 Hey everybody, welcome back to the Linux cast. I'm your host Matt. I'm joined by Tyler. How you doing? But how you doing Tyler doing good? I Am the least organized person in the world today, so be prepared for this to be a horrendous episode so because I have no clue absolutely no clue who we're talking about So that'll be a it'll be a surprise. So be good. All right So this is the Linux cast we talk about Linux usually and Foss related topics and we always start off the show by talking about what we've done this week in Linux We haven't seen each other in a couple weeks. So Tyler, what have you been doing in the last couple weeks in Linux? Livestreaming game development. I'm I'm working on a Resident Evil inspired little game. It'll be like a 45 minute free game on itch And yeah, yeah, I've been working on that live streaming it on Odyssey. It's been a lot of fun also have ran into some Issues with performance which has been awesome because I finally know how to fix performance issues, which is Great So yeah, it's been interesting for sure What's you've been up to? Cool, I would before we run mine. I just want to say I've watched some of your live stream what you're doing that like you Like are you using like is that program that you're using is that? Unity or is that blender? Unity and then I have popped into blender to do you things like Essentially all I've been using blender for is I'll take a 3d model Like let's say the gun and I'll take that into blender and just Render out the gun as like a 2d view and use that for a nice icon. That's really all I've been using blender for But yeah, I am using unity for most of it It looked very complicated. I was like, I'm very impressed That I don't know anything about any of that kind of stuff. So that was very cool All right, so on my end I've been window manager popping again as usual so I Went through and yes, it wasn't yesterday. What was the day before I decided I was gonna go through and triax monad again I did do it and I've been happy with it for the last three days. I mean The issues I've had aside with getting it to capture OBS to capture a window. I don't know what's going on there, but Other than that, I've been actually fairly happy with it and I started finally to understand a little bit of Haskell so I've kind of Made it over the hill a little bit in terms of actually being able to use X-monad again Whether or not I like it or not. Hmm. I'm not sure yet It's cool. It's I love the fact that it has key cords. So like q-tile has key key cords and stuff X-monad has those and those are really useful I really like those because that's something that you can't do very easily with DWM You have to use something like sx-hkd in order to do it So that's kind of cool. It's still very easy to get confused in the configuration file So I'm having a little bit issues there But I've also before that I was using q-tile for a little bit And I was having the stupidest issues like for whatever reason I'd I'd just be merely going out My day and all of a sudden my keyboard would stop working Like, you know, I was like, well, I was like, oh, okay. Well, I mean, maybe my keyboard's going bad So I unplugged the keyboard and plugged in a different keyboard. I got like four keyboards around me and same problem and After doing a little bit of investigation, it only happens the q-tile Like for whatever reason it will not register because the keyboard actually still works I can still enter a tty and everything But there's no key bindings will register at all. It's really really weird and I don't know what's going on there So that got me out of q-tile and then I installed herp slough. I haven't done much with it yet But that's another one that I'm going to be taking a look at here pretty soon on the on the channel I've heard good things about herp slough Never checked it out myself. So I will be interested to see that video for sure and you're using gnomes I know I know You poor bastard That's literally my experience. I don't I don't like the devs. I'm not a huge fan of gnomes and one of the choices They make why didn't you choose KDE if you had to use a desktop event? Why not Katie? I Don't like Katie. It's just personal preference I don't like it. I want to use You might also just like this one Oh, I know you're gonna dislike this one, but I would prefer to use elementary os 6, but it's not yet, so I'm not going to install something that I can't literally update when the official release comes out So, yeah, that upgrade path is stupid. Yeah. Yeah, okay Um You know, I still don't like it. No, but popo s did make skin home The best version of good. No, maybe possibly probably not. I don't think there is a best version of good No, but having said the best version of can almost probably mate All right Okay, so let's jump into the contact information You can follow us on Twitter at the Linux cast you can subscribe to Linux cast at work And you can contact us via email at the Linux cast at gmail.com You can support us on patreon at patreon.com slash Linux cast and you can follow Tyler at You prefer Odyssey so there is a link now in the show notes to his Odyssey page Follow me. He's also on YouTube the link for that