 DistroWatch Weekly |
| Tip Jar |
If you've enjoyed this week's issue of DistroWatch Weekly, please consider sending us a tip.
(Tips this week: 1, value: US$100) |
|
|
|
 bc1qxes3k2wq3uqzr074tkwwjmwfe63z70gwzfu4lx  lnurl1dp68gurn8ghj7ampd3kx2ar0veekzar0wd5xjtnrdakj7tnhv4kxctttdehhwm30d3h82unvwqhhxarpw3jkc7tzw4ex6cfexyfua2nr  86fA3qPTeQtNb2k1vLwEQaAp3XxkvvvXt69gSG5LGunXXikK9koPWZaRQgfFPBPWhMgXjPjccy9LA9xRFchPWQAnPvxh5Le paypal.me/distrowatchweekly • patreon.com/distrowatch |
|
| Extended Lifecycle Support by TuxCare |
|
|
| Reader Comments • Jump to last comment |
1 • Virtual and voice assistants, or just language model (by Vinfall on 2024-01-15 02:12:38 GMT from Singapore)
It reminds me of a discussion between my friend and me, about whether there is ANY truly voice model with underlying voice input and directly voice output.
The surge of LLM certainly boosted so-called voice assistants, as they are fundamentally keyword trigger, phrase analyzer/balancer/responder, and trained language model in general. I'm unsure about which path would lead to a better way, since there is currently no comparable voice model. And making already established TTS (text to speech) and STT technologies better, and integrate them into LLM seems much simpler to me.
2 • Speech to Text (by stanr on 2024-01-15 02:46:19 GMT from United States)
My only interest currently, would be local speech to text. For me, it would be very useful to blurt out my thoughts quickly. Then, I would more likely edit, organize and push them out to my discussion groups.
3 • Virtual/voice assistant (by fenglengshun on 2024-01-15 02:53:27 GMT from Indonesia)
I tried, for about a day, when I first got a wireless earbuds. And it's bad. If it's already bad above, the experience is worse in lower-end devices.
The idea was that Google Assistant should have been able to response to "Hey, Google," from your earbuds or to your phone, at any time, right? Nope, it takes a few tries, then it needs to spend a few seconds loading the interface, then it needs to hear what I say, and half the time because of my accent and the low-power nature of my devices, it just doesn't interpret it correctly.
In the times when it does or I typed instead of spoken the command, most of the time it doesn't really respond satisfyingly because unsurprisingly it's just a google search with no ability to interpret the full implications of my questions and what the search result says.
Things like ChatGPT responds better, but to me they're more a specific-purpose tool -- if I ask AIs questions that aren't specific enough, then it still get it wrong. At which point I just treat it as an advanced filter and text generator/converter tool -- I'm not going to bother asking even ChatGPT questions that's better answered with a normal search, I'm only going to use it when I'm too lazy to make or adjust some bash scripts I need to do batch operations or something.''
Virtual assistants need to just focus on being a good tool instead of pretending it could be the be-all end-all of every questions or requests you want to ask.
4 • Speech to text (by DaveW on 2024-01-15 03:01:19 GMT from United States)
I use spech-to-text on my Android phone (works quite well) but I don't believe that is what you are calling a virtual/voice assisstant.
5 • Voice Assistants (by Wedge009 on 2024-01-15 04:30:53 GMT from Australia)
Don't worry Jesse, I - and I suspect many other DW readers - have not or would not want to use voice assistants. For starters, I imagine many of us would already be quite adept at typing anyway. And then there's the possible privacy concerns depending on the implementation. I was not aware of there being Linux-based offerings so at least it was an interesting read to go through your findings.
The speech-to-text application mentioned by stanr reminds me of one of my previous employers in the late 2000s, using such software to dictate his notes. I found the number of times he kept saying 'scratch that' (to cancel the last phrase uttered because the program misinterpreted his words) amusing, but clearly he found it useful enough to keep using it even though he was proficient at typing anyway (I think perhaps he was trying to reduce RSI-related pain).
I presume the technology will continue to improve with time to the point it might actually be useful someday beyond just being a gimmick or novelty. But at this point I have no desire or interest in trying voice-operated tools.
6 • Adelie (by dkmillares on 2024-01-15 05:36:12 GMT from Brazil)
Glad to see Adelie Linux in the news and on the waitlist.
7 • MX Linux crazy hot (by mixer on 2024-01-15 07:09:00 GMT from Moldova)
I can confirm that MX Linux is a hooot distro.
I tried more than 50 distros on my laptop and MX Linux was for ages (8 years) the only one which heated my pc, and for no reason. The aluminium chassis was always hot on top of the location where CPU is situated.
It was in every version for last 5 years, including latest one. Interestingly antiX is ok.
I suspect that MX uses aggressive kernel settings...
Another distro which heats my pc is Ubuntu Mate (both 22.04 and 23.04)....
Before that Ubuntu Mate worked as charm.
P.S:
this is very frustrating, it is literary not clear what to do, cause system monitor shows no processes which eat CPU, it is very confusing for me.
8 • voice assistant (by Luca on 2024-01-15 07:34:16 GMT from Italy)
I really liked the article about the "AI" voice assistants. It's always the same for me: I see people so happy about their new spying device and then I see them having trouble with them XD
9 • MX linux (by A vd Tweel on 2024-01-15 08:27:30 GMT from The Netherlands)
I've been running MX since 2019, and Debian from 2014 to 2019 on my desk PC. I never noticed any significant rise in temperature.
