Are you being treated fairly? Ha ha. Well, if you're a smarthpone user, the answer is probably most definitely not. The smartphone is designed for on-the-go convenience, and as the favorite entertainment toy for the masses. Hence, if you're ever so slightly less simian, you will feel indignant by the state of current affairs, and seek refuge in something that promises more fun, less pain. Fairphone is one such formula. An Android-based device, with repairability and longevity as its main selling points, plus a rather clean Android experience.

My review of Fairphone 6 shows that this is a capable and interesting mid-range device. But the operating system is the weakest link. Thus, it ain't enough doing just one quick test. We need the long-term results. With about 8-9 months of lightweight usage under me proverbial belt, I'd like to share my latest findings on this phone. Some upgrades, lots of new and fresh annoyances, general usability, and all that. Let's begin.

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Most modern software interfaces are bad. They are designed to look cool, not to be ergonomic or functional. Indeed, they lack contrast, color, they are not intuitive, and they are not fun. Firefox, my favorite dear tragic browser, is a good example of this issue. Mozilla has introduced lots of changes for the sake of it over the years, usually with degraded levels of usability and efficiency. I have written extremely detailed tutorials on how to undo most of these changes, including Proton guides one and two and three, UI customization guide, and even how to edit the address bar (URL bar) color in Firefox 143. This last article worked splendidly until the recent version 151 update. That one broke my customization, and the URL bar is now gray. Again.

I went online to see if anyone has already resolved this, and to my astonishment, there was not a single article offering up-to-date information. I fired up a debugging session, and started tinkering with every conceivable URL-related identifier and class, and through the process of slow, grueling elimination, added and removed those to my userChrome.css file. Eventually, I succeeded, and on top of that, I think my result is prettier than the default. So let me show you. After me.

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This is going to be a short article. A short happy article. Back in 2015, I purchased one G50 machine, a mid-level laptop, intended purely for (Linux) distro testing purposes. Since, I've used in extensively, with probably at least 100 distros tried. At one point, I even had an eight-boot setup configured on the system. Jolly jolly times. All these adventures are meticulously detailed in my Linux section, so feel free to roam and explore at your leisure.

At some point, the inevitable software bloat made the boot times excessively slow. Three minutes and counting. But then, I decided to remove the crusty and rather snail-paced HDD that came with the box and slot in its place a speedy SSD, and ever since, the laptop has kept going on, most loyally. In this article, I want to briefly cover the last couple of years, the fun and games one can have with old hardware, plus a cautious message for the future. Let's.

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Let's say you're a Linux or a macOS user. Let's say you have a need for Windows programs, still, for whatever reason. Your choices are to either run a full Windows virtual machine or try a compatibility layer tool like WINE or CrossOver. If you've read Dedoimedo over the years, then you've studied dozens of articles on these topics, on how to accomplish your cross-platform software goals. But I never talked about related security that much.

Technically, the risks from running Windows software on Linux or macOS are lesser than if you do that natively, but there could be some, after all. As a general rule, you shouldn't run anything you don't trust, regardless of the platform. However, if you must, there are still some nice ways to somewhat restrict the Windows software, so your underlying host is less exposed. Following on my recent CrossOver review, I'd like to focus on this program, and the functionality it offers for some rudimentary security. After me.

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What's life on the Patrician side of the fence, you ask? Well, let me tell you. Late last year, I unpeasanted myself. I bought a Macbook Pro, which entitles me to bragging rights and being addressed as m'lord in public. On the hardware and software side of things, I've been using this new machine for a while now, and I want to share my findings. In much the same manner as my long-term reports with the Titan and the Executive, two Linux-only Slimbook systems, I want to tell you about my Mac experience. The good and the bad, mind, because I'm no fanboy, nor do I wish to become one.

You've already gotten a taste of this would-be neutrality in my first report. It is time for a sequel. Today, we will talk about yet more fun (or lack thereof) with Liquid Glass, some dot release updates and fixes, some odd behavior here and there, some actual problems, believe it or not, overall satisfaction, and all that. Let us commence to begin then. After me.

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Welcome. Today, I'd like to talk today about a familiar topic. Yes, back in 2018, I've already covered this subject. If you want to set absolute size and position for specific application windows, you can do that quite easily in the majestic and superlative Plasma desktop. That guide stands and you can still use it for your various needs, especially if there are programs that refuse to spawn or restore correctly in your desktop session.

Now, I want to enhance the article with some extra tips and tricks. As it happens, the Plasma desktop has gained further functionality and flexibility since, and there are additional, powerful tools at your disposal, should you wish to govern your application windows manually. Follow me then, for a brand new old tutorial.

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It has been a while since I last did a proper distro review. But the occasion warrants it. Canonical has released its latest LTS. What makes the April 2026 edition that much more meaningful or important is that, for the first time ever, Ubuntu no longer uses nor can it use the X11 desktop, due to its Gnome 50 dependency. You have to use Wayland. But the same limitation does not extend to the community flavors, even though Kubuntu also decided to default to the "new" and less capable "successor". But the X11 desktop is in the repos.

