EFI or secure boot, has long been a bit of a mixed bag with Linux. Linux isn’t like proprietary OSes that get signed to boot directly with Secure Boot enabled in the Bios firmware. Secure Boot is a security feature written into BIOS for the purposes of Microsoft to only allow signed software to boot. This is meant to in theory at least, limit rootkits and malware from handling startup of the computer. This did workout to be a ploy for Microsoft to monopolize as systems with this turned on would only work with Microsoft signed OSes. Ubuntu does have a key that allows it to boot, however, getting the OS to work after installation can be a task without taking some precautions first. Many people will have to manually partition their drives in a way required for secure boot. Linux installers will typically assume you want your drive formatted to EXT4 or some variant of EXT that is typically used by Linux. Secure Boot enabled will sometimes prevent Linux from booting this way and so it’s not so cut and dry. EFI keys are available to developers at cost so it isn’t free to get your hands on one of these and smaller developers just won’t be able to unless they create their distro using Ubuntu’s base. Linux users who want to see if their distribution is booted or installed using EFI can look for a specific file using this command: ls sys firmware efi with slashes. If the file is located, this means that you are using secure boot, however, if it is not, it might mean your BIOS is a legacy firmware. The Solus help center has information on this and even has a specific method for installing Solus on to EFI. To Manually partition your drive for such installation, you need to be using GPT for the boot drive rather than Msdos. EFI also prefers the FAT filesystem as this is a proprietary filesystem developed by Microsoft. With Microsoft edging closer to the Open source and Linux communities, this shouldn’t be an issue as much in the future, however, I do have my doubts about the authenticity of them being open to such communities in a way that benefits all parties(More on this in the future).
I wrote an article before about making Pale Moon more private. I covered a few of the settings and back end changes I make each time I install it. I mentioned Noscript, but I didn’t give any details about how I set it up. First though, you have to get the version already marked for your version of “Firefox” or in this case, Pale Moon. If you went to https://addons.palemoon.org/addon/noscript/ you would probably find the Pale Moon addons page devoted to the newest possible Noscript being marked specifically for Pale Moon. Other versions may work, but these are hybrid addons and the closer we get to Noscript 10, the less I trust it to work with Pale Moon specifically. I just opt to stick with 5.0.6. There have been people asking about what happens when Maone, the developer stops supporting the hybrid versions of Noscript, “Will it work with Pale Moon?” Why yes it will. Noscript blocks scripts, that’s its main function and it will do that as long as Java script exists on a page.
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