Home Office Décor
After recent political events in the US that I don't care to discuss here, I decided that I wanted to do something for myself. My study has a mostly bare wall over the desk I've allocated for stuff related to my day job, so I decided it was time to get some art. Here's how it looks thus far.
Being an almost lifelong Blue Öyster Cult fan, I've wanted to get a few particular posters created by Unlovely Frankenstein for over a year.
So I finally decided to order some. Here's what I got. I'm just going to link to their respective pages rather than grabbing images.
- “Lost, Last and Luminous” art nouveau/tarot poster | 11x17 Art Print
- “Flaming Telepaths” movie poster homage | 11x17 Art Print
- “Transmaniacon MC”: Blue Öyster Cult grindhouse movie poster | 11x17 Art Print
I should get these around November 12; once I've gotten them framed and hung I’ll take another picture (with the door to the attic closed this time) and place it below this paragraph.
There is also an artwork by Elizabeth Leggett called “Pocket Full of Posies” that I'd like. I've already got a print of another of Ms. Leggett's works — “Wisdom’s Wing”, and I think ‘Pocket’ would pair well with it if I can find a place in the house where it makes sense to place them both. It also reminds me of Naomi Bradleigh from my fiction.
Fun with Debian GNU/Linux
The following should not be mistaken for an installation guide. Debian provides those on their website. This is more a collection of notes on what packages I’ve installed and what configuration changes I’ve made.
It’s mainly for my own future reference, in case I break an existing computer or get a new one. You’re welcome to use it for ideas; just don’t mistake it for official documentation.
While I had previously used Slackware and might again in the future, Debian GNU/Linux has a larger development team, a more robust governance structure, and a great many packages that Slackware lacks, like data sets for the dictd server. Being a writer, it’s handy to have access to an online dictionary without being connected to the Internet.
I’ve got two computers running Debian: a Lenovo ThinkCentre M92p, and a ThinkPad X270. I’ve also got a couple of secondhand Apple machines with M1 CPUs, a MacBook Air and an iMac. Since Asahi Linux is still kinda experimental and Apple is still supporting my hardware, I’m going to hold off on trying to install Debian on Apple Silicon. After all, macOS is still FreeBSD under the hood, and I can install additional UNIX tools using homebrew. If Homebrew ceases to support M1 Macs, maybe I can replace it with pkgsrc from NetBSD.
Desktop Environment
While Debian uses GNOME by default, I don’t care for it. I regard GNOME developers as petty authoritarians who presume to know better than I how I want to use my computer. Instead, I use MATE, since it’s based on GNOME 2.x, an environment I find more congenial. This can be selected during installation.
Root Privileges
I don’t want to log in as root or use su any more than necessary, so let’s add my regular account to the sudo group, since /etc/sudoers has a preset for anybody in that group.
su
(enter password)
/sbin/usermod -aG sudo "${USERNAME}"
sudo group
Using Debian Unstable
I want to have the most recent available packages, even if there’s a risk of breakage. I’m also an experienced operator, so if something goes wrong I can probably handle it.
Here’s how I did it, but I don’t recommend copying and pasting anything unless you know what you’re doing. Read the manual before trying anything.
deb http://deb.debian.org/debian/ sid main contrib non-free-firmware deb-src http://deb.debian.org/debian/ sid main contrib non-free-firmware
/etc/apt/sources.list file
sudo apt update sudo apt full-upgrade sudo apt autoremove
Additional Packages
Gotta install some packages before my Debian install is fully functional.
tlp (1.7.0-1) (ThinkPad only)
install: sudo apt install tlp
smartmontools (7.4-2 and others)
control and monitor storage systems using S.M.A.R.T.
