Arch Linux on paapereira.xyz

New Crosspoint 1.3.0 for Xteink X4 ebook reader

Sun, 17 May 2026 22:30:00 +0000

To upgrade, just go to crosspointreader.com and upgrade from there. More on how I setup my Xteink X4 here.

One of the new features for this release is the ability to choose fonts.

Get your favorite font and go to crosspointreader.com/fonts to transform the font into the X4 format.

To get the font onto your device connect go to File Transfer and Create Hotspot. From there scan the first QR Code to create a connection with the device and the second QR Code to access a web interface to upload your new font.

New Xteink X4 ebook reader

Sat, 14 Feb 2026 22:00:00 +0000

Just got myself a Xteink X4 ebook reader. It will be a companion for my Kindle Paperwhite, not a replacement.

The Xteink X4 is an ultra-thin, palm-sized pocket eReader created by an upstart tech company. It is widely recognized for its minimalist, distraction-free design and its unique magnetic-ready back, which allows users to attach it directly to the back of a smartphone using MagSafe-style rings. Key Specifications

Display: 4.3-inch glare-free E-Ink screen (220 ppi, 800×480 resolution).

Dimensions: 4.9mm thin.

Weight: 74 grams (significantly lighter than a standard smartphone).

Storage: 16GB internal capacity via an included MicroSD card, storing thousands of books.

Processor: Powered by an ESP32 chip with built-in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.

Battery: 650 mAh capacity, offering a 14-day battery life depending on daily reading habits.

Hardware Controls: Features physical page-turn buttons.

Lighting: Built without a front light to keep the profile ultra-thin and maximize paper-like display clarity.

An excellent resource and community for this device it’s the readme.club and Reddit.

Scripting sending messages with SimpleX Chat CLI

Tue, 25 Apr 2023 09:30:00 +0100

SimpleX Chat as a CLI version. You can read more about it in my last post.

You can pass commands to simplex-chat, so… I finally can send myself messages from my shell scripts in my server when something goes wrong.

Something like: simplex-chat -e "@username A message"

It supports markdown so I can send it in red: simplex-chat -e "@username !1 A message!"

Inside simplex-chat you can list the options for markdown:

SimpleX Chat

Sun, 23 Apr 2023 14:00:00 +0100

SimpleX Chat is ‘The first messaging platform that has no user identifiers of any kind - 100% private by design’.

I’ve been using it for a week or so but I can already tell that this is the one you if you minimally care about your data and your privacy.

In the website you can read more about how does it work and the main features by scrolling through the webpage, read the whitepaper and read the user guide.

Activate WebDAV in Seafile

Fri, 30 Dec 2022 14:00:00 +0000

I turned off WebDAV in Seafile some time ago because it wasn’t working.

Can’t remember the issue itself, but I wasn’t actively using it so…

I’m now in version 9.0.13. Here’s how I enable it.

Make sure you have pycryptodome installed.

1sudo pip install pycryptodome==3.12.0

Activate WebDAV in seafdav.conf

1[WEBDAV]
2enabled = true
3port = 8888
4share_name = /seafdav
5show_repo_id = true

Configure ProxyPassReverse in Apache. In my case /etc/httpd/conf/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf

Upgrading Seafile from 7.1.x to 8.0.x

Sat, 01 Jan 2022 14:17:46 +0000

The new 9.0 Seafile version is out. Time to upgrade. I’m currently running 8.0.16.

Don’t forget to read the release notes from Seafile.

Before upgrading

Reading the release notes, this version needs python modules. I also upgraded pip

1sudo /usr/bin/python -m pip install --upgrade pip
2
3sudo /usr/bin/python -m pip install pycryptodome==3.12.0
4sudo /usr/bin/python -m pip install cffi==1.14.0

I had cffi 1.15 in my system, I had to downgrade:

Seafile log4j vulnerability fix

Thu, 30 Dec 2021 19:57:31 +0000

There is a recent log4j vulnerability (CVE-2021-44228) affecting a ton or services and servers.

Specifically for Seafile, you can read this post in the forum to know more about this issue and how to fix it.

Here are my notes about it.

Scan for vulnerable log4j classes

1sudo -u seafile_user -s /bin/sh
2mkdir /tmp/log4jscan/
3cd /tmp/log4jscan/
4wget https://github.com/lunasec-io/lunasec/releases/download/v1.3.1-log4shell/log4shell_1.3.1-log4shell_Linux_x86_64
5chmod +x log4shell_1.3.1-log4shell_Linux_x86_64
6./log4shell_1.3.1-log4shell_Linux_x86_64 scan $HOME/seafile/seafile-server-latest/

You will see something like this:

Fixing Seafile

Sun, 19 Dec 2021 14:00:00 +0000

Similarly to the beginning of the year, I had a problem with Seafile. It was crashing and I couldn’t start it with systemd.

Here’s my notes/steps/fixes for the issue.

I stopped the services:

1sudo systemctl stop seahub
2sudo systemctl stop seafile

Sudo into the seafile user:

1sudo -u seafileuser -s /bin/sh

Disabled the daemon mode and manually started seafile to see the output errors:

Fix theme option after upgrading rofi to 1.7.1

Sun, 28 Nov 2021 11:59:57 +0000

Following the latest 1.7.0 rofi update, the latest 1.7.1 version all “broke” my theming.

Basically the theme option changed.

