The why and how of backing up your Mastodon data
Your server or your Mastodon account could go away at any time. If you don’t want to lose your data, you should back it up. Here’s how to do that, and how to restore it later.
Category Archives: User Experience
Unbelievably, offensively useless chat with Healthfirst online support
A website that refuses access to critical documents is bad enough. Completely clueless chat agents who provide stock, bullshit, useless answers is much worse.
This is how to make the “Install pending software updates” checkbox go away in GNOME
You can switch GNOME Software to manual updates, or block offline updates completely with polkit. Neither solution is perfect. The GNOME developers have no interest in improving the situation.
Why websites shouldn’t indiscriminately block VPN users
I convinced a state senator that government websites indiscriminately blocking VPN users is bad. Here’s the case I made, which you can use yourself to keep fighting the good fight.
How to stop Google from invading your privacy and others’ when you share links
“share.google” links are evil. Here’s how to get Google to stop spitting them at you.
Can’t log into Costco website, their technical support is useless
I spent nearly four hours of my time proving this isn’t my fault. I’m still doubtful that Costco will do anything to resolve the problem.
Rollout of new Massachusetts unemployment site handled poorly for people with multiple email addresses
Telling people “Your email addresses on the two sites need to match!” without telling them what to do if they don’t is a user-hostile act.
Buyer beware: Printronix printers
The printer I got from Printronix was terrible, the company was unable to resolve any of the issues with it, I ended up returning it for a full refund (part of which I was only able to obtain via a credit card dispute), and I discourage anyone who stumbles across this blog posting from doing business with this company. I didn’t think a printer company could annoy me more than HP does nowadays, but Printronix succeeded.
“Human Interest” is terrible
Several years ago I worked for a company which outsourced management of their 401k to Human Interest. It was… not a positive experience. I don’t remember all the details—I’ve worked pretty hard to forget them since they were so unpleasant—but suffice it to say that it was my impression that they weren’t terribly good at… Read More »
I see that Verizon’s customer website and onboarding experience still sucks as bad as it always has
Verizon’s website and their FIOS customer onboarding processes are full of problems and have been for at least a decade. I ran into nearly 30 of them just trying to complete the simple task of signing up for FIOS service. How do they get away with this?