Changelog.complete.org
Changelog.complete.org
The Changelog | Comments on family, technology, and society
🌐 Visit Changelog.complete.org 🌐 Changelog.complete.org besuchen
🌐 Visit Changelog.complete.org 🌐 Changelog.complete.org besuchen
✍️Write rieview ✍️Rezension schreiben 🏷️Get Badge! 🏷️Abzeichen holen! ⚙️Edit entry ⚙️Eintrag bearbeiten 📰News 📰Neuigkeiten
Tags:
… liked this!
26.2.2025 18:49Comment on Easily Accessing All Your Stuff with a Zero-Trust Mesh VPN by cunha… liked this!
10.2.2025 13:31Comment on Easily Accessing All Your Stuff with a Zero-Trust Mesh VPN by 14 bees in a trenchcoat 🐝[…] John Goerzen wrote an interesting blog post about censorship and the changes to Facebook [5]. […]
31.1.2025 16:02Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Russell Coker: Links January 2025 - LINUXexpert<p><span><a href="https://floss.social/@jgoerzen" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>jgoerzen</span></a></span> <span><a href="https://mastodon.neilzone.co.uk/@neil" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>neil</span></a></span> good write up!</p>
18.1.2025 00:37Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by Hugo<p><span><a href="https://chaos.social/@dentangle" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>dentangle</span></a></span> <span><a href="https://mastodon.neilzone.co.uk/@neil" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>neil</span></a></span> <span><a href="https://floss.social/@jgoerzen" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>jgoerzen</span></a></span> </p><p>I am using IDNET (<a href="https://www.idnet.com/" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc"><span>https://www.</span><span>idnet.com/</span><span></span></a>) with a residential connection, and about a year ago set up my own email server.</p><p>Slowly I'm moving things over to it, and everything seems fine, including to and from outlook.com and gmail.com addresses.</p> <a href="https://www.idnet.com/" rel="nofollow ugc">IDNet: Broadband | Telecoms | Leased Lines</a>
17.1.2025 13:59Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by ChewieBridgy Response
17.1.2025 13:48Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by MxFraudBridgy Response
17.1.2025 13:48Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by fraudBridgy Response
17.1.2025 13:48Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by fraud<p><span><a href="https://mastodon.neilzone.co.uk/@neil" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>neil</span></a></span> <span><a href="https://floss.social/@jgoerzen" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>jgoerzen</span></a></span> Many ISPs voluntarily put their residential IP ranges into blocklists like Spamhaus PBL. Fortunately (in the UK at least) there are real ISPs that actually provide full unfiltered Internet access like <span><a href="https://social.aa.net.uk/@aaisp" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>aaisp</span></a></span> and don't engage in this nonsense. Unfortunately such ISPs aren't available in every country.</p>
17.1.2025 12:49Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by Brett Sheffield (he/him)… liked this!
