quality.

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#Linux #OpenSource #TechNews

00:00 Intro 00:38 Sponsor: Regain control of your internet connection 01:35 Ubuntu's new app store favors snaps over debs 03:36 GNOME 45 alpha is out 05:09 Fedora plans to add telemetry 06:59 Canonical takes control of the Linux Container Daemon 08:13 Ubuntu will let you pick the apps you want at install 09:39 Solus 4.4 and Budgie 11 news 11:24 Gaming News: Steam Deck wins Linux gaming, Steam beta 12:44 Sponsor: Get a PC that was made to run Linux 13:43 Support the channel

Ubuntu's new app store favors snaps over debs

https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2023/07/ubuntu-23-10-new-app-store-deb-support

GNOME 45 alpha is out

https://9to5linux.com/gnome-45-alpha-is-now-available-for-public-testing-heres-whats-new

Fedora plans to add telemetry

https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/devel@lists.fedoraproject.org/thread/55H3DT5CCL73HLMQJ6DK63KCAHZWO7SX/

https://linuxiac.com/fedora-40-plans-to-use-telemetry/

https://blogs.gnome.org/wjjt/2023/07/05/endless-oss-privacy-preserving-metrics-system/

Canonical takes control of the Linux Container Daemon

https://linuxcontainers.org/lxd/

https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2023/07/canonical-takes-full-control-of-lxd

https://linuxiac.com/lxd-containers-project-goes-under-canonical-wing/

Ubuntu will let you pick the apps you want at install

https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2023/07/ubuntu-new-unified-install-plans-sound-meh

https://discourse.ubuntu.com/t/rethinking-ubuntu-desktop-a-more-thoughtful-default-installation/36736

Solus 4.4 and Budgie 11 News

https://linuxiac.com/solus-os-4-4-released/

https://blog.buddiesofbudgie.org/wayland/

Gaming News: Steam Deck wins Linux gaming, Steam beta

https://store.steampowered.com/news/group/4397053/view/3666541770799548342

https://www.gamingonlinux.com/2023/07/nearly-40-of-linux-gamers-on-steam-are-on-steam-deck/

https://www.phoronix.com/news/AMD-CPU-Linux-Gaming-67p

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#Linux #linuxdistro #operatingsystem

00:00 Intro 00:35 Sponsor: Stream any OS, desktop or app to any PC 01:29 The Classic Linux Distro Model 02:57 Why it's broken 04:25 Distros are moving away 05:52 The new model isn't perfect, but still better 08:31 All other OSes do this 09:22 Why distros package apps in the first place 10:14 Universal Packages 11:40 You don't have a choice 13:32 Sponsor: Get a PC made to run Linux 14:27 Support the channel

This video was inspired by the following blog post, which echoed my sentiment and ideas exactly: https://www.ypsidanger.com/the-distribution-model-is-changing/

The distro packages the software for their users. Not the developers of the software, the distro itself. So the distro has a decent amount of control over what they offer, but the users of the distro don't, and the developers of the apps also don't. And this model doesn't really work.

On the surface, for users, it does work. You get a lot of applications from a central repo, and the system is generally pretty stable, depending on the distro you pick. But in the background, you have the thousands of orphaned packages that are still in the repos but aren't maintained. The old apps that can't be packaged at all anymore. The maintainers spending a lot of time repackaging and recompiling software that has already been packaged.

One might not like Ubuntu's snap packages, or Flatpak, or AppImages, but it's undeniable that most distros are moving towards them.

When Ubuntu moves Firefox and Chromium from a deb package to a snap, it's a GOOD THING. For Ubuntu. Because instead of having to package each new version of Firefox or CHromium for all currently supported versions of Ubuntu, they only have to package them once.

Same thing when Red Hat drops the LibreOffice RPM in favor of the Flatpak. Not having to package that behemoth of an app will free up time for Red Hat developers to work on HDR, improving Wayland, and supporting color management.

And moving the packaging of an app from the distro to the app developer means less time spent debugging stuff, and more time spend on improving the app.

So why did Linux distros start packaging software instead of app developers?

