You know, I didn’t think of that. I’ve never run an OS in docker; all I tested my data collection scripts on were my regular VM’s a few times just for fun. And for that matter, most LXC containers I run in Proxmox are privileged to get around restrictions (still haven’t found a way for LXC’s to let me compile different architectures, though. HA may have updated their docker to current, which would explain why it happened so suddenly.

And yes, for now, I’ll just do root login to grab the information; it’s technically more accurate, I am just knee-jerk distrustful of using root to the point until Proxmox and this last year, I almost forgot it existed unless there’s a very weird linux problem I need it for. Thanks for this information, though; I’ve only just started seriously working with LXC and docker containers, so that’s not an approach I woudl have considered.

Full disclosure: I just–and I mean just–got my head wrapped around docker and containers due to installing Proxmox on my server. Right now, my Proxmox server runs a LXC container for docker, and in docker I run Handbrake and MakeMKV images that run the GUIs in a browser or run with command line. They connect to each other through mounting the LXC’s /home/user into both., then added a connection to the remote shares on my other server so I can send them to my media server. Yes, I did have to map all the mountings out first before I started but hey, that’s how I learn.

Long way of saying: I am just now able to start understanding how Home Assistant works–someone said Home Assistant OS was basically really a hypervisor overseeing a lot of containers and now that I use Proxmox, that really helped–but I’m still really unfamiliar with the details.

I installed the full Home Assistant on a dedicated Pi4, so it’s the only thing it does. Until yesterday, the only part I actually interacted with was the data portion, which is where all my files are, where I configure my GUI and script, store addons, etc. The container for this portion runs on Alpine Linux; I can and have and do install/update/change/build packages I need or like to use. in there It’s ephemeral; anything I do outside the data directory (it holds /config, /addons, etc) gets wiped clean on update, so I reinstall them whenever HA does an update .

When I run my data collection scripts on my Home Assistant SBC, they take their information from the container aka Alpine Linux., including saying my OS was Alpine. All of this worked correctly up until–according to the directory dates, December 10th at 2:40 AM when the /sys/firmware was last updated and everything in it vanished, breaking the symlink to /proc/device-tree/model. This also updated the container OS to Alpine 3.19.0. Data collection runs hourly; one of my Pis ssh’s into each computer to run four data collection scripts and updates a browser page I run off apache, so I can check current presence and network status and also check the OS/hardware/running services of all my computers from the browser (the services script doesn’t work on Alpine yet; different structure). I didn’t notice until recently because work got super busy, so I only verified availability and network status regularly.

These are the packages I install or switch to an updated/different version the Alpine container to help with this or just have fun: -figlet (it’s just cute ASCII art for an ssh banner), -iproute2 (network info, when updated has option to store network info in a variable as a json),

• iw (wireless adapter info),
• jq (reads and processes json files),
• procps-ng (updated uptime package for more options),
• sed (updated can do more than the installed one),
• util-linux (for column command in bash),
• wireless-tools (iwconfig, more wireless data if iw doesn’t have it) (Note: I think tr may also be updated by one of these.)

These are the ones I use for data collection that are already installed:

• lscpu (“Model name” “Vendor ID” “Architecture” “CPU(s)” “CPU min MHz” “CPU max MHz”)
• uname (kernel)

These are the files I access for data collection:

• /proc/device-tree/model (Computer model)
• /proc/meminfo (RAM)
• /proc/uptime (Uptime)
• /etc/os-release (Current OS data)
• /sys/class/thermal/thermal_zone0/temp (CPU temperature for all my SBCs except BeagleBone Black)

Until this month, all of those files were accessible both before I do the package updates and after. The only one affected was maybe /proc/uptime by the uptime update to get more options. Again: I’ve been running these scripts or versions of them for well over a year and I test individually on each SBC before adding them to my data collection scripts to run remotely; all of these worked on every computer, including whatever SBC was running Home Assistant. (Odroid N2+ until it died a few months ago) And all of them work right now–except /proc/device-tree/model on my Home Assistant SBC. The only way I can get model info is to add an extra ssh to Home Assistant itself as root and grab the data off that file (and while I"m there, get the OS data for Home Assistant instead of Alpine), save it to my shell script directory in my data container, and have the my script process that file for my data after it gets the rest from the container.

