LINUX Unplugged - Episode 137: Kool as Breeze KDE | LUP 137

Episode Date: March 23, 2016

Plasma Desktop 5.6 is out today & we’ll share of the small things that we simply love. Plus some of our secret LinuxFest Northwest Linux rig build plans are revealed, why gaming on Linux is doing better than you’ve been led to believe & live shootout of open source Skype killers.Also our thoughts on ubuntuBSD, open source GPS tracking, Nvidia shipping Wayland support & more!

I tell you what, it's one of them things that a girl goes through. Although, just to add insult to injury, I can't seem to actually be able to – oh, jeez, now it just disappeared. I can't seem to actually be able to right-click it. So – and now I clicked on a menu that existed for a Plasma that I deleted and now the whole interface is locked up. Well, shit. I had so many nice things to say and now my whole UI is locked up and I got like a bajillion tabs open. I don't want to reset all those up. Oh, man. And now my whole UI is locked up. And I got like a bajillion tabs open. I don't want to reset all those up. Oh, man.

And then I watch the icon. What? What? What just happened? What just happened? I think Plasma Desktop is just going crazy on me. My screen just went blank. Too many features. Something. Damn, man. That sucks. You know, every time I get to a point where I'm like, this is it. And then

something happens to me in production. I'm like, oh, shit, I can't use this. This is no good. This is no good. And, you know, what really sucks is now I think I'm getting to the point where I'm going to have to restart X, which could screw up HDMI capture, which could mess up the stream, and it's going to close all my tabs, which Chrome will likely reopen. But I had things played and paused in certain positions. I had certain pages zoomed in. Like, I took about 15 minutes setting all that up. So I'm going to lose about 15 minutes of work, and I may lose HDMI capture.

Slow down. Before you do that, there is a way to restart only Plasma 5. There is. Well, if it could take input. Well, maybe I could try. Alt F2. Hit Alt F2, and it will always work. And I just got to get you the command.

Give it to me. I'll tell you what. This is no good. This is no good. No good. Because it always happens to me. I'll tell you what. This is no good. This is no good. No good. Because it always happens to me when I'm messing around with Plasmoids. It's always when it happens. I do like that word, though.

I don't even know if I'm saying them right. They're just Plasma widgets. All right. So there is a command to restart Plasma 5. Yes. Yes, I'm just grabbing it. Dunka, dunka, dunka, dunka, dunka. Oh, whoa, whoa.

Whoa, look at that. There's Chrome. So apparently, whoa, I'm using a totally different task switcher all of a sudden. Look at that. It's the one on the side. Wow. So there's all my tabs. You can see I'm going to lose.

You can see I have all that nicely set up. Oh, you shouldn't lose these. That's the good thing. Yes, I am just opening up. I have a shell script. It seems like if I just type restart, restart the computer. Nope. That's not the one. Wow, this index is like a I just type restart, restart the computer, nope. That's not the one.

Wow, this index is like a son of a bitch, man. It's pulling out notes I'd have from clients from years back in my text. Yeah, okay, I'm ready. I'm going to put in IRC. Okay. Dunka, dunka, dunka, dunka. Dunka, dunka, dunka, dunka.

Alright, so let's see. Let's wait for it to come up in irc okay so i gotta i gotta kill two i gotta run two commands okay i know all right so p so p kill f plasma shell but that sounds dirty doesn't it yeah all right so here i'll pull it up on screen so you guys can see what happens so i'm gonna uh put that in there p p kill-f PlasmaShell. Okay, ran that. And then now I got to – now, so nothing happened, but it's probably fine. Alt-F2. Okay, Alt-F2.

And then I have to do what? K start. K start. PlasmaShell dash dash shut up. Yeah, I know that that's stupid. I love it. But that just means don't spit out all kinds of debug code. I love it.

I love it telling That just means don't spit out all kinds of debug code. I love it. I love it. Tell me to shut up. Okay, so now I have, I think I have my desktop. Now, look at, isn't this weird? These plasmoids showed up on here that I wasn't using before. And they're blank. That's weird. Yeah, it is.

But I have my Dropbox icon down in the system tray. Hey. There you go. So thank you, sir. No problem. I have that in a shell down in the system tray. Hey. There you go. So thank you, sir. No problem. I have that in a shell in an usual local bin, and every once in a while, Plasma will just freak right out. So now all those widgets just disappeared when I opened up the drawer.

Isn't that weird? That's very strange. I'm glad you guys are seeing this. It's not just me. We would never believe you otherwise. My CPU monitor is back, which I thought was gone the last time I logged in. I'm going to stop playing with the Plasmoids. It and Dropbox iconcon were hanging out together.

Yeah. Well, thank you for helping me fix that. It's nice to not have to lose work. I like being able to recover on the fly. It feels very like Hollywood. Yeah, right. You know, like reroute the primary operating system. Hold it out, guys.

Yeah. You know, like I remember I was watching 24 one time, and Jack Bauer asked Chloe to reroute the primary operating system or something like that. I was like, I don't know what that means, but that sounds cool. I don't think they think that is anything. Do you know the thing I used to love from 24 was when he'd say, send it to my screen. Yes.

And they'd just like grab hold of a window and throw it across the room. Yeah. I love it. I want that. I'm still waiting on that. Well, actually, there was a package. We used to take the piss out of a friend of mine because he was the debbie and maintainer for a package called Xmove. And Xmove is a program that can do that and has been around for years and years and years.

But I think it's broken now. But, yeah, you could do that. You could send an X program from one screen to another. This is Linux Unplugged, episode 137 for March 22nd, 2016. Welcome to Linux Unplugged, your weekly Linux talk show that's celebrating William Shatner's birthday and has a few surprises up its sleeve, like a huge box. My name is Chris. My name is Wes. Did you like that, Wes?

Oh, yeah. I was getting into that one. I was riding the jankies on that one. So coming up on this week's episode, huge show, big show, unbelievable show. Get out of here. We're going to have to charge you. It's so big. NVIDIA claims they have Wayland working on their current driver, but that might be a

little bit presumptuous. We'll tell you why. Later on in the show, major, major plans, including a big Linux build coming up for Jupyter Broadcasting right around LinuxFast Northwest. What? We're going to tell you about a couple of secret projects that are in the works, some big plans around LinuxFast Northwest, and I'm going to get psyched up about Noah's

switching campaign. Then later on in the show, happy birthday, KD! Well, is it their birthday? What do you call it when they have a release? Because they do it more frequently than every nine months. Yeah, that's true. Happy release day? Yeah, let's do it.

That doesn't jazz it up for me enough. Well, we'll come up with something later on in the show because we're going to talk about Plasma Desktop 5.6. Been running it for a few days. It released today. Going to do a little bit of follow-up. Some people asked some questions since we talked about a Linux Action Show. We're going to do some follow-up on those questions.

Wes, you've been running it right here on this rig. Yep. You're going to share your thoughts on it. So we'll discuss that. Also get the MumbleRooms take on it. We've got a few KDE users in there. And then towards the end of the show, we're going to do a live throwdown of two open source Google Hangouts killers. They look like they're better quality, more control, and use WebRTC and are private and safe and peer-to-peer in the background. So pretty cool show.

And obviously work on Linux. I guess that's kind of a given too. And that's just like the stuff we're going to do after all of the updates we have to get into from all the projects we follow and stuff that's broken since the Linux Action Show. Huge show, Wes. Let's get started. I was worried that we were going to have a bad show today. I got on the air before you got here.

I was like, we are screwed. Why are you telling everyone our secrets, Chris? So those of you who don't know, Wes has been bringing in great brewskis for us to try during the show. And I thought, well, today won't be the day. He's got to go get a burger. Rikai talked him into getting a burger for him. And I was like, so he's not going to have time to get a burger. I mean, really good of the network, really.

Right. Well, there's a burger currency within the network. And you can buy favors with people by buying them burgers. So you've essentially put a burger in your bank. So that's not a bad move overall strategically for you down the road. I agree. But I was worried we wouldn't have any beers. And no beers would be a bad show.

It's not because we need the alcohol. It's because it's like how certain athletes have certain routines they have to follow. Wear the same underwear, that kind of thing. Well, of course we're doing that too. But on top of that, we like to have one beer with the show. And this week, Wes brought in something really kind of eclectic. And it's ecliptic. It's ecliptic brewing.

And I got the Orbiter IPA and you got Phobos. Single hop red ale. Damn. Damn. So those will be the brewskis we're drinking on today's show if you want to drink along with us. And maybe, just maybe, some folks in our Mumble Room will be. Time-appropriate greetings, Mumble Room. Hello.

Hello. Great greetings. Those beautiful voices. That's on fire. I love it. You guys are fired up and ready to go. Okay. So you probably heard the news.

It broke on the 21st. NVIDIA has published patches for its driver to work with Wayland's Westin, essentially the reference compositor. And they've made a few tweaks in there, and they're pretty happy. They say that this set of patches will allow the Wayland Westin compositor to run with NVIDIA's new 364 Linux driver series.

It's a big deal. Big deal. Wayland support. Ladies and gentlemen, here we are. March 22, 2016. NVIDIA ships Wayland support. This gets real. Yeah, it felt like a moment for me. However, not to be a buzzkill, but Martin, the KWIN maintainer, posted on Google+, that one does not simply run Wayland on Wayland Compositor with NVIDIA's new driver.

Plus, that one does not simply run Wayland on Wayland Compositor with NVIDIA's new driver. It turns out that NVIDIA is using EGL streams instead of GBM streams. Okay, what's that mean? It means that there is code that still is pending in Wayland to make Wayland work better with EGL. And so really, it's coming to Wayland to support EGL and the things that it needs for NVIDIA's driver changes. But NVIDIA's patches essentially accommodate for a Wayland that's just a little bit down the road, not actually fully shipping just yet, from what I'm grokking from this Google

Plus thread. So while, yes, NVIDIA gets the headline of shipping Wayland support today, they're shipping support really for Wayland of tomorrow. I suppose that's better than being behind. Totally. Totally is better than being behind. Totally. Totally is better than being behind. And I think, I don't know much, but I suspect that's probably a better arrangement

for mobile too, I suspect. There you go. And mirror support might have been in there too. I don't know. I didn't see anything. Looks like people got Plymouth working a lot better now. Yeah, yeah. Alright, so in between shows. Bit of a controversy. And if anybody in the Mumba room has anything they want to say while we're talking about this story, feel free to speak up.

Just tag me in the chat room with mum and say what you want and I'll keep an eye out. But I stopped covering these hardware server updates from the guys over at Valve because, you know, you don't really ever know how reliable it is. You don't really know like what triggers it. And you can't really compare it without knowing all of the details. But that doesn't stop the press from running stories that Linux gaming is shrinking since the launch of

Steam. Why do we hate games so much? Linux users hate spending money. Linux users hate playing video games. And Linux gaming is doomed. That was the narrative last week. This week, however, thanks to Liam over at Linux Gaming, the article has been reversed over at PC World. In fact, the author of The Linux is Dying, Chris Hoffman, has now written a piece saying

Linux gaming is actually much healthier than Steam's hardware survey implies. There's actually more Linux gamers than ever before. That's great. That is great. Now, here's kind of the basic things you have to understand when people are talking about that Steam hardware survey and the percentage of Linux users. Well, first of all, do you know what triggers that hardware survey? I do not. I'm not completely clear either.

