One of my favorite desktop backgrounds

Desktop backgrounds should be easy on the eyes but shouldn't draw attention to themselves, and this still-frame from the opening credits of NYPD Blue is perfectly suited. It could also be re-tinted, using certain graphics apps.
 

Clementine runs w/o interruption on MX-L 23.3

After Ubuntu Mate developed musicus-interruptus (see previous post), I faced the prospect of a couple of weeks without being able to play any music, until I could get an Android tablet with bit-perfect playback [1] and the ability to drive an external DAC via a USB port. The  Neutron music player is very interesting because it offers bit-perfect playback, although the developer considers it to be irrelevant due to the quality of the processing. However, high-quality processing might place significant demands on the CPU, and might consume a significant amount of power. The Neutron also offers POLARITY ("phase") INVERSION, which I thought was forbidden by the audio mafia.

Then I remembered that I didn't have any problems with music being interrupted when I was using Clementine, which I had written off because it degrades the audio with hidden processing. Fortunately, MX-Linux 23 includes Clementine by default, so I fired it up and listened to hours of background music without interruption. It seems to me that the message is that we can have degraded playback without interruptions, but if we want bit-perfect playback without interruptions, we have to go elsewhere.

Notes

[1] "Bit perfect" is generally understood as the ability to play unaltered data from the source-file. Some people apparently confuse bit-perfect with lossless, when lossless actually means the lack of lossy compression, which is a type of compression that cannot be reversed to re-create the original waveform. FLAC means "free lossless audio compression," which allows .wav files to be compressed for storage and transmission, and restored to their original state for playback.

Not surprisingly, my Ubuntu Mate 22.04 installation has developed audio-interruptus

 I assumed that it would just be a matter of time before Ubuntu Mate proved to be an unsuitable platform for playing music, and I was right. On Saturday, 8/31/24, it began cutting out for intervals of perhaps ten seconds. So, I booted up the live installation which I used for making the full installation, and it did exactly the same thing. So, the problem wasn't due to something I did to the full installation - it's built into the ISO. I gather that it reads the system's date and activates on certain dates. Note that it struck on the first day of a 3-day weekend, after working flawlessly for a couple of weeks.

So, my advice is to forget about using Linux as a platform for playing music, unless you're a system developer and know how to deactivate or eliminate the dirty tricks which are evidently being used for interrupting audio playback.  Based on this assumption, I doubt that Pipewire 1.2.2, which is supposed to contain a solution to Pipewire's random mute-until-reboot "problem," will actually fix the problem, at least entirely.

Fortunately, Android 14 supposedly includes provisions for bit-perfect playback, meaning that the data isn't processed (and probably degraded) on its way from the file to the DAC. There are also Android music players, such as USB Audio Player PRO, which apparently have the ability to bypass the limitations of previous versions of Android. So, with due diligence, it is possible to get an Android device to drive an external DAC with bit-perfect data via a USB cable (perhaps with a power-booster, such as a powered hub).

Notes

[1] Some people are apparently under the impression that merely resampling digital audio to a higher sampling-rate can improve sound quality, when in fact it will degrade the sound quality except in rare cases when a high-grade process is used, such as in a sample-rate-converter chip. When I realized that my Linux player was resampling the data from my music files, and eliminated the resampling, I was amazed by the improvement in sound quality. So, it's best to avoid resampling if possible. If it's not possible, use a high-quality resampling process.

As many audio authorities contend, CD-grade digital is plenty good for consumers, and high-res doesn't sound inherently better. Better recordings might be put on high-res, but the best versions are often reserved for LPs because LPs can't be copied perfectly and don't last forever. Furthermore, if someone wants to buy an LP, they'll probably buy a new one, which unlike buying used LPs generates profits for the music industry. LPs in general are made from digital recordings, which, as anyone with a TV knows, can sound perfectly "analog." (Many if not most or all TVs use TI/Burr-Brown Advanced Segment DACs or the cheaper variant known as Current Segment DACs, which are renowned for their "analog" sound quality even in cheap gear.)

Xubuntu: great but too many deliberate nuisances

I previously recommended Xubuntu 22.04 as a good distro for playing music, at least until Pipewire gets fixed and I can go back to using MX-Linux as my Swiss-army-knife installation. But after using Xubuntu 22.04 for a while, I've decided to drop it because of all the deliberate nuisances built into it, such as pop-ups which are the only indication of a supposed system problem, whose real purpose is to freak out newbies. (It's like a diagnosis of a disease with no symptoms.) It also performs frequent "unattended upgrades" even on my air-gap PC which obviously could not have downloaded any upgrades. They bog down my CPU, and when I try to shut down the PC, they prevent it from happening, although I press the start button until it shuts down. If those were the only ones, I'd put up with them, but there are others.

So, I've been using Ubuntu Mate 20.04 for playing music. It too has the two aforementioned nuisances, and perhaps others, but so far within tolerable limits. (Windows also has such nuisances, or at least it did when I stopped using it over a decade ago, when an update killed my laptop.) Ubuntu Mate was my favorite before finding MX-Linux (I also like Kubuntu), but now that I've stumbled onto using µSD cards combined with fast µSD-to-USB adapters for encrypted full installations, it's easier to use UM as a secure installation for an air-gap PC because of the relative speed of creating µSD-card installations, and their energy efficiency, vs. these same aspects of USB3 installations. (Putting installations on removable drives makes it easier to secure them when not in use, although if they're nonpersistent live installations, there's no need to secure them since they contain no sensitive data when they're shut down, and they can be easily replaced if stolen.)

If UM live installations booted quickly, like MX-Linux live installations, I'd use Cubic to create custom UM ISOs, and use them to create nonpersistent live installations. But by editing the installation to eliminate the need for user-input during the booting process [1], and by using a faster PC, live custom installations of UM would be a viable alternative to MX-Linux live installations for secure PCs.

Notes

[1] With nonpersistent live installations, which don't store any data upon shutdown except what's baked into the ISO (which presumably wouldn't be sensitive), there is no need to log-in when starting the system, although you would want a password so that you could perform superuser-functions, and lock the system during a session, and resume.

Cubic: Barely accessible to average Linux users

8/21/24b

I was hoping to use Cubic to make the equivalent of MX-Linux Snapshots for Ubuntu Mate, but I eventually realized that I probably wouldn't be able to make live installations from them and use them like I do with live installations made from MX-Linux Snapshots, because live installations of Ubuntu take a long time to boot. I'd end up making encrypted full installations from the Cubic-ISOs, and there's no point in going through the hassle of creating a custom ISO to create a full installation and perhaps a backup made with the same software-download used for the primary and settings transferred from the primary.

Besides, it turns out that Cubic doesn't automatically create the ISO from the running installation, as the MX-Linux Snapshot tool does, but requires the user to specify the changes to an already-existing ISO, which Cubic extracts so that the changes can be made to it. Being adept at using Cubic requires more knowledge than what the typical user has, but if all you want to do is to add apps, change settings, and change the desktop background, it's apparently fairly simple. There are some instructions written down to the user-level, such as How to Create a Custom Ubuntu ISO With Cubic, by David Rutland , but they don't cover everything, such as transferring settings. But I gather that user-made settings are contained in the .config file in the user's home directory, and that transferring settings would just be a matter of replacing the original .config file in the ISO being modified with the .config file from the configured full installation.

