For me it’s the paranoia surrounding webcams. People outright refuse to own one and I understand, until they go on and on about how they’re being spied. Here’s the secret - unplug the damn thing when you think you won’t use it or haven’t used it in a while.
They, whoever it is, can’t really spy on you on something that’s already off and unplugged!
Password managers. People will use anything but that: paper, notes app (without any security), using the same password everywhere…
Eh, I don’t trust any 3rd party enough to give them all my passwords and I don’t trust myself enough to secure a server for self hosting a password manager.
I know all my passwords, can’t forget em, no paper or notes, no repeat passwords.
If you know all your passwords and can’t forget them, I’m assuming your using some sort of pattern to remember them in which case you have a major issue in case of data breaches as your other passwords can be guessed.
Just as a heads up, sometimes the pattern is not that easy for computer to brute force. As an example, my old password contains a birth date but with an alternating shift making them a combination of digit and symbol.
Keepass. Password database is a local file.
Technically you could use PGP to encrypt a .txt file with all your passwords in it. Which would be more or less the same thing with a lot less polish to it.
this is the way
Sorry stupid question, but how do I import my passwords from Proton Pass to KeepassDX?
I looked it up for you; you can export your Proton Pass database as a .csv file and then import it into KeePass. Not sure about KeePassDX but on XC, there’s a csv import option. There’s also a json import option but it says BitWarden for that so I’m not sure if the json Proton Pass exports is in the same structure as KeePassXC expects.
Keepassdx is an android app for keepassdx databases with a nice ui. I use it too.
Thanks for the answer! Another question: does saving the data on KeepassDX keep all the passwords and such for me to import to other apps if needed? Or what does the file include?
You can export as csv, html, xml from KeePassXC. Dunno about DX but you can just try it on your desktop if it’s not an option on mobile.
You know I’m looking up all these answers right? I don’t mean to be rude but you can and should just look these up yourself. You can check import and export options by opening keepassxc/keepassdx and checking for yourself
Yeah, you’re right. Sorry, I definitely have a tendency to treat Lemmy as a search engine sometimes. Nonetheless I appreciate you answering me!
Fucking THANK YOU.
A very good friend of mine doesn’t use any password manager. I’ve often in the past told them why don’t they? They argue that then all their passwords would be gone if they forget that one master password. Okay, I say, how the fuck is having to remember 1 password harder than having to remember 20 passwords?
Came to say this exact thing.
FFS I have 100’s of passwords saved in my keepass DB, they are all different.
Passwords will only autofill on the correct site, so look alike sites are captured by that simple bit of security.
I keep telling myself I need to start using a password manager but I’m worried I won’t be able to log into things on my phone or other devices like my work computer when I need to because I don’t know the password. Is that a legitimate worry or is there a solution for this? How do you sync passwords between computer and phone?
I hse keepassxc and store my password database in onedrive. My phone has an app keepass2android which can read the database in onedrive.
I keep trying to convince my parents. Then they say but what if I forget the master password? I say they won’t with a passphrase but they don’t believe me.
Also I don’t have experience with PW managers other than 1Password, Bitwarden and Roboform. I personally didn’t like Bitwarden. I think it’s UI is janky and oldschool. Roboform is so bad I don’t even know where to start complaining. So I keep using 1Password even though the UI has been getting worse but it still works for me because of the good integration into the Apple ecosystem. But it’s rather expensive for managing the 20 something passwords my parents have. I read about breaches on other PWMs sometimes so I don’t really know what to trust and recommend.
Show them you can export the passwords and print them. It will help them to make the switch to know they cannot lose everything because it is on paper. It is what helped my parents
Keepassxc works fairly well for me, with a few quirks. Don’t know how it is on apple though.
Rebooting your PC really does fix a lot of issues.
But in Windows, you have to go to a sub-sub-sub-menu of the old control panel, click on a button called “choose what closing the lid does”, then on “change settings that are currently unavailable” and then disable “fast startup (recommended)”, just to get your pc to reboot properly.
Hold shift while you click start and shutdown (or reboot) when necessary. This will have windows do a full shutdown instead of a hybrid shutdown.
Press windows D to go to desktop and press alt F4 until you get the shutdown menu.