To fix I just add to my ~/.config/rofi/config.rasi file:

Before:

1configuration {
2 (...)
3 theme: "~/.config/rofi/themes/dmenu.rasi";
4 (...)
5}

After:

1configuration {
2 (...)
3}
4
5@theme "~/.config/rofi/themes/dmenu.rasi"

Theme fix after upgrading rofi to 1.7.0

Sat, 04 Sep 2021 15:31:55 +0100

After upgrading to rofi 1.7.0 my themes where broken and weird.

To fix I just add to my theme.rasi files:

1element-text, element-icon {
2 background-color: inherit;
3 text-color: inherit;
4}

Before the fix:

After the fix (all normal again):

Improve pacman performance and add some flare

Sat, 05 Jun 2021 15:12:45 +0100

Want to improve pacman performance and add some flare to it?

Add Color, ILoveCandy and ParallelDownloads options in pacman.conf.

1sudo vi /etc/pacman.conf

Here’s my ‘Misc options’ section:

1# Misc options
2#UseSyslog
3Color
4#TotalDownload
5CheckSpace
6VerbosePkgLists
7ILoveCandy
8ParallelDownloads = 5

Reviewed bookmarks script

Sat, 10 Apr 2021 15:32:24 +0100

Following my previous post I kept improving my bookmarks script.

I simplified the script to use only one bookmark file and defined a structure to help me while searching.

The bookmarks.txt file

It has two sections (just for organization sake), a Quickmarks section for common urls and a Bookmarks section for everything else.

Each line is divided in three parts. A category/name, tags and the url.

 1cat ~/.local/bin/bookmarks.txt
 2
 3>> Quickmarks
 4#
 5#---
 6📚books/Goodreads ...... (reviews) ......... https://www.goodreads.com/
 7📚books/Audible ........ (audiobook) ....... https://www.audible.com/
 8📚books/Kindle_Deals ... (kindle,ebooks) ... https://www.amazon.com/b/?ie=UTF8&node=11552285011&ref_=sv_kstore_5
 9#---
10🟠headspace ............ (meditation) ...... https://www.headspace.com/login
11📶reddit ............... (news,forum) ...... https://www.reddit.com/
12📺youtube .............. (video,stream) .... https://www.youtube.com/
13⭐paapereira.xyz ....... (blog) ............ https://paapereira.xyz/
14#
15-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
16#
17>> Bookmarks
18#
19🏦banking/cgd.pt ..................... (bank) ............ https://www.cgd.pt/
20🏦banking/big.pt ..................... (bank) ............ https://big.pt/
21🏦banking/sodexo ..................... (bank) ............ https://www.sodexobeneficios.pt/
22#---
23#eof

The bookmarks script

With this reviewed script you can also quickly edit the bookmarks.txt file.

Web searching and bookmarks using Rofi

Fri, 02 Apr 2021 15:58:21 +0100

Inspired in a recent DT video and his Gitlab repository, I revamped my websearch shell script I’ve been using with Rofi.

I already had something very similar to this, but I took this opportunity to review the code and to separate my old websearch script into two scripts:

websearch: web searching in an handful of sites
bookmarks: quickly open bookmarks

websearch

This script allows for searching in a number of sites.

You can add your own sites by adding a new ‘options’ line.

betterlockscreen: a simple, minimal lockscreen

Sat, 27 Mar 2021 17:13:39 +0000

betterlockscreen is a simple and minimal lockscreen.

I have been using i3lock, witch conflicts with betterlockscreen, so it will be uninstalled.

To install:

1paru -S betterlockscreen
2cp /usr/share/doc/betterlockscreen/examples/betterlockscreenrc ~/.config

In my case, using i3-gaps, I added to ~/.config/i3/config:

1exec --no-startup-id betterlockscreen -w dim
2exec --no-startup-id xautolock -time 10 -corners 000- -locker "betterlockscreen -l dim"

And reviewed my session key bindings:

Using Epiphany to create applications from webpages

Sat, 20 Mar 2021 14:27:08 +0000

Using Gnome Web (aka Epiphany), your can create ‘applications’ from webpages.

Using Plex as an example, this means that you can ‘install’ Plex from https://app.plex.tv/desktop#!/.

First, install epiphany and enable hardware acceleration.

1paru -S epiphany gstreamer
2gsettings set org.gnome.Epiphany.web:/ hardware-acceleration-policy 'always'

Open epiphany and go to https://app.plex.tv/desktop#!/.

“Install” as an application.

Plex will appear as an app.

Rofi: a window switcher, application launcher and dmenu replacement

Sun, 14 Mar 2021 14:27:52 +0000

Rofi is a window switcher, application launcher and dmenu replacement.

I’ve been using rofi with i3-gaps since early 2019. I had played with it before, but I’ve been using it daily the last couple of years.

I use it to launch applications, open ssh sessions, with pass and with a set of useful custom scripts.

Installation

You need to install the rofi package. I also installed rofi-dmenu for dmenu compatibility, rofi-pass to use with pass and the extra rofi-emoji and rofi-calc.

Upgrading Seafile from 7.1.x to 8.0.x

Sat, 06 Mar 2021 14:08:33 +0000

The new 8.0.0 Seafile version is out. Time to upgrade. I’m currently running 7.1.14.

Don’t forget to read the release notes from Seafile.

Before upgrading

Reading the release notes, this version needs the libmysqlclient-dev (I’m using mariadb-libs) package and new python modules.

I just upgraded pip, installed the new python modules and upgraded others.

