For OpenCentauri, there isn’t any store where you can get CCs with it preinstalled. Installation looks pretty straightforward though as long as you can follow the docs (which are really nice actually!)

Just of note, OpenCentauri is still being developed so it’s not the most stable (and the docs mention that Klipper plugins are pretty much a no-go)

On Android, the only ones I would use is Fennec (F-Droid build of Firefox), or IronFox (privacy focused fork of Firefox), almost purely because they are the only ones that can use extensions (none of the Chromium ones can do that I think!)

Brave is awful, has weird crypto NFT shenanigans going on, I would not recommended. Vivaldi is closed-source and, honestly, isn’t very special (especially the Android version). The best Chromium offering is probably Cromite, which is a privacy-focused one that has an ad-blocker, but still, no extensions which kind of sucks.

I am moving to Piefed at scallisto@retrofed.com (https://retrofed.com/u/scallisto)

I know the community is working on a project called OpenCentauri, an open firmware for the Elegoo Centauri Carbon (great printer and amazing value for the money, but it uses a closed variant of Klipper, who knows what it’s doing in the background)

You also have the DIY Voron kits, and Sovol produces Prusa-likes and Voron-likes that usually use open firmware.

Just avoid Bambu as somebody who owns an A1 (set to LAN only mode, using a microSD card to transfer print files), as aside from the lock down shenanigans and attempting to take down forks of their Bambu Slicer software (which itself is a fork of a fork), they also use a closed firmware and are heavily promoting their cloud services. I also heard that Creality is one to be cautious of too.

I am moving to Piefed at scallisto@retrofed.com (https://retrofed.com/u/scallisto)

Aside from Wireguard, you have Wireguard alternatives-but-not-really-since-they-are-based-on-Wireguard like Netbird and Tailscale. The latter is more well-known, but the main downside is that, to connect to the cloud servers, you need a Google, Microsoft, or Github account to login. It can be self-hosted with Headscale (community project) though (and you don’t need an account for that, since it’s your hardware)! Netbird is similar to Tailscale, but you can use normal email login to use their cloud servers, and they offer official self-hosting support.

Before writing a line of app code, I’m validating demand. And I’ll put my money where my mouth is: the landing page and the waitlist both run on a Debian box in my living room.

This isn’t trying to replace your monitoring server; it’s the mobile, unified, privacy-first front-end I keep wishing those had.

Hello, fellow human! Do you too enjoy the sweet sensations of smell and taste?

Neither, the former is only on iOS / various other Apple bits, the latter is awful in terms of privacy (arguably more so than Whatsapp)

I mainly use Matrix (Element on desktop, FluffyChat on Android, Fractal on mobile Linux) and email (Thunderbird), but I also have Halloy (IRC) installed to. As for any proprietary messaging services I use, it’s mainly WeChat for messaging Chinese friends.

edit: I also have Signal, but pretty much no one in my circle uses it, as everybody who would’ve switched to Signal went all the way and joined Matrix in my experience.

Woah, good thing I uninstalled WhatsApp ages ago

Off topic: That’s a lot of history memes in your backlog posted in quick succession.

Just a small point, double negatives can get pretty confusing. Even in English, you often have double negatives becoming a negative rather than a positive, e.g. “I didn’t go nowhere” or “You don’t know nothing”. Changing which part of the phrase you emphasise can also change that, for instance, if you said “I didn’t go nowhere” it implies that you did in fact go somewhere (double negative becomes a positive when stressing the second negative). This gets all the more confusing when you bring in other languages, since they all handle double negatives differently!

Generally, there are a lot of used options out there (particularly from businesses upgrading their hardware), just like laptops. Even when shopping for new ones, I can find lots of cheap options (though they aren’t very good value usually, but they are enough to serve as a basic media box)

Raspberry Pis have unfortunately gotten very expensive, yes, but those are SBCs, not mini PCs?

Outside, it usually sits around 65-70% humidity, over 80% during the summer. Hong Kong is like that unfortunately. Dunno about the room my printer sits in though, I don’t have a hydrometer in there, but I imagine it’s a little bit lower (maybe 60%? 70% in warmer months?). I don’t dry my PLA though and I’ve mostly had good printing experiences.

Or a mini PC! (little guy that can be a bit smaller + cheaper too, you will need to get a keyboard and/or mouse for it though)

I’m not sure I could deal with the lower specs

To be honest, I think the only one that matters is the cameras, primarily the lack of a zoom lens. The performance is excellent unless you want to do things like Switch or PC emulation (in that case, the OP13 is a no brainer, why are you even considering the Pixel). I also just think the modularity and repairable aspect of it is so awesome!

