2025 Defaults
In 2023 Robb Knight started the defaults trend, covering what people used as their default apps for specific purposes. I did a 2023 version, and while I mentioned planning to do a late 2024 version in my 2024 year end wrap up post, I never wound up getting to it. I’ve got a 2025 edition of my default apps below, with changes in bold.
| PC | Tablet | Phone | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mail Client | Proton Web | N/A | Proton App |
| Mail Server | ^ | ^ | ^ |
| Notes | Joplin | Joplin | Joplin |
| Tasks | N/A | N/A | Tasks (org.tasks Android App) |
| Photo Shooting | N/A | N/A | OpenCam, G Cam |
| Photo Management | File Manager | N/A | AOSP Gallery |
| Calendar | N/A | N/A | Fossify Calendar |
| Cloud Storage | AWS, Proton, Syncthing | Syncthing | Proton, Syncthing |
| RSS | FreshRSS | FreshRSS | FreshRSS (via Read You App) |
| Contacts | N/A | N/A | AOSP Contacts |
| Browser | Brave & LibreWolf | Brave | Brave & Fennec |
| Chat | Google Chat (web) | N/A | Beeper, Signal, Simplex |
| Bookmarks | Brave Sync | N/A | Brave Sync |
| Read It Later | SingleFile Plugin + Syncthing | SingleFile Plugin + Syncthing | Brave’s MHTML or Single File Plugin + Syncthing |
| Word Processing | Abiword | Abiword | N/A |
| Speedsheets | LibreOffice | N/A | N/A |
| Presentations | LibreOffice | N/A | N/A |
| Shopping Lists | Joplin | Joplin | Joplin |
| Meal Planning | N/A | N/A | N/A |
| Budgeting | N/A | N/A | MoneyWallet App |
| News | FreshRSS | FreshRSS | FreshRSS (via Read You) |
| Music | Clementine | VLC | VLC |
| Podcasts/Audiobooks | Phone via Bluetooth | N/A | Audio Anchor |
| Password Management | Keepass | N/A | Keepass |
My own custom additions to the prompt:
| PC | Tablet | Phone | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Operating System | Debian (+ KDE) | Debian (+ Gnome) | GrapheneOS |
| 2FA | N/A | N/A | Agis |
| Ebook Reader | Calibre | Librera (via Waydroid) | Librera |
| Microblogging Protocols | Nostrudel (Nostr) - Friendica Web (ActivityPub & more) | N/A | Amythest (Nostr) - Friendica PWA (ActivityPub & more) |
| IRC | Hexchat | N/A | N/A |
| Photo Editor | Gimp + Darktable | Darktable | Snapseed |
| SMS | N/A | N/A | Flip Phone |
| Text Editor | Emacs, Kate, VS Code | Emacs | Nano (via Termux) |
| Terminal | Konsole | Gnome Terminal | Termux |
| TTS | Festival | e-speak | Google Voice Synthesis |
| Virtual Keyboard | N/A | Gnome Keyboard | Futo Keyboard |
| YouTube & Other Platforms | FreshRSS + FreeTube or a Private Tab | FreshRSS + FreeTube or a Private Tab | FreshRSS + Grayjay or a Private Tab |
| Local LLMs | LM Studio | N/A | PocketPal |
| Local Translation | LM Studio | N/A | G Translate, PocketPal, Amythest |
Why I changed specific things:
I haven’t actually changed my Notes App yet, but I might in the future. Before Joplin, I used to keep a directory of markdown files which I’d sync using Syncthing. This was before I had any sort of server, so both my phone and PC would have to be online and running Syncthing to sync the files. Joplin fixed that by letting me import the markdown directory, then sync to a Dropbox account using E2E encryption. I later set up Nextcloud, then replaced it with a server running FreshRSS & Syncthing. With an instance of Syncthing running 24/7, I can get the same instant sync regardless of what other devices are online, as well as sync other files (e.g. scanned notebook pages as PDFs) in addition to markdown files. Joplin can both import & export notebooks as markdown directories, so there’s no real cost of giving my new (old) setup another try.
