LINUX Unplugged - Episode 85: Give the Kids Linux | LUP 85

Episode Date: March 25, 2015

Will Secure Boot hamper boutique Linux distributions and hurt desktop Linux innovation? Our panel debates. Also getting started with Linux the right way.Plus a recap of the first ever Kansas Linux Fest, our errata, your feedback & more!

Hey, should we talk about some good news real quick? Did you guys see that KDE 5.22 popped out today? A bug fix release, really. It's a new month of work, though, so that's always interesting. And some GTK3 stuff has been cleaned up, for those of you who have a mix. Kwin's got some fixes as well. So there you go, and look at the screenshot. It's really coming along. KDE 5.2 is looking sharp.

I still find GNOME to be a little bit more high DPI friendly, but I keep trying out the Plasma 5 desktop as well. So yeah, if you guys didn't notice, the 5.2.2 just dropped today. So now we've had a little more, a couple more people show up. Did anybody make it to

Kansas Linux Fest this last week? Nobody. I know Tyler made it, but Tyler's not here today. He was there rocking some JB swag, but I did see a blog post that I'll link in the show notes that had a roundup of Kansas Linux Fest. It looks like they had an attendance of about

130 folks who signed up through Everbright, and it was the first annual Kansas Linux Fest. That's really cool. And I noticed you saw this on G+, too, Matt. Yeah, I actually thought it was a really cool picture and great with a blog post that I thought was interesting, so I wanted to share that.

And it looks like it could have been a lot of fun. Yeah, absolutely. So I'll be curious to see how this fest grows, and if you're in the area, it may be interesting to go in next year and check out the blog post. You can also check out openkansas.us and kansaslinuxfest.us, and they have an IRC channel on Freenode check out openkansas.us and kansaslinuxfest.us.

And they have an IRC channel on Freenode, pound openkansas. But kansaslinuxfest.us looks like it's the domain of the fest, but it wasn't loading at the time of the show right now. So I don't know if it's down or what. But, yeah, I think Kansas Linux Fest, you know, it's early. I wouldn't say it's one we're going to go to yet. But it's exciting to see another one pop up and watch it go. So we'll keep an eye on it. And maybe in the future. know, it's early. I wouldn't say it's one we're going to go to yet, but it's exciting to see another one pop up and watch it go. So we'll keep an eye on it.

And maybe in the future... Oh, look at that! Their site just loaded. And maybe in the future we'll have a viewer stop by and give us a report on how it went. In fact, if you ever go to an event, you know, like anything in your area that's a Linux-y or open source event and want to come back and give us a report, we'd love to hear it.

We're trying to give more exposure to this kind of stuff. We're really neat. Especially the stuff we don't get a chance to go to that's across the pond. That's stuff that we really love to hear about because that makes me really jealous. I get really jealous, Matt. I just want to fly. Welcome to Linux Unplugged, your weekly Linux talk show that's powered by Steak and Eggs. My name is Chris.

And my name is Matt. Hey there, Matt. I went to the little restaurant, the mom-and-pop restaurant by the studio called Ellie's. And nobody makes a better breakfast sirloin than Ellie's, Matt. I mean, it is just so good. So today, I'm protein. I'm fired up. I'm ready to go to solve some problems in today's episode. Episode 85 is going to be a little navel-gazing, a little reflective, a little sausage factory this week. Why? Well, we do have some really great feedback to get to, including a make-good that I think is definitely important we make a correction on.

And then, if I can be selfish, I don't think I've really ever done this before. I want to spend part of the show today discussing buying my son his first official Linux laptop for his sixth birthday that comes up later in April. Right now, he's on a tablet. I've had him on a Chromebook. And he's really just kind of getting frustrated with

some of the games and stuff. And I just want to get him a nicer computer. But where do you start with something like this? Something that's not a lot of money, something that's rugged, but something that will be a good Linux experience. And I'm thinking maybe a laptop, maybe a desktop, maybe a NUC. So I'll discuss it with the Mumble Room and Matt. And maybe I'll walk away with a good idea of what would make a good starter's Linux computer. Excellent.

Yeah. And maybe specifically for kids, maybe not. But we'll do that coming up later on in the show. Also, we're going to just discuss a little bit of our coverage of distributions and see if we should make some adjustments if we've given too much attention to some distributions. So, like I said, a little navel-gazing. of what we cover and why we cover it and maybe what we could change, but maybe we'll walk away with a little bit of a mutual understanding of the distributions we think are most relevant today. We'll see.

That's a little ambitious. I don't know if we'll get that far, but it's something to try. But before we start, let's bring in our mumple room because they're here today fired up to help us get through everything. Time-appropriate greetings, mumple room. Hello. Good afternoon. Hello.

Wow, hello, everybody. Hello, everybody. It's really good to have you here. And I'm glad you are because our first email, I wanted to discuss with you all this whole secure boot hoopla. We talked about it on this week's Linux Action Show, but I wanted to get it from the folks too. So Liam writes in to kick off the conversation about altOS lockout, as he calls it. I'm very new to Linux, he says. I'm interested in finding out a solution to a potential alternative OS lockout.

It's been years since I built my own PC, and I'm not very technical to begin with. If this is eventually implemented, how would someone like me install Linux on a laptop? Would this make it harder for System76 or people like System76 to deal with this? And, of course, he links us to this Ars Technica article about Windows 10 making secure boot more of a reality by telling vendors they no longer have to leave an option to turn it off.

And Matt, I wanted to just kind of, let's start here. You've been around for a while. You've seen Microsoft at their best and their worst, literally and figuratively. Do you suppose this is Microsoft's sneaky way to try to lock down what used to be the open PC market to make it a Windows market?

Or is this an overreaction by the tech press? Well, the end result is that it could end up being a situation where there's some lockdown. Is it intentional? I don't think, honestly, they care. I mean they do and they don't, but I think they realize that they're actually setting themselves up for trouble, say like perhaps in the EU where they've been known to be dragged through the antitrust woods a few times. I don't think it's intentional, but I think that it's one of those things where they see it as an opportunity. I think they like to kind of set it up. They know what it does. They know what's going to happen, but I don't think that was the purposeful reasoning behind it. I think it was just kind of a happenstance.

But I'm sure they're not going to lose any sleep over it. I'll tip it over to the mumble room then, and maybe I'll bounce it to Wimpy first. It's just kind of coming from a distro developer standpoint and somebody who's been working really hard on PowerPC hardware where they have their own unique kind of firmware, something very different that makes it a challenge to work with it specifically. It's not designed to lock you out, but it is very different. And so, Wimpy, in that context, when you look at Secure Boot and you look at making what is a fairly open platform, the x86 platform, as far as installing operating systems goes, when you look at something that could make that harder, does it give you pause? Does it give you concern?

It does, yes. harder does it give you pause does it give you concern it does yes um this feels like the extinguish in the three e's frankly doesn't it yeah the extend embrace or embrace love linux so much they're gonna they're gonna gonna try and cut us off um it's interesting the secure boot stuff in in principle it's a good idea um but yes if you make it more difficult for people that have bought their commodity hardware to install linux then that is is going to have an effect on uh linux adoption and you know when you look at the server space there's almost no secure boot or EFI systems in the server space. It's all traditional BIOS because, frankly,

just about every server that anyone sells ends up running Linux these days. So why would you put those things on that platform that make it harder and more cumbersome to work with? So, yes, I have looked at this microsoft announcement and it does give me cause for concern um i think that this is potentially damaging and we'll just have to see how things play out because the other thing of course is is that there are distributions that even now can't do secure boot correct right and that the big players all can. If this feature becomes mandated,

then I think what you're going to find is there's not going to be so many boutique distros anymore. You may actually see the Linux distro choice sort of collapse a little bit around the major distributions. Yes, because now this is assuming this takes off and we are in a place where the majority of the marketplace now has this technology in place. And so if you accept those two factors and you accept that could happen,

which would really only take time, really, it's the only thing you just have to go out a few years. Yeah, wouldn't it make it extremely harder for a small startup distribution, perhaps someone even the size of Ubuntu Mate, from getting like this signed key and't there challenges and hurdles there? How would that work? To be honest with you, all I know is that as an Ubuntu flavor,