But I do understand that a hardware change does and an OS change can sometimes. And I guess from my understanding is it seems to happen a lot more under Windows than it does under Linux. Like maybe driver changes or video card changes. I have only gotten the Steam hardware survey once under Linux. Yeah, me too. I have gotten it under Windows a couple of times and what's crazy about that is I've probably ran Windows

three times, four times, you know, at least in a Steam capacity in as many years. So the fact that I have actually... You're on Linux every day. Yeah. And on some of my machines, Steam auto starts.

So it's weird that I haven't gotten the hardware survey under Linux, but I have gotten it under Windows. We don't know anything about the sampling rates. Yeah. So here's the obvious caveat, though, that's really the elephant in the room. Steam's user base is constantly growing.

So while the Linux usage under the Steam hardware survey has declined from about 2% in March of 2013 to 0.91% in February 2015, that's because it's just a smaller percentage from a larger overall user base.

In October 2013, Valve announced there were over 65 million Steam users around the world. In February of 2015, so that was October 2013, 65 million. In February 2015, Valve announced there were over 125 million active users worldwide. Whoa.

They doubled in less than a year. That's impressive. Yeah. So you're looking at percentages here. In October 2013, you had 0.98% of Linux users. That's about 637,000 Linux users. In February 2015, 0.91% would be 1.2 million Linux gamers. So we've gone up to 1.2 million Linux gamers.

Here's the other thing that's kind of crazy. Valve's Steam Hardware Survey doesn't include SteamOS. What? And doesn't include machines in big picture mode. Oh. So if you've built your own SteamOS box and used big picture mode, or if you like that UI better and you use that under Linux, or you're using SteamOS,

you're not getting counted towards Linux. So that's another reason why the numbers are a little low, which is a little funky. And Valve doesn't really publish much... Go ahead. I guess people just that were using Linux to play Steam now use SteamOS. A lot of people did the experiment in Lake.

And Kitson, you wanted to point something out too that actually is kind of common for Linux gamers. Yeah, one of the things that I find that I have to do to play the games that I want, I have to run it in Wine. And I don't know if Steam has a way of counting users that are running in Wine and saying, hey, this is not actually a Windows user, this is a Linux user running it in Wine. And that's a very important detail.

Yeah, Wine users get counted as Windows users. Val's mentioned that before. And the Linux, Gaming on Linux community has mentioned that the hardware survey seems to pop up more underwined because to Steam it looks like your OS or hardware is changing sometimes. So, yeah, that can be a thing.

Any other thoughts on the SteamOS stuff? I mean, I guess I wanted to just my point in bringing this up on the show today was to sort of put a little anti-spin on the whole Linux gaming is dying. It's actually grown from 700,000 to 1.2 million in the last year. That's a pretty big deal.

It's like one of those things kind of like with political polls where a lot of the reporting spins how you think about it. Go ahead, Rod. Yeah, I only ever use Linux for gaming anyway, and I've never seen a single hardware survey on Linux for my usage in six years. Yeah, I've seen it once I think. So yeah. Yeah, you're right.

Just different stats and stuff like that. OK. So this is the story that people brought up right before we started the show. They said you got to talk about this today. You got to talk about Ubuntu BSD, Unix for human beings. Today they write, we have the great pleasure in their opinion of introducing you to a new project that saw the light of the Internet for the first time this past week on March 12, 2016. Meet Ubuntu BSD. Ubuntu BSD promises to bring the power of FreeBSD Kernel to Ubuntu Linux.

It is based on FreeBSD 10.1 and Ubuntu 15.10 right now. And, of course, it's one of its highlight Cadillac features is it's using the FreeBSD kernel. Ergo, you get the famous ZFS combined with, of course, things like the port system and I would imagine Ubuntu's user land. Ubuntu BSD is currently hosted on SourceForge and it's got an ISO you could download. We have linked in the

show notes. And the code name for this release is Escape from SystemD. But SystemD is misspelled. You're right. It is. I mean, you wouldn't expect the BSD crowd to know that. It's a little bit of a Linux nuance. I agree. Yeah, you'd think if you're actually, so

as the register points out, one of the genesis of this distribution was to break away from, to be a savior from FreeBSD. I'm sorry, from SystemD. The SystemD argument was – remember how hot that was? Remember what a big deal that was? Oh, yeah. That was one of the reasons they created this was to save the world from SystemD. So you'd think if they're creating a project to save the world from SystemD, you'd likely –

Look into it a little. Probably know how to write it. That is an interesting observation. a project to save the world from SystemD, you'd likely probably know how to write it. That is an interesting observation. Maybe they did it deliberately because they clearly don't like SystemD. Spit right in the face. With a big D. Yeah, they did do it with a big D. Why in 2016 do you host

a project on Sourceboard? I did specifically mention that just to see if anybody would catch that. Poby, I'm dying to know what you think of Ubuntu BSD. Is there going to be a trademark issue here, do you think? So I saw that the thread was on the Debian BSD mailing list where it was first discussed, and that's where it first came to my knowledge. And I think I've read all the mails in the thread and someone the the guy uh john boden who created it uh was asked when there'd be a

trademark issue and i think definitely avoided that question or didn't see it or whatever for the benefit of doubt um i don't know uh it's a community project, so much like Ubuntu Marte. It probably should be called something like Ubuntu BSD Remix or something like that, which would, you know, fulfill the naming conventions we use now. But no, I don't see that there's going to be a massive deal about it. I wonder what your thoughts are just on the concept a little bit. I think it's interesting, and I think it actually is a good thing because it highlights how people can take what we've done in the event to project and remix it and change it and make it to what they want you know if someone wants if there's a

demand for this if there are a bunch of users out there who feel that there is a need that's serviced by this to have a bunch of user and all those, the lovely big package repository that we've got, plus the BSD kernel, then knock yourselves out. Go for it. Personally speaking, I think it's a great idea, and I think it's a very positive thing. I think what initially turned me off about it was the sort of overreaction to SystemD. And I'm not in the trenches, so I don't really know if it's been –

I have heard from some admins that say, yeah, our life is a little more hell now because of system D. And I've heard other guys say that my life is a lot easier now because of system D. So I'm really – I don't have a clear picture of it. But it seems like a lot of the naysaying, the gloom and doom really hasn't occurred. I mean things really have just kind of gone along as they always have now. I mean, I think we'll still see, you know,

this April will be a big deployment for systemd machines in that space. Yeah, yeah, that's true. That is true. So, yeah, go ahead. They're using XFCE for this, right? Yes. Why not just use FreeBSD with XFCE

using, like, package-ng? Yeah, you could. That's my question. You could, yeah. Like why even bother with this? I wonder if this would help with some of the Linux emulations. Like this would be a better way for some of the stuff. I doubt it.

Because you're still using the BSD kernel. So you'd have to be able to. We're still compiling things for the BSD tool chain anyway. So it's not even like it's the same tool chain or something. Yeah. Well, there is one reason you would do it. It has the word Ubuntu in it. There you go.

That's true. Yeah. There you go. Hey, everybody. It's word Ubuntu in it. There you go. That's true. Yeah. There you go. Hey, everybody. It's got Ubuntu in it, so it must be good. Interesting project, and I kind of will – I think would be interested in checking in on it and say, I don't know, six months and see where they're at. Maybe see if they base it on 16.04. It depends on too, like – it's always weird when there's something like, it's just like a SourceForge release and some mailing list stuff.

It doesn't feel as much like a project that I will want to check up on if it doesn't have like an actual infrastructure or a page where you get like real communication from the creator. You project snob. There are lots of little projects out there that use whatever hosting they can use. Well, definitely. Just because it doesn't have a fantastic Twitter page and discourse. It does have a Twitter page, actually. Right, yeah. I mean, like a wonderfully beautiful one.

Yeah. Well, I guess I just mean I'm not going to use it in my infrastructure until I know there's more than one package repo for it. It's three days old. Of course you're not going to use it in your infrastructure. Yeah, I would agree. I think if it grew a bit and got a community around it, it would be worth checking out. I don't think you have to wait until it's like PC BSD size.

No. Which is kind of interesting because PC BSD has grown quite a bit. So Ubuntu BSD at Ubuntu BSD and it's followed by Popy. So look at that. Whoa. Yeah. I was following it when it only had 11 followers. Wow. Look at that. Whoa. Yeah. Yeah. I was following it when it only had 11 followers. Wow.

Look at you. Now I'm following it when it has 338 followers. So I like it. Par se now. Three days old. Wow. Wow. Kitson, I wanted to give you the final word on it before we move on.

Yeah. They said – I believe it was William that said, said oh it's ubuntu and that's why they're doing it and that's why somebody would use it i also think the familiarity with the base os would also be a big push as well because it is ubuntu not necessarily the name but a lot of people know how to admin ubuntu that would like to use some of those lower-level features in BSD. Yeah. And that's just a good way of, you know, getting it out there. But a lot of the stuff is in Ubuntu now. It's not going to be in Ubuntu because you don't have Systemd, which Ubuntu will, and you definitely don't have Upstart, which Ubuntu would have had in the past.

Yeah. And you're using CFS instead of a traditional file system on Linux. Yeah. There's a lot of things you don't get. There's a lot of things you're not going to get. You're not going to get Docker or containers. You'll get jails, which is fine. It does feel like a kind of hybrid bastard child of two projects

or like three or four projects really, doesn't it? Yeah, and I wonder too, what happens when FreeBSD finally gets around to developing their systemd? You know it's going to happen. And then where are all those guys going to go? Everybody that needs a refuge from that. Where are they going to go? Where are they going to go?

Gentoo? Slackware? Lumos. No, they just do the one version of BSD. Yeah, you're right. You're right. I know. I know.

I just tease a little bit. Yeah, I tease. Interesting discussion, though. And a project probably worth some of you keeping your eyes on. So if you end up trying out Ubuntu BSD, I welcome you to let us know. Comment in the Reddit thread or even better, you could join us in the mobile room in a future edition of the Unplugged show. Hmm. Ubuntu BSD.

You know, Wes, my problem is I got a lot going on these next few weeks. Linux Fest Northwest is getting crazy. Angela and I had like a little meeting this morning right after Tech Talk, and we were just going down the list constantly. Okay, we got to think about this. We got to take care of this. We got to work on this. We got to make sure this is ready.

It is nuts. And part of it is because we have very few opportunities where so many of the crew are in one spot. Right. And because we all are fairly technically savvy, you can really pull off some cool projects. So not only is there the Linux Fest stuff and the organization of getting everybody in here and getting this place ready to bring a bunch of people in and then figuring out a whole bunch of accommodations for Linux Fest Northwest and the booth and the technology to make that all happen and the scheduling and coordinating coordinating needs to happen with the LinuxFest people.

