 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 953, 31 January 2022 |
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Welcome to this year's 5th issue of DistroWatch Weekly!
There are a number of different approaches to making a desktop operating system appealing to new users. One way is to offer something new and interesting, a new feature or effect that will attract people. Another approach is to offer something familiar in an effort to lower the barrier to adoption. This week we begin with a look at two projects: CalinixOS and HefftorLinux. Both of these distributions are based on Arch Linux and both strive to mimic the macOS user interface. The projects provide quite different experiences though and we talk about that in our Feature Story. In our News section we discuss Ubuntu MATE releasing custom images for the GPD Pocket 3 computer while UBports gets video chat working in the Morph browser. Plus we share details on a wide-spread vulnerability which affects most Linux distributions. Then, in our Questions and Answers column we talk about the performance of different package formats and why portable packages have a reputation for slower start-up times. Then we are pleased to share the releases of the past week and list the torrents we are seeding. We wrap up this week by asking people about Linux certifications in our Opinion Poll. Do you have a job working with Linux systems which required certification? Let us know about it below. We wish you all a wonderful week and happy reading!
Content:
Listen to the Podcast edition of this week's DistroWatch Weekly in OGG (14MB) and MP3 (11MB) formats.
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| Feature Story (by Jesse Smith) |
CalinixOS 2021.10.17
This week I decided to go exploring through the DistroWatch waiting list to see what new wonders I could find. One project which jumped out at me was CalinixOS. The CalinixOS distribution is based on Arch Linux and uses the Calamares system installer to get set up. The project features a window manager configured to look like the macOS desktop. There is a stated focus on performance and being easy (or familiar) to use and the project's website mentions there is a focus on making it possible to work mostly from the keyboard. The CalinixOS website also mentions Btrfs is the default filesystem.
CalinixOS is available in one edition which is a 2.0GB download for 64-bit computers. Booting from the live media is slow and the boot processes repeated becomes stuck launching services. The infamous systemd message "A start job is running..." appears a few times. The live disc eventually boots to a graphical login screen. Here we can sign in with the username and password combination: "calinix/calinix". I did not spot this information on the project's website, but it seemed easy enough to guess.
CalinixOS does indeed feature a design which looks like macOS. The distribution runs the Awesome window manager. A thin panel is placed across the top of the screen which houses the application menu and system tray. A thicker dock is placed at the bottom of the display which holds many launchers. I found it curious that only the launchers for folders (which would open the file manager) had working tool tips. The other launchers, for items like Steam and a terminal, did not display tool tips and did not launch their associated application when clicked.
CalinixOS 2021.10-17 -- Running Firefox on the Awesome window manager
(full image size: 553kB, resolution: 1600x795 pixels)
In a similar fashion, when I opened the application menu in the upper-left corner of the desktop it would display a list of launchers. Clicking the entries in the application menu did nothing. I could also bring up an application menu by right-clicking on the desktop. Well, sometimes right-clicking brought up a menu, other times the desktop would just flicker like something was being drawn and then immediately removed. When the right-click menu did appear on the desktop I could use it to launch programs. I also found I was unable to interact with any icons in the system tray which made it difficult to adjust the clock or get on-line.
Since most aspects of the live environment did not work for me, I put aside CalinixOS and went looking for something different.
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HefftorLinux 2021.06.26
The next project I selected at random was HefftorLinux (which I'll mostly refer to as Hefftor). Hefftor is an Arch-based Linux distribution which features a macOS style desktop. It is intended to be easy to set up and use, leveraging the Calamares system installer to assist with this goal. The distribution offers a handful of editions, including bspwm, GNOME, KDE Plasma, Kodi, and Xfce. I decided to try the Xfce edition which is a 2.0GB download.
The Hefftor live media boots quickly to the Xfce desktop. A thin, transparent panel is placed at the top of the display. This top panel holds the application menu and system tray, and I could interact with both. There is a thicker dock panel placed at the bottom of the display which holds application launchers. Both of these panels will disappear when windows are covering (or near) them. Shortly after the desktop loads a welcome window appears and provides a quick overview of the project and tells us where we can find more information on-line.
HefftorLinux 2021.06.26 -- The application menu
(full image size: 882kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
Installing
There are two system installers in the upper-left application menu, one is labelled Basic and the other Expert. Trying to run either of these installer entries caused a pop-up message to appear briefly and then disappear. The window went by too quickly to read. I examined the launchers and found they use the pkexec program to launch Calamares and, when I tried to run any command using pkexec the same error window would appear and immediately vanish. I opened a terminal and found I could launch the Calamares installer by manually running the launcher's command and just swapping out pkexec with sudo. So basically running "sudo calamares" instead of "pkexec calamares". This allowed me to start the install process.