I bought a HP laptop in 2023, and put MX23 on it. The only times the fan came on was when I ran DOSBOX.
10 • Voice assistants and AI (by perstreperous on 2024-01-15 09:45:53 GMT from United Kingdom)
I suspect that many Linux users are Linux users so they can omit voice assistants, AI and the rest of it, especially with Microsoft declaring 2024 "the year of AI-powered Windows PCs" (including a key on keyboards to bring up Copilot, its AI assistant) and "a more personal and intelligent computing future where AI will be seamlessly woven into Windows from the system, to the silicon, to the hardware" ...
11 • Voice Assistants (by DachshundMan on 2024-01-15 10:07:41 GMT from United Kingdom)
I do not use a voice assistant as I have no confidence that my data will be kept confidential and that questions that I give it will not be used to power advertising or to train an AI without my permission. After going to the trouble of using anonymous search, ad blocker, Firewall etc why would I then choose to give my data away. Perhaps a 100% local installation could be OK but then how would the developers make their money ?
12 • @ 10 Voice assistants and AI (by James on 2024-01-15 11:01:03 GMT from United States)
I suspect that many Linux users are Linux users so they can omit voice assistants, AI and the rest of it,
Yes, exactly why I use Linux!
13 • Voice assists (by crayola_eater on 2024-01-15 11:07:04 GMT from United States)
Had to choose 'None of the above' as I didn't see listed the voice assistant that I rely on - the voices in my head :-)
Like AI, they are gererally useful, yet do experience confusion and hallucinations.
14 • @7 MX heating laptop (by Chris Whelan on 2024-01-15 11:51:30 GMT from United Kingdom)
@7 Have you reported this on the forum? They are very helpful, and may find a solution for you. Alternatively, the MX Package Installer makes it easy to try other kernels, to see if that fixes things.
I can't find other reports of overheating on the forum, so it doesn't seem to be a common problem.
15 • @7 - MX heating laptop (by Uncle Slacky on 2024-01-15 12:16:05 GMT from France)
Ensure that you're running thermald and tlp (tlp is installed by default on MX IIRC), that should keep the temperature down. Also, consider cleaning your fan and exhaust vents and reapplying thermal paste to the CPU, especially if your PC is a few years old.
16 • Voice assistants (by dragonmouth on 2024-01-15 13:16:19 GMT from United States)
The price of convenience is security and privacy.
17 • Eh? Aye! (by Friar Tux on 2024-01-15 14:13:53 GMT from Canada)
I think I've mentioned this here before. I look forward to the day when I can call across the room to my laptop to write a letter to Mom, and the laptop AI presents me with a well written draft to peruse and make minor changes to. This is, of course, IF I ever get used to talking out loud to a computer/laptop/device. I prefer to work silently on my machine, BUT an AI assist would be awesome. I used to have a search engine/launcher on my laptop call Cerebro that was quite good. It stopped working a few years ago, and I haven't found a good replacement since. Cerebro did just about everything I threw at it. It converted metric to Imperial, did calculations, got weather reports, got recipes by ingredient lists, and much more. Anyway, it's gone now, but I do have a bunch of bookmarks to site that do most of the stuff, so, no lose.
I DID vote "None Of The Above" as I have tried all the programs/apps that Jesse mentioned in his article and found the same issues as Jesse. Mycroft looked to be the most promising but trying to install it was a mess so I gave up. While I really don't actually care if any of these VAs "call home", I DO prefer something local on my machine. I don't have privacy issues as I don't do anything "questionable" on my machine. (Questionable = anything I wouldn't want my Gramma, or kids, to see.) I still haven't yet, but I'm going to try out MakuluLinux's AI assisted distro. Should be interesting.
18 • Do you use a virtual/voice assistant? (by Geo. on 2024-01-15 14:42:29 GMT from Canada)
Absolutely not. I had no privacy growing up in a small town and working in a public business. I absolutely do not want some device that listen in or spy 24/7/365. I feel naked and exposed ever since I gave up my land line. I look for opportunities to abandon my leash (mobile) whenever I can. AI will only be used for evil and gain by nefarious actors. Jesse, thank you, that story was hilarious. 😀
19 • In Answer to Friar Tux from Canada on 2024-01-15 14:13:53 GMT (by RetiredIT on 2024-01-15 14:52:25 GMT from United States)
"The development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race."
Stephen Hawking (1942-2018), theoretical physicist, cosmologist, and author
20 • Voice assistance, internet powered, regardless of operating system. (by Greg Zeng on 2024-01-15 16:25:52 GMT from Australia)
Results from the Distrowatch survey this week show that about 80% of the readers are not using computers correctly.
The voice assistant in Apple, Windows and Android needs internet access. Some might argue that Android-based systems are not Linux, either open-source or closed-source. Therefore Android and hence Linux do not have voice assistance.
Voice assistance may have no worries about the breach of privacy. "What was the average weather in New York, on Christmas day?" Voice Assistance is also used in real-time, on internet-powered computers, regardless if Google Keyboard (Gboard) is used. Voice search on websites can be used when microphone input is allowed for text input.
Most web browsers can easily and quickly use YouTube's "subtitles/cc" application. This enables most YouTube publications to print the voice code onto the screen display in real time. The raw text capture is usually in English. Voice capture can then be permanently stored for further use.
