Software Endorsements

[Flaming Dumpster]

For me, the fact that It looks like actual digital feces. It just looks like actual shit and I can't understand why anyone would like it. Also that just everything about it is unnecessary/not needed. The old UI was simple and that's what made it good. I don't know what the fuck anyone on Discord's UX team was trying to achieve but my only thought is that it's only comprised of Pajeets which would explain a lot of questions.

Personally I hate the pointless inclusion of the guild name at the top of the page. Also yet more useless elements added to the message composition area for me to remove with custom CSS hacks

button[aria-label="Send a gift"] {
    display: none;
}
button[aria-label="Open sticker picker"] {
    display: none;
}

button[aria-label="Open GIF picker"] {
    display: none;
}

button[aria-label="Apps"] {
    display: none;
}

The Nitro and shop shilling is more obnoxious than ever before. UI elements have been pointlessly reshaped, like someone did a UX pass with the 2025 edition of retarded UI design. There's far more strange UI glitches too, like if you pop out a stage there's a mysterious whitespace above the page content.

 

[Hentai-Semitism]

Faststone Image Viewer - freeware image viewer. I've been using it for a few years and I have no complaints. It's very fast and has everything I need.

I used early versions (3.0 - 4.0) of ACDSee a long time ago and Faststone reminds me a lot of those. Unfortunately, ACDsee became slow bloatware over the years. I don't even want to know if they still exist.

 

[Slav Power]

Faststone Image Viewer - freeware image viewer. I've been using it for a few years and I have no complaints. It's very fast and has everything I need.

I used early versions (3.0 - 4.0) of ACDSee a long time ago and Faststone reminds me a lot of those. Unfortunately, ACDsee became slow bloatware over the years. I don't even want to know if they still exist.

I remember using it many many years ago back when the entire household had to share a single computer. It was decent, but nowadays I prefer XnView MP as a standalone image viewer. I also have IrfanView installed, but that's mainly for integration with Total Commander to be able to use Lister/Quick View panel as an integrated image viewer, very handy. Also bought licenses for both so I can carry a USB toolbox and use it in commercial settings, though the TC license was more of a moral obligation purchase. Though IrfanView has too many quirks for me to consider it as a full replacement for XmView MP.

 

[Magicat]

Faststone Image Viewer - freeware image viewer. I've been using it for a few years and I have no complaints. It's very fast and has everything I need.

I used early versions (3.0 - 4.0) of ACDSee a long time ago and Faststone reminds me a lot of those. Unfortunately, ACDsee became slow bloatware over the years. I don't even want to know if they still exist.

I love faststone's appearance, but I have to admit XnView MP performs way better. Try opening a .gif in both and compare it. XnView MP runs .gifs almost as well as a browser.
+features and it loads instantly through black magic.

 

[postfeetpls]

If someone is still sleeping on NotebookLM - you have to give this thing a try. Currently it's running(i think) the Gemini 2.5 flash or Gemini 2.5 pro model with massive context window. You can add up to 50 sources for a "notebook". Source can be links to content, pasted content, pdf files, large documents etc. Forgot the exact limit per source but it's absolutely massive. You can fit something like the PostgreSQL documentation in like 1 or 2 sources. It digest it all and helps you go through so much data it's unreal. With a bit of imagination you can use it in so many ways it's amazing. I still can't believe it's free. It's just so good and so helpful in so many ways I love it. Can't recommend it enough.
Especially if you're learning new things or need to go through lots of documentation and notes you've been keeping, anything and everything.

You can turn huge codebases into text files with a script, feed it all to the system and quickly get up to speed with what's going on. Forget about spending days going through functions and modules and documentation. Just put it all in there, ask a specific question - get a specific answer. It's basically Gemini working with the up-to-date data you provide. It creates mind maps helping you to easily navigate through it all, quizes, summaries, podcasts with all the content. It's fucking amazing, it completely changes how you do research and analysis.

 

[Slav Power]

I love faststone's appearance, but I have to admit XnView MP performs way better. Try opening a .gif in both and compare it. XnView MP runs .gifs almost as well as a browser.
+features and it loads instantly through black magic.

IrfanView also has an issue with GIF playback. IIRC it's all down to different standard implementations. IrfanView and FastStone have the shittier one that doesn't detect the playback speed properly, while XnView MP does.

 

[Hentai-Semitism]

I love faststone's appearance, but I have to admit XnView MP performs way better. Try opening a .gif in both and compare it. XnView MP runs .gifs almost as well as a browser.
+features and it loads instantly through black magic.

I don't understand how GIF is still a thing. It's super obsolete. I haven't made one in about 15 years.

 

[Plastic Bag]

Backyard Bandwidth (No limit VPN/Proxy) is going up to $1.99 per month from 99 cents tomorrow. For users who are on 99 cents before this date, the price is frozen for life. It's a decent VPN and surely worth a try; it's barebones, integrated with OpenVPN, but I've not seen anything close to the price.

