Computer Log

A few days ago I attempted to use clonezilla to backup Manjaro. I have my 2 primary OS’s, each about 30GB) on a SSD (sda as far as linux is concerened) volume. Mint is on sda1… and whatever is my current testing backup OS (Manjaro in this case) on sda2. For some reason clonezilla didn’t reflect this fact. It was showing nothing on sda2 and a suspected (because of it’s size) Manjaro on sda7. In addition it was showing other partitions that in total exceeded the capacity of the SSD (250GB). Needless to say I exited the program. I then went to Mint and double check everything using it’s disk utility, and everything was as I expected. So I reattempted Clonezilla and everything was back to normal. Very strange and concerning : (

Is this foreshadowing a possible SSD problem?

Tried updating again (333MB) and had no problems. Mint also came up fine after selecting with grub. Other than another 100MB of updates…everything else was the same!

I did notice that the kernel is now 5.4.13-3-MANJARO the previous problem update it was 5.4.13-2-MANJARO.

Applied 230MB+ of updates via command line. Kernel 5.4.12-1-MANJARO > 5.4.13-2-MANJARO. Everything surprisingly, apparently still works! Updates are where Manjaro has killed me in the past. I get the notification from Pamac on the taskbar, but update using pamac on the command line.

Not so fast

My optimism was a little premature. Yes Manjaro seemed OK…but it something happened that screwed up my Linux Mint signon screen. Some user entries that were on the Menu were gone and the wallpaper was different and I couldn’t sign on the valid user that was there! I restored a clonezilla Manjaro backup and Mint was OK.

I think Firefox is supposed to block sounds from websites automatically playing, evidently because people, myself included, find it annoying. I say I think, because it seems to me, and I might be wrong, that this is a recurring promise. It seems like I hear that the next version will have this feature. And the a release or so later I hear the same promise. However as annoying as the sounds are, I find it just as, and probably more annoying that (when working) they only stop you from hearing the sounds. In my observance the much heavier bandwidth using video is still playing without sound. For me the sound should stop because the video never started playing. When the sound is playing, I at least had a clue that necessary bandwidth is being used, and could attempt to locate and stop the offending bandwidth thief.

The reason this is such a problem for me is because I get my news from clicking on rss news feeds, which opens the subject in a browser tab in a different desktop workspace window. So for example, I may click on 10 rss news articles from different news sources of particular interest to me, out if 100 rss summaries, which opens a new tab in my browser on a different desktop workspace. Then when I’m finished I then go to my browser, for a more depth information on those 10 rss feeds of interest to me only to find that they may have, not only already shown a video related to the story I was interested in but also automatically played other videos of things I have no interest in whatsoever. Because for whatever stupid reason, many sites automatically just go from one news video to a another random video. So in addition to all this bandwidth waste, I may want to replay the video connected to the story I was interested in.

I have been going through this course at Linux Academy and as I expected, most of it so far has been old hat. However I really believe you can always learn something new from anyone. I truly believe I could learn something from someone who maybe had 6 months experience. For many reasons. For one…everyone’s workflow is different, so someone else could be doing completely different than me and maybe has researched how to do something that was important to them that I never looked into. Or maybe they’re around other Linux users at work. Anywho, everyone can learn something from someone else.

For example in this course, I learned about the file command, it’s obviously not essential because I’ve done without it for 25 years. Not long ago I learned about <CTRL>l [lowercase L] which clears the screen, I’d been typing clear for years. Also not essential but very handy and something I use a lot now.

I probably won’t go for the certification, so I don’t feel the need to memorize much of it. For example the course mentioned cat /etc/*release* a handy way to get info on your system. But that’s just something I’d probably just google if I needed it.

Just a silly observation, I frequently underestimate the number of characters to type for autocomplete to make a match. When it comes to this I am the king of underestimation. In my mind I’m sure nothing else can possibly match the characters I’ve typed to autocomplete a command, so hit tab, only to find 20 other commands that begin the same. I could type 10 characters only to find I should have typed more. Sometimes it seems like I could type zqvw8<TAB> and there will be some other command that begins with the same thing.

IMHO it’s a sim. Some argue that it’s a game. I feel it’s a SIM because there isn’t scoring and it tries to model actual flight physics. There are no objectives to make kills or score points like a game. The main objective is to fly from point A to point B by applying flying principles. The aircraft can fly under visual flight rules (VFR) or instrument flight rules (IFR), just like a real plane.

If you let the average kid play this. And you told him to fly a Cessna 172, from KFXE (Fort Lauderdale Executive Airport) to MYEH (North Eleuthera Airport in the Bahamas) and told him/her at the Cessna’s rate of speed it’s going to take an hour plus just flying mostly over the ocean, and nobody is going to shoot you down and you can’t shoot anybody either. And make sure you have enough fuel, otherwise you’ll crash. I have a feeling he or she would soon be saying what kind of crappy game is this.

Finally as of today X-Plane’s own home page say’s “The world’s most advanced flight simulator”.

Being a longtime Linux guy I didn’t really think too much about games or sims. That changed a few years ago thanks to Valve/Steam. I really appreciate what Valve has done for Linux gaming. When I saw X-Plane 10 offered in Steam a few years ago, I knew I had to get it.

When I was on Facebook I had joined a few X-Plane groups. One thing I’ve found amusing is peoples recommendations when asked should you buy through Laminar Research or Steam. It seams most peoples response was along the lines of, Laminar Research because more profit goes to the developers. I read this argument, time and time again. You would have thought these peoples relatives worked there…their concern was so great. I don’t think I’ve heard that strong an argument concerning other titles.

Now I might have eventually learned about X-Plane by some other means, but Steam certainly deserve some credit for making it known to people like me. So a bird in the hand if you know what I mean…and I think you do : ) Also I assume Laminar and hence the developers got something in return. Was there an article I missed The Country bumpkins at Laminar Research gets screwed by Steam? So far, for me, Steam has been a great platform for gaming on Linux.

Almost 1GB of updates, including kernel 5.4.12-1 update was successful. I must say I was concerned, given my bad experience with Manjaro’s updates in the past.

After rebooting I noticed my network trey icon had some red, but it said connected and another message I never saw, reduced connectivity or something like that. Web pages were not loading. I wondered if it had anything to do with an update. Apparently it was just a coincidence because I booted Mint and it wasn’t loading pages either!

It was an ISP problem, service light red on modem. Didn’t call just waited an hour or so and problem was resolved

Well I finally finished downloading X-Plane 11 from Steam. I was able to compare this freshly downloaded version on Manjaro, with the one I’d been using on Linux Mint and learned a lesson. Based on other airports I used, I wrongly assumed that something was wrong with KDEN (Denver International Airport). If I had to give a new X-Plane simmer any advise, as not much more than a beginner myself…it would be. Start your flying at KDEN , because it only gets visually better from there. I had previously flown from a few (maybe 10-20) other airports so when I flew from KDEN I assumed something was wrong…because it was so sparse. Where are all the trees? Why does the airport and very large surrounding area look like it was the testing ground for Roundup weed & grass killer? By comparison all the other airports I had flown from were visually much nicer. How could the 5th busiest US airport, KDEN surrounded by mountains in Colorado look worse than the 18th busiest US airport and the surrounding area in my flat home state of Florida, KFLL (Fort Lauderdale Hollywood International)? Well it does, and that’s just the way it is!