will be there as well And of course you can like comment subscribe on this video on YouTube at youtube.com slash Linux cast. I Got that down. Yeah. Oh, yeah That's better. Okay, so each and every week we select two news items and the at least my link here is older Because it was from last week, but I think it's still relevant. We could talk about a little bit. So definitely yours first Your first all right well my link is pretty interesting I I found it just Browsing like Linux news and I just hadn't heard of it It's way less. I believe is how you're supposed to pronounce it we yl us, but it's just a little neat little program for your Linux install that can just turn your phone or tablet into essentially like a walk-in tablet and I just thought it was nifty I'm definitely going to be doing Like a video on it. I just thought it was it was interesting To read about it because they are they already have experimental Wayland support which I thought was Probably the only thing that made it all like really relevant for new, you know, Linux users Maybe somebody who's just popped in and is using good. No, or you know Ubuntu Like the newest version they might they might be running Wayland and just don't even know it So it's interesting that Wayland supports already, you know being worked on But yeah, I just thought this was a nifty little tool for anybody out there who I Don't know maybe wants to start doing some graphic design on On their Linux install, but it's not gonna show off the money to go get a walk-in tablet Hey Here's something that just just might think your interest and just might you know replace a walk-in tablet Make it not even necessary to go out and get one What are the like tablets and phones that it supports like will run on like any like Android tablet or whatever? I I believe it's Android tablets and phones I'm I'm not sure about iOS at all but yeah, it Just I don't think there's Any weird like support issues when it comes to your phone. I think just as long as your phones, you know Relatively up-to-date on his Android version. I think you should be able to install it It does also make a lot of sense though if you're gonna be using a phone You probably want to use something like the phone I've got where it's got, you know, like an actual stylus with it Just because I assume that's what you're gonna want to be doing is you know drawing and doing stuff. So But yeah It seems like a very interesting Project and as I do my video on it, I'm sure I'll find out any weird bugs or issues that I come into with it I'll definitely talk about those for sure. Cool. Yeah, definitely pay attention to that video. It looks really awesome All right, so mine My news link for this week is the system 76 mechanical keyboard now I don't you do probably don't know this about me, but I am a mechanical keyboard aficionado. I have So I have this one I Have another one that I use and there's another one over there and there's another one over there So I have like I don't know 15 can make a mechanical keyboard. That's ridiculous I only use mechanical as soon as you go mechanical. You can't go Trying to go like you just use your laptop or whatever and have to type on those little butterfly keys like oh, it's like torches It's like it's like using canome I'm not letting that go but anyways, you won't System 76 is a brand that I have talked a few times before on the show before your time, but They have really good hardware in terms of like computers and stuff like that. They make really stuff But we've I've always said they're like the the apple of the Linux community. They are very very expensive and Now they've released a Mechanical keyboard and first of all the keycaps that they've chosen Are ugly. I mean I Know what they're trying to do there They're trying to go with like the old-school like IBM keyboard aesthetic, but then they placed RGB in the background Like those those colors just don't go together. Okay. I mean, that's just I mean that's the first time I saw that was the first thing that I thought that was before I knew that it costs $290 now if you know anything about like the custom mechanical keyboard community or whatever or you know marketplace you'll know that you can get a Custom mechanical keyboard granted you have to put it put it together yourself Which is really easy because they don't have a swappable Key switches and stuff you can get one for like 150 to 180 dollars And that includes the key switches and the keycaps, you know and that's something that you do yourself now Obviously, it's not open source But you know, it's about a hundred dollars cheaper And if you don't want to put one together yourself, you can get a you know a pre-built one That's really good for a hundred dollars or hundred and twenty dollars the one I just got is an IQ Unix L80. It's always 180 dollars And this is like top of the line pre-built, right? And if I wanted to I could go through and take out all the key switches and put in my own because it's hot swappable now the Papa West one is also hot so but which is good But again, two hundred and eighty dollars So the question I have is is the fact that the hardware and software is open source Justify the fact that