FireWally Is A Great Firewall App for Mac, and It's Free “Most people haven't actively managed a firewall in at least a decade, assuming they ever have. But keeping track of which applications are using the internet—and how much data they're using—is still useful at times, as is blocking apps from accessing the net entirely.” Yes free on a Mac is a feature! But despite that, it could be a useful app especially when roaming. It is for Mac only though. The linked article also has a link to the page in the app store to get the app. See

Lifehacker

This Is the Best Firewall App for Mac I

FireWally is a free Mac firewall app that lets you manage data access from the menu bar.

#technology #security

Jack Dorsey’s Bitchat App Sees Downloads Spike in Uganda Over Internet Shutdown Worries “Recently, the app drew attention during Nepal’s Gen Z protests, where it supported protesters in overthrowing the government. On September 4, authorities banned 26 platforms, including Facebook, X, YouTube, and Signal, to curb demonstrations against nepotism and a digital tax. Downloads jumped from 3,000 to 50,000 daily, with 48,000 in Nepal alone on September 8, equating to 38% of global installations. Users leveraged Bitchat’s mesh networking capabilities, with each node extending reach up to 30 meters in crowded areas, to organise marches that culminated in arson at the parliament building and the regime’s fall.” Bitchat is a decentralised peer-to-peer messaging application that operates over Bluetooth mesh networks. No internet required, no servers, no phone numbers. This also means ideally you want to have installed it BEFORE any outages. It is an open source and offline mesh chat application, which means each device acts as both client and server, automatically discovering peers and relaying messages across multiple hops to extend the network's reach. It is similar to what Meshtastic does with license-free radio. There is zero registration required, and therefore it is also not easy to identify anyone using it. It does now also have Geohash channels, where someone on that channel will extend it to the Internet, if available. The Internet side can use the Tor network if available. Broadcast messages are public, but if you know someone's handle on Bitchat, you can chat with full end-to-end-encryption. It has an interesting feature to emergency delete all chats, keys, etc when you triple tap on the app title. And apart from protests and censorship resistance, it is also ideal for any natural disasters where infrastructure has been knocked out. The app runs on iOS as well as Android. See

Gizmodo

Jack Dorsey’s Bitchat Sees Downloads Spike in Uganda Over Internet Shutdown Worries

Ugandans have good reason to believe there will be a blackout soon.

and get the app at

bitchat

#technology #opensource #decentralised #protests #disasters

I replaced Trello, Toggl, and TickTick with free, open-source Super Productivity Well I have not done so myself, as I still see a shortcoming around not being able to set custom repeats based on a first Wednesday of every month, or the last weekday of the month. It does though have repeats based on fixed schedules as well as completion date, which is important if you want to repeat something after you finished a task e.g. cleaning my weather station 3 months after I did it last. But apart from that it has a very nice modern look to it, and is pretty powerful in many other aspects. It has a few powerful productivity views such as Eisenhower Matrix and Kanban, procrastination buster, AI productivity prompts, etc (some are plugins). It also has a great review at the end of the day, with a lot of stats and scoring. I like the tag and project views so you can see different groupings of your tasks. It has quite a focus on timers, taking breaks, etc too. Migrating from a different todo planner is not so easy so as there is no importer from say TickTick at all. It seems there is no global standard for importing/exporting todos across apps. Someone has created a bridging app that may help with this, but for me to fully migrate my 149 unique tasks to this, could be pretty painful as mine have lots of custom repeats, sub-tasks, etc in. It is free with no paid cloud sync service. It will sync via Dropbox, Google Drive, WebDAV, or local file sync (like Synthing). But it is syncing a file, so if two clients edit offline, only the last one will win on re-connection. This is a bit like I had wit Obsidian Notes when using Syncthing. So even if you self-host it in Docker, that is just a web client that must still sync to Dropbox or wherever (unlike say Joplin Notes which is a proper centralised sync server). See

How-To Geek

I replaced Trello, Toggl, and TickTick with this one free, open-source app

You get the power of three, and that too for free.

#technology #productivity #todo

5 costs of self-hosting that nobody talks about I can attest to all of these reasons. Just today and yesterday I've been solving an issue with my docker networks grabbing 192.168.x.x addresses ranges (after the upgrade to OMV8 overwrote the daemon.json file I'd customised to prevent this). And two days before that I was having mysterious freezes on my server which “eventually” came down to a cheap Chinese 2A power supply to one of my RAID disks (well I'll know for sure after a new ATX power supply arrives tomorrow). So, yes you do save subscription costs, but you spend more time diagnosing issues, additional costs upgrading hardware, and taking your data in your own hands. I still think it is worth it, but to be honest, it may really not be a cost saver at all. If I think of what I've spent on server hardware, UPS devices, additional NAS drives, a network cabinet, a firewall and switches that support VLANs, a VPS hosted service, etc. I'm suspecting if I put that US$900 or so aside and just used it for subscription services, maybe I'd still have money left ;-) Some services, like my password manager and todo list manager, I do actually pay for cloud services, because they are absolutely critical and cannot be down. But there is also the fun factor to self-hosting, as well as having home services up when the Internet is offline. See

XDA

5 costs of self-hosting that nobody talks about

Self-hosting is awesome, but few veterans mention these potential downsides

#technology #selfhosting

Solid state batteries are now a reality — better in ALL ways than Lithium-Ion Donut Lab introduced what it claims is the world's first commercially available all-solid-state battery at CES 2026 in Las Vegas, marking a pivotal moment in the decade-long race to bring the promising technology from laboratory prototypes to real-world vehicles. The phone-sized battery cells are already powering the Verge TS Pro electric motorcycle, which enters production this quarter. * Higher density (400 Wh/kg) * Faster charging (potentially in 5 to 10 minutes) * Full charge (no longer needing to limit to 80%) * Safer (No flammable liquid electrolytes, No thermal runaway chains, No metallic dendrites that can cause internal shorts) * Good for 100,000 cycles (high-end Lithium-Ion is about 5,000 cycles). But there is more, at −30 °C and even over 100 °C , they can retain over 99% of their capacity. The usual issue has also been cost, but it is claimed now that without using rare earth minerals, material costs are actually lower than Lithium-Ion too. It still does not stop there though, as these batteries are not created in the cell shapes that Lithium-Ion were, and which required products to conform to the shape of the battery. These solid state batteries behave like clay, so custom sizes, voltages, and geometries are now possible. This also means that these are not only for vehicles but can potentially work in phones and micro-electronics. A solid-state battery uses a solid material (like a ceramic or special polymer) to conduct electricity between its positive and negative sides, instead of the liquid or gel electrolyte found in regular lithium-ion electric vehicle (EV) batteries. As regards a reality check, Verge's TS Pro motorcycle is being launched now with one of these Donut solid state batteries. Range has increased from the older battery types having 350 km, to now up 600 km, with a charging time of 10 minutes. We will have to see the road tests later in 2026, but if so, then solid state batteries will truly be a game changer. Given the range and the charge cycles, that means the battery will be good for about 60 million kms. That is way more than any combustion engine is ever going to last. See

Battery - Donut Lab

and

New Atlas

370-mile+ e-bike cuts the edge with 'world 1st' battery & hollow motor

We've been covering Estonia-based electric motorcycle outfit Verge for a good while now, because it's been on the cusp of something amazing: a hubl...

