Backing up

Well, it's almost New Year Eve... and I am backing up all of my information to a portable HD.

Lots of pictures, documents, you name it, must be stored.

I hope I can finish before the new year starts!

Nostalgia

Nostalgia becomes common during December and, in particular, in the last days of the year.

Today I went for a run and decided to take my old ZTE Open FirefoxOS phone with me.  That was the very first cellphone I bought (back in May 2014) and, after Mozilla terminated FirefoxOS in 2016, I replaced it by an Android smartphone.

The ZTE Open is still operational, though.  True, one cannot use it as a smartphone, but it can make calls, send and receive messages, browse the Web, and play music and measure one's time while one jogs.  That's more than enough for me.

However, I cannot avoid feeling sad about the demise of FirefoxOS.  While most of the apps have Android versions by now, some of the games never made it to Android. For example, my three favorite games, or what I called "The Cat Trilogy", were doomed to extinction and cannot be found in the Android app ecosystem.

The first one is Martha & Maw-maw's Fishing Days, a simple game that I found quite amusing.

Unfortunately, that game disappeared with FirefoxOS.

The second one was called Spooky Cats.  This game can be installed to an Android phone if one has the APK and enables the unknown sources.

You play as a cute kitty that has to go underground to find a child and battles zombie cats along the way.

Colored Cats, by DS Effects, was a great time killer and it's too bad one cannot find it in Google Play.  One can still try to play it here, but it is not the same...

There were other games, like Disney Fix-it Felix, that I cannot find for Android.

Time carries on and changes things and we are left only with bittersweet memories.

At least I can still play those games while the phone works.

Eelo, the Mandrake of the Mobile World?

Today, I visited the OpenMandriva site and found a piece of news that caught my eye.  It seems that Gaël Duval, the founder of Mandrake (later Mandriva) Linux, has started an ambitious Kickstarter project: eelo, a mobile platform that uses FLOSS and focuses on keeping user data on the hands of users.

In a way, eelo attempts to do in the mobile world what Mandrake wanted to do in the Linux world back then.

Duval explains in this way:
"I want eelo to be a non-profit project, a project 'in the public interest'. I think operating systems and web services should be a shared resource: as I explained a few years ago, they are infrastructures, like phone networks, rail tracks, roads.
Non-profit doesn’t mean nothing will be for sale. Probably some eelo smartphones will be for sale, and some premium services will be available for corporates. But profit won’t be the first focus of eelo.  Of course, eelo, as a community project, will welcome contributors."

It would be great that something like that could actually become a reality.  I really liked FirefoxOS, but we all know how difficult it is to enter the mobile realm.

FLOSSophobia

These are changing times.  The impact of the ever-changing technological landscape has forced individuals to adapt to a society that is constantly consuming technological devices and services in ways never seen before.

Some people, especially in the education sector, see this revolution as a promise land where every gadget is a potentiator  for the teaching-learning process (shouldn't it be processes?).  In this idyllic view, people who are consumers of technologies tend to promote what is trendy, from iPads to Facebook, as the snake oil that solves all education-related problems.  Rarely is it that they stop and analyze limitations that sometimes become show-stoppers, such as the tech-divide, terms of service that contradict student privacy policies, or technological discrimination.

Interestingly, in my country, educators tend to be the least flexible concerning new technologies.  Most of them, for example, cannot distinguish the difference between an .odt and a .PNG file.  Driven by either recalcitrance or inertia, they have not been able to embrace the migration from MS Office to LibreOffice, a process that started in 2010.  And now that MS Office was removed, they are crying in desperation.

This phenomenon is not new; many users believe that productivity is equal to procedural automation.  Such idea rests, however, on the false assumption that software is unchanging.  They forgot that Microsoft actually changed the Office interface in 2007 and they had to adapt.  Now that they have to use LibreOffice, they claim that adaptation to an interface that they used before 2007 is way too difficult.

I suspect that the problem has never been the interface, nor is the productivity assumption.  The problem at the core is the rejection of FLOSS because of fear or hatred, a phenomenon that I call FLOSSophobia.