But on top of all of that, we're going to pull off a really cool project, something that will change JB and bring way more Linux into this area right here. You're looking at over there where there's that Wirecast machine. It's gross. I just don't look over there now. Don't look at it, Wes. Super excited. I might be biting off more than I can chew and I pain to tell you how many Bitcoin

it has cost me. But first, before we get into this new project, the new secret project I want to tell you about Ting. Yes, Ting. Ting is my mobile service provider and it's mobile that makes sense. Minutes, messages, megabytes and $6 a month for the line. That's all you pay. No secret crazy plans. No

dumb rollover gimmicks. It's just you pay for what you use for minutes, messages, and megabytes, and a flat $6 for the line. They have fanatical customer service. They have GSM and CDMA networks. So you can get probably at least a high probability that your device will be compatible with Ting, which means you'll get a $25 service credit. Average Ting monthly line is $24, so your first month will be more than paid for. If you're in a contract right now, they have early termination release.

Oh, guess what? No contracts and no early termination for your Ting. Yeah, yeah. That's right. Phones are unlocked. You own them outright, Wes. You own that phone outright, and they have the best control panel in the business. As we get ready to go pick up ham radio for LinuxFest Northwest, I'll be bringing my Ting

hotspot. I just turn it off when I'm not on the road. It doesn't cost me a dollar. That's great. Boop, turn it on, and I just, for that road trip, I use that hotspot. Okay, so what's it going to cost me? Because, you know, I'm paying for my usage. So I go from not paying anything to, like, $35, $45 for one month.

That averages out pretty nicely. Yeah, it does. Yeah, and, you know, I do that every couple of months. It works so smooth, and their control panel lets me turn it on and off. I invite you to go check it out. They also have a great blog, but first go to linux.ting.com. They have their app picks up on their blog. They have great, great 4K online hints.

If you have a 4K television and want to do online streaming, you're a cord cutter and want to watch 4K, they've got a great blog post on that. They have information on fiber internet. I mean, it's a great company, backed by two cows, has been around for a long time. Linux.ting.com. Go there, support this show, visiting that page,

letting them know you heard about it here, supports the show. Try out their savings calculator, see if it's worth your money, read their blog, get to know more about the company, see why I like them so much. Linux.ting.com. And a big thank you to Ting for sponsoring the Linux Unplugged program. We love you guys.

You think I'm chatty? I think so. Yeah. Jonathan Riddle said I was chatty. That's not necessarily a bad thing, though. No. No. I suppose not.

But – I mean you are a Linux podcast personality. I do talk for a living. Yeah. You kind of have to be I guess that's true you sure you're not trying to make me feel better because chatty feels like a bad description

maybe I don't get well I mean if you're like the noisy person in the office bothering everyone while they're trying to get work done but this is your office Wimpy do you think I'm chatty Wimpy he's not answering he's left but he authorized me to say on his behalf do you think I'm chatty, Wimpy? He's not answering. He's left, but he authorized me to say on his behalf. Do you think I'm chatty?

Yeah, okay. Yes, you are chatty. Define chatty for me. Doesn't like there being dead air. Oh, true. It's probably a fair approximation. Yeah, if there's ever dead air, it's intentional dead air because that feels like an American broadcasting golden rule though. You don't ever let there be dead air.

Informal and lively. Yeah. That sounds nice. Yeah. Would you look it up? Well, naturally. You did? Yeah.

I guess I'll take that accusation. You know, every now and then though, I go for the opposite effect. I let there be a pregnant pause just for effect. So sometimes it's worth it. Alright, yeah, fine. Thank you. I will. So let's chat. Let's be chatty. Let's chat about LinuxFest Northwest. So you guys know, but I've talked about it a bunch.

And I won't bore you with the details. It's April 23rd and 24th, so it's next month. It's in Bellingham, which is a gorgeous How long was the last time you went to Bellingham? Probably like six months ago. Oh, that's actually pretty recent for how far it is from you. It really is beautiful, though. Super gorgeous.

Super gorgeous. Hippie town. There might be some clouds of weed smoke. You've got to watch out for that. Just walk through one on your way to a restaurant. Yeah, that's true. So I'm really looking forward to this. And one of the things that we kind of did this year, it came out of our visit to System76, is Emma and Noah are throwing down.

And first I hemmed and hawed about this. And then I decided maybe we should really go crazy with this because, like, we're just switching this. I mean, the end goal is to switch people to Linux, right? So why not just go all out and have some fun with this? And I don't have all – like it all worked out yet because Noah, he's too busy. I should have brought him in for the show so I could put him on the spot. But I feel like – We should start calling him on here.

Yeah. Oh, we should call him. That would be so funny. I feel like we got to get some of this stuff squared away. And I want to go all in on making this work. So the goal here is Emma and Noah, Emma from System76 and Noah, are going to try to convert as many people to Linux and get them switched over and happy with Linux. Now, they both have different approaches. Emma is going to be giving away swag to people who switch.

We're going to bring stickers and swag. And Noah is going to have SSDs. Whoa. Yeah. Now, here's what I learned. And I'm not even joking with you. This is legit, honest to God. I learned this.

Emma is doing a freaking dry run in Denver before she comes out here. No way. She's doing like a practice run to get herself ready. So that way she's got like all the right moves and stuff. Noah's life is basically a practice run though. So that's true. That's a good point. But I'm telling you.

You better be prepared. Yeah. And so you and I, we could brainstorm. I'm also, I've told him he should contact the local Linux users group up there and other things like that. And I'm hoping that maybe listener Jed and Angela can maybe work because Jed's from up there. I'm going to call some like local IT guys, people unhappy with their computers. Yes. Just bring their clients around.

Oh, that's good. That's really good. That's really good. Or put that in Slack. That's really good. You know what? Put a pin on that. We need that one.

That's good. Yeah, get the local IT guys involved. Or a USB drive that just wipes their whole computer and puts Linux on it. That's the other. Just stick it everywhere. So I want to take it up a notch. And we have – we're bringing a whole – here's my thoughts. We're bringing the crew in, right?

So we're going to give jobs to the crew during this time. We're going to go all in. It's going to be a network-wide effort. We're going to have people go out in the audience and, like, grab people. I don't know where we're ever at. Restaurants, library, bar. At LinuxFest, we're going to have people go out into the crowd and, like, prescreen and get likely candidates and have them funnel them into Noah so that he can sit there and rapid convert people. So we're going to have the crew do preliminary work.

I don't think she's going to be doing it. I probably shouldn't be telecasting too much. I got other plans. Hopefully she's not listening. Well, she can't compete with us. We're going to bring the army and the weight of the broadcasting network down on this thing. And there is a critical component that we are launching today to help us with this effort and to help you with this effort.

Teespring.com slash here's the thing. It is a brand new t-shirt, hoodie, and long sleeve shirt. We're hoping to raise some funds for our efforts over at LinuxFest and we're running it now so that way you'd actually have in time to wear LinuxFest if you want to meet up with us and become part of our crew or just get it for yourself. Here it is. Look at this beauty, Wes. become part of our crew or just get it for yourself.

Here it is. Look at this beauty, Wes. It reads, on the front, by popular demand, it has a nice, classy last breast logo. You can wear that anywhere. Yeah. On the front, it's nice and classy. And we have multiple colors. We also have the hoodie.

And we have the long sleeve at teespring.com slash here's the thing. And then on the back, it says, hereesthething, dot, dot, dot. And then our last tux holding the Jupyter Broadcasting Rocket, heresthething. Do you have a minute to talk about Linux? That's great. This is your opening line to get people to convert to Linux right here. And if you want to grab it now, it's going to go for 13 more days, 5 hours, 17 minutes, and it should ship in time for Linux Fest Northwest, or to have on your own.

And the funds for this will go towards supporting, bringing people out here, getting, I mean, just beginning. I mean, this is a massively expensive thing that we're doing, but we can't run too far into the red, so we've got to start something here. Plus, this is an awesome shirt. People have been asking to have the logo on the front smaller, because otherwise it's just like this monster.

It's this massive, like huge advertising billboard on your belly. And so now we've got the logo over the breast pocket area. There's no breast pocket, but in that general area. And then on the back, big tux. Isn't that awesome? And if you didn't want to show that, but you can wear a jacket. So teespring.com slash here's the thing. Three more needed to be ordered for it to ship.

13 days total. This is part one. This is phase one. We'll be giving these out and there may be a special edition at LinuxFest too. If you have one, you may be qualified for a special edition. We'll see. I've talked to Ange about that. Teespring.com slash

here's the thing. So that's phase one, right? That's phase one. Phase two is we've got to change up a little software. We've got to makege about that. Teespring.com slash here is the thing. So that's phase one, right? That's phase one. Phase two is we've got to change up a little software. We've got to make a little front-end, back-end change to get ready for this. Last time I went on the road trip, I used something called Silver Cloud to track my trip. So you could go to jupyterbroadcasting.com slash rover and watch where I'm going. Creep on Chris. Creep on me.

That was a proprietary piece of hardware. And I want to switch over to using something open source. So, you know, something running like on a mobile device. And, Poby, I know – didn't you play with TrackCar, Poby? No, it wasn't me. I wrote my own. Oh, you did write your own. Oh, because it was running on Ubuntu, huh?

Yeah, it would have run on any phone, but I happened to write it for Ubuntu. And so I'm looking at TrackCar. Now, did you look at TrackCar before you wrote your own tracking, or did you just say, ah, this is easy enough? I just looked at yours and thought, that looks cool. I should reintroduce something. Yeah, and of course, I just went with the easy button. I wanted a dedicated piece of hardware. But now I'm thinking, okay, I could probably make it work on the phone. So there's two projects.

And I'd like to get the audience, if anybody in the audience has tried this, TrackCar, T-R-A-C-Car. It is an open source GPS tracking system for various different types of devices. It could work on hardware or, in my case, on mobile. And then it reports back to your own server that you could be running anywhere, right? You could be running on Droplet or whatever. And then it lets you embed like a Google map of your position. So that's Track Car. And then Wes, you found OwnTracks. OwnTracks is a different project that allows you

to keep track of your own location. I could share it with just certain people or I could publicly publish it. It's also open source and uses open protocols and... It looks to be a little more mobile focused. Yeah.

And it also is more like social networking focused. Like if you're looking at the app, like you can see your friends on the map. Right. So I'm feeling like track card might be the better. Unless you want to meet up with all your JB friends. Well, that would be cool too, but I don't need to track their location. You know, they can track mine, but I don't need to track theirs. I kind of want to set up a track server on a DigitalOcean droplet.

I hate asking this, but if anybody out there has experience doing this and wants to save me time and then just transfer me the droplet, I would totally love that, because I've got a lot coming up for LinuxFest. So TrackCar is I think how I'll do my live rover tracking so I don't have to pay for that proprietary

solution. You already have like 10 phones in your pocket all the time. Yeah, well, yeah. And I'm trying to get as much Linux and open source into Lady Jupiter as possible. So every part where I have a proprietary hardware solution or software, I'm trying to put something. That's awesome. So trackcar.org. If anybody knows how to set that up and wants to set me up one, that would be awesome. Otherwise, I'll try to get to it before they go pick up ham.

