TuxJam

Dave (aka thelovebug), Andrew (aka mcnalu), Al and Kevie go for a stroll in the autumnal meadows of Free and Open Source Software and Commonly Creative tunes. As is our custom we begin with a rummage through some unusual releases recently listed on distrowatch.

Kevie and Andrew then turn their attention to Libre Cuts which is “a free, open-source video editor for Android that prioritizes simplicity, efficiency, and privacy. Built for seamless performance, it empowers creators to easily select, edit, and export watermark-free videos locally on their device.”

Next up, Al and Dave take a look at another App called MakeACopy which “is an open-source offline document scanner with OCR for Android, designed for privacy-friendly and self-hosted document workflows.”

Finally we do a roundup of feedback received and also reminisce about the good times had in Manchester in our previous “Half-Cut” special episode. We also look forward to upcoming podcrawls on 24th October and 19th December.

Tunes licensed under Creative Commons type licenses played in this episode are:

1. MorWeen – The Worker
2. Trina Chakrabarti – Calling
3. Katherine – Wearing Out
4. Janevo – Bus Stop (Boom Bap Chillhop)

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Live from Manchester, Half-cut is finally here. In this episode the guys are joined by a live audience, recorded in the courtyard at the Garden Bar in the Pendulum Hotel, Manchester. There was also a special mystery aerial guest; either the press spying on us or else the police monitoring the heaving crowds of TuxJam fans trying to gatecrash.

In this episode the guys look at Idle Fantasy – “A free, open-source offline idle RPG for Android. No internet connection, no account, no ads.” Think Minecraft or Dwarf Fortress with no graphics and where you queue up tasks all day and night while you are busy getting on with real life, or other games.

We also take a look at a tool which we use after every recording to exchange our locally recorded audio files: Syncthing. It syncs files between your devices in real time, without a central server.

Audience participation is also involved along with a section where the some of the devoted fans talk about some of the services that they use to avoid themselves becoming locked into the grasps of the big tech companies.

The tracks included in this episode are:

1. Zak Roland – Beers Over Tears
2. Bodhisattva – Where did all the cold beer go?
3. DJ Klanglooze – Beer beer beer
4. B L O E M E N – Beer Taste

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Al, Kevie and Andrew (aka mcnalu) once again reconnoitre the landscape of Free and Open Source Software and Commonly Creative tunes. Dave (aka thelovebug) is on sabbatical this episode but, worry not, he will be back. We start as always with an amble around unusual releases recently listed on distrowatch.

If you like to game then you might consider trying out Bazzite – The operating system for the next generation of gamers. Is it easy to install? Does it come with all you might need for gaming? Can it keep up with or even surpass Windows as a gaming platform? Can you use it as a daily driver, perhaps even for work? All of these questions receive some kind of answer during our discussion.

Next we take a look at the Android App Alibi for which you can use your phone as a dashcam and save the last 30 minutes when you need it.

Finally we run through feedback received and announce TuxJam Half-cut on Saturday 1st August in Manchester. Building upon the success of the in-person Podcrawl of yesteyear and our inability to meet up at Oggcamp, the guys feel that another AFK meet-up is long overdue. The TuxJam crew will be staying at the Pendulum Hotel and do a live recording followed by a sampling of some fine ales at the local establishments. If you can join us during that weekend please do get in touch.

Songs licensed under a Creative Commons license played during this episode are:

• The New Economy- A Little Story (left behind)
• Cosmic Fruits – Stony Road
• Midnight Coffee Blues – The Coffee’s Still Warm
• Appalachia – As The Crow Flies

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Kevie, Al, Dave (aka thelovebug) and Andrew (aka mcnalu) return for another wander through the fragrant fields of Free and Open Source Software and Creatively Common tunes. We start as always with a run-down of unusual operating systems that caught our eye on distrowatch.

Next up Andrew and Kevie take a look at RawTherapee – a free, cross-platform image processing program that does a job similar to Adobe Lightroom in allowing you to carefully convert camera raw files. This image of comet R3 Panstarrs was taken by Andrew in morning twilight and processed in RawTherapee to ensure the colours are correct – this comet was notably green. Kevie used GIMP to remove some unsightly power lines.

Collabora Office – Collaborative Open-Source Document Editing – then gets the once over from Al and Dave as they explore its suite of online office apps that you can host yourself if you wish.

