 Hey there and welcome to Fedora podcast episode 28. I'm your host Eric the IT guy Hendricks and joining me You're becoming a regular. We should we should see about getting you a raise is Mr. Joseph Gaioso did I get that right? Yes, you got it right. Well happy to be back Yeah, we can talk about it now. I'm good. I'm happy to jump on I don't know if I'll be able to make it too often more, but I'm happy to be here I'm definitely glad to have you joining me this this episode and last episode we talked about Oh my gosh, I looked it up right before the show. What did we talk about last time? We talked about Fedora cloud Yeah, lots of learning regarding that I probably made myself look a little silly with like Fedora cloud can do more than best of virtualization, right? And it's like, yes, Joseph They can do but whatever I learned and I learned and I got interested the thing that I was the most excited about As a as a as an end user I'm happy with that one Awesome. Yeah, so that was episode 27 available now on a podcast player or youtube channel near you. Keep in mind. We are looking at spreading the The reach of the store podcast so make sure to share these episodes with a friend. Make sure you subscribe We'll we'll mention that right up front and off the top of the show We're also looking at some more open source focused alternatives So so bear with us as we look at where we want to Spread the fedora podcast both in audio and video formats But with that said, I think we ought to dive in and bring on our guests today. We're going to be talking about Running fedora on hardware But not just any hardware hardware that you ordered specifically with fedora to run fedora And I can think of no one better than a community friend. Mr. Mark Pearson Mark welcome to the fedora podcast really excited. We've been talking about this episode for like two months now No, we we started talking about it before the summer break. Yeah, some it's kind of a busy time of year A little stop and go but happy we're here I'm really happy to be here too. Awesome. I think we got some momentum under us now So glad that you're joining us. Why don't you introduce yourself? Tell us a little bit about what you do for Lenovo for fedora and then And then if if you don't mind something you do for fun Oh, sure. Okay. Uh, so yeah, Mark Pearson in case it's not obvious when they are riding underneath my on my screen So I'm the technical lead for the Lenovo Linux PC team and so my job Is it's many different pieces but basically the aim is to get Linux up and running on a whole heap of Lenovo PC platforms and My job is part of doing that Initially the sort of like mostly working with Communities like people in Lenovo didn't necessarily understand what was involved do desktop limits on that So it's interacting with that but increasingly finding doing more sort of like advocating within Lenovo explaining how we have to do things how the next process works And you know helping to provide some mentor mentorship internally building up some Linux builds internally so we can do do more uh Helping out customers debugging issues making sure they get off to the right place And every now and then I get to do a little bit of coding for fun. So that's kind of what I do Uh, the second question was what do I do for fedora if I remember rightly? So, uh So a lot of it is very selfishly through the Lenovo program So obviously mainly interfacing as the Lenovo, you know the low novo Point of contact for the fedora community into Lenovo So that hey you guys can come and say you want to find out what's happening or what you're doing or, you know Getting involved whenever the council or one of the work groups have questions with that. So It's mainly as a point of contact. I do uh periodically do merge requests try and get patches for support that's landed upstream And get it brought into fedora a little bit earlier If you're not aware of the you know, particularly the kernel this tends to be but it takes time for Patch to make its way through the open source process to make it up into linus's tree and then back down to this row And we work with fedora if there's something that's going to be needed for a platform As long as it's accepted upstream then we can help to bring that in a bit quicker So I get that's my little technical contribution Uh, which is again got to keep myself happy, right? Um And uh, I try and help out with the test days as much as I can I have I don't think that I have a lot of laptops. I have a stupid number of laptops And so just try and try whenever there's a test day I try and make sure I run it on a range of the different ones to try I think from a floor piece probably yet And then the last question was fun. What do I do for fun? So, um, I I like I like the outdoors. So try and spend as much time outside as possible My my passion is in the wind. I live in canada. I live in ottawa just that will just south ottawa So we have a lot of snow and I really like cross-country skiing. So that that's the thing that makes me happy That's my happy place. I will disappear off into the woods and go ski flowers In the summer, it's a bit difficult And that is so So I I I've been cycling For my my fun things and I've got two two two kids as well. So you keep me busy So why don't we dive into today's topic and in fact, we already have the the obvious question about where can I go and get fedora on uh on lenovo So we'll circle to that here in a minute but um I'm really curious and and honestly so About the lenovo fedora partnership How how did that come to be? What was some of the background and joseph if you want to chime in on this as well We'd love to see how how this relationship came to be sure Actually, I'm not sure when you got involved joseph went when I very first joined the pc team I used to work on network switches And I joined the pc team and it was just as the fedora program was starting up Um, so we we already did a ubuntu certification preload program and we did the red hat certification Uh program so we know we knew the red hat engineers And I don't fully know the ins and outs of how it actually started But I know christin charl and matthew miller and then my boss at the time Had a discussion about doing a fedora preload and a fedora preload makes a lot of sense If fedora is a great distributions, but on new hardware It's the you know, the fairly fast moving Aspect of it is It's perfect. So, uh, yeah, I remember quite early on I think it was one of my first visits to the states to sort of see my boss and team Then I met up with matthew and we went out for curry and kind of hashed out Basically on both sides what the expectations are and it was very important for For us and lenovo to make sure that we were doing something that worked for the fedora team We didn't you know, we wanted to make sure that and that's why we have the agreement that we're not going to modify fedora take fedora Unchanged we add in some another documentation And that comes with other challenges, which we can get into if you want, but that's kind of where it started and I think 20 Was it three three three and a bit years ago 2020 maybe 20 Anyway, I have the date written down somewhere. I did look it up and we did the x1 carbon eight p53 and the p1 gen 2 they were we did the first two platforms to see how it works It was quite interesting like we actually got fedora up and running There's the usual technical challenges and we can talk about that if you're interested, but uh, you know It's not easy getting Linux running on a new hardware platform But we got there and we got it all done and then we started to hit process issues which was kind of It was it was interesting. There's there's been Program has you know not been around that many and it's definitely a lot of it is figuring