I tried out most (if not all) of the music players on flathub, but I always end up going back to Rhythmbox. It's so simple, lightweight, got just enough features (for my use case) and blends well with GTK Desktops (I mostly use Gnome and Cinnamon) and it looks so clean in my Nord theme 😆

How has your experience with Rhythmbox? do y'all got any alternative you think everybody should give a try? I personally think Elisa is a close second!

Just a little "something" I came up with. Instructions on how to compile, including a screenshot link are in the code.

Ubuntu's current LTS version (24.04) contains ffmpeg version 7:6.1.1-3ubuntu5 which has this buffer overflow vulnerability:

https://trac.ffmpeg.org/ticket/10952

https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2024-32230

On my only Ubuntu computer, my update widget says that I need to upgrade to ffmpeg version 7:6.1.1-3ubuntu5+esm2 but can only only do so with Ubuntu Pro. I'm not eligible for Ubuntu Pro.

Ubuntu claims that 24.04 is currently fully supported, and should have complete security updates. However, they seem to have paywalled this security update.

What should I do?

Both don't ship with their own Wayland compositor, but there are enough to choose from.

Xfce comes with a wayland session using labwc out of the box, but was also tested with Wayfire. The devs state you shouldn't hold your breath waiting for the native window manager xfwm to be ported into a Wayland compositor, since they don't know if/when it will be done. Almost all other Xfce components support Wayland now, while retaining X11 compatibility.

LXQt's newest stable release has full Wayland support, with 7 different Wayland compositors to choose from within a GUI settings menu: Labwc, KWin, Wayfire, Hyprland, Sway, River and Niri

https://xfce.org/about/news/?post=1734220800
https://lxqt-project.org/release/2024/11/05/release-lxqt-2-1-0/

PipeWire 1.4.0 (2025-03-06)

This is the 1.4 release that is API and ABI compatible with previous 1.2.x and 1.0.x releases.

This release contains some of the bigger changes that happened since the 1.2 release last year, including:

• client-rt.conf was removed, all clients now use client.conf and are given RT priority in the data threads.
• UMP (aka MIDI2) support was added and is now the default format to carry MIDI1 and MIDI2 around in PipeWire. There are helper functions to convert between legacy MIDI and UMP.
• The resampler can now precompute (at compile time) some common conversion filters. Delay reporting in the resampler was fixed and improved.
• Bluetooth support for BAP broadcast links and support for hearing aids using ASHA was added. A new G722 codec was also added. Delay reporting and configuration in Bluetooth was improved.
• The ALSA plugin now supports DSD playback when explicitly allowed with the alsa.formats property.
• A PipeWire JACK control API was added.
• A system service was added for pipewire-pulse.
• Many documentation and translation updates.
• Many of the SPA macros are converted to inline functions. All SPA inline functions are now also compiled into a libspa.so library to make it easier to access them from bindings.
• The module-filter-chain graph code was moved to a separate filter-graph SPA plugin so that it becomes usable in more places. EBUR128, param_eq and dcblock plugins were added to filter-graph. The filter graph can now also use fftw for doing convolutions. The audioconvert plugin was optimized and support was added to audioconvert to insert extra filter-graphs in the processing pipeline.
• New helper functions were added to parse JSON format descriptions.
• The profiler now also includes the clock of the followers.
• RISCV CPU support and assembler optimisations were added.
• The clock used for logging timestamps can be configured now.
• The JSON parser was split into core functions and helper.
• Support for UCM split PCMs was added. Instead of alsa-lib splitting up PCMs, PipeWire can mark the PCMs with the correct metadata so that the session manager can use native PipeWire features to do this.
• Support for webrtc2 was added to echo-cancel.
• IEC958 codecs are now detected from the HDMI ELD data.
• Conversion between floating point and 32 bits now preserve 25 bits of precision instead of 24 bits.
• A new Telephony D-BUS API compatible with ofono was added.
• The invoke queues are now more efficient and can be called from multiple threads concurrently.
• Clock information in v4l2 was improved.
• An ffmpeg based videoconvert plugin was added that can be used with the videoadapter.
• The GStreamer elements have improved buffer pool handling and rate matching.
• The combine-stream module can now also mix streams.
• link-factory now checks that the port and node belong together.
• The netjack-manager module has support for autoconnecting streams.
• The native-protocol has support for abstract sockets.
• The pulse server has support for blocking playback and capture in pulse.rules.
• The corked state of stream is now reported correctly in pulse-server.
• Fix backwards jumps in pulse-server.
• Latency configuration support was added in loopback and raop-sink.
• The ROC module has more configuration options.
• The SAP module now only send updated SDP when something changed.
• RTP source now has a standby mode where it idles when there is no data received.
• Support for PTP clocking was added the RTP streams.
• The VBAN receiver can now dynamically create streams when they are detected.
• Error reporting when making links was improved.
• Support for returning (canceling) a dequeued buffer in pw-stream.
• Support for emiting events in pw-stream was added.
• pw-cat now support stdin and stdout.

