idk random tech stuff?

[kradeelav]

• every time i see a UX designer ad sometimes i kick myself for not grinding experience in UX/UI when I had the chance as man, that'd be a lot more job opportunities (print design is still kinda there - imo it's a 35/65 split with print/digital - but ur missing out on big tech money), but then every time i actually see a UI design article ... or redesign with explanations ... or anything about that industry at all .. flames on the side of my face would be an understatement xD hating 99% of absolutely everything about that industry is also an understatement (see, me thinking dreamwidth is peak UI LOL) (i mean that lovingly with a shade of irony). 
  
  • "what annoys you about that industry, krad" idk, a few things ... the whole "micro-optimizing engagement is the whole reason of your paycheck" squicks out my ethics more than just slapping a logo on a paper ad. you could have a lively philosophical debate about whether one is actually more ethical or not but for me, I know i'd get fired sooner or later because I'd blow up at an executive for going the 'engagement/moar clicks' route rather than 'functional'. then there's the whole actively disagreeing with literally all the basic ""standards" done in the last 15 years .. if it were my choice we'd be all back to dumbphones, winamp, winXP (or 1996) UI ... anyway this is, clearly, why I am not a UI designer xD

• Been procrastinating on it this past year, but sometime in the past week I moved my (real name) email account over to protonmail also, and burning the google bridge once and for all.  I don't doubt that protonmail's a fed/spook/etc honeypot, but all I want is an email that's not connected with Big Data or going to be sunset like the dozens of other google apps.

• idk why i started experimenting with all these things about roughly the same month LOL but started using tor / a VPN on the regular (actually, duh, protonmail offers a free VPN connection), that's why. in some ways it's ironically way faster (???) for me at times but i'm not fond at how the VPN disconnects every time i close the laptop shut and there's no way for it to automatically reconnect when you wake it, to mimic a basic internet connection seamlessly. hmm.

• Also been using NoScript (no javascript) extensions lately to tighten up browsing habits, and it's fascinating which sites tend to have trackers all over the wazoo versus not. The amount of scripts/trackers that news sites like CNN have has been talked about before, but the most disheartening/unexpected one to see was the amount of data trackers that Inoreader (RSS reader) had.  Easily three times more than most sites. >:l  I'll still pay for it for now because damn that service sure solved an issue for me, but, huh. In hindsight that strikes me as very profitable info, knowing what the things people read who are "explicitly" off of SM and want to stay on the down low. grrr.

... i look at the above and shake my head ruefully + with amusement because this all got started with making my own site. xD  never make your site, kids, it's a gateway drug to OWNIN YER SHIT HACKIN lol. what's next, futzing with the router and raspberry pi's?

Comments

[armaina]

I've always preferred FireFox but NoScript was always the cherry on top for me. Sure it made working with websites a bit more awkward, sometimes you had to learn what 'layers' to turn on to get stuff to work, but I'm way less worried idly browsing the web than I would be, otherwise. Between Noscript and Ghostery I get much of my web experience scrubbed. (not to mention sites load way faster when they're not loaded down by trackers)

Oh I got Feedbro as an extension for firefox for my RSS reading and I think I prefer that over any log-in service or other application.

If you want a VPN running all the time, you may need to look up how to run one on the router level, as opposed to a software level. Iiiii don't have any insight on that, I just know that things like that are possible. (though I might be digging into that some time soon, I don't trust any of the 'big' VPN providers.)

(look for a hacker space/maker space in your area, you may find tools and meetups to learn how to make stuff with raspberry pi >_> )

[kradeelav]

Oooh thank you for the feedbro rec! i'm shocked they even do twitter feeds for free, that felt like a "paying service" type of thing. :o may have to play with that this weekend, it'd be lovely to not have to pay for a RSS reader.

edit: ahhh, I see where the sticking point is. unfortunately inoreader does have a capability where you can make custom rules - eg, if I follow a twitter artist who's amazing with art, but I don't want to see their text or reblogged posts, there's cool rules where you can edit those out. either way, still, thank you - it's nice to know there's a backup that has like, 90% of the functionality.

[queenlua]

i haven't used a VPN in a while, but i'm familiar with the "connectivity go away when laptop sleep :((((" problem from ssh connections. two common solutions in the ssh case (mosh and screen) won't really work, but, i'm curious if adjusting the keepalive value in Some Relevant Location might work? e.g. https://superuser.com/questions/625721/how-to-keep-alive-the-vpn-connection

incomplete solution, yay if it helps, alas if not :P

also dw is PEAK ui you are RIGHT

[armaina]

So, you can add your own rules to Feedbro in regard to how you want it to react to something.
https://armaina.dreamwidth.org/file/29889.png
The feed isn't dynamic so it won't apply to feeds you already got stuff in so you'd have to re-add the feed to get the rule to apply since it's either applied to new articles that come in or articles you view.

It's not perfect by any means, and the free reader I think limits to 100? (and this is all saved client side, they don't see/keep any of the information.) And I'm not sure if there's a way to filter twitter posts to media posts only (IDK if there's a regexp that would work for it, I'm not familiar enough with regexp and twitter to be able to know how to do that.) but there ARE filters of a sort you can apply if you need to.

Though admittedly I'm using it to keep track of comics I follow, because I get little notifs for every update
https://armaina.dreamwidth.org/file/31377.png

[kradeelav]

!!! danke, this feels like a fun little project along with the rest 8D just knowing that it's possible to keep that specific value awake feels like the good kind of puzzle.

of course imma regret saying that NOW lol