F.O.S.S

Important thing first. Ubuntu 20.04 LTS version will be reaching its end of life on 31st May. It was released in April 2020 and had a standard support of five years.

Please check your Ubuntu version and if you are using 20.04, you can:

• Do a fresh installation of Ubuntu 24.04 LTS to get the latest packages.
• Upgrade to Ubuntu 22.04 LTS from your existing 20.04 installation, keeping your files intact.
• Opt for Ubuntu Pro, which will ensure you get essential security patches until 2030 but no new software.

Ubuntu 20.04 LTS is Reaching End of Life — Here are Your Options

Upgrade or sign-up for extended support before it is too late!

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

Time to plan your update.

💬 Let's see what else you get in this edition

• A new Linux kernel release.
• File permission in Linux.
• GNU Taler payment system being approved for Swiss use.
• And other Linux news, tips, and, of course, memes!
• This edition of FOSS Weekly is supported by PikaPods.

❇️ PikaPods: Enjoy Self-hosting Hassle-free

PikaPods allows you to quickly deploy your favorite open source software. All future updates are handled automatically by PikaPods while you enjoy using the software. PikaPods also share revenue with the original developers of the software.

You get a $5 free credit to try it out and see if you can rely on PikaPods.

PikaPods - Instant Open Source App Hosting

Run the finest Open Source web apps from $1.20/month, fully managed, no tracking, no ads, full privacy. Self-hosting was never this convenient.

Instant Open Source App Hosting

📰 Linux and Open Source News

• GNU Taler has officially entered the Swiss market.
• Linux kernel 6.15 is here with a Rust-based NVIDIA driver.
• SteamOS now officially supports more handhelds than just the Steam Deck.
• Qt has introduced Qt Bridges, a new piece of tech for bridging Qt applications with other frameworks and programming languages.

Rhino Linux's new UBXI KDE Desktop doesn't disappoint.

Hands-On with Rhino Linux’s New UBXI KDE 6 Desktop

Rhino Linux’s first UBXI port is here!

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

🧠 What We’re Thinking About

Carmen from Mission Libre has started a petition to get Qualcomm to release fully-free drivers for their in-production chipsets. If the petition is signed by 5,000 people, a hardcopy of the petition and signatures will be mailed to Qualcomm's head office. We can get 5,000 signatures, can't we?

Home | Tell Qualcomm: Publish Free Drivers for Modern Wi-Fi Chipsets!

Tell Qualcomm: Publish Free Drivers for Modern Wi-Fi Chipsets!

🧮 Linux Tips, Tutorials and More

• VS Code on Arch is possible and easy.
• Understand the concept of file permission. It's a must-know for Linux users.
• Want more from Obsidian? Our plugin guide can be helpful.

Looking for some note taking apps suggestion? We have an extensive list.

Top 16 Best Note Taking Apps For Linux [2025]

Plenty of amazing note-taking apps for Linux. Here’s what we recommend you to check out.

It's FOSSAnkush Das

👷 Homelab and Maker's Corner

While it is a proprietary piece of hardware, Flexbar can be a nice addition to your Linux setup.

Miss Apple’s Touch Bar? Flexbar Brings This Experience to Linux

While Apple has discontinued the Touch Bar, Linux users can now enjoy the same experience with Flexbar.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

Also, learn a thing or two about MCP servers, the latest buzzword in the (AI) tech world.

✨ Apps Highlight

If you ever wanted to run an operating system inside your browser, then Puter is the solution for you. It is open source and can be self-hosted as well.

Puter is a Complete, Fully Functional OS that Runs in Your Web Browser

Run an operating system straight from your browser.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

An It's FOSS reader created an FFmpeg AAC Audio Encoder Plugin for DaVinci Resolve. This will help you get effortless AAC audio encoding on Linux if you use DaVinci Resolve video editor.

📽️ Videos I am Creating for You

I tried Microsoft's new terminal editor on Linux! I hate to admit it but I liked what I saw here. This is an excellent approach. I wonder why Linux didn't have something like this before. See it in action 👇

🧩 Quiz Time

Can you identify all the GitHub alternatives in this puzzle?

GitHub Alternatives: Puzzle

Solve this puzzle by figuring out the alternatives to GitHub!

It's FOSSAnkush Das

💡 Quick Handy Tip

In Xfce, you can use the panel item "Directory Menu" to get quick access to files from anywhere. This is like the Places extension in GNOME, but better.

In the configuration menu for it, provide the file extension in the following format *.txt;*.jsonc as shown in the screenshot above to access the files quickly. Clicking on those files opens it in the default app.

🤣 Meme of the Week

The ricing never stops! 👨‍💻

🗓️ Tech Trivia

On May 27, 1959, MIT retired the Whirlwind computer, a groundbreaking machine famous for pioneering real-time computing and magnetic core memory.

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 FOSSverse Corner

ProFOSSer Sheila is having an issue with MX Linux, can you help?

MX Linux / XFCE missing desktop background image!

I am at a loss as to how to fix a new issue on MX-Linux Xfce that started about 30 min ago. I was working on things and my windows are always only expanded far enough right so that I can still see my Conky (top-right on desktop). I clicked outside the window on Conky and it disappeared. So did the background image. Later, switching workspaces, I found the same was true on all of them and when I right clicked on the desktop, no context menu. I went in to the desktop settings and tried to apply a…

It's FOSS CommunitySheila_Flanagan

❤️ With love

Share it with your Linux-using friends and encourage them to subscribe (hint: it's here).

Share the articles in Linux Subreddits and community forums.

Follow us on Google News and stay updated in your News feed.

Opt for It's FOSS Plus membership and support us 🙏

Enjoy FOSS 😄

There are two main choices for getting VS Code on Arch Linux:

• Install Code - OSS from Arch repositories
• Install Microsoft's VS Code from AUR

I know. It's confusing. Let me clear the air for you.

VS Code is an open source project but the binaries Microsoft distributes are not open source. They have telemetry enabled in it.

Code - OSS is the actual open source version of VS Code.

Think of Code - OSS as Chromium browser and VS Code as Google Chrome (which is based on Chromium browser).

Another thing here is that some extensions will only work in VS Code, not in the de-Micorsoft Code - OSS.

This is why you should think it through if you want to use Microsoft's VS Code or its 100% open sourced version.

Let me show you the steps for both installation.

Method 1: Install Code - OSS

This is simple. All you have to do is to ensure that your Arch system is updated:

pacman -Syu

And then install Code - OSS with:

pacman -S code

It cannot be simpler than this, can it?

As I mentioned earlier, you may find some extensions that do not work in the open source version of Code.

Also, I had noticed earlier that Ctrl+C - Ctrl+V was not working for copy paste. Instead, it was defaulted to Ctrl+Shift+C and Ctrl+Shift+V for reasons not known to me. I had not made any changes to key bindings or had opted for a Vim plugin.

Removing Code OSS

Removal is equally simple:

sudo pacman -R code

Method 2: Install the actual Microsoft's VS Code

If you don't care too much about ethics, open source principles and just want to code without thinking it too much, go with VS Code.

There are a couple of VS Code offerings available in the AUR but the official one is this.

Before installing it, you should remove Code OSS

sudo pacman -R code

If you have an AUR helper like yay already installed, use it like this:

yay -S visual-studio-code-bin

Otherwise, install yay first and then use it to install the desired package.

Don't be deceived by the pretty looking screenshot above. I was using a different theme in VS Code.

Removal

You can use your AUR helper or the super reliable pacman command to remove Microsoft VS Code from Arch Linux.

sudo pacman -R visual-studio-code-bin

I let you enjoy your preferred version of VS Code on Arch Linux. Please feel free to use the comment section if you have questions or suggestions.

How do you get help in the Linux command line?

On Linux, there are man pages that come preloaded with any distribution. The man pages are basically help pages which you can access using the terminal.

You get an instruction manual when you purchase a new gadget, right? It is just like that.

If you want to know what a command does, just use the 'man' keyword followed by the command you would like to know about. While it may seem pretty straightforward, the user experience is a bit dull, as it is all a bunch of text without any decorations or any other features.

There are some man page alternatives that have tried to modernize the user experience, or give a specific focus to the man pages for particular users. Let me share my quick experience with them.

1. Qman

Qman is a modern manual page viewer with navigation, scrolling, hyperlink, and table of contents support.

It aims to be fast and offer a couple of features at the same time being a terminal-focused tool.

Key Features:

• Index page that displays all manual pages available on the system, sorted alphabetically and organized by section.
• Hyperlinks to other manual pages, URLs and email addresses.
• Table of Contents for each man pages
• Incremental search for manual pages and free page text search.
• Mouse support
• Navigation history
• On-line help
• Fully configurable using an INI-style config file

Installation

This supports Arch Linux for easy installation using the following command:

yay -Syu qman

For other systems, you need to build it from source

2. TLDR

Love cheat sheets? So, you do not have to waste your time scrolling through a barrage of descriptions? That's what TLDR helps you with.

It gives short and actionable information for commands to follow.

Key Features:

• Community-maintained help pages.
• Simpler, more approachable complement to traditional man pages.
• Help pages focused on practical examples
• TL;DR stands for "Too Long; Didn't Read". It originated as Internet slang, where it is used to indicate that a long text (or parts of it) has been skipped as too lengthy.

Installation

If you need to install Snap for Ubuntu, here is the command to do that:

sudo snap install tldr

For Arch Linux and Fedora, the commands are (respectively):

sudo pacman -Syu tldr
sudo dnf install tldr

3. Tealdeer

If you want TLDR tool, but built on Rust, Tealdeer should be your pick. Simplified, example based and community-driven man pages.

I noticed an interesting thing about the project's name and I'll quote it here below from their GitHub page:

If you pronounce "tldr" in English, it sounds somewhat like "tealdeer". Hence the project name 😄

Installation

It is available on Debian, Arch Linux, and Fedora repos:

sudo apt install tealdeer
sudo pacman -Syu tealdeer
sudo dnf install tealdeer

There are static binary builds for Linux only. You can also install via cargo:

cargo install tealdeer

Once installed, run the command below to update the cache:

tldr --update

To get shell completion in bash:

cp completion/bash_tealdeer /usr/share/bash-completion/completions/tldr

4. Navi Cheat Sheet

If you favored a cheat sheet, and want an interactive UI to complement the same, Navi Cheat Sheet is the answer.

Key Features:

• Browse through cheat sheets and execute commands.
• Set up your own config file
• Change colors
• Can be either used as a command or as a shell widget (à la Ctrl-R).

Install

In Arch Linux and Fedora, use the commands below:

sudo pacman -Syu navi
sudo dnf install navi

You can also try using Homebrew:

brew install navi

Once installed, run navi. It will suggest a command to add a default set of cheat sheets. Run it:

navi repo add denisidoro/cheats

5. Cheat.sh

If your focus is only on Cheat sheets, and get the best of community-driven inputs for the same, Cheat.sh is the perfect terminal tool for you.

Key Features:

• Simple interface
• Covers 56 programming languages, several DBMSes, and more than 1000 most important UNIX/Linux commands.
• No installation needed, but can be installed for offline usage.
• Has a convenient command line client, cht.sh
• Can be used directly from code editors
• Supports a special stealth mode where it can be used fully invisibly without ever touching a key and making sounds.

Installation

You can install it using Curl with the following commands:

curl cheat.sh/tar
curl cht.sh/curl
curl https://cheat.sh/rsync
curl https://cht.sh/tr

To install locally, first install rlwrap and most.

PATH_DIR="$HOME/<a-directory-that-is-in-PATH>"
mkdir -p "$PATH_DIR"
curl https://cht.sh/:cht.sh > "$PATH_DIR/cht.sh"
chmod +x "$PATH_DIR/cht.sh"

6. The MOST Pager

Alright, if you are like me, and probably not looking for anything fancy, but just a colorful man page, you can use the Most pager.

MOST is a powerful paging program. Supports multiple windows and can scroll left and right. It keeps the same good-old man page look with added colors.

Install

sudo apt install most
sudo dnf install most
sudo pacman -Syu most

Once installed, edit ~/~.bashrc:

nano ~/.bashrc

To add the line:

export PAGER='most'

For the latest most versions, color may not appear by default. In that case, below line to ~/.bashrc.

export GROFF_NO_SGR=1

7. Yelp or GNOME Help

Considering you are using a distribution powered by GNOME desktop, you just need to search for the GNOME Help app from the menu. You can also access the same via the terminal using the command yelp.

Press CTRL to open the search bar and type the command that you want when using the terminal interface.

man:<command>
# For example
man:man

Or, if you are in a browser, go to the address bar (CTRL+L). Here, enter man:man. When asked to open the link in help, click on it.

Bonus: Use a terminal with built-in AI

AI is everywhere, even in your terminal. The proximity of AI in the tool lets you quickly use them.

There are a few terminals that come with built-in AI agents to help you get all sorts of help; from simple command suggestion to full-fledged deployment plans.

You may use them too if you are an AI aficionado. Warp is one such terminal which is not open source but hugely popular among modern Linux users.

Wrapping Up

While you have It's FOSS along with the traditional man pages to learn what most commands do on Linux, there are alternatives to man pages which could enhance your learning experience.

If you prefer a GUI, GNOME Help should be helpful or any similar equivalent pre-installed on your distribution. For terminal-based solutions, there are a couple you can try. Take a look at the feature set they offer, and install what you like the most.

What do you prefer the most? Let me know in the comments below!

Obsidian has emerged as a powerful and flexible knowledge management tool, despite NOT being an open source product.

Using plugins is just one of the many tips that you can follow to get the most out of Obsidian.

However, there is a small catch when it comes to compatibility. If you have used several Obsidian-specific plugins, then your notes may not be fully compatible in other plain markdown editors.

In this article, we will take a look at Plugins in Obsidian, how you can install it, and also some essential plugins that can make your learning more effective.

But first, a quick heads-up: Obsidian offers two types of plugins:

• Core Plugins: These are officially developed and maintained by the Obsidian team. While limited in number, they are stable and deeply integrated.
• Community Plugins: Created by users in the Obsidian community, these plugins offer a wide variety of features, although they aren’t officially supported by the core team.

Using the core plugins

Core plugins are officially built by Obsidian. They will come pre-installed. So, naturally, that is the recommended method of installation when it comes to plugins.

Core plugins are displayed in Obsidian settings page. Click on the settings gear icon at the bottom of the Obsidian app window to go to the settings.

In the settings, select Core Plugins to view the Core plugins.

Most of the core plugins are enabled when you install the Obsidian app. But some plugins will be disabled by default.

I have included a brief description under each plugin to know what the plugin does and enable/disable as needed.

Suggested Read 📖

13 Useful Tips on Organizing Notes Better With Obsidian

Utilize Obsidian knowledge tool more effectively with these helpful tips and tweaks.