Well, as a heavy Kubuntu user, I couldn't just ignore this release. After all, I have a mix of 22.04 and 24.04 systems, physical and virtual, including my Slimbook Titan used for gaming, and the Executive, used for casual everyday stuff. With the pro patching enabled, these two ought to be good for quite a while longer, but I want to be ready for the future. Y'know, X11, Wayland, Nvidia, gaming, all the critical stuff. Thus, this new LTS represents a pivotal point. It's going to be the last X11-capable Kubuntu LTS, and so I want to see what gives. Besides, I also want to see whether this LTS is good in its own right, Wayland notwithstanding, considering that 24.04 was quite disappointing. Anyway. Let us commence.

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My Titan is a Linux-only system designed for serious work and gaming. I bought it with the clear purpose of moving away from Windows, a task that I've largely accomplished, with good success. But this journey has not been very easy, with lots of early problems, subsequent firmware-induced power management problems, and then some. By and large, I'm happy with the system. Sort of.

Now, since I last reported on this laptop, a lot has happened. I spent an earnest amount of time playing, fiddling, testing, and I discovered a whole new range of problems and regressions, as well as amazing new things. Indeed, of all the different long-term reports I've written on this machine, I think you will find today's piece most significant. Without a further ado, let's dig in.

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What are you talking about, Dedo, you be asking? Well, I be answering. If you happen to have a heterogeneous operating system setup, your lowest common denominator is data sharing across all these platforms. There are several filesystem options that are supported well, and they include FAT32 and EXFAT. But you may also have NTFS drives in your mix. Okay, on paper, no problem. Linux handles that. For all practical purposes, you can even create and format partitions as NTFS using any one of the Linux partitioning tools.

In reality, I encountered all sorts of issues recently. First, here's a baseline for you. I've been doing data copy from Windows to Linux and back consistently and reliably over the last at least fifteen years. Throw TrueCrypt and VeraCrypt containers into the mix, and still, no trouble. TB upon TB copied and written, millions of files and folders created and whatnot. That was in the past. Today, we're talking system freezes and disk corruption. Technically, another regression. Let's work around it, shall we.

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If you already guessed what this article is all about, congratulations, you be wise. Well, what I'm going to write about today isn't novel or extraordinary. In fact, I had already written about in the past, across several different tutorials and rants. What makes today's piece relevant is the following. Soonish, there ought to be a new Ubuntu LTS. There's a pretty good chance you won't be able to use an X11 session thereon, in the Gnome desktop session. X11 ought to work, in Plasma and friends, though. Nevertheless, this future direction angers me, for pure usability reasons.

Now, you could say, but future, security. Indeed, the primary "argument" against X11 seems to be the scenario whereby rogue programs could read keystrokes. The super irony in this statement is that on any machine, a rogue program could do anything, and the best way to avoid problems is not to have rogue programs running. What makes this even more ironic is that you can have amazingly robust software sandboxing today, ten years ago in fact, without any need for any new fancy stuff. Let me show you.

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In all my years using non-Windows operating systems, I never had a dire need to buy CrossOver. In Linux, I managed doing things the "hard" way, with WINE and lots of manual changes and hacks and whatnot. My best examples are probably the SketchUp & white windows article and Notepad++ guide, as they combine lots of interesting bits and pieces, including plugins, add-ons, weird compatibility, and then some. You may also like my Pharaoh city building guide. All of this work was done using freebie tools. But I never managed to get Microsoft Office to run, and I left it at that.

Recently, though, there's fresh impetus for me to do this. One, I don't want to use Windows 11. The old '10 will keep on running for a while, and with an offline virtual machine or two, my Office needs are sorted. Two, I got myself a Macbook Pro, and I decided to try to make a full transition, in earnest. But I'm talking a pragmatic transition. This means still using familiar programs. To that end, I decided to test and install CrossOver. And this be a review.

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It's been a while since I felt excited about technology. For a good reason, right. Many good reasons. By and large, there's little innovation in the consumer space, both the desktop and the smartphone are mature, finished products, so anything "new" in this domain is likely to be detrimental to the end user, if anything. My Samsung A54 is a great example, a device that gives me grief and occasional glimmer of fleeting hope, and yet, I use it, because suffering is part of the modern IT experience.

Well, I guess it's time for another installment in this saga. Every few months, I feel compelled to tell you about my adventures with the A54. I use it daily, but I don't like it, and I'm not sure I'll ever truly be able to find joy with the device. The early experience sort of sealed the impression for me, and me synapses refuse to change. I mean, to be fair, things had gotten better after a while, but then, they also got worse. Let's see which way the needle points this time. Is the improvement (or worsening) a trend, a fluke, or something else entirely?

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Four months ago, I gave you the previous long-term report of this machine. Not my finest hour. Indeed, in the last two articles, I had my fair share of complaints about the firmware, about the operating system, about all sorts of unnecessary problems and regressions that beplagued my lovely, poor laptop. Not only that, probably the worst part of the whole story is that this Linux-flavored system used to work superbly, until it didn't.