#technology #batteries #EV #environment

Stop Using Your Keyboard and Start Using Handy, a Free Speech-to-Text App “In recent years AI models like Nvidia's Parakeet and OpenAI's Whisper, both open source, have made great strides in turning human voices into text. Both excel at correctly adding things like punctuation and capitalisation, and you can run them right on your computer. The problem? They're both a little complicated to set up. That's where Handy comes in. This is a dead-simple, totally free application that can set up either of these models on your computer and give you a keyboard shortcut to use it.” So whilst Handy may work well on some other desktop environments on Linux, I had quite a few issues trying to get it to work on Wayland. For a start, I had to run an environment variable before it would actually even display the window (WEBKIT_DISABLE_DMABUF_RENDERER=1 ). The suggestion to use wtype for the paste insertion did not work for me under Wayland at all as it gave this: `[ERROR] Failed to paste transcription: wtype failed: Compositor does not support the virtual keyboard protocol`. I had to use the one called dotool. When I tried to use the direct paste method, it kept chopping off the first character, but did insert it where it was supposed to be. In the end, I found the best thing that actually worked was to use no paste method, and I just press control V myself after I finished speaking. So for this to work, you also want to change the setting for Clipboard Handling from Don't Modify to Copy to Clipboard. It's really not ideal, but I must admit, I suppose if you've got quite a bit that you need to type, then it actually can be quicker to use handy and just do one or two basic edits. For other types of text entry though, it might still be better to be able to have that precise control you have when typing on a keyboard. For other types of text entry though, it might still be better to be able to have that precise control you have when typing on a keyboard. I've actually dictated this post using Handy to enter the text here. And I must say that the grammar and everything is quite precise with all the commas in the right places and so on. So yes, it can actually save you a bit of time. Even when you need to pause to think, it actually removes that, or should I say, just dictates it correctly without the pauses. So for me that's quite handy because I pause quite a bit to think sometimes, and that might not work with some voice dictation, especially if they think you've got to the end you know of your sentence. But also from this you can see it does become a bit long-winded when you're thinking aloud. So still I probably might just revert to anyway just using my keyboard for text entry. But your mileage may vary. There are versions offered for Windows, macOS, and Linux. See

WIRED

Stop Using Your Keyboard and Start Using This Simple, Free Speech-to-Text App

It’s called Handy, and it uses AI models to accurately convert your speaking voice into text—all for free.

and their GitHub project at

GitHub

GitHub - cjpais/Handy: A free, open source, and extensible speech-to-text application that works completely offline.

A free, open source, and extensible speech-to-text application that works completely offline. - cjpais/Handy

 #technology #opensource #dictation

This New Android Smartphone Is For Everyone Who Misses the Blackberry — And Has A Hidden Advantage Everyone is covering how this device works in tandem with your existing phone, and are not really emphasising that this can also work as a standalone device with its own SIM card. But be that as it may, for me the bigger thing in modern times is, this useful companion device could be snatched by mobile phone thieves, and you'd still have your main device safely in your pocket or bag. It's often the data that is worth more than the cost of the device. Yes, that's the bigger reality of today, with so many walking around and using their phones on the go. I very rarely actually field any voice calls nowadays as most of the phone interaction is done on social media posts, Signal, etc as texting. A bonus for many may also be that it has a 3.5 mm headphone jack (although I've long been using a USB-C to 3.5 mm jack plug on my phone). See

Lifehacker

This New Android Smartphone Is For Everyone Who Misses the Blackberry

Clicks Communicator is a BlackBerry-like smartphone with a physical keyboard. There's also the Clicks Power Keyboard, which is a power bank wi...

#technology #smartphones #theft

Pebble’s round smartwatch returns in an unexpected reboot “The original Pebble Time Round's sizeable bezels are gone and replaced with a sleek-looking, edge-to-edge 1.3-inch colour e-paper display that's both bigger and higher resolution than the original's. Battery life has been increased to roughly two weeks, and the display is now a touchscreen. The Pebble Round 2's colours include silver, black, and rose goal, alongside a 20 mm matching band in silver or black, and a 14 mm rose gold option.” I have to say I do really like the look of this Pebble watch. Pebble's shakeup of the smartwatch market has really been needed. Apart from going open source, they have brought way longer battery life, and also better e-Ink screens. I moved away from smartwatch's at the end of 2025 as I had tired from super expensive watches that have to be charged daily. That does bring me though to the one and only downside I have with this round version. I understand why the screen had to be made the way it was to retain the thing design and the angled viewing, BUT I have a real aversion as well to an expensive device just becoming a paperweight in a few years time when the battery runs out of charge cycles. It does not look like changing the battery in this device is going to be an easy option at all. From what I understand of the square versions, the battery change should still be possible, but sadly not as easy as a Casio watch. I suppose we'll know for sure when some teardowns have been done after release. The software applications and watch faces are already starting to take off. An end user can even design faces for themselves using some browser based design software. Pebble makes it really easy to design and distribute software, so I'm looking forward to seeing lots of innovation on this front (unlike you see for WearOS and Apple Watches). Something not quite correct in the linked article though, is that anyone who has pre-ordered the square designs, can switch their order to the round design. So you are not locked into that first order. See

