Ourgon

I've self-hosted more or less everything from the get-go back when I was working at a telco which provided me with a 4 Mb/s fixed line back in 1996. One of the first things I did was change to a self-hosted mail server with my own domain, the rest quickly followed. Just to name a few, used daily:

- Proxmox to run all mentioned services

- Software router to bind them all together (OpenWRT in a container)

- Database services (Postgresql, Mysql, Redis) used for many of the mentioned services

- Backup services (rsnapshot, custom backup scripts)

- mail services (Exim, Dovecot, Spamassassin, greylistd, dovecot-managesieve)

- web-related things (first Apache, then lighttpd, then nginx) running:

- "Cloud" (first Owncloud, then Nextcloud) with functional equivalents of e.g. Google Docs (Nextcloud Office), Google Reader (Nextcloud News), Google Meet (Nextcloud Talk, Jitsi Meet), Gmail (Rainloop app in Nextcloud, Roundcube), Google Maps (OSM app in Nextcloud), Calendar etc.

- Wiki (first Twiki, then Mediawiki, now Bookstack)

- Media (mpd, Airsonic, Jellyfin, Peertube, Pixelfed)

- version control (first CVS, then Subversion, then Gogs, then Gitea)

- Search (Searx and Recoll)

- big-tech proxies (Invidious, Nitter, libreddit, Spodcast, searx (see Search))

- Video surveillance (Zoneminder)

- Remote application/desktop service (X2go, NoVNC, now experimenting with Kasm)

- P2P services (Transmission, IPFS, MLDonkey (when needed))

- "Chat" services (first Prosody, then ejabberd, then back to Prosody)

- Timelimit service + app on my daughter's phone to keep her screen time in check, I can remotely give her more time when required

- a "stable" and "development" build server (Debian running in containers)

- ...and a lot more

Basic services are divided over a few containers - base, mail, auth. Most services run on a single container - serve. Some get their own container because they are only started irregularly (bookcook, the bookkeeping service) or they should be separated from the rest - p2p, session (remote application/desktop services). I tend to shun docker, preferring to tailor services to my own needs. Currently the only services using docker are Kasm Workspaces [1] and some linuxserver.io instances which I'm experimenting with.

[1] ...with the database (postgresql) and cache (redis) services being redirected to the 'base' container which runs all database services

Depends on which one you're using, mine contains a Radeon HD 4670. There is a lot of NVIDIA on the PCI bus but this does not seem to be an obstacle to the thing running flawlessly:

   00:00.0 Host bridge: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 Host Bridge (rev b1)
   00:00.1 RAM memory: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 Memory Controller (rev b1)
   00:03.0 ISA bridge: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 LPC Bridge (rev b3)
   00:03.1 RAM memory: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 Memory Controller (rev b1)
   00:03.2 SMBus: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 SMBus (rev b1)
   00:03.3 RAM memory: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 Memory Controller (rev b1)
   00:03.4 RAM memory: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 Memory Controller (rev b1)
   00:03.5 Co-processor: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 Co-processor (rev b1)
   00:04.0 USB controller: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 OHCI USB 1.1 Controller (rev b1)
   00:04.1 USB controller: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 EHCI USB 2.0 Controller (rev b1)
   00:06.0 USB controller: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 OHCI USB 1.1 Controller (rev b1)
   00:06.1 USB controller: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 EHCI USB 2.0 Controller (rev b1)
   00:08.0 Audio device: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 High Definition Audio (rev b1)
   00:09.0 PCI bridge: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 PCI Bridge (rev b1)
   00:0a.0 Ethernet controller: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 Ethernet (rev b1)
   00:0b.0 SATA controller: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 AHCI Controller (rev b1)
   00:0c.0 PCI bridge: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 PCI Express Bridge (rev b1)
   00:15.0 PCI bridge: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 PCI Express Bridge (rev b1)
   00:16.0 PCI bridge: NVIDIA Corporation MCP79 PCI Express Bridge (rev b1)
   02:00.0 VGA compatible controller: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] RV730/M96-XT [Mobility Radeon HD 4670]
   02:00.1 Audio device: Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI] RV710/730 HDMI Audio [Radeon HD 4000 series]
   03:00.0 Network controller: Qualcomm Atheros AR928X Wireless Network Adapter (PCI-Express) (rev 01)
   04:00.0 PCI bridge: Texas Instruments XIO2213A/B/XIO2221 PCI Express to PCI Bridge [Cheetah Express] (rev 01)
   05:00.0 FireWire (IEEE 1394): Texas Instruments XIO2213A/B/XIO2221 IEEE-1394b OHCI Controller [Cheetah Express] (rev 01)

There is some Broadcom as well - the Bluetooth controller, which works fine - as well as some Qualcomm - the wifi controller which, again, works fine.

This is a 'Late 2009 27" iMac', running the internal display as well as an external 1920*1200 24" monitor through a DP->HDMI cable. Everything works, including the silly IR remote control thingy (tested using the IR blaster on my phone).

If ever you get tired of Google - and for those who get tired of Apple or Amazon or whomever they have entrusted their digital photo archiving needs to...

Any of the personal cloud things - Nexcloud, Owncloud, Seafile, Syncthing and others - can be used to sync files - and with that photos and videos - from mobile devices to some server somewhere. This can be the server-under-the-stairs, your NAS at home, a wall-wart with a Raspberry Pi and a drive taped together, a VPS or a commercial entity offering these as SaaS. You can keep using your phones with or without Google, that is up to you. If you run the stuff yourself you'll need to install and configure the parts which make it work, if you use a commercial instance you just have to install the relevant app and tell it to sync your data. You can do this in parallel to using Google Photos, just to make sure you have a backup in case Google wants just that one extra piece of personal data to allow you to access your photos which makes you give up on them. Just one more piece... and one more please...