So one of the things we're doing is the weekend before Linux Fest Northwest, where Noah, if all goes as planned, should be in town, arriving Saturday night to do Linux Action Show Sunday in studio. Then we'll complete Linux Action Show in studio Sunday. We may do it early. Hit the road in Lady Jupiter, head over to Idaho,

meet up with Ham. Yeah, yeah. Then potentially on the way back, there are rumors afoot that we may meet up with a few other JB audience members and do like a caravan back from Idaho. That sounds awesome. Yeah, it really does sound awesome. So the track car would be tracking all of that. So we're getting all of that set up right now.

It should be, yeah, Lady Jupiter is the rover. So like you have function, the rover, and you have the name of current rover, which is Lady Jupiter. Yep. OK. Part of our secret LinuxFest Northwest plans are contained in this box, Wes. Did you see this box when you walked in? No, I missed it. It's very secretive.

You missed this box? It's right over there. Well, I was delivering hamburgers. And beer. And beer, that's true. All right, I'll give you credit there. Oh, that's true. I have had a heck of a time with video.

And sometimes when power goes out, we lose episodes because- Those are the best days. When power goes out, so we, oh boy. I know what everybody, you know what, I'm stopping myself because I'm realizing all of the emails I'm going to get.

Why don't you use a UPS? Why don't you have – I don't have a UPS on our main broadcast machine because in the past it has been introducing buzz to our audio. So I removed a UPS from our main broadcasting machine, which means when the power goes out, you lose the recording. Because the way the video files are written to hard disks, they close out the Atom file at the end of the video file. And if you don't write that Atom file properly, the rest of the video is unusable. There are some recovery tools, but they suck and pretty much only work for MP4s, not lossless video. And this has sucked so bad because we've lost hours of content before. And because it can get stormy here in the Pacific Northwest, that's like a thing.

And so what we're going to do is build a new solution. Build a new solution based on Linux and OBS. And so last week, I think it might have been after Linux Unplugged. I can't remember. You know, I've always sort of as a hobby followed Bitcoin. For a while, I did Plan B as a podcast. And I've always been pretty good at watching when Bitcoin rises and when Bitcoin falls. What is it right now?

What is the – Let's check it out. Yeah. Will you check it out? What is the Bitcoin price right now? If I – too bad you – let's see. So 4.19. 4.29.

4.16 at Coinbase right now. And what did you see? Well, this is Bitcoin average, 4.. So 4.19, 4.29. 4.16 at Coinbase right now. And what did you see? Well, this is Bitcoin average, 4.19. 4.19, yeah. That's pretty good. So the low has been like around 4.07 today or 4.10, or 4.10, I mean, and the high has been 4.17. So it got around – I think it was up at 4.22, Bitcoin was. And I said to Rikai, I said – because Rikai, you know, Rikai stays pretty current on hardware.

And I said to him, could you build me a list of a really powerful machine? I gave him all the things I wanted to do. And the one caveat is all these things have to be shipped directly by Newegg because if I'm going to pay in Bitcoin, Bitcoin is only accepted by Newegg when you ship directly from Newegg. That's the little catch. If it's any of their third-party market providers, they don't accept Bitcoin. They don't do it. I see.

And I wanted to buy this in Bitcoin because otherwise I'm poor. All your money is in the coin. Well, no, but that's where any – Learning a bit about your portfolio today, Chris. Any money I can spend is in Bitcoin. And so I look at it as a personal investment in the business a little bit. So what I decided to do was I spent quite a bit of Bitcoin actually because I figured 425 was probably going to be the high point for a while. So spend while it's high, right?

Maybe I'm wrong. But my philosophy with Bitcoin is if you see it going up and down, if you get it somewhere in the mid-average up, even if it goes up a little bit, you did pretty good. And so I ordered – I don't remember all of the details now. I probably should have pulled this up before the show. But a six-core processor, a new motherboard, quite a bit of RAM, about 32 gigs worth of RAM. Excellent. SSD, M.SATA, 2.5 drives are the ones that go into the motherboard instead of like the regular 2.5-inch. Our 2.5 drives are the ones that go into the motherboard instead of like the regular 2.5-inch.

NVIDIA 960, I think, GTX graphics. Lots of goodies. And the other thing I did is I bought two of everything. So what we'll do now is we will build two of these machines. That's great. Identical builds, identical software configs, both installed ready-to-be OBS broadcast machines. And one will be over there doing all of our endpoint broadcasting and recording a real-time backup of the live stream. And then the second build will be sitting under this table, the broadcast, the desk here. And if anything ever happens to the main broadcast machine, I just unplug the one under the table here and plug in over there, and I can start broadcasting again.

I have a one-to-one backup. And that also means down the road, like if we want to experiment with new crazy versions of OBS or Linux, we could switch over to the backup one, run off that for a couple of days, do our upgrades and experimentations on the new machine, maybe like a new patch or something like that. And if you ever need to, you just fail back to the one you haven't touched. Exactly. It's going to be so, so, so, so nice. And it's going to get rid of so many problems that the Mac Pro caused. I am majorly looking forward to it. So that's one of the projects. So all of the little components showed up today in that box.

What's still missing is I haven't picked a case. I'd like to have identical nice cases. But I don't want to spend too much on that and storage. Because the one thing is, the hardest thing is I don't know if I can really – I don't know if I can buy two sets of storage for this thing because the thing needs like two, three terabytes. Right. Really fast. Maybe even more, like five terabytes.

Really fast. And maybe even more than that if possible. And I don't really want to buy two sets of those. So I haven't bought that yet. I haven't gotten a case yet. There's still a lot I have to buy. And it's like, I only want to spend so much of my personal money. Yeah, exactly.

But the network can't really afford to do it right now. But this, I think, is going to be such a huge upgrade for us because on the back end, we're going to rework a ton of stuff. The way a ton of stuff works, the way we broadcast, it should open us up to a bunch of more streams. And then down the road, hopefully take our capabilities even further. So it's going to be a nice rig with six physical cores and then Hyper-3. And on top of that, we should be

able to stream to multiple places, do multiple encodings, live backups, all that kind of stuff. And then on top of all of that, we should be able to record the build of these things and the configuration of these things and get some content out of it too. So I'm thinking it's going to be a big, huge upgrade for us and it's going to reduce a bunch of dependency on Wirecast,

which I'm really excited about. So yeah. That's a big call. So OBS can do it. Well, we'll see. I don't know if it'll handle all the camera switching, but it's definitely going to handle all of the streaming, all of the master recording and switching of live stream to recorded streams,

which even if I just take all of that off of Wirecast, that itself will make Wirecast more stable and reliable. And then we can just, because a part of the problem is I'd have to buy all new capture cards too, possibly. We will go, what I plan to do is take it as far as we can take it. We may try taking the capture cards out of that machine and putting them in the new machine and seeing how far we can take it. And if we can go all the way, we would

go all the way. But there's a lot of little things like green screening and compositing that we would need to be able to do dynamic stuff that's possible. But yeah. I'm really excited about that. And so for us, LinuxFest isn't just about the Fest and this Emanoa competition,

but there's also some really cool projects we're going to be working on that are going to have big long-term improvements for the network. Paying down some network technical debt here. So I'm pretty excited. So at least not all of it, I think, but a huge chunk of it. It's funny because it's so much money that I spent and then I see it in one box like that and I'm like, I was expecting more boxes. Makes you feel just poor.

But then again, like Amazon ships boxes within boxes within boxes. So I guess I can't complain too much. And I don't know. We'll see where it goes. Noah is already scheming about the setup. So I think it should be really fun. I know OBS can do green screening. But I'm particular.

Oh, that's super exciting. Thanks. Yeah. It's been a long time since I've had a really new computer to build. Right. Except for with the exception of these Librems and the Apollo, which has been boom, all of a sudden hit at the same time. But, you know, my main machine upstairs is like an original first generation i7. Oh, wow.

That broadcast machine there is a 2012 model, right? So that's an old rig. So all these machines are getting several generations old. So to get two of the identical current generation machines and build them, and the nice thing is when that machine's under the table, acting as just like a backup, I'll use it as

all my visuals. It'll have a nice video card, so I can show off some nice new Steam games and do 60 frames per second gaming, stuff like that, which will be really nice. Get captured. You won't have any hardware excuses when your program that you're testing out on air breaks live? Yeah. It's funny because at one point it's a little crazy.

It's a little scary because we're building up a whole bunch of stuff and I've just spent a whole bunch of money on it. At the other time, I can't wait to have it all sort of done and just have that stage that I've been waiting on for so many years done. It feels like I'll be checking off a box that has been years in the making. I'm really excited about that. And just Rekind Night today, we're talking about some of the crazy things we're going to be able to do now. They're going to make other things that will make some of the live stream experience smoother.

We won't have to like bring the stream down between shows. But it will also make it so that way we don't lose content for the released versions too. So it's like it's going to improve the live streams and the recorded shows. But it'll also make it so that way we don't lose content for the released versions, too. So it's like it's going to improve the live streams and the recorded shows, and it's going to be done using Linux. That is awesome. I am really pretty super excited. It's really coming along the way. Yeah, well, we'll see.

We'll see. Now, the thing is to focus on right now, we've got to get as many people switched to Linux as possible. We've got to come up with a game plan. So if you are in the Bellingham area, which has got to be just a few of you, and We've got to come up with a game plan. So if you are in the Bellingham area, which has got to be just a few of you, and you could help us come up with a solid winning game plan where we could take Noah and our crew and interrupt people and not get them upset

and convince them to try Linux. And the other thing I was thinking is if you are going to LinuxFest Northwest, bring a friend who hasn't yet switched because they're going to get an SSD, they're going to get swag, and they're going to get switched to Linux. So that's pretty cool.

And you can help our effort, teespring.com slash here's the thing. That's a pretty cool shirt, too. I want the long-sleeve one myself. We're selling the T-shirt pretty much at cost with a slight markup, just a real small one to hopefully raise a little bit of funds. I mean, someone's got to buy those SSDs. Shipping April 4th, hopefully hopefully or not shipping April 4th. The Teespring campaign ends April 4th and probably printing several days after that to make it in time for the end of April.

So that's teespring.com slash here's the thing. I'm pretty excited. Yeah, it looks like we meet the threshold to ship. Yeah. Awesome. Thanks, guys. I think this could be a thing that we do at other fests too. Like if we could get the formula right, we could do like a little sub-event where we –

so Luggs in Washington, I would imagine everywhere. But Luggs everywhere will have install fest days. Have you seen this? Absolutely. Somewhere where you have people right there on site. You can ask questions. You're trying to get things set up. We could put together that kind of thing.

And if this works, we could put together a meetup, and we could get audience members that would help out with the initiative. Because really what you just need is a production line. People bring their laptops in or their desktops in. Pop them, open them. And you know what would be cool? If we really seriously got into this is if we could could have like monitors and keyboards and mice there, so if they want to get their desktop switched, they just bring their tower, they don't have to bring all their stuff. And of course,

if they're bringing a laptop, it's super easy. We get a little networking in there, so that way we could send them home patched and all that kind of stuff. 100% up to date, just... Hey, what, oh my gosh, what are your favorite applications? Get their icons all set up for them? We could really do this, and we could do it like itself, we could do it like itself. We could do it at scale.

