The problem is that if you want to provide a full-featured file picker, and not rely on Google's limited browser-based version, your app will require the full "drive" scope. (We do, and we do, for our InDesign-to-Google Docs connector plugin.)
If you use some of the lower-tier CASA labs, it's not that expensive (4K/year), but it is definitely a nuisance for a pure desktop plugin like ours that has absolutely no cloud component (other than connecting to GDocs).
There's nothing quite like the "flow" you get into when you're a fast, accurate typist and the code just pours of you like honey. (Well, that sounds slow. ;-)
Especially when using a fantastic mechanical (Hall effect) keyboard like (still) my favorite Apex Pro from SteelSeries.
Nothing matches or probably ever will match the old MIT AI Lab Tom Knight Hall effect keyboards (Microswitch), but these are mighty close. Something about the heft and the smoothness of those keys has never been replicated. I can still remember that feel quite distinctly 45 years later...
Me too (though it was 20 years ago). I think Sibelius and a few others were alternatives installed on the machines but I didn't use any of them in depth.
Even better, you can get a 15m Ethernet cable that brings the network to the point of power (with the standard 15m power cable).
I had my Mini set up outside and extended the power line as far as it would go, but then once inside, the Wifi signal was very weak, even just 30' away.
So I've ordered the Ethernet cable, and will attach it to a simple Wifi extender that's also at the point of power, so the inside signal is strong.
They really should have thought of this in the design -- going through walls is always a challenge.
The idea design would have the router combined with the power adaptor ("wall wart"), so the signal originates inside.
Solar power of course, the problem is: who will manufacture new chips for our salvaged computers?
A specialized civilization like ours has a small window to reboot before tech degrades and scavenging becomes harder. After that short window, securing food, shelter and defense would be the primary goals.
I still really like the idea of Collapse OS. I've loved computers all my life, and if bandits are going to raze my precarious settlement, I want to leave this mortal coil with a retro microprocessor in my arms.
I started my own software company 34 years ago after 10+ years in tech (operating systems & networking at a laser printer spinoff from Knuth's TeX project in SV and a mini-supercomputer spinoff from Josh Fisher's VLIW research at Yale (CT)).
So I effectively vanished into our own little world (the world of print publishing), building plugins for first QuarkXPress and now Adobe InDesign. We've been a 4-man company for some decades now, all working from home long before it was cool. ;-)
After all this time, I've lost almost all contacts with folks from SV. Don't really miss it.
It's certainly going on today, especially in various three-letter agencies trying to control the narrative and keep the truth from public view -- see the Twitter Files by Taibbi and others.
Which ideas "become a thing" also feels very controlled to me. I feel like NGOs kinda form a global para-empire that the US uses to form and control counterelites. Idk really but that's my completely ignorant conspiracy statement lol
If you use some of the lower-tier CASA labs, it's not that expensive (4K/year), but it is definitely a nuisance for a pure desktop plugin like ours that has absolutely no cloud component (other than connecting to GDocs).