Keep is convenient, but it was time for a replacement. So, I tried out Trillium, a self-hosted, open-source note app. This might just be the self-hosted notes app that will make me ditch Google Keep. https://github.com/TriliumNext/Trilium

You can download ready-to-use binaries for [Linux x86_64](http://(https://github.com/basiliscos/syncspirit/releases/download/v0.4.1/syncspirit-fltk-v0.4.1-x86_64.AppImage) (AppImage), Windows (WindowsXP is supported) and Mac OS X (Apple silicon).

Notable changes:

• unified shared folders model, which allows to inspect on a local and remove devices
• possibility to import files from local storage
  performance improvents, upto 5 times on a smaller files
• fix compatibility with global discovery v3 protocol
• support folder_type folder setting (send only, receive only, send & receive)
• support pull_older folder setting (alphabetic, by size, by modification date)
• support disable_temp_indixes (hardcoded to 1 for atm)
• support ignore_permissions folder flag, permissions and no_permissions file flag
• support ignore_deletes folder flag
• support device auto-accept folder flag
• support device introducer and skip_introduction_removals markers
• support outgoing messages to be compressed using lz4

Syncspirit is a syncthing-compatible is written from the scratch software in C++ as classical desktop application.

Award-winning photo editing, graphic design and page layout software for Mac, Windows & iPad. ///

alternative to PhotoShop & Adobe InDesign

Sympa is an electronic mailing list manager. It is used to automate list management functions such as subscription, moderation and management of archives. Sympa also manages sending of messages to the lists, and makes it possible to reduce the load on the system. Provided that you have enough memory on your system, Sympa is especially well adapted for big lists. For a list with 20 000 subscribers, it takes 5 minutes to send a message to 90% of subscribers, of course considering that the network is available.

dnGrep allows you to search across files with easy-to-read results. Search through text files, Word and Excel documents, PDFs, and archives using text, regular expression, XPath, and phonetic queries. dnGrep includes search-and-replace, whole-file preview, right-click search in File Explorer, and much more.

symbolset Wise, Aged Ars Veteran
12y
116
If you let any vendor be essential to your operation, they will blackmail you or they will go out of business and leave you inoperable. That is the nature of the essential dependency relationship. You can't shut them down, can you? No.

This very thing is both the reason for Unix and the thing that killed it. Mainframe lockin being what it is. People got tired of rebuilding everything and demanded portability. And then AT&T exploited their need for Unix.

Sure, their software is convenient. It's useful. But you have to be ready to unhook from any vendor instantly without disrupting your operation. That's inconvenient. It's expensive. It's necessary. If a vendor controls whether you could continue in business, they own your business. You work for them. You wouldn't allow that from any employee, a security contractor, a landlord, an Internet service, an accountant, an engineer, tech or manager. If your CEO goes rogue or dies in the chair you get another and move on. Why should a software vendor have this privilege above all others? There's always another way to do anything. For everything essential responsible people always have a hot spare, a workaround, a plan B. Always

This is also useful when going into negotiations. The one who cares the least controls the relationship.

RickyP784 Ars Tribunus Militum
13y
2,213
Subscriptor
I'm so looking forward to de-VMware-Ing and de-Cisco-ing my network over the next few years as much as possible.

We're starting soon with Arista fiber switches and will start replacing copper IDF switches in the coming years. I think we'll keep Cisco APs, phones, and firewalls, but it's gonna be real nice when our only SMARTnet costs are FirePowers and an ISR voice gateway.

Our Dell VxRail ends service life in 2 years, and that will be the last VMware equipment to go. Unless Proxmox comes a long way in a short time, we'll switch to straight Nutanix. Not ideal, but it's the best of a bad situation. //

Evil_Merlin Ars Legatus Legionis
25y
23,732
Subscriptor
We got ours. And we WERE a big VMware user. We migrated from Hyper-V to ESXi in 2019 for stability and extendibility reasons. The cost increase could be justified by the back end we had, so it wasn't a huge deal. Fast forward to now, we are on a deadline.