16.1.2025 19:36Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by Danni StormBridgy Response
16.1.2025 14:45Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by Tyler Schroder<p><span><a href="https://mastodon.neilzone.co.uk/@neil" rel="nofollow ugc">@<span>neil</span></a></span> Probably does, and on who you email and what weight they give to the RBLs. Also a lot of ISPs block port 25 traffic, though that of course depends on the ISP. Still, I would stand by that if you want your email to be reliably delivered, using a residential IP will usually be a challenge even if I overstated that a bit originally. (I also wouldn't count on "it works for me right now" to necessarily be a durable thing.)</p>
16.1.2025 14:36Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by John Goerzen<p><span><a href="https://mastodon.neilzone.co.uk/@neil" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>neil</span></a></span> <span><a href="https://floss.social/@jgoerzen" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>jgoerzen</span></a></span> half agree, because one day your IP range will be RBL'ed and you're fsck'd.</p>
16.1.2025 14:10Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by Marcos Dione<p><span><a href="https://floss.social/@jgoerzen" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>jgoerzen</span></a></span> </p><blockquote><p>You can't host it on a residential IP, even if static, because people RBL those</p></blockquote><p>I always find it difficult to make such generalisations, since I know a fair few people (including me) who do, or did do, this for years.</p><p>I suspect it depends heavily on the ISP.</p>
16.1.2025 14:00Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by Neil BrownBridgy Response
16.1.2025 13:48Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by Δж3Bridgy Response
16.1.2025 13:48Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by Alex Schroeder<p><span><a href="https://mastodon.neilzone.co.uk/@neil" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@neil</a></span> <span><a href="https://floss.social/@jgoerzen" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@jgoerzen</a></span> migadu likely would work for me. although i use and contribute to deltachat so its possible that id exhaust the soft limit quickly. still seems like its worthwhile.</p>
16.1.2025 13:44Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by Δж3<p><span><a href="https://floss.social/@jgoerzen" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@jgoerzen</a></span> <span><a href="https://mastodon.neilzone.co.uk/@neil" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@neil</a></span> great write-up, john.</p><p>like you i ran my own system for a similar time span and while it was good experience it ended up becoming a burden.</p><p>id not heard of migadu before. i was on mailfence for some time but ran into a lot of legitimate email being caught in sieves.</p><p>mxroute was a good service however its ran by a single operator. bus factor is a variable for me. the concerns you have i also share</p>
16.1.2025 13:42Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by Δж3I never hesitate to comment on your excellent work. You're putting in a lot of effort.
16.1.2025 08:04Comment on 26 Hours At The Creek by Tour and Travels Agency in BodhgayaIn reply to <a href="https://floss.social/@jgoerzen/112452548957550019">John Goerzen</a>. Hi. Concerning Fastmail... They don't have any servers within Australia. Everything is (and has been) in the US.
16.1.2025 07:16Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by ourbeach<p><span><a href="https://floss.social/@jgoerzen" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>jgoerzen</span></a></span> <span><a href="https://eldritch.cafe/@bogdanoviste" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>bogdanoviste</span></a></span> Great review, thank you!</p>
15.1.2025 07:13Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by Bob<p><span><a href="https://floss.social/@jgoerzen" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>jgoerzen</span></a></span> thanks for sharing your review, it was a very interesting read, considering it's rare to see reviews from the POV with such specific standards (not a criticism, I feel like my use case is similar to yours!). Fastmail and Migadu definitely are interesting options.</p>
15.1.2025 02:07Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by Wilf ⒶBridgy Response
15.1.2025 02:00Comment on Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service by Wilf Ⓐ[…] Censorship Is Complicated : What Internet History Says about Meta/FB (changelog.complete.org) […]
13.1.2025 06:45Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Khrys’presso du lundi 13 janvier 2025 – Framablog<p><a href="https://floss.social/@jgoerzen" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@jgoerzen@floss.social</a> I like the thread, even though I have to click view remote instance, I don’t have the shock of switching to a new site and deal with its ui. Sounds silly, but the experience feels more in community rather than switching (some parallels to your bbs analogy)</p>
9.1.2025 22:02Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by EllyseBridgy Response
9.1.2025 21:17Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by TheDragon 🔥<p>I find the chopping up in toots a little jarring to read, but I guess the instance you have chosen imposes a short(ish) limit on the length you post, even though the ActivityPub protocol doesn't.</p>
9.1.2025 18:02Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Adam Sjøgren<span><a href="https://social.gl-como.it/profile/fabrixxm" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>fabrixxm</span></a></span> that;s cheating!
