Issue #221 / Apr 2019

As this issue goes to print, news is circulating about a catastrophic hack on the mail provider VFEmail. According to reports, two decades of saved data for all US users is lost – totally wiped out.

MX Linux and SystemRescueCD

Linux Kernel continues to offer mitigation for Spectre Mitigation, SpeakUp Trojan targets Linux servers, KDE Plasma 5.15 beta arrives, Canonical announces latest Ubuntu Core for IoT, vulnerabilities found in Cisco routers, two new malware campaigns, and US government shutdown ties up $139.2 million in grant funding.

Considering Plan 9 extensions for type conversion, supporting heterogeneous systems, and optimizing CPU idle states.

What cannot be measured cannot be improved. Netdata lets you measure almost anything – at least as long as it's about the performance and health of a Linux computer.

The kernel supports performance analysis with built-in tools via the Linux performance counters subsystem. perf is easy to use and offers a detailed view of performance data.

The Proton runtime environment, which is based on Wine, brings a new crop of Steam-powered games to Linux.

Unison is a handy tool for file syncing, backups, and merging. To get the most out of unison, however, you need to invest time perfecting your preference files to meet your needs.

In the past, using virtual machines required expensive programs such as VMware or open source add-ons such as VirtualBox. Gnome Boxes brings a convenient virtualization option to the Linux desktop.

"I've seen penguins that can type better than that." If you give sudo the wrong password, you deserve to be shouted at, says sys admin columnist Charly. He is not exempt from the insult and sees it as an opportunity to raise sudoing awareness.