1sudo /usr/bin/python -m pip install --upgrade pip
2
3sudo pip3 install --timeout=3600 future mysqlclient
4
5sudo pip3 install --timeout=3600 Pillow pylibmc captcha jinja2 \
6	sqlalchemy django-pylibmc django-simple-captcha python3-ldap

Upgrading

I started by stopping the services:

Moving my dotfiles repository to Gitlab

Sat, 20 Feb 2021 17:19:31 +0000

I’ve been using Keybase to manage my dotfiles with git. Do give it a read to learn how I’m doing it.

This is just how I moved the git server-side from Keybase to Gitlab.

First of all create a new empty repository in Gitlab. I’ve created a ‘dotfiles’ repository.

 1cd ~
 2alias dotfiles='/usr/bin/git --git-dir=$HOME/.dotfiles --work-tree=$HOME'
 3dotfiles fetch origin
 4dotfiles remote add new-origin git@gitlab.com:your_username/dotfiles.git
 5dotfiles push --all new-origin
 6dotfiles remote rm origin
 7dotfiles remote rename new-origin origin
 8dotfiles add your_dotfile
 9dotfiles commit -m "Updated configs"
10dotfiles push --set-upstream origin master

Using profile-sync-daemon in LibreWolf

Sun, 07 Feb 2021 14:14:08 +0000

I talked about LibreWolf last month, and how I made profile-sync-daemon work.

The way I did made Firefox stop working, so this is the better way.

Fixing what I did and set it correctly:

1sudo mv /usr/share/psd/browsers/firefox_bck /usr/share/psd/browsers/firefox
2sudo cp /usr/share/psd/browsers/firefox /usr/share/psd/browsers/librewolf

Replacing .mozilla/firefox with .librewolf in /usr/share/psd/browsers/librewolf and restart psd.

1sudo vi /usr/share/psd/browsers/librewolf
2systemctl --user stop psd.service
3systemctl --user start psd.service
4
5psd p

Synchronizing the system clock across the network

Sun, 31 Jan 2021 14:41:57 +0000

systemd-timesyncd is a daemon that has been added for synchronizing the system clock across the network. (…)

Basically it makes sure your system clock is in sync in you network. In my home network I set this up to make sure my desktop, server and laptop are in sync.

I added NTP servers in the timesyncd configuration file, before enabling and starting the service:

1sudo vi /etc/systemd/timesyncd.conf

1[Time]
2NTP=0.arch.pool.ntp.org 1.arch.pool.ntp.org 2.arch.pool.ntp.org 3.arch.pool.ntp.org
3FallbackNTP=0.pt.pool.ntp.org 1.europe.pool.ntp.org 2.europe.pool.ntp.org

1sudo systemctl enable systemd-timesyncd
2sudo systemctl start systemd-timesyncd
3sudo systemctl status systemd-timesyncd
4timedatectl status
5timedatectl timesync-status

Fixing Seafile

Sat, 30 Jan 2021 16:28:27 +0000

Yesterday I woke up without access to my Seafile instance.

Here’s my notes/steps/fixes for the issue.

Restart Seafile and check for errors:

1sudo systemctl restart seafile
2sudo systemctl status seafile
3sudo systemctl restart seahub
4sudo systemctl status seahub

No errors here.

Check Seafile logs:

1sudo -u seafile -s /bin/sh
2cd /srv/seafile/logs

I found the following in elasticsearch.log:

LibreWolf - A fork of Firefox

Sat, 16 Jan 2021 18:33:53 +0000

LibreWolf is a fork of Firefox, focused on privacy, security and freedom.

I’ve been trying it out and so far so good. It’s basically Firefox, but with out of the box enhanced security and without Mozilla telemetries, Pockets and stuffs.

Installing

1paru -S librewolf-bin

Set LibreWolf as the default browser

I’m using i3-gaps.

I need to change my .profile.

1vi .profile

1export BROWSER="/usr/bin/librewolf"

And replace firefox with librewolf in the mimeapps.list file.

Improving my Boot Time in Arch Linux (part 2)

Sat, 09 Jan 2021 16:38:55 +0000

After improving my boot time the last time, some (not all) boots were still taking time. It seemed to pause somewhere before the login screen.

Analyzing the systemd critical chain, looking for errors in journalctl and some web searching, I found an issue in systemd that matched my problem.

In the issue there is the suggestion to install dbus-broker. I did it and haven’t had any issue since.

Looking for the boot time issue

1sudo systemd-analyze critical-chain
2sudo journalctl -b -p err..alert

The journal from the issue (matched mine):

Starship - A cross-shell prompt

Sun, 06 Dec 2020 14:54:55 +0000

Starship is a minimal, blazing-fast, and infinitely customizable prompt for any shell.

You can see different options for the installation in the Starship site.

In my case, in Arch Linux:

1paru starship-bin

After installing starship you need to tell you shell to use it.

In my case I’m using zsh and added the following to my .zshrc file:

1# starship shell
2eval "$(starship init zsh)"

You can add customizations by creating a ~/.config/starship.toml file.

Paru - An AUR helper and pacman wrapper

Sun, 01 Nov 2020 15:26:57 +0000

Paru is an AUR helper and pacman wrapper written in Rust and based on the design of yay.

I’ve been using yay for about a year now and I’ll be playing around with paru for the next weeks. I still have yay installed and yes, I used yay to install paru.

1yay -S paru-bin

Installing and upgrading packages from the Arch repositories or from the AUR it’s just like yay.