9.1.2025 17:54Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Elena ``of Valhalla''<p><span><a href="https://en.osm.town/@mdione" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>mdione</span></a></span> <span><a href="https://floss.social/@jgoerzen" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>jgoerzen</span></a></span> <span><a href="https://social.gl-como.it/profile/valhalla" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>valhalla</span></a></span> Yes, Phanpy.</p>
9.1.2025 13:53Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Lars Wirzenius<p><span><a href="https://toot.liw.fi/@liw" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>liw</span></a></span> <a href="https://en.osm.town/tags/phanpy" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">#<span>phanpy</span></a>?</p><p><span><a href="https://floss.social/@jgoerzen" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>jgoerzen</span></a></span> <span><a href="https://social.gl-como.it/profile/valhalla" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>valhalla</span></a></span></p> <a href="https://floss.social/tags/phanpy" rel="nofollow ugc">phanpy</a>
9.1.2025 13:24Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Marcos Dione<p><span><a href="https://hackers.town/@thebluewizard" rel="nofollow ugc">@<span>thebluewizard</span></a></span> Well hello! And wow, yes indeed I wrote that book, somewhere around 25 years ago now. I'm impressed anybody remembers it!</p>
9.1.2025 12:58Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by John Goerzen<p><span><a href="https://social.gl-como.it/profile/valhalla" rel="nofollow ugc">@<span>valhalla</span></a></span> Fair enough. On Mastodon timelines, most people will see the last post first, but I can see it go either way.</p>
9.1.2025 12:57Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by John GoerzenBridgy Response
9.1.2025 12:34Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Alan Zimmerman<span><a href="https://social.gl-como.it/profile/valhalla" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>valhalla</span></a></span><br><a href="https://apthread.kirgroup.net/t/6a/ce/0d868c07.html" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">apthread.kirgroup.net/t/6a/ce/…</a><br>
<a href="https://apthread.kirgroup.net/t/6a/ce/0d868c07.html" rel="nofollow ugc">On #Meta, #Facebook, #Censorship, and #FreeSpeech, a thread - AP Thread</a>
Bridgy Response
9.1.2025 06:40Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Lars WirzeniusBridgy Response
9.1.2025 06:40Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Ricardo SilvaBridgy Response
9.1.2025 06:40Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Wouter van HeystBridgy Response
9.1.2025 06:40Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by noahmBridgy Response
9.1.2025 06:40Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Leon P SmithBridgy Response
9.1.2025 06:40Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Lars WirzeniusBridgy Response
9.1.2025 06:40Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by jandrBridgy Response
9.1.2025 06:40Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Wouter van HeystBridgy Response
9.1.2025 06:40Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by noahmBridgy Response
9.1.2025 06:40Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Bart CoppensBridgy Response
9.1.2025 06:40Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Mr CoolBridgy Response
9.1.2025 06:40Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by aspraggBridgy Response
9.1.2025 06:40Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Andres SalomonBridgy Response
9.1.2025 06:40Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by VenyaBridgy Response
9.1.2025 06:40Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by kobajo<p><span><a href="https://floss.social/users/jgoerzen" rel="nofollow noopener noreferrer ugc">@<span>jgoerzen</span></a></span> I think I'd prefer to have the link to the blog post in the first post of the thread, to be able to choose which format to read</p><p>(but then I'm using friendica, so I get threaded view and my experience may be different from that of mastodon)</p>
9.1.2025 06:12Comment on Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook by Elena ``of Valhalla''In light of this week’s announcement by Meta (Facebook, Instagram, Threads, etc), I have been pondering this question: Why am I, a person that has long been a staunch advocate of free speech and encryption, leery of sites that talk about being free speech-oriented? And, more to the point, why an I — a person … Continue reading Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/Facebook
8.1.2025 14:59Censorship Is Complicated: What Internet History Says about Meta/FacebookI last reviewed email services in 2019. That review focused a lot of attention on privacy. At the time, I selected mailbox.org as my provider, and have been using them for these 5 years since. However, both their service and their support have gone significantly downhill since, so it is time for me to look … Continue reading Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email Service
16.5.2024 17:42Review of Reputable, Functional, and Secure Email ServiceI’ve been using E Ink-based ereaders for quite a number of years now. I’ve had my Kobo Libra 2 for a few years, and was looking forward to the Kobo Libra Colour — the first color E Ink display in a mainstream ereader line. I found the display to be a mixed bag; contrast seemed … Continue reading Photographic comparison: Is the Kobo Libra Colour display worse than the Kobo Libra 2?
