• crossgeared . com

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    A screenshot of crossgeared.com loaded in Firefox 148.0.2 in MacOS 26.3

    The internet is truly an awful place in 2026. The enshittification of everything continues, arguably right down to the enshittification of thinking. I’m not going to link directly to The Nation and their terrible site. If only there were a word to describe what happened to thenation.com… You can instead get there from Bluesky, which is itself a product of the wreckage that was Twitter. ugh.

    How is any of this relevant and why am I writing about this? I was recently listening to the new Radavist Podcast interview with John Watson (of The Radavist) and it got me thinking about this site, crossgeared.com. I liked the serendipity of discovering blogs and sites scattered around and I’ve decided move back and participate in that version of the internet. So, crossgeared.com back from its 13 year break. After a couple hours of updates, debugging and fixes it appears that the site is mostly running and ready to be rediscovered by potentially dozens of people.

    What have I done?

    1. Backup everything
    2. Move the site to a new directory (I’ve been with the same host for over 20(!) years)
    3. Fix a handful of SSL issues with Cloudflare, the host, and within WP
    4. Clean up the SQL tables
    5. Update decade-old plugins and replace a few with new ones
    6. Patch up the old theme to mostly work in the current version of WP and current themes

    No guarantees for future updates, but I do have some ideas. Next up, I’m going to continue updating the theme, plugins, and other site infrastructure to something a little more recent. More soon, perhaps.

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  • iOS 26 & iPhone 16?

    Is it surprising how little has changed? The top row and dock are unchanged, although I did turn off the unread email count after it surpassed five digits a few years ago.

    Highlights? It’s fine.

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  • One Month with iOS 7 & iPhone 5s

    screenshots5s

    So, how is it going?  Everything is better.

    I’m very surprised at how much I like both the iPhone and iOS.  I am not exaggerating (much*) when I say that every aspect of the iPhone 5s is better than any of my Android phones.  I should have switched earlier.

    Here are the highlights:

    • Smaller screen size and overall phone size are just right
    • Battery life is outstanding, even with heavy use
    • Bluetooth is actually usable as I can leave it on and not worry about battery life
    • Usability, responsiveness and the screen are all huge improvements
    • Audio quality on phone calls is amazing– I had no idea there was such a difference
    • Control Centre and camera access from the lock screen work well and are very convenient
    • Touch ID is great and works reliably (unless my hands are wet)
    • Photos and videos are high quality, as is the camera app
    • Surprisingly, apps that I used on Android and on iOS are universally better on iOS (Pocket Casts, Instragram, Pulse, Pocketweather, Strava, 1Password)
    • I no longer accidentally hit the ever-present Android ‘Emergency Call’ button on the lock screen multiple times per day

    (*)What aspect of Android do I miss?  I liked the ‘covers’ feature in Action Launcher Pro.  Folders in iOS approximate the functionality, but isn’t nearly as slick.  Anything else?  Not really.

    Just to keep up with Android and get some use out of all of my Android apps I was thinking about upgrading from my c. 2010 first-generation iPad to the new Nexus 7.  But, after using this iPhone, I’m now leaning towards another iPad, likely an iPad Mini Retina.

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