That’s why I’m weirded out; this is one of the things that is the same on every single Linux OS I’ve used and on Alpine, so why on earth would this one thing change?

This could conceivably be an Alpine issue; I downloaded Alpine 3.19.0 to run in Proxmox when I get a chance, and I kind of hope that it’s a deliberate change in Alpine, because otherwise, I can’t imagine why on earth the HA team would alter Alpine to break that symlink. Or they could be templating Alpine for the container each time and this time it accidentally broke. The entire thing is just so weird. Or maybe–though not likely–a bug in Alpine 3.19.0, but I doubt it; I can’t possibly be the first to notice, it was released at least three weeks ago and I googled a lot.

I’m honestly not sure it affects anything at all, but it bothers me so here we are. Though granted, it did make me finally get off my ass and figure out how to login as root into HA as well as do a badly needed refactor of my main data collection script (the one that does the ssh’ing) as well as clean and refactor my computer information scripts, so maybe it was destiny.

Which is why I"m not sure I need a bug report. The part I have non-root access to is inside a docker container and that’s all I needed to collect data. But it’s such a random thing to go missing.since that core update.

Since probably October, I’ve noticed some really really random problems show up that never used to. And for once, I know it wasn’t me messing with the code; I took a sabbatical from HA to learn how to use Proxmox a couple of months ago. and everything worked fine. It was actually a clean install to a new Raspberry Pi as my Odroid decided to stop working and I haven’t had time to learn to solder (hopefully this week, tho). I was kind of wondering if it was the Pi that was the problem.

I know, I’m trying to write up a clear bug report on this, but I’m honestly not sure if it actually has any effect other than messing up my data collection scripts. Yeah, it’s annoying the hell out of me but I’ve been going through the documented issues with the core and it doesn’t look like anyone else noticed a problem. I’ve been trying to figure out if it’s created by an alpine package that I can run, but not much luck there.

Note: I enabled root for Home Assistant OS and the symlink and file are fine there.

I semi-regularly distro-hop, but Xubuntu is the distro I keep coming back to between hops to take a break or when one goes (temporarily) dormant. It’s currently running on my primary server/linux machine.

Reasons: 1.) It’s light on resources 2.) It’s very simple and clean. 3.) It works with all the programs I use regularly; only one needs to be hand-compiled (but that one has to be compiled for literally any Linux machine). 4.) I know it. Scrub/partition/install/configure in under an hour. I can pick up any of my projects again immediately where I left off.

Yeah honestly, wafflemaker is one of those things that if you want waffles not in frozen form, that’s pretty much your only choice. If there is a manual way to do it, I’m honestly scared of the person who worked out how and what they have to do to make it happen.

I am tempted by your grill, though. Hmm.

Egg boiler. On the surface it’s just the most gadgety pointless product invented but I literally wore it out because suddenly I could have hard boiled eggs and no risk of setting my apartment on fire because I forgot about the eggs. After I move, it’s the first thing I’m getting for my kitchen because low-risk hard boiled eggs are totally worth it.

There’s a lot of seemingly ‘useless’ kitchen gadgets like this: full size food processor, waffle maker, breadmaker, even my ridic large instapot. I don’t use them every day or even every week and no, I don’t need them for daily life. Yes I can mince fifty thousand vegetables for this really complicated soup by hand or make bread from scratch or do whatever you do to make a pot roast without them–but I won’t do those things. I know me pretty well now; if I want to make that soup, make some fresh bread, or do that thirty-step fancy pot roast, I need those tools or I’ll default to frozen pizza and maybe have fresh Italian bread if I went to Central Market recently and remembered to grab it from the bakery.

Set up a pihole and let the much faster internet and browsing good times roll. (along with browser extension()

Bonus trauma points: one week after setup, go look at the pihole logs of everything that it’s blocking–and from where. Welcome to random bouts of low-grade paranoia and feeling a little bit stalked.

Both specific and in general 1.) Nectar mattress. The only mattresses i’d ever bought were from amazon and very on sale. Important Life Advice: whatever you have to do to make i happen, get a good mattress. Even my bed approves and it thinks everything is beneath it, including me.

