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>Like the concept of piping info between applications is just starting to make sense (even though I have no clue how it works).

Coming from a programming background it might be easier for you to think of each of the little unix core programs as a function. They all have options and generally do one thing really well. "grep" searches for things. "sed" does regex matching/replacment. "cut"... well it cuts out parts of files. The easiest way to figure out what something does is probably through the man page. (run "man grep" at the terminal). That being said some programs have -really- goddamn big man pages and are much harder to navigate. Bash, for instance, has an enormous man page.

The concept of piping makes more sense in the context of functions. In python you might write something like this:

"hello".upper()

Which would give you:

"HELLO"

In bash you could write that as:

echo "hello" | tr '[a-z]' '[A-Z]'

That first command just prints out the string, but instead of printing it out at your terminal the pipe will send all of it's output to the "tr" command. ("man tr" will help you understand what it's doing there). Because tr does not have it's output being redirected it just gets printed back to the terminal.

>Question 1, should I stick with zsh or learn the basics of bash first?

I don't think you would have much of a problem learning either just so long as you understand that there will be minor differences between different shell languages. Those differences tend to be syntax rather than functionality, and when it is a difference in functionality it tends to be much less commonly used features. If you have to choose one I would recommend bash for scripting solely because it is somewhat more portable. "sh" is even more portable than bash, though it can be more painful to use since it doesn't have some of the nice features in modern shells. Remember that you don't have to use the same language for your shell and for your scripts. You just have to define a different shebang on the first line of the script.

>2. what are some things I can use scripting for (what do you use it for)?

I don't find myself scripting much at home. At work though I spend a TON of time writing various scripts. What I -do- use bash for a ton is one-liners. Once you get used to the syntax you can write some very useful code in just a couple lines. One example that I use frequently is "Run this command every 10 seconds forever" which can be written as

while sleep 10; do
{command}
done

The "watch" program does more-or-less the same thing, but I find it unwieldy once the commands inside get more complex.

An example of a somewhat longer, and arguably poorly written script for backups using tarsnap is here.

>Any explination for common commands would be awesome.

As I mentioned earlier "man" is your friend. The other option is "command --help". You can generally google for some examples, which can be really useful for some of the less easily grok'd programs (awk, for example).

>And I do know a bit of python and have heard of iPython. Could that be a replacement for bash or zsh or is that something completely different and I'm in over my head (very likely). Much thanks.

ipython is not going to be a good replacment for your standard shell. It's cool, and I use it frequently when coding in python, but it simply lacks the powerful integration with the system that bash/zsh has. What it is extremely useful for though is exploratory programming. What really opened my eyes on the subject was the book Python for Data Analysis.

Edit: Syntax

Also, for any shell junkies please don't complain about the non-necessary "echo" up there. I know you could use a here string, but I think it would defeat the purpose of an easily digested example.

Too bad I didn't start my github project out in python, most of it is in bash. For some reason github tells me on the code scale I have 80% in python O.o. Maybe I do some things in similar fashion with .shinc modules for the main script. If you're interested in retro gaming, you could always help me and JC with RetroRig. Most folks like to make games with python to start out, and once I find time myself, I play on going through the book Python Programming for the Absolute Beginner. I've leafed through it, and heard reviews from folks I know, and they love the book. It's a great way to sharpen up the skills. As far as projects, there are probably some sites that could help parse OSS/FOSS projects based on yoru interests.

GitHub only seems to sort/search by trending projects. The suggestions for OpenHatch is nice, and seems promising. They reason I started my project, was not because I like programming or anything (I am not a programmer by any stretch, but very technically minded), but because I loved the idea of making what I am doing. I started out small, and loved every little accomplishment I achieved. I now have a contributor, who also visits this subreddit, /u/beaumanvienna, and it's the most fun thing in the world to bounce ideas of people. Just think of programs you use, and how you can make them cool. The best work you could do and work on, is work you love and are interested in. Then you will be extremely proud of your accomplishments at the very minimum.

Edit: spelling.

So lets compare the new Mac mini MGEM2LL/A that just got announced for the price of $499 with the Gigabyte BRIX Pro GB-BXi5-4570R that's more than half a year old and can be found for $470 and shipped within a few days.

CPU BRIX Wins

1.4Ghz (up to 2.7) dual-core (with hyperthreading) i5 with 3MB cache vs 2.7GHz (up to 3.2) quad-core i5 4MB cache (all Haswell)

GPU BRIX Wins

HD 5000 vs Iris Pro 5200

RAM BRIX Wins

4GB 1600MHz soldered vs free to choose (lets pick the same here +$39)

Storage BRIX Wins

500GB 5400rpm vs free to choose (lets pick the same here +$43.50)

Wireless BRIX Wins

802.11ac + Bluetooth 4.0 vs free to choose (lets pick the same here +$33)

Ports Apple Wins

2 Thunderbolt more, SDXC card slot, IR Receiver, 2 audio ports vs 1 MiniDisplayPort more, Kensington lock

Size BRIX Wins

Mac mini vs NUC and NUC vs BRIX Pro. Note the power brick is external in BRIX Pro.

