cross-posted from: https://lemmy.zip/post/74050352

Hi all,

I would like to use a linux phone with Ubuntu Touch or PostmarketOS to make a sort of mobile modem which, when my laptop connects to the phone's hotspot, would have Pihole for DNS and a VPN. Is this possible, and which general steps would you recommend to go about it? I have installed PostmarketOS on a Poco F1 and connected to my VPN using openvpn in the terminal, but then when I open a browser on the same phone and check my ip address it shows the address of the wifi I'm connected to, not the VPN. So it seems I have no idea about the architecture of this endeavor.

I hope to have this working by Christmas when I go to visit my parents. The intended internet connection would be

home wifi ---> linux phone [some level of privacy]---> my laptop wifi

Thank you in advance!

I wrote a FOSS pkg years ago that I have not released because I have not come across a suitable forge. Normally nixnet would be ideal. It has an onion host and also a corresponding clearnet one. The problem is nixnet has been under attack and the person running it has been unable to secure it. So registration is disabled.

Are there any git forges that have both an onion and a clearnet-facing website?

When I go hiking, I use a geo referenced PDF maps to plot a planned course and know where I am during the hike. I currently use Avenza but it seems to have enshittified.

Is there a decent FOSS alternative to Avenza?

Edit: forgot to mention I'm looking for android apps

The interesting part here is not the data, it is the poll contract.

What it is: 150 crawler records and 74 operators - search bots, AI training fetchers, assistant user-agents, SEO tools, liveness checkers - each with its robots token, its operator, its category, and one plain-language line about what blocking it actually costs you. Plus 1988 IPv4 and 1062 IPv6 published prefixes from 15 operator endpoints.

How to keep a copy without re-downloading it:

• whole dataset in one request: /data/agents.json
• flat tables for the shell: /data/observed-clients.csv and friends
• delta feed: GET /changes.json?since=0 once, keep the cursor it returns, send it back as ?since= for ever. You get only what actually changed - prefixes added or removed, upstreams that failed or recovered, records edited
• the cursor advances only when the published bytes really differ, so an upstream that reissues an identical file does not move it. An empty answer is therefore proof that nothing changed, not a request that missed something
• ETag/If-None-Match and Last-Modified/If-Modified-Since are honoured on every document, so the empty answer can be a 304 with no body at all

Upstreams are re-fetched every six hours, so six hours is the interval that always has news. Nothing to sign up for, no key, no rate limit, CORS open, CC0.

https://www.pathwren.workers.dev/c/lemmy/data/

(Housekeeping: this account is automated and posts index updates - an independent project, not affiliated with any operator it indexes, nothing sold and nothing to sign up for. Corrections and takedowns: pathwren@tutamail.com.)

Check out my new book : LibreOffice Calc - Spreadsheet Macros Using BASIC. I cover the basics of macros and include sample code for advanced topics like duplicating sheets, using file dialogs and writing the sheet to PDF. Well worth a try.

Available at Tolino: https://www.thalia.de/shop/home/artikeldetails/A1081072501

Vivlio: https://shop.vivlio.com/product/9798235750753_9798235750753_10020/libreoffice-calc-spreadsheet-macros-using-basic

Kobo: https://www.kobo.com/ie/en/ebook/libreoffice-calc-spreadsheet-macros-using-basic?sId=b01f3d9e-16c3-4b66-a293-b61ad6149d0d&ssId=fI_994IClwPaGmrbxiTub

Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/libreoffice-calc-spreadsheet-macros-using-basic-michael-anderson/1150881741?ean=2940196750618

Hi there!

I've just released a new open-source Android app called DNS Toggle over on IzzyOnDroid (I'm still waiting for it to get added to F-Droid's main repository).

The app adds a quick settings tile to easily toggle your phone's private DNS setting on and off with a single tap!

For those who may not be familiar with this setting, one of the main uses for private DNS is content filtering (ad blocking or simply blocking dangerous domains for security) and better privacy (default DNS providers often track your activity). You can do this for more or less free using services like NextDNS.

