kinzie @bespectacled239@qoto.org

This article below, from #DuckDuckGo's official #privacy #blog, is about the difficulty of changing the default search provider on #Android devices.

Title:

Search Engines Should be Able to Guide Consumers to Search Preference Menus

URL:

spreadprivacy.com/one-click-preference-menu/

A direct quote from the article:

"Right now, for example, Google’s search preference menu in Europe is shown to consumers just once, on initial device setup. Believe or not, the only way to get back to it thereafter is to erase all data on the device through a hard “factory reset,” returning the device to an initial device setup state."

#weblog

My #thoughts:

I absolutely agree that users should be able to exercise total control over what search provider they use on their devices. It should be as simple as changing a setting. The setting should be easily accessible, user-friendly, and unintrusive.

On a separate topic, the main operating systems that everyday people use, #macOS, #Windows 10, and #iOS have been integrating search features into the operating system itself so you don't have to open the browser to search something.

On iOS, what you type into Search feature is automatically sent to #Apple servers, with no way to disable it.

This is obviously a risk to user privacy. The iOS Search feature does not say where it fetches its results, either. I use it to access my #iPhone's built-in dictionary. Unfortunately, there's no way to access its dictionary without sending information to Apple servers.

@freemo @CrosshairElephant

Oh thanks. I don't know any German though. I'll have to make do with the translarion.

@freemo @CrosshairElephant

Sweet, do you have any advice for reading it? ☺️ (History, language, main ideas?)

@freemo @CrosshairElephant

I haven't. Dr. Freemo, what did you read?

Should I read this?

Title:

"Manifesto of the Communist Party"

URL:

www.marxists.org/admin/books/manifesto/Manifesto.pdf

This is my alt.

@lydiaconwell My thought is that people's understandings of the same concepts can be different. They can be similar enough so that two people can talk to each other and understand what's being talked about, but there is still room for variation.

That's why I believe that what can be expressed through language is limited by two people's mutual understanding of a concept and the words used to convey that concept.

The problem of other minds is related because it has to do with understanding what other people understand, and also understanding "what it's like to be them."

I hope that makes sense...(?)

Title:

"Problem of other minds"

URL:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Problem_of_other_minds

Basic Steps to Understand Difficult Writing

1. Read the piece of writing
2. Summarize the piece of writing
3. If you have trouble, look up unfamiliar words in a dictionary and try again
4. If you have trouble summarizing a paragraph or a longer piece of writing, summarize a sentence or a word
5. Look up unfamiliar concepts with a search engine. Putting the concept in quotes, such as "focal length" will make the search engine only return results with that exact phrase
6. Read in a quiet place, free of distractions

1. Know the purpose and difficulty of the writing. Not all writing is meant to be understood by a general audience and not all writing is written clearly.
2. Find writing that is suitable for your level of understanding
3. If you're unable to understand something, ask someone who knows

#GeneralGoodAdvice

Note:

Summarizing is when you explain a concept to yourself in the most basic way, so it's easy to understand.

@mur2501 Hell...

@freemo What kinds of devices were you thinking? 🤔😌

My TV remote has double A's, I think.

@digital_carver You might have heard of this:

It's a free online course that focuses on teaching someone "how to #learn."

I took it a while ago. Would I say it was helpful? Sort of. The "exercise helps learning" and "the brain has a *diffuse* thinking mode and a *focused* thinking mode" were the two things I remember best from it.

#Learning, to me, is kind of like a magic black box. I learn the things that I learn and I don't know why. There are things I find incredibly tedious and uninteresting that are a lot harder to learn.

The course explains various scientific studies about learning and provides strategies for overcoming common obstacles.

It's a long course and you need to sign up for Coursera to do it.

Name:

"Learning How to Learn: Powerful mental tools to help you master tough subjects"

URL:

www.coursera.org/learn/learning-how-to-learn

@iankenway Hey, it's HAL 9000. ☺️

@freemo I don't really have anything else to say.

It's interesting to me how opinions on communism range from "Communism seems sensible and I have experienced the problems it seeks to fix" to "Communism doesn't work. You all just want free stuff."

In most arguments, neither of the people arguing are entirely wrong. I find that interesting. There's usually a middle ground that's more accurate. ☺️

I'm off to bed. It's 12 AM.

@freemo My stepfather, he is a communist, and he believes—I'm probably oversimplifying this—that workers should be paid a fair share at their jobs and that they should be treated with respect.

He believes there is an owning class and a working class. The owning class makes money from what the working class does and seeks to oppress the working class unfairly so they do not get the full benefit from their work.

The owning class could not get the benefit of what the working class does without the working class.

Workers at McDonald's run the McDonald's but are only paid a small amount from the money that is made. They are treated as expendable and are fired at a moment's notice when it is convenient, regardless of whether it is deserved. This is immoral.

From the small amount I know of communism, it seeks to stop injustices from happening in the workplace by giving workers more say in how the business they work at is run. It stops corporate greed—which is destroying the world and creating unhappiness.

The picture doesn't reflect what I know of #communism or #socialism.

😕

@academicalnerd What is a back end? ☺️

@icymastodon@mstdn.social @strawberryfieldsforever

One more thing: it's good to have a spare computer that you can use to make another bootable USB if the installation fails for some reason.

@icymastodon@mstdn.social @strawberryfieldsforever

More details:

You'll also want to verify that the disk image (the Linux operating system file) works since it can become corrupted when you're downloading it. You can do that by trying it in a virtual machine / using the checksum that the Linux distributor provides.

I strongly recommend trying to install Linux in a virtual machine a few before you install it on your real computer. It's a delicate process. Make sure you write down a few notes about how long it takes, how many steps there are, pre-write any information the OS will require upon installation so you can type it in as soon as the OS installer asks.

It's good to know what a partition is before you try to install Linux.

Troubleshoot issues with the OS in the demo mode before you actually install it (screen brightness, audio, animations, speed, changing settings).

The Linux distributor should have documentation about how to install their OS. Find their website and look for it before you install.

Sorry if this is overwhelming. It's stuff I would've liked to know when I was first installing Linux.