It's FOSSSreenath

Using the community plugins

I’ve found that community plugins are one of the best ways to boost Obsidian’s capabilities. There’s a massive collection to choose from, and at the time of writing this, there are 2,430 community plugins available for installation.

These plugins are built by third-party developers and go through an initial review process before being listed.

However, since they have the same level of access as Obsidian itself, it’s important to be cautious. If privacy and security are essential for your work, I suggest doing a bit of homework before installing any plugin, just to be safe.

Disable the restricted mode

To protect you from unofficial plugins, Obsidian starts with a restricted mode, where the community plugins are disabled. To install community plugins, you need to disable the restricted mode first, just like the auto blocker in some Android phones to block app installations from unauthorized sources.

Go to the Obsidian settings and select the Community Plugins option. Here, click on the "Turn on community plugins" button.

This will disable the restricted mode. And, you are all set! 😄

Install community plugins

Once the restricted mode is disabled, you can browse for community plugins and get them installed.

Use the Browse button to go to the plugins page, as shown in the screenshot above. You will reach the plugins store, that lists 2000+ plugins.

Do not worry about the numbers, just search for what you need, or browse through some suggested options, just like I did.

When you have spotted a plugin that matches your need, click on it. Now, to install that plugin, use the Install button.

Once installed, you can see two additional buttons called Enable and Uninstall. As the name suggests, they are for enabling a plugin or uninstalling a plugin.

This can be done more efficiently from the Obsidian settings. For this, go to the Settings → Community plugins → Installed plugins. Here, use the toggle button to enable a plugin.

This section lists all the installed community plugins. You can enable/disable, uninstall, access plugin settings, assign a keybinding, or donate to that particular plugin.

Manually install plugins

Even though not recommended, if you want to install a plugin, manually, for version compatibility or other personal reasons, make sure to source it from the official repositories or websites.

If it is on GitHub, go to the release page of the plugin GitHub repository and download main.js, manifest.json, and style.css files.

Now, create a directory with the name of the project in the <Your-obsidian-vault>/.obsidian/plugins directory. Press CTRL+H to view hidden files.

In my case, I tried Templater. Next, I transfer the downloaded files to this project directory. Now, open Obsidian and go to the Settings → Community plugins and enable the new plugin.

Install beta version of plugins

This is not for regular users, but for those who want to be testers and reviewers of beta plugins. I usually do this to test interesting things or help with the development of plugins I believe in.

We are using the BRAT (Beta Reviewers Auto-Update Tool) to install and update beta versions of Obsidian plugins.

First, install the BRAT plugin from the Obsidian plugins store and enable it.

Now, go to the GitHub repository of the plugin you want to install the beta version of. Copy the URL of the repository.

Select the BRAT plugin from Settings → Community plugins and click on the “Add beta plugin” button.

Here, add the GitHub URL, select a version from the list, and click on the Add Plugin button.

You can see that the plugin has been added with BRAT. Since we selected a specific version, it is shown as frozen and cannot be updated. Select Latest as version to get updates.

Update plugins

To update community plugins, go to Obsidian settings and select Community plugins.

Here, click on the Check for updates button.

If there is an update available, it will notify you.

Click on Update All to update all the plugins that have an update available. Or, scroll down and update individual plugins by clicking on the Update button.

Move community plugins

You can copy selected or all plugins from your directory to another vault to avoid installing everything from scratch.

Go to the <your-obsidian-vault>/.obsidian/plugins directory. Now, copy directories of those plugins you want to use in another vault.

Copy those directories to your new plugin directory for your other vault (or the newer vault) <your-new-vault>/.obsidian/plugins directory.

If there is no plugins directory in the new vault, create one. Once you open the new vault, you will be asked to trust the plugins.

If it is you, who copied all the folders and no others are involved, click on the "Trust author and enable plugins" button.

Or you can use the "Browse Vault in restricted mode" and then enable the plugins by going to Settings → Community plugins → Turn on Community plugins → Enable plugins.

In both cases, you don't have to install the plugin from scratch.

Don't forget to enable the plugins through Settings → Community plugins to start using them.

Remove a plugin

Removing a plugin is easy. Go to the community plugins in settings and click on the delete button (bin icon) adjacent to the plugin you want to remove.

Or, if you just want to disable all community plugins, you can turn on the restricted mode. Click on the Turn on and reload button in community plugins settings.

So, if you turn off the restricted mode, all the installed plugins will be enabled. Pretty easy, I know, right?

Another way to remove plugins is to delete specific folders in the plugins directory, but it is unnecessary unless you are testing something specific.

Go to the <your-obsiidian-vault>/.obsidian/plugins directory and remove the directory that has the name of the plugin you want to remove.

Now open Obsidian and you won't see that plugin. Voila!

Enjoy using Obsidian

I have shared many more Obsidian tips to improve your experience with this wonderful too.

13 Useful Tips on Organizing Notes Better With Obsidian

Utilize Obsidian knowledge tool more effectively with these helpful tips and tweaks.

It's FOSSSreenath

Plugin is just part of how you can go beyond the obvious and default Obsidian offering. I hope you found this tutorial helpful. Enjoy.

It took me way longer than I’d like to admit to wrap my head around MCP servers.

At first glance, they sound like just another protocol in the never-ending parade of tech buzzwords decorated alongside AI.

But trust me, once you understand what they are, you start to see why people are obsessed with them.

This post isn’t meant to be the ultimate deep dive (I’ll link to some great resources for that at the end). Instead, consider it just a lil introduction or a starter on MCP servers.

And no, I’m not going to explain MCP using USB-C as a metaphor, if you get that joke, congrats, you’ve clearly been Googling around like the rest of us. If not… well, give it time. 😛

What even is an MCP Server?

MCP stands for Model Context Protocol, an open standard introduced by Anthropic in November 2024.

Its purpose is to improve how AI models interact with external systems, not by modifying the models themselves, but by providing them structured, secure access to real-world data, tools, and services.

An MCP server is a standalone service that exposes specific capabilities such as reading files, querying databases, invoking APIs, or offering reusable prompts, in a standardized format that AI models can understand.

Rather than building custom integrations for every individual data source or tool, developers can implement MCP servers that conform to a shared protocol.

This eliminates the need for repetitive boilerplate and reduces complexity in AI applications.

What can an MCP Server actually do?

Quite a bit. Depending on how they’re set up, MCP servers can expose:

• Resources – Stuff like files, documents, or database queries that an AI can read.
• Tools – Actions like sending an email, creating a GitHub issue, or checking the weather.
• Prompts – Predefined instructions or templates that guide AI behavior in repeatable ways.

Each of these is exposed through a JSON-RPC 2.0 interface, meaning AI clients can query what's available, call the appropriate function, and get clean, structured responses.https://www.anthropic.com/

So... how does an MCP server actually work?

MCP servers follow a well-defined architecture intended to standardize how AI models access external tools, data, and services.

Each part of the system has a clear role, contributing to a modular and scalable environment for AI integration.

• Host Applications
  These are the environments where AI agents operate, such as coding assistants, desktop apps, or conversational UIs.
  
  They don’t interact with external systems directly, but instead rely on MCP clients to broker those connections.
• MCP Clients
  The client is responsible for managing the connection between the AI agent and the MCP server. It handles protocol-level tasks like capability discovery, permissions, and communication state.
  
  Clients maintain direct, persistent connections to the server, ensuring requests and responses are handled correctly.
• MCP Servers
  The server exposes defined capabilities such as reading files, executing functions, or retrieving documents using the Model Context Protocol.
  
  Each server is configured to present these capabilities in a standardized format that AI models can interpret without needing custom integration logic.
• Underlying Data or Tooling
  This includes everything the server is connected to: file systems, databases, external APIs, or internal services.
  
  The server mediates access, applying permission controls, formatting responses, and exposing only what the client is authorized to use.

This separation of roles between the model host, client, server, and data source, allows AI applications to scale and interoperate cleanly.

Developers can focus on defining useful capabilities inside a server, knowing that any MCP-compatible client can access them predictably and securely.

Wait, so how are MCP Servers different from APIs?

Fair question. It might sound like MCP is just a fancy wrapper around regular APIs, but there are key differences:

Basically, APIs were made for apps. MCP servers were made for AI.

Want to spin up your own self-hosted MCP Server?

While building a custom MCP server from scratch is entirely possible, you don’t have to start there.

There’s already a growing list of open-source MCP servers you can clone, deploy, and start testing with your preferred AI assistant like Claude, Cursor, or others.

If you're interested in writing your own server or extending an existing one, stay tuned. We’re covering that in a dedicated upcoming post, we'll walk through the process step by step in an upcoming post, using the official Python SDK.

Make sure you’re following or better yet, subscribe, so you don’t miss it.

Want to learn more on MCP?

Here are a few great places to start:

1. How I Finally Understood MCP — and Got It Working in Real Life - towards data science
2. What are MCP Servers And Why It Changes Everything - Huggingface

Conclusion

And there you have it, a foundational understanding of what MCP servers are, what they can do, and why they’re quickly becoming a cornerstone in the evolving landscape of AI.

We’ve only just scratched the surface, but hopefully, this introduction has demystified some of the initial complexities and highlighted the immense potential these servers hold for building more robust, secure, and integrated AI applications.

Stay tuned for our next deep dive, where we’ll try and build an MCP server and a client from scratch with the Python SDK. Because really, the best way to learn is to get your hands dirty.

Until then, happy hacking. 🧛

I have an interesting story to share. You are probably already aware that many products and services offer a trial version for a limited time.

And some people try to take advantage of the trial period by creating new accounts with new email addresses.

But imagine if a multi-million dollar enterprise does the same. And it does so for an open source software that they could have managed on their own.

Free as in Fraud? A $130M Aerospace Company Caught Exploiting Open Source Trial

An unnamed $130M company has been exploiting Xen Orchestra’s free trial for over a decade.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

💬 Let's see what else you get in this edition

• More new default apps in Ubuntu 25.10.
• Fedora's Wayland decision.
• Systemd free distros.
• Making Bash beautiful.
• And other Linux news, tips, and, of course, memes!
• This edition of FOSS Weekly is supported by ANY RUN.

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📰 Linux and Open Source News

• FFmpeg has taken a swipe at rust.
• VS Code is gearing up for an AI-first makeover.
• WSL is now open source under the MIT license.
• Microsoft has fixed a dual-boot issue that broke Linux.
• Warp terminal (non-FOSS) now has experimental support for MCP.
• 2025 looks like a great year for open source, with a few corporate donations.

Ubuntu 25.10 will feature new terminal and image viewer apps.

Ubuntu 25.10 will Have a Brand New Terminal (and Image Viewer)

Ubuntu 25.10 replaces its default terminal and image viewer with modern apps.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

🧠 What We’re Thinking About

Are we finally entering the Xorg-less era? Fedora has taken the bold move to go for Wayland-only desktop offering in the upcoming version 43.

No More Xorg! Fedora 43 Will Be Wayland-only

A bold move by Fedora. Will everyone be onboard?

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

🧮 Linux Tips, Tutorials and More

• Imagine Oh My Zsh but for Bash. The Bash-it framework lets you enjoy a beautiful bash shell experience. I am just surprised that it is not called Oh My Bash 😜
• Not trying to re-ignite the systemd vs sysvinit debate. Just sharing a list of systemd-free distros in the age where most distros are systemd-first.
• Take advantage of multi-cursor editing in VS Code to simplify repetitive actions.

Try Sausage, and enjoy the classic Bookworm game like experience in the terminal.

Play With Words in Linux Terminal With With Bookworm Style Game

Remember the classic Bookworm game? You can have similar fun in the terminal with Sausage.

It's FOSSAbhishek Prakash

👷 Homelab and Maker's Corner

Troubleshooting your Pi? Don’t ignore those blinking LEDs! They are a powerful diagnostic tool that are super handy in headless setup.

Red and Green LED Lights on Raspberry Pi and Their Meaning

Raspberry Pi’s status LEDs are a surprisingly powerful diagnostic tool, especially for headless setups.

It's FOSSAbhishek Kumar

✨ Apps Highlight

Doodle lets you pixelify your Android smartphone with its cool wallpaper collection.

Pixelify Your Android Smartphone with This Wallpaper App

Transform your Android smartphone’s home screen with battery-friendly live wallpapers.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

How about an open source, decentralized alternative to the likes of Discord and Slack? Peersuite is a self-hostable peer-to-peer workspace that isn't user data hungry.

📽️ Videos I am Creating for You

Man pages are good but not easy to follow, specially for new Linux users. Here are some alternatives to the man pages in Linux. See them in action.

🧩 Quiz Time

Can you beat the Essential Ubuntu Shortcuts puzzle?

Essential Ubuntu Shortcuts: Puzzle

Do you know all the handy Ubuntu shortcuts? Solve this puzzle to find out!

It's FOSSAnkush Das

💡 Quick Handy Tip

In file managers like Nemo, Nautilus, etc., you can easily create file duplicates by pressing the CTRL key and dragging the file to a blank space in the window.

If you drop a file while pressing the CTRL key when in another folder, the file will be copied to that directory.

Use CTRL+Z to undo the file duplication. During this, your file manager will ask you whether you want to delete the copied file.

🤣 Meme of the Week

The man's got a Debian-flavored beard. 😆

🗓️ Tech Trivia

On May 18, 1998, the U.S. Department of Justice sued Microsoft, alleging that the company was illegally monopolizing the web browser market by integrating its Internet Explorer browser into its Windows operating system.

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 FOSSverse Corner

Pro FOSSer Neville has compiled a table of Linux distros for beginners that is really well-made. I am so proud of our active community members 🙏

Table of Linux Distros by Difficulty for Beginners

The outcome of discussion in the forum topic was a table representing collective experience of forum members regarding Linux distros which are easy or difficult for beginners. @Tech_JA suggested that we place the final table in a fresh topic where it is not buried among 130 replies. Thanks Jorge. In future our table will be updated here. Last revision 17/5/25 Difficulty Systemd distros Non-systemd distros Beginner Mint LMDE MX/Systemd MX/sysVinit Peppermint/Debian Pepp…

It's FOSS Communitynevj

❤️ With love

Share it with your Linux-using friends and encourage them to subscribe (hint: it's here).

Share the articles in Linux Subreddits and community forums.

Follow us on Google News and stay updated in your News feed.

Opt for It's FOSS Plus membership and support us 🙏

Enjoy FOSS 😄

Working with code often involves repetition, changing variable names, updating values, tweaking class names, or adding the same prefix across several lines.

If you find yourself making the same changes again and again, line by line, then multi-cursor editing in Visual Studio Code can help simplify that process. In this part of our ongoing VS Code series, we’ll take a closer look at this feature and how it can make everyday tasks quicker and more manageable.

Why use multiple cursors?

