LINUX Unplugged - 622: Omarchy Hits Different

Starting point is 00:00:00 Hello friends and welcome back to your weekly Linux talk show. My name is Chris. My name is Wes. And my name is Brent. Hello gentlemen, this is episode 622 and coming up on this episode there is a big trend sweeping over desktop Linux. It's really exciting. We're going to dig into that and take a look at it. Then we'll round out the show with some great boosts, some picks and a lot more. We are not live this week, but we are doing it from the great north.

Starting point is 00:00:40 It is Canada broadcast day. It's Canada Day on the show I'm over at Brent's house up in his lovely lovely property In the bc area. What do you call this general area? Is it like the the kootenai area or the kootenai area or something? The kootenai there are the kootenai up here which kind of extend down into the us as well But this region is specifically called the east kootenai So i'm in the east kootenai has been exploring the east kootenays with Brent and his family and it's been absolutely terrific here on a family road trip So, uh, of course also I have the classic since I didn't do a show for a week and I'm on a road trip

Starting point is 00:01:14 I have a cold so I apologize if I sound a little funky But it's pretty exciting. This is I think the first time I've ever done the show from Canada high-altitude podcast Yeah, we're at like 3,200 feet. We usually are at sea level when we do the show. That's why we sound different, right? That's gotta be it. That's gotta be it. And a big good morning to our friends at Tailscale.

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Starting point is 00:02:53 Thousands of other companies do this as well. Instacart, Huggingface, Duolingo, they've all switched to Tailscale and thousands of our listeners as well. So try it out for yourself as an individual or for a business. Go to tailscale.com slash unplugged. Support the show. Get it for free on 100 devices and up to three users. No credit card required. Tailscale.com slash unplugged. A big trend has been sweeping over Linux in the last week or two, and it's really exciting to watch because it's coming

Starting point is 00:03:26 really from the work of one individual and it's... I mean not to minimize the work that all of the desktop developers and all the distro developers do that make all this possible but every now and then somebody with some influence comes along and reaches a new audience, kind of breaks into a new demographic. And this is really exciting to watch. And we've talked about DHH before. He's created the Omicube project. He's extremely prolific in the Ruby community.

Starting point is 00:03:58 Their company is 32 Signals, right Wes? And they make the Basecamp product. Yeah, Basecamp and also Hey, the email system now. Right. And it was a little bit ago, in episode 566, Chef's Choice Ubuntu, we talked about Omicube, where he had created a spin of Ubuntu, targeted at developers, maybe coming from the Mac. And it was an interesting product, project,

Starting point is 00:04:23 and it got some attention, and it got some users. And he's he's continued his journey because he's a 25 year Mac user who's really kind of realized recently that for the type of work he does, maybe there's other options out there besides Mac and Windows. Windows. And so we saw the first versions of this with Amacube and it seemed nice. We liked it. Obviously it was, you know, it was an Ubuntu base with some things that could be improved. It was a GNOME desktop experience. It was fine. It didn't rock us. It didn't disappoint us. We thought it was a good first attempt. And I think like many of us, DHH has continued this Linux journey. You know, you find your footing in Linux and then you kind of expand out from there. Maybe you start with an Ubuntu or a in Linux, and then you kind of expand out from there.

Starting point is 00:05:06 Maybe you start with an Ubuntu or a Mandrake, and then you try out a Fedora or you try out Arch. I wonder too, you know, before this, DHH kind of famously moved a lot of his companies off the cloud and doing more like dedicated server hosting, so I wonder too if there's some empowerment on that side leading like, with a little more, with a little polish and making a couple custom tools I can really get this Linux thing wherever I need it. Yeah, I bet I bet that sort of was a eye-opener

Starting point is 00:05:31 And I think too, you know when you when you start playing with Linux when you've been saying a Windows user a Mac user for a long time If it works for you stick with it you kind of discover like there's this whole world of stuff out there, all these desktop environments, all these distros you can play with. And it gets really tempting and you just kind of want to keep playing. And you discover things that might be even better than what you started with. And I suspect for DHH and the way he works, he discovered Arch and Hyperland and it kind of unlocked something in his brain. And from that discovery process, he puts it, he just sort of went in, and he's taken about 60 hours of research and testing of

Starting point is 00:06:07 different setups to try to make this ultimate better than a Mac replacement for a developer workstation. He's compiled all of that into essentially a script you can run on a base Archbox and create his next project, which is Oma Archie, or Oma Archie. So you had OmaCube and now we have OmaArchie. This is an Arch-based system that uses HyperLand for the desktop environment.

Starting point is 00:06:33 They describe it as a very opinionated Arch-HyperLand setup by DHH, which we will talk about that. But on X he recently wrote, OmaArch is ready, it's HyperLand plus Arch, and it's never been so easy. Everything comes pre configured pre installed and with six beautiful themes in the box. This is the smoothest and most pleasant operating system I've ever had under my fingers. Wow.

Starting point is 00:06:56 Coming in hot in classic DHH style. It's kind of great. I mean, regardless of the claims and if you agree and if you like his style and setup It's just wonderful to watch someone be excited about Linux I mean we obviously all are in the audiences But the amount we still all come it when we go to meetups and like look other nerds They like what we like I'm getting strong vibes with that again here, and I'm just here for it Yeah, I have to say it's nice for a change to see someone just purely excited about Linux We see a lot of people complaining or whatever that something's not working or their project

Starting point is 00:07:29 is going in a direction they don't like, but I've mostly just seen pure joy about the discovery of Linux and it is so nice. I'll tell you there's a meta theme that is unraveling here that I really like that I'm seeing just sort of like play out because Oma Archie seems to be hitting different than Amacube did. It's making even a bigger splash and it seems to be catching an eye of a larger wave of users and I find this to be remarkable because Amacube is focused at first-timers, people that are just coming to Linux and Oma Archie is theoretically targeted at more advanced users,

Starting point is 00:08:05 people already familiar with Linux. However, we have been monitoring multiple reports across different social media networks of people who I would describe as brand new to Linux that are choosing to go straight to the Arch based system, Oma Archie. Here, Evelyn Perkins, or I'm sorry, I'm probably getting that wrong, on X wrote, all right, Oma Archie is quite something.

Starting point is 00:08:27 It's been a while since I've last used Linux as a daily driver, but Oma Archie is a breeze. It's snappy, it's intuitive, and it's a joy to use. Sure, I had some personal tweaks here and there, like adding Ghostry, and it's a dream machine now. Tahilus said on X, I'm a designer using Macs for the past 14 years. I have no Linux experience. I decided to jump straight into Oma Archie, and I'm a designer using Max for the past 14 years. I have no Linux experience I decided to jump straight into Alma Archie and I'm loving it

Starting point is 00:08:47 I've already made a small theme for myself and I've added some key binds and I'm using SATTY to emulate clean shot. I've replaced Dropbox with own cloud on way bar, etc. Wow brand new people That already feel comfortable like swapping parts out and stuff like that to make it their own. I find this to be really interesting. They were not intimidated by the fact that it's described as the more technical version.