Three years of brief happiness and slightly less brief tribulations are all detailed nicely in the dozen reports I've provided so far. Start reading, click your way back to the beginning, and then work your way to the present once more. This will give you a good indication of the modern Linux desktop usage. Sure, if you choose a different vendor, or a different distro (doubtful), you might get a much better, smoother experience that I had. Unlikely, though. Considering "bad luck" has haunted me over 20 years of use and about as many platforms and chasses, well ... You get the idea. Let's not be despondent, though. Not more than the expected usual quota from a curmudgeony dinosaur. Let's have us a review. Follow me.

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Recently, I got meself a Macbook. All right. The simple question is, what does this mean in practice, when it comes to one's software autonomy? As you well know, I'm an author, and as such, I frequently work with publishers and agents on my written material. Almost to the letter, they all exclusively work with Microsoft Word as the office suite, which implies potential clients have to do the same, too. This is an old, known problem, and I've talked about it many many many many times.

Practically, there are solutions and alternatives. Like say LibreOffice or OnlyOffice. Both offer some level of Office format compatibility, good but not perfect. Then, you could also perhaps set up a virtual machine with Windows running inside it, and then install Office yonder, but that can be costly, and besides, you may not want to give Microsoft your money, especially if they nudged you out of their ecosystem with the likes of Windows 11, as I mentioned in my Macbook review earlier. For that same reason, you may also not want to buy an Office license for Mac, huh! CrossOver is another option. All right, so what about Pages, Mac's native office tool?

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After I encountered a networking issue in an Ubuntu-based virtual machine running kernel 6.8, I decided to run a little experiment. Let's set up the HWE stack, which ought to bring in a lot of new stuff, including the very modern kernel 6.17. Sounds good. I tried, and then, I got an error message that the VirtualBox service wasn't running anymore inside the guest operating system, ipso facto, I didn't have all the guest additions goodies anymore.

I tried to compile the drivers on the command line, and got an error that said: Something went wrong. Looking into the VirtualBox log, it looked as if VirtualBox could not find various kernel header files, even though the right package was installed and all that. Reading online, I found references that VirtualBox 7.1, which is the version running on the host, wasn't compatible with the new kernel. So, seemingly, an unsolvable problem. But it's not. Let me show you what I did, and what you can do.

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Finally. I've discovered a real and silly problem with my Macbook Pro, or to be more precise, with the operating system. As it happens, I wanted to watch a movie clip, in MP4 format. I double-clicked on it, and the system popped a warning: Apple could not verify ... is free of malware that may harm your Mac or compromise your privacy. I could click Done to dismiss the prompt, or move the file to trash. What.

What makes the issue even more bizarre is that I had already played this clip multiple times on this machine, without any issues. Seemingly, something has changed, which affected my ability to watch the video, and also caused the system to completely wrongly diagnose a simple MP4 file as a potentially malicious item. Well indeed, something has changed. But let me walk you through this, step by step. After me.

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Hello there, Internetians. Do you like weird problems? I know I do. Lo and behold, as I was merrily using a Windows 10 host, I suddenly noticed an audit failure in the Event Viewer. I had opened this utility to check something completely unrelated, and then, there it was, event ID 4625, category Logon. The system was telling me about a logon request failure. The text read: an account failed to log on. What what.

Let me ask you another question? How would you feel if you suddenly discovered a failed logon attempt at your system, but one which you definitely have not initiated? Of course, this wasn't a message I could disregard lightly, but then, very quickly, I learned what it was all about, and why I could dismiss it lightly. Let me elucidate.

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In 2026, you really shouldn't have any issues running old DOS content on modern systems with ultra-beefy specs. But sometimes, less is more, it seems, as I mentioned in my first performance-related guide. Believe it or not, a 1994 title managed to challenge my 30-years-younger laptop. Why or how? Well, it has to do with the emulation itself and various associated limitations, thereof. But I showed you a neat workaround.

Now, I want to expand on this endeavor and reveal yet another cool trick. It should help you achieve better performance in the game titles that baffle modern technology. Furthermore, there'll be an added bonus of improved sound compatibility. Following on my second DOS sound tutorial, we will now talk about memory management in the DOSBox emulator. Spooky, ain't it. After me, fellas. Let's do it.

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My article title is perhaps a wee melodramatic. Now, not that long ago, I was given a nice hand-me-down, one iPhone 11, which I also happened to have tested five years prior to that date. I use the device sporadically, testing what life feels like on the other side of the pond. Overall, I'm most interested in the promised support, longevity, how the system behaves across consecutive updates, and such. Long-term value for money.

As this ain't my primary phone, I also allow myself some slack. Well, a lot. Extra testing, perhaps an adventure or two that I wouldn't normally do, albeit far far short from anything silly. I'm not talking about any stupid app installations or such. I'm talking how to copy local MP3 music via VLC and KDE Connect, and then what iOS 26 feels like on this device. We shall now expand on that endeavor, and then some, and I will highlight the ups and downs gathered over the past year or so.

