Alternative to Google Search

There is not much to explain here, as I’ve dedicated a whole post to this topic. The more I use Duck Duck Go, the happier I am with it. Particularly because it is quite easy to change between a world wide search or a local (country) search. I use the former for general queries like programming issues, info about books, etc., and the other when looking for restaurants, leisure activities, etc.

Alternative to Google Maps

This one is a bit tricky. I have to admit that Google Maps offers better search capabilities than its main competitors: Open Street Map, Yahoo! Maps, and Bing Maps. You can misspell the name of a business or just provide some keywords, and it will try to find the best match.

But (there is usually a but), I like quite much the “art” of Open Street Map, because it reminds me paper maps and some bonuses like detailing the exact position of the underground entrances (which Google doesn’t, just the approximate location of the station). So, sometimes I use one, and sometimes the other.

Alternative to Gmail

There was not much sense on switching to Hotmail, Yahoo or any other company if privacy was an issue. More or less they all share the same practices. So, the best solution was having my own mail server. I have a modest VPS on Linode, so I set-up the server as you can see on this guide. Therefore, I have an IMAP server which I can use with Thunderbird or when in roaming with the nice Roundcube webmail.

The only lacking functionality is server-side filtering, which I still have to set-up (if you know a way to extend a day to more than 24 hours, please tell me!). I could live with client-side filtering on Thunderbird, but I also want to enjoy it when using the webmail interface.

Alternative to Google Calendar

Having already a mail server, why do not have a calendar server? I took the same approach, and set-up a calendar server using CalendarServer which I can sync with Thunderbird and my iPhone. For even more functionality, I added a web interface with AgenDAV. This time, there is not any feature missing.

Alternative to Google Reader

I wanted to use my feed aggregator on several computers, so setting up a desktop client on each one and trying to get all of them synced was not a viable option. Therefore, I opted for an in-the-cloud solution with a web interface, as Google Reader is. And again, my server comes to rescue! I liked what I saw on Tiny Tiny RSS webpage, I installed it, and I’m very happy with how if works. Nothing to be jealous from Google Reader. It even have a mobile-optimized interface, so it’s not a hassle to check it from the phone.

Alternative to Picasa

To make it clear, I didn’t check the terms of service of Flickr and other providers. I suppose they’re good enough because they’re used by several artists, but I decided to choose the hard way: build my own web gallery. I found Piwigo, with all the features I was looking for and with enough eye-candy to please me. So, after one afternoon of work, I had it working on my server.

Conclusions

I realize that all the options I’m using are not an option for everybody, because of the simple fact that you need your own server and set it up. This simplify the issue to your priorities. If you want privacy and company-independence, learn how to do it or pay somebody to do it for you. If you don’t care, you can just keep using the free services.

Up to now, and after a heavy use of it, I’m very happy with the decision I’ve taken. It has also been useful to learn some new things, and as learning is fun, it has been a nice leisure activity. Mmm, maybe they’re right when they call me geek :P

Nowadays we use search engines a lot. They have become the standard way of finding websites on the jungle of information that the WWW is today. Web directories are a resource of the past, we just input our words of interest in a textbox, hit the Enter key, and rely on the answers of Google, Bing or Yahoo. They seem to work quite well, and they are free, so what’s wrong with them?

Just two things:

• You are getting a biased view of the web.
• Your telling A LOT about you to a company (and it’s third parties). Probably more than you would under other circumstances.

There is more out there.

When using a search engine, you are getting results according to its criteria. At the beginning, the results were sorted according to more or less objective parameters that measured the quality of the sites. But it has changed. You have probably noticed that you get different results for the same search when you use other computers or compare it with the results that other persons get. I could explain here why this happens, but the web page Don’t Bubble Us explains it with a lot of pictures, not much text and in a funny and easy to understand way. So, before continuing, please have a look at it (and then come back ;) ).

Done? Are you a bit disappointed about the search engine you use? I was. You have probably read the last part about DuckDuckGo, but I’ll talk about it later.

Searching for “herpes” is telling them (and other companies) that maybe you have it.

This is how it works. They know about your interests, your problems, what you are shopping… your life. Again, and in order to do not repeat what others have explained better, I recommend having a quick look at Don’t Track Us.

How do you prefer to be recognised?

So, now you could just be in the mood of “I don’t care about all this bullshit, you are a paranoid” or “OMG! I’m selling my life and having a distorted view of the world! I’ll never use it again.” Or something intermediate, just a bit worried and willing to find a better search engine that keeps your privacy while providing a good service.

Emergency services use dogs. I use ducks.

That’s the search engine I’m using, and the one I recommend: DuckDuckGo (DDG from now on). The have a very nice privacy policy, and I’m quite happy with the results. Actually, what they do is using other search engines to get a bunch of results, and then rank them according to its parameters of quality. So, we could say that they are acting as an anonimizer between you and several search engines.

