Kevin Bowen :xfce:

"'Rich enough to pay the fines': Washington man arrested for allegedly throwing rock at seal in Maui"

https://www.kuow.org/stories/washington-man-arrested-for-allegedly-throwing-rock-at-seal-in-maui
#pnw #Hawaii #news

As much as I like #Xfce, posting screenshots of one's desktop, or "ricing" is mostly boring as hell. YMMV. *shrug*

I also _hate_ the term "ricing" as well.

/rant

Hmmm. 🤔

May be seeing a preview release in June for the #Xfce #Wayland work with #Xfwl4

Stay tuned....

@nekohayo

NOT A FUCKING HOT TAKE.

#Gnome #GTK and #libadwaita have ALWAYS been historically pretty disrespectful and dismissive of anyone who uses their libraries and does not comply with their latest dictates.

Related to the cement factory, #KUOW published an article about it about a month ago.
It kinda blew my mind that, in the year 2026, there is a company/factory that continues to burn millions(!!) of rubber tires to help power its operations.

https://www.kuow.org/stories/seattle-tire-burning-cement-plant-gets-pushback
#pnw #Seattle #Pollution #Environment

More music that is making me happy tonight

The Tubs - Wretched Lie

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zh0P086hPU

#music #Indie #IndieRock

I will say that I was intrigued by the effort that was put into developing the Belter #ConLang even though, to my ears, it sometimes came off as a mish-mash of Afrikaaner/Jamaican affectation at times.

I definitely appreciate the commitment to its use here.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belter_Creole

#ArtificalLanguages #TheExpanse #scifi

Spontaneously ended up down by the water this evening. Caught some rays, watched the ferries, some people watching, and relaxed until the sun set. Grateful.

#pnw #BrackettsLanding #EdmondsWA #pnw #photography #Evidence

An option to export "Only modified preferences" from about:config to a text file or csv might be a neat feature to have.

Can anyone "Well, actually..." me please?

#Firefox #LibreWolf

"Creating edible chemical accidents in the kitchen" is my modus operandi tonight.

By dint of ingredients available within arm's reach, it just so happens to bear a resemblance to something...Italian.
Yes, Italian is on the menu. Indeed.

May all of your ingredient experiments become happy little accidents!

Tonight's soundtrack:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=384GsV2RCR0

#OMFUG #cooking #music #VanishingTwin

@historylink.bsky.social

116 years ago, we had an operational rail service between Everett and Seattle.
Today...not so much. 🤷
One of these days, this part of history may rhyme.

#pnw #PublicTransit #History #LightRail

Score for an Imaginary Soundtrack(Symphonic Suite, Op. 23):
...
[pensive instrumental music]
...
[dramatic music]
...
[resonant digital tones]
...
[fanfare]
...
[fin]

#music #MusicComposition

@qownnotes

Nice to see some support for #MarkDown LSPs(e.g. rumdl) being built into the app.
While I still need to drop down to a CLI to perform a line-by-line review of proposed changes, as long as I trust my #rumdl config, I can now easily re-format my .md files within the GUI.

Thanks for your work! I appreciate it.

Sad #bookstore news to note with the impending closure of Ada's Technical Books.

I don't get down there much these days; but, I always made it a point to poke my head in to Ada's when I was around 15th Ave/Volunteer Park.
I hardly recognize the neighboorhood any longer(R.I.P. Coastal Kitchen!).

https://www.capitolhillseattle.com/2026/04/after-16-years-on-capitol-hill-adas-technical-books-to-close-and-sibling-fuel-coffee-shops-up-for-sale/

#Seattle #pnw #IndependentBookStores #Books

Omigod! Speaking of #TODO apps and stuff, I just remembered rememberthemilk.
I thought that app died a flaming, horrid VC-backed death years ago.

Apparently my login still works & the last time I logged in was 14 years ago!
Time to change the password, I guess....

https://www.rememberthemilk.com

@nobodyinperson

I'm open to recommendations if you have them.

