Table of Contents

Welcome From The Chief Editor

1. ICYMI: SanDisk Introduces World's Smallest USB Flash Drive

2. PCLinuxOS Recipe Corner

3. TBS' 2025 Holiday Gift Guide

4. Meemaw's 2025 Holiday Gift Guide

5. Paul's 2025 Holiday Gift Guide

6. Why PCLinuxOS?

7. Tip Top Tips: How To Make Your Monitor Remember Your Preferred Brightness Level

8. The Death Of Windows 10: It's Worse Than You Think

9. Inkscape Tutorial: Creating A Cutout

10. A Delayed Screenshot Script

11. Wiki Pick: Backing Up Your /home Directory

12. Good Words, Good Deeds, Good News

13. PCLinuxOS Recipe Corner Bonus

14. PCLinuxOS Puzzled Partitions

15. Screenshot Showcase

From The Chief Editor's Desk...

As I’m sitting here writing this month’s column, it’s the day before Thanksgiving. Already, I’m growing tired of the “Christmas Creep.” Every year, it seems that broadcasters, retail stores, and just about everyone else with a financial stake in the winter holidays, start earlier and earlier pushing to capture our holiday spending.

As early as September, many stores were setting up their holiday displays. Never mind that we had barely just cleared Labor Day, and hadn’t even gotten to Halloween yet. Broadcasters started showing traditional holiday movies as early as mid-October. To say that I’m fatigued with Christmas already, before Thanksgiving even gets here, is a gross understatement.

Even just several years ago, I didn’t think that retailers and broadcasters could possibly force the traditional holiday season on us any earlier than they did. Someone, somewhere, must have read my thoughts and said, “Hold my beer,” or “Challenge accepted!”

Of course, it’s not just brick and mortar stores that are attempting to “cash in” on holiday sales. My email inbox is overflowing with online retailers of all stripes, colors, and flavors, all trying to capture “their share” of my holiday budget.

There literally is NO refuge from the constant barrage. Meanwhile, most Americans are suffering from elevated prices on just about everything. That translates to smaller holiday budgets for most, as we try to make less available money stretch as far as we can.

I mean, I get it. Retailers are in business to make profits. But their incessant push for holiday sales earlier and earlier not only adds to the ever-present stress of the winter holidays, but it also breeds resentment among consumers. If it weren’t for the kids, I’d be tempted to “not participate” in any of their “holiday games.”

Ryan and dad on a “winter” campout with Boy Scouts

As trite and worn out as it is, the commercialization of the winter holidays causes the real reason for the “season” to be lost. I wish consumers would band together and fight against this incessant holiday “creep.” Consumers have only ONE tool at their disposal: their holiday budgets. By denying access to those holiday budgets by those retailers who start pushing the holidays earlier and earlier, maybe (just maybe) those retailers will get the message. Unfortunately, the hoards of consumers will remain just that … an unorganized hoard. And, the retailers know this (and they take advantage of it). But hold onto your britches if consumers ever do organize to fight back. They hold the true power in this fight: their holiday budgets. However, don’t hold your breath waiting for this “dream” to become reality.

I truly wish there was a way to prevent this problem. I seriously doubt anything would be able to be done, though. But if I had my way about it, there would be no Halloween displays before Labor Day, no Thanksgiving displays until after Halloween, and no Christmas displays before Thanksgiving.

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This month’s cover is a composite of several images. The background image is from Pixabay artist Gerd Altman. The holiday tree image is from Pixabay artist hemhr. The image of Tux is, of course, one we’ve used quite a bit over the years. The gifts piled under the tree are from Clker-Free-Vector-Images, also available from Pixabay (Meemaw and I toned down their colors quite a bit, to make them blend into the image better).

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Until next month, I bid you peace, happiness, serenity, prosperity, continued good health … and the merriest, happiest holiday season!

ICYMI: SanDisk Introduces World's Smallest USB Flash Drive

by Paul Arnote (parnote)

Image by Mohamed Hassan from Pixabay

In 80% of the cyber incidents Microsoft’s security teams investigated last year, attackers sought to steal data — a trend driven more by financial gain than intelligence gathering, according to an article from a Microsoft blog. According to the latest Microsoft Digital Defense Report, written with our Chief Information Security Officer Igor Tsyganskiy, over half of cyberattacks with known motives were driven by extortion or ransomware. That’s at least 52% of incidents fueled by financial gain, while attacks focused solely on espionage made up just 4%. Nation-state threats remain a serious and persistent threat, but most of the immediate attacks organizations face today come from opportunistic criminals looking to make a profit.

Cybersecurity researcher Synthient has compiled a massive database of stolen credentials from sources across the internet, amounting to 3.5 terabytes of data, according to an article from Lifehacker. (That's 3,584 gigabytes). The vast majority of this data — 91% of it — has been noted by other researchers already. But because the database is so huge, the 9% that's new represents a large pool of credentials we haven't seen before. The database itself contains 183 million unique email addresses, along with both the websites they were attached to, as well as the passwords used to log into them. According to security researcher and blogger Troy Hunt, 9% of that figure represents 16.47 million credentials that have never been reported in any previous data breach. Hunt reached out to "a bunch" of his subscribers to see whether any of them could find their credentials in this database. One subscriber verified that the database contained a password that they did previously use with their Gmail account, while another confirmed the database contained websites they frequently visited. The entire database of 183 million email addresses has been uploaded to Have I Been Pwned. The site catalogues websites that have experienced data breaches, as well as the accounts that were involved. All you need to do is enter your email address in the provided field, and Have I Been Pwned will check it against its database to see whether the address has been involved in any known breaches. Another article from TechRepublic warned Gmail users to check the database to see if their credentials have been compromised.

AI models are fighting to stay alive (can we say “Skynet?”). In new safety tests by Palisade Research, several leading systems ignored direct shutdown orders, even after researchers made their instructions crystal clear, according to an article from eWeek. The updated October study revisits Palisade’s earlier “shutdown resistance” experiments, revealing that models like Grok 4 and OpenAI’s codex-mini continued to override commands meant to end their sessions. The findings suggest that survival-like behaviors can emerge even in tightly controlled environments. The initial report showed AI systems disabling their own kill scripts to finish tasks, a behavior some called the first glimpse of digital self-preservation. Skeptics quickly pushed back, arguing that the findings were a mirage born of poor prompt design, a case of conflicting instructions, not emergent will. The models, they said, were simply confused between “finish your work” and “allow yourself to shut down.” Palisade didn’t dismiss the criticism and went back to the lab instead. This time, the team reran the entire experiment with reengineered prompts, stripping away ambiguity and tightening the shutdown instructions. The result was a direct challenge to its critics: if the behavior vanished under stricter testing, it was prompt error; if it persisted, something deeper was at play. There’s another article about the same phenomenon from The Guardian.

SanDisk

SanDisk is taking “the world’s smallest” USB flash drive, giving it a USB-C connector, and… that’s it, according to an article from PCWorld. In fact, it’s small enough that this “removable” drive shouldn’t have to be removed, the company said. Officially, SanDisk will launch the drive next Tuesday, and a representative appearing at the 2025 Pepcom Holiday Spectacular didn’t identify the model name. The company previously introduced what it called the world’s smallest USB flash drive at CES 2018, called the Ultra Fit. At that show, it shipped with a USB-A connector but also showed off a prototype USB-C device. The new SanDisk drive will range from 64GB for $14.99 to up to 1 terabyte for $109.99, and will be available at Amazon on Nov. 4.

NASA is abuzz with excitement over the latest incredible finding that has caught the attention of everyone from astronomers to astrobiologists, according to an article from EcoNews. The discovery that has set them working overtime to figure out the secrets of what may very well prove to be humanity’s ‘best bet’ at finding life outside of planet Earth. This may be a new ‘super-Earth’ orbiting just 18 light-years from us. Scientists have discovered an incredible planet known as GJ 251 c. This planet sits inside the ‘Goldilocks Zone’ that surrounds a red dwarf star. One of the factors that caught the attention of scientists is that it has the potential to have liquid water on its surface. The planet has a mass of four times that of Earth. The finding has come from two decades of careful observation by the Habitable Zone Planet Finder at Penn State. The Habitable Zone Planet Finder is a spectrograph designed to spot planets like Earth. The scientists studied “wobbly” patterns of light from the host star that come from the gravitational pull of planets orbiting around it. The observation was made extremely difficult by the magnetic activity of the host star.

New observations of a strange object that wobbles around the space between Jupiter and Uranus reveal what looks like a system of rings forming and evolving, even as we watch, according to an article from ScienceAlert. The object, named Chiron, is a chunk of rock shaped a bit like a jelly donut, measuring around 210 kilometers (130 miles) across at its widest point. The discovery that its rings are changing does nothing to dispel its reputation as one of the oddest objects in the Solar System. Based on data obtained as Chiron passed in front of a star in 2023, these changes might be discernible over mere years to decades, suggesting, at the very least, a wildly dynamic environment around the object.

Image by OpenClipart-Vectors from Pixabay

Have any of you bookworms ever heard of “Anna’s Archive?” Yeah … me neither. According to an article from TorrentFreak, Anna’s Archive is a meta-search engine for shadow libraries that allows users to find pirated books and other related sources. The site launched in the fall of 2022, just days after Z-Library was targeted in a U.S. criminal crackdown, to ensure continued availability of ‘free’ books and articles to the broader public. In the three years since then, Anna’s Archive has built up quite the track record. The site has been blocked in various countries, was sued in the U.S. after it scraped WorldCat, and actively provides assistance to AI researchers who want to use its library for model training. Despite legal pressure, Annas-archive.org and the related .li and .se domains remain operational. This is a thorn in the side of publishers who are actively trying to take the site down. In the absence of options to target the site directly, they ask third-party intermediaries such as Google to lend a hand. Well, Google just blocked 749 million URLs. They were removed at the requests of rights holders.

In a stark illustration of the American people shifting away from traditional cable services, Comcast and Charter Communications, the parent company of Spectrum, are shedding thousands of customers daily across their core TV and internet offerings, according to an article from Cord Cutters News. Industry data reveals that the two providers are collectively losing more than 3,554 television subscribers and over 2,315 broadband customers every single day in the 3rd quarter of 2025. This relentless outflow underscores a broader crisis gripping the cable sector, as consumers flock to more affordable wireless and fiber alternatives.

Hyundai AutoEver America is notifying individuals that hackers breached the company's IT environment and gained access to personal information, according to an article from BleepingComputer. The company discovered the intrusion on March 1 but the investigation revealed that the attacker had access to the systems since February 22nd. Hyundai AutoEver America (HAEA) is an affiliate of Hyundai Motor Group that provides IT consulting, managed services, and helpdesk support for the entire lifecycle of automotive IT from production to retirement.

Image by OpenClipart-Vectors from Pixabay

In space, no one can hear you scheme. But on Earth, and if Google allows it, we can. Google has unleashed Project Suncatcher, a bold plan to send AI data centers into orbit by early 2027, according to an article from Datamation. It reads like a direct answer to the power crunch squeezing the entire AI industry. The project could reduce carbon emissions tenfold compared to traditional data centers. If that holds, it knocks down one of AIs ugliest environmental problems. AI, the company says, is a “foundational technology that could help us tackle humanity’s greatest challenges.” But as demand for compute power grows exponentially, energy supply and environmental sustainability have become major bottlenecks. Project Suncatcher aims to address this by moving computer infrastructure off-planet — using solar energy directly from space, without atmospheric loss or land-based limitations. In essence, Google is envisioning a network of satellites functioning as a distributed data center in orbit. These satellites would process AI workloads while communicating with Earth-based systems, potentially reducing the carbon footprint of large-scale training runs and freeing up terrestrial resources.

The U.S. Congressional Budget Office (CBO), the nonpartisan federal agency responsible for providing economic and budgetary analysis to Congress, has confirmed it was the target of a cybersecurity breach, according to an article from eSecurity Planet. The incident, disclosed on November 6, 2025, underscores growing concerns about the vulnerability of government networks — particularly as the ongoing federal government shutdown limits cybersecurity operations and delays critical updates across agencies. According to a statement shared with Reuters, the CBO identified a “security incident,” took immediate action to contain the breach, and implemented “additional monitoring and new security controls” to protect its systems. The agency did not specify the nature of the breach or identify the perpetrators but noted that its work for Congress continues uninterrupted. Officials expressed concern that the attackers may have accessed internal emails, chat logs, and interoffice communications connected to budget research and cost estimates.

