How to Solve Webcam Shenanigans With systemdLast year I talked about my faithful Logitech C930e webcam, and at the end of the article I mentioned that I have to manually disable the autofocus, and that sadly that setting is gone at every reboot, and even every time I unplug the webcam; my question then was, can I automate this somehow?
Ubuntu 5.10 on QEMUFollowing the celebration of my 20 years with Linux, I wanted to recreate the moment I installed Ubuntu “Breezy Badger” 5.10 for the first time, and with QEMU it was quite easy to do on my modern Fedora 44 environment of 2026.
Keychron Q3 MaxThis year I decided to treat myself with a new keyboard, and I’ve chosen the Keychron Q3 Max; this post is a short summary of my impressions after a few weeks of use.
How To Connect Boatswain to OBS StudioI’ve recently got myself an Elgato Stream Deck, and although it doesn’t natively support Linux, there’s a nice app called Boatswain that does the trick (not to be confused with the OCI container monitoring app of the same name).
20 Years of LinuxAlmost exactly 20 years ago I installed and used Linux for the first time. The distro was good old Ubuntu 5.10, code-named “Breezy Badger” back in the day. The hardware was my faithful Apple iBook G3 bought in 2003, with a PowerPC CPU.
Plugins for tmuxI’m a big fan of tmux since I started using it back in 2010. I can’t conceive working on a terminal window without it, and I also use it in remote systems I access via SSH.
My Faithful Logitech C930e WebcamI like boring technology that lasts decades: 2 years ago I was raving about my Harman Kardon SoundSticks (spoiler alert: they are still in service) and today I’d like to rave about my faithful Logitech C930e, an HDMI webcam that’s been with me for 10 years this month.
Conway in BashI’ve added a new version to my venerable Polyglot Conway project, this time as a good old Bash script, a version bootstrapped with the help of ChatGPT.
Screenkey for LinuxScreenkey is a program for Linux that can be used during presentations or webcasts to show the keystrokes you press to the audience, overlaid on top of the applications or systems being demoed. It could be considered the official replacement of the Mouseposé application for macOS.
HelixI’ve tried the Helix editor and, to be honest, I’m split. I have three specific things to say, though.
Retrocomputing Emulators on Your BrowserIn the past I’ve been explaining how to use various emulators to run old operating systems on your Linux box; today, we’re going to use a much simpler approach: just click on a link, and run them on your browser!
Conway in C89Another year, another version of my Polyglot Conway project, this time for C89, also known as “ANSI C”, targeting quite a few compilers of the early 1990s, and some others from our more recent times.
FreeDOS on QEMUFollowing with my recent explorations around running vintage operating systems on various virtualization platforms, I’ve recently tried to run FreeDOS on QEMU, and these are the steps I followed. Sources: Wikibooks and QEMU QED.
Share Your Terminal Live on the Web With ttydIf you’re in the business of giving demos or talking at conferences, webinars, or other gatherings, sooner or later you’ll have to show your terminal for a demo; in this case, this week’s article will surely interest you: ttyd.
Automatic Dark Mode via CSSDark mode (or dark theme, depending on whom you ask) is a great thing, and major operating systems have adopted it in the past few years as a native feature: Windows, macOS, and Linux desktop environments such as GNOME, Xfce, and KDE have a dark mode built-in.
Containers for Non-Technical Readers With Podman DesktopA decade ago, when containers were the hot new thing in town, learning about them required lots of command typing on the terminal. These days, thanks to tools like Podman Desktop, the task is oh so much simpler than ever. In this article we’re going to learn some common container technology concepts, using the visual user interface of Podman Desktop to help us during the process.
Word 5.5 on DOSBoxContinuing with my exploration of old versions of Word in various platforms, I wanted to experience one of the last versions of Microsoft Word for DOS, Word 5.5. Here are the instructions to run it on any platform that supports DOSBox Staging.