7.5.2024 22:16Photographic comparison: Is the Kobo Libra Colour display worse than the Kobo Libra 2?It is, sadly, not entirely surprising that Facebook is censoring articles critical of Meta. The Kansas Reflector published an artical about Meta censoring environmental articles about climate change — deeming them “too controversial”. Facebook then censored the article about Facebook censorship, and then after an independent site published a copy of the climate change article, … Continue reading Facebook is Censoring Stories about Climate Change and Illegal Raid in Marion, Kansas
6.4.2024 14:00Facebook is Censoring Stories about Climate Change and Illegal Raid in Marion, KansasYou’ve probably heard of the recent backdoor in xz. There have been a lot of takes on this, most of them boiling down to some version of: The problem here is with Open Source Software. I want to say not only is that view so myopic that it pushes towards the incorrect, but also it … Continue reading The xz Issue Isn’t About Open Source
4.4.2024 22:07The xz Issue Isn’t About Open SourceI’ve been getting annoyed with Raspberry Pi OS (Raspbian) for years now. It’s a fork of Debian, but manages to omit some of the most useful things. So I’ve decided to migrate all of my Pis to run pure Debian. These are my reasons: Raspberry Pi OS has, for years now, specified that there is … Continue reading Live Migrating from Raspberry Pi OS bullseye to Debian bookworm
3.1.2024 23:33Live Migrating from Raspberry Pi OS bullseye to Debian bookwormI write this in the context of my decision to ditch Raspberry Pi OS and move everything I possibly can, including my Raspberry Pi devices, to Debian. I will write about that later. But for now, I wanted to comment on something I think is often overlooked and misunderstood by people considering distributions or operating … Continue reading Consider Security First
3.1.2024 00:38Consider Security FirstThis Christmas, one of my gifts to my kids was a text adventure (interactive fiction) game for them. Now that they’ve enjoyed it, I’m releasing it under the GPL v3. As interactive fiction, it’s like an e-book, but the reader is also the player, guiding the exploration of the world. The Grumpy Cricket is designed … Continue reading The Grumpy Cricket (And Other Enormous Creatures)
25.12.2023 20:23The Grumpy Cricket (And Other Enormous Creatures)I recently read a post on social media that went something like this (paraphrased): “If you buy an EV, you’re part of the problem. You’re advancing car culture and are actively hurting the planet. The only ethical thing to do is ditch your cars and put all your effort into supporting transit. Anything else is … Continue reading It’s More Important To Recognize What Direction People Are Moving Than Where They Are
14.11.2023 01:02It’s More Important To Recognize What Direction People Are Moving Than Where They AreSometimes we want better-than-firewall security for things. For instance: An industrial control system for a municipal water-treatment plant should never have data come in or out Or, a variant of the industrial control system: it should only permit telemetry and monitoring data out, and nothing else in or out A system dedicated to keeping your … Continue reading How Gapped is Your Air?
