I am not at home (and work is stuck on windows) so I can't verify with 100% certainty... But I believe what I did was pacman -Qm to list the AUR packages. Then I did pacman -Qi <package_name> to list the details about why it was installed, what dependencies it has, what depends on it, and when it was last updated. Mine showed like 2 years prior (whenever I installed the OS) because there hadn't been any update to it in years (until the attack). If your date for last updated is recently, you probably have a problem.

Exactly. I can understand them not installing a browser by default as part of their "principled stance against social media", but blocking the install entirely is WILD. I also do wonder how they actually do that though... Just a list of "known browsers" and blocking their install? It's Linux - what if we fork a browser and rename it "totally not firefox", would it even catch it?

My distro (Garuda) included a couple back when I originally installed it, but doesn't use them currently (namely wine-nine - which was affected) but the built-in system update didn't touch AUR unless you explicitly tell it to, so that saved my bacon in this situation (my AUR packages hadn't been updated in 2 months).

I 100% agree with this. This is SO CLOSE to getting it and offering a phone I actually want. But I want to own my devices and decide what I do on them. The thing hard locking me out of a browser (and discord) is unfortunately a deal breaker. I don't want the hardware mfr to have a say in how I use the device and treat me like a literal child in the process. It's disappointing.

Chaotic is not just as problematic, thankfully. They have systems in place to flag suspicious changes for human review before letting them out and it has, so far, prevented them from shipping any compromised updates.

I thankfully hadn't updated anything from the AUR for a couple of months (it doesn't happen by default when I update the rest of my system) and was unaffected, and after looking at the list of things I had from the AUR, I didn't need any of them... So I now have zero AUR packages on either of my systems.

Eh, depends really. The AUR is not the default place to install software from, it's all user created and comes with warnings almost anywhere you have access to it. I've generally used Octopi to install packages and you have to jump through some hoops to even have it show you packages from the AUR. Generally, running updates for the system, from the Arch flavors I've used anyway, by default doesn't update packages installed from the AUR and you generally update them deliberately and separately. As an example, on my Garuda systems I only have 3 packages installed from AUR and they are so rarely used I forget about them a lot... I'm a bad sysadmin for myself and they don't get updated nearly as often as the main system packages.

But, do other people use their system differently? Absolutely. They have likely ignored several warnings (or read them and accepted the risks) to get there though.

That is an extremely foreign concept to my indoctrinated american brain... My grandmother pre-paid for her entire funeral, casket and burial plot included, back in the early 1980s and didn't pass until 2005. It cost her like $3000 in 1980s money and we were told at the time the same arrangements would have cost about $25000 in 2005. Another family member died that same year and was cremated and that cost about $4000 just for the basic plain box mentioned above. I'm sure today it is at least double that... (guessing based on how much more EVERYTHING else costs vs 20 years ago).

Unfortunately, $5k doesn't buy you a sweet funeral. You're lucky to be cremated and remains in a plain plastic coated cardboard box for $5k.

$5k might cover the costs of moving a country with proper healthcare though.

LLMs making "errors" around elections might be the exact point of them.

Can it be disabled? Please?

Adblockers came up in conversation with a (non-techie) friend the other day and they said they don't have one because they are afraid they'd "get the wrong one" or end up with a virus trying to download "something like that" because they've had trouble with those shady download websites that have a ton of fake download buttons... Like, they look at adblocker as if it is the most scandalous form of piracy or something.

Fun memory of mine from playing Morrowind when it first came out...

#1 was having a printed map that came in the game box that got used A LOT. No directional aids in game, and a quest giver would give you directions to a place like going to a southerner's cousin's house before GPS ("go west out of town along the river road, you will pass 2 dwemer ruins on your right and there will be a small path breaking off to the right. Follow that until you see the strange statue and look for a cave entrance to your west." Yea, I needed that printed map and I basically wore it out playing the game).

#2 early on in the main story, the quest giver tells you he needs to look into some information and asks you to come back and check in "after 2 moons have passed". Well, having been forced to read the book "walk 2 moons" in school recently at that point and having my teacher explain that "a moon" was a month because of moon cycles... I was shocked this quest giver wants me to wait TWO BLOODY MONTHS to continue the main story quests... I get to looking and sure enough there is a whole ass calendar system in Morrowind, so I tried to write down what month it was and wait to see when 2 months had passed... I became the top dog for the mages guild, fighters guild, thieves guild, etc... Explored basically the entire continent. Come back to him and continue the quest but now I'm powered up to fight a god on basically day 4 of the main story. I find out after this that the guy wanted me to wait two nights. TWO NIGHTS. not TWO MONTHS. TWO FUCKING NIGHTS. As in he meant "see the moon twice" not see it go through it's entire fucking cycle twice. I never even tried talking to him for 2 entire fucking in-game months.

I should go back and replay Morrowind...