I've gotten vdirsyncer working bidirectionally between #orage and Google Calendars. That's nifty and was "easy" after setting up Google CalDAV API. So that's kinda cool, I guess.

Although, I've also learned this week that:
- Google Calendar will drop and does not support VTODOs
- vdirsyncer is apparently in the process of being deprecated for pimsync 😡 (https://whynothugo.nl/journal/2026/04/09/deprecation-plan-for-vdirsyncer/)
- Neither of these will probably work well with Proton Calendar
- The local TODO app that I like & have been using for the past 3ish weeks (GTG) seems mostly abandoned & sync is borked(possibly due to the VTODO issue?)
- The NextCloud trial instance I'm using doesn't seem to support the QOwnnotesAPI(I've been using QOwnnotes to help organize my .md documents starting this year and was curious about using its TODO functionality).

Seems that I've just made some poor lifestyle choices.... 🤣

#CalDAV

Two line config to add the #rumdl markdown linter to #Vim:
```
let g:ale_linters = { 'markdown': ['rumdl'] }
let g:ale_fixers = { 'markdown': ['rumdl'] }
```

Then use ALEFix to clean up the file. I've got that remapped to '<leader>af'.

Nifty.
Looks like rumdl support for Markdown linting has just been added to Vim's ALE plugin.

https://github.com/dense-analysis/ale/commit/c59c0d1a573a7b2fe491f78af4f2033bde454753

#Vim #VimPlugin #Lint #Markdown #rumdl

Another day, this time with two doctor's appointments. All positive results today.🎉

Not terribly interesting suburban scenery today; so, I stuck my head into a cherry tree's branches and pretended to be lost in a forest for a moment

#pnw #BothellWA #Nature #Photography #CherryBlossoms

Always nice to see nox get a new update.

https://nox.thea.codes/en/stable/CHANGELOG.html

#nox #Python #testing

@jloc0

Thanks for stating that.
At this time, we(#Xfce) are NOT currently accepting bug reports against #xfwl4.

They will be closed without mercy.

@jloc0

Well, a few months ago, we made an executive decision to actually pay one of our core devs to focus on building #Wayland support into #Xfce. Brian has done a great deal of work to make this happen over the past 3ish months.

Don't quote me on this; but, we _might_ enter public beta for #xfwl4 later this year.
I don't expect it to be ready for our 4.22 release. But, good progress is being made.

@jloc0

Oh wow! That is really interesting to hear.
#xfwl4 is not even in public beta yet.

Thanks for living on the cutting edge.

#Xfce #Wayland

@travisj

Thanks for this! Great article detailing your image processing workflow.
Also nice to see some love for Thunar custom actions.

Q: Is there a reason why you are linking to the 4.12 version of custom actions instead of the current documentation?

#Thunar #Xfce

A new blog post by me:

"List outdated packages in Python's pipx without upgrading"

Solving a papercut in pipx with a small bash function.

https://suburbanalities.blogspot.com/2026/03/list-outdated-packages-in-pythons-pipx.html

#Python #pipx #papercut #Blog #Suburbanalities #Bash

Every morning I wake up and fail my own purity tests.
How can I persist in tolerating myself?

#Sisyphus

Currently, I use the pip-check package to check for outdated packages by using `pip-check -H`.

Is there a better way of checking for outdated #Python packages installed by pip?

Is there an open issue for adding this functionality to #pip that I might follow? Thanks.

#baseball #mariners #goms

Three more days.
I'm more than ready for #baseball season to start so that I can be properly distracted from all of these distractions in the world.

#BreadAndCircuses #Goms

After much lollygagging, foot-dragging, some dawdling, a touch of dillydallying, and a bit of shilly-shallying, I've migrated my reading library & tracking over to #LibraryThing. So far, so good.
New Year's resolution acheived. 🎉

Goodbye & good riddance #GoodReads!