This is a recommended package for tlp.
install: sudo apt install smartmontools
build-essential (12.12 and others)
Informational list of build-essential packages
This is supposed to be for building Debian packages, but I mainly want make. I use it to build this website, as insane as that might seem. I don’t think it’s as crazy as using Node.JS, though. 😼
install: sudo apt install build-essential
m4 (1.4.19-4 and others)
Sysadmins used to use it to configure Sendmail. It’s often used as part of GNU autotools to generate makefiles. I use it to implement partials requiring variables when building this website.
install sudo apt install m4
fastfetch (2.29.0+dfsg-1)
neofetch-like tool for fetching system information
remblanc told me about this. It’s a solid replacement for neofetch, especially if you create an alias for fastfetch -c neofetch, which emulates the old tool. The difference is that fastfetch is mostly implemented in C, rather than shell, so it’s a bit faster.
install: sudo apt install fastfetch
emacs-gtk (1:29.4+1-3 and others)
GNU Emacs editor (with GTK+ GUI support)
Gotta have my favorite text editor. Never mind that it’s actually a virtual Lisp machine. Got 32GB of RAM on my main machine, and 8GB on my ThinkPad, so Emacs won't be swapping much.
install: sudo apt install emacs-gtk
vim-gtk3 (2:9.1.0777-1 and others)
Vi IMproved - enhanced vi editor - with GTK3 GUI
Though I prefer Emacs, I can also use vim. Sometimes I do when it makes sense to so. It’s particularly useful for precise revisions of prose.
install: sudo apt install vim-gtk3 vim-doc vim-scripts
git (1:2.45.2-1.2 and others)
fast, scalable, distributed revision control system
install sudo apt install git
html-xml-utils (7.7-1.1 and others)
HTML and XML manipulation utilities
I use a lot of the tools in this package to build my website, like hxextract, hxincl, and hxtoc.
install: sudo apt install html-xml-utils
webp (1.4.0-0.1 and others)
Lossy compression of digital photographic images
My website provides WEBP-formatted images to browsers that can't handle JPEG XL or AVIF formats. This package provides the cwebp tool that I use to generate WEBP images from JPEG and PNG originals.
install: sudo apt install webp
libjxl-tools (0.9.2-10 and others)
JPEG XL Image Coding System - "JXL" (command line utility)
This package provides the cjxl tool, which lets me create JPEG XL versions of JPEG and PNG images.
install: sudo apt install libjxl-tools
libavif-bin (1.1.1-1 and others)
Library for handling .avif files (utilities)
This package provides the avifenc tool that I use to create AVIF versions of JPEG and PNG images.
install: apt install libjxl-tools
libimage-exiftool-perl (13.00+dfsg-1)
library and program to read and write meta information in multimedia files
I use exiftool to stripn extraneous metadata from images, and to get image dimensions in various shell scripts that I use to build my website.
install: sudo apt install libimage-exiftool-perl
jq (1.7.1-3 and others)
lightweight and flexible command-line JSON processor
This comes in handy for creating my website’s JSON feeds.
install: sudo apt install jq
abcde (2.9.3-1) (ThinkCentre M92p only)
Being a metalhead, I still buy a lot of albums on CD. Using abcde makes it easy to rip them for convenient digital listening.
It doesn’t make sense to install this on my ThinkPad, though; it doesn’t have an optical drive. Though I do have a USB optical drive that I could use with it.
install: sudo apt install abcde
quodlibet (4.6.0-4)
audio library manager and player for GTK3
This is my favorite app for listening to digital music on GNU/Linux. It also comes with Ex Falso, a brilliant tagging and file-renaming tool, as well as a wide array of plugins.
install: sudo apt install quodlibet
comixcursors-righthanded (0.9.1-2)
X11 mouse pointer themes with a comic art feeling (RH, translucent)
If I’ve got to use a mouse I want it to be nice and visible; the default cursor isn’t to my taste.
install: sudo apt install comixcursors-righthanded
arc-theme (20221218-1)
Flat theme with transparent elements
I’ve always liked this theme.
install: sudo apt install arc-theme
obsidian-icon-theme (4.15-1)
Intuitive Faenza-like icon theme
These should look nice with an Arc theme.
install: sudo apt install obsidian-icon-theme
fonts-noto (20201225-2)
metapackage to pull in all Noto fonts
This is my go-to font on GNU/Linux, mainly because not only do I have music by bands with gratuitous umlauts in their names, but I’ve also got some game soundtracks who credit their musicians in Japanese without transliteration.