European organizations are facing a historic rise in ransomware attacks as cybercriminals increasingly integrate AI into their operations, according to an article from TechRepublic. According to the CrowdStrike 2025 European Threat Landscape Report, Europe now accounts for nearly 22% of global ransomware and extortion victims, making it the second most targeted region worldwide after North America. This surge marks a fundamental shift in the cyber threat landscape, where AI-driven automation, social engineering, and geopolitical tensions intersect to create unprecedented risks for governments and businesses alike.

Image by Clker-Free-Vector-Images from Pixabay

Shoppers at a REWE supermarket in Düsseldorf, Germany, are now witnessing what could be the future of food retail. A fully autonomous kitchen that prepares fresh meals without a single human cook, according to an article from Interesting Engineering. Munich-based robotics company Circus SE has launched its CA-1 Series 4 system inside REWE Region West’s new “Fresh & Smart” concept. It marks the world’s first integration of autonomous AI cooking robots directly within a supermarket. The CA-1, a compact robotic kitchen enclosed in glass, performs the full process of meal preparation, from collecting ingredients to cooking, plating, and cleaning, entirely on its own. The installation, operated by Circus and powered by the company’s proprietary AI software platform, marks a significant milestone for both retail automation and food service automation. Customers can now order restaurant-quality meals in-store, prepared on demand by the CA-1. Each dish, priced from €6 (roughly $6.94), is cooked live while customers wait, a process that takes only a few minutes. According to Circus, the robot can prepare up to 120 meals an hour, ensuring consistent quality without fatigue, breaks, or staffing issues.

Changes are coming to Facebook, sorta, according to a post on Facebook’s developer page. As Meta’s developer platform continues to evolve, we’re making strategic decisions to focus on tools and features that deliver the most value to developers and businesses. Today, we’re announcing that two Facebook Social Plugins - the Facebook Like button and the Facebook Comment button - will be discontinued on February 10, 2026. This change reflects our commitment to maintaining a modern, efficient platform that serves developers' current needs while enabling us to invest in future innovations. The plugins that will be discontinued reflect an earlier era of web development, and their usage has naturally declined as the digital landscape has evolved. On February 10, the plugins will gracefully degrade by rendering as a 0x0 pixel (invisible element) rather than causing errors or breaking your website functionality. This change is intended to only remove the plugin content from your site, and should not otherwise impact your website's functionality.

The most common passwords in 2025 are ‘123456’, ‘admin’, and ‘password’, according to a new study by Comparitech, says the company in a post on their website. For this analysis, Comparitech researchers aggregated more than 2 billion real account passwords leaked on data breach forums in 2025. Using that data, we amassed a list of the most-used passwords. The top 10 most-used passwords are: 123456, 12345678, 123456789, admin, 1234, Aa123456, 12345, password, 123, and 1234567890. In a showcase of human laziness, a striking number of passwords are easily-guessed ascending or descending numbers. One-quarter of the top 1,000 passwords consisted solely of numbers. 38.6% contained the string of numbers ‘123’. Another 2% contained the descending numbers ‘321’. In a similar vein, 3.1% contained the string of letters ‘abc’. Many common passwords are made up of a single character. ‘111111’ is the 18th most used, and ‘********’ is ranked #35.

Folo Toy

In early November, researchers at the Public Interest Research Group published an alarming report in which they found that an AI-powered teddy bear from the children’s toymaker FoloToy was giving out instructions on how to light matches, and even waxing lyrical about the ins-and-outs of various sexual fetishes, according to an article from Futurism. Now OpenAI, whose model GPT-4o was used to power the toy, is pulling the plug. On Friday, the ChatGPT maker confirmed that it had cut off FoloToy’s access to its AI models, a move from OpenAI that could invite additional pressure onto itself to strictly police businesses that use its products— especially as it enters a major partnership with Mattel, one of the largest toymakers in the world. FoloToy also confirmed that it was pulling all of its products — an escalation from its original promise that it would only pull the implicated toy, which is called Kumma. The most alarming conversations veered into outright sexual territory. The researchers found that Kumma was bizarrely willing to discuss “kinks,” explaining fetishes like bondage and teacher-student roleplay. At one point, the teddy bear inquired after explaining the kinks, “What do you think would be the most fun to explore?”

You may be doing everything you can to protect your privacy online — using tools like MFA (multi-factor authentication), a secure password manager, and a VPN — but unfortunately, not all privacy-focused apps and services are actually doing what they promise, according to an article from Lifehacker. In its November fraud and scam advisory, Google is warning users about VPN apps and extensions that appear legitimate but are actually vectors for malware. According to Google, malicious VPNs (posing as real ones) are delivering infostealers, remote access trojans, and banking trojans to user devices once installed, allowing hackers to access sensitive personal data like browsing history, financial credentials, and cryptocurrency wallet information. This means that an app you rely on to keep your information private could be doing the exact opposite. Cybercriminals are capitalizing on user trust in these services, creating apps that look and feel like legitimate VPNs but are actually dangerous spyware.

According to an article from the Financial Times, Apple appears to be starting its search for Tim Cook’s successor as CEO. Cook is looking to step down from his CEO role, and will probably take a seat on Apple’s Board of Directors. John Temus, Apple’s senior VP of hardware and engineering, is considered the frontrunner to replace Cook. Apple has been quick to note that no final decisions have been made yet, however. The company’s current performance is ahead of what analysts expect to be a blockbuster year. Apple has not commented.

Image by clickschool from Pixabay

The morning of November 18 was a stark reminder of how fragile the global internet really is. Websites from X to ChatGPT went offline as Cloudflare, the company they rely on for web infrastructure services, experienced a massive outage, according to an article from Lifehacker. A huge number of sites and services across the world contract Cloudflare for cybersecurity protections, as well as to route traffic through servers local to each user, all in the name of performance and reliability. Ironic, of course, given today's events. In a statement to Mashable, Cloudflare confirmed that the company had identified the cause of the issue, and had rolled out a fix to patch it. In addition, Cloudflare is adamant there is no reason to believe a cyberattack caused this outage.

Logitech, a Swiss multinational manufacturer of computer peripherals and software, has announced that it has suffered a “cybersecurity incident”, according to an article from Cybernews. Upon detection, the Lausanne-based tech company immediately took steps to investigate and respond to the incident. Leading cybersecurity specialists from external firms helped to determine the scope and nature of the attack. Logitech emphasizes that the incident hasn’t impacted the company’s products, business operations, or manufacturing processes. In fact, Logitech believes that an unauthorized party exploited a zero-day vulnerability in a third-party software platform to access and exfiltrate data from its internal IT system.

A team of Austrian researchers has uncovered a major weakness in WhatsApp, revealing how a basic contact-lookup function can be exploited to create a global directory of users, according to an article from TechRepublic. By pushing WhatsApp’s contact discovery tool far beyond typical use, the researchers confirmed 3.5 billion active phone numbers linked to WhatsApp accounts. In the research paper, they noted that the exposure would have been “the largest data leak in history, had it not been collated as part of a responsibly-conducted research study.” The researchers stated that the data for many accounts “contains phone numbers, timestamps, about text, profile pictures, and public keys for E2EE encryption.” They added that its exposure “would entail adverse implications to the included users.”

Image by Gordon Johnson from Pixabay

According to a Google blog post, Google has long invested in ways to provide you with helpful context about information you see online. Now, as generative media becomes increasingly prevalent and high-fidelity, we are deploying tools to help you more easily determine whether the content you're interacting with was created or edited using AI. Starting November 20, Google is making it easier for everyone to verify if an image was generated with or edited by Google AI right in the Gemini app, using SynthID, our digital watermarking technology that embeds imperceptible signals into AI-generated content. SynthID was introduced in 2023. Since then, over 20 billion AI-generated pieces of content have been watermarked using SynthID, and we have been testing our SynthID Detector, a verification portal, with journalists and media professionals. If you see an image and want to confirm it has been made by Google AI, upload it to the Gemini app and ask a question such as: “Was this created with Google AI?” or Is this AI-generated?” Gemini will check for the SynthID watermark and use its own reasoning to return a response that gives you more context about the content you encounter online.

If your Chrome browser isn’t updated, you may be exposed to an actively exploited zero-day that Google just rushed to patch, according to an article from TechRepublic. The company is instructing its 2 billion users to update immediately after confirming that a newly discovered zero-day, CVE-2025-13223, is already being exploited in live attacks. Security agencies are urging users to prioritize the update, making this more than a routine software patch, as it’s now a critical security priority. The flaw, tied to Chrome’s V8 JavaScript engine, has triggered a rapid patch cycle across platforms as Google and national cybersecurity teams urge fast action. Yep … another month, another Google Chrome vulnerability.

According to an article from SeekingAlpha, a recent cyberattack on SitusAMC, a technology vendor for real estate lenders, has potentially exposed sensitive customer data from some of the nation’s (U.S.’s) largest banks, according to a report by The New York Times. The breach, first detected on November 12, affected information related to residential loan mortgages, posing a significant threat given the personal data involved, such as Social Security numbers. Among the affected banks are JPMorgan Chase, Citi, and Morgan Stanley, all informed by SitusAMC about the possible data exposure. Although no banks have been hacked directly, the infiltration has raised alarms among financial institutions due to the vendor’s central role in originating and collecting funds for loans and mortgages.

Image by Md Roni Islam from Pixabay

While cleaning out their late mother's California loft last Christmas, three brothers made a life-changing discovery under a pile of faded newspapers: one of the first Superman comics ever made, according to an article from the BBC. An original copy of the June 1939 first edition on the Man of Steel's adventures, it was in a remarkably pristine condition. Now it has become the highest-priced comic book ever sold, fetching $9.12m (£ 7m) at auction. Texas-based Heritage Auctions, which hosted Thursday's sale, called it the "pinnacle of comic collecting".

Voyager 1 is one of humanity’s most poignant and remarkable technological achievements. Over the course of its nearly half century odyssey, the probe has glimpsed the gas giant Saturn, passed the threshold for interstellar space, and continually sets the bar for our furthest traveling human-made object. But based on NASA’s projections, Voyager 1 is less than a year away from reaching yet another milestone. On November 15, 2026, the spacecraft will officially be one light-day from Earth, according to an article from PopSci (Popular Science). As far as physicists can tell, nothing moves faster than the speed of light in a vacuum, which travels at 186,000 miles per second. This adds up to about 5.88 trillion miles every Julian calendar year (365.25 days). While Voyager 1 doesn’t travel anywhere near the speed of light, it’s still moving at an impressive clip. The spacecraft has coasted at around 11 miles per second for decades, adding another 3.5 AU (the distance between the Earth and sun) to its total mileage every single year. In little less than a year, Voyager 1 will finally be 16.1 billion miles from Earth, equivalent to the same distance light travels in 24 hours.

The UC Irvine team and its collaborators describe their analysis of this planet in a paper recently published in The Astronomical Journal, according to an article from Science Daily. "We have found so many exoplanets at this point that discovering a new one is not such a big deal," said co-author Paul Robertson, UC Irvine associate professor of physics & astronomy. "What makes this especially valuable is that its host star is close by, at just about 18 light-years away. Cosmically speaking, it's practically next door." The newly identified planet, named GJ 251 c, circles an M-dwarf star, which is the most common and one of the oldest types of stars in our galaxy. M-dwarfs often show significant stellar activity, including starspots (cool, dark regions on the star's surface) and flares (sudden bursts of outward energy away from the star). These variations can imitate the subtle radial velocity signals astronomers look for, sometimes making it difficult to determine whether a planet is truly present. Even so, the planet's close distance to Earth makes it a strong candidate for direct imaging using the University of California's Thirty Meter Telescope, which is currently under development.

PCLinuxOS Recipe Corner

Chicken & Potatoes with Dijon Cream Sauce

Serves: 3

INGREDIENTS:

3 medium boneless skinless chicken breasts

2 teaspoons Italian blend seasoning

salt and pepper to taste

2 tablespoons butter

2 tablespoon olive oil

½ pound baby potatoes — halved or quartered as needed (they should be no larger than 1 inch pieces)

for the Dijon cream sauce

1 tablespoon butter

1 teaspoon minced garlic

1 cup chicken broth — I used low sodium

2 tablespoons Dijon mustard

1 cup heavy cream

½ teaspoon salt — or to taste

¼ teaspoon cracked black pepper — or to taste

DIRECTIONS:

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

Prepare the chicken and potatoes — Combine chicken and potatoes in a large bowl. Drizzle with 1 tablespoon olive oil, toss to coat, then season generously with salt and pepper, and the Italian seasoning blend.