I benefit from the work that Ubuntu have done partnering with Microsoft to get the signing keys so that they can have signed kernels, and I just get that for free as a derivative, as an official favor. But we certainly know that not everybody gets that advantage. No, exactly so. And that could stifle some innovation because if you look at distributions like Evolve OS with their Budgie desktop,

they're not doing secure boot at the moment. It's something that they're planning to add. But then they've got, you know, if they have additional hurdles to jump through, they may struggle in the new world order. Let's assume worst case scenario in actually getting, you know, their kernel signed so that it can operate in this environment and that would be a shame because you know they're doing interesting work and lots of people get to benefit and get inspired by what some of these other distributions do so you know i looked at some of the the more um design centric distributions to get some ideas and things and if they're not there then it makes that you know the linux ecosystem all that more bland and uninteresting which would be a real shame it would slow down the pace of innovation uh let's get uh echo tie echo so tie a cool high uh echo to he

a coffee oh okay there we go go ahead what do you want to say? Well, I'm just going to say that there's not really much that they're going to do. The reason why I'm saying that is because there are plenty of people that have already invested in having Linux run into their daily lives, especially on the business side. So when you try to set up servers or try to set up consumer products with Secure Boot, they still need to put in an option to get rid of Secure Boot if needed because it would be kind of like an anti-competing kind of thing, especially with monopoly laws. Mario, couldn't you see anything above a certain price point in most cases would have that menu flip? But machines like the Stream PC that you're seeing from HP right now that's $200 that ships with Windows 8.1 with Bing, ding! No. The reason why I say that is because there's plenty of startups that need to have a low budget. And forcing people to choose Microsoft would be, you know, that would just not go through. I don't see it going. Well, I don't know.

They're not forcing you to do anything. If you want a $200 stream PC, then you get one that's subsidized by Microsoft because Microsoft has helped subsidizing that cost. If you want to spend more than $200 and want something that's not locked down, that's fine. That's your choice. You can go get something else. And it's not much different than what Google does with the Chromebooks. It's not impossible to put Linux on there, but it's not really what Google wants you to do. And they're slowly taking steps to lock that down a little bit more at a time.

I'll go to Colton. Go ahead, Colton. DRG, you wanted to add something in there. Yeah. DRG, you wanted to add something in there. Yeah, I just, the whole EFI thing, ever since we started seeing it in the consumer PC market, it's kind of been something that I am,

I don't know if I want to say I'm kind of, I just, I don't, it's kind of scared me a little bit almost just because just the way it works with the operating system to lock everything down. And so like when I got my new computer, the first thing I did – or when I built my new computer, the first thing I did is I went into the motherboard settings and I turned EFI off because I would just rather deal with legacy BIOS and not have to think about that whole EFI thing. Yeah, I've also done that as well because, you know what, honestly, it just makes it easier for me. I'm actually curious, Wimpy, to hear about your perspective working with OEMs. Yeah, so in the not-too-distant future, Ubuntu Marte will be available pre-installed on a range of OEM hardware. And if you look at distributions like Linux Mint and Black Lab, they've already got a history of working with OEMs as a means of shipping their distributions pre-installed

on hardware to sidestep some of this complexity. True. And I think all the distributions are going to have to have some sort of hardware vendor agreement. Wow. Because it may well get harder and harder to do home hacking solutions. And if there's enough distributions working with OEMs, with Linuxux friendly hardware then it might be that the the barrier to entry is the cost of buying a computer that's ready to run linux that that scares me a lot you know uh uh and i i don't we don't know what's going to happen

but i think it's so important what could happen that it might be a little bit worth worrying about right now, because what we are talking about fundamentally is, you know, I grew up and got the exposure to all of the technology and all the different operating systems I did because I wasn't restricted growing up playing with things. So, you know, I would do things like run DOS for a little while, and then I would try BIOS for a little while, and then I would try some sort of crazy other operating system, and then I would try the Mac for a little while, and be like, oh, really? I can't really do a lot with this. This isn't as much fun. Let me go try this other platform that lets me do the things I want so I can learn more. And it would keep drawing me back to the PC platform over the Mac every single time. So I

fear that this kind of transition would fundamentally limit the potential exploration that future generations could do. That scares me a little bit. Well, yeah. If I have to buy a machine first, it's already preloaded for me. That's a great solution for grandma. I agree. And it's good.

I'm really excited for you. I'm not putting it down. But what I'm saying is that kind of leaves me a little sad. So a couple of things. It's all been a bit dreary and gloomy. But if you've bought yourself a computer pre-installed with Linux, then that means it's capable of being installed with any, you know, flavor distribution of Linux. So that's good. But I think what's going to happen is if the PC gets locked down, fine. Maybe it's time to kiss the PC era goodbye and let Microsoft have it.

Because these ARM devices are kicking on time after time. We've got the 64-bit ARM CPUs now. Raspberry Pi 2 and the Odroid C1, whilst not powerhouses, are very low-cost entry devices that you can run a range of operating systems on, and they could well be the platforms that the next generation experiment with and tinker on. And they already are, really.

And maybe our Linux future is on these embedded ARM devices. That's crossed my mind as well. You might be very right. Alright, let's give Heaven's Revenge a chance to talk me down. Go ahead, Heavens. You guys are really over-exaggerating this. As you can self-sign your own kernel, and you can boot it anyway even with secure boot enabled.

As long as you... Even if they try to put secure keys in the firmware, do you think they're going to keep us out of it? We can just sign in with those keys. It's very easy to probe hardware. I kind of feel like... And even so, most things for Secure Boot is good. One, it keeps

that nasty little NSA that all of you always care and worry about out by keeping the secure code. I disagree with that. No, that's not going to keep them from squat. Especially if the company does it and they have their own self-created images. And it can just give more determinism to the whole system. Oh, man.

I agree with that part. You were right. There's a lot of stability. And it's almost like CoreOS for yourself instead of just for the corporate environment. Colonel Linux, did you want to jump in? Did you have something you wanted to respond to? Because I have. Yeah, I mean, essentially, basically,

we've lived without Secure Boot for the last 20-some years. Nothing bad's ever happened. I feel like it is a solution to a problem that never really existed. Well, I mean, there are... They are trying to do it more than... They're trying to apply the problem to way more than it ever needs to be. It's exaggerating. So what I fundamentally disagree with is your premise that it's not that hard to get around.

You can self-sign, et cetera, et cetera. It's kind of like – It's easy. That's kind of like saying – it's kind of like saying, well, Linux doesn't support my wireless card, but if I patch and rebuild my kernel, it works no problem. It's really easy. Yes, technically it is very easy to do that. But to tell somebody who is learning Linux for the first time, oh, yeah, you could totally load Linux on your rig.

You just have to have a self-signed certificate first. That is going to blow their brain off. They're not going to have any idea what to do with that. Yeah, it will definitely prevent new adoption from people who don't know how to self-sign their kernel. That's what I'm fundamentally worried about is I'm worried about that user who buys a PC running Windows, says this isn't good enough, I want something better, hears about this Linux thing, this Ubuntu thing, whatever, goes to install it and can't. Well, this thing is actually scriptable.

All you need to do is run a simple script because it's all automatable. Even though it would be a single step before installing the secure boot kernel it would be just one step it wouldn't be that much of a hard situation to like learn some command line options or yeah installing packages it's just an extra step that is an inconvenience and i'm not obviously the i was just making whom i was just making a comparison like a lot of times we say things are easy to us but they're that's not necessarily means they're easy to everybody else. But it's not like a little difference, though. It's like fundamentally there's not an option for them.