Highlights (since the previous 1.3.83 release)

• Small fixes and improvements.

PipeWire

• Fix some missing includes in metadata.h
• Pass the current error in errno when a stream is in error (#4574)

modules

• Evaluate node rules before loading adapter follower to ensure properties are set correctly. (#4562)

SPA

• Avoid a use after free when building PODs. (#4445)
• Take headroom into account when calculating resync.

Bluetooth

• Fix +CLCC parsing.

GStreamer

• Notify about default device changes in deviceprovider.
• Copy frames between pools and avoid splitting video buffers.

JACK

• Add an option to disable the MIDI2 port flags. (#4584)

Today I can share a major development status update of XPipe, a new connection hub that allows you to access your entire server infrastructure from your local desktop. It can make your life easier when working with any kind of servers by eliminating all the commonly tedious tasks that come up when interacting with remote systems, either from the terminal or from a graphical interface. XPipe comes with integrations for SSH, docker and other containers, various hypervisors, and more without requiring setup on your remote systems. You can also keep using your favourite text/code editors, terminals, password managers, shells, command-line tools, and more with it.

Tailscale SSH support

You can now connect to devices in your tailnet via Tailscale SSH and your locally installed tailscale command-line client. This integration supports multiple accounts as well to switch between different tailnets.

Custom icons

You can now add custom icons to use for your connections. This implementation replaces the old model of shipping the icons from https://github.com/selfhst/icons along XPipe. Instead, you can now dynamically add sources of icons. This can either be a local directory or a remote git repository that can be cloned and pulled by xpipe. XPipe will pick up any .svg files in there, rasterize them to cached .pngs, and display them in XPipe.

As default icon sources, it will still come with the https://github.com/selfhst/icons repository enabled, but now it can fetch these icons at runtime. If you are using the git vault sync, you can also add icons to a synced directory in your git vault to have access to them on all systems.

New docs

There is a new documentation site at https://docs.xpipe.io/. The goal is to expand this over time to provide proper documentation for many features.

Since it came up quite a bit last time I posted about XPipe here, I hope that any questions about what exactly XPipe is, how it makes your life easier, what it can do, and more, can now be answered in detail by the documentation.

Webtop enhancements

The webtop, a container-based KDE desktop environment, received a general overhaul. The list of terminals, editors, and rdp clients has been updated. The language support has been improved so that you can now easily run the desktop environment in any language you want. There were also many new additions and fixes for preinstalled tools of the desktop environment. There is also now more webtop documentation at https://docs.xpipe.io/guide/webtop

Package manager repositories

There is now an apt repository available at https://apt.xpipe.io/ and an rpm repository available at https://rpm.xpipe.io/. You can add them as sources to apt or your rpm-based package manager. This allows you to also install and upgrade xpipe via your native package manager instead of using the built-in self-updater.

Other

• Add support for Gnome Console and Ptyxis Terminal
• Add support for cosmic-term of the new cosmic desktop environment
• Add the ability to launch connections from the command-line with the xpipe launch command
• Add new action to run scripts in the file browser and show their output without having to open a terminal
• You can now import saved PuTTY sessions on a system when searching for available connections. This also works for KiTTY
• Improve application performance when having many connections and categories

A note on the open-source model

Since it has come up a few times, in addition to the note in the git repository, I would like to clarify that XPipe is not fully FOSS software. The core that you can find on GitHub is Apache 2.0 licensed, but the distribution you download ships with closed-source extensions. There's also a licensing system in place with limitations on what kind of systems you can connect to in the community edition as I am trying to make a living out of this. I understand that this is a deal-breaker for some, so I wanted to give a heads-up.

Outlook

If this project sounds interesting to you, you can check it out on GitHub or visit the Website for more information.

Enjoy!

please don't!! linux repository people don't do that please!! firefox is still awesome and, i haven't really read the change the firefox foundation has made, but i really hope this does not mean it will stop existing on linux. will debian replace it with waterweasel?

i still like firefox and i'm content it's still open source at least!!!

Let me start with, that I am running Raspberry Pi servers since the first Raspberry Pi was released more than a decade ago. Only problems I ever had until now, where dying SD-Cards with the first generation of RPIs. Since them I only buy really big high quality SD-Cards and I have RPI(4) servers running 24/7 for years w/o any troubles.

For a new project, I am running a web service on a Raspberry Pi ZeroW2 with an Apache reverse proxy on the same machine. Memory usage, even under load, is a maximum of 100 MB. This RPIZW2 simply dies after a few days, and I have no idea how debug this problem.

