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    11. Recommend me a new phone

      ~tech Ask (recommendations)
      Hi all -- I have had a Moto G5+ for the last two years, and have been largely happy with it. However, it's recently developed some serious issues w/ charging -- it tends to not ever get past ~45%,...

      Hi all -- I have had a Moto G5+ for the last two years, and have been largely happy with it. However, it's recently developed some serious issues w/ charging -- it tends to not ever get past ~45%, and the battery indicator seems to be ... disconnected from how long the phone actually lasts. I have attempted cleaning out the charging port (there was a lot of caked-in dust), changing the charging cable and port, to no avail. It works ok-ish for the moment, but I have largely been limiting it to emergency usage and I suspect it's on it's way out.

      So, I find myself in the market for a new phone. In the past I have typically gone with whatever the cheapest reasonable Android phone has been (hence, the G5+ which I really do like quite a bit besides the poor camera). I am not a heavy phone user, and I really don't care about having the latest and greatest, my priorities are:

      • long battery life (my Moto G5 lasts two days fully charged)
      • cheap (say 200-300$, the SE on this thread is probably the upper bound of what I'd want to spend)
      • reasonably performant
      • preferably reasonable privacy protections (probably a pipe-dream)

      The Moto G series have checked all boxes (apart from privacy) in the past, but I am considering whether I can take this opportunity to rid myself of another Google device in my life. I was thinking potentially going for a refurbished iPhone, but I really have no idea what to be looking for there. I haven't used an Apple device since my iPod (iTunes on Windows PTSD is real, and I don't even want to think about Linux support), and I am more than a bit hesitant to tie myself into their ecosystem, but it's hard to deny their superiority from a privacy standpoint.

      I had also considered a Librem 5 at one point, and would be willing to spend a bit more for something so privacy oriented. But the 6-month order window, and other things I read about Purisms' roll-out have left me a bit wary there.

      Any thoughts?

      Thanks!

      12 votes

    13. Is macOS truly the holy grail UX for older people?

      ~tech Text 299 words
      My mother is 65+ years old and loves everything Apple, but whenever I need to touch her computer I find myself questioning that choice. The degree to which Apple abstract things from the user...

      My mother is 65+ years old and loves everything Apple, but whenever I need to touch her computer I find myself questioning that choice.

      The degree to which Apple abstract things from the user enables the most absurd behaviors. macOS gives little indication about which programs are open, and the red x on the top left corner just closes windows, not apps. Because the session persistence is so robust, the consequence is that my mother's Macbook Air keeps 12+ programs and their states open at all times literally for months. Every time she comes over from another continent, I close a bunch of stuff and get her an instant performance boost. Plus, she's never really sure if a program is open or not.

      The concept of (work)Spaces, as well as the launchpad, spotlight, or even how Finder really works is beyond her. Because of her over-reliance on the dock, she never enabled autohiding, so her screen real state is always crowded.

      Folders are entirely immaterial for her. Everything goes to "Downloads" with no organization whatsoever, and she's always looking for stuff "manually" by reading the filenames.

      Her machine is running Mojave, and right now I can only see that finder displays two "Libraries": Documents and Downloads. Linux and Windows have Videos, Downloads, Music, etc. Those are easy to make sense of. What's the supposed Mac alternative? Buy stuff on iTunes. Well, if something is not on Amazon Video or Netflix my mother is a pirate like me (hehe), so she never made sense of it and I truly despise using iTunes for doing anything at all. She also downloads a bunch of media related to her job.

      I'm not saying macOS is bad, I'm just asking: is it really the best choice for non-technical older people?

      15 votes

    19. I have used Android my entire life. Then I acquired four Apple devices in a week.

      ~tech Text 799 words
      Hi Tilderinos! As the title says, I have used Android almost my entire life. Many parts of the internet (especially reddit) really look down on Apple for many reasons (may of them valid). Starting...

      Hi Tilderinos!

      As the title says, I have used Android almost my entire life. Many parts of the internet (especially reddit) really look down on Apple for many reasons (may of them valid). Starting about 3 weeks ago, I started to wonder if the grass really was greener on the other side. I would like to share my experience.

      My first smart device was an iPod tough 4th generation. Back then, iOS was really bad. Notifications took over the screen. If you didn't want to deal with a notification right then, you had to dismiss it permanently. Multitasking did not exist (until a few updates later) Android was miles better then. Switching was the obvious choice. Flash forward to now, through many different android devices. I had a Samsung Galaxy S10e, Galaxy Watch LTE, and Galaxy Buds. I had the best ecosystem of devices that Android has to offer (Tizen vs WearOS is arguable, but I have not used WearOS).