XDA

Pebble’s round smartwatch returns in an unexpected reboot

The Pebble Round 2 aims to fix all of its predecessor's mistakes

#technology #smartwatches #opensource

13 Open-Source Apps You Can Use from a Web Browser “When we think of open-source apps for design, productivity, or even just for fun, we usually picture desktop software running natively on our computers. The web still feels like it belongs to proprietary giants like Google Docs, Figma, Canva, and CapCut. But open source has been catching up fast. There’s now a growing wave of browser-based open-source apps, many with public hosted instances you can use for real work right away. Some can also be self-hosted later, but this list focuses on the ones you can simply open and start using.” Best of all though, there is zero installation required, so these are really easy to just test out, and bookmark if you like them. See

It's FOSS

13 Open-Source Apps I Use from a Web Browser (And You Can Too)

You don't always need to install an open source software on your desktop or self host in your homelab. I use some of my favorites from the comfort ...

#technology #opensource

You can’t trust your eyes to tell you what’s real anymore, says the head of Instagram “Instagram boss Adam Mosseri is closing out 2025 with a 20-images-deep dive into what a new era of “infinite synthetic content” means as it all becomes harder and harder to distinguish from reality, and the old, more personal Instagram feed that he says has been “dead” for years. Last year, The Verge’s Sarah Jeong wrote that “…the default assumption about a photo is about to become that it’s faked, because creating realistic and believable fake photos is now trivial to do,” and Mosseri eventually concurs.” The message is clear: Seeing is no longer believing! The same has basically become true for video as well. Too many videos and photos are being posted daily onto, especial viral algorithm, sites to be quickly believed by the masses and reshared. Even some presidents have been taken in, mainly because such faked videos or photos also served their political purpose. In 2026, we really have to be asking who is posting this, why are they posting it, is it verified from other sources, who gains from my outrage or fears from seeing this post. Like with cyber-security, humans prove to be the weakest link in the chain. Unfortunately not all social media networks treat fake news equally. We'd have hoped by now Facebook would have learnt its lesson from the Myanmar violence. But rage-baiting unfortunately makes a lot of money for some networks. See

The Verge

You can’t trust your eyes to tell you what’s real anymore, says the head of Instagram

We’re all looking for the guy who did this.

#technology #socialnetworks #ragebaiting #AI #deepfake

Alzheimer’s Fully Reversed in Mice, Scientists Say “A team of American scientists claim they have done something miraculous: they “cured” lab mice suffering from Alzheimer’s disease, which has robbed more than seven million Americans, typically 65 years old and up, of their identity and cognitive ability. The researchers achieved this feat by administering the rodents with the powerful compound P7C3-A20, which they announced in a new paper in the journal Cell Reports Medicine. Scientists from Ohio’s Case Western Reserve University (CWRU), University Hospitals, and the Louis Stokes Cleveland VA Medical Center undertook the study.” There is no approval yet for this drug and I imagine more peer review will still be done too as well as clinical trials, but it does seem pretty hopeful, and especially so as they are claiming a reversal, not just a slow-down. See

Futurism

Alzheimer's Fully Reversed in Mice, Scientists Say

A new compound has been shown to reverse late stage Alzheimer's disease in lab mice, which gives millions of sufferers new cause for hope.

#health #alzheimers

LanguageTool ends free use of Browser Extension — Here are some Options LanguageTool is an AI-based grammar checker. They just announced that the browser extension will only be usable to their cloud service with a premium subscription from Jan 2026. My video explains the announcement, and then goes through an overview of what is involved with self-hosting the community version of LanguageTool which will still use the browser extension, with some pros and cons of this approach. The other alternative is to switch to using something else like Harper, which does not use any cloud or self-hosted service, and works locally from just a browser extension. I contrast how the self-hosted LanguageTool compares in practice with Harper. See #technology #opensource #selfhosting #languagetool

Stop Manually Checking GitHub Releases — These Tools Automatically Install & Update Apps on Linux “Package managers are essential tools on Linux systems. They help you install, update, and remove software packages with simple commands. Most distributions come with their own package managers, like apt, dnf, or pacman. However, many modern tools are distributed as pre-compiled binaries via GitHub releases. Developers using languages like Go, Rust, and Deno often release their software this way. New projects that are not included in the official distro repository yet have to opt for this method. This creates a gap between traditional package managers and these GitHub-hosted releases.” This is probably going to be of more interest to those using Debian and Fedora based package managers, as these are the most popular packages, which are typically generated directly on code hosting sites. But some interesting options to consider between deb-get, Autonomix, Eget, Install Release, bin, stew, and AFX. See

It's FOSS

Stop Manually Checking GitHub Releases — These Tools Automatically Install & Update Apps on Linux

These handy utilities tools simplify installing and managing binaries from GitHub releases on Linux.