Well, and that's something I wanted to touch on a little bit. There was a time that I actually used to do various screencasts and things like that showing people how to install Linux because it was – for the most part, BIOS was pretty unified. It was pretty stupid easy to do. Nowadays, I gave it up. Why? Because every single solitary implementation of Secure Boot is friggin' different on every friggin' computer. I can't, what I'm looking at may not be

the same as the other guy's looking at. I mean, ASUS has got their thing and the other guy's got their thing. You know, it's already a huge hurdle and now we're adding an additional thing to it. Honestly, I'm kind of to the point to where, great, now we're forcing people to buy computers supporting an operating system that supports us. Fantastic. I'm on board.

I'm to that point now without a frustration. I'm down with Wimpy. It's like I think it's the $25 Raspberry Pis and the $35 – all these sub-$100 boards, $150 boards. It's really going to be where people experiment. So that gives me some hope. And as far as the charitable cases to where they're not able to afford a new computer, there are, and increasingly more of them,

organizations out there that will help you get refurbished of hardware. So there are solutions. What I wanted to say is, and I, okay, Colonel Lynx, I agree, it's not a MacBook Pro, but for experimentation and learning purposes, it works. But I guess here's the point I wanted to end on, is really, I agree. It's not a MacBook Pro, but for experimentation and learning purposes, it works. But I guess here's the point I wanted to end on is really what this tells me is that if we really care about this, then we as users should probably begin looking into the free BIOSes and figure out which one we want to back.

You know, like Core Boot and all these other ones that are out there that are like – I forget what ships on the – is it Core Boot that ships on the Chromebooks? I think it's Core Boot. Yeah. There's different ones. ones that are out there that are like, I forget what ships on the, is it Corboud that ships on the Chromebooks? You guys remember? I think it's Corboud. Yeah. There's different ones. This is an alternative. And maybe if there's a way we could get it to a point where we could, I don't know if it would be possible to replace the firmwares, but if we can continue to drive that forward,

that might also be a solution for us. It's not perfect yet, but it's out there in the wild. It's shipping. Yeah. It's about to start. but it's out there in the wild. It's shipping. Yeah, enough to start. So you know what they always say, when Microsoft closes a door, open source always opens a window. Wait a minute, is that?

I'm not sure that's the right saying. Usually with a crowbar, I guess. Hey, Matt, let's take a minute here and talk about DigitalOcean because they rock and they're a sponsor of the Linux Unplugged show. Go over to DigitalOcean

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I spend more on apples. When I go get apples now, like, not computers. I mean like the red ones that you eat. Right, right. Like, it is so crazy that I can do this for $5 a month. It blows my brain organ all over the wall here. It's all over the soundproofing now. And in 55 seconds, you're going to get that thing up and spinning. It's crazy, right? You're going to get 512 megabytes of RAM, a 20 gigabyte SSD, one terabyte

of transfer. Did you hear me say SSD? Because they're all SSDs. I think I need to, I got to say that again. They're all SSDs. Now, why does that matter? Well, you see, back in my day, if you wanted really good performance and you wanted to have like a database and your website all on one array, you would be crazy to have that on a single drive. It just wouldn't work unless you didn't have very much traffic, which that's kind of sad. But if you had some traffic, you needed to have that on a storage array. You're probably going to have that either fiber attached or SCSI attached or God forbid, maybe iSCSI if you've got a separate network with its own dedicated gigabit switch. And this is serious money for one of these SANs. That's crazy. And when you're doing co-hosting and things like that, it drives the cost up way

more because then you also have to pay for that to be in the rack. When DigitalOcean came along, they looked at all of the technologies like Linux and KVM and the best web standards, the best Linux distributions, and of course, the best storage IO. And that's SSDs. That's why they're SSDs throughout the entire infrastructure. You combine that with their incredible bandwidth at their tier one data centers, and it freaking SSDs. That's why they're SSDs throughout the entire infrastructure. You combine that with their incredible bandwidth at their tier one data centers, and it freaking rocks. They've got data center locations in New York, San Francisco, Singapore, Amsterdam, and London, and they do a lot

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Deploy own cloud. Try out their one-click installations for things like GitLab. It's a really awesome service and it's perfect for our audience. DigitalOcean.com and use the promo code DL1Plugged when you check out. And a big thank you to DigitalOcean. Go have some fun, guys. And I love also hearing about what you use them for. So keep sending those into the show as well.

Sometimes it gives me ideas. I think it's, you know, for me, it's the limitless possibilities that you can use it for. It's like here the other day, I wanted to see if I, a long time ago, I did an article on Moodle and I wanted to see, you know, what that would look like on running on DigitalOcean. It was stupid easy.

And how fast it is when you're running your updates and stuff. It's crazy. And they just put out a really great tutorial. I'll link it in the show notes about how to resize your DigitalOcean droplets, which is really, really nice, which I had to do kind of recently for my own cloud one because I've been putting stuff in own cloud. So check it out. Hey, okay. Let's do a correction on the sync thing thing.

Oh, okay. We've talked about sync thing a lot, and we got a couple of emails about that. So he says, I want to drop you a line to correct an error I've heard repeated multiple times on Linux Unplugged and the Linux Action Show, I think. Sync thing is not that hard to manage anymore. People keep saying that key exchange becomes unmanageable beyond a couple of devices. This may have been true a while ago, but they've added a feature to address that

exact problem, starting in version 0.9.18, which I think I tracked that back to September. Oh yeah, that's what he says. It's called Introducer Node. And you can read about it here. Long story short, it makes it so you only have to

do the key exchange with one central node. And the new clients will get the keys for all your other nodes. I personally have SyncThings set up for seven nodes, and key management has been a breeze thanks to using Introducer node. So to kind of maybe help you understand if you're not totally familiar with SyncThings, unlike other Sync products, the way you kind of add devices to SyncThing is they kind of find out about each other and then you put them within each other's, I don't know what to put it, but, you know, blessed areas. I'm losing it because I haven't used it in so long.

But you kind of say, yes, this one's allowed to sync with me. Yes, this one's approved to sync with me. They're both approved with each other and then they start syncing. He's saying that they introduced this feature called Introducer Node. And Wimpy, I'm not sure if you've ever looked into this, but this Introducer Node feature kind of automates the handing out of future clients. And so they talk to this Introducer Node, and it automatically adds them to the sync pool. Yeah, I imagine it was probably the same person that sent you this email, contacted me in the week, and told me about it.

And I haven't installed it or tested it, but I have read about it. And it does seem to solve the problem that I have misspoken about. So I feel like a chump now. Oh, no, I mean, I think we both misunderstood. Yeah, it looks like SyncThing have created a solution to that key exchange issue. That could be really positive, right? Yeah, yeah, exactly, yeah. So I'm going to

look at SyncThing more closely again now. Yeah, I think I will too. And of course, the last time I looked at it, I guess, was before September? I can't really remember the last time I looked at it. I thought I looked at it more recently than that, but I didn't look for the Introducer node feature. I didn't know to go last time I looked at it. I thought I looked at it more recently than that, but I didn't look for the introducer node feature. I didn't know to go

specifically look for that. I will say right here, if that works, very excited about that, because I very much would like to use SyncThing, because everybody wants me to use SyncThing for one thing, but I also like that it's top-to-bottom open source, all of that jazz. So thank you very much for sending that in. I'll play with

that some more, and maybe Wimpy, if you play with it and let us know too, that'd be really cool. And I have a link in the show notes if you're curious about how that jazz. So thank you very much for sending that in. I'll play with that some more and maybe Wimpy if you play with it and let us know too that'd be really cool. And I have a link in the show notes if you're curious about how that works. Because it looks like it makes distributing files via sync thing to a larger audience much easier. I'm still a little skeptical about how well that's going to scale and also what happens if my introducer node's

offline and things like that. But you know what? I could see like setting up the main node here at the studio and then the introducer node up like on a DigitalOcean droplet. But you know what? I could see like setting up the main node here at the studio and then the introducer node up like on a DigitalOcean droplet. There you go. Right? And then just let that run 24-7 and hand out the keys. Makes sense to me.

