I don't know, it looks much better than the old "Terminate" button you get or some random crash that you have no idea why it happened....I received this picture today showing what happens when an application crashes in KDE4. Clearly it uses Beryl to make the pretty, but I have to be honest - if I was working on something and the application happened to crash, literally showing me what happened to x hours of work, I’d probably hang myself.
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Microsoft must work with, not against, open source otherwise it risks sacrificing developer support and credibility among customers - even Windows loyalists.
That's according to the chief executive of a fast growing open source competitor to Microsoft's popular, but closed-source, SQL Server database.
Marten Mickos, MySQL chief executive, told The Register the secret to growth in Microsoft's core Windows franchise lies in working with open source.
According to Mickos: "If you won't work with MySQL, PHP and Ruby then you are lost - that's always been our message."
Microsoft is clearly aware it must ensure open source languages, middleware and applications run just as well on Windows as Windows-only languages, middleware and applications, otherwise open source developers will deploy on Linux.
As such, Microsoft has technology deals with SugarCRM, Zend Technologies, JBoss (now part of Red Hat) and Novell, while it's devised versions of Python and Ruby for the .NET Framework. MySQL, meanwhile, last year joined Microsoft's Visual Studio Industry Partner (VSIP) program and developed a Visual Studio plug in for developers building applications for its database.
There's plenty of scope left to help developers using Visual Studio for MySQL and to improve data, analytics and application interoperability between MySQL, SQL Server and other Microsoft server and Office applications.
Speaking in the wake of claims in Fortune by Microsoft's legal team that Linux and open source infringe on 235 of the company's patents, Mickos suggested, though, that Microsoft isn't going far enough in its efforts with open source, and that this will cost the company dearly.
"I don't think you can say Microsoft is pragmatic on open source - it's religious. It's categorical in a way it shouldn't be, and it's harming them," Mickos said.
"You must never lose the trust of the customer [even] customers who are not using open source. They are looking at Microsoft and asking: 'why are you doing that?' People have a sense of fairness, and you don't want to get hurt.
"It hurts their credibility with customers. The question that arises is if Microsoft is ready to sue Linux for patent infringement, what says they won't sue a customer? As an end user, I'd be worried if I was using a vendor that threatens to sue me."
MySQL is certainly leveraging the Microsoft fear factor. With 700 partners in the systems integrator, VAR and ISV markets, Mickos's company is promising that - unlike Microsoft - it won't end up competing with them, should they develop a lucrative business. Some 60 per cent of MySQL revenue comes form the embedded market, with partners OEMing MySQL's database.
"We are sticking to the knitting - the database," Mickos promised. ®
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When I need to transfer lots of files or directories between computers, I usually use tar and ssh together. Last time I used it however, I realized that perhaps not everyone knows how to do this.
The procedure is very simple, and a full command could look something like this:
tar -cf - directory/ | ssh my.other.computer tar -xf - -C /destination/
Simple huh? If you want compression, just add z for gzip or j for bzip2 to both tar statements. This could be necessary if you are planning to do this over slow lines.
Here there be dragons!
Each time I boot a new version of a distro I'm amazed at how far Linux has come, and in recent times it has come in leaps and bounds, the kernel, KDE, Gnome and a myriad of applications has come of age and really makes Linux an enjoyable experience! I really think Linux is ready for the main desktop stage, with KDE 4 around the corner and who knows what in the new kernel releases there is only good things to come.
Lets get back to Ubuntu and firstly take a look at the offerings on the CD.
If you load it under Windows you get a part of the OpenCD with open source applications to install, Gimp, Firefox and whatnot, and if you click on the desktop screenshot you get a brief introduction into Ubuntu. A very nice touch indeed! It send out a positive message, willing someone into giving Ubuntu a try.
Boot up the CD and get a Grub menu to choose the boot parameters. Note the “safe graphics mode”, this has helped me a lot on some difficult hardware setups (laptops) and is definitely an A+ for ease of use.
