The PC market is in rough waters, and it was for much of last year. Every PC maker except Apple saw year-over-year decline. Laptop sales are said to have suffered the most. From a report: This all made for a somewhat uncertain backdrop heading into CES 2023, the annual conference where tech companies show off the products they'll be releasing in 2023. Throughout the show, executives and representatives from various PC manufacturers acknowledged that the industry has a big task ahead of it this year: keep the laptop exciting. Some companies are trying to do that with goofy hardware things (such as Lenovo's dual-screen, dual-OLED, and touchpad-less Yoga Book 9i). But others are moving away from hardware -- and the raw power that hardware can provide -- and emphasizing quirkier software capabilities in this year's lineups. AMD revealed that some of its new chips will come with its first Ryzen AI engine, built on its XDNA architecture.
Intel's upcoming Meteor Lake chips will also bring AI capabilities.
HP announced new features for its Omen Gaming Hub, including integration with Nvidia's GeForce Now, and new remote management and insight services for IT. A consumer Windows PC, the Dragonfly Pro, was also unveiled, with its integration with HP's new "live concierge" service touted as a highlight. The report adds: And HP isn't alone in this conviction -- quite a few other manufacturers that had a big presence at CES this year emphasized showy software features that utilized camera tracking and AI, from Asus' and Acer's glasses-free 3D displays to Razer's soundbar that follows your head around to optimize your music. Even Lenovo's aforementioned dual-screen Yoga Book is a software offering in many ways; the form factor is hardly new, but the investments Lenovo has made in an impressive system of gesture control are what make it a viable product.

During the CES 2023 in Las Vegas today, Asus announced an upcoming feature that allows users to view and work with content in 3D without wearing 3D glasses. Ars Technica reports: Similar technology has been used in a small number of laptops and displays before, but Asus is incorporating the feature for the first time in OLED laptop screens. Combined with high refresh rates, unique input methods like an integrated dial, and the latest CPUs and laptop GPUs, the company is touting the laptops with the Asus Spatial Vision feature as powerful, niche options for creative professionals looking for new ways to work.

Asus' Spatial Vision 3D tech is debuting on two laptops in Q2 this year: the ProArt Studiobook 16 3D OLED (H7604) and Vivobook Pro 16 3D OLED (K6604). The laptops each feature a 16-inch, 3200x2000 OLED panel with a 120 Hz refresh rate. The OLED panel is topped with a layer of optical resin, a glass panel, and a lenticular lens layer. The lenticular lens works with a pair of eye-tracking cameras to render real-time images for each eye that adjust with your physical movements. In a press briefing, an Asus spokesperson said that because the OLED screens claim a low gray-to-gray response time of 0.2 ms, as well as the extremely high contrast that comes with OLED, there's no crosstalk between the left and right eye's image, ensuring more realistic looking content. However, Asus' product pages for the laptops acknowledge that experiences may vary, and some may still suffer from "dizziness or crosstalk due to other reasons, and this varies according to the individual." Asus said it's looking to offer demos to users, which would be worth trying out before committing to this unique feature.

On top of the lenticular lens is a 2D/3D liquid crystal switching layer, which is topped with a glass front panel with an anti-reflective coating. According to Asus, it'll be easy to switch from 2D mode to 3D and back again. When the laptops aren't in 3D mode, their display will appear as a highly specced OLED screen, Asus claimed. The laptops can apply a 3D effect to any game, movie, or content that supports 3D. However, content not designed for 3D display may appear more "stuttery," per a demo The Verge saw. The laptops are primarily for workers working with and creating 3D models and content, such as designers and architects. The two laptops will ship with Spatial Vision Hub software. It includes a Model Viewer, Player for movies and videos, Photo Viewer for transforming side-by-side photos shot with a 180-degree camera into one stereoscopic 3D image, and Connector, a plug-in that Asus' product page says is compatible with "various apps and tools, so you can easily view any project in 3D."

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Dell continues tinkering with what it hopes to be a repairable laptop like the Framework Laptop. Last year, it showed off Concept Luna, a clamshell designed to easily disassemble for easy repairs, upgrades, and harvested components. This year, Dell showed the press an updated Concept Luna that could support more power while being even simpler to dismantle. The vendor is also exploring how to automate the process, from disassembly to parts diagnostics, on a broad scale. Dell's Concept Luna laptop is comparable in size to a Latitude with some Dell XPS 13 Plus-like stylings. In person, it looked similar to the Concept Luna demoed last year, including appearing to be a functioning PC. But Dell's representative was able to open this year's version up and pull out internal parts much more rapidly -- well under 60 seconds.

