Bonum Certa Men Certa

Links 05/09/2022: OpenMandriva Approaches Big Release



  • GNU/Linux

    • Instructionals/Technical

      • Fedora MagazineManage containers on Fedora Linux with Podman Desktop - Fedora Magazine Manage containers on Fedora Linux with Podman Desktop

        Podman Desktop is an open-source GUI application for managing containers on Linux, macOS, and Windows.

        Historically, developers have been using Docker Desktop for graphical management of containers. This worked for those who had Docker Daemon and Docker CLI installed. However, for those who used Podman daemon-less tool, although there were a few Podman frontends like Pods, Podman desktop companion, and Cockpit, there was no official application. This is not the case anymore. Enter Podman Desktop!

        This article will discuss features, installation, and use of Podman Desktop, which is developed by developers from Red Hat and other open-source contributors.

      • LinuxConfigHow to build Super Mario 64 natively on Linux

        Super Mario needs no presentations: it is one of the most beloved video games characters. Super Mario 64 was originally released for the Nintendo64 console in 1996, and represented the first 3D episode of the Mario franchise. Thanks to a github project, which achieved the full decompilation of the game, it is now possible to build a native Linux port and play it without the need of a Nintendo64 emulator. In order to compile the port, an original, and legally obtained “.z64” rom of the game is needed.

        In this tutorial we see how to compile and launch the Super Mario 64 Linux port on some of the most used distributions.

      • LinuxConfigIntroduction to the OverlayFS

        The OverlayFS pseudo-filesystem was first included in the Linux kernel 3.18 release: it allows us to combine two directory trees or filesystems (an “upper” and a “lower one”) in a way that is completely transparent to the user, which is able to access files and directories on the “merged” layer just like he would do on a standard filesystem.

        In this tutorial we learn the basic concepts behind OverlayFS, and we see a demonstration of its usage.

      • Red Hat OfficialHow to connect to a remote computer using VNC in Linux | Enable Sysadmin

        The Wayland protocol is the latest graphical server software for Linux computers, and it has replaced the X11 system in most major distributions. Old tricks like X Forwarding over SSH and logging in through xhost are on the way out, and remote access is now provided by the remote frame buffer protocol and Virtual Network Computing (VNC).

      • LinuxConfigHow to send desktop notifications using notify-send

        Every desktop environment on Linux has its own notification system which implements the Freedesktop notifications specifications. Some of them, like GNOME or KDE, use their own built-in notification systems which cannot be replaced; others like Xfce or Mate, use more modular components (Xfce notification daemon and Mate notification daemon, respectively). Desktop-independent notification systems also exist (dunst, for example): most of the time they are used on minimal setups (e.g. when using a plain window manager instead of full blown Desktop environments).

        In this tutorial we learn how to send desktop notifications from the command line using the notify-send utility.

      • ID RootHow To Install Unrar on Fedora 36 - idroot

        In this tutorial, we will show you how to install Unrar on Fedora 36. For those of you who didn’t know, The GNU unrar is a freeware used to extract compressed files in RAR format. In addition, it offers several features for manipulating archives, such as the ability to list the contents of an archive or extract only specific files.

        This article assumes you have at least basic knowledge of Linux, know how to use the shell, and most importantly, you host your site on your own VPS. The installation is quite simple and assumes you are running in the root account, if not you may need to add ‘sudo‘ to the commands to get root privileges. I will show you the step-by-step installation of the Unrar decompress on a Fedora 36.

      • TecAdminHow to Change the Default Browser in Ubuntu - TecAdmin

        You probably know that Chrome is the default browser in Ubuntu. But did you know that you can change this? There are several other browsers that come pre-installed with Ubuntu, such as Firefox and Midori. If you’re not a fan of Chrome or if you prefer to use another browser for your browsing needs, changing the default browser from Chrome to Firefox, for example, is pretty straightforward.

        This tutorial will show you how to change the default web browser on Ubuntu and other versions of Linux Mint.

  • Distributions and Operating Systems

    • PCLinuxOS/Mageia/Mandriva/OpenMandriva Family

      • OpenMandriva NewsROME Silver Candidate - OpenMandriva

        Not yet a ROME candidate release, still approaching. These ISO images now receiving updates from rolling Update channel.

    • Canonical/Ubuntu Family

      • CNX SoftwareNVIDIA Jetson Xavier NX fanless embedded box PC features four HDMI input ports - CNX Software

        The BOXER-8256AI ships with two wall mount brackets, a screw package, and a power connector. It supports NVIDIA Jetpack 4.6.2 or above, which should include the recently released Ubuntu 20.04-based Jetpack 5.0.2 SDK.

      • UbuntuUbuntu Blog: The State of IoT – August 2022

        Welcome to the August edition of the monthly State of IoT series.

        Let’s dive straight into the most prominent news across the IoT landscape from the last month.