      I wanted to get back into mountain biking, and I wanted to bring only my buds and watch. This should be an obvious use case for an LTE watch and bluetooth earbuds. Unfortunately, transferring music to the watch is a difficult prospect. You must have the files downloaded onto your phone, but I use Spotify or Google Play Music. Spotify does have a Tizen app, but it is pretty terrible. Also, I wanted to have audiobooks and podcasts downloaded to listen to. I could not find any apps for audiobooks or podcasts for my Galaxy Watch. All my google-fu got me to the answer: Just transfer the files and play them in the watch music app. This was a pretty bad solution for a few reasons. First, listening times did not sync with the phone. Second, I don't think that the watch music app would save the timestamp when you closed it. Finally, the Galaxy Watch has 4gb storage, and only leaves around 2gb usable. Game of Thrones book 5 weighs in at about 1.3gb. If I wanted my book and even a single episode from most of my podcasts, that would not be enough storage.

      Because of this experience, I started looking into the Apple Watch. My grandfather gave me his old iPhone 6s+ and I got an Apple Watch series 3 LTE for a great deal on craigslist. I thought the phone would be a downgrade from an s10e. In a few ways it is, such as the screen, battery life, and camera. But for everything else about this phone, it is just as good as my s10e, which is 4 years newer. I still have my s10e, and I keep it charged. There are very few times where I want to use my s10e over my 6s+. This was not what I was expecting when I switched. I expected to use the 6s+ to see if I could handle a new iPhone, just so I could use an Apple Watch. Since then, I borrowed my dad's old MacBook Pro mid 2012 non-retina, to see if I liked OS X. I am currently typing this in that MacBook. I also bought the AirPods Pro.

      Almost every single interaction between these devices is quick, intuitive, and seamless. OS X is way better than windows. Parallels makes running windows software a dream. When I bought parallels, I was able to pay with my watch through Apple Pay. I have not heard of any software doing anything like that with google/samsung pay and windows. Overcast is able to automatically sync podcasts and playback times to the watch, and easily switch which device is playing. Audible is a bit more clunky (and I am still looking for an alternative for books), but it is possible to get books on the watch, and the playback time syncs without issue. The AirPods Pro seamlessly switch between the phone and watch. They are already paired with the MBP through iCloud, although they do not seamlessly switch. I think this is because the bluetooth chip in the computer is too old. CarPlay is miles better than android auto. Siri is just as good for most thing as google assistant, and is more consistent.

      This is a pretty long post already, but the bottom line is every single apple device I am trying out is better than the corresponding android/windows device that is 2-4 years newer. After many years of shunning apple, I am back on the apple bandwagon. I am currently planning on replacing all of my devices with something from apple (except my gaming desktop, unfortunately). I would like to hear about your experiences with switching to or from either ecosystem.

      (Mods: I wasn't sure if this should be in ~talk or ~tech. Please move it if necessary)

      19 votes

    29. Apple announces new MacBook Air and iPad Pro

      ~tech Text 238 words
      I figured one thread for all of Apple's new product announcements would be enough. The new MacBook Air with the same redesigned keyboard as the 16-inch model and newer processors. I'm glad to see...

      I figured one thread for all of Apple's new product announcements would be enough.

      The new MacBook Air with the same redesigned keyboard as the 16-inch model and newer processors. I'm glad to see that they're bringing the keyboard to the rest of the lineup so quickly (I'm writing this on a 2017 MacBook Pro and this keyboard is not pleasant even after two and a half years of adjustment).

      The new iPad Pro is where things get interesting. Same design as the previous iPad Pros, but now with an ultra wide camera and a LIDAR sensor.

      The iPad Pro also has a new keyboard and trackpad accessory that looks interesting. It has an adjustable hinge that can hold the iPad at any angle, which is one of my biggest complaints with the current keyboard case. I'm interested to see how well it works in a lap when hands on videos start coming out.

      I'm excited that Apple is bringing official pointing support to iOS (beyond the basic accessibility feature in iOS 13). This could be a game changer. I'm also excited that it's coming to iOS 13.4 (and all iPads that can run it) and they aren't waiting until iOS 14 to roll out the feature. I've wanted Apple to start rolling out features on an ongoing basis (like Google is doing with the Pixel Feature Drops) rather than as one big drop every fall.