Yeah, like kernel Linux exactly, yeah. Same thing when my own cloud server goes down, which doesn't really ever happen. I live in 2015 and I use Linux, so I don't really. My own cloud server doesn't really go down unless I break it. That's when it goes down. T to the Z to the V to the I writes in with one more BitTorrent sync kind of follow-up thing or another sync thing, follow-up thing. He says, I've been a JB fan since sometime in 2009.

I followed LastLup and TechSnap religiously. Just a quick thank you to Chris and Wimpy for bringing up the BitTorrent sync issues and suggesting C file. It gave me the push to make the switch. My setup has an interesting twist in that I couldn't actually host the data on my DO droplet due to the size and, well, the cost that would be there.

So I have the front end on DO, which is, this is exactly something I've thought about doing, and then the back end on a local server connected via SSH tunnels and SSHFS. He documented his work at tspSPITZ.com, and I'll have a link in his, you can find a link in his email, in the show notes.

I recently got a job offer from Rackspace, and I can definitely attribute everything I learned to you guys. Oh, but he declined the job. Oh, wow. Well, that's really cool. Good problem to have. Yeah. So there you go, Wimpy.

I hope that makes you feel better. To TZ to the VDI, a long-time listener is loving C file. Do you feel better? Yeah, I don't feel like such a chump anymore. Good, good, good. I have not yet played with C file either, but now I just don't know what to do. I'm totally, totally verklempt. All right.

So let's do a super quick Linux Fest Northwest update. I know a lot of you aren't going, don't care, but I'm just really excited. This is like my full-time job right now. It's ridiculous how much time this is taking, but red or blue and white or whatever. It's so sharp. Linux Action Show hoodie, T-shirt, ladies T, kids T. Teespring.com slash Linux. The funds raised there are helping our Linux Fest Northwest efforts. And standing at right now, I believe Mr. Q5Sys, his ticket has been purchased. I think Rotten Corpse, you're close. Where are you?

Rotten, are you in here? No? No. Chris Moore is locked in Alan Jude is locked in I think Michael Dominic is locked in now I haven't gotten the confirmation but I talked to him on Monday it sounds like he's locked in

so we're going to have a lot of people out are we missing anybody I don't think Are we missing anybody? I don't think we're missing anybody. I think we're going to have everybody here. I'll be there, of course. Yes. Of course, I didn't mention us because we're in Washington, but of course Matt's going to be there as well. Matt's going to be there.

I'm going to be there. Chase is going to be there. All of us local guys will be there, and Noah's going to fly in. So it's going to be all of us in one place for the first time ever, which is really awesome. That's really cool. And so we're going to get some great local recordings. We're going to do some interviews. The Linux Fest guys have volunteered a dedicated room for us to do interviews in so we can get some good evergreen content for a lot of our shows.

In-person interviews. We're going to try to do in-person shows as much as we can. And, of course, we're going to have a lot going on Friday and Saturday nights. We're going to just go down and hang out with the LinuxFest after party Saturday night. So if you'd like to hang out with the crew and just in a more relaxed setting, that's definitely the place

to do it. Or come to the fest and say hi to us. And we're going to have two days of streaming if you can't make it at jblive.tv. And it's April 25th and 26th. And you can probably tell I'm pretty excited. It's going to be really cool. And it's taking a lot of work, but we're going to have, if you

can make it, it's totally going to be worth coming and seeing us because we're going to have the best stuff to give away at all the booths. Well, everyone that shows up always has a really great time. I mean, it's, you know, well, except for you that one year. I mean, that was that's a different situation, but yeah, I mean, for the most part, it's been really, really well, except for you that one year. I mean, that's a different situation. But yeah, I mean,

for the most part, it's been really, really cool. And it's always neat to see the people and kind of assign them, you know, it's like, oh, yeah, I know your chat room handle.

Oh, yeah. Well, yeah, see, like, our Royal Gabe and I just had a great exchange this morning about email. And now when he comes to LinuxFest Northwest,

he can give me a hard time in person, and I'll be able to immediately remember the whole exchange. We'll have a nice laugh, and I'll feel like a jerk. So, mission accomplished, Matt. Or chump. Yeah, yeah, that works, too. in person and I'll be able to immediately remember the whole exchange and we'll have a nice laugh and I'll feel like a jerk.

Mission accomplished, Matt. Yeah, that works too. LinuxFastNorthwest.org if you want to pre-register but the hotels are filling up and stuff like that. Oh yeah. I'm super excited. Yeah, and Odyssey West Odyssey, I hope you can make it too. I know it's a bit of a drive for you but I think he is. At least that was

what I heard last time I heard from him. I think so. I'll have to check. Wimpy, it'd be really great if you go. I know it's a bit of a drive for you, but he can't go. I think he is. At least that was what I heard last time I heard from him. I think so. I'll have to check. Wimpy would be really great if you'd go. I know it's impossible, but it'd be really great if you'd make it. Transport of technology would solve this issue. Yeah. I was looking into it, to be honest.

I really did want to try and find a way. Yeah, it's just crazy. I know. What we need is one of those telepresence robots that you could just like Skype into. That would be awesome. All right. I want a Jitsi robot. Yeah, there you go.

Yeah, Jitsi into. Exactly. Yeah, well, I would assume it would run Linux. Yeah, of course. Yeah. All right. Well, that's probably enough about Linux Fest Northwest. I'm just crazy excited about it, and we'll have clips and stuff in the shows.

But we got to solve a few problems for me. I tell you what, Matt, I have reached the point where it is time to replace, maybe introduce, the most important Linux computer of my lifetime. But before we get to that,

I got to thank Ting. And I really mean I've got to thank Ting. Ting, thank you. Thank you for saving me so much money over the last two years. Thank you for challenging the duopoly of the mobile industry. And Ting, thank you. Thank you so much for actually having the will to fight that fight because I tell you, it wears on me. It does wear on me. on me. And Ting, the reason they make a difference is they're challenging sort of the status quo. And they're just, by doing it in just the most direct and honest way possible, it's no contracts, no early termination fees for Ting's service. They're a mobile service that truly makes sense. They have CDMA and GSM coverage available. So definitely check out their coverage map. There's just a flat rate for your phone. It's $6 a month for the phone line. And then you just buy your phone and you just put it on the account. So the phones are unlocked because

you own the phone outright. You just put it on the Ting service, $6 a month. And then it's just your usage on top of that. It is as basically as bare and raw, just like you own the whole process if you want, or you can work hand in hand with their no hold customer service. And that's what I like about it is, you know. I've got the Nexus 5. I just put Lollipop 5.1 on there. I put the Ting GSM SIM in there. I'm doing this all on my own. I'm not talking to anybody because they have an incredible website that walks me through all of this stuff.

And now I have unbelievable speeds. At Chase's house, 106 megabits a second download on the GSM service. 106 megabits on the GSM service. Unbelievable speeds. I don't even know how – like I mean I'm going to have to retest it. It's so incredible because like at my house, I'm getting like 25 megabits. I'm like that's great. I'm getting 25 megabits.

Yeah, buddy. But at Chase's, like what? So anyways, I've had incredible performance. Even like in the spots where I've had low performance, it's been improved. It is really great. Regardless of what my speeds are, I am super thrilled because I'm only paying for what I use. And Ting's dashboard lets me manage all of that. And I actually have used their Android app to send me a push alert if I go over like two gigs, which that's just so I know.

