Nostr Web Client

SimplifiedPrivacy.com 2y ago

My Controversial Tech Picks:

Mint over Ubuntu

LibreWolf over Brave

MPV over VLC

AnonAddy over SimpleLogin

Session over Telegram/Briar

MetaGer over Duckduckgo

SimpleX over Signal

Gossip over Iris

onlyOffice over LibreWriter

KeePassXC over all mobile 2FA

XMPP over Matrix

Monocles over Conversations

AntennaPod over iTunes

Trocador over exchanges with accounts

Feather over official GUI

Farside over LibRedirect

scp command over NextCloud

KVM Virtmanager over Oracle VirtualBox

And of course, Nostr over Mastodon

Add on to my list with your picks in the comments!

(Or dispute/ask why I made a choice)

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Discussion

mister_monster 2y ago

Yeah, why session over briar? You've brought up publicly the problems with session and big rooms, briar is p2p with forward secrecy.

Trocador... I like trocador. But there's nothing stopping them from logging everything, they could be a honeypot. Their monero bridge is great, unless theyre using it to make themselves valuable to people who want to know what you're doing.

I've never liked libredirect, I found it cumbersome. I use Redirector, a web extension for ff and chromium that automatically changes URLs based on predefined patterns written in regex. On desktop I use my own tool with qutebrowser that does something similar to be found here https://codeberg.org/mister_monster/qutebrowser-url-mutator

SimplifiedPrivacy.com 2y ago

Briar requires both parties to be online and both to add each other to even begin talking. This makes it extremely likely that you’ll have to use out of band, or non-Briar communication to coordinate when you’ll be doing Briar. On the other hand, Session has a model similar to Nostr with nodes for offline communication and you can initiate first contact on Session.

The main difference between Nostr and Session is that Session’s nodes are darkweb onion routed and with Session it goes to the receiver's node while as Nostr the poster picks the node. Session is not good for forward secrecy that’s correct, but it’s #1 for censorship.

Regarding the 2 browser extensions. I will check it out. I see your codeberg here, looks good. When you visit websites with Qutebrowser, does it show up to the website fingerprinting you as Chrome?

mister_monster 2y ago

So the rendering engine is qtwebkit, it should look like safari or epiphany browser to everyone. I forget what the user agent string says by default, I've changed it.

nobody 2y ago

Why Mint over Ubuntu? I've only ever used Ubuntu...but I'm not married to it.

SimplifiedPrivacy.com 2y ago

Mint is basically Ubuntu without snaps. Snaps are universal cross-platform, but at the expense of being slower to open. The majority of Ubuntu software works on Mint. There's other reasons but this would turn into a novel. Maybe we can make an article on this topic? Would that interest you?

nobody 2y ago

Definitely!

Secretary Janet Yellen 2y ago

Mint is faster than Ubuntu, it's running like a dog on any hardware.

cuban 2y ago

can you do a one sentence on why for each 😅

SimplifiedPrivacy.com 2y ago

Yes, I can on another post. It would be a good article more so. A lot of them would require 2-3 sentences though

b75b9a31... 2y ago

Doesn't mention LibreOffice, Mint over Ubuntu... Debian, Gentoo, Fedora there's plenty options an a never ending discussion so use what you like. MPV on Linux is the only option since there's no MPC-HC lol. LibreWolf and Thorium over Brave and others.

SimplifiedPrivacy.com 2y ago

You can put VLC on anything, even windows.

I meant Mint over Ubuntu as they are close competitors for the same niche of new users. Gentoo and others are targeting a different demo for different purposes. LibreWriter is LibreOffice, sorry if this was confusing.

b75b9a31... 2y ago

Mpv or mpv.net can be used on windows too but still prefer mpc-hc since is still maintained in a repo also why I prefer mpc easy has better clarity and colors when displays a video this is very technical but that's what it is 😆

Slimer 2y ago

Why annonady over simple login?

SimplifiedPrivacy.com 2y ago

SimpleLogin is hosted with Protonmail and should be viewed as an extension of it. Proton cooperates with thousands of law enforcement requests and should be viewed as a corporation and not a just open source software that’s just code.

