It's spring time, which means it's time for me to get bored with the operating system on my daily driver and start to re-investigate my options.  The oncoming onslaught of age verification laws that look like they were written by badly trained AI is also helping preempt this thought, since Linux distributions will of course be forced to react in some manner.

I'm currently running Project Bluefin, which is an opinionated variation of the Universal Blue project.  I'm a fan, and I'm not investigating change because of anything holding me back in the current front.

Ground rules:

Boosts welcome.  It'll be a fun time.

#linux #fedora #universalblue #projectbluefin #linuxfromscratch #choices #youdidntreadthisfardidyou #maybedanedid #poll

Welcome to Luminance, and say hello to Lumina

#linux #aurora #universalblue

Using #bootc install-to-existing-root you can now "rebase" from any classic distro to an image based OS like the ones from #UniversalBlue or #BootCrew !

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I used EndeavourOS as a base to easily switch to arch-boot, Bluefin's Egg and many others with no issues!
All you need is bootc, podman and systemd-boot!

https://developers.redhat.com/articles/2025/how-install-image-mode-system-using-system-reinstall-bootc

I had a lot of freezes, reboots and kernel panics the last days. Really annoyed I started searching and found https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2420039

First try was rolling back my #silverblue #universalblue image to a version from October last year. There the issue was not occuring kernel 6.17.

So I added another workaround to my image and downgrade amdgpu firmware, as described in the bugzilla. I'm running kernel 6.18.7 with downgraded firmware about 2 days now and no freeze or kernel panic happened.

I've been on Ultramarine Linux for a while and I strongly recommend it, it's fantastic! Imagine Fedora but you don't have to worry about all of the annoying stuff you have to worry about when you install it for the first time... and with some little comforts on top of that. And that's pretty much it.

But I think I'm going back to Bazzite. And the reason is a silly one but I think it's also quite the testament to the convenience of Universal Blue's images... I'm kind of sick about having to worry about updates. That's it.

On Bazzite, updates just happen in the background without me touching anything and the next time I boot up my computer, poof, they're applied. It just does its thing and I don't even notice it. But here, I often have to manually update through the software center and then, not just reboot, but purposefully reboot to do install my updates.

Why is this annoying, you may ask? Because, usually, when I shut down my computer, it's late at night and I want to go to sleep. And going to sleep for me, with my ADHD, it's a whooooole process. So, having to go through the motions of: Shut down my computer > Let it boot up again > Enter my longass password to decrypt my drive (the most annoying part) > Let it do its thing until it shuts off automatically... well, that's added friction.

And I know how it sounds, like nothing, but it's been enough for me to put off updates plenty of times. But compare that to not thinking about it ever because everything just happens in the background and the next time I'll boot up my computers all of the updates will be layered on top of my system without me even noticing... it makes for quite the difference to me.

When I got into the whole Universal Blue thing with Bluefin, I just couldn't understand what all the fuss was about. Why was everyone talking about "not having to worry about updates, ever?" I kept trying to update manually until one day it just clicked, maybe I noticed that things had updated themselves without me noticing, I don't remember. But since then, it has become such a little piece of comfort that... I miss it. Enough to hop back to an immutable system instead of staying on more traditional Linux distro.

And while I know that for some people, everything happening in the background without ever having to think about it sounds like hell, well, you're probably not the target then. Because to me, it sounds like heaven. Not having to worry about my 'puter other than feeding it a balanced diet of pets on its chassis and the occasional dust cleaning, it's wonderful. It makes it self-sustaining on the software side. And I really like that.

Good job, Universal Blue peeps! You got me.

(please don't be / turn into far right weirdos like so many fucking open source projects)

#universalblue #fedora #ultramarinelinux #bazzite #bluefin #projectbluefin

Finished writing up my notes from the deployment of our latest home server and our switch to uCore: https://github.com/scottsweb/hamlet

Highlights include local SSL, an in home Steam server with Wolf and services that scale to zero when not in use (thanks to Sablier).

#selfhosting #homelab #universalblue #ucore

Bazzite is joining the Open Gaming Collective, which honestly only has one irksome addition...Playtron, which is responsible for yet another crypto Web3 nonsense OS that will never see much success with polluting gaming with cryptocurrency. There has been a lot of failure with monetizing Web3 games and a lack of VC funding in that space (a trend that I hope stays the same).

Beyond that thorn in an otherwise amazing announcement; this collective is designed to reduce the duplication of effort, strengthen other members and still spoil Linux gamers with a variety of options for distros!

As well as improving the quality of the custom OGC Kernel they will be using to power the gaming distros that have joined Open Gaming Collective. As well as upstreaming patches made to Valve packages or other relevant projects to increase project quality!

https://universal-blue.discourse.group/t/a-brighter-future-for-bazzite/11575

#Bazzite #Linux #UniversalBlue