I second the Debian recommendation, with one caveat: if ever you need to install software that is not maintained by Debian (I.e. it is installed using a command like make install instead of apt install) then you could run into significant problems.

Debian uses a system (called APT) to manage the logistics of all your apps and libraries. This is wonderful until you add a program using a different method that APT doesn’t know about. In that case you can “end up in dependency hell” where your system can no longer update or install new packages.

Advanced users can work around this limitation to install things safely, but for a user just starting out I suggest to only ever install packages that exist in the Debian repositories (that is, can be installed with APT or one of its various frontends). This can mean the programs are a little outdated or not available.

Debian has a document that explains this in greater detail, which I suggest every Debian user reads: Don’t Break Debian

Back in the day my college had very strict filtering on the WiFi. I learned how to use SSH tunneling through PuTTY to bypass the firewall to connect to X-Fire. I was so 1337.

I can still hear the ripping jeans sound effect

In Soviet Russia, bar keep tabs on YOU!

Wild animals are wild.

I once rescued an injured duckling from our cat and nursed it back to health.

I fed and watered it several times a day while it convalesced. Each time I reached my hand in the box that tiny adorable creature thrashed its wings and bit my fingers.

After about 3 days I had had enough of it biting the hand that feeds. It was barely larger than a marshmallow but it was kicking my ass.

I decided it must be strong enough so I returned it to its mother, who was conveniently still in the nearby pond. It launched itself toward her and literally ran across the water to be reunited.

That part was touching, so I guess it was worth the effort, but I learned a valuable lesson. Imagine if instead of a tiny bird it had been a dangerous predator with fangs and claws

For web browsing I can navigate alright using spacebar to scroll. Naturally, that works best with a bluetooth keyboard attached, but you could resize the window and use the soft keyboard if you prefer. The “vimium” extension for Firefox makes keyboard navigation much nicer.

I also have one and agree with your conclusion. My PineNote is so cool and really fun to use!

I use mine most often for displaying and editing my character sheet while playing tabletop RPGs.

The display looks great and mine doesn’t have the stuck pixel or the buggy lines issue you experienced, though I do have very noticeable ghosting artifacts. Probably this is because I mainly use the “performance” optimization setting rather than “quality”. Animations play very poorly, so I found it necessary to use extensions to disable animations wherever possible.

Also, of course, the screen is only black and white so sometimes you lose out on information. E.g. if my GM says “the goblin that stole the flask is highlighted yellow. The one highlighted pink is standing his ground. What do you do?” I would not be able to tell them apart.

I get acceptable but not fantastic battery life. Usually after about 3 hours I’ll have around 60% life left. It would probably be better if I was using a lighter program than Firefox. Mine also has phantom battery drain and loses maybe 15% battery life per day if left unplugged while suspended.

I paid $460 USD for mine, shortly before the import tariffs were implemented.

Overall, I would recommend it for someone who meets these criteria:

• is a Linux enthusiast comfortable with the command line and willing to read and follow various guides (there’s a long README that opens on boot which has crucial information in it, like how to fix critical bugs)
• wants to avoid proprietary lock in wherever possible
• wants to avoid shovel ware and use mainline Linux
• wants to support FOSS development and doesn’t mind paying extra to do so
• understands the severe limitations of an e-ink display

I would not recommend it to most people because it is an enthusiast Linux device with an e-ink display. If you’re the kind of person that specifically wants an enthusiast Linux device with an e-ink display then I think you’ll love it

I like you too 💕

That makes much more sense than “tofu table”

In addition this was back when airlines had strong restrictions on wireless being used on planes, so many devices had physical switches to turn WiFi/Bluetooth off. Maybe it’s still turned off

Also an old fart, also love XFCE

I am a longtime fan of Debian Stable, for exactly that reason. I installed the XFCE version using the custom installer about 8 years ago and have had very few issues.

Initially my GPU wasn’t well supported so I had to use the installer from Nvidia, forcing me to manually reinstall the driver after every kernel update. That issue has been fixed in recent years so now I can just use the driver from the Debian repos.

I installed the unattended-updates package about 2 years ago and it has been smooth sailing since

I have some bad news for you - any random idiot with a driver’s license and a two-ton death machine already puts your ass at risk, all the time. We call it “traffic” because we’ve just gotten used to it

I came to the comments to mention that exact experience. There must be historical reasons that SCP uses -P and SSH uses -p but I certainly didn’t expect it since they’re both from the same package (openssh)

Also “Does the ToS have a binding arbitration agreement”