Elisa is currently the “default” KDE music player, replacing Amarok. I am just taking a guess, but I think that Amarok just ended up with too large a codebase to be maintainable at a reasonable pace. I’ve been using Cantata, an mpd player for KDE that’s currently on maintenance mode. On the one hand, I know that for many folks last.fm scrobbling (logging the music you listen to) is something they left behind in the 2010s. On the other hand, I’m not the only person who has commented on the ticket to get the Elisa devs to add support for it. (And you know I love the stats for my end of year posts)

With KDE’s 25th Anniversary and the release of KDE Plamsa 5.23, I got excited to check out a few KDE-focused distros.

Kinoite

First up was Fedora’s KDE-based RPM-OSTree distro, Kinoite. (summary after each video)

https://youtu.be/UoXw1bkVDLg

Fedora Kinoite

Fedora provides a nice RPM-OSTree solution for folks who want to use the tech, but don’t want to use Gnome. The install is a bit barebones and doesn’t come with Flathub pre-configured, reducing the number of KDE applications that can be installed after the distro is first installed. Once Flathub is activated and Discover is reloaded, the user can start installing KDE apps. Not a good starting distro now, but with some sensible defaults, it could be great thanks to the way that RPM-OSTree makes the system more maintainable.

Lightspeed Magazine, June 2014: Women Destroy Science Fiction! Special Issue by Christie Yant

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is one of my favorite collections of stories and one of the best anthologies/magazines I’ve read so far in 2021. A lot of the stories in here a phenomenal. There are also a lot of authors in here who, in the past 6-7 years have become quite a bit more famous. That’s fun. The essay section was a little sad in the repetition of negative situations the women found themselves in. There were rays of hope in there, too. And I hope things are getting better. I’m certainly trying with my kids to raise them without gender limits.

The Consuming Fire by John Scalzi

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Scalzi continues to kick butt in the second book of The Interdependency. I’m used to the second book of a planned trilogy to be all setup for the third book which can mostly be climax. Yet, within this book Scalzi continues to have mini-climaxes and story beats and surprises.

The story continues to be a sort of updated Dune/Game of Thrones type story with multiple families vying for control of the Emperox. Some of them want to manipulate her and others want to unseat the Wu family from their position at the top. There’s also what seems to be a throwaway line involving some simulated folks that isn’t paid off in this novel, so I assume it’s going to turn out to be a huge plot point in book three. The big difference is that Emperox Cardenia is coming into her own rather than being sideswiped by the events and deaths in book 1.

Witches Abroad by Terry Pratchett

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is my second time reading the book

Our third outing with the Witches and the second one that includes Magrat Garlick. This one is part parody of the travelogue and part parody of Fairy Tales and Fairy Godmothers. It also introduces the Discworld version of dwarf bread; my first time hearing about it. This made it extra funny when I encountered it in the Lord of the Rings books.

The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I listened to the audiobook narrated by Greg from Crazy Ex-Girlfriend as I drove the 900-something miles from Maryland to Florida and it was better than I thought it would be. Ms Collins has avoided most of the annoying tropes that often plague prequels. There aren’t too many of what I call “cute” moments (eg in the Star Wars prequels seeing the Death Star original plans). Mostly those are limited to District 12 once again being the focus, the Hanging Tree song’s origins, an appearance of the katniss plant, and the origins of Mockingjays.

The Collapsing Empire by John Scalzi

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I can’t believe I waited so long to read this book, it’s so great. The quick summary: Isaac Asimov’s Foundation Series meets the family competition dynamics of Frank Herbert’s Dune. Interesting to read at the same time as The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes. Both books use the idea of segregated resource management as a form of control. In Hunger Games’ Panem it’s each district being in charge of a particular resource. In The Interdependency it’s each family guild controlling a resource.

Exit Strategy by Martha Wells

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is the perfect ending to the original Murderbot novella quartet. All the threads from the previous three books finally line up in a way that sets Murderbot up for its debut novel. Murderbot takes everything its learned and developed in order to solve the biggest problem its had yet.

The first couple novellas could have been picked up as standalones, but this one really only truly makes sense as the finale, so don’t bother picking up unless you read the first three.

Rogue Protocol by Martha Wells

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Another great entry in the Murderbot novellas! Our favorite SecUnit is once again involved in a mystery while working on the overarching plot of the novellas to figure out what happened during the incident that led it to override its governor as well as help out the humans from the first novella in their legal fight.

Artificial Condition by Martha Wells

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

After reading the second entry in The Murderbot Diaries, I’m sold on why this is such a hit with everyone. Martha Wells takes what was great about the first one - an android who just barely understands human irrationality (although suffering from some himself since he’s made of both synthetic and human tissue) and has to solve a mystery in an update from the older Golden Age format of I, Robot - and changes just enough to keep it incredibly interesting. Tore through this one in just two days and I’m already a few chapters into the next one. This one’s definitely going to be a strong contender for Hugo for best series.