Little bits - August 2024

This post is a few topics I’ve been thinking about, but don’t warrant an entire post individually. Its our busiest time at work as the weather is hot and plants need water. Plus, with Autumn coming soon, we need to get as much work in as possible before it starts raining. So, I haven’t had a lot of energy for working on projects or writing blog posts. However, these things have been on my mind.

Command line comfort

I posted on my Mastodon feed recently that I attribute most of my comfort using the command line to using a text console on an IBM AS/400 system most of my career before becoming a contractor. This text-only interface made me comfortable exclusively using the keyboard, 10-key, and function keys to navigate and get my job done.

I know that for many coming to Linux the command line is a barrier. However, for me it feels like home. I struggle with GUI applications and learning how to configure and use them comfortably. On the flip side, I can learn command line flags the first time through and configure CLI/TUI applications to my exact needs.

I didn’t have a PC in my home until almost the year 2000, so I never experienced any OS before Windows 98.

If you are interested, I also updated my list of favorite command line applications. See the full list here.

Growing dislike of flatpaks

In addition to not preferring GUI applications, I have grown to truly hate flatpaks.

Aside from being bloated, they require the use of additional applications to manage them, which also have their own quirks. I would manage flatpaks without using Warehouse or Flatseal, but doing it manually is so obtuse its not worth learning. And that’s coming from someone who has an easy time learning command line flags! The first barrier is just figuring out what the fuck the package name is.

Next is installing. There is a group of very vocal developers and Linux influencers that think going to an apps website and downloading an executable/installer is bad and that Linux needs a centralized store. That’s why flatpak and Flathub are good.

Fuck that.

Centralizing app installations around a small collection of stores makes those stores gatekeepers. It makes a very small group of people in charge of what apps you can or can’t install. Yes, I know developers can distribute flatpaks on their own and not through Flathub. Do they? No. How many competing stores are there right now? 3?

Last point is there was already a better packaging format and its called AppImage. I wish that would have won.

This rant can go on a lot longer, so leaving here.

The financial privilege of tech content

I’ve talked a lot about what it is like to be low income and follow tech. I’ve just been feeling it more lately. People who work in tech are orders of magnitude higher on the income scales than I’ll ever be. I will never be one of them and their financial privilege makes sure I stay out of their world, too. Of course this means that people who make tech content cater to higher income earners, which means I’m excluded from that as well.

Server rebuild

After the main HDD died in my NAS a few weeks ago, I have taken a different approach to my homelab. I’ve split up many of my services from one server with many VMs, to multiple smaller machines that focus on specific tasks.

During this shuffle, I moved my old NAS out of my homelab and gave it to one of my kids who has recently started PC gaming. That computer was the best computer I have in the house, so I was able to set her up with a decent gaming rig. I now have switched my media server to a Core i3-2100 with 8GB of DD3 RAM. This very ancient desktop I had laying around handles multiple 1080p streams without breaking a sweat. Yes, it uses slightly more power. But the overall cost over a year is pennies.

I’ll probably have more to say about my homelab shuffle in future posts.

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