Awesome talk by Jay Lacroix:

about his life from a poor boy walking to a payphone in the rain, to call Microsoft to unlock his Laptop - to a Linux sysadmin who uses the time frame for all his certificates as a motivator, because he has ADHD!

Should be a very common issue

KeepassDX + KeepassXC, Android to Linux.

Synced with Syncthing.

I do a change on the password manager on one device and on another, Android killed Syncthing again so now I have 2 files, one called "sync conflict".

Both files have some new change, I need to keep both.

When using the import feature in KeepassXC, I think everything is duplicated. This would be the best place to do this.

Any idea how to merge them or at least show the diffs?

Displaying all entries, without folders, sorted by date, could also already help.

kinda-solution

In KeepassXC, bottom left, "all entries". Alternatively, search for "*".

Then sort by date.

This helps to compare the most recent changes, and copy them over to the want-to-keep version of the file.

This is a combo of 2 tricks.

Based off this german guide, a bit outdated and not suited for the Flatpak

Goal

a signature like

Firstname Lastname
Role
_____
<fancy logo>
Company name
Contact info including website and mail

This is probably really easy in Outlook, and kinda linux-y (bundling together parts that only make sense if you are a programmer) on Thunderbird.

1. The Sandbox

When attaching an image, Thunderbird Flatpak needs to have permanent access to that location.

By default it uses portals, so if you use "attach image" it will use some /run/doc/... folder that is gone after restarting the app.

For some reason, using the KDE Plasma Flatpak settings or Flatseal, granting the app access to a certain location, doesnt work, even if you use the real location of the image.

So instead:

1. Create a directory in the internal Flatpak's folder

mkdir ~/.var/app/org.mozilla.thunderbird/SIGNATURE

2. Copy the attachment image there (company logo etc.)
3. Copy the path to the image (for example in KDE Dolphin, no idea about GNOME)

2. The HTML Signature

Just write a new mail (Ctrl+N) and write exactly your signature in there.

You dont need the

--

As that is automatically inserted below the last line.

Add the picture, but replace the path with the real path, not the /run/doc/... one of the portal.

Then the image is inserted, you can resize it.

Now instead of sending, in the menu under "File" use "Save to..." and instead of .eml use .html.

If you want to add a clickable mail address, in the mail compose toolbar, behind the "picture icon" there is a menu, select the "link" icon.

You can add a normal http/https link there. But using mailto:name@server.com you can make it a clickable mail link!

(Whoever needs that in a mail)

3. Sandbox again.

Save that file to the same ~/.var/app/org.mozilla.thunderbird/SIGNATURE folder.

4. Account settings

Navigate to these settings, in the first page of your account, instead of writing your signature, use "use HTML file".

Select the file or paste the exact ~/.var/app/... location in there, again, dont use the portal.

Done!

Once figured out it makes sense. That directory in the Flatpaks storage will not be deleted or interrupt anything. So this is a clean way.

flatpak remove --delete-data thunderbird would purge that entire folder and all it's contents.

Rasierhobel

Die klassischen Rasierhobel bekommen ein Comeback, und sind mittlerweile "zero waste Klassiker".

Ich habe 2 verschiedene, einen von Gilette, den schönen mit Bambusgriff gibts von verschiedenen Anbietern mit verschiedenen Namen.

Die einfachen mit einer zentralen Schraube sind eventuell haltbarer als die mit einer komplexeren Aufklapp-Mechanik.

Die Schraube sollte man evtl manchmal fetten, da hier ja oft Feuchtigkeit reinkommt. Hier kann man Fahrrad-Lagerfett benutzen, oder einfach irgendetwas.

Die Klingen sind billig, und das Rasieren funktioniert top. Ab und zu tauschen.

Flexible Köpfe und schmalere Rasierer etc sind eventuell bei konkaven Flächen wie Achseln oder Schambereich besser. Da sollte man sich aber oft sowieso nicht rasieren, wenn man Juckreiz vermeiden will ;)

Zungenschaber / -reiniger

Eine neuere Empfehlung sind Zungenschaber aus Edelstahl.

Es gibt verschiedene Modelle, dieses hat einen rechteckigen Blechstreifen, der extrem gut alles von der Zunge schabt.

