Debian 8.4 released

I just spent a few hours installing Debian Testing on a 2 year old macbook. If you start with a net install you are mostly on your own, but starting with one of the live cds makes it pretty useable from the start. I think the big difference between the two is installing proprietary drivers. Wireless works out of the box on Ubuntu, but I have to install linux-firmware-nonfree and another broadcom package to get WiFi working on Debian.

I just tell myself that the extra work I put into a Debian install makes me more knowledgable about how the system actually works.

They're both fine. Whether you prefer to rent furnished or unfurnished apartments is a matter of taste. Either way, you'll have it like you like it within a couple of months.

You aren't going to get away from systemd with a Debian or Ubuntu system. Both Debian 8 and Ubuntu 15.04 (and beyond) use systemd. There are very few mainstream Linux distributions that haven't adopted it, Slackware being the notable exception.

I've been predominantly a Linux user on desktop/laptop since 1995. It has literally never been easier; to install, to use, to find hardware that works (even weird stuff like pro audio devices and oddball controllers), and to act like it's a "normal" computer without having to worry about drivers, kernels, X, etc.

I have had at least as much trouble from my Windows partition and my Android phones as I have from my Linux (mostly Fedora and CentOS) systems.

There really is no longer a credible case to be made that Linux is hard to use on the desktop. I even lend my older computers out to extremely non-technical friends (the kind who don't own a computer) without having to go into any significant detail about how to use Linux; they figure it out in a few minutes, mostly on their own.

If you wanted to make that case even as recently as maybe five years ago, I wouldn't have argued. But, really...the Linux desktop experience today is excellent, certainly comparable to Windows or Mac OS X. And, with Steam providing a huge variety of Linux games, I haven't rebooted into Windows in almost a year (I used to reboot for video projection work, but am no longer involved in that business...I was on the verge of switching even that to Linux, and had I done any more of those jobs it would have been with Linux).

I tried to.

Apparently he claimed to have been harassed by the police, but he also was said to be incoherent and violent in his behaviours.

Bruce Perens unnicely -at my opinion that is not the most reliable in the world- disclosed his mental illness. 1 day after on his blog and /.

The family also asked for discretion. A wish that has been followed by the majority of the community. Except people like me. Because, well, I wanted to understand.

I tried to see for similar cases with google news what happened, and a non scientifically screening of hundreds of case in the USA would tend to suggests that if the victim is categorized mentally ill then news about police violence does not seems to make it higher than local news.

I am just a little pea on the internet, I have no way to confirm my conclusions are right. It would require a true journalistic investigation to infirm of confirm the case.

The conclusion I drew for myself having attended FOSS for 10 years as a topic organizer in conferences is the level of freaks tended to be higher than on average. Still not a scientific conclusion.

I naively expected the community to be aware of that. My naive expectation is that the society would recognize the positive contribution of FOSS to the IT thus to the economy and thus would try to push harder on this case.

Apparently I am naïve or delusive according to the feedback I had on this story.

Well, I encourage people to make their own opinions and investigate with their own means.

I am still a tad disappointed in my expectations.