Calibre 5 is out

Fri, 25 Sep 2020 15:22:57 +0100

Calibre 5 is out.

I had installed the python3 version. No need now, just install the calibre package.

1sudo pacman -S calibre

Calibre ebook management

Thu, 24 Sep 2020 11:17:31 +0100

I’ve been playing around and migrating my book library to Calibre.

Installing

I installed the python3 version.

1yay -S calibre-common calibre-python3

Goodreads plugin

I installed the Goodreads plugin to connect to my account and sync my ratings and read dates (for this I created a ‘read_date’ column.

I also sync my top 100 books. For that I created a ’top_100’ column in Calibre and when syncing my ‘Top 100’ shelf from Goodreads I update this column.

System backups with BorgBackup and BorgBase

Wed, 23 Sep 2020 17:46:20 +0100

Since my last post on BorgBackup and BorgBase, I have subscribed to a 1 TB annual plan and have my daily and weekly /home backups running.

The next thing to setup is my system backups. For this (for now) I’m using a more weekly manually approach.

Installation

1sudo pacman -S borg

Setup

Create a new key to use in your backups (leave the password blank, I couldn’t get it to work witch a password)

1sudo ssh-keygen -o -a 100 -t ed25519

Add your key to BorgBase (Account > SSH Keys)

1sudo cat /root/.ssh/id_ed25519.pub

Create a new ‘desktop-system’ Repository in BorgBase and associate your SSH Key

Listening to podcast using gpodder, gpodder.net and AntennaPod

Sun, 06 Sep 2020 11:43:13 +0100

I’ve been using PocketCasts to listen to my podcasts for quite some time. In Android using with the app and in Linux in the website (using MellowPlayer).

But I’ve also been looking to a more open source way to listen to my podcasts.

I’m using for two weeks now AntennaPod in Android, gpodder.net to manage my subscriptions and gpodder in Arch Linux.

Installation and Setup

Install AntennaPod on F-Droid or Google Play
Install gpodder (in my case in Arch Linux yay -S gpodder)
Create an account at gpodder.net
Configure in AntennaPod and gpodder your new gpodder.net account

Managing Subscriptions

I exported my subscriptions in PocketCasts.

Remote backups using BorgBackup, Vorta and BorgBase

Sun, 23 Aug 2020 20:11:14 +0100

I’ve been using a mix of my own scripts with tar/gpg and duplicity to manage my backups (local and remote).

For some time now duplicity has been my choice, but lately it seems that every time a backup is interrupted it doesn’t restart at the archive it was at, but it starts from the beginning.

Since I have many GB to backup, every time duplicity performs a full backup this is a problem because I have to leave my desktop on for many hours. Also the fans start doing overtime and my little nuc starts heating up.

Improving my Boot Time in Arch Linux

Sat, 22 Aug 2020 17:16:32 +0100

I was investigating and issue with duplicity when I stumbled with systemd-analyze.

So I started to see what was contributing for my boot time and after that I started too see how to improved.

This is by no means a guide, but just what I changed to improve.

You can use sudo systemd-analyze blame to see load time for every programs that loads at boot time and sudo systemd-analyze critical-chain to basically see the critical programs that you could focus on.

Manage your Arch Linux mirrors with Reflector

Sun, 02 Aug 2020 15:08:17 +0100

From the Arch Wiki:

Reflector is a script which can retrieve the latest mirror list from the MirrorStatus page, filter the most up-to-date mirrors, sort them by speed and overwrite the file /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist.

Instalation

Install reflector

1yay -S reflector

Create the systemd service

1sudo vi /etc/systemd/system/reflector.service

 1[Unit]
 2Description=Pacman mirrorlist update
 3Wants=network-online.target
 4After=network-online.target nss-lookup.target
 5
 6[Service]
 7Type=oneshot
 8ExecStart=/usr/bin/reflector --verbose --protocol https --country 'Portugal' --latest 30 --number 20 --sort rate --save /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist
 9
10[Install]
11WantedBy=multi-user.target

1sudo systemctl daemon-reload
2sudo systemctl start reflector.service
3sudo systemctl status reflector.service

You can enable the service. I prefer to control when the scripts executes.

Upgrading Seafile from 7.0.x to 7.1.x

Sun, 05 Jul 2020 14:24:44 +0100

I’ve waiting to upgrade to Seafile 7.1 because I keep my installation manually and I wasn’t finding the *x86-64.tar.gz option to download. After asking in the forums, I discovered it’s just a change of name.

Don’t forget to read the release notes from Seafile.

Before upgrading

Reading the release notes, this version needs Python 3 and a set of modules.

Python 3

1yay -S python python-setuptools python-pip
2
3sudo pip3 install --timeout=3600 wheel Pillow pylibmc captcha jinja2 \
4	sqlalchemy django-pylibmc django-simple-captcha python3-ldap \
5	django-recaptcha django-ranged-response

Memcached

The Memcached configuration also changed in this version. I wasn’t using Memcached, so I took the opportunity to set it up.

🖥️ 🐧 Installing Arch Linux in my new NUC7i3BNH

Sat, 09 May 2020 10:40:10 +0100

Time to setup my new NUC7i3BNH.

I will install Arch Linux with no window manager and it will act as my home server with Seafile, Plex, Sickchill, sabnzbd, etc..