Full installations on µ-SD cards

Being able to create full installations on µ-SD cards plugged into an Orlian µ-SD-to-USB adapter is a game-changer. Until recently, I was under the impression that installations couldn't be created on SD cards, and I was afraid that µ-SD cards would get lost or broken easily and were intended to be inserted in devices such as phones and left in place. But after getting some cards and an adapter, I realized that my fears were unfounded, and decided to experiment with creating an installation on one, and wished that I had tried it sooner.

To distinguish µ-SD cards from each other, I use cards with a white space on the label, and mark each one with two stripes from a set of eight colored Sharpies, although I don't use the yellow one because it's not very visible. So, this provides 49 combinations, which should be adequate for most people, and each card could be named with a name such as Xub22-blu-g for an installation of Xubuntu 22.04 on a µ-SD card with a blue and green stripe from left to right. So, if you have multiple cards connected to a PC, you'd know which physical card corresponds to each µ-SD card in the file manager's device list.

The cards and adapter are blazingly fast, allowing installations to be created very quickly, and they run cool. It can be difficult to plug them into or pull them out of tight spaces, but putting silicone lube on the USB connector reduces the amount of force required. USB3 flash drives are much slower and run very warm, indicating relatively high power consumption. The Orlian adapter gets quite warm when transferring something like an ISO (typically about 2.5GB) at high speed, but otherwise it remains cool. µ-SD cards are also easy to store, such as in a Kiorafoto KHD-MSD10 credit-card sized µ-SD-card holder which holds 10 cards, does a good job of protecting them, and is easy to use.

So, creating new encrypted installations for my air-gap PC isn't the ordeal it once was: just update the package index, install a list of apps, and change settings in the normal course of using the installation. You could make a backup installation in case the primary fails when you don't have time to make another. To use the same downloaded software-packages for both installations, save them in /var/cache/apt/archives by entering "echo 'Binary::apt::APT::Keep-Downloaded-Packages "1";' | sudo tee /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/10apt-keep-downloads" before installing any software (copy the command without the double-quotes and paste it into the command-line by pressing Ctrl-Shift-V). Then install the software and copy the packages in the archives directory (except the Partial folder and Lock file, which can't be copied) to a backup drive. After updating the backup installation, copy the backed-up packages to the archives directory in the backup installation, and perform an installation for each of the apps (enter "sudo apt install <app's special name w/o caps or spaces>").

This is another situation where having APT-offline installed by default would come in handy. Instead of having to download the package index twice - once to update the primary, and once to update the backup - APT-offline could be used to download the package index and store it in a form in which it could be installed (which cannot otherwise be done), and it could be installed on both installations. There are also other situations where it would be nice to be able to download the package index once and use it a few times, before it expires and can no longer be installed.  

Once you're finished or almost finished with the settings on the primary, I assume that you could copy the .config directory from the primary to the backup to get the same settings on the backup. Getting the settings perfect on MX-Linux Snapshots typically requires several cycles of creating Snapshots and installations from them, so this approach is quicker, assuming that it works.

If you don't have a fast direct internet connection, the easiest solution to setting-up a PC is probably to temporarily install its wireless card (in the case of an air-gap PC, which should have its wireless card removed to ensure that it can't be surreptitiously activated, such as in wi-fi burst mode, which exists and is hard to detect) take it to a wi-fi hotspot or tether it to a 5G phone and take it to a 5G hotspot. The set-up should include the addition of any PPAs you might need, and APT-offline, which would allow any changes (other than adding PPAs or updating repository-keys) to be downloaded via your phone from then on. Adding PPAs and updating the keys require a direct connection, although a slow one would suffice, and key-updates aren't strictly necessary if you use a major server with many users constantly connecting to it directly, so that any problems would be quickly discovered. For details on using APT-offline, see AnAptOfflineBlog.blogspot.com.

You might need to provide your own AC power at the access-point, using an 12VDC-110VAC inverter or an uninterruptible power supply. You might also need a cardboard hood (black on the inside) to shield the monitor from sunlight so you can see it.

PCLinuxOS: Excellent, when it's not freezing and rebooting

After reading that there's a program (MyLiveCD) for turning installations of PCLinuxOS (including all settings and added software) into ISOs (which the MX-Linux Snapshot tool does for MX-Linux installations), I decided to try PCLinux OS 2024.04 KDE, and found that it's a great distro, other than the fact that it randomly freezes and reboots. So, I investigated, and found that this has been a problem with PCLOS for years, although it obviously should never have been released with it. It's also the only distro I've seen that doesn't have an option to create an encrypted installation.

But in case you want to try it for yourself, be forewarned that if you create a live installation of PCLinuxOS on some drive, you will never be able to use that drive for anything else. The drive apparently becomes formatted with an uncrackable read-only NTFS format, supposedly to prevent anyone from tampering with the installation (as if anyone could make it any worse). This seems to imply that drives have some read-only flag in an area of memory which only special software, apparently including NTFS, can access, and that NTFS probably requires passwords to use that feature. So, if you plan on putting PCLOS on a USB drive, use a cheap disposable USB2 drive (which I fortunately always use for live installations), and don't plan on using it for anything else ever again.

Lessons learned from escaping Pipewire's audio-cutting-out issue

8/19/24

At one point in my quest to find a way to avoid Pipewire's years-long problem of audio randomly cutting out, I concluded that the solution would be to get an Android tablet to use as a music server. However, after using the Celluloid and Parole media players on my full installations of Ubuntu Mate 22.04 and Xubuntu 22.04 (which have PulseAudio, not Pipewire), each on a separate µ-SD card and each plugged into an Orlian µ-SD-to-USB adapter when in use, I've concluded that both are solid general-purpose distros, and that either would be a good temporary music server until Pipewire is fixed and I can go back to MX-Linux, or until I get a new Android tablet. A live installation of either would probably work, but Ubuntu live installations take forever to boot. Oddly, they both have the same couple of weird irritants [1] that would probably torment newbies, but I've found that they can be dismissed or shut down without causing any problems. After using the Xubuntu installation for a few hours, it interrupted the music-playback to notify me that software-updates were available, even though it was running on an air-gap PC and could not have known about any such updates. Notifications can be disabled, but something that can't be disabled might take their place. So, ultimately, it might be necessary to use an Android device to get away from all of these bogus impediments.

I tried Strawberry (from the Strawberry site, since it's not in the Ubuntu repository) on UM2204, but it had a "buffering" problem, as if the LUKS-encrypted SD-card I use as a source is a slow internet connection. The version that comes with MX-Linux 23 doesn't have this problem, but Pipewire, at least for now, has the audio-cutting-out problem. Version 1.2.2, which is in the testing-phase, supposedly addresses this issue.

Now that I've gotten away from the Clementine player and resampling [2], I've realized that CD-grade digital has the potential to sound downright juicy when played through a good digital playback device. The best budget DACs use TI/Burr-Brown Advanced Segment DAC-chips (ASDs), which I explained in my Zen DAC V2 review. ASDs might be the ultimate DAC-chip for audio playback, due to their unique design which gives them low jitter-sensitivity (output noise vs. clock jitter) and unusually tight control over low-level detail. However, ASDs are apparently incompatible with the requirements of ADCs, because there are no ADCs which use ASDs. But the recordings which sound so good through ASDs are made with regular sigma-delta converters, which clearly can be made to sound amazing, for a price. Still, Audio Research and Bel Canto use ASDs in their DACs, which are among the best.

