May 22, 2017

You may have noticed some changes to the site! At least I hope you have… Here’s a quick guide to the various rationales:

  1. I shortened the site name to Linux Rig. The My quickly began to feel a little personal, like it was about my Linux setup, rather than everyone‘s. I was able to buy the domain a few years ago and I’ve been waiting to use it. I’m sure I overthought it a bit, but a shorter URL usually doesn’t hurt.

  2. Linux Rig now has a logo! Interviewing Elio got me thinking about the importance of design in everything. I worked with a great designer who managed to get that cool logo out of the idea of penguins and computers…

  3. I’m off Tumblr. I love(d) Tumblr. The community is great and the backend is super easy to use. But I’ve been nervous about depending upon them ever since Yahoo! bought them. Yahoo! getting sold didn’t make me feel any better. So now I’m on hosted WordPress. The migration was pretty smooth and the hosted support has been great. I’m curious about Ghost, but it’s pretty pricey.

  4. I also decided to migrate the site after Dropbox killed its public folder which I used to host my images (Tumblr’s image hosting could be a bit wonky). If I was going to manually change a ton of image links, I figured I should just do it in a new CMS.

It’s interesting to note that despite all of my writing about the dangers of closed, proprietary systems, I found myself trapped in two (Tumblr and Dropbox). It’s also interesting to note that the closed, proprietary systems ultimately created a lot of work for me! But in the end, I’m glad to be in a new CMS with a new look. And it was interesting going through so many old posts. This site began as a simple, public journal about learning to use Xubuntu and it’s evolved into something much bigger (like a book!).

Feel free to let me know about any issues, thoughts, or suggestions! Or to let me interview you about your Linux setup.

The Linux Setup – Àlex Fiestas, KDE

May 9, 2017

Àlex’s interview is short and sweet. He has a great blog where he delves into KDE and he works on the interesting-looking eyeOS.

You can find more of The Linux Setup here.

You can follow Linux Rig on Google+ here and follow me on Twitter here.

  1. Who are you, and what do you do?

    I’m Àlex Fiestas. In my free time I hack on libre software projects such as KDE.

  2. Why do you use Linux?

    Free software matters to me. I try to use as much as I can to be in control of my computing.

  3. What distribution do you run on your main desktop/laptop?

    Arch Linux.

  4. What desktop environment do you use and why do you use it?

    Plasma.

  5. What one piece of Linux software do you depend upon? Why is it so important?

    KDevelop. It is one of the best IDEs in the world.

  6. What kind of hardware do you run this setup on?

    Macbook Pro 13″ Retina display, with three screens.

  7. Will you share a screenshot of your desktop?

    Sure.

Àlex Fiestas's desktop

Interview conducted September 23, 2016

The Linux Setup is a feature where I interview people about their Linux setups. The concept is borrowed, if not outright stolen, from this site. If you’d like to participate, drop me a line.

You can follow Linux Rig on Google+ here, follow me on Twitter here, and subscribe to the feed here.

May 4, 2017

For months, Mr. Kalanick had pulled a fast one on Apple by directing his employees to help camouflage the ride-hailing app from Apple’s engineers. The reason? So Apple would not find out that Uber had been secretly identifying and tagging iPhones even after its app had been deleted and the devices erased — a fraud detection maneuver that violated Apple’s privacy guidelines.

This is it’s good when everyone see the underlying code.

Uber’s C.E.O. Plays With Fire

The Linux Setup – François Téchené, Purism

April 25, 2017

François is from Purism, a company which makes Linux laptops, as well as its own version of Linux. It’s an interesting project. François is also a great interview subject in that he’s a filmmaker who is using Linux for his work.

You can find more of The Linux Setup here.

You can follow Linux Rig on Google+ here and follow me on Twitter here.

  1. Who are you, and what do you do?

    My name is François, I am from France. I am director of creative at Purism, so most of my creative energy goes to Purism and promoting the copyleft philosophy. I am also a filmmaker and animator, making traditional 2D animation with computers. Some years ago I co-funded the British film production Free Seed Films and, much more recently, the non-profit organization Ethic Cinema, which aims to promote free cinematographic creations.

  2. Why do you use Linux?

    I would like to give as much credit to GNU as to Linux because GNU is the origin of the system and the philosophy. I use GNU/Linux because it matches my philosophy in terms of user freedom and control over software and hardware. I come from a background of proprietary software for multimedia creation and I made the move to free software not so long ago in order to get this freedom, as well as control over the tools that I use everyday. I want control over my hardware obsolescence as much as possible.

  3. What distribution do you run on your main desktop/laptop?

    I use PureOS. It is the OS developed by Purism and it is based on Debian. It is actually Debian Stretch, with some add-ons for privacy and security.

  4. What desktop environment do you use and why do you use it?

    I use GNOME Shell because it is sober, clean, and very efficient, with a modern look and feel. It is also one of the best mobile/desktop convergent environments, in my opinion. Why have different habits when using different devices?

  5. What one piece of Linux software do you depend upon? Why is it so important?

    Do you mean Free software? If so, I would say Blender. It is one of the most amazing programs I have ever used. It’s very powerful and helped me a lot with my transition to free software. Of course, there is other software that I depend upon, like GIMP, Krita, Kdenlive, as well as FFmpeg and Firefox. What would I do without a web browser? 🙂

  6. What kind of hardware do you run this setup on?

    I use a Librem 13, which is a very cool laptop that helps me avoid a lot of headaches. It is fast and its motherboard has been designed by Purism to run free software, so I can update safely. With PureOS, I don’t worry about incompatibility while getting the power, robustness and freedom of Debian.

    I am waiting for the 4K based Librem 15 to arrive.

  7. Will you share a screenshot of your desktop?

Francois Techene's desktop

Interview conducted August 21, 2016

The Linux Setup is a feature where I interview people about their Linux setups. The concept is borrowed, if not outright stolen, from this site. If you’d like to participate, drop me a line.

You can follow Linux Rig on Google+ here, follow me on Twitter here, and subscribe to the feed here.

Goodbye Unity

April 11, 2017

Ubuntu is finally bailing on Unity!

I never understood why Canonical invested so much time, energy, and political capital, on a project that just wasn’t that different from GNOME. They seemed to go out of their way to create something that wasn’t quite as good, but at the same time, wasn’t all that different.

Of course, I’m upset this pivot resulted in people losing their jobs, however Rick Spencer has a nice post reminding Canonical employees there are lots of interesting opportunities waiting for them.