      • Why Ubuntu 22.04 is so fast (and how to make it faster)

        If you’ve upgraded to Ubuntu 22.04 then you probably noticed how smooth the GNOME experience is. If you haven’t noticed then try comparing it to an older Ubuntu release or even the latest Fedora. The main enhancement responsible for this is the introduction of triple buffering in Ubuntu.

      • UbuntuBest practices to publish open-source software operators | Ubuntu

        Running or operating applications requires several tasks throughout their lifecycle: scaling instances, checking the health, integrating with other applications, running backups, and applying updates – to name a few examples. It’s a time and labour-intensive process. To automate these tasks, developers can implement scripts for repeated execution. This is where the software operator comes in. Software operators are a design pattern, a proven and acknowledged approach by the software community. Software operators lift automation to a new level. They don’t only automate the deployment of application workloads, they also encode the expertise required to manage and operate them. In other words, they offer a secure and reliable way to operate applications.

        [...]

        Canonical has developed Juju and the Charmed Operator SDK to develop and run operators in an open-source way. Operators written to run on Juju are called Charmed Operators, or Charms for short. Developers can publish their operators on our app store: Charmhub.

    • Mobile Systems/Mobile Applications

      • Linux GizmosAndroid TV boxes feature Amlogic SoCs and support Android 11.0

        The Tanix X4 and the TX8 Pro are two TV Box devices powered by Amlogic’s SoCs recently launched in the market. Both devices offer similar features including 4K resolution, ethernet and Wi-Fi/Bluetooth connectivity.

        The Tanix X4 TV Box features the Amlogic S905X4 SoC which combines an ARM-G31 MP2 GPU and a quad-core ARM-A55 processor (up to 2.0GHz). Similarly, the TX8 Pro accommodates the Amlogic S905W2 chipset featuring the same GPU (Mali-G31 MP2) along with a quad-core Cortex-A35 processor (up to 1.8GHz).€ 

  • Free, Libre, and Open Source Software

    • Web Browsers

      • Chromium

        • PC WorldGoogle removes malicious Chrome extensions with 1.4 million users

          Extensions hijacking browsers in order to plaster the web with even more ads is nothing new. It’s the fact that these extensions appeared on the Chrome Web Store, ostensibly with Google’s seal of approval, that allowed them to affect such a wide array of users. You can admonish users for being careless all you want, but if Google hosts the extensions and presents them directly to users, the company bears some of the responsibility. But initial testing and scans can only do so much, especially when popular extensions can be sold to less-scrupulous new owners.

    • Standards/Consortia

      • PC WorldUSB4 leaps ahead of Thunderbolt with 80Gbps standard

        The USB Promoter Group announced USB4 Version 2.0 on Thursday, a specification that will allow for up to 80Gbps to be transferred over the USB-C connector that is commonly in use on PCs and smartphones. The standard will be backwards compatible with USB4 Version 1.0, USB 3.2, USB 2.0, and Thunderbolt 3 — but not USB 1.0 or Thunderbolt 4.

        The USB Promoter Group said that the new standard will be published in November, meaning the first products should debut sometime thereafter.

  • Leftovers

    • India TimesSmartphone app accurately detects Covid infection in people's voices

      Its overall accuracy was 89 per cent, its ability to correctly detect positive cases was 89 per cent, and its ability to correctly identify negative cases was 83 per cent.

    • Rolling Stone‘These Kids Are Dying’ — Inside the Overdose Crisis Sweeping Fort Bragg

      Disney’s memorial service was in July. “We were getting ready to go into the chapel,” Bowman says, and Maj. Gen. Chris Donahue, the commander of the 82nd Airborne Division, came into the room and personally informed her that the results of a toxicology report were in. The cause of death was acute fentanyl intoxication.

      [...]

      A staggering total of 109 soldiers assigned to Fort Bragg, active and reserve, lost their lives in 2020 and 2021, casualty reports obtained through the Freedom of Information Act show. Only four of the deaths occurred in overseas combat operations. All the rest took place stateside. Fewer than 20 were from natural causes. All the rest were preventable. This is a seemingly unprecedented wave of fatalities on a modern U.S. military installation.

    • Hardware

      • HackadayGP2040: A Configurable Game Pad Firmware

        [feralAI] and fellow GitHub contributors present for your viewing pleasure GP2040: an open source game pad firmware for RP2040-based hardware. The dual-core RP2040 is a good platform to use for gaming inputs, as there is plenty of CPU grunt to get sub-1 ms USB polling time, regardless of any other tasks the controller may be performing. Currently the firmware supports PC, Android, RPi, Nintendo Switch, PS3, PS4 (legacy mode), and the sweet MiSTer FPGA-based retro-gaming platform.

      • HackadayThis Vintage Alphanumeric Display Was Huge, Hot, Heavy, And Expensive

        It’s easy to take display technology for granted nowadays, but the ability to display data in a human-readable way was not always easy. This is demonstrated well by the Pinlite 30003 Alphanumeric Display Module, a four-character display that was pure luxury for its time.