stuff out As we go along that's been fun. And then yeah, so from there it's carried on Pretty much every year we add. We've been able to add one or two extra platforms Mostly amd platforms. So we've been adding quite a few more those partly at request of the fedora Community we did a poll and one of the big standing pieces of feedback was we want more amd So we were we were able to do that And so I know last year we added the z series and a couple of the p-series amd's this year We're adding the t16 amd. So we've been able to do it a few more The um, we still have some challenges around invidia cards and fedora. So that's that's definitely are The biggest pain point and I know looking forward There's light on the horizon for that. So hopefully fedora program continues well I that answer question um, well, I mean I want to know all the details all the dirty laundry. I want to know where the bodies are buried, but no Honestly, just I've got a really big yard All right, well we established where the bodies are buried now. So I don't know exactly the detail So that was something that was very curious That was something I was very curious about too because I came in it's been maybe over a little year now but That was something that I wanted to to to learn about and I did have questions So you were asking about like, you know the challenges that have come up since the program started I imagine you already mentioned the technical challenges and there may be other challenges too Um There's actually a question in chat that kind of leads into what I would like to ask which is And I don't know if there's a way eric that you could put it. There you go But what are the key differences between hardware on the nibble laptop? For windows versus linux. Okay So the aim of the program is nothing at all, right? That's that's where we go to it's the same hardware Same firmware and uh, we try we try really really hard to avoid having specific, you know linux only configurations. Um, so There's advantages and disadvantages to going that route, but uh for I I think it's a it's a worthy goal Like the aim is you can go and buy The nobo laptop and whether you run windows on linux. It should give you A good experience, right? It should Comparable and and that there are a few caveats and a lot of it is down to the close source nature of pieces that happen in windows That are that much harder to do in linux. So, um It's I I'm an engineer. So I have this real tendency to focus on the problems And the nobo marketing team are going shut up Um, but but what is the what is the biggest issue or the most fundamental? No, like a specific example is I know for the last two years the nippy camera Which is the sort of like computer vision AI camera used on the top end x1 carbons We just have not had support available for that on linux, right? We've been working with intel to get it done But it's it's a tough problem. It's taking time. It's not ready yet And so for the first time, uh, well last year and this year We've not been able to we've had to block linux preloads on the x1 carbon with the nippy camera And it's not unintentional. That's not what we wanted But it's the reality that it takes time sometimes to develop this and that's kind of how so we That that's Basically the main one the other one that comes up sometimes is w1 We are very close to solving the w1 issue. So at the moment, we don't turn on we don't allow w1 for length preload Just because it's not quite there. We don't want linux users to have a bad experience But I think we I'm optimistic. We're going to have that one. Well that's sold for next year Shit sport. We'll see Yeah, so they're there the two ones, but otherwise you have to give You know credit to the hardware vendors they we work with them. So a lot of our processes I'm starting planning for next year's laptop. So I know What the hardware devices are going to be in there and we're talking to hardware vendors They are required as part of our program to have linux support And and your cat is amazing just for the record It's a cat or a dog Probably because she gets to hang out with me all day and just My run and sleep life is good. Yeah, I'll do a plug for the video live stream if you're listening to audio You're missing out I normally listen to this on when I'm walking the dog. So I miss out on this experience. Anyway, so where was I? So yeah, we work with the hardware vendors and you know Well in advance so that they know what's coming and I mean the big companies Intel AMD. It's fairly obvious They're getting their support upstream already and you can see Curie electronics you can see, you know, they were poor on patches landing for the meteor late graphics Yeah, the other so that that that's um, but there's this whole bunch of other vendors doing touch pads and touch screen and Wi-Fi and you know, all these other little controllers in there and you need them support the next two and so You know, it's just making sure that it's it's a bit bumpy Sometimes that's part of the linux program But I will say I think in the three and a bit years for four years I've been doing it. This is something that's getting better The hardware vendors are getting more and for my point of view, that's quite exciting That means that linux support on these laptops should get easier We will definitely have challenges with things like mippy where You know intellectual property and those concerns where they're ugly head and they're difficult to deal with and that's something We have to work through but I think overall the linux ecosystem is it's in good shape It's which is from my point of view is exciting. So as a Illinux and enthusiast first Absolutely from a consumer perspective a lot of that doesn't show to be honest I've I've run a number of platforms using fedora linux Most recently I've got a x1 carbon around here somewhere And it's a couple years old now I was I was issued it by my employer and Ran fedora linux on it from day one. I've done in place upgrades I used the firmware updating tool and keep keep all the patches up to date And honestly it has been a fantastic experience. That's good I've got an aces republic of gamers laptop that's got an nvidia graphics card and a higher end amd cpu But it wasn't built specifically for linux and I've had nothing but issues between the amd cpu and then nvidia gpu So having the right hardware platform and having the right partnerships and as you mentioned working with the community in order To identify those bugs push them upstream get them resolved as quickly as possible and then back downstream into the hardware platforms itself You honestly your team makes this look really easy My head it used to be great Sorry for your podcast listeners So It's a really valid point one of the things that I know i'm finding interesting because we don't do I should be clear We don't do all the nobo laptops and I and I hope eventually our program expands and includes more But we do think pads and stations think center Um And think edge, but that's kind of a little bit unique So but yeah, I know I have lots of people wanting to run on legions on idea pad and you know bit series And those are not part of the next program and let's give credit to the linux community They they make linux run on there, but it's really interesting how many issues are in the platform firmware And and I think it's where programs like ours are important um, so yes helping push hardware vendors is good, but There's a lot that happened in those acpi tables and in and in the bios firmware. Um, and That's just a sad fact of life. It's you know, there's no consortium two sastis Not not ideal, but yeah, that's where you need the vendors to to be involved and and I think it helps I think it helps show that linux, uh, linux is demand is is real