And you can really kind of play around with it and see kind of what you would pay by going over to Linux.ting.com. That will take $25 off your first device. Click on their savings calculator. Plug your current usage information in there and see how much you would save over like a two-year contract period. And then keep in mind too that Ting has early termination relief programs to help you get out of a contract if you're in one. Now, as these devices become more and more important to me, and I have more and more things that I do with my device. So like with my Nexus 5, for example, it does sort of personal things for me. It tracks my sleep, including like recording my noises I make at night. Hello. It talks to my car, right? And it tracks everywhere I drive using automatic and if then,

then that, and logs that to spreadsheets. it has become a very personal computer device to me that has things on it that nothing else holds. And to me, as I think more about how the technology I use reflects on me as a person, just like that article Dan Gilmore wrote and why he switched to Linux from Windows, Ting plays a role in that for me too. And that's why I say thank you to Ting. Go to linux.ting.com, take $25 off your first Ting device, or go get a Ting SIM card. They'll give you a $25 service credit that'll probably pay for more than your first month. And now when you're on Ting, you can do CDMA or GSM and think about the flexibility that gives you. And don't forget, every Ting plan includes hotspot

and tethering. That could be really wicked. Or you can just get a GSM SIM and pop it in like an old tablet or a security device. During the pre-show, somebody told me, you know, can just get a GSM SIM and pop it in like an old tablet or a security device. During the pre-show, somebody told me I just had a Nexus 7 tablet. I wasn't using the GSM SIM, so I got a Ting one for $9, and now when I use the data, I have it. Linux.Ting.com.

Big thanks to Ting. You know, you think back to the early days of cellular and how you were just excited if you actually got coverage in your area. And then you think about what you do with your smartphone through Ting nowadays. And you hold that in like a comparison. It's just mind-blowing. Yeah, yeah.

It really is. It's a new era. I mean, not to make it sound old, but it does freaking blow my mind. I remember suitcase phones. Speaking of the early days, I think it used to be easier to buy a computer for kids than it is today. Oh, yeah. I was looking around and I don't... Okay, so

my son, Dylan, his birthday is coming up. It's 20 days away from when we record this episode of Linux Unplugged. And here's what I'm doing, right, man? I'm shucking and jiving because the conversation comes up. Dylan's got an iPad and his iPad's here's what i'm doing right man i'm i'm shucking and jiving because the conversation comes up dylan's got an ipad and his ipad's kind of old right okay so that seems

pretty it's like okay that's a matter of fact there's no debating that so angela suggests uh maybe we want to buy a new ipad for him and I think to myself, I think, yes, well, maybe I would like to buy a new iPad. And I think, could I be okay with buying another iPad for my son? And I think to myself, yeah, I can do that. You can stomach that. I don't need to. And I thought about it some more and I thought about it some more and I thought, no, I'm actually not really okay with that. I mean I don't have any judgments out there if you want to buy one.

That's fine. Me personally, I just – I didn't want to do that. Plus, my son has been enjoying using an actual computer more than the tablet these days, including playing Minecraft on the computer. So I thought, I said to myself, I said, Self, this is your opportunity to strike. This is the moment. This is where you leap in. The iPad's got to be replaced. You get him on Linux.

He wants to use a desktop machine. He's got a dedicated Minecraft rig. But it's all about the execution. It's got to be the price point. It's got to be durable and preferably portable. Oh, okay. Portability's a thing. Okay. Okay. So this is where I...

And to be honest with you, I would like it to be preloaded with Linux so that way I'm supporting the Linux vendor. Right. Right. These are Linux vendor. Right, right. These are my requirements. Now, I've looked at a lot of rigs. There's a lot of ways I could go. Base requirements is I think I'd like it to be able to play Minecraft.

So let's just say an Intel HD 5000 or better. Don't you think? Yeah, you definitely want to be future-proof, and that's actually reasonably specced for not just future-proofing but, again, for Minecraft and things of that sort. I don't think these requirements are too far out for probably a lot of dads and moms that are kind of like, you know what? My kid could use a computer. And I could see this. Six is maybe a little young, but I could see ranges.

I could see a wide range of ages this would apply to. But I don't know where to begin. Oh, boy. What do you think, Matt? You were taking care of your nephew for a while. What was he using? Just a desktop? Yeah, we actually used an old laptop that I had.

I had it installed. I think it was running one of the Arch variants. And I basically set it up to where, first of all, open DNS all day long, especially as they get older. Because your parental controls, all the other software solutions, regardless of all, OpenDNS all day long, especially as they get older, because your parental controls, all the other software solutions, regardless of platform, are crap. I'm a big, firm believer of OpenDNS because it actually works.

So you do that at the router level. As far as the computer itself, he didn't really do much in the way of gaming on that particular rig outside of emulation. He did some emulator games. Was perfectly happy with it. Plugged a controller in. It was pretty straightforward. He actually was figuring stuff out

pretty quickly on his own. Never used Linux previous to that and actually now prefers it. So, you know, as far as going forward with what your needs are, though, I think you're really wanting to definitely think long as far as future-proofing.

Yeah, I definitely don't want to buy one for a few years. Yeah, right. So you really want to future-proof that out. The reason why I like portables, I'd like something maybe you could bring to the studio with him. But it doesn't have to be. And also, what level of gaming would he be doing on that, too? Are you okay with something that's integrated, even as the technology continues to progress?

I'm thinking gaming is not a huge—I'm thinking Minecraft and stuff. I don't really – so when I think about this, I look at something that would be – for a first user's experience, I want something that's going to be really easy to reload if he messes it up. So that way the reload process is quick. Yeah. I don't know. I noticed you mentioned maybe two – get two computers. Is that what you said? Yeah.

Tell me about this. So my other comment was is don't get a tablet. Get two computers? Is that what you said? Yeah. Tell me about this. My other comment was don't get a tablet. And the reason I think that is because I think if you give a child a tablet, they become consumers of content and games. And that's what they're limited to. They're never going to challenge themselves to be producers of anything. So I think if you want to use this as an educational tool, it has to be a computer.

Right, I agree. And I think that if you want a proper computer, a laptop of some sort, then that's fine. A computer that you can sit down at and get stuff done and maybe in a couple of years is suitable for playing some games on. That's also good because kids do want to play games on their stuff. But the second computer that you absolutely should get is a Raspberry Pi 2 and get a couple of micro SD cards, set them both up and keep one spare. SD cards, set them both up, and keep one spare so when he experiments and screws it up, you can just swap in the second SD card and he can be up and running again.

That is the nice thing. And you can prepare the second one. That's nice. And a Raspberry Pi 2, in a case, is mobile. You know, he can just take that to wherever he needs to go, and he can plug it into keyboards, mice, and monitors wherever he goes, and he can run Minecraft on it. Colonel Lennox, you have a different take?

Yeah, well, my thought is if your son is anything like my son, he's going to some degree expected to work out of the box, right? And so I completely agree with where Wimpy is coming from, and I hope, I can only pray that my kid, when he gets older, wants to actually play with the internals of the computer, but at the moment he's not really interested in doing that, he's just interested in

accomplishing a task. He wants to go to YouTube, he wants to watch his videos, he wants to play his games, and I would be somewhat, I would be somewhat afraid that if the Raspberry Pi didn't provide the experience he was looking for, he would not only write off the Raspberry Pi, but he would write off Linux.

So that was my thought, too. My thought was the first computer is, this is a computer that's fun. There's nothing weird about this computer. Just use it like a normal computer. Make using Linux the norm. Nothing different about it. And then as he starts to experiment,

I love the idea of swapping in pies as sort of like the computer where if something goes wrong, it's just an SD card swap away. And also, if you've got the first computer, which is a Linux computer and it's a proper desktop computer, that can be used. He can teach himself how he makes his sd card images and how he downloads the different you know versions that are available for the

raspberry pi to experiment with you know this is why you want two sd cards so the raspberry pi is there for experimentation and learning and you know if if he gets really um interested and he totally fries it then okay you're down 35 and you buy another one yeah you know that that's that's what they're they're really good for and it's it's how i'm it's how i'm doing things at home the raspberry pi for you know poking prodding putting fingers in uh sticky sweets all that sort of thing and uh proper computers for you, showing how to do, you know, more computer orientated things. Colton, you had a question you want to bounce off me?