From the music industry's perspective, CD-grade digital is a threat to their bottom line, because it lasts forever and can be distributed forever without paying them. So, they like to put their best versions on LPs, which are impossible to copy perfectly. Furthermore, most people are reluctant to buy used LPs because they might be worn out and/or otherwise damaged, so if they want the best version of classic albums from the 60's and 70's,they'll probably end up getting new LPs, which are made from great digital recordings made early in the digital era, but which will never be released in a good digital form. Streaming might be based on the best recordings, because it's watermarked and can't be pirated with impunity, but watermarking apparently degrades the audio at least subtly (since it has to be woven into the music to be effective), which can make all the difference to those who care about sound quality.

Notes

[1] I've noticed a "system program problem detected" pop-up, which is the only indication of a supposed problem, and a supposed "unattended upgrade" that loads down the CPU and prevents the PC from shutting down normally. I'm supposed to believe that an actual unattended upgrade could be occurring even though the installation is running on an air-gap PC. In the first case, I click on the button that just gets rid of the pop-up, and in the other I use the task manager to kill the process, or if I'm trying to shut the PC down and the "upgrade" is preventing it, I just push the power button until the PC shuts down.

[2] Resampling is a mathematical process which introduces audible errors or consumes large amounts of system-resources. Pro-grade gear such as mixing consoles typically uses sample-rate-converter chips, which are very transparent. Resampling to a higher frequency can't IMPROVE sound quality, because resampling cannot add information, such as high-end or low-level detail. High sampling rates are used when converting to and from digital to allow the use of simple, clean, and cheap analog anti-aliasing filters, but when the high-frequency "DSD" used in ADC-chips for sampling the analog input is internally converted to high-res PCM (such as for use by recording engineers, who process it down to CD-grade digital for distribution), very little if any of the musical information is lost.

Although high-res makes it easier for recording engineers to do their job, CD-grade digital is plenty for consumers. Those who disagree probably have never heard a good CD-grade digital recording played back on a good system. I use a Zen DAC V2, which I reviewed in AudioCleanAndCheap.blogspot.com, although when I reviewed it I was unwittingly listening to poorly resampled data.

MX-Linux Snapshot-tool compression-setting affects size of Snapshot AND size of resulting live installation

The MX-Linux Snapshot tool, which turns MX-Linux installations into ISOs which include all of the installation's settings and added software, has an option to select a level of compression from a menu of five levels. I ignored this setting until one of my Snapshots, which was made with the least amount of compression, was just slightly too large to fit onto a 4GB USB2 flash drive, which I like because they're cheap, they work well for this purpose, and they run cool, indicating low power consumption. But I assumed that there would be no point in compressing the Snapshot further, because I assumed that it would always end up being the same size when installed as a live installation. So I just installed it on a 16GB USB3 flash drive that I didn't need for anything else.

But because I'd have to buy a bunch of new flash drives for my system of backing-up data, ISOs, and installations, so that it could handle ISOs and live installations larger than 4GB, I decided that I shouldn't rule out the possibility that a higher level of compression would reduce the size of the live installation, and not just the size of the Snapshot in an ISO form.

So, I tried the zstd compression-setting, which reduced the size of the Snapshot, AND the size of live installations made from the Snapshot, to 3.1GB. The installation loads and runs as fast as the installations made from the 4.1GB Snapshot. As far as I can tell, the only drawback of using the zstd compression-setting is that it took a few minutes longer to create the Snapshot.

Enlightenment - for those who have nothing better to do with an OS than change settings

Curiosity about the Enlightenment desktop drove me to use nearly 500MB of my internet-data allocation to install it on Ubuntu 22.04, which I now admit is nice, although in my opinion the workspace-switching scheme is a solution in search of a problem. In a nutshell, "Enlightenment" is a misleading name, because as far as I'm concerned, it's one of the least enlightened desktops I've used, although I never actually got around to using to do anything. For example, the default fonts are microscopic, and I couldn't figure out how to change them. Perhaps it was meant for developers to use as the basis for an actual desktop, such as Bodhi and Elive, by setting it up to make it usable.

The file manager (Fileman) is a PITA to use. To open an encrypted partition, I had to use Disks to unlock and mount it, but it still didn't appear in the file manager's devices-column, so to access it via the file manager (although it would have been easier to just keep using Disks), I had to go to the /media/<user-name> directory, and I finally found it. Perhaps it was meant to conceal encrypted partitions from those who aren't aware of them, but most other file managers display encrypted partitions in the devices-column as soon as they're plugged in. Bodhi Linux, which is Ubuntu combined with Enlightenment, uses Thunar, the XFCE file manager, which is one of my favorites, so I'm not the only one who doesn't like Fileman.

I was also expecting some sort of a whiz-bang window-manager which would make it easy to move from one to another, but as far as I can tell, that's not the case. Anyways, taskbars seem like the optimal approach for doing this when the window of interest is hidden behind another, and Enlightenment has an optional taskbar in addition to its "i-bar."

But it's not all bad - there are various innovative features, but they don't make up for the deficit in usability.

So, I'm not going to waste any more time on Enlightenment. My distro of choice is MX-Linux XFCE, because I can get a lot done with it, without having to change a lot of settings and figuring out how to change them, and it has the Snapshot tool that makes it easy to create an ISO of a configured MX-Linux installation, with all of the settings and added software. The resulting ISO can be turned into a live installation on a USB2 drive (instead of one of those warm/hot-running USB3 drives), and the resulting installation can be run on an air-gap PC, for the ultimate in security, since it retains no session-data upon shutdown. Instead, data would be saved on separate drives.

Using Conky standard MX-antiX configuration as disk I/O monitor

Rev 8/15/22

 

A good option for a disk I/O monitor is to install Conky (conky-std) and use the standard MX-antiX configuration (see image). To obtain the corresponding configuration file from MX-Linux, open the Home directory, press Ctl-H to display hidden files, then open the .conky directory, then the MX-antiX directory, and copy the "MX-antiX17" file and rename it Standard_antiX_Conky_conf_file.txt. The same version is supposedly on the internet, but I tried the posted version, but it didn't produce the same results, so below I have included a copy of the version which I copied from MX-Linux, which you could test on a live installation.

There are various ways to use it as the configuration file, one of which is to put it in a text file, name it conky.conf, and place it in the Home/.conky directory created by installing Conky. The previous conky.conf directory would have to be removed or renamed. Another way is to put it in a text file named whatever you like and placed wherever you like, although I'd name it Standard_antiX_Conky_conf_file.txt and put it in the .conky directory. Then shut Conky down and restart it with the command "conky -c <path/name of configuration file>." To get the path of a file, right-click on it and select Properties in the menu which appears.

Standard MX/antiX Conky configuration-script:

conky.config = {
-- Standard antiX .conkyrc file written by Team antiX.
-- Feel free to use.
-- anticapitalista@riseup.net

-- Note: delete the line above to disable automatic scaling with DPI
-- on the live system.