In addition to that, they have some tricks that make the experience more enjoyable. One is the red box, also known as zero-click info. It is a red box (d’oh!) shown at the beginning of the search results, containing a topic summary or related topics.  It could be the explanation of an acronym, the result of a mathematical operation or conversion between units, a short definition, etc. I’ve solved several of my quick searches just with that, with no need to go inside other sites.

Zero-clik results for ESA

Next tip I love is the !bang. There are a set of keywords that allow you to perform specialized searches. You can !python to look at python documentaion, !mineforum for minecraft forum, !images for Google images (yes, they don’t provide this service yet), !filestube for search in filestube, etc. So, kind of shortcuts for other sites. And the list of options is huge.

To sum up this short review, to get an idea of the overall capabilities of DDG, try the searches on the goodies page.

Putting a duck in your life.

If you have decided to give DuckDuckGo a try, do not rely just on opening the web page each time. You are not going to do it. You will just use the search box in Firefox or the omnibox in Chrome/Chromium, therefore relying again on you previous search engine. To force yourself to use it for a while, you have to configure it as you default search engine on your browser. Fortunately, it’s really really easy, just a couple of clicks. If you visit the DDG homepage, you’ll see a link with the instructions to do it. So, do it. Now. If you don’t like it, you can always come back. But I haven’t ;)

Happy searching!

Afaitar-se essent vampir no és cosa fàcil.

Pel que fa als granets i irritacions, si que em noto que m’han disminuït. De fet, la irritació és quasi inexistent. A la part del coll encara surten alguns granets, però ni de bon tros com abans, i solen ser només puntets vermells (que dintre del que cap, no és el més antiestètic que et pot arribar a sortir a la cara :P).

Sobre la barba, doncs no ens enganyem, surt abans. Fins i tot el mateix dia que t’has afaitat no vas amb “cara de nen”, però es nota que t’has afaitat recentment. Per qualsevol situació que l’etiqueta requereixi anar afaitat (una presentació en un congrés, una reunió important a la feina, una cita amb una noia), compleix perfectament.

I, l’últim valor afegit que no havia contemplat al principi, és la disminució de temps. Tardo molt menys a afaitar-me, el que fa que se’m faci molt menys feixuc el procés. Abans afaitar-me dos cops a la setmana em feia mooolta mandra, en canvi ara no em fa res.

En conclusió, si sou dels que teniu problemes amb la barba i/o pell, proveu-ho durant uns dies i ja veureu com segurament la cosa millora.

Aquesta és la que faig servir jo.

Tinc un problema, (entre d’altres) i és que tinc un pèl de barba molt gruixut i abundant, i una pell molt sensible. Confirmat per dermatòlegs. Resultat? Afaitar-me és una odissea. En el moment, jo no hi pateixo massa, però en acabat, se’m posa tot ben vermell i apareixen milions i milions de granets, com si fossin constel·lacions d’una nit infinita. Bé, potser m’he passat una mica ara. Però és molt emprenyador i poc estètic.

Una de les coses que em van recomanar va ser no afaitar-me a contrapèl. Ho vaig provar un cop, i vaig pensar: WTF, si sembla que no m’hagi afaitat! Quina tonteria, ja que m’hi poso prefereixo fer-ho bé. Així que vaig seguir afaitant-me com sempre. Intentava no castigar tant la pell com abans, però a tots ens agrada que ens quedi la pell 100% fina com el culet d’un nadó.

Ara ja fa unes setmanes, suposo que degut al canvi d’aires i d’alimentació,  se m’ha empitjorat el problema un altre cop. Com si fos un adolescent, vaig lluint un meravellós puntejat al coll i en menor part a la cara. I ni sabons ni gels ni cremes ni punyetes, no marxen. Per tant, doncs, anem a provar de canviar l’hàbit d’afaitar. he començat avui mateix, i de moment la pell sembla que n’està més agraïda. No m’ha quedat cara de nen (sense pèl), però aquesta ombrejat gris a la mandíbula tampoc queda del tot malament, no? (ara necessito l’opinió d’alguna noia :P)

I no, no penso posar fotos en primer pla, la meva privacitat i dignitat té uns límits tot i que no ho sembli XD

Molts cops em passaven pel cap coses que volia provar, però decidia deixar-les per més endavant per mandra, o simplement me n’oblidava i no hi pensava més. Fa un temps que soc més organitzat que abans, i gràcies a que utilitzo l’Springpad amb la metodologia GTD, m’apunto qualsevol cosa per insignificant que sigui. Avui he decidit, doncs, agafar algunes d’aquestes fites/experiments i portar-les a terme d’una vegada.