I wish it was enough to have a phone that runs my apps just fine today, and simply stick with those apps. Sadly, my experience has been that I have to upgrade those apps every so often (even if only for security patches), and when I do, most of them are larger and run slower on my now-older phone. After a couple years of upgrades, those same apps now fill all of my phone's storage space, and many run like molasses. My phone is now painfully slow at doing the same things that worked fine when I bought it, even after a factory reset and app re-install. Lesson learned: the next phone I buy is going to need high-end specs if it's going to keep running well for more than a year or so.

Could a domain owner be their own trusted third party?

I have a low power NAS box with a large hard drive. I replaced the stock firmware with debian. It serves all my shared files (linux ISOs, music, etc.) and runs all my network services (CalDAV, CardDAV, etc.). I periodically run backups to an external drive, which remains powered down and disconnected most of the time, and can be swapped with an off-site backup drive.

Gigabit ethernet connects all my stationary computers and phones. An old wifi base station connects the mobile devices. A wired-only router sits between my LAN and my modem.

I outgrew the desire for lots of computers and big network hardware long ago. That stuff just takes up space, wastes power, and generates heat. I get much more satisfaction from cool, quiet, efficient systems nowadays.

Seriously, ask her. Show her a couple of options that you're willing to support, point out the differences from her old desktop, and let her choose.

I recommend something with an OSX dock-style launcher, perhaps Unity (with appropriate privacy tweaks) or Avant Window Navigator. I got a 70-year-old to switch from Windows to Ubuntu/Unity in under an hour, with very few follow-up questions.

It might also be helpful to give her a linux distribution that you use regularly, so any support you have to do in the future will be in a familiar environment.

Thankfully, not everyone in the world is as eager as you to accept the status quo and discourage progress.

I prefer open source over a black box mainly to avoid two problems: unverifiable security and abandonware. If Ubiquiti can convincingly show that all security holes are patched before or promptly after someone discovers them, and continue to do so until I no longer have use for the product, then I'm fine with proprietary. I don't know know how they would accomplish the former, though, and so few companies choose to do the latter that I'm skeptical.

That's pretty much what people used to say about Mac users.

I don't care a lick about a facebook app and 49 games. Please sell me a compact, reasonably lightweight, open source phone with a good web browser, a good offline sat-nav app, and regular security updates.

The Ubiquiti stuff looks pretty sweet, but I don't think EdgeOS is open source. What's their track record of bringing updates to old products? Can anyone outside of Ubiquiti audit the code?

I'm among the many who have built up a healthy aversion to certain software after having been repeatedly burned by Pulse. I would not have chosen systemd. That said, I have tremendous respect for the Debian team, and am optimistic that the worst of the problems we find with their choice will be addressed within a couple of years. Let's get the bickering out of our systems quickly, and move on to helping one another turn the new init into something genuinely good.

No, VOIP still sucks. Cellular sucks. Cellular plus VOIP really sucks.

Eh. POTS worked okay for me most of the time, except when wet weather made call quality worse than normal. VoIP works well for me most of the time, except when a bad route makes call quality worse than normal. At least VoIP gives me more alternatives with which to work around a problem, and is a hell of a lot cheaper. I look forward to the day when better codecs (on both VoIP and cellular) and encryption raise the "normal" bar, for basically no cost.

...a programming language (still) doesn't have to be good in order to see widespread use.

make sure you include a neutral to all of your wall switch boxes.

This is a good idea even if you don't plan on automating anything. With a neutral at each of your switch boxes you can install all sorts of electronic gadgets, including trailing edge dimmers, which are much more friendly to LED and other modern lighting systems than the dimmers that work without a neutral.

If you believe Pulse is rock solid or used by the entire world, I can only imagine that you don't get out much. The rest of your comment seems to be responding to something that I didn't write, so I guess I'll ignore it.

Replies like yours make me wish the reply button was disabled until you actually read and understood the comment to which you were replying. You obviously did not.