I run OpenMediaVault as it brings plenty of nice features together like SMART disk monitoring, resource usage monitoring, easy RAID creation, FTP/SSH/browser access, etc. You don’t strictly need it (or TrueNAS, UnRAID, etc) but it’s nice. Unlike TrueNAS and others, OMV seems easier to install on an existing Linux distribution (I run it on Debian).

For important stuff that you really don’t want to lose, you probably want to set up a RAID array of some description. The various NAS solutions like OMV or TrueNAS will make that easier but you can do it without them. It does mean you’ll want a lot of storage (disks will probably be the most expensive part of your setup) and you’ll want your PC to be able to accommodate multiple hard drives (I would think at least 4) particularly if you want to run a RAID.

Jellyfin is good for streaming. Beyond that I don’t know much about sailing the seas at scale.

Nextcloud is decent for file storage and has a few good addons that allow you to use it to selfhost calendars, contact, Joplin notes, etc.

Paperless-ngx is a good solution for digitising documents.

Yes there are plenty of different solutions out there but after a while you come to see that as a feature rather than a bug. Selfhosting definitely carries a lot more friction than outsourcing it all to Google, so it’s something you need to get used to. It helps if you can view the process itself as a hobby rather than a chore and embrace the fact that you will need to learn a lot to make it work.

I tend to use floating or fullscreen for general browsing but often you have to type something while frequently referring back to something else - for example when programming I will be looking at the documentation. Or maybe debugging something on the command line while looking at your code to see what’s going on. In those circumstances tilling is perfect.

It helps if you can treat it as a hobby. My partner’s hobby is music, which is a perfectly sensible thing to do in one’s spare time. I always feel a bit weird when people ask me what I do in my own spare time and my answer is basically fixing my shit, then pushing it just hard enough that it breaks again.

To your question, the unfortunate reality is that those of us who care about privacy and software freedom are a small minority. Why overhaul your business model to suit us when they can continue to milk every other consumer out there who frankly doesn’t give a shit?

Phones are, of course, the worst of all for this. People do great work developing FOSS solutions but it is an uphill struggle and I worry that the hill is getting steeper.

Google Maps is the last Google thing I rely really heavily on. I would love to be able to replace it with OSM but searching for places is far better on Google (admittedly, probably because they have more context for your search due to all the spying). I also rely a lot on Google reviews when I’m in a new place and just want to grab a coffee or a drink or something. Could probably use TripAdvisor for that though.

Most of my data is backed up to (or just stored on) a VPS in the first instance, and then I backup the VPS to a local NAS daily using rsnapshot (the NAS is just a few old hard drives attached to a Raspberry Pi until I can get something more robust). Very occasionally I’ll back the NAS up to a separate drive. I also occasionally backup my laptop directly to a separate hard drive.

Not a particularly robust solution but it gives me some piece of mind. I would like to build a better NAS that can support RAID as I was never able to get it working with the Pi.

I like my Garmin Vívoactive 3. It has all the basic features (for casual walking/running) and looks okay.

I really like the look of the “hybrid” watches like the Garmin Vívomove or Withings watches. They look great but as far as I know none of them have in-built GPS.

Would be very interested in checking out the BangleJS 2 as well.

I don’t think a week is that long to wait for an open source project like this. I suspect as soon as they released 115 they got a deluge of bug reports that are probably keeping them occupied.

Granted, I’m not personally affected because <smug>I use Arch btw</smug>. But on a serious note, it makes sense to me that “bleeding edge” distros where users expect the latest versions quickly would package Thunderbird for their repos, whereas those on more stability-focused distros would wait the couple of weeks for the Flatpak.

There are definitely other win conditions, but it’s still winner-takes-all. So say if an ally is really strong scientifically or culturally it inevitably becomes in your interest to destroy them.

One limitation that games like Civ suffer from is that diplomacy is ultimately pretty shallow because there can only be one winner, so even when you’re building alliances or trading relationships it is generally to gain some temporary benefit until you are in a position to defeat your partner later on (whether militarily, scientifically, etc).

What I would love to see is a multiplayer game like Civ but where each player has independent win conditions (so that a game could have multiple winners, or no winners). The condition could even just be to attain a certain level of happiness or wealth. And if you achieve that then you win even if other nations are bigger or stronger, and conversely if you don’t achieve it you lose even if you are the last nation standing. So decisions to go to war, or focus on technological development, or build alliances or trading relationships, etc, are driven by the wants and needs of your own people and not just a need to dominate others.

I haven’t played ESO but I can tell you the standard of writing in the other ES games is, IMO, very high. Morrowind is my all time favourite, the lore in that game is fantastic.

This looks promising, thanks!

Yes you’re right, what I’m thinking of is basically a magic mirror without the mirror. Thanks for the link, I will check that out!