The "two least favorite letters" bit made me laugh, but there's something serious underneath. Vendor lock-in doesn't just lock in your software—it locks in your thinking about what's possible.

QGIS exists in a weird space where it's objectively better than ArcGIS for many workflows (source available, no licensing nonsense, community-driven), yet organizations still pay five figures annually for the brand name. Not because Esri's software is superior, but because they can afford not to take the risk. Easier to blame the vendor than admit you made a choice.

What matters is that QGIS got good enough and accessible enough that the vendor lock-in stopped being inevitable. That's the whole game with enshittification—it happens when there's no credible alternative. Glad more people are trying it.

MediaWiki + federated forums is an interesting combo. You're essentially building a knowledge base that can be discussed across different platforms. Few thoughts:

The hardest part is usually moderation coherence across systems. MediaWiki has its own culture (documentation, neutrality policies), while forums are discussion-first. When they're federated, which norms win in cross-platform disputes?

The upside: members can contribute from whichever platform they prefer. If someone lives in Mastodon, they don't have to sign into yet another silo to comment on your docs.

The naming matters too. "NodeBB forums" suggests you're aware of federation's value. Just make sure both platforms have strong identity and purpose—"wiki for reference, forums for discussion" beats having them feel redundant.

Doing a really good job with the project. Nice read thank you for sharing.

They keep on calling it secure, but it has no E2EE

Great notes for dealing with people in an open source project that accepts contributions. Most people that take the time to submit an issue want to help, but may not know what you need to help solve their issue. Also great notes about fighting scope creep. Shiny new features are attractive, but can become more of a burden than a benefit.

Personally I'm not sure I would want that workload, but I can always just open source the code with the disclaimer: "I'm providing this code as is. I will not be accepting contributions, but please fork this if you're willing to take on that workload. I would love to contribute myself if you do."

Well damn, I’ve been using them for a while. Guess it’s time to find a new app because that is indeed troubling.

I scrolled down to the “Our sponsors” section on their page. A wretched hive of scum and villainy, full of gambling and essay-writing services. The fact that they put these on their front page is a red flag in itself.

Perfect timing for this post!

Just a couple days ago I spent several hours putting together a short clip in Kdenlive, and after I was satisfied with the preview I tried rendering the final output only to discover some kind of bug(?) that prevented some imported images from displaying and instead were just giant white empty spaces. Some web searches suggested to try the AppImage version instead, but I still had the same problem. After also trying with a fresh install on a second pc (running Windows 10 instead of Linux Mint), and running close to the deadline when the clip was needed, I finally had to remake the entire damn project using Vegas.

I don't do a ton of video editing, and this was the first major hurdle I faced with Kdenlive, but having more problems with a render than a preview isn't something I ever expected to deal with, and has really soured me on the software. Going to give Shotcut a try for my next simple editing task and see how it goes. Thanks for the post :)

Nice, I just found these guys a couple weeks ago.

Their web design isn't great and it's hard to navigate sometimes, but just the fact that they're doing this is incredible.

I just wish Discord wasn't structured as such an information black hole.

I know. That is my gripe with it too.

But github has that already!

Or Reddit, or basically anywhere else.

I just wish Discord wasn't structured as such an information black hole. Then it'd be... alright.

Outsourcing your community forums to a platform where many people already have an account so you don't have to deal with phpbb and user accounts.

Of course they have a Discord.

What is it with Discord eating absolutely everything?

Looks like a mistake. feel free to open a issue if you want to: https://github.com/vegastrike/vegastrike.github.io

Nice, forgotten about this, but how is 47 a majority vs 57?

yeah the hotspot bit requires me to turn on my cellular network which is not most desirable. but thanks for providing this though!

LocalSend actually works without internet - it just needs both devices on the same local network (one phone can create a hotspot for the other to join if you're completely offline).

thanks a lot! I will look into bluetooth file transfer

thanks a lot! Since quick share is not Open source I will look into Bluetooth file transferring

thank you but it requires 2 devices to be connected in the same network, is there an alternative that works without internet connection like airdrop?

Is there a file transfer app that could transfer a file directly to a nearby

I don't think there's anything exactly like Apple Airdrop. Apple's airdrop uses a combination of bluetooth to find nearby devices, and a temporary wifi link to send them. It's a custom protocol, that only works because Apple controls the hardware, firmware and software, whereas on nonrooted android phones you simply don't have that level of control over the devices.

In addition to that, many wifi adapters only support being in one "mode" at once, so they are unable to be simultaneously connected to a network, and connected to another device via a direct conenction. Apple gets around this via hardware control, where they can ensure that all their devices, essentially have two wifi adapters inside them.

If you want an alternative to just send wifi files without an internet connection however, bluetooth supports sending and receiving files. Although, bluetooth is much slower than wifi, and you will have to pair the devices first.

EDIT: it looks like a commenter above has claimed that apple devices don't support bluetooth file transfer. So an alternative you could consider is bluetooth tethering, where you connect to a wifi network hosted over bluetooth, and then send files through there. But this requires even more setup, and I dunno if Apple devices support this as well.

https://localsend.org/

Android has Quick Share, and there's a Windows app as well, but there is no iOS support, just like AirDrop isn't available on Android.

A regular bluetooth file transfer would be an option, but again Apple has never supported that either, because they want you to use AirDrop in their walled garden.

There is probably a third party app, but everything I've ever seen needs a middle server to facilitate the transfer.

You could always use a USB drive, not optimal, but it is an option that both support. Depending on the iPhone you might need an adapter if it still uses the Lightning port instead of USB-C.

by clipboard I simply meant a button to paste what is in clipboard like localsend, not share what is is clipboard automatically. This is not essential, just makes life easier.

Pairdrop requires a server to send a file to and that server send the file it received to the other client. so it might require network connection to be used.

Is there a file transfer app that could transfer a file directly to a nearby device? like how phone transfer audio to an earphone using Bluetooth?

I do not know of a solution for clipboard content, but something like https://pairdrop.net/ for files.