The Calamares installer begins by asking us which kernel option we want to use. The options range from running a regular kernel with NVIDIA drivers, to a long-term support (LTS) kernel with NVIDIA drivers, and both options without NIVIDIA support. There are also entries for Zen and Hardened kernels. We can then select our time zone from a map and pick our keyboard layout. Calamares offers manual and guided partitioning with the guided option taking over available space with the ext4 filesystem. The installer asked me to supply the name and password for a regular user and then began copying files to my hard drive.
The installer worked for a while and then reported an error saying it failed to sync with on-line repositories and bailed out. I confirmed I was on-line and could reach websites using the included Brave browser. Then I tried again. Once again the installer failed halfway through its file copying process saying it could not reach remote repositories.
I tried running the package manager (pacman) from the live environment and discovered half the repositories, those supplied by Arch Linux, seemed to be reachable. However, all the HefftorLinux repositories were off-line and could not be contacted. This prevented Calamares from fetching packages from the Hefftor servers and prevented the installation from completing.
Software management
Since the distribution's repositories were off-line, both the pacman command line package tool and the Pamac graphical software centre failed to work. To make matters worse, when Pamac runs into a situation where it cannot contact remote repositories to check for new software, it reports the distribution is up to date with security fixes. This provides a literal false sense of security.
Hefftor's live environment worked fairly well for me, apart from the package manager and system installer issues. The desktop offered average performance and generally Xfce worked well. The distribution ships with an interesting mix of software, including the Brave web browser, the Evince document viewer and the Thunar file manager. The GParted partition manager, GRsync graphical front-end for file transfers, and a system monitor are included. We also have VLC and qBittorrent included out of the box.
HefftorLinux 2021.06.26 -- The Xfce settings panel
(full image size: 660kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
There are a lot of aliases set up for command line usage. In fact there may be more included in Hefftor than I've ever encountered before. Some of these seem useful, but a few seem dangerous. For example, running "rmd" forces the removal of a directory. The "scp" command is a popular way to transfer files between computers, but it is now an alias to "sudo cp" which means instead of copying files to another machine as my regular user, I end up trying to copy files to a local location as the administrator. I cannot think of a good reason to override common, popular command line tools with aliases to do something that is both slightly different in nature and less secure. This seems like a recipe for a security breach or data loss.
HefftorLinux 2021.06.26 -- Checking for software updates
(full image size: 566kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
Conclusions
For me, it was interesting to examine these two projects which declare almost identical designs and goals (a 2GB ISO offering a macOS-like desktop running on top of Arch Linux with the Calamares installer). Yet the two projects provided quite different experiences. CalinixOS required a password to sign into the live environment and the Awesome window manager barely functioned at all. The system was nearly impossible to use for any purpose and, while the layout of the desktop looked very macOS-ish, having windows display their control buttons down the left side looked alien to the macOS experience.
On the other hand, HefftorLinux offered a smoother introduction with a faster boot and logged into the live environment automatically. Its Xfce desktop worked and did a passable job at imitating macOS. However, the broken installer launcher and the way the panels kept disappearing whenever a window got close to them made navigating the interface frustrating. The biggest hurdle though was the lack of working Hefftor repository servers which prevented the package manager and system installer from working.
In short, these two projects may have had good ideals, but they both need a lot of work to become usable. Despite claiming to be user friendly, both require some guess work and technical ability just to navigate the desktop and launch programs (or the installer) and this is a poor first impression by both distributions.
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| Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith) |
Ubuntu MATE running on GPD Pocket 3, UBPorts gets video chat in browser, patching Polkit vulnerability
The GPD Pocket 3 is a small, personal computer. The mini personal computer can run Ubuntu MATE and the distribution has published custom download images for this device. "In what has become something of a tradition, the Ubuntu MATE team have released images for the GPD Pocket 3 modular handheld PC. Many thanks to the team at GPD for providing sample hardware for us to work with!" In a blog post about the Pocket 3, the Ubuntu MATE team outlines customizations which have been made to make their distribution run better on the small computer.
* * * * *
The UBports team has announced a number of significant changes to their mobile operating system. One of the new features is the ability to use the default Morph web browser for video chats. "The camera permission change mentioned above has been extended so that Morph can now upload video (and audio). Yes, this does mean that we can now video-chat in Morph! Alfred took the groundwork done by Chris and wove this into working video. Florian showed this working on his phone, with two streams of him appearing on the Q&A. He has good WiFi but what that showed is that the video stream has no lags introduced by UT." A complete list of recent changes can be found in the project's news post.
