The easiest way of explaining the title is perhaps to summarise my history in open source:
Got started with Linux in 98, but never really used it full time as the only desktop OS.
Have done a lot of work on web servers & CMses, also a decade with AWS
Once turned a community position in Drupal into setting up a branch in my country for a very well reputed company, interesting stunt.
I’ve always been following the rule “if it works out of the box I’ll use it, if not next distro please”, but now I’ll settle on Qubes and get things to work come hell or high water!
What I’m aiming at is having a clear strategy the same way I had it going into Drupal. Main objectives are:
Becoming a real privacy wizard, and potentially setting up a business helping others achieve the same. Would include anything from basic precautions all the way up to implementing Qubes for clients ++
Contribute to Qubes in any way possible, even if only as an advocate. (Mainly doing cryptos at present)
Possible isolate 1-3 parts of Qubes that might be worth really getting into, alongside with learning the language(s) that are relevant. The choice of this should ideally align with the first point.
I do not think I have the capacity to become a full fledged security specialist, nor am I interested in ever getting near the corporate world again. Anything related to cryptos that goes well alongside with Qubes is super interesting
I’m very much the type of person who does NOT read documentation, but of course I’ll do that for things I’m serious about…
Works out of the box with some tiny hickups, getting used to “thinking in qubes” feels natural after years with VMware & Virtualbox, but getting deeper will require reading up on things for sure!
Of course the local vendor here did NOT have the Thinkpad T450s that I ordered, so now I’m contemplating getting another X230 instead. Old and not the screen resolution I hoped for, but cheap and reliable - I really enjoy the one I have running with Qubes FAR more than my 27 Imac with a 32" screen added
All that is shiny is deceptive, I guess… I do enjoy being in control, knowing that I leave as little data as possible & in general have all options at hand.
Definitely the best start I could imagine! Only problem is that sometimes networking defaults to ETH0 after suspend, curiously mapping wlan to the ETH port instead… No biggie, and I guess its time to learn this again - but this time around without ifconfig haha
Still got occasional problems with networking not recognising wifi after sleep mode. It does work if I shut down all Qubes, not a huge issue, I’ll get around to it eventually.
Going from a 27 Imac with a 30" extra screen to 1380x786 actually feels great, simply because using shortcuts comes in naturally, I’ve got one Debian Qube running with Brave for most stuff, then a Whonix Qube using the Anon distribution browser for sensitive things.
The Monero wallet worked out of the box, Keypass too, so the gradual migration from depending on cloud services and not so secure daily operations has gotten to a good start!
Next is perhaps to start building up a Qube for crypto exchanges and services. Imagine that for at least some of these I can start building a list of IP addresses for a set of firewall rules…
Also got a Corelinux Qube going, Android X86 does not quite work, will keep chipping away on that problem when time allows.
Simply having the option of spinning up a Qube for anything is GREAT!
One of the great things is that I can also run several users in social media in a very easy way. My next business project will revolve around privacy, so “taming” the extreme data gathering on social media is high on the list.
Might even get a first customer soon that has potential real threats, my colleague told me that they’re using their real name @gmail when publishing news from their home country… Which is insane for a country that is half way into a civil war!
Mine has been running fine since I set it up in October last year. No issues. Please refer to the link deeplow posted. I find no changes I need to make to it.
Any questions or obstacles, I’d suggest the best place to post would be there.
Since its been a year I’ll just reiterate a rough outline:
My active building of stuff on Qubes kinda flatlined a bit, but I did use the Lenovo X230 maybe into 2022 before that died. Then fell into the “convenience trap” again for a while
I did get a i7 Dell Optiplex 9202SFF and installed Qubes on that, but had little time to run it actively. Did get the HD from the laptop booted in there by removing the USB hiding commando in Grub
Recently I got around to booting and building on that, migrated the Qubes that were on the laptop to that, upgraded to Qubes 4.1
Then a few days an i7 X230 suddenly went up for sale locally here for a super low price (around 150 USD), and yesterday I got it. It looks almost brand new & has an extended 6 cell battery that has full capacity!
Now I’m back to dismantling all the stuff I have on my too convenient 27inch Retina Imac late 2015, and having Qubes running on the same desk makes me feel that NOW is the time to migrate fully
Also been working on the architecture on my “reverse troll farm” and social media marketing setup which will be part of what I do the next years. Analysing, creating and controlling traffic & the narrative will be key moving forward, and Qubes is the perfect tool for mixing organic traffic with automation, macros and so on.
In terms on usage I might be halfway to those 1000 hours hehe, hopefully using and expanding on the features that are already great in Qubes will be a large percentage of that. Passive use is just not enough to really get on top of these things!