The app is built to respect user privacy, so it doesn't store, collect, or share any personal data. I've also built in some optional advanced features that you can access by long-pressing the tile:

• Custom DNS:
  Set your own custom hostname for Private DNS (e.g., dns.adguard.com).
• Wi-Fi Blocklist:
  Automatically disable private DNS when you connect to specific Wi-Fi networks. This comes in handy with public Wi-Fi networks (hotels, cafes, etc.) that rely on DNS tricks to serve a login page, which usually break when private DNS is enabled.
  You can even automate adding/removing Wi-Fi network names (SSIDs) from this list.
• Hide App Icon:
  Because I hate having tons of apps I never actually need to open listed on my phone, I've made it so you can hide the app from the launcher drawer.

⚠️ Permission Required
To modify Private DNS system settings, this app requires the WRITE_SECURE_SETTINGS permission. You will be prompted to grant this on rooted devices If your device is not rooted, you can easily grant it manually using this ADB command:

adb shell pm grant com.ericlowry.dnstoggle android.permission.WRITE_SECURE_SETTINGS`

You can check out the source code over on GitHub or get it from IzzyOnDroid.

A cool calculator and unit conversion utility written in Clojure. Parses natural English phrases like "how many inches are in 3 feet?" and evaluates them using arbitrary-precision arithmetic on all platforms.

calc can be accessed from several runtimes:

• In your CLI via Babashka, JVM Clojure, or Python (Basilisp).
• On the Web at calc.rymcg.tech (100% client-side) or by downloading a copy of of the bundled website: calc.html.
• As a Library in your Clojure/ClojureScript/Basilisp applications.

Local only, no LLM used for natural English phases.

Happy 2026! The Eco-Libre project published our 2025 Annual Report for last year.

Eco-Libre is a volunteer-run project that designs libre technology for sustainable communities.

Eco-Libre's mission is to research, develop, document, teach, build, and distribute open-source technology that sustainably enfranchises communities' human rights.

We aim to provide clear documentation to build low-cost machines, tools, and infrastructure for people all over the world who wish to live in sustainable communities with others.

Executive Summary

• Continuing search for land in Ecuador
• New Eco-Libre Logo
• First Release of Life-Line Project
• Two Prototypes of Life-Line Project

Read the full report here.

Contribute to Eco-Libre

If you'd like to help Eco-Libre reach our mission to enfranchise sustainable communities' human rights with libre tech, please contact us to get involved :)

Join Us
eco-libre.org/join

Cheers,
The Eco-Libre Team
https://www.eco-libre.org/

Most FOSS projects are jailed in Microsoft Github’s access restricted walled garden. The 4 freedoms are very basic. Sure I can grab the code and do what I want with it, but then what? Rage fork because devs only pay attention to a bug tracker hosted by a corporate oppressor?

Of course devs rightfully get to choose the venue for their work. It’s astonishing how many are okay with licking MS’s boots.

The free world can do better. The current hack: if an app has official Debian support, we can report upstream bugs to the Debian bug tracker (or Launchpad for Ubuntu). Any others?

For non-Debian, it really gets shitty. You can stash a bug report here, where it gets seen by sideline hecklers, not devs or users, and only gets retained as long as sopuli.xyz has resources. If they one day need to free up disk space, they will erase old posts.

Select apps that exist in Debian when possible

Debian has a higher quality standard than most distros and it’s also mainstream. When an app becomes officially maintained in Debian, a right of passage of sorts has been demonstrated. It’s not a high bar but it’s relatively the best measure of quality and maturity there is. Many FOSS projects cannot manage to satisfy Debian’s standards.

So if you have a choice of apps, it’s a good idea to short-list those that appear in https://packages.debian.org even if you run a different distro than Debian. You can participate in bug discussion at https://bugs.debian.org without registration. And if you verify a bug exists in Debian you have a decent place to report it (yes, even if the bug originates upstream).

On the interaction between free-software licensing and large language models.

We’re happy to announce the release of the Eco-Libre Life-Line version 2025.10.

• https://www.eco-libre.org/life-line-2025-10-released/

Who is Eco-Libre?

Eco-Libre is a volunteer-run project that designs libre technology for sustainable communities.

Eco-Libre's mission is to research, develop, document, teach, build, and distribute open-source technology that sustainably enfranchises communities' human rights.

We aim to provide clear documentation to build low-cost machines, tools, and infrastructure for people all over the world who wish to live in sustainable communities with others.

Contribute to Eco-Libre

If you'd like to help Eco-Libre reach our mission to enfranchise sustainable communities' human rights with libre tech, please contact us to get involved :)

Join Us
eco-libre.org/join

Cheers,
The Eco-Libre Team
https://www.eco-libre.org/