October 2007 Archives

AntiX (pronounced "antics"), the lightweight rendition of SimplyMepis (which I've found to be unusually heavy), has a new release available for download.

I liked the first version of AntiX -- it's based on the Mepis core (which, in turn, now tracks Debian rather than Ubuntu) but uses the Fluxbox window manager rather than Mepis' KDE. AntiX also features many more lightweight apps that perform better on older, weaker hardware.

In the past, I've wondered what Mepis can offer that you can't get by running Fluxbox in Debian, Slackware, Damn Small Linux, Zenwalk and Vector. I guess you have to try it.

In the past, I've had very good things to say about both Vector and Zenwalk (both derivatives of Slackware) with Fluxbox. And I run my 233 MHz, 64 MB laptop with Debian and Fluxbox.

On the other hand, a distro that uses Fluxbox as its main window manager should be set up better than one that uses it as an afterthought.

As always, when it comes to Linux, it's all about choice and variety.

When Dell runs its glossy ad in the newspaper (and this newspaper among them) on Sunday, systems are offered with Windows Vista Home Premium (or, in cases of poor features, Vista Home Basic).

But on what seems to be a weekly basis, Dell has been buying ads inside the front sections of major newspapers and offering a choice of Windows XP or Vista Home Basic, with the unwritten hint being to choose XP.

In fact, Dell -- actually Dell's corporate customers who don't want anything to do with Vista at this point -- has been the prime mover in Microsoft's decision to extend the life of XP.

(Going slightly off-track... ) For those comparing Windows Vista with the new Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard, here's some interesting reading from Microsoft-Watch:

Why Leopard Isn't Better than Vista
Why Leopard Is Better than Vista

Back to XP. It would be nice, wouldn't it, to try both XP and Vista on your new PC to see which one is a better "fit"? But since Microsoft isn't about that (unless you fork over the cash for both), I'd give the PC you're planning to buy a test run, if at all possible. In the case of Dell, you can go to those mall kiosks. And many HP/Compaq systems are carried by the major office-tech stores (Office Depot, Staples, Best Buy, etc.).

Rules of thumb: XP runs well in 512 MB of memory. Vista needs 1 GB but wants 2 GB -- or at least that's what geeks are saying. If you have an Intel Core 2 Duo or AMD dual-core processor, you'll be happier with Vista than if you have a Intel Pentium/Celeron or single-core AMD processor. And in all cases, a good video card or graphics chipset with its own memory will make your experience better with any operating system.

Eventually the XP vs. Vista battle will be over. And Vista will stand alone. That's Microsoft's plan -- and these sort of things always go according to plan where Redmond is concerned.

The anticipation for Fedora 8 -- the community-based Linux distribution from Red Hat that's set to debut nine days from now-- is high. There wasn't much to brag about with Fedora 7, I'm told, but the increase in community involvement at that time is something that is continuing, with Red Hat ceding more control over the free distro than ever before. And when it comes to Fedora 8 --codenamed "Werewolf" -- genuine improvements are promised:

-- The Codec Buddy will suggest free alternatives to proprietary codecs for playing multimedia files.
-- Iced Tea is a free, open-source version of Java
-- Improved laptop support, in which the holy grail of power management -- suspend that works -- is supposed to be addressed (probably the No. 1 problem with Linux after wireless support)

I've been experimenting with CentOS, a free version of the mainline Red Hat Enterprise Linux product that costs between $80 (for the desktop version and a year's online support) all the way up to $1,299 (for the server edition with up to 2 sockets and a year's telephone support). CentOS (I've been running version 3.9, but the latest release is version 5) is reassembled from the Red Hat open source by the CentOS people to work just like the real thing (minus the cost, of course). And like Red Hat, CentOS has long periods of support (in the form of security updates) for all of its releases. So if you're the type who doesn't want to upgrade every six months (Ubuntu types) or every couple of years (Slackware, Debian), CentOS may be for you.

CentOS, and by extension Red Hat, has impressed me with its installer (the superb Anaconda), hardware detection and functionality. It's perfect for the office desktop. (Although SUSE, Ubuntu, Debian and even Slackware are strong contenders for the server room and the desktop, in my opinion).

