Linux MagazineAugust 2023的目錄

Podcasting often occupies a space on the low end of the audio recording spectrum. All you really need is a computer, suitable software, and a microphone. Some users, however, might wish to avoid this most basic scenario. You might ask, “If I’m going to all the trouble to set up a studio for podcasting, what else can I do with it?” Or you might want your studio to grow into something more sophisticated. Perhaps you are a musician yourself? Or you wish to host live music – or other performance alternatives that require mixing and multiple mics. In these scenarios, you could easily outgrow the simple mic+Audacity configuration. If you’re looking for something more, try Ardour. Ardour [1] is still considered the reference application as a free tool for recording…

 Pagers are commands for viewing files one page at a time in the terminal. Roughly speaking, pagers serve the same function at the command line as Plasma’s Okular, although pagers are usually used for text files or as a pipe to make screen output from other commands more readable without scrolling. At times, a version of cat can be used for the same purpose, but technically, the pager name is reserved for three commands: less, more, and – most recently – most [1], names that are a sequence of puns, less being more, as the popular saying goes, and more being greater than less. As the newest pager, most is by far the most usable (Figure 1), because the alternatives are limited or awkward to use as soon as you…

At the weekly pickup soccer game in my adopted hometown of San Francisco, with 16 players signed up for an eight-on-eight match, there is always the question of who is going to compete against whom on match day. Preparing the team sheet is usually something taken care of by experienced players, but it is time-consuming and it leads to endless discussions about whether the eight players on one side are simply too skilled for the other eight players, leading to a lopsided game that is no fun to play. To resolve this, I’ve developed an algorithm to generate the team lineup. This allows me to take an interesting excursion into the world of combinatorics and explore the development of suitable algorithms in this month’s column. How many ways are there…

Linux Mint 21.1 64-bit Linux Mint is one of the most popular Debian derivatives, noted for its responsiveness to users. Linux Mint 21.1, codenamed Vera, is based on Ubuntu 22.04 and will be supported until 2027. For this release, the Cinnamon desktop defaults to more vibrant colors and a reduced set of icons that includes only the installation icon, mounted devices, and any items moved to ~/Desktop. The Home folder, Computer, Trash, and Network icons were removed because they are readily available from the file manager. Those who prefer the old look can use the Mint-Y-Legacy theme. Complementing this updated look are new mouse and system sound options. In addition, the Drive Manager has been redesigned and no longer requires the root password. The Update Manager now includes Flatpak packages…

Many of us have sat around discussing something with friends, maybe after a beer or a kombucha, only for someone to say, “This would make an amazing podcast!” Everyone says “Yes!” and nods enthusiastically, and the conversation shifts to talking about what to call the podcast, where it should be hosted, and whether recording something to a smartphone is good enough. Everyone goes to bed excited, only to wake up the next morning wondering why a podcast about mushroom varieties in Zelda sounded like such a good idea. Or not. Sometimes a podcast idea does survive the next-day test, and there’s never been a better time to start your own podcast. As a Linux and open source user, your technical skills are already well suited to the task, and as…

In the old days, we all thought nothing of buying a retail Windows laptop, reformatting (or shrinking) the partition, and setting it up with Linux. Outcomes varied, but eventually you could get it working. But how much time did you spend removing an operating system you didn’t want just to install the system you did want? When Linux started to reach the mainstream, it became clear the world needed reliable, stable, secure options for Linux users who want to boot their computer into their preferred system without the hassles and complications. The list of retailers selling pre-built Linux laptops includes giants like Lenovo and Dell, but also includes some smaller vendors who specialize in Linux systems and therefore make Linux the sole focus of their attention. We’ve reviewed a number…

