September 4, 2019News, OGG, Podcast

mintCast 316.5 – Dive Into Leo

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This week, in our Innards section, we roast Leo over some hot coals 🙂

And finally, we cover listener feedback.

INNARDS:

- Tony H – Tell us a little about yourself and what got you into Linux?
  - Leo – A devious instructor that knew I was looking for a challenge. Can’t remember the version, but around 2002, he handed me a copy of Slackware on disc. With a little prodding from him, mostly in the fdisk area, I got it working after a couple of days of fiddling.
- Tony W – What do you love most about Linux?
  - Leo – That it is a living, breathing version of Hacker Culture; something I had identified with for a very long time. You were free to take, install, modify and just plain “hack” everything. The “free as in freedom and free as in beer” saying never really meant much to me until I realized that it was really a phrase that tried to capture the essence of what hacker culture is. Then, as time to theme and modify got shorter, I started using Linux to get work done. Now, I’m on Linux full-time outside of gaming, and more and more, for gaming, too!
- Joe – What’s your current favorite distro?
  - Leo – Uh, CoreOS? Azure Sphere? Just kidding. Of course, it’s Linux Mint!
- Josh – Where do you want mintCast to go in the next 12 months?
  - Leo – The cheeky answer? “Nowhere.” But seriously? I haven’t given it too much thought. I’ve always been a learner, but much more than that, I’ve found that I love to be an explainer (and more than _that_, I’ve found out that I get a real kick out of people having their “aha!” moments). To that end, I’d like to see mintCast become an entry point into Linux beyond “here’s a flash drive, have fun!”. Obviously, the flash drive is a big part of it, but that’s not all it should be! We’re living through a real surge in popularity in Linux, and I’d like to see this podcast become more than just another podcast in a sea of podcasts. I’d like it to be the Arch Wiki of Linux beginner shows.
- Tony H – What are your must have applications for a fresh install?
  - Leo – Audacity, Firefox, Mumble, VSCode, Discord, Telegram, Steam, Virtualbox, Hexchat, Slack
- Joe – We don’t monetize where a lot of others do? What is your view on that?
  - Leo – Free as in freedom, and free as in beer. Hacker Culture. What’s an open source operating system without people that believe in open source at its core? At least at the moment, I don’t feel like slapping beginners in the face with ads is a good move. Sponsorships? Maybe. Not ads. But really, that’s up to the team as a whole, and we’re just not on board yet, if ever.

VIBRATIONS:

Tony H – Henrik Hemrin commented on Ep315 (mostly to Josh)

Hi,

This is more of comments and reflections on this episode, not really that you need to respond.

– You (Josh) talked about CrossOver from CodeWeavers. I have used CodeWeavers (currently on Mac, but I may use it on Linux instead later) for a while for a certain Windows application. Yes, it has a bit of cost. Not so seldom, they have campaigns (e.g. check their Twitter account). Also good is that they support Wine, so it helps Wine too when purchasing CrossOver.

– micro:mag; I admit I haven’t actually read the content yet, which is what really matters, but Josh & team, the layout is impressive!

– About mobiles, I feel as the MintCast team generally prefer Android in favor over iOS. Is it because the variety of phones incl. price levels? Or because it’s Linux-based? My feeling is that iOS is less messy and more secure and private (considering combination of the OS and the respective company behind them. I do follow progress on “real” Linux phones, and other alternatives, will be interesting what happens, and if they really can attract so apps will be available.

– I can also confirm Linux Mint 19.2 upgrade went very smooth for me, it simply worked! Mint is a good distro…!

Anthony on Crontab
- I have recently took Leo’s linux class where I learned crontab. I sent up automatic updates on my linux image 19.2 computer but unable to get this to run. I have it to run in root and gave it all the permissions I need but still wont run daily like I have it set up to do ant recommendations? I enjoy the automated updates so anything I don’t have to make it do is better my ubuntu server I’m running is running the same thing I have set on my linux mint 19.2 but will.not run on 19.2

Brian Rogers to Joe

Hi Joe, I’m a huge Borderlands 2 fan also! I just wanted you to know you can get the Lilith DLC to work under Linux. The trick in Steam is to right-click Borderlands 2, Properties, and check the box which says “Force the use of a specific Steam Play compatibility tool” This will bypass the Linux version of the game and will run the Windows version under Linux.

