The LibreOffice Conference will start in a week from today with the Community Meeting, at the Faculty of Informatics of ELTE (Eötvös Loránd University) in Pázmány Péter stny. 1/C, 1117 Budapest.
To be usable by the less savvy, the Linux desktop lacks stability. Not software stability, but organizational and human stability.
I want maintainers to have a stable income. I want apps to last a decade, instead of having to chase the next rewrite of an abandoned project.
The Linux desktop is a beautiful accident that only exists because people devote part of their lives to it, for better or worse. We ought to support it financially, as a public service.
Software stability too. Especially for most vulnerable groups of users like beginners or my fellow blind users. We depend on audio (and Braille sometimes), and this is one of the most unstable things in Linux. Imagine if you booted your computer and prayed for your monitor to work correctly this time. this is it for us. I can link you a series of article one smart blind guy wrote, and he knows what he is talking about because he spent years on Linux desktop. If you, folks who want Linux desktop to be a real thing and not a geeky toy, make it accessible for everyone, it will succeed. Othersie… no, sorry, I need my PC to work, hence I use Windows.
@menelion this is unfortunately true, and the solution is much more complex than "just pour money on people without any form of accountability."
The first question is "to whom" and the following one is "for what." I wrote a post earlier this year about the structural changes I think we need to go through so the Linux desktop can be considered of public interest.
I'd love to hear your thoughts about it if you have some time for it.
Tech takes a central place in our lives. Banking, and administrative tasks are happening more and more online. It's becoming increasingly difficult to get through life without a computer or a smartphone.
I'm taking notes while reading. 1. Accessibility *is* a technical problem, not (only) a social one. To make something as huge as an OS accessible means, at least: A) To expose accessibility APIs on every plan of existence of the OS; B) Develop a decent screen reading solution (see JAWS or NVDA for Windows); C) Develop a decent screen magnifying and color altering solution (see ZoomText for Windows); D) Harden audio stability, so that a trivial update won't break your audio system; E) Develop a solution for people with motor disabilities that would allow decent voice control (see Dragon Naturally Speaking, for instance). That is an absolutely technical endeavor. You'd say Linux has Orca screen reader and you are right, but it's developed de facto by Joanmarie Diggs. Alone. No, of course, there are some people sending PRs, but do you see the difference between a paid solution like JAWS or even a community-driven solution like NVDA on the one side and a screen reader developed by one (brave and genius, but one!) person on the other? Again, I really admire Joanmarie, but she does need help, and I mean, lots of help. 2. Mobile. It's yet another challenge because tactile screens accessibility is something else than keyboard accessibility, be it terminal or GUI. Apple (no matter how I hate their policies) already solved many problems, hence the most common combo in the wealthier blind community is Windows + iPhone. Who would do the same for Linux? Up to you (in plural) to decide. 3. Toxicity of the community. I'm really sorry to admit, but open-source community is very often either toxic or indifferent. When I or one of my blind fellow folks open an issue about "X is not accessible at all, please fix it!" (where X is anything from a small web-based solution to the whole LibreOffice Calc), guess what we get? "Send a PR!". Heck no, putain de bordel de merde de… — excuse my language! I cannot spend my whole life to dig into undocumented code then send thousands upon thousands of PRs, then beg their supreme highness of developer to please merge it, then wait till it's released. I need to work, to eat and to feed my family, including cats. Hence… I use Microsoft because it just works, and if there is an accessibility bug, it gets fixed, — not always super mega fast (like in Visual Studio Code, kudos to them!), but it *is* fixed. Unlike with open-source, sorry.
When you go to Freedb.goldwave.ca, you get this message. Beware! Thou hast entered the realm of the Databeast! The chosen in possession of the sacred protocol may pass without offense. Sail upon the gold wave and seek the seedy reader. For only upon this path may the knowledge thou'st quest be granted.
Reminder that as of June 10, Microsoft's stated cloud data sovereignty policy is that they give precedence to US government requests over sovereign countries' laws.
If you have a PayPal account, it doesn't hurt changing passwords now (though PayPal requires 2FA anyway).