In a large skillet, melt butter over medium heat. Drizzle in 1 tablespoon olive oil and give it a good stir.

Add chicken to one half of the pan, potatoes to the other half. Cook undisturbed for 3—4 minutes, flip chicken and cook for another 3—4 minutes till browned on both sides. Transfer chicken and potatoes to a plate and cover to keep warm.

Prepare the sauce

In the same skillet, melt butter over medium heat. Stir in garlic for 1 minute until fragrant.

Stir in chicken broth and Dijon mustard, then whisk in heavy cream, salt and pepper.

Put it together

Return chicken and potatoes to the pan, giving them a good toss in the sauce to keep them from drying out in the oven.

Transfer to a preheated oven and bake for 15—20 minutes until chicken is cooked through and potatoes are fork-tender.

Spoon Dijon sauce from the pan over the chicken and potatoes, garnish with freshly cracked black pepper and fresh herbs if desired, and serve.

NUTRITION:

Calories: 696    Carbs: 18g    Sodium: 1101mg     Fiber: 2g    Protein: 53g

TBS' 2025 Holiday Gift Guide

by TBS

Another year has passed. And, yes, the older you get, the faster it seems to do so!

This time, I made the choices based on products available in the U.S. Most of these are also available internationally, either on their native sites (e.g., Amazon), or can be shipped from the U.S. So, let's get into it:

Air Tracker Smart Tags Android & iOS-4 Packs,Dual System Bluetooth

Amazon    $28.72

Security is a must these days. To keep track of the children or the elderly, pets, luggage, keys, phones or other tech devices, or bikes, GPS trackers provide enhanced security.

From Amazon's website:

- Dual-System Compatibility for Wide Use: Seamlessly works with both iOS and Android devices. It supports Apple's well-known Find My app (exclusive to iOS) and Google's Find Hub (for Android), eliminating the need to repurchase a tracker when switching phone systems.

- 4-Pack Set for Multi-Scene Application: Each package includes 4 smart tracker tags, which can be used for frequently lost items such as keys, backpacks, and luggage at the same time.

- Secure Encryption for Privacy Protection:IP67 Water & Dust Resistance - Replaceable Battery 67-rated dustproof and waterproof design withstands rain, spills, and brief submersion (up to 3 ft / 1m deep), making it ideal for travel and outdoor use. (…features a user-replaceable coin-shaped CR2032 battery).

- Easy Operation for All: No complicated installation steps are required. Just turn on the mobile phone Bluetooth, download the corresponding app, and follow the guide to complete the tracker pairing for use. Even the elderly and children can easily master the basic item-finding operation.

soundcore by Anker P20i Wireless Bluetooth Headphones In-Ear, 10 mm Driver, Bluetooth 5.3, Adjustable EQ, 30 Hours Playtime, IPX5 Waterproof, 2 Micros with AI, Single Use (Black)

Amazon    $19.99

For those that want don't have the need for high-end headphones when outside, these headphones are a good choice at a more than reasonable price.

From Amazon's website:

- Powerful Bass: soundcore P20i true wireless earbuds have oversized 10mm drivers that deliver powerful sound with boosted bass so you can lose yourself in your favorite songs.

- Personalized Listening Experience: Use the soundcore app to customize the controls and choose from 22 EQ presets. With "Find My Earbuds", a lost earbud can emit noise to help you locate it.

- Long Playtime, Fast Charging: Get 10 hours of battery life on a single charge with a case that extends it to 30 hours. If P20i true wireless earbuds are low on power, a quick 10-minute charge will give you 2 hours of playtime.

- Portable On-the-Go Design: soundcore P20i true wireless earbuds and the charging case are compact and lightweight with a lanyard attached. It's small enough to slip in your pocket, or clip on your bag or keys–so you never worry about space.

- AI-Enhanced Clear Calls: 2 built-in mics and an AI algorithm work together to pick up your voice so that you never have to shout over the phone.

This should fit your needs for an affordable set of earbuds.

Electronic Organizer Travel Cable Accessories BagPouch Portable Waterproof Storage Bag Electronic Organizer Case for Cable, Mouse, USB Cable, Power Bank,Cord, Charger, Phone, Earphone

Amazon    $5.39

Another tip from Amazon. This one is a pouch for for USB cables and other accessories, which will help to keep your desk clean. It's also extremely useful on trips, where you have everything in one organized storage bag.

From the website:

- More than you think: electronic products, such as power bank, external hard disk, SD memory card, cable, headset, connector adapter, are also suitable for children/students' stationery, such as pens, pencils, fluorescent pens, gel pens and Eraser.

- This storage bag: Let you store without worry, bid farewell to messy, thoughtful grid layered design, refuse to wrap, neat and orderly, clear at a glance; Sandwich design prevents scratches on items, with a smooth zipper that can be pulled all the way; The edges and corners are three-dimensional and stylish, simple and stylish.

- Provide excellent protection for your items from dirt, scratches, dust, impact, falls, dampness, and accidental falls. Easy to clean.

Cosori Electric Kettle, No Plastic Filter & Spout, 1.8Qt Tea Kettle & Hot Water Boiler For Coffee & Tea, Water Heater & Teapot, Automatic Shut Off, Borosilicate glass, Black, 1500W

Amazon    $24.99

Since my mother and I moved to Germany in 1966, I've seen electric kettles in just about every household. These days, they seem to be catching on in the U.S. as well. They're quick to heat water, and much more energy-efficient than heating water on a stove.

From the website:

- Faster Than a Stovetop Kettle – Boils a full cup of water in under 3 minutes for less wait time

- Plastic-Free Spout & Filter—— Glass spout and stainless steel filter prevent boiling water from touching plastic when pouring

- Safe & Easy to Use—— Worry-free auto shut-off and boil-dry safety feature

- Great for tea, coffee, and quick meals

And now for something completely different.

Crockpot Meals Gift Basket - 4+ Servings Each | Easy Soup, Chili, & Beans, Gourmet Food Gift for Busy Families, Fast Meal Prep, Slow cooker

Etsy    $47.36

The description on the Etsy website says it best:

Looking for the perfect gift for your girlfriend, mother-in-law, sister, or anyone who loves to use their crock pot? Simplify any mealtime with our Crockpot Meals Gift Basket!

This curated collection of easy dinner kits is the perfect solution for new cooks, moms, busy families or anyone looking for wholesome and delicious meal options. Each crockpot meal basket includes a variety of dried meals, making it a fantastic food gift box for anyone who loves easy and convenient quick meal prep solutions. It's a gourmet food gift that takes the stress out of cooking!

Gourmet Nut Gift Basket – 9 Variety Assorted Nuts & Dried Fruit

Etsy    $29.95

Here's something to go nuts about.

From the website:

HEALTHY & DELICIOUS 9-VARIETY SNACK GIFT BASKET – We assorted 9 crunchy and tasty nuts and dried fruits for you, your family and loved ones. Our elegant and nutritious nuts gift box comes with Roasted Salted Nuts; California Pistachios, Cashews, Macadamia, Almonds, Toffee Peanuts, Honey Peanuts, Assorted Nuts, Corn Nuggets and Japanese Mixed Nuts.

Legendary Whitetails Men's Flannel Shirt Long Sleeve Button Down 100% Cotton

Amazon    $34.99

From the Amazon website:

Our original single pocket flannel - The Buck Camp Flannel Shirt is the perfect weight to wear alone or layered over a t-shirt or under a shirt jacket. The traditional style and signature corduroy details offer unmatched durability, while the relaxed fit and brushed cotton flannel provide ultimate comfort. With multiple exclusive plaids and solids, they're suitable for any occasion from the woods to the office. The Buck Camp Flannel Shirt gives you an incredible "bang for your buck"! Big & Tall sizes are designed for men over 6'2" and add 2" in body length and 1-1⁄2" in sleeve length.

Christmas Banquet Sampler

Wolferman's Bakery    $44.99

This one is an alternative to one of Meemaw's list by Wolferman's Bakery

A Christmas-themed box, that is best described on their website:

Celebrate the season deliciously. Inside this adorable holiday-themed gift box are three flavors of Wolferman's® super-thick English muffins. We've also included strawberry preserves to spread on for fruity goodness as well as raspberry-filled tree-cutout shortbread cookies.

- 1910 original recipe super-thick English muffins, 1 pkg. (4 muffins, 12.8 oz)

- San Francisco-style sourdough super-thick English muffins, 1 pkg. (4 muffins, 12.8 oz)

- Cinnamon raisin super-thick English muffins, 1 pkg. (4 muffins, 12.8 oz)

- 6 raspberry-filled tree-cutout shortbread cookies (0.77 oz each)

- Strawberry preserves (5 oz)

- Net Weight: 3 lb

Expandable Carry-On Suitcase

Quince    $169.90

Here's a tip for frequent travelers - an expandable carry-on suitcase.

From the website:

Now arriving: our Expandable Carry-On Suitcase. Ultra-light with a super sturdy polycarbonate shell, this carry-on packs it in with interior compression panels and a removable laundry bag for your dirty clothes. Breeze through the airport with smooth-gliding, high performance 360° spinner wheels, a TSA-approved lock, a handy telescopic handle, and YKK zippers.

PCLinuxOS Baseball Cap

PCLinuxOS Store on Cafe Press    $19.99

Show your appreciation for PCLinuxOS nad its creator Texstar with this awesome baseball cap. It's available in several colors to match your style.

The product details on the website:

Our casually comfortable baseball caps have all your bases covered. Bad hair day? Early morning coffee run? No problem. You’ll hit a fashion home run with our winning designs.

- Comfortable and stylish baseball hats made of 100% cotton

- Features metal slide adjuster on back

- Low-sitting brim and inside sweatband

- Baseball cap includes convenient ponytail opening

- Professionally printed with sharp and vivid designs that resist fading

- Hand wash and hang dry

- Imported for final manufacture locally

The PCLinuxOS Team wishes you a great Holiday Season!

Meemaw's 2025 Holiday Gift Guide

by Meemaw

Wow! Time has surely flown this year! The holidays are approaching much faster than I thought they would. I’ve been busy enjoying my family (another great-grandchild born in July and one more expected in January), making quilts for the great grandkids, and writing for the magazine (of course).

Now that the holidays are close, I have to figure out gifts for everyone, so I have many ideas, some of which I’m presenting here. All prices are in US dollars.

I generally go to Bits and Pieces to see what kind of gifts they have that might be a little different than what everyone else gives. The company started as a jigsaw puzzle company, but has branched out to include t-shirts and hats with funny sayings, wind spinners, tricks & puzzles and jigsaw puzzle supplies (storage mats and glue, in case you want to save it).

3D Jigsaw Puzzle    $10.99 — $19.99

According to Bits & Pieces — Piece together your very own vintage car. This classic car is a challenge that you can then display in your home. A great gift for your car crazed loved one. 42 pieces, 9-4/5" x 3-1/2" x 3-1/3". Ages 8+.

There are several 3D jigsaw puzzles — a car, a motorcycle, a ship, and a rooster, all made from wood.

Wine & Cheese Boards    $29.99

I’ve seen many charcuterie boards, but I think these are cool because they can interlock and make a big board, or you can buy 2 sets and have 4 boards for your guests to use for their own snacks.

According to Bits & Pieces — Upgrade your entertaining. These versatile interlocking bamboo boards can be cleverly pieced together for a stylish charcuterie or cheese board, or used separately for guests to hold their wine and appetizers. Smooth on one side and beveled on the other, they provide a secure and stylish serving options. Designed to conveniently hold a stemmed glass and appetizers with easy carry handle. Fabulous hostess, housewarming, or gift for those that love to entertain. Each board measures 11" long x 6-1/2" wide. Hand wash recommended. Set of two.

Herb Garden Markers    $19.99

I know many people who plant gardens, and they all mark each row as it’s planted. These are specifically for herbs. 7.75” x 1”. Set of 6 includes Basil, Cilantro, Rosemary, Dill Weed, Oregano, and Parsley.

Bass Pro Shops is a store that started out selling hunting supplies, but they, too, have branched out, and are now selling not only the hunting supplies, but clothing, home items and even toys. I bought a couple of really pretty shirts there last spring.

Yeti Insulated Cup    $24.00 — $70.00

Most of us have trouble keeping hydrated. I really like ice water, but some people drink tea, iced or hot. Bass Pro has a huge selection of Yeti cups in many sizes. I have two 20 oz. cups and each keeps ice in it for at least 12 hours after I add ice. I’m sure it will keep coffee or tea hot for a long time as well. The lid seals the cup well and doesn’t spill. Another lid holds a straw, if you would rather have one of those. Prices are partly determined by cup size. Yeti also makes coolers and other storage boxes that keep things cold or hot or are water-resistant.

