Updated 03-Aug-2025 These are more-or-less protocols (well, maybe Signal is not). So instead this article could be named: Signal, Element, Dino / Movim / Conversations I've used Signal for the past number of years as a chat / videocall app, having switched from Telegram after it went full Nazi. But there are other options, some ... Read more
Updated 03-Aug-2025 Sometimes there is a confluence of innovations, both technological, and economic, which conspire to prompt a purchase. Now it is that time for me, concerning the 2024 BYD Dolphin Standard Range. Incidentally, I rode in a BYD Dolphin driven by a GRAB car, driving home from the hospital after getting stitches in my ... Read more
Updated 08-Aug-2025 Note see also Sandisk Clipjam and Portable Music Players and Linux Because the Sandisk Clipjam appears to be no longer manufactured, the most approximate portable MP3 player (with clip, suitable for running/bicycling) is the Ruizu x52 mp3 player. It is about $25 USD on Lazada, sold by Ruizu itself, with good reliability ratings. ... Read more
Updated 03-Aug-2025 Google is such a tool. Even with apps only mode they show full-screen background ads on top of everything. Without that mode, nearly every element on the screen pushes apps and content that is unwanted and unneeded. It is now impossible to remove this without changing Google TV / Android TV launchers. Thankfully, ... Read more
Updated 03-Aug-2025 Codium aka VSCodium Alternative to the instrumented VSCode. Less tracking, same Open Source flavor. Another option is Pulsar, the resurrected Atom editor. Ignore Pulsar, vscodium is fine. Note that with Foam, Codium can provide some level of Obsidian-like functionality, though not nearly as extensive functionality and constrained to a desktop (no mobile apps). ... Read more
Updated 03-Aug-2025 I use Obsidian which is a closed source application but focused on open data standards, and with a thriving community of extensions and use cases. The main competitors of Obsidian are Notion (closed source cloud service) and Logseq (open source). So, why Obsidian? Why Obsidian? Freemium model, including various ways to help fund ... Read more
Updated 03-Aug-2025 Git is great, and even better as a core part of a full development / deployment toolchain. These days there are choices as to which more robust Git platform to use. First, those not to use: Github (owned by Microsoft), proprietary Gitlab (owned publicly traded company), open core Both of these are worrisome ... Read more
Updated 03-Aug-2025 This is meant to help with selecting and installing a chrome-based browser, with minimal tracking and other cruft. Ungoogled Chromium for Debian Actually there are a variety of OS builds for ungoogled Chromium. For Debian, the simplest is the add repository and install manually option. echo 'deb http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/ungoogled_chromium/Debian_Sid/ /' | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/home:ungoogled_chromium.list ... Read more
Updated 03-Aug-2025 I have not played with Mobian (yet), but it, and two other projects (Termux and UserLAnd), are quite promising. The biggest issue seems to be hardware at this point, as there are only Pine Phone and Tab, and Purism Librum, as well as one or two other devices are supported. That said, the ... Read more
Updated 03-Aug-2025 Current cost-effective computing is focused on small, mobile, and Linux + Windows + Android. The Windows is for general familiarity and games for the children Current Devices Linux c214 - Ampton (ASUS C214MA) chromebook with Debian 12 (Bookworm) and Breath 4gb / 32gb + 256gb microsd n8 - NUC8i3BEH (Intel NUC) Debian 12 ... Read more
Updated 03-Aug-2025 Termux is an Android application (and plugins) which provides a Linux environment as a terminal emulator. Actually the Termux terminal doesn't need to be used, as it is possible to access various elements via API. The main support is various programming languages. Access to repositories via Git. And using Rclone, one can mount ... Read more
Updated 03-Aug-2025 Major update to this post as of April 2024, nearly 4 years later The below is woefully out of date. Trying to do the same thing with the same product (but different device) results in tears, mainly around Xiaomi OEM unlocking. The unlock tools simply don't work on the Linux and Windows devices ... Read more
Updated 03-Aug-2025 Because ChromeOS is simply ridiculous in terms of resource requirements (on devices meant for it), the only proper approach is to install or boot from a USB drive running Debian Linux (in this case, Debian Stable). Note: there is GalliumOS but it seems to have stalled development. There are various steps involved in ... Read more
Updated 03-Aug-2025 There are low-end and high-end Chromebooks. This is about relatively low-end devices, specifically an ASUS C214MA which is a cheap, somewhat small, ruggedized device meant for the schooling market. It has an 11.6" HD+ screen and a 4gb/32gb RAM/ROM configuration. In our household we've run up against the limits of this device in ... Read more
Updated 03-Aug-2025 I've used Linode for the past three years, and before that, another two years (with 3 years of AWS in between). There has been a (reasonable) increase in prices, and not much else since the acquisition by Akamai. Before Linode I used Servint which had more tools but also was much higher in ... Read more
Updated 03-Aug-2025 smartctl is a tool for testing hard drives. There is a graphical interface called gsmartcontrol which oddly cannot be found in the standard Debian testing repository but is otherwise available.
Updated 03-Aug-2025 This is a fantastic tool: sudo apt install grub-customizer grub-customizer A nice little GUI.
Updated 03-Aug-2025 I've been having trouble with the sleep cycle of a new monitor, such that causes problems with the LXDE lxpanel app. Basically the panel unloads when the monitor sleeps (or awakes). Since lxpanel is more or less frozen, I've looked to other desktop distributions to remedy this. Though I am generally satisfied with ... Read more
Updated 03-Aug-2025 To change the volume name of a removable disk (USB / SD), in Debian (or other Linux): Open up > Accessories > Disks Click on device Click on gears icon (Additional partition options) Edit Filesystem Enter partition name
Updated 03-Aug-2025 PPAs are personal package archives that allow people to distribute application packages to Ubuntu distributions. Since Ubuntu is based on Debian, and PPA packages are in the .deb format, they can theoretically be used in Debian. However, there are several complications that need to be understood: Why PPAs are not recommended for use ... Read more