Once booted you are put into a Gnome based LiveCD environment and immediately you will notice the strange looking desktop icon, one is for the installation, okay, but the other one? Open it and see to how great a length the developers of Ubuntu has gone to make this as user friendly and feature packed distro as possible!
Yup, a folder full of promotional goodness! From Nelson Mandella explaining the meaning of 'ubuntu' to presentations on the operating system, fliers, logos, etc. a very nice touch indeed! You can use the LiveCD and do a Ubuntu/Kubuntu presentation! Now that is smart marketing.
Now before some of us go and faint, lets get on with the installation...
Six easy steps, that is all it takes. There are other distro that also follow a similar installation method and this, to me, is the most fail safe way of getting the OS installed. No way you can mess this up, just answer a few very simple questions and your set!
Now lets restart and see what we get.
Once restarted we are presented with gdm, log in and you again see the familiar gnome desktop.
I'm not going to go into what packages are installed by default since this has become rather irrelevant with the package managers of late, Ubuntu sporting over 10 000 packages to choose from, just about anything you may need for every task and some more.
Onto the package manager, Synaptec.
As we know there are a few installation mediums used in Linux today with RPM, deb and source being the most common. Ubuntu, being a Debian offshoot, uses Debian package management. The plus of this is that it is a solid and well tested medium.
Open up Synaptic ("Add/Remove" under the applications menu), easy enough, click the corresponding application and install, what could be more difficult? It even has the option to show you unsupported and commercial packages. You will need this to get those DVDs working, very well thought out and could not be easier to use.
Now onto personal preferences. I will probably never get used to the 'sudo' environment. It seems all too easy that one could make a mistake, seeing the sudo and user password is the same. I know it can be configured otherwise, but tell that to a Linux newbie. Also, no SElinux support, or maybe I overlooked it? Seeing this is a LTS version I would thought it would be considered default. People who are going to use this will probably be serious users in the business sector (for the support on offrer) and one would think you are going to give them the most easy to use distro, yes, but also the most secure. I feel Fedora and SuSE is a bit better options on this front. Something Ubuntu developers should maybe consider looking into making a permanent feature?
This is a very solid and well supported distro, well worth the try, even in the business sector. The road to being rated the most popular distro on various forums and discussion boards across the Internet has not been without its hick-ups, but the Ubuntu forums are informative and the wiki is also well maintained to iron out any problems there might arise. There is also documentation, electronic and paperback, available and I would love seeing Ubuntu replacing Red Hat as the preferred choice for Linux courses at varsities and colleges.
No wonder people are speculating that Ubuntu is starting to take over where Red Hat failed in the business sector. You HAVE to try this distro, easily a 8,5/10.
I usually test a distro for a week or so, but under the circumstances and seeing that I have no Internet connection atm to try out more features, you will have to be satisfied with this very brief look into Ubuntu. I'll see if I can get a review of Fedora 6 up since I have it installed and have enjoyed testing it, just need a few screenshots to complement the review but I have trouble getting it to bot from the CD in the virtual environment. If nothing else works I'll have to borrow a few from Osdir.com.
Until next time, happy Linuxing!
I was “forced” to take a long break from work (January to end of May) and this seriously messed with my reviews that I had lined up since I left all my CD's at home. Almost left the laptop there as well.
Those of you who know South Africa will also know that we have one of the worst internet infrastructures in the world making it impossible to get connected if you are not at home with your fixed land line. I'm trying to update this blog with a GPRS connection from a cellphone at 9Kbps! And they want to host the soccer world cup here in 2010? Yea right...
Anyway, time is not wasted however and I did do allot of fishing the past few weeks, one of my favourite pastimes, and instead I'm going to give a little feedback on that rather.