which I think is important So that helps, you know, we have our program competitors have a program and there's a reason right there's demand out there, so it's important for sure So you mentioned producing additional hardware platforms with that with that pre-built support for fiora What what does that process look like from identifying a hardware platform? Whether it's a think center or an excellent carbon to testing out fedora What does it look like to from decision to there's actually a a platform out the door? All right, so firstly just wave your hands if I start babbling Okay, because this is this where I can if I go too much but so we as I mentioned I'm starting right now gathering hardware specs and so we will gather those and we will work with the red hat engineers and canonical engineers under nba To make sure that they know what's coming and obviously working with the hardware vendors to know So that that's the starting point And then things bubble along quietly and so we get the very first hardware prototypes The linux teams don't actually do a lot with the very early ones We found our experience has been that there's just too much instability too many firmware. She's been fixed that it's of limited value They need to get the platform somewhat stable We do get a few of them the sort of like the key key platforms so that we can get some early testing on We've started testing on a couple of next year's platforms very early just just to get an idea of where we are And to be able to go to intern and say hey, you got you've got graphics drivers issues or amd You've got some you know, whatever. Um, and those are not specific examples. I'm making those up But so after the early prototypes, which we have the Like the main prototypes we call them sit So we have those kind of the prototype level that's where our program really kicks in So that's where we get hardware samples We'll be sending some off to the red hat lab and engineers We send me up to canonical or sending off some to the hardware vendors and so a bunch of hardware goes out And that's when we start bringing up that X and basically finding out where the issues are and it's a whole bunch of Communication just saying right this doesn't work to their device drivers engineers. You need it Therma team got the other and pulling together all the pieces And so by the end of that we should be in good shape We should actually have something to run and we hit the pre-production hardware We call SPT and we do another another round of Testing on that. So that's where we start to do the certification process for Yamantu and red hat and with fedora That's where we will start to do our qa testing So the way fedora doesn't have a certification program So we kind of have like we've developed our own internal testing program that we do for fedora That essentially makes sure that qa team gets it. They handle it and make sure there's no issues If there are then I have to go and make sure that they're fixed upstream and then I have to work with You know, these are bugzilla and sign fedora and get the fixes pulled in And that's it. So when everything's ready to go Um, I think maybe I go off to the release engineering team And if I'm really lucky, I get to just take a release image like fedora 38 release image If I'm really lucky, I get to just take that and go Fedora 38 release image here we go chances of that happening Kind of small the timing is rare. I think it's happened once maybe twice But usually what happens if you go to the release engineering and say can we have a A new image based off the latest So you've got fedora 38 and then you're about Fixing so we like can we get an image built with these fixes in and they do it because they're amazing And they do it and they give it to me and then it goes off to our qa team They will do more sanity checking make sure it all works We do energy certification, which is actually really interesting very painful but to make sure that All the you know that you're not burning watts and that you're sleeping properly It will catch any suspenders you sleep issues there And to make sure that your numbers are Are you know within a certain envelope and and industry except to one we because we have energy star on windows We and we use the same hardware and that's really a question We have to do the energy certification on the next as well, which is good That you know means you're getting product that you know is going to work Once that is all done. We build our preload Uh image that goes off to manufacturing And it's already and done and then we have to go to the web teams and say pretty please Please put this up on the website. I suspect we're going to be talking about that shortly So yeah, that's that's the process in quite a long twisted nurture Did did any of it confusing any questions? That makes a lot of sense that it's good to have that perspective I think between that and then you talking about the hardware vendors that you work with It really goes to show that when we say like oh just just you know get support on on my computer I want to run x hardware on linux just make it happen. It really when you when you Kind of showcase look these are all the steps that are involved. It really demonstrates It's not an easy process or a lot of moving parts Yeah, and I think any vendor who is doing this, you know seriously give them credit and you know Because the industry and it's it's quite exciting that so many are right. So it's not easy. It's that there's We all benefit from the work that each other's doing but um, which is great, right because community, but uh, yes Yeah, very happy for that for sure Now one of the things that I've I've come to love and and also respect about uh fedora Users especially those that will go as far as like joining the matrix space Or the fedora discussion board and get engaged with the community Is that a lot of those people are very very conscious of things like privacy rights things like Things like uh dedication open source not a lot of proprietary blobs in what they're using So very fedora, I guess what i'm saying has a very Large population of very idealistic people People I used to be one Sadly becoming a parent and and everything has made me a little bit more pragmatic, but you know still like my open source freedom But um, it's a super power It is it's a super power. It's like you're not going to get it anywhere else, right? It's really It's really critical to maintain it. Um, I I think it's important. Yeah And so one one of the other areas of interest that the the fedora community has been it's been chatting about lately has been a commitment to the the environment towards towards a natural ecosystem towards responsible waste and A little bird told me that Lenovo is actually working pretty hard to cut down on their waste with different laptops You want to talk about those programs? So I can I had to do some research for this So yeah, I was primed for this bit. So I will just as a caveat. This is not my area So I will try and be as good as possible And a big thank you to the Media team who helps me gather some pieces for my point of view is actually really interesting because I I I knew there was some of this stuff going I I get 10 some internal talks Mainly I use them to keep an eye on what technology is coming down the line to make sure that limits gets thought about But I've been to a few of those around the sustainability, but I wasn't sure what I can talk about Um, so I've got a few notes Um And it kind of breaks down and I'm going to have to read this a little bit So if I'm looking sideways, that's why because this is not my my area But uh to break down into kind of like two main pieces where sustainability is one and durability And the pairability is another but um, so one of the