Open-source News

EmulationStation Desktop Edition 2.0 is out now | GamingOnLinux  GamingOnLinux

Mask of the Rose set to release on June 8th  GamingOnLinux

Samuel Pitoiset of Valve's Linux graphics driver team has landed another Radeon Vulkan "RADV" driver improvement today for Mesa 23.1-devel to further along its VKD3D-Proton capabilities for enjoying Windows Direct3D 12 games on Linux with Steam Play...

Best free remote desktop software 2023  IT PRO

How to Run a Large Language Model on Your Raspberry Pi  MUO - MakeUseOf

Red Hat developer David Airlie has shown off the progress being made on bringing up not only the open-source Mesa NVIDIA Vulkan driver "NVK" but doing so while making use of the NVIDIA GPU System Processor (GSP) firmware that ultimately is needed for being able to deliver better open-source driver support and performance...

Asahi Linux developer Asahi Lina has posted an update on the ongoing work bringing up their Rust-written DRM kernel driver along with the AGX Gallium3D Mesa OpenGL driver as well as progress towards the in-development Vulkan driver too...

Asahi Linux Continues Making Progress On Apple Silicon Graphics ...  Phoronix

BeyondEdge Joins the Linux Foundation and SONiC  PR Newswire

New ShellBot DDoS Malware Variants Targeting Poorly Managed Linux Servers  The Hacker News

Effortlessly Save Your Linux Desktop Settings with SaveDesktop  It's FOSS News

Besides the ongoing work around the reverse-engineered Apple Silicon graphics driver being brought up in the Rust programming language, the other notable Rust effort within the Direct Rendering Manager (DRM) kernel subsystem is a rewrite of the basic VGEM driver in this increasingly-used programming language. That Rust VGEM driver has now been sent out on the mailing list for review as part of a request for comments...

Linux VGEM Driver Rewritten In Rust Sent Out For Review  Phoronix

With the Linux 6.3 kernel the Habana Labs AI driver has moved to the new "accel" accelerator subsystem/framework while for the Linux 6.4 cycle this summer this Intel driver is continuing to speed ahead as it prepares support for the new Gaudi2 AI hardware and making other improvements for this open-source training/inference stack...

Intel's Habana Labs Accelerator Driver Readying More Gaudi2 ...  Phoronix

Big Ambitions drops Native Linux support shortly after the Steam release  GamingOnLinux

Trisquel 11 is now available as the latest major release for this one of a few Free Software Foundation (FSF) approved Linux distributions that is "100% libre" and meets all of the fully free software requirements. Trisquel 11 is re-based against Ubuntu 22.04 LTS while making various other changes in the process...

Trisquel 11 LTS Released As Ubuntu-Based, FSF-Approved Linux ...  Phoronix

Labwc 0.6.2 was released on Monday as the newest version of this wlroots-based window-stacking Wayland compositor that is inspired by Openbox...

A 5-minute tour of the Fediverse murph Tue, 03/21/2023 - 03:00

People want to communicate over the internet as easily as they do in real life, with similar protections but, potentially, farther reach. In other words, people want to be able to chat with a group of other people who aren't physically in the same location, and still maintain some control over who claims ownership of the conversation. In today's world, of course, a lot of companies have a lot to say about who owns the data you send back and forth over the world wide web. Most companies seem to feel they have the right to govern the way you communicate, how many people your message reaches, and so on. Open source, luckily, doesn't need to own your social life, and so appropriately it's open source developers who are delivering a social network that belongs, first and foremost, to you.

The "Fediverse" (a portmanteau of "federated" and "universe") is a collection of protocols, servers, and users. Together, these form networks that can communicate with one another. Users can exchange short messages, blog-style posts, music, and videos over these networks. Content you post is federated, meaning that once one network is aware of your content, it can pass that content to another network, which passes it to another, and so on.

Most platforms are run by a single company or organization, a single silo where your data is trapped. The only way to share with others is to have them join that service.

