I wonder if uni2ascii would fix this? The description says UTF-8 to 7-bit ASCII and vice versa converter.

Here's a link for a write-up on security. It's focused on Ubuntu and Mint, but a lot of what's written can apply to any distro.

https://easylinuxtipsproject.blogspot.c … urity.html

I'm just guessing here but I think he means "so then Devuan as [will become] different [another] distro option," i.e., so then Devuan will become another distro option for people to consider.

In Synaptic, kvm is described as "QEMU Full virtualization on x86 hardware." My rig is 64 bit. Can I use kvm on it? Also, would a guest 64 bit OS work on it?

Hyperbola already got plans just for that, albeit forking the OpenBSD kernel. I wish them success.
https://www.hyperbola.info/news/announc … d-roadmap/

As someone who is only a user of the OS, but would like to see it become one of the "big" distros, I'd say it wasn't the accusations that damaged the project, but the dumb April Fool's joke that did (in full agreement with ChuangTzu). I just hope 4 months from now nothing like this happens again.

32-bit Linux is going the way of the Dodo bird. How long will it be before Devuan drops it?

So is the updater now ready for prime time?

It really isn't safe to use older browser versions. Have you considered using browsers that support legacy extensions and are still maintained with security and bug fixes? There's Pale Moon, Basilisk, and Iceweasel-UXP to choose from (and the upcoming Borealis Navigator). There are still choices out there. While it can't be said that all legacy extensions will work on them, the vast majority will.

Is there supposed to be an icon in the panel? I don't have one. I copied the files/folder according to the instructions and rebooted. I didn't have any updates (checked in Synaptic) so is that why?

I looked that up and I see that there are 24 versions of it. Which version did you try? It might be worth a shot to try an earlier version. Or, try changing to Gecko compatibility. That's the setting I use.