Weekly Forum Summary

Community
11

This week in our forums…

Key Stats

In the past week, the Linux community forums had the following activity and key statistics:

  • Total New Posts: 33
  • Total New Topics: 3

Top Members

Interesting Topics

Here are some of the most interesting or helpful discussions from the past week, with an emphasis on new topics.

  1. Extending a partition to a different disk
    A fresh support thread from @tmick asking how to resize a small /home on an SSD by moving storage to a 3 TB HDD, and how to mount the remainder as a /Virt partition. @MarshallJFlinkman shared practical pointers to the Arch Wiki’s fstab documentation and a LinuxQuestions “move /home” workflow (copy files, test fstab swap, rollback plan). Useful reading if you’re planning a clean move of $HOME without LVM. linux Support

  2. Our community forums: feedback
    @Brian_Masinick shared thoughtful feedback on how the weekly summary helps keep up with forum activity during a busy week, with @hydn responding appreciatively. A nice meta-thread about how community tooling (like these weekly summaries) supports participation. Community Site Help forums

  3. Kali Linux Sept 9th 2025 last-snapshot
    New topic from @hydn reporting on a large update tied to Kali 2025.2, including an updated GNOME, an overhauled menu aligned with the MITRE ATT&CK framework, and sizable package refreshes. Good context on why this snapshot is heavier than usual and what changed in the desktop experience. General Discussions Discussions kali-linux debian distros

  4. Can Linux save ewaste
    @Brian_Masinick suggests UnGoogled Chromium for lower resource footprint and privacy. @ricky89 notes Firefox disk cache growth during long streams; @MarshallJFlinkman recommends reviewing about:cache and leveraging Arkenfox to disable disk caching and reduce writes—a highly actionable tip for prolonging SSD life while maintaining performance. General Discussions Discussions

  5. Linux Updates and European mirrors
    A multilingual note from @billy about Debian mirrors sparked a tangent on resilient DNS. @unixdude shared using FRR + anycast + Pi-hole at home (with WireGuard to a DO VM) to keep DNS up during maintenance, and @hydn chimed in on the reliability benefits. Great mix of practical ops insight and home-lab wisdom. General Discussions Discussions

  6. Linux top: Here’s how to customize it
    @hydn updated the write-up with screenshots comparing procps-ng top 4.0.4 versus older builds, calling out newly exposed fields (e.g., ioR/ioW, nDRT). If you monitor IO or thread details, this is a quick way to modernize your top layout. Community Picks monitoring command-line tools

  7. 50 Linux Text Editors You Should Know About
    A lively editors roundup: @AnthonyRKing mentions Mousepad’s syntax highlighting quirks, @ricky89 lists daily drivers (Geany, Gedit, VS Code) and GUI preference, and @Brian_Masinick reflects on the old emacs vs. vi debates, giving nods to Doom Emacs and neovim for modern workflows. Community Picks software tools

  8. Debian derivatives (or pure Debian), let us know what you like and why you like it
    @hydn outlines why he leans Debian family (predictable base, sane defaults), runs Kali day-to-day for newer kernels/firmware, and values consistency across servers and labs. @Brian_Masinick compares with antiX (nosystemd, lean WMs), and @Mohaa discusses init/Wayland needs with seatd/polkit on minimal installs. General Discussions Discussions debian distros

  9. What I’ve learned from distro hopping
    @Brian_Masinick praises balanced, non-dogmatic takes on tools and distros—what’s “best” depends on your workload and familiarity. @MarshallJFlinkman shares a “paper evaluation” approach that led to Linux Mint for a decade, plus an interest in Qubes OS for compartmentalization. General Discussions Discussions

  10. Favorite Derived Linux Distributions (Built on Debian, Arch, etc.)
    @Brian_Masinick revisits Slackware roots, running -current with a runlevel 4 GUI login into Xfce, contemplating fvwm/fvwm-crystal. A nice historical callback with practical notes on modern Slackware usage. General Discussions Discussions distros

Activity by the @staff Group

Highlights from staff this week, with posts that added guidance, resources, and community polish:

  • @hydn

    • Shared the official Devuan install guide to support a Debian/Devuan discussion: link.
    • Showed how to switch the forum UI to dark mode (and that it may honor system settings): link.
    • Commented on anycast + Pi-hole for resilient DNS in a mirrors thread: link.

  • @ricky89

    • Contributed practical editor choices (Geany, Gedit, VS Code) to the editors mega-thread: link.
    • Raised a useful Firefox disk-cache question in an e-waste thread, prompting performance/privacy advice: link.

  • @unixdude

    • Shared real-world anycast DNS with FRR + Pi-hole (home and DO VM over WireGuard) for high availability: link.

  • @tmick

    • Posted an update on storage planning for dual-SSD Debian/Windows plus a 3 TB VM datastore in the QEMU-KVM thread: link.

Staff were active across general discussions, tips, and site-help, balancing hands-on guidance with community housekeeping.

Best Reply or Topic of the Week

  • Best Reply: @MarshallJFlinkman’s guidance on taming Firefox disk usage with about:cache and Arkenfox in the e-waste thread: link

    From Firefox, enter the following:
    about:cache
    …I think disk caching is disabled because I am using Arkenfox hardening on Firefox… If you have sufficient free memory, and are more concerned with limiting disk writes, disabling disk caching may solve the live stream content filling the disk or wearing out the SSD.

Why it stood out: concise, actionable, and privacy-friendly advice that solves a real annoyance (runaway disk cache) while extending SSD longevity—plus it’s easy to try and revert.

Thanks for reading. See you again next week! :slightly_smiling_face: