LWDW 196: Defending Linux

Microsoft Defender heads to Linux! ChromeOS 78 adds virtual desktops, turning CentOS 8 into the perfect desktop, and a people detecting Raspberry Pi.


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Timestamps:
04:41 RedHat 8.1 live kernel patching
06:26 CentOS 8 on the desktop
11:00 Void Linux
13:16 Open-source smart homes
18:11 ChromeOS 78
21:46 Fraidycat
24:41 NPM donations
26:46 Mac OS KVM
29:46 GNOME Shortwave Radio
33:06 Defender comes to Linux
37:41 Thermal Pi
41:11 Emails


Colour key – Venn Jill Pedro

Live kernel patching RH8.1

  • Lots of people have been waiting for live Linux kernel patching in RHEL, like that of SUSE and Ubuntu.
  • Considering production is Red Hat’s shtick, this is a very welcome addition.

 

CentOS Desktop

  • Allow me to go ahead and say it, don’t use CentOS as a desktop unless you are being forced to. , 
  • There is no advantage to be had, zero. 
  • That said, this will get you up and running with some of the basics.
  • This is a great guide for getting started using a desktop on CentOS 8, especially for all those animators using Maya, Modo, Blender, Renderman etc.
  • And yes, now that Blender 2.80 is officially supported on RHEL and CentOS 8, it makes it a lot easier to install.
  • I usually use the lighter weight window managers on Cent for memory efficiency using animation apps.
  • If you want something which makes Debian Stale look positively up-to-date, Cent is where you want to go.
  • I do see the appeal in having a super LTS in the RPM world, but this is probably only for specific use desktops/workstations.

 

Trident Linux (RTheren)

  • Project Trident, of BSD distro fame, is moving to Linux
  • Void Linux to be precise.
  • This early version is just their own spin of Void, no Trident bits have made its way there yet
  • Later versions will see the same type of OS that they had in BSD land.
  • Trident is based on TrueOS, which is a rolling FreeBSD distro.
  • If TrueOS is Debian, Trident is trying to be its Ubuntu.

 

Open source smart home 

  • A smart home hub and associated devices specifically focused on privacy.
  • To the point where they will fuzz your internet connection with garbage and gibberish to skew any possible tracking your ISP may be doing.
  • This is wonderful!  Create a self-hosted smart home with devices that you can make yourself that are beautifully designed.
  • The thermostat had my interest until I looked at the parts list. 
  • Not something I want to go full-metal DYI on. 
  • Going to stick with my Nest for the time being. 

 

ChromeOS 78

  • Virtual desktops
  • Separate OS and browser settings, further distancing the “Browser as an OS“ view.
  • Keep an eye on your Chromebooks in the coming weeks to see when this drops.
  • Backups of Linux apps and files can now be saved to local storage, external drive, or Google Drive. That copy can then be restored when setting up a new computer.
  • Crostini GPU support is now enabled by default making your experience a lot more clean and zippy.

 

Distributed stalking

  • I get the intended use for this project but, yeah. 
  • If you want to lurk on a bunch of people’s/companies feeds in different social networks, it could be very nice.
  • It makes it so you specifically don’t have to login to all the different services.
  • Like Pedro said, it is nice not to have to login to follow feeds.
  • Honestly, I like having a unified notification area in my browser that doesn’t pop up whenever there is a new post and I can check when I want to.
  • I always have browser notifications pop ups turned off because they are annoying.
  • I have been using the Fraidycat plugin to follow YouTube and Twitter streams and am enjoying it quite a bit.
  • Also, kudos on the art design, layout and colors of the website.  Very nice!

 

NPM fund

  • This is a better solution vs nothing or having ads spammed in the console. 
  • ^                                                     ^^^^^^^
  • The opt-in approach is always better, and gets rid of visually annoying ads.

 

Simple MAC KVM

  • Getting macOS to work in a virtual machine with KVM acceleration can be a tricky and tedious process, until the macOS virtual machine in QEMU came along!
  • With a little QEMU know how and setting up a partition and configuration you can get macOS running quickly by running two macOS Simple KVM scripts.
  • You can also use it with the Virt Manager GUI.

 

Shortwave radio

  • I have always enjoyed having a dedicated radio player app, and Shortwave, which is in its first public beta, and the successor to Gradio is one of the best!
  • Shortwave’s killer feature, and one I have always wanted is the ability to easily save individual songs, including its metadata, for listening later.
  • In fact, when you listen to a radio stream it is automatically recorded in the background, so you can save songs afterwards.
  • This beats all the years of recording radio streams in XMMS and Audacious, and then spending lots of time splitting up the songs and naming them.
  • Shortwave includes all the important Gradio features, and all of your data can be transferred from Gradio.

 

MS Defender 

  • Last week we talked about Microsoft Edge coming to Linux, and now Microsoft Defender Advanced Threat Protection antivirus is coming to Linux next year.
  • This was also announced at the Microsoft Ignite 2019 conference in Orlando
  • Actually, Microsoft Defender is one of the better antivirus packages for Windows and Mac, so this makes sense from a business point of view to protect their Azure cloud infrastructure.
  • Microsoft having to create a container to protect Office 365 from viruses is both brilliant and pathetic!
  • Something like this is needed since most shops run a mixed environment. 
  • Last thing Linux needs is stories like those of Macbooks being used as Zombie servers to infect all Windows hosts that come in proximity.

Slice of Pi

Ceiling Pi is watching you 

  • I do like the detail of the sheer amount of heat coming out of the Pi CPU causing a bit of interference.

Feedback

Miyo

  • Yeah, I stand by that until there’s an option to just pick a sane, automatic, partition layout.
  • Though that probably does defeat the purpose of “making it your own” somewhat.
  • Thank you again to the developer of MiyoLinux, or the “make it your own linux” lightweight Devuan distro we talked about in March!
  • Still have it running on one of my laptops :-D  In fact, it’s the one I used yesterday to do show notes. 

 

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