I’m anti enshittification & pro digital privacy. A few years back when Evernote started restricting their service & a password manager I’d paid for multiple users for fucked me over it dawned on me that “Big Tech” did not have my best interests at heart. Since that Eureka moment I formed an interest in FOSS & ive not looked back.

I’m not in IT, 100% self taught. Started with Nextcloud with NGINX. I expose as little as possible, the rest is local only though ive set up Wireguard for external access.

I self host mostly what everyone else does: Nextcloud, Joplin, Paperless, Immich etc etc. Special shoutout to Homebox which ive found extremely useful when boxing up & organising our roof space & garage. I like to use Docker containers.

Its become a bit of a hobby & the path led me to the Fediverse. The next step is likely switching fully to Linux

Set this as an alternative search engine

https://noai.duckduckgo.com/?q=%25s

I absolutely loved Reddit. Deleted my posts & left after the Spez api farce (Joey on Android you were a good soldier). I occasionally go back there anonymously to check niche subs (using Redlib).

Reddit is essentially shite now:

• Endless bots
• Same crap re-posted repeatedly (describe your cat I’ll draw it, 12 shitty manga characters - pick one to fight on your team, this is my cat the last thing you ate is its name etc etc etc
• The exact same jokes repeated endlessly
• Reply after reply quoting the next few words of a song lyric
• Topic replies tend to go way off the rails within 2 posts

Fediverse seems to be a more knowledgeable/mature crowd. Some great information disseminated. Ive seen some wonderful actual discussions between people with differing points of view asking for further clarification then discussing further. You never see that on Reddit.

Sure, we could do with a ton more posts & the niche communities continue to struggle but I’d much rather visit Lemmy 2 or 3 times a week than Reddit every day.

Voyager on Android. I subscribe to as much as I could find that I was interested in. These show in “Home” feed.

I look through the “All” feed to see whats going on & subscribe to anything relevant, then switch back to “Home” for my individual feed.

Amirite?

Some of my favourite mobile centric uses (I’m a FOSS leaning Android):

• I like to try to ensure most things are available offline: maps, notes, passwords (manager also holds “emergency” documents), media, ebooks, podcasts etc
• OsmAnd has offline Wiki articles, this is awesome when travelling
• OsmAnd can be great for finding POI’s such as food outlets, toilets etc when travelling (I since extensively mapped my own locality to help visitors by way of thanks)
• Using stuff I self host synced to various devices: Nextcloud, Joplin, Paperless-ngx, Immich, Jellyfin & a bunch of others
• whoBIRD is great especially when travelling
• If WiFi/data is unavailable when travelling away from home, hook the phone up to TV with a hub, HDMI, keyboard with track pad & it becomes a full media system

No major difference its just what works for you. I used Hoarder (KaraKeep) in the early days but found I preferred the Linkwarden UI particularly on mobile so switched. But they’re both great.

Strangely I’ve found I tend not to use it for everyday bookmarks use (I’ve put those in a Joplin note). Instead I use Linkwarden for interesting stuff I might need at some point - long read articles or information for projects that I’ll be undertaking in the future, be that videos or written guides. You can set folders (topics) & tags for ease of retrieval.

• Randomly removes email addresses I use every day from the auto-complete forcing me to type them literally in full for weeks until it remembers them again.
• A colleagues name starts “tom…” but it ALWAYS auto-completes with another colleague “tim…”. Every single time.
• Search sucks. Not sure if this particular complaint is just our company setup but for some reason it hides stuff older than a given date “on the server” which means you have to remember exactly where stuff is & open the folder before it displays the contents rendering search pointless. Absolutely hopeless

Wouldn’t be without it!

I tried Hoarder (KaraKeep) & Linkwarden. Both excellent but I preferred the UI for Linkwarden, particularly on mobile, so I stuck with that - i found Hoarder awkward to edit thumbnails for example though things may have changed in KaraKeep. From Android perspective both have apps but I prefer to use browser plugin. With Linkwarden there’s some hoops to jump through on Android Firefox but it works perfectly once set up. Both excellent choices.

Why not both? I’ve exposed my Nextcloud instance to www but don’t want to expose Immich. The Memories plugin for Nextcloud is great for sharing photos to family (I tend to share only photos from special events rather than everything).

I have Nextcloud on a Pi5 8GB running an SSD. Immich currently on a Pi4B 4GB with external HDD.

Another shout for Homebox. I used to use a spreadsheet but over time found I simply didn’t maintain it but I’ve found I always maintain Homebox.

Homebox allows parent/child relationship between items & exports to spreadsheet.

I dont utilise the QR code facility because my family members would not bother to use QR codes. Instead I’ve numbered all boxes in each location (attic, garage, basement etc), printed contents of each box & put the printout into physical folders left in each location so even the most Luddite in my family can easily locate stuff then, in theory, remember where they took it from & if the stars align & its my luck day, put the item back in the same box that they removed said item from. When that happens I always check my lottery numbers too!

They can’t filter/search a physical printout but at least they can find stuff (I guess I should simply add a QR code to each printout for a best of both worlds solution).

Overall I’ve found Homebox a useful, simple & fun tool

Never knew I needed? Another vote for Paperless-ngx. I still feel like I’m living in the future using it. The trick I’ve found was initially setting up a good document naming & management convention & following it religiously for every document. The search function is fantastic at narrowing down results. Used in conjunction with specific coloured tags I can immediately see what I need from search results.

Fired up Immich recently. Amazing. Will be donating as I like their stance.

I also enjoy Linkwarden. Switched from the also excellent Hoarder as I prefer the UI.

Most used? Nextcloud with Joplin.