rantcomputing

The speaker is happy to have de-Appled and de-iClouded their Apple account. They don't want Apple to have access to their data and share it with other affiliated companies. They talk about the interest in retro computers and how far back they can be used. They mention running Puppy on a 386 processor. They discuss upgrading their operating system to Raspberry Pi and Debian. They mention the benefits of open-source systems and their dislike for commercial companies wanting to own user data. They talk about gaming on Linux and the potential of virtual reality and augmented reality systems. They predict that initially, these systems will be expensive, but eventually, they will become more affordable and popular. They mention the younger generation being more open to adopting new technology. Hi everyone. Today, I'm glad to say I've been de-Appled, which means I hope, I hope that my account with Apple, where they, you know, they have iCloud, I've been de-iClouded, that's the word I'm looking for, been de-iClouded. That's only on one device. Hopefully, I'll be able to do it on another device, because I'm not interested in their iClouding. I want to own my data, and I want Apple to own it. I don't want Apple to sift it and use it in their, I think they're planning to do a social app of some description, and they're also passing on the information to anybody who they're affiliated with, like Pixar and Apple, what do they call it, Apple Plus? Yeah, Apple Plus and all these other things. Nothing to do with them. I don't, my data is for me, not for them. Anyway, that's a little rant, just about that. I thought I'd talk today a little bit about different computers, different possibilities, if you like. Now, one of the things I found most interesting was the retro, retro computer, people getting quite, I mean, quite old systems to work usefully, and that quite intrigued me, is how far back can you go? And the reason for this is, when I was involved with Puppy, one of the things that I did quite late on, it was quite a late version of Puppy, I wanted to see what was the most basic system that I could run it on. And I had, I think, a 286. I couldn't get it to run on a 286, but I managed to get it to run on, this is an Intel processor, I managed to get it to work on a 386, I think it was a 386SX or something like that. And that was, that was about as far back as I've gone, because if you go further back, because somewhere I think I've still got a, well, we've got an Amiga 2000, which is a combination of an XT processor and a Amiga setup, an Amiga board, it's the two combined. And I think it's got quite a ridiculously small hard drive, if it's still working. And what are you going to do with that? You know, you're very limited, if you've got a browser for it, or you can get a browser for it, you might be able to do something useful. But my feeling is that it's worth upgrading your operating system, so this is the one thing I'm, hopefully I'll be doing today, is trying to get my, I can't find the cable for my Raspberry Pi, which version is it, Raspberry Pi 4, and then eventually I want to get a 5. But D3, I've got a switch for it, and I've even got a little box for it, I don't normally put them in boxes, I just staple them to a board or something. Anyway, so if I can get that version 3, if I can get the 3 running, and running the new operating system which Raspberry Pi have brought out, that'll keep me going and happy for a while. It all depends what, because that's, the Raspberry Pi OS operating system is based on Debian, and Debian of course is the, one of the systems that are used by GNU. So you get GNU, that's the free operating system, completely open, completely open source, GNU Debian is a system that I'm sort of moving towards it as quickly as I can, because all the commercial companies want to own your data. They want to franchise you, they want you to buy a new machine every 10 minutes, and if you want to do that, because it's worth having, it's worth having the hardware you can afford and you can make use of, if you do, for example, if you're doing, if you're into gaming, then it's worth getting the fastest and best PC you can, the biggest, you know, several screens, three screens, or a bendy screen, or whatever it is. I'm not a gamer. The reason I'm not a gamer is really because when I started using Linux, the games were rubbish. Now the situation is slightly different, there are some good games, and if the, if people start using the, because I was never much of a phone user, I didn't, I didn't find, I liked, I liked the direction they were going in, but they weren't my sort of, they weren't my sort of thing, but I am quite interested in virtual reality, augmented reality, however you like to call it, and there's some good systems coming out. Initially, they're going to be very expensive, and then the prices will come down, and they'll be available for everyone, and people will wander around with goggles on, and the older generation are going to say, why don't they get a decent mobile phone, it's much better, you can do so much more with it, and it's much easier to use. The usual thing, the kids are always the ones who adopt the new technology, make use of it, whether that's AI or whatever it is. Anyway, that's enough for me, for me, that's enough from me today. Bye now.