Warranty Tie for Geeks / Apple Wins for n00bs

1 year limited warranty extended to 3 years with AppleCare +$99 vs 3 years GIGABYTE warranty.

Note how I googled the web for the different parts earlier for BRIX and have to put them inside the BRIX while with Apple you just go to one website and it comes pre-assembled. Also I think AppleCare is better suited for newbies.

Price BRIX Wins

$598 vs $585.5

Availability BRIX Wins

Mac Mini was just announced and still hasn't shipped, BRIX is already shipping worldwide for more than half a year.

OS BRIX Wins Linux Wins

Mac Mini includes OS X and can somewhat run Windows and Linux. BRIX doesn't include OS but supports better the best OS out there (notice Intel's dual band wifi + bluetooth card and Iris Pro graphics) while it can run Windows and nowadays Hackintosh is easy to install.

If you want to go the ultra-cheap route your best bet is probably any cheap, Linux-compatible scanner + tesseract-ocr. I honestly haven't used tesseract myself but it's definitely the most popular OCR program on Linux.

If you're willing to shell out extra, Brother makes some really excellent network printers and scanners; at my job we use a Brother DCP 7065DN which, as a network printer/scanner combo, works just fine with my Linux laptop.

You can get a standalone Brother scanner refurbished for about $150 on Amazon. It supports OCR and scanning to network, USB flash drive, etc.

I too have been looking at getting a new laptop, had an Aspire One before too (d255), but my current is an HP pavilion touchsmart. I love the netbook formfactor, even 11" is too big for me to really like.

However, I am so sick of battery (never had a laptop with greater then 1.5 hours), never being able to play games without tons of effort (though Fallout 4 is almost playable on this 1ghz apu with lots of effort :) ).

So I am currently saving up for an Acer Aspire E 15 E5-575-33BM. It has a 7th gen I3, 4gib of ram (taking 1 of 2 slots, up to 32gib), m.2 wifi slot, and m.2 sata slot (sata slot free). About $50 more and it will be mine. 15.6" screen is really too damn big for me, but damn, it is so much better then my current one :).

Anybody here have any experience with this? Is the 7th gen i3 well supported? Etc.

No-Deal...

Pi: $35

Enclosure: $20?

HDD: $60: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=500GB%20external%20hard%20drive

SD Card: 4GB? $5...if you don't have one sitting around (I had like 30...but run raspbian on a 32GB)

Cables: $10 if you go to best buy and pay out the ass...$4 on meritline

USB Hub: $5

Keyboard: $30: http://www.amazon.com/Logitech-Wireless-Keyboard-Multi-Touch-920-003070/dp/B005DKZTMG?tag=thelinactsho-20

$155 tops. And I was generous with my estimates.

I think CS and CompE professors often give a lot of very biased and bad advice -- it's too bad. Just like being a linux enthusiast, you don't really need to have a degree or be paid to do it for fun. There are a few very good books on VHDL and Verilog. One is the Designer's guide to VHDL which describes basic logic circuits in VHDL.

It's also just like becoming a good programmer or linux admin in the way that you can't be afraid to read manuals. If you can do that, you can get through it. Google and the Xilinx forums are probably better than they were when you were last in school.

I'd go with something like this, it's a bit more out of the way plus it's able to lay flat so it would work better for shows like techsnap where it looks like your standing all the time. It's smaller than the one you linked but for the purposes of running the show it'll work if a touch screen really is waranted

http://www.amazon.com/Touch-Screen-15-Inch-TouchScreen-Monitor/dp/B007948V24/ref=sr_1_15?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1416209026&sr=1-15

if not I'd go with a standard moniter with a keyboard/mouse combo like this one which is fairly small and compact
http://www.amazon.com/Logitech-Wireless-Keyboard-Multi-Touch-Touchpad/dp/B005DKZTMG/ref=sr_1_3?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1416209311&sr=1-3&keywords=keyboard

What speed connection are you getting?

The model you linked is definitely not a beefy router. If you want to go for something like a consumer router i use a WDR3600 as a secondary (basically configured as an access point) running OpenWrt (my setup is detailed in this blog post).

If you want to step up to an x86-based router PC Engines have a couple of new boards (2GiB RAM model, 4GiB RAM model) on which you can run you operating system of choice (including firewall-specific ones like pfSense, IPFire, or VyOS).

It's funny you bring up minicom! It's one of those programs I completely forget about until I run into a hung up HP or Cisco switch. Sidenote this cable works out of the box with Linux http://amzn.to/2kEutDz I have one of these in the truck, one in my backpack, in my toolbag, and one in the shop at all times.

The thing that really has frustrated me about Solus is when we stack that distro next to the Ubuntus and the Archs of the world then we set people like the OP up for disappointment. That's sad to me because if you're not a heavy lifter in the distro world then the only way you really make it long term is if you are laser focused.

