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More Linux on MacBook Pro

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Last week I did a full upgrade and something about the kernel crashed my elementaryOS 8.1 installation. That's a problem; I don't want an unreliable computer.

So I had a CD from a recent Linux magazine with Linux Mint. It installed well, found the broadcom wifi, and all was well.

Then I got to dinking around  with making it look more Maclike. Installed the White Sur theme with icons. So now I have the rounded corners, the red yellow and blue dots on the left of a window, and a Maclike logo for the program launcher.

I installed Plank (a Maclike dock), and fiddled with it. Then for no reason I can discover, Plank just disappeared. I uninstalled and reinstalled it and no dice. It's there, it has preferences, but I couldn't make it show up on the screen.

But it's ok. Linux Mint on a Mac is pretty easy to use. Firefox, Emacs, pandoc, Upnote all work fine. Without the dock, I can run everything from a minimal panel in a way that's a little calmer. I don't need this machine to do everything (although it handles Zoom, too). I just need it to behave predictably.

One never knows if the machine itself is responsible for some of the flakiness. But for now, it'll do.

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