21 • Artificial intelligence (by Bobbie Sellers on 2024-01-15 17:08:54 GMT from United States)
Above some competent individual wrote:
"In Answer to Friar Tux from Canada on 2024-01-15 14:13:53 GMT (by RetiredIT on 2024-01-15 14:52:25 GMT from United States)
"The development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race."
Stephen Hawking (1942-2018), theoretical physicist, cosmologist, and author "
No worries. The AI being developed is little more than a search engine. Full artificial
intelligence requires consciousness and I doubt very much that anyone aside from
philosophical theoreticians is interested in that.
Heck some companies seem determined to stamp out customers consciousness.
Thus the tools that enable consciousness suppression. Some individuals seem
determined to suppress consciousness personally and use chemicals to that end.
22 • Talking to computers (by Bobbie Sellers on 2024-01-15 17:14:45 GMT from United States)
Have you thought to try Knoppix, I believe the version that is voice controlled is
called "Ariadne" but it has been years since I paid attention. The problem is that
random noise, radio or TV can interrupt you. I prefer typing to talking and am
slow at either.
Favorite feature of posting is the chance to garner fresh Twain quotes.
23 • Knoppix (by Jesse on 2024-01-15 17:28:17 GMT from Canada)
@22: "Have you thought to try Knoppix, I believe the version that is voice controlled is called "Ariadne""
You're thinking of the "Adriane" edition of Knoppix. It is not voice controlled. It has a screen reader built into it that runs by default.
24 • AI (by mf6333 on 2024-01-15 17:29:11 GMT from Poland)
Mycroft can be found in AUR. Sometimes I ask some questions to Aria - AI built in Opera web browser.
25 • Mycroft is kaput (successor projects exist) (by ChanceNCounter on 2024-01-15 19:37:22 GMT from United States)
You haven't received a response from the MycroftAI team because they wound down operations about a year ago. Unfortunately, although they handed over their forum to a successor project, the rest of their web site and attached infra (including their GitHub org) is just sitting there misleading visitors.
You were probably looking for its successor NeonAI, a surviving derivative with a staffed studio behind it. There's also a nonprofit foundation upstream of Neon, currently in the process of incorporating, but we aren't in a position where I'm comfortable triggering a sudden influx of users ;)
Note to passing vigilantes: the former Mycroft staffers whose names turn up in old GitHub issues are not the former Mycroft staffers responsible for, well, any of it. Please don't harass random FOSSies! (You wouldn't think I'd need to add this to a random comment on DistroWatch, but we've had some experiences.)
26 • Voice Assistant (by pc4life on 2024-01-15 19:39:00 GMT from United States)
It wouldn't even occur to me to try a VA on my pc or laptops.
27 • Voice assistants, Copilot Linux (by Mr. Moto on 2024-01-15 19:52:57 GMT from Japan)
My experiences with Google assistant mark it as an annoyance more than a helper, popping up unwanted and not popping up when called for. It's now disabled on my phone.
@10, Copilot is available in the Linux Edge browser. I use Edge sometimes, so might try it out one of these days.
28 • AI and Linux (by Simon on 2024-01-15 21:55:46 GMT from New Zealand)
Just at the moment (though not for long), AI still serves mostly incompetent users who can't get things done quickly themselves, and Linux users tend to be the kinds of competent users who can, so the survey results aren't surprising. It's not just the speed and privacy issues that Jesse mentioned explicitly at the start (typing instructions is often faster than delivering them verbally as a natural language request, and to use one of the current AI speakers is to give up your privacy voluntarily)... it's also the unreliability illustrated in the conversation with Alexa: this is very significant and makes these assistants worthless in many contexts.
It's one thing to ask your AI to play a particular song and it plays something else: you know immediately that it has got things wrong. It's different when it's providing answers to questions when we *don't* already know the answers (e.g. "how much do I need to charge that client?"); here the consequences of even one mistake every hundred questions could be very, very bad. Reliability is essential, and we know when we type an instruction that the result can be trusted: we don't, when we ask an AI assistant, so the current generation of AI assistants have limited use.
Give them a few months though, or years at the most. These technologies are improving at a staggering pace... and we're about to see more and more use of edge AI, in which the training that's been done with these online engines over the last couple of years is coded into portable engines that don't need to access the huge datasets (so that you can operate your phone or whatever using natural language instructions but *without* having to go online). As the language processing gets better and better and the privacy issues are mitigated by edge implementations, more and more of us will be using it. AI is going to start popping up everywhere: in video game characters that respond in natural language when we ask them natural language questions; in image editing plugins that select objects intelligently (e.g. a person in a photo) and allow you to drag them around while the space they used to occupy is filled with believable content, and so on and so on. Linux will probably be a playground for some of the most interesting and creative uses of it, in the sciences at least... for a (probably brief) season, before the Linux kernel becomes as irrelevant as all the other IT that used to be developed by humans rather than by the IT itself.
29 • AI assistant (by Dan on 2024-01-16 01:26:50 GMT from Israel)
I've found a free-as-in-freedom AI assistant for Android, called Dicio. It's made by one of the developers of NewPipe, an amazing app I was glad to discover years ago and still use. Dicio is available on F-Droid. I've never tried Dicio myself but I was surprised it wasn't reviewed and nobody in the comments mentioned it yet.