More details of the RPIZW2:

• Uses Raspbian configured via Ansible to be an exact replica of my RPI(4), only Apache and a webservice were added
• Quality power supply (original RPI hardware) and literally plugged to the same electricity circuit as the RPI(4)
• The webapp is just a 'hello, world' with the current time and my internet connection is not fast enough to be DOSed
• Monitored memory usage etc. for several hours and found nothing out of the ordinary
• fail2bann is active and running
• SD-card has several unused GIGs of free space and is same brand/quality as the one in the RPI(4)

Anyone experienced something similar? Has anyone an idea how to approach debugging this problem?

I am not sure that there is a better place at Lemmy for this kind of question than here. I'll happily move this post to another place, if it is not appropriate here.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/26398979

I got this PC from my dad when he upgraded in like December ish. I've been running Kubuntu on it and just using it like a sort of general purpose desktop for me and my wife, but I've got a hankering for some tinkering and feel like it has more potential, so I'd love some project ideas!

I have a router I'm running nord vpn but I use bitTorrent on windows and I'm looking to switch. Does anyone have a flavor of Linux and program they use?

Any advice would be helpful I'm getting nowhere on forums.

Hello folks!

So I have installed gentoo a few times before so I am not completely new to it. But I am new to managing things like btrfs and or LVM manually.

So my plan is to install Gentoo with btrfs and snapper so that you can boot in to read only snapshots from grub and rollback once booted. This is what Opensuse Tumbleweed does.

I would like to know which btrfs layout and or LVM layout is required for such a setup. I have been able to find some info that I think requires the /boot subvolume to be on the root of the system. Also some say you need to make the .snapshot volume some say you dont and snapper does this. So their is a fair bit of conflicted info about it to get working right.

I've done something similiar to this over the years for organization purposes and not having to change much between shells except add a path. You can also add cases that check your shell and do something slightly different if needed.

I've been using Linux exclusively for about 8 years. Recently I got frustrated with a bunch of issues that popped one after another. I had a spare SSD so I decided to check out Windows again. I've installed Windows 11 LTSC. It was a nightmare. After all the years on Linux, I forgot how terrible Windows actually is.

On the day I installed the system and a bunch of basic software, I had two bluescreens. I wasn't even doing anything at that time, just going through basic settings and software installation. Okay, it happens. So I installed Steam and tried to play a game I've been currently playing on Linux just to see the performance difference. And it was... worse, for some reason. The "autodetect" in game changed my settings from Ultra to High. On Linux, the game was running at the 75 fps cap all the time. Windows kept dropping them to around 67-ish a lot of times. But the weirdest part was actual power consumption and the way GPU worked. Both systems kept the GPU temperature at around 50C. But the fans were running at 100% speed at that temperature on Windows, while Linux kept them pretty quiet. I had to change the fan controls by myself on Windows just because it was so annoying. The power consumption difference was even harder to explain, as I was getting 190-210W under Linux and under Windows I got 220-250W. And mind you, under Linux I had not only higher graphical settings set up, but was also getting better performance.

I tried connecting my bluetooth earbuds to my PC. Alright, the setup itself was fine. But then the problems started. My earbuds support opus codec for audio. Do you think I can change the bluetooth codec easily, just like on Linux? Nope. There is no way to do it without some third party programs. And don't even get me started on Windows randomly changing my default audio output and trying to play sound through my controller.

Today I decided to make this rant-post after yet another game crashed on me twice under Windows. I bought Watch Dogs since it's currently really cheap on Steam. I click play. I get the loading screen. The game crashed. I try again. I play through the basic "tutorial". After going out of the building, game crashed again. I'm going to play again, this time under Linux.

I've had my share of frustrations under Linux, but that experience made me realise that Windows is not a perfect solution either. Spending a lot of time with Linux and it's bugs made me forget all the bad experience in the past with Windows, and I was craving to go back to the "just works" solution. But it's not "just works". Two days was all it took for me to realize that I'll actually stick with Linux, probably forever. The spare SSD went back to my drawer, maybe so I can try something new in the future. It's so good to be back after a short trip to the other side!

What’s New

• Messages are automatically adapted to dark mode with a quick toggle in the header.
• New "Appearance" Settings UI to globally control message threading/sorting order.

What’s Changed

• Criteria for closing idle message databases.

