LINUX Unplugged

The lead developer of PipeWire Wim Taymans joins us to discuss Linux’s multimedia past, and its exciting future. They promise to greatly improve handling of audio and video under Linux.

Plus we review the professional grade Precision 5530, tour our new studio in a box, and release one of our first production tools as free software!

Special Guest: Wim Taymans.

Support LINUX Unplugged

Links:

• JACK Audio Connection Kit|Home
• GetJacked · GitHub — Some simple scripts to build a "Studio in a Box" with JACK.
• PipeWire — PipeWire is a project that aims to greatly improve handling of audio and video under Linux.
• PipeWire Wiki
• Launching Pipewire!
• Precision 15 Inch 5530 Developer Edition — Dell’s thinnest, lightest and smallest 15" mobile workstation is more powerful than ever.
• Precision 5530 Benchmarks — JB1 Reaper Custom Build vs Dell Precision 5300
• TechSNAP Episode 385: 3 Things to Know About Kubernetes — Kubernetes expert Will Boyd joins us to explain the top 3 things to know about Kubernetes
• TechSNAP Episode 386: What Makes Google Cloud Different — We bring on our Google Cloud expert and explore the fundamentals, demystify some of the magic, and ask what makes Google Cloud different.
• TechSNAP Episode 387: Private Cloud Building Blocks — We bring in Amy Marrich to break down the building blocks of OpenStack.

elementary OS’ latest and greatest released today, and we talk with Dan and Cassidy from the project about their biggest release yet.

Then community news, a preview of upcoming Ubuntu 18.10, and we announce our own free software project. Plus a chat with Dalton about the new Ubuntu Touch release and we find a real Photoshop replacement for Linux.

Special Guests: Alan Pope, Brent Gervais, Cassidy James Blaede, Dalton Durst, Danielle Foré, and Martin Wimpress.

Support LINUX Unplugged

Links:

• Tiny Palm smartphone baffles gadget fans - BBC News — A tiny Android smartphone designed to be a "companion phone".
• KDE e.V. receives a sizeable donation from Handshake Foundation | KDE.news — We are excited to announce that the KDE e.V. received a donation of 300,000 USD from the Handshake Foundation.
• elementary OS 5 Juno is Here — Refinement, Productivity, & an Improved Developer Platform.
• Allen questions the Flatpak FUD - Pastebin.com
• Flatpaks, sandboxes and security — What Flatpak brings to this is understanding of the specific desktop app problem space
• Should GNOME Drop Support for GTK3 Themes? — It seems that our love of customisation is merely an illusion
• Restyling apps at scale — tl;dr: If you want to change how an app looks, you need a designer in the loop.
• DXVK 0.90 released : linux
• Pumpkin Carving Contest #JackOLinux — Submission deadline is October 24, 2018, and the top 3 winners will be announced on October 31st!
• Chrome OS Stable Channel Gets Linux Apps
• Did Microsoft Really Just “Open Source All Its Patents”?? — This means the company can use or distribute ‘Linux System’ technologies without risk that another OIN participant may assert their patents against such ‘Linux System’ technologies.
• Ubuntu 18.10 Release Date and New Features [Updated] | It's FOSS
• GPD Pocket 2 Preview — The GPD Pocket 2 is a handheld computer that looks like a laptop, but which is small enough to fold up and slide into your pocket.
• UBports — Ubuntu Touch is the touch-friendly mobile version of Ubuntu. This operating system is developed and maintained by UBports: An international community of passionate volunteers. This means Ubuntu Touch is 100% community driven and independent.

Red Hat developer Andy Grover joins us to discuss Stratis Storage, an alternative to ZFS on Linux and its recent milestone.

Also Google subtracts Plus, some KDE and GNOME news, and a bit of forgotten Linux history.

Special Guests: Alan Pope, Alex Kretzschmar, Andy Grover, and Martin Wimpress.

Support LINUX Unplugged

Links:

• IRL Glasses
• Google Exposed User Data, Feared Repercussions of Disclosing to Public — Google exposed the private data of hundreds of thousands of users of the Google+ social network and then opted not to disclose the issue this past spring, in part because of fears that doing so would draw regulatory scrutiny and cause reputational damage, according to people briefed on the incident and documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.
• Project Strobe — The consumer version of Google+ currently has low usage and engagement: 90 percent of Google+ user sessions are less than five seconds.
• Google Has 'No Plans' to Enable Chrome Hardware Acceleration on Linux
• KDE Plasma 5.14 — A lot of work has gone into improving Discover, Plasma's software manager, and, among other things, we have added a Firmware Update feature and many subtle user interface improvements to give it a smoother feel.
• Farewell, application menus! — These menus have been with us since the beginning of the GNOME 3.0 series, but we’re planning on retiring them for the next GNOME release (version 3.32).
• Creative Selection (Audiobook) by Ken Kocienda
• Eazel - Wikipedia — Eazel was founded by Andy Hertzfeld in August 1999 in Mountain View, California. It had 22 initial employees and raised $12 million from a number of venture capital investment companies
• Eazel launches Nautilus software then lays off 40 workers — After releasing the first version of its new Nautilus open-source desktop software with much fanfare Monday, Eazel Inc. bit the bullet just a day later and laid off more than half of its 70-member staff
• Jobs at Linux Academy
• Andy Grover (@iamagrover) — Hacks on @StratisStorage at Red Hat, and has other creative dreams too. Bass. Rustlang. Mostly cat and political retweets these days.
• Stratis Storage (@StratisStorage) — Easy to use local storage for Linux.