The computer was easier to take apart because it doesn't have screws (last year's Concept Luna had four). Dell's rep simply stuck a pin (it could be anything that fits, they said) into a hole in the security lock slot on the right side of the system's deck. That allowed Dell's rep to pull off the keystone north of the keyboard and then slide the keyboard up and out. Once the system was open, the speakers, fan, motherboard, and battery were removed instantly thanks to pop-out modules, which, Dell said, are recyclable. The concept laptop also got rid of the cable connecting the battery, so there are no cables, adhesives, or other types of connectors.

Dell built Concept Luna with simple display upgrades and repairs in mind as well. Dell's spokesperson promptly removed the system's LCD by inserting a pin into a hole in a keystone south of the screen and then took off the keystone, releasing a latch underneath the piece, and plucked the display off the chassis. There's also potential for better accommodations for beefier components in the updated Concept Luna. Last year's version used passive cooling, while the new one has a fan. The fans lock into the motherboard, keeping it in place. A tech giant like Dell releasing something like Concept Luna could certainly give the younger Framework a run for its money, but Dell still isn't talking about releasing a laptop with Concept Luna's repairability. And it could ultimately decide not to. However, in addition to advancing the laptop's design this year, Dell also looked into automation techniques that could further this concept on a scale that could extend beyond a single product.

For the last thirteen years the Free Software Foundation has published its Ethical Tech Giving Guide, notes a recent FSF blog post. "The right to determine what a device you've purchased does or doesn't do is something too valuable to lose."

Or, as they put it in the guide: It's time to reclaim our freedom from the abuse of multinational corporations, who use proprietary software and malicious "antifeatures" to keep us powerless, dependent, and surveilled by the devices that we use. There's no time at which it's more important to turn these unfortunate facts into positive action than the holiday season.

The gifts that we recommend here might not be making headlines, but they're the rare exception to the apparent rule that devices should mistreat their users.
For technical users, the guide recommends pairing the FSF-sponsored Replicant, a fully-free distribution of Android, with the F-Droid app repository, which has hundreds of applications including Syncthing, Tor, Minetest, and Termux.

They also praise the X200 laptop, "one of the few home user devices that's able to run fully free software from top to bottom." With easy-to-repair hardware, it's the laptop most frequently used in the FSF's own office — just one of several freedom-respecting devices from Vikings. And there's shout-outs to MNT's Reform laptop, products from PINE64 and Purism, plus a freedom-respecting VPN, and a mini wifi adapter .

The guide even recommends places to buy DRM-free ebooks, including No Starch Press, Smashwords, Leanpub, Standard Ebooks, Nantucket E-Books, Libreture (which also offers a storage solution). Meanwhile for print books, there's the Gnu Press Shop

And it also recommends sources for DRM-free music (including Bandcamp, Emusic, the Smithsonian Institute's Folkways, the classic punk label Dischord, HDTracks, and Mutopia).

And it also tells you where to find free (as in freedom) films...

Recently the authors of Elements of Publishing shared an update. "After ten years in print, our publisher decided against further printings and has reverted the rights to us. We are publishing Elements of Programming in two forms: a free PDF and a no-markup paperback."

And that's not the only old book that's getting a new life on the web...

22 years ago, long-time Slashdot reader Stephen T. Satchell (satch89450) co-authored Linux IP Stacks Commentary, a book commenting the TCP/IP code in Linux kernel 2.0.34. ("Old-timers will remember the Lion's Unix Commentary, the book published by University xerographic copies on the sly. Same sort of thing.") But the print edition struggled to update as frequently as the Linux kernel itself, and Satchell wrote a Slashdot post exploring ways to fund a possible update.

At the time Slashdot's editors noted that "One of the largest complaints about Linux is that there is a lack of high-profile documentation. It would be sad if this publication were not made simply because of the lack of funds (which some people would see as a lack of interest) necessary to complete it." But that's how things seemed to end up — until Satchell suddenly reappeared to share this update from 2022: When I was released from my last job, I tried retirement. Wasn't for me. I started going crazy with nothing significant to do. So, going through old hard drives (that's another story), I found the original manuscript files, plus the page proof files, for that two-decade-old book. Aha! Maybe it's time for an update. But how to keep it fresh, as Torvalds continues to release new updates of the Linux kernel?

Publish it on the Web. Carefully.

After four months (and three job interviews) I have the beginnings of the second edition up and available for reading. At the moment it's an updated, corrected, and expanded version of the "gray matter", the exposition portions of the first edition....