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Several technology-related news sites posted a story this past week which talked about a vulnerability in Polkit. The Polkit software is installed on most Linux distributions and is a key part of the pkexec software which allows users to perform administrative actions. The vulnerability allows regular user accounts to gain root access to the machine if they can run programs. A fix has been released and most Linux distributions have already published package updates to fix the issue. Bleeping Computer shares details on this wide-spread issue: "Researchers at Qualys information security company found that the pkexec program could be used by local attackers to increase privileges to root on default installations of Ubuntu, Debian, Fedora, and CentOS. They warn that PwnKit is likely exploitable on other Linux operating systems as well."
* * * * *
These and other news stories can be found on our Headlines page.
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| Questions and Answers (by Jesse Smith) |
Comparing performance between package formats
Trying-out-a-new-package asks: I often want to have up to date versions of packages that I can't find in my distro's official repos. I've heard Flatpak and Snap are slow. Will the performance difference be significant to the point I should consider older native packages over Flatpak or Snap or is performance close to the same?
DistroWatch answers: Usually when people talk about portable packages being slower than a distribution's native package format, they're talking about the time it takes for an application to start. Portable packages, particularly Snap packages, have gained a reputation for starting up slowly compared to RPM/Deb package formats. However, once the application finishes loading, usually performance is in the same ballpark.
Since most people only need to open a new application once during a desktop session, the start-up time probably won't have a big impact on your application use. The more important factor will be how quickly the software performs once it is up and running.
I tried to do some research on the performance differences between the different formats and got widely different answers on how much of a difference (or even if there would be a difference) in performance a person would see from one package format to another. So I decided to test drive a few packages.
I decided to try running a few packages using multiple package formats on Manjaro Linux to see is there was a difference which could be observed. To do this I found a few applications which were available in each package format and then tried running the programs multiple times to see if I could spot a difference in start times and responsiveness. I chose Manjaro as my test platform as I was concerned distributions like Ubuntu and Fedora might be optimized to favour their preferred portable package format.
I chose Firefox, GIMP, and GnuCash as the three applications to test. Each is widely used and available in all three formats. Below I have recorded the average load times (in seconds) along with notes on how well the application performed once it was up and running.
| Package | Start-up Time (Cold) |
Start-up Time (Cached) | Performance |
| Firefox (Native) |
5s | 2s | good |
| Firefox (Flatpak) |
6s | 3s | good |
| Firefox (Snap) |
18s | 3s | good |
| GIMP (Native) |
12s | 3s | good |
| GIMP (Flatpak) |
9s | 3s | good |
| GIMP (Snap) |
failed to launch | failed to launch | n/a |
| GnuCash (Native) |
2s | 1s | excellent |
| GnuCash (Flatpak) |
2s | 1s | excellent |
GnuCash (Snap) |
failed to launch | failed to launch | n/a |
Ultimately, performance once the application was up and running was identical (or close enough I couldn't spot a difference) when using the applications. However, there was a noticeable difference in start times. Flatpak and native packages tended to open in about the same amount of time, give or take a second. However, the Firefox Snap package was three times slower to launch the first time. Future launches were a lot quicker, but that first start-up time for Firefox was unusually slow.
Unfortunately the other two Snap packages I installed failed to launch entirely. No error message was displayed when trying to open the GnuCash and GIMP Snap bundles from the command line, the programs simply failed to open and the snap program failed to terminate on its own.
Based on my experiences, both during this test and in the past, I'd say there isn't a significant difference in performance between running Flatpak and native packages. Though my trial here, and my reviews of previous versions of Ubuntu, suggest Snap packages still suffer a delay during their initialization.
* * * * *
Additional answers can be found in our Questions and Answers archive.
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| Released Last Week |
OPNsense 22.1
OPNsense is a FreeBSD-based specialist operating system designed for firewalls and routers. The project's latest release is OPNsense 22.1 is based on FreeBSD 13 and improves boot speed while removing older, insecure cryptography components. "22.1, nicknamed "Observant Owl", features the upgrade to FreeBSD 13, switch to logging supporting RFC 5424 with severity filtering, improved tunable sysctl value integration, faster boot sequence and interface initiation and dynamic IPv6 host alias support amongst others. On the flip side major operating system changes bear risk for regression and feature removal, e.g. no longer supporting insecure cryptography in the kernel for IPsec and switching the Realtek vendor driver back to its FreeBSD counterpart which does not yet support the newer 2.5G models. Circular logging support has also been removed." Additional information and a complete list of changes can be found in the project's release announcement.