      • HackadayMagnetic Maniac Manages Mangled Memory

        Ahh, floppy disks. Few things carry nostalgia quite like a floppy — either 3 1⁄2 or 5 1⁄4, depending on which generation of hacker you happen to be. (And yes, we hear you grey-beards, 8-inch floppies were definitely a thing.) The real goodies aren’t the floppies themselves, but what they carried, like Wolfenstein 3d, Commander Keen, DOS, or any number of other classics from the past. Unfortunately a bunch of floppy disks these aren’t carrying anything anymore, as bit rot eventually catches up with them. Even worse, on some trashed floppies, a format operation fails, too. Surely, these floppies are destined for the trash, right?

      • Hackaday2022 Cyberdeck Contest: The Black Beast Will Help You Survive A Robot Apocalypse

        With AI systems getting smarter every day, one might wonder if they might someday evolve into a sentient Skynet-like system and try to take over the world. We’re not sure how close we are to such a situation, but we do know that if the robot apocalypse were to happen, we would want to stay close to [LordOfAllThings], who would likely be carrying the Black Beast. This scary-sounding machine is in essence a Raspberry Pi-based portable computer built inside an outdoor carrying case, with a wide range of unusual peripherals that make it the digital equivalent of a Swiss army knife. In other words, it’s a cyberdeck built for end times — and whatever comes after.

      • HackadayThe 7805 Is Dead! Long Live The 7805!

        The 78XX series of regulators are very handy to use. If you need, say, a 5V regulator, you grab a 7805, add a capacitor for stability, and send in enough voltage for the regulator to work with. Cheap and easy. However, the part is not without its faults.

    • Health/Nutrition/Agriculture

    • Proprietary

    • Security

      • Krebs On SecurityViolence-as-a-Service: Brickings, Firebombings & Shootings for Hire

        A 21-year-old New Jersey man has been arrested and charged with stalking in connection with a federal investigation into groups of cybercriminals who are settling scores by hiring people to carry out physical attacks on their rivals. Prosecutors say the defendant recently participated in several of these schemes — including firing a handgun into a Pennsylvania home and torching a residence in another part of the state with a Molotov Cocktail.

      • Privacy/Surveillance

        • [Old] CPO MagClass Action Lawsuit Accuses Oracle of “Global Surveillance,” Creating Detailed Profiles of Five Billion People

          A class action lawsuit is accusing Oracle of conducting global surveillance, essentially attempting to create detailed shopping and spending profiles of the world’s entire population.

          The suit accuses Oracle of creating profiles for five billion people worldwide, attaching things like purchase records and GPS locations to their name and contact information. While social media platforms usually dominate the conversation about global surveillance, the Oracle Data Marketplace and the company’s BlueKai service have quietly become one of the world’s largest sources of the sort of personal information that “data brokers” sell for targeted advertising purposes.

        • [Old] PC MagClass-Action Lawsuit Accuses Oracle of Tracking 5 Billion People

          This claim is backed up by a video on the ICCL website(Opens in a new window) of Oracle CEO Larry Ellison describing how the company's real-time machine learning system collects this information and confirms the 5 billion profiles stored in the "Oracle Data Cloud." The profiles are referred to as a "Consumers Identity Graph."

        • [Old] Extreme TechOracle Faces Class-Action Lawsuit Over Tracking 5 Billion People

          The filing claims that Oracle has created “proxies” for sensitive data that other data brokers and advertisers have agreed not to track. Case in point, Facebook made it more difficult to target users based on race in certain advertising categories several years ago, but Oracle’s Identity Graph helped advertisers achieve the same results. It did this without acquiring any user consent, and even common sense measures like blocking third-party cookies are not enough to stop Oracle’s sophisticated data collection.

        • [Old] Irish Council for Civil LibertiesClass action against Oracle’s worldwide surveillance machine

          Oracle’s dossiers about people include names, home addresses, emails, purchases online and in the real world, physical movements in the real world, income, interests and political views, and a detailed account of online activity: [4] for example, one Oracle database included a record of a German man who used a prepaid debit card to place a €10 bet on an esports betting site.[5]

          Oracle also coordinates a global trade in dossiers about people through the Oracle Data Marketplace.

        • Associated PressTech tool offers police ‘mass surveillance on a budget’

          Sold by Virginia-based Fog Data Science LLC, Fog Reveal has been used since at least 2018 in criminal investigations ranging from the murder of a nurse in Arkansas to tracing the movements of a potential participant in the Jan. 6 insurrection at the Capitol. The tool is rarely, if ever, mentioned in court records, something that defense attorneys say makes it harder for them to properly defend their clients in cases in which the technology was used.

          The company was developed by two former high-ranking Department of Homeland Security officials under former President George W. Bush. It relies on advertising identification numbers, which Fog officials say are culled from popular cellphone apps such as Waze, Starbucks and hundreds of others that target ads based on a person’s movements and interests, according to police emails. That information is then sold to companies like Fog.

    • Defence/Aggression

      • JNSThe BBC’s perfectly sealed thought system

        Deech, a former Oxford University law lecturer, wrote that “it is absolutely unacceptable to respond to comments with murder or violence,” and that Atwan’s comments “could amount to glorifying terrorism,” a crime under English law.