A threat actor, "Chucky_BF" claims to sell almost 16 million email addresses and plaintext passwords to PayPal accounts worldwide. But is the data from a recent hack?
Done that. And learned idiots at PayPal restrict password length to only 20 characters. Who the fuck limits the upper limit to such a low value? What kind of shit backend are they running if it can't handle more than 20 characters?
@matt the main thing of "dod" is that it's kind of an anti-pattern; you're supposed to eschew one-size-fits-all generalisations and patterns, instead looking at your data first. but then people want to treat it as a movement and a pattern anyway. Similarly, Brian is telling people to stop following him and to think for themselves, unsuccessfully.
Ah. I understood the Life of Brian skit, but I thought that DOD _was_ about general patterns, like imitating the layout of relational database tables, structs of arrays, etc.
Welche Messenger sind bei Blinden am beliebtesten und warum? Sind Android und IOS beide genügend barrierefrei für blinde? Gibt es vielleicht online eine aktuelle Wissenssammlung? #blind
ca. Fünf Personen aus dieser Gruppe habe ich diese Frage auch gestellt. Sie und ihre Bekannten verwenden den dominanten Messenger von meta. Die angeführten Gründe waren die gute Barrierefreiheit und die Popularität, Datenschutz hat auf Nachfrage keine wesentliche Rolle gespielt.
i think i'm still the only person to note that the authors of the 95/5 paper are *cryptocurrency grifters* who want to sell you their Web3 solution to this "problem"
i believe it warrants wider discussion when this paper is brought up
MIT’s Project NANDA has a new paper: “The GenAI Divide: State of AI in Business 2025.” This got a writeup in Fortune a few days ago about how 95% of generative AI projects in business just fail. Th…
I think many people misunderstand the purpose of code review. The purpose of code review is not for the reviewer to find bugs, and certainly not for them to ensure that the code is bug-free. Anyone who depends on code review to find bugs is living in a fool's paradise. As everyone should know by now, it is not in general possible to find bugs by examining the code.
The primary purpose of code review is to find code that will be _hard to maintain_. The reviewer looks at the code and tries to understand what it is doing and how. If they can't, that means it will be hard to maintain in the future, and should be fixed now, while the original author is still familiar with it.
hey, #GNOME devs, here's an idea: put a "start a wi-fi hotspot" button in the top-right status pop-up, or maybe as an option at the bottom of the wireless networks list, so that i don't have to open the settings app for that
also having some sort of status display for how many devices are connected to your hotspot would be nice
"So many conferences are mid. Why was BSC 2025 so good" The article describes exactly what you'd expect from of a small group of young white dudes organizing a lan party with programming talks.
Why did I enjoy this invite only thing which was wholly designed to cater to exactly me and nobody else. Gosh, good question.
And the two pieces of "much needed software" that I could download for free, File Pilot and RAD Debugger, aren't at all screen reader accessible. And unlike with some genres of games, there's no reason those kinds of tools can't be accessible. This is a common problem with GUI software from the Handmade crowd.
They're numbered, I think. so as long as you know the current order, you can just shuffle them around. I've not tried it, I only have the one account I'm afraid.
@cachondo Lol my issue is, I've got my personal mastodon, the station I broadcast on's session, and my broadcast session, but they're now in the wrong order.
@cachondo I looked in the folder in appdata roaming, and have found seven separate Mastodon folders, but no main config file, unfortunately, so I'm still stuck with my sessions in the wrong order.
Ein Besuch in der bunten Stadt am Harz lohnt sich!
Als Herberge kann ich aus eigener Erfahrung empfehlen: Hotel „Zur Tanne“.
zur-tanne-wernigerode.de/ Sehr schönes Ambiente, unaufdringliche, angenehme Athmosphäre und ein sehr gutes und schönes Frühstück mit vielen kleinen Überraschungen.
Herzlich Willkommen im Hotel Zur Tanne Die Tanne ist eines der ältesten Hotels in Wernigerode. »Alles prima, die Mischung aus rustikaler und moderner Einrichtung in den geräumigen Zimmern ist großartig.
The UbuCon India UbuCon India is the first-ever UbuCon by the India LoCo dedicated to the Ubuntu ecosystem and the broader Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) community in India.
