A heads-up, folks!

SOME time soon the physical server of Tux Machines will need to be moved from one datacentre to another (the current datacentre is shutting down for good). Nothing will change, except perhaps some IP addresses, and duration of downtime is expected to be a couple of hours. In that period of time the IRC network will also be down (same physical machine), but it will be back online at around the same time as the site.

In terms of uptime, we haven't done too badly. 126 days since the last downtime and the issues we recently mentioned (due to a sort of DDOS) have been mostly resolved for weeks. That started around February and stopped at the start of this month. It might resume. Hopefully not...

So, in summary, if some time this coming month there's a long downtime, then it is likely intentional and scheduled. Given sufficient leeway or advance notice, we might even give a heads-up before the server starts its journey. The downside with such things may be, if you post a message about a site going offline and immediately (or shortly) after that the site does go offline, who's actually going to see that message? So we forewarn readers as early as today. █

(Almost 50% of Web Traffic is Linux at the Client Side, Even Higher on the Server Side)

We're not as small as they want us to think

Combined market share continues to grow

CONTRARY to myths perpetuated by corporate media (funded by companies such as Apple and Microsoft through advertising), "Linux" is not a niche player. As actual surveys show, GNU/Linux on the desktop keeps growing, Android is already dominant (de facto standard on portable/mobile devices), and ChromeOS is also a 'thing' -- something based on Gentoo GNU/Linux even if it no longer respects freedom.

Don't let media shame and humiliate GNU/Linux advocates. So much progress has been made; further progress remains to be made. █

Ongoing issue

EVER since February of this year we've had a hard time pushing back against a torrent of problematic requests, seemingly crafted to cause trouble. We wrote some programs a few months ago to automate mitigations, but occasionally the server still slows down or even hangs up on some legitimate connections/requests.

It would be nice to have an optimal, long-term solution, but we do not have that yet. At the moment it is a compromise. █

Tux Machines is now self-hosting IRC

Tux Machines is probably one of the largest (in terms of # of pages) GNU/Linux sites out there. But the IRC channel is relatively new (compared to the site).

THE 'IRC wars' of May (and to some degree June as well) left us in a precarious situation and over at Techrights we have set up our own IRC network. In June we set up a #tuxmachines channel in this new network. It has a two-way bridge set up with Freenode, so either network would be valid for following our updates.

We've accordingly updated the IRC page and the corresponding archives. We welcome people to join us in IRC. It's a substitute to RSS feeds or social (control) media. It's now hosted by us, so from a privacy perspective the readers are far better off. It's definitely an upgrade, a well overdue one. █

We turn 17.5 years before Christmas

THE 30,000^th comment was recently posted in this site, but that in itself does not say much. More than half a decade ago we had to stop new account sign-ups due to an epidemic of SPAM. It wasn't manageable anymore due to increasing volumes. So leaving comments became harder, too.

Nowadays, as a result, most comments are basically just updates made to submissions of ours, adding related links to existing news updates. We consider that to be a good/better use of the comments feature. It's not prone to abuse. It also helps in keeping the site concise and tidy (less repetition).

It's summer here in England (like the rest of the northern hemisphere), so we try to enjoy the outdoors a bit more often (a certain pandemic notwithstanding). Above is a highland cow. We met one (and her calf) a few weeks ago in the countryside. █

Variscite, a leading System on Module manufacturer, and Basler, an expert in embedded vision, are stepping up their collaboration for solutions based on the NXP i.MX 8 application processor series.

Tel Aviv, June 24, 2021 – Basler and Variscite continue to expand their cooperation, which started in 2018. Both companies offer a complete solution based on NXP i.MX 8 series for the embedded market with production-ready hardware and software.

Today Tux Machines turns 17. Seventeen years of promoting freedom and privacy in the technical world. Our devotion will carry on along with the community and supporters. Tux Machines is here to stay; today, tomorrow, and in the coming years. Let's celebrate Tux Machines. Cheers! █

Video download link

THE site is turning 17 very soon. We thought it would be worthwhile belatedly explaining how it works and how editorial policies evolved to better serve readers and lurkers. █

Video download link

THIS site will turn 17 in a couple of weeks (screenshot below). The video above explains how we got here, who's responsible for it, and where we move from here.

The video is very informal (totally unscripted, unedited, improvised), but it's also the first time we publish such a video in this site (or the blog).

We wish to thank all those who have supported or merely read us for many years. Spread the word. We're always eager to reach audiences that don't know much about GNU/Linux and may consider switching to it.

