Ah, I was thinking of curved space over the surface of the sphere. Right you are. No me for me to start getting non-Euclidean

Huh, checks out.

That would make it even less possible

For document editing, I have had fairly good luck with OnlyOffice, although it is not without its issues. Others also recommend Collabora, which plays well with NextCloud and LibreOffice.

DAVx5 basically acts as the connector between your server and your calendar/contacts/files apps. I would imagine that this could be built into an app, but there are a lot of ways that such apps can sync or operate locally. I’m guessing that it is just a little more specialized than most developers want to get.

Thanks for the Syncthing-Fork tip! For now the official version is working for me, but I’ll have to migrate myself soon.

From my understanding, OpenVPN provides the same secure remote access as Tailscale, by a slightly different method. You should be fine to use what you’ve already set up.

I’ve done this.

For contacts, calendar, and files, I use OwnCloud, although NextCloud is as good/better. I couldn’t figure out Self-Signing certificates, which is supposed to be pretty easy, but I am kind of a dummy. NextCloud requires it. On my phone, I use DAVx5, and I replaced the GrapheneOS stock apps with Fossify apps as needed - although that is up to personal preference.

For photos, I use Immich, which is hands-down the best option.

NextCloud also has options for document editing, photo backup, and notes, but I can’t testify to those.

Syncthing is an ideal way to seamlessly sync files and folders between devices, but you will end up with the files on both devices. I use it sparingly, and they are phasing out android support. It’s still very useful to migrate large file libraries and act as a stopgap for other services.

There are tons of notes apps, and it largely comes down to preference. I settled on NotallyX, which can import your Keep notes directly (using Google Takeout iirc). It also has the option to store files externally, which means they can be synced for backup. There are also self-hosted web-apps, like Memos, or the slightly more adventurous Blinko.

I got a lot of great input from this community not too long ago.

The one Google feature I am not able to reproduce is Google Messages. If you use texting to any degree, there are some FOSS apps with pretty nice basic features (I’m using Fossify which is nice). However, there are none that have solid group-messaging features, reactions, and other RCS capabilities. It seems to be a technical/logistical/legal hurdle that is presently insurmountable. Lots of people don’t use texting anyway, so it may not be a concern for you.

Edit: And of course, you need a way to tie everything together. I use Tailscale, which is ridiculously easy to self-host.

From what I gather, most people use a simple Linux distro like Ubuntu or Debian with a large community knowledge base. Then run the pieces you want through Docker. It’s pretty simple once you learn how.

Your laptop will be perfectly capable.

Unrelated but there are several open source podcast aapps that will do this like AntennaPod or Cardo

No, the screen still absorbs the same amount of light, even when it’s producing its own. It is effectively black from the Sun’s perspective even when the screen is white.

A display that uses a reflective light display such as LCD or e-ink would be the exception. Since they work by changing reflectiveness, they absorb more or less light from their surface.

Raccoon is still in active development, although it went through a change in leadership a while back. Still the same great team.

Saddle shaped universe confirmed

Wait, now it’s only $700 million. $400 million. $34 million… And it’s $6.50.

Yeah, I guess there is someone out there who would buy a fleet of dumpster cars for $6.50.

Ship your books as Media Mail or consolidated shipping. You will save tremendously and won’t have to give up your library.

USPS

TSI

Absolutely!

This is my library from years ago, before I knew any better. It’s honestly split between Amazon and Nook from those years. Since quitting that, I’ve been using Libby (and its predecessor) almost exclusively to check out eBooks and audiobooks from the library. I don’t often have much interest in re-reading, but it is also nice nice to own certain books, and there are some that I re-read or use as reference.

New books will be coming from more friendly sources. I’ve learned my lesson!

Also, this community helped me find places to purchase books and e-books directly without DRM in the future like eBooks.com and Downpour.

Also valid. Many of the books I own are difficult to locate, so this was necessary. Successfully removing the DRM of the entire library at once has been SIGNIFICANTLY more accessible than locating niche communities with private trackers (often requiring membership and/or payment) for every title.

I hope it helps anyone in the same situation.

Comment from bearCatBird:

HERE IS WHAT WORKS AS OF AUGUST 2024 (Windows 10)

NOTE: if these instructions don’t work for you, check the replies to my comment for updates from people. I can’t always update these instructions to include various work-arounds people have found.

