In the words of the American writer Susan Sontag, “To collect photographs is to collect the world.” And to see the world as it was, from dramatic historical events to the quirks of everyday life, there’s no better place to begin than a photo archive. Newspapers – whose photojournalists capture everything from grand state ceremonies to dog-grooming competitions – provide us with some of our most important archives.

The Daily Herald Archive has more than three million photographs of life in Britain during the 20th century. Founded in 1912, the Daily Herald was in print for 52 years, spanning two World Wars, the postwar era and the swinging ‘60s. Today, the archive provides a unique portrait of a country undergoing great change, while also documenting local eccentricities and everyday life. Now held at the National Science Media Museum in Bradford, the Daily Herald Archive is the Science Museum Group’s largest collection.

I'd really hope that the tons of history and records at all newspapers can find a living home like this. The same goes for so many long standing organisations as it is tragic when decades of history just go "missing".

See https://artsandculture.google.com/project/daily-herald-archive

#technology #dailyherald #newspaper #archive #history

If you want to use your smartphone, you'll need a SIM card of some sort. The Subscriber Identification Module (SIM) assigns you a phone number and connects your phone to a mobile network or carrier. Without a SIM, you can't call, text, or use any of the best data plans.

In recent years, the physical SIM card has been overshadowed by the eSIM, culminating in Apple's decision to remove physical SIM card slots from the iPhone 14 lineup. And while less well known, iSIM has the potential to eclipse both of these.

It certainly also gets a bit more complicated for cellular service providers. Certainly the present and future should provide subscribers with more options, if only providers were moving a bit quicker as we are not yet seeing all those options (choices are still thin on the ground).

See https://www.androidpolice.com/sim-esim-and-isim/

#technology #SIM #eSIM #iSIM #mobile

The application allows you to use realistic oils, acrylics, watercolors, and other wet and dry materials. You can mix colors, change oil thickness, use watercolor diffusion, and mimic the way natural painting interacts with real canvases. Rebelle is designed for any level of painter who wants to design any form of painting.

The app runs, though, on Windows or macOS only.

See https://lifehacker.com/drop-everything-and-get-this-150-painting-software-for-1849632251

#technology #art #painting #rebelle

Just noticed this really useful GUI tool that was not around a year ago or so when I switched my Home folder partition to Btrfs. It seems to cover all the generally used type of Btrfs features you'd use including running and monitoring scrubs or balance operations, and even viewing and browsing snapshots, with options to restore individual files.

See https://gitlab.com/btrfs-assistant/btrfs-assistant

#technology #opensource #Linux #btrfs #BtrfsAssistant

Yes, it seems expensive, but it is in fact cheaper than some competing 10" eReaders which have a way lower pixel density. These larger format readers with pens are just more expensive, and there is no getting around that.

Obviously, battery life is one of the major pluses over LCD and OLED displays, as is the functioning in very bright sunlight. So this will appeal to a niche of users who would find that really useful.

You can write directly on-page in PDF documents. You can import and create handwritten sticky notes in Microsoft Word docs and web articles, with adjustable font sizes and layout. You can also create handwritten sticky notes in TXT, PNG, GIF, JPG, TXT, RTF, HTM, HTML, PNG, GIF, JPG, JPEG, BMP and EPUB.

See https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2022/09/amazons-340-kindle-scribe-is-its-first-e-reader-with-handwriting-and-pen-support/

#technology #Kindle #eInk #annotations

Microsoft confirmed that it’s removing SwiftKey from the Apple App Store and ending support for the iOS version of the keyboard app on October 5th. It will still be available if you’ve already downloaded SwiftKey on your iPhone, so long as you don’t uninstall it yourself.

SwiftKey has been available on iOS since 2014, two years before Microsoft acquired the app. SwiftKey will still remain available and fully supported on Android, and Microsoft continues to roll out regular updates.

SwiftKey is actually a very good keyboard, and probably the reason why Microsoft bought it. I do suspect though also that Apple's very restrictive policies make it very difficult for devs to provide some of the really useful features that are found on Android (just think of the crippled robo caller apps). Although I'm still chiefly iPhone user (was iPhone, bought Android, back to iPhone), I did just buy a budget Android phone this week (just to play a bit with) and no doubt Apple's quality, stability, privacy, and camera are better, but Android has more of the apps I'm missing, and the flexibility, so maybe I'll end up being a two-phone person...

See https://www.theverge.com/2022/9/28/23377227/microsoft-discontinuing-swiftkey-ios-keyboard-app

#technology #swiftkey #microsoft #iOS

According to The Byte Attic, the first commercially available microcomputer was the Q1, based on the Intel 8008 processor. The first Q1 microcomputer was delivered in December of 1972, making it the first, as far as he can tell. Later revisions used the Z80 processor, which is the model pictured above that The Byte Attic has in his possession. It’s a beautiful little machine, with a striking orange plasma display.

The irony is that this machine is almost entirely forgotten about. The original unit may have looked more like a typewriter, pictured here. If you have any first hand knowledge, or especially software, documentation, or surviving hardware bits, make sure to check in to add to the knowledge pool about this amazing little machine.

See https://hackaday.com/2022/09/28/the-first-microcomputer-the-q1/

#technology #vintage #retro #Q1 #microcomputer

Open source Duplicati allows you to set your own encryption and compression before efficiently backing up to many remote services. But good candidate targets too are a second drive, or even FTP to a remote computer on the network.

But with Google not offering a native Linux Google Drive sync or backup, maybe using Duplicati is actually a more secure way of achieving this.

See https://www.addictivetips.com/ubuntu-linux-tips/how-to-back-up-directly-to-google-drive-on-linux/

#technology #opensource #googledrive #Linux #Duplicati

Shows again it is really worth buying an Android phone that has LineageOS support. Once your phone no longer gets OEM updates it is time to think about flashing it with a custom ROM like LineageOS. Not only will you get a newer version of Android OS, but also a whole host of extra features too.

I actually managed this week to get LineageOS 14.1 installed on an ancient Galaxy Grand Neo Plus, and it actually works, but must admit the old hardware is holding it a bit back now.

See https://www.xda-developers.com/samsung-galaxy-s-iii-galaxy-note-ii-android-13-custom-rom/

#technology #android #lineageos #GalaxySIII