15.9.2023 22:33How Gapped is Your Air?Two years ago, I wrote Managing an External Display on Linux Shouldn’t Be This Hard. Happily, since I wrote that post, most of those issues have been resolved. But then you throw HiDPI into the mix and it all goes wonky. If you’re running X11, basically the story is that you can change the scale … Continue reading A Maze of Twisty Little Pixels, All Tiny
12.9.2023 13:40A Maze of Twisty Little Pixels, All TinySome decades back, when I’d buy a new PC, it would unlock new capabilities. Maybe AGP video, or a PCMCIA slot, or, heck, sound. Nowadays, mostly new hardware means things get a bit faster or less crashy, or I have some more space for files. It’s good and useful, but sorta… meh. Not this purchase. … Continue reading For the First Time In Years, I’m Excited By My Computer Purchase
11.9.2023 23:56For the First Time In Years, I’m Excited By My Computer Purchase$ grep kermit /etc/services kermit 1649/tcp What is this mysterious protocol? Who uses it and what is its story? This story is a winding one, beginning in 1981. Kermit is, to the best of my knowledge, the oldest actively-maintained software package with an original developer still participating. It is also a scripting language, an Internet … Continue reading Try the Last Internet Kermit Server
4.8.2023 22:51Try the Last Internet Kermit ServerThis is the fourth in a series about archiving to removable media (optical discs such as BD-Rs and DVD+Rs or portable hard drives). Here are the first three parts: In part 1, I laid out my goals for the project, and considered a number of tools before determining dar and git-annex were my leading options. … Continue reading Backing Up and Archiving to Removable Media: dar vs. git-annex
12.7.2023 01:53Backing Up and Archiving to Removable Media: dar vs. git-annexThis is the third post in a series about data archiving to removable media (optical discs and hard drives). In the first, I explained the difference between backing up and archiving, established goals for the project, and said I’d evaluate git-annex and dar. The second post evaluated git-annex, and now it’s time to look at … Continue reading Using dar for Data Archiving
17.6.2023 01:16Using dar for Data ArchivingIn my recent post about data archiving to removable media, I laid out the difference between backing up and archiving, and also said I’d evaluate git-annex and dar. This post evaluates git-annex. The next will look at dar, and then I’ll make a comparison post. What is git-annex? git-annex is a fantastic and versatile program … Continue reading Using git-annex for Data Archiving
16.6.2023 04:59Using git-annex for Data ArchivingI have several TB worth of family photos, videos, and other data. This needs to be backed up — and archived. Backups and archives are often thought of as similar. And indeed, they may be done with the same tools at the same time. But the goals differ somewhat: Backups are designed to recover from … Continue reading Recommendations for Tools for Backing Up and Archiving to Removable Media
29.5.2023 16:57Recommendations for Tools for Backing Up and Archiving to Removable MediaMartha, now 5, can’t remember a time when she didn’t fly periodically. She’s come along in our airplane in short flights to a nearby restaurant and long ones to Michigan and South Dakota. All this time, she’s been riding in the back seat next to Laura. Martha has been talking excitedly about riding up front … Continue reading Martha the Pilot
3.5.2023 12:18Martha the PilotProbably everyone is familiar with a regular VPN. The traditional use case is to connect to a corporate or home network from a remote location, and access services as if you were there. But these days, the notion of “corporate network” and “home network” are less based around physical location. For instance, a company may … Continue reading Easily Accessing All Your Stuff with a Zero-Trust Mesh VPN
14.4.2023 02:47Easily Accessing All Your Stuff with a Zero-Trust Mesh VPNUpdate 2023-04: The version of this page on my public website has some important updates, including how to use broadcast detection in Docker, Yggdrasil zero-config for ephemeral containers, and more. See it for the most current information. Sometimes you might want to run Docker containers on more than one host. Maybe you want to run … Continue reading Using Yggdrasil As an Automatic Mesh Fabric to Connect All Your Docker Containers, VMs, and Servers