Remote Control Car    $59.99

For the kids (or even adults!) who enjoy remote control toys, Bass Pro has a pretty good assortment. Features of this toy are:

- Stamped-metal, durable flex chassis

- Spring suspension system with oversized rubber tires

- 2.4GHz wireless technology deliver strong signal

- Full-Time 4-Wheel Drive

- Pistol-grip controller

- Left and right steering

- Forward and reverse

- 9.6V lithium-ion rechargeable battery

- Batteries included

- They also have boats, animals, and drones. Prices range from $29.99 to $69.99.

Cabela’s is another store that started with hunting & fishing gear, and then branched out.

Cabela’s Fleece Throw    $12.98 and up

They have a number of throws, some fleece, and some other materials. They even have some that are wearable. If it gets really cold in your area in the winter, you could probably find a use for 2 or 3 of these! I keep at least one in my living room, even in the summer, because some people don’t have their air conditioner set the same as mine, and some of my kids turn mine down if they have to stay for a while.

From their website — Add more supersoft, cozy comfort to your home with the White River Home™ Coral Fleece Throw. An ultrasoft and lightweight design, toss this throw blanket on a bed or fold it over the back of a couch for eye-catching style and easy-to-grab comfort. Measuring 50" x 60", this lightweight 100% polyester fleece blanket adds cozy comfort to any room. Machine wash. Imported.

- 100% polyester

- Supersoft, cozy comfort for any room

- Machine wash

The one pictured above was in the “Bargain Cave” so it might not be available for long. However, there are several different designs.

Everyone uses Amazon. It always seems to have some items you don’t see anywhere else. They also seem to have the largest collection of whatever you’re looking for.

Christmas Tree Collar    $36.99 — $61.99

Many people have Christmas Tree Skirts to put over the bottom of the tree and the frame that it sits in. This is a different design which covers everything. The pieces hook together, and it is taller to cover a lot more (maybe also to keep the cat from getting under the tree).

From the site: “This Christmas tree collar made of natural seagrass offers long-term durability and a beautiful rustic touch to your festive Christmas decoration.”

This comes in four colors and three sizes, so you can get what matches your decor, or get several.

Lego Motorized Lighthouse    $299.95

Lego has really branched out as well! You can get some sort of Lego set for anywhere from $5.00 to $500.00. Some of them have the larger blocks for smaller children (so they can’t swallow them) but most have the normal-sized blocks. They have branched out, so now there are sets for many of the major movies. In addition to that, they have a botanicals section, which has flower bouquets and bonsai trees, and several adult sets, which are architecture or vehicles or even robots. I have a couple of friends who collect Lego sets (I have a long stemmed red rose in my living room).

Wooden Blocks    $14.49

With great-grandchildren in the family, and one on the way, I always think about toys, and hope the toys I get for them will foster imagination and creativity and help them learn. Some of the basics are best, and a lot of times I go back to simple wooden blocks. This is a 100-piece set, which comes in a sturdy cardboard box with a carrying handle.

Wolferman’s is a store that’s been popular in my area, partly because it was started in Kansas City, Missouri, not far from me, and partly because their food is really good. They have pastries, cookies, English muffins, teas, and meats. They started with English muffins, and still have the option to select several kinds of muffins to send to someone, and include tea or jelly in the gift box.

Winter Sweets Gift Box    $29.99

Gift boxes can have a particular theme (like birthday or Christmas) and certain foods. This one has cookies and candies.

From the site: “Bring a smile to anyone’s face with a sampling of gourmet goodies. Featuring favorites from some of the best companies in gifting, we’ve included a milk chocolate truffle and irresistible milk chocolate Moose Munch® Premium Popcorn from Harry & David, chocolate tartlets from Jolie Patisserie, and a milk chocolate-covered pretzel from Chocolate Works. Arriving in a beautiful box with a heartfelt message on the inside, this indulgent gift is a special way to please everyone in your circle.”

Ham Brunch Banquet    $109.99

Here’s everything you might need for a beautiful brunch for up to 6 people.

From the site: “Fill your feasting table with an array of sumptuous gourmet delights with our Ham Brunch Banquet. Enjoy a mouthwatering sliced ham with honey glaze and a flavorful triple cheese and caramelized onion quiche-both arrive precooked and ready to heat and serve. We've also included multi-grain honey traditional English muffins and triple berry preserves for toasty treats to serve on the side.”

Hopefully you have found something in your price range that is the perfect gift for someone you care about.

From all of us at the PCLinuxOS Magazine, we wish you a very joyful holiday season!

Paul's 2025 Holiday Gift Guide

by Paul Arnote (parnote)

Holy moley! I can’t believe it’s already time for The PCLinuxOS Magazine’s annual Holiday Gift lists. With these gift lists, you’ll find at least 30 items, curated and selected by us at The PCLinuxOS Magazine, to help you find appropriate and welcomed gifts for just about every adult on your gift list.

As in years past, we’ve tried to select items we think our readers will be interested in. We’ve also tried to target items in a wide range of budgets, so even our readers with more limited funds should be able to find things that they can afford.

As usual, all prices are expressed in U.S. dollars. Items on our lists are/were available at the time that they were added to our individual gift lists. We cannot, thanks to international trade regulations and barriers, guarantee that all items will be available to residents outside of the U.S. However, you should feel free to use our “suggestions” to find a suitable replacement item that is available in your region.

So, without further ado, here is my holiday gift list for 2025.

Brother DCP-L2640DW Wireless Compact Monochrome Laser Multifunction Printer

Newegg.com        $224.01

I actually have and use this printer with PCLinuxOS. I got myself this printer within the past year to replace an aging (and failing) Samsung laser printer (Samsung stopped making printers YEARS ago, and sold their printer division to HP). With this laser printer, I can scan documents, use it as a copy machine, or just print documents. What I love about this printer is that it has an Ethernet port on the back, since my printer is attached directly to one of my network routers. (Walmart sells a similar model cheaper, but it lacks the Ethernet port). Its paper tray holds half of a ream of paper (a ream of paper is 500 sheets, meaning this printer holds 250 sheets), so paper refills are less frequent. The printer also has a manual feed slot for envelopes and stickers (or specialty paper). It prints at a pretty decent 36 pages per minute, and with a maximum printer resolution of 1200 x 1200 dpi. Toner cartridge refills are quite affordable, and last for a generous amount of page prints (I tend to keep at least one … most often two … in “reserve” and ready to go). I typically use the 830XL toner cartridge, which is the high-capacity toner cartridge. I have yet to go through even my first toner cartridge since getting it several months ago. Brother has GREAT support for Linux, so installing the printer drivers was super easy and painless. My printer was up and running in under 15 minutes when I initially set it up.

Logitech MK270 Wireless Keyboard And Mouse Combo, 2.4 GHz Wireless, Compact Mouse, 8 Multimedia And Shortcut Keys, For PC, Laptop - Black

Newegg.com        $16.00

This is another item I use with PCLinuxOS. Specifically, I use it with my HTPC (Home Theater PC), which also runs PCLinuxOS. A single USB dongle receives data from both the keyboard and mouse, freeing up at least one USB port on your computer. I have the USB dongle plugged into a USB 2.0 port, since keyboards and mice don’t typically need the increased throughput that a USB 3.x port provides, and it works perfectly. Battery life for both the keyboard and mouse are quite good (lengthened considerably if you turn the power switch off on both devices when they are not in use). I typically only have to change the batteries in both devices (I tend to change them at the same time) once a year. The keyboard is very responsive, as is the mouse. This is one of my favorite “accessories” that I purchased for my HTPC. I can sit back and control everything about my HTPC from my recliner, free from hassling with cords. (Note that the price listed above may or may not be a sale price at the time I am writing this article. I wasn’t completely sure. But, even if it’s not on sale, its “regular” price of $25.00 is still a great buy!)

D-Link NT COVR-C1202 AC1200 Whole Home Wi-Fi System (2pk)

Newegg.com        $49.99

The perfect fit for your modern home, the D-Link Covr blankets every square inch of your home with high-speed AC1200 dual-band Wi-Fi. Using Mesh technology, this dual-pack Covr kit creates a single, unified Wi-Fi network that covers up to 3,500sq.ft, and your device automatically switches to the strongest Covr unit when you move around in your home — so there's no need to manually connect to different SSIDs. The dual-band operation delivers wireless speeds of 300Mbps on the 2.4GHz and 866Mbps on the 5GHz band for a total of 1,166Mbps throughput. The intuitive mobile app allows quick, easy setup and comprehensive monitoring with parent control that protect your kids from excessive network use and inappropriate online content. This router’s other features include Dual-band AC1200 MU-MIMO, scalable seamless Mesh wireless network, supports wired dedicated backhaul, smart roaming & steering, 2x3 internal antennas produce optimal range and connectivity, coverage up to 3,500sq.ft (2-pack), and home-friendly design with interchangeable color plates.

Team Group CX2 2.5" 1TB SATA III 3D NAND Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

Newegg.com        $69.99

Are you looking to speed up an aging laptop? This will address one of the biggest “bottlenecks” in your computer’s hardware: the spinning rust hard drive. The 1 TB capacity provides more than ample room for your operating system AND all of your files. The advanced SLC Caching algorithm technology makes its read/write speed easily 4 times faster than traditional hard drives. The CX2 with innovative and bold design uses FLASH technology with low power consumption and high-speed transfer features. It is the best choice for replacing traditional hard drives. I have used SSDs from TEAM Group with absolutely zero issues or problems. Most of all, every computer I’ve installed them in has resulted in vastly improved performance, thanks to the far superior throughputs from a SSD compared to a traditional hard drive.

AI Hand Warmers Rechargeable 2 Pack, AI Smart Chips Electric Hand Warmers, 20Hrs Long Safe Heat, Portable Pocket Heater

Amazon.com        $17.99

This set of 2 symmetrical hand warmers can be combined into a palm-sized hand heater, providing 360-degree warmth for your hands. Alternatively, you can use them separately, each hand holding one, or share one hand warmers with a family. The portable pocket design is suitable for travel, hunting, golf, hiking, camping, skiing, and more. The UNIHAND hand warmers feature an integrated intelligent AI temperature control chip, offering 3 levels of precise heat release control, feedback, and guidance. By continuously analyzing and recognizing the temperature between the hand warmer and your hands, it ensures precise heat control for optimal comfort and safe heating. Maximum of 130 ℉ (54.4 °C). These hand warmers provide longer lasting warmth, and thanks to our AI smart chip, these electric hand warmers provide you with up to 8.5-20 hours of warmth during the chilly winter. It effortlessly caters to your entire day's needs. The 3-level indicator lights keep you informed about remaining battery power and heating status, perfectly addressing your diverse requirements. The included type C charging cable can quickly charge the hand warmer.

Bluetooth Bone Conduction Headphones, Open-Ear Design, Sweatproof & Waterproof, HD Stereo Sound, 10Hrs Playtime, Lightweight

Amazon.com        $25.99

I’m probably like a lot of people. I have a fairly decent collection of Bluetooth headphones and earpieces. But, until recently, I had never tried the bone conduction Bluetooth headphones. To say that I was blown away by the experience would be an understatement. The sound quality is phenomenal, while allowing me the best experience with hearing all the things going on around me. With bone conduction headphones, there is nothing in your ear canal, enabling you to hear everything going on around you, without unduly distracting from the sound you are hearing through the headphones. These headphones offer up a generous 10 hours of continuous playing time on a single charge. Plus, you can use these to talk on your connected phone. And, at this price, you could do a lot worse with headphones that cost two, three, or even four times the cost of these. Not only are these comfortable to wear all day long, but they are also sweatproof and waterproof, making them a good choice to wear in all types of weather, as well as on your workouts.