We have mainly 3 types of species targeted by bank anglers in South Africa that you can find in any dam or river throughout the country, the Carp, Barbel and the Yellowfish. As we know the Carp and Barbel can get huge (over 40Kg for both species) but the Yellowfish, indigenous to this land, is far more scarce and smaller in size, but one of the best fighters on light tackle!
To catch the fish one would of course need specific bait and tackle for each species. For Carp you can use a normal carp fishing rod with line of 5-10lb breaking strain and an assortment of “off the shelf” baits available everywhere. The reason for the light line is two fold, the lighter the line the further you will cast and the carp does battle, but not close to what you could expect from a barbel.
It is possible to land a 8-9kg Carp with 8lb line if you are patient and “play” the fish into the landing net. So it is not necessary for overly strong line.
Usually they prefer a bit of a meaty bait and because of this I do not target barbel (I do not like the mess of preparing the bait, carp bait is much cleaner) and if I catch them it is a complete bonus. The most common bait used amongst bank anglers are chicken livers, dead day old chickens obtained from hatcheries and fish head.
Yellowfish is enormous fun on light tackle and boy do they fight! Most people use lures to catch them since they are hunters, from fly fishing to spinning tackle, it all goes and you normally get them in the streams and rapids where there is bit of faster moving water. You could try your hand at bait and some people have caught monsters of over 6kg with bait, but your success rate will not be as high. You could use the carp tackle and also present them with something meaty, like a cricket, grasshoppers or flying ants, just be warned that barbel will also take this bait, so if you see the barbel turning the water, steer clear!
There are some other species also targeted by anglers in our rivers and dams, but they are not widely spread throughout the country and are specific to a region, under these you find trout, kurper, tigerfish, etc.
Lest take a bit of a look at carp fishing and the traces and bait most commonly used by myself.
First we have our trusted Rietvlei trace.
As seen in the picture you have two hooks, one above the ground bait/lead and one below. The hook length of the one on top must never be longer than the distance to the lead at the bottom. This is important since when the ground bait dissolves the hook should be right in there for a better hook-up chance. The one at the bottom should be the same length as the first and usually we attach a floaty to this to make the hook drift right above the ground bait. So if the carp are feeding on the bottom, the first hook will come into play, if they feed on the floating particles, then the second hook will do the job!
I'm only going to explain how to make this trace since there is only basic variations in making the different traces, the basics stays the same. What you need is two lines, one of a breaking strain of 20lb+ (I use 25lb) and the other the same as the leader line (15lb for me with a 7-8lb mainline). The reason I use such a heavy line to attach the ground bait and weight to is to help with the abrasive nature of the lead used on the line. Most anglers only use a line of the same breaking strain as their leader, but I have lost allot of tackle due to the trace breaking at this point after a few casts and therefore I opt for the heavier line here. It will also be almost impossible to cast this weight of, that is to say if the leader line holds!
You will clearly see that the centre line is much thicker than the hook lines. The hook lines is the same as the leader and is used to attach the hooks to. The top hook line must never be longer than the distance to the ground bait/lead and is attached to the same swivel as the line used for the ground bait/lead. The bottom hook line should be the same length. The reason for this was already explained. Note the beads on the line, this is to protect the knots from damage caused by the ground bait/lead.
Normally you would use as light as possible tackle, swivels from size 12-16, hooks from size 1-6. Remember that the smaller the hook the more chance there is of the hook straightening under pressure, specially if you hook a large enough fish, so if you use a small hook and you feel a monster on the other end, play the carp into the landing net to avoid loosing the fish because you were too anxious, take your time and your tackle will hold!
The disadvantage of this trace is that because the hooks are fixed at certain lengths you sometimes get a “double” hook-up. As the fish fight with the one hook in the mouth the second hook could land up in the body of the fish. If this happens allot then it is time to consider the next trace.
The gliding Rietvly trace.