Multi-cursor editing lets you place more than one cursor in your file so you can edit several lines at once.

Instead of jumping between lines or writing the same change repeatedly, you can type once and apply that change across multiple places. Here are a few common situations where it comes in handy:

• Renaming a variable or function in multiple places.
• Adding or removing the same snippet of code across several lines.
• Editing repeated structures (like object keys, class names, or attribute values).
• Commenting out a bunch of lines quickly.

Once you start using it, you’ll notice it helps reduce small repetitive tasks and keeps your focus on the code itself.

Placing multiple cursors: mouse and keyboard

There are two main ways to place multiple cursors in VS Code using the mouse or keyboard shortcuts.

Let’s start with the mouse-based approach, which is more visual and straightforward for beginners.

Then, we’ll move on to keyboard shortcuts, which are faster and more efficient once you’re comfortable.

Method 1: Using the mouse

To place cursors manually using your mouse: Hold down Alt (Windows/Linux) or Option (Mac), then click anywhere you want to insert a new cursor.

Each click places a new blinking cursor. You can now type, delete, or paste, and the change will reflect at all cursor positions simultaneously. To cancel all active cursors and return to a single one, press Esc. This method is handy for quick edits where the lines aren’t aligned or when you want more control over cursor placement.

Method 2: Using keyboard shortcuts

The mouse method is a good starting point, but learning keyboard shortcuts can save more time in the long run.

Below are a few keyboard-driven techniques to add and manage multiple cursors efficiently.

Add Cursors Vertically in a Column

When you want to add cursors above or below the current line to edit a block of similar lines (like inserting or deleting the same code at the beginning of each line), use this shortcut: Ctrl+ Alt + Up/Down arrow keys.

This aligns cursors in a vertical column, making it easier to apply the same action to adjacent lines.

Select the next occurrence of the current word

To select and edit repeated words one by one such as variable names or function calls, place your cursor on the word and use: Ctrl + D

Each press selects the next matching word and adds a cursor to it. You can press it repeatedly to continue selecting further matches.

Select all occurrences of a word in the file

If you want to update every instance of a word across the file at once, for example, replacing a class name or a repeated property, use: Ctrl + Shift + L

This selects all matching words and places a cursor at each one. It’s powerful, but use with care in large files to avoid unintentional edits.

Editing with multiple cursors

Once your cursors are in place, editing works just like usual:

• Type to insert text across all cursors.
• Use Backspace or Delete to remove characters.
• Paste snippets — they get applied to each cursor position.
• Standard commands like cut, copy, undo, and redo all function as expected.

Just keep an eye on alignment. If cursors are placed unevenly across lines, your edits might not be consistent.

Since you seem to be interested, check out some of the other VS Code keyboard shortcuts.

15 Best VS Code Keyboard Shortcuts to Increase Productivity

Do you want to be highly productive? Get familiar and memorize these VS Code keyboard shortcuts for Linux, Windows, and macOS.

It's FOSSCommunity

Wrapping Up

Multi-cursor editing is one of those small but effective features in VS Code that can make repetitive tasks less of a chore.

You don’t need to learn all the shortcuts right away. Start simple, try placing cursors with Ctrl + D or selecting multiple lines vertically and build from there. As you become more comfortable, these techniques will become second nature and help you focus more on writing logic and less on repeating edits.

While setting up a Raspberry Pi 5 for a new project, I decided to go with a headless setup - no display, keyboard, or mouse. I flashed the SD card, connected power, and waited for the Pi to appear on my network.

But nothing showed up. I scanned my network, double-checked the router’s client list, still no sign of the Pi. Without access to a display, I had no immediate way to see what was happening under the hood.

Then I noticed something: the green status LED was blinking in a repeating pattern. It wasn’t random, it looked deliberate. That small detail led me down a rabbit hole, and what I found was surprisingly useful.

The Raspberry Pi’s onboard LEDs aren’t just indicators, they’re diagnostic tools. When the Pi fails to boot, it can signal the cause through specific blink patterns.

If you know how to read them, you can identify problems like missing boot files, SD card issues, or hardware faults without plugging in a monitor.

In this guide, we’ll decode what those LED signals mean and how to use them effectively in your troubleshooting process.

Raspberry Pi 5

The Raspberry Pi 5 is a major step up in terms of power and architecture. It packs a 2.4GHz quad-core ARM Cortex-A76 CPU, supports up to 16GB of LPDDR4X RAM, and includes PCIe, RTC, and power button support.

But when it comes to diagnostics, the big upgrade is in the STAT LED.

On the Pi 5:

• Red LED (PWR): Shows power issues (not always ON by default!)
• Green LED (STAT): Shows SD card activity and blink codes
• Ethernet LEDs: Show network status

Here’s what the green LED blink codes mean:

Thanks to the bootloader residing on the onboard EEPROM (Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory), the Raspberry Pi 5 can perform much more detailed self-checks right from the start.

Raspberry Pi 4 & 400

The Raspberry Pi 4 and the keyboard-integrated Raspberry Pi 400 also feature sophisticated LED diagnostics, similar in many ways to the Pi 5.

The Raspberry Pi’s onboard LEDs aren’t just indicators, they’re diagnostic tools. They typically have:

• Red LED (PWR): Indicates power status. On the Pi 4/400, this LED is solid ON when the board is receiving sufficient power. If it's off or flickering, suspect a power issue.
• Green LED (ACT): The activity LED. While showing SD card activity, like the Pi 5, it also flashes specific patterns to indicate boot issues.
• Ethernet LEDs: Found on the Ethernet port (Pi 4 only), showing network link and activity.

Like the Pi 5, the Raspberry Pi 4 and 400 boot from onboard EEPROM, enabling them to run more detailed diagnostics than older models.

The flash codes for the green ACT LED on the Raspberry Pi 4 and 400 are identical to the Pi 5 codes listed above.

Raspberry Pi 3 Model B, B+, and A+

Moving back a generation, the Raspberry Pi 3 models were popular for their performance and features.

These boards typically have:

• Red LED (PWR): Solid ON when receiving adequate power. Off or flickering suggests a power problem.
• Green LED (ACT): Indicates SD card activity. It also flashes error codes if the boot process fails.
• Ethernet LEDs: Found on the Ethernet port (Model B and B+), showing network link and activity. The slimline Model A+ lacks the Ethernet port and thus these LEDs.

Unlike the Pi 4 and 5, the Raspberry Pi 3 boards rely entirely on the SD card for the initial boot process (there's no onboard EEPROM bootloader).

This means the diagnostic capabilities are slightly less extensive, but the green ACT LED still provides valuable clues about common boot problems.

Here's what the green ACT LED flashes mean on the Raspberry Pi 3 models:

Raspberry Pi 2 and Pi 1 (Model B, B+, A, A+)

This group covers some of the earlier but still widely used Raspberry Pi boards, including the Raspberry Pi 2 Model B, and the various iterations of the original Raspberry Pi 1 (Model B, Model B+, Model A, Model A+).

Their LED setups are similar to the Pi 3:

• Red LED (PWR): Solid ON for sufficient power. Off or flickering indicates a power problem.
• Green LED (ACT): Shows SD card activity and signals boot errors.
• Ethernet LEDs: Present on models with an Ethernet port (Pi 2 B, Pi 1 B, Pi 1 B+).

They lack advanced diagnostics and rely on the same basic LED flash codes as the Pi 3 series:

Raspberry Pi Zero and Zero W

The incredibly compact Raspberry Pi Zero and Zero W models are known for their minimalist design, and this extends to their LEDs as well.

The most significant difference here is the absence of the Red (PWR) LED. The Pi Zero series only features:

• Green LED (ACT): This is the only status LED. It indicates SD card activity and, importantly, signals boot errors.

Since there's no PWR LED, diagnosing power issues can be slightly trickier initially. If the green ACT LED doesn't light up at all, it could mean no power, an improperly inserted SD card, or a corrupted image preventing any activity.

Pironman 5 Case With Tower Cooler and Fan

This dope Raspberry Pi 5 case has a tower cooler and dual RGB fans to keep the device cool. It also extends your Pi 5 with M.2 SSD slot and 2 standard HDMI ports.

Explore Pironman 5

Conclusion

In conclusion, Raspberry Pi’s status LEDs are a surprisingly powerful diagnostic tool, especially for headless setups.

They allow you to troubleshoot and pinpoint issues without needing a screen or direct access to the Pi.

It’s an intriguing feature that makes the Pi even more versatile for remote projects, as long as you know what the blink codes mean.

After all, knowing the code is half the battle, without it, those flashing lights might as well be a mystery show.

You can take your debugging to the next step by adding a UART to your Pi and fetch the debugging data in your computer.

Using a USB Serial Adapter (UART) to Help Debug Raspberry Pi

A UART attached to your Raspberry Pi can help you troubleshoot issues with your Raspberry Pi. Here’s what you need to know.

It's FOSSPratham Patel

In the same context, knowing the Raspberry Pi pinout is always helpful.

Understanding the Raspberry Pi 5 Pin Out

Let’s take a closer look at each pin in Raspberry Pi 5 and its specific function to ensure you’re well-prepared for your project.

It's FOSSAbhishek Kumar

What do you think? Have you ever used the Pi’s LEDs to diagnose an issue? Drop a comment below and share your experiences.

Manually formatting code can be tedious, especially in fast-paced or collaborative development environments.

While consistent formatting is essential for readability and maintainability, doing it by hand slows you down and sometimes leads to inconsistent results across a project.

In this article, I’ll walk you through the steps to configure Visual Studio Code to automatically format your code each time you save a file.

We'll use the VS Code extension called Prettier, one of the most widely adopted tools for enforcing code style in JavaScript, TypeScript, and many other languages.

By the end of this guide, you'll have a setup that keeps your code clean with zero extra effort.

Step 1: Install Prettier extension in VS Code

To start, you'll need the Prettier - Code Formatter extension. This tool supports JavaScript, TypeScript, HTML, CSS, React, Vue, and more.

Open VS Code, go to the Extensions sidebar (or press Ctrl + Shift + X), and search for Prettier.

Click on Install and reload VS Code if prompted.

Step 2: Enable format on save

Now that Prettier is installed, let’s make it run automatically whenever you save a file.

Open Settings via Ctrl + , or by going to File > Preferences > Settings.

In the search bar at the top, type format on save and then Check the box for Editor: Format On Save.

This tells VS Code to auto-format your code whenever you save a file, but that’s only part of the setup.

Troubleshooting

If saving a file doesn’t automatically format your code, it’s likely due to multiple formatters being installed in VS Code. Here’s how to make sure Prettier is set as the default:

• Open any file in VS Code and press Ctrl + Shift + P (or Cmd + Shift + P on Mac) to bring up the Command Palette.
• Type “Format Document” and select the option that appears.

• If multiple formatters are available, VS Code will prompt you to choose one.

• Select “Prettier - Code formatter” from the list.

Now try saving your file again. If Prettier is correctly selected, it should instantly reformat the code on save.

In some cases, you might want to save a file without applying formatting, for example, when working with generated code or temporary formatting quirks. To do that, open the Command Palette again and run “Save Without Formatting.”

Optional: Advanced configuration

Prettier works well out of the box, but you can customize how it formats your code by adding a .prettierrc configuration file at the root of your project.

Here’s a simple example:

{
  "singleQuote": true,
  "trailingComma": "es5",
  "semi": false
}

This configuration tells Prettier to use single quotes, add trailing commas where valid in ES5 (like in objects and arrays), and omit semicolons at the end of statements.

There are many other options available such as adjusting print width, tab width, or controlling how JSX and HTML are handled.

You can find the full list of supported options in Prettier’s documentation, but for most projects, a few key settings in .prettierrc go a long way.

Try It Out

Create or open any file, JavaScript, TypeScript, HTML, etc. Add some poorly formatted code.

<html><head><style>body{background:#fff;color:#333;font-family:sans-serif}</style></head><body><h1>Hello</h1><script>document.querySelector("h1").addEventListener("click",()=>{alert("Hello World!")})</script></body></html>

Then simply save the file (Ctrl + S or Cmd + S), and watch Prettier instantly clean it up.

As you can see, Prettier neatly indents and spaces each part of the html code, even across different embedded languages.

Wrapping Up

It doesn't matter if you are vibe coding or doing everything on your own, proper formatting is a sign of writing good code.

We’ve already covered the fundamentals of writing clean, consistent code - indentation, spacing, and word wrap, and automatic formatting builds directly on top of those fundamentals.

Once configured, it removes the need to think about structure while coding, letting you focus on the logic.

If you're also wondering how to actually run JavaScript or HTML inside VS Code, we've covered that as well, so check those guides if you're setting up your workflow from scratch.

If you’re not already using automatic formatting, it’s worth making part of your workflow.

And if you use a different tool or approach, I’d be interested to hear how you’ve set it up, let us know in the comments. 🧑‍💻

Sausage is a word forming game, inspired by the classic Bookworm. Written in bash script, you can use it on any Linux distribution.

The goal of the game is simple.

• Earn points by spotting words.
• Longer word spotting results in coloured letters. Using coloured letters give more points.
• Smaller words introduces red letters, which when reached bottom, you lose the game.

Installation

You need to have git installed on your system.

Use git to clone the official Sausage repository:

git clone https://gitlab.com/christosangel/sausage.git

Switch to the clone directory:

cd sausage

Give execution permission to the install.sh shell script.

chmod +x install.sh

Run the script:

./install.sh

Once the installation is finished, open Sausage in the same location using:

./sausage.sh

Essential commands and shortcuts

The interface has all the key combinations described properly. Even the direction of motion is displayed.

To move without selecting any word, use the arrow key.

Once a starting word is decided, press the Space/Enter key to select that letter. Now, use the navigation keys to continue selection.

To show all the words, press the b key in the game.

To undo a letter select, press the Backspace key. Undo a word selection with the Delete key.

Press r key in game to reshuffle. Each reshuffle loses a turn and introduces multiple red cells. Existing red cell drop one cell down.

Configuration

Limited configuration is possible here. Either manually edit ~/.config/sausage/sausage.config file or use the c key in the game start page.

You can find more gameplay details on its official GitLab page.

Removing Sausage

Technically, you run Sausage from the script itself. Still, initially, it has created a few directories. This screenshot from the official repository shows them:

So, to 'uninstall' Sausage, you have to remove the cloned repository and if you want to remove the game related files, check the screenshot above and remove them.

Up for a (word) game?

If you ever played the classic Bookworm, Sausage will be pure nostalgia. And if you never played that before, it could still be fun to try it f you like these kinds of game.

It's one of those amusing things you can do in the terminal.

I let you leave a few words in the comments 😉

Sausage is a word forming game, inspired by the classic Bookworm. Written in bash script, you can use it on any Linux distribution.

The goal of the game is simple.

