this post was submitted on 30 May 2024
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Linux

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Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).

Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.

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Trying to discover new/unheard Linux desktop programs (Sorry for the confusion).

Edit: I apologise for confusing a lot of people. I meant Linux desktop “programs” coming from Windows/Mac. I'm used to calling them “apps”.

Edit: 🙌 I’m overwhelmed with the great “programs” people have recommended in the comment section. Thank you guys.

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago

Thunderbird

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 months ago
  • Obsidian - great markdown-based note app
  • NewsFlash - fast and elegant RSS news reader
  • Bottles - program to run Windows apps and managing them easily
  • BreakTimer - a life-saver for me; it allows you to set a break after given amount of time
  • LibreWolf - privacy-focused fork of Firefox

There are a lot of awesome programs on Linux, I recommend browsing Flathub to find them

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago

Apparently people still believe that floorp is proprietary. That's not true, some of it's components went closed-source for a while to switch licenses. Now it's back to being open-source

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago

Haven't seen anyone mention Alacritty yet, that's my favorite terminal emulator.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 5 months ago (2 children)

Someone already mentioned Logseq, but I'm really enjoying Obsidian for my note taking needs. It's similar, but I have found Obsidian to be very nice. Not FOSS, but I really like what the devs are doing.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

Same here. I have tried:

  • Joplin
  • Standard Notes
  • loqseq
  • simple notes
  • craft and a few others, but I keep coming back to obsidian. Currently self-hosting it using one of the plugins, that helps me easily sync between pc, MacBook, android and iOS.
[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Nice! Yeah you've definitely tried a bunch of apps.

What service are you using to self host obsidian? And is it cheaper than paying for obsidian sync?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

Nextcloud and Janitor plugin. In my opinion, obsidian sync is not worth it. You have many ways to sync your data across different devices. Even using GitHub or Sorj.

Edit: For my usecase, Janitor plugin works the best. You could try it.

Edit:

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago

Cool thanks for the info! Ill check it out

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Same I tried logsec but it needs a bit more polishing and most importantly the excalidraw plugin is not that good.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Yeah I've tried One Note, Evernote and notion before coming across Logseq and Obsidian. I'm really enjoying it. I haven't given Excalidraw much use in obsidian but I may do so in the future.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 5 months ago

It's a game changer for me. Obsidian plugin allows previewing these drawings in notes, and we can also link notes in the drawings. The built in canvas feature is simply bad. All it needs to do is center the text inside boxes. Wish the devs made it open source and this problem could get fixed but apparently they don't believe in it.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 5 months ago
  • Nvim with lazy-nvim
  • Emacs (org mode)
  • Krita
  • Strawberry Music (can organize and transcode music)
  • Easy Effects (for poorly balanced YouTube videos or voice chat)
  • Calibre
  • YARG (I like plastic guitar)
[–] [email protected] 5 points 5 months ago
  • sshfs. I use it for everything.
  • autossh
  • git. It always annoys me how Debian doesn't come with it out of the box. Gets me every time I set up a new server.
  • Signal desktop app.
[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

Any flavor of vi, Gnu Screen, lrzsz, bash with the usual cli tools (awk, sed, grep, tail, head, rev, cat, tac, and recently jq and yq). Also openssh client. Some flavor of netcat is also crazy useful too. This is a good home for me to do my thing.

Edir: oh, and git. How did I forget git?!

[–] [email protected] 5 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

There's no doubt there are a great variety of Linux packages in use.

Recently I did a CD install of Debian 12 (Bookworm) desktop with Gnome, which loads a bunch of stuff over the Net. Here are extra packages that I installed manually. The first set is used by and with an automated configuration script that I wrote, so they have to come in to begin with.