Word 5.1a and Excel 4 for Mac on Basilisk III’ve been using some famous versions of Microsoft apps lately, of the “pre-Office” era: Word 5.1a and Excel 4, which were both running on the Macs available to students at the high school I attended in Geneva around 1993. This article provides the instructions for you to do the same with Basilisk II.
Mini vMac on FedoraMini vMac is a very common “Classic Mac OS” emulator, and this article contains the instructions required to get it running on Fedora 41.
32 Years of PC ConfigurationsI’ve been keeping track of the various characteristics of personal computers I’ve owned during the past 32 years, and here’s a table comparing those data points.
Cute Battery on your tmuxJust like last week, let’s add some more information to our tmux status bar: this time, the current battery level.
Weather on your tmuxPeople have asked me how to display the weather on the status bar of my tmux session, as shown in a previous post of this blog.
How to Create and Read QR Codes on the TerminalHisham recently said something very true: remember when we all silently told ourselves “stop trying to make QR Codes happen, it will never catch on”?
Split and Join Arbitrary TextLast week I enumerated some strategies to split and join large files on the terminal; let’s see how to do more split and join, but this time for any text on the standard input, just like the creators of Unix wanted us to operate on data.
Split and Join Large FilesThis post explains some useful combinations of commands that you can use on Linux (or sometimes also in other operating systems) to split large files into smaller pieces, and then how to rebuild the original file from those pieces.
Adopting WezTermI’ve recently discovered WezTerm, also known as “Wez’s Terminal Emulator” by Wez Furlong, and I’ve adopted it completely, becoming my default terminal application.
5 Years of Full-Time LinuxFive years ago I bought a TUXEDO Computers laptop and finished my migration to Linux completely, without ever looking back.
OpenShift Local CRC From Another MachineDuring the preparation of my “Learning OpenShift” course for LinkedIn Learning, I used OpenShift Local (formerly known as “CodeReady Containers” or CRC) to demonstrate the various features of the platform from a developer’s point of view.
Opening Microsoft Access Databases on LinuxIn the past few months I’ve been writing about my software archeology experiments, including how to convert old HTML code from 1999 to run in today’s browsers, how to run Macromedia Flash movies with Ruffle, or even how to run Java applets now that they aren’t supported anymore.
Recording Getting Started Guides on LinuxAs I’ve said in the past, producing videos in Linux isn’t very straightforward or stable; it can be a bit of bumpy ride. But I’m stubborn, and Linux is the platform I want to use, so when I was tasked with the creation of “Getting Started” video guides for our products at VSHN, I used Linux to create them.
ResticOne of the greatest discoveries I’ve made after switching to the Linux galaxy is, without any doubt, the fantastic Restic; a backup tool that deserves to be better known and more widely used.
Fedora 38In December 4th, 2005, I published my first blog post about Linux. I wrote it on Ubuntu 5.10 “Breezy” after installing it on my faithful iBook G3. Many years have passed, and I’ve become a full-time Linux user now, having used no other operating system in the past 5 years.
FOSS in Developing CountriesThe other day, I had friends in Bolivia asking me if they could install Windows on a laptop they got through an NGO that initially came bundled with Linux.
GNOME ExtensionsLast week I talked about Firefox extensions, last year I talked about VSCode extensions, now it’s time to talk about GNOME extensions. For those who don’t know, GNOME is the name of one of the various desktop environments available for Linux and other operating systems.
D, or What Go May Have BeenIn my quest to learn more and more programming languages, I recently dipped my toes into the D Programming Language. My reaction to it involves sadness; on the positive side of things, the language is undeniably brilliant.
Various Flatpak Tips and TricksI use Flatpak a lot, on my work and personal laptops. I had to find a few tips and tricks to make it work the way I wanted, using all the apps I prefer.
Live-StreamingLately, I’ve started to stream some live events on YouTube on behalf of VSHN. I was an absolute live-streaming beginner, so I had to learn a few tricks.