We could do it at LinuxFest Northwest. That could be like a really cool thing we do when we go out there. And it would always make for a great like little two-minute update in the show too. So anyways – oh, sorry, Wimpy. Wimpy says he's not – I'm sorry, Wimpy. So anyways, really excited about LinuxFest Northwest. You'll probably be hearing obnoxiously more about it. And if you're Ham Radio, you're really going to hear more about it because we're going to be coming your direction, ham.

Prepare your body. Put pants on when they get there. We're coming for you. And I got like a few things I got to fix in Lady Jupiter because you know what I realized is living in an RV is like living in a boat. And it is a constantly decaying object. See, in a house, you tell yourself that you could live in this thing for 30 years, and you'll just have to fix up a few things here and there. But about 5-10 years into it, you realize there's like tens of thousands of dollars

worth of work to do. But with an RV, every month, there's something to do. Now, it's not always this big, but there's always something. So, right now, I can't use my microwave when I'm on generator power. Why would you want to? I can't go pick up ham without a functioning microwave. So, I've got to fix that. I'm going to try to fix that tonight after the show.

Can't wait. I'm beginning to repair it to get it ready for the road. Like each major voyage you go on, there's like a little something you got to do afterwards. So that's mine is fix the generator. So that way the microwave and more importantly, the electric fireplace work while we're on the road. I mean, Ham has expectations about the mood in Lady Jupiter. Got to set that mood in Lady Jupiter.

Gotta set that mood. All right. Very good. Very good. So I'm looking forward to that. And you'll probably see some sort of video update soon with Ham's smiling face on it. And more from LinuxFest Northwest. And then, of course, if you can't make it, we will be streaming it live.

And we'll have a meetup page hopefully launched soon. All right. So I'm itching to tell you about something that I'm surprised I'm this happy about. Are you still – are you in KDE 5.6 right there? I switched back, but I've been using it. Oh, you are no longer? Yeah, and now I'm trying it out in a virtual machine. Oh, look at you.

Look at you. Look at you. Well, OK. So it came out today, so we got to talk about it. I've been running it for a few days here, and it's easier than ever now to try it. There's like many options, and I know we have a few different people trying a few different ways in the mumble room plus i'll tell you about how i'm trying and we'll find out how west is trying it too and how you can try but first let's talk about digital ocean love digital ocean uh speaking of some of our plans for

linux fest northwest yeah some of them involve spinning up droplets when we go on location you know if you want to stream to multiple destinations, you could do that from your connection. But if you really want to have high-resolution streams, you could consider also streaming from a DigitalOcean droplet. OBS is very easy to send from one spot to the other. In fact, Tech Syndicate just recently did a video on this. We were kind of concocting this solution for our new setup. DigitalOcean droplets are just our go-to infrastructure. of concocting this solution for our new setup.

DigitalOcean droplets are just our go-to infrastructure. You need a Linux rig with a super fast connection, a blazing fast CPU that's crazy easy to manage, and a beautiful UI to set up. That's DigitalOcean. It starts at just $5 a month. You get 512 megabytes of RAM. All SSDs, the $5 one gives you a 20 gigabyte SSD with a terabyte of transfer.

And of course, their pricing structure just works really simply, and it goes up from there. If you just need it for a few hours, easy peasy. Their interface is so simple. You can be a server master working on servers since servers were a thing. Or you could be a total noob and you will still find DigitalOcean's interface appealing. Isn't that like an amazing? It's awesome. That's like a line they have struck that is very rare, especially, let's just be honest, in a web app. Like it almost never happens in a web app.

And I mean, if anyone's going to complain about it, it's going to be you. So the fact that you like it. Yeah, you're right about that. Also, they have a great API. Oh, I love that API. You can use that API. You can tap that API all you want, or you can take advantage of the open source code that's already done that.

And then you can just. And it's like one curl. Be like, bam. Lazy web, you got it, boom. Check them out, digitalocean.com. Use our promo code DOUnplugged. That's Use our promo code D-O-Unplugged. That's how you support this show. D-O-Unplugged.

All one word. Lowercase. Gives you a $10 credit over at DigitalOcean. You can spin up an Ubuntu rig, a Debian rig, a Fedora, free BSD. I do generally Ubuntu LTSs, but I don't judge if you do free BSD. I won't judge. And the BSD Now guys have talked about a few cool ways you can use that HTML5 console on DigitalOcean to actually install other BSTs as well. Or Arch.

Or whatever you want. Yeah. The power of KVM. We're just going to put that out there. Yeah, because they're using KVM as the virtualizer. It's a really great infrastructure. It's a great infrastructure based on Linux, a great way to run Linux rigs, and a great way to support the show. DigitalOcean.com

just use that promo code DOUnplugged. All one word lowercase. And a big thank you to DigitalOcean for sponsoring the Linux Unplugged program. And I'll just give a quick shout out too. We haven't talked a lot about this feature since it first came out. Floating IPs are a brilliant way to make you

to make a $10 operation look like a $50 million operation. And team accounts, if you're an open source project or in a business, are also rocking. So check them out, digitalocean.com. Use the promo code DLNplugged. They're really great data centers all over the world. Thank you, DigitalOcean. OK. So anybody in the Mumba Room running like Leap or Tumbleweed with a current version of Plasma Desktop installed on their machine in the Mumba Room? I am.

Can you describe your setup a little bit to me? Yes. It's just the most current version of Plasma on Tumbleweed. It's very basic. Do you know, is that 5.6 already? I believe it's 5.5.6 or something like that. Well, sir, that is no longer the latest because today Plasma 5.6, which I'm sure you'll get very soon, has been released. And it is interesting. And also, it comes with a video. How about this? I don't think I've ever seen Plasma KDE Desktop do this, and it's kind of interesting.

We can watch a few seconds of it. The clock is ticking, so it is the time to release Plasma 5.6, which brings many improvements and features to your desktop. The default Plasma theme, Breeze, now follows the application color scheme scheme allowing for a more personalized experience. K-Runner gained cleaner look and support for drag and drop. The much improved task manager in Plasma 5.6 now displays progress of tasks, such as downloading or copying files. This is actually kind of a neat feature. So in Dolphin, when you're moving files around, in the Task Manager, there's a little loading bar that goes across the Dolphin entry to indicate the progress of the file copy. Isn't that kind of a nice touch?

file copy. Isn't that kind of a nice little touch? It's a nice touch. Playback. A music or video player shows beautiful album art and media controls. This actually hasn't worked for me yet, but the idea is like when you hover over a task bar entry for your task manager, normally you'd get like a plasma

window that pops up with a preview of the window. Well, with like VLC or Sandstorm or, not Sandstorm, what app? I don't know what application that is. Or Spotify, you get not only a preview of the window, but you actually get little player control bars at the bottom of that little comp is like a pop-up preview. I don't know what you call that.

So you never have to leave the application you're currently working with. Users that place a folder applet in their panel can now choose between list and icon view. Additionally, tooltip animations have become more subtle. I like this next one. When adding desktop widgets, all windows get minimized and the widget explorer becomes semi-transparent during drag.

Isn't that cool? Yeah, that's nice. Activity Manager backend was revamped, so creating and switching between activities should be noticeably faster. This release brings back the weather and media frame widget. I actually like that. If you enjoy using plasma, please consider donating to KDE so we can continue to work together and make the best free software possible.

I guess I shouldn't cut her off. So there you go. She just sort of covered some of the features of 5.6. So here was my takeaway. And then I want to get your takeaway. And then we'll go to the mumble room. And then we'll wrap it up. But something really weird happened to me this week.

And I'm really uncomfortable with it because I've never been in this position before. Never? Yeah. And I'm glad Wimpy's not here anymore. Wimpy, you left, right? Good, oh good. Because I would feel bad even saying this if he was listening because I would just feel awful. I found myself so this here is the Librem that I'm running 5.6 on and I have the Apollo

still running in Butumite 1510 which is now I'm just using as my portable and I have this one here. And here's the thing. I found myself, every time I wasn't using this desktop, missing Plasma 5.6. Wow. Little things. Like I was at home and my MiFi dropped out. Actually, it didn't drop out.

I restarted it. And when I restarted it, I could never get Ubuntu Mate to refresh my available wireless networks and connect to it again. And right here on KDE Plasma 5.6, there's just a little refresh button you just click and it just refreshes all the wireless networks. Now, I'm not saying that's what – I'm saying there's about a million of these little things now in 5.6 that have been refined and come together to actually make a really tremendous desktop. It's really performant. It's really performant. It's really fast. I don't – I mean, Mate is fast as well, but it's definitely faster than GNOME 3. As somebody who drives GNOME 3 all the time, it's definitely faster than GNOME 3.

And there are things in it like the new K-Runner looks a lot better. You can do alt space to launch the new K-Runner, and it's cleaner. It looks better. It searches like a son of a gun, man. Yeah, it does. It is one of the best desktop searches. K-Runner itself is really powerful, and there's a whole bunch of other functionalities. You know what, too?

And this is always something I've always known, and one of the reasons I always kind of have been sort of attracted to a KDE desktop or a Plasma desktop, console is one of the best terminal emulators out there. Have you ever had like three or four tabs open to your servers? Did you know you can send, and the other terminal applications do this as well, but this is the default, guys. Did you know you can send your input to all of your tabs at once? So like if you want to do app-get update across all your machines,

you can be SSH'd in, tab, tab, tab, and just say execute this command right in console across all my tabs, and you could update all your, you know, it's just, it's a great console application. Kate is a great text editor. Dolphin is a great file manager. Like, really good. And the problem has always been, the problem has always been, for me, since they went to version 5, has been Plasma Shell itself. Now, it did actually crash on me in the pre-show, and hopefully that'll be in the after show

if you guys want to see that. But we were able to recover. Like, I didn't have to restart. Nope. Back up and running. Here's where I'm at with this, and this is why I'm genuinely excited about this. Every single stinking release of KDE since about

5.3 has been, for me personally, remarkably better. And now 5.6 is the accumulation of much neededneeded improvements to the Breeze theme. The Breeze theme is much more consistent now. They have the icons much more flushed out. It adopts whatever color choices you've chosen. The default layouts, at least on this Kubuntu with neon packages installed, are much more

clean and sensible. I'm not overloaded with choice. And I kind of feel like it feels more modern than GNOME 3 in some ways. Like the way – OK, here's just an example. So this has been really nice. All of my icons down there are just working. And I know – I don't know exactly why. But like I have my Chrome icon.

I have my Hangouts icon. I have my Dropbox icon down there, my system tray. And you know what, Wes? They don't have ugly white boxes around them. No, they don't. They don't – like they're not oddly sized. They're not mismatched in size like they used to be on the Plasma desktop. They're all consistent.

They all look good. And I have the power to hide them if I want to. Yeah, I just – for me, I'm actually seriously considering putting Plasma 5.6 on everything and just going all in for a little while and see how I feel. I've never – oh, so before I go too much further, actually, I will follow up. I will write it down so I don't forget because I've got a lot of questions after our Friday or Sunday show. So I will write down the questions. I wanted to hear your thoughts because I've been talking for a little bit. What did you do?