• Earn points by spotting words.
• Longer word spotting results in coloured letters. Using coloured letters give more points.
• Smaller words introduces red letters, which when reached bottom, you lose the game.

Installation

You need to have git installed on your system.

Use git to clone the official Sausage repository:

git clone https://gitlab.com/christosangel/sausage.git

Switch to the clone directory:

cd sausage

Give execution permission to the install.sh shell script.

chmod +x install.sh

Run the script:

./install.sh

Once the installation is finished, open Sausage in the same location using:

./sausage.sh

Essential commands and shortcuts

The interface has all the key combinations described properly. Even the direction of motion is displayed.

To move without selecting any word, use the arrow key.

Once a starting word is decided, press the Space/Enter key to select that letter. Now, use the navigation keys to continue selection.

To show all the words, press the b key in the game.

To undo a letter select, press the Backspace key. Undo a word selection with the Delete key.

Press r key in game to reshuffle. Each reshuffle loses a turn and introduces multiple red cells. Existing red cell drop one cell down.

Configuration

Limited configuration is possible here. Either manually edit ~/.config/sausage/sausage.config file or use the c key in the game start page.

You can find more gameplay details on its official GitLab page.

Removing Sausage

Technically, you run Sausage from the script itself. Still, initially, it has created a few directories. This screenshot from the official repository shows them:

So, to 'uninstall' Sausage, you have to remove the cloned repository and if you want to remove the game related files, check the screenshot above and remove them.

Up for a (word) game?

If you ever played the classic Bookworm, Sausage will be pure nostalgia. And if you never played that before, it could still be fun to try it f you like these kinds of game.

It's one of those amusing things you can do in the terminal.

I let you leave a few words in the comments 😉

An interesting development has taken place as openSUSE has decided to not offer Deepin Desktop anymore over repeated security concerns.

Deepin Desktop Removed from openSUSE over Security Concerns

openSUSE is not happy with Deepin Desktop and they have their reasons for that.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

💬 Let's see what else you get in this edition

• A new OpenSearch release.
• GNOME's new default video player.
• What went down at GrafanaCON 2025.
• And other Linux news, tips, and, of course, memes!
• This edition of FOSS Weekly is supported by Aiven for OpenSearch®.

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📰 Linux and Open Source News

• OpenSearch 3.0 launched with some major upgrades.
• The OSU's Open Source Lab has survived its funding woes.
• GNOME has changed its default video player, opting for a modern offering.
• Nextcloud has been kneecapped thanks to Google's apathy.

GrafanaCON 2025 didn't disappoint, with Grafana 12 and Grafana Assistant making a debut.

Grafana 12 & Grafana Assistant Making a Debut at GrafanaCON 2025

GrafanaCON 2025 was an absolute banger, packed with exciting new launches.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

🧠 What We’re Thinking About

UC Berkley demos that a humanoid robot can be built under $5,000. If it comes in mass-production, are we looking at robotic house helps in the near future?

You Can Build an Open Source Humanoid Robot for Just $5,000

UC Berkley shows an interesting project for the open source and robotics community.

It's FOSS NewsGourav Patnaik

🧮 Linux Tips, Tutorials and More

• Using VS Code? Have better control on the indentation.
• Here are a few tips and tweaks for handling message threads in Thunderbird.
• Don't want a specific package to be updated? It's possible on Debian and Ubuntu.
• Explore some interesting KDE widgets.

Manage your photo collection in Linux with these software.

9 Best Linux Photo Management Software

Looking for a replacement for the good-old Picasa on Linux? Take a look at best photo management applications available for Linux.

It's FOSSAnkush Das

👷 Homelab and Maker's Corner

Reuse, reinvent, rock out. Abhishek (not me, the other one) shared how he gave his old speakers a new life with this DIY guide:

How I Turned My Old Hi-Fi Speakers into Bluetooth Ones with Raspberry Pi

Curiosity, more than sustainability, drove me to add Bluetooth features to my old speakers and thus play Spotify and other players wirelessly through it.

It's FOSSAbhishek Kumar

My favorite Raspberry Pi case, Pironman 5, has just received an upgrade!

Pre-order will get you a 25% discount. Check out more on their webpage.

✨ Apps Highlight

RSS Guard is a no-nonsense feed reader app for Linux.

RSS Guard: A Superb Open Source Feed Reader App

A cross-platform open source feed reader that gets the job done.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

📽️ Videos I am Creating for You

Have fun in the terminal by flying a train.

🧩 Quiz Time

How much knowledge do you have about the Linux kernel? This trivia quiz will test that:

Kernel Chronicles: Linux kernel Insights

Think you know about the Linux kernel? Answer these questions!

It's FOSSAnkush Das

💡 Quick Handy Tip

In Linux Mint Cinnamon panel, you can change the way time is displayed. Just right-click on the time in the panel and select Configure. In the configuration window, enable the "Use a custom date format" option.

Now, enter your preferred format in the "Date format" and "Date format for tooltip" fields.

You can click on the "Show information on date format syntax" button, which will lead you to a detailed documentation about available date format options if you feel lost.

🤣 Meme of the Week

The hate is real with this one. ☠️

🗓️ Tech Trivia

To challenge Intel's 486 dominance in the early 1990s, Texas Instruments (TI) sold their own line of 486 microprocessors. However, these TI-branded chips were actually designed by Cyrix, offering software compatibility at a potentially lower cost, yet ultimately failing to dethrone Intel in the microprocessor market.

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 FOSSverse Corner

I recently made a new post, in which I explain the differences between the 2.4G and 5G Wi-Fi bands.

Difference between 2.4G and 5G Wifi

Not strictly related to Linux but I recently had an interesting discussion with a not-so-technical friend who confused 2.4G and 5G wifi as 2nd generation and 5th generation. I can see why there is a confusion. Terms like 3G, 4G and 5G got popular due to the rise of smartphones. It is easy to mistake 5G of wifi connection for 5th generation of network. Here’s the thing: In terms of Wi-Fi networks, G in 2.4G and 5G are the frequency unit GHz. It has nothing to with 5th generation of cellular da…

It's FOSS Communityabhishek

❤️ With love

Share it with your Linux-using friends and encourage them to subscribe (hint: it's here).

Share the articles in Linux Subreddits and community forums.

Follow us on Google News and stay updated in your News feed.

Opt for It's FOSS Plus membership and support us 🙏

Enjoy FOSS 😄

Indentation is how code is visually spaced. It helps define structure, scope, and readability. For example, Python requires indentation to define blocks of code.

Other languages might not require it, but messy indentation can make code really hard to read (and debug). Common indentation styles include:

• 2 spaces (popular in JS, HTML, CSS)
• 4 spaces (common in Python, Java)
• Tabs (some devs swear by them)

VS Code lets you customize indentation per file, per language, or globally.

Let’s explore all the ways to tweak that!

1. Change indentation via the status bar (per-file basis)

This is the easiest method and perfect when you're editing just one file.

1. Open a file in VS Code.
2. Look at the bottom-right corner of the window. You’ll see something like Spaces: 4 or Tab Size: 4.

1. Click that label, a menu pops up!

Now, you can choose:

• Indent Using Tabs
• Indent Using Spaces

And below that, choose how many spaces (2, 4, 8 - up to you).

Just changing the indentation setting doesn’t automatically re-indent the whole file. You’ll want to reformat the document too.

Here’s how:

• Press Ctrl + Shift + P (Linux/Windows) or Cmd + Shift + P (macOS).
• Type Format Document and select it.

• Or use the shortcut:
  • Ctrl + Shift + I on Linux
  • Shift + Alt + F on Windows
  • Shift + Option + F on macOS

Boom! The file gets prettied up with your chosen indentation.

2. Set global indentation in user settings

Want to make your indentation choice apply to all new files in VS Code? Here’s how:

1. Open Command Palette with Ctrl + Shift + P or F1.
2. Type Preferences: Open User Settings.

1. In the Settings UI, search for Tab Size and set it (e.g., 4).

1. Then search Insert Spaces and make sure it’s checked.

This tells VS Code:

“Whenever I press Tab, insert 4 spaces instead.”

Also check for Detect Indentation, if it’s ON, VS Code will override your settings based on the file content. Disable it if you want consistency across files.

3. Set project-specific indentation (Workspace settings)

Maybe you want different indentation just for one project, not globally.

1. Open the project folder in VS Code.
2. Go to the Command Palette and select Preferences: Open Workspace Settings.

1. Switch to the Workspace tab.
2. Search and set the same Tab Size, Insert Spaces, and Detect Indentation options.

These get saved inside your project’s .vscode/settings.json file.

Perfect if you want 2-space indentation in a JS project but 4 spaces in a Python project you're working on separately.

4. Set indentation based on programming language

Now, here's the power-user move. Let’s say you want:

• 4 spaces for Python
• 2 spaces for JavaScript and TypeScript

Easy!

1. Open the Command Palette → Preferences: Open User Settings (JSON)

1. Add this snippet:

"[python]": {
  "editor.tabSize": 4
},
"[javascript]": {
  "editor.tabSize": 2
},
"[typescript]": {
  "editor.tabSize": 2
}

This overrides the indentation per language.

You can find all language identifiers in the VS Code docs if you want to customize more.

You can also drop this into your .vscode/settings.json file if you want project-level overrides.

Bonus Tip: Convert tabs to spaces (and vice versa)

Already working on a file but the indentation is inconsistent?

• Open the Command Palette → Type Convert Indentation
• Choose either:
  • Convert Indentation to Spaces
  • Convert Indentation to Tabs

You can also do this from the status bar at the bottom.

If you need to convert all tabs in the file to spaces:

1. Press Ctrl + F
2. Expand the search box
3. Enable Regex (.* icon)
4. Search for \t and replace it with two or four spaces

Wrapping up

Like word wrapping in VS Code, indentation may seem like a small thing, but it's one of the cornerstones of clean, readable code.

Whether you're coding solo or collaborating on big projects, being consistent with indentation helps avoid annoying bugs (especially in Python!) and keeps the codebase friendly for everyone.

VS Code makes it super easy to control indentation your way, whether you want to set it globally, per project, or even per language.

We’ll be back soon with another helpful tip in our VS Code series.

Sometimes I do weird things for the sake of it. Like once, I used Raspberry Pi as a WiFi extender for fun. This is one of those stories.

I had an old pair of hi-fi speakers gathering dust in a forgotten corner of the house.

The only problem? They needed a Bluetooth dongle and DAC to work, and I didn’t have either. But with my love for DIY and a determination to salvage my musical aspirations, I decided to take a different route.

I thought of giving my old speakers a new life by if converting them into Bluetooth speakers. In this article, I’ll take you through my journey of reviving these old speakers.

From putting together a DAC, connecting both speakers, and grappling with my first soldering iron (spoiler: it wasn’t pretty), to finally using my old Raspberry Pi 3 as the brains behind a fully functional Bluetooth speaker system.

It wasn’t perfect, but the experience taught me a lot and gave me a setup that delivers impressive sound without spending a fortune.

Let’s dive into the details!

What I used

I gathered a mix of new and existing components. Here’s everything I used for this project:

Two Hi-Fi Speakers: These were the stars of the show— old obviously that had been lying unused for years. Their sound potential was too good to ignore, and this project was all about giving them a second chance.

DAC Chipset: A Digital-to-Analog Converter (DAC) was essential to drive the speakers. I used a basic DAC module that supported input from a 3.5mm jack and output for the speakers.

Soldering Iron: This was my first time using a soldering iron, and let’s just say my initial attempts were far from perfect. I used it to solder the speaker wires to the DAC, which was crucial for connecting the entire system.

12V 2A Power Supply: To power the DAC, I used a 12V 2A adapter. Make sure your power supply matches the specifications of your DAC module for safe and efficient operation.

3.5mm Audio Cable: This was used to connect the DAC’s audio output to the Raspberry Pi’s 3.5mm jack.

Raspberry Pi 3: I used an old Raspberry Pi 3 that I had lying around. Any Raspberry Pi model with a 3.5mm jack will work for this project, but if you have a newer model with HDMI-only output, additional configuration may be required.

With these items in hand, I was ready to transform my speakers into a powerful Bluetooth system.

If you’re planning to try or follow along this project, you should likely already have some of these components at home, making it a cost-effective way to repurpose old equipment.

Connecting the DAC with the Speakers

The DAC I ordered didn’t come with convenient connectors, so I had to get my hands dirty—literally.

I rummaged through my dad’s toolbox and found an old soldering iron, which I hadn’t used before. After watching a couple of quick tutorials online, I felt brave enough to give it a shot.

Soldering the speaker wires to the DAC wasn’t as straightforward as I had imagined. But after a few tries, and a lot of patience, I managed to secure the wires in place.

Before closing the speaker lids, I decided to test the connection directly. I powered up the DAC, connected it to the speakers, and played some music through a temporary audio input.

To my relief, sound filled the room. It wasn’t perfect yet, but it was enough to confirm that my soldering job worked.

With the DAC connected, I was ready to move on to the next part of the build!

Adding Bluetooth functionality with Raspberry Pi

There are countless guides and projects for turning a Raspberry Pi into a Bluetooth receiver, but I stumbled upon a GitHub project that stood out for its simplicity. It is called Raspberry Pi Audio Receiver.

The project had a script that automated the entire setup process, including installing all necessary dependencies. Here’s how I did it:

Download the Installation Script

First, I downloaded the script directly from the GitHub repository:

wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/nicokaiser/rpi-audio-receiver/main/install.sh

Run the Script

bash install.sh

For first-timers or DIY enthusiasts new to this, the installation screen might seem a bit overwhelming. You’ll be prompted several times to install various components and make decisions about the setup.

Don’t worry, I’ll break down what’s happening so you can follow along with confidence.

Hostname:
The script lets you set up the hostname (the internal name for your Raspberry Pi) and a visible device name (referred to as the "pretty hostname").

This visible name is what other devices will see when connecting via Bluetooth, AirPlay, or Spotify Connect. For example, you could name it something like DIY-Speakers.

Bluetooth Configuration:
The script installs Bluetooth-related packages and sets up an agent to accept all incoming connections.

The Pi is configured to play audio via ALSA (Advanced Linux Sound Architecture), and a smart script disables Bluetooth discoverability whenever the Pi is connected to a device.

AirPlay 2 Setup:
This feature installs Shairport Sync, allowing the Raspberry Pi to act as an AirPlay 2 receiver. It’s perfect for Apple users who want to stream music directly from their devices.

Spotify Connect:
Finally, the script installs Raspotify, an open-source Spotify client for Raspberry Pi. This enables the Raspberry Pi to act as a Spotify Connect device, letting you stream music straight from the Spotify app on your phone or computer.

Each step is straightforward, but you’ll need to be present during the installation to approve certain steps and provide input.