The URL for the alpha-beta version of this Web book is satchell.net/ipstacks for your reading pleasure. The companion e-mail address is up and running for you to provide feedback. There is no paywall.
But there's also an ingenious solution to the problem of updating the text as the code of the kernel keeps changing: Thanks to the work of Professor Donald Knuth (thank you!) on his WEB and CWEB programming languages, I have made modifications, to devise a method for integrating code from the GIT repository of the Linux kernel without making any modifications (let alone submissions) to said kernel code. The proposed method is described in the About section of the Web book. I have scaffolded the process and it works. But that's not the hard part.

The hard part is to write the commentary itself, and crib some kind of Markup language to make the commentary publishing quality. The programs I write will integrate the kernel code with the commentary verbiage into a set of Web pages. Or two slightly different sets of web pages, if I want to support a mobile-friendly version of the commentary.

Another reason for making it a web book is that I can write it and publish it as it comes out of my virtual typewriter. No hard deadlines. No waiting for the printers. And while this can save trees, that's not my intent. The back-of-the-napkin schedule calls for me to to finish the expository text in September, start the Python coding for generating commentary pages at the same time, and start the writing the commentary on the Internet Control Message Protocol in October. By then, Linus should have version 6.0.0 of the Linux kernel released.

I really, really, really don't want to charge readers to view the web book. Especially as it's still in the virtual typewriter. There isn't any commentary (yet). One thing I have done is to make it as mobile-friendly as I can, because I suspect the target audience will want to read this on a smartphone or tablet, and not be forced to resort to a large-screen laptop or desktop. Also, the graphics are lightweight to minimize the cost for people who pay by the kilopacket. (Does anywhere in the world still do this? Inquiring minds want to know.)

I host this web site on a Protectli appliance in my apartment, so I don't have that continuing expense. The power draw is around 20 watts. My network connection is AT&T fiber — and if it becomes popular I can always upgrade the upstream speed.

The thing is, the cat needs his kibble. I still want to know if there is a source of funding available.

Also, is it worthwhile to make the pages available in a zip file? Then a reader could download a snapshot of the book, and read it off-line.

Lenovo has taken issue with the design of the Framework Laptop and one of its power buttons. The Verge reports: In a tweet, the startup claims to have been contacted by Lenovo's legal team, who say the circular design of the power button on one of Framework's designs is too similar to the stylized "O" Lenovo uses in the wordmark for its "Legion" brand of gaming laptops. "Consumers could believe that Framework's Broken O Case or the motherboards they cover are produced by, sponsored, endorsed, licensed, or otherwise affiliated with Lenovo, when that is not the case," a screenshot of the legal letter from Lenovo posted by Framework reads.

The offending power button design doesn't appear on any of Framework's laptops. Instead, the circle can be found in the 3D printer case schematics that Framework released back in April, which allow customers to build their own Raspberry Pi-style miniature PCs using just the laptop's motherboard (these can be bought separately, as well as harvested from a Framework laptop). This YouTube video gives a nice overview of how the 3D-printed enclosure is supposed to work (the power button gets pressed at the 9:35 minute mark). [...] Framework doesn't physically sell anything with the offending power button design on it, so fixing the problem is theoretically as simple as uploading a replacement set of CAD files to GitHub. So, rather than fighting Lenovo, Framework is holding a competition for its users to submit new designs for its power button. Entries are open until August 25th, and the winner gets a free i5-1135G7 Mainboard.

In the last two weeks, six new Linux laptops have hit the market (or were announced). "The Linux hardware scene is getting better by the day," writes the site FOSS Weekly:

• Star Labs teases its new StarFighter Linux Laptop with a 4K (10-bit IPS) display.

• MNT Research introduces a "more affordable" 7-inch mini Linux laptop, the MNT Pocket Reform.

• KDE's Slimbook 4 is here with AMD Ryzen 7 5700U processor and a better battery, starting from $1,000. "Buying from Slimbook supports KDE development too," notes Gaming on Linux, adding that there's a choice of 14 or 15.6 inch displays.

• TUXEDO's Pulse 15 — Gen2 (also with an AMD Ryzen 7 5700U processor) has a 15-inch HiDPI WQHD 165Hz display, along with eight cores and 16 threads. (And the Register notes its twin cooling fans, "allowing them to overclock the chip and run it at 35W," and a choice of distros.)