        The BBC dismissed her complaint, insisting that inviting Atwan to comment was “editorially justified” and that “if extreme views are expressed on the BBC we would always seek to challenge them.”

      • The Jewish ChroniclePeer attacks BBC for 'glorifying terrorism'

        The BBC has refused to back down after a former Governor of the corporation said its coverage of the Salman Rushdie attack “could amount to glorifying terrorism”, the JC can reveal.

        Baroness Ruth Deech, a crossbench peer, wrote to Director General Tim Davie after a British-Palestinian commentator appeared to express sympathy for the Rushdie assailant’s extremism on the BBC News Channel.

      • The Jewish ChronicleIn full: Baroness Deech's letter to the BBC

        It was wrong for the BBC to have given him this airtime. His comments about Rushdie could amount to “glorifying terrorism” under the Terrorism Act 2006. It is absolutely unacceptable to respond to Sir Salman’s writing or comments, no matter how offensive they might seem to some, with murder or violence, and any attempt to explain or justify violence committed against him should be challenged vigorously, not least by the presenter. No direct challenge was made on the programme when Mr Atwan spoke about this topic.

      • Frontpage MagazineHorror of Love Jihad Strikes India Again

        The liberal ecosystem within India is not dissimilar to the United States or other western theaters which are remarkably easy to buckle under cries of 'Islamophobia' if suspects, assailants, perpetrators of any crime happen to be Muslim.

        Despite its pluralism, and the fact that the majority religion (Hinduism) lives peacefully with the minority religions of Islam and Christianity, there are frequently shrill cries from media, academia and the chattering classes whenever any aspect of Hindu culture is seen to usurp Islamic hegemony.

    • Environment

      • Energy

        • HackadayHackaday Prize 2022: Drying Clothes With Ultrasound

          Clothes dryers are great, and a key part of modern life, but they do use a lot of energy. [Mike Rigsby] decided to see if there was a more efficient method of drying clothes that could compete with resistive heating for efficiency. Thus, he started work on an ultrasonic clothes dryer.

      • Wildlife/Nature

        • Counter PunchAnimal Welfare in the Bible

          So I decided to ask some Christian activists, scholars, and theologians — who are concerned with animal ethics — whether they thought the Old Testament had more to say on the subject than the New Testament, and whether they viewed this as a problem. Here’s what they said.

        • Counter PunchHow to Green Our Parched Farmlands and Finance Critical Infrastructure

          There are, however, other ways to finance these essential projects. “A work-around,” says Tucker, “is so-called off-balance sheet money creation.” That was the approach taken in the 1930s, when commercial banks were bankrupt and the country faced its worst-ever economic depression; yet the government succeeded in building infrastructure as never before.

    • AstroTurf/Lobbying/Politics

      • The VergeGoogle put Parler’s app back in the Play Store

        Parler, which advertises itself as a platform for free speech, agreed to moderate posts that show up in the Play Store app, according to a Bloomberg report. The company previously told The Verge that it has a similar deal that allows it to remain on the App Store — “Anything allowed on the Parler network but not in the iOS app will remain accessible through our web-based and Android versions.” (The Android version was, at the time, available via side-loading and therefore did not have to conform to Google Play policies.) The company also said that its algorithm could detect violent content that violates its guidelines.

      • The VergeTwitter had a new plan to fight extremism — then Elon arrived

        Instead, researchers hoped to identify people who were about to engage with harmful tweets, and nudge them toward healthier content using pop-up messages and interstitials. “The pilot will allow Twitter to identify and leverage behavioral — rather than content — signals and reach users at risk from harm with redirection to supportive content and services,” read an internal project brief, viewed by The Verge.

        Twitter researchers partnered with Moonshot, a company that specializes in studying violent extremists, and kicked off a project called Redirect, modeled after work that Google and Facebook had done to curb the spread of harmful communities. At Google, this work had resulted in a sophisticated campaign to target people searching for extremist content with ads and YouTube videos aimed at debunking extremist messaging. Twitter planned to do the same.

      • The VergeTwitter’s edit button is a big test for the platform’s future

        Whether Twitter should have an edit button is still a fun and controversial debate. Will some users abuse the feature, creating (or manufacturing) viral tweets and then changing them to something problematic that lots of users see? You betcha. Do most people want an edit button to do totally valid, normal, platform-improving things? Yep. Can Twitter do enough to track and mitigate the abuse, so that the vast majority of users — who just want to correct typos, re-phrase things that are being misinterpreted, and update their tweets as things change — can use it for its intended purpose? That’s the real question.

      • Counter PunchWhy Gorbachev Was One of the Greatest Failures in History

        A myth has since grown up that the Soviet Union was in a state of collapse when Gorbachev took the helm, but this is not correct. It was politically and economically dead in the water, but it was not falling apart and the Government faced no serious challenge to its authority. It might have continued in this semi-moribund state for decades – like the Ottoman Empire in the 19th century – if its leadership had so wished.

