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According to StatCounter (via OS Technix), Linux’s desktop marketshare reached a record high of 4.45% in July 2024. I enjoy following these trends as someone who has exclusively run Linux since August 2020 and has offered some thoughts on encouraging Windows and MacOS users to switch to Linux. Let us see the full StatCounter statistics:

  • Windows (72.8%)
  • OS X (14.92%)
  • Unknown (7.14%)
  • Linux (4.45%)
  • Chrome OS (1.41%)
  • FreeBSD (0.01%)

On one hand, it us neat to see Linux staying within three percentage points of the popular Unknown OS. But there is a downside; I will have to switch to FreeBSD if Linux surpasses Unknown OS because Linux will then not be cool anymore.

(Note: My jokes aside, the OS Technix article reasonably speculates that many of the “Unknown” users may be running Linux.)

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I wrote a New Leaf Journal article about installing Ubuntu Touch on a Google Nexus 7 tablet back in July 2021. That turned out to be one of our all-time most-read articles, and it has been one of our most-read articles of 2023 despite the fact that the Ubuntu Touch project discontinued support for it in April 2023. It may seem odd that I never wrote a follow-up, but there were two reasons. Firstly, while installing it was fun, I never found a specific use for the Ubuntu Touch Nexus 7 (I did end up using a second Nexus 7 that I installed LineageOS on and I have a new project in the works about that one). Secondly, I did not know where my Ubuntu Touch Nexus 7 was for a while. I just found it and am installing the last updates for it. Better late than never?

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The top WordPress plugins are… a little sad? by Chris Coyier (chriscoyier.net)

This is a little negative-nancy-ish, so if you aren’t feeling that right now — just close this tab 😜. It struck me recently how this list of plugins I saw in the 2023 Annual WordPress Survey wasn’t full of fun and interesting plugins that do interesting and unique things, they mostly just fix boring problems […]

In November 2023, Chris Coyier published his thoughts on the 20 most popular WordPress plugins as of July 2023. I run two WordPress sites: this one and The New Leaf Journal. Between the two, I use a good number of plugins. Surely I must have thoughts on the list! Well first, let’s see the plugins:

  • Yoast SEO
  • Monsterinsights Google Analytics
  • WordPress Importer
  • All-in-One-WP-Migration
  • Wordfence
  • Contact Form by WPForums
  • Elementor Website Builder
  • Duplicate Page
  • Akismet Spam Protection
  • Contact Form 7
  • WooCommerce
  • Classic Editor
  • Google Site Kit
  • Yoast Duplicate Post
  • Really Simple SSL
  • WP Mail SMTP
  • All-in-One SEO
  • UpdraftPlus
  • Jetpack
  • LiteSpeed Cache

I only use two of these plugins. I use UpdraftPlus on both this site and NLJ (see my post on using it for migrating to a new host). I use the Classic Editor plugin on this site but not on The New Leaf Journal.

There are a few that I used a long time ago. I used Yoast SEO from summer 2020 through the end of 2021 before switching to the lighter, more performant, and less annoying The SEO Framework in 2022 (see my post on its humane site maps). I shamefully used Monsterinsights Google Analytics four about two months in 2020 (before I knew better) before switching to the local and privacy-friendly Koko Analytics in 2020. I discuss my Koko Analytics stats in every edition of our weekly newsletter and in The New Leaf Journal’s year-end article rankings (see 2023). I accept an invitation from another post to give it my high recommendation. I briefly used Wordfence in 2020 before quickly moving away from all-in-one security suites. I will note separately that neither Monsterinsights nor Wordfence cleaned up after themselves well, leaving a ton of options behind. I believe I also used Realy Simple SSL for a time early on before figuring out how to set the requisite headers in my site’s .htaccess file (hat tip to Jeff Starr and his myriad free resources at Perishable Press). I never tried the other plugins. I will note with regard to caching that I have used WP Super Cache since late June 2020 and have been consistently impressed by it.

