“For a party that prides itself on the economy, the Tories have a shocking record of running it. Our economy has the slowest growth in the G7. We have got greater regional inequality than almost any other developed nation. Food banks now do the job of Government in providing for families—families that are more often than not in work.
Government could start solving this crisis by providing solutions, like closing tax-avoidance loopholes or creating a windfall tax for energy companies. But instead, we get endless bills paying lip service to a manufactured culture war. The priority isn’t the economy. It seems to be things like protecting freedom of speech, and yet the Tories are the ones who banned schools in England from using sources that are not overtly pro-capitalist. They are cracking down on freedom of assembly and protest. They are privatising Channel 4, when the Culture Secretary didn’t even know that Channel 4 receives no public money, so the argument is not financial. And as the Member for Rhondda touched upon earlier on, when we consider, that the Culture Secretary was a key focus of a Channel 4 documentary once about the influence that Christian fundamentalism has on UK politics, it becomes even more concerning that this decision is political and it’s personal. It is not professional.
But most terrifying of all, however, is that the Government literally wants to get rid of the Human Rights Act. And that begs the question: for whom do they think rights have gone too far? Do you know how scary it is to sit at home and wonder if it is you—is it your rights that are up for grabs? We have witnessed Windrush. Our economic strategy is to open our doors to the rest of the world when we need their hard work and then chuck them out 50 years later without a word’s notice. We tell our own citizens that their safety cannot be guaranteed in Rwanda, but we are perfectly happy to ship asylum seekers, people fleeing war and persecution, over to Rwanda as though they are cattle to be dealt with by someone else and despite knowing that this plan costs more than it will ever save.
This is just little England elites drunk on the memory of a British empire that no longer exists. We have the lowest pensions in Europe and the lowest sick pay. We pretend minimum wage is a living wage when it is not. We miss our own economic targets time and time again. We are happy to break international law. We are turning into a country where words hold no value.
And over the last 12 years, I fear we have been sleepwalking closer and closer to the F word. And I know everyone is scared to say it for fear of sounding over the top or being accused of going too far, but I say this with all sincerity. When I say the F word, I am talking about fascism—fascism wrapped in red, white and blue. And you may mock and you may disagree, but fascism does not come in with intentional evil plans or the introduction of leather jackboots. It doesn’t happen like that. It happens subtly. It happens when we see the Governments making decisions based on self-preservation, based on cronyism, based on anything that will keep them in power, we see the concentration of power whilst avoiding any of the scrutiny or responsibility that comes with that power. It arrives under the guise of respectability and pride, that will then be refused to anyone who is deemed different. It arrives through the othering of people, the normalisation of human cruelty. Now I don’t know how far down that road we are. Time will tell, but the things we do in the name of economic growth—the warning signs are there for everyone else to see, whether they admit it or not.” Mhairi Black
“Mastodon is used to publish 500-character messages with pictures, polls, videos and so on to an audience of followers, and, in turn, to follow interesting people and receive their posts in a chronological home feed. Unlike Twitter, there is no central Mastodon website – you sign up to a provider that will host your account, similarly to signing up for Outlook or Gmail, and then you can follow and interact with people using different providers. Anyone can become such a provider as Mastodon is free and open-source. It has no ads, respects your privacy, and allows people/communities to self-govern.” Eugen Rochko preempted the planned aquisition of Twitter by a mere 6 years. joinmastodon.org
“Auch dieses Foto ist ein aktuelles Bild aus einem Krieg, den Putin gerade führt. Aber es wurde nicht in der Ukraine aufgenommen, sondern in Idlib in Syrien. Ein Krieg, den wir gerade zu vergessen scheinen, obwohl auch von dort zehntausende nach Deutschland geflohen sind aus Angst vor den Bomben Putins. Und, so groß die Hilfsbereitschaft für ukrainische Kriegsgeflohene gerade ist, so schwer macht es Deutschland den Geflüchteten aus Syrien, in diesem Land anzukommen. Die Menschenwürde ist unteilbar, sagt das Grundgesetz, und doch machen wir Unterschiede.” Georg Restle
“What all these petty, superficial differences – from owning cars and clothes to having Netflix and Instagram accounts – add up to is not real human solidarity for an oppressed people. In fact, it’s the opposite. It’s tribalism. These comments point to a pernicious racism that permeates today’s war coverage and seeps into its fabric like a stain that won’t go away.” Moustafa Bayoumi asks that we offer help and solidarity to innocent people who need protection, irrespective of geographical proximity or skin color. www.theguardian.com
“Thinking that endemicity is both mild and inevitable is more than wrong, it is dangerous: it sets humanity up for many more years of disease, including unpredictable waves of outbreaks.” Aris Katzourakis would like to keep the focus on how bad things could get if we were to give in to misplaced optimism. www.nature.com
“Before we get started, let me say this upfront: GNOME shell is not a traditional desktop and if you try to use it as one, you will not be very efficient.” AJ Reissig
If you would like to be notified of available updates the day they become available, open the Software & Updates application and set the following options:
Are you unable to get a list of updates?
You may run into the following error message when checking for updates for the first time:
Unable to get list of updates:
Failed to update metadata for lvfs: checksum failure: failed to verify data, expected yJcztsgVmmvtkn9na5YyQVdyqFNIXlzYUgrACKX
Run the following command to fix the issue:
$ fwupdmgr --force refresh
Enable unattended upgrades
If you would like to enable the automatic and unattended downloading and installation of security upgrades, run the follwoing command:
$ sudo dpkg-reconfigure unattended-upgrades
Configuring unattended-upgrades
Automatically download and install stable updates? Yes
Network manager detects and configures network interfaces to automatically connect your system to available networks. By default, however, it will only recognise network interfaces not declared in /etc/network/interfaces.
Use the following command to open /etc/network/interfaces:
$ sudo nano /etc/network/interfaces
Delete or comment out any configuration details for the primary network interface.
Use the following command to open /etc/NetworkManager/NetworkManager.conf:
If you would like neofetch to display every time you open a new terminal, open .bashrc with the following command:
$ nano ~/.bashrc
Add the following text at the end of the file:
# use Neofetch to display information about the system
if [ -f /usr/bin/neofetch ]; then
clear && neofetch;
fi
Apply the changes with the following command:
$ source ~/.bashrc
Hide the snap directory
The snap directory in your home folder is not supposed to be accessed manually. Use the following command to hide it from view:
$ echo snap >> ~/.hidden
Hide the Desktop directory
The Desktop feature was disabled in GNOME 3.28. While this decision was not universally popular, developers pointed to the fact that, as an unmaintained feature, it stood the way of other improvements. Use the following command to hide the associated Desktop folder from view:
Debian GNU/Linux was first released way back in 1993 and has been under active developement ever since. Today, the Debian Project unites thousands of contributors from across the globe with the aim of producing “an operating system distribution that is composed entirely of free software”. www.debian.org
These instructions offer a straightforward path to the GNOME 3.38 desktop running on amd64 hardware. You need a reasonably fast connection to the Internet, an Ethernet connection to your router and a bootable Debian CD image.
It is probably easiest to write such an image to a USB storage device and use that for the installation. If the only computer you have access to is running Windows, I would suggest you use Rufus as a means to create a bootable USB flash drive. Depending on your acutal requirements, there are many different Debian images to choose from. If you are following these instructions to install on amd64 hardware, use the unofficial firmware-11.4.0-amd64-netinst.iso, which “includes non-free firmware for extra support for some awkward hardware”.
Debian GNU/Linux will be the only operating system installed on your computer. Ensure that all of your data is safely backed up elsewhere because formatting your storage device will lead to the loss of all data.
In the examples which are to follow, debian is used as the hostname and bullseye as the username. You may of course substitute any names that you prefer. Just be careful to also make the required changes before executing any of the commands. Decide on an encryption passphrase to encrypt your storage device and a user password to secure your user account. In addition to Debian packages, Flatpaks and Snaps will be enabled as well.
Installing the base system
Step 1
After booting the system from the USB stick that you have prepared, continue by selecting the text based installer.
Step 2
Keep English as the language for the installation.
[!!] Select a language
Language: English
Step 3
Select United States as the location for your system. This will also set United States as the default locale for the system environment. You will have an opportunity to set additional locales and adjust time zones at a later point during the installation.