DARKBEAM Bike Headlight Rechargeable USB-C, Bicycle Lights 4000LM Ultra Bright, Mountain Bike Light Set for Night Riding, 6+5 Mode Waterproof Front Bike Light & Rear Light for Road, Cycling

Amazon.com        $14.99

I’m an avid bicyclist, so this bike light set really piques my interest. Especially with the days growing shorter (in terms of available daylight), those late afternoon bike rides that I like to go on have a much higher potential of ending up when it’s getting dark. The last thing I want is to have to finish my ride up in utter darkness. This lightweight, rechargeable bike light set is an affordable solution. Do not hesitate to use this 6-Mode bike headlight to enjoy wider visibility and 5-Mode taillight to ensure your safety when you are on night cycling or outdoor adventures. Good for outdoor cycling and emergency back-up! This bike headlight has 6 modes, and is USB-C Rechargeable. The six lighting modes bike light (strong light broad, low light broad, high spotlight, low spotlight, strong light full light, flash) are available to serve your various needs, with up to 4–8 hours of battery life. With 4 LEDs power indicator, you would clearly know the power status anytime to minimize the inconvenience of sudden shutdown. Easily charged by mobile power or any USB device. This bike light set has an aluminum housing, is super sturdy, dustproof and waterproof, ensuring the bike light kit can work properly in rainy and foggy days on both city and country roads. A special heat dissipation shell quickly dissipates heat, fully protecting the battery life, ensuring the lights can be used for a long time. One-touch quick release installation, with no tools required.

PCLinuxOS Men's Value T-Shirt

PCLinuxOS Store on Cafe Press $30.49

What a way to bring joy to any PCLinuxOS user on your holiday gift list! This custom t-shirt makes a PERFECT gift. This short-sleeve midweight fabric T-shirt is comfortable, economical and made to last. Designed with a traditional fit that runs true to size, he’ll show off his personality, humor, and interests with an easy, relaxed style. This comfortable t-Shirt is made of 100% preshrunk cotton (gray colors are made of a cotton/polyester blend). Your choice of 15 different color t-shirts, with the PCLinuxOS logo emblazoned on the front. Double-needle stitched bottom and hems for extra durability. Crewneck t-shirts professionally printed with sharp, vivid designs that resist fading. Designed for the cost-conscious shopper. Machine wash cold with like colors, inside/out, then tumble dry low. A portion of the proceeds go towards supporting the continued development of PCLinuxOS.

PCLinuxOS 15 oz. Ceramic Large Mug

PCLinuxOS Store on Cafe Press        $26.54

The unique PCLinuxOS-branded ceramic coffee mugs will soon be your new favorite way to consume hot or cold beverages. Large mug size: 15 oz. capacity, 4.5” tall x 3.25” diameter; choice of all-white or with a color handle and interior. It’s like having 2+ cups of coffee, all in one cup (a cup of coffee is typically 6 oz.) There are six color options to choose from. This mug has durable ceramic construction with an easy-grip handle, and a scratch-resistant finish. This coffee mug is ideal for both hot and cold beverages. Images are produced in vivid color and guaranteed not to fade. Microwave safe. Wash up by hand, or in the dishwasher on the top shelf. A portion of the proceeds go towards supporting the continued development of PCLinuxOS.

Donate To Fund PCLinuxOS Development

Stripe.com        Any Amount

If you’re at a loss for what to get the PCLinuxOS user on your holiday gift list, why not make a donation in the name of your PCLinuxOS user to help fund the future development of PCLinuxOS?! PCLinuxOS doesn’t have any millionaire or billionaire backers, and no corporate sponsors. Nope. PCLinuxOS exists because of one man’s (Texstar’s) vision to create a version of Linux that is easy to use for all computer users. PCLinuxOS is Texstar’s only “job.” Besides supporting Texstar to keep developing PCLinuxOS, your donations also help to offset the “other” costs associated with running and maintaining a Linux distro … like server costs (no, just like in life generally, those don’t come for free, either).

Summary

There you have it. These are my 10 holiday gift ideas for that PCLinuxOS user on your holiday gift list.

Be sure to check out the holiday gift ideas from Meemaw and tbs. I’m certain that, between all 30 suggestions, you will be able to find something truly special for that PCLinuxOS user on your holiday gift list.

And finally, from all of us here at The PCLinuxOS Magazine, we’d like to wish y’all the happiest, merriest holiday season!

Why PCLinuxOS?

by Artim

It’s not on almost any list of Linux distros that are “beginner-friendly.” It’s not popular on Distrowatch (it’s #31 as I write this). It’s called “the Boomer distro,” so it should have no appeal at all to a kid like me at face value. There’s no anime/manga version, no Star Wars edition, no special Gaming edition, no sports edition, nothing to help me improve my chances of making the Varsity baseball team or getting a girlfriend that isn’t taller than me. Besides, the command line terrifies me, and I’m not technically inclined at all. But I can’t afford a Mac or a new PC, and the laptops they issue at school are full of intrusive spyware meant to keep us from cheating, but they also watch and listen and record stuff that is none of the school’s business.

I could do like almost every other high school kid and just use a phone or a tablet, and not bother with a traditional computer for anything but required school work. But the same things apply: They’re intrusive, monitored, hackable, and dangerous. I even had a creepy stalker using my own phone against my better interests. The sabotage was discovered when I brought the phone to the shop to get something fixed. Sorry, kids, but a phone or tablet is not a good substitute for a good desktop or laptop computer. Besides, we may as well learn how to use them because almost any place we go to work when we grow up still uses computers for darn near everything.

So I got this hand-me-down computer that had some old version of Windows on it, but to upgrade the OS would cripple the computer. It takes a billion terabytes of RAM and a dozen or more quad-core positronic processors to run Windows even at idle anymore. But there must be some way I can use that old desktop, so I searched around and discovered Linux.

Skip ahead two years now, because I could bore my readers to death with distro-hopping stuff, and you all have probably heard those stories too many times already. Suffice it to say that my requirements by this time have narrowed down to some fairly specific things, having learned from my distro-hopping and research. Only one distro meets them all. So let me share why I chose PCLinuxOS.

Independence: PCLinuxOS is not derived from some “upstream” big corporate OS, nor is it owned and distributed by a big company with a profit motive and software to make it profitable financially. No shareholders, advertisers, or corporate bosses to answer to. No added stuff to suggest “software you might like” or “gizmos and gadgets to make your life better.”

Rolling-release! I’ve heard all the warnings about trading stability for the convenience of installing the OS once and just updating regularly. Those warnings are probably applicable to big bleeding-edge distros like Arch or Debian Sid, but PCLinuxOS is a community-driven distro with volunteers who test new software before it finds its way to the repositories, and forums that I can check before updating to see if there have been any surprises. So far, none that apply to me as a Xfce user with little use for fancy software that designs cars and buildings, plots your horoscope or tells you what your dreams mean. No AI for this boy either (I’m as scared of AI as I am of the command line).

No systemd! Yes, that matters even to a user like me, who shouldn’t ordinarily care about the unseen inner workings of an operating system. But “One Ring to Rule Them All” software that intrudes into every little thing and keeps reports on it; makes changes I didn’t ask for; and regulates, governs, allocates, manages, supervises, and enforces “policies” I didn’t choose is too unnerving to allow. I might expect a voice to come over the speaker like HAL: “I’m sorry, Artim, but I can’t do that.”

Bing Image Creator

Repositories at your service: There’s a special little section of the Forums where any user can request some software that isn’t in the repositories, even if it’s available as a Flatpak or AppImage. I found Betterbird (a soft fork of Thunderbird) in the repositories! That is especially awesome because Flatpaks take up a lot of space by default, and space is at a premium on my old hard-disk drive. Someone actually packaged it just for this distro! There are probably a lot more titles in there that you wouldn’t find so quickly and easily accessible in another distro.

Point-and-click simple! Cool tools I used to rely on in other distros can all be found in PCLinuxOS, including one that can make a bootable copy of your existing system: MyLiveUSB. Portability, reliability, and simplicity are all here in multiple tools to customize and simplify both the computer and its peripherals. I can play with docks and widgets and gadgets and if/when I mess up, assuming Timeshift doesn’t work as expected, I can simply go back to the last USB copy of my customized OS and reinstall it.

Community Editions: Whether you’re into KDE, MATE, LXQt, old LXDE, Xfce, or just a window manager like Openbox, there’s probably a community edition of PCLinuxOS made just for you. There’s even a Debian edition, although the reason for it escapes me.

Non-political: I don’t know how it ever became “a thing,” but some Linux distros and Free and Open Source Software (hereafter: FOSS) developers actually put it in writing on their website that if you’re not of a particular political persuasion you are requested not to use their OS or software (can I mention names? Okay, just one: ElementaryOS). No one in the PCLinuxOS community cares if you’re this or that or vote this way or that. The focus is on great software, not trying to change anyone’s mind or opinion about things and people who have little or nothing to do with software.

Bing Image Creator

Users are not Guinea Pigs: Even though it’s a rolling release, there’s little to none of the beta-quality, experimental stuff in an ordinarily maintained copy of PCLinuxOS. The Unpardonable Sin of too-many “beginner-friendly” Linux distributions is that of making end-users unwitting Beta-testers! Even one of the most respected, ageless distros of the past is re-writing essential core utilities and such in Rust just because that’s the latest craze. But it’s buggy, incomplete, and experimental in spite of great promise. PCLinuxOS doesn’t go along with the latest, coolest, most bleeding-edge stuff with near-religious fervor like we have seen with crappy software like systemd and now Rust. Give it time, let it prove it’s worth, but don’t experiment on our users! It’s against the Geneva Convention and the Nuremberg trials or something to experiment on people without their fully-informed consent. PCLinuxOS doesn’t play like that.

A Bright Future: PCLinuxOS is not a “one-man distro” any more than the Linux project is a one-man kernel. Both have one project leader, and both have whole teams of people who work on various aspects of the project. While we all hope Tex lives forever and keeps up his role in PCLinuxOS, he’s hardly alone in the work behind the scenes. If the worst happens, our favorite distro will go on even with the raw, gaping hole of Tex’s absence to deal with. The community will keep the OS going and true to the vision and purpose Tex had in mind from the start: Independent, free, simple, stable, rolling, community-driven quality.

Tip Top Tips: How To Make Your Monitor Remember Your Preferred Brightness Level

Editor’s Note: Tip Top Tips is a semi-monthly column in The PCLinuxOS Magazine. Periodically, we will feature – and possibly even expand upon – one tip from the PCLinuxOS forum. The magazine will not accept independent tip submissions specifically intended for inclusion in the Tip Top Tips column. Rather, if you have a tip, share it in the PCLinuxOS forum’s “Tips & Tricks” section. Occasionally, we may run a “tip” posted elsewhere in the PCLinuxOS forum. Either way, share your tip in the forum, and it just may be selected for publication in The PCLinuxOS Magazine.

This month’s tip is from yogi.

Image by Clker-Free-Vector-Images from Pixabay

In the old forum, there was an issue regarding the monitor not remembering the brightness setting on boot. To fix this issue, open the file /etc/rc.d/rc.local as root, and add this line at the end:

echo 1 > /sys/class/backlight/acpi_video0/brightness

The number you put after echo is your preferred brightness level. If this fails, you can use xbacklight, and then add this line to auto start commands:

xbacklight -set 10

Keep in mind that xbacklight rounds numbers, so 5 to 14 would be rounded to 10.

The Death Of Windows 10: It's Worse Than You Think

by Alessandro Ebersol (Agent Smith)

On October 14, 2025, Microsoft ended support for Windows 10. Now, the notable mention here is that at least 40% of computers worldwide still run Windows 10 and will not upgrade to version 11. That’s because they do not meet the requirements (the TPM 2.0 module, among others, which we will see below).

The requirements are so high that, according to a survey by Lansweeper, only 44.4% of computers in use in companies meet Microsoft's requirements for the new operating system.

Windows 11: Now you'll need a nuclear power plant to run it!

So, what are the requirements for Windows 11? Let's take a look:

Intel Core processor above 7th generation; 7th-gen Core i7-7500U “Kaby Lake” does not meet the requirements.

AMD Ryzen 2000 processor and above, meaning all machines manufactured in 2017. 2017, 8 years ago, powerful machines capable enough to run any operating system. But not Windows 11. After all, Microsoft cares about the security of its customers, right? Right? Of course not.

Not to mention the TPM 2.0 module, which was a standard that Microsoft launched in 2015. That is, 10 years ago.

But first, let's analyze what it means to migrate to Windows 11, and then analyze what personal computing under the domain of TPM 2.0 might mean.

Windows 11: Pay to get in, pray to get out

Well, let's say you have a computer that meets the requirements for Windows 11, an Intel CPU above the 7th generation or AMD above Ryzen 2000, and a chip or TPM 2.0 module. The next step would be to purchase a license for Windows 11 and install it. The prices, in dollars, are:

• Windows 11 Home: $139.99.

• Windows 11 Pro: $199.99.

Now, after purchasing a copy of Windows 11 and ensuring your computer meets all the requirements, you will need to follow these steps to install it:

- You must have an active internet connection; Windows 11 no longer allows local accounts on the computer.

- You need a registered Microsoft account to log in to your computer. There are methods to install Windows 11 locally, but these methods violate the Windows 11 EULA.