In retrospect, as this is composed after making the above video, it's worth noting that the antiX-19.4 page could not be found because of the dash (or hyphen). We rarely miss important news and we're typically very quick to cover/mention important stories. █

2021 is no different from 2020, as we are still fighting the pandemic, but this won't stop or prevent us from running the Web site with solid focus on GNU/Linux and Free Software news. Tux Machines is here to stay. Better and Stronger. █

LIVES at risk. This is a travesty. REPUBLIC OF NAMIBIA'S MINISTRY OF ENVIRONMENT, FORESTRY AND TOURISM: "We should manage elephants based on science and not emotions." By auctioning/selling off 170 live elephants? Give us a break. Oftentimes, animals were to make a sacrifice over humans because they are just "animals", so they can't speak to us, and can't protest. We're asked to assume they're just the least important, therefore we can eradicate (or "cull") them -- as simple as that. How I wish the the Animal Kingdom will become a force and burn this kind of society just to make a statement -- and then, maybe, humans will truly realise the value of animal rights. Shame on those African countries which don't give a shit about all those people who tirelessly devoted their time and life to protecting the wild animals, and specifically the elephants. Animals can't speak, but they can see you and they can feel you; just look into and gaze at their eyes, doesn't that give you goosebumps? Burn. █

Credit: Penguin rendering by Mogz

THE Tux Machines site turns 17 in a couple of months and traffic has never been better. This past week it was on average 100,000 hits per day and later this month we will have posted the 150,000^th node.

Sorting out the news isn't a simple task, but with experience it gets a lot easier and we're glad to be a leading syndicator in that space. █

We are in the process of moving the TuxMachines Web site to a better server with more capacity and better hardware. There may be temporarily odd behaviour on the site (if data is accessed which is out of date). █

Identifying who has logged into your system in Linux is way easier than the Windows Operating System.

In Linux System whenever someone tries to log in using SSH is recorded by the log file, the log file is located in /var/log/auth.log. location can be different in other distribution.

If you not found the auth.log file in your system try to execute the below command to view the log from systemctl.

journalctl -u sshd |tail -100

• -u (Show the user journal for the current)
• sshd (SSH user created by system by default)
• tail -100 (Print top 100 result from log file)

Summary: A little glimpse at how we monitor this site for DDOS attacks and general performance, especially now that DDOS attacks have already become pervasive and routine (Apachetop helps identity attack patterns and visual, colourful alerts are triggered in Nmon and Htop)

TUX MACHINES may seem to have become rather slow if not unreachable at times. Over the past few months we've had issues with bots that request as many as 10,000 files per minute from the site's server, which is obviously unable to cope with the load/bandwidth and actually deliver what's requested. Sometimes it even resets Apache in order to regain order. At the moment we lack a permanent solution, but we have some mitigations in place.

More than 5 years ago we had to stop new account sign-ups due to spammers setting up loads of dummy accounts (hundreds per day), then directing these to vandalise the site. This inevitably led to tighter control from an editorial perspective and it reduced the number of comments.

Running a site is no picnic; it's a 24/7 responsibility. We do the best we can to maintain a reliable service whilst at the same time also pursuing the latest news stories of interest. This takes a huge amount of time and dedication.

If it is difficult to reach the site or if the site feels very slow, it's almost definitely due to those bots. The server's uptime is now 160 days. █

Summary: The latest twist in Microsoft's PR strategy is, divert attention and blame to other companies [1,2], even if their alleged abuses are in fact a copy of Microsoft's own

• Microsoft Backs Epic’s Apple Battle on Game Technology Access

  The graphics technology, known as Unreal Engine, is a suite of software used by millions of developers to build 3-D games and other products. Cutting off Epic from Apple’s iOS and Mac developer tools would mean the gaming company can no longer distribute Unreal Engine to other developers, Epic said in its legal filing. Microsoft, which makes the Xbox, uses the technology for games developed for consoles, PCs and mobile devices.

• Microsoft Supports Epic Games, Says Apple Blocking Access to Unreal Engine Would Harm Game Creators

  In a declaration in support of Epic Games [PDF], Microsoft gaming executive Kevin Gammill wrote that "Apple's discontinuation of Epic's ability to develop and support Unreal Engine for iOS or macOS will harm game creators and gamers." Specifically, Gammill said that games utilizing Unreal Engine will be put at a "substantial disadvantage," citing Microsoft's own racing game Forza Street for iPhone and iPad as an example.

• Developer 'left with no option' will shoot 40 kangaroos to free up land for new homes

THIS may be hard to believe, but after more than 16 years we've managed to put together 140,000 Drupal nodes (this one is the 140,000^th). Most of these are news clippings and clusters of links. The rest are pages, blog posts and forum threads.

The next meaningful milestone will be the 150,000^th node and our 20^th anniversary (some time in 2024). We're quite certain we'll get there, along with 200,000 nodes, as this past week we've been in the region of all-time record traffic.

Susan is still involved sometimes, albeit behind the scenes. We thank her enormously for all the work she did. █

TUX MACHINES has been run from one single place over the past 3 months because of the COVID-19-induced lock-downs. We no longer travel far from home (it's impractical)... and we both work from home anyway.

The prolonged shut-down of businesses (they only reopened a fortnight ago) resulted in lack of access to some digital necessities, but that almost always meant more free time to rethink and reassess the workflow and the workspace with existing hardware (reshuffling what we already have, both new and old).

Last month I showed how the screens on my desk were split to handle multi-tasking. Last week I shuffled to portrait mode (as shown above). Rianne too uses 2 or 3 screens, but her setup is somewhat simpler. We basically both use a combination of RSS readers. I mostly use QuiteRSS and she uses Thunderbird and QuiteRSS in conjunction (best of both worlds). We're still hoping that an intern based in Africa will start participating soon. The pandemic has made access to the Internet a lot harder for him. He wants to cover programming and Web-related topics for us. █