Any recommended OCR software for Linux?

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by salamanderjuice

Last time I used Linux Mint they were forcing DDG as the default browser search engine and they were extremely aggressive about that as it doesn't even come with the option to switch to Google pre-included. It's honestly easier to switch from Bing to Google in Microsoft Edge than Firefox on Mint. At least last time I tried. Left a bad taste in my mouth.

They still don't load Google Search by default, but they've made it much easier to add now. You just go to Settings > Search > Find More search engines (and Google is in the list with about 20 others). Just pick Google from there, install it and set it as your default.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by salamanderjuice

Last time I used Linux Mint they were forcing DDG as the default browser search engine and they were extremely aggressive about that as it doesn't even come with the option to switch to Google pre-included. It's honestly easier to switch from Bing to Google in Microsoft Edge than Firefox on Mint. At least last time I tried. Left a bad taste in my mouth.

That's never been true. Whereas Edge on Win 10 is impossible to remove or completely disable. As was once the case with IE4. MS even inflicted Edge on Win 7 last month!

You can make ANY browser the default on Linux, if there is a Linux version. I even have ancient versions of browsers for Win 95 in WINE for ancient multimedia titles.

I've never had trouble changing the default search in Firefox or Waterfox. I also have Chromium purely to access some Google services and the odd stupid website I need that only works on a Chrome based browser.

Linux Mint is my regular all day OS since December 2016, but I gave courses on Red Hat Linux to Dell in the late 1990s, used Cromix in 1986 and MS Xenix in 1987.
Using, installing and selling NT since 1994.

[salamanderjuice]

Originally Posted by Quoth

That's never been true. Whereas Edge on Win 10 is impossible to remove or completely disable. As was once the case with IE4. MS even inflicted Edge on Win 7 last month!

You can make ANY browser the default on Linux, if there is a Linux version. I even have ancient versions of browsers for Win 95 in WINE for ancient multimedia titles.

I've never had trouble changing the default search in Firefox or Waterfox. I also have Chromium purely to access some Google services and the odd stupid website I need that only works on a Chrome based browser.

Linux Mint is my regular all day OS since December 2016, but I gave courses on Red Hat Linux to Dell in the late 1990s, used Cromix in 1986 and MS Xenix in 1987.
Using, installing and selling NT since 1994.

That is totally true. I'm not talking about the default browser. I'm talking about the default search engine in Firefox with Mint. By default it's Duck Duck Go and Linux Mint goes the extra step to remove Google from the included search providers list on Firefox. On any other distro/platform Google is already included (and default) and you just click Google in the search bar or in settings. On Mint you have to go through extra steps to add Google back that are not obvious.

I'm not making this stuff up. It's harder than it should be or is on any other platform because Mint wants their DDG monies. There's countless blog posts and forum threads on how to do this. Here's a sampling:

https://www.systutorials.com/how-to-...search-engine/

https://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?t=269835

https://devopspoints.com/linux-mint-...n-firefox.html

[DiapDealer]

Moderator Notice
Language please

A very cursory search shows how to quickly enable the Google search engine for selection as the default engine.

Don't like it if you don't want; but suggesting they're "aggressively" keeping anyone from using any search engine they want in Mint's Firefox is bit of a stretch.

[salamanderjuice]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Language please

A very cursory search shows how to quickly enable the Google search engine for selection as the default engine.

Don't like it if you don't want; but suggesting they're "aggressively" keeping anyone from using any search engine they want in Mint's Firefox is bit of a stretch.

It's aggressive because they patch Firefox specifically to remove Google and reset it on every update of Firefox. I can't think of a single other major distro that does that. It also wasn't quite as cursory a Google search either back when they first started doing it.

[Greg Anos]

Why use Firefox? There are other browsers out there, I use Brave, myself.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by salamanderjuice

It's aggressive because they patch Firefox specifically to remove Google and reset it on every update of Firefox. I can't think of a single other major distro that does that. It also wasn't quite as cursory a Google search either back when they first started doing it.

I wasn't crazy about this decision when it first happened, but it's an easy to pick Google now and you don't have to reset it every time Firefox updates. Linux Mint retains your settings from Firefox update to update. (I actually don't remember Firefox ever not retaining your settings from update to update.)

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by Greg Anos

Why use Firefox? There are other browsers out there, I use Brave, myself.

