I'm considering buying a laptop from Tuxedo, but I'm in Australia and I'm not sure how bad that idea is. Does anyone have experience or recommendation? I would not buy from any american company though. Is there a risk to not go through the country, or that I would have to pay a massive tax on it?

I bought 2 lenovos before. It seems to be getting worse for Linux and Amd. My first one was awesome, the second one had so many issues and I have to use a usb wifi and blacklist the internal one, so I probably want to skip lenovo this time, even if I have to pay a lot more.

So, I just learned about this the very, very hard way. After buying a second hand S10 and finding american ones can't be unlocked, traveling 4 hours to buy another one after much research, much annoyances to unlock it (samsung requires you to be online, which I didn't know) and testing multiple ROMs, I finally read this page more properly https://wiki.lineageos.org/devices/beyond1lte/ which says "known quirks: IMS". I thought it was just something like dolby sound.

What it means is that it doesn't suport VoLTE and most currently used phone systems. Samsung made their proprietary mess, unlike most other developers, which means it will probably never have an open source version.

And that applies to ALL modern samsung phones. I had samsung phone before with a custom OS, but didn't realize because VoLTE wasn't mandatory back then. Now it is here in Australia, and many countries. So if you ever plan to buy a samsung phone to degoogle it, know that it won't make phone calls. SMS and mobile data also doesn't work.

I don't know how I missed this. It should be talked more often given how popular samsung is. There should always be a warning "YOU WON'T BE ABLE TO MAKE PHONE CALLS IN THE FUTURE IF YOU CONTINUE".

S10 was the last decent phone ever made (for me). Not too big, SD card, headphone jack (one of the most important things for me), good camera, etc, etc... That's why I was so persistent to find one to degoogle.

So I'm stuck with my amazingly shitty pixel 5 (and other ones are even worse for me). And considering the possibility of a life without smartphones at all, since this is a losing battle. Mainstream doesn't care and evil companies have every incentive to kill freedom. It has been getting really bad and it will just get worse. But anyway... this post is not about this.

Be warned, if you care about freedom don't ever buy samsung again. Not because they are evil (they are), but because you won't be able to make phone calls on your "phone".

Hi, I wanted to start using Godot, and I'm wondering if people here have recommendations on learning resources for a first timer.

I can find a number of tutorials, but I know that bad tutorials can make it harder to learn the software than it should, so recommendations would be welcome.

I have a considerable experience with Blender and unity, if that matters, though I would want to learn things the "Godot way", not just a "Godot for unity users". Trying to learn Unreal in the past just made things harder and created bad practices on me.

Also, I'm using Linux. From what I read I don't think I want to use the .net or c# stuff, because I don't want to have to download and rely on .net.

Hi, I hope it's the correct place to post this.

After finding that my S10 is an american version and it's too hard to put a custom ROM, I decided to try again to use my pixel 5. I had GrapheneOS on it, and I dislike it a lot. So I put back the stock ROM and installed Lineage. I found that almost everything I hate on Graphene is actually because of the stock ROM and anything based on it will be the same. I found that what I like about android is actually samsung changes.

Then I tried CrDroid, which seemed kind of amateur looking to me (maybe because of the logo? or the bad install instructions? I don't know). And was I wrong! It brought back the joy of trying custom ROMs I experienced in the early days of android. So MANY things you can customize... almost anything you want is actually there.

Besides being fun to use I made it work much better than samsung (for me), with better usability, without any spyware and performance issues. Things like:

-Change the brightness just by sliding the top of the phone. (multiple annoying clicks and slides on stock ROM)

-Haptic feedback when changing it, so in case I didn't set it to auto brightness, I can change even if I can't see the screen in the sun.

-Per app network permissions (common to custom ROMs apparently, but a massive reason to get rid of samsung).

-Massive customization on the top drawer. I can finally have all options I want with just one slide, specially wifi and mobile data in a single click, separated buttons (multiple clicks on stock, because it's mixed in the mystic "internet" button, which I hated so much)

-No google search bar garbage forcing me to put a custom launcher to to get rid of it.

-Great performance and battery life. (though also common for most custom ROMs).

-Much more, almost anything you want.

The only things I haven't found yet is how to add labels to the top tiles and automatically set file transfer when connecting a cable (it always go to charging and requires a password to connect, which is nice for security but it should ask it just once).

Besides that it's just sad that the pixel5 is a shitty phone (no headphone jack or SD card), but most phones are like that these days. I wish it was easier to put CrDroid on the s10 (and the hardware is as well supported).

Anyway, it's a personal experience, but it may be useful for anyone on the fence about trying CrDroid, or even just to try a custom ROM. Lineage and Graphene is almost the same as stock without google crap, so it's not that much more worthy the effort trying to change it. But CrDroid is, if you are looking for something really different.

And of course, it doesn't have the Snowden level of security of Graphene, so the CIA might find my plans to steal Trump's fake tan warehouse. But I'm happy with that risk.

