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Latest Comments by Nic264
Mojang say no to NFTs and blockchain with Minecraft
22 Jul 2022 at 4:24 pm UTC Likes: 1

Quoting: devland
Quoting: Nic264I still believe people should be free to do whatever they want with the software they run

...

And shady stuff like Blockverse should be regulated by law, not by software EULAs.
There are a lot of conflicting ideas here. Doing whatever you want with the software you run is, most of the time, illegal. In the case of Minecraft it definetely is. And you can never do everything one might want because there are always restrictions. Either from the EULA or general laws and regulations.

In the digital world the rule of law starts with the EULA which is enforced by copyright laws. Most of the time you either run open source software, which also has restrictions on what can be done, or copyrighted programs which you cannot even own because they are often sold on a subscription model that relies on services which you cannot control.

The only thing you can do is stop using something if you don't like it. That and writing your own new version with your own EULA that will force your view of how things should be done onto others so they can then complain in turn. :)
I'd call that incomplete or unclear rather than conflicting ^^
Of course there has to be limits to what you can do with software in the end, especially when it comes to the consequences. All you say is true you never really own most of the software you buy etc. ← That's exactly what I regret.
When I buy a chessboard I don't sign a contract with the vendor about what I have the right to do or not with it. This obviously doesn't mean I can go around and scam people using it.

To sum up maybe more clearly (I hope) what I initially meant:
* I don't like that a software vendor gets to decide what I can or cannot do with the software they “sell”, as a person that believes in FOSS.
* I really really don't like when they get praised for it. Here I see an article that I read as “That's good, we want more restrictive UELAs!”, and I feel like many people agree with that sentiment.
* I would have wholeheartedly agreed if Mojang said they don't want their brand (as opposed to their software) near any NFT. That would be compatible with FOSS principles.

Mojang say no to NFTs and blockchain with Minecraft
21 Jul 2022 at 4:33 pm UTC

Quoting: Purple Library Guy
Quoting: Nic264
Quoting: Mojangblockchain technologies are not permitted to be integrated inside our Minecraft client and server applications [1] nor may they be utilized to create NFTs [0] associated with any in-game content
Quoting: liamdThis is good
I'm going to disagree here, that's against:
0. Doing whatever I want to do with the software I run.
1. Changing that software to do what I want.

Note I'm not an NFT proponent, at all, but I still believe people should be free to do whatever they want with the software they run. (Of course Minecraft is not Free Software, but the world is not black & white and the more freedom we get as users the better IMO.)

I would prefer if that was a trademark thing instead: you do whatever modding you want with the game client and server, but if you want to mod for NFT support then forget about using our name and logo we do not want to be associated with it.

And shady stuff like Blockverse should be regulated by law, not by software EULAs.
Hmmm . . . where you get into problems with that is that Minecraft is generally not a solo thing, and the use of these NFTs is something that is almost by definition not done by yourself. Further, the use of NFTs in a community setting is almost solely for the purpose of walling off most community members from doing (whatever the NFT does)--the whole point of NFTs is that they are supposedly Non-Fungible, meaning they can be reserved for one person and taken away from everyone else.

Thus you could look at NFTs themselves as going against (0) and (1), and banning them contrariwise as supporting those ideas.
Think about a stamina bar that prevents you from running infinitely in a game: is that a restraint against you freedom to use the software however you like? No, that's just the rules of the game. If you have freedom (1) and the stamina bar annoys you: patch it out from the game! But the stamina bar itself is not an issue.

NFTs are a tool to track ownership of $things via a decentralized ledger. Just like a stamina bar they don't have any impact over what you're allowed to do or not to the software you run. They can only have an impact in the software when they are part of the rules.

Mojang say no to NFTs and blockchain with Minecraft
21 Jul 2022 at 1:43 pm UTC Likes: 1

Quoting: Mojangblockchain technologies are not permitted to be integrated inside our Minecraft client and server applications [1] nor may they be utilized to create NFTs [0] associated with any in-game content
Quoting: liamdThis is good
I'm going to disagree here, that's against:
0. Doing whatever I want to do with the software I run.
1. Changing that software to do what I want.

Note I'm not an NFT proponent, at all, but I still believe people should be free to do whatever they want with the software they run. (Of course Minecraft is not Free Software, but the world is not black & white and the more freedom we get as users the better IMO.)

I would prefer if that was a trademark thing instead: you do whatever modding you want with the game client and server, but if you want to mod for NFT support then forget about using our name and logo we do not want to be associated with it.

And shady stuff like Blockverse should be regulated by law, not by software EULAs.

Microsoft chucks GNOME $10,000 from their FOSS Fund
20 Jun 2022 at 7:47 pm UTC Likes: 1

As a side-note, it's quite interesting to see that even Microsoft see the OSI as the go-to for proper open source licenses.
Note that Microsoft (and GitHub) are both OSI “Maintainer”-level sponsors [External Link], meaning they each granted the OSI 10 000 USD (per year, I guess).

Microphone noise suppression app NoiseTorch returns with a new release
14 Jun 2022 at 2:52 pm UTC

Quoting: DrMcCoy
Quoting: Nic264That doesn't mean distros should keep the same name, after all it's not the same software anymore but a derivative, even if it's only small patches.
Let me give you some perspective here: there's literally barely any package at all in any distribution that doesn't have a single patch applied. Name me any program, I'll tell you that it'll have a dozen patches applied on Debian or Gentoo.