Preparation

Upgrade BIOS Firmware

Download the latest BIOS
Copy the .bios file to a USB drive
Boot and enter the upgrade page with F7

Burn ISO to USB pen drive

Download the Arch Linux ISO
Burn the iso in the usb pen drive.

1lsblk
2cd Downloads
3sudo dd bs=4M if=archlinux-2020.05.01-x86_64.iso of=/dev/sdc status=progress oflag=sync

Installation

Boot from the usb pen drive (setup the boot sequence entering the BIOS with F2).

Manage dotfiles using a git bare repository

Wed, 01 Jan 2020 18:33:15 +0000

I’ve been searching the best way to manage my dotfiles using git.

After seeing this video and checking this tutorial I decided to give it a go.

I will be using keybase as my (private) git repository.

Create and setup repository

Create a repository in keybase using the application
Create a bare repository

1mkdir -p $HOME/.dotfiles
2git init --bare $HOME/.dotfiles
3alias dotfiles='/usr/bin/git --git-dir=$HOME/.dotfiles --work-tree=$HOME'
4dotfiles config --local status.showUntrackedFiles no
5echo "alias dotfiles='/usr/bin/git --git-dir=$HOME/.dotfiles --work-tree=$HOME'" >> $HOME/.zshrc

Adding files

Add a first file to test if everything is OK

1dotfiles status
2dotfiles add .vimrc
3dotfiles commit -m "Add vimrc"
4dotfiles remote add origin keybase://private/your_username/dotfiles
5dotfiles push -u origin master

Every time you want to add a new file

1dotfiles add .bashrc
2dotfiles commit -m "Add bashrc"
3dotfiles add .zshrc
4dotfiles commit -m "Add zshrc"
5dotfiles push

Dotfiles in a new system

In a new system, you can get your dotfiles by:

 1alias dotfiles='/usr/bin/git --git-dir=$HOME/.dotfiles --work-tree=$HOME'
 2echo ".dotfiles" >> .gitignore
 3git clone --bare keybase://private/your_username/dotfiles $HOME/.dotfiles
 4dotfiles config --local status.showUntrackedFiles no
 5mkdir -p $HOME/.dotfiles-backup
 6dotfiles checkout
 7if [ $? = 0 ]; then
 8 echo "Checked out config.";
 9else
10 echo "Backing up pre-existing dot files.";
11 dotfiles checkout 2>&1 | egrep "\s+\." | awk {'print $1'} | xargs -I{} mv {} $HOME/.dotfiles-backup/{}
12fi;
13dotfiles checkout

Then, every time you want to refresh your dotfiles

1dotfiles pull

🖥️ 🐧 Installing Arch Linux in my new Surface Go

Sat, 30 Nov 2019 18:01:16 +0000

Surface Go

Surface Go (10’’ - Intel Pentium Gold 4415Y - RAM: 8 GB - 128 GB SSD - Intel HD 615)
Surface Go Black Type Cover

Final setup

Run only Linux
Arch Linux
Gnome

Preparation

Needed hardware

Surface Go
Surface Go Keyboard or USB keyboard/mouse
USB pen drive
USB Ethernet adapter
USB-C to USB adapter + USB Hub or USB-C hub

Burn ISO to USB pen drive

Download the Arch Linux ISO.
Burn the iso in the pen drive.

1sudo dd bs=4M if=archlinux-2019.10.01-x86_64.iso of=/dev/sdc status=progress oflag=sync

Connect the dongles

Depending on your setup make sure you have the USB pen drive with the Arch Linux ISO burned and a Ehternet cable connected.

Folder thumbnails in Thunar

Tue, 13 Aug 2019 21:12:35 +0000

My favorite file manager is Thunar, but it hasn’t folder thumbnails by default.

Here’s how to enable it.

Install tumbler and imagemagick

1yay -S tumbler imagemagick

Create the following a folder.thumbnailer file and add the following

1sudo vi /usr/share/thumbnailers/folder.thumbnailer

1[Thumbnailer Entry]
2Version=1.0
3Encoding=UTF-8
4Type=X-Thumbnailer
5Name=Folder Thumbnailer
6MimeType=inode/directory;
7Exec=/usr/bin/folder-thumbnailer %s %i %o %u

Create the folder-thumbnailer script

1sudo vi /usr/bin/folder-thumbnailer

 1#!/bin/bash
 2
 3convert -thumbnail "$1" "$2/folder.jpg" "$3" 1>/dev/null 2>&1 ||\
 4convert -thumbnail "$1" "$2/.folder.jpg" "$3" 1>/dev/null 2>&1 ||\
 5convert -thumbnail "$1" "$2/folder.png" "$3" 1>/dev/null 2>&1 ||\
 6convert -thumbnail "$1" "$2/cover.jpg" "$3" 1>/dev/null 2>&1 ||\
 7rm -f "$HOME/.cache/thumbnails/normal/$(echo -n "$4" | md5sum | cut -d " " -f1).png" ||\
 8rm -f "$HOME/.thumbnails/normal/$(echo -n "$4" | md5sum | cut -d " " -f1).png" ||\
 9rm -f "$HOME/.cache/thumbnails/large/$(echo -n "$4" | md5sum | cut -d " " -f1).png" ||\
10rm -f "$HOME/.thumbnails/large/$(echo -n "$4" | md5sum | cut -d " " -f1).png" ||\
11exit 1

1sudo chmod +x /usr/bin/folder-thumbnailer

To add a thumbnail to a folder you just need to add a .folder.jpg file and your set. You can decide to use different names in the /usr/bin/folder-thumbnailer script.

pass - the standard unix password manager

Sat, 22 Jun 2019 18:31:17 +0100

I’ve been using pass as my password manager for the last months.