things that I thought was really interesting Is they've embraced the circular economy, which was not something that I was hugely aware of it's uh I don't so it was not something I knew about but basically the idea about it is is so Uh products made and used and then returned instead of being discarded consigned to waste They look to basically to reuse them in some form. So we have Uh services so you can return your device at the end of its life and it gets wiped clean All data and then it either gets recycled or repurposed Uh, which was really interesting and I I know again going off a little bit of a tangent But when I was talking to them about this, I was like, oh, so did you donate them and they were like, yes I was like, oh, Linux would be a great fit for that because uh, just if you go to any community event You will see a ton of old hardware because Linux keeps running on it for years I was like, I wonder if uh, so that's a little action item for me is to go and find out what happened to this And if you can chew on some more Linux in but uh, yes There's pieces there. They will also recycle it. They will maybe I think believe they will maybe take out pieces to be used as Extra components so they can extend the life of other laptops. You know, there's there's a whole big and the sacred economy Which is apparently You know alive and well they have a program and they call the nobo's asset recovery service So I don't know a lot about it, but we do have it It's real and I was allowed to talk about it publicly. So there is um There's one website on the node if you certainly know those sustainability There's a whole report with a lot in it and so it's public um And I know that there's also a big push for recycled materials in the platform so there's a lot of they call it PCC, which is post-consumer content And basically recycle plastics. So I think there's a whole bunch of that goes into platforms and Plans to increase it every year. I'm not going to do numbers But there's a bunch and I know like all the packaging this bamboo and recycled cardboard and I think Aluminium or aluminum depending on where you are in the world magnesium I think that's a large part of that is recycled too. So there's that that was interesting from my point of view stuff I didn't know about I don't know if I can answer many questions about it because I'm reading off a sheet but there's that And then the other part was the durability and repair ability and I know repair ability is something very close to People's hearts in the limits community Well, durability too, right? We're kind of known for our durability actually so but there's a there's a whole bunch of stuff they're doing to be able to extend life cycles and The one that I found the most interesting personally is that there's a goal that by 2025 26 84 percent of repairs can be done at the customer sites without having to send it to their service center you know It's watch this space and I wish I knew more the funky details of how that happens but Yeah, there's work happening and from my point of view it's kind of interesting to learn about And that's one of the reasons why I volunteered to To work on the fedora podcast is because I get to talk to people and work on work on topics that I don't necessarily know Yeah And I was like, yeah, I I'd be meaning to find out for a while and it's like, okay And I think I got some help for this one. I was like I'd need to cover these topics Please help and so they should So you want me a bunch of stuff? and mark mark and his team Were incredibly responsive as joseph and I were we're prodding him for topics and things to discuss so It wasn't too bad, right mark. I mean, we didn't we didn't make you over the coals or anything So if you're no no, and if you have a topic for fedora that you want on the podcast Just reach out to to the fedora marketing team We'd be more than happy to To talk with y'all And I'll bounce that back and say just genuinely I try and be I think one of the important parts of doing And the next thing is openness, right? There's a reason we love open code and open commuter And I try to it's not easy. It's not necessarily coach said, but I will say I've been I've been really strongly supported than the nova And I've been been allowed to do stuff like this. I'm an engineer. They don't usually let us out of our Out of our Covered under the stair And I've been I've never it's been really good. So I try and I try and be as open as possible about, you know What's happening with our program and what we're doing? It's not always easy, but much as it can Yes, we're very grateful. I know it's been most everything that I know has been In this conversation, but also kind of learning about it from from previous talks you've given you've been in a previous participant in Fedora nest and what have you and also very active in the discussion forums So I think that um, I know at some point we'll transition into Into that piece, but uh Fedora and just as a note the the forums and the community part is one of the happy parts of my job I don't love internal paperwork and process. It has to be done Being part of the community is kind of fun Nice, we're great. We're very happy to have you and you're awesome I was very sad to miss fedora Flock this year. I couldn't make it because I was actually on on vacation with my family at the time couldn't be Genuinely that was the one. I was like, I really wanted to go to that Yeah, I think all of us are out on that one. Maybe next year I I'm definitely starting to have the conversations. I need to have to try to get there next year any so uh mark the engineer we actually had a uh a pretty deep technical question come in asking if the laptops that are shipped Have Libre boot or an other open bootloader? Yeah, no, we've had uh, I've had this customer core boot is the other one that used to get mentioned so no, it's the same bios as is used for windows and uh Yeah, at the moment, there's no plans of doing an open boot. I I can totally see why people want it I get it, but no at the moment. It's not a plan although knowing knowing the linux kernel and the uh in the open source community I have a feeling that someone out there is working on that So I imagine a number of platforms even specific to Lenovo would probably support that It's just not something that Lenovo as a manufacturer is is providing out of the box. So it may still work tester Yeah, but yeah, I don't know. I know there's some really really smart people who work on that stuff You lost to them. But yeah, it's not something that we're doing. I'm one of the most basic people when it comes to running a desktop or laptop My stuff works. I'm happy a long time ago. I used to work on the bootloaders for power pc based network switches So I know how much work it has. Uh, but yeah, that was many years ago when my hair was not good All right, Joseph, I want to put you on the spot here because you've been flying a little under the radar And uh, so I'm going to put you on the spot and we're going to talk about the the relationship from the other perspective so we have we have this partner in Lenovo and um, I am I am in love with Lenovo because I run fedora. I I work at red hat and I So I'm around Lenovo products all over the place, but I know that fedora is not just to give me give me give me The fedora community does not have the uh the attitude of We're an open source project. We're we're an open source community. So just give us all the handouts So I know that fedora does a lot of work from a marketing perspective and from a community perspective to even give back to Lenovo You want to talk a little bit about that relationship? Sure thing. So yeah, that was something that became a very intentional focus on the marketing team around march So I knew