it's at least a hundred dollars more expensive then Similar boards, what do you think? I don't think so. I mean, I've I've actually done a whole video on System 76 and their hardware being just too pricey But so the keyboard that I'm using right now, this is the Logitech TKL It's wireless slim. I believe these are like brown switches. I Only bought it because I End up taking like my keyboard with me everywhere because a lot of my friends just don't use mechanical keyboards And I I hate I hate a big keyboard. That's those spongy keys I cannot stand that whatsoever So I end up taking it with me and I like something slim This thing is two hundred twenty dollars and the only reason it's that much is because it's slim Mechanical keyboards and it switches and it's wireless It also comes with a whole bunch of extra buttons and stuff. I I don't need them But still I would not pay a one hundred dollar premium for essentially Not a key chron keyboard like if you think about it the the keyboards aesthetics It's very close to a key key chron and you could pick up the same You know form factor keyboard here for 60 bucks on Amazon Well, yeah, even if you went with the key chron that was hot swappable and stuff That's a hundred dollars, right and that comes with you know everything you need But like I said, it's not open source. So I My view on the whole open source thing is that I don't care about the hardware and who cares if the hardware is open source I I don't I'm not an electrical engineer So I can't get in there and start looking at the the PCB and you know, whatever the software the fact that that's open source is Great and I understand that it costs money now again. I don't care that there's a premium on this I think two hundred dollars would have been a great price It would have been you know, and maybe it's about fifty dollars more than really what it's would be worth if it wasn't open source That extra fifty dollars is a great premium for whatever $300 is is just too expensive now you go on and on about the price because the price is really the thing that you know Caught my eye and made me say you want, you know, this is and no, no, sorry, but I mean there's the The problem is is especially in the 65% keyboard market or whatever. They're just so many options You know in terms of And they're really good. I mean, it's not as if like we're talking. I mean you mentioned the key crown at $60 There's a ton and ton of like 65% keyboards between 65 and $8. I mean, there's like hundreds of them go to Amazon and search for them You got like every Chinese brand you can imagine has some You know razor has one There's the and pro there's all you know, there's all these ones right and they're all less than a hundred dollars There's just this is the reason why open source hardware Never works is because they have to chart I mean I understand that they they can't do the whole mass production thing that other companies can do so that's going to Be more expensive. I understand it just They always take the more expensive part and then just push it way out of the park in terms of just you can't justify $300 for keyboard because at $300 you can get a Whole kit and get like Top of the line. I know obviously you can spend way more than $300 if you're gonna, you know Get crazy switches and you know crazy form factors and stuff like that But at $300 you're at the you're like at right at the point where you can build an actual keyboard for that You know, I mean like let's be honest at $300 you're pretty darn close to like moon lander ergo docks easy like land I I can't justify a Small keyboard with limited at $300 you're getting very close to computer price, right? I mean you can almost buy I mean you at $500 you can get a computer, right? So you're $200 away from actually buying a computer now this and this is just a keyboard Right, I mean if you look at it you can buy that raspberry pi 400 or whatever for like a hundred bucks that is it now It's a crappy keyboard. Now if this had a raspberry pi in it for $300 That'd be cool, right that that that would be much more interesting because I mean in Arduino or something Yeah, just anything it'd be cool I mean that that'd be really neat because Then it would give it something that makes it more than just something that is you can buy for 150 bucks Yeah, I think that's our thoughts on the system 76 thing It's disappointing because when they first said that they were going to do this like when you want That's really kind of cool But there was always that niggling back in the back of my mind like well, this is system 76 You know, they're gonna charge, you know If if system 76 made wheels, they'd be the exact same price as the Mac Pro wheels Yes, they would so They're the Apple the Linux community That's in it. Yeah, whatever what was mostly disappointing about it is the system 76 seems to be the only Vendor here in the states that we can actually get this kind of hardware from now You can talk about Dell and IBM or whatever But there I mean if you want to buy an Ubuntu based Dell laptop good luck finding on their website I mean, yeah, they bury that thing like they don't they're ashamed of it Even their technicians if you were to