Technology StacksFor the past 20 years there’s been this trend to give names to a particular set of operating system, programming language, database tech, and something else. Here goes a list with the most common ones.
Three Key Tenets of GNOME App UXIf you are developing apps for GNOME, I kindly ask you to pay attention to the following three key points of application usability. These are features that all GNOME GUI apps should support no matter what. In the humble opinion of this author, of course.
Linux Package Manager StrategyThere are quite a few package managers available in Linux, and it’s hard to figure out which one to use for what. What I’m going to recommend here is my personal take after lots of back and forth, and trying new things.
Computers Bundled With LinuxFor those interested in buying a computer with Linux built-in, here’s a list of options. There might be more, but these are the ones I found by scouting around.
Alpine Linux in VirtualBoxI’ve been playing with Alpine Linux on VirtualBox, and here are some notes I took during the process.
Video Editing in LinuxLet’s talk about the worst part of my Linux experience so far: video editing. It’s not like I’m editing videos every day in my Linux machines, but every so often I have to do something around video, and seriously, it’s a PITA.
First Web App in RustMy exploration of Rust continues; this week, I rewrote a Python Flask application I use for demos at work.
Migrating from macOS to LinuxThis is the story of how, after being a loyal macOS user for 15 years, I decided to start using Linux full-time.
The Developer Guide to Migrate Across GalaxiesThis is the presentation I gave at the second App Builders Conference in Lausanne, Switzerland, April 25th, 2017.
POSIX Device FilesModern operating systems provide a clear separation of the kernel processes from those running in user space, which prompts the question of how to access I/O devices from user processes, without breaking the above mentioned architectural separation, which guarantees stability, security and performance.
Feeling Like a Grown Up KidJedi Knights, when they achieve a certain level of maturity in their craft, are told to build their own lightsaber, as one of the final steps of their training. Software developers have similar feats to accomplish at least once in their coding life, like building their own Linux kernel, writing a rant about Microsoft Windows in their blog, submitting a patch for some open-source system, or even starting and managing their own company or open-source project.
XubuntuSince I discovered Ubuntu I’ve been trying to install it in different hardware, in different computers, even in virtual machines, and I just love it. It installs without problems, I can add and remove the coolest productivity and development tools fast and easy, everything is ready to use, and it just feels great.
How to Install Ubuntu 6.06 Dapper in an Apple G3 iBookAfter upgrading my good ol’ PC to Dapper, I proceeded to download and burn a copy of it for PowerPC systems, and I have managed to install it in my old faithful G3 iBook in dual boot, with Mac OS X 10.2 “Jaguar” on the other partition. Here’s how I did it.
How to Install the Linksys WPC54GS Wireless-G Network Adapter in Ubuntu 6.06 Dapper“Dapper”, the new version of Ubuntu has been released yesterday! So I downloaded the ISO file, burn the CD down and proceeded to install it over my old Breezy Kubuntu installation.
How to Install the Linksys WPC54GS Wireless G Network Adapter in Ubuntu 5.10 BreezyWell, that was a long title. My mother recently changed her 4-year old Dell Inspiron 4100 for a brand new iMac G5, so I took that old laptop (20 GB hard disk, 256 MB RAM) and, after backing up her data, wiped it completely and reinstalled it with the following configuration.
Kubuntu 5.10 and the Linksys WPC54GS Wireless-G Network AdapterOK, so this time I’ve tried to make the same I’ve described before, but for Kubuntu 5.10. I have changed to Kubuntu since I like KDE more than gnome, and also, Kubuntu seems to run faster than Ubuntu. And so I said to myself, OK, these are the same guys who make Ubuntu and Kubuntu, the wireless stuff should work fairly easily. After all it’s the same kernel…
Get the Facts - I Mean, Get ThemIf you enjoy Microsoft PR material, you may find this “Get the facts” page somewhat interesting. For those of us who really deal with MS and Open Source stuff day by day, please just don’t laugh too loud.