If you don’t have your files on another physical location you can show me, you don’t have a backup, you don’t own your files, you basically give your “digital life” to someone else.
Likewise, as the old rule goes, if you don’t have a secondary backup, then you don’t have a backup.
Yes, two is one and one is none.
I use raid 0 for backup.
^/s
I’ve never heard that expression before.
I like it!
But that extremely expensive NFT I bought has my name on it, not yours. Therefore it is owned by me and nobody else.
No I won’t show it to you.
Honestly, just Googling (or DuckDuckGo-ing) things. I tend to be the “tech person” that people ask about their computer problems quite often, and 9/10 times I just copy-paste the error code into the search bar and it tells me what to do. I’m not secret about it either, I’m like you can literally just Google it and it’ll usually work. But people still seem to think it’s magic lol.
There’s a hidden skill in there that allows you to filter out the bullshit/scam/unhelpful solutions and zero in on the helpful, legitimate stuff.
You also need crazy fast reflexes for all the popups.
Ah yes, “two idiots one keyboard”.
There’s a rumour that it was part of a bet about which producer could make the dumbest hacking scene.
Nah. People are using you and too lazy to care. They pretend it’s magic cause it’ll get you to continue being their gateway to laziness.
I think you’re underestimating peoples’ ability to filter out the massive amount of garbage results/astroturfed reviews/posts/websites out there.
As a similar “tech person,” me googling tech problems is exactly as lazy as the person asking me.
Their solution is “ask someone” and our solution is also “ask someone.”
An ad blocker, on desktop and phone.
It blocks annoying ads and also protects you against malware (malvertisement).
And please just enable blocking cookies and annoyances in unlock origin. It has filters that can be enabled, and you’ll never see a cookie banner again.
I set up my Pi-Hole years ago and haven’t touched it since. Maybe I should update it.
Wires:
- Ethernet
overpreferred over WiFi for non portable desktops - Audio gear : wired will sound better. Bluetooth headphones have batteries that almost certainly aren’t repairable.
- Peripherals, in the sane vein. I just don’t get having to charge a keyboard or mouse that sits on my desk all day.
I agree with everything except a wireless mouse. I have a magnetic usb “nub” that plugs into the mouse so when I need to charge it every couple of weeks it’s as simple as moving the mouse near enough the magnetic cable and it pops into place.
For me, the benefits of a wireless mouse far outweigh the imperceptible-to-me lag from the 2.4ghz dongle 10cm away in clear view. The only downside I can see is the weight of the battery, but I’m not a competitive FPS player so I’m good.
But what are the benefits of a wireless mouse? You don’t have to string the cable from the back of your PC to the mousepad, sure, but that’s something you do once a blue moon (unless you often go to LAN partys (which, in itself, are probably not a thing anymore)). At work, okay, I sometimes get up off my chair and have my company-provided wireless mouse on my leg to keep scrolling while I read through legal documents, but that’s a rare use case, too, no?
I don’t like the feeling of the cable dragging on the desk. Or the cable snagging on the monitor stand, or anything else on the desk.
I also prefer the aesthetics of a wireless mouse. One less cable to manage. The charge cable is tucked away and only comes out every week or so to charge overnight.
Yeah, my keyboard has a cable but my keyboard doesn’t move, and it’s a pretty sexy (and heavy) cable so it’s different than a mouse cable.
As for latency, from what I understand in many cases a wireless mouse can have less latency than some wired mice. So that’s nice too.
I guess the main downside is weight but that has never bothered me. That said, I’m not a competitive fps player, but even so some wireless mice are quite light.
Fair points you’re making there!
I guess it never bothered me enough to have even crossed my mind.
I need to look into the latency thing. From my limited knowledge it makes no sense that a wireless mouse could have better latency than a wired one. Unless the wire is made of something barely conductive to electricity and the wireless works with stupidly fast transmission tech, I guess o.o
Great review of several high end mice, wired and wireless. He found no correlation between wires and latency. Ultimately, he concludes that the most important properties of the mouse are weight and feel.
Thank you for that link, it’s actually pretty interesting and cool! Would’ve never assumed that the difference between wired and wireless can be THAT insignificant while there’s also such a big difference between brands within the same category.