call them up, I'm pretty sure they'd they'd be like what? Sure, I'll ask my manager if we have it, but no Anyways What was I gonna say, okay, let's go ahead and move on to the main topic. What is the main topic this week Tyler? the main topic is so does Google actually care about Linux security at least they Talk like they do. I don't know if you saw the link that I put in here, but it's About Google funding some Linux kernel developers full-time to just maintain and Focus on the actual like Linux kernel security and continue the development so apparently the two the two full-time maintainers that they've Funded is guess Gustavo Silva and Nathan chancellor and I Just wanted to talk about this deep. I I find it Good, but very I'm very wary of the fact that Google is actually funding and Making it seem as if they do care a ton about Linux security and they for their own purposes They do care about Linux security and I think that's sort of the Problem I don't know. How do you feel about Google funding? Full-time maintainers for security It doesn't surprise me at all because they if you look at the biggest contributors to Linux kernel actually one of them is Google So and that's been that way for quite some time So it's not that I think that they probably do care about Linux security the the real question is do they care about it because of Linux security or because They use Linux and I think that that's the where it goes They're doing it for selfish reasons and you know, whatever. I mean, that's okay as long as we benefit from it Who cares what their motivations are behind it? I Don't think that this is something that will happen for very long because eventually they're gonna ditch the Linux kernel But I mean if you look on your phone and look and see what Linux kernel you're using on your phone You'll probably find that it's probably four dot fourteen or one earlier than that. There's a ton if you look There's a ton of three dot stuff out there in terms of Android phones because they just don't get updated at all Like if you buy a sure if you buy like a $40 phone from You know your local Kroger And it's made by ZTE that thing is never ever ever going to get an update And it's you know, maybe it starts out like with Android 9 or 10 or whatever and you're maybe using like 4.14 or whatever it is But you're never gonna get an update to that so I think that they're they're really focused on the top tier Android stuff Which is unsurprisingly because that's where they make their money, right? Yeah, well, I think what what sort of Puts me off about Google being So Willing to Can't put in cash towards security on Linux is It makes me worry that eventually the Linux Community will get to the point where we're so used to having full-time Maintainers and stuff that we just won't be able to handle it when Google leaves and those full-time maintainers are no longer getting paid Consistently or at all to put in as much work as they do. I think that's what worries me about it Is maybe it'll change the way we treat security on Linux I think maybe It's possible if that happens, but I don't see that the Linux community at Large doing that mainly because I don't think that the Linux community and in general the specific like kernel maintainers Are ever going to give up enough control to Google to have that happen? Now that being said there are organizations in the Linux community in the FOS community that are much more Buddy buddy with Google then the Linux kernel maintainers are so for the like the the Linux foundation Obviously Google sits on that board, right? So they're very close together But also canonical, right? I mean canonical and Google work together a lot canonical and Microsoft work together a lot And now I don't necessarily think that that's a bad thing But I also think that it's something that You have to be a little bit wary of because you know that Unlike canonical unlike open Susa, you know those company Microsoft and Google are very much companies that are They need to make profit right at the end of the day. That's what there's their entire goal. They Their goal isn't to forward FOS software their goals to make money for their shareholders, so You know, well, I excited like I don't think that like those come companies and organizations working together is a bad thing It's just something that you have to be Vigilant about and always kind of think about in the back of your mind and just you know That's necessarily something we have to worry about. It's just something that you know You have to understand that sometimes the motivations especially like I mean To go back to the main topic, you know, I would talked about her, you know, when I first started was that I don't think that Google Contributing this to the salt to the kernels Linux security is a bad thing You just kind of have to keep in mind their Reasons for doing it, right? So that's the whole thing Yeah, I I don't know. I just What what makes me nervous is what happens when we have enough corporate backing or enough corporate Positions in the Linux space for maintaining the actual Linux kernel to where there's no incentive to maintain any portion of the Linux kernel without You know