As far as Camera Apps go, I switched from the default AOSP camera to the Google Camera app and Open Cam. Sometime recently-ish, GrapheneOS started shipping the required libraries to use the Google Camera app without needing to connect to Google Servers or install Google Play Services, so that made it nice and easy. G Cam offers a lot of interesting computational photography, such as ProRes Zoom, as well as automated tasks like astrophotography (point it at the night sky and it’ll automatically shoot with the right settings, then auto stack your images). OpenCam goes the opposite direction, offering the most custom control (right down to the edge detection algorithm used in sharpening), and its “raws” are as close to an actual raw as the camera firmware will allow (as opposed to G Cam/AOSP’s raws that are really just uncompressed jpegs with computational photography partially applied).
I changed my Calendar since Simple Calendar was bought out, and Fossify was a fork that continued on with the ethos of the original. It’s not that I really changed my calendar; it’s that Simple Calendar changed, and Fossify is based on the original code.
I changed my Cloud Storage, switching to AWS (specifically AWS glacial archive) for my cloud backups. Nowhere else can you store data for $0.00099 per Gig, and only get charged for what you’re actually using. My November bill was $0.07, including one cent of tax (I’m well overdue to make a blog post about it or something, it’s rather insane going from consumer to enterprise grade storage). You will need to pay a cent or so per gig if you want to download the data, but I’ve never actually needed to restore backups from the cloud; it’s always just been there for redundancy. For passing files between devices, I generally use Syncthing or Proton Drive, and for a temp backup of my phone photos I use Proton Drive’s photo backup feature until I can copy them to my computer.
For RSS I previously had a Nextcloud server, at least until the RSS plugin stopped getting developed. I mainly used Nextcloud for RSS, so I swapped out running Nextcloud on my VPS to running FreshRSS and Syncthing. I recently migrated from a VPS to a janky home server, but I’m still running the same FreshRSS+Syncthing setup.
As far as Browsers go, I’ve transitioned largely to Brave. If you want the long story, you can read my posts Firefox: A brink of their own making and Browsers: Plummeting Off the Brink. But, long story short, Librewolf started having more compatibility issues and memory leaks, which led me to mostly use Brave (I still have Librewolf, and it’s technically the default browser on my PC, but I mostly open Brave when I want to browse the web). I have always used Brave on my tablet since Gecko doesn’t have touch controls. Fennec on Android had some issues (occurring after those posts): first, a security vulnerability that was left unpatched for months - then, more recently, an issue where it would refuse to load web pages which also took a while to patch.
With Chat Apps I still use Google Chat since that’s what family uses, although I’ve started using Beeper on my phone since it allows me to install a chat app that allows G Chat without Google Play services. It also works with Telegram for the rare times I use that. I still have Matrix, but I don’t think I’ve used it any time recently, largely replacing it with SimpleX.
I’ve started using Browser Sync to sync bookmarks, mostly just out of convenience, all through Brave which uses E2E encryption.
For Read It Later functionality I’ve gone from saving pages as ‘printed’ PDFs to using the SingleFile plugin on Desktop + Android (Fennec), and Brave’s save a page as a single file feature on Android. Both produce a cleaner archive of a page to read later, which I still sync the same way with Syncthing.
Regarding Word Processing I found Abiword to be a way lighter word processor than LibreOffice. Opening it is near instant, rather than waiting for sluggish LibreOffice Word. The format .doc is old and simple, so I get rather perfect compatibility from Abiword, and don’t fret about sending a .doc file I created in Abiword to somebody else. If I get something newer, like a .docx, I still use LibreOffice.
As far as Music goes, as well as long form audio like downloaded podcasts or audiobooks, I’ve switched things up a bit. Instead of using VLC on my computer I use Clementine, which is a lot nicer than VLC when handling music. For longform audio I use Audio Anchor on my phone, which tracks my listening progress, and if I want to listen on my computer I just set my phone to use my PC for Bluetooth audio.
