Australis13

Forgetting the fact that the US is now run by a fascist regime who is actively targeting minorities and the neurodiverse, even my own government's general advice basically implies that it's not a good idea to travel to the US (our travel advisory has added warnings three times so far this year, despite leaving the overall risk level at Level 1/Green). The list of caveats is so long that I'd need to have an exceptionally good reason for travelling there now. Here's just a sampling of the warnings from the Overview section (yes, there's a much bigger detailed list of advice):

Violent crime is more common in the United States than in Australia. Gun crime is also prevalent. If you live in the United States, learn and practice active shooter drills. Medical costs in the United States are extremely high. You may need to pay up-front for medical assistance. Ensure you have comprehensive travel insurance. Some prescription and over-the-counter medications readily available in Australia are illegal in the United States. Some states have laws restricting access to abortion and other reproductive health care services. Research local laws and consult your doctor before making any decisions about your medical care. There's no federal law that explicitly protects LGBTQIA+ people from discrimination. Some US states and localities have laws that may affect LGBTQIA+ travellers. An approved ESTA or valid visa doesn’t guarantee entry to the United States. US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officials at the port of entry will determine your eligibility. If CBP denies your entry, you may be held at the port of entry or a nearby detention facility while US authorities arrange your return to Australia (or the last country you visited).

See https://www.smartraveller.gov.au/destinations/americas/united-states-america for all the details.

Confirmed: https://www.science.org/content/article/yes-cats-are-liquids-only-one-dimension

You get one dodgy episode and that's all anyone remembers...

Yes, although regular brushing (esp. with a deshedder) and vacuuming helps a lot.

Yes! I have to understand how a process works before I can do it myself.

To all the people who just "give it a go" without knowing exactly what they're doing - I cannot comprehend how you do that.

I've stumbled across a solution: install the Linux Surface project kernel.

I've tested both the mainline kernel provided by Debian and the Linux Surface project and the former consistently produces the error with the keyboard detached. With the Linux Surface kernel it boots successfully regardless. I don't fully understand the mechanism, unfortunately, but this provides a workaround at least.

Thanks - I'm going to have to do a bit more reading to get my head around that. Secure Boot is not my forte!

I think I've found one of your previous posts with the links you were referring to: https://fedia.io/m/linux@lemmy.world/t/113434/UEFI-Secure-Boot-keys-replacement-guide-please-help-sanity-check

And also some more comments here that looked useful: https://lemmy.world/comment/11384715

So based on @j4k3@lemmy.world's advice, I had a look at RHEL and found this:

https://github.com/rhboot/shim/ https://github.com/rhboot/shim/blob/main/SbatLevel_Variable.txt https://github.com/rhboot/shim/blob/main/SBAT.md#uefi-sbat-variable-content

Debian's own shim repo (https://salsa.debian.org/efi-team/shim) seems to derive from this. Shim is apparently the bootloader application that is reporting the error I'm seeing.

Unfortunately still no idea what causes the issue (let alone why it's correlated with the keyboard), but it makes me wonder if somehow the contents of the SbatLevel variable aren't formatted correctly in the absence of the keyboard cover.

More digging required.

Thanks, I will check out those resources and see what I can find.

Something something deflector dish...

That was Jon Pertwee's go-to for technobabble when he was in Doctor Who (although the full line "I've reversed the polarity of the neutron flow" only appears twice, IIRC).

Yeah, that's got my attention too. Definitely going to try them out now since I need an alternative for remote support for family.