Ethernet over WiFi for non portable desktops
Wi-Fi basically is wireless Ethernet, so I don’t know what “Ethernet over WiFi” is supposed to mean, and I don’t know what problem is being solved nor what solution is being proposed.
Ethernet (hard wire connection) is preferable to WI-FI. Ethernet > WI-FI. It has significantly higher speed and stability.
I see. In networking, X over Y has a specific meaning regarding layers.
Im familiar with RFC-2549 😜
They’re saying “prefer hardwired Ethernet cables rather than wifi”
I have Bluetooth earbuds that crack open when they hit a hard surface (have surviveed so far) and the battery is a little Li-Ion pouch on soldered wires. They probably don’t last as long as sealed ones of the same size but it’s very easy to find and install a replacement battery. Just check disassembly guides before buying.
While I’ve only used one or two types of bluetooth headphones, i’ve never hand any trouble replacing the battery with them. The cups just snap out and then you unplug the lithium cell and plug a new one it, at least in my experience, so that may just have been a thing with the model you got.
The fuck is “Ethernet over WiFi”. Isn’t ethernet by definition wired? If it’s x over WiFi, isn’t that just WiFi with extra steps?
Edit: I see from other comments they mean “preferable compared to”, not “used atop of”.
I think they meant it like “I prefer ethernet more than wifi”
Yeah, I saw that after seeing the other comments. I just didn’t refresh the page to see your comment until after I typed up my edit. Lol, sorry.
While not at ALL repairable, I’ve been using my AirBudz for over five years, for 50+ hours every week and the batteries still last for hours. I have my cans for FLACs, but no complaints for the price wirh AirBudz.
- Ethernet
Reboot fixes a ton of issues.
And if that doesn’t work check the physical connection by unplugging it and plugging it back in.
Is my client bugging or is this comment empty?
Nah, looks about right and empty
Awk, sed, and grep.
You might have a different type of person in mind than other commenters. Most commenters had such people in mind who won’t install a password manager or an ad-blocker, or won’t hard reboot their Windows unless supervised. Having said that, I don’t think that even if you had technical people in mind this fits the question. They tend to take substantial more effort to learn and use effectively than the scope set by the original question. I thought this question was for little things that have a quick, lasting, and substantial effect. Learning awk and sed is a different thing entirely, I think of those more as productivity tools you can invest in mastering, and pay off in the long run.
mind expanding on what these solve?
Awk is a helps you do any kind of processing of semi structured text data.
Sed is a stream editor which lets you edit a file using commands. Which is tedious until you need to replace something in a bunch if files or make very specific edits across a large number of files.
Grep is just find pattern in text file.
That assumes you can unplug it. Most devices I own have the camera built right into the device, and it can sometimes be hard to find an option that doesn’t include it. I have a Webcam cover on my desktop and laptop.
I haven’t seen one that would work for my phone, but if someone has hacked my phone, I probably have bigger issues.
That, and most people don’t know how to disable the device from their device manager.
Is it a monitor provided by your workplace? If not, well, it’s not that hard to find a monitor without a built-in camera. I found one easily enough for my gaming desktop… Unless the monitor market has dramatically changed since 2019-ish…
I’m surprised by how many people use Overleaf for writing LaTeX instead of installing something locally. It’s not that hard, guys. And the experience can be infinitely better as you can actually customize it however you want.
My recommendation is using typst instead. It’s basically the modern version of latex. And it has a good online collab platform too.
Hmmm… I must say, I tried to get back into LaTeX and I got broken packages after broken packages.
Really pushing for Typst adoption now. Works perfectly. Fast as hell. Bye technical debt.
I’ve heard about Typst, never really tried it. I don’t think I’ll completely be able to switch anytime soon since no journal accepts it afaik. But maybe I can try it out for personal stuff.
I’ll try out Typst. If it works well, I’ll definitely switch from LaTeX.
You don’t need a fancy computer. There’s endless amazing games and they run on a potato. I was just starting Bayonetta and my machine doesn’t even spin up. But it does when I open Firefox or my note taking program 🤷🏻♀️
Just keep it away from unsafe networks cuz it’ll have vulnerabilities.