Starting point is 00:09:13 In fact, DHH themselves says, go to Omacube, don't use Omarji, this is too hard. And they went, okay, I want the hard one. I want the one that doesn't look anything like what I'm used to using. And DHH was interviewed recently, we'll put a link to the interview, I want the hard one. I want the one that doesn't look anything like what I'm used to using and DHH was interviewed recently we'll put a link to the interview and he has some thoughts on on why that might be and why Alma Archie that we using hyperland that doesn't look anything like a Mac or doesn't look anything like Windows might be drawing more people in

Starting point is 00:09:38 Than the desktops that look like something they're familiar with and I think in this attention culture that we're in How do you how do you grab someone? You can try to grab them with lofty visions of open source and why it's better to own your operating system. And it totally gets some folks. And then there's an even larger group of people who just go like, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'll get to that someday. But if you can hook them with some sizzle and you can hook them with, wait, wait, what's

Starting point is 00:10:04 this? This is really cool. This looks amazing. This looks different. It works different. I think that might actually be more compelling, more convincing than going like, oh, no, no, it's super easy. You're going to get exactly what you already had.

Starting point is 00:10:20 I've come to the conclusion that maybe we've been going around this a bit the back way. We've been trying to make it oh so easy, oh so the same, and in an attempt of that, we've kind of just lost sight of why would someone even do it then? Why would they do it? They do it for the lofty ideals, and you're going to get some hardcore folks with that, but this is, there's something else here and I can feel it. He's right. What he can feel is that Linux distributions for far too long have been focused on this mythical new user that does not exist. Our next layer of demographic are these web

Starting point is 00:10:58 developers and software developers, Ruby developers and Python developers that are on Macs and that are on Windows, but they know how to use their computer. They know how to do a config file. They're not scared of this stuff. In fact, some of them probably know more about this stuff than us Linux users do. DHH wrote, mainstream Linux distros have been focused for too long on being as similar to Windows and Mac as possible to ease adoption. I've come to believe this isn't the way. Linux needs to embrace its own aesthetic, its own ethos unapologetically.

Starting point is 00:11:30 Lean into rice and tuis. Did you say tuis? Tuis. That's another thing that's happening here, is there's this movement of maybe you don't need some perfect graphical desktop application that matches your desktop environment. Maybe all you need is a terminal and a TUI.

Starting point is 00:11:50 And maybe these TUIs do just enough. They're simple, they're powerful, they're not confusing, they're not getting constantly redesigned. A simpler aspect of the theming, right? Like just by picking a consistent color scheme, not necessarily consistent like, you know, a consistent color scheme, not necessarily consistent like, you know, window toolkit or framework, you can have that kind of simpler version of the same thing that we've come to expect, but with a lot less work. Bren, are you surprised at the reports we're seeing of folks that, you know, 20-year Mac user, 25-year Mac user, five years on Windows after leaving the Mac,

Starting point is 00:12:23 and now I'm sick with Windows. These reports were seen. I think our instinct would have been to send them to Gnome or Plasma. That has been the traditional path is send them to a place where there's tons of support. You can find documents on anything that goes wrong on those platforms. Tons of people who are happy with those platforms, it's well understood,

Starting point is 00:12:45 etc. etc. etc. So I am pleasantly surprised that a project like Hyperland, which I don't know seems like it has an extra difficulty to get into because it's like super custom, very opinionated, etc. It's tiling out of the box. You need to be opinionated. That's always been my problem with Hyperland is I don't have an opinion. I need somebody to show me what it's capable of and then I'll develop an opinion. Which is where this fits perfectly, doesn't it? And that was my challenge when we came to Hyperland, when we explored it a little while ago was I didn't even know where to start.

Starting point is 00:13:18 And yet this seems like it's really attracting a lot of people who have the same goals as someone like DHH to just kind of step in try it and work from there. Wes do you think maybe it's because it's a different kind of simple right it's not simple in how you change a setting or how you navigate it necessarily but it's simple in its scope it's simple in what it's trying to accomplish right when you when you look at Gnome and Plasma and they're trying to recreate a full desktop, these are complex, complicated pieces of software. Hyperland is more modern.

Starting point is 00:13:51 It's a little more. It's a lot more minimal. It's not trying to do as much. You bring your own apps you're already familiar with. So maybe it's a different kind of simplicity that's appealing to this user base type. Yeah, I mean, it's it's a tool you can learn and the surface area isn't that large. And when you pair it with something like a Merge, that's already kind of put the pieces together

Starting point is 00:14:12 that you were gonna have to discover, right? And one of the big problems in this part of it is sort of like, okay, well, the whole idea is I put together the pieces I want and I customize them. But like what, as you're saying, what even are the options that I can do? Especially if you're not familiar with the idea of different desktop environments to begin with. So if you're coming into an environment that has like, oh, here's a Bluetooth. Yes, you can see

Starting point is 00:14:32 where your Wi Fi is. Yes, you can easily launch apps. Yes, you can get to a terminal really quick. Then on top of that, it's yes, there's a learning curve. But it's kind of like the vi key bindings learning curve, where it really kind of like the VI key bindings learning curve where it really pays off where once you know it, and if you are a person who uses a computer for work and like actually have stuff to get done and sometimes dealing with the window manager or just like getting stuff going or arranged

Starting point is 00:15:00 or in the right place on your desktop, is that all slowing you down? I mean, you should watch DHH work on this thing, because this isn't, right, this isn't new to Linux users or Tiling wouldn't have managed any of this, but just, you can see them fly through it, and that's a super satisfying thing, and it rewards the work you put in in a way that other systems don't necessarily. There's another thing that strikes me about all of this. What we're seeing succeed here isn't a corporate backed distro,

Starting point is 00:15:28 and it isn't a corporate backed desktop. The biggest corporate backer Arch Linux has is Valve, and they're very much focused in their own domain, in their own specific niche. Vaxri certainly doesn't have a corporate sponsor. It's DHH is probably one of his largest supporters now. So it's to me remarkable that these two combinations are seeming to be a winning recipe here. And I just I want to reflect on that for a moment that it's not a corporate back distro

Starting point is 00:15:59 and it's not a corporate back desktop. It's like a celebrity back distro. Well what I mean is you know Arch is winning hearts and minds over Ubuntu and I'm not trying to carve Ubuntu out but when you think about the Steam Deck and how they switched from a Steam runtime based on Ubuntu and for the Steam deck switched to an Arch base. That was a big moment and Valve seems very excited and interested in Arch. And now you see the same thing happening with DHH. He started with Ubuntu and now he's found Arch and he's very excited about Arch. And these new people they're bringing over, they love the AUR and stuff. They're loving having

Starting point is 00:16:42 everything available at the command line to install. And that's how they're able to build these scripts to build out Omarachi and whatnot is because of the AUR. And I just find it, Arch is doing something right. It seems to be appealing to more and more types of users, even though it doesn't have a CEO telling it these are our top KPIs for the next quarter. Do you think you can put your finger on what it is

Starting point is 00:17:07 about Arch other than the AUR that might be causing this trajectory? I mean, I think part of it, like you touched on, it's simple and it's darn fast, right? Plus you pair that with the existing Arch Wiki. So there's sort of instructions for what you need to do. And when you actually need to do something, it's easy and it's simple and it's, and it's fast. Like it just does not get into your way.

