Linux Luddites

not all change is progress


November 1, 2015

Episode #60


Direct download links: MP3 & Ogg

0:01:23 Feedback
0:22:01 Lukas F. Hartmann Interview

Breaking with tradition, this show kicks off with your feedback, before pitching into an extended interview with Lukas F. Hartmann. Like us, Lukas has long been concerned about the increasing complexity of modern computing environments, including Linux. In an effort to recapture the immediacy of the home computing era of the 80’s, Lukas has developed a Lisp-based operating system called Interim OS. So join us as we talk about Interim and much more with an honorary Luddite.

0:01:23 Feedback

A huge thank you to Kristian Tizzard for the PayPal donation, and to Galen White for becoming a Monthly Supporter.

We received a predictably full postbag about the latest Sarah Sharp affair; special thanks go to Keith Zubot-Gephart, Enzro Greenidge, Lynne Dixon, Matthew Platte, Ouan, Will, Nathan D. Smith and Jezra, all of whose comments provided an idea of the breadth of the feedback we received, and which we used on-air.

We’re looking forward to hearing how Dave Allan gets on with his new Steam Controller, and are grateful to Lars Falk-Petersen for the tip about DietPi.

Whilst his comment was far too long to read on air, a big thank you to Jon “The Nice Guy” Spriggs for setting a few facts straight on the topics of certificates and security protocols.

0:22:01 Lukas F. Hartmann Interview

Lukas F. Hartmann is the founder of the German company MNT Media and Technology, which specialises in software and board-level hardware integration, and was the technical co-founder of Spacedeck. Lukas has also written a minimalist DAW for Linux which uses a cut-down version of Lisp as a scripting language.

And Lisp is also the focus of Interim OS, which is Lukas’ attempt to produce a compact and understandable operating system built from scratch. Interim runs bare metal on the Raspberry Pi 2, with hosted versions available on other platforms.

But our interview with Lukas was as much about what has changed in general purpose computing over the last few decades, and how the empowerment initially offered by that technology has largely ceased to be, as it was about Interim itself. For more of Lukas’ thoughts on this topic, we recommend you grab a cuppa, put your feet up, and read Interim OS: Reclaiming the Computer through Minimalism and Genericity. A huge thank you to Lukas for finding the time to talk with us.


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