To try and bake down the complex answers, if you are basically familiar with PGP or SSH keys the concept of a Passkey is sort of in the same ballpark. But instead of using the same SSH keypair more than once, Passkeys create a new keypair for every use (website) and possibly every device (e.g. 2 phones using 1 website may create 2 sets of keypars, one on each device) - and additionally embeds the username (making it “one-click login”):

• creating a passkey is the client and server establishing a ring of trust (“challenge”) and then generating a public and private pair of keys (think ssh-keygen ...)
• embedded in the keypair is the user ID/username and credential ID, which sort of maps to the three fields of a SSH keypair (encryption type, key, userid optional in SSH keys) but not really, think concept not details
• when using a passkey, the server sends the client a “challenge”, the client prompts the user to unlock the private key (device PIN, biometric, Bitwarden master password, etc.)
• the “challenge” (think crypto math puzzle) is signed with the private key and returned to the server along with the username and credential ID
• the server, who has stored the public key, looks it up using the username + credential ID, then verifies the signature somewhat like SSH or PGP does
• like SSH or PGP, this means the private key never leaves the device/etc. being used by the client and is used to only sign the crypto math puzzle challenge

The client private key is stored hopefully in a secure part of the phone/laptop (“enclave” or TPM hardware module) which locks it to that device; using a portable password manager instead such as Bitwarden is attractive since the private keys are stored in BW’s data (so can be synced across devices, backed up, etc.)

They use the phrase “replay” a lot to mean that sending the same password to a website is vulnerable to it being intercepted and used n+1 times (hacker); in the keypair model this doesn’t happen because each “challenge” is a unique crypto math puzzle generated dynamically every use, like TOTP/2FA but “better” because there’s no simple hash seed (TOTP/2FA use a constant seed saved by the client but it’s not as robust crypto).

(x-posted comment) There’s a MV3 alternate (same dev!) “uBlock Origin Lite” which this article completely misses out on mentioning: https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/ublock-origin-lite/ddkjiahejlhfcafbddmgiahcphecmpfh

There are certain websites and tools which need chrome/chromium making it a necessary evil; for example there’s a new trend in firmware flashing of devices like ESP32 boards and HAM/GMRS radios which are web based and use Chrome tech. This new MV3 fork isn’t as good as the original but it’s better than nothing and does stop some ad trash.

Aurora is based on Fedora Kinoite, a RHEL-type system; you’re looking at Debian-type info in that link. Have a look to the Fedora docs to learn how grub is managed in this ecosystem: https://docs.fedoraproject.org/en-US/fedora/latest/system-administrators-guide/kernel-module-driver-configuration/Working_with_the_GRUB_2_Boot_Loader/

The other data shows that posts and comments are going up linearly (a little suspicious but OK), but I wonder how the modlog affects the data (meaning how is it captured and when). I made one comment to a honest post yesterday (hosted on a remote instance), which then the post was deleted by admins like so:

Removed Post Any app for call recording ? reason: Rule 2: Please use [email protected] for support questions.

So my comment shows in my history but cannot actually be accessed; was this comment counted? was that post counted? Was I counted as an active user yesterday if that was the only activity I did all day? Was the one person who upvoted my comment before the thread was deleted counted?

Lies, damn lies and statistics. :)

As a sort of historical side comment regarding your concern about misinformation - “how much does it cost to register one?” has been the litmus test to use for a long time (I’m of an age). More specific to .info, it was one of the very first “new” TLDs introduced in 2002/2003 and the owners basically gave away millions of domains for free to gain market share.[1]

This led to a lot of scammers, hackers, malware and whatnot infecting the entire .info TLD and it was in trouble by having the entire thing blocked even around 2012, almost 10 years after introduction.[2] It was troubled with new “crackdowns” (enforcement rules) as well due to it’s overwhelming use for nefarious purposes.[3]

Ad-hoc data from my own employment experience, in 2024 it’s still 100% blocked (like ref[2]) by corporate firewalls who leverage strict rules along with many others who had the same troubled history (.xyz to name one) and the whole list of “free” domains. However, .info now generally costs $20 USD/yr (with many places offering first year discount for less than $5 USD) so I think it’s trying to turn itself around.

Point being, “unrestricted” TLDs which are super cheap have had the historical tendency to attract scammers, phishers, malware and other nefarious entities because the cost of doing business at scale (these guys register hundreds of domains to churn through for short periods of time - “keep moving, don’t get caught” i.e.). Having lived through this whole saga, I open all TLDs I know to be cheap/free in private/incognito tabs and treat them with suspicion at first.

• [1] https://dnjournal.com/columns/50million.htm
• [2] https://www.itnews.com.au/news/parliament-quietly-blocks-info-domains-290150
• [3] https://domainincite.com/12744-afilias-blames-security-crackdown-for-massive-drop-in-info-domains

Most of them (besides weechat-android and quasseldroid which use bouncers/relays) seem to have fallen out of maintenance; Goguma appears to be currently maintained and updated as a pure standalone client and would be what I’d recommend trying first.