One week ago, we announced LibreOffice 25.8, our brand new major release. It’s packed with new features, and has many improvements to compatibility and performance too.
@lkundrak Yes, it says exactly that about Linux in the blog post 😊
Regarding OpenOffice, it's not only unmaintained but has years-old, unfixed security issues now: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apache_O… – Yet Apache keeps calling it the "leading open source office suite".
I download it as Appimage because it's a hassle to have to install a hundred DEB or RPM files every time it updates. Why can't it be just one DEB/one RPM?(For some reason, I've never figured out how to make the Libreoffice Flatpak show the correct theme.)
@jpmens yes, it counts the lines in the "raw" curl.1 - it's a bit of a blunt thing to do, but we have roughly the same approach to it through the times so it is a decent way to plot the growth
Hmm, actually not sure if lengthy man page is a good thing on its own. Manuals can be extensive and complete but they can also be repetitive, redundant or clobbered.
Maybe the ratio of lines/number of curl options would be a more revealing indicator? When options go up the man page should also go up. If options stay the same but man page grows/shrinks it's getting more/less extensive.
Maybe a graph with absolute numbers of lines and options as well as the ratio combined?
@jimfuller @icing wondering if the attacker went into the trouble of actually using these versions, or just spoofing the user agent with valid versions. Logged HTTP and TLS versions may help spotting impossible combinations.
I actually don't have more insights myself, but no one has said anything about these being exceptions, special or attacks. Just showing the curl use on these sites a random day.
Inspired by the BBC Tech report from @tdp_org, I looked at Wikipedia.
Yesterday, Wikipedia received over 45 million requests made with curl, from 113 distinct curl releases.
Of these, 32 million use the default UA (e.g. curl CLI). The other 13 million embed libcurl with a longer UA string containing curl (e.g. GuzzleHttp/PHP, PycURL, UnityPlayer)
Inspired by the BBC Tech report from @tdp_org, I looked at Wikipedia.
Yesterday, Wikipedia received over 45 million requests made with curl, from 113 distinct curl releases.
Of these, 32 million use the default UA (e.g. curl CLI). The other 13 million embed libcurl with a longer UA string containing curl (e.g. GuzzleHttp/PHP, PycURL, UnityPlayer)
Curl is just one projects that make up the $8.8 trillion open source industry. In a keynote at Open Source Summit, curl creator Daniel Stenberg asks why help is so scarce.
The intersection of open-source software and proprietary systems often sparks debate, and Sony’s Playstation is at the heart of a current controversy. This a...
advertise the introduction of a remote kill switch with the next release of curl, for "security". Obviously it doesn't have to be there. Just to scare the clueless CxOs and make them freak out.
@christmastree it is on the conservative side yes. I don't really know how many installs I should count per mobile device. But also: it actually does not matter too much if it is 20 or 50 billion...
With how often I've yelled at abusive Google behaviour and its risk without anyone really caring, especially for the first round of their dev doxxing by forcefully showing everyone's legal name on the Google Play Store (forcing some trans people to choose between pulling their app(s) down or being forcefully outed and deadnamed), I feel quite tired to even consider yelling again but...
I think Google's true goal here is not safety. I think it is to control externally published apps more and make running a third party app store way harder.
Most likely, this is also an attempt to truly get rid of privacy enhancing open source apps like ad blockers, YouTube client NewPipe, etc.
After all, Google here gets to choose what is malware.
I've boosted some toots recently that explain this better than I do so check those out. But sheesh this is a horrible step in the wrong direction.
So what? Whoever wants (near) full control doesn't run stock #Android but a decent #CustomROM such als #LineageOS and its derivatives (/e/OS, iodé and more), and runs FOSS Apps as far as possible. What #Google does? I couldn't care less.
@PC_Fluesterer You shouldn't have to choose between Open Source apps from anonymous developers and compatibility with banking or other sadly "Play Integrity"-locked apps people may need.
How will new people be able to properly see how much the FOSS world has to offer if they are forced to learn about custom ROMs first to just dip their toes in the water? Not to mention all the extra support questions FOSS devs will deal with with "app won't install".
