Linux

Although Randy Bias’s article, titled “Avoiding a Geopolitical Open Source Apocalypse”, is a bit dated — it was published in October 2024 — it remains relevant. The piece appears on thenewstack.io and provides useful food for thought about cooperation between East and West for a shared, secure open-source ecosystem. Some think that open source software is generally more secure, but is it? Open source software mainly made in the West has well-documented security issues of its own, due in part to its heavy reliance on overworked and volunteer maintainers. Securing open source software requires time, energy and diligence. Unfortunately, many projects are very thinly resourced and lack the expertise required to look for security risks diligently. ...

“Waydroid” is an exciting project that provides a full Android system in a Linux container. It runs on ARM, ARM64, x86, and x86_64 CPUs and has direct access to the hardware, since it is not a virtual machine (VM). Although it may seem obvious, I still want to mention it: this project is Open Source. The text was automatically translated from German into English. The German quotations were also translated in sense. ...

Linux users should take a look at “Burn-My-Windows” by Simon Schneegans. This extension offers nice window animations. It’s also worth checking out Simon’s repositories in general. The text was automatically translated from German into English. The German quotations were also translated in sense.

In 2006 I upgraded my Xbox with a modchip and a larger hard drive. My goal wasn’t to play cracked games on it, but to install the Xbox Media Center (XBMC). XBMC later evolved into today’s Kodi Media Center. The modchip was necessary to install Linux and a custom launcher. That made it possible to switch between the original BIOS and XBMC or a homebrew BIOS. Why am I telling you this? Back then I didn’t know there were only modchips with proprietary software. It wasn’t until 2024 that some hackers developed a modchip based on the Raspberry Pi Pico with open-source firmware. The video “Why You Need To Put A Raspberry Pi Pico Inside Your XBOX Right Now!” by @MachoNachoProductions explains how the installation works and why it’s really exciting. ...

Over the past few days I tried out Ubuntu on a netbook and have come to the conclusion that Linux is becoming a real alternative. The text was automatically translated from German into English. The German quotations were also translated in sense.