-- set to yes if you want Conky to be forked in the background
    background = true,

    short_units = true,

    cpu_avg_samples = 1,
    net_avg_samples = 1,

    out_to_console = false,

-- X font when Xft is disabled, you can pick one with program xfontsel
--font 7x12
--font 6x10
--font 7x13
    font = '8x12',
--font 7x12
--font *mintsmild.se*
--font -*-*-*-*-*-*-34-*-*-*-*-*-*-*
--font -artwiz-snap-normal-r-normal-*-*-100-*-*-p-*-iso8859-1

-- Use Xft?
    use_xft = true,

-- Xft font when Xft is enabled
--xftfont gentium:size=12
--ftfont DejaVu Sans:size=10
    font = 'DejaVu Sans:bold:size=9',
--xftfont DejaVu Sans:size=9

-- Create own window instead of using desktop (required in nautilus, pcmanfm and rox desktops)
    own_window = true,
    own_window_transparent = true,
    own_window_hints = 'undecorated,sticky,skip_taskbar',

-- Text alpha when using Xft
    xftalpha = 1.0,

--on_bottom no

-- mail spool
-- mail_spool $MAIL

-- Update interval in seconds
    update_interval = 1,

-- Use double buffering (reduces flicker, may not work for everyone)
    double_buffer = true,

-- Minimum size of text area
    minimum_width = 5, minimum_height = 5,
    maximum_width = 180,

-- Draw shades?
    draw_shades = false,

-- Draw outlines?
    draw_outline = false,

-- Draw borders around text
    draw_borders = false,

-- Stippled borders?
    stippled_borders = 0,

-- border margins
--border_margin 10

-- border width
    border_width = 1,

-- Default colors and also border colors
    default_color = 'white',
    default_shade_color = 'white',
    default_outline_color = 'white',

    color1 = 'ffffff',
    color2 = 'ffffff',
    color3 = 'ffffff',
    color4 = 'yellow',
    color8 = '77ccff',
    color9 = '5599cc',

-- Text alignment, other possible values are commented
-- alignment top_left
    alignment = 'top_right',
--alignment bottom_left
--alignment bottom_right

-- Gap between borders of screen and text

    gap_x = 30,
    gap_y = 30,

-- Add spaces to keep things from moving about?  This only affects certain objects.
    use_spacer = 'right',

-- Subtract file system buffers from used memory?
    no_buffers = true,

-- if_up_strictness link:  up | link | address
    if_up_strictness = 'address',

-- set to yes if you want all text to be in uppercase
    uppercase = false,

-- boinc (seti) dir
-- seti_dir /opt/seti

--# antiX additives examples. Add below Text##
--#Battery examples##
--#${color}battery: ${color}$acpiacadapter, ${battery_percent BAT1}%
--#${color}battery:${color} ${battery}
--${color}ACPI Battery: ${color}$battery
--${battery_bar 11,0}
--#Wireless example##
--${color}Wireless:
--${color}essid: ${wireless_essid $template6}
--${color}IP:${color} ${addr $template6}
--${color}speed: ${color} ${wireless_bitrate $template6}
--${color}link strength: ${color} ${wireless_link_bar 7,50 $template6}


    own_window_argb_value = 0,
    own_window_argb_visual = true,
    own_window_colour = '000000',

-- time template
    
    template0 = [[${if_match "pmfix${time %p}" == "pmfix"}${time \1}${else}${time %I:%M}${endif}]],

-- battery templates

    template1 = [[${if_existing /sys/class/power_supply/BAT\1}\n${color}bat\1:${color3}${alignr}${battery_percent BAT\1}%\n${color1}$alignr${battery_bar 4,170 BAT\1}${endif}]],
    template2 = [[${template1 0}${template1 1}]],
    
-- network templates

--    template3 = [[${color}\1 \2: $alignr${color3} ${\2speed \1}\n${color2}$alignr${\2speedgraph   \1 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}]],
--    template4 = [[${if_up \1}${template3 \1 up}\n${template3 \1 down}\n${endif}]],
--    template5 = [[${template4 $template4}${template4 $template5}${template4 $template6}${template4 $template7}]],

    template4 = 'eth0',
    template5 = 'eth1',
    template6 = 'wlan0',
    template7 = 'wlan1',

    
};

-- fluxbox adjustment
return_code = os.execute('pidof -q fluxbox')
if _VERSION == 'Lua 5.1' and math.floor(return_code/256) == 0 or
   _VERSION ~= 'Lua 5.1' and return_code then
   conky.config.own_window_transparent = true
   conky.config.own_window_argb_visual = false
end

-- stuff after 'TEXT' will be formatted on screen

conky.text = [[
${color3}${alignc}MX Linux
${color8}$alignc${font DejaVu Sans:size=12}${template0 %H:%M}$font
${color}${alignc}${time %a %d %b}
${color}${alignc}Uptime: $uptime

${color}res:${alignr}${color3}${execi 600 xdpyinfo | awk '/dimensions/ { print $2}' }
${color}dpi:${alignr}${color3}${execi 600 xdpyinfo | awk '/resolution/ { sub(/x[0-9]*/,"",$2); print $2}' }
${color}cpu use:${alignr}${color3}${cpu}${color}%
${color}cpu freq:${color3}${alignr}${freq}
${color}$alignr${cpugraph cpu0 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}\
# battery
${template2}
${color}disk I/O:${alignr}${color3}${diskio}
${color}${alignr}${diskiograph 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}\
# network
${if_up $template4}
${color}$template4 up: $alignr${color3} ${upspeed $template4}
${color}$alignr${upspeedgraph   $template4 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}
${color}$template4 down: $alignr${color3} ${downspeed $template4}
${color2}$alignr${downspeedgraph $template4 30,170  5599cc 5599cc}${endif}${if_up $template5}
${color}$template5 up: $alignr${color3} ${upspeed $template5}
${color}$alignr${upspeedgraph   $template5 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}
${color}$template5 down: $alignr${color3} ${downspeed $template5}
${color2}$alignr${downspeedgraph $template5 30,170  5599cc 5599cc}${endif}${if_up $template6}
${color}$template6 up: $alignr${color3} ${upspeed $template6}
${color2}$alignr${upspeedgraph   $template6 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}
${color}$template6 down: $alignr${color3} ${downspeed $template6}
${color2}$alignr${downspeedgraph $template6 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}${endif}${if_up $template7}
${color}$template7 up: $alignr${color3} ${upspeed $template7}
${color2}$alignr${upspeedgraph   $template7 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}
${color}$template7 down: $alignr${color3} ${downspeed $template7}
${color2}$alignr${downspeedgraph $template7 30,170 5599cc 5599cc}${endif}
${color}${alignr}${color8}Used / Total
${color}mem:${alignr}$mem ${color3} /${color} $memmax
${color}swap:${alignr}$swap ${color3} /${color} $swapmax
${color}root:${alignr}${fs_used /} ${color3} /${color} ${fs_size /}
]]

Xubuntu 22.04: Not my top choice, but a serious contender

Although between MX-Linux 21 XFCE and Kubuntu 22.04, my OS-needs are fulfilled, I couldn't resist getting a copy of Xubuntu 22.04 and giving it a spin. What I found was basically a fun distribution with lot of good stuff, but also with some minor problems, and not a slick as Kubuntu 22.04 or Linux Mint 20.3. Still, I could easily live with it.

The main feature I wanted to try on Xubuntu was zooming the screen with a keyboard, which turned out to be easy, with the help of a couple of simple xdotool commands which someone posted to the internet:

running the following command from the terminal, zooms in:

xdotool keydown Alt click 4 keyup Alt

and this command zooms out:

xdotool keydown Alt click 5 keyup Alt

As he suggested, I turned them into shell scripts, but ultimately assigned each one to a function key. (First create the scripts, give them execute-permission, and then put them somewhere safe such as in a bash-scripts folder in your Home directory, and perhaps make them read-only so they can't be deleted inadvertently. To create a shortcut-key, select Settings in the main menu, then the Keyboard utility, and then the Application Shortcuts tab, and the rest should be obvious.) He suggested a key-combo, but each time the command is run, the display in or out by a discrete amount, and if you want to zoom more, you have to press the key-combo again, which isn't convenient. But by assigning it to a function key, I can hold the key down, and it continues to zoom, although still not smoothly.