Nitrux 2022.01.29
Nitrux is a Debian-based, desktop distribution which features a customized KDE Plasma desktop and the OpenRC service manager. The project's latest release updates key packages and features Pacstall, a framework for installing third-party software, similar to Arch Linux's user repository (AUR). "We've updated the following components of the distribution. For a most extensive list of changes, see Notes. KDE Plasma to version 5.23.5, KDE Frameworks to version 5.90.0, KDE Gear to version 21.12.1. Firefox to version 96.0. Pacstall to version 1.7.1. LibreOffice to version 7.5.2. We have tweaked our default configuration to provide smoother KWin performance and overall system responsiveness. We have added a package to include firmware for AMD GPUs unavailable in the kernel packages. We have changed the theme for powerlevel10k to a basic version due to a bug with Station and Nota (see Known Issues). We have reduced the size of both ISO files to 2.3G and 1.3G for the standard ISO and minimal ISO, respectively. Sidenote: The minimal ISO includes the package 'linux-firmware' that increases the size of the ISO to 1.3G; without it, the file size would be around 800M (or less); however, we'd reckon to remove it would cause users various issues." The release announcement contains further information and screenshots. Please note that the release announcement refers to this version as "2.0.0" while the ISO files are tagged with the date (2022-01-29) only. When an announcement and corresponding media do not align, DistroWatch uses the version in the ISO filename to make searching for information on archived versions easier.
Nitrux 2022.01.29 -- The Nitrux live desktop
(full image size: 204kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
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Development, unannounced and minor bug-fix releases
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| Torrent Corner |
Weekly Torrents
The table below provides a list of torrents DistroWatch is currently seeding. If you do not have a bittorrent client capable of handling the linked files, we suggest installing either the Transmission or KTorrent bittorrent clients.
Archives of our previously seeded torrents may be found in our Torrent Archive. We also maintain a Torrents RSS feed for people who wish to have open source torrents delivered to them. To share your own open source torrents of Linux and BSD projects, please visit our Upload Torrents page.
Torrent Corner statistics:
- Total torrents seeded: 2,675
- Total data uploaded: 41.5TB
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| Upcoming Releases and Announcements |
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Summary of expected upcoming releases
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| Opinion Poll (by Jesse Smith) |
Linux certification
This week we received a question about Linux certifications and we left it best to allow our readers to respond based on their experiences in their region.
I'd like to see an opinion poll asking which Linux certifications people have. I'm curious, because I recently passed the LPIC-1 exam. When I look at Linux jobs in my area, most job ads want CompTIA Linux+ or RHCSE. Microsoft had an MCSA Linux certification for a while, but it's been discontinued. Are any of these other certifications helpful for a newbie Linux Sysadmin just getting started?
Do you have a certification from a Linux course? Did you need one to get a job in system administration? Let us know the details in the comments.
You can see the results of our previous poll on trying UBports in last week's edition. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.
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Do you have any Linux certifications?
| CompTIA: | 30 (2%) |
| GIAC: | 4 (0%) |
| Linux Foundation: | 23 (2%) |
| LPIC: | 34 (2%) |
| Oracle: | 5 (0%) |
| Red Hat: | 29 (2%) |
| SUSE: | 8 (1%) |
| More than one of the above: | 28 (2%) |
| Other certification: | 45 (3%) |
| None: | 1184 (85%) |
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| Website News |
Donations and Sponsors
Each month we receive support and kindness from our readers in the forms of donations. These donations help us keep the web server running, pay contributors, and keep infrastructure like our torrent seed box running. We'd like to thank our generous readers and acknowledge how much their contributions mean to us.
This month we're grateful for the $65 in contributions from the following kind souls:
| Donor |
Amount |
|---|
| Werner S | $12 |
| John S | $11 |
| Steve W | $10 |
| Sam C | $10 |
| Olivier F | $8 |
| DuCakedHare | $5 |
| Gary P | $5 |
| J.D. L | $2 |
| Bizūnas S | $1 |
| Stephen M | $1 |
* * * * *
New distributions added to database
Ultramarine Linux
Ultramarine Linux is a Fedora-based distribution featuring extra package repositories such as RPM Fusion, the Budgie (or Cutefish) desktop, and multimedia codecs. Ultramarine can be considered a spiritual successor to Korora Project and aims to make Fedora a more desktop-friendly experience.
Ultramarine Linux 35 -- Running the Budgie desktop
(full image size: 597KB, resolution: 1536x864 pixels)
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DistroWatch database summary
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This concludes this week's issue of DistroWatch Weekly. The next instalment will be published on Monday, 7 February 2022. Past articles and reviews can be found through our Article Search page. To contact the authors please send e-mail to:
- Jesse Smith (feedback, questions and suggestions: distribution reviews/submissions, questions and answers, tips and tricks)
- Ladislav Bodnar (feedback, questions, donations, comments)
- Bruce Patterson (podcast)
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| Reader Comments • Jump to last comment |
1 • MacOS-like OS (by codesipper on 2022-01-31 04:48:14 GMT from France)
CalinixOS & HefftorLinux: "both strive to mimic the macOS user interface."