2.) My bed.

Oh boy, here we go. This goddamn bed.

I bought it roughly twenty years ago and it literally took my entire tax return at my first job and then some to get it and the very first piece of furniture I personally picked out and bought for myself which may explain absolutely nothing about how I ended up like this.

It’s fairly straightforward, plain four poster queen bed but so incredibly melodramatic no matter the room I put it in, this thing will dramatically not fit and carry on like it’s actually in a castle tower in 1700s Frances waiting for a princess to sleep in it (it did not act like this at the store, okay). It has an unnecessary number of parts (some really could have been consolidated and a couple I’m not sure even have a function other than to add time to assembling it) every piece of it is awkward to move, even the parts that have no reason to be and don’t look like they are, and every single piece is ten times heavier than than look or is reasonable, sane, or really should even be possible. The wood is dark and does a very cool dark gleaming thing, and it takes hours to clean and oil it to a soft gleam (so. goddamn. many. parts). Twenty-four hours later it’s sitting there dull and dramatically telling everyone who sees it I never clean it and also use substandard wood oil

It takes a very base minimum of two people to even attempt to put it together and you better not have plans for the rest of the day because it doesn’t matter how many times you have done this, somehow, you will always get six parts wrong because whoever designed this has another job making complicated puzzle locks that you will never solve and will die mad about it (this person is a sadist). Just looking at it in any given bedroom I live in, it makes me feel I should be wearing something long, white, and flowy while waiting for my angsty vampire lover to visit me in the dead of the night and not taking my night’s sleep shorts and a tank top.

This bed is a snobby, judgemental asshole who acts like I didn’t buy it at the goddamn Roomstore at ten percent off because it was a floor model.

But. it’s a goddamn tank that’s been in substandard moving vans and the backs of multiple trucks and dropped down stairs and sometimes forgets to at least look scuffed. It will survive all the wars and still give its occupants a great night’s sleep. Those deceptively slim posts are strong enough to joust with a burglar, beat him to death, and then put back and rehang my very melodramatic bed curtains on them (though I’ll need a little hysterical strength to hold them up for very long; I am not kidding how stupid heavy those thing are and should not be). I love this bed, it is my soulmate, and it is where I will sleep until I move to a convenient grave. I hope all of you are able to have one of these in your life and if you already do, you have my condolences; but it’s ride or die now.

3.) The best headphones I can afford and a budget for potential upgrade/replace every two years (you don’t have to use that timeline,but it works for me). Related: Sonos speakers. No, they are not the best in any class but they are good to really good in multiple speaker classes and are affordable–if you budget strictly and buy a piece at a time or watch for amazon sales like it’s your job–for normal people.

4.) Kindle may actually be the most important single decision I have made in my life. I like books; I didn’t want to use a screen. I did it and a decade and change greater with slowly degrading eyesight I bless the day I decided to try it every day. Currently on an Oasis.

5.) Giving up and budgeting specifically to pay a ridiculous amount of money for my jeans. Sure, the receipts legit horrifies me, but they fit perfectly, are crazy comfortable, can pretty much survive anything I do to them (and I am hard on my clothes) and some have been with me since before the Obama administration and don’t even have a loose thread on them. I have literally every single pair i ever bought and they still look great (and I never add up the cost of them all and what thing I could have bought with that much money, God).

Okay, hear me out:

I get the argument that most of these protests are meaningless/if you REALLY want to change you’re going to have to do this this this. whatever (I usually stop reading there). I understand, but I don’t agree.

Sure, it’s nice when a protest can actually enact real changes but lets face it; that’s not common and sometimes not going to happen: fine. The decision to make a protest shouldn’t be decided on the basis of ‘can I win’; a much less restrictive–and very deeply fun–philosophy should be "is this worth taking time out of my day just to annoy/frustrate/irritate those who are doing this?’ If yes (it should always be yes), "So lets find out how many ways me and anyone else I can recruit can make this happen’.

In other words: every time a subreddit finds a new and interesting and stupid and ridiculous and just weird way to be irritating and embarrassing af…I am living for this.