Es ist krass, was man damit wegbekommt.

Durch das Edelstahl bleibt es lange "scharf" (rechteckig) und lässt sich fast schon steril reinigen.

Es gibt 3 gängige Modelle, aber nur eins taugt etwas.

Die beiden rechten hier sind nur ca. 30% so effektiv, sehen hübsch aus aber sind komplett sinnlos. Man muss sehr viel mehr rumkratzen, absolut nervig!

Ich suche eine Uhr mit folgenden Eigenschaften

• recht klein, angenehm zum schlafen (bin da sehr empfindlich, trage selbst Uhren deswegen kaum)
• akkurate Herzfrequenz/Puls und evtl. Blutdruck
• einfache Technik
• Verbindung zu Smartphone über Bluetooth oder USB-c
• keine Internetfunktion, keine Sorgen
• App sollte komplett ohne Internet gehen
• App sollte ohne Play Services und auf GrapheneOS funktionieren

Optional:

• lange Akkulaufzeit (muss absolut nicht sein)
• andere Features

Verwendung: Schlafqualität messen, anzeigen lassen. Sport und Puls bei Anstrengung ist glaube ich weniger relevant und anfälliger für Fehler.

Quellen

Den Youtube-Kanal "The Quantified Scientist" habe ich gefunden. Ein deutscher Bio-Student, der Smartwatches testet.

Er bewertet die Genauigkeit vieler Uhren sehr genau und wissenschaftlich, jedoch sind ihm die anderen Faktoren ziemlich egal.

Ergebnis

Das Xiaomi Mi Band 8 soll mittlerweile das beste der Serie fürs Sleep Tracking sein.

Zudem scheint mindestens ein Gadgedbrige-Entwickler es zu haben, denn die Xiaomi-Band Unterstützung wurde daran getestet. Gadgetbridge ist eine OpenSource App zur Verbindung mit Smartwatches, und hat sogar wirklich viele coole Funktionen, inklusive Schlaftracking.

Man kann sie sehr günstig kaufen. Die App wird wohl zur ersten Einrichtung benötigt, mal sehen wie invasiv das ist. Ab da geht Gadgetbridge alleine.

Update

Das Mi Band 8 funktioniert super mit Gadgetbridge. Auf der Website wird bald eine aktualisierte Anleitung sein.

Es hat viele coole Funktionen, Schlaftracking ist beim Tiefschlaf okay, erkennt Schlaf aber schnell als zu leicht und damit zu viel REM Schlaf.

Wetter-Synchronisation mit KleineWettervorschau geht auch top! Genauso wie Musik-Steuerung, Handy finden, intelligentes Wecken (wenn der Puls höher ist), stoppuhr, taschenlampe, schrittezähler usw.

Ohne permanenten Druck ist Pulsmessung wohl immer eine Herausforderung, da es mit Licht geht, und das dann beim Verrutschen oft ganz falsche Ergebnisse bringt.

!kaufempfehlungen@feddit.org

Using "rum" and a custom version by "ElementalWarrior" of WINE, compiled yourself.

Should also work in a Distrobox container

A small, efficient laptop

I am looking for a laptop which is as efficient as an android phone, small, fast, and cheap.

I would prefer a stripped down Fedora Kinoite, but tbh ChromeOS is a masterpiece of efficient and secure OS design.

Even on 4GB RAM it just works, boots in seconds, while still having encrypted storage.

The issue is of course, that it is based on Google Chrome, and even Chromium is completely full of Google (use googerteller with e.g. Fedora Chromium and you see it pings Google all the time).

ARM Laptops with Linux support

The new Snapdragon laptops are extremely impressive, and will have real Linux support in a short time.

But they are damn expensive, and I am looking for something for light tasks, with the focus on:

• being light and small (11in or so?)
• being inexpensive
• long battery life (!)
  • very low standby battery use (like my GrapheneOS pixel, 1% over night)
  • reasonably big battery for use
• okay specs for light tasks
• open firmware

I watched a talk on getting Coreboot working on Chromebooks (ccc website) and while elly also got Fedora working on an ARM Chromebook, that sounded like way above my skills.

The x86 ones still have awesome batterylife (on ChromeOS), but using x86 in 2024 for an efficient machine... sounds like a waste of money.