And then there's AiryxOS, that not only wants to look like MacOS, but also wants to be able to "have binary compatibility with macOS software, meaning you can drop a bundle onto AiryxOS and execute it just as on macOS... [and] source compatibility... This means you can take your mostly unmodified Mac source and build the project on above AiryxOS to produce a similar bundle that will run there."
Currently, however, the BSD-based AiryxOS is in more unstable shape than the two Linuxes. But then if "Wine" can run Windows apps on Linux, I wonder if AiryxOS's tool to run Apple apps on BSD should be called "Cider" :)
2 • @1 (by anotherone on 2022-01-31 07:42:20 GMT from Spain)
"I wonder if AiryxOS's tool to run Apple apps on BSD should be called "Cider""
Great. And if a tool to run BeOS/Haiku applications appears, what about "Beer"?
3 • Linux certifications (by Jeffrey on 2022-01-31 08:01:38 GMT from Czechia)
I think the usefulness of Linux certifications can depend on your situation. I took the Linux Foundation's entry-level certification (LF Certified System Administrator) partly because I had no formal IT education or training (aside from basic high school IT classes), and that seemed to me the most affordable one for me at the time (both i terms of money and effort). In such a situation, it can be useful to show that a beginner can take on such an exam, even if it is entry-level. Also, learning for and passing practical certifications (as opposed to simple-choice or multiple-choice tests) does give you some more practice, which never hurts. (My LFCS has expired years ago, but I recently took the RH Certified System Administrator exam, and that and its preparatory course are pretty thorough.)
On the other hand, you can't really compete with experienced veterans if you only have basic certs, but you probably don't go for the same positions as them. And then, when you get more experienced, you can go for more certs, and advanced ones (e.g. "Engineer" and "Architect" certs).
4 • Arch based distros (by Guilherme on 2022-01-31 09:25:00 GMT from Estonia)
seems like anyone with the slightest idea of a customisation for a desktop decides to make one these days. Funny enough they usually bring nothing new to the table and die soon
5 • Polls, command line and certifications (by penguinx86 on 2022-01-31 10:01:11 GMT from United States)
Last week's poll asked about learning the command line. When I took the LPIC exam last year, just about every exam question was command line based. I looked into CompTIA Linux+ and it's exam objectives were mostly command line based too. You need a good working knowledge of the command line and the Bash shell to pass these certification exams.
6 • Linux certification (by James on 2022-01-31 11:34:19 GMT from United States)
Do you have any Linux certifications?
None: 431 (87%)
I guess Linux is not just for Tech Geeks anymore!
7 • Linux training and certification (by Donald Sebastian Leung on 2022-01-31 12:13:27 GMT from Hong Kong)
I've personally started my Linux journey in mid-2020 by taking training courses offered by The Linux Foundation, followed by four certifications (three of which I passed):
- Linux Foundation Certified Sysadmin (LFCS): Flagship certification by The Linux Foundation. A closed-book, performance-based exam on the Linux command line. Was fun but also slightly challenging, managed to pass on the first attempt but not by a large margin (-:
- OpenJS Foundation Certified Node.js Application Developer (JSNAD): An open-book (but only official Node.js docs allowed), performance-based exam on writing simple Node.js applications. Pretty straightforward if you took their recommended preparation course. Overall, a good exam experience
- Linux Foundation Certified Engineer (LFCE): Excellent exam experience, similar to LFCS (also closed-book, performance-based on the Linux command line), but very difficult! Did not get anywhere near passing it on first attempt and I didn't use my second attempt, but I knew pretty much how I failed so I have nothing to complain about
- OpenJS Foundation Certified Node.js Services Developer (JSNSD): Similar to JSNAD in both format and difficulty, but focusing on HTTP services. Also a straightforward exam if you know your stuff and good exam experience overall, but ran into some autograding issues that were eventually resolved through a request for manual grading
Overall, courses and certifications by The Linux Foundation are top-notch and I would recommend them to anyone looking for Linux (or other open-source) certification, whether or not they have a prior CS / IT background. After all, it's the organization that overlooks the development of the Linux kernel itself ;-)
***
Speaking of IT certifications in general, I would strongly recommend IT practitioners of the 21st century to take a few related certifications, at least one of which is directly related to Linux, best if they're performance-based so you know how well you do in a semi-real-world scenario. Whether or not they decide to apply for Linux sysadmin positions or not, Linux powers an absolute majority of the Internet and many modern technologies and paradigms (e.g. cloud computing, cloud native) are built on top of it, so not getting familiar with the Linux command really puts one at a disadvantage against other competitors.
