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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: June 16th, 2023

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  • I don’t think that purity testing people is an attractive method of talking about free software? We should meet people where they are, and besides, if games are good, they’re good. Doom started out as proprietary software and got GPL’d. It’s also cool to think that reverse engineering software, like in the case of OpenMorrowwind, is a thing. Besides, I pirate proprietary software all the time with cracked DRM. The harm is in the restriction of user freedom, not necessarily in the existence of the laws if you view the laws as fake and don’t adhere to them. Let’s talk about cracking DRM and decompiling these games. Let’s talk about modding them. Let’s talk about making servers and playing them online together.






  • if is short for input file if is short for output file

    This dd command from the command line is what I use because it is built in and perfectly bare bones for my needs. I like to use the command flag --status=progress to show a status bar while duplicating the data. A word of caution: the dd, or ‘data duplicator’ program is sometimes known as the ‘destroy disk’ program because if you flash the iso file to the wrong disk/drive you can mess up the drive. Use the appropriate level of caution because there is no undo button. You can use the lsblk command to list the block devices on your machine and use the correct device. Quick instructions: use lsblk to list your block devices and locate your flash drive. If the flash drive is mounted (the /sdb/ will have something like /media/files if it is) you can unmount with $umount /path/to/sdb. Once the drive is unmounted you can use the dd program to duplicate the data (iso file) to your drive.




  • I was once like you. You can do it. I like Linux mint. Here’s how to install it: Go to https://www.linuxmint.com/ and see what it’s about. It’s friendly, it’s very Windows like, it just works. Go here for the install guide: https://linuxmint-installation-guide.readthedocs.io/en/latest/ Pick an .iso file and download it. Go to https://etcher.balena.io/#download-etcher To download the program that puts .iso files on USB drives. Use the Balena Etcher program to burn the .iso onto a USB thumb drive. Put your non-redownloadable files with sentimental value in another drive and remove the drive from your computer. Do not skip this step, order another drive if you have to (INB4 new laptop, but don’t forget this with your other machines). Plug in the USB drive that has Linux Mint on it. Power off your computer. Wait 20 seconds. Power on your computer. Mash the F2, F10, F12, and F5 keys until you get to the bios screen, or get to the bios screen if you know some other way. Find the setting that says something like “boot priority” and put USB drive above your C drive. Save and power off. Wait 20 seconds. Power on. Press F12 or whatever key you need to to get to the boot selection screen. Choose the option to boot from the Linux Mint USB drive. This is where you can test drive Linux before installing. Try ctl-alt-t to bust open a terminal. The terminal is your friend, but not required for the install. Close terminal with the command ‘exit’ or ctl-d or ctl-c ctl-d. Double click the install icon on the desktop. Follow instructions. Choose to delete windows forever from your life and put Linux on the hard drive. Follow instructions, they are no harder than any other wizard you have seen to install software. Reboot. Enjoy. Here are some tips: The terminal is your friend. Commands for learning the terminal, because the terminal can teach you to use the terminal (man is short for manual): man man man apt man ls man cd man vi man nano man less man pipe man mkfifo man rm apt search game —> searches for the keyword 'game" apt update ----> this is how to update your cache. Use it to pull your software updates apt upgrade ----> this is how to apply the updates to your machine.

    —End terminal stuff— You can use your machine in the normal way too, same as any windows machine. Look around and explore. All the stuff in the software center is free (gratis). There’s lots of stuff. No more .exes to get software. Look at www.fsf.org to discover why free software is important.

    If you have trouble you can DM me. I will help if I can. Good luck, you got this.




  • My main bone to pick with Plex is that I believe that free and open source software should be gratis (free as in beer). You’re right about the authentication though. I have mine set up with a simple user name and password over http. I rely on the VPN to limit access to the network through a forwarded port. I don’t really like the idea of authentication being done on someone else’s machine for privacy reasons, which is why I choose jellyfin that runs on my local machine. I’m not currently sharing it, and if I did I would change some of my security practices.







  • I have this exact use case too. I use Linux Mint with Jellyfin installed from the built in software hub. You cannot find it from the command line because it’s a snap. The software app works and provides one click installation. Clicking on the jellyfin icon in your start menu brings up a browser tab that you can use to configure http access if you want. I use a raspberry pi running pihole and pivpn for a VPN and the wireguard app on my phone to connect to that VPN. This works on my cellphone over the network and allows me to access the jellyfin media via the jellyfin app. I think it works nicely. I have jellyfin media player on the laptops and the streaming works on the lan. I will caution that I haven’t been able to easily set up wireguard on the laptops. I use phone to stream, so this might just be a motivation problem on my part.