The Best Podcasts for Your Smart, Bored Kid

Some excellent kid safe and also informative podcasts in the list at the linked article. I’d say though they are not just for long trips in the car, as it is actually a good habit to listen to focussed and informative topics at any time. Much of my own day, including shopping trips and when driving, are spent listening to podcasts.

Audio podcasts are great for those times when you are busy doing something, and cannot be watching a screen the whole time. You can slow down, or speed up, podcast listening too.

See https://www.wired.com/story/best-podcasts-for-kids/
#Blog, #kids, #podcasts, #technology

Why after nearly 20 years I moved away from Vodacom – Loyalty often does not Pay

I’ve been with Vodacom since just after number porting went live in South Africa, and I’ve been on a contract with them for most of that time until after I retired from work, and no longer had a work cellphone allowance. It was just cheaper to move to a pre-paid service.

When I moved to pre-paid, I just asked them to change my contract to pre-paid, and I went on from there, topping the account up every second month or so. Whenever I topped up I saw I was offered 30% extra airtime for whatever I bought – that’s nice, so if I spent R100 I’d actually get R130 or whatever it was. But over the last 3 months after moving medical aids I do now spend up to an hour or longer talking on the phone to my medical aid and I noticed the costs are nearly R100 a call.

Today I got another offer from Afrihost to switch to their new AirMobile offering (which is a Mobile Virtual Network Operator). So I checked out the call costs and noted they were 64c per minute. I phoned Vodacom to check what I was paying as I can never see in the VodaPay app what the call rates were, and I also cannot see any history of itemised calls (except for the data use on my data SIM). I was then told I’m paying R1.53 per minute for calls! So, I get an extra 30% of airtime when I top up, but I’m paying over 100% more in costs! What a rip-off. It was explained to me that there are actually three different pre-paid plans, and I was on the Power Bonus one, but there is a different one that is only 79c per minute, if I’d like them to switch me to that one. No-one told me there were three options when I was switched to pre-paid, and I always thought there was just “pre-paid”. Well…. I replied that actually don’t worry, I’m going to rather switch providers, but I asked her to escalate the issue that no-one gave me any options when I was changed to pre-paid and how come I ended up on the most expensive one – there is no loyalty from the company after you’ve been with them for 20 years.

I’m not going to (yet) say Afrihost’s AirMobile is the best out there, but for me, it is certainly way better than I was getting from Vodacom. The whole migration was completed online and live after about 3 hours, including the RICA process and the number porting. As I have a phone with eSIM capability, I just scanned the QR code that came in the e-mail, and my eSIM was set up.

Apart from the way cheaper costs, visibility of pricing, and way simpler online management (without all the adverts and bonus offer popups in the VodaPay app), the AirMobile offering also shows me detailed usage of both the data usage and itemised phone calls with the cost for each call (no itemised billing was included on pre-paid with Vodacom).

The fact that I received a free R100 of airtime and 10GB of data from AirMobile was not at all why I changed, as I look only at ongoing monthly usage costs. But it is a nice sweetener seeing I had R88 credit left at Vodacom which I lose.

The moral of the story though is, just like with short term insurance, life insurance and bank accounts, you have no investment value in those companies at all, no matter how long you’ve been with them. If you want a better deal, you need to look around and then just make a move. An exception may be if you get quite hefty loyalty bonuses, like I get from my short term insurance for no claims. But still, factor that in and decide if you want to move after your bonus is paid out, or weigh up what you will save overall over 3 or 5 years anyway.

So, let’s see how this goes with Afrihost. Afrihost has been my fibre ISP for the last few years, and I’ve been really happy with their service so far. My migration described above, though, was purely my own initiative, and all I received was the standard migration package and pricing that everyone else receives. I know it sounds a bit like an advert, but it is an important principle to look around for better offers you can get, no matter where you decide to go.
#Blog, #Afrihost, #AirMobile, #southafrica, #technology, #vodacom

#google #job #blog #news #history

♲ Digital Angel - 2024-04-10 22:22:14 GMT

Surprise: #Google has transformed itself from a #hipster #startup into a cheesy, normal #company, where you are now just as much of an #employee as anywhere else.https://social.clawhammer.net/blog/posts/2024-01-19-CultureChange/
#job #history #economy #internet #software #developer #coder #nerd #change #news #business #management #blog

Digital Angel (@digitalangel)

Hailing Frequencies Open: h3x3@xmpp.chat

Free app Actions adds nearly 150 features to Apple Shortcuts

Highlights include many tools for converting units, a bunch of system integrations for checking things like whether a particular Bluetooth device or Wi-Fi device is connected, and a bunch of features for working with images and lists. The application works for both mobile devices, including the iPhone and iPad, as well as Macs. A few of the actions only work on one or the other but the vast majority work on all devices.

