TRS-80

Yes, sure, no problem!

OK, what follows is not trying to rain on anyone's parade. Just my perspective. Because honestly I never actually use armbian-config for anything. I just learn to install whatever software I need myself, either from packages and/or use a container, or whatever. Because personally, I do not like "wizards" and automated things which hide important details from me. So, coming from this perspective, I always wondered who actually uses armbian-config? Do a lot of people use it? I am totally ignorant here. I just know that we are always talking about the burden of maintaining things, especially with what resources we have available. And I can't help but think that we are slightly re-inventing the wheel here. There is already Docker and others for people who want to containerize things. There are projects who maintain ready to go containers. Then there are Ansible scripts. And many other things, too. I guess I can't help but wonder if armbian-config even needs to be a core component of Armbian at all? I guess to some people, the answer is "yes" but it has never been that way for me, personally. To me, Armbian has always been "a Debian based distribution for SBCs." Later I learned that in reality it is actually some build script framework, and the published images are simply an automated output of that. OK, so I am fine with either/both of those definitions. But now, as hinted by what I quoted from Igor, we are getting into a lot of complexity and maintenance burden (with armbian-config), and for what? Should we instead perhaps be talking about scope creep? Or defining what this project actually is? If I am completely off base then please disregard. I gather that this has been a part of Armbian from the beginning. Maybe a lot of people love/want/expect it. I really have no idea. And if it has already been determined to move forward no matter what, than I apologize for derailing the thread. OTOH, maybe these questions need to be raised? Maybe what Igor was struggling to grasp (and what I picked up on) was a clue to a larger question? As someone who feels less experienced (in certain aspects) and perhaps even less involved (in some ways) than some others here, I will leave it to the rest of you guys which is correct.

Thinking long and hard about that was actually the very first thing that crossed my mind. But I would say no, for all these reasons: 1. The [...] I left out from OP title was a location where I do not log in from. 2. My password management setup supports auto type which almost never makes a mistake. Much less 3 in a row. 3. I simply don't recall anything like that happening on Friday. I am maybe 80% certain of #3, by itself. But when you add the other 2 factors, it is approaching mid-high 90-something% level of certainty in total.

Maybe I will try and find a few minutes to add a short note to Docs about this. Unfortunately I am pretty busy though. If someone else can get to it, that would be awesome.

Not as of yet. I will update of course should that change. You remind me though that I wanted to point out I use an offline password manager (and additional protocols which I will not detail here) and every login I have everywhere is some unique long random password. So that particular attack vector (using same passwords different places) should not apply to me. To be clear, it also appeared they were not successful in logging in to my account as far as I can tell. But I changed my password here anyway.

I use separate entire HDDs for my "data" storage, but we are essentially talking about same thing. You could (and probably should) create a separate partition at least. Then you could use whatever filesystem you want, and it makes it perhaps a bit easier / cleaner to do system upgrades / recovery, and then migrate to bigger storage later on as your needs grow. If your experience will be anything like mine, you will start playing with these SBC and using one or more as NAS, putting some files on there, syncing between devices, sharing media, etc. but it will work so well that you will be putting more and more stuff on there before you know it! Then, because your photos and other personal data are important, you start to think about backups and redundancy. You become a victim of your own success, in other words. So then, following steps (later on; this is where I am at currently) become implementing ZFS, having multiple physically distributed NAS (e.g., another at friend / family house), etc... So, conclusion is to start out with the future (at least a little bit) in mind, and your upgrade path will be a bit easier later on. Where to mount this data folder/partition? I would consult the Linux Filesystem Hierarchy Standard if I were you. But also keep in mind permissions, etc.

I assume you are referring to: Why I prefer ZFS over btrfs ? If not, then I would give it a read. It's long but a lot of good points are made both ways.

I received an email notification same as title of this post 2 days ago. Just now I changed my password. But I thought I would make a post to see if anyone else might have been targeted (as I am a Moderator), especially any other Admins or Moderators. I am going to ping everyone I can think of (actually, I simply use the list here) below, but please add anyone else who I miss. @Igor @lanefu @Werner @TonyMac32 @SteeMan @soerenderfor @pfeerick @NicoD @JMCC @balbes150 @_r9

Good! Let them read some books, lest they never become as studious as their father!

If you are on kernel >= 5.6, kernel modules (i.e., wireguard-dkms package) are no longer required (as they are built in to the kernel since then).

Big if true!

I realize you are probably joking, but look here.