PostmarketOS is tempting for the future, but it looks like it would need a bit more work until we get there.

And you’ll be keeping the phone for a long while, so something that also supports pmOS (like the Fairphone) could make it useful once it is no longer receiving Android updates!

And of course, you also have mobile Linux, which is slowly becoming more usable over time! postmarketOS is the one I’ve tried, but there is also Mobian, Ubuntu Touch, and SailfishOS. I personally like pmOS since it aims to stay close to the mainline kernel, meaning you can install any Flatpak app onto the device (it might not always scale well, but it does open a lot of cool options!)

As for the comparison between custom ROMs, you mainly have LineageOS and derivatives like e/OS, iodeOS, and CalyxOS, as well as GrapheneOS which is doing its own thing with Pixels (and future Motorola devices)

Base LineageOS is pretty much stock Android without Google services by default (though you can install microG). e/OS focuses more on the degoogling side of things, and they tie in Murena cloud services + their own iOS-like launcher too. iodeOS is another more privacy-focused spin of Lineage, and they have additional controls on content blocking (advertisements, trackers, that sort of thing), and you can optionally enable parental controls too. CalyxOS is a security-focused Lineage spin, though not to the extent of GrapheneOS. They only recently came back from the dead, but they seem like another good option too!

GrapheneOS is an uber secure version of Android, there’s a table online for all the security features that Graphene has over the others, look at those and see if any of them are important to you. They also have a neat feature where apps requiring Google services can be sandboxed and kept separate from the system!

You are in the UK, so that is a good start. If you want longevity, I would prefer the Fairphone 6, which has excellent battery, decent cameras, and amazing custom ROM support (+ mobile Linux is developing too!), and it will also be very repairable, so you can easily replace the battery, ports, etc. as they wear out. They also have a long 5 year warranty + 8 years of promised software updates, quite a bit longer than both OnePlus and Google. The main downside for the Fairphone is no telephoto camera, which is a bit of a bummer, but the rest of the specs are very apt for the price €599, or £519 in the UK, and I would say the extended support + custom ROM support makes it an excellent deal.

The Pixels are pretty terrible in all respects (thermal issues, poor battery, decent cameras but not competitive, etc.), with their only redeeming quality being that you can install Graphene on them (awesome if you prioritise security), and even that advantage is going away with Motorola soon releasing supported devices! I would avoid Pixels for the most part, unless you can score a deal on a used Pixel 8 or 9 series (barely different from the 10 really, the 8 is nicer if you want rounded edges, 9 if you want to iPhone 4 style boxy shape), or you really want GrapheneOS now for its better security.

OnePlus has great cameras and far more performance than anyone would need in a phone (hell, you can emulate some PC games on it with GameNative), and it supports LineageOS too. I’ve also heard that the 13 in particular has excellent battery life. It’s a pretty nice option if you want performance and cameras!

You might also want to look at some of the Sony Xperia devices if you want a) headphone jack! b) no notch/cutout! c) front-firing speakers d) great cameras and e) microSD card slot! The Xperia line is also relatively compact, if you want a smaller phone.

I would use CoMaps, it’s awesome, offline maps are clutch when there is poor network, almost all the shops, restaurants, and sites are marked (and can be self-marked if they are not there, it’s OSM after all! Shouldn’t be a big problem in most cities though), and it has all the bell and whistles (autoupdate route when you make a wrong turn, metro support, TTS directions, everything!)

No traffic though, but I’m fine with that since I mostly commute on foot and by metro anyways.

I never said they were terrible. Plastic fantastic is lighter, doesn’t shatter, and cheaper too. But in the context of the MP2, it’s almost certainly a glass back, since it supports wireless charging and it doesn’t look like a plastic one. Kind of sucks, but hey, they’re trying to target iPhone users and all that (as you said, Apple aesthetic)

And yes, wireless charging is pretty lame in my opinion. The technology is cool, but it’s really not that inconvenient to plug in a cable, especially if you have one of those phone stands with the slot at the bottom for a cable to seep through

Well this sucks

On the one hand, this really sucks. I don’t think Luanti infringes on copyright (even Mineclonia is a bit of a stretch, they don’t own the idea of voxel games). On the other hand, it’s all the more reason to use F-Droid, Obtainium, and other third-party app stores!

Also what on Earth is Tracer(dot)ai???