You tried it out on the spot, Nick. What did you think? No, I was also similarly impressed. I feel like for a little while, Plasma 5 had felt kind of like the early days of GNOME 3 where I really liked what they were doing. I liked all the changes. I liked seeing the updates. of gnome 3 where i really liked what they were doing i liked all the changes i liked seeing the updates but it's the same kind of thing where it just wasn't quite stable enough or i'd had enough problems or enough things had changed i wasn't sure how they were going to work out

but i've really enjoyed it it worked really well um i was using kubuntu on here it's been working very nicely uh i want to try maybe something like open seuss with it as well i think that would be entertaining and that might be something that I would consider putting on like friends' computers. But it has been – it still might – personally, KDE still feels like a lot of – A lot of machine. It's a huge desktop environment and it does what it does really well, but it takes over everything. So I don't know if I'll be using it every day. But for systems where that's what I want, it works really well.

That's an interesting comment and an interesting way to put it. And Kitson, I kind of wanted to let you jump off from Wes's point there because you say you like the way it feels. Yeah, I like the way it feels. And I'm actually a traditional GNOME user, believe it or not. And I think that the reason that it works so well, and I think the reason that you like it too, is because it feels like how a computer should work.

It doesn't feel like a touch interface shoehorned onto a desktop. Wow, that is a good point. Yeah, that is a good point. You know, the other thing that because I haven't been using it for a while, so there's still novelties to me that are fun. Like when you take a screenshot, they just have like one of the best screenshot applications. And it like you have, you can, with a little bit of work, you can send like your screenshots to third-party services right from the screenshot application like Imgur or stuff like that. They have great online account integration.

I'm going to stick with it for a bit and I might try loading on the Apollo too. Anybody else in the mobile room want to jump in on their thoughts on KDE? And I'd like to know if you – what distros you've been trying it on. I've used 5.5.6 on multiple different distros. I haven't used 5.6 yet, obviously. But, I mean, everything that – a lot of the stuff that they've mentioned in this is actually already in 5.5.6. Like the media player plasmoid is really cool because you can create custom shortcuts so that no matter what media

player is playing, you can actually automatically pause something or move songs regardless of what actual player you use. So you can always have the same global shortcut and that's really awesome. Oh, that is nice. So, Rodan, it sounds like you've been sticking with it for a while. What is it that's been sticky for you about Plasma Desktop?

What's kept you there? Well, I switched a year ago, actually. Well, a little bit over a year ago. And I've gone back and forth with different DEs, but I've always gone back to KDE now. And it's because Plasma has an infinite amount of control. Like, if you want to have, like, for example, Kitsune said that he liked it because it was a traditional desktop and it wasn't like a touch thing but if you want a touch looking desktop

you can do that i actually have like if you've seen my setup it kind of looks similar to gnome because i can change it to the way i want it to look but that that's one of the that's the power of Plasma. But the biggest reason to use KDE Plasma is actually KWin. Because you can do pretty much anything you want to do with KWin. Anything that any other window manager can do, KWin can do it. And there's tons of things that only KWin can do. I am continually impressed with KWin. Yeah, and I think it's a big part of why the 5.6 desktop feels so responsive compared to the GTK desktops. And I'm talking about resizing windows or the way they draw.

It just feels a little bit like how good Compiz feels. To me, Compiz and KWIN, I can perceive a difference in the way that Mutter renders things or whatever GNOME is using. Yeah. I mean, even on my virtual machine, when you drag the window around, perceive a difference in the way that Mudder renders things or whatever GNOME is using. It's Mudder. Even on my virtual machine, when you drag the window around, it's fast. Yeah, the transparency works like in a VM. There's a really cool default feature. Hold Alt and then use the right-click mouse on any corner,

and you can resize the window super fast. Oh, so you don't have to get all accurate with where you grab it. That is nice. Right. There's also one of the things that I like. This is actually the reason why I was having a conversation with someone here on Mumble, and someone said that we have a conversation about games and full screen and stuff like that, and sometimes window mode games

are better performers than full screen. In KDE with KWIN you can use the no borders rule. You can actually just put a game in window mode and then right click the title bar and

go to more options and click no borders. It removes the border full screen that window, and it looks like it's a full screen even though it's not. Yeah, the things you can tweak are pretty impressive. That is really cool. So that – yeah, I could see that making it sticky for you. Wizard, you've tried it on Debian. I don't think we've gotten a Debian take yet.

What's your impressions? So I've had ups and downs with it all the way through i stuck around i went through the kde4 to kde5 transition inside of debian and it was terrifying but uh it's uh it was it ended up working out really well uh you know there's there's been ups and downs i've had i've been through the points where the desktop has crashed continually that's actually why that's I had that script sticking around somewhere because my desktop crashed a lot at the beginning, but it's

been getting better. It's gotten to the point where I have to use that Restart Plasma script. I use it maybe once every couple months. It's really good now. In fairness, I have a restart Cinnamon script.

Do you? Yeah. Isn't that built into Cinnamon? Yeah, but, well, there were some other features. So, you know what really sucks super, super bad, and it's just what it is right now, but the Discover or Muon or whatever it's called, Software Center,

are you seeing this? I mean, I know they're trying, and I don't want to be mean but look how awkward this is so let's go into oh I don't know let's go into system settings right so that's a category system and settings and look at this Wes it's just blank

there doesn't appear to be anything there there's nothing there and like the icons are all strange you know what's right here are widgets like the weather widget awesome widgets compared to the software boutique or Like the icons are all strange. You know what's right here? Our widgets. Like the weather widget, awesome widgets. Compared to the software boutique or app grid. Yep. I'm just talking for Ubuntu systems.

Yeah, yeah. The software boutique is what Wimpy has been working on, which is just awesome. This is – I installed VLC, but I mean this is just – this is a huge disappointment. I like that it's cross distro. That is a nice – it's like GNOME software in that sense. I do – I respect that and I understand it's a big challenge. But I am not like – It needs to deliver more. What I want from the boutique and what I want from Ubuntu Software Center and what I want from Muon Discover, whatever you want to call it, I want to find a new app that delights me.

And I want to install it on my desktop. And I want to then share it with Linux Action Show audience. I want to discover new software via this. I didn't necessarily do that with the software boutique. But I installed a whole bunch of apps in about five minutes that was really – I mean for people that are going to get Ubuntu Mate 16.04 and they're going to launch that welcome center. They're going to – in five minutes, they're going to have their entire software stack. And what they've learned about what a PPA is, you won't have to deal with anything.

It just takes care of all of that for you, and it gives you the best software on Linux in minutes. This doesn't do that. This does Spockulate. This does Spotlight, Digicam, VLC, Corita, you know, some really solid QT applications, but just doesn't do just, and Marble, but just doesn't do just as all the desktop applications available for Linux, and I find it to be a major disappointment.

Nuan actually used to be better, but they started recently, as in 5.5.3 update, they started porting it more, because it used to just not be on Framework 5. Then they started porting it, and they changed a lot not be on framework five then they started porting it and they changed a lot of stuff that i don't really like like the update system is actually it used to be much better than it is now so check this out uh just to kind of give you an example wes now i don't have anything loaded uh in this vlc media player so it's not as cool all the lower three is probably going to block this but as i hover hover over VLC in my task manager, you can kind of see it there, Wes.

You see I have play and previous and next. And I can also – so it's integrated now into the freaking task manager, our playback controls. And the reason why this is a big deal for me is I play a lot of media through VLC. I'm usually using live streamer or I'm grabbing the RTSP stream of something and I'm tossing – or I'm throwing an MP3 and I'm listening to a podcast. And so to be able to just play and pause right there is neat. It's neat because it's a different way to do it and it accommodates for multiple media applications at once. So whereas a media applet will just do whatever application is controlling the volume, this

I can manage. Spotify, VLC, and the other, just for me because I'm sometimes running several apps at once. Yeah, exactly. It's really nice. This is just a really tight desktop, really well-performing. And one of the other things, true to their word, the KDE Neon Project already has a developer version. Now, remember, this is really just for testing and developing. It's not for daily use.

They already have an ISO out with 5.6. I'll have it linked in the show notes. You can download this and try it out right now. linked in the show notes. You can download this and try it out right now. The KDE Neon project has their files hosted at files.kde.org. They're all in with the KDE project. So anyways, if you want to try it out, if you want to try out 5.6,

we do have a link in the show notes. This is kind of a big deal for me. For me, this feels huge because not only am I thinking about switching to KDE, but I'm thinking about switching to Neon specifically. Wow. In anticipation of 16.04. Yeah. And to be switching not only from GNOME but to also be switching from Arch. That's a big change.

It feels like a mistake almost but – because Arch will have 5.6. Yeah. It might already have it. But the Neon project itself is such an interesting experiment. And 16.04 looks like such a promising release. I know. And even if I don't stay with 16.04, it's like I feel like I have to install it and use it for a while just to be in the zeitgeist of when it releases. Yeah.

Yeah. But it's funny because my 16.04 review is coming up, and it's like I need to immerse myself in Unity and yet here I am extremely attracted to 5.6. So yeah. I know, I know. Kitson, you can go ahead and mention it on the air. You don't have to just type it. You wanted to give a plug for Tumbleweed. We should mention Tumbleweed a try. I think you'd have great luck with it. I have. I really haven't ran into any problems or surprises updating anything, and I've been running it for almost a month now. Sonics711 in the chat room says, I'm chasing the dragon. I should be careful. You know, you might be right. And here's what I was thinking is I would like to really try to give it a go.

And so some of you listening might be wondering, well, what about your sound problems, Chris? And this was like the number one question that got sent into the Linux Action Show. Phone on lover now? Yeah, am I all in on phone on? Am I super excited about phone on? No. But in recent KDE releases, I think it might have been in 5.5,

they have... Well, who am I getting echo back from there? Who am I getting echo back from? Sorry. Five-fives started it. Yes. And then the five-sixes, the more full implementation. Yeah. Yeah, I kind of suspected that was the case.

Thank you for the clarification. So I can do a process of elimination now that essentially prevents problems. It requires I manage it more, but it allows me – at the same time, I can manage it. So it's actually not bad. more, but it allows me, at the same time, I can manage it. So it's actually not bad. So if you're looking at my screen right now on the video version here of Linux Unplugged, you see I'm in the audio volume settings. And you can just get there by right-clicking on the volume applet and going to audio settings. All the tabs are super important, input devices, output devices. But you see something here, Wes? Do you see how I only have one device listed in output devices?

Yes, I do. And do you see how I only have one device listed in output devices? Yes, I do. And do you see how I only have one device listed in input devices? Now, there are some instances where I have a machine that literally has three sound cards in it. The HDMI port, a USB sound card, and the onboard. And the onboard. Well, what you can do now, starting like Rotten said in 5.5 and continuing in 5.6, and there's other things as well. But one of the nice things is I can simply just turn those other sound cards off. And then the Plasma desktop isn't even aware they're available.

And it can't cock it up. It's literally – You just choose what you actually want to use. Yeah. By a process of elimination, by eliminating all the other sound cards as available options to the system and only making the one sound card I want available, everything defaults to it. Solves my problem. I'm making the one sound card I want available. Everything defaults to it.