My other main interest was whether it's particularly well suited for use as an offline installation which cannot be connected directly to the internet, which it isn't. However, it can be used as such using the technique I describe in this post for authenticating a package index obtained via APT-offline by installing it via APT-offline on an installation of the same type which has been updated via a direct internet connection.

A direct update installs missing keys and updates outdated keys, but without providing any indication that this is taking place. I learned this accidentally, by entering "echo 'Binary::apt::APT::Keep-Downloaded-Packages "1";' | sudo tee /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/10apt-keep-downloads" (which can be copied w/o the beginning and ending quotes, and pasted into the command-line via Ctl-Shift-V, and ensures that software-modules which are installed via a direct connection are retained in /var/cache/apt/archives after being installed - the archives-directory is the destination for software-modules downloaded as part of the normal installation-process). I entered this command before performing a direct update on Kubuntu 22.04, and later found the Debian-archive-keyring package in the archives-directory even though I hadn't installed it or anything which requires it. So, it was obviously installed during the direct update, without any indication that it was being done. As far as I've been able to determine, there is no other way to install or update keys, without a thorough familiarity with the APT security system, and as far as I can tell, there are no current, publicly-available descriptions of this system.

Although debian-archive-keyring apparently isn't installed during the initial direct update on Xubuntu 22.04, as it is on Kubuntu 22.04, some keys are apparently installed or updated on Xubuntu 22.04, because until a direct update is installed, some of the required keys are apparently missing or outdated, as indicated by the "cannot authenticate packages" (CAP)-warnings which appear when installing software, using a package index which has been installed via APT-offline. (The package manager, APT, is disabled until the package index is updated. The direct update required a 45MB download, and the update via APT-offline required about 48MB.) It appears that APT's developers designed its security system so that keys can be updated whenever necessary, without regard for a schedule, and distributed with updates, so that the updated package index can be authenticated.

Xubuntu 22.04 has a good selection of apps, although the text-editor doesn't have a functional spelling-checker (it has a plugin, but I couldn't get it to work). One of my posts describes a "custom action" for Thunar, XFCE's file manager, for opening text-files with the spelling-checker Aspell (included in Xubuntu) by right-clicking on them and selecting the spelling-check option. The image viewer is great except for its limited zoom-capability, so I usually install Eye of Mate. Although Xubuntu has some good widgets, it doesn't have a disk I/O widget, but you could use Conky with the MX-Linux standard configuration (described in one of my posts), nmon, or GKrellM. I decided against installing APT-offline's GUI, because it would have required many packages, totaling about 18MB. Installing Kdenlive would require a 200MB download, as opposed to 60MB for Kubuntu 22.04.

Xubuntu 22.04 doesn't have a package-installer GUI, which surprised and disappointed me until I realized that the command "sudo dpkg -i <deb-pkg>" accomplishes the same thing. So, I was wrong about not being able to install APT-offline on plain Ubuntu until the package index is updated.

The bottom line is that although Xubuntu 22.04 isn't the most highly-polished distro I've used, and it has some minor problems which are apparently left as an exercise for the user, it's fun to use, unlike some distros I've used, such as MX-Linux Fluxbox, which is too much work for too little reward, and not sufficiently polished for my tastes. But Fluxbox is fast, and compared to antiX, which looks as if it was designed by someone who is legally blind, and which for example can't copy/paste between apps or open encrypted drives without entering text-commands, even Fluxbox is very user-friendly.

Mint's HDHomerun problem

Everything was going fine with my new Linux Mint 20.3 XFCE installation, which I was considering for use on the desktop PC which I use as a PVR and for processing ISOs and large files in general, until the moment when I fired up the HDHomerun-GUI (hdhomerun-config-gui), tuned in a station, and hit View, to which VLC responded by opening and displaying a black screen.

After wracking my brains over the course of a couple of days, and searching for answers on the internet and finding nothing (which itself is a clue that something's rotten), I've concluded that this is a dirty trick which is implemented by sensing the hardware, and when certain hardware is detected, corrupting or disabling the HDHomerun's output stream so that VLC can't display it. It's the only thing that makes sense, partly because I booted my $200 Brix with an encrypted flash drive installation of Mint 20.3, and was able to watch TV through it, and even record it to the flash drive, although I wouldn't advise recording video to flash drives, especially if they're encrypted. Mint has a reputation for having hardware compatibility issues, but it makes no sense that it would have more than other types of Ubuntu. But when it works, it's great.

I ended up going with Kubuntu 22.04, which I preferred slightly over Mint even before the HDHR problem. Dolphin can't access system folders, but a version with system access and superuser privileges is coming soon. In the meantime, there's Krusader, which is amazing for a file manager that can be installed on Kubuntu with a single 3.5MB package, although it's more cumbersome than Dolphin, so I use it only when necessary.

How to run an interactive shell script in a terminal with two clicks in Mint XFCE

Rev 7/24/22

Running non-interactive shell scripts is just a matter of giving them execute-permission (right-click on file, select Properties, then Permissions, etc.), and then double-clicking on them.

But if your shell script requires user input, you need to run it in a terminal, and one way to do that is to create a Thunar custom action named something like Run Shell Script that runs the following command, without the brackets: [xfce4-terminal -e "./%n"], with the appearance-condition of *.sh. This is all explained in my post entitled "Performing spell-check via right-click in XFCE."  Then, to execute the shell script, just right-click on it, then select Run Shell Script in the menu which appears.

Mint 20.3 XFCE also has "screen zoom" (or "desktop zoom") capability. You just select Compiz as the window manager (go to Settings in the main menu, and select Desktop Settings, which is not the same as Desktop), and if you want to use the keyboard to control the zoom-level, go into Compiz-settings and disable the mouse zoom-settings (perhaps not necessary) and select some key-combination for zoom-in and zoom-out. I chose Alt-Super-(up-arrow) and Alt-Super-(down-arrow), respectively, and it works like a charm.

There are many other settings related to zoom, but I just left them alone. You could, for example, make it possible to use a mouse or touchpad to trace out a rectangular area on the screen and zoom it to full screen, or at least to maximum zoom-level if it's too small to zoom to full-screen. (The left mouse-button is Button 1.) In Xubuntu 22.04, the XFCE window-manager, xfwm4, apparently has a zoom function, so you wouldn't need to use Compiz for that.

Additional comments on MX-Linux 21 Fluxbox and Lubuntu 22.04

rev 6/23/22 (see Notes)

After trying Lubuntu 22.04 and finding that it's fantastic [1], I decided to take another look at MX-Linux 21 Fluxbox. I had tried it and gave up due to frustrations with making changes to the panel and dock, but I've since realized that docks are easy to change, create, delete, move, etc., once you learn a few tricks (mentioned below), and that you can tailor the panel or panels to your liking by selecting Settings, then Tint2 Settings in the main menu. I just selected one of the prefabbed panels and left it as it was, although the panel included Clipman, so I went into Clipman's settings, selected the History tab, and set Remember History to O, because clipboard-management apps are security risks and should be used only when necessary, such as if you're writing code and want to save code-clippings for reuse. In some cases, I ended up uninstalling the clipboard manager app because there was no way to prevent it from keeping a clipboard history.

As usual, APT-offline wasn't installed by default, but all that's necessary to install it is apt-offline.deb and python3-magic.deb, which are both minuscule, and which I installed by using a package-installer. Later, I installed APT-offline-gui via APT-offline, but the launcher added to the main menu during installation didn't work, so I tried to fix the launcher but couldn't because the problem was deeper in the system. So, I'll just launch it by entering "sudo apt-offline-gui."