2.2.2023 04:18Using Yggdrasil As an Automatic Mesh Fabric to Connect All Your Docker Containers, VMs, and ServersIt’s been nearly 8 years since I last made choices about music playing. At the time, I picked Logitech Media Server (LMS, aka Slimserver and Squeezebox server) for whole-house audio and Ampache with the DSub Android app. It’s time to revisit that approach. Here are the things I’m looking for: Whole-house audio: a single control … Continue reading Music Playing: Both Whole-House and Mobile
10.12.2022 00:28Music Playing: Both Whole-House and MobileI loaded up this title with buzzwords. The basic idea is that IM systems shouldn’t have to only use the Internet. Why not let them be carried across LoRa radios, USB sticks, local Wifi networks, and yes, the Internet? I’ll first discuss how, and then why. How do set it up I’ve talked about most … Continue reading Building an Asynchronous, Internet-Optional Instant Messaging System
8.12.2022 21:12Building an Asynchronous, Internet-Optional Instant Messaging SystemWisdom from my 5-year-old: When flying in a small plane, it is important to give your dolls a headset and let them see out the window, too! Moments like this make me smile at being a pilot dad. A week ago, I also got to give 8 children and one adult their first ever ride … Continue reading Flying Joy
28.11.2022 16:04Flying Joy“OK,” you’re probably thinking. “John, you talk a lot about things like Gopher and personal radios, and now you want to talk about building a reliable network out of… USB drives?” Well, yes. In fact, I’ve already done it. What is sneakernet? Normally, “sneakernet” is a sort of tongue-in-cheek reference to using disconnected storage to … Continue reading Dead USB Drives Are Fine: Building a Reliable Sneakernet
2.9.2022 01:43Dead USB Drives Are Fine: Building a Reliable SneakernetInspired by several others (such as Alex Schroeder’s post and Szczeżuja’s prompt), as well as a desire to get this down for my kids, I figure it’s time to write a bit about living through the PC and Internet revolution where I did: outside a tiny town in rural Kansas. And, as I’ve been back … Continue reading The PC & Internet Revolution in Rural America
30.8.2022 01:22The PC & Internet Revolution in Rural AmericaMost of us carry cell phones with us almost everywhere we go. So much so that we often forget not just the usefulness, but even the joy, of having our own radios. For instance: When traveling to national parks or other wilderness areas, family and friends can keep in touch even where there is no … Continue reading The Joy of Easy Personal Radio: FRS, GMRS, and Motorola DLR/DTR
15.8.2022 14:02The Joy of Easy Personal Radio: FRS, GMRS, and Motorola DLR/DTRI have been looking for a good tablet for Debian for… well, years. I want thin, light, portable, excellent battery life, and a servicable keyboard. For a while, I tried a Lenovo Chromebook Duet. It meets the hardware requirements, well sort of. The problem is with performance and the OS. I can run Debian inside … Continue reading I Finally Found a Solid Debian Tablet: The Surface Go 2
22.6.2022 23:46I Finally Found a Solid Debian Tablet: The Surface Go 2In the recent article The Internet Origin Story You Know Is Wrong, I was somewhat surprised to see the argument that BBSs are a part of the Internet origin story that is often omitted. Surprised because I was there for BBSs, and even ran one, and didn’t really consider them part of the Internet story … Continue reading Lessons of Social Media from BBSs
21.6.2022 01:52Lessons of Social Media from BBSsSaturday, I wrote in Pipes, deadlocks, and strace annoyingly fixing them about an issue where a certain pipeline seems to have a deadlock. I described tracing it into kernel code. Indeed, it appears to be kernel bug 212295, which has had a patch for over a year that has never been merged. After continuing to … Continue reading Pipe Issue Likely a Kernel Bug
20.6.2022 16:31Pipe Issue Likely a Kernel BugThis is a complex tale I will attempt to make simple(ish). I’ve (re)learned more than I cared to about the details of pipes, signals, and certain system calls – and the solution is still elusive. For some time now, I have been using NNCP to back up my files. These backups are sent to my … Continue reading Pipes, deadlocks, and strace annoyingly fixing them
19.6.2022 03:46Pipes, deadlocks, and strace annoyingly fixing themLike many young programmers of my age, before I could use the Internet, there were BBSs. I eventually ran one, though in my small town there were few callers. Some time back, I downloaded a copy of Jason Scott’s BBS Documentary. You might know Jason Scott from textfiles.com and his work at the Internet Archive. … Continue reading Really Enjoyed Jason Scott’s BBS Documentary