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Persona fans debate whether Persona 4 needs a remake by Carlos (Automation West)
After the success of Persona 3 Reload, fans are starting to wonder which of the other Persona games would deserve a remake. One popular debate that is going on right now is whether a Persona 4 remake done similarly to Persona 3 Reload would be viable at all.

A new article in Automation West described an online debate over whether Persona 4 needs (another) remake. I have documented in the pages of The New Leaf Journal that I am a fan of Persona 4 and of the modern Persona series as a whole. However, count me as being on the side of “some [who] would like Atlus to focus on new projects, such as the hotly anticipated Persona 6.” Persona 4 received an excellent and much needed deluxe (so to speak) version in Persona 4 Golden and that game is readily accessible thanks to its availability on Steam and other platforms. I do not think that modern visuals or game play tweaks (which may only make Persona 4’s unfortunate declining difficulty curve worse) are worth the effort. Persona 3’s reboot (which I have yet to play) is justified in large part thanks to the game’s best version, Persona 3 FES, not being so easily available (especially with the upcoming Answer DLC). Instead of re-making Persona 4, Atlus can apply some lessons from Persona 4, namely its best-in-series social links and character writing, to a whole new game. (I suppose it can learn from the proper difficulty curve in Persona 3 FES).

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I read on the AlternativeTo blog that Steam is planning to extend SteamOS support to the Asus ROG Ally and other Windows-based handheld gaming devices. I am not too on top of the market for current modern computer game handhelds because I do not personally have a use-case for one, although I am always happy to see how much Valve’s efforts to develop its own gaming ecosystem have benefitted Linux as a whole. Thus, I am not up to date on what Linux support is (if there is any real Linux support at all, that is) for the non-Steam Deck devices. The news update made me wonder whether Steam Deck support for these devices means that more general Linux options may soon follow.

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I recently published a short post on overhearing a woman abusing the word like in an atrocious sentence. On the same day I published that post, I overheard something more articulate, but nevertheless unusual. This was a gentleman in Brooklyn Heights: “They’re not kidding when they say you shouldn’t put pressure on the artery where they went in.” Duly noted. According to my doctor friend, they went with radial access on the man. At least he is on top of things!

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Kawaii Typo by Nicholas A. Ferrell
I sometimes use the search box on The New Leaf Journal (despite its limitations) to find one of my old articles. I tried to run a search for teracube, which refers to my old phone (I reviewed it back in 2021). However, the search failed. Why did it fail? Because I typed teracute. Search results page...

Yesterday I posted about making a typo when I used The New Leaf Journal’s on-site search to look for something I wrote about my now-old Teracube 2e phone. Once I corrected my typo, I found what I was looking for: A short leaflet about upgrading my phone via ADB. I wanted to find it not because I was trying to upgrade my Murena Teracube 2e (it upgrades normally these days), but instead because I was trying to update another device that I once dicussed in The New Leaf Journal, my LineageOS-powered Google Nexus 7 Wi-Fi (2013) tablet. The tablet is no longer officially supported by LineageOS, but I found a build from a developer who decided to keep maintaining his own version. While I did figure out how to upgrade, the new ROM did not fit my use-case. One thing led to another, and my Nexus 7 tablet has seen an unexpected revival.

DivestOS updater screen on Google Nexus 7 Wi-Fi (2013) tablet.

Out: LineageOS. In: DivestOS. That is all I will say here, but you can expect a new article about an old tablet in The New Leaf Journal in the not-too-distant future.

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I published several New Leaf Journal articles on the subject of the relentless abuse of the word like. My first four articles on the subject were inspired by things I overheard while walking around Brooklyn. I was walking in Manhattan near the Winter Garden the other day when I heard a woman talking on the phone. I recorded the quote contemporaneously in an SMS to my good friend Victor V. Gurbo (good thing I did since I installed a new OS on my phone a few hours later without saving the message): “But like, I was like, whatever.” That’s even worse than like… and like… yeah… Oh yeah? Well I was like I’m going to like save this quote and like literally start a new series like, on my like website,

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I subscribe to the AlternativeTo.net RSS feed. A new feed update appeared in my reader a couple of days ago: Google Shuts Down Adsense Accounts in Russia Impacting Youtubers and Content Creators. I have two questions. First, what is the difference between a Youtuber and content creator in the context of someone who is trying to make money posting videos on Youtube? Second, this didn’t already happen? I thought that that all of this stuff was shut downn two years ago between the big tech companies and the actions of the Russian government. Go figure. (PS: AlternativeTo’s speculation that Google’s decision was prompted by one of Russia’s myriad new foreign agent laws seems to be over the target to me.)