Why use Google search?
But it was simple to add Google search and updates to firefox don't change the search setting.

[kacir]

Originally Posted by salamanderjuice

Last time I used Linux Mint they were forcing DDG as the default browser search engine and they were extremely aggressive about that as it doesn't even come with the option to switch to Google pre-included. It's honestly easier to switch from Bing to Google in Microsoft Edge than Firefox on Mint. At least last time I tried. Left a bad taste in my mouth.

I was furious when that happened for the first time. Took me about 10 minutes to figure out how to restore Google as a default search engine in their Firefox. Nowadays when I install Mint for somebody, it is one of the first things I do.

[gmw]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Why use Google search?
[...]

I've got to say that I have been wondering exactly this. It's been so long since I have used it that I can't remember if it did anything useful besides capturing private data.

[Pajamaman]

Originally Posted by rcentros

I'll grant that Android (though built on the Linux kernel) is not a Linux distribution, but that argument doesn't really apply to ChromeOS, a GNU/Linux distribution based on Gentoo Linux. Basically a Chromebook is Linux running the Chrome browser. It can now run Android applications (using a virtual machine) and it also runs Linux applications (in a container). And Chromebooks have been consistently outselling Macs for the last year, or year and a half. They are becoming a significant part of the "desktop" world (desktop referring to desktops and/or laptops).

Its been a while since my foray and lightning exit from chromebook. I figured I would install Linux on it, even though its already "Linux" (but without the functionality of full Linux), but promptly discovered it lacked the resources to make it practical (fast onboard storage).

I found ChromeOS horribly limited for my needs. Browsing, email, wordprocessing, yes. Anything else, not really. For example, a recent visitor to these boards discovered installing Calibre on a chromebook is hard to impossible, at least for a "dumb" end user. So no, a Chromebook is only Linux in a very limited sense. It lacks the functionality of a full Linux install.

I am unfamiliar with running Linux apps in a container on one. Maybe that would have worked for the user wanting to run calibre. If so, no one advised him. IME chromebooks are only good for what they're designed for, and are most certainly no replacement for a windows/linux/mac PC. Even with Android apps, which, IMO are again no replacement for a real PC and not much good for serious heavy duty work.

But if you want argue chromeos and android are "Linux" let's just say everything including Windows is C with a bit of assembler. Ah, to heck with it. It's all binary. So they're all the same? Clearly not.

[PeterT]

Originally Posted by Pajamaman

For example, a recent visitor to these boards discovered installing Calibre on a chromebook is hard to impossible, at least for a "dumb" end user. So no, a Chromebook is only Linux in a very limited sense. It lacks the functionality of a full Linux install.
.

.

As an experiment I installed calibre on my Chromebook with no issues. Initially I installed from the tepository by a simple sudo apt-get install calibre. That installed a version 3 from the repository.

I then uninstalled it and installed the Linux version from the official web site. Had one error during the install and had to install one library (again via apt-get; I think it was libnss.so). That has given my a fully installed calibre with the caveat that due to some usb issues I can't connect a usb based reader and have it recognized by calibre.

Sent from my Pixel 4a using Tapatalk

[salamanderjuice]

Originally Posted by Pajamaman

Its been a while since my foray and lightning exit from chromebook. I figured I would install Linux on it, even though its already "Linux" (but without the functionality of full Linux), but promptly discovered it lacked the resources to make it practical (fast onboard storage).

I found ChromeOS horribly limited for my needs. Browsing, email, wordprocessing, yes. Anything else, not really. For example, a recent visitor to these boards discovered installing Calibre on a chromebook is hard to impossible, at least for a "dumb" end user. So no, a Chromebook is only Linux in a very limited sense. It lacks the functionality of a full Linux install.

I am unfamiliar with running Linux apps in a container on one. Maybe that would have worked for the user wanting to run calibre. If so, no one advised him. IME chromebooks are only good for what they're designed for, and are most certainly no replacement for a windows/linux/mac PC. Even with Android apps, which, IMO are again no replacement for a real PC and not much good for serious heavy duty work.

But if you want argue chromeos and android are "Linux" let's just say everything including Windows is C with a bit of assembler. Ah, to heck with it. It's all binary. So they're all the same? Clearly not.