Starting point is 00:17:30 And I think while other systems that you come into might have like, Oh, you, you feel that more, like everything is more completely solved or like the edge cases are really covered. But to like understand how to tweak it or modify it, there's a lot more you have to learn and I think in this case Again, it's like you're gonna get rewarded because there's not that much happening with arch and most of it is really just packaging upstream stuff and so once you've seen it strung together and you've got instructions for how to modify it or tweak it right like The AUR and package builds work because they're also very simple

Starting point is 00:18:01 It's basically a bash script with some you know a bunch of helpers to make it easy and a whole lot of recipes you can copy. And Arch, with their keep it simple, stupid sort of mentality, I like more niche things like Nix and very opinionated and philosophical sometimes, but Arch is just very pragmatic. They don't have thoughts on purity that are gonna get in the way of you running whatever random thing you download. That's why half the package builds out there

Starting point is 00:18:30 are extracting app images or devs, and you can pretty much get them to work on Arch. So I think it's just a very compatible, hackable ecosystem as well. I wonder if the pace of development of Arch, and also it's like lean towards modern software like quick updates and updates you can get right away is part of the reason as well, especially for developers.

Starting point is 00:18:52 Right, you do get good hardware enabled with that, right? You get latest kernel stuff. I think that makes it special, you're trying to run around like a new framework or a new Beelink kind of thing. But then you combine that with the AUR, it's a nice package. In fact, it was really,

Starting point is 00:19:05 really nice, I have to say, revisiting Arch this week when we gave it a go, which we did, and we'll share our thoughts on that. OnePassword.com slash unplugged. That's the number one password.com slash unplugged, all lowercase. Take the first steps to better security for your team by securing your credentials and protecting every application Even unmanaged shadow IT. That's why you got to go to one password comm slash unplugged If you're a security or IT professional, you probably have a mountain of assets to protect device identities and all their applications It is a lot. It also creates a mountain of security risk It is a lot. It also creates a mountain of security risks.

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Starting point is 00:21:24 Now we saw that there are some suggestions DHH gives Well, as you heard there, we gave Omarchi a try this week. Now we saw that there are some suggestions DHH gives for Linux hardware that might work really well for this. And works really well for other Linuxes too. So he suggested things like the B-Link, which we've had our eye on for a while. There's one sitting right here in front of me. The Framework, he also likes. But he also recommends like MinisForum system 76 tuxedo computers but the main one

Starting point is 00:21:49 that he recommends is the Beelinks and the framework 13 and also I guess he's got a desktop he likes a lot. So we did the right thing this week and pulled out the old droid h4 plus that I've had collecting dust here from building a project server and we threw it on that this thing. It's such a nice little machine The old droid such a great small size and Brent has a mini ITX adapter for it So it's like a little computer that just you know, it's gonna be great for a man's we'll talk about that more later And we did talk a little bit in self host 138. I think DHH would like the old right h4 if you looked at it It's essentially an all Intel system. That's silent

Starting point is 00:22:29 It just requires a little DIY But of course arch is a total breeze to install on that thing. It's absolutely no problem. And maybe we should start there Arch has gotten way nicer to install you just when it boots up now because that's one the things I was wondering by the way, it's like how are all these guys that have never ran Linux getting going on Arch so easily? Well, because all you got to do now is type in Arch installer and you get a quite nice end curses installer that walks you through all the basic questions and manages to give you a pretty powerful setup. This is not your grandpappy's Chris Lass Arch, no, no. This was the first time you used that installer, Chris.

Starting point is 00:23:08 And you like throughout the process, you were like, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. This is so easy. I loved it. I loved it. And so it doesn't need to be graphical. It doesn't need to be, it just needs to be competent and just enough.

Starting point is 00:23:21 And so I got a really nice ButterFS with sub volume setup. The networking was all set up and it was just a minimal MVP install of Arch, which is all you really need because once you have a basic Arch install, or you can do it from the existing Arch, but once you have a basic Arch install, you just do the right thing

Starting point is 00:23:37 and W get that script, throw it right into bash and. That should be safe. You don't problem at all. One little note here while you're installing that I thought was interesting was that Omarchi requires disk encryption. That's just as it's designed and I thought, you know me and encryption, I think that's a really nice thing. Because why not use it everywhere?

Starting point is 00:23:57 So I thought that was a nice, you know, this is a, I don't know, I'm doing air quotes distro because are we calling it that yet? But it's a distro that is opinionated, and I like this opinion. It's not a distro yet. I think he mentioned it is a goal. It's tricky. I wonder if there's some issues with software distribution because he's

Starting point is 00:24:16 distributing a lot of different type of software, and technically, you're running the script and pulling those things down. So there may be a difference there in distribution. I don't use encryption by default unless it's a very specific system, but the logic makes sense here. They set up auto login by default and so they just want the system to be a little more protected. I think it works too in the sense that the systems I don't care about having auto login on are also the ones I don't

Starting point is 00:24:40 care about encryption on and sort of vice versa. So yeah, that's that's probably true. It's worth 10 minutes reading through the manual, they've set up a nice simple manual that gives you kind of the overview of the tools they've selected. Again, it's opinionated, and the key bindings that are set up, and there's a lot of them. And some of the defaults that you should know about, and the way to execute applications of the manual, it's lean mean and great. So I want to give a big plug for that. We'll have links to that in the show notes because you're going to need that.

Starting point is 00:25:09 You are because you really can't do anything until you know at least some of the keyboard shortcuts because by default you can't actually click on anything to get much to happen besides, I don't know, maybe setting up Bluetooth. Yeah, there's a couple of icons you can click to get like, you know, B-top and whatnot, but it is a keyboard first environment. It's meant for you to embrace the keyboard. Obviously, you can use the mouse inside your applications and whatnot, but manipulating the windows, launching applications, changing their location, other size, all of that. It's meant to be done with the keyboard.

Starting point is 00:25:37 So you want to just take a minute to go over those. You know, I was hesitant to be just thrown into hyperland by default like this because the last time we tried hyperland, I kind of bounced off it pretty hard. But coming back to the manual again, it's actually one of the best introductions I've seen to hyperland and like how to come to a tiling window manager like this and not bounce off it immediately.