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Recently, I've done quite a lot of DOS-related stuff. It all started because of one awesome game, the lovely WW2 simulator called 1942: Pacific Air War. As it happens, this humble old title introduced all manner of challenges into my modern gaming world, including both performance and sound issues, which you sort of wouldn't expect. Namely, the simulator wouldn't run as fast as you'd expect some thirty plus years after its inception, and the sound wouldn't work correctly, either.

I resolved both these issues, as I've shown you in my dedicated DOSBox sound in Linux tutorial and the related performance guide. Now, I would like to build up on these two pieces, and give you yet more tips and tricks on how to enhance your modern-day DOS experience. To wit, we shall start with the sound once more, and then, in a sequel, cover the game speed element, too. And much as I've shown you above, these two will also nicely dovetail together. Now, let us commence.

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Over the years, I have grown to dread and resent operating system upgrades, across the board. They usually bring pain, regressions, problems, and new usage paradigms, for no good reason. In particular, with Windows, you can expect hours upon hours of undoing low-IQ crap. In Linux, you can expect tons of breakages, because quality is a forbidden word in the nerdy cycles. When I realized I needed to upgrade my Macbook Pro from its Sequoia (15.X) to Tahoe (26.X), I felt somewhat uneasy.

Then, I remembered my experience with the iPhone, and how reasonably seamless the whole process was. And now that I also have a recipe for how to tame the unholy elements of Liquid Glass, perhaps the ordeal won't be too arduous. Furthermore, Apple have implemented various changes and improvements in Tahoe, with two dot releases (at the time of writing) meant to have fixed the early bugs and annoyances. With optimism in my proverbial step, I set about doing the system upgrade. After me.

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Hear hear. I am happy to report that, after almost thirty years of competition in software-induced hardware instability, Windows has finally managed to catch up with Linux. A couple of months ago, Windows managed to give me its most poetic farewell gift, a string of BSOD crashes on a system that was, until that point, spotlessly stable and robust. After I had applied the July 2025 updates, a desktop system began crashing randomly. Its reliability factor went from hero to zero. Not unlike the issues that plague my Linux machines. Oh the excitement!

My approach to computer problems is always self-centered. I always assume that somehow I had caused the issue, or that my system is at fault. And every single time, every single time, it turns out, no, it's not me, it's shitty software peddled by this or that vendor that ruined my tranquility and made my hardware misbehave. This incident seems to be no different, so let me tell you a lovely story. It began in July, with an innocent monthly update. It escalated into a set of BSOD. Follow me.

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Let me present you with a scenario. You are a former or current Windows user, check. Once upon a time, you discovered TrueCrypt (and possibly VeraCrypt) and are using it, check. For compatibility reasons, your containers are formatted with NTFS, check. They reside on external USB drives, which also use NTFS as their filesystem, check. You got yourself a Macbook, with Apple Silicon, ergo ARM processor, check. And now you want to use your legacy Windows stuff on this new system. Check mate.

I found myself facing this very challenge. The problems are multiple. The processor architecture to start with. There ain't no native TrueCrypt builds for this family of chips. If you use VeraCrypt, there are, but the version that supports legacy containers is somewhat old. MacOS can do NTFS read only, but not write. The list of potential obstacles is long. Luckily, there is a solution. It ain't trivial, but its doable. For nerds only. Now proceed.

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Wow, slow down there. Did I just drop a paradox on ye? An oxymoron or something? Well, here's the thing. By default, you will not have write functionality for any NTFS-formatted devices in macOS. I've discovered this recently on me Macbook. Not a biggie, but then, I have lots of legacy stuff from Windows I'd like to copy over, or even just access and use occasionally. This means some method of providing the necessary filesystem support.

One way you can solve the problem is by buying software that does this. And in a way, you should. However, if you don't want to be spending money, there's a somewhat roundabout method by which you could accomplish the same for free, with some rather big caveats. Above all, today's guide is a lovely experiment first and foremost, and a useful and practical and recommended recipe second. But let me show you what I did.

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Almost every day, I read Linux news (on a few select sites). And almost every day I come across another example of tragic self-sabotage that hampers the potential growth and proliferation of the Linux desktop. In every single case, the deep, underlying reason is the same. A lack of awareness of what "product" is and what "product" should be. So, here we are, and welcome to another nice rant.

Today, I would like to try, for the umpteenth time, to convey my message. It is quite likely to fail for many reasons. One, I will be misunderstood. Two, I will be ignored, because it is easier to treat me as a grumpy outsider than someone with a valid story that needs to be acknowledged, because that acknowledgment implies tons and tons and tons of hard, grueling and boring work. Three, the past 25 years of Linux desktop development show that there's little hope of change. Now, let's begin.

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In addition to a couple of physical systems, I run roughly two dozen Linux virtual machines, most of them Ubuntu-based. Because of this unlikely high count of systems, I often encounter problems most other people don't see. Case in point: random networking connectivity issues in Ubuntu (or flavors) running with the latest available kernel at the time of writing.

The issue manifests in various ways. You try to connect to a Web page, it says: no connectivity, but then immediately thereafter, it does connect. You try to update your system, and you get errors. You try to ping a system, which you know is pingable, routable and will give you the expected result, and you get still more errors. If you repeatedly try these actions, they will succeed, but about 50% of cases will initially fail. Let's debug and fix this.

