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Cake day: June 25th, 2023

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  • I think on mutable distros, or at least arch, you can run a command to reinstall all installed packages, which will verify integrity of the package files (signatures) and then ensure the files in the filesystem match package files? And I think it takes minutes at most, at least for typical setups.

    I do think it’s also possible to just verify integrity of all files installed from a package, but I don’t remember if it required an external utility, pretty sure it’s on the arch wiki under pacman/tips and tricks






  • Why does every distro need yet another package manager?

    I think most package managers - the ones actually part of a distro - are old. It’s not a question of why they all use different package managers, it’s a matter of them having developed them long ago before any single one matured.

    That said, there are other considerations, which is also where new ones come from - different distros will have different approaches to package formats, dependency management, tracking of installed packages and system files, some might be implemented in a specific language due to the distro’s ideology, some might work in a different way (like NixOS), and there’s probably a whole bunch that just want a different interface.

    You wouldn’t ask why Linux has a different way of viewing installed programs from Windows, and in the same vein packages are not a universal aspect of Linux, so each distro has to make its own choices.

    Also I like pacman, some people complain about the commands being obscure, but I feel like they’re structured in a much more logical way. Don’t confuse it with yay though, pacman doesn’t build packages, and yay is specifically a wrapper around pacman that has different commands, while adding the ability to interact with the AUR.









  • I generally agree, but I’m not gonna continue buying on steam just because they’re developing new tech - I happily buy games on steam because of the features steam provides.

    That said, DRM-free games is something steam does not and probably will not provide - it’s a niche GOG is comfortable with, so many people who value freedom on software will choose it as their first platform of choice.

    In that sense, the hardware is completely unrelated - it does nothing towards the goal of DRM-free games, and in case of the index, locks more games behind a platform.


  • What take even is that? I can understand some complaints about Linux support for how much people praise the deck, but why would they make their own handheld… And VR headset? I feel like hardware shouldn’t be locked to specific platforms, and I would rather blame Valve for not releasing steam-independent software for their headset.



  • Hold up, how is proton leveraging open source to avoid dev costs? Are you referring to steam using and contributing to existing projects instead of reinventing the wheel? Or to game developers that use it as a reason for not making native Linux versions, which wouldn’t be Valve’s workforce in the first place?

    I can see how the things Valve does contribute to their business model - steam input giving their controller compatibility with games, proton letting them launch a Linux-based handheld, and the new recording feature probably there for the steam deck… But the thing is, Valve is still providing all those things to customers for no extra charge, and they keep adding new stuff.


  • Windows 10. The reason I switched was pretty funny - I had previously bought a cheap SSD and moved my install over to it, and installed Arch on my HDD hoping to experiment with it.

    I never really did that, but one day before Christmas my computer booted straight to Arch to my confusion, and after a while I figured out my SSD failed. I ended up installing gnome to have something to use in the meanwhile, since I wasn’t gonna be buying a new SSD in the next few days, but then I just decided to stick with Linux. As I learned more about it I realised I was barely missing anything, and I preferred Linux for what I had.


  • If the quote is accurate, he went a step further and put pirated games on the devices. Even if pirating the game is legal in some way (he owns it legitimately so putting a copy is fine or something), sending such devices out to customers then means he’s also distributing pirated games.

    That said, somebody in the comments claimed he didn’t distribute games, but rather software that made it easy to pirate games - I don’t know what the precedent is for that being considered illegal, but it does call the original claims into question.