like like I mentioned before I came into the fedora project About a year before just because I thought tech is cool and fedora is neat and it has secure boots So it's the one I went with But in in growing that I did see Lenovo's presence beforehand I assumed that there was some relationship or a collaboration on the technical end But I wasn't sure How much more there was or if there was room to do that One concern that does come up within fedora is, you know, we want to emphasize that this is not, you know Fedora is not a business. It's an open source project where a community decisions are arrived at together and that can Chaff a bit with Some maybe tendencies that might sound too salesy or would have you So actually from my end even though for them for the whole time I've been working on the marketing team. I did have a desire to see like hey I hear that there are laptops that you can buy from Lenovo with Linux installed But I don't see that talked about too much and I wasn't sure how much we could talk about it because of fedora's culture then march comes around and the fedora council starts talking about the The five-year plan that we're trying to do though the fedora strategy 2028 And one of those objectives that we discussed was it was very explicit So the the objective is literally fedora linux is available pre-installed on more systems from more vendors And the impact of that that we're looking for is reduced barrier to entry let some more people try fedora So that's very specific language that we're trying to commit to for the next five years So I got very excited. I jumped into it saying like well, yeah from a marketing perspective We could be doing all these things and which I'll get into now And the whole community was like yes, let's do that. Like why aren't we already doing that? Which I was very excited about and very pleased for that reaction. So one of the things that we did as part of Doing that for the marketing perspective is we have to have that client communication with with Lenovo directly So that led to a fun Lenovo fedora world domination plan So that thread is there if you want to like see what some of that initial conversation was a lot of ideas are there And really it led to us so starting communication started answering some questions and get clarification on a few different things. So if I can try to And also another thing that I'll say is this That we're trying to do with Lenovo. Lenovo is in my opinion are You know, they've been with the fedora community through this program for a long time We really wanted to give them the attention because even though you may have seen announcements or what have you for other partners Lenovo has been there. Lenovo is here with fedora laptops that you can buy So from my perspective was like the marketing salesy guy I want to shout that from the mountaintops and make sure that um We are doing as much as we can on the fedora side to Not not empower but like Really like take advantage of of everything that Lenovo is providing for us to help them see success Help them see what they want to see through the Lenovo program and then Get that to more people who are interested in not only in fedora, but also in linux and have them see Hey, Lenovo is is is moving in this space and it's very exciting come support us um, the two broad categories that I would say most of our marketing initiatives will be on Or maybe I should say three it would be Support through social media Which we are working on that's part of a broader initiative on just in general We are trying to have more active social media presences in a more sustainable way That's been a challenge in the past The third the the second pillar I would say is uh kind of trying to be a liaison I know mark in in your case you you've been around you've been around So you know a lot of folks to talk to and you you know you you mentioned you listen to the podcast so um That's something where if in in your case you may know but if there are other areas where If you needed to get connected to the fedora magazine or or if there was something community blog oriented or the podcast or The youtube channel in general We wanted to make sure that uh when it came to any other areas of fedora that involved content production that we explored those opportunities and Get something going seeing if anyone is interested to help there and then the third piece is Uh kind of getting to the question that folks have been asking about in chat, which is finding lenovo laptops so that it Basically what we are trying to do is provide A a a pay a what I say web Yeah, we want to have a web page basically that says if you want a laptop That ships with fedora on it Here's the website and you can go there and find them And this would be our easy way of lifting up a lot of the lenovo linux configurations that are out there The ones that come preloaded fedora One of the challenges that we saw as part of that world domination discussion is there were a few configurations that were available But either they were available only in certain regions or they weren't available yet It was something that was still being developed And even then some folks would have you know something I'd heard from like even my year from before It'd be challenging to find the links So I that's part of the evolving relationship that we have between fedora and and uh And lenovo and as part of us wanting to make sure like hey, you know In as far as as you're able to go lenovo We want to do what we can to push the other the other way ahead And that's the idea behind that um as it currently exists It's a table that we completed Um and right now it lives in fedora discussion There's three broad categories Where the device should um either it ships with fedora It's uh specifically does support fedora or it's fedora friendly And so what's the logic behind that the logic behind that is somewhat obvious, right? But if it ships with fedora ships fedora, but specifically it's uh, it means you can you can buy Adrenalinix from the vendor and it's been tested so that it's going to give you an experience that you that should run well If it supports fedora that it kind of has two situations in it and one of them is This is somewhere where there where maybe the the partner isn't shipping fedora But they do want to support fedora how to make sure that it is working So there are some folks who exist in that category Um and where the vendor has kind of put their name saying yeah This does support fedora even though if we're not shipping it, but another category That exists within supporting fedora is the stuff that a u mark has done the work It does run with fedora, but maybe there's something going on where the configuration to get it available on the web store That's not available yet for whatever reason. We still want to point folks to those devices So that's where um those devices would live And then the logic behind which to be honest, brock you could correct me if maybe this is stretching it I did want to come up with a fedora friendly category Which is basically something that maybe lendova hasn't put their name on it saying yes We have tested it to run fedora But in these cases these are devices that have been approved for rel So the idea there is you know if it runs rel, you know, I don't know you could give fedora a shot You know, it should be all right. I don't know mark. What are your thoughts for that one? Absolutely, and so the way our Linux program is designed is everything is upstream, right? So Honestly, my aim is I want anybody to be able to run anything that's distro and you know some are easier than others and fedora is Basically from my perspective one of the easiest to get running on platform But yes, so any any of our platforms that have been Linux certified