Everything remains the same except the top hook is attached to a swivel making it glide along the line. This will reduce the “double” hook-up and give the same performance as the above trace. It is however important that once you bait the hooks you hook the top hook into your ground bait, this will ensure that it will land closer to the ground bait once in the water.
The next one is the baby shoe trace.
As seen from the picture it has two hooks attached to the bottom. This is a less favourite but it can be that the fish would prefer the bait a little distance from the ground bait and floating.
The bait used to catch carp includes such a wide variety that it would be impossible to name them all, but here are the basics:
From front left right:
Floaty in assortment of flavours, this being a cinnamon flavour.
Competition floaty, same as above but much smaller. This being a plain floaty.
Maize pips. From normal no flavour to anything imaginable.
Ground bait/bom dips. This is to add a little flavour a colour to the water once the ground bait hits the water. Hopefully attracting fish and get them to feed. Banjo is a banana flavour.
Muti dip. Used to dip your hooks and bait into to add that extra flavour and colour needed.
Also an assortment of various dougs (not pictured).
This is basically what you need to catch some carp, but the most essential is knowledge. Knowing your area, knowing where the fish feed (looking for rising fish), experimenting and knowing what they would prefer on a warm or colder day, etc. And this comes from experience and getting to know your angling spot. Do not be afraid to ask a neighbour what he is using if you see him having success. I have know anglers to also give me some of their bait to try. This is a great sport and everybody enjoys seeing someone else caching a good sized fish, we pat them on the back and shake hands and tell the story as if we caught the fish ourselves. Mostly all bank anglers are very sociable and you can make great friends just introducing yourself and asking advice.
Remember, if you are not going to eat the fish, release it to fight another day!
Hope you enjoyed this blog post, here are a few photos to end it all off with!
The cubed box desktop effect.
Wobbly windows! Notice the red emerald in the systray, yup, that is Beryl.
Look closely in the Konsole window and you will see the "mouse cursor on water" effect!
The "rain on desktop" effect.
Invert all colour!
Invert current window colour only.
udevd[826]: get_ctrl_msg: unable to receive user udevd message: Socket operation on non-socket
udevd[826]: get_netlink_msg: unable to receive kernel netlink message: Socket operation on non-socket
udevd[826]: get_ctrl_msg: unable to receive user udevd message: Socket operation on non-socket
udevd[826]: get_netlink_msg: unable to receive kernel netlink message: Socket operation on non-socket
udevd[826]: get_ctrl_msg: unable to receive user udevd message: Socket operation on non-socket
udevd[826]: get_netlink_msg: unable to receive kernel netlink message: Socket operation on non-socket
etc.
Boot from LiveCD
create the RAID arrays
mount /dev/md(x) /mnt/gentoo
cp -rp /dev/* /mnt/gentoo/dev/
reboot
Today Novell and Microsoft announced a partnership in which Microsoft has made some unlikely-seeming promises regarding Linux. What aren't they telling you? First, you can be sure that Microsoft's not out to help a competitor. This announcement paves the way for Microsoft to implement significant control over commercial customer's use of Free Software. And it has significant negative implications for Open Source in general.
Joint letter to the Open Source Community
From Novell and Microsoft
Today's announcement of the collaboration between Microsoft and Novell marks the beginning of a new era: Microsoft is coming to terms with Linux.
Over the past six years, we've seen the effect that the open source community has had on Microsoft. They've shared some source code, driven community projects like IronPython and WiX, and they continue to work with a number of open source software companies like JBoss, SugarCRM, XenSource, and Zend.
However, today's news is a big step forward for the Linux market. Today, for the first time, Microsoft is collaborating directly with a Linux and Open Source software vendor. With this news, Microsoft is saying that Linux is an important part of the IT infrastructure.
More importantly, Microsoft announced today that it will not assert its patents against individual, non-commercial developers. Novell has secured an irrevocable promise from Microsoft to allow individual and non-commercial contributors the freedom to continue open source development, free from any concern of Microsoft patent lawsuits. That's right, Microsoft wants you to keep hacking.