getting a job for it. If there's enough jobs in maintaining the Linux kernel And it gets to be that way for quite a while like let's say even a decade I what what makes me nervous about that is it might it might Make the people willing to maintain the Linux software or Linux kernel Unwilling without being paid to do it if you get what I'm saying That's what just makes me nervous about it. But I could see that That that's also probably just a Conspiracy nut sort of idea. It's really I don't say that's likely. It just I don't know That's why I'm wary about so many jobs coming into actually maintaining Linux Itself. I think it's a great thing But it also makes me wary. So yeah, I mean cuz I mean obviously we the more people get paid to do it The more people would want it, but all right exactly The question you have to ask is then would those jobs go away, but I don't I think even if like For what exit even if we lose companies along the line Let's just say Google eventually decides they don't care about first of all Google stop listening to me you bastard Dumbass phone Even if we lose The Google, you know, you know along the way I don't think we'll ever see all of the jobs that this creates to go away, right? Cuz Linux and we always kind of fear that like one day we're gonna wake up and Linux is going to go away Or because you know not be what it always is and I don't think that that's ever going to be the case. Um, I Have a hard time seeing Linux ever becoming At least in terms of what the important parts like so like like we all know that the desktop Linux is Unimportant nobody cares about that. I could see the desktop Linux going away someday or becoming so marginalized It's just a community maintain project like I Could see it someday canonical saying you want we're not going to do desktop I could see it. I don't think it's going to happen But I you know, I can imagine that happening But the important parts of Linux Which is the parts that make money that in terms of like servers and stuff like that that stuff here is going to stay It's going to stay open source. I believe Probably forever because I think that it benefits too many corporations that share the code, right? The the part that the biggest thing we have to worry about as a Linux community isn't necessarily the corporate influence Which is it is worrying But the biggest thing we have to worry about is actually bringing in new fresh young developers because right now we have Very how do I put this? Senior development They're the people who developed the limbs kernel have been doing it for a very long time and eventually Linus Torvalds and all those guys So they're gonna retire like we need somebody whether they're getting paid or not to to take To be able to be his protégé or whatever and take over him when he decides to eventually, you know Go spend his money or you know, whatever You know because eventually I think that's gonna be the the the biggest The the biggest thing we have to do as a community over the next 15 to 20 years is replace the OGs right, you know the the people who started Linux that are eventually going to age out of the system I mean when I was there, that's anyone. Oh, I'm killing Linus Torvalds off You know eventually he's gonna like I said, he's gonna retire and all these guys that work with them have been with him since the beginning basically and that was like the 1980 like the mid 1980s, so it's it's been 35 36 years, you know, so it's been a long time and eventually he's going to retire so we need the fresh blood and What we really would be really great is to see like a benefit from this whole Google thing of them bringing in Developers or whatever because if they can bring in developers and pay them and then get those developers interested in open source Those developers may eventually go on when they leave Google because people leave Technic companies all the time to move around Right, maybe eventually they go work at a Mozilla or they go to work for the Linux Foundation and develop the kernel or whatever Maybe this brings in some fresh Developers that'd be one positive way of looking at it, right? Yeah, I think I think you're definitely right. Yeah, mom I mean, hope we could hope I'm right It's also possible. We could look at it completely the other way around and say this is the doom of the Linux kernel And everything is going to be terrible and we're all gonna be using Chromo s in a year and it's gonna be just horrible. You know, the only thing worse than you know Chrome Chrome OS Yeah, Chrome OS and I don't know if this is true. Do you know if it's true the Chrome OS is based on gentoo? Is that true? Uh, that is true. Yes, if they're gonna base it on a Linux Base, why would they base it on gentoo? That's just like come on man arch by the way I Have no idea why they went with gentoo, but there has I mean there has to be some technological reason why they went with gentoo um I mean Obviously chromo is so far removed from its gentoo base that it probably doesn't matter what they built on. Oh, yeah Oh, yeah, but it's weird that they built it on a Linux distro at all instead of just building it on a kernel Like they did with android Well, it's amazing to