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Let us begin. If you use TrueCrypt or VeraCrypt for your encryption needs, then, typically, what you do is: you open the relevant application, point to the desired device or container, mount it (with a password), and go about using this new path like any drive in your system. Once done, you unmount it. This procedure works great, provided you can actually run TrueCrypt or VeraCrypt in your system. But what if you cannot?

You may struggle thinking about an appropriate scenario, but let me paint it for you. ARM build of Ubuntu. Say, a virtual machine on your Macbook, as I did recently. Compared to the x86 architecture, you might experience a dearth of software. For example, TrueCrypt ain't available at all. VeraCrypt can open old containers, but only up to version 1.25.9. This one doesn't have a build for Ubuntu 24.04, and you can't install the Deb file from 22.04 due to hard-coded dependencies. Ipso facto, there seems to be NOTHING that can open old containers on a recent ARM build of Ubuntu. So let me show you a neat workaround.

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Consider this my first sort of longer-term usage report of my Macbook Pro. Now that I've had the device for a couple of months, I've gotten a bit more accustomed to the operating systems and its ways, the good and the bad, some of which I've deliberately changed. After all, for people using both Macs and classic PCs, the difference in the usage mode can harm productivity. I tried to address that in my above-linked piece.

Now, I want to tell you about additional discoveries I've come across, including some odd results and discrepancies. Yes, there be a few of those, too. I refuse to be a fanboy, and hence, I will share all my findings, be they good or bad or weird. Let's commence then, and have a look at the new and interesting things I've come across in the past several weeks.

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It was a little bit hard for me to choose the title for this article. It's a bit wordy and descriptive, and it covers a rather curious problem. To wit, you have a Linux system, most likely one based on Ubuntu. The networking works in it. You can ping, browse, use apt on the command line. But if you say launch Discover, which would be KDE's software management frontend, it will complain that it's offline. Indeed, NetworkManager shows no networks, even though you're online. Weird, innit, guv.

I encountered this problem when I created my own system from "scratch", starting with Ubuntu Server, and having added the Plasma desktop environment on top of it. I did this in an ARM-based virtual machine running in VirtualBox on my Macbook, as this seems to be the best way to have your own Ubuntu-based KDE-based ARM architecture Linux distro set up. But obviously, the network was "borked". I resolved this, and I want to show you what I did to get there. After me.

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Fun sad fact. In 2007, when I wrote my review of 1942: Pacific Air War, I had better performance using DOSBox on a single-core Athlon running Windows XP than I have in 2025/2026 with multi-core new-gen modern processors and Linux as the operating system. Indeed, I've been recently re-playing this fabulous WW2 simulator, but the in-game playback smoothness, even the graphics, simply aren't as nice as they were 17 long years back.

This momentous setback prompted me to try to resolve the issue. Here we are. An article that should partially help you improve your DOS games speed. However, take into account I can't really guarantee success, as my own tests shows lots of unpredictability and weirdness. Still, it ought to be quite useful. And we will tie this guide to the tutorial on DOSBox sound issues I wrote recently, too. After me, folks.

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My neverending Linux desktop adventure is one helluva ride. Up and down, sideways, and then we loop again, skidding precariously along the monorail of nerdy emotion, missed opportunities, tragicomic ego games, and a complete disregard of what product is meant to be. Case in point, me Slimbook Titan machine. Linked here you have the last report. Use that to go back in time, all the way to the moment of purchase. You will see my satisfaction seesawing, going from abysmal to solid to great to pointless to silly to nice, many which ways.

In my latest report, I mentioned a workaround to intermittent system freeze issue via general purpose event (GPE) interrupt blocking or masking, which seem to have resolved said freezes, with the added bonus of having no sound notification when the battery charger is plugged in or out. But it does resolve a stupid and unnecessary issue, which bugged me greatly. Now, we shall see what gives a month later.

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When I first saw The Matrix roughly a quarter of a century ago, like many a young nerd at the time, I was thoroughly impressed. The movie was visually spectacular and quite revolutionary, with its slick use of bullet time and AI-related philosophy. Indeed, thanks to The Matrix, lots of FOSS developers still think oppressive dark themes with a glaring green tint are the correct way of doing user interfaces. The notion of life inside a simulation is another rather popular theme. Quotes, check. Red pill, blue bill, golly! I remembered the film as entertaining, fast-paced, tense, nice. Then, I watched it again several weeks ago, and, ugh, it didn't age well.

To me, nowadays, the techno-grunge leather, neon lighting and pseudo-philosophy look all utterly outdated. The concept of yet another AI robotic apocalypse seems cliche. There's no romance whatsoever between Neo and Trinity, the conversations feel stilted, and the action isn't as actiony as I remembered. Far from it. But the worst part is the use of humans as fuel. I can't honestly say what my impression of this bio hazard was back then, but I'm sure feeling mightily skeptical now. So I thought, let's actually calculate whether humans would ever make for a practical fodder for robots and alike.

