After a third-party seller fiasco on Amazon, I have finally secured a refurbished 2014 Mac Mini desktop. Of course her new name is simply “Minnie.”
Let’s hope that Apple will support this outdated operating system for a few more years
Minnie will have a renewed purpose in life as a file and media server which includes these functions:
store and serve photo, music and video files to access remotely for friends and family
external hard drive for backups
Time Machine backups
host and support this website as well as the FoxCast audio files
serve as a normal desktop for me and the significant other
With a hard wired ethernet cable to the 5G modem, a static IP address I can call up files even when I am away from home, which is more frequent lately.
After purchasing a new monitor, keyboard, mouse, ethernet and HDMI cables, she now has a head and input devices to interact with.
This will serve as my ultimate backup and storage solution for years to come. I’ve been wanting to do this forever and finally have the opportunity to do it.
A recent trend going around the fediverse and blogosphere is showing off what your default software tools are so now it is my turn. In the past, I would try the latest shiny software to see if I could incorporate it into my daily digital workflow. But that got exhausting because there was always a shiny new toy later. Over time, however, I’ve settled on what works and to limit my subscription dollars going out. Therefore, I find that for the most part, Apple’s default software applications are good enough.
What works for you doesn’t always work for me, so don’t come at me with “what about ?” I won’t hear it.
📨 Mail Client: Apple’s Mail on both Mac and iOS.
📮 Mail Server: iCloud.
📝 Notes: I use an home-grown database for everything which I call “FoxOS.” Formerly known as “Grey Matter” and “Pensieve.” Apple’s Notes for collaborating with the missus.
✅ To-Do: Apple’s Reminderd
📷 iPhone Photo Shooting: Apple’s Camera app, usually with ProRAW enabled.
🟦 Photo Management: Apple’s Photos app, and editing in Lightroom
📆 Calendar: Apple Calendar
📁 Cloud File Storage: iCloud Drive
📖 RSS: Feedbin
🙍🏻♂️ Contacts: Apple Contacts
🌐 Browser: Safari on iOS and Mac.
💬 Chat: iMessage
💁🏻♂️Social: N/A
🔖 Bookmarks: Safari
📑 Read It Later: Feedbin and Matter.
📜 Word Processing: The aforementioned FoxOS
📈 Spreadsheets: Numbers.
📊 Presentations: N/A
🛒 Shopping Lists: Apple Reminders
📰 News: RSS and Apple News
🎵 Music: Apple Music
🎤 Podcasts: Apple Podcasts
🔐 Password Management: Apple KeyChain
The Point Of All This
Apple’s apps are pretty darn good for everything I want to accomplish. I’m also a bit of a purist, so I tend to default to defaults, even if they aren’t quite as robust as other options. There was a time in my life when I was a bit more adventurous, but I largely cannot be arsed.
A recent trend going around the fediverse and blogosphere is showing off what your default software tools are so now it is my turn. In the past, I would try the latest shiny software to see if I could incorporate it into my daily digital workflow. But that got exhausting because there was always a shiny new toy later. Over time, however, I’ve settled on what works and to limit my subscription dollars going out. Therefore, I find that for the most part, Apple’s default software applications are good enough.
What works for you doesn’t always work for me, so don’t come at me with “what about ?” I won’t hear it.
📨 Mail Client: Apple’s Mail on both Mac and iOS.
📮 Mail Server: iCloud.
📝 Notes: I use an home-grown database for everything which I call “FoxOS.” Formerly known as “Grey Matter” and “Pensieve.” Apple’s Notes for collaborating with the missus.
✅ To-Do: Apple’s Reminderd
📷 iPhone Photo Shooting: Apple’s Camera app, usually with ProRAW enabled.
🟦 Photo Management: Apple’s Photos app, and editing in Lightroom
📆 Calendar: Apple Calendar
📁 Cloud File Storage: iCloud Drive
📖 RSS: Feedbin
🙍🏻♂️ Contacts: Apple Contacts
🌐 Browser: Safari on iOS and Mac.
