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  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:06 PM

    RE: tech.lgbt/@nina_kali_nina/1174

    The new policies for the Linux kernel make it more or less impossible to support a slop-free fork of Linux, so if you're worried about the reliability of your system level software, or have ethical concerns about LLM usage on your computer, the time to act is, well, now.

    If you have time this weekend, I recommend you to try one of the slop-free systems: NetBSD, 9front, Haiku, or OpenBSD. If you're adventurous, you could try new AlpineBSD, or research smaller systems, like RedoxOS or FreeDOS. If you don't feel adventurous, you might want to check out anti-AI Linux distributions, like Elementary or Gentoo.

    There's no "one solution that fits all". But there's a solution that I chose for myself, and that's NetBSD: it gives me the most freedom, it supports most of my hardware, and can run a great deal of software I need. It's not easy to run, but it's a great learning opportunity. There's quite a few folks around using BSD and capable of giving hints and advice, so if you feel stuck, toot about #netbsd.

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Replies

  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:12 PM

    If you don't know where to start, a great starting point would be:

    • Get yourself a virtual machine - that can be Qemu or maybe VirtualBox, these are free. There are other options available, depending on the OS you use.
    • Go to NetBSD.org and download the installation image (it can be a USB image or a CD image)
    • Create a virtual machine, add a virtual hard disk, and the NetBSD image you downloaded to it, and start
    • Have the NetBSD website with the manual open. It explains lots and lots of things. You'll learn a lot about your computer by reading it, and it can be useful even for other OSes (if you decide that NetBSD is too hard)
    • Install NetBSD, and then configure a graphical interface for it, and maybe some software, like free office suite (LibreOffice or maybe Abiword+Gnumeric), or incredible graphic editors (Krita and Inkscape). They might not necessarily be what you're used to, but they're worth trying, and you might like them enough to use them on your normal OS.

    Good luck!

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  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:14 PM

    @toots I feel there must be some financial incentives in play. But then if you try using LLMs, you might discover that they're built for the maximum engagement, they're really good at convincing people that they can do the job...

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  • tootstoots@fairy.id
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:17 PM

    @nina_kali_nina yeah I think Linus' immigration into USA from Finland might have been weighed down by Transmeta or whatever, but I'm definitely not one to judge or suspect or being an amateour detective. Whatever; I actually suspect none of the things I listed has much to do with anything, but yeah the LLM train surely has incentives, beyond my interest really, since I try to ignore all of it.

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  • Gorgeous na Shock!indigoparadox@mastodon.social
    Oct 15, 2026, 9:02 PM

    @nina_kali_nina @toots I think it's just desperation. Like the "every bug is a CVE" thing. And dropping support for the 486. Any and every thing they can try while holding onto crazy complex stuff like cgroups and Microsoft/Google stuff that *does* generate dev hours and funding.

    It always amazes me that Linux, like, still boots and stuff. Truly a modern tower of Babel.

    I use it so I can't say much, but I can totally see how it would drive its creators insane!

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  • tootstoots@fairy.id
    Oct 15, 2026, 9:31 PM

    @PyrexContainer @nina_kali_nina I deeply doubt Linus Thorvalds is gaming the system like this. He's a super-upstanding citizen, his wife and family is beyond critiques, and he's got a ton of humble-gotten money in the banks, Linus won't turn cynically grubbing for some blind reason; I really think the chance of him being like that would be inexistent.

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  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 9:33 PM

    @toots @PyrexContainer lately he came across as an asshole in mailing lists. And if not an asshole then just a tired disgruntled engineer who has ran out of care for the community

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  • tootstoots@fairy.id
    Oct 15, 2026, 9:43 PM

    @nina_kali_nina @PyrexContainer yeah he's "always" been kind of crude in the lkml or those places but I still think it's a larger threshold to be hopefully not seen. We'll have to hold our popcorns, but he's from Finland, and , well but I really doubt he'll go totally Darth Vader, or your favourite villain, since I don't keep up with the marvel bs, but fingers crossed.

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  • The Orange Themetheorangetheme@en.osm.town
    Oct 15, 2026, 9:42 PM

    @nina_kali_nina @toots I think it's a lot like nicotine: plenty of people aren't addicted to it until they try it, and then it's really, really hard to stop, because that's what it does. I've seen LLMs compared to gambling, and I believe it's using the exact same neural pathways. People talk about it and behave the same way someone with a gambling problem would. (Not to absolve people of their agency, either. I also believe it's easier to stop using LLMs than it is to stop gambling.)