In Linux, Android and Windows.

Here’s how I set it up and the apps that can be used.

Installation

Arch Linux

I installed pass, pass-otp for one time password support, dmenu for an easy way to copy your passwords to the clipboard and if you prefer qtpass foi a gui application.

1sudo pacman -S pass pass-otp dmenu qtpass

You can use the command passmenu to open a list of your passwords using dmenu. For convenience you can assign it to a keyboard shortcut.

How to Make Qt Apps Match Dark Themes on Xfce

Sat, 09 Feb 2019 18:40:14 +0000

In summary, I prefer dark themes and my QT based applications weren’t matching this preference. I’m using Xfce.

After some digging around, and this video, here’s what I did.

1$ nano ~/.config/Trolltech.conf

[Qt] style=GTK+

1$ sudo pacman -S qt5-styleplugins

1$ sudo nano /etc/environment

QT_QPA_PLATFORMTHEME=gtk2 QT_STYLE_OVERRIDE=gtk2

Connecting to ProtonVPN in Arch Linux

Sat, 14 Apr 2018 18:35:36 +0100

I recently signed up with ProtonVPN.

Here’s how I connect in Arch Linux.

1sudo pacman -S openvpn
2
3sudo wget -O protonvpn-cli.sh https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ProtonVPN/protonvpn-cli/master/protonvpn-cli.sh
4
5sudo chmod +x protonvpn-cli.sh
6sudo ./protonvpn-cli.sh --install
7sudo protonvpn-cli -init
8sudo protonvpn-cli -connect
9sudo protonvpn-cli -disconnect

Disable the touchpad while typing

Tue, 07 Nov 2017 11:45:22 +0000

Here’s how I set things up to automatically disable the touchpad while typing in my laptop, using the driver’s automatic palm detection.

These are just my notes. Check the entire Arch Wiki entry on Touchpad Synaptics.

First of all you should test if it works properly for your touchpad and if the settings are accurate. Enable palm detection with synclient PalmDetect=1.

Then test the typing. You can tweak the detection by setting the minimum width for the touch to be considered a palm, for example synclient PalmMinWidth=8.

Seafile Installation Notes in Arch Linux

Sun, 28 May 2017 18:23:43 +0100

These are my notes about installing Seafile in my Arch Linux home server.

Note: I have reviewed and added to these notes several times.

I’m using:

Seafile
A NUC with Arch Linux as my home server
A WD My Cloud NAS

Create a new share seafile
Create a new directory in the server

1sudo mkdir /home/nas/seafile
2sudo chmod 750 /home/nas/seafile
3sudo chown seafile:seafile /home/nas/seafile

Setup a mountpoint in the server

1sudo vi /etc/fstab

1nas:/nfs/seafile /home/nas/seafile nfs users,noauto,x-systemd.automount,x-systemd.device-timeout=10,timeo=14,soft,intr,noatime,file_mode=0640,dir_mode=0750 0 0

Set NO_ROOT_SWASH in the WD My Cloud NFS exports configuration (when I restart my NAS I have to do this again…)

1ssh -oHostKeyAlgorithms=+ssh-dss sshd@192.168.0.99

1vi /etc/exports

1"/nfs/seafile" *(rw,no_root_squash,sync,no_wdelay,insecure_locks,insecure,no_subtree_check,anonuid=501,anongid=1000)

1exportfs -r

Server installation

Pre-requisites

 1sudo pacman -S python-imaging mysql-python
 2
 3mkdir /tmp/cower
 4cd /tmp/cower
 5cower -d libsearpc
 6cd /tmp/cower/libsearpc
 7makepkg -sri
 8cower -d libsepol
 9cd /tmp/cower/libsepol
10makepkg -sri
11cower -d libselinux
12cd /tmp/cower/libselinux
13makepkg -sri

Download Seafile

https://www.seafile.com/en/download/

Install TagSpaces on Linux

Wed, 14 Dec 2016 21:02:24 +0000

I’ve been using TagSpaces from some time now, and I ended up to buy a Pro version.

You get the Pro version by receiving a download link by email. I’m on Arch Linux and the pro versions provided are not for Arch, but it has a .deb version.

Here’s how to install it on Arch. Updating is basically the same.

 1yaourt -S xarchiver electron libgcrypt15
 2
 3cd ~/Downloads
 4mv tagspaces-pro-2.5.0-amd64.deb tagspaces-pro-2.5.0-amd64.ar
 5xarchiver -x ./tagspaces tagspaces-pro-2.5.0-amd64.ar
 6xarchiver -x . data.tar.xz
 7rm -f control.tar.gz
 8rm -f debian-binary
 9rm -f data.tar.xz
10
11sudo cp -R opt/ /
12rm -rf opt
13sudo cp -R usr/ /
14rm -rf usr/
15rm -f ~/Downloads/tagspaces-pro-2.5.0-amd64.ar
16
17vi ~/.local/share/applications/tagspaces.desktop

1[Desktop Entry]
2Name=tagspaces
3Comment=Offline document organizer and browser for your local files, supporting easy file tagging and document editing.
4Exec=/opt/tagspaces/tagspaces
5Terminal=false
6Type=Application
7Icon=/usr/share/icons/hicolor/512x512/apps/tagspaces.png

Gnome Touchpad Issue

Sun, 04 Dec 2016 22:54:32 +0000

In Gnome 3.20 (I think) Gnome switched to use libinput over synaptic for the touchpad lib.