Just in time for a little nostalgic binge of Niven's Ringworld books as a respite from the world. I haven't done much, if any, review writing. Maybe that will change after escaping that horrendous UI.

https://www.librarything.com/profile/kevinbowen

#Reading

Six days until Spring Equinox, and Seattle weather tryin' to get all its homework done at the last minute. wtf? 🤣

(this will all be gone by noon most likely...)
#Seattle #wawx #pnw #Whiteout #Snow

Cool. One remaining flatpak application to run after another borked update.

It's me, not you #flatpak. I swear.

The only app left standing is #KeyPassXC which has been reliable & stable, for me, for 3+(?) years.

Aside from keeping my password manager current, I just can't be bothered.
So it goes.

@travisj

Great article! Nice insight into your #design process and engaging with an open source project for the first time as a designer.

Thanks for the little shout out to #Xfce and the usefulness of #Thunar custom actions.

@tragivictoria

Yes, that attempt has been discarded in favor of building a compositor based on smithay.

You can read about the details of decision here:
https://alexxcons.github.io/blogpost_15.html

#Xfce #xfwl4

After 20+ years into a relationship, the phrase "grease me up woman!" takes on a whole new meaning.🤣

#BackPain #Ointment #Unguent #OverSharing #TigerBalm #TheSimpsons

Remember kids: friends don't let friends "Zorn". Not even once.

A concise and funny article propping up early Zorn experiments as some kind of evil or fucked up taboo. Good stuff! 🤣

"Here is a list of things Naked City sounds like: a jazz “Revolution 9,” a broken tape of a French murder mystery, a rollercoaster on the brink of falling apart, the varsity jazz band in a mental institution, The Wizard of Gore, a man in a red velvet suit whispering something seductive and then screaming in your ear, nothing else."

Wholesome tunes for the entire family to gather around the stereophonic sound system in the living room and listen together to on a cold winter Sunday evening.

"The Sicilian Clan"(linked in the article) is still one of my favorite "smooth" jazz-noir bits after 30+ years.

https://www.treblezine.com/john-zorn-naked-city-gleeful-noise-jazz-experiment/
#JohnZorn #AvantJazz #FreeJazz #music #Jazz

@opencollective @benjam @shannonwray

I'm not really sure that this presentation actually clarified anything in terms of #Xfce and its financial relationship to #opencollective

Unfortunately, I think that may be causing more confusion. The presention seemed very convoluted.

In my personal opinion, I think that it is a net positive that we, #Xfce, are actually starting to spend the donations that we have received from our generous supporters on paying our core developers to improve the project.

A few years ago, my neighborhood/apartment complex would've been going nuts celebrating a #SuperbOwl victory. Fireworks. Horn honking. General merry-making.

This year it's silent.

I'm not remotely interested in #Football; but, I can always appreciate some community jocularity. Someone always has managed to put on a good fireworks show.

Considering my local demographics, I'm kinda sad my neighborhood is so quiet tonight.

#SeattleSeahawks

@jimedrand

Replacing labwc with xfwl4 would be the goal, yes.

Whether that happens with the upcoming 4.22 release, or not, is still TBD.

We'll have a much clearer plan & roadmap after the 1st development release of Xfwl4 (expected to be sometime mid-2026).

#Xfce #xfwl4 #Wayland

A FAQ page is now available regarding the work Xfce/Brian is doing to build Xfwl4, an Xfce Wayland Compositor:

https://wiki.xfce.org/xfwl4_faq

#Xfce #Wayland #Xfwl4

Traditionally, #Xfce is newsworthy perhaps once every other year.

It's part of the reason I've been using it for 20+ years and volunteering with the project for...um *cough* 13+(!) years. Quiet, stable, predicatble. Boring, even. I prefer that in my Desktop Environment.

It's not even the end of January and we've already had one big announcement with #Xfwl4 and there are probably two more on the way this year:

1. The initial development release of Xfwl4 sometime mid-year.
2. The probable release of Xfce4 4.22 in December(Our release roadmap still needs to be updated, real soon now).