I had a problem with updating the package index via APT-offline without first updating it with a direct connection, because I kept getting "cannot authenticate package" (CAP) messages while trying to install software until I performed a direct update. I gave up on trying to understand precisely what was wrong, because it requires a good grasp of the Debian security system, which is very convoluted and is supposedly undergoing changes (including to validate packages when they're being installed, apparently in addition to when they're being downloaded), but performing an update with a direct internet connection seems to have corrected the problem, and then it could apparently be updated via APT-offline from then on, without producing CAP-messages. After performing a direct update, then an update via APT-offline, I performed another direct update, and APT apparently found that the existing package index was the latest, and just left it alone.

A couple of days later, I realized that MXL-Fluxbox includes a "Fix GPG Keys" tool, and created an unencrypted installation to see whether this tool would take care of the CAP-problem, which it didn't, even when online. (When booting the installation, it stopped with an "(intramfs)" (initial RAM file system) prompt, and I entered "exit" and the boot-process resumed. When the login screen appeared, I clicked on the menu-symbol at the top-center and selected the Fluxbox option, although I'm not sure what it does. But I confirmed that performing a direct update does fix the problem, whatever it is, by using APT-offline to install some package-index files which I downloaded a few days earlier for my initial MXL-FB installations, finding that it had the CAP-problem, and performing a direct update (which required only about 1MB, probably because the package index was just a few days old and APT apparently decided not to replace it). After the direct update, the CAP problem was gone, and then I performed another update via APT-offline (reinstalled the same package index files), and found that the CAP problem was still gone. 

Then I performed another update via APT-offline, using package-index files obtained about a week after the initial batch, and went through the motions of installing some software, and did not receive any CAP messages, apparently indicating that the direct update "permanently" fixed the CAP-problem. So, if you have a slow internet connection at home, you could probably create an installation and use it to obtain the packages required to install APT-offline from the Debian Packages site (MX-L21-FB is based on Debian 11/Bullseye), along with the reference checksums for the packages, calculate their checksums (right-click on each file, select Properties, then Digests, and then Hash), compare them to the references, and assuming that they match, install them by clicking on them and following the instructions. Then you could use APT-offline to perform an update (perform a set-op to generate a signature file, then a get-op, using some device which can readily obtain a 4G or better internet connection, to download and screen the package-index files, and then an install-op, which in the case of package-index files, installs them completely). Then you could perform a direct update, which based on my experience would require downloading only about 1MB due to the update via APT-offline (although I assume that you'd have to perform the two updates on the same day, or at least within a couple of days).

If you want to add any PPAs to your installation's sources-list, this would be the time to do it - there have apparently been improvements to the process of adding PPAs, because when I added the one for version 1.1 of the LXQT desktop to my Lubuntu 22.04 installation (https://launchpad.net/~severusseptimius/+archive/ubuntu/lxqt, which by the way didn't seem to do anything), the PPA's package-index files were added too, without having to perform an update (perhaps because I had just performed an update). After adding the PPA, I got an error message which indicated that there was no InRelease file (which was wrong), and that as a result the index or the PPA couldn't be used. Still, I had no problems generating a signature file for the upgraded desktop-components (a 100MB download, although Thunderbird is 57MB of that).

But if you don't even have a slow internet connection at home, you could power your PC with an inverter or an uninterruptible power supply so that you could take it to some place where you could establish a high-speed wireless internet connection, in which case you would perform an update and install APT-offline-gui (which would install APT-offline as well), and any software you might need in the foreseeable future. You might want a cardboard hood on your monitor to block sunlight, and something like a clipboard to use as a flat surface for your mouse. But once you've performed a direct update, it appears that you could use APT-offline from then to make any kind of change to the installation.

I also  had a problem when trying to perform a get-op on a signature file for GIMP, because the gimp.deb and gimp-data.deb files weren't available from the server, at least by the name listed in the signature file. But when I installed GIMP via a direct connection, everything went well, even though it requested precisely the same files. Two different versions of gimp and gimp-data were available, so perhaps by using a direct connection APT was able to find the secondary (older) versions when it couldn't find the newer versions, and download them, although the newer versions were the ones that were installed. Perhaps the older versions were actually pointers to the newer versions.

After installing GIMP, I tried to find the downloaded packages in /var/cache/apt/archives (where APT places downloaded packages for installation), so that I could use them on another installation of the same type, but they had apparently been deleted automatically after installation. I had installed a tiny app (gpw, a nifty password-generator) to determine whether it would be retained after installation by default, and it was, so I assumed that this would apply in all cases. I also "installed" a lot of apps via APT-offline (referring to the APT-offline "install"-op, which just copies downloaded app-packages to the "archives" directory, after which they must be actually installed normally, such as by entering "sudo apt install <app>"), and they were retained after actual installation. So, to retain all downloaded packages after installing them, it's apparently necessary to enter "echo 'Binary::apt::APT::Keep-Downloaded-Packages "1";' | sudo tee /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/10apt-keep-downloads" (to execute the command, copy it, without the beginning and ending quotes, as you would normally copy text, and paste it into the command-line with Ctrl-Shift-V).

After using my MXL21-FB installation for about a week, I generated an ISO from it, using the Snapshot MX-Tool (which works only on MX-Linux installations). Instead of having Snapshot store the ISO on the original installation, which is on a Kingston USB3 DataTraveler (which has a slow write-speed but runs cool, indicating low power consumption), I had it store it on an SD card which I formatted with an EXT4 format, using the Disks program, since Linux writes to EXT4-formatted drives faster than it does to FAT-formatted drives. Snapshot couldn't find the SD card until I realized that I had the file manager set up to require me to click on the drive-name to mount it. Then I used the Snapshot-created ISO to create a nonpersistent live installation (which in the case of live installations made from ISOs made with Snapshot, boot very quickly, unlike regular live installations) on a cheap, cool-running USB2 drive.

Naturally, turning an installation into an ISO is done only when you are fairly certain that you won't be making any significant changes to the installation in the near future, but I mentioned it above in order to explain some of the following changes.

Xfce4-notes, an excellent desktop-notes program, can be installed on MXL21-FB with a download of about 200K, which is nothing compared to some note-programs. I use xfce4-notes as a nonpersistent scratchpad, since it stores data in the installation, which in the case of the aforementioned nonpersistent live installation doesn't retain data after shut-down. FeatherNotes is also excellent, and quite a small download. I use FeatherNotes as a persistent scratchpad, with the notes stored on an encrypted flash drive (since FN allows the user to select the storage location), and backed-up on additional encrypted drives (I use two levels of backup - one drive to keep a running backup, which is transferred to other back-ups each week). Another approach would be to just use a separate small unsaved text-editor window as a nonpersistent desktop-note, and a text file as a persistent note, in cases where installing notes-programs would require large downloads.

MXL-FB's Dockmaker app (which can be launched by right-clicking on the screen, then selecting Appearance, then Docks, then Dockmaker) is quite straightforward, although if you want to add an app to a dock using a command and an icon, and you want to use the icon from the main menu, go to the menu-entry, right-click on it, and select Edit. Then click on the icon, and wait for quite a while (30 seconds on my $200 Brix, which I use as an air-gap PC), and a window with a bunch of menu-icons, including the one of interest, will appear. (I learned this by accident, by clicking on the icon, getting no immediate response, and then moving onto something else without closing the launcher-edit window. After a while, the aforementioned window of icons appeared, and I realized that it was the response to clicking on the icon.) Then use the name on the icon of interest, and a search program such as Catfish (also included in MX-L21-FB by default) to search the /usr/share/icons directory to find the location of the icon's file, and then go to Dockmaker, and click on the icon-window, and navigate to the icon-file of interest (Dockmaker's default icon-size is apparently 48x48). A few icons are in usr/local/share/icons.