July 18th, no more ESX. Anywhere. No VMware products period.

All Windows systems going back to Hyper-V using Windows Server 2025.
All Linux/GNU and appliances going to KVM.

The company saves a BOAT load of money.

Broadcom made the decision REALLY easy for us. Best thing is that we will have it all gone before the audit, so when they get here (and we will LET them come) we can turn them away at the door with proof in hand. //

Are you willing to pay for your host? Windows Server does VM's quite fine for almost any loads. Good management tools and decent amount of guest coverage. //

Depending on guest oses
Proxmox, quemu with vmm or other gui, openstack , openshift with addon for vm's
or
if mostly windows hyperv. //

sjl Ars Tribunus Militum
19y
2,785

Spuwho said:
Heard a company is looking into a general Broadcom boycott. processors, controllers, network switches, storage equipment, other software products. Not just dumping VMWare, but anything related to or dependent on Broadcom. They really pissed off a lot of people.
I have an LSI (Avago, Broadcom - in order of the buyouts) SAS controller in my home-brew NAS.

If I ever need a replacement, I'll be looking at options from Microchip (the company that bought the company [Microsemi] that bought the company [PMC-Sierra] that bought Adaptec.) Possibly Marvell. Not Broadcom, specifically because of this. Sure, I'm a very small fish in that particular pond, but still.

We were lying in bed with our newborn, and my wife said, "We are starting to accumulate a lot of photos and videos of our baby, and I don't want to pay for App-Which-Must-Not-Be-Named anymore. You always want to build something for me, so why don't you build me an app which can do that?"

That was how the idea started to grow in my head. After that, I began to find existing solutions in the self-hosting space with similar backup functionality and the performance level of the App-Which-Must-Not-Be-Named. I found that the current solutions mainly focus on the gallery-type application. However, I want a simple-to-use backup tool with a native mobile app that can view photos and videos efficiently. So I set sail on this journey as a hungry engineer on the hunt.

An alternative to the immich-CLI command that doesn't depend on nodejs installation. It tries its best for importing google photos takeout archives.

Starting from version 1.26.7, VeraCrypt discontinued support for the TrueCrypt format to prioritize the highest security standards. However, recognizing the transitionary needs of our users, we have preserved version 1.25.9, the last to support the TrueCrypt format.

On this page, users can find download links for version 1.25.9, specifically provided for converting TrueCrypt volumes to the more secure VeraCrypt format. We strongly recommend transitioning to VeraCrypt volumes and using our latest releases for ongoing encryption needs, as they encompass the latest security enhancements.

Monitor your security cameras with locally processed AI
Frigate is an open source NVR built around real-time AI object detection. All processing is performed locally on your own hardware, and your camera feeds never leave your home.

Get access to custom models designed specifically for Frigate with Frigate+.

I continue to use WordStar for DOS 7.0 as my word-processing program. It was last updated in December 1992, and the company that made it has been defunct for decades; the program is abandonware.

There was no proper archive of WordStar for DOS 7.0 available online, so I decided to create one. I’ve put weeks of work into this. Included are not only full installs of the program (as well as images of the installation disks), but also plug-and-play solutions for running WordStar for DOS 7.0 under Windows, and also complete full-text-searchable PDF versions of all seven manuals that came with WordStar — over a thousand pages of documentation.

I’ve also included lots of my own explanations on how to use and customize WordStar, many WordStar-related utility programs, and numerous other goodies.

Carolyn Clink kindly did the scanning of the manuals. When she was done, I said to her, “Countless WordStar users will thank you.” She replied, “Oh, I think I can count them.” ;)

And it’s true that the WordStar die-hard community is pretty small these days (George R.R. Martin still uses the even-older WordStar 4.0). But the program has been a big part of my career — not only did I write all 25 of my novels and almost all of my short stories with it (a few date back to the typewriter era), I also in my earlier freelance days wrote hundreds of newspaper and magazine articles with WordStar.