To get started, simply install the application and create a new shortcut. The best way to get a feel for the new abilities is to go to Shortcuts, create a new shortcut, and browse the actions by app. You’ll find everything under “Shortcuts”.

See https://lifehacker.com/tech/actions-app-adds-new-features-to-apple-shortcuts
#Blog, #ios, #shortcuts, #technology

Kobo announces its first colour e-readers

Rakuten Kobo is launching its first colour e-readers, the Kobo Libra Colour and the Kobo Clara Colour. Both use E Ink’s latest Kaleido colour screen technology, which has subtle, pastel-like hues and drops from a 300ppi grayscale resolution to 150ppi when you view content in colour.

Prices seem to be about $10 to $30 more than the black and white model, and a stylus will cost extra if you want one.

It will be interesting to see what thew reviews show from May 2024 after they’ve shipped. Kobo’s are actually excellent readers and this also shows again how they can out-innovate Amazon. Kobo’s also have long supported the ePub format, which Amazon only started to support about a year or two back. Amazon’s only big strength is their massive bookstore.

It is quite easy to buy books and use Calibre to push them to a Kobo reader.

See https://www.theverge.com/2024/4/10/24124411/kobo-libra-colour-clara-colour-e-reader-kindle-e-ink
#Blog, #ereader, #Kobo, #technology

The Fairbuds noise-canceling earbuds have an easily swappable battery

Fairphone, the makers of the ultra-repairable Fairphone 5, have launched a new pair of easy-to-repair wireless earbuds. Instead of tossing away your earbuds when the batteries eventually die, Fairphone’s new Fairbuds let you replace the batteries inside the buds themselves and their charging case.

In addition to replacing the batteries, you can repair or exchange the left or right earbud, the silicone ring, earbud tips, the charging case outer shell, and the charging case core. The new buds also come with a standard two-year warranty, but you can add one extra year if you register them online.

Certainly, these objectives should be embraced by all manufacturers. I will never forget my first (and only) Apple AirPods and their batteries failing just a month past the warranty period ended. They were super expensive, and I vowed to never again pay so much money for a disposable product.

The downside though with Fairphone products is they are not the cheapest around, so many are still going to buy cheap disposal earbuds. They are very likely not as good as the top end earbuds are either, but I’d be interested to see some reviews around the sound quality.

One would have to assume these could last at least two or three times longer than any earbuds which have non-replaceable batteries (batteries are usually the component that fails). But the cost of any batteries being replaced also needs to be factored in.

I’d hope though if there is enough support and sales, that these prices could actually get cheaper over time too.

See https://www.theverge.com/2024/4/9/24125089/fairbuds-fairphone-noise-canceling-earbuds-battery-replace-repairability
#Blog, #earbuds, #environment, #technology

Modder made an IRC client that runs entirely inside the motherboard’s BIOS chip

#join edk2. User has then posted a private message in that channel saying "Hello from UEFI!". There is a single reply shown saying "what?".">
Phillip Tennen, developer of the open-source axleOS, has recently decided to use what he learned from that project to create an IRC client that runs entirely within the UEFI pre-boot environment, with no operating system required. This “UEFIRC” is nearly fully functional, with a graphical interface and a TrueType font renderer, and it’s all written in the Rust programming language.

Wow! It does suggest two things to me:

1. IRC is really the lightest weight social chatting app of them all…
2. IRC users are a bit different…

Technically I suppose any text based micro-blogging type service could work. Twitter or Mastodon without videos and photos may also work. But the nature of how IRC still works today, means you can get a pretty close experience to the real thing even in the BIOS.

See https://www.tomshardware.com/software/someone-made-a-functioning-irc-client-that-runs-entirely-inside-the-motherboards-uefi
#Blog, #BIOS, #IRC, #technology

Solved e-mail not working in luckyBackup app with smtp-cli app

I love the free and open source luckyBackup app for doing rsync backups of my user data, as rsync is fast and reliable, and you can easily verify seeing your files that are backed up. I’ve been using luckyBackup for many years now, despite it no longer being supported from about 12 years ago (little has changed with regards to rsync, which it uses, and rsync updates still).

The only problem I, and many others had, was when Google tightened up their SMTP access for sending of mail. We started getting authentication errors for SMTP logins with app passwords. But I’d seen many complain but no easy solution was ever mentioned for luckyBackup, which executes a command line execution to send the logs via e-mail.