30 • Leo AI on Brave browser (by Andy Prough on 2024-01-16 05:31:00 GMT from United States)
I just downloaded Brave and turned on the Leo AI assistant thing in the browser sidebar. I asked Leo to write a thankyou letter to my Aunt for a christmas gift, and Leo wrote a lovely and thoughtful thank you note.
There's a button to "Summarize this page", and when I clicked it Leo wrote a shorter thankyou note, but still a nice one.
I asked Leo to summarize a sporting event from today, and it wrote about the score from a game that actually never happened. Complete work of fiction.
I asked Leo to summarize the weather in my city today, and it told me that the temperature was "mostly sunny with a high of 78°F (25°C) and a low of 56°F (13°C)". This is complete fiction - the weather was below freezing all day today and we had snow.
I asked Leo to write a python script to print the current weather in my city, and it wrote one up very quickly. I doubt that it actually works, but it looks cute.
I asked Leo how many gold records Taylor Swift has, and it gave me a completely fictional answer that a Grammy Award = 1 gold record, and that she therefore has 10 of them.
I asked Leo what the conversion rate from dollars to Euros is today, and it told me 1 dollar = 0.89 euros. I did a Brave search for dollars to Euro conversion, and Brave search told me 1 dollar = 0.92 euros. So Leo does not have access to Brave's own search engine, and it just makes up completely fictional responses and passes them off as fact.
Leo certainly does not appear to be capable of doing any real work of any kind whatsoever - it appears to be just grabbing some intelligent sounding text from the internet and copying and pasting it and modifying it and calling it artificial intelligence. It writes fictional "news" that never happened and reports it as fact. Nothing that it says could in any way be trusted. If you used this for a homework assignment you would almost certainly get a failing grade.
31 • Any old algorithm presented as "AI", and open voice recognition (by perstreperous on 2024-01-16 09:17:36 GMT from United Kingdom)
@30: Also observed here. This sort of thing is (going to be) a major problem - "generative AI" which is an existing (non-AI) algorithm with a coat of paint.
@29: I am the worst nightmare of English voice recognition, as I am Scottish, but the voice recognition by Dicio is spectacularly (and hilariously) off - annoyingly, it quite often gets words right then has a think and changes them to something else. It reminds me of where Google was about eight years ago. It is unusable here, which is a shame as open, offline tools of this type are desperately needed.
32 • Voice Assistant (by Knightron on 2024-01-16 09:29:12 GMT from Australia)
I feel like the poll isn't really providing enough options considering how common smart phones are these days. I have a proprietary voice assistant on my phone but I personally never use it. I have no interest in voice assistants.
33 • @17 Friar Tuck: (by dragonmouth on 2024-01-16 12:04:48 GMT from United States)
One of the biggest fallacies in computer universe is "I have nothing to hide".
34 • @21 Bobby Sellers: (by dragonmouth on 2024-01-16 12:28:51 GMT from United States)
I'm glad you mentioned "search engines". The first few were developed to provide answers to users. Over time, they became data-harvesting applications. Computers were a quantum leap in data collection and correlation over manual methods. AI will be as big an advance in data gathering and manipulating over computers as commercial space flight will be over hot air balloons.
35 • AI Assistant (by Otis on 2024-01-16 13:08:25 GMT from United States)
The "hey Siri" thing made me laugh the first time I used it, and the response was a list of possible answers I already knew, so I googled it and zeroed in on the surgical technology class of instrument I was looking for.
No more artificial "intelligence" after that. Have fun with it, people. I don't use a microwave oven and both my car and motorcycle are stick shifts. Lemme alone. Scram, ya bother me.
36 • Nothing to hide (by Friar Tux on 2024-01-16 13:13:11 GMT from Canada)
@33 (dragonmouth) if you're referring to me, I didn't say I have nothing to hide. I said I do not do anything "questionable" on my machine. (Questionable = anything I wouldn't want my Gramma, or kids, to see.) I have plenty of stuff I consider personal/hideable/no one else's business, but it is not on my computer.
If you're referring to the general population, I might be inclined to agree.
37 • @17; @19; @21--artificial intelligence; quote by Hawking. (by R. Cain on 2024-01-16 17:53:27 GMT from United States)
"...The development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race..."
Stephen Hawking, interview with the BBC, 2014
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"OUTSIDE OF THEIR PARTICULAR AREAS OF EXPERTISE scientists are just as dumb as the next person."---Richard P. Feynman
"I have found that the reason a lot of people are interested in artificial intelligence is for exactly the same reason a lot of people are interested in artificial limbs: they are missing one."...and...
"Artificial intelligence has the same relation to intelligence as artificial flowers have to flowers."
David L. Parnas
38 • hotter distribution (by Matt on 2024-01-16 18:40:18 GMT from United States)
I never tried to find out the cause, but Void linux runs much cooler than Debian on the same laptop. Both were running XFCE and the same proprietary Nvidia driver.
39 • @36 Privacy, not secrecy (by Douglas Reynholm on 2024-01-16 19:00:46 GMT from Denmark)
Even if people have no secrets they still have (or should have) the right to privacy. I draw the curtains at night, not because I'm doing something dodgy (I swear), but because I want to do the dishes, read books etc. in private.
@Jesse: Brilliant and hilarious feature story this week. thumbsup.jpg
40 • running hot (by MikeOh Shark on 2024-01-17 01:27:54 GMT from United States)
I started running MX Linux Xfce version about 5 years ago when I got a new laptop. It ran hot when new but each kernel update dropped my power consumption ( I had my laptop plugged into a wattmeter).