While some people will sneer and dismiss my thought as a hyperbole, there is plenty of evidence to categorize this recalcitrance as the product of a hegemony with political an economic power to propagate both fear (FUD) and sheer hatred toward FLOSS.  They resort to ridicule, insulting remarks, and unproven claims to slow down the adoption of free/open source software.

I have seen it many times. "Linux is a cancer".  "Open sauce".  "Linuxtard". I even remember the teacher who did not bring a laptop for her presentation and, when I offered her my Linux netbook, she rejected it as if I had presented her something illegal.  She tried to use an old Windows computer instead but, when the computer failed, she ended up displaying her presentation with my Linux netbook.

Clearly, this teacher's position was not based on ignorance or lack of expertise because she knew Linux existed and all she had to do was to display slides.  Her refusal was due to indoctrination: she had learned that Linux and non-Microsoft office suites had to be rejected.

The case of my colleagues is similar.  They think they are computer literate because they use MS Office (despite knowing nothing about file formats).  With LibreOffice, their inconsistencies manifest and they feel self-conscious, exposed, and incompetent.  They both hate and fear feeling this way, so they cling to that which makes them feel validated and, in so doing, they assume a rejection discourse on FLOSS.

No doubt; FLOSSophobia is a new reality that the information era has brought about.  From the social standpoint, there is virtually no difference in the mechanics of FLOSSophobia and, say, xenophobia or homophobia.  The only difference rests on the fact that society is still oblivious to the adverse consequences of FLOSSophobia.  However, a day will come in which this phenomenon will be subject of analysis, like Cyber-bullying, sexting, and other realities that ICTs have put onto the table.

Openmandriva Lx 3.03... Nice!

Yesterday I saw that Openmandriva Lx 3.03 was released. 

The version that I had installed on my laptop was 3.0.  I tried 3.1 and 3.2 but they simply would not launch properly and it was until much later that I found a way to circumvent the problem.

I gave this new version a try and I can happily report that:

1.  This version is considerably faster.
2.  It launches without any problems.
3.  Despite the fact that the Openmandriva GRUB 2 replaced my existing Mageia GRUB 2, Mageia now does not have to run the check that makes the system wait for 1:40 before starting.

In addition, Steam works perfectly and Openmandriva picked up my Epson scanner/printer perfectly, too.

Bendy and the Ink Machine Chapter 3: A Roller Coaster on Linux

Although I am not a gamer, I like to play games occasionally.  To do so, I I run Steam on my Linux computers.
 
One day, I stumbled upon a title that happened to be interesting: Bendy and the Ink Machine.  It is a horror game that relies more on the ambience than it does on jumpscares to create its effect.

The first chapter is free, so I installed it and played it.  I liked the experience, so I bought the second chapter. It was good.

I joined the crowd that was waiting for the third chapter and, when it came available on September, I bought it.

The problem was they released an update that broke the game on some Windows machines and, for what I could see, prevented Linux users from running the game.

After a while, somebody came up with a solution and posted it on a forum.  One had to add this line to the properties of the game: -screen-fullscreen 0

With that, I could play the game again on Linux.

The company wanted to surprise the user base.  So, they released an update that combined Bendy and the Ink Machine with another game, Hello Neighbor.  It was a Halloween gift.

However, the new update broke the game on Linux again.  This time, not even the magical line helped.

Today they released another update.  The game started, but crashed.  Understandably, many users are not very happy about it.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

**************************************
In a moment of desperation, I discovered that the game runs on Linux via WINE if one uses the Windows Steam client.

But that is not a solution... 

Those good surprises...

Yesterday I decided to update PCLinuxOS on my ZaReason Strata laptop. 

PCLinuxOS has always remained a reliable OS to work and, as the update included Lomanager, the distro's method to update LibreOffice, I couldn't delay.

Although the update was fast,  LibreOffice was taking a considerable time to finish.  Yes, I must thank my ISP for that: my connection has been unstable for over a week, with a speed sometimes down to a crawl.

Speed was abnormally slow.  I became a bit restless.

That was when I saw the Steam icon on my desktop...the round icon that had not been clicked on since October 2015.

Back in 2014 or so, PCLinuxOS was, among my OSs, the one that best worked with Steam; all of my games ran like a charm.  However, due to a mysterious problem that I could never solve, the Steam client refused to work after an update.  I read the forums and tried suggestions to no avail.  My Steam on PCLinuxOS was broken.