Yeah, I think one thing that's that in my it would be important for me, at least if I was going into a situation like this is what, you how much am i really willing to spend yes yes right that is a big component thank you i can't believe that really has been brought up until this point because it is a huge component it's not a lot you know i mean we the original budget was like maybe a nexus 9 kind of area was kind of what we were thinking so right so you're going from there then you know how much like like you know if you want to go with a laptop, then are you going to be able to find a laptop that's in that price range that's going to do enough to keep them busy? Right. Yeah. Akati, you had a point to make. Akote? Akati? Yeah, I just think that...

I just think that, you know, when you look at costs, I mean, it's cheaper to go with a desktop, and, you know, later on you can actually build out from that by, like, allowing them to open up the desktop and just kind of see what parts do what. That sort of thing. I mean that's how I started when I was a kid. Yeah.

Yeah. It is fun to be able to open it up and play around. I'm surprised though. I mean like how come nobody has really recommended the NUC? It seems like – or the Meerkat from System76. It seems like a decent rig. All right. I'll tell you.

There is one machine. I'm holding all my – I haven't put all my cards on the table. I do have one machine in mind. This is not a plug, but I did notice that System76 four days ago on their Google Plus page said they have a Lemur 14-inch

coming in early April. I'm not, like, super stoked about the resolution, 1366x768, but then again, he's not going to care, and if it's Intel graphics... Yeah, he's six. Yeah, Intel graphics, you know, that might be better for Intel graphics, to be honest with you. And it's

a lot like the Ultra Pro, the Galago Ultra Pro, but bigger. It's clearly a 14.1-inch screen. And this starts at $599, so this might be the way to go. And here's the other component is, now, going back to your iPad, I'm going to wager you've got Otterbox-like protection around that thing. Yeah, yeah.

Okay. What's your protection plan for a laptop? Because they don't make Otterboxes for those that I know of anymore. Yeah, responsibility. Yeah, and that's – it's a big one. I mean like my nephew who – now he's 18 now, but when he was 17, it's like that laptop was – I mean, yeah, it was used, but it's like you break it, you bought it. That's it. There's no – that's it.

That's all there was. It's very true. If I do end up getting this Lemur though, I'll do a review for it on last as well. But I think – I don't know. So I was kind of leaning towards NUC or a laptop because a NUC I could also just pick up and bring to the studio. The Bonobo would just be too heavy for him. You know, that's the nice thing about this. It's half the weight of the Bonobo.

I don't know. Well, and I guess you get him a proper, like a good laptop bag. I mean, you know, real nice and padded and all that. That's got good reinforcement there. I mean, he'd probably be fine with that. Before I pull the trigger, I'd like to hear from the audience. Have any of you picked up like any of these more recent Chromebooks? The Chromebook seems like a bad way to go because it's so easy to wipe them.

But I would like to hear the audience's route. I'm leaning towards the System76, A, because if I'm going to spend the money, I'd like it to go towards the Linux ecosystem. B, I don't want to have to ever hassle with it when I reload. And C, I like System76. Yeah, they have the Meerkat too, but I don't think it'll be... I don't know if it'll be shipping in time. It's going to

be tight, because this doesn't ship until April or something. And his birthday's on the 14th, so it's really going to be tight if I can pull it off. But, yeah. I don't know.

Colonel Linux, you wanted to point out if I can pull it off. But, yeah, I don't know. Yeah, it might, yeah. Yeah, Colonel Linux, you wanted to point out the packing it around, something that a dad has to factor. Well, no, I've just, yeah, so you're going to the studio, he's coming with dad, you're going to get some work done. Can you imagine when he's like,

Dad, can I bring my computer? And you're like, no problem, son, let me disassemble the LCD and the computer and grab a keyboard and a mouse and put it all into a bag. No, just get the Lamar. That makes more sense. Actually, he nailed it.

Yeah, boy, he really painted that picture. By the time you're done putting a solid state in that bad guy and you're buying him a decent keyboard and mouse and you buy the LCD, you're probably into it for close to what the Lamar would be anyway. And I'll pledge a couple bucks towards getting Dylan off the apple juice. Yeah, I think having a solid laptop that actually

runs correctly the first time would be right. And I think it's pronounced lemur. Rottencorps tells me that somebody from Kansas Linux Fest joined us towards the end of the show here. Is that true?

Yep, that's me. Well, hey, Ryan. You know what? I'd love to talk to you. Why don't we do that here? Why don't I take a quick break and then we'll chat a little bit. So I'll let you guys know what I decided to do with Dylan's laptop. And then I'll give you kind of a review of whatever I end up getting and how the whole deployment goes and his reaction to it. I mean, he's played with Linux before.

I've had it on a Chromebook for him for a little bit. But it always ends up going the wrong way. I also had it on an old HP laptop, but it keeps dying. So every time, every machine I've given him Linux on, it's kind of been a little bit of a rocky ride. And I don't think he's blamed Linux, but it's because dad keeps giving him it on hardware that's like my secondary hand-me-downs. And so the end-all experience is to him, these computers are things that work for a few days until the hardware craps out on them. And so this next time around, it's like for his birthday,

and he's like, okay, let's get him his own computer, and we'll see what happens. So I'll update you guys in the future. Well, and I think if you also have it preloaded with all his favorite stuff, you know, Minecraft set up and ready to go. I mean, because it's a birthday experience, I think that adds to the wow, this is awesome, Dad.

Yeah, and the Meerkat comes out on the 26th. That might be a route to go to, but see, then I have to do all the disconnecting and reconnecting every time. That can get old. Unless there was like a perfect Monarch travel case he could bring. Nah, go laptop. Yeah, I think so. Hey, Matt, before we talk a little bit about Kansas Linux Fest, which I'm excited to hear about this new Linux Fest. First year, they did it.

Let's mention Linux Academy. This will be like Dylan's eighth birthday present. I'll get him like a year of Linux Academy, and then he'll really be off to the races. But you don't have to wait. You can start right now by going to linuxacademy.com slash unplugged. Get our special 33% discount. Linux Academy is a great resource for our audience, perfect for you guys. Built by Linux and open source enthusiasts

and educators, developers, and system administrators. And Linux Academy has a whole bunch of courseware and they're constantly improving that courseware retroactively and also adding new courseware. It's a really nice system. So when something brand new comes out in the Linux sphere that you need to learn about, you know Linux Academy is on top of it. Since they've been a sponsor

I've really watched them jump on top of great new technologies and not just like have courseware on it, but truly deep understanding courseware that when you're done, you're really going to walk away feeling knowledgeable about it because they have real world scenario labs. They have virtual machines that spin up. You choose from seven plus Linux distributions. You go through the course where you actually work with the actual technology. You just SSH in from your desktop and start working on the rig. It's really a nice experience. And if you use SSH with a little compression or something like that, it's really fast. I mean, we all know that, right? But they know that. So they make it so that way,

their lab servers spin up, give you a public IP, you log into them, you set up the stuff. It's really cool. And I think one of the things that I've struggled with when I was in IT, it's not really an issue for me anymore. But there are sometimes like branches of technology that all of a sudden you just find yourself falling back into, oh, now all of a sudden I have to support something that connects to Amazon S3 or something that uses Amazon's simple DNS or simple mailing service. I have no idea how to do that. Well, Linux Academy's got your back. You get access to all of the courseware.

So if all of a sudden you find yourself having to worry about that, they got you covered. Or if you want to make sure your resume just looks a little bit better, they got you covered. In fact, I've been getting notes from Anthony over there about some of the amazing things they have coming up. Like on April 16th, they're going to have a big content release, and you can watch it live, 9 p.m. Central, April 16th. That's really cool. But they've also, from CompTIA, been approved for quality content requirements, meaning that you can go take the LPIC 1 and Linux Plus exams after you've taken the courseware at Linux Academy and get your certification and you're done.