What’s Fixed

• Thunderbird Release channel was not displayed in "About Thunderbird".
• Crash could occur when shutting down during MAPI send.
• The error message for compacting a corrupted local folder was not useful.
• Deleting or detaching attachments in a saved .eml file appeared to work but failed.
• On HiDPI screens, clicking addresses in the header could show popup off-screen.
• Opening an .EML file in profiles with many folders could take a long time.
• Some messages may have been threaded incorrectly in unified folders.
• Unified folders could become unusable instead of being automatically rebuilt.
• Folders at level 3+ were not auto-discovered when IMAP subscriptions were ignored.
• New subfolder did not inherit parent view, sort order, sort type, or columns.
• With "Fetch headers only" enabled, messages could not be sorted by size.
• Selecting starred messages did not update immediately.
• Marking a unified folder as favorite did not show it in favorite folders.
• Users with many folders experienced poor performance when resizing message panes.
• The UI could falsely report a message as encrypted when a null cipher was used.
• Search messages dialog list could not be sorted by clicking the header icon.
• Sending to multiple SMTPs could fail silently due to missing address book.
• "Replace" button in compose window was overwritten when the window was narrow.
• Changing the UI font size did not apply to some dialogs.
• Deleted Gmail messages stayed visible until compact/expunge, despite settings.
• Export to mobile did not work when "Use default server" was selected.
• Account settings menu could be loaded twice.
• Account Settings updated font size were not reflected in the content frame.
• Add-ons: Context menu entries were incorrectly aligned.
• Middle-click autoscroll cursor appeared without arrows instead of expected design.
• Some functionality was missing for newsgroup messages opened from a file or URI.
• Notifications for new mail were not showing for IMAP.
• Message and folder lists could display incorrect line spacing after restart.
• Clicking a 'mid:' link could clear the thread pane and cause errors.
• Release channel incorrectly showed What's New page after update.
• "Save Link As" was not working in feed web content.
• Sort indicators were missing on the calendar events list.
• Visual and UX improvements
• Security fixes

I want a Tails-like LiveUSB OS like tails, but without the tor reliance. Does anyone have a suggestion? Heads is dead, last release 2018, but it resembles what I am looking for.

I'm admittedly yelling at cloud a bit here, but I like package managers just fine. I don't want to have to have a plurality of software management tools. However, I also don't want to be caught off guard in the future if applications I rely on begin releasing exclusively with flatpak.

I don't develop distributed applications, but Im not understanding how it simplifies dependency management. Isn't it just shifting the work into the app bundle? Stuff still has to be updated or replaced all the time, right?

Don't maintainers have to release new bundles if they contain dependencies with vulnerabilities?

Is it because developers are often using dependencies that are ahead of release versions?

Also, how is it so much better than images for your applications on Docker Hub?

Never say never, I guess, but nothing about flatpak really appeals to my instincts. I really just want to know if it's something I should adopt, or if I can continue to blissfully ignore.

I spent a lot of time figuring out how to get vmware with the vmmon and vmnet kernel modules installed, because it only supports Fedora 40 with Kernel version 6.10.10-200. I tried downgrading to that kernel but that didn't work, because kernel-headers-6.10.10-200.fc40.x86_64 couldn't be installed. mkubecek/vmware-host-modules didn't work either, but gleb-kun made some patches to it (thanks).

So anyway just in case anyone finds this useful who also has no idea about this stuff:

To use 17.5.1:

• download VMware from https://softwareupdate.vmware.com/cds/vmw-desktop/ws/17.5.1/23298084/linux/core/

• extract it, make it executable, run it as sudo

• it should be installed now but don't try to use it yet

• download the modules wget https://github.com/gleb-kun/vmware-host-modules/archive/workstation-17.5.1.tar.gz

• extract it

• cd into the folder

• sudo make

• sudo make install

• restart your device

• now you can run VMware hopefully

To use 17.6.1 (or later, this worked for me even for 17.6.3):

• Sign up to Broadcom and download VMware

• extract it, make it executable, run it as sudo

• it should be installed now but don't try to use it yet

• download the modules: wget https://github.com/gleb-kun/vmware-host-modules/archive/workstation-17.6.1.tar.gz

• extract it

• cd into the folder

• sudo make

• sudo make install

• restart your device

(Note: Even though I know QEMU emulators like Boxes or virt-manager would have been easier, I have to use VMware and this is meant for others who are similarly unfortunate )

Are there any issues with driver support for 8k that will affect purchase choice?

I recently bought an 8k TV (which is not brutally expensive when refurbished) and want to connect my workstation to it. I went through the list of video cards from my local store and the cheapest that claims 8k support is the Gigabyte RX 6400.

Is a Gigabyte RX 6400 Eagle 4G a good video card for mostly text output at 8k resolution? I might do things like play Netflix in 1/4 of the screen and have text in the other 3/4. Definitely nothing at all challenging in terms of video. AMD drivers have a history of being reliable, but will I face some issues like lack of HDMI support for 8k?

I've watched a YouTube video about trying this on Windows and they got frame rates as low as 4 FPS for games which is not a concern for me. It definitely works OK with Windows driving the card. Will I be likely to have issues running the same hardware on Linux?

Wish all the companies I bought from called me a zombie from the abyss 🥰