Starting point is 00:26:01 And so I would argue it was one of the best descriptions of how to embrace hyperland and that style of dealing with applications and moving windows around. So I would, even if you're not gonna use this, if you're interested in hyperland and finding success with hyperland, it's a good place to start. Yeah it gives you an idea of what you can do with it and that was what I really appreciated about this is it gave me a sense of, oh, okay, so this is how I could configure hyperland. And boy, it is smooth. It is really nice. And I liked a lot of the options using lazy Vim, I think is it's nice. It's a nice touch having Neo Vim set up in their two ways like lazy Docker and whatnot. And lazy Git

Starting point is 00:26:42 are included. I think that's really great to see. The, some of the design seems like it's really more focused at people coming from Macs. You noticed the Chrome zoom issue. Oh, I did. Yeah, that's, I think, because a lot of people that are coming from Macs that are high DPI. And so some of these things just expect you

Starting point is 00:27:00 to have a pixel double display. You mean the display I plugged into the Odroid is not compatible with that? No, See some of those things didn't quite work right. You can tell because they also ship the specific Apple display brightness control utility. Yes. Yeah, so there's an element of this that I'm sure they've received a lot of feedback about because they have an FAQ on the website that's like how do I remove the software I don't use? There's a lot that gets included that I don't use

Starting point is 00:27:28 from just a whole litany of things. I'm wondering how you felt about that as somebody who usually has very specific control over the software that goes on their machine. How do you feel about that process? Yeah, it's not necessarily my favorite out of the box. I think it is very much optimized for like, this is the machine that I use

Starting point is 00:27:47 for my corporate development work, right? Where I need Zoom, cause I do Zoom meetings. I want password to log into my company's account and you know, a bunch of things like that. So for my personal development work, not exactly optimized, but I will say, right? Like at the end of the day, this is just a series of pretty nice bash scripts with different, you know, essentially modules for the different

Starting point is 00:28:10 components. So not only can you of course rely on, you know, Pac-Man and yay to remove things at that level, if you'd like to after the fact, you could definitely fork it and comment things out or add on stuff that you want to install that doesn't get included by default. Yeah, it is a bash script and so you could just modify the bash script and I'm just gonna take a moment. We'll just go down this lane just for a moment This is where you begin to go. Oh if DHH understood what Nix was we wouldn't be doing this with bash and DHH does not understand what Nix is

Starting point is 00:28:47 this with bash and DHH does not understand what Nix is he posted on social media he said quote I don't think Nix OS is for me where I think Nix can fit in supremely well is for isolated development environments basically what DevM is doing so he seems to maybe grasp like five percent of it but it hasn't clicked and I I only bring this up because out of all of the people out there where Nix is a good use case, people building systems like this have gotta be at the absolute top of the list, right? Like I'm number 25 on the list, and I'm very satisfied when I use it.

Starting point is 00:29:18 He should be like number one or two on the list. So I really do hope that his journey continues, and that after he has exhausted his excitement with Arch, he does take another look at NixOS because if he distributed this as a module where I could just turn certain things on or off, it would be absolutely Chef's Kiss perfect. Yeah, it would take hackability and shareability, I think, to the next level. And then one thing too is it would be kind of maybe an optimization in the sense that the plus side to having everything be separate bash scripts is like

Starting point is 00:29:50 I said, right, it's pretty easy to modify in terms of just disabling them, removing them, adding stuff to it. The downside is they each just run, right? Like it goes through and does each of the bash scripts that it needs to do. And that means each one of those doesn't have any idea about which other ones are running and it doesn't do anything fancy like compile the total list of packages to install after running all of them. So what actually happens is each module does its own like Pac-Man and yay build which doesn't make anything faster.

Starting point is 00:30:16 It also makes me wonder like how well does this work? How much item potency can you bake in in terms of like changes or updates? Is it going to be easier to just pave an arch system and install a newer version if there's radical changes versus be able to involve a place? I don't know. Right. How does it how does it deal with AUR rot and things like that to our question? But you know, when we were going through it, a couple of things aired out and it made me realize too, if this was an if this was a next process, it would build and it made me realize too if this was a NICS process it would build and it would

Starting point is 00:30:45 verify it builds before it actually implemented and that would also mean that all of the updates that DHH ships would be atomic and would be built and then you people would switch over to them and so system updates going forward would be more reliable for all the OMA Archie or OMA NICS users. So the two things that I miss setting up is that it doesn't, like Wes said, each individual component and process isn't really aware of the other.

Starting point is 00:31:10 So there isn't like a global check and build that verifies everything's working, everything's available. And then there isn't this sort of atomic update and check down the road as they issue more updates. And they've already done a round of updates. And one of the things too that as a system builder, if DHH is listening to this you

Starting point is 00:31:26 know they recently just switched from VLC to MPV great choice with NICS when you switch to MPV it was like VLC never existed on that system like it was never there it was never in the DNA of the system at all it's gone and if you change out any other component it's like that as well it's very, it's gone. And if you change out any other component, it's like that as well. It's very clean. It's surgical. And the one thing you will find with Arch over time, you might not want to remove a lot of software. As you start uninstalling things on Arch, as you have more things installed, it will start to get a little gamey with you. And you'll have to start answering questions and doing some dances. Those scenarios do not, not will not cannot exist in NICS

Starting point is 00:32:06 It's very clean Because you're building essentially a new state one that VLC never existed now MPV exists And so it's that is built like it was always that way and it's so elegant and especially when you're distributing software, okay? End of the next diversion. I just I had to make that point if you're building a system. It seems like the way to go. But that aside, I thought really well put together system if I just took off things like I don't need zoom, I don't need a couple of other things. And so and I do like a couple of things that were included like the web2 app I think is a really nice addition. It's essentially, I think it's a bash script

Starting point is 00:32:46 that creates a local looking application out of a website. It creates a desktop launcher. It downloads a PNG icon. It looks really great. It was also extremely easy to use. I made a little web app out of the JB website in about three minutes. And this has been a feature you've been asking for, Chris,

Starting point is 00:33:04 for years now. Yeah. So I I think it's I don't know I'd like so there's I'm not saying all the additions are bad I think some of them are actually really great Wes what about what about anything you saw that you're like oh I don't know if this is gonna work or anything you thought was really nice to see added? I thought it was interesting that they're using Mies as a mise en place which is not really a Nix alternative, not really a brew alternative, but is specifically targeted at developers.

Starting point is 00:33:32 And maybe you've seen things like RBN, basically, hey, I'm working on different projects and they each need a slightly different version of Python or Ruby or Node.js. And the kind of thing that like, you know, the system package manager isn't really optimized for. And so Meeze has got all of that including,

Starting point is 00:33:49 included also as like Elixir, there's a wide language support. So it can install those things and manage them per project for you. And it can also handle environmental variables, secrets, and it's got a task runner, kind of like Just or Make, all built into one little app. That is a pretty clever inclusion.

Starting point is 00:34:12 I like that. There's other just small things that they've done. So they have super keys to go right to a music player. So Super M launches Spotify, I'd probably swap that out to something else. Super T launches your activity monitor. Super G launches signal. Super D launches Lazy Docker.

Starting point is 00:34:31 Super O launches Obsidian. There's a lot of little things you can map to these hotkeys. And once you learn this, I would love like some sort of printout of all of this. You really can move on the system. And so I'd say probably after two hours of playing with it, I felt like I wasn't even going to my mouse. And then I was in a chat and I realized that they have mapped hotkeys for emojis.

Starting point is 00:34:53 Yeah, so useful. Yeah. And so they use the cap locks key. Cap locks, M, S is a smile, right? Or like cap lock key and then M, H is a heart. Emoji lock. Yeah, it's yeah, caps caps lock is another emoji lock key, basically.