How many of us swear up and down by Clonezilla, or Khali Linux, BunsenLabs for example? When I need to clone a drive I don't even think of another tool, when I'm doing security and pen testing Khali Linux is THE standard, BunsenLabs lets me use my beloved and worshiped IBM ThinkPad 600x that I've had for 17 years.

They are all AMAZING practically irreplaceable distros and they will be around and successful for a long time because of that.

How many of us would use any of those as a daily driver distro, or compare them to Ubuntu? They can't really compete in that market and if they did we would all be worse off because we would loose out on those amazing laser feature sets that those distros DO offer.

In this entire discussion about if Solus could be a workstation daily driver we've missed what Solus is doing that NO other distro I've found is.

1. I install it once
   
2. Out of the box users can use it
   
3. Never have to "upgrade to the next version"
   
4. Desktop Environment is so friendly it requires NO tweaking and NO explaining to new users.
   
5. The software that IS there works 100% of the time because it's carefully screened
   
6. Wifi works (i'm looking at you Bug#1574347)
   
   There is absolutely a market for that kind of distro. That market is not daily Ubuntu users, Arch users or Fedora users. It's users that want to treat their computer like an appliance because they need the computer to do that "one" or "two" things but those things are so critical it has to do them 100% of the time without failure. I've not found another distro that can meet that requirement.

What's that Ubuntu user doing with a PC? Didn't he receive the memo about the line where two surfaces meet ?

EDIT: Yes, yes, downvote me, we'll talk in a year

I couldn't find a TS-435A (from the video at 00:36:20) but there is a TS-453A on amazon.

Right now its $584.74 Empty with 4GB of RAM ($731.99 for 8GB)

https://www.amazon.com/QNAP-Professional-Grade-Attached-Supports-TS-453A-4G-US/dp/B017YB7T6U

You could build a FreeNAS or UnRaid box with the same hardware as the iXSystems FreeNAS Mini and have a really great NAS rig.

Have a look at some cheap print servers like this. They will allow you to share your USB printers on the local network with minimum effort.

Sadly, what you can run into often is the FAT32 size limitation if your .iso size is greater than 4GB, much like the openSUSE main installation ISO. This is where the Zalman ZM-VE300 is better when using NTFS. Additionally, the drive is emulating an actual CD/DVD drive when using the .iso files, which means the BIOS does not have to be capable of booting from a USB Flash drive.

I recently got some of the iClever ones (3 port usb 3.0 & Ethernet). Works great on arch and fedora 21 (haven't tried anything else)

here's the exact one I'm using:
http://www.amazon.com/iClever-Converter-Ultrabooks-Compatible-Chromebook/dp/B00KRTVOUE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1421025302&sr=8-1&keywords=iclever+ethernet

Sorry about the huge ugly title text! I've used Ardour to mix things in the past, and I've been using Linux pretty heavily since around 2010. But this is my first completely 100% F(L)OSS album.

Here's a link to more details on the album's lyrical content.

http://rpmchallenge.com/index.php?option=com_lyftenbloggie&view=entry&year=2016&month=03&day=02&id=8884:the-deed-is-done

And a summary of some more technical details (that I had posted elsewhere):

> I used one of these: http://www.amazon.com/Art-USB-Dual-Pre-PS/dp/B002KEAT78
plus a Rode NT1A, AKG C3000B, AKG C1000S, Fender Telecaster '74 thinline reissue guitar, Seagull acoustic 6-string, Old solid state Kay amp with a Peavey bass cabinet, Mexican Squier Fender Jazz Bass, Yamaha MO6 keyboard, drummer's drums, Hydrogen drum machine (for Lippity Lippity and temporary drums during recording)... and probably some other things.

oh yeah, and I used Ubuntu 12.04.5 on a Lenovo L412.

Thanks for the detailed feedback /u/iamoverrated . I just cracked open the case and it's only a 255W PSU in it.

Currently there are 2 1600x900 monitors plugged into the 9800GT.
I have no problem running proprietary drivers (currently running nvidia drivers.
I plan on just using it for casual gaming (when time permits), nothing else like crypto-mining or anything.

I presume the GTX 750Ti would be my best (only?) choice here? Both it and the 650Ti are the same price on SCAN atm:

• 750 : Scan.co.uk
  
• 650 : Scan.co.uk
  
  Edit: Just had a look and the 660 is also in the £130 ball-park. (I might purhase this one, along with a PSU for ~£60)
  
  
• 660 : Amazon
  
• CX600M : eBuyer
  
• CS450M : eBuyer

$250 and I can't upgrade beyone 4GB RAM? I bought two NUC for $124 each a couple of weeks ago with a Celeron 3050. I threw a cheap SSD and 8GB RAM into each of them, total cost around $225 each and perfectly compatible with Linux.

Not sure how this is a good deal unless you are really into bamboo.

Here is the mobile version of your link