I wanted there to be a monument to this, the finest word-processing program ever created. As Anne Rice said, “WordStar was magnificent. I loved it. It was logical, beautiful, perfect. Compared to it, Microsoft Word is pure madness.”

And, I suppose I’m thinking a bit about my legacy, too. Once I’m gone, my literary estate will need to deal with my electronic manuscripts, and my executor should be able to work with them on her own computer rather than just mine. Also, there are countless other writers who are no longer with us who wrote with WordStar, including Arthur C. Clarke; I hope this archive I’ve created will be of use to scholars.

Anyone can have WordStar for DOS 7.0 up and running on a Windows computer in a matter of minutes using this archive; with just a little bit more work, WordStar for DOS 7.0 also runs just fine under Linux and Mac OS.

Here’s the link to the full 680-megabyte archive:

https://sfwriter.com/ws7.htm

WPDOS under Modern Windows and macOS, New Printer Drivers, Euro Symbol Support, and Added Features for WPDOS 5.1 and 6.x

What this is

This repo contains downloads of compressed disk images of bootable USB keys.

Version 1 is based on several upstream FOSS projects, plus some ancient DOS freeware applications. The idea is to provide a complete, easy-to-use, distraction-free environment for writers. It is set up for English with provision for US and UK keyboard layouts. If you want other translations, I welcome help!

To get your work off the key, just insert the key into a computer that's already running any more modern OS than DOS.

You cannot go online with the keys and there are no Internet tools. There are also no games included. Both are intentional.

What it contains: SvarDOS plus a menu launcher and a choice of freeware writing tools

The operating system is SvarDOS, the latest release as of January 2025. For source code for the OS, go to the SvarDOS website.

There are no build scripts or source code here. I did not use any. I did not compile anything at all. What I did was take pre-existing compiled code from SvarDOS and other projects, install it, and configure it. Then I worked out how to make bootable media in VMs, imaged those DOS-bootable USB media, and put the downloads here.

The main writing-tools key has a simple launch menu using the DOSShell menu from PC DOS 2000, which back in 2021 I made into a Virtualbox VM and published on my tech blog.

It contains three word processors, two outliners, three plain-text editors, and some other apps. These alls are all explicitly freeware or products from companies that no longer exist.

By 21st century standards, DOS is so tiny and simple that it can run on almost anything. It has a library of thousands of apps, including some very powerful tools. Many were shareware or public domain, and are legal to use for free. Even many formerly commercial apps are legally freeware now. As an example, there's a good assortment at the FreeDOS repo. FOSS was not a big thing in the DOS era – it predates the invention of the GPL, for instance – but DOS versions of some of the big-name FOSS apps, such as Emacs and Vim, do exist. //

There's one purpose where being the digital equivalent of a hermit in a cave in the desert is an advantage. A function for which a total lack of ability to connect to a WLAN and access the Web is a desirable thing: a standalone, non-networked, multimedia-free writing machine.

Early versions of many of the big-name word processors ran on DOS, including the classic WordPerfect and the original Microsoft Word. There are other writers' tools, too, such as Symantec's GrandView outliner. Not all are free to use these days, but a surprising number are. For instance, one of the most popular British apps from the 1980s boom times, Arnor Protext, is now freeware. Even some of the big names, when the last inheritor ceased trading years ago, as we described regarding MicroPro's WordStar last year. //

Microsoft Word 5.5 came out in 1990 and was the first DOS release with a modern CUA user interface – in other words, drop-down menus using standard keystrokes. It still works well and Microsoft released this version as freeware in 1999 as a Year 2000 fix for all previous versions of Word for DOS and OS/2. (Unfortunately, this doesn't apply to Word 6.0 for DOS, which was the final DOS version and is a little more pleasant to use.) //

