Nerd On Demand

The current state of the web browser scene http://mekineer.com/dokuwiki/doku.php

Customization of Android: http://mekineer.com/dokuwiki/doku.php

A rought draft review of online sync and backup. http://mekineer.com/dokuwiki/doku.php I've started using Dokuwiki to catalog what I've been learning. Actually, to catalog what might be useful to others, because there's a lot of details that I may journal, that most people wouldn't want to read. Still, I mostly write this stuff for myself, so it might be a little hard to read, without much introduction.

http://sci-hub.io/

I have used ad blockers since 2007. I immediately notice how bad it is, when I use a browser without the ad blocker. Ublock Origin is what I use currently. http://marketingland.com/ad-blocker-usage-highest-among-key

Adjust your computer monitor, so that it doesn't affect your ability to sleep at night: https://fluxometer.com

Operating systems come and go, and each time I am forced to adopt a new one. I spend countless hours customizing it and accumulating a software library of programs. Just when I have it working smoothly and just the way I want, it becomes outdated, and is no longer supported by new hardware. This has been true for me with Windows, and now for Android. I moved from Win98 to WinXP, and temporarily to Win7. At least Windows used to strive for backwards compatibility. In Android, ...applications and customizations become outdated at a faster rate. One reason why this may be, is that Microsoft and Google want you to give up your software, and move to the cloud. But in the cloud, software will change periodically as well, as they modify or recreate web programs, or leave them behind. This is why I give hope for Linux. It has staying power. Your tools and customizations won't become outdated. The knowledge you gain, will continue to be valuable for your lifetime. For the phone, there is potential in Ubuntu Touch.

Pretty soon, you will be able to run any Android application, on any operating system that can run the Google Chrome web browser! https://developer.chrome.com/apps/getstarted_arc

I was researching why Google would make Android 4.x and 5.0 Lollipop successively slower/bloated after Gingerbread. It goes against what I read about them branching out Blink from Webkit, because they wanted to make it smaller, removing tons of code. I then came across this gem: http://prng.net/blink-faq.html [Quote] A Short Translation from Bullshit to English of Selected Portions of the Google Chrome Blink Developer FAQ...Continue reading

What is free software, and why is it so important for society? http://www.fsf.org/about/what-is-free-software

I upgraded my phone, a Galaxy Note 1, from a heavily tweaked Samsung TouchWiz Gingerbread (2.3) to Beanstalk, a CyanogenMod derivative based on Kit Kat (4.4). This is my review. Kit Kat changed the gui, without adding features that are of benefit to me, or actually reducing the gui's effectiveness (gui is Graphical User Interface). For most applications, it got rid of the use of the menu button on my phone, in exchange for three slashes taking up space on my screen. This made... it more like iOS, which I find inferior. Stop copying inferiority. Also, bring back the long press context menu for items on screen. iOS doesn't have it either: stop copying inferiority. Stop trying to make things pretty: pretty to me is speed and functionality. My phone boot time, went from an average of 63 seconds, to 94 seconds. You added a lot of bloat for nothing. Thanks

If your mouse starts to double click because it is getting old, there is a software fix for that! See "MouseFix" towards the bottom of the page: http://www.danieljackson.co.uk/fun/old/ The symptom from old mice, is that you get a double click, even if you just click once.