It was because there were so many different systems using the same packaging formats, deb or RPM or whatever else, but different libraries, kernels, drivers, and everything else, that app developers simply did not have a way to distribute their own software to every distro.

But nowadays, we DO have formats that let you distribute applications everywhere with one single package.

They lack some features, especially due to the sandboxing they tend to use, that limits how they can interact with other apps. Thing is, these formats are still under heavy development.

But the real question is: do you prefer staying on the current model where we stagnate, duplicate work, and where developers and users have no control over which version of the software is used, or would you rather face a few teething issues, but let developers improve their apps, and the whole of the Linux software ecosystem?

I know what I choose, and it's not these old packages. And presumably, if you stick to mainstream distros, like Fedora, Ubuntu, or their main derivatives, chances are you're not going to have a choice either. Because whether you like it or not, we're moving to Flatpak or Snap on most distros.

It's more efficient, and their current problems can and will be fixed. The duplication of work that legacy packaging creates is unfixable, it's a structural problem.

And of course, if you hate these universal packaging formats, I'm sure you'll still be able to find a lot of distros that will not move to them even in the future. You'll just be running the non official version of an app, just like what you're doing right now when using a distro's package.

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#steamdeck #steam #linuxgaming

00:00 Intro 00:45 Sponsor: Secure your internet connection 01:43 What I wanted from this SteamOS Console 02:48 Console in name only 04:39 The specs 06:03 SteamOS / HoloISO: not easy 11:40 Performance: top notch 14:10 Not worth it, but I love it! 15:51 Support the channel

Fix for AMD GPU bad performance https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=271286

I went for a Micro ATX PC, which means that, yes, it doesn't look like a console, but it was easy to install the GPU, it has ample room for cooling, and it sort of fits in my TV cabinet, so who cares. It's a Tuxedo Cube.

So here I have an intel core i7 12700,. I have 32Gigs of 3200Mhz RAM, I have a 1TB PCIE4 SSD, with a 750W modular power supply. For the GPU, I got a Radeon 6650XT off Amazon for 300 euros. The total cost is a bit less than 1400€, which isn't cheap.

On it, I installed HoloISO, which had issues: First, the default kernel they pick doesn't work with a lot of hardware, it lacks support for a bunch of things, so I had no Wifi and no Bluetooth support. Fortunately, they also ship with the holoiso kernel, which is more mainline, and does support a lot more things. You can select it during boot, with GRUB.

So I turned to the controversial Grub customizer, that's a graphical app that lets you tweak your grub boot options. HoloISO, like SteamOS, is based on Arch, but they don't really ship a correct pacman config with the correct repos, so I had to manually edit the pacman config to add the necessary repos to it, and then run a full system update, followed by the install of Grub Customizer.

And it flat out didn't work, it couldn't open the grub config file. That's because that file is preconfigured with conditions to boot with specific options on certain devices. I just commented all these conditions, and then Grub Customizer managed to open the file, and I could set the HoloISO kernel as the default boot option.

All games ran at 720P max. Of course, a simple web search gave me the answer, it's because SteamOS is meant for the steam deck, but you can change all that in the game's properties to select the max resolution you'll allow.

Then, the performance was horrible. I couldn't manage 1080p60 in Spiderman at medium details, Jedi Fallen Order had to run at 768p on medium to even get close to 60FPS, it was a mess, and this system should have been able to give me a lot more.

After a few hours of looking online, I found a solution: some AMD cards on Linux run in low power mode by default, and don't move to full power when you need them to.

But how's the performance then? Well, I can play virtually everything at least at 1440P, max settings at a smooth 60FPS.

I've completed a full playthrough of Spiderman, also running at 1440p high settings, upscaled to 4K through in game FSR. I've played about 13h of Cyberpunk at max details, 1440p upscaled to 4K through the in game FSR, with sharpness turned to the max, and it maintains 60FPS no problem, even when driving around in the city.

I played about a third of Red Dead Redemption 2, also running at 1440p, high settings, upscaled to 4K through HoloISO, at a smooth 60 fps as well. Everything can run at 4K High details, from 50 to 60 FPS.