Always get the version of the gadget with replaceable batteries unless you want a brick in 3-10 years. Additionally, prefer 18650, AA, AAA batteries, and keep some rechargeable ones around.
Eneloop batteries (the white ones, not the black ones) are the best AA and AAA batteries out there for sure. Panasonic sells a package of Eneloops with a charging device that accepts both AA and AAA batteries, it’s very good. Can be charged via USB and can also charge other devices, it’s the kind of device I dreamed about in the 90s.
SFTP file transfers, I’m guilty of forgetting about it myself sometimes.
Whether it’s Syncthing for keeping device data synced and backed up, or just wanting to get a file from point A to point B and using your preferred SFTP client like FileZilla, it can be really easy to forget just how easy these are.
I’m currently trying sync thing. It gets the job done but it confuses me a lot. Like you say sftp is just so much more straight forward.
And you can probably hook that up into your file system, making it super convenient.
I can try and help a bit with Syncthing, it’s got a couple idiosyncrasies that I feel like I’ve come to understand.
Which aspect of it is troubling?
Well, one device says it’s syncing, but the other doesn’t. Or it just doesn’t detect changes even after restarting it. In the end it somehow works but the UI feels finicky.
If I use USB, scp or sftp or something it just feels straight forward. I say x and it does x or I get an error. With syncthing all that is hidden and it’s confusing.
I also once had an error on a specific folder. I tried deleting and adding it again, but it was still broken. I searched online and it might be because I deleted a hidden folder. I occasionally delete stuff I don’t know. And it wasn’t able to recover from that or provide a proper error message.
All in all I think I’ll keep using it and banging my head against the wall until it works for me. It could definitely use some UI/UX touchups.
That sounds similar to the issue I ran into, Syncthing will create a .st-ignore text file (can’t remember the actual name) that links the device folders together. When I’ve deleted that I’ve encountered similar confusion and problems trying to get new folders running.
If you have Android clients, I’ve found Syncthing-Fork to be slightly better for the initial setup.
What I’ll tend to do when I have problems is remove each folder I’ve set up in Syncthing from both devices, then I’ll usually create a new folder path for my purposes. If I’ve already set up when I’m trying to accomplish then I will either rename it (sometimes it helps) or just try from the beginning again.
For example, I want my tablet to get videos from my phone and my PC, and I want these files backed up in general. So on my phone I create /Send-to-PC and on my tablet I create /Receive-from-PC. Either the host or the client can initiate the synced connection for the first time setup, so it’s just a matter of naming the Syncthing Label (such as a comment descriptor about the folder, like Media), setting the folder path within the client device (on android this might be /storage/SD-Card-ID/MediaFolder) and then choosing which devices will be connected to this label (usually via a tick-box with the Host or Client name). This is usually it, but you do have the option to set Folder Type for whether you only want to send, only receive, or send and receive, as well as Watch for Changes.
These last two may also be part of what you are noticing too. For example, if you have Watch for Changes disables, you’d have to wait for the scheduled upload, which can save phone battery by not having it sync constantly, but can also prevent syncing quickly when you want it. Or, more likely what you may run into, Send & Receive being the default can result in some odd quirks when you the Host removes an uploaded file to the client. All of the sudden your project file is vanished! This happens to me from time to time, as I’ll upload a video I want to edit on my tablet, then I’ll move/delete it since I’m in the process of editing, only to remember that Send & Receive makes it so that the client also moves it from the shared folder.
Anyway this probably isn’t very helpful, but hopefully seeing a tired rundown of how someone else uses it gives you an idea of what may be happening on your end!
😵💫
I’ll probably end up configuring a virtual file system instead
+1 for syncthing.
I feel the same way about webcams. I’m paranoid about them too, but you know what’s an easy solution? Buy a desktop monitor without one and then buy a USB webcam.
If you’re on a laptop, then for the camera just tape a piece of paper over it. As for the internal mic, you might be fucked lol cause I got nothing.
To the people who insist on me adding a sticky note to my webcam, I can only say
sudo modprobe -r uvcvideo
Anyone with root (or equivalent) access to your pc could easily undo that though.
If they have root access to my PC, webcam access is arguably not my biggest concern
It’s not the biggest, but it still is a concern, and is exceedingly easily mitigated.