GNU/Linux and BSD Leftovers

posted by Roy Schestowitz on May 17, 2026

• Applications

  • Barry Kauler ☛ YouTube download GUI improved

    EasyOS has a YouTube download GUI, a frontend for 'yt-dlp' commandline utility. Quite a long time since I worked on it, and recent posts by don570 and pp4mnklinux have reminded me: [...]

• Games

  • Godot Engine ☛ Release candidate: Godot 4.6.3 RC 2

    A Saturday surprise

• Distributions and Operating Systems

  • Nate Graham ☛ Start with Fedora KDE or Kubuntu – Adventures in Linux and KDE

    A major problem our corner of the world faces is that there’s absolutely terrible information about which Linux-based operating system to choose when you’re ready to make the move:

    https://distrowatch.com/ shows approximately five billion options and provides no real guidance for making a decision.

    Asking “what Linux distro should I use” to a search engine, an AI, or YouTube returns a veritable graveyard of bad advice, link-spam blog posts, and interactive “help me choose a distro” websites that will steer you wrong 100% of the time.

  • BSD

    • Undeadly ☛ Migrating mail servers from exim to OpenSMTPD (smtpd) is fun and useful

      However, that software has had its share of security issues over the years, and during the preparations for the OpenBSD 7.9 release, the ports maintainers decided that

      "History of security issues + setuid root is a terrible combo."

      and it was time to remove exim from the packages collection.

  • Devuan Family

    • Stéphane Huc ☛ Devuan: Opensmtpd Client Auth

      OpenSMTPD is a free implementation of the SMTP protocol, as defined in RFC 5321 , with some additional standard extensions. It allows the machines to exchange mail.

      OpenSMTPD is a part the OpenBSD base system. It was ported to others OSes, as Devuan.

    • Stéphane Huc ☛ Devuan: use the OpenNTPD time synchronization client

      OpenNTPD is a service that can be used to synchronize the system clock to the time servers using the NTP (Network Time Protocol) .

      OpenNTPD is a part the OpenBSD base system. It was ported to others OSes, as Devuan.

  • Canonical/Ubuntu Family

    • InfoQ ☛ Ubuntu Embraces Local Hey Hi (AI) Instead of Cloud-First OS Integration

      Ubuntu has outlined its Hey Hi (AI) strategy, describing it as a deliberate departure from industry trends towards cloud-centric, AI-first operating systems. Instead, the company says, Ubuntu will focus future releases on local intelligence, modular design, and strict user control.

  • Devices/Embedded

    • Rui Carmo ☛ Announcing ios-linuxkit: Linux on iPad, the Hard Way

      I’m done waiting for Apple to fix things. And one of the things I think should exist is a decent way to run Linux binaries on my iPad.

      And after almost six months messing about with ARM emulation in various forms, I can finally do something about it.

  • Open Hardware/Modding

    • Robin Sloan ☛ The big button

      Here’s Marcin Wichary with a huge guide to the fun of key­board customization, fea­turing a pic of his own setup …  Marcin's battlestation Marcin's battlestation

       … which is even better than I expected it would be, and that’s saying a lot, because my expec­ta­tions were high, given that it’s Marcin, and it’s key­boards. He writes:

      "I also have one big arcade button in a big box. It’s a long story, but I com­mis­sioned it hoping it’d be fun to press, and guess what: It’s really fun to press."

    • Old VCR ☛ The Tomy Tutor and the state of 1983 home computers

      Using a design modeled on the doomed Texas Instruments 99/8, one of several unreleased successors to the TI 99/4A, the Tomy Tutor and its overseas siblings, the Japanese Pyuuta (ぴゅう太) series, promised an easy kid-friendly introduction to computers with a durable case, nice graphics and sound, games on cartridge, and two, count 'em, two internal dialects of BASIC (one on early systems). It had 16K of RAM, though this was entirely tied up in the 9918A video display processor with only 256 bytes of RAM directly addressible by its 2.7MHz TMS 9995 CPU, and of Tomy's promised peripherals only game controllers and a tape deck were ever offered. Still, despite the bowdlerized operating system and bupkis contemporary expansion options, the Tutor was nevertheless one of the first true 16-bit home computers, and as part of the 1983 low-end home system cavalcade, an inexpensive choice as well.