On the other hand, AnonAddy has a better UI, better reputation, seems like just 1 developer which is more hipster, Greenhost is a more trusted host by me, and is more representative of a FOSS project. You can self host it, and F-Droid has apps for it by different random developers. SimpleLogin uses Coinbase as a crypto payment provider, which blocks Tor and is going to get the transaction run through an anti-fraud (and therefore anti-privacy) surveillance tool.

I do not support crime, I but do support a decentralized internet. Protonmail & Coinbase are more centralized than a lone hipster with Greenhost and Globee.

Slimer 2y ago

That's a great explanation and gave me some things to research 🙏

sommerfeld 2y ago

You should really use rsync instead of scp. Or if you want some syncing automation, use syncthing, it's very easy to setup.

Your choices over messaging apps are a bit all over the place. You need to meet people where they are, otherwise you'll talk to no one. What you can have is a ranking of preferences.

I could nit pick more, but most picks are solid!

SimplifiedPrivacy.com 2y ago

Rsync is whole software , not 1 file to send someone. Syncthing is good for among your PCs, again not sending someone 1 file

sommerfeld 2y ago

What do you mean with "whole software"?

You can and should use rsync to send just 1 file, the command syntax is exactly the same. rsync is a drop-in replacement for scp. scp is just objectively worse in every way.

SimplifiedPrivacy.com 2y ago

Oh ok thanks. I'm happy you spoke up. I thought rsync was just like timeshift for whole disc backup

m0xie 2y ago

Graphene over Calyx

rado1 2y ago

XMPP protocol is almost abandonware. Basic specification is pretty poor, everything what you expect from messenger is a part of some extension. Not supported by particular server or not supported by particular client. Or built on extension still in "draft" past 15 years. Even the most used "pidgin" client is not supporting "must have" basic set of extensions.

237f9e52... 2y ago

Have you tried Conversations(Android) or Gajim(desktop)?

rado1 2y ago

Tried Gajim 3y ago, put on "something is missing" list. Don't remember exactly.

There is a lot of jabber features not included in basic specification but via XEPs. Did not find a client that has all required XEPs implemented.

237f9e52... 2y ago

I cannot agree.

Just try Conversations on Android and Gajim on desktop.

xmpp is a solid and reliable protocol.

rado1 2y ago

1. XMPP is solid. But without XEP is very limited. Client based on pure XMPP is almost unusable for people.

2. Tried to get list of supported XEPs for gajim. https://gajim.org/support/extensions is dead link - bad way to persuade me.

After spending some time of googling, I have got list of supported XEPs. Will give it a chance again.

SimplifiedPrivacy.com 2y ago

Pidjin is old mate. See our video for newer ones that all all interconnected

rado1 2y ago

Any multiplatform (Linux/Windows) jabber client not still in aloha phase on github? Seeking 3 years already.

(What video do you mean?)

SimplifiedPrivacy.com 2y ago

https://video.simplifiedprivacy.com/xmppclients/

cactus 2y ago

Why Gossip>Iris and LibreWolf>Brave?

Also, Session removing PFS is not really a problem at all: https://maglit.me/session-pfs

SimplifiedPrivacy.com 2y ago

Our new animated tutorial covers Gossip:

https://video.simplifiedprivacy.com/gossip/

SimplifiedPrivacy.com 2y ago

Librewolf has stronger anti finger and isn't pinging Amazon brave at startup. Reject google chrome changes

237f9e52... 2y ago

Many good choices 👏👏👏

237f9e52... 2y ago

Why mpv over vlc? Maybe I should make a transition.

SimplifiedPrivacy.com 2y ago

Higher quality graphics. Watch something cinematic side by side

237f9e52... 2y ago

I can confirm, mpv is much better option. VLC is already purged.

Monkey Pox Denier 2y ago

dd over any other Backup Solution

Jordon Miles 2y ago

Why anonaddy over simplelogin?

Toxic Bitcoiner 2y ago

Keet over SimpleX and Signal? Haven’t heard much about Keet lately.

HODLBurger 2y ago

Simplex has great forward privacy.

Keet is a different category imo but a great video chat & file sharing tool. (File sharing could use better UI)

antifragilemoney 2y ago

Why SimpleX over SphinxChat or CipherChat?