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Weird problems rarely manifest solo. To wit, I recently encountered several issues running my virtual machines in VirtualBox on top of Kubuntu 24.04. These problems occurred after I upgraded my system to Kubuntu 24.04, and then added a new kernel into the mix. First, I couldn't run any guests because the program's drivers weren't loaded into memory. I had to install headers manually, and recompile the kernel. Whatever.

Then, as soon as I solved this issue, there was a fresh one. It read: VT-x is being used by another hypervisor (VERR_VMX_IN_VMX_ROOT_MODE). VirtualBox can't operate in VMX root mode. Please disable the KVM kernel extension, recompile your kernel and reboot (VERR_VMX_IN_VMX_ROOT_MODE). Uh oh. Lots of words. Kernel compilation? Sounds very naughty. Well, let's debug.

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Every few weeks, this question comes up (via email), usually after I publish a negative review of yet another of my bittersweet Linux endeavors, which almost always revolve around Ubuntu and its derivatives, or, more specifically, Kubuntu, my distro of choice. These articles prompt my readers to challenge my choice of software. In parallel, the readers also usually recommend I try a different distro or two, which could hopefully resolve my angst and my usage problems.

The recurrence of this phenomenon prompted me to write this piece. I want to explain my rationale into why Ubuntu is the best desktop choice (and it is), why other distros aren't as optimal, and why Linux is in a bad state, regardless of what you select. Hopefully, this will settle the debate. Or perhaps make you write me even more, with yet more suggestions, so you push through my stubbornness. Well, let us commence.

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Here's a simple yet juicy topic. Muscle memory is both a blessing and a curse. How so, you ask? Well, I've gotten myself a Macbook Pro. Nice machine and all that. Then, since I'm also a pretty serious Linux user, I've set up an Ubuntu + Plasma virtual machine, using VirtualBox, for my Tuxy needs. So far so good. Where things go ever so slightly off the tangent is once you start typing or using keyboard shortcuts.

Being an long-time PC person, my fingers are accustomed to standard PC keyboard, with the Ctrl button as the outermost one, followed by Fn, and then some. The usage of these keys is so ingrained in my brain that I actually remapped the Mac's own modifier keys to match the Windows/Linux usage. But now, there's a fresh problem. The Linux virtual machine obeys the keys as is. What to do? Well, there's a simple solution.

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Apart from a short stint with Commodore 64 and ZX Spectrum, I've been a PC user my whole life. Until late 2025, I've never used the Mac. Not even once. And now that I have gotten meself a nice device, there's 30+ years worth of muscle memory and productivity optimization working against the Mac usage paradigm. Every time my fingers touch the keyboard, something strange happens.

I have two options before me. Adapt to the Apple way of doing things, or try to make the Macbook behave more like a Windows/Linux system. My choice is the latter. I'm still an active user of those two operating systems, and, in a way, the majority wins. Also, if there's a way, then why not. If macOS lets me implement a few simple changes that will make my life immediately better, I want to try them. In this guide, I will outline a bunch of tweaks and tricks for Windows and Linux converts with ingrained reflexes. Let us commence.

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Linux. Things work, until they don't. Nothing like getting a horrible error JUST when you need to do some actual work, or some important task. Case in point, as outlined in my Slimbook Executive report 12, VirtualBox suddenly wouldn't launch any guests. The error said: Kernel driver not installed (rc=-1908). The VirtualBox Linux kernel driver is either not loaded or not setup correctly. Please try setting it by executing ... Yes, indeed. This popup suddenly showed when I tried to fire up one of the virtual machines. Annoying and frustrating, especially since I've not really made any changes to VirtualBox in quite a while.

As instructed, I ran the /sbin/vboxconfig command, and it informed me that my system was missing the necessary kernel headers to compile the driver for the running kernel. I then remembered I had recently upgraded the kernel on the box, from 6.8 to 6.14, but for some reason, VirtualBox hasn't been auto-configured with this change. Anyway, let me show you quickly the issue, all of the interesting details, and then how to fix this, so you can be on your merry way.

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I always thought I was the grumpiest person on the Internet. Was I wrong. As it turns out, there are people far more talented than me in harboring grudge, disliking technology and writing about it, all in one lovely curmudgeon package. Indeed, if there were a place called Grudge R Us, it would probably be owned by Homo Ludditus, a blogger with an angry mission, funny style and useful content.

When it rains, it pours. You discover one grumpster, you discover many. Should Homo Ludditus keep you hungry for more, worry not. JWZ to the rescue. What can I say about this weird 90s-looking site? Well, it's obvious the owner loves The Matrix. And that they have developed grumpiness into an art form. It ain't empty grump, neither. We're talking hard-earned decades of major tech experience, the only kind that can breed this level of sweet bitterness and insight.

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If there's one thing the Windows desktop does not need more of, it's the mobile-like features. And yes, every time, Windows 11 manages to surprise me with yet more stupid gimmicks, ported straight out of the touch-based smartphone world. Case in point, adaptive brightness on battery power. I was using my test instance, and I noticed the screen brightness changing. The display would dim or lighten up, depending on what I was doing, but I couldn't quite pinpoint it.