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  • Jock Punk Xilatsxilatsad@yiff.life
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:10 PM

    @nina_kali_nina Doing one last Arch Linux backup, and then I'm going to try NetBSD on my desktop. It didn't like my wifi card on my laptop. T.T

    Maybe I should learn to write drivers for Intel Wifi cards....

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  • mccmcc@mastodon.social
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:09 PM

    @nina_kali_nina Imagine we forked from last summer or whenever right before the first pro-slop policy was (ie the documentation policies that predated the code policies).

    Aside from the problem of getting a team together, what do you think would be the limitations on developing from that point?

    (To be clear this is not my preferred solution. I'm just trying to understand what the options are.)

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  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:21 PM

    @mcc well, the first problem is that it'd have to be a hard fork; it won't be possible to import fixes from upstream because they are all going to be tainted, due to the new policies. The second problem is that Linux doesn't have stable ABI, and its API is also fairly volatile, which means in the near future the binaries for Linux and the binaries for neverslop-Linux will not be compatible (which means things like flatpak, appimage and docker will be very confusing or difficult to run). And then it'd be difficult to get any support from Intel, AMD and Nvidia for their hardware, because they and the main vendors (Ubuntu and Redhat) and the main users (Google, Amazon, Microsoft, Meta) will not care about the neverslop-Linux. And then vulnerabilities found and fixed in upstream will have to be fixed in neverslop-Linux if they're old enough, but Linux now uses a horrendous practice of calling every bug a CVE, with 1000 CVEs a month, making it impossible to triage and fix.

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  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:23 PM

    @mcc in terms of supporting security long term: it was done by a project called Linux-CIP. But the Linux-CIP style project is only possible if there's sensible CVE reporting in upstream and the possibility to port the patches. The new policies, as I said, mean that everything is potentially and maybe even likely to be tainted

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  • Jessie Nabein :neofox_peek_owo:jessienab@wetdry.world
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:28 PM

    @nina_kali_nina @lanodan did XFCE get slopped? :blobcatsob:

    I'm so tired I honestly don't know I have the spoons to move off Linux... I think I have to just limit future exposure when using new/updated software.

    (Also very hard to move to OpenBSD full time, for gaming reasons)

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  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 9:36 PM

    @sackofbones @jessienab @lanodan that's pretty great actually! I think the Linux compat code and the nvmm hypervisor both need a bit of TLC. I think it should not be impossible to get podman running with Linux kernel that is hardware acceleration-virtualised

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  • Haelwenn /элвэн/ :triskell:lanodan@queer.hacktivis.me
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:35 PM
    @nina_kali_nina Same but well I'm more on the sway side of things, where I guess if it's stuck with slop dependencies, something like velox could be used.

    That said right now I'm more considering moving server stuff first as there's much less software involved there, and could pave the way for desktop migration later on.
    (Most of the things I care about being TUI anyway, so could be tested on a server install)
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  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:44 PM

    @lanodan I chrooted into Debian from NetBSD and it was okay. I could get X11 working but not GL. So uhhh :)

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  • OfficeplantOfficeplant@mastodon.social
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:19 PM

    @nina_kali_nina Good luck everyone, my first hangup is finding a proper source of entropy somewhere. (2008 Thinkpad R61i, core2duo life) Also it asking for cylinder and head counts on an SSD, praying BIOS reported all of that correctly.

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  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:28 PM

    @Officeplant you can smash the keys to generate the entropy, especially if you ask a proper RNG for the order of keys to hit

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  • OfficeplantOfficeplant@mastodon.social
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:31 PM

    @nina_kali_nina ahh, I did a few minutes of keysmashing but I'm going attempt a proper reinstall if I can figure out how to generate proper entropy on my newer i7-9700T tiny thinkcenter.

    Or I might try NetBSD on my AMD thin-client from 2012 instead of the older thinkpad. I can avoid wireless issues that way as well.

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  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:37 PM

    @OliviaVespera sadly none of them would work with Steam. You could have Steam on FreeBSD, according to reports, but it's not fully free of slop. You can also emulate Windows and Linux in NetBSD, and run Steam this way, or use NetBSD's wine and open-source tool called steamdepot to get games from Steam on your computer. The game compatibility won't be very high yet, but some popular indie games like Balatro, Celeste, Va-11 Hall-A or Kitsune Tails would work.