      • Counter PunchGorbachev Rode the Tiger and Ended Up Inside It

        This destructive process of sweeping away all the institutions of state socialism via radical privatization did not give birth to the free market capitalism that the ideologues of the IMF and their Russian acolytes desired. Instead, it gave way to a system where privatized assets passed into a few hands that had mastered the system of pirate capitalism.

      • Counter PunchWhere Does Russia Receive Its Aid From?

        Even most of Russia’s key post-Soviet allies belonging to its international organizations, the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) and the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), have avoided supporting Moscow. Kazakhstan, for example, a member of both institutions, took steps in July to begin exporting its oil across the Caspian Sea, bypassing Russian-controlled oil pipelines. This directly undermines the Kremlin’s strategy of restricting oil to Europe to compromise the region’s energy security. The key exception among post-Soviet states has been Belarus. Over the last decade, President Alexander Lukashenko has steered Belarus further into Russia’s orbit. Enticed by cheap Russian oil and gas and lucrative transit fees as both these commodities continue on to Europe, Lukashenko has also increasingly relied on Russian security forces to enforce his rule—notably evident during the 2020 Belarusian protests

      • TruthOutBiden Adviser's Lobbying Firm Is Undermining Democratic Party Priorities
      • Counter PunchThe Story of Ted Hall, the Atomic Spay

        Joseph Allbright and Marcia Kunstel, former Moscow correspondents and authors of the book on Ted Hall, Bombshell (1997), appear on numerous occasions in the film to offer expert historical commentary on the Hall narrative. Photos of Hiroshima and an interview with the pilot of Enola Gay, Paul Tibbets, provide historical evidence of the nuclear devastation that Ted Hall helped create and wished to end. Well-chosen music evokes past events.

      • Common DreamsTrump Calls Biden 'Enemy of the State' in 'Fully Unhinged' Speech

        "What Trump did by calling Biden an 'enemy of the state' to his poorly educated crowd is literally threatening the president."

      • Common DreamsWashington Post Ripped for 'Neocolonial' Editorial Against Chile's New Constitution

        "Green or not, energy for the North continues to trump democracy in the South."

      • TruthOutAntiwar Activists Decry Saudi Arabia's "Sportswashing" Golf Tournament
    • Censorship/Free Speech

      • GannettOn Salman Rushdie: Reading and speaking to thwart those who would silence us

        Purchasing the book and using it as a prop at my commencement was an act of resistance to censorship and terrorism, for sure; yet it was amusing that, like most of those threatening or criticizing Rushdie, I had not read the book, either.

      • The VergeCloudflare blocks Kiwi Farms due to an ‘immediate threat to human life’

        Concerns about Kiwi Farms grew after transgender YouTuber and Twitch streamer, Clara Sorrenti (Keffals), had been targeted by a dangerous harassment campaign by users from the site. Last month, Kiwi Farms users waged a swatting attack against Sorrenti, otherwise known as the act of providing a false tip to police that someone’s planning on carrying out a violent crime, resulting in police swarming the victim’s home.

        Sorrenti later went into hiding and started a #DropKiwifarms campaign that urged Cloudflare to stop serving Kiwi Farms. Users across Twitter shared the hashtag, also with some revealing the harassment they’ve experienced at the hand of Kiwi Farms’ users.

      • CloudflareBlocking Kiwifarms

        We have blocked Kiwifarms. Visitors to any of the Kiwifarms sites that use any of Cloudflare's services will see a Cloudflare block page and a link to this post. Kiwifarms may move their sites to other providers and, in doing so, come back online, but we have taken steps to block their content from being accessed through our infrastructure.

        This is an extraordinary decision for us to make and, given Cloudflare's role as an Internet infrastructure provider, a dangerous one that we are not comfortable with. However, the rhetoric on the Kiwifarms site and specific, targeted threats have escalated over the last 48 hours to the point that we believe there is an unprecedented emergency and immediate threat to human life unlike we have previously seen from Kiwifarms or any other customer before.

      • ScheerpostThe Chris Hedges Report: Ukraine and the Crisis of Media Censorship

        Throughout the Ukraine war, Western news outlets have mindlessly parroted the opinions of a ruling elite and overseen a public discourse that is often unhinged from the real world. 

    • Civil Rights/Policing

      • NBCSaudi Arabia investigates video of men attacking orphaned women and girls

        ALQST, a British-based rights group which focuses on Saudi Arabia, said in a statement that the attack was a retaliation against women staging a sit-in and strike over living conditions inside the facility.

      • Helsinki TimesTelework still largely regulated at company level in Europe

        Access to telework and working arrangements when working from home are still largely determined at company level in most EU Member States, with just France, Lithuania and Portugal currently enshrining the right to request telework in legislation. While some common ground exists, there are varying standards and practices in place with regards to telework in the EU, which can be regulated through legislation or collective agreements.