One of the biggest challenges in modern app development is the requirement to develop a separate codebase for each platform that you want to support. Fortunately, the Fyne graphical user interface (GUI) toolkit lets you program your app once and then deploy it rapidly to multiple devices. Fyne is an open source GUI toolkit built for the Go programming language, a popular general-purpose compiled programming language created by Google a little over 10 years ago. Go is frequently used for cloud services and infrastructure projects. However, the Fyne toolkit makes it possible to quickly build native GUIs for desktop and mobile devices. One of a number of GUI toolkits for Go, Fyne aims to be the simplest to use, appealing to both beginners and experienced GUI developers. Fyne’s idiomatic design…

Each year my church hosts a basketball league, and several years ago we wanted to upgrade to digital scoreboards because our existing classic board was showing its age. The first version of this new scoreboard software was written in Python [1] and used the GTK toolkit to create the public display. A web page designed for an iPad allowed courtside control. The gym is a shared space that also hosts a meeting room, party hall, and general-purpose room. To support these roles, two NUC small-form-factor computers drive the displays (100-inch LCD TVs). Windows was necessary to support all of the display software so that PowerPoint and ProPresenter would run natively. In general, a video system has a huband-spoke-style network wherein each device has a dedicated home that runs to a…

Hard disks have the unpleasant tendency of filling up faster than expected. It is not always immediately obvious why. Keeping things tidy should not be underestimated in this context. Untidy, poorly organized hard disks tend to fill up faster than well-organized ones. Because life is a mixture of order and chaos, most users probably face this problem. The unexpectedly high utilization level of hard disks is often caused by duplicate files. The typical candidates are photos, music, or videos, which can quickly occupy several gigabytes of space and are often difficult to find. There are several graphical applications on Linux to help you detect and remove duplicates like this, and there are several more for the command line. GUI or CLI? Well-known tools with a graphical interface for a cleanup…

Audacity [1] is one of those “must-have” tools for anyone who records or edits audio files. It is cross-platform (macOS, Windows, Linux), making sharing files and collaboration easier. The Audacity audio editor and recorder comes with an easy-to-use interface and works with a wide range of hardware. Audacity supports direct microphone or through-a-mixer recording in mono or stereo, and it includes some convenient keyboard shortcuts for more efficient editing. You can record directly into Audacity or open most audio and some video file types for editing. In this article, I cover direct recording into Audacity using a single source (microphone) and some basic editing. You will only use a handful of effects and features for simple podcasting. The effects I describe in this article are the ones I use most…

The Free Software Foundation (FSF) maintains a list of free distributions that contain no proprietary software [1]. Although DistroWatch lists 274 Linux distributions, the FSF lists only 10 free ones, and many of those are no longer developed. A notable exception, Trisquel has released a version every one to three years since 2007 [2] (Figure 1). Trisquel was founded by Rúben Rodríguez, who remains a leading developer for the distribution. Recently, Rodríguez took the time to discuss the distribution that has been such a large part of his life for the past 16 years. Linux Magazine (LM): How did Trisquel get started? What were the original goals and was there a decisive moment in the project? Rúben Rodríguez (RR): The project started almost 20 years ago, when I was at…

As networks grow and increase in complexity, it becomes more and more difficult to document all of the devices that you manage and their relationships. In the worst of cases, knowledge of the network may be scrawled on a series of spreadsheets or hand-drawn sketches – or maybe even stored inside the heads of a few overworked IT staffers. A number of free and proprietary solutions provide a means for visualizing and documenting the network, often combined with additional management features. Many of these tools are useful, but some may be missing a critical feature that you need or, on the other end of the spectrum, might suffer from feature bloat. Others will lock you into a specific management or monitoring environment. With all of this in mind, it would…

Linux Magazine is looking for authors to write articles on Linux and the tools of the Linux environment. We like articles on useful solutions that solve practical problems. The topic could be a desktop tool, a command-line utility, a network monitoring application, a homegrown script, or anything else with the potential to save a Linux user trouble and time. Our goal is to tell our readers stories they haven’t already heard, so we’re especially interested in original fixes and hacks, new tools, and useful applications that our readers might not know about. We also love articles on advanced uses for tools our readers do know about – stories that take a traditional application and put it to work in a novel or creative way. Topics close to our hearts include:…