Be it with that or all you want to Should work very well with the fedora. I've run fedora on virtually everything that I have Everything and the only caveat that I will offer is nvidia card Depending on your generation video cards, you may need to go through some hoops to get the nvidia drive installation Yeah, which is which is I think fair for a lot of folks that have been following here So so that that now that list that we linked to which thank you for for showing it on screen It does currently live in this discussion page because it's something that Really was for the purposes of getting out there so that we could talk about it in the community But the the next step is to migrate this over to Fedora docs so it would live there and still be marketing maintained So that list will grow with other options as they're available I actually mentioned a mark earlier that I think verge requests that'll be facilitated through there so that We can collaborate more closely there as opposed to What I have now is not an ideal solution really And then the third phase which The websites and apps team is kind of in on the loop on Is to do the actual Website piece so that wouldn't be for everything if you if you saw the list you saw there's ships with fedora supports fedora And then a long list of fedora friendly So really in in that case I I think the list the the the web page that we're looking to develop that can make it very simple to To find the links to these configurations Would be emphasizing what ships with fedora first and then maybe secondarily Maybe I don't know how to maybe de-emphasize or something but lower down You'd find what supports fedora and then maybe we'll have a link at the bottom that just points you to the fedora documentation Because I do think that the that that page on fedora docs will be the source of truth that'll inform The the web pages that gets built and updated over time So that's the one that i'm very excited for because it it helps to just make it very easy if you're looking for Um, a machine if you want to buy your lenovo laptop and you're like hey, I hear that like where's my fedora lenovo? I want to buy it. Um, we could just give you this link and there there are all the options for you um, it's a little work in progress, but um, we're we're getting there and we're grateful to To be to where we are now So, I don't know if you guys have any comments there, but I can keep on going on on other things And it's been it's been interesting because there's been a bunch of comments coming through on the side about how Oh, yeah, I have been uh, I was just Kind of get it all in a coherent way. No, no, no, no missing any comments and and so yeah I know I had a if you don't mind I will respond to those but I will just say, you know A big thank you to the marketing team because it's it's awesome. So I'm an engineer I don't have a marketing budget and I know it's something that we have been missing On our side. We do all the technical work. We have not done a job of marketing or selling it So but it's been it's been really fun to work with the to-do marketing and very welcoming and yeah, correct Thank you. So done that. So um, but I know there were a few comments about, you know It being a scavenger hunt and it's really hard to find and absolutely. Yes. I 100% agree Um, so just just to explain some of the there are actually technical reasons for this. So, uh, every And this is obviously the novice specific but every geo has their own web team And it's up to the web team if they put them online and that in itself is a challenge And that's something which I think we have to do a better job of basically showing there is For daughter of demand, right? They are very much focused on if they're going to ship laptops as their job is But what's been really interesting is so initially we had the most success in the us but the us takes, uh, the Um, they set up a blah blah blah platform with linux. They set up a whole separate bundle So you can find this platform with linux bundle and you go in there and all of the options You're basically you'll have just linux and you know, you might have to choose between the ones from fedora But it's all been crafted just for linux and that's great And it does mean that you can actually search and you can search for linux And it will find just those platforms and we actually have a dynamic page that will show those Which is wonderful. Uh, the promise is a whole heap of work and they are, you know They've got a bunch of other stuff to do. They've got all these other platforms to go They've got a heap of things to do and so the linux team are coming in there and go. Hey, yeah, we've got 40 platforms and they're just They're best one So that's definitely been a challenge and it's a shame because it gives a very very good use of experience But they've just not been able to get many platforms up, but I will have an update in a second On the europe side or people in me about europe england's included And a few others they took a different approach and It's much simpler. So basically you can go and you go into let's take the x1 carbon 11 Then you go into x1 carbon 11 and should be able to go in there and it will be windows is selected by default That is the default, but you can go and choose fedora as your operating system And it will modify things Accordingly and that's much less work for them. So they can basically just add in your option and it shows up There are a couple of downsides the the user experience is not as good because there are a few limitations We talked about nippy camera and w1 and and you know There's a few windows specific things that don't want on linux And so if you configure a system and then change the os you might get an error message So there's a few usability bumps that honestly is linux users I think we can accept And the other big downside is search ability is much harder because of the way the website works and this is outside my league You can't just search for linux. So you have to know that the platform has it Go into the build your pc and then choose it But there's no good way to search it and and it's a limitation So i've been looking into how we fix that because if I can have the amir Ease of them putting up. I don't want it to be a lot of work for them I want them to just be able to go bank linux is available if I can fix it So it's searchable as well that'd be great. So we're looking at that But that's just to explain some of the questions about why is it hard to find Just a little lift behind the curtain so you understand what's going on Yeah, it's a good point too because in some respects I would like for this It's kind of like a little database that we're trying to develop But I think that the goal And up for us kind of supporting it as far as you can, you know, I hear that of You know the marketing team or the media team having to So it's a work to try to turn on these platforms on the website and that can be a challenge So that's in my mind part of the value add for the fedora project is Trying to smooth out those areas where there would be a challenge because there are more things than going on Than just shipping a laptop with fedora. Um, so I do see that as an opportunity But over time as you're doing that work then the listing for Lenovo's that ship with fedora becomes less and less this Kind of this thing that we need in order to get the word out for hey here are the places where you can buy Lenovo fedora And it becomes just an additional place where maybe someone's on the regular fedora website They click on our hardware partner link and then they happen to see the Lenovo is there But otherwise if someone knows that Lenovo does ship with Linux and with fedora, they have you know, it's it's it's You know innocuous for them to