#technology #Linux #opensource

Windows fatigue continues to push thousands of gamers to switch to Bazzite Linux distro “Bazzite, a Linux distro that has a lot in common with Valve's SteamOS, is designed specifically with gaming in mind, offering a console-like experience that ditches the majority of Windows 11's most annoying features. In recent usage statistics posted to X, Bazzite shared weekly growth of roughly 1.25x over the past 30 days. To put the number in perspective, this means that Bazzite pulls in roughly 50,000 weekly users.” There are tons of different Linux distros, but they can actually all do the same things (same Linux kernel underneath). The presentation, included packages, and the package manager type, are what really separates them a bit. So you can really pick any distro you want, and make it work. I use Manjaro KDE, and it is playing all the games I want (including Windows-only games), it does all my browsing, document creation and editing, video creation and editing, and lots more. What is different about Bazzite, is that it has specialised around making gaming work well from the get-go, and it has a focus on newcomers to Linus as well. Interestingly, it also has a rollback function for any system updates that may cause problems. Best of all, it's fast, has no adverts, no TPM v2 requirements, and no AI Copilot. See

XDA

Windows fatigue continues to push thousands of gamers to switch to this Linux distro

The SteamOS-like Linux distro's weekly downloads are increasing rapidly.

or their website at

Bazzite - The operating system for the next generation of gamers

Bazzite makes gaming and everyday use smoother and simpler across desktop PCs, handhelds, tablets, and home theater PCs.

#technology #Linux #Windows11 #gaming

GreyNoise launches a free scanner to check if you're part of a botnet “GreyNoise Labs has launched a free tool called GreyNoise IP Check that lets users check if their IP address has been observed in malicious scanning operations, like botnet and residential proxy networks. The threat monitoring firm that tracks internet-wide activity via a global sensor network says this problem has grown significantly over the past year, with many users unknowingly helping malicious online activity.” This service involves nothing being installed in your network or devices. It is just looking to see if your IP address has been picked up in their database for suspicious activity that could indicate there is malware or possible botnet activity originating from your IP address. By just visiting their website the check is done from your browser, but if you register a free account with them, you can set up alerts based on your IP addresses. I set up an alert for my home network as well as for my VPS server. See

BleepingComputer

GreyNoise launches free scanner to check if you're part of a botnet

GreyNoise Labs has launched a free tool called GreyNoise IP Check that lets users check if their IP address has been observed in malicious scanning...

#technology #security #botnets

Portmaster is an open source application firewall built to monitor and control network activity on Windows and Linux “Every packet is visible to the service, and any packet can be stopped before it leaves the system. The software matches traffic to the app that created it by using eBPF and the proc filesystem on Linux or a kernel driver and the IP Helper API on Windows. This approach lets users see each connection while still setting rules per application. It also helps the service sort out unusual cases. Portmaster can recognize Snap packages, AppImage apps and scripts on Linux as well as Windows Store apps and system services that run under svchost.exe.” I love that it shows per application how many, and what countries, connections are being made to the Internet. It also intercepts DNS queries that may have bypassed your user settings. The linked article does link directly to the GitHub project, where you can get the files to install it. See

Help Net Security

Portmaster: Open-source application firewall - Help Net Security

Portmaster is a free and open source application firewall built to monitor and control network activity on Windows and Linux. The project is develo...