This week it became critical as I noticed my backups stopped running a few days ago, and of course, I got no error e-mail. I looked to using Duplicati backup now which is really excellent and saves masses of space, but it is horribly slow, especially on the first run. For my 1.1 TB of data it has now been running nearly 24 hours and it has 230 GB still to go!

So, a renewed effort on luckyBackup finally found a breakthrough. I looked at alternative CLI mail command apps and actually got ssmtp to work, by adding an option AuthMethod=LOGIN. This got me to realise that of course GMail’s (and some other SMTP servers) are not always standard. But the ssmtp app does not execute properly from within luckyBackup.

Then I came upon a comment in a post where someone said they had created an open-source app called smtp-cli for the command line, and it also did some diagnostics along with some optional parameters including also an option --auth-login. And it worked, including inside of luckyBackup!

The app only had updates done 5 years ago, but I see various issues have been closed, and more than once it was said no update was actually required as users can use the numerous parameters to control various issues. It also has a --verbose option to give lots of feedback on its progress or issues.

This app is also pretty useful if you’re having any issue with e-mailing from cron jobs as it will handle that job pretty well too.

I just wish I’d come across this app sooner!

See https://github.com/mludvig/smtp-cli
#Blog, #luckybackup, #opensource, #smtp, #technology

Magnets are switching up the keyboard game with an additional keystroke setting

These keyboards rely on magnets and springs and activate by sensing changes in the magnetic field. Popularized by Dutch keyboard startup Wooting, these switches rely on the Hall Effect and have actually been around since the 1960s.

You can change how far you need to press down to register the keystroke, as well as for the release point.

The one thing you can’t change, though, is the switch’s resistance. Despite all the talk of magnets, that’s still handled by the spring inside the switch, after all (for the moment, until the xyz is released).

But interestingly, this also means with temperature differences, you may also have to “calibrate” your keyboard. The price point for the Akko MOD007B PC Santorini keyboard at around US$110 to $150 is certainly not more expensive than many mechanical keyboards.

See https://techcrunch.com/2024/04/07/magnets-are-switching-up-the-keyboard-game/
#Blog, #keyboards, #technology

How to update the firmware on Raspberry Pi

Essentially, firmware is a form of low-level software that instructs hardware on how to operate and interact with other devices and components. For instance, firmware tells a computer to turn on when you press the power button, and it also tells a Raspberry Pi how to read micro-SD cards and USB drives.

Depending on what you do with your Raspberry Pi, you might never need to update its firmware. Aside from the occasional bug fix, you only have to update your Raspberry if you upgrade a project with new processors, memory chips, or printed circuit boards. You probably won’t need a firmware update if you only use the Raspberry Pi to power a mini RC rover, but if you feel like adding a bit more processing power to a device running Windows 11, you’d better install new firmware.

So, this may mostly not really be required, but it is handy to know if you plan to re-purpose your Pi with newer hardware.

See https://www.xda-developers.com/how-to-update-the-firmware-on-raspberry-pi/
#Blog, #raspberrypi, #technology

Starlink in Zimbabwe: Techies Find Ways to Disguise Kits, Evading Authorities

In a country choked by high internet costs and limited options, Zimbabweans are turning to remarkable ingenuity. Facing arrest and equipment seizure for using Starlink, tech-savvy individuals have devised a way to disguise the kits.

One such individual who communicated anonymously with us here at Techzim has said he’s helping people hide their Starlink terminals from the authorities.

They modify the terminal so that it looks like a solar panel, or just a light. They are also able to make it work without the indoor router, removing any evidence of the presence of a Starlink connection, even if the authorities suspect, or a neighbour snitches.

It now seems to be a sort of business helping do this via kits that can be purchased. It is certainly also needed in countries where the Internet is itself censored (LOL yes also including Australia).

IT’s just really sad also where suppliers can get away with not having enough innovative competition for them to lower their prices through a competitive market. Governments too are not always putting their citizens first as licensing seems to have some other objectives. Ask citizens, and they’re probably going to just say they want to have choices.

See https://www.techzim.co.zw/2024/04/starlink-in-zimbabwe-techies-find-ways-to-disguise-kits-evading-authorities/
#Blog, #africa, #technology, #zimbabwe

This Asus PC case monitors your dust filter so you don’t have to

Traditionally, one would have to periodically check the status of the dust filtering on a PC case, but that’s not the case (pun intended!) with the Asus ProArt PA602. This chassis has a fancy infrared (IR) sensor behind the front-facing dust filter. Should this detect a set layer of dust covering the filter material, a small LED will illuminate on the side of the case. It’s tastefully done. No alert on an LCD screen, no obnoxious sound. With this activated, you will know to clean the filter (and give the inside a quick air blast) next time the system has been shut down.