A "dumb" end user might struggle to figure out how to install Calibre on Windows 10S. But you wouldn't say that Windows 10S isn't Windows. ChromeOS does some weird things from a normal Linux distro perspective like running the entire GUI in essentially 1 X11 window and its locked down but it's still very Linuxy in how it operates. Android is a little different and does its own thing for drawing interfaces and running programs. But they both use the Linux kernel under the hood. I can "do real work" on an Android tablet quite easily. Termux + a proot-distro and I can do all the same things I do on my Linux desktop.

Someone did explain to that guy that it was possible to run Linux apps on Chromebooks via. Crostini. I suppose Crouton would have been worth a mention too since it's more compatible.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by Pajamaman

Its been a while since my foray and lightning exit from chromebook. I figured I would install Linux on it, even though its already "Linux" (but without the functionality of full Linux), but promptly discovered it lacked the resources to make it practical (fast onboard storage).

I didn't install Linux on the Chromebook, but I'm using the built-in Crostini (which is Debian 10 – "Buster"). That's basically all I use (on the Chromebook). I've even installed an email client and Firefox in this Linux "container." I've played around with Android apps a bit but not much. I don't think I've actually used anything ChromeOS was originally designed for (online Google Docs, etc.). I guess I still use the Chrome browser sometimes and share files on Google Drive. But even with a "real" Linux computer I share files on Google Drive and use the Vivaldi browser (based on Chrome) when Firefox has trouble with a specific site.

Originally Posted by Pajamaman

I found ChromeOS horribly limited for my needs. Browsing, email, wordprocessing, yes. Anything else, not really. For example, a recent visitor to these boards discovered installing Calibre on a chromebook is hard to impossible, at least for a "dumb" end user. So no, a Chromebook is only Linux in a very limited sense. It lacks the functionality of a full Linux install.

A Chromebook wouldn't be my first choice either. But, nevertheless, sales are soaring (up 277% year to year, last quarter) and this Linux platform is becoming popular in the market (outselling Macs now). The reason I bought a Chromebook was to see if they would run some screenwriting applications — the question came up a lot on the forums. They will — everything I threw at it ran. But I'm sticking with a Chromebook for another reason, that is (if you're using it for writing) it's a very cheap, light platform with a 12-14 hour battery life — and a real keyboard. The battery life is the main draw for me.

As for Calibre, after reading your post, I tried installing it. Installation went without a hitch but, as PeterT mentions, there's no direct Calibre access to the USB port — so that makes it useless for DeDRM and easy integration.

Originally Posted by Pajamaman

I am unfamiliar with running Linux apps in a container on one. Maybe that would have worked for the user wanting to run calibre. If so, no one advised him. IME chromebooks are only good for what they're designed for, and are most certainly no replacement for a windows/linux/mac PC. Even with Android apps, which, IMO are again no replacement for a real PC and not much good for serious heavy duty work.

I can't argue with much here, except to mention that Chromebooks weren't really designed for writing applications and yet they work really well for this (so long as its a Linux application). Even a moderately priced Chromebook comes with 32 or 64 GBs of online SSD storage and most seem to include microSD slots for long-term storage. A 16 GB Chromebook I found on Shop Goodwill for $27 has enough room and power to run all the Linux writing applications I wanted to use it for.

Originally Posted by Pajamaman

But if you want argue chromeos and android are "Linux" let's just say everything including Windows is C with a bit of assembler. Ah, to heck with it. It's all binary. So they're all the same? Clearly not.

ChromeOS and Android are not the same. Android uses the Linux kernel (so it's based on Linux) but it uses some kind of funky java (or something like java) front end GUI. ChromeOS, on the other hand, is Linux. It's a very specialized (and limited) Gentoo version of Linux basically designed to run the Chrome browser. Over time it's gotten more capabilities, but without the Linux Debian sub-system, I would (personally) have zero interest in it.

Even Windows 10 has a Linux subsystem built-in now, mostly for development. And, in their Azure division, Microsoft even uses an internal Linux Distribution, called CBL-Mariner. I keep wondering when Microsoft will release their own Linux Distribution — I'm convinced that, eventually, they will. And, instead of a Linux subsystem, they'll use a Windows VM for running "legacy" Windows programs.

https://betanews.com/2021/07/12/micr...d-cbl-mariner/

Maybe not. We'll see.

[leebase]

Now you got me lusting after a Chromebook when I've never wanted one before. And I have a powerful MacBook, and iPad, and...well, I just like tech toys in general