If as a result of using Dockmaker you end up with multiple listings for a single dock in the menu accessed by right-clicking on the screen, you can go to the home directory, press Ctrl-h to show hidden files, then go to .fluxbox, then submenus, then appearance, and remove the redundant entries (superuser privileges aren't required). It's probably a good idea to make a backup copy before you start editing, in case you make a mistake and need a reference to correct it.

The file manager (Thunar) wasn't set up to my liking, so I changed the settings by going to Settings in the main menu, then selecting File Manager. Settings which control Thunar's response to plugging in flash drives can be accessed by going to the main menu, selecting Settings, and then selecting Removable Drives and Media. I set it up so that I can plug in a bunch of flash drives without having windows popping up all over the screen. This caused some confusion later, when I couldn't find the SD card with Snapshot, until I realized that I hadn't clicked on the SD card's name in the file manager to mount it.

In conclusion, MX-Linux 21 Fluxbox is a gem, although it's not very slick and it doesn't have frills such as multiple workspaces, the ability to zoom the entire screen, or the ability to change window-manager settings. It's one of the fastest types of Linux I've used, and includes MX-Tools, including the aforementioned Snapshot tool (which is apparently unique to MX-Linux and antiX) and includes a good selection of generally-useful apps, including FeatherPad, an excellent text editor, and GKrellm (Gnu Krell Monitors system-monitor, which includes configurable disk I/O monitors), which I've never seen included by default on any other distro. It doesn't include Libre Office (which for me is like using a nuclear weapon to kill a fly), so I installed Abiword. I considered adding KDE Partition Manager until I realized how much data would be required, so I installed Disks (gnome-disk-utility) which combined with GParted (included on MX-F by default) can do anything you could want to do to a drive. I also installed Marble, which I like because it does a lot of what I need from a virtual globe without being connected to the internet. Google Earth does everything and has incredible resolution, but requires a fast, data-unlimited internet connection.

Notes

Rev 6/23/22 - Changed title and added Note 1.

[1] The only problem I found with Lubuntu 22.04 in my brief trial run was that plugging-in flash  drives caused it to freeze, so that all I could do was to log off, etc., although I was able to eliminate this problem by conf  iguring the file manager so that it didn't mount removable drives when they're plugged in. My previous complaint about using the file manager in administrative mode to move .deb-files into /var/cache/apt/archives was apparently due to some error on my part, because I had no difficulty with it in subsequent attempts. So, PCmanFM-QT,the LXQT file manager, is among the best I've used, although it lacks Thunar's ability to add custom actions.

I added a PPA run by "Serverus Septimius" to install LXQT 1.1.0 on Lubuntu 22.04 by entering "sudo add-apt-repository ppa:severusseptimius/lxqt," which in my case also added the PPA's package index to my installation's package index, although I had performed an update immediately before adding the PPA to see what effect it would have on the process of adding the PPA. Then I used APT-offline to install LXQT 1.1.0, which required a 100MB download (57MB of which was Thunderbird). I didn't notice any effects, unless the improvement in my experience with PCmanFM-QT was due to the upgrade. However, PCmanFM-QT was not included in the upgrade.

Both Lubuntu 22.04 and MXL21-FB have very functional software selections without a lot of niche apps, but only MX-Linux, and apparently antiX, have a tool known as Snapshot, which can turn installations of these types of Linux, with  all of their settings and added software, into ISOs which can then be used for creating various types of copies of the original installations. I use a nonpersistent live MXL21-FB installation on a cheap, cool-running (energy-efficient) USB2 flash drive for my air-gap PC, and when it's shut down, it does't retain any session-data, so it's as secure as possible. So, hopefully, there will soon be an official MX-Linux LXQT which can be purchased in the form of DVDs.There already is an MX-Linux LXQT created by an MX-Linux/LXQT enthusiast and made available for download, but it's available only as a download.

Lubuntu 22.04: Almost perfect

 Keywords: "Lubuntu 22.04 review"
Other than sluggish responses to password-inputs during booting, a bug (probably already fixed by some upgrade) which hinders the opening of encrypted flash-drives which are plugged in after the system is booted, and a slow first Firefox Snap launch during each session (although after loading, it's amazing), Lubuntu 22.04 quickly became one of my favorites, along with MX-Linux XFCE (and KDE), Ubuntu Mate, and Kubuntu (I'm partial to Debian/APT-based distros, due to APT-offline). (MX-Linux with the LXQT desktop would be a great combination.) Lubuntu 22.10, which will have a more mature version of the LXQT desktop environment, will undoubtedly be fantastic. You can install LXQT 1.1 (the latest as of this writing), but it's from a PPA, not the Ubuntu repository. I've read that it's excellent, however.

Lubuntu 22.04's selection of software is probably the most functional I've seen, without a lot of niche apps. For example, I almost always install Disks (gnome-disk-utility) when I create an installation, but Lubuntu includes the KDE Partition Manager, which does everything that Disks does. It also includes the Muon package manager, which is a lot like Synaptic, and a software-sources-management app like Software & Updates (i.e. software-properties-gtk) in addition to the Discover app-store.

The file manager, PCManFM-Qt is a sort of combination of Thunar and Dolphin, and is powerful and easy to use. It can be configured to open files and folders with one click, and has a button to open a tab as a root instance, although the administrative password is still required.

Lubuntu 22.04 includes Noble Notes, which is very functional although somewhat cumbersome compared to desktop-notes apps and widgets. I believe I read that an LXQT notes-widget is in the works - hopefully it will be like XFCE's notes-widget.

To add an app to a panel, you would just drag its icon from the main menu to a "Quick Launch" widget/area in the panel.

I had a "package cannot be authenticated" problem when trying to install software after performing an update via APT-offline, but I performed it again (60MB download each time using APT-offline, and 30MB when using a direct connection, which is small for a package-index update compared to most I've seen lately), and the problem went away. I'm not sure exactly what caused the problem, but I suspect that the first time, I didn't give the APT-offline get-op (a specialized download/screening process) sufficient time to write the package-index files from DRAM (apparently used as a transit point to maximize the download-rate) to the flash-drive installation which I had designated as the storage-location, because for one thing after installing those package index files, there was no InRelease file among the resulting packages lists, although there was an InRelease file among the package lists after installing the 2nd batch of package-index files. (It didn't occur to me to compare the two sets of package-index files themselves until after I had deleted the first set.)

The installer (Calamares) apparently couldn't create an installation on a flash drive which already contained an installation (perhaps as a safety measure), so I had to format the drives which I decided to use for Lubuntu installations before I could perform an installation on them with this installer. I prefer Kingston USB3 Datatravelers (a 32GB is probably optimal) because the installation-process isn't glacial, the resulting installation is sufficiently responsive, and the KDT-USB3 drives which I've used run cool compared to most USB3 drives I've tried.

Lubuntu 22.04 is definitely a worthy member of the Ubuntu family, although you might want to wait for the next point-release if you don't want to perform an upgrade to get rid of some bugs, or if you want a more mature version of the desktop without installing it from a PPA. However, you might have to get 22.10 for the upgraded desktop.

