Hacker News: LinAGKar

New comment by LinAGKar in "Motorola announces a partnership with GrapheneOS"

LinAGKar — Mon, 02 Mar 2026 23:02:53 +0000

They already can't have had such a requirement, since the Fairphone can be bought with either Google apps or /e/OS.

New comment by LinAGKar in "YouTube blocks background video playback on Brave and other browsers"

LinAGKar — Mon, 02 Feb 2026 15:18:27 +0000

This is about background playback, not adblocking. They can still play ads.

New comment by LinAGKar in "Apple Demands EU Repeal the Digital Markets Act"

LinAGKar — Sat, 27 Sep 2025 07:54:30 +0000

Places are increasingly expecting people to have a smartphone, and using an app for things like parking your car, charging you car, going to the gym, paying for stuff, identifying yourself online etc. Sure, for now most of the time you can get away with most things without one (possibly ate the cost of being a second class citizen), but every now and then you run into something that straight up requires a phone.

For example, at the gym I go to they do have a card reader as an alternative to checking in with the app, but at one point it was not working, which meant a smartphone was mandatory to go to the gym. And it was left that way for months; fixing it was clearly not a priority because the expectation of society is that everyone has a smartphone (you'll be met with surprise if you tell people you don't have their app installed, and incredulity at the idea that someone might not have a smartphone). And outside my workplace they put up car charging stations that have no way to pay for charging without an app.

And then (at least here in Sweden) there are increasingly places that accept no payment methods other than mobile payments (Swish here in Sweden), and online services like healthcare services requiring you to authenticate with BankID on a smartphone (or sometimes Freja e-ID, which also requires a smartphone), for things like ordering from pharmacies, doing your taxes online (and getting your tax return sooner), accessing healthcare services etc, and meanwhile physical alternatives like physical pharmacies are increasingly getting outcompeted and shutdown. So you may be able to get by without one, but at the cost of getting cut off from parts of society, and that's likely to increase.

And of course there was recently the news that the UK may require a digital ID (probably on and Android or iOS phone) in order to get employment or residence: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/starmer-digit...

New comment by LinAGKar in "Britain to introduce compulsory digital ID for workers"

LinAGKar — Sat, 27 Sep 2025 06:37:38 +0000

Well, maybe the app will keep working and you can update it from Aurora Store, or maybe you'll be fine as long as you don't change your employment or residence. Pretty vague so far.

New comment by LinAGKar in "Britain to introduce compulsory digital ID for workers"

LinAGKar — Fri, 26 Sep 2025 15:01:30 +0000

In this case, sounds like you'll not just be required to carry an ID. Everyone in the country will be legally required to carry an Android phone or iPhone.

Well, maybe the app will keep working and you can update it from Aurora Store. Pretty vague so far.

New comment by LinAGKar in "Britain to introduce compulsory digital ID for workers"

LinAGKar — Fri, 26 Sep 2025 14:57:50 +0000

And if Google bans you for some reason (which they have been known to do sometimes), I guess you'll be kicked out of the country unless you buy an iPhone.

New comment by LinAGKar in "Britain to introduce compulsory digital ID for workers"

LinAGKar — Fri, 26 Sep 2025 14:54:03 +0000

No, it will be mandatory right from the start, and employers will be required to check it

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/digital-id-ca...

New comment by LinAGKar in "Apple Demands EU Repeal the Digital Markets Act"

LinAGKar — Fri, 26 Sep 2025 12:54:19 +0000

Not so much with smartphones though. While there is Android, it's slowly becoming just as bad as iOS, and modern society requires everyone to have one of those (and an aftermarket OS may not be a possibility either due to some apps using Play Integrity API).

New comment by LinAGKar in "The "most hated" CSS feature: cos() and sin()"

LinAGKar — Wed, 17 Sep 2025 07:44:33 +0000

So why do people hate CSS's trigonometry implementation?

New comment by LinAGKar in "GrapheneOS accessed Android security patches but not allowed to publish sources"

LinAGKar — Thu, 11 Sep 2025 13:55:38 +0000

So basically to summarize, Google embargoes security patches for four months so OEMs can push out updates more slowly. And if those patches were immediately added to an open source project like GrapheneOS, attackers would gain info on the vulnerabilities before OEMs provide updates (the GrapheneOS project can see the patches, but they can't ship them). But a lot of patches end up being leaked anyway, so the delay ends up being pointless.

New comment by LinAGKar in "How Does the Cycle of Political Violence End? Here's What an Expert Says"

LinAGKar — Thu, 11 Sep 2025 10:25:17 +0000

There were a number of of deaths during the capitol attack, including a police officer who suffered a stroke a day after being beaten by the rioters. And there was certainly a lot more violence.

New comment by LinAGKar in "WinBoat: Run Windows apps on Linux with seamless integration"

LinAGKar — Tue, 02 Sep 2025 06:44:35 +0000

How does this differ from WinApps?

New comment by LinAGKar in "Nokia’s legendary font makes for a great user interface font"

LinAGKar — Sat, 30 Aug 2025 14:05:52 +0000

I've made sure to configure the browser to allow zooming on any website. Don't understand why websites try to block this.

New comment by LinAGKar in "Apple revokes EU distribution rights for an app on the Alt Store"

LinAGKar — Wed, 27 Aug 2025 16:18:52 +0000

Mostly because the people who want sideloading are using Android. And on Android the situation is constantly getting worse, while on iOS it's largely just sticking to the status quo.

Nevertheless, this serves as an excellent demonstration of the problem with the changes Google are making, since they would allow Google to do exactly what Apple just did.

New comment by LinAGKar in "A new PNG spec"

LinAGKar — Thu, 26 Jun 2025 15:39:45 +0000

>we'll be researching compression updates for PNG Fifth Edition.

What sort of improvements might we expect? Is there a chance of it rivalling lossless WebP and JPEG XL?

New comment by LinAGKar in "Frequent reauth doesn't make you more secure"

LinAGKar — Fri, 13 Jun 2025 09:39:57 +0000

Does that mean Tailcale will stop doing it? Currently they require you to log into every node and reauthenticate it every now and then, unless you disable key expiry.

New comment by LinAGKar in "Why Koreans ask what year you were born"

LinAGKar — Wed, 11 Jun 2025 21:47:14 +0000

From what I understand, it used to be similar here in Sweden, but that change with the du reform in the 60s and 70s, when people started saying "du" to everyone, and "ni" became purely plural (unless you're speaking to royalty).

We also pretty much always use first name, at least everywhere I've been. Would feel weird to call people by their last name.

New comment by LinAGKar in ""Localhost tracking" explained. It could cost Meta €32B"

LinAGKar — Wed, 11 Jun 2025 09:09:53 +0000

Is there anything in those EU directives that requires browsers to let webpages connect to localhost? Because that's the main issue here. And also maybe apps should need permission to listen on ports or connect to localhost, but I doubt the regulation prevents that either.

On https://localmess.github.io/, they think that this is technically possible on iOS too, and the main reason it wasn't done there is due to restrictions on apps running in the background.

This is nothing new that has been opened up because of those regulations.

New comment by LinAGKar in "Google restricts Android sideloading"

LinAGKar — Thu, 05 Jun 2025 21:17:53 +0000

What comment?

New comment by LinAGKar in "Compressed music might be harmful to the ears"

LinAGKar — Fri, 16 May 2025 22:07:06 +0000

It's also useful for cars, which I think is where most radio listening is done, since you may not hear the quiet parts.