• Pre-orders have opened for the Roma — the first RISC-V Laptop (which may ship in September). Ars Technica reports they're offering "free Silicon upgrades" — that is free system-on-a-chip and system-on-module upgrades for its quad-core RISC-V CPU. And there's also a companion NPU/GPU, notes a blog post at RISCV.org, "for the fastest, seamless RISC-V native software development available." (As well as "early access to next-generation laptop and accessory upgrades at generous discounts or for free.") The blog post calls it a "Web3-friendly platform with NFT creation and publication plus integrated MetaMask-style wallet."

• System 76's "Lemur" Alder Lake- and coreboot-powered laptop arrives with 14 hours of battery life.

Mike Bouma writes: Version 1.7 of AROS One for x86 has just been released and it's a distro of the "AROS Research Operating System," originally "Amiga Research Operating System." It's a standalone, free and open-source multi-media centric operating system that's designed to be portable, flexible, efficient and lightweight and can be seen dual booting with Windows 10 on an Acer laptop here. The most popular AROS specific community portal is AROS Exec.

Parts of AROS were used to create the commercial PowerPC based Amiga-like operating system MorphOS, which has recently seen a new release as well, version 3.17. The most popular MorphOS specific community portal is MorphZone.

It was "the furthest any Right to Repair bill for consumer electronics has come to becoming law" in America, reports the nonprofit California Public Interest Research Group.

And yet... The California Senate Appropriations committee failed to pass Sen. Susan Eggman's Right to Repair bill, SB 983, on May 19, which would have significantly expanded Californians' access to the parts, tools, and service information needed to fix consumer electronics and appliances.... The policy had broad, bipartisan support, with 75% of Californians and majorities of both parties supporting Right to Repair. The bill, which passed through the judiciary committee with only a single opposing vote, met the same fate as a similarly popular medical Right to Repair bill that Sen. Eggman introduced in 2021. Sander Kushen, CALPIRG Advocate issued the following statement in response... "SB 983 could have saved California households as much as $4.3 billion a year in reduced spending on electronics and helped Californians reduce toxic electronic waste. Instead, industry groups' heavy lobbying effort helped to kill the bill."
"Other states are pursuing similar legislation and there's also a pending federal bill," reports the San Francisco Chronicle" The right-to-repair movement is gaining steam with President Biden as a vocal advocate. In July 2021, he asked the Federal Trade Commission to draft right-to-repair rules. The FTC said it will target repairs restrictions as antitrust violations.

In recent months, major tech players have opened up limited ways to help consumers fix stuff. Apple has said it will sell manuals, parts and tools but only to owners of the iPhone 12 and 13 models. Microsoft said it's looking into repair options for its computer accessories. Google will sell replacement parts for Pixel smartphones via iFixit, a self-described "wikipedia of repair."
But they also explore why the California bill failed: The legislative bill, which would have been the first of its kind in the United States, would have required makers of electronic gear such as cell phones, game consoles, washers and dryers, computers — almost anything with a chip inside — to ease the route to fixing broken stuff by providing parts, tools and manuals at reasonable prices. Supporters pitched it as a no-brainer to save consumers money and reduce e-waste.

But the electronics industry says that it could have created a free-for-all, allowing pirates to flourish, unauthorized people to access sensitive information and trade secrets to be violated... "We're going up against the rights of some of the biggest companies in the world," said Kevin O'Reilly, a Right to Repair campaign director with U.S. Public Interest Research Group, or PIRG. He's also associated with CALPIRG. "Apple and Google and other tech giants have either lobbied against the bill or supported organizations that lobbied against the bill."

An anonymous reader shares a report: The Amazon Appstore doesn't come with Windows 11 by default, but anyone in the US can download it by heading to the Microsoft Store on their device. It's as simple as installing any other native Windows app -- a good start for potentially getting users onboard. Unfortunately, it's unclear when it'll arrive for users in regions outside the US. You'll need an Amazon account to log in, of course, but the service itself is free. It might be easy to install, but I found browsing and using the service unsurprisingly mediocre. I'm testing this app store out on a souped-up gaming laptop, yet for some reason, the Appstore felt sluggish, taking seconds to load each page and dropping frames when the home screen banner was changing slides. The storefront itself is barebones, offering just two basic categories along the left-side panel and a basic search bar along the top.

As for the app selection, it's as bad as you might've guessed from the jump. Forget Google apps, obviously -- they aren't on Fire Tablets, and they aren't here. TikTok has been predominantly featured on Microsoft's press images for the Appstore since it was announced, and for good reason: it's the only major social network with a listing. Forget Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter -- you're stuck with TikTok if you want to experience the social side of the web.

