There is quite a range of devices out there now with varying capabilites. Things like the Onion Omega2+, Oranage Pi, and more.

Raspberry Pi also remains good. While the Pi5 is expensive and more powerful - raspberry pi also makes the Pi Zero boards which are cheaper less capable boards which are closer to what the original raspberry Pi was but newer hardware.

I’d say the Pi5 is a heading more towards a full PC like device (hence the comparisons to cost and capability minipcs pepple are making in thia thread). But there remain plenty of lower spec machines out there now similar to the original cheap Raspberry Pi concept. And we’ve had high inflation recently - to some extent the cost perception avtually reflects money being worth less than it was and buying less for $10 or $20.

Laptops are not generally designed to run like that with a closed lid. Heat dissipation is designed around the idea the laptop is open and some of it is through the keyboard surface. The lid closed would change that.

Systems can of course be setup to power off the display but for server/service uses open laptops may not be efficient space wise.

Having said that if the scenario is low power use the heat dissipation may not be a major issue. But if there is an unremovable battery i’d still be concerned about heat dissipation with the lid closed and even just the battery itself regardless of heat dissipiation.

Low power and arm architecture are big differentiators between Pi and laptops.

I totally agree recycle laptops where possible, but they’re generally noisier and less energy efficient plus the battery degrades over time and is a fire risk.

They’re not necessairly a good fit for always-on server or service type uses comparef to a small board like Raspberry Pi. But a cheap or free second hand laptop is definitely good for tweaking, testing and trying our projects.

Maybe I’m misunderstanding, but the commands would apply within the zsh, which is a bash alternative, not within the programmes running themselves?

Or are you saying its sus because its illogical/confusing to have opposite uses for tgebsame shirt cut? I can see that as people using a terminal and launching vim would constantly be working against “muscle memory” each time they switch which would be annoying! Being familiar with keyboard shortcuts is what can make terminal based workflows so fast.

Do you have any drives/ partitions set up to load at boot other than the main linux partition?

A common issue can be if linux is trying to mount a partition specified in fstab (the config file that lists all the hard drives to be loaded) and it can’t mount it, it will go into emergency mode. It does this as it assumes the drives are critically important and to prevent any damage to your system. You can mark non essential partitions as “nofail” in the fstab file so that linux continues to boot even if those partitions are unavailable.

If you’d added a USB drive or another hard drive to auto mount at start up and its not available to linux then that might be the issue. Reinsert those drives and linux should boot. Alternatively you can login using emergency mode and edit the fstab file yourself if you know what youre doing. The offending drive can be removed/commented outthe fstab file or the nofail option added.

If your linux install is set to mount your windows C: partition (for file access in linux for example) then its important to know the drive can be locked out by windows. Windows “fast startup” is a very common cause - it basically means windows doesnt shut down fully, it does a fake shutdown (hibernates), and doing this locks down the drive, preventing any access to the C: drive including in linux. If this scenario applies to you, boot into wndows, disable fast startup in the control panel and then try to reboot into linux.

It this works it is still worth using the “nofail” option in fstab for any non essential drives. I personally dont auto mount my windows drive at all anymore; I have it visible in my file manager but manually mount it (just clikcing on it does it) when I need it.

Yeah true, but if you’re choosing Debian then I can see why there is caution about “unverified” flatpaks.

Ultimately if they’re not verified then you’re taking it on trust that they’ve been repackaged by a good actor and not a bad actor. We have no reason to believe there are malicious flatpaks are on flathub and verified only really meansnit was packaged by the originating project itself. But it is still a separate chain of packaging and security from the official one in a distro.

And Flathub doesnt need to be the repo used. Fedora for example created its own repo so it could verify its own flatpaks in the same way as its other system repos. Other distros do not seem to be following that path.

Personally I take the risk on flatpaks in the same way I will take risks on the opensuse OBS (or AUR in arch) - if i need/want the software and it’s not in the main repos for my distro I will generally take it off flathub rather than add an OBS source I dont know well. (If its small software I might build from source myself).