I have been using Linux on laptops as main/only compute since around 1997 (started with an Inspiron 4000, PII-400 IIRC), Dell is generally extremely boring and very Linux/BSD compatible. I have been buying gently used Precision models (typically using local marketplace, Craigslist in USA) as they tend to have better build quality and non-janky custom parts (think “winmodem”). They last forever, pretty much every Linux/BSD distro works. The most important thing is to stay away from Broadcom chips and look for Intel eth/wifi. Stay away from Inspiron to avoid hardware problems, in modern times those are the bottom of the barrel janky hardware.

The Dell Latitude line used by businesses are even more boring than Precisions and really always have been - their BIOS has a somewhat unique charging profile “always plugged in” to extend battery life - I use two ancient E6330 models tuned to super low power modes as mini-servers (think anything you’d use a raspberry Pi for) that have been chugging away for probably 5+ years just running cron jobs, backups, Syncthing services and whatever I toss on them. Throw an SSD in anything and it just works - power goes out, batteries act as UPS. $100 USD each, “just work”.

Thinkpads have always been a Linux favorite, at least the old models when IBM owned the brand but not too sure about the Lenovo modern ones. Last Thinkpad I owned was a 32bit one back in like maybe 2010 and it worked just fine. They tend to be more expensive used than Dells (retain their purchase price better, like a nice used auto).

I have successfully sent back a PS5 controller (the original from the box) within the 1-yr warranty; they sent me a brand new controller. You comment “every quarter”, those controllers should be under warranty. Here is the US based link to get started: https://repairs.playstation.com/s/request-repair?id=2&locale=en-us&language=en_US

At the quantity the OP might use, buying by the gallon might make more sense - having a look to Amazon, the popular concentrations in gallon+ sizes are 70% and 99.9% (about the same price, $25 USD/gal) - it probably makes more logistical sense to go with 70% here to reduce evaporation and increase usable liquid on these tall, thin objects (so let’s say “sloppy use” of oddly shaped hard to handle glass).

I’ll leave my update at 70% concentration as the more economical choice - I’d presume based on their comment a soak in ZAP ($18 USD/gal) first is needed, then followed by the iso method… so it’s a little expensive no matter what for something they might not care about that much.

There are ways to clean glass passively, it sounds like your residue is organic.

• acetone, the pure kind you buy in a tin can at the hardware store. it will require some form of sealed container to put the glass in (acetone evaporates quickly and eats almost all organic matter) - finding a container big enough for your glass might be the hard part of this but it works (soak for days, and do not touch acetone with hands or use organic gloves - internet search for proper gloves)
• ZAP heavy duty citrus cleaner, comes in a gallon jug. soak the glass in it for days or longer, doesn’t need a sealed container. This is the same stuff you can use to clean your sink drain and is pretty safe to handle but still, wear basic gloves just in case.
• high-purity (like say 90%) iso alcohol with table salt as an abrasive (standard grocery store things). This is more of for the inside, where you can put in alcohol + salt and seal with your hand and vigorously shake to let the salt scrub the residue and the alcohol to eat it. Uses a lot of alcohol due to it’s evaporation, so buy a bigger jug.
• specialty products found on 420-friendly websites or your local 420-friendly store; weed residue is a thing for bongs, bubblers, pipes and any other sort of smoking apparatus and they need cleaned and are hard to get inside; products are made to soak the glassware in to try and get the junk out. generally expensive and hit or miss on quality but they exist

Hope this helps. (edit: acetate -> acetone, oops)

This is unfortunately a choice the Nautilus (GNOME) folks have taken; in other file managers (Thunar for XFCE, Caja for MATE, etc.) the ability to use custom actions are a first class citizen. Within Nautilus, the nautilus-actions project was superseded by the filemanager-actions project which was then archived: https://gitlab.gnome.org/Archive/filemanager-actions - a custom GNOME action might be something like gio open /path/to/terminal.desktop %d (where %d is the directory from Nautilus)

There are 3rd party attempts to recreate what was stripped out of/abandoned in Nautilus such as this one: https://github.com/bassmanitram/actions-for-nautilus

Went down the rabbit hole for you while drinking some tea listening to the rain - it looks like in the future there is a new app/proposal for FreeDesktop to use xdg-terminal-exec as the new/default way and it’s hard coded into the GNOME “gio” code over here (ctrl+f search xdg-terminal-exec): https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/glib/-/blob/main/gio/gdesktopappinfo.c

That said, it looks like the nautilus-open-terminal Nautilus extension is shipped as part of gnome-terminal so it’s hard coded to run that terminal not using the above code. Instead, you’d need to leverage a different extension called nautilus-open-any-terminal for now until the landscape changes: https://github.com/Stunkymonkey/nautilus-open-any-terminal

(disclaimer: not using GNOME/Nautilus or Fedora, theorycraft from me)