[!!] Select your location
Country, territory or area: United States
Step 4
Use the keymap that is the correct one for your particular keyboard.
[!!] Configure the keyboard
Keymap to use: your keyboard
Step 5
If your system has multiple network interfaces, set your Ethernet interface as the primary interface to use during the installation.
[!!] Configure the network
Primary network interface: choose your Ethernet interface for installation
Set the hostname for your system. In this example, we use debian as the hostname.
[!] Configure the network
Hostname: debian
Continue
[!!] Partition disks
Partitioning method: Guided - use entire disk and set up encrypted LVM
Be careful to select the correct target device for your system.
[!!] Partition disks
Select disk to partition: your target disk for installation
Choose to keep all files in one partition.
[!!] Partition disks
Partitioning scheme: All files in one partition (recommended for new users)
Now write the changes to disk.
[!!] Partition disks
Write the changes to disk and configure LVM?
Yes
You may skip the overwriting of the disk with random data by selecting Cancel. Please be aware, however, that skipping this step will cause a reduction to the quality of the encryption.
Step 8
Enter your encryption passphrase.
[!!] Partition disks
Encryption passphrase: your encryption passphrase
Continue
Confirm your encryption passphrase.
[!!] Partition disks
Re-enter passphrase to verify: your encryption passphrase
Continue
You probably want to use the maximum available space for partitioning the disk.
[!!] Partition disks
Amount of volume group to use for guided partitioning: max
Continue
Step 9
Write the changes to disk.
[!!] Partition disks
Finish partitioning and write changes to disk
Confirm writing the chages to disk.
[!!] Partition disks
Write the changes to disks?
Yes
Step 10
Do not scan additional installation media.
[!] Configure the package manager
Scan extra installation media?
No
Select your archive mirror country from the list.
[!] Configure the package manager
Debian archive mirror country: your country
Select the archive mirror from the list. For the fastest downloads, use the site that is closest to you.
[!] Configure the package manager
Debian archive mirror: mirror closest to you
You probably won’t need to configure an HTTP proxy:
[!] Configure the package manager
HTTP proxy information (blank for none): leave empty
Continue
Step 11
The Debian Popularity Contest attempts to map the overall usage of Debian packages with information from installed systems, such as yours.
[!] Configuring popularity-contest
Participate in the package usage survey?
Yes
Step 12
Choose standard system utilities from the list of predefined software collections and deselect all other entries.
[!] Software selection
Choose software to install:
[ ] Debian desktop environment
[ ] GNOME
[*] standard system utilities
Continue
Step 13
Remove the installation media before booting into your new system.
[!!] Finish the installation
Installation complete
Continue
Installing the GNOME desktop
You have now successfully installed Debian GNU/Linux on your computer. As yet, there is no graphical user interface.
Step 14
Enter your encryption passphrase to boot into the system for the first time. In this example, the encrypted disk is labelled sda3_crypt.
Please unlock disk sda3_crypt: your encryption passphrase
Log into the system with your username and user password.
Debian 11 GNU/Linux 11 debian tty1
debian login: bullseye
Password: your user password
Step 15
Install a minimal GNOME desktop by entering the following command. You will be asked for your user password to gain sudo privileges:
$ sudo apt-get install --assume-yes gnome-core
If you are installing into a virtual machine, use the following command to enable copy and paste between host and the guest:
$ sudo apt-get install --assume-yes spice-vdagent
Step 16
Restart your system.
$ sudo reboot
Step 17
Enter your encryption passphrase to boot into the system.
Please unlock disk vda3_crypt: your encryption passphrase
From within the GNOME desktop, open Firefox ESR from the Activities menu and re-open these instructions at edafe.org/debian-howto.
Step 19
GNOME power options by default are unfavourable. Open the Settings application from Show Applications under the Activities menu and adjust the power options.
Power Saving
Settings > Power > Power Saving > Automatic Suspend
Suspend & Power Button
Settings > Power > Power Button Behaviour: Power Off
Step 20
Continue by setting the following keyboard shortcuts:
File manager
Settings > Keyboard Shortcuts > Home folder
Shortcut: [Super + f]
Web browser
Settings > Keyboard Shortcuts > Launch web browser
Open a terminal with [Super + t] and, where applicable, use copy and paste to enter the commands set out on this page. Be careful not to miss any punctuation.