After I installed tlp and powertop I found that my power consumption was much lower. Now, my laptop runs cool and I never hear the fan come on. I use about 5 to 9 watts when surfing with the upper end being when screen brightness is turned up and the keyboard backlight is on. Even when running HandBrake it doesn't get hot.
Ask for help in their excellent forum. Be sure to post your system information as someone will likely have a similar machine and setup.
41 • AI Assistant (by A on 2024-01-17 02:51:46 GMT from Poland)
I'm finding the whole idea of talking to a piece of metal degrading and dehumanizing. We're already living in a dystopian world and it's only going to get worse...
42 • AI (by zephyr on 2024-01-17 10:31:36 GMT from United States)
@37
Back in the late 1960's to early 1970's had a chance encounter with Stephen Hawking. He was sitting rather uncomfortably in a wheel chair and spoke with a voice box, His caregiver translated he wanted to look at a carbon arc projector, I was 15 or 16, and worked for Loew's Theater in Dallas. Mr. Hawkings was lecturing at El Centro College, about a 100 feet away. The Assistant manager there that night was John C. Cantu, still teaching Philosophy at SIU, Michigan or University of Michigan. He was 17 then. We carried Mr. Hawkings up a staircase to the projection booth. I really didn't realize how important of a chance meeting it was until much later in life. Imagine the questions I would love to ask now!
43 • Hot distro (by Ennio on 2024-01-17 22:09:08 GMT from The Netherlands)
Given that AV Linux has announced the passage to MX as its base, it really seems MX Linux is quite hot...
44 • Nothing to Hide (by Nathan on 2024-01-17 23:00:30 GMT from United States)
I don't want Google to know what board games I like, not because I'm ashamed of my taste in games, nor because it isn't anybody's business (I freely share my gaming interests with my friends so that they'll come over to play). It's because I don't want Google crafting a browsing experience for me centered around manipulating me into purchasing yet another Catan expansion.
We have different levels of privacy for different people. My wife and kids know my daily schedule, and that's great (even necessary). What business does Apple, Amazon, or Google have in knowing such a personal detail? Actually, quite a bit of business - there is a lot of money in giving me well-timed advertisements for places I'll be driving past within the hour. Maybe some people aren't bothered by their personal lives being mined for marketing purposes, but I'm not one of those people.
45 • Voice Assistant and privacy (by Gary on 2024-01-18 00:27:11 GMT from Canada)
After installing Mycroft on ancient PC running MX Linux 21, my experience was of limited success, mostly due to incompatible sound card and it's drivers! I've no reason to doubt it would have worked on their hardware, but oddly, owners of their hardware seemed to keep pretty quiet about it before this project faded and transitioned to another vendor with interest in developing that OS.
Glad to note some of that Mycroft talent actively working to improve 'Home Assistant' in their 2023 Year of the Voice. Kudos to Mycroft successors for continuing to develop their products.
I get that many (most) of the readers here wouldn't trade their privacy for the supposed convenience of using your voice, however, when facing loss of vision coupled with the sky high cost of assistance tech (for example
https://www.letsenvision.com/glasses) the possibility of affordable voice assistance puts privacy concerns on the back burner (unfortunately).
Several android apps are on the play store: Envision AI, Seeing Assistant, Seeing AI, Lookout, Lazarillo and I am grateful for all development to assist!
46 • Privacy & co. (by Sondar on 2024-01-18 15:50:57 GMT from United Kingdom)
So nice to be amongst so many knowledgeable folk who understand the importance of personal privacy, etc. More reasons that I never switch on (or even carry about!) any of the half-dozen mobile phones that kind and well-meaning friends and family have equipped me with! It's a dangerous enough world as well as greed for my dosh barely masquerading as giving information. Information gathering has become an obsession - just don't play!
47 • Offline text-to-speech (by Oskar on 2024-01-19 01:22:53 GMT from Japan)
@2
Since OpenAI made its Whisper TTS model free to use a number of open source projects have incorporated it, like self-hostable whisper-based TTS web portals. My favorite is SubtitleEdit (a windows GUI subtitle editor), which now can do local TTS and output as a subtitle file. I have recorded talking to myself during my commute, and then used SubtitleEdit to get my "stream of consciousness" transcribed completely off-grid, with good results. Offline TTS is a very useful tool to have.
48 • MX - Hot (by 142857 on 2024-01-19 02:34:10 GMT from Germany)
@43
Perhaps this may be an invitation to administer at lower levels - or to try to run the system as smoothly as possible, at the expense of resources? However, MX actually delivers a very good product, but this factor is actually a bit irritating. There are also many processes running in the background. When changing the kernel, however, I was able to determine differences in performance and the temperature also dropped about 5 ° C. However, the utilization of the RAM is limited - and the response time is also okay. Just keep an eye on the conky - and hope that the harmony will return. MX is able to built less hungry OS's, that's why I can not understand this behaviour.
49 • Do you use a virtual/voice assistant? (by James on 2024-01-19 12:16:28 GMT from United States)
No, unless I am listening to music my sound is turned off. Even back in my Windows days I shut down Clippy, what an annoying character.