The result of the holiday season at the end of last year is our USB-DOS project on GitHub. It's a – so far, very small – collection of images of bootable USB keys. There are both FAT16 and FAT32 images. The FAT16 image will fit on a 256 MB key, if you can still find one that tiny; the FAT32 image will fit on a 4 GB key with a lot of room to spare. The first release, version 1.0, contains MS Word, Arnor Protext, an outliner, and the WordPerfect Editor. It boots straight into a graphical menu that lets you run the apps without ever even seeing DOS's command line. The second release, version 1.1, is nearly twice the size, but that's because it adds in the DOS components from Robert Sawyer's WordStar 7 archive, including file conversion utilities, and substantial documentation as PDF files. For that reason, we also added Adobe Reader for DOS.

https://github.com/lproven/usb-dos

When you install a fresh, clean copy of Windows – say, if you're switching to the LTSC edition – Ninite is here to kickstart provisioning the new OS.

Ninite is a very simple, but very clever, tool that automates the process of installing a user-configured suite of apps and runtimes onto Windows. Not only will it help you get up and running as quickly and easily as possible, but if you keep the tiny custom installer, you can re-run it later and it will update everything it originally installed to the latest version. //

If you're also missing some important device drivers, Snappy Driver Installer Origin can help you there, as we have described previously. With LTSC there's much less need for O&O AppBuster but O&O ShutUp10++ makes it trivially easy to turn off most Microsoft telemetry.

Basic concepts of Microsoft Word for beginners and those who want to start again

But if you value more control over your digital footprint, consider cultivating a file collection as part of that:

• Cobalt.tools is a free web-based utility that converts content from YouTube, Instagram, and other online sources into downloadable video and audio files.
• PlayOn, which I’ve written plenty about on the cord-cutting beat, can save videos from streaming services such as Netflix and Hulu.
• Keep an offline archive of articles you find useful. The Single File browser extension can save web pages as self-contained HTML files that are readable offline, and Obsidian has a free web clipper that works in tandem with its desktop app.
• If you’re a big note-taker, consider apps that store your notes in open formats that other apps can access. Obsidian is one, but there are others, like Joplin and Logseq.

For all the melodies you have in you
Speldosa is the result of a unique collaboration between Klevgrand and the Swedish artist Wintergatan/Martin Molin. Wintergatan has primarily worked in the physical world (the Marble Machine is probably the most astonishing example), while Klevgrand has performed its craft within the digital sphere. When these two worlds now meet, it results in a product that both visually and audibly inspires the creation of music that you didn’t know you had in you.

Speldosa (Swedish for "Music Box") is the essence of the shared beliefs of Klevgrand and Wintergatan, and their fascination with minimalism. A simple melody played on a music box can contain an equal amount of emotional power as any symphonic work. There is something about the music box sound that never ceases to fascinate.

The instrument itself has been meticulously recorded by Wintergatan and transformed into a playable digital instrument plugin. It features four different models (Modern, Vintage, Antique, and Eternal = Reversed), two different Room models, and an algorithmic reverb.

Obsidian has made managing my work significantly easier
For someone who struggles with organization, it really helps

There are a lot of note-taking apps out there that I've tried, but Obsidian is the first to have finally captured me. I don't need overly complex notes, I just need something to help me keep track of my day-to-day life... and this finally does it for me in a way no other app has before. //

CJ
Key features:

• Sync across devices
• Data control of your files/data
• Ease of dropping a note from your phone or desktop
• Ability to organize your notes based on your method

I feel like the author was trying to convey they chose a new note taking methodology that worked for him.

You can apply a note taking methodology to anything, including the trusty pocket notebook.

This author chose a new methodology and chose to use obsidian. That's it. Not that obsidian is better at note taking apps.

So far for the literal speed to note taking onenote and Trello seem to be the winners. They also sync flawlessly. There may be other apps too.

All that being said, you can make a mess of your notes in any app too.