Quite a thoughtful case, apart from having the dust filter warning, it also has wheels to move it more easily.

But it does show also, is that even cases can innovate as well. I’d like to see more of these and maybe have the sensors also on the other dust filters (my case has one underneath as well), as IR sensors themselves are not very expensive to incorporate.

See https://www.xda-developers.com/this-asus-pc-case-monitors-your-dust-filter/
#Blog, #cases, #dust, #technology

German state of Schleswig-Holstein ditches Windows, Microsoft Office for Linux and LibreOffice

Schleswig-Holstein, Germany’s most northern state, is starting its switch from Microsoft Office to LibreOffice, and is planning to move from Windows to Linux on the 30,000 PCs it uses for local government functions.

The announcement (in German) was made yesterday by the state’s Minister-President Daniel Gunther, who has served in that position since 2017. According to a translated version of the announcement, independence was a key motivation for switching to open source software.

This is unlike the reasons that were given by Munich and Lower Saxony which were stayed to be cost savings, and then Microsoft discounted their services. Back when LiMux started, it was mostly seen as a way to save money. Now the focus is far more on data protection, privacy and security. Consider that the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) recently found that the European Commission’s use of Microsoft 365 breaches data protection law for EU institutions and bodies.”

See https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/germanys_northernmost_state_ditches_windows/
#Blog, #datasovereignty, #germany, #opensource, #technology

Android’s Find My Device network settings FINALLY start going live for some users

Nearly a year ago at Google I/O, the new “Find My Device” network for trackers was announced for Android, but then delayed indefinitely for the benefit of iPhone users. Now, finally, the network is starting to roll out – sort of.

The Find My Device network piggybacks off of all Android phones with Google Play Services to help users find lost items including phones and smartwatches, as well as trackers, headphones, and more. Google first announced the network in May 2023 with the goal of rolling it out in the months to follow, but the company later announced a delay.

Yes, the hold-up was supposedly Apple refusing to implement their part of the deal, to warn Apple users that an Android tracker was following them. And yes, this despite Google having long ago implemented the warning for Android users. A whole lot of new trackers for Android were supposed to be based on this new standard.

So, I’ve been sitting with a set of AirTags that warn me daily that they are following me around, because I could not yet buy the new trackers for Android. Let’s just hope this now moves ahead with some speed. No-one wants to buy outdated trackers that only work with Samsung, or Tile, or whoever. The new standard will allow any Android device to find your lost tag, which is how Apple’s AirTags work for any iOS device passing by.

See https://9to5google.com/2024/04/03/android-find-my-device-network-live-early/
#Blog, #android, #technology, #trackers

UK govt office admits ability to negotiate billions in cloud spending curbed by vendor lock-in

It’s one of the points I’ve been making since the beginning of enterprise cloud services. It’s not to say necessarily that a cloud service is bad, but you have no control (and often no easy way out) if prices jump (remember Microsoft changing their SQL database licenses from per CPU to per core – think it was that way around).

Quite often too, cloud providers use their own proprietary formats inside their cloud, so all works wonderfully, but what went out of the window was many governments’ requirements around open data standards. There was one very good reason for open data standards, and that was for easy portability to any other service, e.g. using ODF document standard and then moving from LibreOffice to, or from, FreeOffice.

Combine both of these and you’re in a tightish spot. You may also have very few skilled IT staff left, because all your services now sit in someone else’s cloud.

So, you just want to factor all of this in very carefully when considering whether to go into a cloud or not. We won’t even mention the UK govt’s experiences recently with Oracle…

See https://www.theregister.com/2024/04/04/uk_cddo_admits_cloud_spending_lock_issues_exclusive/
#Blog, #cloud, #technology, #UK, #vendorlockin

Overview of Memories Advanced Photo Management Suite that installs inside Nextcloud

Memories is a fast, modern and advanced photo management suite, that installs quickly and easily inside Nextcloud. My video contrasts it with the Photos app that comes with Nextcloud, and highlights some reasons why you may want to use it instead of Photos. This app has face, object, landmark, place, and human action recognition capability through the Recognise app. It’s not that obvious, but albums can be shared, and photos commented on, with other Nextcloud registered users using the underlying Nextcloud file commenting system.

