Popped in a random SATA m.2, so I can test drive a few distros

Edit: it helps to put it into the m.2 slot that's actually SATA capable

I started with openSUSE Tumbleweed. It's a binary rolling release distribution, but not bleeding edge. There is a test pipeline for updates.

What I did like about it was the integration of the package manager with btrfs' snapshots: you can just roll back updates.

(open)SUSE has always been famous for its GUI driven system configuration tool YaST. It's still there, but so far it hasn't gotten in my way (I don't use it).

I've used it for 2 days now and I can only summarize my experience as:

death by a thousand paper cuts.

I've been having issues that should not have been issues anymore in $current_year. Things that would be a big hurdle to a novice and are an annoyance to me.

More in the comments 👇

Chat, idk if I can keep using this. I'll give it some more time, I honestly want it to work.
But I should already brain storm what's next?

Edit:
smart scan and memtest

I just wasted 2 hours of my life trying to set up SIP with my FritzBox.

Why? There is a bug with the web interface. Copy pasting a password causes it to mess it up with a hidden white space. You have to type it out by hand.

My extension for 39C3 is ħ in eV⋅s 6582

Yes I'm a nerd

If you got an older system, like me and my Haswell based T440, and you've been wondering why YouTube completely trashes your CPU: they're delivering codecs the CPU lacks hardware acceleration for.
Right click on the video -> Stats for nerds -> if it shows anything but avc1 it's giving you AV1 or VP9 but not H.264. If you got Firefox, just install the h264ify plugin.
On Linux there's also the vainfo tool to check if your VAAPI is even functional.

Who else is gonna be at Congress this year? Please check in

Let's share some MacGyver stories. I'll start:

One morning after booting up my laptop, the image was stuck in an 800x600 area in the top left corner. It was the highest resolution that xrandr reported. I thought the display cable was broken again, but it was not.
After dumping the EDID EEPROM of the LVDS panel I noticed it's completely empty. Just gone. There was no way to write to it.
Said laptop had a VGA out. (Later) VGA carries DDC2B, a serial communication channel with the monitor so that the PC can automatically recognize the supported resolutions. It's just I2C.
I wired up the LCD's EEPROM to the VGA port and used that to re-flash it with some EDID binary I made up. It worked.

Does anyone here have a programmer for BGA eMMCs?

I've been using OBS to stream a bit in discord among friends.
I wanted to add the desktop of the lab PC as a video source, while using my laptop to actually stream to discord.


For that you need nginx as well as the rtmp plugin on the receiving machine:

apt install nginx libnginx-mod-rtmp

Edit /etc/nginx/nginx.conf and add the following section:

rtmp {
        server {
                listen 1935;
                chunk_size 4096;
                allow publish all;               

                application live {
                        live on;
                        record off;
                }
        }
}

Restart nginx and check if it's running and listening to the assigned port:

systemctl restart nginx
ss -antpl | grep 1935

You can then stream your desktop with just ffmpeg

ffmpeg -f x11grab -s 1920x1080 -i :0.0 \
       -f flv rtmp://<Receiving_IP>/live/desktop

For OBS set up the stream as follows:

Settings -> Stream -> Custom
Server:       rtmp://<Receiving_IP>/live
Stream Key:   lab

Then set up your scene with XSHM or pipewire screenrecording and start the stream.

On the receiving end use VLC video source -> add -> path/url -> rtmp://localhost/live/lab

Does anyone know of a camera streaming solution for Android that is not DroidCam?

Been using my phone as web cam through USB. But bumping the cable ever so slightly causes a disconnect and the stack to hang until I either reboot the phone or plug it into a charger and out again. That only works half the time though.

Me irl

On the Autobahn. See you in Hamburg