#technology #opensource #security

Decentralized YouTube Alternative PeerTube Adds Creator Mode “PeerTube is a free and open source video hosting platform that serves as an alternative to YouTube. Unlike centralized platforms, it allows anyone to create their own video hosting instance while connecting with others through federation. It is developed by Framasoft, a French non-profit organization focused on digital freedom. Before you ask, the organization keeps itself afloat on donations rather than advertising or scraping people's data. The project recently hit two milestones: PeerTube v8 was released, bringing collaborative features and design improvements. Just a week later, the mobile app received its long-awaited Creator Mode.” PeerTube has steadily been improving this year and playback has also been getting much better. A year or so back, it was still plagued sometimes with buffering. It works much the same way as Mastodon and other Fediverse networks do so you can host your own PeerTube instance if you want to. There are some biggish YouTube creators there too, but it does not pay money like YouTube does as there are no adverts shoved into everything. I also post my videos there at gadgeteerza@video.hardlimit.com. But yes, my follower count there is way lower than on YouTube, because I suppose so many love the YT ads. ;-) See

It's FOSS

Decentralized YouTube Alternative PeerTube Adds Creator Mode

The open source YouTube alternative offers some welcome updates for content creators.

#technology #peertube #opensource

Affinity, as an alternative to Photoshop, runs as an AppImage on Linux “Canva, after acquiring the team behind Affinity Photo, Designer, and Publisher, launched the free Affinity app that brings together all three of the aforementioned apps. And while it doesn't officially support Linux, the community has stepped up to fix that. So, if you're someone working in image and photo editing, Linux is one step closer to perfection.” Although the linked article does give a Python code snippet to install this via an installation script on Linux, many may feel more comfortable just downloading and running the AppImage version as this packages the WINE files with it, so it all runs sweetly. The first run will be slow as it creates the WINE folder files etc inside ~/.AffinityLinux-Appimage/, and thereafter it will start quickly. At initial startup, it prompts for a DPI setting, and it is probably best to leave that at the default (mine was 96) otherwise I notice it displays for a much larger screen. From

XDA

I thought I needed Windows for Photoshop, but this Linux project is just as good

Affinity on Linux is a game changer

and you can get the AppImage at

GitHub

Releases · ryzendew/Linux-Affinity-Installer

A repository that helps users get affinity software working on GNU/Linux 🐧 - ryzendew/Linux-Affinity-Installer

#technology #Linux #photoediting

AA Browser is a WebView browser experience for Android Auto head units Transform your driving experience with a sleek, modern browser designed specifically for the road. Built with cutting-edge Material 3 design and optimised for automotive interfaces. This browser will work on Android Auto head units, but note the warnings about not looking at it whilst driving. It may though keep younger passenger amused, especially those who are too young now to use social media in Australia. There are no trackers in the app itself, but it does not have ad blocking capability of the websites you may visit. You'd need to download the APK file, though, and sideload it to your phone. See

GitHub

GitHub - kododake/AABrowser: Android Auto WEB Browser

Android Auto WEB Browser. Contribute to kododake/AABrowser development by creating an account on GitHub.

#technology #androidauto #browsers #opensource

Hacker Busts Startup Running Huge Web of AI-Generated “Influencers” on TikTok “404 Media reports in an explosive scoop that Doublespeed has been hacked. This wasn’t just one account associated with the startup, but the entire backend used to manage its phone farm — so it provides an extraordinary glimpse at how the service is actually being used to manipulate social media at scale. Not only is Doublespeed a possible breeding ground for disinformation campaigns or financial scams, but they seem to be getting away with their phone farm operation without any pushback from TikTok.” Which all just goes to show yet again, many “influencers” are not even real people, the follower, likes and comment numbers also just cannot be trusted. I posted only about a month ago about how Twitter used to fake the post views to charge advertisers more money, for adverts that were not seen by those numbers at all. Once money and advertising get involved on a platform you don't pay to use, it all gets very murky. It's all about driving engagement up, and faking numbers, to fleece advertisers. I really don't think the owners of Facebook, X, Instagram, TikTok, etc are really interested at all about the social side of social media, nor the end user experience. Many of us remember how these networks were in their early days, when you interacted with real humans. Today, most of these accounts have AI-generated responses to any comments. If you still want human social interaction and some moderation of chats, you'll need to look to decentralised social media today. See

Futurism

Hacker Busts Startup Running Huge Web of AI-Generated "Influencers" on Instagram

A hacker found a way into the backend of AI startup Doublespeed, which offers customers access to a massive phone farm network.

#technology #socialnetworks