For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been seeing high school teachers pop up on my social media feed, some of them crying or visibly depressed in their videos as they talk about how their students are struggling to read or write even a simple, meaningful sentence. They claim that they’re being forced to promote students to the next grade even when they fail their tests.

As an Asian, this is honestly difficult for me to wrap my head around. I can’t imagine how that’s even possible! But at the same time, I feel like there’s probably some nuance to this. Is the situation really that bad, or are people exaggerating it and being overly dramatic?

I am not talking about “শ্যামলা-ফর্সা,” nor am I referring to albinism. I mean genuinely white skin, like the kind we commonly see among Europeans.

Did Bengalis somehow mix with British people during the colonial period, or could this simply be a genetic variation that causes some Bengalis to have skin tones that light?

Reddit humour, amiright?

Every now and then, whenever some guy posts or comments something about their wife, some other dude will use that joke in the replies, and these gets quite a lot of votes. This is an overused, unfunny and honestly the worst joke I have ever heard. There's no originality, no creativity, I don't even understand how can someone find this even remotely funny.

So much frustrated when I went to buy a TV for my family. I swear this thing cost triple the price compared to TVs in other countries. Even our neighbor country have cheaper TV models. But for some reason a country like ours, where GDP is so low, we have to pay way more than people who are earning 10 times the money than us in other nations.

Well, this was surprising, considering I used to be a huge fan of minimal UI design. That changed after I started using Simkl. Its interface is incredibly well-designed and thoughtfully crafted.

I really appreciate how information-dense the UI is. The subtle animations, smooth transitions, thoughtful use of icons, and accents colors, all come together beautifully. In these day and age where designers are leaning toward increasingly minimal and simplified interfaces, Simkl manages to stand out by embracing a more feature-rich approach.

And honestly, I kind of love it.

The Android app's UI is horrible. Idk how did they come up with this design and never updated it.

Since my last post, many people wanted to know how to exactly replicate my style. So here I am now writing in details on how I themed Gnome to my liking.

⚠️ Warning
Always check the GitHub source and code executions thoroughly before executing it

Required Extensions and Apps

First, install the following extensions and applications:

• Blur My Shell
• ChromaLeon
• Dash to Dock
• Open Bar
• Rewaita (available on Flathub)

Optional Extensions

Optional Extensions that you can install to improve the overall experience :

• Alphabetical App Grid
• Burn My Windows
• Dynamic Music Pill
• Tiling Shell
• Top Bar Organizer
• Vitals
• Weather or Not
• Date Menu Formatter
• My Computer (by yannmasoch on GitHub)

Icons

For icons, I use Neuwaita. But sadly, as of now, the person who created it, deleted the repo from their Github. Idk how to find it anywhere else.

Installing Blur My Shell

At the time of writing this tutorial, Blur My Shell hasn't been updated on the official GNOME Extensions website. You'll need to install the latest version directly from GitHub.

If you already have the version from the Extensions website installed, I recommend removing it before proceeding.

Follow the installation commands :

git clone https://github.com/aunetx/blur-my-shell
cd blur-my-shell
make install

Fixing Rounded Popup Corners

After installing Blur My Shell from GitHub, you'll need to fix the popup corner rounding issue. Go to this GitHub page and follow the installation instructions. Once installed, you'll notice a new Corner Radius option under the Popups section in Blur My Shell.

Enable Popup Blur, then adjust the corner radius to your liking.

Here are the settings I use :

https://preview.redd.it/w069ptgtzpgh1.png?width=733&format=png&auto=webp&s=9f08ca37ebf40aea3535f72cfdb96ee805141802

Enabling Application Blur

To blur application windows correctly, edit the gtk css files located in ~/.config/gtk-4.0/gtk.css and ~/.config/gtk-3.0/gtk.css to make the sidebar and other app backgrounds transparent and add this code in both of the files :

window {
  background: alpha(@window_bg_color, 0.7);
}

.sidebar-pane,
.sidebar,
.navigation-sidebar {
  background: transparent;
}

.content-pane {
  background: @view_bg_color;
}

Then open the Blur My Shell settings and enable Application Blur. For the best performance, set the Blur Type to Static. You can also use Dynamic if you prefer, but performance may vary depending on your hardware.

Make sure Enable All by Default is turned on.

Here are my settings, including the custom blur pipeline I created. Feel free to copy them :

https://preview.redd.it/cbr5om391qgh1.jpg?width=5432&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c13d5fa3a9bda8c3a3fff99033330a557f63c14c

Theming The App Backgrounds

To recolor your applications, you can either use ChromaLeon or Rewaita.

I recommend using ChromaLeon, and Rewaita only to customize the window control buttons in the top-right corner.

After installing ChromaLeon:

• Apply your wallpaper.
• Choose your preferred accent color.
• In the Preferences tab, enable only:
  • Tint Apps
  • Darker Tint

In the Rewaita app, open the Theming tab, scroll to the bottom, and choose whichever Window Control Style you prefer. I use the Colored style.

If you don't like how ChromaLeon themes application backgrounds, you can uninstall it and use Rewaita instead. Personally, I don't recommend this approach.

Styling the Dock and Top Panel

Open the Dash to Dock settings enable "use built-in theme" in the Appearance tab and you can keep everything else default or adjust to your liking.

For the top panel, use Open Bar. This extension also styles the dock. I'll provide my exported configuration text file in the comment.

Simply paste the contents into a text file, then open Settings Admin tab of Open Bar extension and import the file. This will replicate both my top panel and dock styling.

And don't forget to enable Dock Blur inside Blur My Shell.

Optional Visual Effects

If you want even more visual flair, you can install:

• Burn My Windows (I use the Aura Glow effect)
• Dynamic Music Pill
• My Computer

These are completely optional and won't affect the core setup.

And that's it! Bye.

Since we know that Bangladesh has many conservative laws regarding the screening of R-rated movies, I was wondering whether they actually removed any scenes from the movie to comply with local regulations. If they did, I would have to cancel my plans to go see it.

I have watched the movie, and it's good. The cinematography is amazing, and the story is solid. But I still don't understand how it became so highly rated. No other movie has been able to dethrone it from the number one spot for so long.

IMO, there are many other great movies that are arguably better than The Shawshank Redemption, yet they don't even come close to its ranking.

Do they hate their children or what? 😭😭

So I was having this conversation with people who were dead serious about brushing teeth after breakfast. What's your take on this? Do you brush before or after?

To be fair, I have never actually seen anyone do this in real life. I’ve only seen it in movies or online media, where a partner or children surprise someone in the morning by bringing them breakfast in bed immediately after they wake up, especially on occasions like birthdays. They usually just start eating without brushing their teeth first.

I have no idea how common this really is, but it seems like something that does happen at least occasionally.

This is coming from an Android + Linux guy. I’ve never owned an Apple product ever in my life. After using Samsung’s Tizen, LG’s TV OS, and the widely used Google TV, I had finally decided to try the Apple TV 4K. And I can genuinely say I’ve never had such a smooth and polished TV experience ever before.

Their UI/UX is on another level. Everything feels fast, clean, and thoughtfully designed. It’s probably the closest thing to a truly premium TV interface.

And the craziest part is that there are no ads. Imagine that!! A device you actually paid for doesn’t constantly try to sell you something.