14.6.2022 00:13Really Enjoyed Jason Scott’s BBS Documentary200 years ago, my ancestors migrated from Prussia to Ukraine. They left for many reasons, many of which boiled down to their strong pacifism in the midst of a highly militarized country. Last week, my wife, the boys, and I walked through the favorite palace of Friedrich Wilhelm III, the king of Prussia who was … Continue reading Visiting Germany: Reflections on Schloss Charlottenburg
5.6.2022 01:47Visiting Germany: Reflections on Schloss CharlottenburgIt seems that lately I’ve written several shell implementations of a simple queue that enforces ordered execution of jobs that may arrive out of order. After writing this for the nth time in bash, I decided it was time to do it properly. But first, a word on the why of it all. Why did … Continue reading Fast, Ordered Unixy Queues over NNCP and Syncthing with Filespooler
29.5.2022 22:39Fast, Ordered Unixy Queues over NNCP and Syncthing with FilespoolerNote: this post is also available on my website, where it will be updated periodically. When things are difficult – maybe there’s been a disaster, or an invasion (this page is being written in 2022 just after Russia invaded Ukraine), or maybe you’re just backpacking off the grid – there are tools that can help … Continue reading Tools for Communicating Offline and in Difficult Circumstances
3.3.2022 02:49Tools for Communicating Offline and in Difficult CircumstancesI recently wrote that managing an external display on Linux shouldn’t be this hard. I went down a path of trying out some different options before finally landing at an unexpected place: KDE. I say “unexpected” because I find tiling window managers are just about a necessity. Background: xmonad Until a few months ago, I’d … Continue reading KDE: A Nice Tiling Envieonment and a Surprisingly Awesome DE
7.2.2022 21:45KDE: A Nice Tiling Envieonment and a Surprisingly Awesome DEI’m going to lead with the technical punch line, and then explain it: Yggdrasil Network is an opportunistic mesh that can be deployed privately or as part of a global-scale network. Each node gets a stable IPv6 address (or even an entire /64) that is derived from its public key and is bound to that … Continue reading Make the Internet Yours Again With an Instant Mesh Network
8.1.2022 03:57Make the Internet Yours Again With an Instant Mesh NetworkI first started using Linux and FreeBSD on laptops in the late 1990s. Back then, there were all sorts of hassles and problems, from hangs on suspend to pure failure to boot. I still worry a bit about suspend on unknown hardware, but by and large, the picture of Linux on laptops has dramatically improved … Continue reading Managing an External Display on Linux Shouldn’t Be This Hard
13.11.2021 16:21Managing an External Display on Linux Shouldn’t Be This HardIn the aftermath of my report of Facebook censoring mentions of the open-source social network Mastodon, there was a lot of conversation about whether or not this was deliberate. That conversation seemed to focus on whether a human speficially added joinmastodon.org to some sort of blacklist. But that’s not even relevant. OF COURSE it was … Continue reading Facebook’s Blocking Decisions Are Deliberate – Including Their Censorship of Mastodon
13.9.2021 18:58Facebook’s Blocking Decisions Are Deliberate – Including Their Censorship of MastodonUpdate: Facebook has reversed itself over this censorship, but I maintain that whether the censorship was algorithmic or human, it was intentional either way. Details in my new post. Last November, I made a brief post to Facebook about Mastodon. Mastodon is an open-source and open social network, which is decentralized and all about user … Continue reading Facebook Is Censoring People For Mentioning Open-Source Social Network Mastodon
11.9.2021 17:10Facebook Is Censoring People For Mentioning Open-Source Social Network MastodonI’ve appreciated the bullseye upgrade, like most Debian upgrades. I’m not quite sure how, since I was already running a backports kernel, but somehow the entire system is snappier. Maybe newer X or something? I’m really pleased with it. Hardware integration is even nicer now, particularly the automatic driverless support for scanners in addition to … Continue reading Excellent Experience with Debian Bullseye
25.8.2021 17:41Excellent Experience with Debian BullseyeI have a problem. I have a directory that I use with org-mode and org-roam. I want it to be synced across multiple machines. I also want to keep the history with git. And, I want to use end-to-end encryption (no storing a plain git repo on a remote server), have a serverless setup, not … Continue reading Distributed, Asynchronous Git Syncing with NNCP
