So, Firefox ate itself today. None of my various profiles seem to restore the prior functionality. I guess it's time to try a backup restore and see what that begats.

Is there a way I can give YouTube a list of languages to _not_ auto-dub into English for me?

I speak Spanish; I don't want your shitty English translation.

I'm learning Italian; if I click on a video in Italian, it's probably for listening practice.

Google's help page on this seems to be aimed entirely at content creators, not at viewers: https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/15569972

What's the easiest way for some technically illiterate old people to securely share their #Windows desktop with their geographically distant child, who is using a #Linux desktop, so said child can take control and poke things? Doesn't have to be cost-free but preferably not subscription based.

Asking for a @bright_helpings's parents.

(double points if this solution also works on an #iPad)

How can I get files/folders to sort where underscores (_) are at the top, on #Debian #Linux #XFCE Thunar file browser? Thank you!

Die Mutter wollte heute ihr Tablet wegwerfen. Also, ernsthaft. Und ein neues kaufen. Denn sie hat sich irgendeinen Virus eingefangen; eine Computerstimme sagt in Endlosschleife, dass man den Windowssupport anrufen solle, die IP wäre gesperrt oder was weiß ich, dazu ein "Admin-Passwort"-Eingabedialog über dem Startmenü, welches auch nicht mehr zugeht. Dann war sie kurz hier: Ist ein Androidtablet. ich habe den Browsertab mit dem Video mal zugemacht.

Er jeg den eneste på social.data.coop som får en hel masse timeouts fra mastodon serveren?
#datacoop #mastodon #techsupport

request for help getting data off a hard drive that has both a windows and linux partition:

so i have this hard drive with a linux and windows partition. i would like to get access to the files on the linux side.

i have this SATA dock: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00LS5NFQ2?ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_fed_asin_title it's supposedly compatible with linux and windows, and it does work when i plug it into my linux machine and pop the hard drive into the dock, but it only shows me the stuff on the *windows* partition. it shows that there *is* another partition, but when i go to open it, it shows no files.

if any of you leet hackers have recommendations for how i can get access to my linux partition files, i'd love to know <3

To the less tech savvy folks out here on the #Fediverse. When you have a computer issue where do you go first? Please boost for reach!

Well, isn't this delightful? AWS US-EAST-1 decided to take a holiday, dragging Alexa, Venmo, and half your online life with it. A DNS resolution issue, they say. Translation: the internet forgot where it put its keys. What's been your biggest frustration today with the outage?

https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/amazons-aws-outage-has-knocked-services-like-alexa-snapchat-fortnite-venmo-and-more-offline-142935812.html?src=rss

I'm very interested in the native container support on macOS 26 because I use a Mac mini as a home server.

Is it safe to upgrade yet? I don't care about liquid glass being a catastrophe because server, but I do need it to work.

Does anyone have first hand experience they're willing to share?

This week I fixed a laptop for a client. It was the second time this client has had me do work for her. The first invoice was in 2016.

2016. It’s been nine years. Her husband isn’t in IT, but he’s a tech-savvy person, so he provides most of her tech support. But when he couldn’t resolve the issue, she still remembered me and came back to me for service in 2025.

That’s customer loyalty. Treat them right. They remember. They’ll come back.

#CallMeIfYouNeedMe #FIFONetworks

Today’s interaction with AI #techsupport. I bought some software back in August that has strict licensing. I only just started it up for the first time today and as soon as it contacted its license server, it complains invalid license and won’t work.

So I look online. I search help. I do the stuff. I’m good at self service. Nothing helps, so I open a tech support ticket. I get an email from an AI assistant.

First email gives me 3 things to try. 2 I knew were right but the third was genuinely useful. I tried it and it didn’t fix things. So I email the results back to the bot.

Second email mentions 2 of the things from the first one. It has 2 new things to try. One is obviously wrong because it’s a command for different software that the same vendor sells. And one is wrong because I’m buying through a reseller and they’re telling me to go to the original source for help. I can’t.

I reply that none of this is useful and why. It basically sends me email number 1 again with things to try. So I tell it send me to a human.

Here’s the punchline. The human says they reissued my license, which might fix the problem. And they say “This issue may have been caused by the amount of time that has passed between the purchase of this license type and the installation of the software, but I am not trained with technical support so all I can really provide is conjecture.”

That fixed the problem.

So the human answering tech support tickets is not trained on tech support. It’s not that these companies are getting good results from AI and that’s why they use it. It feels like they just don’t give a fuck any more.

How-To Geek: Microsoft Office 2016 and Office 2019 Are Dead. “Today is the day we’ve been waiting for, as Microsoft has officially ended support for the Office 2016 and Office 2019 suites, standalone apps, and servers. That means if you are still running any of these versions, you won’t be getting any more fixes or technical support from Microsoft.”

https://rbfirehose.com/2025/10/18/how-to-geek-microsoft-office-2016-and-office-2019-are-dead/

I currently use Firefox across my various Mac and iOS devices. I also use #Firefox in a Windows machine.

If I want to switch to #safari what is the best way to keep bookmarks in sync?

If I export Firefox bookmarks, then import on #ios will any existing bookmarks be duplicated? (I suspect so).

What are your favorite bookmark syncing tools?

i installed chromium on my lubuntu system for reasons and although i installed it with `sudo apt install chromium-browser`, when it came time to uninstall, i did `sudo apt remove chromium-browser`, but it was stilllll therrreeee.

it turns out the correct magic spell was `sudo snap remove chromium` (not apt and not `chromium-browser`!).

what a trixy little program.

niche MS Word problem I'm looking for help with.

I sometimes have to make documents with equations in them for our clients. We used to use MathType equations but lately we switched over to the native MS Office equations.

I often capture an image of the equation from the source document using an app called Equatio and paste it into the right place in MS Word.
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Can any #LinuxFingerers suggest any reasons why the bluetooth on my Dell Optiplex occasionally drops out in my #Kubuntu install?

I think it's pretty weak at best - if I try to listen to audio that's streamed to it, it's almost always fairly choppy - but every now and then it'll disconnect entirely for a few seconds, leaving my mouse dead in water until it comes back online.

I've tried searching around, but haven't been able to find anything particularly useful.