Thanks to everyone who have been working on this! I think XFCE and Gnome are good initial choices! XFCE is my go to when installing for other people, and was my own daily driver for some time. Just the right balance of light weight while not dumbing it down too much. I have not been a huge fan of some of Gnome choices in the past (v3 in particular) however recently I been reading up again on GNU/Linux phone scene (Librem 5 and PinePhone, the latter I actually purchased recently) and all the development that Purism are doing on the phosh library is being upstreamed into Gnome. So I guess this will allow some interesting possibilities going forward for Armbian on smaller screens, should a phone/tablet interface be preferred to regular desktop for whatever reason.

I don't follow the cluster stuff as much as you do lanefu (yet) but because of my recent interest in Pine64 I became aware they sell a CLUSTERBOARD with 7 slots for their SOPINE A64 COMPUTE MODULEs. Now of course being A64 based these would be less powerful than what you are describing in OP (as well as having different form factor), however OTOH these are actual things you can buy in their store, right now. Not sure how relevant PCIe lanes are to cluster computing, but I guess it depends what the work load is. Especially if the workload is not CPU based, that could potentially be a killer feature. I also cannot help but speculate it might be too niche a market to interest some mfr. But what do I know. A counter point, Pine64 are selling something already in this space, so... who knows? EDIT: I was just watching some NicoD video and was reminded that ODROID N2+ might be even better for this. The I/O is hobbled (shared USB) but has Gigabit Ethernet (not PoE though) but rates pretty high in his CPU/rendering type benchmarks. Also, I know, it's a "dream" thread, so I hope you don't mind too much my mini review of current solutions (as a comparison, or in case anyone is looking now). OK, back to "dreaming"...

Let us know how it works out (or if you have any other questions)! 73

Have you seen the PineCube that's in development? I have no idea how it compares to those specs, just throwing it out there as I have become quite enamored with Pine64 as of late. Historically / currently, I have been using the little Wyze / Xiaomi IP cameras, re-flashing them with Xiaomi Dafang Hacks. I noticed recently you can even find them in Home Depot these days (Wyze ones) for only $20-30(!). Of course, if you are bound and determined to roll your own, there will be no stopping you, and I shall stand aside...

Yes, it's a mess. In the beginning, we thought, oh it's Linux!!!111!!! How wrong we were... I have only become more and more disillusioned over the years since, finally turning most recently to outright disgust. I have never been a fan of Ubuntu, it seems to me like they take standard GNU/Linux (i.e., Debian) and then like to add their own "special snowflake" crap on top, after which it is no longer really even GNU/Linux any longer. All the while diluting the (IMO very important) underlying political philosophy. I never saw the point. For me, the PinePhone is the "plain GNU/Linux phone" that I have been looking for. Unlike Canonical, Pine64 have no delusions of grandeur interest in developing their own OS, nor locking you into their "ecosystem." In fact, there are several different OS and interface options on PinePhone, none of which come from Pine64 themselves. So now, all of a sudden, we are talking about a real potential viable and vibrant "ecosystem", instead of typical euphemistic usage of that term which is really only a marketing-speak code word for "walled garden." As a matter of fact, some time ago (during Librem 5 research) I had come across this (IMO excellent) article by this guy called Amos Batto, wherein he compares all the various Linux phone projects / interfaces / OSes which came before. He is talking from point of view of Librem 5, but it's all equally relevant to any other Linux phone (including PinePhone): The strategic advantages of Phosh for mobile Linux He also points out some problems with Ubuntu Touch (and others) which now seem quite prophetic, as (the Purism developed) Phosh is rapidly becoming the most used interface, even on PinePhone!

Maybe it will be up to you to write one? Thinking back more generally (and this has nothing to do with any specific board which has been mentioned), just because something looks sexy "on paper" (specs, etc.) does not mean it works out that way in reality. As Igor alluded to, software support is very important, which is why I am always repeating about making sure any device you are considering is first on the Armbian Supported Devices list, where "Supported" does have some significant meaning, i.e., that you are likely to have at least a decent experience. Maybe you know it already, but as I said, it bears repeating!

I am not sure how resource intensive that software really is (my guess, after 2 minutes of reading, is "not much" but I could be wrong). Anyway, it that's true, there are going to be an almost overwhelming number of boards that meet those (quite reasonable) criteria. So then we have to find some maybe different differentiating criteria, perhaps by asking questions like: What else might I use it for? How cheap can I find one? What might fit some power supplies I already have here? Which ones have a nice case available (if you want a nice case)? (maybe now you have some more of your own ideas here) etc... Basically, your requirements do not seem hard to meet (and even less so if you are willing to use a USB Wi-fi dongle, although certainly there are plenty of boards with Wi-Fi built-in). But I can highly recommend always using Armbian Supported Devices list as a starting point for any research / board selection. And then just checking that there are not any particular niggles about some board you may have your eye on. Often these will be listed right on the device page (especially if they are glaring) but I always recommend doing a brief forum / Internet search as follow-up anyway, just in case (well, the more expensive the board, the more research I probably do ). If there is a significant amount of traffic flowing over the USB interface, perhaps be aware that different boards architect this differently. This is one of main criticisms of RaspberryPi for example, they share Ethernet and USB on the same limited bus which becomes crippling for certain use cases (i.e., NAS). But maybe bitrates you are dealing with are not significant enough to worry about (I have no idea)?