Then I realized, maybe the operating system is adjusting the brightness in a contextual manner, based on what's shown up. So I went back into the settings, and indeed. There it was. Stupidity. The system was configured to change brightness based on content (on battery power). What the ... Well, I changed this, and my screen assumed its expected brightness level, and stayed so ever since. I will shortly show you how to do the same, but also discuss this meaningless feature a bit more. After me.

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Sometimes, no news is good news. And early news is bad news. The fact I'm writing my 12th report on this laptop so quickly after I've published the 11th piece means that there be old and new and colorful problems in the software stack, big and juicy enough to warrant a fresh article. Indeed.

My Slimbook Executive is a wonderful piece of hardware. It's slick and sexy, it's got a great keyboard, and it's fun to use. For a while, it was simply flawless. A true joy to behold and handle. But then, badly executed [sic] updates ruined its spotless record. Firmware "fixes" that I didn't ask for and kernel patches that I can't really filter out of my list of updates brought in an instability that I'm fighting to this day. I won't bore you with links, you can check my Linux section and peruse the dozen reports about this machine. Today, we shall talk about what happened in the last month, and, good sirs and madams, was it eventful.

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Typically, over the years, I've mostly used "big names" distros for my serious workloads. Initially, SUSE, later on, flavors of Ubuntu. There's one exception to this rule: MX Linux. I've used it mostly on my low-end devices, like the eeePC, and it has delivered quite admirably so far. The reason why I was willing to step out of my rather strict norm is the combination of many various qualities that MX Linux has.

You can get a sense of what I'm on about from my latest MX-23 review. No, it ain't perfect. But, over the years, the distro team has worked hard on improving the system, with tangible results, contrary to most other distros that have shown a deterioration in quality. It comes with a session save option during the live testing and installation, something very few other distros offer. It's lean and fast. It uses init rather than systemd, which is completely unnecessary in the home environment, nor does it bring the hallowed speed improvements that were sold as systemd's major advantage over its crummy predecessor. Well, MX-25 is here, and it's time for a fresh adventure. New Debian base, big changes. Let's begin.

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Wait, what. Mic drop? Dedoimedo built his own distro? No, nothing of the sort. And yet. Well, let me intrigue you. But also, let me explain. Some time ago, I got myself a Macbook. This is one of those Apple Silicon systems, meaning ARM architecture. I also want to use Linux on this box, through virtualization. And this instantly creates a "problem", because there's a relative dearth of Linux distributions and software readily available and compiled for the ARM processors. For example, there's no ARM version of Kubuntu, which would be my favorite option.

Emulation, i.e., going from x86 to ARM is possible, but there's a major performance penalty. Thus, I need a native build. But, "shopping" around, I couldn't find what I wanted. The most enticing option was the server build of Ubuntu. No GUI. Hm. Could this be a baseline upon which I might add a desired desktop option, and enjoy Linux on this Mac? Well, let's find out, shall we?

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Every few months (or years), I get a bout of nostalgia, and I revisit my old DOS classics. More recently, I've played the lovely Panzer General turn-based war game and the spectacular F-16: Combat Pilot simulator. In both cases, I used DOSBox installed in Linux. While the former doesn't really change much, Linux distros come and go, and they bring somewhat different levels of support for the emulator along the way.

Just days back, I decided to strap myself into the cockpit of WW2 planes in the amazing 1942: PAW simulator. In 2007, it worked splendidly. In 2025, I encountered a multitude of issues with both the sound and actual performance, which may sound surprising, but here we are. In today's tutorial, I would like to give you some tips on how you can enable music and sound in various games, especially if they have a somewhat flaky out-of-the-box experience. So let's commence.

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Hello there, dear readers. I would like to inform you of a nice three-week sale gala, commencing today, and ending on January 7. What is it about, you ask? Well, my career-focused book, aptly named How to Make Your Career Suck Less. Indeed, this fine, cheekily named title will be available at a handsome 50% discount through all Draft2Digital stores for 21 merry days.

I also want to take this opportunity to briefly inform you on my recent writing endeavors. Things are going rather well. I'm working on getting my military history, new sci-fi and new fantasy books published. In parallel, I'm (still) writing the AI ethics piece and romantic novel, side by side. The mind exercise of jumping between the two totally disparate themes in quite invigorating. Hopefully, quite soon, you shall have a plethora of good, engaging subjects to peruse. Stay tuned for updates.

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Commence to popcorn. I am quite certain this article will draw its due share of flak, praise and unrelated commentary focused on a tiny word on line 56. But as you probably know I really like the Plasma desktop environment. It's my default Linux desktop, when I use Linux, and it's awesome. Still, there are lots of issues, current and future. The implementation across Kubuntu editions isn't that good, and it's getting worse. The 6.X family is a bit meh so far, with Wayland problems and less than ideal presentation layer.