And so this makes this console a better performer than a PS5, because PS5 rarely runs AAA games at 4K60, generally, if you want 4K high details, you're using quality mode, and you're running at 30FPS, not 60.

The performance mode on PS5 generally runs games at 1440p, and either medium or high details.

Cost wise, compared to a PS5, it's very expensive for a marginal visual improvement. And yet, I love it, and I plan to play everything I can on this and not on the PS5.

Because it runs Linux, and I love Linux. It also works with an Xbox controller, which I prefer to the dualsense 5. Also, my game library is mostly in Steam these days. I can also start a playthrough on my TV, and then pick up my Steam Deck, make sure my saves are synced, and go play on that outside, or in bed, or on holidays.

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#privacy #linux #webbrowser

00:00 Intro 00:37 Sponsor: Proton Mail, the private and encrypted email service 01:51 What's Browser Privacy 03:03 Google Chrome 05:14 Mozilla Firefox & LibreWolf 07:11 Brave 09:14 Tor Browser 10:51 Microsoft Edge 11:57 Opera 12:56 Vivaldi 14:07 What should you use? 15:05 Sponsor: Get a PC that was made to run Linux 16:02 Support the channel

So, Chrome is THE most used browser in the world, on mobile, and on desktop. Out of the box, it doesn't have an ad blocker, or a tracker blocker enabled. To use that browser to the fullest, you'll also need to use a Google Account, and thus everything you do in your browser will be collected unless you specifically disable it.

You can disable a lot of things in your Google account and the web browser settings, but you'll need to download extensions to block the most invasive trackers and limit fingerprinting. Chrome is also not open source.

On Privacy tests.org, we can also see that Chrome has weak fingerprinting resistance.

Firefox has a good reputation for privacy, but it's not the best choice either. By default, it collects telemetry data, including how many tabs you have open, how many windows, how many webpages you visit, the number and type of extensions, duration of your browsing sessions, and some technical data on your OS, the version of the browser, the language, and your IP address in their server logs. Firefox can also use this data to recommend extensions to you.

In terms of protections, Firefox doesn't block tracking scripts or pixels but it does block social media trackers, cross site cookies, cryptominers, plus all tracking when you're in incognito mode. Firefox is open source, so you can be reasonably sure that it doesn't collect more than what it tells you.

If you like Firefox but you don't want the telemetry, and you want improved fingerprinting protection, then there's Librewolf.

Brave offers a lot of what you'd be able to do in another browser with extensions, but it does so out of the box. They call them "shields", and they block ads, trackers, fingerprinters, and cross site cookies by default. They also auto redirect GOogle's AMP pages to the "real" website, and they redirect tracking URLs so you're not even visiting the tracking domain at all.

The ultimate private browser is probably Tor Browser, but it won't be for everyone. Tor Browser blocks everything that the website might want to learn about you, so there's no tracking at all, and no fingerprinting, but ads aren't blocked.

Edge is based on CHromium, the base for CHrome, but they remove everything Google related from it, to mostly replace it with Microsoft related things, like a Microsoft account.

Edge, by default, has an opt-out for telemetry. It will block trackers from third party sites, and some ad trackers as well. It also collects "required" diagnostic data that can't opt out of, and this data is used to personalize ads from microsoft. If you use a microsoft account, you'll also give MS a bunch of data in the process, including device information, usage data, browsing activity, bookmarks and more.

Opera is yet another chromium based browser, which gets the worst results on privacytests.org. It has a unique fingerprint, and doesn't block tracking scripts, or pixels, it doesn't resist fingerprinting, it doesn't remove tracking parameters, and it also doesn't block the major tracking cookies.

It doesn't send "do not track" signals by default either. Their privacy policy also states that they might share personal data with third parties, which can be worrying, as Opera has been bought by a chinese consortium in 2016.

Vivaldi is also a chromium based browser. At first start, it will ask you what you want to block.

Vivaldi doesn't collect any data, browsing history or anything else, even if you use a Vivaldi account, because everything is encrypted in there.