      • European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working ConditionsTelework in the EU: Regulatory frameworks and recent updates

        Ten countries adopted new regulation on telework since the beginning of the pandemic, underlining the importance of further developing capacity building for social dialogue. In Member States with a relatively weak culture of social dialogue, implementing national-level regulation at company level and protecting employees teleworking is especially challenging.

        A significant number of collective agreements on telework were introduced during the pandemic at company and sectoral levels, particularly in sectors with existing arrangements, such as in financial services, manufacturing and information and communications. New agreements were developed in the public services and administration, education, and health and social work activities sectors, highlighting how telework is fast becoming an established way of work organisation across the EU.

      • The Telegraph UKSharia law returns to Afghanistan as Taliban confirms public whippings

        The Taliban has been enforcing Sharia law for a while since seizing power by ousting the government last summer.

        However, although there have been unconfirmed reports of similar punishments being carried out elsewhere in the country, this is the first time the Taliban has officially said public whippings are being used.

        It came just days after Mawlawi Hibatullah Akhundzada, the Taliban’s leader, ordered all existing laws to be scrapped and submitted a series of six new articles for how the country should be governed in accordance with Sharia law.

      • Common DreamsOpinion | 'Water Is Dignity,' Say Jackson, Mississippi Activists as Crisis Continues

        As of September 2, the vast majority of the residents of the city of Jackson, Mississippi—over 150,000—still have no access to safe drinking water. The Jackson water crisis began on August 30 when flooding caused the pumps at the main water treatment facility, O.B. Curtis, to fail. This left most residents without clean water and many with no water at all due to low water pressure. Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves warned residents on August 31, “Do not drink the water from the pipes if you can avoid it.”€ 

      • Common DreamsOpinion | America Needs a Civic Group to Oppose a Cashless Society

        The most perceptive ancient historians and philosophers could not have foreseen a time when a certain type of mass convenience and abundance becomes a threat to democracy, justice and dispersed power. Welcome to the incarcerations of the credit card payment systems Gulag and the corporate state’s drive to stop consumers from paying with cash.

      • Counter PunchHow About a Civic Group to Oppose a Cashless Society?

        If you are in the lower 20% of the income scale, unbanked and outside the Gulag, consumer protections are really weak. Rip-off practices such as pay-day loan rackets and check cashing gouges proliferate.

      • Counter PunchBy Refusing to Prioritize Drivers’ Safety, UPS Risks Major Strike

        It’s not just cookies and steaks that are baking in the trucks. Drivers are collapsing and dying from the extreme temperatures.

      • Counter PunchLabor Day: Unions Have a Stake in Ending Minority Rule in the United States

        The assault on labor has contributed greatly to soaring income inequality and stagnant living standards for workers in the United States. From 1979 to 2019, productivity (the income generated from an hour of labor) has grown by 60 percent; yet the typical worker’s real (inflation-adjusted) compensation rose by just 14 percent. But wages used to rise with productivity: from 1948 to 1979, productivity rose by 118 percent, and real compensation increased by 108 percent.

      • Counter PunchAmerica's New Moment of Labor Mobilization

        It comes on the back of a wave of successful efforts to mobilize at Starbucks and Amazon. The growth of unionized stores at Starbucks in particular has been stunning. Since baristas in Buffalo, New York, became the first at the chain to unionize in December 2021, colleagues at a further 234 outlets have followed suit in recent months.

      • TruthOutOn Labor Day, Let's Celebrate 2022 as a Pivotal Year for Independent Unions
      • Common Dreams'We'll Come Back Stronger,' Vows Chilean Left After Plebiscite Loss

        "We resisted for 500 years and will continue to do so."

    • Monopolies

  • Gemini* and Gopher

    • Personal

      • Summer Retrospective

        Summer is coming to an end. The temperatures are dropping below 30€°C. To think that when I was young we expected a few days only of 30€°C and more. Summer is coming to an end and my summer break is coming to and end at the end of September. As always, the prospect of going back to work is not very enticing. I’m looking forward to a future were we mostly entertain each other and the basic necessities of life are free.

    • Technical

      • Dream XI



        I got a new computer.

        It looked strange.

        There was a detachable screen. And a leather seat. One that you could find in a car.

        On the left side of the leather seat, was an embedded keyboard, on the right, a touchpad. They had the same leather finish as the rest of the seat.

        It felt like sitting in a car. But it wasn't a car. It was a computer. The screen hovered in front of me. It had no mounting point or base to rest on. It moved along with my head. The keyboard was nice and easy to use.


* Gemini (Primer) links can be opened using Gemini software. It's like the World Wide Web but a lot lighter.



<

Recent Techrights' Posts

The Brand 'Watsonx' is a Terrible Name for IBM 'Hey Hi' (Chatbots) Because Watson Agreed With Adolf Hitler
Almost a century has passed and IBM still believes that selling "intelligence", chatbots in particular, should be done under the name "Watson"
Digg's Latest Incarnation Already Failed, It's Infested With LLM Slop
Many submissions go to slopfarms and some get summarised by slop
Microsoft-Controlled Media With Embargo and Press Operatives
This won't be the last example of media manipulation for narrative control or face-saving "damage control"
EPO "Cocaine Communication Manager" - Part III - It's in His Eyes
Workers are free to draw their own conclusions
Former Debian Project Leader Branden Robinson Cautions Against Cover-up and Censorship in Debian
Debian drama. Again.
 