P.S.: If you do decide to try, you may get stuck trying to find all the files required on the instructions (at least I did). For example, in the pixel 5 download page:

https://crdroid.net/redfin/12

You will find vendor_boot.img on the "recovery" button on that page, like this one https://sourceforge.net/projects/crdroid/files/redfin/12.x/recovery/latest/

And the other ones on the "Download older versions" button like this https://sourceforge.net/projects/crdroid/files/redfin/12.x/

It didn't seem to be right, but it is, or at least it worked for me.

I hope it's ok to post on this community. It seems to be the most active. Skip to the summary at the end if you are in a hurry.

Every time the issue with google's dick move come up, I barely see any mention to Jolla/SailfishOS. Why is this not the Linux phone that we should be supporting?

I bought an Xperia way back in 2018 I think, and bought their community support and installed. It was usable. I ended up giving up on it because it was much worse than the ungoogled android alternative back then. The GPS took a long time to work, a lot of stuff was rough.

And some things were great surprises that comes with using a Linux phone. Syncthing android wouldn't install, but then I just installed the normal Linux Syncthing like normal and it worked perfectly!

But now with google killing F-droid and such, even a rough Sailfish will be a better option. I didn't stop using it because it was unusable, but because open source android was better. Open source android will die, and Sailfish must have gotten better by now.

So why isn't it an option? One thing I heard people complaining is that they are charging yearly for updates. Is this the problem?

People, even the very rich and evil microsoft gave up on investing in their windows phones. And those massive companies can only do so by profiting a lot from personal data. Any company will need a massive investment to be an option. Specially until it gains traction, with a small user base, it MUST be very expensive. And we, who want to see Linux working on phones, must invest on it. Otherwise any company trying it will go bankrupt.

There are few of us, it's a massive undertaking. Those of us who can must invest on it. Put our money where our mouth is. It's sad, but the world runs on money. Linux was successful because massive companies profited from it and needed it. If Linux relied solely on donations do you think an average person could use a Linux desktop today?

And then there are those saying "it's stupid to start from scratch". Jolla didn't start from scratch. They came from Nokia and have been building SailfishOS for more than 10 years. There's a lot of work already done to be ignored.

And on top of it, it's not an american company. So no PRISM and other things on it. Specially with the orange king, it's a massive plus to have software free from their system, unlike AOSP, which can just forbid their use by any country the orange king doesn't like.

So, why is it not an option? And those currently using it, what's your experience? Those who bought Xperia and installed on it, how did it go?

TL;DR: Sailfish wasn't ideal before, but with google's dick move, that will be better than not having open source apps.

A phone system will be very expensive and we must pay the entry price to support it, if that's the reason people don't like Jolla.

Jolla has been on the market for a while and already did a lot of work. SailfishOS is not something from scratch, if that's the reason.

Anyone using it currently, how has the experience been for you?

EDIT: I forgot to mention. Bank apps, Facebook stuff and other massive companies apps probably won't work on Linux, nor degoogled phones, and never will. They are allergic to freedom and if you need them, an alternative OS is not for you. Just like Adobe never worked on Linux and probably never will. It's not profitable enough. If that's what you need, just accept google decisions because you don't have a choice. This post is not for that audience.

Links from A_norny_mousse that I missed:

https://sailfishos.org/
company: https://jolla.com/
download: https://shop.jolla.com/ => Get free trial (yes it requires an account, but there’s no timebomb in the trial)
docs: https://docs.sailfishos.org/ (thanks to the community!)
forums: https://forum.sailfishos.org/

I don't know where to post this (or if I should, but I'm lost). Skip to the end for the "too long, didn't read" version.

So, this may sound kind of crazy, and maybe I am. I live in a van, and I managed to live 3 months in the outback, some 120km west of Bourke. No one lives there, I didn't even find signs of humans where I was staying. I thought I was safe.

But I didn't know they round up the sheep by plane, so eventually they saw the van from the plane and I was told I probably should go since this is so weird.

I was going every 3 weeks or a month to Bourke to buy food and get water. It was literally the only time in my life I felt really happy. I've always struggled with depression, but now I understand that my problem is other people. If I'm alone, I can have a (mentally) normal life like other humans. This has been 2 months ago. I still haven't recovered after experiencing happiness for the first time. Life has lost all meaning and I'm just living because I'm not dead. I have to do something or go back. But I can't do what I did again. I'll live in fear of being found out.

So I want to find a property for sale that's far from people, but close enough that I can travel for food (maybe up to 200km), for maybe a maximum of $150k, but hopefully less. It can be pretty small, as long as no one can kick me out and it's far away from people. I can't find anything like that, or even much more expensive. I called a real estate agent in Bourke and he said it's impossible, only people who know people, and only massive lands. Unfortunately I found I'm incompetent in self sufficiency (I can hunt but I didn't have the courage to kill and I couldn't find plants to eat there), so it needs to be close enough to a town. To be clear, people are what I'm afraid of. I need to feel safe, to know I won't see any human, and no human will see me.

So, tl,dr:

I need a piece of land, even if small, for hopefully less than $150k, a maximum of 200km from the nearest town, but with no one around the land. Better if it's in the outback. Is there some kind of professional I can talk about that? I am completely ignorant of these tings.