What if desktop computing went a very different direction in the late 90s? Deeply multithreaded from the start, fast, intuitive, and extremely stable. This is the world of Haiku, and we go for a visit.

Plus the latest community news, true flicker freedom comes to Fedora, and our favorite tools for easy virtual machines on our laptops.

Special Guests: Alex Kretzschmar and Brent Gervais.

Support LINUX Unplugged

Links:

• System76 To Release A "New Open-Source Computer"
• Fedora 29 Succeeds At Flicker-Free Boot Experience On Intel Hardware
• Google gets into game streaming with Project Stream and Assassin’s Creed Odyssey in Chrome
• Halloween Documents
• BeOS R5
• R1/beta1 – Release Notes | Haiku Project — It’s been just about a month less than six years since Haiku’s last release in November 2012
• Ars spends too much time trying to work in Haiku, the BeOS successor — What starts as a joke

We chat with Nate Graham who’s pushing to make Plasma the best desktop on the planet. We discuss his contributions to this effort, and others.

Plus we get the scope on a new Juno feature from the source, and the creator of WSLinux a distro built specifically for Windows 10’s Windows Subsystem for Linux joins us.

Also some community news, some old friends stop by, and more!

Special Guests: Alex Kretzschmar, Brent Gervais, Cassidy James Blaede, Hayden Barnes, Martin Wimpress, and Nate Graham.

Support LINUX Unplugged

Links:

• ytdl-webserver: 📻 Webserver for downloading youtube videos. Ready for docker.
• Google Secretly Logs Users Into Chrome Whenever They Log Into a Google Site — Starting with Chrome 69, whenever a Chrome user would access a Google-owned site, the browser would take that user's Google identity and log the user into the Chrome in-browser account system
• Christoph Tavan on Twitter — "Clear all Cookies except Google Cookies", thanks Chrome."
• PlayOnLinux 5.0 Alpha Released With Redesigned UI, Phoenicis — PlayOnLinux 5.0 Alpha has a completely redesigned user-interface and rolls out their new "Phoenicis" platform. This new platform is decentralized, Git-based, and improves POL's script engine. The current PlayOnLinux 5.0 Alpha release has support for about 135 different games.
• AppCenter and Content Ratings — Starting with Juno, we’ll display a content warning when a user goes to download an app that meets or exceeds a certain level of OARS data—think nudity, violence, or language content.
• Getting the team together to revolutionize Linux audio — With the video part of PipeWire already in production we decided the time has come to try to accelerate the development of the audio bits. So PipeWire creator Wim Taymans, PulseAudio developer Arun Raghavan and myself decided to try to host a PipeWire hackfest this fall to bring together many of the core Linux audio developers to try to hash out a plan and a roadmap.
• Precision 15 Inch 5530 Mobile Workstation Laptop
• Nate Graham is creating KDE Plasma | Patreon — I'm Nate Graham, and I'm on a mission to make KDE Plasma the best and most widely-used computer operating system interface on planet Earth.
• KDE's Goals for 2018 and Beyond | KDE.news — Nate reasons that focusing on irksome details of the most common and commonly used of KDE's software, such as Plasma, Dolphin, Okular and Discover, would be the first step towards polishing the whole.
• This week in Usability & Productivity, part 37 — Here’s your latest Usability & Productivity report–and we’ve got all kinds of goodies to share!
• Recommended Watch: Konquering the World
• 'Netflix for Open Source' Wants Developers to Get Paid — A startup called Tidelift hopes to help these unsung programmers get paid with a business model the company compares to Netflix. The idea is that a company pays a subscription fee to Tidelift, which takes a cut and then distributes the remainder to open source projects that the subscriber uses, such as Babel. In exchange, the subscriber gets assurance that the software is properly maintained.
• Tidelift
• WLinux — A Linux distro optimized for WSL based on Debian.
• WLinux: GitHub
• John's +1 to Root on ZFS
• zedenv — ZFS boot environment manager
• Traefik - The Cloud Native Edge Router / Reverse Proxy / Load Balancer
• KDE - KDE Community Code of Conduct

Linus takes a break and the Linux kernel adopts a new Code of Conduct. We work through these major watershed moments, and discuss what it means for the community.

Plus our review of our brand new ThinkPad T480’s running Linux, the bug you need to know about, and why this might be one of the greatest Linux laptops of all time.

Special Guests: Alex Kretzschmar, Brent Gervais, Danielle Foré, and Eric Hendricks.

