Pico boo!

I remember people used to talk about market

WHO WE ARE

We’re trying out Raspberry Pi and Pico projects this issue – so what’s your favourite maker project or Pi add-on?

Newsdesk

Is Wayland ready  for prime time?

Linux lands on the Red Planet

The Perseverance rover’s successful Mars landing took Linux and open source software to another planet

Secured-core server announced

AMD and Microsoft have teamed up to bring a greater degree of security to devices

RISKY BUSINESS

Keith Edmunds is MD of Tiger Computing Ltd,

Make your own laptop

A modular notebook that users can easily configure and upgrade

Bye bye Python 2

Fedora is now almost free from Python 2, though some packages still require the aging language

Play games with Steam Link

Steam Link enables you to stream games from your PC to other devices

Distro watch

What’s lurking behind the free software sofa?

PRIORITIES THE PEOPLE

Matt Yonkovit is Percona’s Head of Open Source

TRIED AND TRUSTED

Jon Masters has been involved with Linux for

Kernel Watch

Jon Masters summarises the latest happenings in the Linux kernel, so you don’t have to

Answers

Got a burning question about open source or the kernel? Whatever your level, email it to lxf.answers@futurenet.com

Mailserver

Write to us at Linux Format, Future Publishing, Quay House, The Ambury, Bath BA1 1UA or lxf.letters@futurenet.com .

HotPicks

Photoflare

Qytdl

Version: GIT Web: https://github.com/ jahendrie/qytdl

KWipe

Version: 3.0.3 Web: https://github . com/PyCoder/KWipe

GabTag

Version: 2.1Web: https://github.com/ lachhebo/GabTag

Fvid

Version: 1.0.0 Web: https://github.com/ AlfredoSequeida/fvid

Draw.io

Version: 14.4.2 Web: https://github . com/jgraph/drawio

Spech

Version: 0.2.1 Web: https://github.com/ megahertz/spech

0 A.D.

Version: Alpha 24 Web: https://play0ad.com

Quadplay

Version: Beta update 65 Web: https:// github.com/morgan3d/quadpla

Guitar

Version: 1.2.0 Web: https://github.com/ soramimi/guitar

Sonice

Version: 2.2.1 Web: https://github.com/ sunny/so-nice

On the disc

Discover the highlights from this month’s packed DVD!

AMD Ryzen 9 5950X

Zak Storey climbs onto the closest thing the computing industry has to a unicorn, and straps in for the ride of his life

WD Black SN850 1TB

Move over Samsung, there’s a new PCIe 4.0 storage king in town says Alan Dexter, as he reaches for the ermine-lined cloak

SparkyLinux 2021.03

Its rather unimpressive-looking screenshots intrigued Mayank Sharma, who wants to find how this distro has survived for as long as it has

SystemRescue 8.0

If you’re as adventurous with your installations as Mayank Sharma, then you too would want to keep a copy of this distro handy…

CentOS Stream 8

Mayank Sharma takes a look at the distro that has the open source community up in arms, to see what the hullabaloo is all about

Spiritfarer

In these turbulent times management has shown uncharacteristic compassion and allowed Rachel Watts to contemplate life

Audio workstations

The Linux desktop has always had its share of music software. Michael Reed looks at the cream of the current Digital Audio Workstations crop

Plugin support

There are many plugin standards in the computer audio world

Installation

How easy is it to install a DAW?

User interface and ease of use

It’s the nerve centre, so it’d better be good

JACK support

The JACK system offers an advantage to Linux-based musicians

MIDI workflow

For electronic music, MIDI workflow is the most important aspect of a DAW

Audio workflow

Recording audio, chopping it up and processing it are key DAW features

Special features

What makes a particular DAW stand out from the rest?

Audio workstations

The verdict

PLUG & PLAY Pi PROJECTS

Jonni Bidwell with the help of Tom’s Hardware bring you the best in Raspberry Pi-based fun

Get your kit ready

Prepare your USB cables, SD cards and a cup of tea. It’s Raspberry Pi project time…

Image recognition

Get into machine learning and train your Pi to recognise and classify other Pis, without having to write a single line of code

Multi-room Pi audio

Get your Raspberry Pis in sync, audibly throughout your home

Pi-based KVM over IP

Use your Pi as a remote control for your PC, even if it won’t boot to an OS

Gaming on RetroPie

Turn your Raspberry Pi 4 (or 3 or Zero) into a retro gaming rig with RetroPie and dubious internet downloads

Environment sensors

With sensors and data and neat tidy cables, that’s how our garden grows

Bitcoin Node with RaspiBlitz

Make the Bitcoin network a bit bigger and better with a Pi and a large storage device

MotionEyeOS

Learn how to build your own motiontriggered home security camera

A PARENT ’S GUIDE TO PROGRAMMING

Mike Bedford investigates which languages to consider if you want to help your children get a head-start in coding

ALL YOUR DATABASE ARE BELONG TO US

With the help of Patrick McFadin, the Datastax database guru, Jonni Bidwell gets a handle on the wherefore and why of Kubernetes

BACK IN THE TECH SADDLE

Nicole Parrot is the director of technology at

Register now for the Coolest Projects 2021

Individual and team entries are now open so you can show off your amazing builds to the world!

MX-Fluxbox Pi 21.02.20

Les Pounder is always on the lookout for a new slice of Pi and with MX Linux he discovers something fresh from the oven

Escape from the evil space squids!

Captain Les Pounder of the USS Rentaprize has to evade the clutches of the evil space squids, but can he do the maths to escape the planet?

New tricks for the Pico voltmeter

Tam Hanna expands his basic Raspberry Pi Pico voltmeter to improve accuracy and add a resistor measurement capability

Terminal multiplexer

Shashank Sharma is enthralled by screen multiplexers, and Byobu presents an elegant and efficient approach to managing multiple windows

Run the perfect videoconference session

Move over Zoom, Skype and all the rest – Nick Peers reveals how to set up your own public (and private) group video chats for free with Jitsi Meet

Getting started in 3D using Blender

Even if you’ve never used Blender before, Michael Reed will have you blending like a pro by the end of this tutorial

Run an Apple II on your Linux system

Les Pounder steps into his time machine and travels back to 1977, and not just to watch Star Wars on the big screen for once

How to add special effects to photographs

Fancy getting more creative in your photography? Mike Bedford offers some inspiration by introducing a few special effects for you to explore

Co-editing documents with Confluence

Integration of OnlyOffice Docs with Confluence enables multiple users to edit office documents in a single interface, as Kseniya Fedoruk reveals

PYTHON: Immerse yourself in a first-person shooter

Calvin Robinson looks to the iconic PC games Doom and Wolfenstein 3D for inspiration, in the latest instalment in his Python coding series

PYTHON 3: Monitoring cycles in directory trees

Mihalis Tsoukalos sips a cold Mythos in the Greek sun while working with dictionaries, os.walk(), files, symbolic links and directories