Set the time zone for your area.
$ sudo dpkg-reconfigure tzdata
Configuring tzdata
Geographic area: your area
Ok
Configure locales for all the languages that your system is going to be used with. Use UTF-8 locales wherever possible.
$ sudo dpkg-reconfigure locales
In this example, German and Japanese locales are generated in addition to the default locale for the system environment.
Configuring locales
Locales to be generated:
[*] de_DE.UTF-8 UTF-8
[*] en_US.UTF-8 UTF-8
[*] ja_JP.UTF-8 UTF-8
OK
Keep en_US.UTF-8 as the default locale for the system environment.
Configuring locales
Default locale for the system environment:
en_US.UTF-8
OK
Step 22
Add the non-free and contrib repositories to enable the selection of packages that do not meet the Debian Free Software Guidelines or otherwise depend on such packages for their operation.
By default, Debian installs the Extended Support Release (ESR) version of Firefox. The Extended Support Release is updated with major security or stability fixes. The Snap package, on the other hand, installs the Rapid Release version of Firefox. In contrast to the ESR, the Rapid Release receives major updates at least every four weeks. Both versions can be used concurrently and are availble on your desktop as Firefox ESR and Firefox Web Browser, respectively.
Step 26
Enable the installation of applications from Flathub with the following command:
“Insofern soll man sich von dem Gedanken frei machen, daß man durch eine verlängerte Präsenz nun unsere Vorstellung von Demokratie, von Parlamentarismus dort heimisch machen kann. Sondern man muß das eben schon dem eigenen Naturell, den eigenen Entscheidungen überlassen.” Peter Scholl-Latour
#CriticalMass Essen am 13. August auf der Rüttenscheider Straße — gestartet wird jeden 2. Freitag im Monat um 19:00 Uhr vom Willy-Brandt-Platz aus. criticalmass.in
“The side-effects are mild … Listen to doctors who work in intensive care, because we are heartbroken every day and don’t want you to end up here.” Dr Samantha Batt-Rawden wants people to come off the fence and get the jab. www.theguardian.com
David Swanson joined the Marines of Echo Company in April 2004 as an embedded photographer for The Philadelphia Inquirer. He was widely recognised for the image of Private Eric Ayon. Echoes of war is Swanson’s account of his time spent with Echo Company in Ramadi, one of the most dangerous places in Iraq at the time. Swanson published this video some years after it had disappeared from the pages of The Philadelphia Inquirer.
“Ich schlage vor, lasst uns einfach Mal tauschen: Jan-Josef Liefers wird Corona-Spezialist und Christian Drosten und Melanie Brinkmann bilden das neue Ermittler-Duo im Tatort. Ich kann mir gut vorstellen, was dann passiert: die Infektionszahlen explodieren und der Tatot wird besser.”
I pre-ordered the Hammerhead Karoo 2 during the last quarter of 2020, fully aware that I might be getting a device that would still require a significant amount of “continuous enhancements”. In other words, I bought into the promise of Hammerhead delivering “the world’s finest cycling computer” through software updates. Eventually.
In many ways, the Karoo 2 already is a good bike computer. In other ways, however, the Karoo 2 is far behind its competition and most definitely a work in progress. I never considered returning the device. Instead, I look forward to seeing the improvements that Hammerhead will be introducing over time. My other cycling computer is a Wahoo Elemnt Roam. hammerhead.io
Limited battery capacity and USB-C cable
After about 3 hours of riding, I would expect the battery of my Karoo 2 to be half-empty. On at least two occasions, however, the Karoo 2 died on me with an empty battery after just over 4 hours of use. Unless you turn off the very features which, in all likelihood, made you buy the device in the first place, charging becomes an absolute necessity on longer rides. This is easier said than done, because charging the Karoo 2 while in its mount is impossible with the cable supplied in the box. There just isn’t enough space between the base of the unit and the handlebar for a conventional USB-C plug to fit into. I use a UGREEN Right Angle USB-C to -A Cable and connect the Karoo 2 to a Zendure SuperMini 5K power bank during rides.