This process takes about 5 minutes to complete, but once done, your Raspberry Pi transforms into a multi-functional audio receiver, supporting Bluetooth, AirPlay 2, and Spotify Connect.

Testing the DIY Bluetooth speakers

With the hardware setup complete and the Raspberry Pi configured as a Bluetooth audio receiver, it was time for the moment of truth - testing the DIY speakers.

The goal was to see how well this entire setup performed and whether all the effort I put in was worth it.

To test the system, I decided to connect the speakers to my smartphone via Bluetooth.

After pairing, I opened my music app and selected a random song to play. The sound flowed seamlessly through the speakers.

I’ll admit, hearing music come out of the old hi-fi speakers felt incredibly rewarding. It was proof that all the soldering, scripting, and configuring had paid off.

How did It perform?

• Audio Quality: The sound quality was surprisingly good for a DIY setup. The DAC delivered clear audio with no noise, and the hi-fi speakers held up well despite being unused for a long time.
• Bluetooth Range: The range was decent since my Pi is in this plastic enclosure, I could move around my room and still maintain a stable connection.
• Responsiveness: There was no noticeable delay or lag in audio playback, whether I streamed music or used Spotify Connect.

Final thoughts

This project was a blend of frustration, curiosity, and pure DIY joy. What started as an attempt to salvage some old, forgotten hi-fi speakers turned into a rewarding learning experience.

From figuring out how to solder for the first time (and not doing a great job) to repurposing my old Raspberry Pi 3 as a Bluetooth receiver, every step had its challenges but that’s what made it so satisfying.

The best part? Hearing music blast through those old speakers again, knowing I brought them back to life with a bit of effort and creativity.

It’s proof that you don’t always need to spend a fortune to enjoy modern tech; sometimes, all it takes is what you already have lying around and a willingness to tinker.

If you’ve got old speakers collecting dust, I highly recommend giving this a shot. It’s not just about the outcome; the journey itself is worth it.

How I Turned my Raspberry Pi into a Wi-Fi extender

Here is how I re-purposed my Raspberry Pi to a Wi-Fi extender! A good way to spend your weekend with your Raspberry Pi.

It's FOSSAbhishek Kumar

💬 And if you did something like this in your home setup, please share it in the comments. I and other readers may get some interesting ideas for the next weekend projects.

Rust everywhere! It was included in the Linux kernel code a couple of years ago. And even before that happened, a race started to re-write tools into Rust.

14 Rust Tools for Linux Terminal Dwellers

Rust-powered tools for the terminal? Here are some of the best options as alternatives to some popular command-line tools!

It's FOSSSreenath

And now it seems that Ubuntu is relying heavily on Rust re-implementations. In the upcoming Ubuntu 25.10, you'll see GNU Coreutils replaced with Rust-based uutils. The classic sudo command will also be replaced by Rust-based sudo-rs.

Ubuntu 25.10 is Switching to Rust-based Sudo

The upcoming Ubuntu release will use sudo-rs instead of sudo.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

Too much of Rust? What do you think?

💬 Let's see what else you get in this edition

• Curl saying no to AI slop.
• Redis returning to its open source roots.
• Detailed terminal customization video
• KDE being done with Plasma LTS releases.
• And other Linux news, tips, and, of course, memes!
• This edition of FOSS Weekly is supported by AWS Valkey.

❇️ Scale Your Real-Time Apps with Amazon ElastiCache Serverless for Valkey

What’s Valkey? Valkey is the most permissive open source alternative to Redis stewarded by the Linux Foundation, which means it will always be open source.

What’s Amazon ElastiCache Serverless for Valkey? It’s a serverless, fully managed caching service delivering microsecond latency performance at 33% lower cost than other supported engines.

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Valkey-, Memcached-, and Redis OSS-Compatible Cache - Amazon ElastiCache Customers - AWS

Learn how customers are using Amazon ElastiCache for for their caching needs.

Amazon Web Services, Inc.

📰 Linux and Open Source News

• KDE Plasma LTS releases are no more.
• UN ditched Google Forms for this open source solution.
• AdGuard 1.0 has been released for Linux.
• Redis is open source again with an OSI approved license.
• The OSU's Open Source Lab is in urgent need of funding.
• Grafana 12 and Grafana Assistant were announced at GrafanaCon 2025.

Mission Center 1.0 is a release packed with many nice changes.

Mission Center Hits A 1.0 Release! Making it the Best GUI System Monitor for Linux

Mission Center 1.0 is here with a refined interface and many cool features.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

🧠 What We’re Thinking About

AI slop doesn't look like it will stop any time soon, but curl has put a stop to it in its bug bounty program.

Curl is Done With AI Slop

The curl project is cracking down on low-quality AI-generated bug reports.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

🧮 Linux Tips, Tutorials and More

• Ever wondered what is LUKS Encryption?
• Learn how to enable or disable word wrap in VS Code.
• Your Logseq setup isn't complete without these 7 plugins.
• Install DOSBox in Ubuntu to play retro games on a modern Linux system.

I have always considered Kazam to be the best screen recorder for Linux. For the past several years, it didn't see any development. But finally, there is Kazam 2.0 with newer features now.

Record Screen in Ubuntu Linux With Kazam [Beginner’s Guide]

This tutorial shows you how to install Kazam screen recorder and explains how to record the screen in Ubuntu. The guide also lists useful shortcuts and handy tips for using Kazam.

It's FOSSAbhishek Prakash

👷 Homelab and Maker's Corner

I review SunFounder's 10-inch DIY touch screen display.

SunFounder Touchscreen review: Add a Premium Touch to Your SBC

Transform your Raspberry Pi into a versatile interactive device with SunFounder’s 10-inch touchscreen. Here’s my experience with this device.

It's FOSSAbhishek Prakash

🎟️ Free Webinar | How SOC Teams Save Time with ANY.RUN: Action Plan

Trusted by 15,000+ organizations, ANY.RUN knows how to solve SOC challenges. Join team leads, managers, and security pros to learn expert methods on how to:  

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✨ Apps Highlight

Don't get lost in words, install this open source dictionary app to always have a dependable resource at hand.

freeDictionaryApp: Open Source Android App That Helps You Get Information on a Word

An easy way to get additional information about a word!

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

📽️ Videos I am Creating for You

A step-by-step video tutorial to transform your functional but boring terminal into an eye candy with additional features.

🧩 Quiz Time

Can you correctly Guess the Linux apps in this crossword?

Guess the Linux Apps: Crossword

You have seen them around you and perhaps used them all, too. Can you solve this crossword by correctly guessing the Linux software?

It's FOSSAbhishek Prakash

💡 Quick Handy Tip

With GNOME Tweaks, you can set app window focus from "Click to Focus" to "Focus on Hover". For doing that, open GNOME Tweaks and go into the Windows tab. Here, under Window Focus, click on "Focus on Hover". Now, enable the "Raise Windows When Focused" toggle button.

With this, whenever you hover over another window, it will be automatically focused. The window won't lose focus when the cursor is on the desktop. To revert to stock behavior, click on the "Click to Focus" option.

🤣 Meme of the Week

The list never ends! 🥲

🗓️ Tech Trivia

After Commodore declared bankruptcy in 1994, German company Escom AG bought its name and tech for $10 million, aiming to revive the iconic Amiga, but eventually sold the rights instead.

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 FOSSverse Corner

Regular FOSSer Rosika has created a file management script for Android and Linux.

File management script for Android and Linux

Hi all, 👋 I don´t know whether the following would be of any interest to any of you but I thought I´d post it here anyway. 😊 Often enough there´s a situation in which I find myself obliged to scan physical documents (i.e. documents on paper) in order to produce a digital equivalent of them. In most cases I need to have them in digital format for being able to quickly and easily access them e.g. when dealing my income tax return. Anyhow, due the setup of my computer peripherals it´s…

It's FOSS CommunityRosika

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Share it with your Linux-using friends and encourage them to subscribe (hint: it's here).

Share the articles in Linux Subreddits and community forums.

Follow us on Google News and stay updated in your News feed.

Opt for It's FOSS Plus membership and support us 🙏

Enjoy FOSS 😄

Word wrap automatically breaks a long line of text so it fits within your current editor window, without you needing to scroll horizontally. It doesn’t add line breaks to your file; it just wraps it visually.

Picture this: You’re writing a long JavaScript function or a long SQL query. Without word wrap, you’d be endlessly dragging that horizontal scrollbar. With it, everything folds neatly within view.

This is especially useful when:

• You're working on a small screen.
• You want cleaner screenshots of your code.
• You prefer not to lose track of long lines.

Now, let's see how to turn it on or off when needed.

Method 1: The quickest toggle - Alt + Z

Yep, there’s a shortcut for it!

1. Open any file in VS Code.
2. Press Alt + Z on your keyboard.

And that’s it! Word wrap is toggled. Hit it again to switch it off.

Method 2: Use the command palette

Prefer something a bit more visual? The Command Palette is your go-to.

1. Press Ctrl + Shift + P (or Cmd + Shift + P on macOS).
2. Type Toggle Word Wrap.
3. Click the option when it appears.

This is ideal if you’re not sure of the shortcut or just want to double-check before toggling.

Method 3: Set a default from settings

Want word wrap always on (or always off) when you open VS Code? You can change the default behavior.

1. Go to File > Preferences > Settings

2. Search for “word wrap.”

3. Under Editor: Word Wrap, choose from the following options:

• off: Never wrap.
• on: Always wrap.
• wordWrapColumn: Wrap at a specific column number.
• bounded: Wrap at viewport or column, whichever is smaller.

You can also tweak "editor.wordWrap" in settings.json if you prefer working directly with config files.

Wrapping up!

Word wrap might seem like a tiny detail, but it’s one of those “small things” that can make coding a lot more pleasant. Take the indentation settings for example, another crucial piece for code readability and collaboration. Yes, the tabs vs spaces debate lives on 😄

We’ll continue exploring more quick yet powerful tips to help you make the most of VS Code.

Until then, go ahead and wrap those words your way.

I have got my hands on this 10 inches touchscreen from SunFounder that is made for Raspberry Pi like devices.

If you are considering adding touch capability to your Raspberry Pi project, this could be a good contender for that.

I have used a few SunFounder products in the past but the Pironman case made me their fan. And I truly mean that. This is why before I opened the package, I had a feeling that this will be a solid device.

Let me share my experience with SunFounder's 10 inch DIY Touch Screen with you.

SunFounder Latest 10 Inch DIY Touch Screen All-In-One Solution for Raspberry Pi 5, IPS HD 1280x800 LCD, Built-In USB-C PD 5.1V/5A Output, HDMI, 10-point, No Driver, Speakers, for RPi 5/4/3/Zero 2W

This SunFounder Touch Screen is a 10-point IPS touch screen in a 10.1″ big size and with a high resolution of 1280x800, bringing you perfect visual experience. It works with various operating systems including Raspberry Pi OS, Ubuntu, Ubuntu Mate, Windows, Android, and Chrome OS.

SunFounderSunFounder

Technical specifications

Before we get into the nitty-gritty of performance, let's look at what you're actually getting with this display:

Assembling

SunFounder has a thing for assembling. Like most of their other products, the touchscreen also needs some assembling. After all, it is properly called 'a 10 -inch DIY touchscreen' so there is obviously a DIY angle here.

The assembling should not take you more than 10–15 minutes to put all the pieces together.

The assembly basically requires attaching the single board computer with the screws, taping the speakers and connecting it to the touchscreen cable.

It's actually fun to do the assembly. Not everyone will be a fan of this but I am guessing if you are into maker's electronics, you won't be unhappy with the assembly requirement.

Experiencing SunFounder DIY Touchscreen

The device is powered by a 12V/5A DC power that also powers the Raspberry Pi with 5.1V/5A. There are LED lights at the back that indicate if the Pi is turned or not.

There is no on-board battery, in case you were wondering about that. It needs to be connected to the power supply all the time to function. Although, if you need, you can always attach a battery-powered system to it.

The display is IPS and the surface feels quite premium. Some people may find it a bit glossy and slippery but the IPS screens have the same look and feel in my experience.

Colors are vibrant, text is crisp, and the IPS panel means viewing angles are excellent.

The 10 point capacitive touch works out of the box. The touch response is quite good. I noticed that the double-click mouse action actually needs 3 quick taps. It took me some time to understand that it is the intended behavior.

My 4-years old daughter used it for playing a few games on GCompris and that worked very well. Actually, she sees the Raspberry Pi wallpaper and thinks it's her computer. I had to take the device off her hands as I didn't want her to use it as a tablet. I would prefer that she keeps on using a keyboard and mouse with her Pi.

On-screen keyboard

SunFounder claims that no drivers are required and the touchscreen is ready to be plugged in and play if you use Raspbian OS.

While I didn't have to install any drivers, and the touchscreen worked fine, I had to install squeekboard package to activate the on-screen keyboard on my Raspberry Pi 5 with Raspbian OS.

The official SunFounder document mentions that this package should be preinstalled in Raspbian OS but that was not the case for me. Not a major issue as the on-screen keyboard worked fine too after installing the missing package.

Using On-screen Keyboard in Raspberry Pi OS

Here’s what you can do to use a virtual keyboard on Raspberry Pi OS.

It's FOSSAbhishek Prakash

Speakers

Before I forget, I should mention that the touchscreen also has two tiny speakers at the bottom. They are good enough for occasional cases where you need audio output. You won't need to plugin a headphone or external speakers in such cases.

But if you want anything more than that, you'll need to attach proper speakers. It really depends on what you need it for.

Dude, where is my stand?

It would have been nice to have some sort of stand with the screen. That would make it easier to use the touchscreen as a monitor on the table.

At first glance, it seems like it is more suitable as a wall mount to display your homelab dashboard or some other information.

But it's not completely impossible to use it without a dedicated stand on the desk. I used the extra M 2.5 screws to increase the length of the bottom two screws. That gave it a stand like appearance.

I thought I was smart to utilize those extra screws as a stand. Later I found out that it was intended for that purpose, as the official document also mentioned this trick.

I remember the older model of this touch screen used to have a dedicated stand.

I still think that dedicated stand attachments would have been a better idea.

By the way, if you want and have the resources, you can 3D print a custom case for the touchscreen. SunFounder provides the 3D Printer File and all necessary steps on its documentation website.

What can you use it for?

The imagination is your limit. There are no dearths of touch-focused Raspberry Pi projects.

Here are a few usages I can think of:

• Cyberdeck setup
• Smart home dashboard
• Retro gaming setup
• Use in 3d printers
• Robotics control interface
• In-car entertainment system (I mean, why not, if you have an ancient car and want to do some tinkering)
• Mini kiosk for small businesses
• Homelab dashboard display
• Weather station and agenda display
• Digital photo frame

Should you get it?