8 • linux certs (by Appalachian on 2022-01-31 12:21:25 GMT from United States)
It's no wonder that 87% of DW readers don't have a certification. The cost to get one is outrageous. Unless your employer will pick up some of the cost, or unless you're guaranteed to get some advanced position by having the certification, then they're simply too expensive.
9 • snap,Flatpcks etc (by kc1di on 2022-01-31 12:36:18 GMT from United States)
Nice test wish you had included Appimages also as I use those for a couple programs and have notice very little difference in them and native packages where available.
My tests pretty much have mirrored yours. Snaps seem much slower and often do not launch correctly. Guess I still prefer native .deb/rpm packages but the big guns seem to be bent on pushing different package management systems. I can partly see the advantage to them but not sure I see the advantage to the average op. Thanks for the reviews thought enjoy them.
10 • Certs (by Rob Rickson on 2022-01-31 13:21:34 GMT from United States)
Depending on your market sector, certification may be mandatory. I've got a security clearance and have done work for various government organizations, and the majority of my work is as a Linux admin. To get in the door in a number of these positions you need Security+ (DOD 8570 requirement), and RHCSA. You can get by without the Red Hat cert, but for me at least it's given me a lot of leverage in salary negotiations with defense contractors.
Linux+, Linux Foundation, and LPIC seem to be unknown and/or unimportant in this sector. I'm not denigrating those particular certifications (I know very little about the Linux Foundation certs), just that I don't see requests for them.
11 • Certifications: (by dragonmouth on 2022-01-31 13:49:04 GMT from United States)
My company hired the best and the brightest graduates of the best programming schools. They all had the latest certifications. However, it took them 3-6 months to learn how to program in the real world.
Certifications impress the HR flunkies. In the trenches, it is experience that counts.
12 • Certs (by John on 2022-01-31 13:56:01 GMT from Canada)
No I did not need any kind of certification to get a development job in IT. But when I started, even a 4 year college degree was optional.
Back then people were desperate for IT workers. IT wages were not that good compared to Union Jobs at the time (I took a pay cut), so most people stayed with the money. I decided on IT because I thought I would love the work, little did I know how finances would reverse.
These days, seems certs and college are needed. With how IT is playing out compared to 40 years ago, I feel bad for the young people just starting out. Seems they have to deal with a lot of BS compared to when I started out.
13 • credentials (by Jay on 2022-01-31 16:05:08 GMT from Sweden)
There are two routes to getting a decent job in IT. One is the paper chase route that will get you past the first hiring hurdle (HR 'droids).
Based on some years of experience in trying to being those that're paper-trained up to the point of actually being useful, skill sets vary widely from person to person even when they have papers.
If you already know your way around a server room, a better route is to find someone already in IT (with the ability to recommend hiring) that has a good idea of what your skill set includes and demonstrate the full range of your abilities.
When you already have the requisite skills, you're usually better off starting with a smaller firm (where you can shine in multiple roles) and grow with the company for a few years - then use demonstrated ability and experience to get you in the door for your next hire.
14 • Of certifications and stuff... (by tom joad on 2022-01-31 16:08:06 GMT from Moldova)
No certs here.
However, I bought my first computer in '85 which was an Apple IIc with the extra drive. Realized quick that the Apple way was a dead end ending, $$$$, at the Apple Store every time. Jumped to Radio Shack MS-Dos box with the 10 meg hard drive...Wow!!! Took four semesters of college networking classes which was mostly Novell and a dead end. I have had several jobs over the years doing the help desk thing. Landed at Linux around 2007 and never looked back. Over the years I have built computers, fixed computers and rebuilt computers for myself, family, others and for $$$$.
Except for the IIc all of it was MS based equipment. I don't think a Cert will benefit me much.
A customer asked me on a help line who I would call to fix my computer. I told him we, the techs, read the manuals and figure it out ourselves. (silence)
15 • Certifications (by Jesse on 2022-01-31 16:10:35 GMT from Canada)
@6: >> "Do you have any Linux certifications?
None: 431 (87%)
I guess Linux is not just for Tech Geeks anymore!"
That is one possibility. I think it's also likely that a lot of people who do work professionally with Linux never bothered to get certified because it wasn't necessary. I've been the Linux IT guy for a handful of places and they never asked about certification. As long as I could do the job, they were happy.
A lot of us, especially those of us who got into Linux early, learned either before certifications in Linux were common or learned on our own time. I suppose I could get certified, but it's never been a job requirement.