Title Description Purpose
info Gnu info processor "Config"
curl Command line tool for transferring data with URL syntax "Config"
dbus-x11 Simple interprocess messaging system (X11 deps) "Config"
emacs Editor "Config"
gconf2 GNOME configuration database system (support tools) "Config"
mc Midnight Commander - a powerful file manager "Config"
python3-iniparse Access and modify configuration data in INI files "Config"
python-lxml-doc Python XML documentation "Config"
python3-lxml Pythonic binding for the libxml2 and libxslt libraries "Config"
sakura Simple but powerful libvte-based terminal emulator "Config"
Title Description Purpose
"apcupsd" "APC UPS Power Management" "Monitor"
"artha" "Handy off-line thesaurus based on WordNet" "Utils"
"backintime" "Simple backup/snapshot system" "Utils"
"brasero" "CD/DVD burning application for GNOME" "Utils"
"bwm-ng" "Small and simple console-based bandwidth monitor" "Monitor"
"ccze" "Robust, modular log coloriser" "Utils"
"certbot" "Automatically configure HTTPS using Let's Encrypt " "Utils"
"claws-mail-dillo-viewer" "HTML viewer plugin for Claws Mail using Dillo" "Mail"
"claws-mail-feeds-reader" "Feeds (RSS/atom) reader plugin for claws mail" "Mail"
"claws-mail-plugins" "Claws mail" "Mail"
"claws-mail-spam-report" "Spam reporting plugin for claws mail" "Mail"
"cmake" "Cross-platform, open-source make system" "Retroshare"
"conky-all" "Highly configurable system monitor" "Monitor"
"copyq" "Advanced clipboard manager with editing and scripting features" "Utils"
"cups" "Common UNIX Printing System(tm) - PPD/driver support, web interface " "Utils"
"dcraw" "Decode raw digital camera images" "Photo"
"devilspie" "Automatically resize windows" "Utils"
"dict" "Dictionary client/server and a selection of dictionaries, too" "Utils"
"dictd" "Dictionary server" "Utils"
"diction" "Utilities to help with style and diction" "Utils"
"exiv2" "EXIF/IPTC photo metadata manipulation tool" "Photo"
"festival" "General multi-lingual speech synthesis system" "Utils"
"ftp" "Classical file transfer client" "Utils"
"gedit" "Popular text editor for the GNOME desktop environment" "Editor"
"gimp" "GNU Image Manipulation Program" "Photo"
"git" "Fast, scalable, distributed revision control system" "Utils"
"gnome-audio" "Audio files for GNOME" "Utils"
"gnome-extra-icons" "Optional gnome icons" "Utils"
"gnucash" "Personal bookkeeping and finance" "App"
"golang" "Go programming language compiler" "yamn"
"hplip" "HP Linux Printing and Imaging System (HPLIP)" "Utils"
"hplip-gui" "HP Linux Printing and Imaging - GUI utilities (Qt-based)" "Utils"
"hugin" "Panorama photo stitching program" "Photo"
"imagemagick" "Image manipulation programs" "Photo"
"libbz2-dev" "High-quality block-sorting file compressor library" "Retroshare"
"libcurl4-openssl-dev" "Development files and documentation for libcurl (OpenSSL flavour)" "Retroshare"
"libglib2.0-dev" "Development files for the GLib library" "Retroshare"
"libjpeg-turbo-progs" "Programs for manipulating JPEG files including loss-less rotation" "Photo"
"libmicrohttpd-dev" "Library embedding HTTP server functionality" "Retroshare"
"libopencv-dev" "computer vision core library" "Retroshare"
"libqt5opengl5-dev" "Qt 5 OpenGL library development files" "Retroshare"
"libqt5multimedia5" "Qt 5 Multimedia module" "Retroshare"
"libqt5network5" "Qt 5 network module" "Retroshare"
"libqt5x11extras5-dev" "Qt 5 X11 extras" "Retroshare"
"libreoffice-base" "Database component for LibreOffice" "Utils"
"librsvg2-bin" "Command-line and graphical viewers for SVG files" "Photo"
"libsqlcipher-dev" "Sqlcipher shared library" "Retroshare"
"libssl-dev" "Secure Sockets Layer toolkit - development files" "Retroshare"
"libspeex-dev" "The Speex codec library" "Retroshare"
"libspeexdsp-dev" "The Speex extended library" "Retroshare"
"libupnp-dev" "Portable SDK for UPnP devices" "Retroshare"
"libxslt1-dev" "XSLT 1.0 processing library" "Retroshare"
"libxss-dev" "X11 Screen Saver extension library (development headers)" "Retroshare"
"lm-sensors" "Utilities to read temperature/voltage/fan sensors" "Monitor"
"mosquitto" "MQTT version 5.0/3.1.1/3.1 compatible message broker" "Home Automation"
"mosquitto-clients" "Mosquitto command line MQTT clients" "Home Automation"
"net-tools" "NET-3 networking toolkit" "Utils"
"numlockx" "Enable numlock in X11 sessions" "Unknown"
"openhab-addons" "OpenHAB Home Automation" "Home Automation"
"otpclient" "Simple GTK+ software to generate OTPs (TOTP and HOTP)" "Utils"
"pandoc" "General markup converter" "Utils"
"pcmanfm" "Extremely fast and lightweight file manager" "Utils"
"python-is-python3" "Symlinks /usr/bin/python to python3" "Devel"
"python3-babel" "Tools for internationalizing Python applications - Python 3.x" "Devel"
"python3-calmjs" "Node.js Python framework for building toolchains and utilities" "Devel"
"python3-cheetah" "Text-based template engine and Python code generator (Python 3)" "WeeWX"
"python3-configobj" "Simple but powerful config file reader and writer for Python 3" "WeeWX"
"python3-dateparser" "Python parser for human readable dates" "Devel"
"python3-doc" "Python documentation" "Devel"
"python3-ephem" "Compute positions of the planets and stars with Python 3" "WeeWX"
"python3-nltk" "Natural language processing" "Utils"
"python3-pycryptodome" "Cryptographic Python library" "eoas"
"python3-pyqt5" "Python 3 bindings for Qt5" "Devel"
"python3-pyqt5.qtmultimedia" "Python 3 bindings for Qt5's Multimedia module" "Devel"
"python3-serial" "pyserial - module encapsulating access for the serial port " "WeeWX"
"python3-setuptools" "Python distutils enhancements (setuptools compatibility)" "Devel"
"python3-tz" "The Olson timezone database" "Utils"
"python3-usb" "USB interface for Python (Python3)" "WeeWX"
"python3-venv" "Venv module for python3" "WeeWX"
"python3-vobject" "Parse iCalendar and VCards in python" "Android"
"python3-xdg" "Freedesktop.org standards" "Tonto2"
"qgit" "Qt application for viewing GIT trees" "Utils"
"qrencode" "QR code encoder into PNG image" "Photo"
"qtcreator" "Integrated development environment (IDE) for Qt" "Retroshare"
"qtmultimedia5-dev" "APIs for multimedia functionality" "RetroShare"
"qtox" "Tox client" "Retroshare"
"qttools5-dev" "Qt 5 tools development files" "Retroshare"
"rapidjson-dev" "Fast JSON parser/generator for C++ with SAX/DOM style API" "Retroshare"
"rblcheck" "Query real-time black list (RBL) servers" "Mail"
"retroshare-gui" "Secure communication with friends" "Retroshare"
"rsync" "Fast, versatile, remote (and local) file-copying tool" "Utils"
"sane" "Scanner graphical frontends" "Photo"
"sqlite3" "Command line interface for SQLite 3" "Firefox Devel"
"sqlitebrowser" "GUI editor for sqlite databases" "Unknown"
"ssh" "Secure shell client and server (metapackage)" "Utils"
"tcl8.6-dev" "Tcl (the Tool Command Language) v8.6" "Retroshare"
"tesseract-ocr" "Command line OCR tool" "Unknown"
"timeshift" "System restore utility" "Utils"
"torsocks" "Use socks-friendly applications with Tor" "QTox"
"trash-cli" "Freedesktop.org trash implementation" "Utils"
"tree" "Displays an indented directory tree, in color" "Utils"
"ttf-bitstream-vera" "Bitstream Vera family of free Truetype fonts" "Utils"
"whois" "Intelligent WHOIS client" "is_tout.py"
"xsane" "Graphical frontend for Scanner Access Now Easy (SANE)" "Photo"
"zbar-tools" "Bar Code Scanner and Decoder" "Photo"
"zip" "Archiver for .zip files" "Utils"