50 • Clippy (by Friar Tux on 2024-01-19 13:11:24 GMT from Canada)
@49 James I loved Clippy. Actually, when I was on Windows 95, I had this program that had a butler walk into the screen from the lower right side to make announcements - "You have mail, sir." "There appears to be an error, sir." Unfortunately, that was too long ago for me to remember the name of the program. But it was fun.
51 • MS assistants (by Friar Tux on 2024-01-19 19:14:17 GMT from Canada)
@49 (James) Oh, and I also enjoyed Microsoft's Rover, Courtney, and Merlin (my favourite). I haven't really found anything comparable in Linux. Any suggestions, anyone?
Number of Comments: 51
Display mode: DWW Only • Comments Only • Both DWW and Comments
| | |
| TUXEDO |
TUXEDO Computers - Linux Hardware in a tailor made suite
Choose from a wide range of laptops and PCs in various sizes and shapes at TUXEDOComputers.com. Every machine comes pre-installed and ready-to-run with Linux. Full 24 months of warranty and lifetime support included!
Learn more about our full service package and all benefits from buying at TUXEDO.
|
| *NEW* NovaCustom |
NovaCustom PrivacyGuard Laptops - Escape from Big Tech
The NovaCustom PrivacyGuard Laptop is ideal for anyone who prioritizes privacy. Comes with Dasharo coreboot open source firmware and Zorin OS Pro, free from influence of Big Tech.
|
| Archives |
| • Issue 1169 (2026-04-20): Lakka 6.1, free software and source-based distributions, FreeBSD Foundation publishes compatible laptop list, Debian holds Project Leader election, Haiku progresses ARM64 port, Mint to extend development cycle, Linux 7.0 released |
| • Issue 1168 (2026-04-13): pearOS 2026.03, EndeavourOS 2026.03.06, which distros are adopting age verification, Arch adjusts its firewall packages, Linux dropping i486 support, Red Hat extends its release cycle, Debian's APT introduces rollbacks, Redox improves its scheduler |
| • Issue 1167 (2026-04-06): Origami Linux 2026.03, answering questions for Linux newcomers, Ubuntu MATE seeking new contributors, Ubuntu software centre is expanding Deb support, FreeBSD fixes forum exploit, openSUSE 15 Leap nears its end of life |
| • Issue 1166 (2026-03-30): NetBSD jails, publishing software for Linux, Ubuntu joins Rust Foundation, Canonical plans to trim GRUB features, Peppermint works on new utilities, PINE64 shows off open hardware capabilities |
| • Issue 1165 (2026-03-23): Argent Linux 1.5.3, disk space required by Linux, Manjaro team goes on strike, AlmaLinux improves NVIDIA driver support and builds RISC-V packages, systemd introduces age tracking |
| • Issue 1164 (2026-03-16): d77void, age verification laws and Linux, SUSE may be for sale, TrueNAS takes its build system private, Debian publishes updated Trixie media, MidnightBSD and System76 respond to age verification laws |
| • Issue 1163 (2026-03-09): KaOS 2026.02, TinyCore 17.0, NuTyX 26.02.2, Would one big collection of packages help?, Guix offers 64-bit Hurd options, Linux communities discuss age delcaration laws, Mint unveils new screensaver for Cinnamon, Redox ports new COSMIC features |
| • Issue 1162 (2026-03-02): AerynOS 2026.01, anti-virus and firewall tools, Manjaro fixes website certificate, Ubuntu splits firmware package, jails for NetBSD, extended support for some Linux kernel releases, Murena creating a map app |
| • Issue 1161 (2026-02-23): The Guix package manager, quick Q&As, Gentoo migrating its mirrors, Fedora considers more informative kernel panic screens, GhostBSD testing alternative X11 implementation, Asahi makes progress with Apple M3, NetBSD userland ported, FreeBSD improves web-based system management |
| • Issue 1160 (2026-02-16): Noid and AgarimOS, command line tips, KDE Linux introduces delta updates, Redox OS hits development milestone, Linux Mint develops a desktop-neutral account manager, sudo developer seeks sponsorship |
| • Issue 1159 (2026-02-09): Sharing files on a network, isolating processes on Linux, LFS to focus on systemd, openSUSE polishes atomic updates, NetBSD not likely to adopt Rust code, COSMIC roadmap |
| • Issue 1158 (2026-02-02): Manjaro 26.0, fastest filesystem, postmarketOS progress report, Xfce begins developing its own Wayland window manager, Bazzite founder interviewed |
| • Issue 1157 (2026-01-26): Setting up a home server, what happened to convergence, malicious software entering the Snap store, postmarketOS automates hardware tests, KDE's login manager works with systemd only |
| • Issue 1156 (2026-01-19): Chimera Linux's new installer, using the DistroWatch Torrent Corner, new package tools for Arch, Haiku improves EFI support, Redcore streamlines branches, Synex introduces install-time ZFS options |
| • Issue 1155 (2026-01-12): MenuetOS, CDE on Sparky, iDeal OS 2025.12.07, recommended flavour of BSD, Debian seeks new Data Protection Team, Ubuntu 25.04 nears its end of life, Google limits Android source code releases, Fedora plans to replace SDDM, Budgie migrates to Wayland |
| • Issue 1154 (2026-01-05): postmarketOS 25.06/25.12, switching to Linux and educational resources, FreeBSD improving laptop support, Unix v4 available for download, new X11 server in development, CachyOS team plans server edtion |