You need to remove xf86-input-synaptic and install xf86-input-libinput. You’ll also need to remove the synaptic config file.

Use Reflector to update your pacman mirror list

Sun, 04 Dec 2016 20:22:12 +0000

1sudo pacman -S reflector
2
3sudo vi /etc/systemd/system/reflector.service

1[Unit]
2Description=Pacman mirrorlist update
3
4[Service]
5Type=oneshot
6ExecStart=/usr/bin/reflector --verbose --country 'Portugal' -l 5 -p http --sort rate --save /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

1sudo systemctl start reflector

GPG encrypted backups to rsync.net

Mon, 28 Nov 2016 21:02:25 +0000

I use rsync.net for my cloud/offline backups.

Here’s how to do gpg encrypted backups.

Mount rsync.net using sshfs and create a backup folder

1mkdir -p /home/your_user/rsync.net/
2sshfs 99999@server.rsync.net: /home/your_user/rsync.net/
3mkdir -p /home/your_user/rsync.net/backups/

Create and encript a directory

1tar --xattrs -czpvf /tmp/2016-11-28_my_dir.tgz -C /home/your_user/my_dir .
2gpg --cipher-algo aes256 -c -o /home/your_user/rsync.net/backups/2016-11-28_my_dir.tgz.gpg /tmp/2016-11-28_my_dir.tgz

Restore and decrypt a directory

1mkdir -p /tmp/extract
2cd /tmp/extract
3gpg -o- /tmp/2016-11-28_my_dir.tgz.gpg | tar zxvf -

Unmount rsync.net

1fusermount -u /home/your_user/rsync.net/

Backups using ecryptfs and rsync.net

Sun, 27 Nov 2016 21:12:33 +0000

I use rsync.net for my cloud/offline backups.

Here’s how to do encrypted backups using ecryptfs.

Install ecryptfs-utils

1sudo pacman -S ecryptfs-utils

Generate a passphrase

1ecryptfs-setup-private --nopwcheck --noautomount

Mount rsync.net using sshfs and create a backup folder

1mkdir -p /home/your_user/rsync.net/
2sshfs 99999@server.rsync.net: /home/your_user/rsync.net/
3mkdir -p /home/your_user/rsync.net/backups/

Mount the backups folder as an encrypted filesystem and copy some files

1sudo mount -t ecryptfs ~/.Private /home/your_user/rsync.net/backups -o key=passphrase,ecryptfs_cipher=aes,ecryptfs_key_bytes=24,ecryptfs_passthrough=n,ecryptfs_enable_filename_crypto=n

Unmount rsync.net and the encrypted filesystem mount

1sudo umount ~/Private
2fusermount -u /home/your_user/rsync.net/

Remove pacman cache

Thu, 10 Nov 2016 21:33:11 +0000

pacman keeps a cache of package versions it installs in /var/cache/pacman/pkg/.

As you install and upgrade more packages, the more it grows.

So, it’s a good ideia to clean it from time to time.

If you want to keep the last 2 versions of each package as an example, just execute the following.

1sudo paccache -rk 2
2
3==> finished: 2670 packages removed (disk space saved: 8.49 GiB)

Nextcloud Arch Linux installation

Mon, 07 Nov 2016 22:44:10 +0000

There are my notes for installing Nextcloud in Arch Linux in my home server.

Server installation

1sudo pacman -Syu apache php php-apache mariadb
2cower -d nextcloud
3sudo pacman -Syu php-gd php-intl php-mcrypt php-apcu

PHP configuration

1sudo nano /etc/php/php.ini

Uncomment the following modules:

gd.so
iconv.so
xmlrpc.so
zip.so
extension=pdo_mysql.so
bz2.so
curl.so
intl.so
mcrypt.so

Add the following to open_basedir:

/tmp:/usr/share/webapps/nextcloud:/dev/urandom

MariaDB setup

1sudo mysql_install_db -–user=mysql -–basedir=/usr -–datadir=/var/lib/mysql
2sudo systemctl enable mariadb.service
3sudo systemctl start mariadb.service
4sudo systemctl status mariadb.service
5sudo mysql_secure_installation

Create Nextcloud database

1mysql -u root -p
2 CREATE DATABASE IF NOT EXISTS nextcloud;
3 CREATE USER ‘username’@’localhost’ IDENTIFIED BY ‘password’;
4 GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON nextcloud.* TO ‘username’@’localhost’ IDENTIFIED BY ‘password’;
5 quit

Apache setup

1sudo cp /etc/webapps/nextcloud/apache.example.conf /etc/httpd/conf/extra/nextcloud.conf
2sudo nano /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf

Comment the line:

Fixing Google with 2-Step Verification Online Account in Gnome 3.8

Fri, 14 Jun 2013 19:03:00 +0100

In my Arch adventures I added my Google account in the Online Accounts.

Having the 2-Step Verification activated, after I logged in with my password, and entered the token, the account the credentials expired.

After trying again, same thing.

I’m in Arch with GNOME 3.8.3.

So, after some googling I found a solution in the Arch forum.