GNU/Linux Grew a Lot in Nicaragua
We've not noticed until today
Techrights Has Over 1,000 Good Articles 'in the Tank'
Drafts, notes, and lengthy documents
New Article Challenges Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) for Choosing the Wrong SLAPP Cases to Investigate
The one point we can agree on is that SRA does not know how to correctly select the worst culprits/offenders
Why IBM is Still Scary and Dangerous
Keep a distance from "Big Blue" Bully
Measuring the Growth of Our Mission and Community
Something between experiment and prototype
Richard Stallman in the United States - Part III - Georgia Tech Did a Fine Job Upholding Free Speech Principles
The real problem was social control media (toxic)
Debian's Master is Deleting Criticism of SystemD and Other Things (On-Topic and Published by Debian Developers), Resorts to the Excuse Messages Are "Too Long"
Censorship serves nobody except the masters that control this censorship
Gemini Links 21/02/2026: Veganism and DeskPi RackMate T0
Links for the day
On The Web, XBox Already a Dying Breed
Down to about 0.05% on large machines, based on statCounter [...] Microsoft will never publicly admit or say how many billions it lost on the XBox
2026 a Year of 'Top-Down' Microsoft Layoffs (Management First)
Stay tuned for what comes next
Your "Likes" Aren't Yours and They're Mostly "Worthless Clicks"
Social hermits are not popular, irrespective of how many "Facebook friends" or "likes" they get
Waggener Edstrom/Frank Shaw Lied, There Are Definitely Microsoft Layoffs
Microsoft never issued a formal statement, it made allusions by proxy
Slop Hype Makes Our Core Technology Less Reliable and Far Less Resilient (We Pay for the Catastrophe That Follows)
Only slop-free projects can be trusted
Going for 1,000 (Days of Uptime)
universal records are vastly better
Firefox is No-Go in China, Not Even 1% "Market Share" Anymore
Given Mozilla's utterly rubbish marketing these days (politics over technical aspects), set aside the cheerleading for slop, there's hardly a chance of Mozilla Firefox reaching or exceeding 10% again
Links 21/02/2026: Tensions Over Iran and Illegal Cheeto Tariffs, Presidential Approval Sags
Links for the day
Links 21/02/2026: "Moving Away From Cloudflare", Many Layoffs or Shutdowns in Games (Including XBox/Microsoft)
Links for the day
GNU Linux-libre is a Grown-Up Today
"before that, every distro that wanted to respect its users' freedom had to remove itself all of the binary blobs that were distributed as part of the kernel Linux's so-called sources"
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, February 20, 2026
IRC logs for Friday, February 20, 2026
Gemini Links 21/02/2026: "The Evil of Action" and Slop Bots Causing Great Harm Online (Not Just the Web)
Links for the day
Like a Shell
Overreactions can backfire
Not Only Leaders of XBox Got Sacked (Layoffs)
Phil Spencer and Sarah Bond got laid off
9PM on a Friday Night: Microsoft Says the Layoffs Are Not Layoffs
We've said for a long time that XBox is doomed this year
Gemini Links 20/02/2026: Misfin Server and Magic in Programming
Links for the day
analytics.usa.gov Reckons Windows "Market Share" Fell to Just 38%, Vista 11 Not Even a Third of Windows Users
This coming summer Vista 11 turns 5
The New Digg.com is Slop
Slop "summaries" and Serial Sloppers are drowning out the site with fake 'articles' (plagiarism)
Linus Torvalds: Bill Epsteingate Good Enough for Me to Wine and Dine With
Torvalds is more connected to Jeffrey Epstein than Richard Stallman ever was
Our Uptimes Are Always Better Than Any Site That Uses Clownflare
Clownflare as a company operates like a cult
GNU/Linux Apparently Rose to 6% in Uzbekistan
If accurate, this represents a new problem for Microsoft and a big win for Software Freedom
Sponsored Videos and 'Articles' in The Register MS, Stenography as a Service/Product
They should more accurately label these actors
It's Friday Again and Many People Leave IBM for Good (IBM Should be Reported for Illegal NDAs That Hide Layoffs)
we very seldom see anyone deviating a lot from the "template-like" narrative, let alone mentioning "layoffs" or "RA" or some other term that implies non-consensual departure
The Little Clique of Sloppers/Spammers About "Linux" Got Even Smaller
Thankfully there are still genuine and legit GNU/Linux sites out there
Links 20/02/2026: Microsoft Intentionally Kills Older Hardware, "The Story of XBox" Shows How Defective Microsoft Hardware Really Was
Links for the day
Turkmenistan One of Many Countries Where Microsoft Fell to Distant Third in Search
We expect many layoffs in Bing some time soon
Don't Wait for "Red Hat Layoffs" Because After Bluewashing They're IBM RAs and Don't Wait for "IBM Layoffs" Because They're Perpetual
