February 26, 2020MP3

mintCast 329 – fish Pi and Wine (mp3)

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First up, in our Wanderings, I go fishing, Bo has some Wine, and Joe bakes some Pi.

Then in our news, Python 2 is dying, a new kernel is in the works, ElementaryOS is getting devs paid, and more.

In security, we talk more Firefox woes.

Bi-Weekly Wanderings:

Leo
- Been hearing about “FISH” shell for a while, and never figured I’d need anything more than BASH. Well, that’s still true, but FISH is pretty awesome.
- We missed the news of Fish’s 3.1.0 release back on the 12th.
- Great for beginners, but can be a double edged sword.
Bo
- Recorded first session of Star Trek Adventures. Check it out at ecnradio.com
- I could let Leo have the highest kernel version of the show so I installed kernel 5.5 and borked my Mint installation.
- Running into Wine installation issues on Mint.
- I’ve been taking on small Python projects at work.
Joe
- For my reading pleasure
  - Demon accords
  - Stormlight archive book 1 and 2
  - Looking for something new
  - Going to listen to Andy Weir again
    - Listened to the Martian
      - Really good book
    - Have Artemis in my queue
    - Both great books
  - Used voice aloud for Steven Barnes Aubry Knight book 2
    - A classic book, worth the read. I like it better than the first book and think the third book is a little weak
- Pulled the screen from an old laptop and converted the monitor so that I could use it with the Pi 4
  - The connection is relatively simple
  - Fabricating the stand for it was a bit more difficult but only because it is a bit out of my normal wheel house
    - Used a soft board that was very light to do it and repurposed an old tablet stand to hold it in the correct position.
    - Attached the controller board and the pi to the back of the screen as well. The viewing angle is very narrow but it is working great and has a much lower profile than the other screen i was using for it.
  - Also setup the case of the pi so that it connects to the back of the stand. It looks pretty good.
- I have never liked any of the BT receivers that I have purchased. Granted that may be because i buy the cheap ones.
  - But I do have plenty of broken bluetooth headphones.
  - Solution: Bust out the soldering iron and convert an old pair of headphones into a bt receiver giving longer battery life and better sound quality
  - The Sony XB650 is not the simplest choice for this as the battery is on the opposite side to the usb port and controls but the end result is pretty low profile and sounds great.
  - I was even able to use a 4 pole female 3.5mm adapter and wire into the existing microphone so that my gaming headsets will work properly. Although i used an old 3.5mm extension cable and this added a problem where the speaker audio was being pumped back through the mic. This can be easily fixed by either putting back in the old mic or replacing the jack with a new one.
  - 10 solder points total the cable was a bit difficult to work with and took longer than it should have to connect the headphone wires.
  - Moved all the electronics from the left ear to the right ear including the battery and shortened all the cables down to about 2 inches. Had to shave down the supports at the back of the can so I could put in the battery and controller for it along with the NFC tag.
  - I have done similar in the past with one of the neck band headphones that i have. That was much simpler. Some speaker wire from each headphone connection to a 3.5mm female jack. It works well but not pocket friendly. Although the built-in mic is useful.
- Also received the DIY desktop headphone amplifier
  - It was fun to put together
  - Good way to practice through hole soldering
  - There was also some surface mount but that was easy
  - Did not quite get the left channel chip soldered properly on the first try and had to go back and fix it
  - End result is pretty good. It works as an amp and gives me a knob to control the volume
  - Had to switch from my razer krakens to the neo classics in order to have something that could be pushed with minimal distortion(for testing)
  - Good volume but not great quality
  - What do you expect for 9 bucks
- Went to the lug on saturday. Spent a lot of time there writing show notes.
- My son had fun as well. I was using my 7130 and he was using the 7140.
- Lots of discussion about old school linux and new advances. Discussed powershell on linux and WSL.
- Had a root canal. Can’t say it was fun but i will say it was one of my better visits to the dentist. I do have to go back for the crown and I have already had the cleaning. Also not fun.
- I want to ask if anyone knows what to do about cable hardening on headphones.
  - Something that happens to some headphone wires as they age.
  - The only thing I know to do is use a hairdryer to get them into the most comfortable position and then live with it or replace the whole dang cable.
- Ordered the parts to fix my 3d printer
  - Also ordered the mosfet fix this time too so hopefully i don’t have any further board burnout problems
    - I understand that similar things can happen to the mosfets but they are 10 dollars to replace as opposed to 120
    - Will have to keep a close eye on the first couple of run throughs as I hear that some of the fetts come broken.
    - Will do a slightly difficult test print and see how it comes out and how much time it takes to dial in.
    - Then a few simple prints to test longevity and because i need more headphone desk hooks. And maybe a stand or two

The News:

Security Update:

Firefox 73 Fixes Remote Code Execution Bug

Announcements:

Our Next Episode will be live March 8th, 2020. 2PM CST, 8PM UTC

Wrap-up:

Joe – www.Tllts.org linuxlugcast.com MeWe [email protected]
Bo – ecnradio.com

Moss – Triad Bardic College, Peaceful Hippo, MeWe, music on Bandcamp and Moss Bliss’ YouTube channel or Robert Warren’s channel, I should have my ReverbNation site back soon, [email protected], [email protected], Sponsus (Now with Tiers, and a Donate Button!)!

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 you can get your five minute news digest at Full Circle Weekly News

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

Josh for all his work on the website and the livestream
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!)