My impressions of Ubuntu 22.04

Screenshot of my MX-Linux 21 XFCE installation

 

Based on the lavish praise heaped upon Ubuntu 22.04, I gave it a shot, and found that it's actually quite disappointing, starting with the 3.4GB displacement of the ISO. It doesn't even do a very good job of opening files in response to clicking on their icons, which is one of the most basic functions. I had to install quite a few apps to compensate for the poor functionality of of the ones included by default, and just installing APT-offline (not the GUI) required a download of something on the order of 10 MB, as I recall, whereas with MX-Linux XFCE, I just had to install a couple of small packages. The highly-touted workspace-overview struck me as a gimmick designed just to be different, rather than functional, because it's essentially as easy to use multiple workspaces in XFCE - there's a workspace-switcher widget which has an icon in the panel which provides a thumbnail of each workspace. It doesn't even have a desktop-notes app or widget, although Feather Notes is excellent and requires only a 750 kb download to install it. I previously used Ubuntu Mate, and I still use Kubuntu on my desktop-PC, and both of them are great, although I still prefer MX-Linux XFCE. The KDE version is also excellent, although each package-index update requires a download of approximately 120 MB, and the file manager, without add-ons, is a toy compared to Thunar.

So, I did a search for articles by others with a similar perspective on Gnome, the desktop used (with modifications) by Ubuntu, and eventually found one entitled GNOME Linux — A Complete Disaster?, based on versions up to 41, by someone who develops other Linux distributions. It supports the complaints of a former Ubuntu-developer, who claims that Canonical no longer cares about Ubuntu desktop.

My current favorite is MX-Linux 21 XFCE, partly because the file manager (Thunar) is powerful and easy to use, and MX-Linux includes MX Tools, including the apparently-unique Snapshot tool which allows installations to be turned into ISOs. This allowed me to turn my installation into a live installation, which I put on a cool-running 4GB USB2 drive and run on my air-gap PC (a $200 Gigabyte Brix, which consumes very little energy and has plenty of power for my purposes), and when I shut it down, the installation doesn't retain any session-data. Since I use the original installation for nothing but tweaking the installation and making new ISOs, I didn't have to worry about power consumption and put it on a Sandisk Ultra Luxe USB3 drive which has a fast write-speed but runs hot, indicating high power consumption. I can also connect it to the internet to make changes, with confidence that no hacker can access any data on it. With other Debian-types of Linux, I would have to use the original installation as my working-installation, and I would use APT-offline to make changes to it (including upgrading the OS itself) to avoid connecting it to the internet.

MX-Linux installer tries to put bootloader on live source-installation by default

When installing MX-Linux, pay close attention to the designation for the drive on which the installation is to be placed, so that when you get to the point in the installation-process where you're given a choice of drive on which to install the bootloader, you'll make the right choice. In my experience, the installer tries to put the bootloader on the live installation used for booting the PC, so if you don't change this setting, the installation process will fail, and near the end, after perhaps 70 minutes (on a slow but cool-running drive such as a Kingston USB3 Datatraveler).

I've experimented with the MX Snapshot (an MX Tool) in MX-Linux, by using it to create ISOs from encrypted "full" flash-drive installations, and live installations from the ISOs. Then I used one of the live installations to boot another PC, and to create another encrypted "full" flash drive installation. So, the MX Snapshot tool is extremely useful. Anyone who has spent a long time getting an installation tweaked to their liking can appreciate the ability to quickly and easily create back-up copies and re-create the original installation.

There's a lot to like about MX-Linux XFCE

When I first started using MX-Linux, I was leaning toward the KDE version, until I got fed up with Dolphin, the KDE file manager, due to its lack of access to such things as system directories. I disliked some aspects of MX-Linux XFCE, until I realized that all I needed was to change some settings. For example, it has an optional panel which can be placed anywhere on the screen in a vertical or horizontal orientation (although it works better in horizontal mode), so that I was able to put all of the controls centered at the top of the screen, along with a "LCD" clock which is highly visible regardless of which wallpaper I select, whereas the default desktop-clock's minutes-digits blend in with dark backgrounds and can't be seen very well. There doesn't appear to be any way to change its color scheme.

MX-X is set up by default to mount flash drives and open a file-browser window for each partition, or to open a window for entering the password for encrypted partitions, which I don't like. Fortunately, it turns out that there are file-manager options which allow you to plug in a bunch of flash drives, and then open a file browser window and mount and view each partition at your convenience, without a lot of windows popping up all over the place at inconvenient times.

Another advantage is that it's easy to install APT-offline on MX-21 (all flavors) it without an internet connection, even though the package manager is locked on any new installation, including live installations, until the package index is updated. All it needs is APT-offline and python3-magic, based on the APT-offline page on the Debian Packages site, and on Distrowatch, which lists all packages installed by default on essentially every type of Linux. You would just go to the Debian Packages site, download APT-offline and python3-magic, calculate the checksums of your copies and compare them to the reference values on the Debian Packages site. (Besides checking the ISO's checksum before using it, these are the most important checksums to check, because if APT-offline is corrupted, it might allow malware to be installed on your system. So, I recommend using the SHA256 checksum, or the MD5 sum and the file size.) APT-offline can download the package-index files (75-80MB for the XFCE version, and 120MB for the KDE version) into a folder so that they can be installed on multiple installations (such as to start over from scratch while experimenting with it) without having to download them each time. To install the same software modules/packages on multiple systems over time, you need to install the package index which was originally used for installing the software. But I gather that at some point, the package index will become too outdated to install, so you'd need to download a fresh copy and perhaps some new software-module revisions specified by the new package index.

But the frosting on the cake is MX Snapshot, which allows you to make an ISO out of your full installation, with all of the added software and settings. I used Snapshot to make a few ISOs, and it works very well, and I used the MX Live USB Maker to create a nonpersistent live flash-drive installation which I run on my air-gap PC. It's secure because when it's shut down, it retains no session-data (I save everything on separate flash drives with EXT4 and LUKS partitions). If the full installation from which I made the ISO ever stops working, I can just create a new full installation from the ISO, so that I can tweak the installation and generate a new ISO if I like.

So anyone who's considering getting into Linux, or who's shopping around for a new type of Linux, should give MX-Linux a shot. It's one of the most popular types of Linux for good reason.

Sandisk Ultra Luxe USB-3 FD for Linux installations

Rev 2/26/22 (see Notes)

I finally got around to buying a small metal 64GB USB-3 flash drive from Sandisk (Ultra Luxe) to use for Linux installations, and found that it works very well. The installation-process went extremely quickly (I'd say less than 10 minutes, although I didn't time it), and the resulting installation runs without a hitch and has fast response.  Although I can't guarantee that every one is as fast, I'll buy a Sandisk Ultra Luxe the next time I need a flash drive for this purpose.

The Sandisk Ultra-FIT (stubby) is good if you plan on leaving the drive plugged in, because it has a plastic connector-shroud, which I've worn out as a result of plugging and unplugging it frequently. (The bottom of the shroud came off.) However, it still worked even with part of the shroud missing, although caps required tape to keep them in place. 

 

Notes

Rev 2/26/22 - Deleted reference to 64GB Verbatim Metal Executive because it died after using it for a couple of times. So, the disappointing performance which I obtained from it while it was working might not be typical.

A couple of decent desktop backgrounds

Although my sky-snapshots usually end up being disappointing, I couldn't resist taking these, and have found them to be excellent as desktop backgrounds. So, I decided to post the photos and my 16:9 cropped versions, in case anyone else wants to try them.

Click on the image of interest below for the high-res version.