look it up and be able to do that. So in some respects, it's almost No, it's it's very cool. And thank you for doing that Um So to summarize it sounds like the best place to go for a regular fedora user to go and get a hardware platform with fedora pre-installed is that discussion thread that we've got linked to find what platforms are fedora native and Follow that link out to the out to the Lenovo website That the list that that platform Yeah, and the only caveat I'd need to say is that I know like for these ones in europe We can't list all all the countries done So it might have a link to the uk or france, but just change up your country And I think I know so We have we have a us one to add which is not on that page yet But I think we might add the us ones That may be separately just so that you have a europe and the us but Just because they are handled differently if that's okay. Yeah for sure Yeah, and I know that um when I what it'll be nice about switching over to the documentation Once we once we have that set up which it should be easy. It's just get lab is scary for me. Okay guys I just have to do it But then on that page we'll be able to spend a lot more about like what do the categories mean and the caveats for different regions and And and you know some some direction on interpreting the the the tape to the folks know what they're looking for but That was very exciting. I don't know if you had any any more to share on on that specific us configuration No, so it's literally breaking news about an hour before the podcast So come on the x1 carbon 11 is finally online in the us with fedora. So it's there um Don't buy it today Hey, it's uh the sale on windows is it's a bit bigger. Why is that? And they went oh, it's just because the platform's only gone up. Give them a bit. They're gonna fix it So there will be that there's a discount. There's there's a 40% discount on the linux one But there's a 45 on the windows. So it should see that They told me they're gonna fix it So a don't send me hate mail saying why is the linux more expensive because it's just reasons it's not deliberate and But yes, so, um That's available on the us finally they we do have some other platforms rolling out now They are not the fedora preloaded ones and maybe I should just cover because I know there's a question about it I said to me over there, but we are the us has definitely been slower this year for getting platforms up It's been you know, and that's something we'll work with them on and it's just Just just time effort All right, sorry. I was over here running down like don't post about the us one Hey, you know what my mind to give a little insight on the thought process behind marketing content like social media content Um, you just gave me an excuse to have a separate uh post about oh there you go We know what about the podcast and then later on I have one to be like and here's the laptop. So I'm happy for good And it's very exciting and super timely. Yes. No, I was gonna say. Yeah. I was like, I knew it was coming and I was like Can you guys get this done before 5 p.m. Right? And they were like Why? And I was like, oh, they've done it. It was awesome. Thank you to that team. Thank you. Thank you to the podcast I was gonna say you I've not been able to say this before but you heard it here first on the fedora Just don't click by now just I guess I'll jump off of that to piggyback on so another piece like we're excited for this initiative Not just because you know more more linux be loaded on laptops But also because it is I know for some of us who are using linux We do think of it as an extension of advocacy for open source And especially when we think about Lenovo and then the business needs and what have you I'm gonna put on my sales hat again and say like look we want to send it a man's signal, all right We want to communicate that folks are interested in laptops that support linux and what a good way to do that is by the laptop that already ships with it So I want I want to start talking about that and you may hear that a little more than in marketing messaging because This is the way that shows in a concrete way to to our hardware partners that Not only is it valuable for them to be supporting linux Whether it's through whatever I mean whether who to or rally like like you said a lot of it is upstream So it helps out folks But um with fedora specifically you want to see more fedora hardware by the fedora preloaded laptop And it's I'm not a marketing person. It's a compensation that I find very awkward Honestly But yeah, no, it's true. Um, so yes, it's massively appreciated by the legacy when anybody buys any limits preload Right, it's it is a very strong signal and it and it helps. So um, we we have a strong just Set the scene like enterprise, uh, linux usage is doing very well and and it's kind of nice you guys Working companies sport linux, but seeing a lot more Enterprise customers looking for linux. So that's helpful, but on the consumer side It's you know, it's a little bit softer. Um And and it's it's important to it's important to send it's not me I'm not the person who needs to know but it's important to send that signal so that they can see that Then it's demand is real and fedora as well. Um, so so that's good Um, I will as a note there is a I mean people can tell me the promise. I'm biased and everybody in the nowhere knows I'm biased But there is you know, it there is a you know, there's a contact us thing on the web page I think a point to do is kind of small in the bottom But if you can't get what you want on your system, it's worth letting them know right if the web team see I know somebody pulled out the x13 yoga They see a whole bunch of requests for the x13 yoga and it's not available with the next and it should be or It's worth letting them know because if it and don't abuse it only if you're genuinely interested because If it's a bad signal then it doesn't help Yeah, I think that's that we're well, um, so send all of your emails to mark Yes, honestly, I I Had uh, so we do, um the the fedora page is excellent and it's really good for targeting for all ones And I will be helping keep that up to date when we do any fedoras, but we do also have www.lenovo.com slash linux and on there whenever we complete a preload It goes on that page. That's useful. I've had a few comments bits feedback on the design a bit We've we've we've improved it, but it's still not great, but you should be able to find Uh, there's you need the www in front there whoever just put that in But yeah, it's uh, you should be able to find the systems which have been tested with linux And the last one is yes, so we're on fedora podcast everybody loves fedora, but the ubuntu certification from my point of view is is As much of it is you know, we get ubuntu free though, but it does help show linux support. So The linux team appreciates it if you can't buy fedora if you buy ubuntu, it's better than no os no os does not help linux support at all because from Uh, you know, if I know it's a bit cheaper, but we really appreciate those uh, those linux sales I'll ask you this to answer my question because I was actually thinking about that with when I went when trying to come up with fedora friendly Um, I biased it to rel because I figured the relationship between rel and fedora I'm not an engineer. So you I'm kind of showing showing my my ignorance there But um, I did have the thought if if you want if you want To try to run fedora on a laptop, but it doesn't have the fedora option To still say use the linux option whether that be ubuntu or rel and you should still have A good shot at at at running. All right. Do you in your opinion? Oh, absolutely. Yeah, so now yeah, we don't do rel preloads just for the record So you won't be able to