While I agree to most of the glued/soldered/planned obsolescence criticisms related to applethings I do feel the need to point out those "obsolete" macthings tend to run Linux just fine. I should know, writing this on a 'late 2009 27" iMac' which I got for free due to its video card being broken (which it is no longer, 8 minutes in the oven at 195°C is all it takes) running Debian. While it is also possible to get more recent versions of macOS to run on these things this is not nearly as easy nor useful as running Linux which just supports the hardware without any qualms. Apple does not want you to use older hardware so they don't build macOS for machines which are perfectly capable of running it. Installing unsupported versions is made possible by monkey-patching the release in a rather hit-and-miss fashion, often leaving parts of the hardware (bluetooth, sound, wifi) without or with sub-standard support. All this while Linux runs flawlessly on the same hardware.

> I wish more linux laptops had the build quality and support of macbooks

I'm glad my "Linux laptops" are very much not like those macbooks with their glue and solder and "no user-serviceable parts inside (and we really mean it)"

> This isn't a rant from an Apple fan, this is a rant from a laptop fan. ThinkPad's aren't good laptops despite what the guy with the pocket protector says. They are flimsy and feel cheap. They still have 20th century tech (eraser mouse, c'mon!). They are my grandfather's laptop.

The good thing with those machines is that you'll be able to keep on using your grandfather's laptop while those whose grandfathers opted for macbooks are left wanting. I'm using a T42p from 2005, apart from putting in an SSD I have not changed the thing. It was, and still is, a perfectly useable tool.

Drop Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Youtube, Tiktok, NYT, WaPo, Fox and all those other creators of permanent anxiety. Take up farming, buy a plot of land and build your own house, create something. Realise that:

- the climate has always been changing and it always will but humans and most other species survived. It takes an extinction level event to make a big dent in the biosphere

- social inequality is far less now than it has been in earlier times when people often lived or died at the whim of some aristocrat

- there is no shortage of workers, only a shortage of people who want to do a given job for a given reward

- there have always been 'billionaires' and there will always be since having a lot of resources makes it easier to gain more resources. Some billionaires do interesting things with their resources, others lie on them like Smaug. As long as there are enough resources left for the non-billionaires I don't care about them other than doing my best to not feed them if I can

- the media is rubbish. Don't criticise the media, be the media. Corporate media doesn't bite the hand that feeds it so just avoid them (see above).

- corruption is everywhere and has always been, it is not for nothing that Utopia was named so - it does not exist. Just like I try not to feed the billionaires I try not to feed corrupt institutions, occasionally breaking a law or two instead of giving in to their demands. That means they have a stick to hit me with if and when they want but knowing that they always will be able to find that stick means it doesn't make any difference to me

Eventually we will but it will take a shake-up of the market by an outsider who does not have an existing business based around cars priced at current levels. Electric cars are far less complex than ICE-based vehicles so there is no real reason for them to be more expensive. The current excuse for their high prices is the cost of the battery pack but battery prices have been on a downward trajectory for a long time now. Eventually a newcomer will find the lure of selling an EV for half of the lowest priced competitor too large to ignore and the rest will be history. That newcomer will be derided by the existing sellers and the media which depends on advertising income from those established actors but that attack won't succeed if the increase in price-performance is large enough.

That is the theory, now look at the practice of proprietary software/services and see if the theory holds. It clearly does not, one of the bigger problems with proprietary IT is the lock-in caused by undocumented data formats, services which do not allow bulk data extraction and similar obstacles.

Proprietary vs. open is like renting vs. owning without the legal protection offered to renters. If your data is locked in some proprietary format you're beholden to the proprietor who can - and often does - abuse his power by raising prices, adding intrusive 'features', selling access to your eyes and more. No EULA is going to change that since those agreements can be changed more or less at will.

In other words keep your EULA, I don't want it.

Selling that excess power is possible, as is buying some extra panels - there is enough space for at least 36 more on just that single roof. For now I choose to add panels - and batteries in the not too distant future, once the market is flooded with used EV-batteries - and continue on my course of decentralising the 'net using 'old' hardware - not a single new product is used in any of my computing endeavours. Most of it is either dumpster-dived and repaired, bought 2nd hand or acquired through places like Freecycle.

There is a big difference between "introspection" and "revisionism". The '1619 Project' clearly falls in the latter category and as such deserves to be denounced for the fraud it is, as does its author. As to it being published as an "essay project", the NYT themselves presented it as [The 1619 project is] a major initiative from The New York Times observing the 400th anniversary of the beginning of American Slavery. It aims to reframe the country’s history, understanding 1619 as our true founding.

The gray old lady would never have published this. The current incarnation of the NYT is related to its predecessor in name only.

Pull the thing out of the house and let it burn outside. It is a relatively small battery so outside it won't do much harm, this in contrast to what it seems to do in that room. Tossing it in the pool is also possible but given the small size that'd be a waste of pool water which would need to be replaced. Just let it burn outside. Use a rake, broom or whatever other long thing at hand to pull the thing outside.

After the stack has taken what it needs there are 35 solar panels left on the barn roof. Excess heat is used to heat the upper floor, given that it is well-insulated it needs no additional heating. Problem, solved.