Starting point is 00:35:07 It's so fun. You'll also notice that when you, when you get installed it asks for your name and email because that is also set up with a auto completion key, which I think maybe it says something about DHH's general workflows. I think a lot of this, I'm like, I think I got a lot of impressions of,

Starting point is 00:35:24 of his workflow through this actually I do want to add really quick that the wofi though launcher is very nice and you know with the rest of the theming which THH did a great job with that really integrates nicely I mean you don't need it a ton once you learn all the shortcuts or add your own but as a fallback That's just right there. I mean, it's you know, given k-runner a good run for its money. Yeah, I agree. One thing I'm enjoying about these like hyper opinionated versions of Linux is that we get a little tiny peer into how someone uses their computer. And you know that's one of my favorite things like just watching Wes solve a problem is a very different way than I would approach

Starting point is 00:36:00 it and you learn new things. So like these little shortcuts, for instance, is like, oh wait, I can integrate that into my computing life and my lifestyle gets better. And so I hope we get to see more of these from more people. Like there are lessons learned on how to do this maybe a little bit better, or that will be more well supported in the future. When you think we're trying it today, but what happens six months down the road when this is like crufty and stuff.

Starting point is 00:36:27 But I want to get more like insights into how people are using their computers. It is it is out of all of the you know, distro isn't it yet, but out of all of the custom Linux desktop setups, it's the one where I feel like you're the most connected with its creator and you have the most insight into how he uses his computer. And I think a DHH is a well known figure in the Mac community, the Mac development community, and B, since he's a 25 plus year Mac user, he's probably just by osmosis shaped the way he sort of used his workflow and that I imagine is true for a lot of other developers that have been on the Mac workflow for a long time. So

Starting point is 00:37:03 because he was sort of a Mac native creating the Linux workflow, I think he's created something that appeals to so many of those same people. Like I saw on Reddit somebody that, you know, they have a Mac studio and they went out on Amazon and for like the cost of the upgrade of RAM on their Mac studio, they bought an entire B-Link computer. Amazing. The entire computer, hooked it up to their Apple display and put Omar Archie on there and they're using that now. And they got it, you know, they spent they spent all that money. They spent like, you know, several grand on a Mac studio and now they're using like a $600 B-Link. It kind of breaks down the value proposition of the Apple ecosystem a bit doesn't it? Yeah. I mean I hope Apple's paying attention. Well

Starting point is 00:37:43 actually I don't. I don't. I like it. And I what's also what's so great about it is it's winning because it's not competing on Apple same terms, right? Like what you're seeing here, the framework, that's an anti MacBook, the Beelink. It's an anti Mac, right? You can open up those Beelinks, you can put your own memory and you can put your own hard drive and you can put multiple hard drives in them. They're the ant, and they're cheap. There are as much as component upgrades for an entire Mac. So like they're the anti-Mac, right? And then

Starting point is 00:38:13 the Hyperland interface, and all of this stuff that they're installing, it's so anti-Apple. There's no App Store involved, there's no Gatekeeper at all, it's all free software, It's all maintained and getting updated It's it's the antithesis of the Mac in its interface and how you use it how it's distributed and yet it's winning That's what's brought these people over we have created without we the the world of free software And then DHH has brought it all together and created something that's like the anti Mac and that's what's appealing to these people Well, I wonder if they're realizing that they've reached the limits of what the Mac is offering them,

Starting point is 00:38:48 much like I did when I moved to Linux and then seeing like, wait, if I just have a little bit of a learning curve, like you do on any new pieces of hardware or software that you use, you get a whole new set of superpowers. Yeah. You got to go into it, except in the premise it's going to be different and that you're not looking for one-to-one replacements. But if you're lucky,

Starting point is 00:39:09 you may find something that's even better. That's even more efficient, that helps you get work done. So, man, it's exciting to watch. And I was excited when Omicube came out and it's nice to see this hasn't faded, that this passion and this drive. And then when he does this, you see this whole wave of people.

Starting point is 00:39:27 I mean, we could sit here and I could read you 30 different posts that I collected over the last week and a half of people talking about switching. It's just absolutely bonkers. So great work from DHH. I thought it was interesting watching him comment on it and just that one of the things that stood out for him

Starting point is 00:39:40 is he got excited seeing stuff on Unix porn and people's setup and seeing that like the potential was there sort of acknowledging all that Linux could do and and seeing like, oh, this really just needs more visibility and a bit of the stumbling blocks removed. And he sort of saw himself as being in a perfect position to solve both of those and then goes and pours what you say 60 plus hours of work into that and I think kind of hit it out of the park. Unraid.net slash self hosted.

Starting point is 00:40:14 Unraid is a powerful easy use operating system for self-hosters, home labbers, for servers and attached storage. It makes the most out of your hardware no matter what you have on hand. Really the possibilities are limitless with Unraid. You hear us talk about a great application or a great HomeLab thing you can do? You can build it with Unraid. And now they also include built-in tail scale support so they bring secure remote access with no port forwarding. You don't have to worry about static IPs changing with your ISP, no complex firewall rules, and thousands of

Starting point is 00:40:44 applications with active network support. Just boom, check a single box and the application you deploy on Unraid is now on your tail net. They also support virtual GPU support for VMs, including sharing amongst multiple VMs and making templates for those VMs really easy. Obviously, they support things like XFS and ZFS if you want to do some fancy ZFS file system stuff. In fact, one of the things I think is really useful is they will import your existing ZFS pool from say like a FreeNAS or Ubuntu or Proxmox. That is really nice. It also makes it

Starting point is 00:41:18 really simple to get Windows going in a VM if you want something that maybe you have one Windows box on your network that's just contained in a VM, and then you want remote access to it, and maybe it has access to a GPU that you also put in your Unraid. You can start playing around with that too. And of course, all of the Steam valve streaming stuff, absolutely there's applications for that. Jellyfin, Plex, Nextcloud, Home Assistant, it's all there.

Starting point is 00:41:41 And I think what's really great about Unraid is they're built on top of modern Linux. So that means, like with the most recent version, great wireless support right out of the box. They're not doing that thing where they ship like some super ancient kernel and they just like apply all their crazy out of band patches on top of that.

Starting point is 00:41:58 They're really smart about this. And they have a real revenue model here that makes the development of this actually sustainable. And you can get started right now, support the show, no credit card required, try it for 30 days for free, Unraid.net slash unplugged. It really does let you go from zero to a hundred with a system that you can rely on that's built well, does now all these crazy, crazy, crazy layers of stuff in between there. It all just makes sense with good common sense stuff you can deploy on your own when you need to,

Starting point is 00:42:28 like standard troubleshooting skills backed by a great community, something I don't really mention enough. They have such a great active community over there as well. So go check it out. Support the show. Get it for free for 30 days, no credit card required. It's Unraid. Unleash your hardware at unraid.net slash unplugged.

