Search: Kagi (paid)

Email and calendar: Tuta (paid)

Synced storage (like Dropbox): Synology Drive (free, used with my Synology NAS)

Photos: Synology Photos (free, used with NAS)

Passwords: Bitwarden (paid)

Music subscription: Tidal

Music purchases: Qobuz and Bandcamp

No complaints about any of these. Quite happy having de-googled and de-appled.

Desktop Environment

• Operating System: Fedora Workstation Linux

  • Great package manager updates
  • Excellent performance

• Productivity Tools:

  • Note-taking: Zim Wiki (preferred for GUI and plaintext storage)
  • Document Editing: Considering OnlyOffice if Collabora Office doesn’t work out
  • Backup Solution: Filen cloud provider with desktop sync app

• Browsers:

  • Primary: Firefox with Arkenfox
  • Backup: Ungoogled Chromium (for sites incompatible with Firefox)

• Password Management:

  • Bitwarden (kept on phone)
  • KDE Connect for clipboard sharing between devices

Mobile Setup

• Device & OS: Pixel 8 Pro running GrapheneOS

  • More stable and polished than previous CalyxOS on Pixel 5
  • Better Google Play sandboxing compared to microG

• Mobile Apps:

  • Browsers: IronFox and Vanadium
  • App Sources: Primarily open-source from GitHub/F-Droid, updated via Obtainium
  • Non-FOSS Apps: Sandboxed Google Play for banking and other essential apps
  • Maps: HERE WeGo (previously used Magic Earth but it lacked public transport info)
  • Loyalty Cards: Catima

• Search Engine: Kagi

  • Quality results
  • Sound business model (subscription-based)
  • Fediverse integration for Lemmy search

• Self-Hosted Services:

  • Contacts and calendar via Radicale on NAS with Nginx

• Car Integration:

  • Still using Android Auto (found MagSafe holder alternatives more distracting)
  • Physical cards stored in MagSafe wallet on phone back

I had to change my name and hairstyle

for me:

• google drive > pcloud (objectively better app tbh)
• chrome > librewolf > floorp (i like having the tab bar at the bottom, and librewolf is a bit annoying sometimes)
• photos > ente
• gmail > proton > tuta > “disroot” (proton and tuta aren’t IMAP, and their first-party apps are slow. disroot probably isn’t the best one, I just chose one that supports IMAP)
• google search > ddg > SearXNG
• google office > onlyoffice on windows, libreoffice on linux
• google maps > Organic Maps
• google passwords > bitwarden
• google auth > ente auth :)

I’ve recently been thinking about this.

I’ve seen plenty of recommendations for the Proton suite, but seeing as the premium plan runs 10 bucks a month for:

• Mail (Need premium for IMAP compatibility with the Proton Bridge)
• Calendar
• Drive service --more on this one later
• VPN (this one looked nice, but IIRC VPNs are less necessary for home traffic if all my requests are HTTPS)
• Password Keeper
• And crypto wallet,

it was a mite expensive for my tastes who was only going to use the mail service and calendar and perhaps the VPN. I looked into Posteo.de and it had all that I wanted from an email provider (encryption on-server, IMAP compatibility and privacy-focused). It’s much cheaper (1 EUR/mo.) and it has a fantastically retro and sleek website (the epitome of web design-- nice-looking without being obese or fiddly).

I’m also trying out a few search engines, namely Mojeek and Marginalia-search because I want to both move away from Big Tech and Google in particular as well as open my horizon to the more human side of the web.

I have yet to figure out what to do about Android. I’m trying out using a dumb-phone for a while, but that’s more of a temporary thing.

With regards to Proton Drive, it seems nice but I’ve heard of poor Linux support. That’s a big dealbreaker for me.

I’m afraid that I can’t step away from Big G just yet; work runs off it. But one can dream. And every bit of data that Google doesn’t have is one degree fewer of control they will have over me eventually, when the Big Tech overlords pull the trigger on whatever they have cooking up.