With Ebook Reading, the only change I made is using Librera via Waydroid on my tablet instead of Calibre. Librera offers better touch controls.
I’ve changed my Decentralized Social Media Clients a bit, mostly on the Activity Pub side of things. I’ve found the Friendica web app to be nicer than trying to use Friendica in Fedilab over the Mastodon API. As far as Lemmy goes, I use it less than when I was giving it a try in 2023. For a while I used it through Frendica, although Frendica doesn’t always sync groups right, so I’m thinking about using RSS instead. I generally use Lemmy logged out anyway, so RSS and a browser that auto clears cookies won’t disrupt me that much.
In terms of IRC, the only change is that I no longer have a mobile client installed. There’s plenty of smart people using IRC, and sometimes questions can’t be asked by an internet search. For example, I was taught about SSH tunneling by a stranger on IRC: I had no idea it existed, but it solved the problem I had - while a search engine can’t answer questions you don’t know how to ask, a person who knows what they’re talking about often can. However, IRC was before my time, and it’s really not my preferred means of communicating. And, with generative AI, you can often get pointed in the right direction in a similar way. When I upgraded to my current phone on Black Friday of 2024, I went to install IRC and then realized I never use it on my phone anymore, so I just didn’t.
Regarding Photo Editing, I’ve become a big fan of Dark Table. It’s way easier than the janky process of editing raws in Gimp, and while it’s got a steep learning curve, it eventually levels off to become pretty intuitive. It’s now the only way I edit raws and often my go-to for editing jpegs.
I changed my SMS by just having two phones. One cheap phone that acts as a home phone, and my ‘real’ phone that’s simply a pocketable computer. I rarely use SMS or make calls anyway, and it’s a slight increase to security and battery life. I posted about it in a blog post here if you want to read more on my thought process.
I’ve changed my Text Editors up a bit as well. I’ve come to like Emacs for its keyboard shortcuts. If you change the defaults slightly (e.g. copy/paste to your standard Ctrl C/V) I’ve found I’m a lot faster with an all keyboard setup than keyboard + mouse that most text editors/word processors focus on. I’ve also started using VS Code a lot more, even outside of code itself; it’s handy for handling a number of files in directories. Not to mention AI extensions make things like vibe coding my /photos/ page a lot easier (trust me, the AI revisions look much better than my original handwritten HTML). I’ve also found AI extensions handy to do slow manual tasks, like changing a bunch of links to local URLs.
With Text To Speech (TTS) software, I’ve changed to using Google’s Speech Synthesis on Android. Turns out it can run entirely offline (you can revoke the internet permission after downloading voices) with no Google Play Services. The voices sound better than RHVoice, so I switched.
The Virtual Keyboard change was pretty simple; I like the Futo keyboard more since the clipboard is more robust and the keyboard is more customizable.
I changed up how I watch YouTube and other Video Platforms. I follow video content via RSS, and a lot of times I just open the videos in a private tab on PC (and a default browser on Android that auto clears cookies on exit). Though I’ve still got the redirect plugin that opens YouTube links in FreeTube if I go to watch a YouTube video on PC and I’m not in a private tab. I mostly switched from NewPipe to GrayJay on Android since I like the UI, it has a few extra features, and it supports more than just YouTube.
This year I also added to other sections, Local LLMs and Offline Translation. Local LLMs are rather handy - see my post Non-Generative uses of Local LLMs and my older Local LLMs and AI Ethics (mine makes nukes) if you’re interested. They translate pretty well, being how I do offline translation on my PC. I have a couple languages stored in Google Translate on my phone (like Speech Synthesis, it works offline without G Services) and can use a local LLM on my phone as well if I run into a language not pre-configured in G Translate. Amythest, a Nostr client, also automatically translates Nostr and Activity Pub posts that it comes across - which I’ve found to be really neat.