I’ve been living the Linux desktop lifestyle for a couple of months now. Not full time, and not exclusively, but what desktop computing I do I’ve tried to do under Linux (still the ARM Ubuntu desktop running as a virtual machine under UTM on the M2 Pro Mac Mini). And it’s mostly been… fine?

So rather than just complaining, I figured I’d document some solutions I’ve come up with and how they’re working for me.

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Nobody buys a computer; they buy into an ecosystem.

This has been true for (basically) forever. A computer has only ever been as useful as the software you could run on it, and as only a small fraction of the people who have ever owned computers can program them, this mostly means the software you can buy (or otherwise obtain) for it.¹

Computer ecosystems have always evolved. Defender of the Crown and Delux Paint were excellent reasons to buy into the Amiga ecosystem, but WordPerfect was a solid reason for abandoning it.

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In our previous episode I described how I undertook a new adventure in Linux to see whether it was workable for me these days as a desktop operating system.

But if you’ve ever played around with Linux you’ll know that there isn’t one Linux. Linux comes as distributions and different distributions have their own philosophies and included software and desktop environments and default apps. Your own experience of Linux might not be the same as any other persons'.

In this post I’m going to go through some of the options I’ve explored and choices that I’ve made so far.

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In or around 2002 I got my first Mac, a white G3 iBook. Ever since, my main computer has been a Mac.

I’ve certainly not only used Macs since then. My day job has mostly had me using Windows (except for a brief and unsuccessful diversion into academia for a couple of years where I was able to use a Mac), but the computers I have bought myself and have control over have been Macs.¹

In recent years, however, I’ve been beginning the question the stewardship of the Mac by Apple’s current management. Apple just isn’t that into the Mac anymore, and I’m a bit wary of hitching my wagon to a platform that’s always going to play second fiddle (or third, or fifth) to cash cows like the iPhone.

As a result, every now and then I have a look to see how green the grass is on the other side. I’ll load up Linux on a VM or a Raspberry Pi or something and have a play and quickly forget about it. While my objective is usually to see whether Linux is now a viable replacement for macOS for my use, mostly I don’t get that far. Usually I’ll just get distracted by something and move on and back to the Mac.

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Build details:

• Lulu (V1 PCB) in space grey with clear encoders;
• Boba UT4 62g tactile switches;
• KAT Cyberspace keycaps.

The Boardsource Lulu was the board that runied everything for me.

Up until the Lulu I was perfectly happy with normal keyboards. I tended toward the smaller side – my ideal keyboard was probably a nice 60 per cent – but definitely within the realms of the mainstream, as far as keyboards as a hobby goes.

The Lulu started like any other keyboard. Somewhere (probably either Reddit or on GeekHack) a group buy was advertised, and I paid my money and waited a long, long time. Eventually, it arrived and I built it and the rest was history.

The thing with the Lulu is that it was my first split keyboard. Now split keyboards are all I want to use.

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I find in order to learn anything new I need to attempt to do something with it. For reasons I can’t easily articulate I decided that I should get into emacs (the file editor, not the discontinued education-focused Apple all-in-one) and figured that using emacs to write this blog would be a good project.

Emacs is famed for its modularity, and of course there was an emacs package specifically for managing Hugo blogs.

Visiting the GitHub page for the package I saw there was an Issue attached to the package that was along the lines of “I have forked this package to use ChatGPT to write blog posts and it’s awesome and you should check it out”.

It is fair to say that this left me flummoxed.

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The Boardsource Unicorne is a fancier version of the Corne keyboard, a small 3x6 column staggered split keyboard.

Here are the quick details:

• Boardsource Unicorne MX Keyboard;
• Matcha Latte linear switches (60g, with long pole POM stems, PC top housing and Nylon bottom housing);
• KAM SuperUser keycaps with the 40s ortho terminal kit;
• No stabs, because it doesn’t have any keys big enough.

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With the recent descent into AI madness of the Wordpress folks there have been a few people on Mastodon looking for other hosting options, so I figured I’d do a quick “here is how I set up my blog” post.

The short version is that it’s a static site generated with Hugo, hosted on the file sharing space provided by Fastmail to its email customers. This is pretty easy and doesn’t cost me anything more than I was already paying for my email, but might be missing some of the features other people need.

Edit: This page has been updated to reflect my updated posting system using rclone and GitLab CI.

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I’m pretty happy with my current desk setup at home as far as ergonomics go. I have a small house and there is a small part of that small house where a small computer desk lives.

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Build details:

• Command 65 by Play Keyboard
• Ice Kachang Tactile Switches
• TX Stabilisers (PCB mount)
• Hammerworks CRP C64 Round 2 keycaps

This is the first in my series of posts about my keyboard collection; not because it’s my favourite, or because it’s the most expensive or the best, but because it’s really easy to photograph.

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