Since the release of the Karoo 2, a number of reviews similar to this one have been published on the Internet:
“Usually on rides I’ve found it lasts around 10–11 hours with all my power meter and heart rate sensors connected up, a route loaded, and flicking between screens. Riding without a route loaded (but still with sensors) massively increases the life per charge, to around 13 hours.” Anna Marie Hughes
After about 10 months of using the Karoo 2, I have come to the conclusion that something must be off with either my Karoo 2 or the running times reported elsewhere…
I am going to leave it there.
Komoot limited to 50 planned tours, use Ride with GPS
The Hammerhead Dashboard is supposed to facilitate the integration of the Karoo 2 with services such as Strava, Ride with GPS, Komoot and others. Unfortunately, synchronisation of available routes with any of these services does not take place automatically and requires the use of either a computer or a smart phone.
With Komoot, there is an added limitation in that it is only possible to “sync your 50 most recent planned tours”. Having used other bike computers in the past, I am stunned that this should even be an issue. Komoot users with more than 50 routes to choose from end up in a loop of having to continuously mess about just to get individual routes to show up on the Karoo 2…
The solution to the problem is to ditch Komoot entirely and use Ride with GPS.
The Dashboard itself is of limited functionality. Route planning is rudimentary at best and there are next to no tools for post-ride analysis of your data. While not necessarily a disadvantage, this needs to be spelled out clearly. Integration with third party services should be flawless. Hammerhead’s focus, meanwhile, appears to lie elsewhere.
Missing auto-lap functionality
The Karoo 2 does not offer auto-lap functionality. Currently, there is no way to set reminders of any kind. Hammerhead merely say that they are “working on adding more towards the lap functionality“. This appears to be a long-standing issue with users of the Karoo 1 as well. The auto-lap feature has reportedly spent more than a year in the “development pipeline”, yet Hammerhead are not committing to a “dedicated timeline for its implementation“.
With Software Build Version 1.187.987, Hammerhead appear to be pleased that they “fixed an issue that prevented users from viewing a Live Tracking link if they weren’t logged in ahead of clicking the link.” They are missing the point. What is preventing users from viewing any link is having to register and then authenticate every time they want to access the link. Until such time that Hammerhead get rid of these short-sighted requirements, actual owners of the Karoo 2 won’t be sharing anything.
In the meantime, getting a SIM and data plan for your Karoo 2 does not appear to make a lot of sense. Unless, that is, you’re planning on inflicting Live Tracking links on friends and family…
Hammerhead no longer require registration to view Live Tracking links. This is a welcome improvement and, in conjunction with a dedicated SIM, appears to be working well.
“Ich würde mir wünschen, dass wir wegkommen davon diese Ereignisse, wie sie jetzt auch im WDR passiert sind, immer als Einzelfälle zu diskutieren. Und es ist ja heute immer wieder aufgekommen, daß es sich um strukturelle Probleme handelt, die nach ’45 nicht einfach aufgehört haben. Und ich glaube es gibt ‘ne Situation, in der man sich in Deutschland sehr, sehr stark wünscht, daß nach ’45 ein besseres Deutschland entstanden ist [sic]. Aber der Wunsch alleine erzeugt noch nicht die Realität. Und da brauchen strukturelle Probleme strukturelle Lösungen.” Max Czollek
Gemeinsam mit ihren Gästen formuliert Enissa Amani eine bemerkenswerte Antwort auf die vom WDR am 09.11.2020 erstmalig ausgestrahlte Sendung “Die letzte Instanz“, deren Umgang mit dem Thema Rassismus bestenfalls als naiv zu bezeichnen ist.
“The location-tracking industry exists because those in power allow it to exist. Plenty of Americans remain oblivious to this collection through no fault of their own. But many others understand what’s happening and allow it anyway. They feel powerless to stop it or were simply seduced by the conveniences afforded in the trade-off. The dark truth is that, despite genuine concern from those paying attention, there’s little appetite to meaningfully dismantle this advertising infrastructure that undergirds unchecked corporate data collection.” Charlie Warzel and Stuart A. Thompson show the ease with which supposedly anonymised data from your smartphone is re-identified. From nothing to hide to nowhere to hide—we are all Americans now. www.nytimes.com
