Yes I have to switch to light mode everytime I go outside during the day because (unfortunately) my screen just isn’t quite bright enough in direct sunlight but switching to light mode helps me see things a little better.

But normally I prefer to be in dark mode. It saves battery (I have an AMOLED display) and is easier on the eyes especially indoors/in dark environments/at night.

If my screen was brighter I’d leave dark mode on when outside in direct sunlight too.

I went with Nvidia and I never really had any issues on Linux with it (I only use Linux).

AMD might be better on Linux out of the box in the sense that you can just install whatever distro and it’s going to work and with Nvidia some distros will require to install the drivers yourself or tinker one time in the terminal but it’s really not that big of a deal

But go with whatever you think is best for you.

I have graphene OS on my pixel 8. RCS works flawlessly with the Google messages app. No issues…

I want to like futo but I think it just needs more time. I’m using Gboard without the Internet access turned on (I’m using graphene OS) so I’m not worried about Google knowing anything I type.

I mostly use the swipe to text feature and I just haven’t found another keyboard that does it better than Gboard (unfortunately)

Personally I’d be way more concerned with using OEM Android in the West than using wechat anywhere but if it’s really an issue for you then I’d say insist on trying session or signal… One of those are probably your best options if you’re worried about being spied on…

If she’s unwilling to try them or doesn’t like them then I guess you have to settle for wechat or traditional SMS (although without RCS I find SMS to be a trip to a previous decade lol)

But have they figured out how to keep the wheels from falling off?

I think the US would be better off to finally have a president who is one of them. Meaning not rich or famous. Just a regular working class person who isn’t well connected.

Seems like every president is rich, well connected, famous or totally bought off and they all end up running the country basically the same way. The only thing that ever changes is the surface level Idpol/who they pander to.

Btw I’d still use mint…I only switched away because I wasn’t a big fan of how much it looked like windows and how green everything was. Lol. But I was still a noob at the time and hadn’t fully comprehended how customizable Linux distros are. I could’ve changed a lot with the appearance if I knew what I was doing

Honestly. I don’t think you’re missing much. It’s not like if you go to a different distro suddenly you’re going to have all these new applications you can’t get on mint or anything.

I started with mint and played around with other distros (mostly Debian/Ubuntu & Arch based ones) and I ended up settling on an Ubuntu based distro with kde desktop.

Using something like Arch might make sense if your PC is super new as they tend to have support for the newest hardware.

At most you might want to try a different desktop environment but if you have no reason to hop I would say don’t waste your time unless you’re bored and want to experiment just for the hell of it.

there’s a site that will let you play around with different distros/desktop environments over the Web (it’s going to be slow and you can’t use a VPN when connecting) but that might be a good choice before going through the trouble of downloading a distro, flashing to USB and possibly installing it on your PC/laptop just to find out you hate it.

For your phone use “newpipe”.

For privacy on your computer use YouTube in a different browser than your main browser without logging in. For example I use brave with an ad blocker just to watch YouTube on my computer and then I go back to my main browser for my daily usage for anything that’s not a Google service/website

In my experience I’ve noticed Linux tends to (disproportionately) attract both libertarians and socialists/communists. I feel like I run into more of both within the Linux community than I do in other communities.

I started using Linux because I couldn’t force myself to use Windows 8. Up to that point I used whatever version of Windows came right before the graphical interface but 8 was too awful so I started playing with mint and never went back…

I got off the capitalism train in the middle of that but that was only because I decided to major in business and when I saw how the sausage was made I jumped ship but I didn’t know anything about socialism or communism or marxism or whatever you want to call it. I was so not into politics or economics that I literally had to search the Internet and ask people on social media what was an alternative to the crap I was reading for my classes… And then I went down that rabbit hole. If was enlightening. I learned a lot.

Also… for people who think college is Marxist indoctrination…Marx was brought up for one paragraph in one book at the very very end of my 4 years. But by that point I already knew who he was just from the rabbit hole I went down when I was curious for some alternative to what I was being taught.

If enough people steal via self checkout they will go away. (This is not shopping/self checkout advice)

Yeah I’ve been looking for an alternative to Nova myself. I’ve tried many but I just keep coming back for one reason or another. .I have graphene os but the default launcher is a little too plain for me. The search continues I guess. I’ll check some listed here that I haven’t tried. Maybe lawnchair will be worth it when they put out a new release.

For me it’s this (the color coded notification LED on phones) and while on the topic of phones I used to have a xiaomi phone several years ago that had an infrared face unlock feature so you could use face unlock in complete darkness. Haven’t had a phone with that before or after. It was awesome.

Are you using the VPN on your laptop or phone only? If so, maybe try to run your VPN at the router level and see if you can cast then? It might work…

By not caring who wins you already seem to understand this sick game of three card monte they keep playing on Americans every 2 to 4 years. Good on you for not playing along.

I don’t think it matters all that much if trump/republicans win or if Biden/democrats win.

I feel like I’ve seen enough elections in my life to know that the POTUS is largely just a human sock puppet for the peasants to fight over online and in the street.

No matter which corporate owned tool wins the gameplan stays the same.

Impoverish you. Obey the donors. Sanctions + bombs. Tax cuts. Turn their pockets inside out when it comes to anything poor/working class people need. I could go on but I think you get the point.

The slow suicidal summersault into ww3 shall continue. Buckle up.

You’re right. I was just referring to items where the generic version did but the name brand version didn’t.

There would be another president & the west wouldn’t be happy with that one either

Hard to say. Gotta check the labels because I’ve noticed a lot of the store brand items (especially at Walmart) have known carcinogens in the ingredients.