      14 votes

    33. Jailbreaking - How do you know if a tweak is safe?

      ~tech Ask (advice)
      I've been jailbreaking for years now, and one of the things that have always puzzled me was how the jailbreak community determines whether or not a tweak has malicious code since they aren't...

      I've been jailbreaking for years now, and one of the things that have always puzzled me was how the jailbreak community determines whether or not a tweak has malicious code since they aren't always open-sourced. With the latest releases of checkra1n, and unc0ver, I've gotten back into jailbreaking since I wanted to jailbreak my 12.9" iPad Pro. From my understanding, the jailbreak itself (usually) is open-sourced, so it can generally be "vetted" that way. I typically stay away from using too many tweaks and try to stick with those from the "more well-known" developers, but I'm curious how others decide which developers/tweaks to trust and use? Do you strictly base it on "bug-reports" and a developer's reputation? What other factors come into play? There are tweaks like "Compatimark" that helps with compatibility information (but that's not really what I'm talking about).

      Edit: First time posting a topic here, so hopefully it isn't breaking any rules.

      9 votes

    42. Rameses B - Cosmonauts (2020)

      ~music Text 108 words
      'Cosmonauts' is a 9-track concept album about coming together through the hard times when you feel most alone and pushing each other to achieve things you couldn't otherwise do individually. When...

      'Cosmonauts' is a 9-track concept album about coming together through the hard times when you feel most alone and pushing each other to achieve things you couldn't otherwise do individually. When you reach it, you'll feel a grand sense of euphoria.

      • On Bandcamp.
      • On DistroKid (contains Spotify, Apple Music, iTunes, Google Play, Tidal and iHeartRadio links).
      Songs on YouTube:
      1. Raindrops (ft. Rhode)
      2. All for One (ft. Veela & Zoë Moon)
      3. Lost
      4. Hold Me Close
      5. Through My Eyes
      6. Hero (ft. irosa)
      7. God Mode
      8. Cosmonauts
      9. Far from Home

      A few weeks ago an announcement video was also posted, a 1:30 minute mix of a few songs on the album.

      3 votes

    46. Let's share recipes!

      ~food Ask (recommendations)
      With Pepperplate.com moving their service to an overpriced subscription (queue the exodus), I've been moving some key recipes over to Paprika¹, I figured it'd be a good time to ask for some decent...

      With Pepperplate.com moving their service to an overpriced subscription (queue the exodus), I've been moving some key recipes over to Paprika¹, I figured it'd be a good time to ask for some decent recipes.

      Tuck your recipe and method in a <details> with a good <summary> so the thread is easy to browse.

      I'll get us started!

      Coconut-Braised Chicken with Chorizo and Potatoes This comes from [Food and Wine Magazine](https://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/coconut-braised-chicken-chorizo-and-potatoes)

      INGREDIENTS

      Chicken

      • 2 tablespoons canola oil
      • 6 whole chicken legs (2 pounds)
      • Kosher salt
      • Pepper
      • 1/2 pound fresh Mexican chorizo
      • 1 onion, thinly sliced
      • 1 tablespoon minced peeled fresh ginger
      • 1 garlic clove, minced
      • 1 dried chile de árbol, broken in half
      • 3 cups unsweetened coconut milk
      • 1 pound baking potatoes, peeled and cut into 2-inch pieces
      • 2 tablespoons fresh lime juice, plus lime wedges for serving
      • 1 tablespoon unsalted butter

      Gremolata

      • 1/4 cup finely chopped cilantro, plus sprigs
      • 7 coffee beans, finely crushed (1/2 teaspoon)
      • 2 teaspoons finely grated lime zest

      METHOD

      Make the chicken

      • Preheat the oven to 425°. In a large enameled cast-iron casserole, heat the oil. Season the chicken with salt and pepper. Working in 2 batches, brown the chicken over moderate heat, turning occasionally, about 8 minutes per batch. Transfer the chicken to a large plate. Add the chorizo and onion to the casserole and cook, stirring to break up the meat, until the onion is translucent, about 5 minutes. Stir in the ginger, garlic and chile and cook until fragrant, 1 minute. Add the coconut milk, potatoes and chicken to the casserole and bring to a simmer. Cover and braise in the oven for about 1 hour, until the chicken is cooked through. Stir in the lime juice and butter and season with salt.

      Make the Gremolata

      • In a small bowl, combine all of the ingredients and mix well. Make sure the cilantro and lime zest is fairly dry, but not dehydrated.

