Introduction

Hey guys! My name is Gregory Ballantine. I created the Bit Goblin site to share and document my experiences with technology. Primarily, I’m a Unix system administrator and network engineer, with some working knowledge in Windows SA, programming, website development and cybersecurity. I really enjoy anything that relates to computers!

For a little background on me and my experiences, I’ve been a System Administrator of some sort for close to six years now, and have been using computers frequently for at least 10 years. I started out using computers mainly to play games, which eventually lead me to writing scripts and kept me interested enough to eventually learn how to code websites. From there, it was game over, as I started to learn about how to properly set up and host a website and thus I started using Ubuntu (per my brother’s recommendation).

My first Linux distribution, as I hinted at earlier, was Ubuntu. My brother installed it – I think it was 12.04 or 12.10 – for me so I could experiment with it on my desktop but I shortly ditched it solely for Windows. When I wanted to start working with websites, I ended up using Ubuntu 13.10 (and I later realized it was a beta version lol). I followed an old Ars Technica guide on how to securely set up a website on Ubuntu and that got me started with how to properly install packages using apt.

Throughout the years I have tried my best to use some form of Linux as my daily driver, from Ubuntu to Debian, Fedora, some weird times with OpenSUSE, and eventually Arch Linux. This quest to find the “perfect” distribution for my daily needs also lead me to try out some different software; using LibreOffice instead of Microsoft Office, Rhythmbox and later Clementine instead of iTunes. I really like consistency across my devices, so if a piece of software didn’t support both Windows and Linux I was probably going to look for something else.

Looking back at the Linux distros, I hadn’t actually used Arch in any meaningful way prior to AMD releasing their Ryzen line of processors. I got an R7 1700 to build a new virtual machine server for my home, and Arch Linux was the only distro that I could think of that 1) had a stable, up-to-date kernel that would support Ryzen and 2) had at least decent documentation (Arch’s docs are fantastic btw) on how to set up and configure a KVM host. Prior to that, I had only used Arch once – it was a test in a virtual machine to see if I could actually do it, and after the install booted up the VM was deleted. Now Arch is my daily driver. It’s funny how these happen sometimes.

Right now, I’m currently using plain Pop!_OS on my “personal” machines – my two laptops and my gaming desktop – and Debian with a few FreeBSD machines as my home networking infrastructure. Pop! gives me the best shot at having updated packages to support newer hardware and games, while Debian/FreeBSD give me the stability I need for my home network. I can go into more details on my home network if anyone is interested!

I also have a couple of channels on YouTube, if you’re interested. I have some videos focused on Old School RuneScape content, and a whole channel dedicated to drum covers. Any support on any of my platforms will be much appreciated. Go give those channels some love!