Hopefully, the recently unveiled Plasma 6.5 release will redeem KDE's hard work over the years. While my soul still harbors a lot of skepticism and disappointment toward Linux, I'd like to see the operating system succeed, on some reasonable level. The Tux ship seems rudderless, but the Plasma team is trying to break that. With some good mojo from the Steam Deck work, there just might be light at the end of the tunnel. To that end, we must take 6.5 for a spin. After me, most gingerly and grumpily, then.

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Ah, I jinxed it. Mega jinxed it. Remember my ninth report, basically the big One UI 8.0 update? Well, that one went most smoothly, and I had no negative things to report whatsoever. Smooth sailing all the way. Alas, as it turns out, too much optimism and hope can be detrimental to one's mood. Especially if there's a sudden squall of fresh problems.

Happy go lucky me, I had not planned on writing a new Samsung A54 report that soon, but as it turns out, I must. Within days of the Android 16 update, I encountered a whole bunch of new issues on this device. From my most positive experience with this smartphone yet, to a rather ragged state of affairs. But enough teasers. Come with me, dear fellas, and feast your eyes.

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When I first tested Kubuntu 24.04, I was rather dismayed. The system felt like one giant regression. Since, I tested the distro multiple times. Each review revealed improvements, alongside various old and new bugs and problems. Even a fresh install of the 24.04.2 release, the second LTS bundle, wasn't as pristine as it could possibly be. But it was a lot better than the early attempt, for sure.

Then, I upgraded my Slimbook Executive, going from 22.04 to 24.04. Boy oh boy was this a rough experience. There were sooooo many upgrade issues, as outlined in my tenth long-term usage report for this laptop. Never before have I had a Linux upgrade with so much cruft and noise. Some of these are Kubuntu-specific, but some, like the format change for the apt sources files, it's 100% Ubuntu, and it's 100% nonsense. Anyway, in today's article, which I hope won't be too acerbic, I want to share some fresh findings from my 24.04 usage, across several physical and virtual systems, all of which serve a different, unique purpose. Let's begin.

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Recently, I encountered a fresh problem in my virtualization adventures. I wanted to export one of my Linux virtual machines, so I could use it on a different host. On paper, the functionality is there in VirtualBox. File > Export Appliance. Then, you choose the desired virtual machine, decide what format you want to use, configure MAC addresses, and let VirtualBox generate the ova file. On the target host, you import this appliance.

I tried to do this and encountered an error. The GUI said E_INVALIDARG 0x80070057, without too many details. Reading through tickets on the VirtualBox forum, I learned that there could be many various issues for the failure in the import process. Rather than try to solve these potential problems one by one, I chose a different route. A manual machine import, without using the OVA process. Let me show you.

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You would think Windows is annoying when it comes to its updates. But at least there's one entity doing the updating, and if you handle it, you're sorted. Not so in Kubuntu, or most Plasma systems, I'm afraid. Recently, especially since I installed and/or updated a bunch of systems to 24.04, I've been seeing more and more restart required prompts. But not one. Nope. A torrent. A barrage of notifications popping, one after another, sometimes three, sometimes eleven. And they would happen without my intervention, which is alarming.

As it happens, I don't like automatic updates, so I keep them off. Or so I thought, because no matter what I chose through the Discover GUI, Kubuntu would still ignore my wishes and occasionally run a background update, and then annoy me with pointless messages, always when I don't want or expect them. I found a second place to cull this unwarranted noise, but still, this wasn't enough. Then, a third place. My oh my. In today's tutorial, I will show you how to get rid of the KDE Daemon update reboot message deluge. After me, if you please.

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Uh oh. Bring out your popcorn. Strap in and get ready for a spectacle. For today's article can only have two possible outcomes: utter genius or total failure. There is no middle ground, I'm afraid. When a curmudgeon, a Linux nerd and an embittered long-time Windows user, ergo me, decided to splurge money on an expensive posh laptop that will elevate him from the status of peasantry to sweet nobility, there can be no other option. My actions will either vindicate me, or I shall become a total idiot for wasting hard-earned dough on an over-expensive slab of metal and plastic.

To wit, a Macbook Pro! So, this is a review. But there's a lengthy introduction. If you need context and understanding as to why I chose to buy this gadget, you will need to read the first few paragraphs. If you only care about the spec and the use, feel free to skip the why part. Still, for pure entertainment value, I suggest you do savor all the bits and pieces. Let us commence then, most gingerly, forward.

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The eternal tragic hero the likes of those mentioned in Greek mythology reports for duty. That would be me, that is. Once more, I must test my Slimbook Executive, a Linux-only laptop that I use for serious stuff. Or try to use, provided how benevolent the muses of software feel at any given day. Were my experience with the Linux desktop only positive, you would not be reading these articles. But that's not the case.

The Executive is a beautiful machine, and for a while, it worked impeccably, until bad updates made it bad. Since I've battled a range of silly problems, including power management, session management, keyboard behavior, and then some. They come and go. It's a complex story that involves tons of different components of the Linux ecosystem, with each somewhat to blame for the fiasco. Over the last year or so, I was able to get rid of many of the problems. Most notably, I upgraded the operating system. This report shall tell you whether that bold move helped eradicate the last traces of this annoying affliction. Follow me.

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