Brief Recommendations for OCT 2023 Month End Report
Tags: consulting, report, recommendations, 2023
Published: 2023-10-29 12:27:46

## 2023 OCTOBER MONTH END REPORT

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Contained here within is a report regarding my recommendations for October 2023 month end. These are just recommendations and are by no means a testament to anything or anyone.  
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### Changes

A lot of changes in the internet landscape lately have made and broken several big names. Brand loyalty is something everyone is reconsidering especially when it comes to tech decisions. The veil has been lifted and we are not the ignorant consumers we once were. It's a global economy and a global product, technology is, and it's represented this way in the many pieces that have to come together in cooperation for everything to work properly.  

### VPN

That being said, for VPN I recommend [SurfShark](https://surfshark.club/friend/LrABgR6P) now for VPN. I was recommending [ProtonVPN](https://proton.me) and I still use them. I have found SurfShark and am impressed with it.  

### E-Mail

I still recommend [Proton Mail](https://proton.me) for email. They have many tiers, free, paid, and you can even host your own domain. With encryption handled by PGP keys you can rest assured that the built in encryption is top notch. Google was a great contender, however, privacy issues remain at an all time high.  

### Browser

I've been using a newish to me browser called [Palemoon](http://www.palemoon.org/). It is a nice throwback to an earlier time and based on the Goanna engine. It doesn't seem as if it has that much work being done on it, and it's not quite as advanced as all the rest, but It's different then chrome which is apple webkit and it is different then firefox which is gecko.  

That being said, I recommend [Firefox](https://getfirefox.com). They have several different versions. When choosing the download for PC you can select which version. They have ESR for extended support which is a solid version of their browser with the least amount of bugs and flaws. It also lacks cutting edge features that may or may not be present in the final versions which are being developed as I am writing this.  

- Firefox ESR - Extended Support Release
- Firefox - The Normal Installation
- Firefox Beta - A testing version for regular users to use.
- Firefox DEV - Developer edition.
- Firefox Nightly - a bleeding edge nightly build. 

If you are a regular user, I recommend the ESR and also the normal installation. You can switch profiles so going back and forth between the two can mean different profiles if you set it up correctly.  

### Operating System

I no longer recommend microsoft windows. While I am available to help anyone transition away from windows and minor support I am no longer selling windows machines as business machines. For gaming it is a different story as these are evolving circumstances in the gaming industry.  

I now recommend Linux. Not just any linux but [Debian](https://debian.org) in particular. Arch is coming along nicely and it's doing well from what I can gather. A lot of development is being made. I no longer recommend using some of the flavors and distributions that were once so readily available as these have become soft targets. I'd stick with heavily maintained distributions that are and have always been neutral and dedicated to the task at hand instead of anything else.  

Thanks for reading.