Starting point is 00:42:51 Well, Chris, you've now spent a week up north. I'm wondering, do you have any observations perhaps that have occurred to you or any oddities you'd like to share with the show? You know, Wes, I don't know if this is uncouth, but we came straight to Brent's family property, met the family and I gotta say Wes, all these Canadians look alike to me. They are almost identical. It's really something. So there's that. That's been strange. It's hard to tell them apart. I have to be honest with you. That sounds offensive but

Starting point is 00:43:19 in this case I think it's actually true. You know something's been on my mind during our travels here because you know as always you take some time off and then like a whole bunch of stuff goes on and In the last week or so one of the largest youtubers in the world PewDiePie discovered arch discovered graphene OS discovered self-hosting and you know sovereignty and data and things like that and of course we just talked about DHH and Discovering Arch Linux and hyperland and things like that I guess I thought nobody was ever going to talk about these things but us and you know are the in the Linux the Linux community in general

Starting point is 00:43:55 Because it just seemed like these topics that we've been talking about for four or five years we're just never going to break into the next echelon of Community and conversation that you know the next wider group of users and then pewdiepie comes along and he manages to make a successful video around graphing os and uh arch and Rising his setup And it made me realize

Starting point is 00:44:21 that We were early by years to some of these things. We have been, we were so early that it's to our to our deficit. It's to our our own self-harm because we talk about these things before they're interesting to a wider population which because what it means is we're making things that for an audience that is that is smart enough to understand and appreciate why talking about these things before everybody else is important and that's what made me realize how much this show is going to only live or die on support from this audience

Starting point is 00:44:57 because we are making a show for such a niche like I we talked about things so early so ahead of the rest of the mainstream that I Actually just thought the rest of the mainstream was never gonna talk about these things because it's been years and I just okay Well, this is just to our little circle. This is just for us to know but no it does eventually break through we were just Early which means you as a listener were early which means we're making content for a very select group of people and That group of people if they want to keep it going we need their support So I'm so grateful for our members who do support this show some of you signed up after our member special preview last week We could use some more

Starting point is 00:45:34 I think that promo is still going from last week and then of course we have folks that boost us and support each individual episode and You know This is a very unique product in this sense. So that's what that's what I realized when we start seeing PewDiePie and these others talk about this stuff. We were so, so early that only a few of you weird ones got it and have listened and supported us. And I'm very grateful. Thank you, everybody.

Starting point is 00:45:59 And we do have some boost to get into in that regard because you can support each episode with an entirely open stack using peer-to-peer software with a boost. And Fountain FM has had some major improvements. Totally new playback UI, brilliant refactoring of the library, architecture tweaks that save battery life, and now if you're a premium member too, you can have it open up right to your library, not the home feed and they're making it easier and easier to boost for first timers and long timers so if you've ever thought about trying out fountain FM and you want all the you know the transcripts

Starting point is 00:46:36 the chapters and all that stuff and the boosting it's a great time to boost and try out fountain and we have a boost from Mr. Turd Ferguson. Turd Ferguson. Who is our baller booster this week. Hey Rich Lifestyle. Hey Rich Lifestyle. 44,880 sats. Says I hope you enjoyed the week off. Did you do anything fun?

Starting point is 00:46:58 Yes, we went swimming, we went hiking. Well, not much hiking, but we had to hike to go swimming. It says if you guys were traveling back to the 80s and could only bring one piece of modern technology, which would you bring with you? Oh, wow. At first I thought cell phone, but it's kind of pointless because you wouldn't have a way to charge it necessarily. Yeah, then I thought laptop, but internet is not really widely distributed or anything like that. Like there's no data, there'd be no cellular data, so there's really no point in having a cellular phone or a laptop. Well, maybe a laptop, but what would you do with it? Would you bring your SB32s?

Starting point is 00:47:35 Yeah, but there's no Wi-Fi to connect to. Oh yeah, God, I keep forgetting that. Yeah, I think you guys are forgetting that this is as much a smuggling operation as anything else So if you do bring a laptop, right you can include the Linux kernel source code on that laptop As well as maybe some minor stock price, you know data and then you'll be able to be the creator of Linux And then Chris you can you know approve whatever you want for the kernel. You're right. That's how I get be cash FS in earlier I like this Biff. That's a good. That's a good plan In fact, that's how you could become sneaky the top contributor.

Starting point is 00:48:08 You know, like the Bitcoin white paper, you stick that on the laptop too. I think the play though is more like a Star Trek villain play where you want to accumulate a piece of technology that you can reverse engineer over your lifetime and just keep getting rich and rich and rich as you like, you reveal one more piece of a robot hand or a chip or something like that. You know what I'm saying? That's the move. When I'm thinking about that kind of thing, I'm almost wondering, what about an automobile, a modern-day automobile? Because they got computers, they got combustion parts in know, like parts in there for the engine, like there's stuff in there that you can get rich off for the rest of your life.

Starting point is 00:48:49 So as you were saying that I was imagining like the Mars Rover and the Mars helicopter. Yeah, they got some fancy stuff in there. I'm thinking that's the way to go. It is like a whole vehicle, because these things are basically cars on computers now, right? So that's my thinking.

Starting point is 00:49:04 Thank you, Turd. Appreciate the boost. Otter Brain boosts in with 10,000 sats. Superior ability breeds superior ambition. Inspired by the TUI challenge, I took a deep dive into NeoVim configuration on NixOS. Really a rabbit hole of telescope, tree sitter, and lap, I eventually discovered Nick's Vim was, have you seen this greatly simplified and tidied up my configuration? I mean, he looks as great too, but I really get that little squirt of dopamine customizing

Starting point is 00:49:38 a tool. Is there a name for this condition? Yeah. What is that when you're on that? Yeah. I love getting dial love that ever so right the dopamine configuration I have not yet tried NYX VIM. Wes you know about it but Brent you know about it too you both you guys have seen it but don't use it like

Starting point is 00:49:53 come on well during the 2e challenge I as you know tried to dive into learning VIM and I decided well like these Neo Vim people must know what they're doing so I'm gonna dive in there Maybe they have some same defaults. And then immediately ran into, oh yeah, I got to customize this thing. And so I did find NixVim and I thought it sounds amazing, like exactly the thing we want to get and would make this much easier if you happen to be on NixOS. But then I spent about another 30 minutes deciding that I was just going

Starting point is 00:50:25 down a massive rabbit hole and I was going to very quickly lose the TUI challenge doing this. But I did put a little note. I just choose to use a desktop OS that isn't so complicated it needs its own Vim editor. That's all. So I don't have that problem. Interesting. Yeah I'm trying to avoid so far avoided a complicated Neo Vim setup. I'm partially afraid of that exact reason bread But yeah, I do think next thing would be what I would use Where I or to eventually go down that path we did see a couple notes from Listeners who were doing the tweet challenge after our episode who also mentioned that next Vim was a nice place to land

Starting point is 00:51:02 Well, we received a row of ducks from a dude trying stuff. Howdy, y'all, from the big TX medium-time listener, first-time booster. Hey, thank you. Sort of some newbie questions about the show here. First one, why does Brent hate building computers? Do you hate building computers, Brent? I think there might be a little clip of me suggesting I might.

Starting point is 00:51:26 I think you love building computers. Can we get that? Well, you know, you and I built a computer together this morning. That's true, we did. I hate building PCs. And it was a computer, I have to admit, I tried to build previously and forgot that I needed to buy a hard drive and memory for it. So it's been sitting like literally on my tea station for the last four months. Maybe.