IBM layoffs are silent and "forever" (small trickle that never ends and is widespread - after all IBM is a very global and ubiquitous firm)
Links 20/02/2026: Standards, Science, and Politics
Links for the day
What Do People Ever Buy From Microsoft Anyway (Not PCs)?
Microsoft sells two things these days: 1) vapourware/promises. 2) its stock.
Gemini Links 20/02/2026: "Mainstream Unix, Underground Unix", Slop Staging DDoS Attacks Against Small Sites
Links for the day
IBM Inclusivity: Red Hat Summit is for Rich Sponsors Like Microsoft and Rich Guests Who Pay $500 a Day
Nothing signals societal tolerance more than paying a large military contractor
GNU/Linux Adoption is Higher in Richer Countries
Is it because freedom is actually expensive - something that only privileged people can pursue?
Links 20/02/2026: Windows TCO Versus Deutsche Bahn, Europe Seeks More Independent Digital Future
Links for the day
IBM, Red Hat and Fedora: Don't Say "Master", It Offends People. Also IBM, Red Hat and Fedora: "Master Podman".
The hypocrisy at Red Hat and Fedora shows no boundaries
IBM Layoffs Aren't Just in IBM 'Proper'
Who is still using Lotus after the HCL move?
The Register MS Gets Paid by Gartner to Promote a Ponzi Scheme for Gartner, Microsoft, and Others
The credibility of that site will suffer because it tries to sell a major scam to its audience
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, February 19, 2026
IRC logs for Thursday, February 19, 2026
Gemini Links 19/02/2026: "Towards a Gemini Famicom Resource" and Dumping Microsoft
Links for the day
IBM Behaves Like a Company Looking for Loose Change Between Sofa Cushions
Chasing laid-off workers for dollars and even pennies, making excuses and devising loopholes (such as PIPs) to flout severance obligations
Microsoft Found Another Bailout Opportunity: Killing People
Good thing that Nadella is not racist!
No "Smart Mobs" (Social Control Media) in BRIC?
It looks like the "Social" "Media" sites tracked by statCounter see little from (or of) BRIC, and moreover it is declining fast
The Few Slopfarms We Saw Today
The sentiment has changed a lot
Links 19/02/2026: Protecting Framework Laptop 13, Hardware Drive Shortages
Links for the day
In Africa's Second-Largest Nation, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Opera 10 Times Bigger Than Firefox (and GNU/Linux Now at 5%)
This will become an accessibility problem
Links 19/02/2026: "A.I.pocalypse" Inevitable and "Butlers to LLMs"
Links for the day
An Inherently Royal (Monarchs') Legal System Where Size Matters (Big Capital Eats the Small)
This reinforces the notion that justice is only for those who can afford it
These Statistics Should Keep Microsoft Shareholders Awake at Night
Windows is, in general (all versions collectively), declining over time
Economic Failure and Other Harsh Realities Have Nothing to Do With Slop 'Innovation'
Advanced propaganda, not advanced 'AI' [...] They attack workers while insulting their intelligence
Spaniards Shutting Down MElon's Digital Weapon of "Smart Mobs"
Are the Spanish people already acting based on gut feeling and shunning/shutting out the provocation vector?
Bitcoin: government engagement contradictions
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Richard Stallman in the United States - Part II - "Haters Gonna Hate"
we shall carry on with this series at the right pace
Typical! Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) Tells Victims of Fraud to Wait 10 Weeks
justice delayed is justice denied
EPO Union Leaders in Rijswijk Explain Where EPO Strikes Stand and How to Prepare for Next Week's
We have some revelations to share in a few days
statCounter: Only One in 350 Iranians Would Use Microsoft for Web Search
Microsoft is trying to fake "demand"
Slides Shown a Week Ago by the EPO's Staff Committee Ahead of the Second Very Large Strike
This coming weekend we'll drop a 'bombshell' of sorts
EPO "Cocaine Communication Manager" - Part II - Illegal Drug Addicts Mobbing the Wrong People, This Will Definitely Backfire
This year may well be the last year of Team Campinos. Nobody will hire them after that.
Mass Layoffs (But Silent Layoffs) Still Happening in IBM, You Need Only Look Closely (There Are NDAs, PIPs, 'Early Retirement' Sweeteners and IBM - Like Microsoft - Skirts the WARN Act)
the layoffs are definitely happening
Microsoft's "AI CEO" (Slop Propagandist) is Projecting, Many Microsoft "Jobs to be Replaced With All-Indian Low-Paid Staff in 12 Months"
Windows is perishing
Very Little Slop
We are not finding much slop anymore
Links 19/02/2026: Illegal Kangaroo Court for Patents Attracts Aggressive Firms, Public Domain Review Grows
Links for the day
Gemini Links 19/02/2026: Taxing the Rich, Raspberry Pi 4 Tinkering
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, February 18, 2026
IRC logs for Wednesday, February 18, 2026