Then, for the “Set Launch Options” I have this:

-NoLauncher -nomoviestartup

And one final setting… you need to rename Borderlands2.exe to Launcher.exe found here:

~/.steam/Steam/steamapps/common/Borderlands 2/Binaries/Win32

(or, you can create a link from Launcher.exe to Borderlands2.exe)

To get your current .sav file data copied over, copy those files to this location:

~/.steam/steam/steamapps/compatdata/49520/pfx/drive_c/users/steamuser/My Documents/My games/Borderlands 2/WillowGame/SaveData/<unique_number>/

Enjoy! JavaKing

@SafyreLyons on Twitter

Hey I love you podcast, I love it a lot! Thanks for keeping me in the loop with all things Linux and Ubuntu!

Bill Dietrich on Reddit

Heard the podcast guys say the “fragmentation” argument about Linux is overblown or a red herring, and dismiss it. I’d like to discuss that.

https://www.reddit.com/r/mintCast/comments/cnevy0/mintcast_3145_moss_interview_for_real/ewzr025/

Brian in England (mintcast.org)

Hi – I know I’m commenting on an old mintcast (MC310), but I wanted to comment on Leo’s mention of HP Stream. I too had to set mine to Legacy but found Mint too slow so I used Antix MX 18.2. This works fine for my ham radio programs running in WINE. I had problems with WINE in Mint – I needed more time time to work on that. My main machine is a Novatech desktop running LM19.1 MATE. I still need my Dell laptop with Win7 to run my favourite OCR (ABBYY) and satnav updates. I’m an applications guy so need reliability. Best wishes to all you guys.

Leo’s Response

I was actually quite impressed with what I could do with my Stream. It runs Mint Cinnamon well enough to make it through Youtube and Plex on Firefox. I also use it with Batocera to play a few older console games on the go. It can sweat its way through N64 and PS1 games!

Nice desktop! And I run a little Windows myself when gaming on the desktop, so I understand!

Erik Leitz

Hi Mintcast team!

I have an idea for the podcast: how is Mint unique when it comes to applications or functioning inside of the distribution? Items that come to mind include timeshift, nemo (and being able to right click to make an ISO bootable USB), and of course, Cinnamon. Other than now Deepin, I’m pretty sure Mint is the only distribution to have created its own desktop environment. There may be other apps that the Mint team has developed but those are the ones I am familiar with.

FYI – we are halfway through the office conversion to Linux via Mint. Only 6 more workstations to go!

Keep up the enjoyable podcast. By the way, I like the team mix you have right now.

Thanks

Leo’s response

We did a bird’s-eye view a couple episodes ago, so I think this is just the natural progression! This is a great idea and I’d love to cover it. The Kernel Updates app is also (possibly based on Ukuu?) unique to Mint.

I hope the last few Mint upgrades go very well for you!

Glad to hear it! Thanks so much.

Larry Murphy – email

I listened to the interview with Moss and he mentioned what he always installed. He mentioned Stacer for info. I’d never heard of so I looked it up and it was exactly what I wanted for system info. It’s all in one place. I used system info and hwinfo but as I said Stacer is one utility in one place. I now have it on my desktop Thanks to Moss. Different topic, I like the input from several different hosts It’s just like Linux, more input and more choices. I think it’s great. Keep up the great work and the show is one of, in my opinion, one of the best for Linux. Thanks again for all you work.

Leo’s Response

Stacer is certainly growing on me, too. I really enjoy the look and feel of the whole thing, and is great for people that don’t want to fiddle about with all the different tools you’d need to have otherwise.

Thanks for the positive feedback, and I agree! Diversity of opinion is awesome.

WRAP-UP:

Joe – www.Tllts.org www.linuxlugcast.com MeWe [email protected]
Bo – undercastnetwork.com
Moss – Triad Bardic College, Peaceful Hippo, MeWe, music on Bandcamp and all over YouTube (search for Moss Bliss, ignore the young black South African gospel singer), [email protected], [email protected]
Tony Hughes – HPR – http://hackerpublicradio.org/correspondents.php?hostid=338
- Occasional Blog https://tony-hughes.blogspot.com/
- Twitter @TonyH1212, [email protected] [email protected]

Tony Watts – [email protected], Echoes of Savages (band)
Josh – [email protected], [email protected], edublocks.org and @all_about_code on Twitter
Leo – leochavez.org and @leochavez on Twitter, and Full Circle Weekly News

Before we leave, we want to make sure to acknowledge some of the people who make mintCast possible …

Josh Lowe for all his work on the website and the livestream (We’ve had over 60 listeners today on the backup mixer platform and brought on some new listeners who’ve never heard of the podcast)
Bytemark Hosting for hosting mintcast.org and our Mumble server
Archive.org for hosting our audio files
The Linux Mint development team for the fine distro we love to talk about <Thanks, Clem!>