Nobody is forced to learn about CustomROM. You can buy devices w/CustomROM installed of the shelf ready to use. I for one know about murena.com/america/products/sm… and shop.iode.tech/ but there may be more. You can use those the same way you would use stock Android, except without Google surveillance.
@PC_Fluesterer Do you think that when an user hears about Open Source and gives it a try but gets an error message because the app dev has not registered with Google that we can just tell them "Oh, just buy a new 400$ device from here" and that they'll still be interested in learning more about the world of FOSS?
Of course not, what will happen is that that user will instantly give up on FOSS and we lose another potential person for our cause.
1. Someone will be responsible for the apps someone else makes 2. If one of the apps in the coop gets banned, *all* of the apps in it may get banned
Also, depending on Google's implementation, the following might also happen: 3. Joining/leaving the coop will force a resign, forcing all existing users to reinstall (and lose data) 4. The dev will have to wait for the coop to sign each update, slowing down their ability to release updates
@ysotomayor Yes that's right, if you've previously purchased the Excel module, or the productivity bundle, head to: nvaccess.org/my-account/downlo… and ensure you are logged in, then you can download the updated version :)
When I visit my account page, with both the latest Firefox and Chrome, and NVDA 2025.2, I hear things like: "Microsoft Excel with NVDA <span>(eBook)</span>" Something is broken in that table.
@VE3RWJ I know that's not new, and I recall there was a reason for it, but good question, worth another look to see if we can fix it! Thanks for the prompt :)
@Razemix Jj, jsem zvědavý, jakého výrobce vybrali vývojáři. Zatím Pixely jedou dál, ale nikdo neví, jak dlouho. 😔 Možná pak ještě přesun na iPhony, ale tam mě štve ta cena.
@ozzelot Jako o dumbphonu jsem chvíli uvažoval, ale když jsem si to kriticky zhodnotil, tak bych se z toho asi spíš zcvoknul. 😄 Navigaci/mapy používám celkem často, to tam prostě moc dobře nefunguje. Chci aspoň trochu rozumnej foťák, ne 2 Mpx. A sice na sockách nevisím 24/7, ale jsem rád, že můžu bejt jednoduše ve spojení.
Ty linuxový telefony maj samozřejmě taky svoje nedostatky, ale lepší se to.
Purism makes premium phones, laptops, mini PCs and servers running free software on PureOS. Purism products respect people's privacy, freedom, and security
@Razemix Bože, takhle USAcentrickej marketing se mimo čistý MAGAscamy jen tak nevidí :D Docela fajn by byl některý z těch nejvíc dopilovaných targetů postmarketOS (Pixel 3a, OnePlus 6/6T), ale to je zas starší hardware a ty OnePlusy už tak nějak občas náhodně umíraj...
@phanecak To je sice pravda – zatím GrapheneOS běží jen na Pixelech. Na druhou stranu je odměnou jeden z nejbezpečnějších systémů a instalace je přitom jednoduchá na pár kliknutí v prohlížeči. @GrapheneOS
@phanecak Pixels are currently the only devices combining a high level of security with proper support for another operating system. There aren't other options available which preserve the standard privacy and security protections of up-to-date Android 16, let alone offering substantial improvements to both as we do.
We're working with a major OEM towards a subset of their future devices meeting our requirements for updates and hardware-based security features. Likely 1 to 2 years away.
Nechá mě pak KB stáhnout si u ní na webu KB Klíč dobrovolně a bude mu důvěřovat nebo ji k tomu bude muset donutit zákonodárce? Zákonodárce (státem/y zaúkolovaná Komise): Nic s chainem důvěry nezačínajícím na Google Play/Apple Store už si nenainstalujete blbouni, pro vaše dobro!
Taky mě to utahování šroubů štve. Mám na Play pár appek, čistě z testovacích/zkušebních důvodu. Neustálé aktualizace jen kvůli podpoře nového API (jinak Google appky maže) nebo nové ověřování či vyplňování dalších dotazníků je vopruz. Teď mi zase přišlo další avízo. Ještě jsem to nečetl, ale evidentně to bude stát za to. 😐
Alas, it is time for more uncomfortable questions, in this case regarding the announced Android developer verification program: commonsware.com/blog/2025/08/2… #AndroidDev
Join us once more for the Reaper Made Easy Q&A. Saturday, August 30th, 3PM Eastern, 8PM UK
Hey all, it's that time again.