I hope that I handle this much Xfce excitement this year. 🤣 🚀

Guess my little mid-winter mini sabbatical from #Xfce is officially over.
Time to catch up on the latest progress. 😆

Nice to see this announcement come through today.

Especially nice to see a burst in financial donations coming in to help support the initiative with building out #Xfwl4

It's really heartening to see the support from the community. Thank you!

For any questions related to xfwl4, please visit our Matrix channel #xfce-dev.

https://matrix.to/#/#xfce-dev:matrix.org

#Xfce #Xfwl4

Per the blog post details:

"If you’re interested in the detailed reasoning behind the project or want to explore all the technical details, check out the issues and the work in progress source code."

Xfwl4 issues:
https://gitlab.xfce.org/kelnos/xfwl4/-/issues

Xfwl4 source code:
https://gitlab.xfce.org/kelnos/xfwl4
#Xfce #Wayland #Xfwl4

I can't see them; but, I sure as hell can hear them.
Don't know if we're in a bit of a false Spring.
The little birdies have been out, raging, up in the trees just off my deck for the past two days.

#Birds #pnw #FalseSpring #Video

Just watched a really wonderful, and touching #documentary of groundbreaking #AvantGarde sorta #surrealist filmmaker Maya Deren, "In the Mirror of Maya Deren" [2003].

She was a Russian/Jewish and American experimental filmmaker and important part of the avant-garde in the 1940s and 1950s. In my opinion, probably one of the more important women behind the camera in the early days of cinema.

Given some recognition (and budget), I honestly think she could have rivaled Cocteau with his Orpheus films. Just wonderful stuff.

At the very least, hunt down "Meshes of the Afternoon" for a taste of her work. Highly recommend.

Music by John Zorn as a bonus.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xpOkIWH3C2E

#film #cinema #Dance #Choreography #WomenInFilm

Meatspace is weird.
Drove out to a ranch house in the suburbs, yesterday, for a friend's one-year old's birthday.

Turns out pretty much all of the 20-ish adults, plus a couple semi-feral children, were complete introverts and struggled to make eye-contact with anyone.
Along with the birthday-guest's parents, there were at least two polycule/throuples mixed in with some "traditional" relatives flown in from out of state.

I had a great time bonding with the birthday girl and the 82 year old mother of the host. But, man, I've never been around such a group of people actively avoiding conversation. 🤣

As a general recluse, I felt like an exhibitionist there! Good times.

#Introverts

Growing up outside of #NYC in the '70's, pre #CableTV, I'm thankful for independant channels and syndication. Not counting UHF, we only had 7 channels:

NEW YORK CITY
[2] WCBS-TV (CBS)
[4] WNBC-TV (NBC)
[5] WNEW-TV (Ind.)
[7] WABC-TV (ABC)
[9] WOR-TV (Ind.)
[11] WPIX-TV (Ind.)
[13] WNDT-TV (NET)

Channel 13 was, IIRC, PBS, CFPB(i.e. Electric Company, Sesame Street, Zoom, Dr. Who, and all that icky adult stuff).

But for me, the independent channels(5, 9, and 11) was a abundant cultural banquet. It exposed me ~40 years of "classic" cartoons(non-stop Warner Bros, Looney Tunes(even the "bad" ones!!), B-movie #sci-fi & Japanese monster movies (#Kaiju), along with weird shit I didn't understand like the Uncle Floyd Show, and Joe Franklin.

Once cable came along, some diversity was lost. Even with 100 more channels, it became harder to stumble upon a 3 Stooges film, some random western, or "Tarantula"! & "The Amazing Collosal Man" for the 500th time.
The terrain got larger; but, the land became slightly more barren. YMMV

#Television #Movies #Nostalgia

Looks like #pyenv releases will now be more closely in sync with #CPython releases thanks to some newly implemented automation. That's great news!

Thanks to the devs for making this happen.

https://github.com/pyenv/pyenv/issues/2980

#Python