      Plating

      • Spoon the braised chicken and potatoes into shallow bowls. Garnish with the gremolata 
and cilantro sprigs and serve with lime wedges.
      Gordon Ramsay's Stupid Simple Broccoli Soup

      INGREDIENTS

      • 1 large or two medium broccoli clusters (as fresh as possible)
      • Salt (3 tsp.)
      • Ground Black Pepper (4-5 turns on the grind wheel)
      • Water
      • Olive Oil
      • Goat Cheese (2 slices per bowl, preferably 'ashed')
      • Walnuts (about 5 per bowl)

      METHOD

      Cutting the Cheese

      • You will want to slice your goat cheese at this point
      • Dip the knife into the boiling hot water before each slice for even smooth cuts. Cut two slices of goat cheese per bowl being served. I like them about 5mm or so thick.
      • After cutting, use the hot smooth side of your knife to smooth one side of the cheese slices for appearance.

      The Soup

      • Your broccoli is finished cooking when you can pierce it with little or no effort. Remove the stock pan from the stove burner.

      DO NOT POUR THE WATER OUT!

      • Use a slotted spoon to add broccoli to a blender but be careful because it's boiling hot!
      • Pour enough of the water left over from cooking the broccoli to fill the blender half way.
      • Add a pinch (or more) of salt.
      • Use several pulses on your blender to break the broccoli up and then puree for several seconds.

      Plating

      • Add five walnuts to the bottom of a shallow bowl and then place pieces of goat cheese on top of them.
      • Pour soup into shallow bowl around the cheese, not on it. Drizzle lightly with olive oil and serve at once!
      Miso-Squash Soup with Sesame-Ginger Apples This is from [SeriousEats](https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2015/10/miso-squash-soup-recipe.html) and is another super simple soup that is always a hit.

      INGREDIENTS

      • 1 1/2 quarts plus 2 cups water, divided, plus more as needed
      • 1/2 ounce kombu (approximately a 4- by 6-inch piece; see note)
      • 1/2 ounce grated bonito flakes (about 3 cups; see note)
      • 1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon vegetable oil, divided
      • 1 leek, white and light green parts only, diced (about 1 1/2 cups)
      • 2 medium carrots, diced (about 1 cup)
      • 2 medium cloves garlic, sliced
      • 2 (1 1/2-inch) knobs ginger, 1 knob peeled and thinly sliced, 1 knob peeled and finely grated, divided
      • 1 (2-pound) squash, such as kuri, kabocha, or butternut, peeled, seeded, and diced
      • 2 tablespoons white or red miso paste
      • 1 tablespoon fresh juice from 1 lemon
      • 1 teaspoon kosher salt, plus more as needed
      • Pinch sugar, if needed
      • 1 large crisp apple, such as Fuji, peeled, cored, and diced
      • 1 large or 2 medium scallions, white and light green parts only, thinly sliced on the bias
      • 1 teaspoon toasted sesame seeds
      • 1/2 teaspoon toasted sesame oil
      • 1 teaspoon rice vinegar
      • Shichimi togarashi, optional

      METHOD

      • Combine 1 1/2 quarts water, kombu, and bonito flakes in a large saucepan and bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce to a bare simmer and cook for 5 minutes. Remove from heat, let cool for 5 minutes, then strain through a fine-mesh strainer. Discard solids and set dashi aside.
      • In a large Dutch oven or soup pot, heat 1 tablespoon oil over medium-high heat until shimmering. Add leek, carrot, garlic, and sliced ginger. Cook, stirring, until vegetables are glistening and just starting to turn tender, about 4 minutes.
      • Add squash and pour just enough dashi on top to cover vegetables. Bring to a simmer and cook until vegetables are fully tender, about 30 minutes. Using a standing blender or immersion blender, and working in batches if necessary, blend soup until very smooth. Blend in miso and lemon juice.
      • Return soup to pot and thin with enough water to reach a pourable, silky-smooth consistency. Season with salt, add sugar to taste, and keep warm.
      • Meanwhile, fill a medium bowl with 2 cups water and 1 teaspoon kosher salt. Add diced apple and let soak for 10 minutes. Drain apple well, then return to bowl. Toss with grated ginger, scallions, toasted sesame seeds, sesame oil, rice vinegar, and remaining 1 teaspoon vegetable oil. Season with salt, if needed.
      • To serve, ladle hot soup into bowls and top with the apple-scallion salad. Garnish with shichimi togarashi, if desired.

      ¹Paprika is an overpriced recipe organizer -- paprikaapp.com -- it's okay, but also kind of lame.

      16 votes