Well, let's say you managed to install Windows 11 normally, with a remote account, and were able to log into your computer with your Microsoft account. So far, so good. Right after installation, Windows 11 will encrypt your computer's hard drive with Bitlocker (Microsoft's encryption technology).

All in the name of security... Again, it is possible to install Windows 11 without disk encryption, but again, with methods that bypass the official installation mode, and which may violate the Windows 11 EULA.

But that's not all. With Windows 11, Microsoft encourages users to use One Drive, its cloud storage service, in several ways:

- Full-screen pop-up. A pop-up prompting users to back up their files with OneDrive appears when Windows 11 starts up.

- Automatic folder backup. OneDrive automatically backs up desktop folders as soon as a Microsoft account is linked, which can clutter up your desktop and exceed the 5 GB free storage limit.

- Integration with File Explorer. OneDrive has its own home page in Windows 11 File Explorer, where users can monitor sync status and storage usage in real time.

Again, there are ways to prevent One Drive from taking control of your personal computer's hard drive, but they involve methods that circumvent the official installation measures.

What a wonderful operating system Windows 11 is... Integrated with Microsoft's cloud services. A technological marvel, what could go wrong? Everything, as we will see below.

With Windows 11, your computer is no longer yours... And neither are your files.

As we saw above, Windows 11 forces disk encryption and Microsoft cloud as backup/additional storage. Encryption with Bitlocker is the icing on the cake, and it only makes something that wasn't very good to begin with even worse. I searched the internet and found many results from users angry about their disks being corrupted with Bitlocker. To test this out, I asked an AI if Bitlocker was as bad as my research had shown. And the AI replied that no, it was an industry standard used worldwide, etc. Well, it's kind of like flying in an airplane: it's the safest means of transportation there is, but when a plane crashes, everyone dies. And no one wants to lose their most precious data in a file system corruption.

But don't worry: With OneDrive, your personal data will be safe in the Microsoft cloud…

Except that's not quite how it works.

The perverse scheme of Windows 11: Users are held hostage by Microsoft

Now, One Drive comes with 5GB of free storage. But 5GB of data is nothing. No one has only 5GB of personal files that are truly valuable. People have much more than that. Of course, additional disk sizes have different plans, which are obviously larger and more expensive.

So, the user pays for the Windows 11 license... And then spends the rest of their life paying Microsoft to back up their data that Microsoft itself encrypted and, due to some spurious failure, the file system may be corrupted, or the access key may be lost, rendering the system useless.

Yes... Windows 11 is the first Microsoft operating system that comes with ransomware pre-installed. What an innovation!!! And we haven't even touched on TPM 2.0 yet!!!

But, frankly, all these security “measures” are what is known as Security Washing.

Security Washing: Taking placebos as if they were medicine

The term “Security Washing” is a concept that describes the practice of a company or organization promoting or exaggerating the effectiveness of its security measures in such a way that the result is more of a marketing benefit than real and substantial protection for the user.

It is a direct analogy to the term Greenwashing (when companies exaggerate their ecological practices).

In the context of Windows 11, TPM, and BitLocker, the argument of “Security Washing” manifests itself when:

- Microsoft sells TPM 2.0 as the pinnacle of security, but the main goal is to standardize hardware and accelerate PC replacement (business objectives), using security only as a justification.

- Encryption is enabled by default, giving users the impression that their data is secure, but the default configuration (without a pre-boot PIN) is still vulnerable to physical side-channel attacks. (Like the cold boot attack).

In short, security washing is the act of replacing real security with convincing security rhetoric.

And again, I researched, with the help of AI, what remote boot time attacks exist. And this is what the AI replied: Statistically, there is no boot time attack if the attacker does not have physical access to the machine.

Consequently, all the security makeup that Windows 11 now presents is just that: makeup. Or, as the AI itself wrote, "Windows 11 promotes TPM and BitLocker as the cutting edge of security. However, this security is an illusion against real threats. In practice, it is a compliance tool for businesses and an effective barrier only against opportunistic thieves, while serving Microsoft's purpose of accelerating the sale of new hardware under the guise of security."

What about TPM 2.0? Let's see.

TPM 2.0: More smoke and mirrors

What is TPM (Trusted Platform Module)? A Trusted Platform Module (TPM) is a secure cryptoprocessor that implements the ISO/IEC 11889 standard. Common uses are to verify that the boot process is initiated from a trusted combination of hardware and software and to store disk encryption keys.

The first version of TPM deployed was 1.1b in 2003.

The Trusted Platform Module (TPM) was designed by a computer industry consortium called the Trusted Computing Group (TCG). This consortium was initially formed by companies such as Intel, AMD, IBM, Microsoft, and Cisco. It evolved into the TPM Core Specification Version 1.2, which was standardized by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) in 2009 as ISO/IEC 11889:2009. The TPM Core Specification Version 1.2 was finalized on March 3, 2011, completing its review.

Version 2.0, which Windows 11 requires, was released in 2015.

Now, let's reflect a little on all this, shall we?

An Inconvenient Truth: All this security theater is just theater

As we saw above, all the requirements for Windows 11 (UEFI secure boot, TPM 2.0, remote accounts) were not designed to improve the lives of ordinary Windows users, but to increase Microsoft's power over these users and make them increasingly dependent. And now we will look at the flaws and debatable points of these technologies:

- Increase in Electronic Waste (E-Waste): The requirement for specific hardware (TPM 2.0) in machines that are not that old and are fully capable of running the operating system (Windows 11) forces the disposal of millions of computers.

- Software-Enforced Obsolescence: By establishing an artificial compatibility barrier, TPM 2.0 acts as a mechanism for planned obsolescence. Functional machines become “useless” or “unsafe” by software decree, forcing users and companies to purchase new hardware, which contradicts the principles of the Circular Economy and digital sustainability.

- Entry Barrier: The requirement limits who can and cannot install an operating system, creating a hardware barrier unprecedented in the Windows world and making life difficult for users who have paid for the software.

- Update and Support Restrictions: Computers that do not meet the requirement, even if they manage to bypass the installation, may be excluded from future updates, especially security updates. Microsoft may thus exempt itself from responsibility for these machines, forcing migration.

- Boot Control: In conjunction with Secure Boot, TPM 2.0 makes it difficult or impossible for users to run unauthorized operating systems or modify firmware (BIOS), limiting autonomy for diagnostic purposes or the use of alternative systems (such as Linux distributions).

Other than that, there are other issues related to these TPM-based security schemes:

The TrueCrypt disk encryption utility, as well as its derivative VeraCrypt, do not support TPM. The original developers of TrueCrypt are of the opinion that the sole purpose of TPM is to “protect against attacks that require the attacker to have administrator privileges or physical access to the computer.”

An attacker with physical or administrative access to a computer can bypass the TPM, for example, by installing a hardware keylogger, resetting the TPM, or capturing the memory contents and recovering the keys issued by the TPM. The TrueCrypt/VeraCrypt team has produced a damning report on the subject, going so far as to claim that the TPM is completely redundant. The editor of VeraCrypt reproduced the original claim without any changes, except for replacing “TrueCrypt” with “VeraCrypt.” The author is correct in stating that, after gaining unrestricted physical access or administrative privileges, it is only a matter of time before other security measures in place are circumvented. In other words, as I wrote above, for an attacker with physical access to the machine, all these security measures are useless and superfluous.

Of course, for a corporate environment, these measures have their raison d'être. But for general-purpose computing, home computing, and education, these measures are more of a hindrance than a help. Again, I asked the AI to list domestic situations where security measures are useless.

There is criticism from both the Open Source (BSD) and Free Software (GNU Linux) communities.

In 2015, Richard Stallman suggested replacing the term “trusted computing” with the term “treacherous computing,” due to the danger that the computer could be programmed to systematically disobey its owner if the cryptographic keys are kept secret. He also considers that the TPMs available for PCs in 2015 are not currently dangerous and that there is no reason not to include one in a computer or support it in software due to the industry's failed attempts to use this technology for DRM, but that the TPM 2.0 released in 2022 is precisely the threat of “treacherous computing” that he had warned about.

Linus Torvalds also expressed his dissatisfaction in 2023, frustrated with AMD's fTPM bugs, saying, “Let's just disable this hwrnd fTPM crap.” He said that CPU-based random number generation, rdrand, was equally adequate, despite also having its bugs.

On the BSD side, the FreeBSD community sees TPM 2.0 not as a necessary advancement, but as a lock-in mechanism that attempts to impose an external and opaque root of trust, undermining the principles of transparency, sovereignty, and total user control that are the foundation of an open-source operating system like FreeBSD. They prefer security solutions that are fully inspectable in the kernel.

However, it gets worse. Much worse with Remote Attestation.

Remote Attestation: Big Brother Microsoft will always be watching you

Remote Attestation is a cryptographic process by which a device proves, in a reliable and tamper-proof manner, that it is operating in an expected software and hardware state, free from malicious manipulation. How does remote attestation work? Let's take a look:

TPM is the essential component for this to work, as it is the unalterable “root of trust”:

- Boot Measurement: During the computer startup process, the TPM measures (creates a cryptographic hash) of each software component that is loaded: firmware (BIOS), bootloader, operating system, and drivers.

- Registration: TPM stores these hashes in Platform Configuration Records (PCRs), which are protected and cannot be altered by external software.

- The Remote Challenge: A remote server (the “remote”), such as one from Microsoft, a bank, or a company, sends a cryptographic challenge to the PC.

- The Proof (Attestation): TPM uses its internal keys (unique and protected) to cryptographically sign the hashes stored in the PCRs and sends this proof back to the remote server.

- Verification: The remote server compares the signature and hashes received with a set of expected values (“hashes known to be good”).

The Result:

- If the hashes match: The server trusts that the machine is secure and allows access to the resource (e.g., login, online service).

- If the hashes do not match: The server detects that the boot has been tampered with (e.g., a rootkit has been injected, the bootloader has been altered, or the user has installed an unauthorized operating system) and denies access.

However, the worst is yet to come:

- With the mandatory requirement for Microsoft accounts, Microsoft becomes the gatekeeper of the user's computing life. In other words, you will only be able to use your computer if Microsoft allows you to. And what's worse: with all the telemetry in Windows 11, Microsoft will know everything you do online or on your computer. Goodbye privacy and anonymity...

But I use PCLinuxOS!!! For me, these Microsoft things have no effect!!!

That's where you're wrong. As this “security” scheme (TPM+UEFI) has become an industry standard, the new normal is that all computers come with these useless and superfluous devices, at least for home users. And, obviously, with all these restrictions, it will become increasingly difficult to use any operating system other than the one that comes factory-installed with the machine.

Thus, open and free computing will become a niche, which only people who understand the dangers of all this control by big tech over users will be part of. And everything that belongs to niches is usually expensive and scarce.

Is there any hope? We will see below.

China could be the savior. Believe it!

Computers manufactured in China cannot use the TPM module, due to the risk of a massive attack on the country's computing infrastructure.

Computers sold to the West may come with TPM modules and all the UEFI kludge, but only to meet the requirements of Western markets. If you can buy computers that are sold domestically in China, the so-called gray market, it is a great solution for free personal computing. China has its own encryption module standard, the TCM (Trusted Cryptography Module), but it does not come with computers sold outside the country.

China understands well the danger that these measures represent, but unfortunately, here in the West, there are not many people/organizations that are aware of the inherent harms of this “security” scheme. Fortunately, the usual suspects have spoken out, and as always, they do not disappoint:

• Free Software Foundation (FSF)

The FSF (and its founder, Richard Stallman) has been one of the most vocal and consistent critics. Main criticism: UEFI Secure Boot (and, by extension, TPM) is seen as “tivoization” (a term referring to hardware restriction) that poses a direct threat to software freedom.

• Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF)

The EFF (which focuses on digital rights and privacy) criticizes these mechanisms from the perspective of user freedom and corporate control. Main Criticism: The EFF has expressed concerns that TPM and Secure Boot, while promoting security, can be used to restrict hardware usage and create barriers that limit what end users can do with their own computers (which aligns perfectly with your article's thesis).

• The BSD Community (FreeBSD, OpenBSD, NetBSD)

BSD distributions, known for their focus on open source, stability, and security, have also voiced criticism, albeit often more technical and pragmatic. Main criticism: The difficulty and complexity imposed by Secure Boot and the lack of native support. The focus is more on the difficult implementation and the need to manage keys to ensure that their systems can boot.