16 • Certs (by Robert on 2022-01-31 16:51:00 GMT from United States)
They are all expired now, but I did hold the LPIC1, Linux+, and the entry-level SUSE certification. At the time you could take 1 test and get all 3, maybe that's still available.
Never got a job inIT though. I keep telling myself to do it, but lack motivation.
17 • Thank you for covering security (by concerned user on 2022-01-31 20:22:53 GMT from United States)
As per https://ubuntu.com/security/CVE-2021-4034 the
fixed versions of https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/policykit-1 appear to be :
0.105-31.1 release (main) 2022-01-26 (for Jammy)
and
for Impish Indri (current stable release) PolicyKit trunk series
0.105-31ubuntu0.1
18 • @2 (by RoestVrijStaal on 2022-01-31 21:50:42 GMT from Netherlands)
> Great. And if a tool to run BeOS/Haiku applications appears, what about "Beer"?
I'd opt for Nihonshu
19 • @11 (by Justin on 2022-01-31 21:53:08 GMT from United States)
@11 true dat
We tried hiring fresh graduates last year. I couldn't believe how little they actually knew or could do. One guy talked up his "impressive" resume, but when you looked at his Github projects, they were basically "git clone," "git clone," "import a to b", wow, look how impressive I am! He was bragging about something he was going to need to do 20 times a day, not once a semester. Needless to say, he never got the job.
20 • certification (by Certification on 2022-01-31 22:32:40 GMT from Portugal)
Long ago IBM had various courses, up to sysadmin, not sure if certified or not. @6, @15 may do (did) better than certified.
Current days, I would choose big enterprise offerings.
21 • Certification (by DaveT on 2022-01-31 23:09:30 GMT from United Kingdom)
Certification? Just a means of extracting money IMHO.
Never bothered with it, never will.
You can shove PRINCE2 where the sun doesn't shine too.
BSc and MSc qualifications and 40 years experience has sufficed for me.
And this year I retire!
22 • Certifiable (by Trihexagonal on 2022-02-01 01:24:39 GMT from United States)
I've never taken a computer class, have never worked in IT, never tried for a Linux certifications and didn't even finish High School.
I taught myself to use every computer I've touched and Operating System I've used from an AppleII to SysV.
That being my personal goal set long before I ever used a computer..Having had the hots for UNIX since hearing as a young lad that's what flipped Ma Bell's switches.
And chicks dig guys with pocket protectors. I just knew it..
*sing* I'm not Certified, but I'm Certifiable...*sing*
23 • Certification (by JustJack on 2022-02-01 01:36:11 GMT from United States)
TL;DR: Get a SANS certification (any) and score above 90 to get an invite to the advisory board mailing list, you will get hired from that list easier than anywhere else.
Don't bother with re-certs. Work on a CISSP to get past the HR-droid-bots for your next gig.
Finally, learn how to code and promote yourself.
24 • BCS-SIGIST cert (by Julian Pursell on 2022-02-01 05:31:33 GMT from United Kingdom)
I hold a SIGIST cert.
Testing is platform-independent. I can test linux, windows, the interface between me an my next door neighbours, any system.
I care not what it runs on, it all falls before the mighty tester.
25 • @6 Linux certification (by Alexandru on 2022-02-01 08:10:29 GMT from Romania)
Quote:
"""
Do you have any Linux certifications?
None: 431 (87%)
I guess Linux is not just for Tech Geeks anymore!
"""
Would be interesting to compare this result to Windows certification:
Do you have any Windows certification>
None: XYZT (99.999%)
Still, running Windows sometimes assumes geekish knowledge.
26 • 25 • @6 Linux certification (by James on 2022-02-01 11:49:32 GMT from United States)
You completely miss or purposely misinterpret my point. Spreaders of Linux FUD always call Linux a "tech geek OS' . It is not, I am a casual user, so they can and do exist. Windows is touted as the "non-geek easy to use OS". It is no easier or harder to use than Linux.
27 • Linux Certifications (by Robert on 2022-02-01 17:04:31 GMT from United States)
My career has focused on government, healthcare and defense, and in my case every job I've had either requires certification or recommends it. "Recommended" is a misnomer because if you have certification and your applicant competition does not, guess who's getting hired? I have RHCE and Security+. People told me early on that CompTIA certs are low-level for novices, but many health and NATO-member defense sectors won't even talk to you if you don't have at least Sec+. Check out DoD-Directive 8140/8570.