Memories is a great way to collaborate and share photos privately with friends and family, and even to share public links to some of your albums. It can even work on a Raspberry Pi hosted in the home.

It also has apps for iOS and Android, which can optionally auto-upload photos into Memories.

By saving/reading titles and descriptions into the photo’s EXIF headers means that importing or exporting out of Memories is a lot less of a chore with migrating between photo services.

Watch https://youtu.be/2A6u0AluCnI
#Blog, #opensource, #photomanagement, #selfhosting, #technology

Android 15 may be taking privacy to a whole new level by hiding locations even from the network

In a surprise move that’s more iPhone than iPhone, it looks like Android may be taking privacy to the next level, with new devices able to hide their locations even from their networks.

Even more markedly, Google has also previewed a feature to protect devices from IMSI grabbers and intercept platforms. These are the technologies used by law enforcement and sometimes criminals to capture phone IDs and trick those phones into connecting to a copycat network, allowing calls and messages to be intercepted.

As ever with this level of phone security and privacy, it’s good to have even if it won’t be a game-changer for the vast majority of users. But for journalists, politicians, celebrities, dissidents and protesters, this is a major advance in the improvement of personal privacy and data security and is as welcome as it is surprising.

I suppose too with the global adoption of RCS it also means that insecure text messaging can also be a thing of the past soon (ish). Wonder if the bulk SMS companies have aligned with this yet.

See https://www.forbes.com/sites/zakdoffman/2024/03/29/google-upgrade-samsung-s24-s23-pixel-vs-apple-iphone-15-pro-max/
#Blog, #privacy, #technology

LocalSend and SnapDrop can be used for universal AirDrop instead of pushing to Apple

Firstly, Airdop only works to other Apple devices, but there is a lot more to the world than just Apple devices! These open source (private and secure despite what Apple claims) apps will do universal file transfer between Apple, Linux, Windows, Android, etc devices.

They work on the same LAN so keep the traffic local. Snapdrop can even be self-hosted by you. Pairdrop (also .net address) is a fork of Snapdrop that offers a few extra bells and whistles like permanently pairing your devices (also Syncthing is better for this) as well as a temporary public room.

See https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/03/the-two-apps-i-use-when-i-need-airdrop-on-non-apple-devices/
#Blog, #alternativeto, #filetransfer, #opensource, #technology

Proton Pass now supports passkeys on all devices and plans: Beating Bitwarden to mobile devices

Passkeys are an easy and secure alternative to traditional passwords that can help prevent phishing attacks and make your online experience smoother and safer.

Unfortunately, Big Tech’s rollout of this technology prioritized using passkeys to lock people into their walled gardens over providing universal security for everyone (you have to use their platform, which often does not work across all platforms). And many password managers only support passkeys on specific platforms or provide them with paid plans, meaning you only get to reap passkeys’ security benefits if you can afford them.

They’ve reimagined passkeys, helping them reach their full potential as free, universal, and open-source tech. They have made online privacy and security accessible to everyone, regardless of what device you use or your ability to pay.

I’m still a paying customer of Bitwarden as Proton Pass was up to now still not doing everything, but this may make me re-evaluate using Proton Pass as I’m also a paying customer of Proton Pass. It certainly looks like Proton Pass is advancing at quite a pace, and Proton has already built up a good reputation for private e-mail and an excellent VPN client.

Proton is also the ONLY passkey provider that I’ve seen allowing you to store, share, and export passkeys just like you can with passwords!

See https://proton.me/blog/proton-pass-passkeys
#Blog, #opensource, #passkeys, #ProtonPass, #security, #technology

ActivityPub plugin for WordPress Adds Your WordPress Site to the Fediverse

This plugin effectively turns your WordPress blog into a one-person Mastodon (or another microblog) instance on the Fediverse. You carry on doing your blogs as normal, but anyone from right across the Fediverse can find and follow you, and reply and like your posts.

What is really nifty is that replies from the Fediverse appear as comments on the WordPress blog post. So, you manage all the interactivity from inside WordPress.

This is ideal for those who are primarily focussed on their blog and would prefer to manage things there. Their Fediverse address will be that of their blog (with that domain name). In this way, you also own your Fediverse address and retain your blog’s branding.

This is perfect for businesses who run WordPress news blogs already, and who do not want to establish, and manage, a separate Fediverse account. Retaining their own branding is also the cherry on the top for them.

If you already have a Fediverse address, then that stays separate from your blog’s address.

See https://lifehacker.com/tech/make-your-wordpress-site-part-of-the-fediverse
#Blog, #blogging, #fediverse, #technology, #wordpress