There's multiple reasons for that, all of which I have personally seen:

  • Upstream might be dead, but the program still has a large user base

  • A security patch needs to be applied STAT

  • The distribution has a different or novel strategy to handle multiarch, so libraries need to be installed somewhere different

  • The build files install support files wrongly and doesn't care

  • The project fails to compile with a certain compiler version. Very common on Gentoo

  • The project never considered you might want to install different versions at the same time

  • The project doesn't work correctly with a certain library version

  • The project doesn't work correctly with a certain combination of libraries



Some of those you'd want to push upstream, but it might take a while until they react. Some of those you don't, like when your distribution handles things differently.
I'm not arguing about the usefulness of distro-specific patches, I know they are often required to get the software to build, run or be well-integrated with the rest of the system.
All I'm saying is if the authors ask for something like changing the name for modified version, 3rdparty packagers should just respect those wishes. All it takes is just another distro-specific patch after all (half-sarcasm).

Quoting: DrMcCoyIf all of these would mean you'd need to rename the package, no distribution at all would have a Firefox, GNOME, KDE, LibreOffice, etc. None of the names you'd expect on a system would exist.
Hey Firefox was my example first! It requires an explicit written permission from Mozilla [External Link] to keep the name Firefox in patched 3rd-party packages. Again, see “Fennec F-Droid” in F-Droid [External Link]. It was also rebranded as IceWeasel [External Link] in Debian between 2006 and 2017.

Let's also not forget about Google Chrome/Chromium, Visual Studio Code/VSCodium/“Code - OSS” and others.

I'm not saying that's the kind of thing I want as a user, but it makes sense to me that original name = software that's officially endorsed and supported by the authors.

The relationship between developers and packagers is often complicated… So I'll leave you with this example from KDE [External Link] where the author of Okteta opposes a Microsoft Store publication, and his wish is actually respected by the packagers! 🤯

Microphone noise suppression app NoiseTorch returns with a new release
13 Jun 2022 at 8:20 pm UTC

Quoting: DrMcCoyAyyyy, okay, I strongly disagree with that:

Quoting: lawl
Quoting: principisBesides, that's a very annoying clause ["Modified versions may not be conveyed to others under same name as the original program"] to have... It makes it impossible for packagers to apply distro-specific patches.
Good. You got the point of the clause.
Distro-specific patches are very common and pretty much necessary for distributions to, well, essentially work as intended.
That doesn't mean distros should keep the same name, after all it's not the same software anymore but a derivative, even if it's only small patches.

That works well for Firefox for Android for instance:
* if it says « Firefox for Android », you know it's the official binary from Mozilla and the only people you have to go to for support
* if it says « Fennec F-Droid », then it's not officially supported by Mozilla so you should first try and reproduce issues with the official distribution before reaching to them

That seems to be the model that the original author wanted more than a year ago [External Link] already, it's just too bad they didn't make it clearer earlier when handing the project over.

Microphone noise suppression app NoiseTorch returns with a new release
13 Jun 2022 at 3:48 pm UTC Likes: 2

Quoting: BumadarThat was fast, when I read it here and checked out there forum it was pretty much doom and gloom, the programmer was ready to stop.
Note the original author does not endorse the project revival, see https://github.com/noisetorch/NoiseTorch/issues/328#issuecomment-1152801922 [External Link] :
I disagree strongly with how it is currently being run, but i'm still not interested in maintaining the current version. As long as some people want to maintain it, that's fine. Find a new name please.

Manage your Linux PC remotely as KDE Connect lands on iPhone and iPad
10 May 2022 at 8:50 pm UTC

Quoting: ripper81358While i have used KDE Plasma for many years i am not happy with KDE Connect. It is a great tool but for some reason the connection to my androidphone fails as soon as the screen is locked.

I have to unlock the phone while my PC is running, otherwise my phone isn't detected by KDE Connect. I don't know if this caused by Android or my Kubuntu system, but this issue is rendering KDE Connect useless for me.
This looks like Android battery optimizations. In the Android settings you should have an option to disable any battery-related restrictions for KDE Connect. It looks like this [External Link] on my phablet under Applications → KDE Connect → Battery → No restrictions.

GE-Proton 7.15 is out, enables Fall Guys on Linux and Steam Deck easily
25 Apr 2022 at 3:33 pm UTC Likes: 2

Quoting: gradyvuckovicWhy did they even publish the update without at least testing it once to ensure it works?
Initially Fall Guys failed to start for some other reason (DirectX shared resources, see here [External Link].
So they did the right thing: they stopped thinking and simply followed Valve's instructions. Sure they made a small mistake where to put the file, but at least they did the unblocking part.

If they just went with their internal testing and stopped at “Can't get it to run, nevermind…”, we probably wouldn't have Fall Guys running on Linux yet.

So they did test it, and their tests actually failed, but I'm glad they published nevertheless :-)

Steam Deck Developer Mode does not turn off the read-only filesystem
4 Apr 2022 at 6:46 pm UTC Likes: 19

Quoting: ExpandingManI guess I haven't been paying attention. The filesystem on SteamOS is read only by default? Why in the world would anyone do that? It seems so insane to me I'm not sure I'm reading it right.
Almost everything in the embedded world uses read-only system partitions by default: iOS, Android, Ubuntu Core, the Nintendo switch OS… you name it.
In the desktop world macOS Catalina or Fedora Silverblue/Kinoite are examples.
In the server world OpenSUSE MicroOS, Fedora CoreOS.

It mainly makes sense when you want to push updates to lots of devices and you don't want things to break. Which is the case here.

Quoting: ExpandingManI guess I do not envy the people who are responsible for marketing and distributing this stuff to the general public. I failed even to get a non-technical family member to use a password manager that she had to unlock.
That's not something the general public should be concerned about. Is this family member using an Android device? Do they know it runs a Linux kernel with a read-only system partition?
Probably not, people just don't need to know.