Federation allows users of different services to inter-operate with one another without creating an account for each shared resource.

Admins for each service instance can block other instances in case of egregious issues. Users can likewise block users or entire instances to improve their own experience.

Examples of Fediverse platforms

Mastodon is a Fediverse platform that has gotten a lot of attention lately, and it's focused on microblogging (similar to Twitter). Mastodon is only one component of the Fediverse, though. There's much, much more.

• Microblogging: Mastodon, Pleroma, Misskey
• Blogging: Write.as, Read.as
• Video hosting: Peertube
• Audio hosting: Funkwhale
• Image hosting: Pixelfed
• Link aggregator: Lemmy
• Event planning: mobilizon, gettogether.community

History of the Fediverse

In 2008, Evan Prodromou created a microblogging service called identi.ca using the Ostatus protocol and status.net server software. A few years later, he changed his service to use a new protocol, called pump.io. He released the Ostatus protocol to the Free Software Foundation, where it got incorporated into GNU/social. In this form, the fediverse continued along for several years.

In March 2016, Eugen Rochco (Gargron) created Mastodon, which used GNU/social with an interface similar to a popular Twitter interface called Tweetdeck. This gained some popularity.

Image by:

(Robert Martinez, CC BY-SA)

In 2018, a new protocol called ActivityPub was accepted as a standardized protocol by the W3C. Most Fediverse platforms have adopted it. It was authored by Evan Prodromou, Christine Lemmer-Weber, and others, and it expanded upon the previous services to provide a better and more flexible protocol.

What does the Fediverse look like?

The Fediverse, being made of any application using the ActivityPub protocol, is pretty diverse in appearance. As you might imagine, a microblogging platform has different requirements than a video sharing service.

It can be intimidating to wander into the great unknown, though. Here are some screenshots of my favorite federated services:

The Mastodon web client has a simplified view, as well as the advanced view, the simplified default view shows a single column of the Home feed, with options on the right to view more.

Image by:

(Bob Murphy, CC BY-SA 4.0)

The Advanced Web Interface, shown below, has the home timeline, local timeline, federated timeline, as well as a user's profile. When users first start, the easier one-column view is the default.

Image by:

(Bob Murphy, CC BY-SA 4.0)

Pixelfed has an interface focused around displaying images and videos:

Image by:

(Bob Murphy, CC BY-SA 4.0)

Peertube is for sharing videos:

Image by:

(Bob Murphy, CC BY-SA 4.0)

Mobilizon is an event planning site, with plans for Fediverse integration:

Image by:

(Bob Murphy, CC BY-SA 4.0)

Our favorite resources about open source Git cheat sheet Advanced Linux commands cheat sheet Open source alternatives Free online course: RHEL technical overview Check out more cheat sheets Switch to open source social

Ready to start? Check out fediverse.info for a nice video explanation and a subject-based way to find (self-selected) other users.

Go to fedi.tips for a comprehensive guide on how to get started, how to migrate your data, and more.

Mastodon has several great entry points:

• Joinmastodon.org: The largest list of Mastodon servers
• Joinfediverse.wiki: Great information on different fediverse services and instances
• Fedi.garden: A well-curated list of instances

For help deciding which instance to join (assuming you don't want to spin up your own just yet), visit fediverse.party/en/portal/servers.

Are you a data nerd? Visit the-federation.info for stats, monitoring service, and a data-driven look at the known Fediverse.

Get federated

The Fediverse is a way to use the social media in an individualized way, either by choosing an instance with a community that suits your needs, or running your own server, and making it exactly the way you want. It avoids the advertising, algorithms, and other unpleasantries that plague many social networks.

If you are looking for a community that better suits your needs than the big silos, take a look, the Mastodon and the Fediverse may be a good fit for you. Get federated today.

You can find me at @murph@hackers.town on the Fediverse.

A whirlwind tour of all the connected sites that form the world of open source social networks.

Image by:

Opensource.com

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