Solve my problem. And so I am now able to use the Plasma desktop and drive the sound effects from this machine and not have it randomly change sound cards on me. Or what was happening to me in Plasma before is some desktop applications would use one sound card. And other ones would use another sound card. That's the worst. It's awful. So that was the number one question that came in after last is, but what about the sound? Because I've gone on and on about that problem.

I don't think it's particularly solved, but because I can disable devices that I don't want to use. It's enough for you. It solves the problem for me. So there you go. Problem solved. If you don't have two, three sound cards in a machine, it's not as big of a deal. But most of us these days do have HDMI out. And if that supports sound, which it does, then. You probably have your nice USB DAC.

I mean. Yeah. Now, you you know I haven't hmm. I haven't tried it on the DAC upstairs where I had a problem where it would reset the volume to maximum. That would be phase two. That's a dangerous problem. That's phase two. Yeah it is because the speakers up there are my editing speakers and they are

loud dude. It literally I think it gave me a heart palpitation when the first time because it was like a KD error message, like a brrrring error. And it was so loud, my ears rang afterwards. And Rekai, I think, came out of the room and said, is everything okay? Like, it was ridiculous.

Yeah, so, Kitson, has that happened to you? Where it just resets the volume to maximum for like an application? Like, what happened if I recall was, is for some reason, the application volume got set low, but the system volume would be set to 100%. And so a system message would come up at 100%. Have you gotten that, Kitson? I've had that happen a couple times, not recently. The one big thing that happens to me is my mic will get unplugged because I got an old mic and the connection is kind of janky. And then I'll go to plug it back in and it will be muted and I have to switch everything back over.

It doesn't default correctly. Yeah. I'll see if I run into those. I think the only way I can really find out is if I – jump in. Yep. Holy smokes. This is a slick desktop. Oh, also, I should mention, speaking of Martin and KWin and how great KWin is, 5.6, real solid, like this one, will run on Wayland release. This is the will run on Wayland release.

That might be fun to try. Yeah, big deal. Now, not ready for production, not 100%, but so much work has gone into making this freaking work on Wayland, and a lot of that work is showing up in 5.6. Pretty cool. Pretty damn cool. And you could probably just go try it out using the Neon ISO in the show notes. And, you know, what's funny, what's ironic about this and the story of my life as a Linux user, super annoying. I don't distro hop anymore.

I desktop. Well, actually, I'm about to distro hop too. You are, right? God, old habits die hard, don't they? What's really frustrating is all this freaking choice because also GNOME 3.2.0 is about to come out. And GNOME 3.2.0 is looking really good. Yeah. So go figure.

I'm getting all excited about Plasma Desktop right as the new GNOME is about to come out. I just – These are good problems to have though. Yeah. Yeah. We're first world problems to have though. Yeah, yeah. We're first world problems for sure. But yeah, I tell you what. You know what? I just – I'll just revel in it.

I'll just revel in it. I guess at least I have a place to talk about my problems. You guys are like my therapy session. Yes, that's right. OK. Mumbarum, any closing thoughts before we move on from Plasma Desktop 5.6? Yeah, I thought with that video that KDE was totally going the gnome direction with release announcements,

but I think that they really messed it up. The music was awful. The voiceover was boring. You still need a good mic. Yeah, and there was a little bit too much echo. The voiceover was kind of robotic. Yeah, the music could be a little more excited. Like you could do something like a...

Yeah. Plasma 5.6 is a brand new release from the KD – or something like – you could spice it up. You should talk to Chris. He'll do it. Yeah, totally. I would too. But I actually at the same time am really glad because one of the things that I have complained about is how bad Linux journalism is. complained about is how bad Linux journalism is.

And when the projects are releasing videos themselves, like you've been watching the Mycroft project has done this brilliantly, is you don't fumble the message. You don't have a chance for there to be a misinterpretation because the journalist, well, not only will they get to write about what you're doing, but they'll just also embed your video. It gives you an opportunity to speak to the public directly about what's great and new and not have to get lost in translation. And now it's just a matter of refinement. Make it a little peppier.

Make it a little more excited. This is a big deal. A lot of awesome stuff just happened and you are excited about it. I mean, I am more excited about it than the person in that video was. Not to be too critical, but let's be real. And also, yeah, the music did suck. But you know what? At least they had music.

Yeah. The old cloud project didn't even have music, right? So we are seeing- We helped them out, though. This is legitimately a new interesting trend we are seeing in open source. We are going from the community that barely even has screenshots of our shit to the community that is creating videos about our shit. That is a huge transition for us and one I completely support.

Because if nothing else, it gives people an opportunity to share something. I know that sounds stupid, but, you know, a two-minute YouTube video is an easy share. And you can spread the word and people can watch it. Yeah, it's so much easier to be like, hey, check out this cool desktop I'm using rather than GitHub read me with just text. And like Q5 says, it helps them control their image in the message. And so that way, you know, it doesn't get fumbled by the quote unquote journalists out there. I actually think it's a good trend.

But the problem is doing a video and doing a good video are hard. That was a good attempt. And I really, I respect them for trying it. They could spice it up a little bit. And it just takes a little bit of trial and error. I mean, look at my early... Find people who know how to do it. My early stuff is embarrassing as hell.

My current stuff is embarrassing as hell, and I've been doing it for 10 years, so I can't give them that much crap. You know what I can talk about, though? And I do love this. Linuxacademy.com slash unplugged. Go support the Unplugged program and I do love this, linuxacademy.com slash unplugged. Go support the Unplugged program and learn more.

Actually, go support yourself. This is a great opportunity to learn more about any of the technologies built around Linux, the Linux stack, or any of the really good stuff that people make money off of on Linux. And what I love about the Linux Academy is it isn't just a feature for their training website. Got to have that Linux and open source stuff on there. It's really what they're all about. website. Got to have that Linux and open source stuff on there. It's really what they're all about. They got in this as a way to be advocates for Linux. Programmers, developers, Linux enthusiasts, system administrators, they got together and they built the Linux Academy platform. They now have 2,339 video self-paced courses, downloadable comprehensive study guides,

seven plus distributions you get to choose from, live server spun up on the demand with an SSH connection. And not only have they recently expanded into new offices, launched an app for mobile, but they've brought in a whole bunch of staff to get new content on board even faster and make sure older content stays relevant. Because you know what? Turns out Linux changes a bunch. Like all the time. And they get that. You know, they're not going to just create something and let it rot. They really have some interesting technology, too, like scenario-based labs, which are right in the middle of a common everyday environment task.

So you really have hands-on experience and confidence. Instructor mentoring is available, which is great, especially for stuff like this. Experts who, like, know what they're doing. Have you ever done, like, work training? Have you ever done, like, a work training program? I worked for a few places that would actually give me, like, a little bit, little bit – like I was like $1,200 a year or something like that. Have you ever had anything like that? No.

Yeah, I worked for a place. They're like, well, we'll give you courses, which is all on banking, or you can get a $1,200 budget. And so I just kind of worked that in moving to when I went into contracting and I worked for somebody as a contractor for a while. So I had like a $1,200 educational budget. But that was because I was going to community colleges and I was going to like professional training courses for Citrix and VMware and nothing, nothing like Linux Academy existed for me. Now today, something like Linux Academy would have changed my game.

I could have taken on new clients and had the confidence to expand into different technologies fast. I know I could have stayed current and part of that game was staying certified, even if it was for reviews, that way I'd get a raise, or if it was for getting a client, it was just to make myself feel better and challenge myself. Having a resource like Linux Academy

would have blown my face off. Linuxacademy.com slash unplugged. Go there to support the show and blow your own face off. They got courseware on Amazon Web Services. They got the Red Hat certifications, Python, Ruby, Android development, if you want to get into that biz.

PHP, if you know what's good for you, don't tell Michael Dominick. And, of course, the entire Linux stack, Nginx, Apache, Ruby on Rails, all of it's over at LinuxAcademy.com. And they have a community that's stacked full of Jupyter Broadcasting members because I've been talking about them for a while. In-depth resources are great. Listen to it in the shower or while you're on the go. Mix it in with your podcast playlist and advance your skill set. LinuxAcademy.com slash unplugged. And a big thank you to Linux Academy for sponsoring the Unplugged program. Check out their livestream archives too.

So, Google Hangouts. Pretty damn good. Hard to beat. But not open. No, not open. And maybe a little creepy. And so a couple of things have been submitted into the show recently. One from producer Rotten Corpse and one from our very own Wes.

And they both, in their own corners, are powerful open source Google Hangout and Skype killers. And there's been a lot of hoopla around Skype recently on Linux. So let's start with the new contender, the one that most of us haven't heard about before. Hubble.in. You think I'm saying that right? Hubble.in. I think that's how you're saying it. And I want to start up, let's do a meeting right now with our live chat room.

So I'm going to go lup, well, maybe I can just do slash lup. So it's H-U-B-L, H-U-B-L dot I- do slash lup. So it's h-u-b-l dot i-n slash lup. I'm going to start up a video conference right now, and we'll see it. And then we'll compare this to the other open source contender, which has recently gotten a whole bunch of updates. Real live science right here on Linux Unplugged. All right. So I'm going to set my name. And look at this.

I like this right off the bat. So you set your name here. This is one thing that struck me. But then look at this, Wes. Choose your video quality, low rate, medium rate, or awesome rate. Right up front. I'm going to go awesome rate. That feels good.

Yeah. Okay, so now next. Okay, so now I've started. It's going to ask for permission to use my webcam. I'll say yes. Go ahead, use my webcam. And I could send email invites out to people if I wanted to. Look at that.

We already got somebody in there. That's great. Yeah. So there's Popey down there. That's awesome. That's really good. That's cool. Hey, guys.

How's it going? Hello. Hi. Hi. Hi. Look at that. Popey. Oh, yeah.

You're in the mom room, so you have your mic muted. That's cool. And so you see it has the little thumbnails down here. Oh, we just had another person join. So it's really easy for everybody to get in there. And Fatty Fatso just got in there. There's Fatty Fatso. He's in his Linux tux.

He doesn't have to use video if he doesn't want. You can turn off your microphone or your webcam if you want to be private for a moment, which is kind of a cool feature. I mean, really a needed one for any, like, enterprise scale use. Here's what I like, though. I gave out one URL, hubble.in slash lup, and now we've got one, two, three, four, five, six people who've joined.

Just like that. Some of them, we're getting a little playback, but that is nice. You have the ability to start a chat. Now, two more people just joined. Look at that. Hello, PTD. Hello, Patrick.

So there we go. A couple more people just came in. Hi, guys. Good to see you. I love my microphones in this shot. That is really nice. Slick, easy to do, way, way quicker than Hangouts. And here's a nice thing.

Look at this. It is using peer-to-peer web technology. It's not going through their servers. They're not recording it. It's all happening peer-to-peer. All right. I'm going to hang up on you guys, but thank you. That was a good experiment. So, okay.

That's contender number one, Hubble. Contender number two, well-established name. Someone we know. With a varied history. Kind of trust. Used to use it on the desktop, but now they want you to use it on the

web. Yes, friends, it's Jitsi. And Rodencorps, you're the one that submitted Jitsi for a contender this week. Do you want to mention what it was about the new Jitsi updates that got you all excited and wanted to plug it on the show? And by the way, before Rodden starts, it's meet.jit.si.lup. Hopefully I'll be able to put the full URL in the show notes. Okay, go ahead, Rod. You might be in transit right now.