Starting point is 00:51:49 Did you see the ending here? PS, you all got me to watch baseballs. Oh, that's so great. The whole show is so great. So the combination is one, two, three, four, five. So thank you, by the way, for the first time. Boost always appreciate that. There's a last question here if you want to see if you can answer it Chris

Starting point is 00:52:09 I know we go through all of them. Why is Tuesday? Why is it a Tuesday on a Sunday? so the show used to be on Tuesdays and You know, I used to end the show see you next Tuesday and I always liked that better than see you next Sunday So I just wanted to keep it and so it's a Tuesday on a Sunday I'm glad that you watch baseballs if anyone else has any other questions on what the heck we're doing over here yeah please send them in it can be a little weird at first I suppose thank you for the boost nice to hear from you a dude trying stuff pod button comes in with a row of ducks I've moved to Linux Mint from Nix due to issues with Nvidia drivers.

Starting point is 00:52:48 I wanted to play games and it refused to work. I'm listening to episode 616 on June 27th. On the 27th, June is not... Oh, it's July now. Oh my gosh. Yeah, episode 616 was from Boston to Bootsy. Ah! So it's our Boston episode. Doing a little time travel check in. Thank you, Podbun. I always appreciate that. I'm sorry to hear you had Nvidia drivers,

Starting point is 00:53:07 but if Linux has been solved before, I suppose that's always a positive. It's frustrating when you go to play the game and the driver isn't working and you just want to play the game. I understand, Podbun. Jordan Bravo boosts in with 4,444 sets. This old duck still got it.

Starting point is 00:53:25 PewDiePie just released a video about de-Googling. He's using Arch, Graphene OS, Nextcloud, self-hosting, and more. I don't normally watch his channel, but it's great to see these topics get some more widespread exposure. I agree. I was, you know, going on about how they're late and we were blah blah blah earlier. Like, that made it sound negative. I am actually really glad that this is getting wider attention.

Starting point is 00:53:48 I actually kind of given up on the idea that it would. I agree. Can I just say I think this solidifies one of my predictions from earlier in the year? I think you're probably right, David. I hate that. I hate that, too. Mr. Bravo goes on to say, if Graphene Project dies,

Starting point is 00:54:03 I would probably go with another privacy-focused Android, Android such as Calix or maybe even a Linux phone. There's just no way I could put up with the creepy surveillance of a stock Android and unfortunately iOS is just too restrictive for my liking. Yeah there's that. I would agree with all of that. Yeah yeah that that app store control with Apple is really a problem. There was even just a slightly more complicated third party way for me to distribute my own apps, I'd feel a lot better. Yeah, I agree.

Starting point is 00:54:31 I think, yeah, we should really give Kalex a try if Graphene OS goes away. Thank you, Jordan. Appreciate that. Well, Rotted Mood boosted in 10,000 Sats. ["Rotted Mood"] This one's very simple, one character. just an emoji of the Vulcan salute. Haha, thank you for the value, Rodded Mood, and of course, hope you live long and prosper. Pickle Arts comes in with 4,444 Sats.

Starting point is 00:54:59 Things are looking up for all the duck. Listening to episode 615 right now, future check in from a one a Canada. Hey, one. Hey, do we have a map for that one? Do we have is that a also thank you for the check in. Thank you for the time travel check. I appreciate that. Is that a map thing because I know you both have maps. Oh my gosh. Look at oh whoa. Oh, that's why you're trying to unfold that to the right sector. I think having an a one a postal code is like you're trying to unfold that to the right sector, I think having an A1A postal code is like,

Starting point is 00:55:27 you're at the top, right? You got the very first postal code at the top of the list. I don't know where this is, but I think it's amazing. That's where they started. I'm getting jealous. I'm a little jealous. Whoa, Wes, careful. Oh, the corner's sharp.

Starting point is 00:55:40 Yeah, I know, you guys went to Canada, but I've been investing in new maps, so hey, hey. Clearly. Is that a backroads map book? So where is he? Mr. Mr. Maps, Mr. Well, the Canadian postal code region a 1a is located in Newfoundland in Labrador specifically within st. John Yes, zip code is a better deal Can I just say it's very strange that we start our postal codes from right to left, it seems.

Starting point is 00:56:08 Why is it way up in the right? Shouldn't it be up in the left? I've been asking this every day. We'll get the answer at some point. I don't know if we will. I think I blend history. I'm just gonna say that. I like that.

Starting point is 00:56:19 I like that. All right, well, that's fun. Thank you. And hey, proper for this is Canada Day on the show, so. actually if you just say it a 1a it's got Canada all over it a 1a a a 1a a 1a Hey a 1a All right. All right. We had our fun. Thank you pickle arts. Nice to hear from you Marcel comes in with 5000 sats. I like you. You're a hot ticket. Hey, Marcel.

Starting point is 00:56:46 Oh, Marcel's following up. We asked folks to share their electronics projects, and Marcel shares github.com slash you'd better run. It's an ESP8266 based ePaper screen that shows me how much time I have to catch the bus. That sounds so useful. That's great. Another project is an autonomous robot

Starting point is 00:57:07 I helped make for a robotics competition. It runs NixOS by the way, and although it wasn't supposed to have ESPs, only some custom PCBs, we had to add one at the last minute because of some hardware problems. So we used the ESP to bridge USB to CAN bus, well, really USB to UR to SBI to CAN.

Starting point is 00:57:26 Wow, you are doing some things Marcel. Thank you for writing in. That's so awesome. So the you better run thing is so great. He's got it in a picture frame and he's got the E-ink display inside the picture frame. And then it's just got the in the city and out of city different times at the different stops.

Starting point is 00:57:40 It's simple and also very, very useful. That's awesome. Yes. Thank you Marcel. We'll put those links in the show stops. It's simple and also very, very useful. That's an awesome use. Thank you, Marcel. We'll put those links in the show notes. That's too good. I love that it's elegant. I mean, it's like a minimal display, but with the picture frame,

Starting point is 00:57:54 there's something artsy about it. Great. Yeah. Marcel also included a little YouTube link here of the Eurobot Germany finals first round where this thing is included. Marcel when I met you why didn't you mention any of this? This sounds right up our alley. Thanks for sending it in. Well Gene Bean boosted in a row of ducks, stumbled across this tonight and thought it might

Starting point is 00:58:20 fit into Linux unplug or maybe even that TWIB show. Or maybe a little bit of both. The tech seems very Linux Unplugged, but Cashew sounds very TWIB. They seem to have recently restored around Nostr2, so Cashew may not be part of it any longer. I just can't tell. And he links us to a little GitHub here for Tollgate. Tollgate, you gotta pay the toll to get on the WiFi.