I may remove this post, since I don't know if I should be posting this. But thanks for any help. The story is a lot longer than that, but I guess it's enough info.

I saw it on f-droid news and I'm surprised I haven't heard anything about it. Probably because it's new.

Most other browsers are Firefox forks, but if I understand this one only uses the engine. As such most other ones feel like just slightly different Firefox versions. But this one is very different, and I'm liking a lot! Many things on the UI are easier to use and many options I don't see in Firefox. I specially like the options it give before you first use (search engine, ublock, block or not AI).

It's also a lot faster, because I blocked many samsung services on my phone like face recognition and Firefox becomes super slow without it (Fennec keeps crashing).

The only thing I don't like so far is that I don't see how to hide the URL bar for fullscreen, and typing a URL is very weird in the middle of a bunch of options (very welcome options, but URL typing should be prioritized).

I highly recommend giving it a go. Specially the chromium browser people. I never experienced the complaints I see from them before blocking services on my phone, but those who had issues with Firefox clones might find that it's better.

One question I have is how trustworthy is the developer. But he seems to not be based in the US, which is a big plus to begin with.

Are there other communities I should post this on? I think this project would benefit from more exposure.

I don't see any donation option. And it's annoying that the only communication is through microsoft's github..

I hope this is not inappropriate. I live in australia, a massive supporter of israel/US. I am aware that my money here will always directly or indirectly support israel/US murdering people. There's nothing I can do about them, but I want to make sure I'm not helping them, and even better, if possible, hurting them.

I would like to take the money out of the bank and invest in companies that do not support in any way the monsters, and part of it to donate to fight them, if such option legally (since they control the law) exists. But I'm having trouble finding anything.

I found this thread which lead nowhere on reddit https://old.reddit.com/r/HalalInvestor/comments/1az8ph6/stocks_that_arent_supporting_israel/ But I think most of them are americans. Maybe in a non american audience I could get ideas.

As for donations, my main concern is that, like I said, they control the law, so I have little way of knowing that any organization I donate to will be allowed to do something legally, and any organization actually fighting them are instantly "terrorists" and my money would never reach them.

For that reason, I am not trying to help Palestinians, but also, and more importantly, because that would treat the symptom, but not the disease. After they wipe out Palestine from earth, they will go after the next profitable target. Or not even wait for that, see Iran, Iraq, Cuba, etc. There are enough people trying already to help them, and they are being stopped because the oppressor is too powerful. I want to help fix that issue instead.

And if I can't help, at least I want to make sure I'm not making it worse. Keeping my money in banks or basically anywhere in australia is helping to make it worse. Even paying taxes here is making it worse. I want to make sure I'm not the problem.

I am not worried about profits. I am just worried about not wasting/loosing money. It's my only weapon, I have to use it well, and I might need it in the future, though I don't need much money currently, since I live in a van.

So, long post.... is there any suggestion?

So, I've had a s21 ultra that I bought second hand years ago and I love it. I don't use as primary because I don't trust google/samsung (I use graphene on a pixel5) but I keep it as stock for the amazing camera.

I made the mistake of making a google account to play games. I just used random letters as I have no interest on it and I'm just being forced for the game to run. Today the phone was stuck on "phone is starting". I tried reseting cache on recovery, but nothing. I figured only factory reset would work.

Now it forced me to login to my @#$@$#%ing google account that I never wanted. It won't let me use my @#$@#$ing phone if I don't know the @#@%@ing google garbage. Is my amazing phone now a piece of brick because google needs to sell my data for my "security"? Is it really gone?

It's recently updated. I don't remember if I unlocked the bootloader (I don't think there are custom roms for it so I didn't bother) but it seems to be locked. Is there really nothing to be done?

I bought it for 1/4 of the price, but it was still a lot of money for me. Totally worthy because the camera is amazing, but did google really destroy my phone for my "security"? I understand forcing to wipe out data, but bricking the phone? How on hell is that for my security?

Just complaining out loud. I know that the answer is the same as "protect from terrorism" or "protect the children" is just really "to give us more money". But anyway, is there something that can be done?

Apple is the same or even worse right? if not, as much as I hate them, I would move. But now... It looks to me that if I want a good camera, I buy a real bulky one. If I want a good processor, I buy a laptop. Nowadays phones need to be just cheap garbage that can be thrown away easily if you don't want to please google/apple....

Anyway, any help is appreciated, though with my knowledge of phones, I think there is none. It's a brick now, that I wish I could throw at some people on google...

Unrelated, but expected, there was a proudly displayed "Make america great again" red cap on the front, not visible because of the glass reflection. It is so weird how every owner of this kind of car I've seen has the exact personality I would expect. It's just a car, and yet, it's also a personality.

Anyway, there should be a sticker visible on the windshield right? If it is illegal is there a way to report it?

I realize now that I stupidly forgot to include the disabled sign in front of it. So I'm not sure that would be enough proof... Though you can still see the sign on the reflection of the super shiny metal (it's also weird that I've never seen one of those dirty from off road driving).