Linux

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/32033583

Direct link to a text article about the situation

https://www.vidarholen.net/contents/wordcount/

I think the least that distros can do, is allow listing all packages and system settings in config files like .toml rather than having to type in every single package to install, or click through system setting GUIs to setup. Would that require using a whole programming language or system like NIx?

While NixOS works much differently from most distros, that's the only reason I use it: package and system settings in text files. If I fix something, it's fixed permanently, I don't need to hunt down files in random directories if I want to change a setting. If I ever need to reinstall the OS I don't have to write dnf install every single damn package and manually setup all that up all over again. Having daily-drove Windows macOS & Fedora as throughout the years, my setups have felt hacky as well as houses of cards as I've wanted or had to set them up again (I don't mean Fedora specifically, but distros in general).

Basically it feels insane that it's the way most linux users and servers in the world operate. If I, a humble computer hobbyist can figure out Nix, why don't more users do so, and why is Nix so niche?

I want to see either a persistent rectangle box on the edges of the region being recorded (anything outside the box isn't recorded), or dim the parts of the screen that aren't being recorded. I looked for screen recorders for hyprland & wlroots and didn't find any with this functionality. wf-recorder + slurp works for me but I want a boundary visual.

Just thought I'd throw these out there, somebody might like them. There are a lot of different ways of getting the same result.

Screenshot (I shortcut it to F6):

maim --select | xclip -selection primary -t image/png

One key and then I just select the screen shot and middle-click to paste the image where I want it.

OCR a screenshot (I shortcut it to ctrl-F6)

TMPFILE=$(mktemp);maim --select $TMPFILE.png ; tesseract $TMPFILE.png $TMPFILE ; xclip -sel primary $TMPFILE.txt

This may be a little messy as a forced one-liner. This way I can select text from an image on screen, and have the OCR'd text available with, again, my middle click.

Should go without saying it uses maim and tesseract, both should be available with your package manager of choice, and there are alternatives to both of those utilities.

I want to replace Win10 on the desktop system I mostly use for gaming. It is an older system with an Nvidia GeForce 1050ti gpu in it, which from what I found, should not be a problem. I was thinking about going with Ubuntu since it is well supported. I was interested if anyone has any opinions about this. I am also going to try and dual boot it with the Win10 for now. I purchased a new SSD drive just for Linux.

For the "old farts" out there who wants to made their ultrawide screen behave like a old TV.

Instructions how to compile, screenshots, etc are in the code.

cross-posted from: https://ani.social/post/9568483

I was trying to do that but I noticed ls | grep searchterm just searches the book TITLES for searchterm. Is this possible, to search the text of ebooks?

cross-posted from: https://beehaw.org/post/18210719

Archived

Facebook is banning posts that mention various Linux-related topics, sites, or groups. Some users may also see their accounts locked or limited when posting Linux topics. Major open-source operating system news, reviews, and discussion site DistroWatch is at the center of the controversy, as it seems to be the first to have noticed that Facebook's Community Standards had blackballed it.

[...]

DistroWatch says that the Facebook ban took effect on January 19. Readers have reported difficulty posting links to the site on this social media platform. Moreover, some have told DistroWatch that their Facebook accounts have been locked or limited after sharing posts mentioning Linux topics.

If you're wondering if there might be something specific to DistroWatch.com, something on the site that the owners/operators perhaps don't even know about, for example, then it seems pretty safe to rule out such a possibility. Reports show that "multiple groups associated with Linux and Linux discussions have either been shut down or had many of their posts removed." However, we tested a few other Facebook posts with mentions of Linux, and they didn't get blocked immediately.

[...]

Addition to include the DistroWatch link: https://distrowatch.com/weekly-mobile.php?issue=20250127#sitenews

cross-posted from: https://programming.dev/post/21196370

Linux newbie, here. Does this seem reasonable or normal? That's a lot of downgrades and deletions. I feel like if I click confirm I'm gonna nuke my system. Am I right to be concerned here?

I do have backups in case of any issues, but still... I'd rather not spend the time to rebuild.

cross-posted from: https://programming.dev/post/15948376

I was looking into buying a used or refurbished laptop and installing a Linux distro on it. Mostly want to use it for surfing the web, but I am sure it will have a lot of other uses. What are some good sites to buy a laptop? What should I consider as far as the type of hardware goes (Gpu, WiFi, etc)? What would be good distros to consider? I have been working with Linux for a long time, so I would not consider myself a beginner. Thanks for any advice.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/14567056

I personally see this as a simple version of desktop Linux. If you like what you see donate.

