I have read that early DualSense units had a bug that affected battery life. If you still have yours, it might be worth updating the firmware.

Tell me you’re a novice without telling me you’re a novice.

6 ≠ 16
v ≠ o

I don’t like closed systems, vendor lock-in, overpriced tools, or buying equipment that I’ll never truly own.

Reminds me of the Apple version of Karateka, which did something special if you inserted the floppy disk upside down.

https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/5/22564151/karateka-apple-ii-upside-down-easter-egg

Sadly, many motherboards don’t have POST code displays.

In principle, one could probably do this to a rooted phone by removing all the Google apps, and all the Google services, and giving up the other apps and services that depend on them. It would be a nontrivial task, and the steps would likely be different for each phone model (and possibly each OS version). I don’t know of a project that does this successfully. You might try searching xdaforums.com for someone who has done it.

However, I wouldn’t depend on Google services staying disabled when Google still controls the OS.

IMHO, it’s safer and easier to replace the entire OS.

The Xperia phones are often horrendously locked down

Not really, at least when compared to most other brands. I’ve had three or four different Xperia models, and unlocked the bootloader on every one of them using official Sony tools. They even have official open-source software archives, which are very helpful to people who build de-googled “ROMs”.

The one thing that has been especially locked down is the TA partition, which contains DRM keys used for Sony’s proprietary apps. It’s not needed for an open-source OS like LineageOS.

For this phone specifically, it looks like official LineageOS support is already underway, despite it being a fairly new model:

https://wiki.lineageos.org/devices/pdx234/

I would definitely recommend a Pixel device if you’re going to go De-Googling.

Pixels do have unusually good support for user-installed OS, but the irony here is that you can’t truly de-google them, because no OS will change the fact that Google controls the hardware and firmware.

Neat. I just hope it can be disabled to save power.

A more charitable reading might detect irony in that comment. Their intent might not have been victim-blaming.

In case you want to give it a go:

https://lutris.net/games/star-citizen/

https://robertsspaceindustries.com/orgs/LUG/

Linux doesn’t need Steam to play Windows games. I won’t pester you to name your game if you don’t want to, though.

Which game? Linux can run a lot of Windows games these days.

I’m encouraged by the facts that Sony’s game controller linux driver works with no signup, and that this announcement mentions needing a Steam account but says nothing about a PSN account.

This is disappointing, though:

some key features, like HDR, headset feedback, eye tracking, adaptive triggers, and haptic feedback (other than rumble), are not available when playing on PC.

I see these tactics being used far more extensively by wealthy individuals and corporate interests than I do Chinese interests.

How can you so confidently distinguish one from the other?

Delta Chat

It’s an email front-end with opportunistic PGP, including all the drawbacks thereof.

Not really comparable to a modern e2ee instant messenger.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forward_secrecy

When I last looked it over (maybe a year or so ago) these problems stood out:

• Immature code base.
• Custom onion network that seemed unlikely ever to have enough users to be very effective against attacks.
• Small limit on chat group size. (I think they have raised it from 10 to 100 more recently.)
• Small limit on media attachment size.
• Desktop support appeared to be an Electron app. (I avoid those because they’re incredibly wasteful of resources, and often suffer from Electron’s many bugs.)

Its design showed some neat ideas, but it was not practical for my needs.

Also, I have read more recently that Session removed forward secrecy, which rather undermines its value proposition.

GNU Taler looks interesting, but is it usable today?

It’s apparently designed around exchanges, and I don’t see any exchanges mentioned on the site. Do any actually exist?

The FAQ mentions depending on wire transfers, which have famously high fees that would have to be passed on to users somehow. Aggregating payments into delayed settlement transfers could mitigate that cost between high-volume organizations, but it won’t help people who just need send money to each other. (Meanwhile, ACH transfers are practically free, but I don’t know if they fit Taler’s design or plans.) Does Taler have a plan to solve this?

Related: I think FedNow (USA) might enable transfers between individuals once the tools and user-facing services are developed. It’s very new.

It’s worth noting that any way to electronically move money is unlikely to stay both private and convenient for long after getting popular, because governments generally don’t like that.