Games don't fare much better. Looking at the top paid titles, I only recognized two names -- and that was because I knew the Nickelodeon properties they were based on -- not the games themselves. Free titles didn't fare much better; you'll find Subway Surfers and the Talking Tom series, but not much more. None of our favorite free-to-play titles appeared in a search: no Among Us, Call of Duty Mobile, or Roblox. Granted, you can fill all of these absences elsewhere on Windows 11. Many of these titles have versions on Steam or the web -- you don't need the Android version of Among Us to play on Windows. The same goes for those missing apps, from Google services to social networks to recipe apps and smart home controls. It's not hard to access Gmail these days, even if it's not in a dedicated app, and that all begs the question: why does this service even exist?

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Forbes: Google had plenty of news about Stadia, the consumer-facing aspect of its cloud gaming products, at its Google for Games Developer Summit. On the flip side of that is the white-label platform Google's been working on: a way for other companies to license the game streaming tech that powers Stadia. Previously, that B2B offering was believed to be known as Google Stream. Google has now confirmed more details about the offering, including its name.

It's now called Immersive Stream for Games (which doesn't exactly roll off the tongue as smoothly as Google Stream). The Stadia team built it with the help of the folks at Google Cloud. The company says the service will allow companies to run their own game trials, let users play full games, offer subscription bundles or have full storefronts. In other words, publishers might be able to run their own versions of Stadia with their own libraries of games, branding and custom user interface.

We've seen a version of Immersive Stream for Games in action. Last year, Google teamed up with AT&T to offer people a way to play Batman: Arkham Knight for free via the cloud. Thousands of folks took advantage of the offer. AT&T plans to offer its customers access to another game soon with the help of Immersive Stream for Games. While that version of Batman: Arkham Knight was only available on desktop and laptop web browsers, the next game will run on mobile devices too. If all goes well, it could be a decent way for AT&T to show off what its 5G network can do. Immersive Stream for Games will include other features Google revealed for Stadia today, including a way to offer free trials of full games and a project aimed at making it easier to port games so they run on Stadia tech, as well as analytics. Developers and publishers can send Google an inquiry for more details.

On Tuesday, Dell announced a new design concept for a laptop that's long lived, easy to take apart and fix, and takes a smaller toll on the climate. The Verge reports: Called "Concept Luna," the proof-of-concept laptop dreamed up by Dell's design team has a number of unusual features that are intended to make repair and maintenance easy. No screwdrivers or glue solvents are needed to pry loose a broken keyboard or peel off a cracked screen; both components simply pop free after a pair of keystones holding them in place are removed. The entire system contains far fewer screws than a typical Dell laptop, reducing the time needed to replace components. And you'll never have to worry about replacing a broken fan, because there isn't one: a shrunken-down motherboard placed in the top cover allows the laptop to passively cool itself.

Dell design strategist Drew Tosh described Luna as a "front end concept" intended to "solve some of the larger problems we're trying to get ahead of in the future," namely e-waste and climate change. A laptop that is easy to repair and upgrade is less likely to be replaced with a new one that takes yet more energy and resources to produce. When that computer eventually does stop working, parts can be harvested to live on in other machines rather than winding up as toxic trash in landfills. [...] "We're really focused on reuse and recycle," Tosh told The Verge. "And really, it would be more like reuse, reuse, reuse, and recycle only when we really have to." So far, only several prototype versions of this laptop exist. But the design Dell is showing off is as sleek and portable as any laptop in the company's current lineup.

Other ideas in Concept Luna are more focused on the climate impact of electronics. The aluminum in the chassis is smelted using hydropower energy, replacing what is often one of the dirtiest manufacturing steps with a low-carbon alternative. The motherboard is a quarter the size of the board in the Latitude 7300 AE, and according to Dell, it could have a 50 percent smaller carbon footprint. A life cycle analysis of the Latitude 7300 AE found that manufacturing accounted for 65 percent of the device's climate impact and printed wire boards were the most energy-intensive components to make. Considering Dell's leading position in the global laptop market, this level of carbon cutting on an individual parts basis could translate to significant reductions across the industry. Another key factor determining how long lived any laptop will be is the availability of spare parts for repair -- most importantly, screens and batteries [...]. [I]ndividuals can already order "tens of thousands" of spare parts from Dell, including replacement screens and batteries, however, these components are often unavailable for purchase online. [I]ncreasing the number of spare parts customers can buy online is "something we are working on right now."