I'm very new to Linux. Currently tinkering with Nobara and wanted to install st. I was able to successfully install it last night but when I started attempting to patch it for customization purposes I think I messed something up. I had needed to remove st multiple times and re-install so I could start fresh and fix my errors. Now when I attempt to run make clean install I get a host of errors related to packages that are installed but can't seem to be found?

[astralpath@nobara-pc st]$ sudo make clean install
[sudo] password for astralpath: 
rm -f st st.o x.o st-0.9.tar.gz
c99 -I/usr/X11R6/include  `pkg-config --cflags fontconfig`  `pkg-config --cflags freetype2` -DVERSION=\"0.9\" -D_XOPEN_SOURCE=600  -O1 -c st.c
Package fontconfig was not found in the pkg-config search path.
Perhaps you should add the directory containing `fontconfig.pc'
to the PKG_CONFIG_PATH environment variable
Package 'fontconfig', required by 'virtual:world', not found
Package freetype2 was not found in the pkg-config search path.
Perhaps you should add the directory containing `freetype2.pc'
to the PKG_CONFIG_PATH environment variable
Package 'freetype2', required by 'virtual:world', not found
c99 -I/usr/X11R6/include  `pkg-config --cflags fontconfig`  `pkg-config --cflags freetype2` -DVERSION=\"0.9\" -D_XOPEN_SOURCE=600  -O1 -c x.c
Package fontconfig was not found in the pkg-config search path.
Perhaps you should add the directory containing `fontconfig.pc'
to the PKG_CONFIG_PATH environment variable
Package 'fontconfig', required by 'virtual:world', not found
Package freetype2 was not found in the pkg-config search path.
Perhaps you should add the directory containing `freetype2.pc'
to the PKG_CONFIG_PATH environment variable
Package 'freetype2', required by 'virtual:world', not found
x.c:15:10: fatal error: X11/Xft/Xft.h: No such file or directory
   15 | #include <X11/Xft/Xft.h>
      |          ^~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
compilation terminated.
make: *** [Makefile:16: x.o] Error 1

I'm not sure why these issues are occurring now. Could someone help point me in the right direction to troubleshoot? I'm really lost on how to proceed even though the error output seems to be giving me some pretty explicit instructions.

Thanks in advance :)--

I am planning to reinstall the OS on my ThinkPad T400, and I'd like to try using the Trinity desktop environment. Can you suggest some distributions that work well with TDE?

TL;DR I am using Windows and I want help setting up all the conveniences I enjoyed back into Linux... specifically an alternative to OneDrive.

I am going to admit something that is strange and maybe evil... at the least it betrays a loss of integrity and deficit of dignitity.

For the past few months I have been using Microsoft Windows as my OS. It started with finally deciding to play with AI and turning on the features on my phone... which meant turning on Google Play Services... not necessary, but it is what I did.

Then I randomly bought some tiny Livaa PC to mess around with that came with Windows, so I got comfy with that.

As a student, I must use Microsoft Word because as much as Libre Office tries it just mangles the formatting. So, I discovered Office 365 and how it is easily accessible in the Edge Browser... plus Bing AI.

One day I just thought fuck it, I want to use all the music software, play all the games. I want to use my graphics card without needing to think. I want all the harware I bought to work. So I installed Windows. I use OneDrive. I ask Bing, and Bard, and Opera AI...

Well, I pay for Kagi because it is better.

....

Anyways, I think I had my fun. I want to go back. I need to, it is potentially immoral not to.

Please help me transition back!

I noticed yesterday that my 5950X never goes into C6 state, as Powertop only shows C0 C1 and C2. I know there have been issues with Zen and Zen+ regarding C6 states but it shouldn't be a problem from Zen2 forwards? I tried running zenstates --c6-enable but that didn't seem to work and I couldn't find any settings in the bios of my Gigabyte X570 Ultra.

Is there a way to enable C6 states? I'm running Arch on the Zen kernel with ZFS modules. (I also notice the same behaviour on my Proxmox server which has a 5700X)

cross-posted from: https://kbin.social/m/linux/t/468935

Will it be Slowroll or Linarite -- or nothing at all? Programmers are conflicted about where the venerable Linux distro should go from here.