💬 Chat: iMessage
💁🏻♂️Social: N/A
🔖 Bookmarks: Safari
📑 Read It Later: Feedbin and Matter.
📜 Word Processing: The aforementioned FoxOS
📈 Spreadsheets: Numbers.
📊 Presentations: N/A
🛒 Shopping Lists: Apple Reminders
📰 News: RSS and Apple News
🎵 Music: Apple Music
🎤 Podcasts: Apple Podcasts
🔐 Password Management: Apple KeyChain
The Point Of All This
Apple’s apps are pretty darn good for everything I want to accomplish. I’m also a bit of a purist, so I tend to default to defaults, even if they aren’t quite as robust as other options. There was a time in my life when I was a bit more adventurous, but I largely cannot be arsed.
I just successfully migrated all of my digitized notes into a new personal database which I used to call “Grey Matter” as a second brain, or pensieve. A second brain is a system where I can collect, refine and process ideas that hopefully will lead to future insights or research.
It’s like adding additional RAM memory to your own brain to help me connect and visualize my thoughts. Every note is linked to another and if there is a general topic such as, photography, it creates a node for other notes to connect or backlink to.
Now that my clean slate initiative is almost complete and have removed my personal name offline, I’ve renamed the database as The Fox Operating System or simply FoxOS.
A photography node on a graph view of my notes in Grey Matter
I just successfully migrated all of my digitized notes into a new personal database which I used to call “Grey Matter” as a second brain, or pensieve. A second brain is a system where I can collect, refine and process ideas that hopefully will lead to future insights or research.
It’s like adding additional RAM memory to your own brain to help me connect and visualize my thoughts. Every note is linked to another and if there is a general topic such as, photography, it creates a node for other notes to connect or backlink to.
Now that my clean slate initiative is almost complete and have removed my personal name offline, I’ve renamed the database as The Fox Operating System or simply FoxOS.
My second brain with backlinked notesA Photography node
The clean slate protocol I initiated a few days ago is a success. After creating a new domain name and building a new website, with a new e-mail account and a new Apple ID, I am slowly migrating some of my crucial data from backups.
I have yet to delete the old Apple ID for fear of missing a few crucial pieces of correspondence from companies I do business with but all that should be wrapped up by this coming week. For now, I can breathe a sigh of relief as I start building good organizational and privacy habits to ensure nothing gets out of control again.
The clean slate protocol I initiated a few days ago is a success. After creating a new domain name and building a new website, with a new e-mail account and a new Apple ID, I am slowly migrating some of my crucial data from backups.
I have yet to delete the old Apple ID for fear of missing a few crucial pieces of correspondence from companies I do business with but all that should be wrapped up by this coming week. For now, I can breathe a sigh of relief as I start building good organizational and privacy habits to ensure nothing gets out of control again.
After recent price increases, subscription fatigue, privacy concerns and probably long overdue contentment, it’s time for a change. I’ll be withdrawing more from technology, technology blogs and restructuring everything to maximize privacy, reduce monthly subscription spending and pursuing avenues of personal interest.
I am heavily embedded into the Apple eco-system after decades of using Windows/Android. I have stuff scattered all over the internet, cloud storage and external hard drives with almost zero organization. That’s changing as of today.
First up, a new identity. I will no longer be using my personal name online. I don’t need to “brand myself” anymore since I am done playing the game. I created a new Apple ID that is generic and not personal. Then I created an iCloud account to go with it. Next, I purchased a new web domain (silverfox.website) and email address to match it and then made THAT one the new/updated Apple ID. The hard part is switching everything from contact information to businesses and services I use over to the new account. Sure, I’ll lose a lot of subscriptions, but I am pairing them down and prioritizing anyway.
With iCloud+ services such as Private Relay and “Hide My Email” I can create generic, disposable email addresses. Apple then allows me to use random, generic passwords and will even store them for me using their KeyChain.
When all of this is sorted I need to discipline myself to keep it organized, unlike my previous attempts. Maybe then I can get back to enjoying what I love in peace such as photography, reading and geocaching.