Why is Microsoft doing this? Because they recognize that customers today are deploying mixed source solutions - Windows and Linux - and they want these solutions to work well together. This will help Microsoft by making it easier for Linux customers to deploy Windows in their Linux environments. Microsoft is committing significant resources to promote joint Windows-Linux solutions. This is all about co-existence and giving customers greater choice.
The collaboration has multiple pieces:
* Patent coverage* Virtualization
- The concern over potential patent infringements makes some people nervous about the deployment of open source technologies.
- To do this, Novell and Microsoft are providing covenants to each other's customers, therefore releasing each company from the other's patent portfolio.
- What it really means is that customers deploying technologies from Novell and Microsoft no longer have to fear about possible lawsuits or potential patent infringement from either company.
* Virtualization Management
- Microsoft and Novell will collaborate in enhancing and developing the functionality required to efficiently virtualize Windows on Linux and Linux on Windows.
- Both will now be first class citizens in data centers, addressing the needs of mixed environments. They will both enjoy optimized, supported and tuned device drivers to maximize their potential.
* Office Open XML
- As a plus, the companies will work together to implement the necessary standards to manage data centers that run mixed environments (WS-Management).
- Novell will develop tools to manage virtualized Windows machines, and Microsoft will develop tools to manage virtualized Linux systems.
* Collaboration Framework
- Novell engineers have been working for the last year together with Microsoft engineers through the ECMA TC45 working group in producing a complete specification that would allow for interoperability across office suites.
- Novell will develop the code necessary to bring support for Office Open XML into OpenOffice, and we will contribute that support back to the OpenOffice.org organization. We will also distribute the Office Open XML plug-in in our own edition of OpenOffice. In addition, we will participate in the Open XML Translator open source project.
* Mono, OpenOffice and Samba
- One of the most important components of the collaboration agreement today is that we have setup a framework between Novell and Microsoft to discuss future collaborations.
- Today's announcement marks the beginning of a new era, and should not be considered a limitation. With the collaboration framework in place, we will periodically evaluate areas where we can work together improving the interoperability of our products.
- Under the patent agreement, customers will receive coverage for Mono, Samba, and OpenOffice as well as .NET and Windows Server.
- All of these technologies will be improved upon during the 5 years of the agreement and there are some limits on the coverage that would be provided for future technologies added to these offerings.
- The collaboration framework we have put in place allows us to work on complex subjects such as this where intellectual property and innovation are important parts of the conversation.
- Novell customers can use these technologies, secure in the knowledge that Microsoft and Novell are working together to offer the best possible joint solution.
This is a watershed moment for Linux. It fundamentally changes the rules of the game. We're really excited about this deal, and we hope you are too.
For the past twenty five years or more Dick, who is 65, has pushed and pulled his son across the country and over hundreds of finish lines. When Dick runs, Rick is in a wheelchair that Dick is pushing. When Dick cycles, Rick is in the seat-pod from his wheelchair, attached to the front of the bike. When Dick swims, Rick is in a small but heavy, firmly stabilized boat being pulled by Dick.
At Rick's birth in 1962 the umbilical cord coiled around his neck and cut off oxygen to his brain. Dick and his wife, Judy, were told that there would be no hope for their child's development.
"It's been a story of exclusion ever since he was born," Dick told me. "When he was eight months old the doctors told us we should just put him away, he'd be a vegetable all his life, that sort of thing. Well those doctors are not alive any more, but I would like them to be able to see Rick now."
In 1975, Rick was finally admitted into a public school. Two years later, he told his father he wanted to participate in a five-mile benefit run for a local lacrosse player who had been paralyzed in an accident. Dick, far from being a long-distance runner, agreed to push Rick in his wheelchair. They finished next to last, but they felt they had achieved a triumph. That night, Dick remembers, "Rick told us he just didn't feel handicapped when we were competing."