Docs for Linux on ARM Chromebooks?

Neither chrultrabook nor mrchromebox touch ARM, at all. There are some small scripts and projects that do this, like this one.

Bottlenecks

Chromebooks have often nice chassis' and displays, but kinda bad keyboards with missing keys.

Also, too little RAM. Using Fedora with ZRAM in an aggressive mode (to compress all RAM) might be a workaround, but cause reasonable CPU overhead (it uses zstd for compression).

And then, too little storage. I find this hard to discover, are there ARM / modern x86 Chromebooks with upgradeable NVME or at least eMMC?

Using an SD card would be a workaround, which is btw. also not possible on Pixel Tablets (thanks Google).

The Problems with Chromebooks

Google uses a custom userspace, the boot (on ARM) is not really u-Boot anymore, they dont seem to test the mainline kernel and are slow with patches.

Personally I think you can clearly see how they often just do the least amount of work possible to comply with the GPL. Like, visiting their code repo is already privacy invasive.

Also a ton of firmware problems like broken audio, USB, sleep, input devices, which I couldn't fix.

Alternative: Pixel Tablet & GrapheneOS

Comment: I mean the new Pixel tablet, not the old "Pixel tablet C".

The good

A Google Pixel Tablet would be an alternative. It runs GrapheneOS, which (I know) has awesome battery life and efficiency.

GrapheneOS is also fully degoogled and runs all my FOSS apps, as well as having support for banking and stuff I might want.

GrapheneOS is extremely secure while also being extremely stable (in both ways). I know that I can rely on my phone when I managed to break my Laptop again.

The bad

The Tablet is the first edition, a MVP pretty much. For drawing, a standards-compliant pencil can be used, but it has quite some latency and no palm rejection (video source).

It is also very expensive, considering that it has no SD card slot, and 128GB of storage go for 300+€ on the used market.

There seem to be less people disappointed from it than I expected.

You see, I also dont really know what I want XD

• a small appliance device, just for travelling and watching stuff there?
• Should it have a keyboard? I hope a 5-pin one, no garbage bluetooth
• Pen I think yes, as it is probably awesome for sketching things (I am tired of not being able to do that, and a drawing tablet is not portable)

It may be that a Pixel tablet is actually better here. But a ton of good Linux software is simply missing on Android. Like, a PDF editor that does it's job, Libreoffice, GIMP, Inkscape, a real Firefox (with addon support and sandboxing).

There is some progress in virtualization, I might be able to use Termux with VNC to some extent, but it would suck for batterylife and probably also UX.

I guess a modern AMD or Intel Chromebook with supported, tested firmware, would be the best option for a compact, opensource, efficient laptop.

Meanwhile a Pixel Tablet would work 100%, be possibly way more energy efficient than a normal Linux distro could ever be, also more secure, mostly never have broken software.

I would like to test this though, tuned, stripped down KDE Plasma, power profiles, ... but at the level of firmware issues, this could stop being fun. But, fun is relative, right?

What do you do? Do you run ChromiumOS, or Linux on a Chromebook? Or do you use a Pixel Tablet as a Laptop replacement?

Cheers!

Result

I will get a Chromebook. It is just too tempting to hack with a corebooted device.

Framework Chromebook

The Framework Chromebook would be brilliant, poorly I guess there is no DIY edition (8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage are just too small) and I hope it could also remove the pain of the shitty keyboard on Chromebooks.

This would be a really fun way to workaround 1. The lack of coreboot support on Framework Laptops 2. All the downsides of Chromebooks.

Until then, I will get something with hopefully 8GB of RAM on Ebay.

Others

Honestly, this is pretty frustrating. A Thinkpad Yoga 11e sounds cool, upgradeable to 8GB (in theory, if the RAM you have works) and with an m.2 slot.

Using a very lightweight desktop could work? But batterylife was bad even back then, so yeah.

FydeTab + FydeOS

https://github.com/openFyde

I found a usable ChromiumOS fork!

This may work on regular Chromebooks, opening some options. Open firmware but still an efficient but open OS?

The FydeTab Duo is now released, a Tablet using FydeOS, so more a Chromebook than a Linux Tablet.

I dont know what components of which OS they use, and expect something ChromeOS like