Recent comments

Rambler OP wrote

XP Pro was the last MS OS I ran at home and honestly, loved it. I still probably have an old XP SP3 disk somewhere. Didn't know installs were still in use outside of POS systems and purpose built use cases in factories and industry running software that requires it.

May try MX Linux on an older laptop that I'd like to breathe new life into. I've heard good things about AntiX as well.

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Kalchaya wrote

I gave a test drive to around 20+ distros over the last couple years. Only ones I found usable for an XP Pro expat was MX Linux, Linux Mint, AntiX, Kodachi Linux, and Tails. My pick of the litter was MX Linux for install. Linux Mint, Kodachi and Tails for LiveCD use.

My upcoming move from XP Pro to a Win 7 Pro rig will have MX Linux on separate SSD. I will continue to use Linux Mint for online banking/shopping, and Kodachi or Tails to safari into the darkest darkness of the Darknet. MX Linux and Kodachi impresses me the most!

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Kalchaya wrote

Depends on what you need it for, and what you need it to do. Considerations could be:

  1. No logs policy (backed up in it's TOS), and preferably certified by a 3rd party.

  2. Based outside the 14-Eyes jurisdiction.

  3. Reliable kill-switch.

  4. No leaks.

  5. GUI client.

  6. Compatible with your OS.

  7. Uses compatible protocol (IKEv2, Wireguard, L2TP, OpenVPN, etc.).

  8. TOR friendly.

  9. Multi-hop.

  10. Unlimited bandwidth/fast speed.

  11. No auto-renew or ability to disable it.

4

Kalchaya wrote

There are no 'good' cookies. Only those some are fooled into thinking are useful to themselves....but are always far more useful to others. I have Self-Destructing Cookies on my Firefox-deriative browsers, Cookinator on auto, then always back that up with BleachBit and CCleaner prior to turning off the PC.

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Kalchaya wrote

While I fancy myself a 'futurist' able to make fairly accurate predictions, I would not attempt that prognostication. Developers are an unreliable lot. The same one that creates a freeware app today is likely to sellout tomorrow, and include nasty bundleware with his app. In its early days, Firefox used to be one of the good guys, now it's just as likely to "fuck you over" as Chrome is:

https://digdeeper.neocities.org/ghost/mozilla.html

Brave is another one that started out okay, then quickly crossed to the darkside:

https://www.zdnet.com/article/privacy-browser-brave-busted-for-autocompleting-urls-to-versions-it-profits-from/

https://www.netsparker.com/blog/web-security/brave-browser-sacrifices-security/

I would not venture to guess which browsers will go rogue in the future. I can only list those that are okay now. Browsers are much like sites that source software. Right now, Softpedia and Majorgeeks are kinda/sorta safe...how long before they become as nasty as CNET is unknown.

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Kalchaya wrote

One way is to get Ramble better represented on the alternative search engines. Yesterday I did an experiment on Google, Duckduckgo, and Startpage. Tried two searches:

ramble

ramble.pw

The second was a sort of 'control', since obviously if someone already knows the full name, he would not need a search engine. On search one, Google came up with every possible answer but the right one. One search two, Google provided the correct link. On search one and search two, Duckduckgo failed to provide the ramble.pw link. On search one, Startpage provided every link but the right one...some were ramble.com, ramble.org, ramblechat, and rambleofficial. On search two, Startpage did list the ramble.pw link.

All three failed the test. Unfortunately I have no idea how to solve this...I can only point out the problem.

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