arox, Sounds like you are doing probably more custom and/or low level stuff than I am, but I take your point. I target Debian for similar reasons. Microcontrollers are another story, I just try and stick with widely known and readily available hardware (i.e., Arduino / knock-offs, Nordic RF radios, etc.). But we are well above that here. We are talking about an Allwinner A64 (SoC) in a phone form factor (i.e., touch screen, etc.). Not sure what use-case you had in mind exactly for such a device, but to me GNU/Linux gives me a platform that is by far the most likely to be supported going forward for any length of time. And the more open (and/or popular) the hardware, the better the long term support situation. I mean, in an ideal world, all these things would be completely F/LOSS/H, and then we could really be sure. But from where we are currently (with completely locked down Android, etc.) just having real GNU/Linux on a phone platform is a huge improvement. I am pretty sure that all the rest will come in time. If that doesn't meet your requirements right now then so be it, but this platform has far greater chance than anything else to meet them going forward, IMO.

My s5 is still plenty snappy, BUT I am using LineageOS and no Google crap whatsoever. s5 is essentially ODROID-XU4 (same SoC) in a different form factor. On Android, of course you also have benefit of all the proprietary secret sauce blobs in addition. PinePhone OTOH is based on A64 (quad core) and maybe not as optimized, either (maybe room for improvement there? I don't know). From videos I have seen, I think the s5 might have the edge there, but then again that's not really what it's about, either... To be clear, I did not receive one, but neither did I pledge for the crowd funding in the first place. I have just been following the saga for a long time already. That's kind of a big chunk of change, and there have almost always been detractors (not just recently), so I was always taking a "wait and see" approach. I have actually heard many people describing PinePhone as "pocket Linux computer with touch screen." Not sure what you mean by SDK, as the phone runs no-BS GNU/Linux. In my view I guess, the OS is the SDK (in the case of Linux). Sources for everything are available, except of course few blobs for some of the hardware, but this is same as vast majority of ARM devices. By "no-BS" I mean, real GNU/Linux, not "Linux lite" aka Android, which although technically is using (some old) Linux kernel, it is surrounded by Java VM bullshit and Google kernel interfaces. In the case of PinePhone, it's just plain old regular GNU/Linux, with plain C GNU kernel interfaces. Which is so nice and refreshing for a change (IMO). As stated in OP, all basic things are apparently working, from what I have read (from many people on Pine forums; however I personally still do not have phone in hand). Including Wi-Fi and Bluetooth (in case I did not mention those specifically, I have read confirmations in the meantime, as I personally was also wondering about BlueTooth in particular). EDIT: Elatronion is one of guys I alluded to in my previous post. He is on Odysee (decentralized alternative to YouTube, based on LBRY) but has made several videos about PinePhone where you can see what current state of affairs actually looks like.

Is that the correct SSID?