Yeah this is inbuilt (not an extension) and very similar to Windows fancy zones.

Many are suggesting deleting the Windows partition and resizing the Linux one, but another option is to back up your data and do a fresh Linux install.

During setup, you can delete all partitions and create new ones—ideal if you want to separate the root system and /home folder. Keeping system and user data on separate partitions makes future reinstalls easier, as your personal files can be preserved.

This misses the step where you delete the windows partition - between steps 4 and 5. You have to delete the NTFS partition and resize your linux partition to fill the empty space.

You can also create a new linux partition if you wanted as a separate space to store stuff.

Most people expect a GUI interface to get into their desktop. But you dont have to use one if you dont want. SDDM can log into any desktops you have - KDE but also Gnome or XFCE etc. It can also help select X11 vs Wayland sessions.

There are alternatives like LightDM if you dont like SDDM. Or TTY is fine too. But generally they’re not large pieces of software and while they are undoubtedly bloated from what they could be, they are still small and lightweight in the era of Tbs of storage and Gb of memory. The savings you’d get in not using them would be small on the scale of the rest of the OS. Obviously they’re useless for none GUI machines / servers.

They’re called display managers because historically the concept was added to X11 system where you’d have a stand alone X terminal running locally for the end user with an X server which would then connect to an X display manager on a central machine. This was in the Unix days and shared spaces like governments, universities or corporations and the set up was potentially less hardware intensive allowing cheaper X terminals and an expensive central server.

The concept has gone now - PCs are vastly more poweful and can easily run the entire OS locally, and thin clients are the modern set up if you do want terminals/clients and central servers. The most common scenario is now the display manager running on your local PC, alongside everything else and essentially replicates the TTY login in a GUI form. So yes its basically a session manager but the name is historical and probably won’t be going anywhere fast.

I wonder why Apache continues to support OpenOffice. Its barely moved since 2014 and hasn’t even had a security update since 2023. They could archive it as an active project (keep the code available for those who want it) and redirect most users who land on the OpenOffice site to LibreOffice.

Debian has a good page on it and how their set up works:

https://wiki.debian.org/SecureBoot

Edit: Ubuntu is derived from Debian and then Mint from Ubuntu, but they may have their own differing approachsnto secure boot.

If your linux OS supports secure boot then it does help improve security.

The differing opinions on it are often because it can cause issues in some set ups and in a default set up its only a marginal security gain.

It will add a layer of security at boot by preventing 3rd party unauthenticated processes / software from running and creates a secure boot chain from your BIOS up to the OS. But the default set up also means other authenticated OSes like Windows can be run, so its not as secure as it could be.

To really secure it you could create your own keys and then only your OS could boot. But as a linux newbie thats likely way more than you need and there are risks if you fuck up, to the point of accidentally locking you out of your own machine

So your choice is really just the default set up being on or off. On is a bit more secure but if you experience any issues then turn it off and don’t worry about it.

Its not doing nothing. Linux uses a Microsoft provided key for initial BIOS authentication and then has its own tree of keys that it uses for security. So it does have the benefits of locking out malicious code/processes even in a default set up.

Using your own secure boot and TPM keys is certainly more secure, but it doesnt follow that secure boot with the default set up is doing nothing to help secure your system at boot.

Linux supports secure boot so if a distro supports it it’s worth using it.

Linux can use a key signed by Microsoft in a preboot loader and then itself perform its own key authentications for all other processes and software (a shim), forming a secure chain from the BIOS up during boot. You dont have to play with creating your own keys.

So if your OS supports secure boot it is worth using it for added security at boot. Its far from perfect in this set up (as there are plenty of windows OS that also have permission to boot) but it is better than a free for all without it even if the risk is low for most desktop users.

You can go further and generate your own keys and use secure boot and TPM together to lock down the system further but you dont have to to get some benefits from secure boot.

As per your other thread, incase others are interested. I dont own one but on searching options seem to be limited. It can be jail broken and Kodi installed.