By then, Steam in Mageia and Openmandriva was going good, so I didn't worry much.  Later, I also started playing on Fedora.  It was not a real loss.

Yesterday, I don't know why, seeing that the LibreOffice install was slow, I clicked on the Steam icon without actually expecting anything to happen.  A window displayed the hopeful message, "connecting to your account."

And, before my eyes, Steam came back from the dead!

I don't know for how long the issue has been fixed.  That's, in my opinion, unimportant.  Shame on me for giving up and not staying on top of the matter.  I learned a lesson here.

Thanks, devs and community members!

Elive is getting closer to version 3.0!

Yesterday was my daughter's 7th birthday --and Distrowatch announced Elive had made a new beta available: version 2.9.8.

Elive is a truly beautiful Debian-based distro that uses Enlightenment as the window manager, so its footprint is rather small and relatively old systems can run it.

When I saw Elive Topaz (the last stable release), I knew that this distro really puts attention to details.  Never had I seen a desktop more polished and glamorous! 


I also discovered that Elive was criticized because it was a project that offered free live CDs but, to be able to install the distro, one had to pay.  Back then, I believed that free software had to be also cost-free, so I did not pay.  However, I kept thinking about the project for a long time and, after understanding more about free software, my vision changed.

I have to say that this took some years.  While some distros seem rushed to get releases according to an inflexible calendar, let us just say that Elive prefers to take its time.  The last stable release I was referring to dates from 2010... It is so old that the EliveCD page suggests visitors to download the latest beta instead of trying out Elive Topaz!

In October 2014, my need to have Elive running on my laptop was so big that I paid for the module to install beta 2.3.9, the 19th release of a long development stage that started back in 2013.  And I could not have been happier than I did: the beta has run like a stable release on my hardware.  What's more, I have never had a problem with it since the install!

Yesterday's release (2.9.8) comes after 12 previous releases that followed the beta which I installed. Elive really takes its time, you see?

I wonder what this new beta has to offer.  One thing is sure: I am going to give it a try!

MX Linux saves the day

Last Friday, when I was working in my office, a colleague asked me for help.

She had turned on the new desktop computer (a Windows 10 machine) and, as she didn't have a user, she was barred out.  That was bad for her because she wanted to print urgently.

I don't have a user on that machine, either.  However, Megatotoro had made a bootable pendrive with MX Linux for me, so I plugged it in and started the OS.

Once inside, configuring the printer was a snap since I found the same tool I use in Mageia.  I selected the wrong driver at first, but got the right one on my second attempt.

I printed her documents and she was amazed and thankful.  I was glad my first time with MX Linux went well.

Oh, and her file was an .odt she made with LibreOffice!

10 Days with Fedora 26 and Mageia 6

About 13 days ago or so, I posted an entry on my preparations to upgrade Fedora Workstation KDE 25 to Fedora 26.

My original intention was to do it via CLI, but it did not go well because, after having downloaded all the packages, the system reported insufficient space in / for the install.  Apparently I, being a Fedora noob, had not removed all the old packages and had less than 75 MB left.

I performed a clean install and everything went perfect.  I am still trying to figure out how to enable the scanner, though.

By the way,  # yum clean all gets rid of the old packages.

 

During those days, Mageia 6 was finally released, so I decided to remove the Mageia 5 on my work laptop and put in the brand new version.  I kept my /home and the upgrade was perfect.

Today I even changed the Mageia 6 Sta2 on my daughter's UEFI desktop and a problem that prevented me to install WINE there was gone.

Good!

Getting Prepared to Upgrade from Fedora Workstation 25 (KDE) to 26

I decided to install Fedora Workstation 25 (KDE) on December 28, 2016 and, despite the learning curve, I found myself happy with it.

Today, DistroWatch announced that Fedora 26 was released, and this announcement threw me at the eternal crossroads of the Linux users: If the system is running fine, why upgrading it?

Taking into account that I am not an expert Fedora user, the operation can become a risky one.  In addition, today is one of those days in which my technological biorhythm (if such a thing actually exists) instructs me to keep away from computers as much as I can.

But I have this article that details the upgrade process.

What can go wrong?

Let's live dangerously!