You're done. By going to linuxacademy.com slash unplugged, you'll get started right now. They've got courseware on Python, Ruby, Android development, backup, like using rsync. I mean, the whole spectrum. It's everything. And when you get to choose from 7 Plus Linux distributions,

you get to download the content offline and listen like a podcast. You can learn on the go and be productive while you're doing stuff. It's just a great solution for the people that have time constraints or free time. LinuxAcademy.com Unplugged. Go check

it out. All right. Well, Ryan, thanks for joining us sort of last minute, I suppose. And tell me about what you did at Kansas Linux Fest and how it was. Okay, well, I was one of the original two organizers for Kansas Linux Fest, and we spent kind of the whole year planning it.

I've been living in Kansas for two years. I got a job as a Linux systems administrator over here, and I want to thank you. I'm actually kind of nervous talking to you because I was really getting into Linux and then I found your show and it really has been with me my entire journey, you know, going from being somebody who knew very little about Linux and open source software to being a big advocate now and putting together events like Kansas Linux Fest. Well, what made you crazy enough to try to do a Linux Fest? I mean, that's pretty ambitious.

Well, actually, I was just – it came from – I was pissed, actually, because I got into town and I live in Lawrence, Kansas, which is home to the University of Kansas. And there was no active Linux user group in town. And that drove me crazy. I could find like six web pages of old Linux user groups that had died out. But I was like, where am I going to go? I'm this geeky guy and I want to talk to geeky people who love open source.

And so I decided to just start my own Linux user group. About the same time, I met this guy, Mike DuPont, and he is brilliant. And he was actually putting Open Kansas. It's openkansas.us. It's a group that is in Kansas that's promoting open knowledge, open source software, and Linux. And he said, hey, I've been thinking about putting together an open source conference. You're head of the Lawrence Linux user group. Do you want to help me out? And I was like, yes, of course I do. The funny thing was, we really only

expected about 30 people to show up. 20, 20, you say? 30, 20 to 30. We didn't expect that many people. We thought we'd have our speakers and then maybe an additional 10 or 20 people. We ended up, we counted it up after the event, we ended up getting around 200 people. So that really shattered our expectations. That's great. Yeah, not to mention we had Rackspace, who came on as a sponsor. We had many local places, CalTesting. They do end-of-year assessment software for student testing for a whole bunch of states.

We had – I don't want to leave anybody out, but I know I'm going to. We had our local – one of our local ISPs. We had – unfortunately, some people kind of didn't get on board until it was too late, so we didn't really have time to put things together with them. Fortunately, Linux Pro Magazine came on and they provided a whole bunch of their magazines for free. Cool. And actually, it's funny because you talked about Linux Academy and they're actually based out of Lee's Summit,

which is right next to Kansas City. And we're right on that east side of Kansas where the fest was at. And so we asked them to come. Unfortunately, I didn't realize they were that close until a couple weeks before the event. So they said, no, we're not going to make it this year, but we'll be there next year. Cool. So I'm going to try and hold them to that. But we had a lot of interest from people like Ricky Ensley,

if you guys know about her. She's from Lawrence. And she's actually part of what inspired me to start the Lawrence Linux User Group here in Kansas, because I went to LinuxCon 2013, which was in New Orleans. And while I was down there, I ran into her as well as three other people from Lawrence. And I'd never met them before. I said, why did it take us coming down to New Orleans to meet and network like this? I said, we need to do something back home. And so that's where this effort came from. So and you're crazy enough to do it again next year, it sounds like. Absolutely. I actually,

I'm so glad that you said that because you, our biggest sponsor was individuals walking in the door. We made over $2,000 from individual sponsors coming in and making donations. That's great. And I think, you know, I like to watch these things because I I've noticed these, the,

even this actually some of the, the events, you know, when there are a couple of hundred people are really, really perfect. It's a sweet spot where the crowd is small enough that everybody is really nice to each other because they keep bumping into each other and, you know, you actually start conversations and some actual things can happen in communities. It's really neat. The energy level, I just want to say the energy level was so high and the engagement was so high. I've never seen that. I've been to quite a few open source conferences at this point. Yeah, and we had big speakers.

You know, we had one of the guys over at Twitter's open source. I don't remember exactly what it is. Their open source outreach group or whatever. I don't remember exactly what it is, their open source outreach group or whatever. And we had a guy from Oracle come in and give a talk about, you know, kind of what they're doing in open source. And we just had so many awesome speakers. And if you guys can, you know, I tried to put as much as I could on my blog, which I posted in the chat and I'll post it again. And maybe we can get it in the show notes if you put my putting that in. I tried to put as awesome.

Well, I tried to put as much as I could in there about who was there and what we did. And it was just super awesome. And it's really great because it's building communities on top of the community that we built there. There were the Wichita, which is a pretty big city here in Kansas. There was a guy who stood up at the beginning and he said, I'm so happy you put this together. I'm the president of our Linux user group down in Wichita. And he said, you know, and he kind of went through his whole spiel about what they were doing, and then another guy stood up and he said,

I'm president of a Linux user group down in Wichita too, and I had no idea there was another one in town. We need to get together and do some stuff. And so it was a lot of interactions like that that really, I think, built the community. And we had an after party where, unfortunately, I got really, really drunk, so i don't remember all of it but the but there was a point when uh one guy was telling me he says i've been living in a bubble he's like i didn't know there were all these people around me

who were interested in the same thing yeah and you discover that when you show up and you like you or like around here if you go to meetup.com, you discover that's the same thing. Ryan, Acoffee has a question for you. Go ahead, Akati. Yeah, I was just wondering, what was your cost of entry this year? Oh, boy. Well, a lot of it came out of pocket. And I really want to thank Mike. He's such a phenomenal guy. I think he spent over $1,000 just out of pocket costs. He might have meant entry to the fest. Oh, there was no cost of entry. You didn't have to sign up. You could just so we could keep track of who was there. But that's actually why we don't have firm numbers. Right, right right yeah we we we didn't want to prevent anybody from coming just because they didn't sign up or they didn't have the money

and so we we told everybody come in we're completely open um and and so there was no cost of entry only if you wanted to donate and and if you donated we had some swag to give you, you know, just for a little bit of love and giving back. And so, but yeah, just going back to that, you know, definitely want to thank Mike. He put so much, you know, he was my other organizer. We tried to pull as many people in, but I don't think many people took us seriously until like a week before the conference started. And then people started, we had all sorts of companies reaching out to us at that point, and we had a couple of speakers saying, like, I want a part of it. And at that point, it was really hard to get anybody else fit in.

But I'm hoping that because we've had so many people reach out to us, that next year we'll be able to incorporate more speakers and more sponsors. And I would say, you know, as it gets like, you know, as you get to the month. I would definitely go to that next year. Yeah, yeah. We'll just let people know. If you get to the month or two point out, you know, we can start helping spread the word so people can make plans to attend.

Well, awesome. And Chris, we'd love to fly you down and have you be a part of the event. Oh, okay. Sure. Wow. Maybe you never know. I'm not joking. You never know.

This is a good time is you never know maybe kansas city is growing yeah maybe i will you just have fibers down there just have to uh hit me up a little while beforehand uh next next year and uh you just never know because i do want to all right can i can i plug a couple things real quick yeah sure so that all right so for those of you who feel like you're in a bubble out in the middle of the Midwest and Missouri, Kansas or Nebraska, feel free to check out KansasLinuxFest.us or OpenKansas.us or just reach out to me and I'll try to give my information to Chris or follow me on Twitter, Ryan Lee Sipes. And just, I try to post as much as I can about what's going on in the Midwest

as far as Linux and open source is concerned. And I'd love to help anybody who feels like they're a lonely geek find a community here in the Midwest to be a part of and contribute to. That's great. Yeah. And if you feel like, I know that feeling and it's not true.

There are others out there. You can find them. You're not alone. You're not alone. Yeah. All right. Very good. So I think we'll wrap it there.

I had a discussion piece around. So good to know. I feel so much better now. I had a discussion piece around distribution coverage, but, you know, I can bump that to a future episode because I liked getting some coverage there of the Kansas Linux Fest. I just love these Linux Fests. They're so much fun. Also, I'd like to point out that I contribute to Evolve OS, and it hasn't gotten some play on here really that much yet, Chris. You're right.

