DeaDvey's Blog

Living life without a smartphone

For over a year now, I have not had a smartphone, I've been using a Nokia 105 (2019) which is a dumb phone with calling, SMS, Radio, Calender, a torch and a few games, though I never actually play the games as the only free one is snake.  Firstly, I will talk about my opinions on the Nokia phone itselfl, it's tough and reliable, with a removable battery that I can charge with a universal battery charger that I found, it would be nice if it supported more wallpapers as there are only three and you cannot upload more to the device.  However, I only really use it for calling and texting, which it does the job, one thing that has annoyed me is that there is no convienient, one button way of hanging up, for some reason you have to go into the mid call options menu then navigate down to "end call" button which seems like bad UX.  It would also be nice to have the option to store contacts on both the SIM card and internal memory at once, you can store a single contact on either one but then it shows up as two seperate contacts as opposed to one single contact that is stored on the SIM card AND the memory at once. Finally, the battery is not very good, however , seeing as I have around 5-10 minutes daily screentime on it, it still lasts around a month, but, I am planning on getting a spare battery for occasions when the charge is low, it would be quite useful.

Switching to a dumb phone:
I was never someone to use my smartphone a lot anyway as I have a desktop PC which is much better, and I've always been of the opinion that it's rude to go on your phone while with someone, and I find it annoying when people do this, even when I had a smartphone.  Previously I had Ubuntu Touch installed on my Smart Phone and that was pretty basic, there wasn't a terribly good app selection, so I was already doing 99% of things on my PC and only really called and texted people on that device, I probably had around 20 minutes daily screentime on the Ubuntu Touch and so the switch to a dumbphone for me was actually quite easy.  I wanted to switch because I found my phone distracting and didn't like the idea of smartphones removing the core human ability to exist without constant connection to the internet and instant dopamine hits from addictive applications such as TikTok.

Issues with the lack of a smart phone:
I have certainly noticed pain points, mostly artificial, such as my college expecting everyone to have a smartphone for the bus, and the register which is a QR code... The school's email uses a specific verification software which is a mobile app, I managed to set it up where it sends me an SMS code, however, it often doesn't work, or takes 10+ minutes to send the code.  The bus passes, which the college distributes via the buses app, was unavailable to me for a few weeks, before I was given a physical card, however, the card seems to be much better than the app and more reliable, and I've known people to not be able to get the bus because their phone was dead...
Finally, I notice more so just how much people around me use their smartphones, and it can feel a bit lonely sat doing nothing while my friends or family go on their phones around the table.

Benefits with the lack of a smart phone:
I find my life much more calm without the costant nagging of a notification filled, internet connected device, and I find that I don't miss the ability to instantly find information, no matter where you are, it actually makes life more interesting, me trying to remember something during a class or on my commute.
I take an A-Z map of Birmingham in my pocket wherever I go in case I get lost, and I have had no issue, I don't need Google Maps or anything.

Landline or Mobile?
Even when I am "out", I rarely use my phone and I think I could probably go without a mobile at all, the only time I've found it useful having a mobile was when I had a flat tire on my bike, but my parents didn't even pick up anyway so I ended up having to walk it home anyway, so I think I could go with only a landline.
The main issue with a landline would be the lack of SMS, I don't know of any landline's that support SMS because, while I prefer calling, most of my friends complain when I call them up and they seem to find it awkward.

Conclusion:
It was quite easy for me to switch full time to a dumb phone and my small issues with it's design are not very important as I don't use it much.  Additionally, I've found my life to be much better without the smart phone, and have found most of the issues with having no smartphone are purely artificial and relate more to people expecting you to have a smartphone as opposed to the absense of the smartphone itself.
I would seriously reccomend people who want to decrease their screentime or just dislike smartphones to at least try using a dumb phone exclusively, or even a landline!

Burnt mounds and shattered rock

What they are:
Burnt mounds are archeological sites, largely found in the UK.
They are beleived to date back to 1500 - 1000 BC, when Britain was in it's Bronze Age.
Burnt mounds usually consist of "shattered rock" and burnt ground and are typically found near river, or where rivers are beleived to have flown at this point, this points to the likelyhood that water was a crucial in the usage of these, and the burnt ground evidently points to the fact that burning and fire occured at these sites.

The Shattered Stones:
The shattered stones show evidence of shattering due to heat, this lines up with the burnt ground present.
The stones are found to have "hairline cracks" across their surfaces, due to heating, and in the places where the stones have shattered, there are sharp corners and jagged edges, due to the abrasive breaking, some stones can even be ripped apart down the hairline cracks.
If you live near any burnt mound sites, then you can often find these stones on the site, or downstream from a site.

Possible usages:
The two most probable usages are for
I. Cooking
II. Steam Saunas
Cooking seems like the go to answer here, due to the fire, however rarely is bone found around the site, which would be a clear giveaway for cooking occuring at the sites.
One proponent of the Steam Saunas theory is Mike Hodder, the theory is that stones where heated up on a fire and then carried into a makeshift tent (possibly using a deer antler to carry the hot stones) and placed in a bath of water from the river, the stones would boil the water and create a steamy environment within the tent.
This theory has been recreated in Mosely Bog and shown to work, some people describe exiting the tent as giving a feeling of being "reborn", so could Bronze Age citizens have used the Saunas a religious experience?
It's unlikely we will ever know for sure which theory is correct, or maybe both are completely wrong and it's something else entirely (other, less popular theories have been proposed), either way, it's interesting to think about the possibilities and to visit sites.