The answer always depends on what you need and what you want.

If you are on the lookout for a new touchscreen for your homelab or DIY projects, this is definitely worth a look.

Sure, the price tag is more than the official Raspberry Pi touchscreen but SunFounder's touchscreen has better quality (IPS), is bigger with better resolution, has speakers and supports more SBCs.

Basically, it is a premium device, whereas most touchscreen available on lower prices have a very toy-ish feel.

If affordibility is not a concern and you need excellent touch experience for your projects, I can surely recommend this product.

In an earlier article, I discussed installing plugins and themes in Logseq.

And you already know that there are plenty of third-party plugins available in Logseq plugins Marketplace.

Let me share some of the Plugins I use to organize my contents.

I presume you know it already, but in case you need help, here's a detailed tutorial on installing plugins in Logseq.

Customize Logseq With Themes and Plugins

Extend the capability and enhance the looks for Logseq with themes and plugins.

It's FOSSSreenath

Markdown Table Editor

Creating tables in Markdown syntax is a tedious process. Tools like Obsidian have a table creator helper that allows you to create and edit tables easily.

When it comes to Logseq, we have a very cool plugin, Markdown Table Editor that does the job neatly and greatly.

You can install this extension from the Logseq plugin Marketplace.

To create a table, press the / key. This will bring you a small popup search. Enter table here and select Markdown Table Editor.

This will create a popup window with a straight-forward interface to edit table entries. The interface is self-explanatory where you can add/delete columns, rows, etc.

Bullet Threading

Logseq follows a bullet blocks approach, with each data block is a properly indented bullet point.

Now, the point to note here is "Properly indented".

You should be careful about the organization of parent, child, and grandchild nodes (bullets) in Logseq. Otherwise, when you reference a particular block of a note in the future, not all related data will be retrieved. Some points may appear as part of another nested block, which destroys the whole purpose of linking.

Bullet-Threading extension will help you keep track of the position you are currently editing in the greater nested data tree. This is done by visually indicating the bullet path. Such an approach makes the current indent location visually clear for you.

Never again loss track of data organization because of the lack of awareness about the indentation tree.

Tags

Tags is the best plugin to organize the data in logseq where there is only a very narrow difference between pages and tags. It is the context of usage that differentiate pages and tags from each other.

So, assigning single-word or small phrase tags to your notes will help you access and connect between the knowledge in the future.

The Tags extension will query the notes and list all the tags in your data collection; be it a #note, #[[note sample]], or tags:: Newtag tag.

You can arrange them alphabetically or according to the number of notes tagged with that specific tag.

You can install the plugin from the Logseq plugins Marketplace.

Tabs

Working with multiple documents at a time is a necessity. Opening and closing documents one by one is surely not the best experience these days.

Logseq has the Tabs plugin that implements a tab bar on top of the window so that you can have easy access to multiple opened documents.

This plugin offers several must-needed features like pin tabs, reorder tabs, persisting tabs, etc.

Usually, newly opened document replace the current tabs. But you can use Ctrl+click to open links in background tab, which is a very handy feature.

Journals Calendar

Journal is a very important page in Logseq.

You can neatly organize document tree and scribble things and tag them properly. Each day in the Journal is an independent Markdown file in the Journals directory in your File manager.

But it may feel a bit crowded over time, and getting a note from a particular date often includes searching and scrolling the result.

The Journals Calendar plugin is a great help in this scenario. This plugin adds a small calendar button to the top bar of Logseq. You can click on it and select a date from the calendar. If there is no Journal at that date, it will create one for you.

Pages with Journals will be marked with a dot allowing you to distinguish them easily.

Todo Master Plugin

Todo Master plugin is a simple plugin that puts a neat progress bar next to a task. You can use this as a visual progress tracking.

You can press the slash command (/) and select TODO Master from there to add the progress bar to the task of your choice. Watch the video to understand it better.

Logseq TOC Plugin

Since Logseq follows a different approach for data management compared to popular tools like Obsidian, there is no built-in table of contents for a page.

There is a "Contents" page in Logseq, which has an entire different purpose. In this case, this real table of contents renderer plugin is a great relief.

It renders the TOC using the Markdown headers.

Wrapping Up

Logseq plugin Marketplace has numerous plugins and themes available to choose from.

But you should be careful since third-party plugins can result in data losses sometimes. Weird, I know.

It is always good to take proper backup of the data, especially if you are following a local-first note management policy. You won't want to lose your notes, do you?

💬 Which Logseq plugin do you use the most? Feel free to suggest your recommendations in the comment section, so that other users may find useful!

Before the age of blogs, forums, and YouTube tutorials, Linux users relied on printed magazines to stay informed and inspired. Titles like Linux Journal, Linux Format, and Maximum Linux were lifelines for enthusiasts, packed with tutorials, distro reviews, and CD/DVDs.

These glossy monthly issues weren’t just publications—they were portals into a growing open-source world.

Let's recollect the memories of your favorite Linux magazines. Ever read them or had their subscription?

Linux Magazines That Rule(d) The Linuxverse

Once upon a time when it was fashionable to read magazines in print format, these were the choices for the Linux users.

It's FOSSAbhishek Prakash

💬 Let's see what else you get in this edition

• RISC-V based SBC, Muse Pi.
• Lenovo offering Linux laptops.
• Trying tab grouping in Firefox.
• And other Linux news, tips, and, of course, memes!
• This edition of FOSS Weekly is supported by PikaPods.

❇️ PikaPods: Enjoy Self-hosting Hassle-free

PikaPods allows you to quickly deploy your favorite open source software. All future updates are handled automatically by PikaPods while you enjoy using the software. PikaPods also share revenue with the original developers of the software.

You get a $5 free credit to try it out and see if you can rely on PikaPods. I know, you can 😄

PikaPods - Instant Open Source App Hosting

Run the finest Open Source web apps from $1.20/month, fully managed, no tracking, no ads, full privacy. Self-hosting was never this convenient.

Instant Open Source App Hosting

📰 Linux and Open Source News

• QEMU 10 just released with many new upgrades.
• Proton Pass now allows attaching files to passwords.
• The Indian court orders a ban on Proton Mail.
• Kali Linux is urging users to add their new signing key.
• Running Arch Linux inside WSL is now officially possible.
• The Muse Pi Pro is a new RISC-V SBC with AI acceleration.

Lenovo offers Linux laptops with cheaper price tag .

Lenovo Cuts the Windows Tax and offers Cheaper Laptops with Linux Pre-installed

Lenovo is doing something that many aren’t.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

🧠 What We’re Thinking About

Perplexity is ready to track everything users do with its upcoming AI-powered web browser.

Perplexity Wants to Track Your Every Move With its AI-powered Browser

Perplexity’s new Comet web browser is bad news if you care about privacy.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

🧮 Linux Tips, Tutorials and More

• Organize better with Logseq journals and contents pages.
• Learn how to create a password-protected Zip file in Linux.
• Our apt command guide is a one-stop resource for all your apt command needs.
• Dual-booting CachyOS and Windows is a nice way to get the best of both worlds.

Firefox has finally introduced Tab Groups, join us as we explore it.

Exploring Firefox Tab Groups: Has Mozilla Redeemed Itself?

Firefox’s Tab Groups help you organize tabs efficiently. But how efficiently? Let me share my experience.

It's FOSSSourav Rudra

👷 Homelab and Maker's Corner

Someone managed to run a website on a Nintendo Wii.

This Website Is Running on a Wii

Alex Haydock found a dusty old Wii console at a hardware swap and modded it to run his website.

404 MediaSamantha Cole

✨ Apps Highlight

We tested out GNOME's new document viewer, Papers.

Hands-on with Papers, GNOME’s new Document Reader

Tried GNOME’s new document reader, it didn’t disappoint.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

📽️ Videos I am Creating for You

🧩 Quiz Time

Test your Ubuntu knowledge with our All About Ubuntu crossword.

All About Ubuntu: Crossword Puzzle

A true Ubuntu fan should be able to guess this crossword correctly.

It's FOSSAbhishek Prakash

🛍️ Deal you might like

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A digital apprenticeship with the pros at O’Reilly—add new skills to your DevOp toolkit with our latest guides bundle.

Humble Bundle

💡 Quick Handy Tip

In Brave Browser, you can open two tabs in a split view. First, select two tabs by Ctrl + Left-Click. Now, Right-Click on any tab and select "Open in split view". The two tabs will then be opened in a split view.

You can click on the three-dot button in the middle of the split to swap the position of tabs, unsplit tabs, and resize them.

🤣 Meme of the Week

We really need to value them more 🥹

🗓️ Tech Trivia

On April 27, 1995, the U.S. Justice Department sued to block Microsoft’s $2.1 billion acquisition of Intuit, arguing it would hurt competition in personal finance software. Microsoft withdrew from the deal shortly after.

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 FOSSverse Corner

Know of a way to rename many files on Linux in one go? Pro FOSSer Neville is looking for ways:

What is the best way to rename a heap of files?

There are two rename apps a Perl program a utility from util-linux You can also use mv in a loop I have the util-linux version trinity:[nevj]:~$ rename -V rename from util-linux 2.41 I used it to do the following The syntax of that rename version is rename ′ from ′ ′ to ′ files I have several folders of these image files so I just cd’d around and did each folder by hand. Just wondering… has anyone used the Perl version of rename or do people do it with the File Manager or some o…

It's FOSS Communitynevj

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Share it with your Linux-using friends and encourage them to subscribe (hint: it's here).

Share the articles in Linux Subreddits and community forums.

Follow us on Google News and stay updated in your News feed.

Opt for It's FOSS Plus membership and support us 🙏

Enjoy FOSS 😄

Mozilla's Firefox needs no introduction. It is one of the few web browsers around that is not based on Chromium, setting out to provide a privacy-focused browsing experience for its users.

Sadly, some recent maneuvers have landed it in hot water, the most recent of which was a policy change that resulted in an intense backlash from the open source community, who felt wronged.

The consensus being that Mozilla broke their promise of not selling user data, leading to widespread concern over the organization's commitment to user privacy.

Since then, they have tweaked Firefox's Terms of Use to better reflect how they handle user data, clarifying that they do not claim ownership over user content and that any data collected is used for maintaining and improving Firefox, in line with their Privacy Policy.

Behind the scenes, Mozilla has also been focusing on developing more AI-powered features for Firefox—an approach that has drawn mixed reactions, with many asking for improvements to the core, everyday browser functionality.

Luckily, they have finally delivered something on that front by implementing the long-requested Tab Groups feature.

Firefox Tab Groups: Why Should You Use It?

As the name implies, Tab Groups allows users to organize multiple open tabs into customizable, color-coded, and collapsible sections—making it significantly easier for users to reduce visual clutter, stay focused on priority tasks, and streamline workflows.

This can greatly boost productivity, especially when paired with the right tools and tips for optimizing your workflow on a Linux desktop. Being someone who has to go through a lot of material when researching topics, I fully understand the importance of efficient tab management on a web browser.

Using a tab grouping feature like this helps minimize distractions, keeps your browser organized, and ensures quick access to important information without you getting overwhelmed by an endless stack of tabs.

You can learn more about how this came to be on the announcement blog.

How to Group Tabs in Firefox?

If you are looking to integrate this neat feature into your workflow, then you have to first ensure that you are on Firefox 138 or later. After that, things are quite straightforward.

Open up a bunch of new tabs and drag/drop one onto the other. This should open up the "Create tab group" dialog. Here, enter the name for the tab group, give it a color, and then click on "Done".

You can right-click on existing tabs to quickly add them to tab groups, or remove them for easy reorganization into new groups.

Tab groups can be expanded or collapsed with a simple left-click, and you can drag them to rearrange as needed. If you accidentally close Firefox, or even do so intentionally, you can still access your previous tab groups by clicking the downward arrow button above the address bar.

Similarly, managing an existing tab group is easy—just right-click on the group to open the "Manage tab group" dialog. From there, you can rename the group, change its color, move it around, or delete it entirely.

Besides that, Mozilla has mentioned that they are already experimenting with AI-powered tools for organizing tabs by topic, which runs on their on-device AI implementation. It is live on the Firefox Nightly build and can be accessed from the "Suggest more of my tabs" button.

Suggested Read 📖

I Tried This Upcoming AI Feature in Firefox

Firefox will be bringing an experimental AI-generated link previews, offering quick on-device summaries. Here’s my quick experience with it.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

Logseq is different from the conventional note-taking applications in many aspects.

Firstly, it follows a note block approach, rather than a page-first approach for content organization. This allows Logseq to achieve data interlinking at the sentence level. That is, you can refer to any sentence of a note in any other note inside your database.

Another equally important feature is the “Special Pages”. These are the “Journals” and “Contents” pages. Both of these special pages have use-cases far higher than what their names indicate.

The Journals page

The “Journals” is the first page you will see when you open Logseq. Here, you can see dates as headings. The Logseq documentation suggests that a new user, before understanding Logseq better, should use this Journals page heavily for taking notes.

As the name suggests, this is the daily journals page. Whatever you write under a date will be saved as a separate Markdown file with the date as the title. You can see these pages in your file manager, too. Head to the location you use for Logseq, then visit the journals page.

Let's see how to make this Journals page most useful.

Journal page as a daily diary

Let's start with the basics. The “Journals” page can be used as your daily diary page.

If you are a frequent diary writer, Logseq is the best tool to digitize your life experiences and daily thoughts.

Each day, a new page will be created for you.

If you need a page for a day in the past, Just click on the Create button on the bottom of Logseq window and select “New page”.

In the dialog, enter the date for the required journal in the format, Mar 20th, 2023. Press enter. This will create the Journal page for the specified that for you!

Journal as a note organizer

If you have read the Logseq Pages and Links article in this series, you should recall the fact that Logseq considers the concept of Pages, Tags, etc. in almost similar manner. If you want to create a new note, the best way is to use the keyboard method:

#[[Note Title Goes Here]]

The above creates a page for you. Now, the best place to create a new page is the Journals page.

Logseq has a powerful backlink feature. With this, if you use the Journals page to create a new page, you don't need to add any date references inside the page separately, since at the very end of the page, you will have a backlink to that day's journal.

This is beneficial because you can recall when a note was first created easily.

Journal as a to-do organizer

Logseq can be used as a powerful task manager application as well, and the Journals page plays a crucial role in it.

If you come across any task while you are in the middle of something, just open the Journals page in Logseq and press the / key.

Search and enter TODO. Then type the task you are about to do.

Once done, press / again and search for Date Picker. Select a date from the calendar.

That's it. You have created a to-do item with a due date. Now, when the date arrives, you will get a link on that day's Journal page. Thus, when you open Logseq on that day, you will see this item.

It will also contain the link to the journal page from where you added the task.

Other than that, you can search for the TODO page and open it to see all your task list, marked with TODO.

