The Devterm R-01
About a year ago i was on the lookout for a new computer, something energy efficient, repairable
and... well... something not normal. I mean: Sure, you can get a really good modern notebook for
a small buck these days, but this is just a bit too boring.
Well, i found the Devterm from
Clockwork Pi. As an 80s child i really liked the form factor and the memories it brought back, and
while having my initial doubts about the size of the keyboard as a daily driver i nevertheless
ordered it. And to make my life a bit more interesting i ordered the RISC-V variant. What could go
wrong?
Well, as it turned out: Not much.
The Devterm arrived a few months later, as advertised in kit form. The kit itself is in my opinion
of the quality of better Revell kits and i had absolutely no problems assembling it. The OS supplied
with the Devterm is an Ubuntu 22.04 LTS which come with TWM preinstalled - a reasonable choice for
a relatively slow machine like this. One of the first things i did was to change the WM to bspwm,
installed the sakura terminal and a few little helpers like Mutt for email, the nnn file manager,
calcurse for sheduling and a few others.
One problem regarding to the Risc-V platform in general and the realtively low-end Devterm in special is the lack of an browser. Sure, there are text based options like Lynx and Elinks, but i personally like a bit of graphics while i am browsing the web. As a lucky coincedence the Dillo browser was revived this year and is now back in active development. I downloaded everything i needed to built it from source, cloned the git repository and here i am, having a decent usable webbrowser capable enough for browsing the smol web and at least some of the more mainstream sites. While its no match for todays Javascript polluted mess that the commerciweb has become (but for this i got my smartphone) i am pretty much happy with it for daily use.
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