install: sudo apt install fonts-noto
fortune-mod (1:1.99.1-9 and others)
provides fortune cookies on demand
A bit of classic UNIX fun: run the command, get a random quote. The really nasty fortunes that used to be in the fortunes-off package have been removed from Debian. Not that great a loss; I enjoyed some of the bawdier stuff but I don’t need Hitler’s bullshit.
install: sudo apt install fortune-mod fortune-anarchism fortunes-bofh-excuses fortunes-debian-hints
anarchism (15.3-3)
Exhaustive exploration of Anarchist theory and practice
This package installs an older version (from 2019) of the Anarchist FAQ to read offline. It is with anarchism, particularly libertarian socialism, that my sympathies lie — though I have always held my nose and voted Democratic in order to fuck over Republicans (sometimes this even kinda works). However, I really ought to read more theory, since I know just enough to understand that "libertarians" in the US are generally more interested in the privatization of tyranny for profit than its abolition.
install: sudo apt install anarchism
dictd (1.13.1+dfsg-1 and others)
More convenient than a paper dictionary, and accessible even offline. For some reason, Slackware never included this. If it had, I might not be using Debian.
The dict daemon isn’t much use on its own; you need dictionary data packages to go with it.
install: sudo apt install dictd dict dict-gcide dict-foldoc dict-wn dict-jargon dict-devil dict-elements
curl (8.11.0-1 and others)
command line tool for transferring data with URL syntax
I’m surprised this wasn’t installed as a dependency for something else. I use this fairly regularly, often enough that I bothered to RTFM and write a config file so that I could identify myself in the user agent string as a courtesy to other website operators.
install: sudo apt install curl
vlc (3.0.21-2 and others)
multimedia player and streamer
I’ve been using this video player for years; it’s the old reliable. I sometimes use it as a music player on macOS, too, for music that I ripped off of my CDs when I don’t want to connect to the network just so that Apple Music will work properly. (And my wife and I certainly can’t watch porn together in Emacs, can we? ASCII art just doesn’t do it for either of us.)
install: sudo apt install vlc
deluge (2.1.2~dev0+20240910-1)
multi-interface BitTorrent client (metapackage)
Yes, I still use BitTorrent in 2024. I use it to download GNU/Linux distributions like Debian.
I don’t use it to download or upload bootleg media. No sir. But if you do, I’ll never tell unless tortured.
Why? Because if buying isn’t owning, then downloading isn’t stealing. As Cory Doctorow explains, you aren’t actually buying digital media, or even physical media with digital features. You are merely buying a license to use said media. Said license can be unilaterally revoked at any time by the copyright holder. Thanks to near-ubiquitous DRM, media that you have purchased can be taken from you without due process.
There’s also a shitload of media — books, movies, games, music, etc. — that’s basically “out of print”. People would still buy it if they could, but you can’t buy what the entertainment cartel refuses to sell unless it’s available via secondhand sales. However, with digital media there’s no such thing as a secondhand market, which is just the way the movie, music, and game industries like it.
I don’t think that copyright should be a license to impoverish our culture by sitting on works that are no longer commercially viable instead of releasing them into the public domain; and I’m acting on that opinion by providing my own fiction free of charge on this website. Of course, that won’t necessarily hold up in court, but that’s what jury nullification is for.
tl;dr: stealing from corporations is praxis. The money corporations lose to ‘piracy’ is chump change compared with what workers lose to unpaid overtime and outright wage theft.
install: sudo apt install deluge
rsync (3.3.0-1 and others)
fast, versatile, remote (and local) file-copying tool
I almost forgot this. How in Xiombarg’s name am I supposed to deploy my website without it?
My brain must be made of yogurt this morning. But I hate yogurt… Even with strawberries!
install: sudo apt install rsync
More to Come?
If I install additional packages, and I remember to do so, they’ll be listed here.
Obligatory Screenshots
A page devoted mostly to notes on setting up a GNU/Linux installation needs some screenshots, so here they are.