buy that off the site. We don't we don't do it. We don't do a rel preload It's more enterprise focused, right? but yes my experience with I can't think of any actually is is yeah, if it works on ubuntu it will work on fedora Yeah, like fedora is a great distribution. A you guys are super friendly and welcoming But you're also at that nice Up-to-date which for new hardware makes a big difference and You've been so great to work with and and you know shout out to just informed but you know all all of the engineering team who just make it easier for me to be able to get fixes in and that's it's you know, there's It's it's one of my go-to's if I've got a new piece of hardware I will usually actually go for dole on it first just because it's got a newer kernel and Or use it new use space. It makes a difference. So when your platform's year old Every you know anything will run on it nicely. It's always good. Nice Which I didn't want to say that and it'll be my last thing because I know we're getting toward the end here But I very specifically was like I have to make a mess on my desk Because normally I'll record on a similar like an aces gaming rig, but I'm like no I have 60s I was gonna say that I I know that one's just got out. It's gone out of support right so that yeah, yeah But it's running great. I love it. So it was it was I wanted to get into it But I worried we don't have time to get into it But long story short, I was able to get a hand on this one because I was in the market for a used laptop And I got it for the generous price of free And it's it works right. It's pretty cool Now I'm running fedora kina white literally my use case look eric I'll give you a run for your money in terms of like basic desktop use case because I only use firefox bad and like But it but it works. It's all there. I didn't have to do anything not even anything in the command line Uh, it even like the like the webcam work like I've had issues on other platforms where some things Wouldn't be there. So and also from a sustainability perspective, you know the work that you're doing now that That's going to extend for the life of the device. So thank you for for my computer being able to run for I can't take any credit for t46. Yes. That was before I even joined this team You're part of that legacy. So thank you mark. Anyway Thank you a little bit. So yeah, I just wanted to mention that because I really want to hook up everything It is kind of cool. How long they keep going. So and it's yeah My stack of laptops is a few of them are getting older, but they still keep going and it's good So I'm I'm going to push my luck here and ask you one last question Are there any announcements or anything we should keep an eye out for? I mean, we had the one today and if I was gonna say No, that's old news that that happened like an hour ago. Yeah No, so we should have uh, I mean it's not really an announcement because I think I've talked about it one of the uh, previous um With all the events, but we should all our amd platforms this year are not complete yet the uh, the dates on those That's not the next thing. That's just generally so they should be showing up in the next I think the next couple of months. Um, so without trying to I can't be specific But yeah, so we should and there's some fedora on those so we I'm hoping You know expecting those to come out and uh, should have some they they look like good good systems So, uh, yeah, I think nothing. Well, I think I think I can shout. I'm not allowed to talk about next year's but Big So just of any in closing thoughts as we wrap it up today No, I'm just I'm very excited about this. I'm gather the fedora community. So behind the initiative Hopefully people will continue to work on their space Start seeing more content when it comes to Like the marketing repeat and visits on the on the on the podcast or at other spaces So folks can can get the word out Because I really want to make sure that as much as value as fedora can add back to lenovo and our hardware partners That we do that and marketing was something that I think was missing before and hopefully now we can Whether it's it's adding on top of marketing folks are already doing or trying to fill the gap or experiment or show A new new space for for what we can do messaging Um, I'm excited for that and I'm excited to have the fedora partner initiative As something we're invested in on the marketing team Mark, how about you closing thoughts? No, thank you for having me on it's been fun. Really enjoyed it as that it's kind of cool to listen to these podcasts and it gets Joy there Thank you for coming and also, thank you for having me. I probably won't be on the next one But I knew I knew I could share things on this topic. So I'm grateful for that awesome, yeah, I I listened to the fedora podcast as a listener and and when when when it took break I I don't know why I keep volunteering for things but But I get to hang out and chat with folks like you Although I think mark threw down the gauntlet. We should probably try and be more difficult to work with joseph. What do you think? Yeah, after me, okay All right, so Wrapping up today. Keep an eye out for an announcement from on the fedora socials. We'll we'll work with mark to To find out when that when that pricing issue gets fixed and we'll put that out there So if you are a fedora user and you want to run fedora on a pre-loaded platform definitely go out and And put in that feedback help give marks me ammunition to expand his team to expand the number of platforms that they offer And and even more so when when that pricing does get fixed go out and buy yourself a new laptop I give you permission. I'm not responsible for any spousal Retribution, but I you have the it guys permission to go out and buy you a new laptop. I actually was All right blame Linova. I was actually in the market a couple of weeks ago and as we were planning Whether it was marks intention or not actually decided to hold off and want to wait a few months I want to see what the new amd platforms look like before I make my decision But definitely going to be keeping an eye on that so keep an eye on the fedora channels both social and youtube And wherever you get your podcast because we're going to continue We're going to continue forward. All my kids are in school. So Really excited to to get some momentum under us as we get the podcast rolling That said, I actually don't know what our next episode is. I think we had another partner step up and want to be on the show But if not, I know we've got a whole list of spins that are anxiously waiting for for additional Some additional chance to talk with the community. So Hop on over to the fedora a matrix space where there is a podcast room submit your ideas And and volunteer someone to to be a guest on the show to be interviewed but that said If you're watching us live the audio podcast will be available Usually around six or seven in the morning. I think is the time we've settled on for the audio version Of course the live the the video version is is available as soon as we hit the the end stream button But tell a friend share this with with anyone that you know that runs fedora And help promote the fedora community the fedora podcast and of course our friends over at lenovo So on behalf of our guests today, mr. Mark pierce from lenovo my co-host Joseph gaioso and myself erithi it guy hindricks. Thank you all for joining us Definitely like subscribe hit the notification icon and and leave some comments because that helps generates All the algorithmic things that we we loathe but appreciate when it shows is something that we actually enjoy watching So do all the things and until then really appreciate you joining us and we'll see you again in two weeks. Thank you all so much