 

[Officer Barbrady]

If someone is still sleeping on NotebookLM - you have to give this thing a try. Currently it's running(i think) the Gemini 2.5 flash or Gemini 2.5 pro model with massive context window. You can add up to 50 sources for a "notebook". Source can be links to content, pasted content, pdf files, large documents etc. Forgot the exact limit per source but it's absolutely massive. You can fit something like the PostgreSQL documentation in like 1 or 2 sources. It digest it all and helps you go through so much data it's unreal. With a bit of imagination you can use it in so many ways it's amazing. I still can't believe it's free. It's just so good and so helpful in so many ways I love it. Can't recommend it enough.
Especially if you're learning new things or need to go through lots of documentation and notes you've been keeping, anything and everything.

You can turn huge codebases into text files with a script, feed it all to the system and quickly get up to speed with what's going on. Forget about spending days going through functions and modules and documentation. Just put it all in there, ask a specific question - get a specific answer. It's basically Gemini working with the up-to-date data you provide. It creates mind maps helping you to easily navigate through it all, quizes, summaries, podcasts with all the content. It's fucking amazing, it completely changes how you do research and analysis.

It makes me jealous that this level of tech wasn't easily around when I was in high school. Sure you had Google and CliffNotes to get by but I would've killed to be fed answers as good as AI produces nowadays. Just throw your homework and an epub into it, go grab a drink and by the time you're back it's all done for you.

 

[Quioui]

Backyard Bandwidth (No limit VPN/Proxy)

I don't think they allow torrents.
When I switch qBittorrent's network interface from 'Any' to 'Open VPN' my numbers of peers drops off a cliff, and if I stop then restart the torrent then it stalls forever (unable to find any peer). It could be skill issue, but I did it fine with Mullvad (which itself has slow and limited peer discovery), and the iknowwhatyoudownload history is blank.

Still nice for the price, altho I'm curious about the grandfathered-in cheaper price as they don't really have an account system.

 

[Plastic Bag]

I don't think they allow torrents.
When I switch qBittorrent's network interface from 'Any' to 'Open VPN' my numbers of peers drops off a cliff, and if I stop then restart the torrent then it stalls forever (unable to find any peer). It could be skill issue, but I did it fine with Mullvad (which itself has slow and limited peer discovery), and the iknowwhatyoudownload history is blank.

Still nice for the price, altho I'm curious about the grandfathered-in cheaper price as they don't really have an account system.

They have separate torrent proxies I think

 

[Colon capital V]

I don't understand how GIF is still a thing. It's super obsolete. I haven't made one in about 15 years.

As opposed to what? APNGs? But yeah I get what you mean, I don't know how or why MP3s are still popular either. Extremely outdated format that gets mogged by OGG Vorbis, but unfortunately isn't as supported as MP3s on platforms.

 

[Flaming Dumpster]

As opposed to what? APNGs?

What about WebPs?

 

[Niggergante]

As opposed to what? APNGs? But yeah I get what you mean, I don't know how or why MP3s are still popular either. Extremely outdated format that gets mogged by OGG Vorbis, but unfortunately isn't as supported as MP3s on platforms.

I'm not too keen on all the new media formats out there besides webm and mkv. Is there a quick rundown or cheat sheet somewhere?

 

[Hentai-Semitism]

As opposed to what? APNGs? But yeah I get what you mean, I don't know how or why MP3s are still popular either. Extremely outdated format that gets mogged by OGG Vorbis, but unfortunately isn't as supported as MP3s on platforms.

Why not just use AVC/AAC MP4/MKV for everything? Is it about licensing? I'm being serious.

I'll take a proper video file with sound over a tiny, compressed slideshow with no sound any day. As for APNG, I don't think I've seen a single one in my whole life.

 

[Fraygorryt The Wise]

Why not just use AVC/AAC MP4/MKV for everything? Is it about licensing? I'm being serious.

I'll take a proper video file with sound over a tiny, compressed slideshow with no sound any day. As for APNG, I don't think I've seen a single one in my whole life.

I don't think you understand the purpose of a GIF.

 

[Hentai-Semitism]

I don't think you understand the purpose of a GIF.

I guess I don't. Again, what does it have that MP4 doesn't? Is it about automatic looping?

 

[Magicat]

I don't understand how GIF is still a thing. It's super obsolete. I haven't made one in about 15 years.

How I wish that could be said for .webp and .webm - they're cancer.

.gif's still everywhere and popular among animated image formats. If you download an animated image off the web, there's a good chance it'll be .gif. A lot of animated avatars on this forum are .gif, for example.

---

Unrelated: I recently came across mpv.io (video player) and it rocks. I've been using VLC without issue for ages till I had an issue last week with a codec called opus(?). Found it runs without any effort in mpv.

 

[Battlefield42]

Unrelated: I recently came across mpv.io (video player) and it rocks. I've been using VLC without issue for ages till I had an issue last week with a codec called opus(?). Found it runs without any effort in mpv.

Get fucked VLC. MPV IS THE BEST VIDEO PLAYER

 

[Hentai-Semitism]

A lot of animated avatars on this forum are .gif, for example.

I will admit I didn't think of that. They do have some limited use.