Ditched Windows for Linux, man, feelin’ free like a bird. No more Microsoft bullshit, nah. And instead of Google Search, I’m rollin’ with SearXNG. It’s like Google but decentralized, no data sellin’, straight up respectin’ my privacy. Open source all day, every day, that’s my way now.
I’ve done and tinkered with many things in 2023 like most of us here (migrated to lemmy, degoogle, unsubscribed to streaming services, linux, etc). Some things that are less known that I think worth to mention are:
Using shift+right click to open the full context menu in Windows 11
Finally set an Address bar shortcut for searching reddit content with Google. No more typing "site:reddit.com…"
Anilist with TachiyomiJ2K(mobile)+Taiga(desktop)+Mal-Sync(browser extension) for maximum anime/manga tracking automation!
My only shame in 2023: Creating a Facebook account (anonymous account) for the messenger and local hobby groups. All I can say is Facebook seemed to intentionally obfuscate its setting/option menus because they’re all scattered in different pages and just a plain mess. f u zuck
What’s your setup with your kids? Just got my son a used hp laptop bc I learned the hard way he needed java Minecraft (not available on iPad) to connect to the server I built for him. Used a friend’s employee f&f discount for Win11 seat.
Now that it’s here, I kinda want to hook him up with some of my strategy, management, sim, etc games from Steam.
Well, my older one was on raspberry os for a while, because she just needed a web for school stuff, but I couldn’t get movie streaming working, and she was starting with video projects the SD wasn’t enough so I ended up getting her a laptop without pre-installed os and set it up with Fedora, and to date no serious problems.
The younger one has my old Ryzen 1700 PC, and tried Fedora first and couldn’t get his games (Roblox or Fortnite) to work, but did get Steam to work… So without much investigation I just tried another distro based off Debian, and gave a try to popos. Same thing. Reading about it, it’s deliberate these developers don’t want their games working on Linux.
So I’ve temporarily swapped his ssd with a windows 10 setup until I can get him to give up these games. I guess age will do it :(
Around a month or two ago I got flashpoint and ruffle so I can play flash games on my computer. I have never really used either program before. I got ruffle because flashpoint doesn’t have Nitrome games on their platform and I wanted to play a specific game. Haven’t done much with ruffle since the games run kinda slow on my desktop.
I’ve switched to the Arc web browser, where tabs behave more like bookmarks (and they replace bookmarks as well). It’s been a game changer for me - my favourite feature is the ability to close a window and it doesn’t remove any of your tabs. Just open a new browser window and they’re back. My tabs are also more organised than ever.
Large Language Models, specifically ChatGPT+, are now part of my daily life and I’m not just talking tech. For example I use it in the kitchen every time I cook a meal I haven’t made a thousand times before and I’ve been cooking better than ever. Unlike a recipe website, you can tell it you don’t have (or don’t like) a particular ingredient and chat about alternatives, then it will update the cooking instructions. Love it.
I’ve given up on streaming music services, and gone back to occasionally buying a new DRM free albums. This has been part of a general cost cutting theme to my year - especially monthly bills.
Started renting a VPS and a domain. Now I have my own silly blog, a few services and a proxy to go to blocked sites (with the possibility to upgrade to censorship-resistant protocols if needed!)
Among other things got an IRC bouncer, so started hanging out on IRC a lot more.
Deleted my Twitter, Reddit and Insta (which were almost dead anyway but still).
Went from hating IT and thinking it’s just not for me to studying it in uni, as well as learning some topics myself.
Degoogled my smartphone as much as I could with ADB (although barely noticed a difference, everything was from F-Droid anyway).
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