Thank you to u/toobnugget for the versions and more instructions, it also worked for me. Here’s additional information to help people out. Just do it all in this order.

NOTE: If any of the links are broken, try pasting the broken URL into waybackmachine.org and look for files from today’s date (8/12/24) or earlier.

CONFIRM ALL SOFTWARE IS UNINSTALLED

1. If you had previous versions of the software installed, uninstall them.

2. Then confirm there are no lingering data files with user settings. For example, with kindle, remove these lingering directories if they exist.

   C:\Users<USER>\AppData*\Amazon C:\Program Files\Amazon C:\Program Files (x86)\Amazon C:\ProgramData\Amazon

3. You can also clear your registry (as described here) but I would save this as a last resort and only do this if you’re unable to get the full instructions from this post to work.

CALIBRE INSTALLATION

NOTE: if you want to use a kindle e-ink device, see step 2 of u/OccasionallyPrincess’s comments here and also u/SeniorSiesta’s comment here.

1. Download and install Calibre 7.13 (download here) (Some people tested with newer versions (7.2.1) and said it works, but I haven’t verified.)

2. In Calibre install the KFX input plugin (see OP’s instructions up top), restart Calibre

3. Download the DeDRM v10.0.9 (download here, the zip file at the bottom called DeDRM_tools_10.0.9.zip, then extract the zip to a folder.)
   NOTE: Some people had better luck using the alpha version of DeDRM. See this post here for more information if v10.0.9 isn’t working for you.

4. In Calibre install the DeDRM files (see OP’s instructions up top), restart Calibre

KINDLE INSTALLATION

NOTE: Some people had to turn off WiFi and unplug ethernet so they were 100% offline when installing Kindle to avoid automatic updates before disabling it in settings.

NOTE: Mac Users, you can probably download newer versions of the kindle app, as confirmed by this post.

5. Download and install Kindle 2.4.0(70904)

https://kindleforpc.s3.amazonaws.com/70904/KindleForPC-installer-2.4.70904.exe

See u/Tilduke 's response here for more information.

(Other sites: download here or here or here)

6a) Disable your internet

• Many people needed to disable their internet/wifi temporarily for step 6b

6b) Launch Kindle (don’t login if possible), then go to

• Tools > Options > General > disable “Automatically install updates…”

• Tools > Options > Content > define a new path to save the kindle books you download

• Finally, re-enable internet and Login (For more information about this step, see this comment)

7 ) Select a book, right click, download

CONFIRM THE DRM IS REMOVED

8 ) Find the book you just downloaded from Kindle in the new path (it will be the files that are newest, since they won’t have book titles), select the .azw file, and drag it into Calibre. (Do not use the “Add Books” function.)

NOTE: Some people had better luck NOT dragging in the file and instead loaded it from the menu. See this comment for more information.

9 ) Once loaded in Calibre, right-click the book > view > view with calibre e-book viewer (if the book opens successfully, then the DRM has been removed. Use pgup and pgdn to see the pages). Close the viewer.

CONVERT THE BOOK

NOTE: This example shows conversion to EPUB, but you can convert to any format you want.

10 ) In Calibre, right click the book > Convert books > convert individually

11 ) Choose EPUB on the upper right, then click OK to export

12 ) If you want to change the location where Calibre exports the book, go to preference (CTRL + P) > click “Run Welcome wizard” at the bottom > then define a new folder for your calibre books to be saved. This folder will be where the book saves when you drag in the .azw file and also where the .epub exports.

For more context, see: https://www.reddit.com/r/Calibre/comments/1c2ryfz/2024_guide_to_dedrm_kindle_books/lhtah7p/

I’ll include the text of the post in the comments below.

Edit: Now available - see comments.

I probably overstated by saying it is equally dangerous with somebody driving drunk. However, there are lots of studies that show it causes serious impairment.

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle/2788264

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9940647/

https://www.nhtsa.gov/sites/nhtsa.gov/files/documents/812440-marijuana-impaired-driving-report-to-congress.pdf

https://jcannabisresearch.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s42238-023-00202-y

BAC is also well correlated with impairment. Obviously it varies from one individual to another, but it is related strongly related enough to have fair and consistent enforcement.

AFAIK, blood tests that measure the presence of marijuana are relatively cheap, but measuring the concentration is slightly more difficult and is not well correlated with impairment. That means enforcement is problematic and subjective.