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Microsoft is taking the fight to Chromebooks in schools with the $250 Surface Laptop SE, but inexpensive hardware is only part of the equation. One reason Chromebooks have succeeded in education is because of Chrome OS, which is well-suited for lower-end hardware, easy for IT administrators to manage, and hard to break with errant apps or malware. Microsoft's answer to Chrome OS is Windows 11 SE. Unlike past efforts like Windows in S mode (which is still its own separate thing), Windows 11 SE isn't just a regular version of Windows with a cheaper license or a cut-down version that runs fewer apps. Windows 11 SE defaults to saving all files (including user profile information) to students' OneDrive accounts, and it has had some standard Windows 11 features removed to ensure a "distraction-free" learning environment that performs better on low-end devices. The operating system also gives IT administrators exclusive control over the apps and browser extensions that can be installed and run via Microsoft Intune.

If you're a school IT administrator with a fleet of PC laptops or desktops, you might wonder if you can buy and install Windows 11 SE on hardware you already have so you can benefit from its changes without buying new hardware. The answer, Microsoft tells us, is no. The only way to get Windows 11 SE is on laptops that ship with Windows 11 SE. And if you re-image a Windows 11 SE device with a different version of Windows 10 or Windows 11, it won't even be possible to reinstall Windows 11 SE after that. [...] Microsoft has published documentation (PDF) that more fully explains the differences between Windows 11 SE and the other editions of Windows (including Windows in S mode).

After months of negotiations, President Joe Biden's Build Back Better agenda advanced into its last phase of debate this week. The bipartisan infrastructure bill contains billions to expand high-speed broadband across the country, aiming to close the digital divide over the next 10 years. From a report: But the administration's $65 billion down payment on broadband can only help connect families who can afford a computer. So Biden's latest version of the Build Back Better program goes further, allocating new funds to bring federally funded desktops, laptops, and tablets to poor Americans. Last week, the White House released its latest version of the Build Back Better plan, outlining a $1.75 trillion budget proposal to tackle climate change and invest in other social services like Medicare. Deep within the over 1,600 pages of the bill is a new initiative -- the Connected Device Grant Program -- that would help provide free or discounted desktops, laptops, or tablets to low-income households. To accomplish that goal, the Commerce Department would receive $475 million to award community groups that want to distribute these devices locally.

For many professionals, Hawaii seems a dream spot for remote work. But pulling off remote work in the Aloha state takes more than a plane ticket and a laptop. From a report: The pandemic devastated the state's economy. According to the Hawaii Tourism Authority, visitor arrivals fell 97.6% between August 2019 and August the following year. Employment in the state's leisure and hospitality sector, which accounts for nearly one in five jobs, fell 53% between February and August 2020, according to the Pew Center. Thanks in part to state initiatives -- including pre-arrival coronavirus testing for visitors and marketing campaigns wooing remote workers -- tourism is on the rebound. In April, visitors reached nearly 500,000, compared with roughly 4,500 in April 2020. One program, called Movers and Shakas (named after the friendly Y-shaped hand gesture with extended thumb and pinkie that means "hang loose"), was launched in December with local business leaders. It offers free airfare to remote workers who commit to staying at least a month and participate in volunteer activities. The program's 50 spots attracted 90,000 applications. Applications for the second round will open this month.

As it is elsewhere, reliable Wi-Fi is the litmus test for many. Some areas of the Hawaiian islands, especially rural regions, lack robust broadband or cellular infrastructure. Tomasz Janczuk, a 45-year-old based in the Seattle area who owns and operates a software-development firm, chose the three Big Island hotels that he and his family lived in for a month based on Wi-Fi strength. During an off-road excursion, Mr. Janczuk got a call from an employee about a service outage at his company. He pulled over and had to climb on top of his Jeep for sufficient reception to help troubleshoot the problem. "If there's no Wi-Fi, you have to fall back on cellphones, and that is quite spotty out there," said Mr. Janczuk, who also carried a hot spot. Some workers find that Hawaii's spectacular surroundings -- which drew them in the first place -- can be a distraction. Jasmyn Franks, a social-media strategist for an advertising agency in Kansas City, Mo., began working in mid-May from the palm-tree-filled backyard of her aunt's house in Mililani, a mountainous city on Oahu. Ms. Franks, 30, said initially, the first five to 10 minutes of every conference call were taken up with colleagues admiring her background. "So, there was a point where I was just like, 'OK, let's just take this to the corner or something where it kind of looks like I'm at the house.'"

During the lockdowns I edited dozens of Slashdot posts from the front-passenger seat of my car (using a cellphone for a mobile hotspot).