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#Debian #Linux #bookworm

00:00 Intro 00:38 Sponsor: Check out TuxCare's newsletter for news about Linux security 01:24 Debian 12 Stable 02:17 Not completely FOSS anymore 04:24 Desktops: not that outdated 09:16 Apps and packages 11:14 Who it's NOT for 13:02 Debian 12 is a great desktop 14:33 Sponsor: Get a PC that runs Linux perfectly 15:25 Support the channel

KDE Plasma 5.27 video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=onPUaAKoGIM GNOME 43 video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wefK40cjz9s GNOME 44 video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_HZIHvACggs

So, to begin with, Debian 12 moves away from its pure "FOSS" roots. Debian 12 now enables the non-free firmware repo by default IF Debian detects you'll need it on your computer. Just know it's possible to disable this during the boot process.

Debian 12 actually splits non free software into 2 different repos: non-free, which is for packages and apps that don't conform to Debian's guidelines on free and open source software, and non free firmware, which is the same thing, but specifically for drivers and firmware.

Debian isn't generally known for shipping the very latest and greatest desktop environments, but Debian 12 isn't far off. For Plasma users, you get the very latest, KDE 5.27, with all its bug fixes and updates, which means you're not missing out on anything.

If you were using Debian 11, you were using KDE 5.20, so you're jumping a full 7 versions ahead, which means your experience will be drastically better, whatever your use case.

If you're a GNOME user, you'll get GNOME 43, which isn't the latest, but GNOME 44 wasn't a huge update by any means. If you were using Debian 11, you were on GNOME 3.38, which means you'll get a whole 4 new versions worth of features, support, performance improvements.

Of course, Debian 12 also updates virtually every single package and app they ship. You get the LTS kernel version 6.1, and you get the Mesa drivers 22.3, and the nvidia drivers 525.

All in all, 67% of packages were updated from Debian 11, and the repos now include 11000 new packages as well, for a total of more than 64 000.

Of course, Debian 12 isn't a desktop for everyone. If your use case is "I like using the very latest thing", then obviously, it's not for you. If you want the most beginner friendly distro, while Debian isn't a bad choice; it's also not the easiest. If you want to game on Linux, Debian will also not be your first choice.

In the past, I would never have recommended Debian Stable as a desktop for most users. It was too old, too outdated, the older applications in its repos were just not a great experience, and Flatpak wasn't super well supported. Older desktop environments were also lackluster, as each new release brought some crucial improvements that you really couldn't do without.

With the maturity of formats like Flatpak, snaps or AppImages, you don't have to care about what versions of apps are in your repos. If you need something newer, you can get it, without adding a third party repo that might mess up your system's dependencies and shared libraries.

And desktop environments on Linux are now very mature, which means using a 6 month to 2 year old desktop isn't a dealbreaker anymore.

And of course, Debian stable won't be for everyone. Tinkerers, enthusiasts, hobbyists, and people who like to game won't find what they want in Debian 12. But for anyone who just wants a computer that works reliably, day after day, without failed updates or stuff that randomly breaks, Debian 12 is an obvious choice. In terms of combining stability, software availability, and now, hardware support, nothing comes close.

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#rss #socialmedia #linux

00:00 Intro 00:40 Sponsor: Learn about kernel livepatching with this free webinar 01:45 Why social media sucks for news 04:04 What is RSS 04:55 Advantages of RSS 06:49 What can you add to your RSS reader 10:13 Choosing an RSS Reader 13:02 Use RSS, not Social media for your News 13:45 Sponsor: get a PC that runs Linux perfectly with Tuxedo 14:29 Support the channel

The big, main reason social media sucks for news is that they were never designed for that. All the big social media platforms have one goal, and one goal only: to keep you there for as long as they can, so they can show ads, and make more money.

On top of that, things you are subscribed to might also never be shown to you.

You can't really go back to older things, search through what you archived, sort it in a specific way, create your own organization system.

RSS works with 2 components: an RSS Feed Reader, and RSS Feeds. Feeds are what you'll subscribe to: they're just a simple file a lot of websites have, that can be read by the Feed Reader, which will aggregate all these feeds in one place. And RSS has TONS of advantages!