| • Issue 1153 (2025-12-22): Best projects of 2025, is software ever truly finished?, Firefox to adopt AI components, Asahi works on improving the install experience, Mageia presents plans for version 10 |
| • Issue 1152 (2025-12-15): OpenBSD 7.8, filtering websites, Jolla working on a Linux phone, Germany saves money with Linux, Ubuntu to package AMD tools, Fedora demonstrates AI troubleshooting, Haiku packages Go language |
| • Issue 1151 (2025-12-08): FreeBSD 15.0, fun command line tricks, Canonical presents plans for Ubutnu 26.04, SparkyLinux updates CDE packages, Redox OS gets modesetting driver |
| • Issue 1150 (2025-12-01): Gnoppix 25_10, exploring if distributions matter, openSUSE updates tumbleweed's boot loader, Fedora plans better handling of broken packages, Plasma to become Wayland-only, FreeBSD publishes status report |
| • Issue 1149 (2025-11-24): MX Linux 25, why are video drivers special, systemd experiments with musl, Debian Libre Live publishes new media, Xubuntu reviews website hack |
| • Issue 1148 (2025-11-17): Zorin OS 18, deleting a file with an unusual name, NetBSD experiments with sandboxing, postmarketOS unifies its documentation, OpenBSD refines upgrades, Canonical offers 15 years of support for Ubuntu |
| • Issue 1147 (2025-11-10): Fedora 43, the size and stability of the Linux kernel, Debian introducing Rust to APT, Redox ports web engine, Kubuntu website off-line, Mint creates new troubleshooting tools, FreeBSD improves reproducible builds, Flatpak development resumes |
| • Issue 1146 (2025-11-03): StartOS 0.4.0, testing piped commands, Ubuntu Unity seeks help, Canonical offers Ubuntu credentials, Red Hat partners with NVIDIA, SUSE to bundle AI agent with SLE 16 |
| • Issue 1145 (2025-10-27): Linux Mint 7 "LMDE", advice for new Linux users, AlmaLinux to offer Btrfs, KDE launches Plasma 6.5, Fedora accepts contributions written by AI, Ubuntu 25.10 fails to install automatic updates |
| • Issue 1144 (2025-10-20): Kubuntu 25.10, creating and restoring encrypted backups, Fedora team debates AI, FSF plans free software for phones, ReactOS addresses newer drivers, Xubuntu reacts to website attack |
| • Issue 1143 (2025-10-13): openSUSE 16.0 Leap, safest source for new applications, Redox introduces performance improvements, TrueNAS Connect available for testing, Flatpaks do not work on Ubuntu 25.10, Kamarada plans to switch its base, Solus enters new epoch, Frugalware discontinued |
| • Issue 1142 (2025-10-06): Linux Kamarada 15.6, managing ZIP files with SQLite, F-Droid warns of impact of Android lockdown, Alpine moves ahead with merged /usr, Cinnamon gets a redesigned application menu |
| • Issue 1141 (2025-09-29): KDE Linux and GNOME OS, finding mobile flavours of Linux, Murena to offer phones with kill switches, Redox OS running on a smartphone, Artix drops GNOME |
| • Issue 1140 (2025-09-22): NetBSD 10.1, avoiding AI services, AlmaLinux enables CRB repository, Haiku improves disk access performance, Mageia addresses service outage, GNOME 49 released, Linux introduces multikernel support |
| • Issue 1139 (2025-09-15): EasyOS 7.0, Linux and central authority, FreeBSD running Plasma 6 on Wayland, GNOME restores X11 support temporarily, openSUSE dropping BCacheFS in new kernels |
| • Issue 1138 (2025-09-08): Shebang 25.8, LibreELEC 12.2.0, Debian GNU/Hurd 2025, the importance of software updates, AerynOS introduces package sets, postmarketOS encourages patching upstream, openSUSE extends Leap support, Debian refreshes Trixie media |
| • Issue 1137 (2025-09-01): Tribblix 0m37, malware scanners flagging Linux ISO files, KDE introduces first-run setup wizard, CalyxOS plans update prior to infrastructure overhaul, FreeBSD publishes status report |
| • Issue 1136 (2025-08-25): CalyxOS 6.8.20, distros for running containers, Arch Linux website under attack,illumos Cafe launched, CachyOS creates web dashboard for repositories |
| • Issue 1135 (2025-08-18): Debian 13, Proton, WINE, Wayland, and Wayback, Debian GNU/Hurd 2025, KDE gets advanced Liquid Glass, Haiku improves authentication tools |
| • Issue 1134 (2025-08-11): Rhino Linux 2025.3, thoughts on malware in the AUR, Fedora brings hammered websites back on-line, NetBSD reveals features for version 11, Ubuntu swaps some command line tools for 25.10, AlmaLinux improves NVIDIA support |
| • Issue 1133 (2025-08-04): Expirion Linux 6.0, running Plasma on Linux Mint, finding distros which support X11, Debian addresses 22 year old bug, FreeBSD discusses potential issues with pkgbase, CDE ported to OpenBSD, Btrfs corruption bug hitting Fedora users, more malware found in Arch User Repository |
| • Issue 1132 (2025-07-28): deepin 25, wars in the open source community, proposal to have Fedora enable Flathub repository, FreeBSD plans desktop install option, Wayback gets its first release |
| • Issue 1131 (2025-07-21): HeliumOS 10.0, settling on one distro, Mint plans new releases, Arch discovers malware in AUR, Plasma Bigscreen returns, Clear Linux discontinued |