But according to CNBC, I wasn't the only person working from a vehicle... When Erica Horn received a work email in May 2020 saying her company would be fully remote for the next year, she knew right away it was time to live out her long-held dream of living out of a van... Horn is not alone. Many workers with jobs that let them work remotely during the pandemic left behind their sedentary housing situations and moved full-time into vans. These remote workers drive from location to location in their homes, working from internet hotspots in their vans and spending their free time in nature and exploring new places. As vaccines roll out and states start to open up, some workers are returning to their offices.

But many workers who've adopted the van life don't want to give it up...

Like overseas backpacking, van life appeals to those with a love for travel or the outdoors who have the privilege to work remotely and the budget to spend thousands of dollars buying and setting up their vans. They can shift the money from rent and car payments toward a lifestyle of endless travel... For some, working out of a van is less about travel and more of an alternative to leasing an office. Kenzo Fong, CEO of tech start-up Rock, began working out of his van in May 2020 after his children began doing their schoolwork at home during the pandemic. Fong still lives in his San Francisco home, but during the days, he gets into his van and picks a new location in the city...

Some van lifers only need a laptop. Others have more elaborate set ups complete with multiple monitors. But most carry at least two hot spots from different network providers so they can catch signal from at least one of the services as they hit new locations... Despite the challenges of life on the road, those who spoke with CNBC said they plan to continue their nomadic lifestyle until their companies stop allowing remote work or until they get burnt out. Horn said she originally planned to live on the road for at least a year, but that's now changed.

"At six months, I still feel like I'm just learning this, just getting the hang of it and just getting started," she said. "I could actually see myself doing it for closer to two years, and who knows, maybe longer."

Microsoft on Tuesday announced a new 2021 Surface Laptop, called the Surface Laptop 4. The new version adds 11th-gen Intel Core processors, paired with Intel Iris XE graphics. There's also an AMD processor option -- Zen 2 series -- with a graphics chip called AMD Radeon Graphics Microsoft Surface Edition. From a report: For all the buzz Microsoft's Surface tablets get, I've always thought the Surface Laptop was actually Microsoft's secret weapon. Since Surface Laptop debuted in 2017, it's been a strong contender for the best all-purpose slim Windows laptop. But plenty of companies offer 13-inch-class slim laptops, all hoping to be the Windows version of Apple's ubiquitous MacBook Air. (Microsoft also introduced a 15-inch version in 2019.) Microsoft says the Surface Laptop has the Surface line's highest level of customer satisfaction. Besides simply working well and being stylish and easy to use, the Surface Laptop was frequently on sale at very reasonable prices, making it a great way to get a rock-solid clamshell laptop for not much money. Shortly before the Surface Laptop 4 preorders went live, you could still order a Core i5 13-inch Surface Laptop 3 (with 8GB RAM and a 128GB SSD) for $769, or $899 for a 256GB SSD.

"Today, on October 4th, the Free Software Foundation (FSF) celebrates its thirty-fifth year of fighting for software freedom," announces a blog post at FSF.org: Our work will not be finished until every computer user is able to do all of their digital tasks in complete freedom — whether that's on a desktop, laptop, or the computer in your pocket. The fight for free software continues, and we wouldn't be here without you.

To celebrate, we have a full week of announcements and surprises planned starting today, and we will end in an online anniversary event featuring both live and prerecorded segments this Friday, October 9th, from 12:00 EDT (16:00 UTC) until 17:00 EDT (21:00 UTC). We'd love for you to join in celebration of this amazing community by submitting a short (two-minute) video sharing your favorite memory about free software or the FSF, and a wish for the future of software freedom. We'll be collecting the videos all week and airing a selection during the birthday event on October 9th...

If you are able to, please make a donation of $35 or more to help keep the fight for user freedom going another 35 years, we'll send you a commemorative pin... We're another year older, but that doesn't mean we're slowing down our efforts to bring software freedom to users around the globe. Stay tuned for more information on how we plan to ring in the FSF's next year, and the vital role each one of us plays in ensuring free software's success for the future. We hope that you'll be able to take part in our festivities this week!
The announcement suggests 10 different ways to celebrate, which include:

• Try a fully free distribution of GNU/Linux, which can be run "live" without making any permanent changes to your computer's hard drive.

• Take an hour to follow our Email Self-Defense Guide, and learn how to opt out of bulk surveillance .

