Good article. I learned long ago that, at least the case of your development environment, it’s best to install the latest upstream release instead of just relying on the system provided version. Go makes doing this extremely easy relative to some other languages out there.

I recently started uses dotbot for managing dot files across my systems. It sounds very similar, in terms of the simplicity of the implementation, to yadm. You define a config file in yaml or json and run the “install” script which calls the dotbot utility, passing in your config file. With a simple change to the install script, I’ve been able to create multiple config files, one per environment (work, home, linux, mac, etc.) and I’ve been thinking about how I could automatically sync changes to git whenever I edit a config file. Leaning towards setting up an autocmd in neovim to automatically commit and push changes on save when I have one of the config files open. Just not yet sure how to do this in a way that would only run the sync for the configs and not every json or yaml file on my system. I’ve only ever set up autocmds for specific file extensions but the syntax leads me to believe it’s flexible enough that any arbitrarily specific file name or path could work the same.

This sounds really similar to how I do things but I use Ansible. What are the advantages to something like yadm, that is specifically designed for dot file management, and a generic config management utility like Ansible?

There’s a difference between complaining and providing constructive feedback. This post falls in the former category. If you are a user of a free product and you don’t like how it works, you are entitled to a full, no questions asked, refund. You’re welcome to make suggestions but devs who work hard to provide something at no cost and on their own time owe nobody anything. I’ve seen this play out year after year in the open source community and it’s led to a lot of very good projects shutting down when the developer gets fed up with the demands and behavior of the community of users.

I run Ubuntu on a 2011 MacBook Air. I have to believe a 2012 Pro would also run it without issue

Exactly right. Facebook will factor this in as am expected cost of doing business (if they didn’t already) and their stock will go up. This isn’t a penalty, this is just like paying a bribe. In the end, both are just lining the pockets of officials more interested in appearing to do something for the next news cycle so they can get re-elected.

I think reality lies somewhere in the middle. Yes you have to read and yes you have to configure things but the docs are all on the wiki. There’s a point where this is easier than figuring out how to undo the defaults on, say, Ubuntu and do your own thing without official documentation on it.

Honestly… I don’t get this. It’s a bit more work than other distros but I think that Linux users often get to a point in their Linux journey where customizing a system with defaults is more difficult than just starting from a blank slate.

Are we just going to pretend Debian doesn’t exist?

But if you don’t consent, do they still let you use their services? I’m going to bet that, at best, it’ll be designed to make users think they must consent to use the service.

I love how there’s a whole generation of people who think that we went straight from email to to Slack and Discord. There was a whole, vibrant, ecosystem of XMPP and IRC services before these walled gardens showed up and supplanted open protocols in order to data mine their users.

I’m preaching to the choir in here, obviously, but we’ve been preaching this gospel for years and nobody cared. Not looking so crazy now. Unfortunately, the damage is done. Privacy has lost.

So turn my argument around and replace performance with disk capacity. Cost per gigabyte is so low now that you’ll end up spending more money in electricity compiling the dependency out than you would by having the disk space to not worry about it in the first place.

The irony of the “compiling software on modern hardware isn’t bad at all” argument for Gentoo is that the same hardware hardly benefits from custom compiled software. There was a time when hardware was slow and performance improvements could be made, but that was also back when it took ages to compile software, so there was a trade off of time taken up front for performance during real time usage.

If you want to learn Linux internals, build a system using Linux From Scratch. If you want a system that’s maintainable and highly customizable, run Arch Linux. IMO, Gentoo no longer really has a niche.

For me the tipping point was when ads started becoming malicious. As long as ads are not static and are being served by unaudited and unregulated third parties, they have no home on my browser. I feel bad about it because I understand that some independent sites legitimately need the revenue but unless they provide information about how they vet their ad providers or they only serve static ads, I’m going to block them.

Shamelessly stolen from the HN thread:

Don’t just comment and complain, contact your antitrust authority today: US:

• https://www.ftc.gov/enforcement/report-antitrust-violation
• antitrust@ftc.gov

EU:

• https://competition-policy.ec.europa.eu/antitrust/contact_en
• comp-greffe-antitrust@ec.europa.eu

UK:

• https://www.gov.uk/guidance/tell-the-cma-about-a-competition…
• general.enquiries@cma.gov.uk

India:

• https://www.cci.gov.in/antitrust/
• https://www.cci.gov.in/filing/atd

Email template:

I would like to bring your attention to Google’s recent proposal to add a feature to its Chrome (Chromium family) of browsers called Web Environment Integrity. This provides a mechanism to reinforce Google’s already dominant browser market position by creating a technological control that can be used to nullify a user’s choice of browser, device and operating system. This technology also has the potential for abuse by preventing users from using browser extensions that can enhance security by blocking unwanted and potentially malicious content, as well as browser extensions that help vulnerable users with enhanced accessibility needs, such as color blindness and visual impairment.

Google’s dominant, near-monopoly position in the browser market already harms me as a consumer by reducing browser choices and preventing a competitive market for developing new browsers. Allowing Google to include this feature will reduce my browser choices and consolidate the browser market even further, and it is incumbent on [INSERT AUTHORITY HERE] to take action against this abusive behavior.

I’m curious what you mean by getting hands dirty with system maintenance on Arch. Granted, I have been using Linux and Unix systems at this point longer than many people on here have been alive… but after a year of running Arch on my new laptop, it’s been pretty un-messy. The messy part is really the setup since you have to pick each and every piece, but if you search just about any issue and include “arch Linux” on DDG, the answer is almost always one of the top 5 results and the Archwiki is hands down some of the best Linux documentation currently available.

Oh no… they’re making Linux history videos about things I was alive for… this must be what old feels like

Slackware 10.1 was my first time taking Linux out on the town. Had IBM Thinkpad T23. Thought I was pretty hot stuff. I still have massive respect for the project. They’re one of, if maybe the only, Linux distro out there that comes close to the quality of documentation as FreeBSD and because of that they’re the only distro that still feels like I think Unix felt like, or should feel like… idk maybe that’s nostalgia speaking…

1. Code in Nvim
2. At work we build using shell scripts, for personal stuff it’s usually Make
3. At work, deploy with Jenkins to Kubernetes or through Puppet to real/vm hosts. a. At home, I use Ansible 99% of the time
4. Debugging?

Is it just me, or does this account really seem like a bot account based on post history?