Generate a Google Application-specific password;
Go to Passwords and Keys (seahorse);
Find your Google credentials (something like “GOA google credentials…”);
Right click > Properties;
Click on Show password;
Replace your password with the application-specific password you generated:

{‘authorization_code’: (……), ‘password’: <’YOUR_APPLIC_SPECIFIC_PASS’>}

Adventures in Arch (Part IV): Install extra programs

Mon, 10 Jun 2013 18:47:00 +0100

In this part I will show the extra programs I installed.

I will keep updating this post in the next weeks, to add more programs installed.

This is the list of programs I have installed:

Chrome (download from AUR)

1mkdir builds
2cd builds
3tar -xzf google-chrome-beta.tar.gz
4cd google-chrome-beta
5makepkg -s
6sudo pacman -U google-chrome-beta-28.0.1500.36-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.xz

GNOME Tweak Tool

1sudo pacman -S gnome-tweak-tool

Tomboy

1sudo pacman -S tomboy

To get my notes I recovered the following folders from my /home backup:

Adventures in Arch (Part III): Customizing

Sun, 09 Jun 2013 20:20:00 +0100

In this part I will show the customizations I made in the desktop environment.

I will keep updating this post in the next weeks, in case I have other tips.

Fonts

I like Ubuntu fonts so:

1sudo pacman -S ttf-ubuntu-font-family

GNOME Shell tweaks

Install GNOME Tweak Tool:

1sudo pacman -S gnome-tweak-tool

Some changes I made:

Files Menu: activated the option to always use the location entry.
Fonts: I changed all the fonts to Ubuntu.
Shell: activated Show Date in clock; chose All in the arrangement of buttons on the titlebar.
Theme: enabled dark theme.
Typing: chose Control + Alt + Backspace to kill the X Server.

GNOME extensions

Using GNOME’s Web browser go to: https://extensions.gnome.org/

Adventures in Arch (Part II): Fine Tuning

Sun, 09 Jun 2013 17:31:00 +0100

In this part I will show the fine tuning I made in the system. I will keep updating this post in the next weeks, in case I have other tips.

fstab

Since I have the system installed in a SSD drive, I changed the mount flags in fstab to trim the drive:

1sudo nano /etc/fstab

1UUID=aee33023-2254-42fc-94ac-612314eeb332 / ext4 noatime,discard,data=ordered,errors=remount-ro 0 1
2UUID=114aaab1-1cb8-4853-bacc-819237d2d063 /boot ext4 noatime,discard,data=ordered,errors=remount-ro 0 2

I also mounted /tmp in memory:

Adventures in Arch (Part I): Installing

Sun, 09 Jun 2013 16:59:00 +0100

Inspired by the recent Linux Action Show experience with Arch, I decided to give it a try.

I have now completely changed from Ubuntu to Arch.

Any tips or advises please let me know.

Resources

Backups

Since I will format and install Arch I need to backup my /home partition.

I created a Ubuntu USB Live Disk, rebooted into the live environment and backed up all my files.

Arch Linux on paapereira.xyz

New Crosspoint 1.3.0 for Xteink X4 ebook reader

New Xteink X4 ebook reader

Scripting sending messages with SimpleX Chat CLI

SimpleX Chat

Activate WebDAV in Seafile

Upgrading Seafile from 7.1.x to 8.0.x

Before upgrading

Seafile log4j vulnerability fix

Scan for vulnerable log4j classes

Fixing Seafile

Fix theme option after upgrading rofi to 1.7.1

Theme fix after upgrading rofi to 1.7.0

Improve pacman performance and add some flare

Reviewed bookmarks script

The bookmarks.txt file

The bookmarks script

Web searching and bookmarks using Rofi

websearch

betterlockscreen: a simple, minimal lockscreen

Using Epiphany to create applications from webpages

Rofi: a window switcher, application launcher and dmenu replacement

Installation

Upgrading Seafile from 7.1.x to 8.0.x

Before upgrading

Upgrading

Moving my dotfiles repository to Gitlab

Using profile-sync-daemon in LibreWolf

Synchronizing the system clock across the network

Fixing Seafile

LibreWolf - A fork of Firefox

Installing

Set LibreWolf as the default browser

Improving my Boot Time in Arch Linux (part 2)

Looking for the boot time issue

Starship - A cross-shell prompt

Paru - An AUR helper and pacman wrapper

Calibre 5 is out

Calibre ebook management

Installing

Goodreads plugin

System backups with BorgBackup and BorgBase

Installation

Setup

Listening to podcast using gpodder, gpodder.net and AntennaPod

Installation and Setup

Managing Subscriptions

Remote backups using BorgBackup, Vorta and BorgBase

Improving my Boot Time in Arch Linux

Manage your Arch Linux mirrors with Reflector

Instalation

Upgrading Seafile from 7.0.x to 7.1.x

Before upgrading

Python 3

Memcached

🖥️ 🐧 Installing Arch Linux in my new NUC7i3BNH

Preparation

Upgrade BIOS Firmware

Burn ISO to USB pen drive

Installation

Manage dotfiles using a git bare repository

Create and setup repository

Adding files

Dotfiles in a new system

🖥️ 🐧 Installing Arch Linux in my new Surface Go

Surface Go

Final setup

Preparation

Needed hardware

Burn ISO to USB pen drive

Connect the dongles

Folder thumbnails in Thunar

pass - the standard unix password manager

Installation

Arch Linux

How to Make Qt Apps Match Dark Themes on Xfce

Connecting to ProtonVPN in Arch Linux

Disable the touchpad while typing

Seafile Installation Notes in Arch Linux

Setup a NAS share