Here are third-party packages I admire. These are not available in Debian repositories although some provide Debian-compatible repositories of their own.

Tor Browser Bundle: Anonymizing Network Browser

This is available from https://dist.torproject.org/torbrowser/ as a tarball. This should be unpacked and the whole tor-browser_en-US directory moved to the ~user folder. This is so that the browser can auto-update at user authority as the need arises.

RetroShare: Secure Communications with Friends

This has its own Debian-compatible repository.

metar: A Package to Parse METAR Coded Weather Reports

~/lab_pip/bin/activate
pip install metar --upgrade

weeWX: Open source software for backyard weather stations.

From http://weewx.com/docs/debian.htm. Although a Debian package exists, doing any development practically requires that all the code be in user-space, so don't install the package. Download it instead.

OpenHAB: Home Automation

This has its own Debian-compatible repository.

Ant: GTK3/4 Themes by eliverlara

From https://www.gnome-look.org/browse?cat=135&ord=latest.

This is for claws-mail. It provides better contrast.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

OpenBSD user, in no particular order, definitely missing some stuff: pdksh (OpenBSD) or oksh (Linux/MacOS), su, unix/posix utils (man (most important), find (second most important), apropos, awk, grep, df, du, dd, ed, etc), mg, openssh, got, heirloom-doctools/troff, bc-gh (bc calculator with a bunch of extensions), xclip, xdotool, xeyes (very important), yt-dlp (youtube-dl seems dead these days), some C compiler (clang/gcc), httpd, opensmtp, ffmpeg, libressl/openssl, pf, tmux (I prefer to use my window manager, but if I'm in tty or need to retain a shell session, tmux is useful), ping, ifconfig, traceroute, netstat, nc/netcat, unwind (or other dns server like unbound)

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