18.8.2021 16:11Distributed, Asynchronous Git Syncing with NNCPRecently I have been taking another look at the services at rsync.net and it got me thinking: what would I do with a lot of storage? What might I want to run with it, if it were fairly cheap? Backups are an obvious place to start. Borgbackup makes a pretty compelling option: very bandwidth-efficient thanks … Continue reading Roundup of Unique Data/Storage Hosting Options
3.6.2021 04:53Roundup of Unique Data/Storage Hosting OptionsNote: This post is also available on my webiste, where it will be periodically updated. As I’ve been thinking and writing about privacy and decentralization lately, I had a conversation with a colleague this week, and he commented about how loss of privacy is related to loss of agency: that is, loss of our ability … Continue reading Recovering Our Lost Free Will Online: Tools and Techniques That Are Available Now
22.2.2021 04:13Recovering Our Lost Free Will Online: Tools and Techniques That Are Available NowA little while back, I spent a week in a remote area. It had no Internet and no cell phone coverage. Sometimes, I would drive in to town where there was a signal to get messages, upload photos, and so forth. I had to take several devices with me: my phone, my wife’s, maybe a … Continue reading A Simple, Delay-Tolerant, Offline-Capable Mesh Network with Syncthing (+ optional NNCP)
4.2.2021 01:52A Simple, Delay-Tolerant, Offline-Capable Mesh Network with Syncthing (+ optional NNCP)Not long ago, I posted a roundup of secure messengers with off-the-grid capabilities. Some conversation followed, which led me to consider some of the problems with P2P protocols. P2P and Privacy Brave adopting IPFS has driven a lot of buzz lately. IPFS is essentially a decentralized, distributed web. This concept has a lot of promise. … Continue reading The Hidden Drawbacks of P2P (And a Defense of Signal)
31.1.2021 02:13The Hidden Drawbacks of P2P (And a Defense of Signal)Amid all the conversation about Signal, and the debate over decentralization, one thing has often not been raised: all of these things require an Internet connection. “Of course,” you might say. “Internet is everywhere these days.” Well, not so much, and it turns out there are some very good reasons that people might want messengers … Continue reading Roundup of Secure Messengers with Off-The-Grid Capabilities (Distributed/Mesh Messengers)
19.1.2021 20:37Roundup of Secure Messengers with Off-The-Grid Capabilities (Distributed/Mesh Messengers)Note: this is another article in my series on asynchronous communication in Linux with UUCP and NNCP. In the previous installment on store-and-forward backups, I mentioned how easy it is to do with ZFS, and some of the tools that can be used to do it without ZFS. A lot of those tools are a … Continue reading Remote Directory Tree Comparison, Optionally Asynchronous and Airgapped
12.1.2021 17:53Remote Directory Tree Comparison, Optionally Asynchronous and AirgappedIt is undeniable that banning Donald Trump from Facebook, Twitter, and similar sites is a benefit for the moment. It may well save lives, perhaps lots of lives. But it raises quite a few troubling issues. First, as EFF points out, these platforms have privileged speakers with power, especially politicians, over regular users. For years … Continue reading The Good, Bad, and Scary of the Banning of Donald Trump, and How Decentralization Makes It All Better
12.1.2021 01:04The Good, Bad, and Scary of the Banning of Donald Trump, and How Decentralization Makes It All BetterI remember reading an essay a month or so ago — sadly I forget where — talking about how things end for tyrants. If I were to sum it up, it would be with the word “alone.” Their power fading, they find that they had few true friends or believers; just others that were greedy … Continue reading This Is How Tyrants Go: Alone
7.1.2021 04:00This Is How Tyrants Go: AloneNote: this is another article in my series on asynchronous communication in Linux with UUCP and NNCP. In my previous post, I introduced a way to use ZFS backups over NNCP. In this post, I’ll expand on that and also explore non-ZFS backups. Use of nncp-file instead of nncp-exec The previous example used nncp-exec (like … Continue reading More Topics on Store-And-Forward (Possibly Airgapped) ZFS and Non-ZFS Backups with NNCP
4.1.2021 17:18More Topics on Store-And-Forward (Possibly Airgapped) ZFS and Non-ZFS Backups with NNCP