Never thought I would use that term, but downgrading is definitely an option now. With the announcement of Apple raising their digital subscription package Apple One, 9to5mac.com/2023/10/2… I’ve decided to go backwards instead.
After two years of silence, I finally heard the fan kick in on my M1 MacBook while downloading images off Adobe to my external hard drive. Took me by surprise!
I tried using Smugmug as a personal website and canceled that…again. I re-subscribed to Adobe…again. I wish I could quit Adobe but they make it so damn easy love/hate on them.
Just canceled my Adobe Lightroom account and lost my Portfolio website as a result. Looking at SmugMug as a website and unlimited photo host but damn. Those site customizations are frustrating. What have I done?
Anyone wishing to explore artificial intelligence first needs to study philosophy.
Eastern works such as Tau, western works such as the meditations of Marcus Aurelius, the Bible, and other modern day thinkers.
To understand and explore artificial intelligence, we have to explore the implications or consequences for this understanding and knowledge of ethics, consciousness, epistemology, intelligent problem-solving and most importantly, free will.
While taking a couple of Stanford online courses on quantum theory, quantum computing and quantum mechanics, I was overwhelmed by the theories and possibilities. Quickly, those theories will become reality. An intelligent, conscious being driven by qubits and binary coding will exist. What would it’s role be? Will it have a place among us? Will it have the same rights and freedoms that we do?
I’ve had the opportunity to make a few backgrounds for the iDevices and wanted to share them at no cost if you are interested. Good for any device. Just click here to download and save to your screens. Let me know what you think and maybe even send a screenshot with them installed?
I’d like to put it out there to the World Wide Web right now- if I ever use artificial intelligence to write this website for me, I’ll shut it down first. But, until the damn thing grows arms, breasts and sentience, I’m in charge, so we’ll do things my way.
While it is true that artificial intelligence (AI) is changing the way we work, read, and create, I don’t believe it will take away the human soul’s creativity. AI can absolutley be seen as taking over if you think of it as sentient, but it isn’t. It is all programmed, programmable and flawed. Just like us.
AI is a tool in our toolbox, nothing more. Those tools are no different then a hammer/chisel to sculpt. No different then pencil/paper, paint/canvas, light/film/photo.
AI can be viewed as an intern. Some interns are paid and most are not. But either way, we can allow AI to do some research for us, format the data and organize data to fit our desired outcome. Now, would I trust an intern’s copy without proof-reading? No. We polish it up and make it our own, conform to our needs and desired outcomes.
If I ask AI to generate a blog post for my website I am sure it will be very competent in spitting out text that is very factual, very droll, with keywords that will generate search engine optimization and offer suggestions on how to best get the best return on investment for all of it’s hard work and I take all the credit.
Image Credit: Me (human) + AI
But it isn’t me. It won’t be personal now matter how I try to spin it off as my own. It is artificial, emotionless, calculating and maybe too perfect in comparison to my flawed brain, typos, run-on sentences, etc.
This website will no longer be a personal website at that point. It would be formatted to reach the most viewers based on the most current topics of thing that I personally don’t give a damn about. That isn’t a personal blog. It is artificial.
To be clear, I do not fear artificial intelligence. As a closet geek, I am amazed at what programmable software can do right now and still wonder what is holding us back to do even more. I took a few semesters at Stanford online for quantum computing and quantum mechanics and was in awe at the theories and possibilities. Combining quantum computing with machine learning and artificial intelligence is a step forward to benefitting mankind. I do fear that like all tools in the hands of humans, that it can be perverted to do harm to others.
🤖
“We refuse to accept the responsibility for anything that we’ve done, like we did with the Cylon. We decided to play God, create life. And when that life turned against us, we comforted ourselves in the knowledge that it really wasn’t our fault, not really. You cannot play God then wash your hands of the things that you’ve created. Sooner or later, the day comes when you can’t hide from the things that you’ve done anymore.” – Commander William Adama
🤖
“Technology changes, but people stay the same.” – Robopocalypse
However, as I said earlier: until the damn thing grows arms, breasts and sentience, I’m in charge of this personal website, so I’ll do things my way.