You're right. If you could, I can hook you up with all the developers, and we can talk about that. All right. You know what? We should. We should probably get an Evolve OS dev on the show here and talk to him and see what's up. Because you're right. It is something we have not given a lot of time to,

which was the topic of our discussion piece. And that's a little teaser, I guess. You know what? I'll try to remember to put it in next week's episode. Because it's, you know, we're getting, boy, I don't know if we want to start another 20-minute conversation at this point in the show, Matt. You know what I mean?

Like, I feel like we should probably save it for next week. It might be worthwhile. I guess maybe I'll tease the topic, and then maybe you can join us next week. We should do this more often, actually. Now that I think about it, why don't I always do this? Okay.

Because I don't always know what the topic's going to be. That's why. I know that. I want to talk next week about the amount of coverage we've given to certain distributions, specifically Arch and Fedora and Ubuntu,

in comparison to other distributions like Evolvo OS, Mandriva, Mint, and OpenSUSE. And part of it is because my sense and the production staff's sense and Matt's sense of where the interest lies in the audience, part of that is our own internal interest, and part of that is the relevance that we assess those distributions to have. All of those factor into what we cover. But I think it's always worth reevaluating that because things change over time. And that would be a discussion I'd like to have next week, not to do too much navel-gazing, but really to kind of say what are things that are truly distinguishing about these distributions that deserve our attention?

What should we be focusing on? And are we focusing too much on the wrong thing? So that's a conversation I'd like to have with our lug next week in episode 86 of Linux Unplugged. So join us. We do the show live over at jblive.tv on Tuesdays, specific time, 2 p.m. But if you go to jupiterbroadcasting.com

slash calendar, you can get that converted to your local time zone. We've got robots, and the only thing they do is patiently wait to convert that. But I pay them in frickin freaking Bitcoin by the hour. So go over to jupiterbroadcasting.com slash calendar. You can add it to your own calendar. Also, send us your feedback. Go over to jupiterbroadcasting.com slash

contact. And then, you might not have known about this, but we have a subreddit. Who knew, right? LinuxActionShow.reddit.com makes this show better. Submit topic ideas. There's feedback threads. Usually Unplugged doesn't get much love because you guys are apparently just not very talkative about Linux Unplugged doesn't get much love because you guys are apparently just not very talkative about Linux Unplugged in there.

But there is, well, actually last week we got quite a bit. But there is a discussion thread in there for every episode of Linux Unplugged. And also stories and apps and all kinds of stuff that get linked there make their way into this show and Linux Unplugged. Love for life. That's right.

That's right. So thanks, everybody, for being here. Thanks to the Mumba Room. Matt, have yourself a great week. I saw that there is a new episode of Married and Amused out which... Yeah, after a bit of a hiatus, we're back. Basically, we had

a little bit of a home illness kind of thing going on there for a while but we're back. It happens, Matt. It happens. And it looks like a good game. It looked funny too. I watched a little bit of the intro and it had me laughing. Yeah, it was a lot of fun. And anywhere you want to send folks throughout the week? As always, if you want to just kind of keep up in general,

articles to video games to whatnot, MattHartley.com, subscribe in any one of the options available. Email to social media. That's just put all in one spot. That's a great idea. All right, everybody. Well, thanks for tuning in to this week's episode of Linux Unplugged. See you right back here next Tuesday. Yeah, that's true. It's better than Married and Abused.

That would not be a good show. Yeah, that's true. It's better than Married and Abused. That would not be a good show. Yeah, that's a private show. That's usually when it's all in the doghouse and I did something stupid. Married and Abused. That's true. All right, well, that was a fun show. Thanks, you guys. We had a light turnout during the pre-show, and then it really filled out during the show, which is awesome.

Ryan, thanks for making it in here at the end. We had a little chat about Kansas LinuxFest towards the top, and I think I got your blog post already in the show notes. Oh, that's awesome. I'm sorry I missed it. I'm actually at work, and I thought, man, I really need to get in here and plug Kansas LinuxFest before everybody's

forgotten about it. It was good work. You jumped on it. It was nice. Alright, jbtitles.com. Let's boat this sucker. Let's boat it up. Boat, boat, boat, boat it up. So have you guys noticed that since the day it was announced that BQ may have GPL compliance issues, Popey hasn't shown up?

Hmm? Coincidence? I think not. I think Popey's recording another show this evening. I'm kidding. Sorry to- It's all right. I tease. I tease. But come on, Wim evening. I'm kidding. Sorry to – It's all right. I tease.

I tease. But come on, Wimpy. It's a much better conspiracy. Yeah. We've got to keep up our blame, Popey. What we ought to do is we ought to live stream. You know what we should do? We should live stream the show he's doing right now so that way we could boost their audience for them.

Here's my question. Can I ask a question? This is for Ubuntu people who might be listening to this. Where is my phone for North America? That's what I want to know. I know. I'll buy one. I just need you guys to

get that to me. I think I'm getting an S6. I think I'm getting an S6. I mean, I might get the Mules or whatever it is when it comes out, but I think I'm getting the S6. Well,, I might get the Mules or whatever it is when it comes out, but I think I'm getting the S6. Well, I want that Maizu phone, the MX4. Yeah, Maizu, that's what it is, yeah. But it doesn't have the – I guess it doesn't have the bands for the US.

What do you guys – so there's several different suggestions these days to sort of get the entire last catalog online. The tried and true one would be archive.org. Of course, their sync thing is also possible. And also, Git Annex could be a possibility. Do you guys have any thoughts of a way to do a massive

online archive? Well, I have one idea, although it's a little retro. You get yourself these red envelopes, and then you mail out these CDs. I'll just put them on disk, and I'll just charge do it on subscription 50 bucks for it yeah that's a good idea um i have uh something that sort of plays into the education thing my my school district is like extremely anti-unix especially lately like like they want nothing to do with anything that's not windows

like a few years ago all of the school websites were like powered by wordpress on apache servers and on like linux apache servers and now they're all running on iis servers and they're all static web pages ouch which is terrible in the first place i have no idea why they're doing that but and then and then like also the um like we had we have like several hundred max that used to be like like you know just like a couple months ago they were all running like mavericks or whatever and then this school district just just decided that they didn't want it to be running Mavericks anymore. So they blew all of them away and installed Windows 7 on them. Nice.

Oh, isn't that – oh, I hope they're using group policy and Active Directory. Oh, I hope. Yes, they are. They are. And the other thing is none of the – the group policy they have set up does not –, it doesn't force them to install updates, and none of the teachers bother doing it. So every computer in our school is still vulnerable to that exploit that was talked about on Coder Radio a few months ago.

That's fantastic. So before everybody runs off, I kind of wanted to talk about that and just elaborate, but I'll make it really brief. The place that changes, guys, is not so much with the teacher itself, but with the staff, the tech staff of the school or even at the board, the school board. We tried to go through the school board to try and get some Linux machines into school and get open document formats being used. And I work for the library system here at the regional level. And when we want to get something into a library, a lot of it comes down to convincing you know the other tech guys and then ultimately also showing how it saves money and how it you know is is a better solution and

it can be done but it has to be done from that point of view because you're trying to convince people who are like why can't we just stick with what we have no the thing is though i totally get that it's it it it is more with the administration that that has changed because, like, my teacher in my school that does all the computer stuff, he actually instructed me to install Ubuntu on one computer just because he wanted to mess with it and try it out the first time that someone like a higher up from the it department came in the room and noticed ubuntu running on that computer they they got like super pissy and they were like you know that computer should be running windows 7 and like the computer was called and that's the thing the computer was too old to actually run windows 7 all it could run was windows xp and so I had installed Ubuntu on it and the IT administrator did not like that.

Oh boy. Colton, you change a network one funeral at a time. That's true.