Okay, very good. So here we go. So if you want to join me, you can see me here. I'm on the – have you tried out Jitsi, Wes? Yeah, I'm on there right now. Are you? Did you – look at that. There's Wes.

That's me. Hi, Chris. Hello, Wes. As you can see, he's doing the automatic switching. Hello, fellow jitzer. So I just called him fellow jitzer. But I like how it's switching between them. And also, this one shows you the signal strength of individual

people, which is kind of nice. Oh, look at this. I can make people disappear, which is kind of nice. I can mute individual people. I can kick people out. I'm digging this. Open, close the contact list. Show or hide the... Oh! We should switch

to this on last. This just be Google Hangouts right there. One button, hide the strips. That is really neat. Look at everybody showing up. It's handling this connection just fine. So both of them using WebRTC. And we're both using it. Yeah. This is a hard call, but I think I want to give the nod to Jitsi here for a couple of different reasons.

I like these notifications when someone else connects too. Yeah. I like the Jitsi notification system. Jitsi Meet also allows you to share documents with everybody participating, share a Prezi session, and it allows you to share your screen. So I think it has Hubble beat a little bit. Yeah. This new update allowing you to share your screen is really cool.

So I would try it but then I would just share my screen. You should try sharing your screen, Wes. Do you want to try sharing your screen? And then I think I can click you to bring you up. So there's Wes right there. I like this. Oh, wow.

Look at that. I can, oh. When I hover over Oh, wow, look at that. I can, oh. When I hover over your signals there, look at that, Wes. I get your exact bit rate that you're currently sending me right now. And the resolution. It says a little low resolution. But of course that's probably just your webcam. Yeah, probably. So there's your screen. LUP is the best.

Yeah, because here's Mr., let's see, what's it say his name is? Lin Fax or something like that. He's sending me a different resolution than you are. And whoever this guy is, he's sending me – well, he's sending me the same resolution. Here, this guy looks like he's – hello, fellow Jitser. I'm bringing you up on screen. He's sending me, no, 160 by 90.

I'm not sure. I've got to play. I've got to see if I can get a high definition. What about me? What am I sending? What am I sending? I'm sending 320 by 180. So that would be the one thing is if I could get a high definition. What about me? What am I sending? What am I sending? I'm sending 320x180. So that would be the one thing.

If I could get it up. Let's see. Settings. You can start without audio. That's kind of neat. Hmm. Yeah. Okay. I think these are both pretty good winners here. But Sam Radio, you have 720p on yours? Alright.

Well, that's something. Huh. Hey, citizen coming in with no video so he can still participate. I like that. This is pretty cool. I think, Mitt, I think if you need a Google Hangouts replacement that you want to be open source, that works in your web browser, I think you give it to meet.jit.si. We'll have a link in the show notes. I did have to install a Chrome extension to get the screen sharing to work.

Oh, you did? But it installed very quickly. Yeah, it did. If you did it on air, it lost. Yeah, I mean, it was just like one hit add. So are you able to go – so can you bring your screen back? Oh, you turned your screen off. Oh, okay.

No, that's fine. That's fine. Oh, we have somebody else. This is really cool. Oh, there's Popey. So what's Popey coming in at? Popey is coming in at 640 by 380 for some reason. I don't know why he's not higher resolution video.

That seems to be the thing. Gotta play with that. But this is a damn... A more controlled trial would be interesting. You can lock the room down too so people can stop joining. You can invite others to join. That is great. So there you go. Two open source

Google Plus... Oh, are you back, Rodden? No, it's not Rodden. It's me, Gary Devlin. Gary Devlin, go ahead. But I'm just saying that another advantage that GT has over all of the other competitors is that it has the video bridge with the GT from the desktop. So if someone is on the regular GT, can talk to you over that. Oh, so you could still use the desktop.

That is damn cool, dude. That is really nice. I really like some of the options. That's something that they've been working on to make it work. You know, we could use this. So when Popey talks, Popey could be on video.

Yeah. So Popey, try talking in the mumble room while you're on jitsy video see if you can pull that off that could be kind of cool i can do that oh look at that that is so cool and it's almost synced up too look at that this could be a cool way to get the actual faces of the mumble room on the stream if we want to i mean we have the video stream anyway yeah that is really neat i could i could route my microphone through this as well. You could, but I don't know. I think it's more because the nice thing is you could have some people on here.

I guess I'd have to know when to switch it. I guess this could be used in place of Mumble too, but I like the Mumble room better for this kind of thing. Yeah. All right. Well, very cool. So we'll have links to both of those, open source Google Hangout and Skype replacement. So if you've been bellyaching about Microsoft killing support for Skype.

This might be my go-to replacement for family members, chats with friends. Yeah. Kitson, you had something you wanted to jump in before we move on? Yeah. Actually, it's something that I found. It's a different topic. Did you see this thing about a Rust-written microkernel OS? And they were throwing some shade on Linux, if I recall, right?

Yeah, this is really cool. It's called Redox. Yeah, yeah, and they were slamming Linux a bit in their announcement. But yeah, Redox, a Rust-written microkernel open source OS. Yeah. Yeah, I have heard of it. It's impressive. They've got it in a pretty good way.

They've got it GUI up. Yeah, they say the whole thing weighs I just don't – It's impressive. They've got it in a pretty good way. They've got it GUI up and – Yeah, they say the whole thing weighs in at just 26 megabytes for the ISO. Wow. 26 megabytes. Maybe I'll give that a spin this week. You should, dude. Give it a report back. Yeah, that would be pretty cool.

That would be pretty good. All right. So that's probably the end. I love this. Wave goodbye, Popey. Wave goodbye, Popey. Wow, that's beautiful. Beautiful, Popey. Bye-bye. Bye-bye now. I love this. Wave goodbye, Popey. Wave goodbye, Popey. Wow, that beautiful, beautiful Popey.

Bye-bye. Bye-bye now. Bye, guys. Thanks for testing the different HTML WebRTC-powered solutions. I'm hanging up on your faces. It is nice to know that we're all just connecting as peers. Thanks for using Jitsi Meet. Yeah, you're right. And you know what that's going to mean is hopefully better connection speeds, right, and better latency

and whatnot because you're not routing through a server. And the nice thing is, of course, since you're not routing through a server, nobody's recording your session. You could record your session, but nobody else. And we recorded that session. We did. We did. That's an example of that. All right.

So there's a lot coming up on future episodes of Linux Unplugged, especially as LinuxFest Northwest gets closer. Oh, man. But also as some major distros release, there's going to be a lot of stuff and a lot of opportunity for you to get your thoughts in on the show, so please do join us live. Go over to jblive.tv. We do the show on Tuesdays. You can go to jupiterbroadcasting.com slash calendar to get that S converted to your local

time zone, and then you join our virtual log via Mumble, which is an open source communications program, and you can get the server in our chat room, the information by doing bang mumble. It's kind of like our little, like, that's like the hardest part. That's the test. You the server in our chat room, the information by doing bang mumble. It's kind of like our little like. That's like the hardest part. That's the test to prove you're worthy. You got to join the chat room.

You got to do bang mumble, and you got to install mumble. And then that's it. You just got to have a working mic. I'd be nice to Blaster. That's probably a good idea. And it's our virtual log. You can hang out with us and share your thoughts. And as some big stuff is coming up, it's a great opportunity for you to get in there

and take part of it. So we'd love to have you go to jupyterbroadcasting.com slash calendar to get that converted to your local time zone. And a big thank you to our virtual lug for making it this week. Thanks to Wes for once again saving the show by supplying the beer. It's a close call this week. I do what I can. The beer and the burger. You went above and beyond this week, man.

That's pretty impressive. Well, that means Rika will get this show out, you know. That's right. Lickety split. Greased up with Five Guys Grease. That is gross. It is. Follow the network at Jupiter Signal for show announcements and live streams.

At Chris Ellis for my stuff about LinuxFest Northwest. LinuxActionShow.reddit.com for feedback on this week's episode and topic suggestions. Thanks so much for tuning in to this week's episode of Linux Unplugged. And we'll see you right back here next Tuesday. Thank you. Why don't we kill a few minutes and talk about something? I started to bring this up in Tech Talk, and I shut the conversation down because I actually wanted to talk about it here in Linux Unplugged. Whoa, saved it. I know it.

So Android N has been out for certain devices. I don't think you've tried it yet, though. I haven't, no. No, but you could, right, on your Nexus 5? Yeah, maybe I should. Yeah. Well, I don't know if you'll be able to try this on the Nexus 5, but one of the hidden features in Android N is multi-windowed mode.

So not just like side-by-side windows, but like full-on broken-up multi-windowing desktop environment with a bar down at the bottom, a system tray, quick launch icons. Awkward black around Chrome. Desktop icons on the desktop. Android N is potentially, I'm looking at this thinking, this could be a Chrome OS killer. Easily. Yeah, it looks like it.

Could it also be an Ubuntu desktop killer? Because you get a Linux-based OS, and the x86 project is even more so. You get a Linux-based OS, you get mainstream corporate applications like Microsoft Office, Adobe Lightroom, you get an official Telegram, Evernote, you get Google Chrome, Netflix, Hulu,

all of that stuff on a desktop environment that could run on ARM or Intel. I mean, maybe if you're like, you know, so I was looking at the Stack Exchange. Did you see the Stack Exchange survey that came out recently? Yes, I did. And, like, the number one thing everybody's working on is WebDev, right? That's like the, well, you could do WebDev on this thing, potentially.

I suppose so, yeah. Take this thing down to, like, like Ange said in Tech Talk. Take this down to, like, Android Q. So this has been around for a few years. I'm not saying with N this happens, but Android Q, you have a really well flushed out multi windowing system that you could download an ISO for and set up on a laptop

or buy a Chromebook that actually runs this. Yeah, okay. I could see it. I could see installing it on people's machines. I mean, I might, if it was flushed out, I might rather install this on my, like on a friend's machine than, say, Windows. What do you think about, like, Wimpy, what do you think about, like, more hardcore work cases, like production, development? Do you think it's ever going to be possible on something like this?

My question to you is, if this is an Ubuntu desktop killer, can you produce a show on it? My question to you is, if this is an Ubuntu desktop killer, can you produce a show on it? You know, I don't know about today, but there are becoming some decent media production tools for Android. Like there are Icecast and live video streaming, RTMP and Twitch, you could do from Android devices. On iOS, there's full-fledged video editors. I have not looked on Android. Maybe. I don't think today, but maybe one day. Hmm.

What about you, Wimpy? Could you do your... Could you do most of your daily driving on an Android device if it was multi-windowed on a powerful, considerably powerful hardware? So say you could pick your x86 box of choice. I don't need much power to do what I do, but yes, I have used

Android successfully to do the things I would need to do of a day. I could definitely see this on a tablet, like if you had a nice Bluetooth keyboard and a good, you know, like SSH program to get some work done, and you have Chrome up on one half of the screen, terminal on the other. That'd probably work for a lot of remote stuff.