Starting point is 00:58:43 It enables WiFi routers to accept Bitcoin payments for internet access. It allows the users with a router and an internet connection to operate as an internet service provider. They say one of the reasons mesh networks haven't been widely adopted is the infrastructure operators didn't have a simple permissionless way to transfer the operating cost of the infrastructure to users. But thanks to Bitcoin and eCash, toolgate operators can transfer the cost of the internet gateway to users of the access point in a granular manner. So you kind of stream Sats, this is actually what you do,

Starting point is 00:59:14 you stream Sats while you use it. Like a small amount, 200 Sats a minute or something like that. While you use the Wi-Fi. Fascinating. And it's designed, specifically designed for open WRT routers So that's a pretty great building block I would way rather use something like this than you know, oh spend 40 bucks and you get

Starting point is 00:59:32 24 hours of Wi-Fi or something like that. I I hate that in the hotel. So this is a really cool idea. Thanks Tolgate you got to pay the toll to get on the Wi-Fi. Thanks Gene being thank you everybody who boosted We didn't have an absolutely outrageous week this week and we would love to try to see to get on the Wi-Fi. Thanks, Gene Bean. Thank you, everybody who boosted. And we didn't have an absolutely outrageous week this week, and we would love to try to see to get these these numbers up a bit. We had 31 of you stream those stats as you listen. So your streamers collectively stacked forty six thousand four hundred and twenty sets. Not too bad at all. Thank you, everybody who just sets that thing on stream and lets them go

Starting point is 01:00:01 as you listen to the podcast. Means a lot to us. And then, of course, when you combine that with our boosters, everybody who sent a message into the show, we stacked a grand total of 131,654 sats this week. If you haven't tried out Fountain FM yet, it is getting so great. They've really been working on that and making it a great package. And it makes it really simple to boost.

Starting point is 01:00:29 Of course, you can keep your podcast app and you can boost with something like the Breeze app, which is a lightning node in your pocket. You can find that at B-R-E-E-Z. It's just the Breeze app. It's really simple. And again, thank you to our members who also support us. We really appreciate all of you. Now we got two picks before we wrap up our special Canada episode. And the first one you've been playing with this morning, and it's making some waves online. It's the Gemini command line, an open source AI agent that brings Google's Gemini AI to the terminal. What do you think of it so far, Wes?

Starting point is 01:01:05 OK, so the front end is Apache 2.0 licensed, so it is open source. Obviously the back end is powered by Gemini, so that comes with all the usual caveats. But it's pretty slick and it's a perfect fit for this episode because out of the box it comes with themes and it looks really nice as a TUI interface. I sent you a couple pictures. They've got some on their GitHub as well. It's already in Nix. I'm sure it's in a bunch of other places. Otherwise, they have installation instructions as well.

Starting point is 01:01:34 And it makes it quite easy to get started interfacing with Gemini. And not only is it just like a chatbot interface, right? But it's an agent in the sense that it can access, with your permission, your local file system. So I was able to have it quickly write me a script to tell Brent a secret message. It not only spit out the code for that, right? But it saved a file, it made the file executable, and then it even ran the file all from the same little 2E interface. And it does, it looks like it's, it's built to run on, on Archie. Like it just looks right at home with the theming and the terminal and all of that. It's pretty great.

Starting point is 01:02:08 It's neat to see it on the command line. Honestly, it doesn't feel like a Google product in a good way. Yeah, you wouldn't even know. It's a wild future we live in. All right, and then not one, but yes folks, two picks this week. And this one is Sniffnet comfortably monitor your Internet traffic. You can say Sniffnet is a technical tool, but at the same time, it strongly focuses on the overall user experience. Most of the network analyzers out there are rather cumbersome to use where Sniffnet's cornerstone is to be usable and easy for everyone.

Starting point is 01:02:39 It's Apache licensed and it is written in rust. Boy, is it written in Rust. 98.7% Rust, according to GitHub here. I don't even know what toolkit it's using. It's kind of got a custom looking UI, but it has a very nicely developed UI. Yeah. Oh, and I guess it's available for Windows and Mac OS as well.

Starting point is 01:03:00 You can choose a network adapter. You can set a set of filters. You can view overall statistics about your net traffic, you can have real-time charts about the intensity of the traffic generated. It's a great way to keep an eye on your network, even when the thing's minimized. You can export and import PCAP reports,

Starting point is 01:03:17 identify 6,000 upper layer services protocols, even Trojans and worms, it just identifies them in the internet traffic. It really is a cool app. This is like the kind of tooling that I used to actually use professionally just to analyze and discover networks and kind of learn what they're about. And I think people should probably run these on their home network about once a year and just kind of see what's going on.

Starting point is 01:03:41 I'm just noting, Chris, that you're visiting here, the Great White North and my wireless networks and such, and all of a sudden your pick is this sniffer? I couldn't, couldn't, I don't know why that came up. I just, your WiFi working better today though, right? Oh, it seems quite fast, like double the speed I've seen previously. So you let me know if there's any other weirdness going on.

Starting point is 01:04:01 Yeah, well, don't worry, it's all taken care of now. Thanks. Yeah, it's a nice little app. Of course, we'll link to it in the show notes at linuxonplug.com slash 622. I'd be curious to know if anybody out there has actually tried the Gemini command line, or if our audience is too afraid of it.

Starting point is 01:04:18 Are you too afraid? Does it scare you because it's Google and it's AI, or are you actually using it out there? Or you're like Wes, and you're just out there abusing it, making it do horrible things. I would love to know what he's done to this thing up to now. Yeah, yeah. I do like that you can have it just go and look at stuff

Starting point is 01:04:32 and build and then I assume if it fails, it figures out from there. I mean, it's pretty useful actually. Yeah, and you can, you know, it can handle bigger code bases, do things beyond Gemini's already quite generous 1 million token context window. You can feed it in sketches or PDFs.

Starting point is 01:04:50 Anything Gemini can do, you're enabled to do on top of it, but tied in more to your local file system. Let us know if you give Alma Archie a try you can find it at omarchy.org And we'd love to know what you think of the hyperlens setup and all of that Kick the tires get a blank arch install and run the script and give it a go. You can try it in a VM I don't think you're gonna get the same experience, but it will run in a VM and Report in boost in and let us know what you think of it I it's probably not gonna be for most experienced Linux users because of some of the choices that have been made, but it's beautiful. There is a lot of great ideas

Starting point is 01:05:29 in there. We would love, love, love to have you try it and report back to the show. Give it a try. Take the tires. I think that's it from our Canada special show. Should we hit the hot tub next, Chris? Yeah. You got anything for us to eat before we hit the hot tub? You've got to have a snack before we get in the hot tub. We got moose steaks sitting in the fridge waiting. Yeah. Yeah. You got anything for us to eat before we hit the hot tub? You're gonna have a snack before we get in the hot tub. We got moose steaks in the fridge waiting for us. Of course we do. We will be back in the studio next week live at our regular time to make it a Tuesday on a Sunday. See you

Starting point is 01:05:54 next week. Same bad time. Same bad. Of course you can tune in at JB live.tv or JB live.fm the time is at jupiter broadcasting comm slash calendar or it's posted early in a podcasting 2.0 app for you. We'd love it when you join us. We have that Mumble Room, that Matrix, all of it gives it a real nice live vibe. And of course, you can catch the release version all cleaned up by editor Drew at LinuxUnplugged.com. We have the RSS feed posted there. And if you're a member, be sure you're checking out the bootleg or the ad free version.

Starting point is 01:06:22 We've got a couple of extra special things just for you. All right. Thank you so much for joining us on this week's episode of the Unplugged program. And we'll see you right back here next Tuesday, as in Sunday. So so Thanks for watching!

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LINUX Unplugged - 622: Omarchy Hits Different

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