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  • Olivia VesperaOliviaVespera@spacey.space
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:39 PM

    @nina_kali_nina then I think, the best thing to do, is to not update the kernal and hope someone finds a way to rebase linux. at least for the moment.

    I do want to explore BSD though.

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  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:43 PM

    @OliviaVespera I fear there won't be much progress in this area :(
    But there are other hopes; it should be possible, with relatively small amount of tweaks, to run podman with virtualized Linux kernel, and thus bring Linux+Steam+Proton in a container. And maybe even get GPU pass-through eventually...

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  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:38 PM

    @alexmu their official stance is that LLM code is not compatible with OpenBSD in license. However, they imported some LLM tainted code from the upstream (e.g. tmux and Xorg)

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  • ShadSterlingShadSterling@mastodon.social
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:33 PM

    @nina_kali_nina another way to start is by switching from proprietary and/or OS-specific apps to apps that can run on BSD. I used to use the Mac-specific Banktivity to track my bank accounts, now I’ve gone back to using spreadsheets, in LibreOffice which runs on BSD, Linux, macOS, and Windows. I’m in the process of replacing the macOS builtin Mail.app, testing whether the Vivaldi browser’s builtin client suits me. Maybe after I switch I should write up what I land on and why…

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  • XfavataXxfavatax@haunted.computer
    Oct 15, 2026, 8:00 PM

    @nina_kali_nina I used the live NetBSD image to verify that all my necessary hardware was working before I proceeded to a full install. I am apparently one of the lucky few where wifi just worked out of the box.

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  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 8:37 PM

    @unchartedworlds the Zoom app doesn't work, but the Zoom-through-website used to work in the past. Recently it's been crashing my Firefox, and I don't have Chromium to try it out. All and all, it should be possible to find a workaround to join Zoom calls. In fact I need to figure this out for myself, because I have a Zoom class that I need to join regularly.

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  • Roamin' Chemicalsroaminchemicals@mastodon.social
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:17 PM

    @nina_kali_nina Last time I tried to get NetBSD running on my laptop I hit a wall with network config, but I'm going to try again. I can't remember which laptop, so maybe I'll get lucky and it will be different hadware this time 😄

    Any idea if NetBSD installation might get more user friendly with time, or would that be at odds with other project goals?

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  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:26 PM

    @roaminchemicals the installer, when it works, is actually quite nice. But it bugged on me and other people, especially on newer laptops. The network support can be hit and miss, but you almost definitely can tether from your phone

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  • Roamin' Chemicalsroaminchemicals@mastodon.social
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:32 PM

    @nina_kali_nina Yeah, the menu definietly bugged out on me at least once now that I think about it. Thanks for the tip about tethering, that could get me up and running at least!

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  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:39 PM

    @roaminchemicals that's great to hear!
    I noticed that the installer bugs the most on formatting the disk, so these days I format the disk externally the way I like, and then it's a smooth sailing in most of the cases.

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  • Vaporeon :vaporeon: ☭vaporeon_@glaceon.social
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:17 PM

    @nina_kali_nina Thoughts on how to minimize slop exposure under Gentoo now that the kernel itself is getting slopped? Would you say that staying on 6.12.x or 6.18.x branch would have less slop than the latest kernel versions?

    I am trying to use NetBSD more, but currently I am not able to switch all of my computers over to NetBSD

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  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:27 PM

    @vaporeon_ I'd switch to the CIP kernel if you could, LTS with security patches and thus reduced amount of slop from upstream.

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  • alcinnzalcinnz@floss.social
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:19 PM

    @nina_kali_nina I hear that NetBSD's driver infrastructure is promising in that it'd make it easier to port these drivers to other kernels. Thus removing barriers to kernel competition!

    Not that most people would care about any other differences...

    As for me: I think I'll stick with elementary OS, & let them make such calls for me. They are at the very least vocally anti-"AI"!

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  • ShadSterlingShadSterling@mastodon.social
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:24 PM

    @nina_kali_nina my attempt to switch from Mac to Linux is at 18 months and not very close to done, so, I won’t be trying to go from Linux to BSD in a single weekend - tho once I’m not using the Mac I might try to put BSD on it

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  • Nina Kalininanina_kali_nina@tech.lgbt
    Oct 15, 2026, 7:30 PM

    @ShadSterling good news is that if you get used to the software (desktop, office suite, etc etc) you'll likely find it available on NetBSD, unless it's something very niche and professional

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