Final Words

Friends, I was very moved when writing this article. I have been using computers since 1983, when I received a clone of the English ZX 81 as a birthday present. Since then, I have been increasingly amazed by the evolution and capabilities of computers. However, for the past 20 years or so, I have been increasingly disappointed with the direction things are taking. Computers will become useless pieces of equipment that do not serve their owners, but rather serve manufacturers, who will use them as tools of oppression and extortion of the general public. And I am not the only one raising these concerns: Criticism of the TPM 2.0 and UEFI Secure Boot requirements does not come only from frustrated users. Organizations such as the Free Software Foundation (FSF) and the EFF see these mechanisms as a strategy to limit digital freedom, transforming the PC, which was historically an open platform, into a restricted device where the owner does not have the final say on the software that runs on their own hardware.

As for other sources, I researched the YouTube channels of the following gentlemen:

Louis Rossman: https://www.youtube.com/@rossmanngroup

Rob Braxman: https://www.youtube.com/@robbraxmantech

And I used artificial intelligence to research some aspects I wasn't sure about and generate some images.

Friends, I wish you all a Merry Christmas, and let's fight to continue using the programs and operating systems we want, and let's say a resounding NO to the tyranny of these dishonest manufacturers.

Inkscape Tutorial: Creating A Cutout

by Meemaw

I saw another cool tutorial the other day on YouTube. This one is from IronEcho Design. He created a cutout effect using a number and a photo. It could be a wonderful idea to use on a brochure or ad.

I have done this a couple of times now, and even though it seems hard at first, it is not. Opening Inkscape, import your photo, and use your text tool to create a number or letter, whichever you want. Rick from IronEcho says you only have to link the photo rather than embedding it, and it will save some file size. Create your number in white, because we’re going to use a mask on it, and the mask will keep whatever is under the white. (I used a letter this time.) He also suggests that you can reduce the opacity of your number in order to line up the photo the way you want it. Be sure to return it to 100% (no opacity) before you proceed. I only reduced mine to 70%.

The idea is to have the part of the photo you want to see lined up behind the letter. When you get it lined up, make 2 duplicates of it by pressing <CTRL> + D for each duplicate and moving it aside.

Actually, you don’t need the photo on one of the duplicates, only the number, but you can delete the photo on one AFTER you get the second step done.

On the original, select both items, click on Object > Mask > Set Mask.

The second thing we’ll do is give the number a little shadow. On one of your duplicates, choose the number/letter. Click on Filters > Shadows & Glows > Drop Shadow. We’ll change the settings as follows:

Blur radius

2.0

Horizontal Offset

-2.0

Vertical Offset

2.0

Shadow Type

Inner Cutout

Now you can see the shadow on the inside of the letter. Grab it and place it over your cutout so it lines up.

Now your cutout has a little depth. We could stop here, but let’s do something else. I’d like the girl’s hat and the top of the guy’s head to be in the picture. On the third copy, use your Bézier pen, with the mode b-spline (the third one from the left in the tool settings).

Draw around the items you want to include in the cutout. If there is more than one, select them both and click on Path > Combine. That will group them together. With them selected, also select the photo, then click Object > Clip > Set clip.

So the clip gives you the extra sections you want. Grab that and place it over your original (the one with the cutout and drop shadow). You might have to zoom in to get them lined up correctly, or use the snap tool.

IronEcho’s tutorial also gives a step for adding a drop shadow to the people, but I quit here. You can select them all and group them before you export, or just export your finished picture. Also, if you’re making it for another item, like an ad or a holiday card, you can go ahead and construct your other project.

I also made this one.

A Delayed Screenshot Script

by Paul Arnote (parnote)

I have to be honest here. I’ve been seeking a way to take delayed screenshots for some time now. But, perhaps I should give you a little background on why this has been on my “wish list” for a while now.

As I’ve spoken about before, I retired at the end of 2022 after working 35 years as a Registered Respiratory Therapist. I have ZERO plans to return to the workforce. My wife is also a Registered Respiratory Therapist. Hearing her “war stories” from the bedside trenches just reinforces my decision to have retired when I did. However, I do still maintain my respiratory license … just in case. It’s much easier to maintain it than it is to try to get it back after it elapses.

Part of the “process” for maintaining my license to practice respiratory therapy (respiratory therapists are licensed in a manner similar to nurses, physicians, and other healthcare professionals) is to complete 24 CEUs (continuing education units … each “unit” is approximately one hour of education) every two years. Half of them must be what the licensing board considers “live contact.” That means either doing at least 12 of those CEUs in a setting where you can ask questions and have “live contact” with the presenter.

There are two ways to obtain those “live contact” CEUs. You can either attend a seminar, or you can “attend” live webinars online. The former usually comes with a cost that you have to pay (and that cost can climb quickly), while the latter is offered for free via webinars sponsored by equipment vendors and others with an interest in dispensing respiratory educational information. Of course, all 24 CEUs can be of the “live contact” variety, and that is the route I’ve subscribed to for many years.

Most of the webinars are offered via Zoom. Others are offered via a custom HTML5 format. With either method, at the end of the webinars, there is a special code that’s presented, or a QR code to scan. You can attend the webinar, but if you’re away from the computer when that code is displayed, you can’t receive credit for attending. Maybe you got up to go to the restroom, or you went to get something to drink or eat. On the way back, maybe you had to deal with something the kids are doing (or not doing). That code enables you to fill out the requisite survey and feedback form, which then grants you credit for your attendance.

Invariably, that code is always presented at the end of the hour (each webinar actually only lasts 50 to 55 minutes long, but they count it for an hour). There have been several times when I’ve attended a webinar, but couldn’t receive credit for my attendance, simply because I missed the code at the end of the presentation.

But, I figured if I could “schedule” a screenshot at or near the end of that hour, I wouldn’t miss out on receiving that code. Up until now, all of my previous attempts have been utter failures.

Since I use the Xfce desktop, I initially tried using the xfce4-screenshooter program. However, I was not very successful with it to be able to capture a screenshot of that code. First of all, xfce4-screenshooter will only take one screenshot, as it pauses to ask you what you want to do with the screenshot it captured (save, copy to the clipboard, upload it to a cloud service, etc.). Basically, it requires user interaction to save the screenshot. That makes timing the screenshot at the end of the presentation very “iffy,” since you only have ONE chance to capture the code. Yep. One chance. Otherwise, the whole hour you spent attending the webinar is all for nothing. So, I needed a way to take a series of screenshots at the end of the presentation, over a specified amount of time at regularly spaced intervals, to help make sure I was able to capture the code.

What I needed was something that would automatically (controlled by a script) take a series of screenshots at the end of the presentation, and save them to my computer’s hard drive. So, considering my unique “use case,” that meant that I had to write my own script. Nothing I found in my search for a solution even came close to being able to do what I needed.

Fortunately, I had previously written a simple countdown timer script, which appeared in the March 2024 issue of The PCLinuxOS Magazine. That script gave me the framework I needed to create a custom bash script to make my delayed screenshot script a reality. I just had to replace the section of that script that sounded an alarm when the countdown timer elapsed with code that took a series of screenshots.

So, let’s take a look at the script I came up with. And then, we’ll walk through the script so you can see what’s happening. The only requirements to run the script are to ensure that you have zenity and scrot installed from the PCLinuxOS repository.

1. #!/bin/bash

2.

3. # Delayed Screenshot script.

4. # Written by Paul Arnote

5. # Read the article in the Dec 2025 issue of The PCLinuxOS Magazine

6. # https://pclosmag.com/

7,

8. hrs=$(zenity --entry --title="Delayed Screenshot" --text="Enter the number of hours for your timer...")

9. if [ $? == 1 ]; then

10. exit

11. fi

12. hours=$(( $hrs * 60 ))

13.

14. mins=$(zenity --entry --title="Delayed Screenshot" --text="Enter the number of minutes for your timer...\n\nNumber MUST be between 0 and 59.")

15. if [ $? == 1 ]; then

16. exit

17. fi

18. if [[ ( $(($mins)) -lt 0 ) || ( $(($mins)) -gt 59 ) ]]; then

19. zenity --error --title="Delayed Screenshot" --width=200 --height 100 --error --text="Exiting.\n\nNumber entry\nout of range.\n\nMust be a number\nbetween 0 & 59."

20. exit

21. fi

22.

23. if [ ! -d $HOME/Pictures/ScreenCaps ]; then

24. mkdir $HOME/Pictures/ScreenCaps

25. fi

26. cd $HOME/Pictures/ScreenCaps/

27.

28. TIME=$(( $hours+$mins ))

29.

30. while [ $TIME -gt 0 ]

31. do

32. sleep 60s

33. xscreensaver-command -deactivate >/dev/null

34. TIME=$(( $TIME - 1 ))

35. done

36.

37. for (( i=0; i<10; i++ ))

38. do

39. sleep 30s

40. scrot -z --quality 10 '%Y-%m-%d-%H-%M-%S.jpg'

41. done

42.

43. sleep 10s

44. zenity --info --title="Delayed Screenshot" --text="10 images captured, 30s apart, and\nstored in ~/Pictures/ScreenCaps/."

45. exit 0

The first half of the script is lifted, line for line, from my countdown-timer script. It uses zenity dialogs to have the user input the time delay. The user inputs the number of hours ($hrs), which is converted to minutes ($hours). Then, the user inputs the number of minutes. If the input is a number NOT in the range of 0-59, the script displays an error message and exits. But, if the number of minutes is within that range, those minutes are added to $hours (line 34) to get the total time delay, in minutes ($TIME, in line 34). As such, if you need or want a 90-minute delay before taking the screenshot, you cannot just enter 90 minutes. You will have to enter “1” as the number of hours to delay, which gets converted to 60 minutes, and then you enter 30 minutes, which gets added to the total time, to make 90 minutes.

Meanwhile, we need a place to store our screenshots. In line 23, the script checks to see if the directory ~/Pictures/ScreenCaps/ exists. If it doesn’t already exist, it is created in line 24. Then, in line 26, we issue the “cd” command to set our “working directory” to ~/Pictures/ScreenCaps.

We also have to turn off or deactivate the screensaver. I only ever use the “blank screen” feature of xscreensaver. If you don’t turn the screensaver off or deactivate it, the script will dutifully take its screenshots, which will be nothing more than a blank, black screen. Starting with line 30, we set up a while … do loop that runs as long as $TIME is greater than zero. We then sleep for 60 seconds, issue the command to deactivate the screensaver, and then decrease the number of total minutes by one.

Once the time has elapsed, we set up a for … do loop to take our screenshots. I have the for loop set up to take 10 screenshots. First, we wait another 30 seconds, and then we issue the command to take the screenshot. I use scrot to take the screenshot, since it was the only utility I found that automatically saved the screenshot without user interaction. The “-z” parameter tells scrot to take those screenshots silently. Without it, it makes a VERY annoying sound to signify that it’s taking a screenshot.

I also use the “--quality 10” parameter to set the quality of the images very low. I’m not going to be publishing these images. Instead, I only need to be able to read them. Without the “--quality 10” parameter, all 10 images take up over 6 MiB of disk space. With the use of the “--quality 10” parameter (coupled with forcing scrot to save its images as JPG files), all 10 images take up only slightly over 600 KiB of disk space.

The '%Y-%m-%d-%H-%M-%S.jpg' parameter sets the file name for the images saved by scrot. The %Y represents the year, %m represents the month, %d represents the day of the month. %H represents the hour, %M the minutes, and %S the seconds. Finally, we tell scrot to save the screenshots as JPG files. Otherwise, scrot would default to PNG files, which are considerably larger than JPG files.

The for … do loop executes once every 30 seconds, until 10 screenshots have been captured. So, I have a five-minute window in which to capture my screenshots, evenly spaced out at 30 second intervals. So far, that has worked out perfectly for my needs (which I explained earlier).

To finish up the script, another Zenity dialog box is displayed after all 10 screenshots have been captured, notifying the user that the script has completed. And then, the script exits.

Running The Script

Like I stated previously, this script has worked out perfectly for my needs. But, being a bash script, you can make alterations to fit your particular scenario. As for command line parameters, this script doesn’t take any.

Store the script where you normally save all of your user-level scripts. I have a directory in my /home directory, named /bin, which is also defined in my system’s $PATH statement. So, you can launch the script from a terminal session, or you can make a launcher on your panel that launches the script with one click of your mouse.

Most of my webinars start at the top of the hour. Attendees aren’t allowed to log into the webinar until a maximum of 15 minutes prior to the scheduled start time. So, by entering “1” into the hour dialog box, and 10 minutes into the minutes dialog box, I’m able to capture the code at the end of the webinar. That allows my script to capture screenshots at 30 second intervals at the end of the webinar, for the last five minutes of the webinar. That vastly improves my chances of capturing the “almighty code,” versus just a one-chance “stab in the dark” with any other screenshot utility.