Journal to manage tasks

Task management is not just adding due date to your tasks. You should be able to track a project and know at what stage a particular task is. For this, Logseq has some built-in tags/pages. For example, LATER, DOING, DONE, etc.

These tags can be accessed by pressing the / key and searching for the name.

For example, if you have some ideas that should be done at a later date, but not sure when exactly, add these with the LATER tag, just like the TODO tag explained above.

Now, you can search for the LATER tag to know what all tasks are added to that list.

Using the Journal page is beneficial here because you will be able to recollect on what date a particular task was added, allowing you to get more insight about that task. This will help you more, if you have entered your thoughts of that day in the Journal.

The Contents Page

Logseq has a special Contents page type, but don't confuse it with the usual table of contents. That is not its purpose. Here, I will mention the way I use the contents page. You can create your own workflows once you know its potential.

You can think of the Contents page as a manually created Dashboard to your notes and database. Or, a simple home page from where you can access contents needed frequently.

The most interesting thing that sets the contents page apart from others is the fact that it will always be visible in the right sidebar. Therefore, if you enable the sidebar permanently, you can see the quick links in the contents all the time.

Edit the Contents page

As said above, the Contents page is available on the right sidebar. So click on the sidebar button in the top panel and select Contents. You can edit this page from this sidebar view, which is the most convenient way.

All the text formatting, linking, etc., that work on Logseq pages works on this page as well.

1. Add all important pages/tags

The first thing you can do is to add frequently accessed pages or tags.

For example, let's say you will be accessing the Kernel, Ubuntu, and APT tags frequently. So, what you can do is to add a Markdown heading:

## List of Tags

Now, link the tags right in there, one per line:

#Kernel
#Ubuntu
#APT

For better arrangement, you can use the Markdown horizontal rule after each section.

---

2. Link the task management pages

As discussed in the Journals section, you can have a variety of task related tags like TODO, LATER, WAITING, etc. So you can link each of these in the contents page:

## List of Tasks

#TODO
#LATER
#WAITING
---

3. Quick access links

If you are visiting some websites daily, you can bookmark these websites on the contents page for quickly accessing them.

## Quick access links

[It's FOSS](https://itsfoss.com/)
[It's FOSS Community](https://itsfoss.community/)
[Arch Linux News](https://archlinux.org/)
[GitHub](https://github.com/)
[Reddit](https://www.reddit.com/)

After all this, your contents page will look like this:

Wrapping Up

As you can see, you can utilize these pages in non-conventional ways to get a more extensive experience from Logseq. That's the beauty of this open-source tool. The more you explore, the more you discover, the more you enjoy.

In the next part of this series, I'll share my favorite Logseq extensions.

There is something about CachyOS. It feels fast. The performance is excellently smooth, specially if you have newer hardware.

I don't have data to prove it but my new Asus Zenbook that I bought in November last year is rocking CachyOS superbly.

The new laptop came with Windows, which is not surprising. I didn't replace Windows with Linux. Instead, I installed CachyOS in dual boot mode alongside Windows.

The thing is that it was straightforward to do so. Anything simple in the Arch domain is amusing in itself.

So, I share my amusing experience in this video.

I understand that video may not be everyone's favorite format so I created this tutorial in the text format too.

There are a few things to note here:

• An active internet connection is mandatory. Offline installation is not possible.
• An 8 GB USB is needed to create the installation medium.
• At least 40 GB free disk space (it could be 20 GB as well but that would be way too less).
• Time and patience is of essence.

Creating live USB of CachyOS and booting from it

First, download the desktop edition of CachyOS from its website:

You can create the live USB on any computer with the help of Ventoy. I used my TUXEDO notebook for this purpose.

Download Ventoy from the official Website. When you extract it, there will be a few executables in it to run it either in a browser or in a GUI. Use whatever you want.

Making sure that USB is plugged in, install Ventoy on it.

Once done, all you need to do is to drag the CachyOS ISO to the Ventoy disk. The example below shows it for Mint but it's the same for any Linux ISO.

If you need detailed steps for using Ventoy, please follow this tutorial.

Install and Use Ventoy on Ubuntu [Complete Guide]

Tired of flashing USB drives for every ISO? Get started with Ventoy and get the ability to easily boot from ISOs.

It's FOSSSagar Sharma

Once I had the CachyOS live USB, I put it in the Asus Zenbook and restarted it. When the computer was starting up, pressing F2/F10 button took me to the BIOS Settings.

I did that to ensure that the system boots from the USB instead of the hard disk by changing the boot order.

When the system booted next, Ventoy screen was visible and I could see the option to load the CachyOS live session.

I selected to boot in normal mode.

There was an option to boot into CachyOS with NVIDIA. I went with the default option.

While booting into CachyOS, I ran into an issue. There was a "Start Job is running..." message for more than a minute or two. I force restarted the system and the live USB worked fine the next time.

If this error persists for you, try to change the USB port or create live USB again.

Another issue I discovered by trial and error was relating to the password. CachyOS showed a login screen that seemed to be asking for username and password. As per the official docs, there are no password required in live session.

What I did was to change the display server to Wayland and then click the next button, and I was logged into the system without any password.

Installing CachyOS

Again, active internet is mandatory to download the desktop environment and other packages.

Select the "Launch installer" option.

My system was not plugged into a power source but it had almost 98% battery and I knew that it could handle the quick installation easily.

Quite straight forward settings in the beginning. Like selecting time zone

and keyboard layout.

The most important step is the disk partition and I was pleasantly surprised to see that the Calamares installer detected Windows presence and gave option to install CachyOS alongside.

I have a single disk with Windows partition as well as EFI system partition.

All I had to do was to drag the slider and shrink the storage appropriately.

I gave more space to Linux because it was going to be my main operating system.

The next screen gave the options to install a desktop environment or window manager. I opted for GNOME. You can see why it is important to have active internet connection. The desktop environment is not on the ISO file. It needs to be downloaded first.

And a few additional packages are added to the list automatically.

And as the last interactive step of install, I created the user account.

A quick overview of what is going to be done at this point. Things looked fine so I hit the Install button.

And then just wait for a few minutes for the installation to complete.

When the installation completes, restart the system and take out the live USB. In my case, I forgot to take the USB out, but still booted from the hard disk.

Fixing the missing Windows from grub

When the system booted next, I could see the usual Grub bootloader screen but there was no Windows option in it.

Fixing it was simple. I opened the grub config file for editing in Nano.

sudo nano /etc/default/grub

OS_PROBER was disabled, so I uncommented that line, saved the file and exited.

The next step was to update grub to make it aware of the config changes.

sudo grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg

And on the next reboot, the Windows boot manager option there to let me use Windows.

This is what I did to install CachyOS Linux alongside Windows. For an Arch-based distro, the procedure was pretty standard, and that's a good thing. Installing Linux should not be super complicated.

💬 If you tried dual booting CachyOS, do let me know how it went in the comment section.

I guess you already know that It's FOSS has an active community forum. I recently upgraded its server and changed its look slightly. Hope you like it.

If you have questions about using Linux or if you want to share something interesting you discovered with your Linux setup, you are more than welcome to utilize the Community.

It’s FOSS Community

A place for desktop Linux users and It’s FOSS readers

It's FOSS Community

💬 Let's see what else you get in this edition

• New Ubuntu flavor release.
• Exploring pages, links, and tags in Logseq.
• Ubisoft doing something really unexpected.
• And other Linux news, tips, and, of course, memes!
• This edition of FOSS Weekly is supported by Valkey.

❇️ Valkey – The Drop-in Alternative to Redis OSS

With the change of Redis licensing in March of 2024 came the end of Redis as an open source project. Enter Valkey – the community driven fork that preserves and improves the familiar high-performance, key-value datastore for improving application performance.

Stewarded by the Linux foundation, Valkey serves as an open source drop-in alternative to Redis OSS – no code changes needed, with the same developer-friendly experience. For your open source database, check out Valkey.

What is Valkey? – Valkey Datastore Explained - Amazon Web Services

Valkey is an open source, high performance, in-memory, key-value datastore. It is designed as a drop-in replacement for Redis OSS.

Amazon Web Services, Inc.

📰 Linux and Open Source News

• Ubisoft has surprised us with its open source move.
• Ubuntu 25.04 has arrived, delivering many upgrades.
• Similarly, Xubuntu 25.04 and Kubuntu 25.04 are here, offering up useful refinements.

ZimaBoard 2 crowdfunding campaign is live on Kickstarter. I had the early prototype sent a few days ago and I share my experience with ZimaBoard 2 in this article.

Initial Impressions of the ZimaBoard 2 Homelab Device

Apart from the silver exterior, I have nothing to complain about in ZimaBoard 2 even if it is a prototype at this stage.

It's FOSS NewsAbhishek

🧠 What We’re Thinking About

Android's Linux Terminal just got a noteworthy power up.

Android 16 lets the Linux Terminal use your phone’s entire storage

Android 16 Beta 4 uncaps the disk resizing slider, allowing you to allocate your phone’s entire storage to the Linux Terminal.

Android AuthorityMishaal Rahman

🧮 Linux Tips, Tutorials and More

• It's easy to check which desktop environment your Linux distro has.
• Check out these 21 basic, yet essential Linux networking commands.
• Some tools you can use when you have to share files in GB over the internet.
• Continuing the Logseq series, learn how to tag, link, and reference in Logseq the right way, and when you are done with that, you can try customizing it.

If you just installed or upgraded to the Ubuntu 25.04 release, here are 13 things you should do right away:

13 Things to do After Installing Ubuntu 25.04

Just installed Ubuntu 25.04? Here are some neat tips for you.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

👷 Homelab and Maker's Corner

Build a real-time knowledge retrieval system with our step-by-step RAG guide.

Tuning Local LLMs With RAG Using Ollama and Langchain

Interested in taking your local AI set up to the next step? Here’s a sample PDF-based RAG project.

It's FOSSAbhishek Kumar

✨ Apps Highlight

Docs is a self-hostable document editor solution with many neat features.

Online Docs... but Sovereign: This is Europe’s Open Source Answer to Big Tech

Docs is an open source, self-hosted document editor that allows real-time collaboration and gives users control over their data.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

📽️ Videos I am Creating for You

See Fedora 42 in action in the latest video. By the way, that weird default wallpaper has a significance.

🧩 Quiz Time

Try your hand at our Essential Linux Commands crossword.

Guess the Popular Linux Command: Crossword

Test your Linux command line knowledge with this simple crossword puzzle. All you have to do is to correctly guess the essential Linux command.

It's FOSSAbhishek Prakash

Alternatively, can you match the Linux distros with their logos?

💡 Quick Handy Tip

In GNOME File Manager (Nautilus), you can invert the selection of items using the keyboard shortcut CTRL + SHIFT + I.

🤣 Meme of the Week

Hah, this couldn't be more true. 😆

🗓️ Tech Trivia

On April 20, 1998, during a demonstration of a beta version of Windows 98 by Microsoft's Bill Gates, at COMDEX, the system crashed in the live event. Gates jokingly said, "That must be why we're not shipping Windows 98 yet". If you ever used Windows 98, you know that it should have never been shipped 😉

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 FOSSverse Corner

Can you help a newbie FOSSer with their search for a Linux distribution chart?

Looking for a Linux distribution chart

I’m wondering if there’s ever been a table/spreadsheet created to provide a basic breakdown of most, if not all, distros at a glance. I’m not talking about subjective metrics like some charts display (e.g. user friendliness, cutting edge, community, etc.), but about objective criteria like the following: Available architecture Desktop environments (possibly with individual categories for filing system, window manager, terminal, etc.) Shell Package manager Installation (e.g. CLI, Calamares, etc…

It's FOSS CommunityThunder_Chicken

❤️ With love

Share it with your Linux-using friends and encourage them to subscribe (hint: it's here).

Share the articles in Linux Subreddits and community forums.

Follow us on Google News and stay updated in your News feed.

Opt for It's FOSS Plus membership and support us 🙏

Enjoy FOSS 😄

Logseq provides all the necessary elements you need for creating your knowledge base.

But one size doesn't fit all. You may need something extra that is either too complicated to achieve in Logseq or not possible at all.

What do you do, then? You use external plugins and extensions.

Thankfully, Logseq has a thriving marketplace where you can explore various plugins and extensions created by individuals who craved more from Logseq,

Let me show you how you can install themes and plugins.

Installing a plugin in Logseq

Click on the top-bar menu button and select Plugins as shown in the screenshot below.

In the Plugins window, click on Marketplace.

This will open the Logseq Plugins Marketplace. You can click on the title of a plugin to get the details about that plugin, including a sample screenshot.

If you find the plugin useful, use the Install button adjacent to the Plugin in the Marketplace section.

Managing Plugins

To manage a plugin, like enable/disable, fine-tune, etc., go to Menu → Plugins. This will take you to the Manage Plugin interface.

Here, you can enable/disable plugins in Logseq using the corresponding toggle button. Similarly, hover over the settings gear icon for a plugin and select Open Settings option to access plugin configuration.

Installing themes in Logseq

Logseq looks good by default to me but you can surely experiment with its looks by installing new themes.

Similar to what you saw in plugin installation section, click on the Plugins option from Logseq menu button.

Why did I not click the Themes option above? Well, because that is for switching themes, not installing.

In the Plugins window, click on Marketplace section and select Themes.

Click on the title of a theme to get the details, including screenshots.

To install a theme, use the Install button adjacent to the theme in Marketplace.

Enable/disable themes in Logseq

All the installed themes will be listed in Menu → Plugins → Installed → Themes section.

From here, you can disable/enable themes using the toggle button.

Changing themes

Make sure all the desired installed themes are enabled because disabled themes won't be shown in the theme switcher.

Click on the main menu button and select the Themes option.

This will bring a drop-down menu interface from where you can select a theme. This is shown in the short video below.

Updating plugins and themes

Occasionally, plugins and themes will provide updates.

To check for available plugin/theme updates, click on Menu → Plugins.

Here, select the Installed section to access installed Themes and Plugins. There should be a Check for Update button for each item.

Click on it to check if any updates are available for the selected plugin/theme.

Uninstall plugins and themes

By now you know that in Logseq, both Plugins and themes are considered as plugins. So, you can uninstall both in the same way.

First, click on Menu button and select the Plugins option.

Here, go to the Installed section. Now, if you want to remove an installed Plugin, go to the Plugins tab. Else, if you would like to remove an installed theme, go to the Themes tab.

Hover over the settings gear of the item that needs to be removed and select the Uninstall button.

When prompted for confirmation, click on Yes, and the plugin/theme will be removed.

Manage plugins from Logseq settings

Logseq settings provides a neat place for tweaking the installed Plugins and themes if they provide some extra settings.

Click on the menu button on the top-bar and select the Settings button.