First, you'll only ever get what you subscribed to. There is no algorithm, no recommendations, no ads in between posts. And you can add a LOT of sources: websites, video channels, podcasts, social media accounts, and even newsletters.

Second, all feed readers have organization capabilities.

Third, you can sort things. Fourth, you can go back and search through older articles. Fifth, you can navigate super easily from one article to the other. And finally, it's portable: all readers will let you export and import your feed list.

RSS is all about adding sources, or feeds to your reader.

A lot of websites will display a small orange square icon, which is the RSS logo. Clicking the icon will bring you to the feed, or give you a URL you can copy. That's what you want to add to your feed reader.

But some websites don't have an RSS feed, or an icon to access it. No matter, most RSS feed readers will let you add any website URL, and automatically create an RSS feed for you.

If you want to add videos from a youtube channel, let's say a bearded french Linux content creator, most feed readers will also just let you copy paste the channel's URL and add it as a feed. On Peertube, it's even easier, just click the subscribe button, and you get the ability to access the feed.

You can even add social media posts if you really want to. Using rss.app, you can just copy paste a social media profile in there, and it will spit out an RSS feed you can add to your reader. And you can also add podcasts.

If you're really into RSS, you can also add newsletters. Using the website kill-the-newsletter.com, you can generate an email address and a feed.

The first thing you'll need to pick is obviously an RSS Reader.

If you want a single device solution, it's very easy. On Linux, Newsflash is the one I use. A few web browsers will give you access to an RSS Feed reader built-in, like Opera or Vivaldi, and Thunderbird also has the ability to do that.

If you want the simplest multi-device solution, Feedly is a good bet. You can create a free account, add up to 100 different feeds, create a few folders, and if you want to go over that, they have paid plans. They have mobile apps, and a web interface on PC.

There's also Newsblur, which does the same thing, and is open source, but the free version limits you to 64 feeds.

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#worldwideweb #internet

00:00 Intro 00:38 Sponsor: Learn about the CARTA security model for free 01:25 Big Tech Centralization 05:05 Internet Filtering 08:31 Internet Blackouts 09:44 Alternative Internets 11:22 Signs of healing 13:39 Sponsor: Get a device that runs Linux perfectly 14:32 Support the channel

The first big thing that's killing the open internet is centralization by big companies. Big tech companies like Apple, Google, or Microsoft are making all efforts to ensure that their users stick to their online services and products, and this ends up dictating what parts of the internet you end up accessing or not.

Using a specific web browser means you're using a specific engine, which dictates what you can or can't do online. It's also the search engines from these companies that will dictate which websites surface, and which don't. The algorithms from the platforms you use, like youtube for video, Facebook, or Twitter will define what content you see, and what content you don't.

And then you have the lack of interoperability between services. But this stuff, you can still bypass yourself. More concerning is what countries do to limit what you can and can't access.

https://www.comparitech.com/blog/vpn-privacy/internet-censorship-map/

Countries implement various filters that are basically censorship. Some of it is acceptable, like blocking illegal material, and some of it is more questionable, like blocking websites that reference various copyrighted materials.

All these filters make the internet less open: you can't freely access what you're looking for if your country decides it's not allowed.

When filters aren't enough, countries now implement full internet blackouts, generally to deal with protests against the government's actions. In 2020, 268 million people had their internet access shut down, that's 49% more than in 2019.

While these blackouts are selective, and can still let governments access the internet themselves while the general public can't, they're devastating for a country's economy and business, and they can't be maintained for very long periods of time.

https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/10/the-global-economic-damage-of-internet-blackouts/503093/

https://news.yahoo.com/268-million-people-had-internet-122208785.html

https://www.wired.com/story/iran-internet-blackout-economy/

Now, the ultimate candidate against the open web is what China has built. They might be linked to the general internet everybody else enjoys, but it's a one way street: people can access their websites, but Chinese people can't access most of the rest of the internet, being limited to what the Chinese government allows.