| • Issue 1130 (2025-07-14): openSUSE MicroOS and RefreshOS, sharing aliases between computers, Bazzite makes Bazaar its default Flatpak store, Alpine plans Wayback release, Wayland and X11 benchmarked, Red Hat offers additional developer licenses, openSUSE seeks feedback from ARM users, Ubuntu 24.10 reaches the end of its life |
| • Issue 1129 (2025-07-07): GLF OS Omnislash, the worst Linux distro, Alpine introduces Wayback, Fedora drops plans to stop i686 support, AlmaLinux builds EPEL repository for older CPUs, Ubuntu dropping existing RISC-V device support, Rhino partners with UBports, PCLinuxOS recovering from website outage |
| • Issue 1128 (2025-06-30): AxOS 25.06, AlmaLinux OS 10.0, transferring Flaptak bundles to off-line computers, Ubuntu to boost Intel graphics performance, Fedora considers dropping i686 packages, SDesk switches from SELinux to AppArmor |
| • Issue 1127 (2025-06-23): LastOSLinux 2025-05-25, most unique Linux distro, Haiku stabilises, KDE publishes Plasma 6.4, Arch splits Plasma packages, Slackware infrastructure migrating |
| • Issue 1126 (2025-06-16): SDesk 2025.05.06, renewed interest in Ubuntu Touch, a BASIC device running NetBSD, Ubuntu dropping X11 GNOME session, GNOME increases dependency on systemd, Google holding back Pixel source code, Nitrux changing its desktop, EFF turns 35 |
| • Issue 1125 (2025-06-09): RHEL 10, distributions likely to survive a decade, Murena partners with more hardware makers, GNOME tests its own distro on real hardware, Redox ports GTK and X11, Mint provides fingerprint authentication |
| • Issue 1124 (2025-06-02): Picking up a Pico, tips for protecting privacy, Rhino tests Plasma desktop, Arch installer supports snapshots, new features from UBports, Ubuntu tests monthly snapshots |
| • Issue 1123 (2025-05-26): CRUX 3.8, preventing a laptop from sleeping, FreeBSD improves laptop support, Fedora confirms GNOME X11 session being dropped, HardenedBSD introduces Rust in userland build, KDE developing a virtual machine manager |
| • Issue 1122 (2025-05-19): GoboLinux 017.01, RHEL 10.0 and Debian 12 updates, openSUSE retires YaST, running X11 apps on Wayland |
| • Issue 1121 (2025-05-12): Bluefin 41, custom file manager actions, openSUSE joins End of 10 while dropping Deepin desktop, Fedora offers tips for building atomic distros, Ubuntu considers replacing sudo with sudo-rs |
| • Issue 1120 (2025-05-05): CachyOS 250330, what it means when a distro breaks, Kali updates repository key, Trinity receives an update, UBports tests directory encryption, Gentoo faces losing key infrastructure |
| • Issue 1119 (2025-04-28): Ubuntu MATE 25.04, what is missing from Linux, CachyOS ships OCCT, Debian enters soft freeze, Fedora discusses removing X11 session from GNOME, Murena plans business services, NetBSD on a Wii |
| • Issue 1118 (2025-04-21): Fedora 42, strange characters in Vim, Nitrux introduces new package tools, Fedora extends reproducibility efforts, PINE64 updates multiple devices running Debian |
| • Full list of all issues |
| Star Labs |
Star Labs - Laptops built for Linux.
View our range including the highly anticipated StarFighter. Available with coreboot open-source firmware and a choice of Ubuntu, elementary, Manjaro and more. Visit Star Labs for information, to buy and get support.
|
| Random Distribution | 
EasyOS
EasyOS is an experimental Linux distribution which uses many of the technologies and package formats pioneered by Puppy Linux. The distribution features custom container technology called Easy Containers which can run applications or the entire desktop environment in a container. Packages, desktop settings, networking and sharing resources over the network can all be controlled through graphical utilities.
Status: Active
|
| Tips, Tricks, Q&As | | Tips and tricks: Using SQLite to manage ZIP files |
| Tips and tricks: Copying columns of text, organizing files, creating torrents |
| Tips and tricks: Tools for rescuing the operating system and data files |
| Tips and tricks: Void source packages |
| Tips and tricks: Transitioning from PC-BSD to TrueOS |
| Tips and tricks: Play nicely, drop secure shell sessions cleanly, check init's name |
| Questions and answers: The safety of software in distribution repositories |
| Questions and answers: Why distros offer custom builds of packages |
| Tips and tricks: Compiling the Linux kernel |
| Tips and tricks: Command line weather, ionice, rename files, video preview snapshot, calendar, ls colour settings |
| More Tips & Tricks and Questions & Answers |
| TUXEDO |
TUXEDO Computers - Linux Hardware in a tailor made suite
Choose from a wide range of laptops and PCs in various sizes and shapes at TUXEDOComputers.com. Every machine comes pre-installed and ready-to-run with Linux. Full 24 months of warranty and lifetime support included!
Learn more about our full service package and all benefits from buying at TUXEDO.
|
| Star Labs |
Star Labs - Laptops built for Linux.
View our range including the highly anticipated StarFighter. Available with coreboot open-source firmware and a choice of Ubuntu, elementary, Manjaro and more. Visit Star Labs for information, to buy and get support.
|
|
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