We close with a round-up of feedback and a recounting of tales from Oggcamp 2026 which 50% of TuxJam attended.

Tunes licensed under lovely Creative Commons type licenses played in this episode were:

• Roy Smiles III – The Ocean
• Appalachia – Cohutta
• Jon Worthy – Is That What You Said
• SHOR – ORANGE CITY

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Your hosts, Dave, Andrew Al, and Kevie are back for another round of FLOSSy software and creative commonsy tunes. As usual they start the show as usual by taking in a selection of recently released distros, linux or otherwise, from distrowatch.

Have you ever needed to help a family member or friend by remoting into their device only to be met with proprietary software that sometimes accuses you of using it for business? Well, Andrew and Al take a look at RustDesk which offers an alternative built on open source software and that allows you to self-host its servers.

Next up, Kevie and Dave take a look at Rudra. This is a keyboard driven launcher for GNOME shell described by its developers as “a modern, deeply integrated launcher designed to replace the default GNOME overview… Built for speed, minimalism, and deep customization.”

We finish up by running through feedback received, conducting a reminiscence of the last podcrawl and looking forward to the next podcrawl at 6pm BST (5pm UTC) on Saturday the 11th of April. Also don’t forget that OggCamp 2026 is fast approaching – 25-26 April – and you’ll find 75% of TuxJam in attendance though arguably the best 25% will be absent 🙁

Tunes licensed under lovely Creative Commons type licenses played in this episode were:

1. Harlan Hamblin – Let The Old Ghosts Fade Away
2. Tercer Milenio – Algun Dia
3. Joshua W – Rhyme
4. Andi Komposa – Good Mood

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2 raised to the power 7 or 200 or 80 or 1000000, call it what you will but TuxJam is now officially in 8 bit territory. Once recovered from nerding out over this fact, your hosts, Kevie, Al, Andrew and Dave start the show as usual by taking in a selection of recently released distros from distrowatch.

Next Kevie and Andrew relate their experiences of using DietPi which offers a slimmed down and highly customisable OS for a variety of single board computers including all Raspberry Pi models.

Dave and Al then relate their experience with FoxClone which is an image backup solution written in Pascal that offers a neat FrontEnd for partclone.

We then talk about feedback (we love feedback!) and upcoming things such as PodCrawl on 21st Feb, HPR Beer Garden, Oggcamp 2026 and how you can get in touch with us (did I mention how much we love feedback?).

Tunes licensed under lovely Creative Commons type licenses played in this episode were:

1. Haydn Davies – Run Baby Run
2. Bod – New Beginning
3. Igor Pumphonia – New Me
4. Richard Shekari – A Fresh Start

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Dave (aka the lovebug), Al, Kevie and Andrew return for our final show of 2025 in which we recount experiences of trying Free and Open Source Software interspersed with tunes sporting Creative Commons licenses. There may be some giggling and silly antics.

As ever we begin by running our eye over recent releases listed on distrowatch. We then move on to share our experiences of StormOS and how well it fulfills its stated aim: “to help bring new users over to the world of Arch Linux by offering an easy to install, out of the box Arch Linux experience”. Kevie suggested we look at StormOS because Christmas is a stormy time of the year, especially up on the Isle of Lewis. Nature obliged and sent Storm Bram to batter not only Kevie in the Hebrides but also Andrew in Glasgow during the recording. Thankfully Storm Bram did not blow us away… but did StormOS?

Next up we look at a fun take on a very old computer game in the form of Breakout71 which we tried on our phones. Dave “I’m not a gamer” Lee gave it a particularly thorough test.

Finally we do a round-up of upcoming events including the next podcrawl on 20th December 6pm UTC, the HPR beer garden, Living the Tux Life, the HPR New Year extravaganza and OggCamp 2026. If you have any feedback, we’d love to hear it, please get in touch.

Tracks played in this episode are:

1. Hollywood Drunks – Let It Snow
2. Canon and Variation – Twin Musicon (https://www.audiolibrary.com.co/twin-musicom/canon-and-variation) 
3. Christmas Canon – dmWiggins (https://www.jamendo.com/track/1476465/christmas-canon)
4. Tatyana Litvin – Auld Lang Syne

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It is time to buy gifts for your TuxJam hosts the geeks in your life and Kevie, Dave, Andrew and Al have recorded their annual special TuxJam episode to provide you with ideas for us them.