Support LINUX Unplugged

Links:

• Cloudflare goes InterPlanetary
• Linux 4.19-rc4 released, an apology, and a maintainership note
• Code of Conduct: Let's revamp it.
• Code of conduct - Gentoo Wiki
• NCoC: No Code of Conduct: A Code of Conduct for Adults in Open Source Software
• Richard M. Stallman on the Linux CoC
• Code of Conduct: Let's revamp it.
• Lenovo ThinkPad T480
• Ubuntu on Lenovo ThinkPad T480
• Lenovo ThinkPad T480 - ArchWiki
• T480s Linux throttling bug
• Workaround for Intel throttling issues in Linux.
• ThinkWiki
• KXStudio
• Optimised Ubuntu Desktop images available in Microsoft Hyper-V gallery

We announce our big news, Jupiter Broadcasting is joining Linux Academy and what we have planned for the future is huge!

Plus a new NextCloud lands, concerns are brewing for the Solus project, and a report from the recent Libre Application Summit.

Special Guests: Alan Pope, Anthony James, Brent Gervais, and Martin Wimpress.

Support LINUX Unplugged

Links:

• Jupiter Broadcasting Joins Linux Academy — Jupiter Broadcasting has been creating the world’s favorite podcasts on Linux, open source, and free software since before they were even called podcasts.

Intel has disappointed the kernel community with its latest security disclosures but there’s still hope for a better future. That’s more than can be said for the state of privacy on Android, so we discuss some alternatives.

Plus the latest community updates, a new timeline for the Librem 5, tempting new Chromebooks, and some top picks.

Special Guests: Alan Pope and Eric Hendricks.

Support LINUX Unplugged

Links:

• Airplane Mode: A box designed to seduce you into digital disconnection
• LMDE 3 “Cindy” Cinnamon released!
• GNOME Tweaks 3.30
• Purism Pushes Back The Librem 5
• Progress update from the Librem 5 hardware department
• ZeroPhone: $50 open source smartphone
• Google won’t patch flaw in old versions of Android
• Android collecting 10 times more data than iOS, claims study
• $600 Chromebooks are a dangerous development for Microsoft
• Linux Kernel Developer Criticizes Intel's Meltdown Disclosure
• ​Linus Torvalds talks frankly about Intel security bugs | ZDNet
• Linux 4.19 lets you declare your trust in AMD, IBM and Intel
• Proven: An alternative to Twitter's verified accounts powered by Keybase
• rat: Compose shell commands to build interactive terminal applications
• tcpdump101.com: Build packet capture syntax online

Steam Play rocks the Linux world as it promises new levels of compatibility with AAA Windows games. But the story of how Valve is doing it might be just as fascinating.

Plus community news, our thoughts on building a market for Linux apps, the latest from UBPorts, and more good news from LVFS!

Special Guests: Alan Pope, Brent Gervais, Marius Gripsgard, and Martin Wimpress.

Sponsored By:

• DigitalOcean: Visit do.co/unplugged for a limited time special offer, or enter dounplugged after you create your account for a $10 credit. Promo Code: dounplugged
• Ting: Visit linux.ting.com and get a $25 discount off a device, or $25 in service credit if you bring one!
• Linux Academy: Visit linuxacademy.com/unplugged to support the show and sign up for a 7 day free trial.

Support LINUX Unplugged

Links:

• Realtek on the LVFS!
• Fedora Moves Ahead With Plans To Drop Packages Having Bad Security
• Ubuntu Touch OTA-4 Release
• KDE Itinerary
• Updated: Intel Answers Complaints About Microcode Benchmarking Ban
• Benchmarks Of Intel's Latest Linux Microcode Update
• Organizing a Market for Applications
• Libre Application Summit
• Origin of the name Proton — We've been working on this for a long time. We needed an internal codename we could use that wouldn't tip our hand if it leaked (so Wine puns are out), and that we wouldn't be embarrassed to continue using after release (sorry, BadgerBadgerBadger). A bunch of ideas were tossed around the CodeWeavers office one afternoon, and I ended up picking Proton because it's short, easy to remember, sounds cool, and is hard to Google for.

Docker controversy is brewing, but it's probably not what you think. We get around of community updates directly from the source, and why Debian an Intel are playing the game of he said, she said.

Special Guests: Brent Gervais, Cassidy James Blaede, Danielle Foré, and Martin Wimpress.

Sponsored By:

• Ting: Visit linux.ting.com and get a $25 discount off a device, or $25 in service credit if you bring one!
• Linux Academy: Visit linuxacademy.com/unplugged to support the show and sign up for a 7 day free trial.
• DigitalOcean: Visit do.co/unplugged for a limited time special offer, or enter dounplugged after you create your account for a $10 credit. Promo Code: dounplugged

Support LINUX Unplugged

Links:

• Download Docker CE without logging in
• Flatpak 1.0
• Flatpack Release 1.0.0
• Kick-starting the revolution 1.0
• PulseEffects
• Akademy
• KDE.news: dot.kde.org
• OggCamp 18
• fosscon.us
• intel-microcode: Update intel-microcode to 20180807
• Imad Sousou: "This is not true."
• Um: Create and maintain your own man pages so you can remember how to do stuff