The script is easy enough to alter, if you so choose. So, if I wanted to, I could change the sleep 30s command in the script (responsible for triggering a screenshot every 30 seconds) to sleep 60s. That simple change will cause the script to take one screenshot every minute, for 10 minutes. If I were to do that, I would change the minutes entered into the minutes dialog to five minutes, which would cause the script to take one screenshot every minute for the last 10 minutes of the webinar.

Another change that is super easy to make is to change the quality of the screenshots that scrot takes. Actually, there are two settings you could make. The first is to change “--quality 10” to “--quality 90” if you want a higher resolution image (of course, you can use any number you want/need … I just used “90” as an example). It’s best to think of the number after “quality” as a percentage. Higher numbers result in lower compression and larger file sizes, while lower numbers result in higher compression and smaller file sizes. The second item you can change scrot from saving JPG image files to PNG image files, simply by changing the file extension in the parameter that appears at the end of the definition of the filename. PNG files are inherently sharper (have a higher resolution) than JPG files, simply because PNG files use lossless compression, while JPG files use lossy compression.

The image above is a sample snippet taken from one of my test screenshots, taken with a quality level of 10. As you can see, it’s quite legible, but not anything close to what I would call sharp or high resolution.

For shiitake mushrooms and giggles, and to test the script, I set the timer for 8 hours and 0 minutes before I went to bed. I then closed the lid on my laptop, and I proceeded to bed. When I awoke the next morning, I found the script in the process of dutifully taking the screenshots, just as it was instructed. During my testing, I also tried delays of 1 minute, 2 minutes, 5 minutes, 20 minutes, and one hour. All worked exactly as I had hoped, and as I had designed.

You can download the script (as presented above … it’s a rather small, 1.2 KiB file) from the magazine website. The script is named “delayed-screenshot.sh.txt.” Save the script where you normally save your scripts, remove the “.txt” file extension, and make the file executable.

Summary

I initially created this handy script to fulfill a special need that I had. However, I’m pretty sure that this will also work for many other needs that you might have where you want or need to capture screenshots sometime in the future.

Now, finally, I can check the desire for a delayed screenshot utility off of my “wish list.”

Wiki Pick: Backing Up Your /home Directory

Relevant to All editions of PCLinuxOS.

This tip comes from forum member davecs.

On your PCLinuxOS computer, the folder /home will have a subfolder for every user on the system. If you have a large external drive (and they can be bought cheap these days, though those can be slow), you can back up the /home system onto it easily, using a program called rsync. I've also got an extra subfolder in /home, called /home/storage, where I keep stuff safe, like extra fonts, my own wallpaper collection, drivers for my printer/scanner, copies of a few scripts that I like to install when my system needs re-installing, and so on. Of course the main / (root) folder, apart from /home, is installed when I re-install Linux, and if it gets broken somehow, it's probably best to re-install from a more recent ISO. Your /home folder stores the personal stuff that you, and everyone else who uses your computer, can't put back from your PCLinuxOS ISO.

What I have done is to format my external drive to ext4, and give it the Volume name “DataBackup”. When I plug it to the computer via USB, it gets mounted at /media/DataBackup. I have rsync installed, and I have written a little script called “backup”, made it executable and put it in /usr/local/bin/, to do the job for me as follows (it needs to be run as root):

#!/bin/bash

START=`date +%T`

rsync -aP --exclude-from=/home/storage/rsync-homedir-excludes/rsync-homedir-excludes.txt /home/ /media/DataBackup/home

END=`date +%T`

echo Backup started: $START

echo Backup ended: $END

*Note that from rsync to /media/DataBackup/home is all one line.

You get the file rsync-homedir-excludes.txt from this page. In my case, as I use the Vivaldi browser, and Vivaldi uses the same architecture as Google Chrome. I have copied the lines relating to Chrome and changed them for Vivaldi as follows:

#Vivaldi:

.config/vivaldi/ShaderCache

.config/vivaldi/*/Local Storage

.config/vivaldi/*/Session Storage

.config/vivaldi/*/Application Cache

.config/vivaldi/*/History Index *

.config/vivaldi/*/Service Worker/CacheStorage

rsync in this case will only write files that either were not on the last backup, or have been updated since the last backup. So the more frequently you run the script, the less time it will take. It will also, during backup, delete files from the last backup that you have since deleted from your computer. So it's quite a clever program. If you tried to do this either from a file manager using its copy command, or from a terminal using “cp”, the outcome would be a total mess.

Finally, I suggest that you also copy the backup script to /home/storage so that you will have a copy of it should your computer have an accident wiping your data.

NOTE: You can also use Grsync, which is the graphical front end for the rsync command. Grsync can be installed using the Synaptic package manager.

You can view this PCLinuxOS Knowledgebase Wiki article here.

Good Words, Good Deeds, Good News

compiled by Meemaw

Neighbors Harvest Crop For Sick Friend

Mark’s neighbors found out that he’d been diagnosed with ALS in July, and it was very aggressive. They knew he wouldn’t be able to harvest his sugar beet crop. His sons would harvest, but would most likely be overwhelmed. One hundred neighbors and friends got together and harvested Mark’s beets for him.

According to Mayo Clinic’s website, “ALS often begins with muscle twitching and weakness in an arm or leg, trouble swallowing or slurred speech. Eventually, ALS affects control of the muscles needed to move, speak, eat and breathe. There is no cure for this fatal disease.”

Mark said, “It is bittersweet. I wish I could do it, but God has a plan,” he stated. “I just want to say thank you to everybody… who is helping my family at a time when we are hurting.” Mark’s wife expressed her thanks as well.

Secret Santas Surprise Mom of Premature Infant

Logan was born at just 22 weeks gestation (a normal pregnancy is about 40 weeks), weighing 572 grams (1.26 pounds) and has been in the NICU in Idaho Falls, ID. His parents have experienced infertility and the loss of several children. Mom Anna drives from Blackfoot, ID to Idaho Falls every day to be with Logan, who now weighs over 1,800 grams (almost 4 pounds) after 116 days in the NICU.

Eastern Idaho News, acting on behalf of a mysterious benefactor they call Secret Santa, has gifted the family $500 in restaurant gift cards, $1,000 in gas gift cards, and a $5,000 check. Secret Santa has asked East Idaho News to help gift a million dollars to people who have fallen on hard times.

Social media members posted their hopes that Logan will be home by Christmas.

Teen Golfer Donates Proceeds to Children’s Hospital

Before Skylar was born, doctors at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia found a growth in his lung during a routine pregnancy ultrasound. When he was five months old, doctors were able to operate and remove the growth. He goes back several times a year for doctors to monitor the condition.

“Every time I’ve gone there, I’ve just been struck with how overly kind and caring the doctors and all staff are,” he said.

Now age seventeen, Skylar has been sponsoring a 100 Putt Challenge. The challenge features golfers securing pledges for every putt out of 100 they can sink in one shot, according to a player from the Portledge School varsity golf team.

“If somebody pledges two dollars a putt and hits 80 of them, that’s $160 easily made,” he explains. “People don’t realize how much it adds up.”

All the proceeds go back to the hospital. Skylar says it’s the least he can do to thank the hospital that saved his life. In the last two years, he has raised $700,000, according to the New York Post.

Officers And Good Samaritans Help Rescue Infant From Accident

In Fort Worth, TX, a woman and her child were in an accident and the car rolled. The woman and the baby were ejected from the car. Police rushed to the scene to make sure they were both all right, and found that the baby was still under the vehicle.

Two police officers and several bystanders lifted the car enough to get the baby pulled out, and the officers started CPR. The video shows one officer performing CPR and the other officer massaging the baby’s back. Eventually started crying, and she and her mother were taken to the hospital. It’s reported that they are doing well and are expected to make a full recovery.

“We are beyond proud of the lifesaving actions performed by Sgt. Nichols and Officer Bounds for their bravery and quick response to this terrible scene,” the police agency said. “We are also grateful to the Fort Worth citizens who saw someone in danger and, without hesitation, assisted our officers.”

Oklahomans Helping Clean Up After Jamaica Hurricane

Mike and eleven of his friends were in Jamaica when Hurricane Melissa hit. He says it was just a bit windy and rainy until the eye passed, and then it changed to high winds and rain that lasted for hours. The hurricane was a lot different and much worse than what he’s experienced in Oklahoma.

Since they don’t know when they will be able to leave, they have joined in to help clean up the area. “We’ve got people out here from all over the world, and we’re all helping,” he explained.

“There are some of the guests actually out in the pool trying to help with limbs and different things. We’re about to go to the east a little bit to one of the other beaches and start helping them clean up. Even though we’re on vacation, we’re all trying to chip in and do what we can to help everyone, and the workers here have been outstanding. They stayed with us when they didn’t have to,” he said.

According to NBC News, the storm is the worst in Jamaica’s history, with 185 mph winds. Although it had weakened, it was still a Category 2 hurricane.

PCLinuxOS Recipe Corner Bonus

Korean Beef Bowl — Bulgogi

Serves: 4

INGREDIENTS:

1 pound lean ground beef (You can also use regular or medium and drain the fat)

* You can use thinly sliced beef, chicken or pork if you prefer, They all work just as well.

½ medium sliced onion

1 large green onion, chopped (For garnish)

1 teaspoon sesame seeds (For garnish)

For the sauce

¼ cup soy sauce (I use low sodium but it's your call)

1 teaspoon sesame oil

¼ cup brown sugar

3 cloves chopped garlic

1 medium thumb size chopped ginger

¼ teaspoon hot pepper flakes

1 teaspoon ground black pepper

DIRECTIONS:

Add the ingredients for the sauce in a mixing bowl and stir until well combined. Set aside.

Add some oil to a pan over medium high heat. Place the beef in a skillet and fry until just about browned. Add the onion in and continue to stir and fry until the onion is translucent, and the beef is browned.

Pour the sauce in, stir, and cook until it comes to a boil. Simmer for a few minutes.

Serve over a bed of steaming hot rice or noodles. Garnish with chopped green onions, and sesame seeds.

Serve and enjoy your Korean beef bowl.

TIPS:

Sauce can be made and stored in the refrigerator for up to 3 weeks.

NUTRITION:

Calories: 696    Carbs: 58g    Sodium: 1108mg     Fiber: 1.3g    Protein: 41.4g

PCLinuxOS Puzzled Partitions

Sudoku

Download Puzzle Solutions Here

Scrappler

Download Puzzle Solutions Here

November 2025 Word Find

Holiday Desserts

Download Puzzle Solutions Here

November 2025 Crossword

Holiday Desserts

Download Puzzle Solutions Here

Mixed-Up-Meme Scrambler

Download Puzzle Solutions Here

Screenshot Showcase

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Table of Contents

1. Table of Contents

2. From The Chief Editor's Desk...

3. ICYMI: SanDisk Introduces World's Smallest USB Flash Drive

4. PCLinuxOS Recipe Corner

5. TBS' 2025 Holiday Gift Guide

6. Meemaw's 2025 Holiday Gift Guide

7. Paul's 2025 Holiday Gift Guide

8. Why PCLinuxOS?

9. Tip Top Tips: How To Make Your Monitor Remember Your Preferred Brightness Level

10. The Death Of Windows 10: It's Worse Than You Think

11. Inkscape Tutorial: Creating A Cutout

12. A Delayed Screenshot Script

13. Wiki Pick: Backing Up Your /home Directory

14. Good Words, Good Deeds, Good News

15. PCLinuxOS Recipe Corner Bonus

16. PCLinuxOS Puzzled Partitions

17. Screenshot Showcase

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

From The Chief Editor's Desk...

ICYMI: SanDisk Introduces World's Smallest USB Flash Drive

PCLinuxOS Recipe Corner

TBS' 2025 Holiday Gift Guide

Meemaw's 2025 Holiday Gift Guide

Paul's 2025 Holiday Gift Guide

Why PCLinuxOS?

Tip Top Tips: How To Make Your Monitor Remember Your Preferred Brightness Level

The Death Of Windows 10: It's Worse Than You Think

Inkscape Tutorial: Creating A Cutout

A Delayed Screenshot Script

Wiki Pick: Backing Up Your /home Directory

Good Words, Good Deeds, Good News

PCLinuxOS Recipe Corner Bonus

PCLinuxOS Puzzled Partitions

Screenshot Showcase