In the settings window, click on Plugins section.

Here, you can get a list of plugins and themes that offer some tweaks.

And that's all you need to know about exploring plugins and themes in Logseq. In the next tutorial in this series, I'll discuss special pages like Journal. Stay tuned.

Large Language Models (LLMs) are powerful, but they have one major limitation: they rely solely on the knowledge they were trained on.

This means they lack real-time, domain-specific updates unless retrained, an expensive and impractical process. This is where Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) comes in.

RAG allows an LLM to retrieve relevant external knowledge before generating a response, effectively giving it access to fresh, contextual, and specific information.

Imagine having an AI assistant that not only remembers general facts but can also refer to your PDFs, notes, or private data for more precise responses.

This article takes a deep dive into how RAG works, how LLMs are trained, and how we can use Ollama and Langchain to implement a local RAG system that fine-tunes an LLM’s responses by embedding and retrieving external knowledge dynamically.

By the end of this tutorial, we’ll build a PDF-based RAG project that allows users to upload documents and ask questions, with the model responding based on stored data.

What is Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG)?

RAG is an AI framework that improves LLM responses by integrating real-time information retrieval.

Instead of relying only on its training data, the LLM retrieves relevant documents from an external source (such as a vector database) before generating an answer.

How RAG works

1. Query Input – The user submits a question.
2. Document Retrieval – A search algorithm fetches relevant text chunks from a vector store.
3. Contextual Response Generation – The retrieved text is fed into the LLM, guiding it to produce a more accurate and relevant answer.
4. Final Output – The response, now grounded in the retrieved knowledge, is returned to the user.

Why use RAG instead of fine-tuning?

• No retraining required – Traditional fine-tuning demands a lot of GPU power and labeled datasets. RAG eliminates this need by retrieving data dynamically.
• Up-to-date knowledge – The model can refer to newly uploaded documents instead of relying on outdated training data.
• More accurate and domain-specific answers – Ideal for legal, medical, or research-related tasks where accuracy is crucial.

How LLMs are trained (and why RAG improves them)

Before diving into RAG, let’s understand how LLMs are trained:

1. Pre-training – The model learns language patterns, facts, and reasoning from vast amounts of text (e.g., books, Wikipedia).
2. Fine-tuning – It is further trained on specialized datasets for specific use cases (e.g., medical research, coding assistance).
3. Inference – The trained model is deployed to answer user queries.

While fine-tuning is helpful, it has limitations:

• It is computationally expensive.
• It does not allow dynamic updates to knowledge.
• It may introduce biases if trained on limited datasets.

With RAG, we bypass these issues by allowing real-time retrieval from external sources, making LLMs far more adaptable.

Building a local RAG application with Ollama and Langchain

In this tutorial, we'll build a simple RAG-powered document retrieval app using LangChain, ChromaDB, and Ollama.

The app lets users upload PDFs, embed them in a vector database, and query for relevant information.

Installing dependencies

To avoid messing up our system packages, we’ll first create a Python virtual environment. This keeps our dependencies isolated and prevents conflicts with system-wide Python packages.

Navigate to your project directory and create a virtual environment:

cd ~/RAG-Tutorial
python3 -m venv venv

Now, activate the virtual environment:

source venv/bin/activate

Once activated, your terminal prompt should change to indicate that you are now inside the virtual environment.

With the virtual environment activated, install the necessary Python packages using requirements.txt:

pip install -r requirements.txt

This will install all the required dependencies for our RAG pipeline, including Flask, LangChain, Ollama, and Pydantic.

Once installed, you’re all set to proceed with the next steps!

Project structure

Our project is structured as follows:

RAG-Tutorial/
│── app.py              # Main Flask server
│── embed.py            # Handles document embedding
│── query.py            # Handles querying the vector database
│── get_vector_db.py    # Manages ChromaDB instance
│── .env                # Stores environment variables
│── requirements.txt    # List of dependencies
└── _temp/              # Temporary storage for uploaded files

Step 1: Creating app.py (Flask API Server)

This script sets up a Flask server with two endpoints:

• /embed – Uploads a PDF and stores its embeddings in ChromaDB.
• /query – Accepts a user query and retrieves relevant text chunks from ChromaDB.
• route_embed(): Saves an uploaded file and embeds its contents in ChromaDB.
• route_query(): Accepts a query and retrieves relevant document chunks.

import os
from dotenv import load_dotenv
from flask import Flask, request, jsonify
from embed import embed
from query import query
from get_vector_db import get_vector_db

load_dotenv()
TEMP_FOLDER = os.getenv('TEMP_FOLDER', './_temp')
os.makedirs(TEMP_FOLDER, exist_ok=True)

app = Flask(__name__)

@app.route('/embed', methods=['POST'])
def route_embed():
    if 'file' not in request.files:
        return jsonify({"error": "No file part"}), 400
    file = request.files['file']
    if file.filename == '':
        return jsonify({"error": "No selected file"}), 400
    embedded = embed(file)
    return jsonify({"message": "File embedded successfully"}) if embedded else jsonify({"error": "Embedding failed"}), 400

@app.route('/query', methods=['POST'])
def route_query():
    data = request.get_json()
    response = query(data.get('query'))
    return jsonify({"message": response}) if response else jsonify({"error": "Query failed"}), 400

if __name__ == '__main__':
    app.run(host="0.0.0.0", port=8080, debug=True)

Step 2: Creating embed.py (embedding documents)

This file handles document processing, extracts text, and stores vector embeddings in ChromaDB.

• allowed_file(): Ensures only PDFs are processed.
• save_file(): Saves the uploaded file temporarily.
• load_and_split_data(): Uses UnstructuredPDFLoader and RecursiveCharacterTextSplitter to extract text and split it into manageable chunks.
• embed(): Converts text chunks into vector embeddings and stores them in ChromaDB.

import os
from datetime import datetime
from werkzeug.utils import secure_filename
from langchain_community.document_loaders import UnstructuredPDFLoader
from langchain_text_splitters import RecursiveCharacterTextSplitter
from get_vector_db import get_vector_db

TEMP_FOLDER = os.getenv('TEMP_FOLDER', './_temp')

def allowed_file(filename):
    return filename.lower().endswith('.pdf')

def save_file(file):
    filename = f"{datetime.now().timestamp()}_{secure_filename(file.filename)}"
    file_path = os.path.join(TEMP_FOLDER, filename)
    file.save(file_path)
    return file_path

def load_and_split_data(file_path):
    loader = UnstructuredPDFLoader(file_path=file_path)
    data = loader.load()
    text_splitter = RecursiveCharacterTextSplitter(chunk_size=7500, chunk_overlap=100)
    return text_splitter.split_documents(data)

def embed(file):
    if file and allowed_file(file.filename):
        file_path = save_file(file)
        chunks = load_and_split_data(file_path)
        db = get_vector_db()
        db.add_documents(chunks)
        db.persist()
        os.remove(file_path)
        return True
    return False

Step 3: Creating query.py (Query processing)

It retrieves relevant information from ChromaDB and uses an LLM to generate responses.

• get_prompt(): Creates a structured prompt for multi-query retrieval.
• query(): Uses Ollama's LLM to rephrase the user query, retrieve relevant document chunks, and generate a response.

import os
from langchain_community.chat_models import ChatOllama
from langchain.prompts import ChatPromptTemplate, PromptTemplate
from langchain_core.output_parsers import StrOutputParser
from langchain_core.runnables import RunnablePassthrough
from langchain.retrievers.multi_query import MultiQueryRetriever
from get_vector_db import get_vector_db

LLM_MODEL = os.getenv('LLM_MODEL')
OLLAMA_HOST = os.getenv('OLLAMA_HOST', 'http://localhost:11434')

def get_prompt():
    QUERY_PROMPT = PromptTemplate(
        input_variables=["question"],
        template="""You are an AI assistant. Generate five reworded versions of the user question
        to improve document retrieval. Original question: {question}""",
    )
    template = "Answer the question based ONLY on this context:\n{context}\nQuestion: {question}"
    prompt = ChatPromptTemplate.from_template(template)
    return QUERY_PROMPT, prompt

def query(input):
    if input:
        llm = ChatOllama(model=LLM_MODEL)
        db = get_vector_db()
        QUERY_PROMPT, prompt = get_prompt()
        retriever = MultiQueryRetriever.from_llm(db.as_retriever(), llm, prompt=QUERY_PROMPT)
        chain = ({"context": retriever, "question": RunnablePassthrough()} | prompt | llm | StrOutputParser())
        return chain.invoke(input)
    return None

Step 4: Creating get_vector_db.py (Vector database management)

It initializes and manages ChromaDB, which stores text embeddings for fast retrieval.

• get_vector_db(): Initializes ChromaDB with the Nomic embedding model and loads stored document vectors.

import os
from langchain_community.embeddings import OllamaEmbeddings
from langchain_community.vectorstores.chroma import Chroma

CHROMA_PATH = os.getenv('CHROMA_PATH', 'chroma')
COLLECTION_NAME = os.getenv('COLLECTION_NAME')
TEXT_EMBEDDING_MODEL = os.getenv('TEXT_EMBEDDING_MODEL')
OLLAMA_HOST = os.getenv('OLLAMA_HOST', 'http://localhost:11434')

def get_vector_db():
    embedding = OllamaEmbeddings(model=TEXT_EMBEDDING_MODEL, show_progress=True)
    return Chroma(collection_name=COLLECTION_NAME, persist_directory=CHROMA_PATH, embedding_function=embedding)

Step 5: Environment variables

Create .env, to store environment variables:

TEMP_FOLDER = './_temp'
CHROMA_PATH = 'chroma'
COLLECTION_NAME = 'rag-tutorial'
LLM_MODEL = 'smollm:360m'
TEXT_EMBEDDING_MODEL = 'nomic-embed-text'

• TEMP_FOLDER: Stores uploaded PDFs temporarily.
• CHROMA_PATH: Defines the storage location for ChromaDB.
• COLLECTION_NAME: Sets the ChromaDB collection name.
• LLM_MODEL: Specifies the LLM model used for querying.
• TEXT_EMBEDDING_MODEL: Defines the embedding model for vector storage.

Testing the makeshift RAG + LLM Pipeline

Now that our RAG app is set up, we need to validate its effectiveness. The goal is to ensure that the system correctly:

1. Embeds documents – Converts text into vector embeddings and stores them in ChromaDB.
2. Retrieves relevant chunks – Fetches the most relevant text snippets from ChromaDB based on a query.
3. Generates meaningful responses – Uses Ollama to construct an intelligent response based on retrieved data.

This testing phase ensures that our makeshift RAG pipeline is functioning as expected and can be fine-tuned if necessary.

Running the flask server

We first need to make sure our Flask app is running. Open a terminal, navigate to your project directory, and activate your virtual environment:

cd ~/RAG-Tutorial
source venv/bin/activate  # On Linux/macOS
# or
venv\Scripts\activate  # On Windows (if using venv)

Now, run the Flask app:

python3 app.py

If everything is set up correctly, the server should start and listen on http://localhost:8080. You should see output like:

Once the server is running, we'll use curl commands to interact with our pipeline and analyze the responses to confirm everything works as expected.

1. Testing Document Embedding

The first step is to upload a document and ensure its contents are successfully embedded into ChromaDB.

curl --request POST \
  --url http://localhost:8080/embed \
  --header 'Content-Type: multipart/form-data' \
  --form file=@/path/to/file.pdf

Breakdown:

• curl --request POST → Sends a POST request to our API.
• --url http://localhost:8080/embed → Targets our embed endpoint running on port 8080.
• --header 'Content-Type: multipart/form-data' → Specifies that we are uploading a file.
• --form file=@/path/to/file.pdf → Attaches a file (in this case, a PDF) to be processed.

Expected Response:

What’s Happening Internally?

1. The server reads the uploaded PDF file.
2. The text is extracted, split into chunks, and converted into vector embeddings.
3. These embeddings are stored in ChromaDB for future retrieval.

If Something Goes Wrong:

2. Querying the Document

Now that our document is embedded, we can test whether relevant information is retrieved when we ask a question.

curl --request POST \
  --url http://localhost:8080/query \
  --header 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  --data '{ "query": "Question about the PDF?" }'

Breakdown:

• curl --request POST → Sends a POST request.
• --url http://localhost:8080/query → Targets our query endpoint.
• --header 'Content-Type: application/json' → Specifies that we are sending JSON data.
• --data '{ "query": "Question about the PDF?" }' → Sends our search query to retrieve relevant information.

Expected Response:

What’s Happening Internally?

1. The query "Whats in this file?" is passed to ChromaDB to retrieve the most relevant chunks.
2. The retrieved chunks are passed to Ollama as context for generating a response.
3. Ollama formulates a meaningful reply based on the retrieved information.

If the Response is Not Good Enough:

3. Fine-tuning the LLM for better responses

If Ollama’s responses aren’t detailed enough, we need to refine how we provide context.

Tuning strategies:

1. Improve Chunking – Ensure text chunks are large enough to retain meaning but small enough for effective retrieval.
2. Enhance Retrieval – Increase n_results to fetch more relevant document chunks.
3. Modify the LLM Prompt – Add structured instructions for better responses.

Example system prompt for Ollama:

prompt = f"""
You are an AI assistant helping users retrieve information from documents.
Use the following document snippets to provide a helpful answer.
If the answer isn't in the retrieved text, say 'I don't know.'

Retrieved context:
{retrieved_chunks}

User's question:
{query_text}
"""

This ensures that Ollama:

• Uses retrieved text properly.
• Avoids hallucinations by sticking to available context.
• Provides meaningful, structured answers.

Final thoughts

Building this makeshift RAG LLM tuning pipeline has been an insightful experience, but I want to be clear, I’m not an AI expert. Everything here is something I’m still learning myself.

There are bound to be mistakes, inefficiencies, and things that could be improved. If you’re someone who knows better or if I’ve missed any crucial points, please feel free to share your insights.

That said, this project gave me a small glimpse into how RAG works. At its core, RAG is about fetching the right context before asking an LLM to generate a response.

It’s what makes AI chatbots capable of retrieving information from vast datasets instead of just responding based on their training data.

Large companies use this technique at scale, processing massive amounts of data, fine-tuning their models, and optimizing their retrieval mechanisms to build AI assistants that feel intuitive and knowledgeable.

What we built here is nowhere near that level, but it was still fascinating to see how we can direct an LLM’s responses by controlling what information it retrieves.

Even with this basic setup, we saw how much impact retrieval quality, chunking strategies, and prompt design have on the final response.

This makes me wonder, have you ever thought about training your own LLM? Would you be interested in something like this but fine-tuned specifically for Linux tutorials?

Imagine a custom-tuned LLM that could answer your Linux questions with accurate, RAG-powered responses, would you use it? Let us know in the comments!