even think that it's based on Linux because I don't know Have you seen the steps it takes to get Linux running on a chromebook? It takes? Yeah, well now I mean base wise. I've seen some of the Like the stories behind it, but even just using the apps within chromo s At least for a long time there was actually quite, uh, burdensome It's a little lot. It's apparently a lot easier now, but Um, yeah, it's it's a pain. Yeah, okay. Let's go ahead and um, move on to the apps of the week, so Let's uh, why don't you go ahead and talk about your app of the week? So my app of the week is called dust 3d and it's this really neat and simple 3d Modeling software. Um, I'm definitely going to be exploring it some more. Um It's completely free and open source and it's not meant to Compete with like blender or anything. It it's It's completely different. It's meant for just if you want to model something Um, and you need either a very simple model or you're not trying to get very advanced with the model Like you just you just need something as say a good placeholder or something like that Um, it's really what what this is for or just making simple models very quickly It's very interesting and unlike blender You can hop in this and know nothing about it and just start messing around for a few minutes and end up with a Pretty decent 3d model even not knowing what you're doing. Um, it's very fun piece of software to mess around with Cool. Um, I don't know anything about 3d modeling. I'm not, um Artistic At all like not even a bit. So, um, all right, so I can just fake my artistic. Yes. Yeah, I can't even fake it I if you if uh My limitations of our art, you know art is probably stick figures and even then Uh, not good So, um, cool. Uh, so my pick this week is a terminal based application surprise surprise called beats b e e ts And basically what this is is a it's it's written in python. So if you're anti python, I'm sorry about that A base basically what this is is a media library management system. So basically what you'll do is you'll run this in your in your Music folder and it will go through an attempt to tag using various methods to Tag your music collection so that organizes them in the proper folders It organizes them with you know artists album and all that kind of stuff. Um, it's not as automatic as the Uh, the github page makes it seem unfortunately There's quite a bit of stuff that you actually have to add in to it in order for it to actually work Uh, there's plugins and stuff like that. You have to add in order to Get access to all the media libraries and stuff that it will actually check. Um, and Uh, it will actually transcode audio and stuff like that too. So it has a ton of different features If you want to go through and check it out. Um It's if if you are one of those people who Uh back in the early 2000s used Nefarious, I don't want to say nefarious uh various means of getting your music Not so legally line wire Napster before term, you know nap, you know legal Whatever if you're one of those people and just downloaded just tons and tons of music and whatever your library is probably a mess And tools like this it would be definitely be something that you could look into to help you organize your music library Uh For the first time so without actually having to go through and do it, you know, um manually which would suck So that beats uh and I links for both of these And the news items will be in the show notes whether you're watching this on youtube or through a podcast catcher So you can get all the links and stuff like that to these things in the show notes That's a very nifty little program. I'm definitely gonna have to be using this. Yeah, it's cool. Um, it's uh And it still is being updated. So it's it's been around for A long time, but it's just there's been Commits and stuff to it within the last five days. So it's definitely not been abandoned. So um, I did have a few A bug in it, but I don't think that they're bugs necessary more just the fact that it is a complicated program so Getting it up and running is a little bit of a you know A task so make sure you check out the wiki and stuff like that because it has really good documentation as well. So Anyways, that is beats. All right. So uh, that is it for this week uh coming up Next week we're going to be talking about Uh using pipe wire. Is it time for prime time? So, uh, I don't know if you've ever used pipe wire or not Tyler, I have not either. So this is we have homework Uh between today and next thursday we have to install pipe wire on it. It doesn't have to be your main system Uh, whatever And use it It's or at least try to use it All right, this is gonna be fun. Right. Um, so that is coming up next week Along with the news and the apps and pics of the week So, uh, we'll be before we go actually before we go I should go ahead and um Thank our current patrons, uh, if I can Uh, Devon, Marcus, Megalyn, Donnie, Sven, Merrick, Camp and Mitchell. There's no uh, like the video here So I'm kind of half-assing this but thanks everybody for your support patreon.com slash linuxcast if you want to support the channel and um Thanks everybody for watching. We'll see you next week. Mm-hmm. Say it