I want higher pay, don't you? RHCE and other vendor certs prove you know what you're talking about and not just googling for answers on Stack Exchange. They give you a leg up in salary negotiation and put you at the front of the line. I have 20 years of IT experience in HPC and Linux. Believe me, certifications are worth every penny. My advice is to get one vendor cert or one cloud cert e.g. AWS, and Security+. These are relatively inexpensive compared to the dividends they pay later.
28 • 'none' certs (by not mind on 2022-02-01 17:08:19 GMT from United States)
I'd not mind seeing how many of the 87% clicking on 'none' for linux certifications actually work in linux admin and/or IT jobs
29 • Linux Certification (by Otis on 2022-02-01 17:08:38 GMT from United States)
It was a dream for a while. When I first encountered this thing called open source operating systems daring to be there at all let alone battle for shelf space with Microsoft's Windows I wanted to know everything about it and to participate in its creation, etc. Certification? I must not have had the enthusiasm I thought I had, because the things I did get educated in enough to receive credentials have nothing to do with operating systems.
30 • Linux Certification for Tech Geeks (by Simon Plaistowe on 2022-02-02 01:04:19 GMT from New Zealand)
The poll shows what most of us already know... you don't need certs to get the work done, just experience and the inexhaustable will to keep on learning. I've been working with computers for almost 40 years now, yet still I have no Linux-specific certs (or M$-specific either).
31 • certs...? (by Ostro on 2022-02-02 11:36:34 GMT from Poland)
All one need to know is how to use apps, whether on Linux or on Windows. The knowledge how the OS works is not a necessity at all for a normal user. :)
32 • Linux Certifications (by penguinx86 on 2022-02-03 00:09:46 GMT from United States)
I started with LPIC Linux Essentials because it only cost $120 and never expires. I was a UNIX Sysadmin for 10 years before Y2k, so Linux seems familiar to me. It was a fairly easy exam. It looks good on my resume, since all my Microsoft certifications are over 10 years old for stuff that is no longer supported. Then I went on to take the two LPIC-1 exams at $200 each. This was a goal I set for myself over 10 years ago. So, I finally got serious about it and took the exams last year.
I chose LPIC-1 because it has a 5 year expiration, compared to Linux+ and the Red Hat certs with a 3 year expiration. But then I found out the LPIC certs aren't well recognized in the USA. If I had to do it over again, I would have done CompTIA Linux+ instead. The CompTIA certs can be renewed online every 3 years by taking an online Certmaster course and evaluation exam for about $200. CompTIA Linux+ also renews A+ CE if you are already A+ CE certified. I didn't consider the Red Hat certs, because Red Hat is too proprietary and the training and certs are too expensive.
I agree with @27 that DoD jobs require the CompTIA Security+ to meet the IAT level 2 DoD 8570 baseline certification requirement. I looked at DoD contractor jobs on Indeed.com most of them require Security+ as a minimum. Also, it seems like the DoD loves proprietary Red Hat and non Red Hat certs don't carry as much weight. The Security+ and LPIC-1 certifications might get me an interview for an entry level help desk job as a contractor for a foot in the door.
For the LPIC and CompTIA exam objectives, they are mostly based on Debian and Red Hat distros and mostly using the command line. I used VirtualBox to run VMs of Debian, Mint, Fedora, CentOS and a trial version of Red Hat to study for the LPIC exams. Both of the LPIC exams were more difficult than I expected, but I was able to pass them both on the first try after studying for about 3 months.
33 • @31, certs...? (by Abby Normal on 2022-02-03 00:14:16 GMT from Hong Kong)
I doubt many "normal" users hang around Distrowatch. I doubt most "normal" users even know what Distrowatch is. I'm sure most readers here share an interest in Linux and FOSS. A few may be certified, some more may be certifiable, even more are self-taught, and many just muddle along, but I believe most also share an interest in how an OS works.
34 • @33 Abby Normal: (by dragonmouth on 2022-02-03 14:27:23 GMT from United States)
So what you are basically saying is that it is "abnormal" to share interest in Linux and FOSS and hang around Distrowatch? :-)
35 • "Normal" linux users.. distrowatch (by Otis on 2022-02-03 15:49:14 GMT from United States)
@33 To me it's a bit like my smartphone; I love to check by the forums for that device to see what meanderings are going on with its users usage and thinking and of course its ecosystem. I'll never be an expert with regard to that device or linux or my car or other things important in my life, but I'll try to keep up with developments as best I can.
36 • certification (by hulondalo on 2022-02-04 22:47:29 GMT from Hong Kong)
ten years ago everybody i knew had at least ccna. today with everything moving to cloud, vendor- or operating system-based certs seem not so popular as security. in some countries in asia, cissp is mandatory if you wanna be cto or cisa for auditors.
Number of Comments: 36
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