China has built their own entire alternative internet, with their own services and their own websites, and it's not for nothing that we're talking about the great firewall of china, because when you're in there, you can't access anything the government has deemed "not ok".

https://priteshpawar.com/chinese-alternatives-to-popular-apps-and-websites/tech-industry-and-case-studies/priteshpawar/ that it would be a grave mistake to let their citizens have access to information sources that

Of course, it's not all doom and gloom. The internet is showing signs of healing, at least on certain fronts.

First, decentralized services are emerging again, slowly offering alternatives to the big closed down networks. Mastodon for example is a success story of a federated, decentralized network offering a viable alternative to Twitter, and that can talk to a variety of other services, like Pixelfed, Wordpress, Peerube, Castopod, and the like.

Various laws are also being passed, forcing big tech companies to relinquish a bit of control, over their platforms or app stores, for example, with Apple being forced in the EU to have iMessage be interoperable, and allowing 3rd party app stores on iOS.

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00:00 Intro 00:48 Sponsor: Secure and Monitor your Internet Connection with Safing 01:52 Make the interface more familiar and reorder it 05:10 Use Microsoft Fonts 06:51 Improve file compatibility 08:48 Import Templates and Styles 09:32 Add Extensions to get more features 11:05 Other Options 12:58 Sponsor: get a laptop or desktop that runs Linux perfectly 14:01 Support the channel

To switch to a more comfortable interface, open any of the applications of the suite. Click on the "View" menu, then "User interface". By default, it's the standard menubar and toolbar combo, but if you click on "tabbed", you'll see that you can now use a ribbon interface, just like what Microsoft Office uses.

Next, we'll look at the icons. From the tabbed interface, click the main menu, in the top right corner, and select "Options". Then click the "View" menu, and in the "Theme" drop down menu, you'll have plenty of options.

You can also reorder any of the icons from any of the tabs of the ribbon. CLick the main menu again, and then "customize". Then click the "Notebookbar" tab. here, yu'll see the "target" dropdown menu that lets you select which tab you want to change.

To install Microsoft fonts, you generally have a package in your distro's repositories, provided you enabled the non free software ones. the package is generally called ttf-mscorefonts or ttf-mscorefonts installer. On Ubuntu or Ubuntu based distros, for example, open a terminal, and run

sudo apt install ttf-mscorefonts-installer

If you're using an arch based distro, you can find it in your graphical package manager through the AUR. For Fedora, I left a link in the description of the video.

https://www.linuxcapable.com/install-microsoft-fonts-on-fedora-linux/

If you want to use these fonts by default, you can configure that as well. Click the main menu, then Options. Then, go to the name of the app you're using, here it's LibreOffice Writer, and select the "basic fonts" tab.

You'll want to enable all compatibility features. To do that, open the main menu, then Options. In the Load Save tab, click on Microsoft Office, and make sure all the checkboxes are ticked.

Next, in the LibreOffice Writer tab, and the Compatibility tab, tick the "Reorganize form menu to have it MS compatible" checkbox. Also tick the "Word compatible trailing blanks" checkmark.

Next, if you interact with MS Office users a lot, you'll want to send them documents using the Office formats. Click on the "general" tab of the Load / Save panel, and in "Always save as", select Word 2007-365 (docx). Then in the document type dropdown, select spreadsheet, and change the "always save as" field to Excel 2007-365 xlsx, and repeat that step for Presentations and the pptx format.

To import styles and templates, click the "File" tab in Writer, and then "Templates". There, click the "Manage" button, in the top right corner, and click "Import". There, you can select "templates", "presentations", or "styles".

LibreOffice lets you install extensions to add features to the suite. You can head over to extensions.libreoffice.org to view a full list.

To install extensions, download them from the extensions portal, and you'll get a .oxt file. Then, in LibreOffice, click the "Extensions" tab, then the "extensions" menu, and "Extension manager". Click the "Add" button, and go find your oxt file to import it.

After that, these extensions will all display their commands in the "Extensions" tab.

https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Feature_Comparison:_LibreOffice_-_Microsoft_Office

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s87xFvfeg7Y&t=3s