Fedora, by its nature, is not as locked-down as Red Hat in terms of features. It functions as a test bed of sorts for the mainline Red Hat product, and Fedora's community orientation makes it perfect for the home/nerd user who wants to use something close to RHEL but more cutting-edge. I'm anxious to see how the latest from Fedora runs on my $0 Laptop (Gateway Solo 1450).

Fedora's main competitor -- openSUSE, Novell's free rendition of SUSE -- released its latest, version 10.3, on Oct. 4. Among its new features is easier implementation of proprietary codecs for multimedia (sound familiar?), Novell's anti-malware program AppArmor, virtualization tools (something Fedora is also including), improved package management and much quicker boot time.

At this point, however, all the buzz is still about Ubuntu, whose 7.10 "Gutsy" release has dominated Web discussion for the past month or so. I'm running it on my laptop now, and at this point I feel confident saying that its the best thing I've run on this PC. One thing I've learned is that while some things run on my Gateway laptop that never did on the VIA thin client, a laptop poses its own unique problems -- mostly touchpad and fan issues (the thin client's fan almost never runs, and you can't hear it when it does; the laptop's fan is loud, and thus far only Debian, Ubuntu without the latest kernel, and Red Hat/CentOS manage the fan properly) and the dreaded suspend which only partially works in Ubuntu).

As always, the way to find out if a Linux distro works for you is to install and give it a test drive. Your PC -- and you -- might like it (or not).

Remember, if SUSE or Fedora don't float your boat, there's always Ubuntu/Kubuntu/Xubuntu, Debian, PCLinuxOS, Mepis, Slackware, Sabayon, Mandriva, Linspire, Zenwalk, Vector, Gentoo, the BSDs (FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, PC-BSD, DesktopBSD) and dozens more.

It's freedom of choice that's truly free.

A quick look at Distrowatch today tells me that Damn Small Linux has released its landmark 4.0 release, and the business version of Sabayon has its 1.1 version ready for download.

If you have older hardware, Damn Small Linux very well could be the way to go, especially if you want to run a live CD or a "frugal" install (in which two or three large files act pretty much as a live-CD environment, but are stored on the hard drive). I've generally preferred Puppy Linux, but depending on your hardware and what you want to do, DSL might be a better choice. Go here for a detailed list of changes to DSL. A bonus for users of DSL is the new book, "The Official Damn Small Linux Book: The Tiny Adaptable Linux That Runs on Anything." I've definitely had a lot of fun with DSL. If it had a better image-editing program (i.e. I want MtPaint), I'd be a bigger fan. But otherwise, it runs better than Puppy on low-ram systems -- especially my 64-MB laptop.

I've tried Sabayon before, and it's a very nice KDE implementation. The "Professional" edition is the one you want because it includes OpenOffice. Among other things, Sabayon handles auto-configuration very well. Check the release notes.

I'm also eager to take a look at Fedora 8 when it comes out. Now that I have a laptop that will boot it, I'm anxious to see how Fedora handles hardware detection (including suspend/resume and wireless) and how quick (or slow) the distro is. Here's where the release stands now at the "test 3" stage.

For me, hardware detection is the live-and-die test that Linux (or BSD or anything else, for that matter) must pass in order to gain traction. The easier a distro makes it for you to have the proper monitor resolution, mouse settings, wireless settings (including encryption), power management and USB detection, the better.

There's the way to stick it to Yahoo.

Google surprised me by slowly rolling out the IMAP e-mail protocol for users of its Gmail service. Since Web-based e-mail clients are basically front-ends for IMAP-style e-mail access, it only makes sense to allow users of your Web e-mail portal to check their mail from ... any mail client they wish without resorting to the use of the POP protocol, which downloads all the mail to the hard drive of the computer on which you are using the stand-alone mail client.

Back in the days of dialup and small amounts of disk space, POP made sense -- you didn't want your phone line tied up, and you were always hitting your storage limit, so POP-ing your mail down to your own PC made sense.

But now, with always-on broadband, free mailboxes offering 2 GB and more of space, and with just about everybody needing to read their mail on multiple PCs (I use between three and six in any given week), the iPhone, Palm handhelds (including Treos) and more, IMAP -- in which mail stays on the server and can be accessed by multiple apps on multiple devices at multiple times -- is the only way to go.