Stocking Fillers (below £10)

• Tux Stress Toy – Kevie
• Tapo P110M Smart Plug – Kevie
• Buy a cheap SD/USB stick and fill it with TuxJam – Andrew
• Cobee One More Game/Go To Bed Gift Decision Maker Coin (Silver) – Dave
• Funny Tech Support Checklist Helpdesk Hotline Coffee & Tea Gift Mug – Dave
• Adnams Ghostship Nuts – Al

Low price (£10-£25)

• Linux Command Line Cheat Sheet Desk Mat – Kevie
• Jlab Talk Microphone – Kevie
• Tux(ish) Rechargeable Handwarmers – Andrew
• Cheap Yellow Display – Dave
• Lepro Desk Lamp LED Desk Lamp 9.2W – Dave
• UGREEN M.2 NVMe SSD Enclosure – Al

Mid range (£25-£100)

• Cosori Cup Warmer & Mug – Kevie
• The Smart Garden 3 – Kevie
• Sabrent 252W 8 port charging station – Andrew
• WisMesh Tag The Pocket-Sized, Compact Meshtastic Tracker – Dave
• D5 Solar Lora Node built in 3.7v battery for Meshtastic Repeater – Dave
• iDventure ClueBox Pro – Al

High End (over £100)

• Steam Hardware Set (not available until next year) – Kevie
• Digital Canvas – Kevie
• Steam deck OLED – Andrew
• Bluetti AC180 DC and AC Power Station – Andrew
• YETI Roadie 24 2.0 Hard Cooler – Dave
• Escape Room Cottage – Al

WOW, you REALLY love them (£silly money)

• ARCHAX £3 million – Kevie
• Vaonis vespers pro cosmic bundle – Andrew
• SFERRA Giza 45 Sateen Flat Sheet – Dave
• ThinkPad T1g Gen 8 – Al

Festive Creative Commons tracks played on this episode:

• Flashinmusic – We wish you a punk rock Christmas 
• Roy Smiles III – Snow Falling In Aachen
• Alex-Productions – Deck The halls (Jazz Version)
• Jingle Bells – Anup
• Twelth Eve Christmas Cheer Chestnut Vagary – Harper’s Hamper

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The quadrapodcasting bipeds – Al, Andrew (aka mcnalu), Dave (aka thelovebug) and Kevie – are back for another session of Free and Open Source Geekry and goodness sprinkled with tunes that are creatively common.

One we have rounded up some recent releases on the watch of distros we share our experiences of the “Cheap Yellow Display” or CYD. As the it says on the tin, it is cheap and yellow and has a display, but all this is backed up with a capable WROOM ESP32 with the usual WiFi and Bluetooth support on a decent dev board with LEDs and other nicely niche features. We discuss our experiences with it and some uses for it too.

Finally, we run through our feedback received and note some upcoming events that our listeners may be interested in:

Beer lovers amongst you might enjoy Kevie and Dave’s Beer Garden series over on Hacker Public Radio.

Creative commons licensed tunes played in this episode are:

1. The Stereo Inspectors – Hollow Crown 
2. Ismael Concepcion – No Existe la Distancia
3. Eldertide – The Dying Trees of Mona
4. Federico Guglielmetti – Libero di credere
5. Tabby Wolfe – World on Fire

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Following a restful summer (and autumn for Kevie) Dave, Andrew, Al and Kevie reunite once again to look at software that is open and free, and tunes that are commonly creative. They begin with their usual roundup from distrowatch.

Next we look at a lean and mean gnu/linux distro called Catbird which sports the attractively lightweight and rodent-free DWM window manager.

We then chill out by playing the beautiful and endless skiing game called Lato. Note however that the eponymous hero, Lato, who is always late, frequently meets his end and if you’re not careful so will your phone. It is only the side-scrolling that is, in theory, endless.

Finally we discuss feedback with a difference. It was given in-person according to Kevie but the rest of us are unsure as to what that means and are researching the “in-person” app. We mention the recently launched HPR Beer Garden series hosted by Kevie and Dave and also, not one but two upcoming podcrawls.

Creative commons tunes played in this episode are:

1. The Fifth Resonance – The Wandering Sage
2. The Glass Child – Oceans
3. The NumbKnives – You Don’t Understand Me
4. Infraction – Time To Believe

And also a snippet of the soundtrack of Lato:

Traveler (2019) by Alexander Nakarada (www.serpentsoundstudios.com)

Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License

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