Fly You High - DeaDvey

2 Years on the Linux desktop

Initiation:
I began using Linux in late November of 2022 after I heard that it can be better for programming in, I installed Linux Mint because my cousin recomended it.  When I installed Linux Mint, I somehow ended up corrupting my Windows partition, which I was intending on using as a dual boot, in hindsight, I think this was a good thing as I was now sort of stuck on Linux with no quick way to just boot back into Windows if I felt like it.  At first, I was using it like Windows, I was installing everything from installers off the web and finding the whole thing a bit confusing, I didn't see the benefit of using the package manager, I assumed it would be as buggy and shit as the Microsoft Store, but I was surprised, it had every program I needed on it and more.  I was also attracted by the customisability of the Cinnamon desktop environment, I was blown away by small things as simple as being able to change the menu icon and add a colour picker to the panel.  Eventually I learnt about installing other desktop environments, my Windows brain was confused by the fact you could have the same files and system on a seperate desktop environment, I was so used to it just being like how the creators wanted it to look.  I also ended up using XMonad and i3 and getting into ricing and more customisation.

Distro Hopping:
In early 2023 I started using Arch Linux because it sounded cool, unfortunately I accidently overwrited my Mint partition (I think there's a theme of me doing this without any backup) I did enjoy the rolling release style of Arch Linux, but I also found it confusing and things went wrong a lot that I didn't know how to fix.  So then I tried OpenSUSE Tumbleweed as I heard that it had the rolling release cycle but was much stabler than Arch and more user friendly, I stayed on OpenSUSE TW for a while with little issue, one issue being that because OpenSUSE was abit more obscure, some software didn't work easily with it, meaning I had to get more comfortable with building programs from source.  Around this time, I also setup an OpenSUSE Leap server on my old PC (I still have it but it's not running).

NixOS:
In late 2023, I started using NixOS a bit, though I kept jumping between OpenSUSE and NixOS and Arch Linux every month or so.  NixOS is just so awesome with it's declarativity and is so nice to use seeing as things just continue working on it forever.  Every time I try to switch to something else now, I end up going back to NixOS or OpenSUSE as for me, they just work.

GCSE era:
When I was taking my GCSE exams in 2024 (UK secondary exams) I was trying not to use my PC too much, and mostly just used my 20 year old laptop with Puppy Linux (Lightweight) on it.  I never really tinkered with Puppy much as it was mostly for productivity and getting stuff done, it had some queerness though.  On Puppy, you're always logged in as a root user, and some options don't carry over when you reboot, such as WiFi conections, I also tried AntiX, but it seemed to perfom a bit worse then Puppy on my Acer Laptop.

And that's where I am, I still swap between these three distros (OpenSUSE, NixOS, Arch) every few months, I'm currently on NixOS on my PC, OpenSUSE on my laptop and NixOS and Debian on my two servers, I think I've left Arch Linux behind, I don't really see any advantage to it over OpenSUSE or NixOS Unstable for me, I like things working, but I also like tinkering and customisation.  Now that I'm doing my A Levels, I've got my PC setup without a GUI on NixOS to prevent distraction, and I mostly just do some programming and writing on it, I also have multiple laptops now, some running Nix, some on Arch and one on OpenSUSE, though this will undoubtebly change at some point, knowing me, I can rarely settle on something for too long.

The Witcher The Last Wish

4/5

I've played the Witcher Games (2 and 3, planning on playing 1 at some point) so I thought I'd play the source material.
I enjoyed the format of the book, as a collection of short stories about the exiting adventures of Geralt, I've ranked the stories in order of how much I enjoyed them:

I) The Lesser Evil - I enjoyed seeing Geralt tackle with a tough decision, in both of which there is great death.  His choice in the end gave him the nickname "Butcher of Blaviken"
II) The Witcher - Named after of course Geralt, we see his skill in taking down a beast for the King of Temeria after all previous people failed, his skill with the blade is expertly introduced in this first story
III) The Last Wish - Geralt meets Yennefer and the name sake of the book, I found the Djinn lore unique and interesting, I thought it showed Geralt and Dandillion's friendship even better than "The Edge of the World" as you see how distressed Geralt is that Dandillion is hurt.
IV) A Grain of Truth - A sleeping beauty like story but with a twist, Nivellan was a bit of a weird guy, but seemed generally good meaning, I enjoyed Geralt hearing a story and figuring things out from there and the mystery of the situation.
V) The Edge of the World - The Sylvan was an interesting character and the elves where quite horrible, a good look at the friendship between Geralt and Dandillion
VI) A Question of Price - A bit harder to follow due to the many named characters, and the idea was a bit weird, Pavetta is 15 and Duny is probably between 40 and 50 which is very weird...
VII) Voice of Reason - This is a weird one as it's spread out with each bit inbetween all the other stories, and not much really happened, the fight at the end was interesting though.

Overall I enjoyed the format and the interesting adventures as well as quite well introducing different facets of Gerlats character such as strength, intellegence, friendship and weaknesses.

Fly You High - DeaDvey

Glogger

So I think Glogger is finished ish,
I made a program in python I call "glogger" and it is this, a static gemlog generator using plain text files as the database.
I have also improved on my old blog generator by:
I) Having a config file that allow you to edit the formatting and other details
II) Using the "click" program that allows you to write text in your editor before it is passed on to python, maintaining any newlines and making it much nicer to edit text.
III) Allowing for multiple users seemlessly on one gemlog
IV) Letting you edit previous posts and updating them straightaway

I hope it works nice, the idea is to be lightweight, I also think it would be trivial to port it to a html website, I might make it general purpose, I literally think there would just need to be a file extension config in config.py.

Fly You High - DeaDvey