… if they hadn’t given up on their Livemarks, which I now use as a plugin on my desktop version of this browser. Sadly, the mobile Android version doesn’t have it, so in case you try to sync, you’ll have some cleanup work to do later… sigh…
Motorola and GrapheneOS announce partnership
Now it’s official: both GrapheneOS and Motorola announced a partnership agreement – which means that if you want to run GrapheneOS, you won’t necessarily need a Google Pixel device much longer, but you’ll have a bit more choice. And choice is always good.
Also: I sometimes get asked by friends who don’t have Pixel devices what other operating system than GrapheneOS would be advisable to run on their devices? And I just learnt through a post on the GOS forum that finally DivestOS has a spiritual successor called AXP.OS – so have a look in case you’re interested in a bit more privacy, and in case you want to have support beyond what the hardware vendors (and GOS) offer. Unlike with other systems, this one offers to relock your bootloader if your device supports that (Pixels do).
You’re welcome.
Free software: a shoutout to Debian – and to KDE Connect
Larry Cafiero wrote a nice review of Debian 13.3 “Trixie” over at FOSS Force, and I have to admit that Debian is also my standard go-to Linux distribution after years and years of use. I second his mentioning of the XFCE desktop especially for older devices like my wife’s old Lenovo SL500 laptop with only 2GB of RAM and a by now ancient Intel Core 2 Duo processor, and his mentioning of KDE Connect (Gnome has something similar called GSConnect, but the KDE guys invented that one) is also worth consideration. Pretty happy with it, and GSConnect always reminds me when my Pixel phones (6a and 3a) or my new Samsung Galaxy Tab A11+ are fully charged.
If you search my site here for Debian or for Ian Murdock, you’ll find an interview I did with him (RIP Ian), and even my late and not so computer-literate brother Willi (RIP as well) did never look back to Ubuntu after I showed him Debian.
Recommended reading for beginners of GNU/Linux.
This sums it up pretty good
An unknown Red Hatter calls it out for what it is… thanks Liam for writing his opinions down for us.
Two from today
Took two pictures of Bella today – and one included me:
Both taken with Mitchie’s Panasonic Lumix 20mm/1.7 lens on my Olympus OM-D E-M10 Mk2 camera. For the second one, I also used two studio strobes, both gridded, front one in a beauty dish. The cat found that super interesting 😉
Like always, thanks for viewing.
Sick and tired of that so-called “AI”?
So are we. Just get back to your browser as you knew it, with a script called “Just the browser”. Or read more about it from Liam on TheRegister first. You’re welcome.
Selfie mit Katze
Out of camera image, nothing changed. ISO 6400, f/2, 1/13s, 17mm. Thanks for viewing.
The internet is sooo kaput
After a bit of reading, yesterday I decided to have another fresh look at a browser called Brave. And yes, I knew about the controversies regarding its crypto- and “AI”-integration, and also the ones about its owner. But it’s still one of the better browsers around, so I tried it on Arch and Debian Linux, on Windows 11, and even on my phone (which runs GrapheneOS and which does have a pretty secure Chromium-based browser called “Vanadium” already).
I’m not the typical internet user who is using a browser for pretty much everything, and no “doom scrolling” for me, thanks. But what hit me is that after less than 24 hours, Brave’s built-in tracker stats showed me this:
Almost 3,500 trackers in less than 24 hours? Wow – see the headline of this post… time to regulate the internet, and to “take it back”. A website needs just two things from us as end users: the URL you want to see, and the IP address where it should be sent. No scripts, no cookies, and most definitely no ads and trackers.
Anyway, thanks like always for reading. Oh, and the background photo within the Brave browser is by Anna Wangler, on Unsplash.
I’m walkin’, yes indeed…
It’s now a bit over 2 years since I’ve treated myself with some of these “fitness trackers”, and while first checking about and against this “tracking” part, I’m using Gadgetbridge on my phone to keep all of the data locally (versus in some “cloud”, which means someone else’s computers). Means that on January 9th, 2024 I’ve bought that Xiaomi Mi Band 8, and since January 29th, 2024 I am doing 10.000+ steps a day. Each day. Didn’t miss a single one since then. And so, here’s today’s summary on Gadgetbridge:
8.85 million steps including those few first days with mostly only playing around with the device and software, and 8.72 million if you start counting 713 days ago, counting only those where I reached my self-set goal.
That device can be really recommended btw, and if like me you use it as a step-counter only, it still keeps the battery for about two weeks until it reaches 30% charge. So I charge it each and every 2nd Sunday only, which is perfect for me.
Not interested in sleep, pulse, or any other tracking, but that’s just me…
And like always, thanks for reading.
Heise about TV sets
Someone at heise seems to need a new TV set – they’re examining those since a while, for instance here or here (both links are behind paywalls; sorry).
To sum it up: in the first of these articles, they compared lower-cost OLED against LCD TVs, and the most positive remarks were made about LG’s cost-effective “B5” series.
The latter article seemed to favour Japanese makers like Panasonic and Sony, as most other media both in Germany and in the UK say as well. Panasonic uses LG panels, while Sony has Samsung, and the first comes with Amazon’s “Fire”, and the latter with Google’s software. LG and Samsung have their own software, and for/against all of these “smart” TVs, you’ll need a filter list in your Pi-Hole (or not connect them to the internet at all if you want to avoid being spied upon).
Luckily, our own Panasonic LCD from about 2013 is still a good one – while the on-device “apps” more or less stopped working (due to not enough CPU power and/or memory I guess), its picture is still really good – better than a low-cost LG LCD TV we bought for our dad in my opinion. And even if the original remote control has long given up most of its keys, and the TV sometimes reboots without any apparent reason, we’re still happy with it. A newer one wouldn’t improve the programs, and ours is still too good to use it as a bigger monitor in the kid’s dorm or so (athough it would be awesome together with some kind of home trainer or so) 😉
My sister lately bought LG’s mid-tier “C5” series, which is probably what most people would be really happy with. Haven’t asked her tho what was wrong with her older one (also LG), which looked nice to me on our last visit to hers.
Anyway, and as always – thanks for reading.