Like you guys, I have also zeroed in on this board for NAS usage. When compared to other RK3399 based boards, I really appreciate the fact that Pine64 included a standard PCIe (x4) slot. Everyone else is doing PCIe through GPIO/HAT which means custom parts (which are often unavailable) and/or dealing with fiddly ribbon cables or other DIY solutions. It will be so much easier to source standard PCIe SATA boards now and in the future. Anyway, I wanted to add my little bit of research and thoughts to the thread. Please refer to following table (prices current as of date of post on AliExpress in USD and including shipping to US, except ASM1061 which is the one in Pine64 store and does not include shipping): |-------+----------+-----+------------------+-------| | Ports | PCIe gen | Phy | Chipset | Price | |-------+----------+-----+------------------+-------| | 2 | 2.0 | x1 | ASMedia ASM1061 | 9.99 | | 4 | 3 | x1 | ASMedia ASM1064 | 15.39 | | 4 | 2 | x4 | Marvell 88SE9230 | 30.66 | | 4 | 2.0 | x1 | Marvell 88SE9215 | 18.44 | |-------+----------+-----+------------------+-------| I very nearly bought (nowadays commonly available on AliExpress and cheap) ASM1064 based board, only to realize that it is PCIe gen 3 and ROCKPro64 only support PCIe gen 2.1. Therefore, it would have likely become limited by x1 Phy (assuming >2 HDD, or SSD(s)), if it were even recognized at all. Now because I am looking for 4 port board (I will probably add (2) 3.5" HDD now and 2 more later on), I think Marvell 88SE9230 based board is ideal for me. If you are pretty sure you won't need more than 2 ports, there is also Marvell 88SE9215 which is cheaper. I seem to recall a number of people (and not only in this thread) recommending to stay away from adapter they sell in Pine64 store (this is ASM1061 I included above for comparison). Some more resources: Pine64 wiki ROCKPro64 Hardware Compatibility (PCIe devices) where they list a few more devices (and I also encourage everyone to add their experiences / data to the table there, I plan on doing so later on). I actually ordered, then cancelled ASM1064 (after making above realization), but given its cheap price, now I am thinking I may order again strictly for science. @wolf7250, Since it's been a while now, did you ever get the project together? What was your experience? @pfeerick, Which PCIe to SATA adapter have you been using? It does seem that ROCKPro64 Armbian Stable is by now indeed on 5.x, which I am really excited about as now ZFS is also being packaged in Armbian and this is what I really want to try (and have for a few years now, in fact)! As this is the same chip I purchased (but different board), I was curious what sort of problems and what did you do to get it working? Of course I will eventually report back my experiences, too, although it will likely be a 2-3 months from now, unfortunately...

From little I know about Ansible, it seems like it may perhaps even be "the right" tool(?). However, languages / frameworks that current (and likely future) maintainers already know and are comfortable with, IMO, should also be an important consideration. Perhaps even more important? I kind of lean this way, but... how willing are people to learn new tool and switch to it? Especially if that would reduce work / maintenance burden in the long run (which I suspect is true, but do not even know for sure, maybe @lanefu can elaborate here as he seems to be the one with most experience with it)? Just $0.02 from someone who fancies themselves a bit of a strategic thinker and student of computer / tech history. EDIT: This may seem like a "small" decision, but I don't think it should be rushed. "Complete re-writes" in different language / framework have been known to kill entire projects (some with much. much more resources behind them than we have). Therefore the benefits should be clear and real, and not simply based on personal preferences.

Hmm, I like to support Tor network also. I came here at first to warn you it's not recommended to run it from your own home / business but when looking for the link it appears that the Tor Exit Guidelines are in fact no longer making such cautious recommendations. Well, the last I read that page was probably a couple years ago, so I consider the fact that Tor nodes seem to be becoming more mainstream accepted is very good progress! Personally, I would still follow rest of recommendations there, as it can still be a bit "touchy" IMO (especially exit nodes) but I guess I am just a worrier. Well, instead of standing on the sidelines like a coward and giving advice I suppose I should instead thank you for doing your part, and having the courage to actually stand up a node and grow/participate in the network, which I was too afraid to do so far. So, cheers, mate. Back to actual subject, my thought process went along in order of a few (in my mind, at least) distinct groups: There are many COTS[0] devices like those supported by OpenWrt / LibreCMC but those tend to be lower in specs, especially in RAM. But they are (sometimes / often) cheaper. Then there are network oriented boards supported in Armbian like ESPRESSObin, Clearfog Base and Pro which all meet your RAM requirements. These are more powerful, but also more expensive (last time I checked). Lately, I personally have been looking very closely at ROCKPro64. Now this is a general (not network specific) board, and my use-case is NAS. However what I like about ROCKPro64 is that there is a standard PCIe x4 slot right on the board already. Several RK3399 based boards support PCIe, but often through nonstandard GPIO pins or other fiddly interfaces, meaning you have to buy special hardware (which can and have sold out), or fabricate your own to do anything useful. Which is too fragile supply chain IMO when considering replacements / spares. I really like the idea of a standard PCIe port, as all standard PCIe hardware now becomes available to us (presently and in future). A really smart decision on their part, and one of reasons I started paying more attention to Pine64 recently over their competitors (as it's a bit puzzling to me why more companies have not followed suit). There may also exist some other cheaper board meeting your requirements, but I couldn't tell you what that might be offhand (maybe someone else can) as I never performed research for those particular set of requirements yet. However, as a general rule, nowadays I pretty much exclusively use Armbian Supported Devices List as a starting point for any research. Mainly because I have learned that the nicest sounding ("on paper") hardware means nothing without the proper software support. Even then, it is well advised to follow up on specific board(s) of interest by searching relevant subforums here, their hardware page, and the greater Internet to become aware of any specific little niggles / gotchas which may exist for any particular board and application. Kindly report back how your research comes along, to make it a bit easier on the next guy coming along looking for similar requirements. [0] Consumer Off The Shelf