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Ten Open Source RSS News Readers for Smartphones by The Privacy Dad (Welcome to The Privacy Dad's Blog!)
Ten open source RSS news reader apps for smartphones ranked by positive user experience.

The Privacy Dad blog published a good list of open source feed readers for Android. My current set-up is a Miniflux running as a PWA (I am running a Miniflux instance with Pikapods). But before I switched to Miniflux, I was using an open source local feed reader for Android that is not on The Privacy Dad list: Handy Reading. Handy Reading is a fork of the now-unmaintained Flym RSS and is a very nice feed reader. It can extract full text and allows the user to set how often each feed is checked. What sets it apart from similar solutions, however, is that you can save articles from outside your feeds into Handy Reading, making it a quasi read-it-later solution as well. To be sure, it is not as good a read-it-later tool as something like Omnivore, Wallabag or Shiori, but it is a nice addition to an all-around solid local open source feed reader.

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What is Your Most Favorite Sports Anime Series? (Anime News Network)
What is Your Most Favorite Sports Anime Series?

Anime News Network posted the following question: What is Your Most Favorite Sports Anime Series? I like to field queries here on site. Before I answer, I must ask a question in response to the question: Can I lie? I can? Great! Now that I can lie, I will answer the question as follows: “I love Cross Game more than any[ sports anime] in the world.” If my question and answer response to the question caused you to do a head tilt, I would tell you to watch Cross Game. However, that is difficult these days thanks to licensing limbo.

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Hyperkin's "No-Drift" N64 Stick Is Available Now by Damien McFerran (Time Extension)
Accessory maker Hyperkin has just released a Hall Effect stick for the N64, a "no-drift, GameCube-style" replacement that "requires zero soldering."

A new Time Extension news report about Hyperkin’s hall effect Nintendo 64 joystick mod crossed my feed reader. When I first read the article, I thought I had previously written about this in The New Leaf Journal, but it turns out that I had written about an 8BitDo hall effect mod. I happen to be a fan both of good hall effect controllers and the original, unique, Nintendo 64 joystick. The latter point gives me some pause about the Hyperkin mod. I quote from the Time Extension report: “Mimicking the GameCube’s analogue stick, you’ll be able to ‘feel the nostalgia and comfort of the GameCube era while dominating your favourite N64 games. This stick is designed for maximum comfort and a competitive edge, making long gaming sessions a breeze.'” While I prefer the GameCube controller to the Nintendo 64 controller, the Nintendo 64 had a more interesting (albeit less durable) joystick. If we are releasing mods, I would prefer one that preserves the feel of the original instead of replacing it with a more generic GameCube-style joystick, durability aside.

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I installed the Hum link shortener on The New Leaf Journal and I like it thus far. Now I just played around with the ActivityPub WordPress plugin settings so I am trying this post to see how it looks from Mastodon. Don’t mind me. (I should also figure out why my New Leaf Journal posts stopped showing up through the AP plugin but that’s another matter.)

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I have seen more than enough anime series in 2024 thus far to be reasonably (not absolutely) confident that the second season of MF Ghost will not be a realistic contender for my annual year-end top-six ranking. With that out of the way, count me as excited to watch the Chad-faced protagonist Kanata engage in some high-octane drifting, disappearing line attacks, and late breaking. As I noted in my 2023 ranking article,while MF Ghost missed by year-end top six by 2-3 spots, I often found myself looking forward to it more than my anime of the year choice, which happened to air on the same day. With luck, maybe MF Ghost season 2 will cut down on everything that doesn’t involve racing (its romance writing is on par with its predecessor, Initial D, and I submit for the record that this is not a complement).