• Download and experiment with one of the oldest parts of the GNU operating system, the GNU Emacs text editor. Try the tutorial by launching the editor and typing Ctrl-h + t (C-h t), or see if you can make it through some of the games included with Emacs, such as Alt-x (M-x) dunnet or M-x tetris.

• Make the commitment to replace one nonfree program that you use with one that respects your freedom, such as using LibreOffice instead of Microsoft Office.

• Petition the administrators of your favorite Web site to free the proprietary JavaScript lurking on their page that many users run and download without ever realizing it.

Fortnite-maker Epic Games and Apple are currently embroiled in a public battle over Apple's App Store policies, and in the latest move in the dispute, Epic has announced a Fortnite tournament taking place August 23rd where players can compete to win anti-Apple prizes. From a report: Last week, Epic added a new direct payment system to Fortnite in violation of Apple's policies. Apple removed Fortnite from the App Store the same day, and shortly after, Epic launched a campaign against Apple by suing the company, releasing a "Nineteen Eighty-Fortnite" video mocking Apple's famous "1984" ad, and promoting the hashtag #FreeFortnite. Players who compete in the tournament have the opportunity to win an in-game skin of the evil-looking apple featured in Epic's "Nineteen Eighty-Fortnite" video (cheekily dubbed the "Tart Tycoon"), a "Free Fortnite" hat, and even non-iOS gaming hardware, including an Alienware laptop, a Galaxy Tab S7, a OnePlus 8 phone, a PlayStation 4 Pro, an Xbox One X, or a Nintendo Switch.

Ars Technica's technology reporter Jim Salter tested Walmart's 11.6-inch EVOO laptop, which sells for $139 and ships with just 2GiB of RAM and a 32GB SSD, which he worries "simply is not enough room for Windows itself, let alone any applications." The first thing I noticed while looking through the Windows install is that our "internal" Wi-Fi is actually a cheap USB 2.0 Realtek adapter — and it's 2.4GHz-only 802.11n, at that. The second thing I noticed was the fact that I couldn't install even simple applications, because the laptop was in S mode. For those unfamiliar, S mode locks a system into using only the Edge browser and only apps from the Microsoft Store. Many users end up badly confused by S mode, and some unnecessarily buy a new copy of Windows trying to get out of it. Fortunately, if you click the "learn more" link in the S mode warning that pops up when you attempt to load a non-Store app, you are eventually led to a free Microsoft Store app which turns S mode off. On my first try, this app crashed. But on the second, it successfully disabled S mode, leaving me with a normal Windows install....

I verified that I was on an older version of Windows 10 — build 1903, from March 2019 — and initiated an upgrade to build 2004, from April 2020. Windows 10 was having none of it. It wanted at least 8GiB of free space on C:, and I couldn't even get to 6GiB free, after only a day of using the system.... Meaningful benchmark results were impossible to attain on this laptop, since it was too slow and quirky to even run the benchmarks reliably. But I didn't let a silly thing like "being obviously inappropriate" stop me from slogging painfully through the benchmarks and getting what numbers I could. The first suite up, PCMark 10, eventually produced a score of zero. I didn't know that a zero score was even possible. Apparently, it is... Cinebench R20 also took several tries to complete successfully, and eventually the test produced a jaw-droppingly bad score of 118...

Under Fedora 32 — selected due to its ultra-modern kernel, and lightweight Wayland display manager — the EVOO was incredibly balky and sluggish. To be fair, Fedora felt significantly snappier than Windows 10 had on this laptop, but that was a very, very low bar to hurdle. The laptop frequently took as long as 12 seconds just to launch Firefox. Actually navigating webpages wasn't much better, with very long pauses for no apparent reason. The launcher was also balky to render — and this time, with significantly lower memory usage than Windows, I couldn't just blame it on swap thrashing... [W]ith the laptop completely open, several questions are answered — the reason I hadn't heard any fan noise up until this point is because there is no fan, and the horrible CPU performance is because the CPU can't perform any better than it does without cooking itself in its own juices....

At first, I mistakenly assumed that the A4-9120 was just thermally throttling itself 24/7. After re-assembling it and booting back into Fedora, I found the real answer — the normally 2.5GHz chip is underclocked to an anemic 1.5GHz. The system BIOS confirms this clockrate but offers no room to adjust it — which is a shame, since the system never hit temperatures higher than about 62C in my testing.
His verdict? Walmart's EVOO laptop "doesn't have either the RAM or the storage to do an even vaguely reasonable job for normal people doing normal things under Windows, even when limited to S mode...

"There may be a purpose this laptop is well-suited to — but for the life of me, I cannot think what it might be."