That may be a jumping off point for doing more but I can’t see that anyone has successfully installed linux on it for example.

https://github.com/NSSpiral/Blackb0x

So I dont own one but was interested in what could be done.

As far as I can see the 3rd gen model is less versatile than the 1st and 2nd, because its so locked down and has very limited storage. Its more like an iPhone than a PC.

However apparently it can be jailbroken and Kodi installed onto it: https://github.com/NSSpiral/Blackb0x

Jail breaking means “unlocking” the restrictions apple put on the is on the device so you can do more with it.

But this project is last updated in 2021 and from the looks of it online, fundamentally there isn’t much more that can be done. Jail breaking it would be a first step to do anything with it if you want to experiment.

Kodi would certainly give it a new lease of life but that still keeps it as a media consumption device. Kodi is an open source media tool that has a good TV friendly interface, and a huge range of plugins for streaming video and audio (legally but also illegally; kodi itself is perfectly legit and legal but there are plenty of plugins that essentially allow media piracy). You could then sell it on eBay if its working? Someone might want it even if only for cheap?

Other than that, recycle it? If your local refuse centre doesnt recycle it some companies might?

If youre new to linux, then I’d say Linux Mint is the place to start. Use it with XFCE if light weight is what you want.

Not having cutting edge packages is a red herring - you really dont want bleeding edge as thats where the errors and breakages happen. Mint is reliable and secure which is what you need when starting out. You dont want to be a beta tester. Dont confuse latest packages for most secure on linux - plenty of packages have stable older versions which get security patches.

Mint is also very popular, with a huge range of easy to find resources to help set it up the way you want it.

Wayland is also a red herring - its the future but its just not really ready yet. Yes its more secure due to how its built but the scenario you’re using linux in the particular security benefits you’re hearing about are not really going to impact you day to day. And the trade off is that Wayland is still buggy, with many apps still not working seamlessly. Most apps are designed for X11 and x-wayland is an imperfect bridge between the two. I’m not saying Wayland is bad - it’s actually good and is the future. But you dont want to be problem solving Wayland issues as a linux newbie. Dont see Wayland as essentialnfor an good stable and secure linux install.

Personally I wouldn’t recommend Fedora - it has a short update cycle and tends to favour newer bleeding edge tech and paclages. Thats not a bad thing but if what you want is a stable, reliable low footprint system and to learn the basics, in wouldn’t stray into Fedora just yet. It has a 13 month cycle of complete distro upgrades and distro upgrades are the times when there are big package changes and the biggest chances of something breaking. The previous version loses support after a month so you do need to upgrade to stay secure. Most people won’t have issues between upgrades but with any distro when you do a big upgrade things can easily break of you’ve customised things and set up things differently to the base. It can be annoying having to fix thongs and get them back how you want them, and worse can lead to reinstalls. Thats nor a uniquely Fedora problem, but the risk is higher woth faster updating and bleeding edge distros. And in fairness there are lots of fedora spins that might mitigate that - but then you risk being on more niche setups so support can be harder to find when you need it.

For comparison the latest version of Mint supported through til 2029, and major releases also get security patches and support for years even after newer versions are released. There is much less pressure to upgrade.

If the EU were concerned about the US jurisdiction of Linux projects it could pick:

• OpenSuSE (org based in Germany)
• Mint (org based in Ireland)
• Manjaro (org based in France/Germany, and based of Arch)
• Ubuntu (org based in UK)

However if they didn’t care, then they could just use Fedora or other US based distros.

I think it would be a good idea for the EU to adopt linux officially, and maybe even have it’s own distro, but I’m not sure this Fedora base makes sense. Ironically this may also be breaching EU trademarks as it’s masquerading as an official project by calling itself EU OS.

How is it misleading? Plex Pass is a subscription? It would be confusing to many people if it said “Plex pass” instead of “Subscription” as not everyone would necessarily even know what that is. Subscription is very clear.