As summer, for most of us, moves toward fall...
Oh no! Let's not talk about that. Forget I said anything. Summer is forever, right?
What I'm actually here for is to remind you of our monthly Live Q&A meetup. Join Scott and Jenny K on Saturday. for I'm Perplexed, What's next? A Q&A session covering all things REAPER, OSARA and accessible production. As usual, we'll be making sure questions from newcomers slip to the front of the queue. Details are at reaperteacher.com. That's also where you can send us something that you're working on to listen to during the session. Constructive feedback from objective, experienced ears can be super useful. There are normally a few present to help us with that if the hosts lose focus. :)
It's 2025, and Canada is literally on fire. 1 in 4 Canadians can't afford enough food to eat. Housing starts are down, and are projected to continue falling.
What are Carney's priorities? Subsidizing the fossil fuel industry, of course. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Amid his push to strengthen energy and economic ties with Europe, Prime Minister Mark Carney revealed Tuesday that the federal government will imminently be unveiling major new investments in port infrastructure.
Amid his push to strengthen energy and economic ties with Europe, Prime Minister Mark Carney revealed Tuesday that the federal government will imminently be unveiling major new investments in port infrastructure.
This page provides a chronologically ordered list of my work by publication type. For a quick overview, please check my Google Scholar profile. My ORCID is 0000-0001-5361-2885. I also ser…
André Polykanine
in reply to Thib • • •Thib
in reply to André Polykanine • • •@menelion this is unfortunately true, and the solution is much more complex than "just pour money on people without any form of accountability."
The first question is "to whom" and the following one is "for what." I wrote a post earlier this year about the structural changes I think we need to go through so the Linux desktop can be considered of public interest.
I'd love to hear your thoughts about it if you have some time for it.
ergaster.org/posts/2025/02/28-…
Prosthetics that don't betray
ergaster.orgAndré Polykanine
in reply to Thib • • •1. Accessibility *is* a technical problem, not (only) a social one. To make something as huge as an OS accessible means, at least: A) To expose accessibility APIs on every plan of existence of the OS; B) Develop a decent screen reading solution (see JAWS or NVDA for Windows); C) Develop a decent screen magnifying and color altering solution (see ZoomText for Windows); D) Harden audio stability, so that a trivial update won't break your audio system; E) Develop a solution for people with motor disabilities that would allow decent voice control (see Dragon Naturally Speaking, for instance). That is an absolutely technical endeavor. You'd say Linux has Orca screen reader and you are right, but it's developed de facto by Joanmarie Diggs. Alone. No, of course, there are some people sending PRs, but do you see the difference between a paid solution like JAWS or even a community-driven solution like NVDA on the one side and a screen reader developed by one (brave and genius, but one!) person on the other? Again, I really admire Joanmarie, but she does need help, and I mean, lots of help.
2. Mobile. It's yet another challenge because tactile screens accessibility is something else than keyboard accessibility, be it terminal or GUI. Apple (no matter how I hate their policies) already solved many problems, hence the most common combo in the wealthier blind community is Windows + iPhone. Who would do the same for Linux? Up to you (in plural) to decide.
3. Toxicity of the community. I'm really sorry to admit, but open-source community is very often either toxic or indifferent. When I or one of my blind fellow folks open an issue about "X is not accessible at all, please fix it!" (where X is anything from a small web-based solution to the whole LibreOffice Calc), guess what we get? "Send a PR!". Heck no, putain de bordel de merde de… — excuse my language! I cannot spend my whole life to dig into undocumented code then send thousands upon thousands of PRs, then beg their supreme highness of developer to please merge it, then wait till it's released. I need to work, to eat and to feed my family, including cats. Hence… I use Microsoft because it just works, and if there is an accessibility bug, it gets fixed, — not always super mega fast (like in Visual Studio Code, kudos to them!), but it *is* fixed. Unlike with open-source, sorry.