While this is a valid advice normally, OP has already tried this with Linux on a netbook and a dual boot chromebook. Since OP wants to do AV stuff it's probably going to be a lot better experience with a desktop (assuming more capable than laptop) and monitor(s). Going another laptop route might be fine for learning but OP wants to switch and that's not going to happen unless it's on OP's main rig.
My advice would be leave the windows installation alone and add a new drive (SSDs are pretty cheap these days) and install Linux on that. Use the BIOS to set the default drive to the new Linux drive and install and use Linux. You'll have your windows install exactly how it is when you want to go back and just pick that as the boot device from the boot menu. Making Linux the default boot drive also helps with habit forming.
VirtualBox is free and open source, the windows guest additions piece is not. However, they're both available for free download from the same site and they do not make any distinction between those two (at least at the time, haven't looked). They were waiting for companies to download the guest additions piece and going after them to shake down licensing fees. While I don't recall/know exactly, it seemed like they were almost exclusively going after companies they already had commercial relationships with to add more licensing fees to existing contracts. So yes, from my perspective they were shaking down customers after trying to entrap them with ambiguous free downloads. They had the legal right to do so, but it felt in bad faith.
Oh wow, I had blocked out the virtual box guest additions debacle/shake-down from my memory. It almost felt like entrapment, the way they went about it.
The file browser looks like windows. But the top bar is very Mac like, maybe if you put a start menu it would help. But to get a windows feel, you'll need the start menu, application window bars, and the status info all at the bottom (default windows).
Nice, thanks for being open to suggestions. It's hard to get columnar data to be responsive on mobile. Not sure if there are any card layout type css libraries that are compatible with tables.
After reading that post and the linked github issues, with the latest updates and comments from the last 24 hours. Here's the TL;DR:
This is only relevant if you want to use an email client with Proton Bridge.
If you're just using Proton for encryption and signing (you can use the same PGP outside of proton too) then there is no issue at all.
If you want an external tool (like a hardware yubikey) to decrypt your messages that someone else has sent to you using the public key that corresponds to the external tool there will be signature validation shenanigans. This is because Proton expects to be the only entity doing any encryption.This is an important issue for those that need to send encrypted emails (and signatures) with specific keys.
It is not an issue for anyone using Proton email for a secure email service even if they want to use an external email client on desktop (like Thunderbird) with Proton Bridge.
gnome-initial-setup will default to displaying the toggle as enabled, even though the underlying setting will initially be disabled. (The underlying setting will not actually be enabled until the user finishes the privacy page, to ensure users have the opportunity to disable the setting before any data is uploaded.)
I see what they're saying here and how they're trying to give users options for users to opt-out before "accidentally" sharing data.
We are not interested in opt-in metrics.
To make this a little more confusing, metrics collection is actually separate from uploading. Collection is always initially enabled, while uploading is always initially disabled. The graphical toggle enables or disables both at the same time.
Given all this I have even lower confidence that the opt-out will be bug free, especially over time. If the settings are separate then why just one toggle? If it were separate, I might want to collect then inspect the data and maybe even choose to share (or use the data myself some other way).
Few users would opt in...
Well yes, if it's all my way or the highway. I understand that this is a tough problem to solve and a tougher one to message correctly. Hopefully someone will figure it out one day.
Just to clarify for anyone reading this good advice; you want to separate the root and home partition. That allows for reinstalling the OS in your root partition without losing data in your home partition.
Not what you're asking for and others have provided a lot of options... but if you still want to support authors and get DRM-free audio books, check out https://libro.fm. It works like Audibe credits and easy to pause and resume membership (more cost effective than buying books retail and you can buy extra credits). They also support a local brick and mortar book store of your choice with your purchase.
The whole software is currently considered alpha. If you want to test bleeding edge stuff, you could build the main branch locally and test that. Or you could use the app releases and report bugs on github (the devs would much prefer pull requests fixing bugs than just reports and they're great at merging). I'm not a dev but I have contributed to the app.
The issue is that most of the content posted is archived fairly quickly. Deleting/rewriting only hurts the humans that might have gone looking for it. The way I look at it is, if the data is searchable/indexable by search engines (as a proxy for all other tools) at any point of its life cycle then it's essentially permanent.
I'd like to try Wayland + Sway. Do you have any recommendations for a starting config?