Since Yahoo Mail charges for POP service and doesn't even offer IMAP, Google's move to IMAP (they already have free POP access) cements them as the go-to free mail provider.

So if you already use Outlook (or Thunderbird, Evolution, Sylpheed or what have you), once you go IMAP, you never go back.

Update: My Gmail account does not currently have IMAP capability.

Another contender: AOL -- remember them? -- offers both POP and IMAP access to its free mail service. And if you have an AIM account, you're already signed up. Along with the best-in-class Xdrive online storage service, it makes AOL more of a contender than you might realize.

(Note: the "f" word was removed -- by the author -- several times from this post. If you wish, please think of it where appropriate.)

If Steve Ballmer appeared before me right this minute, I'd punch him in the stomach. Hard. More than once.

That's for screwing up the brilliantly simple FTP functionality in Internet Explorer 6 by pretty much gutting it in Internet Explorer 7.

Between home and work, I use Linux, Mac OS X and Windows -- bet you can guess what my "official" work box is running. Yes, I finally decided to upgrade from IE6 to IE7 on my company's Dell Optiplex GX520. I try to never upgrade anything when I don't have to, but I figured that it's been OVER A YEAR since IE7 made its debut. Surely they've "improved" whatever they screwed up in the upgrade. I've been using Firefox (on Windows, Mac and Linux) a lot because of tabbed browsing, and I'd like to have the same feature in IE.

I use IE as my FTP client because it's so easy and intuitive. You open an FTP site and get a bunch of folders, just like in your own directories. You can click them open, create new folders, drop stuff in them, delete stuff out of them.

So I install IE7 and go about my day.

When I have to do some FTP work, I open IE7. It looks different. I have a list of files. I can open them, but I can't create new folders or upload new files.

What the hell? Ballmer -- you and your ilk are IDIOTS. Your browser has an advantage over Firefox, and you have to ruin it?

Turns out you can use IE7 for FTP. Here's the "official" way:

Here's a shortcut for getting an FTP directory listing within IE7:

Open Internet Explorer 7

In the address bar, type the following command:

ftp://username:password@domain

IE 7 will display a list of files and folders from the FTP domain

To quickly save a file locally, right-click the file and select "Save Target As..."

To manage the remote and locals files more completely, click the 'Page' menu button on the right-hand side of the IE 7 browser window and select the option, "Open FTP Site in Windows Explorer"

you can now drag-n-drop the files from remote FTP server to local file system easily

Microsoft's Internet Explorer 7 has some great enhancements over IE 6; however, with these enhancements comes a loss of some basic and useful functionality. I don't expect Microsoft to rest too long before they update IE 7 with an easier way to FTP - but - for now you have a hack. Enjoy.

This "worked" for me on one FTP site, but it DIDN'T WORK on another -- meaning the one I use most of the time.

So here's a WAY BETTER SOLUTION:

I wanted to use FTP to help someone out with transfering files and rather than worry about using a proper FTP client, a web browser can usually do the business, I tested to make sure it would work.

For Internet Explorer you have to do surprising things to log in to a password protected FTP server. Like this in the address bar

ftp://myname:address.hidden.to@non.subscribers.com

And off you go.

This NO LONGER works with Internet Explorer 7, is ok for 6 and below.

Turns out there is a crazy solution, good to know tip. (yeah you all knew!)

Open a normal file browser/explorer as you would for the local file system, yes that one, not Internet Explorer.

Type in the FTP address in the location bar ftp://anftp.site.com

And off you go. It prompts for the login details. You can use drag and drop etc.

Should work for web site uploads to your web server too.

I'm glad the solution is so easy. I use FTP clients in Linux, and I even downloaded and installed FireFTP for Firefox, but it's not as good, easy and fast as the IE (and now just "Windows") solution.

At this point, I'd prefer to "go back" to IE6, but what are the chances of that working -- and of keeping my nearly 1,000 bookmarks in the process?

Hey Ballmer, can you maybe try some things that won't drive people away from your products? Why don't you stop threatening to sue the makers and users of Linux and other open-source software over shadowy intellectual-property violations and JUST MAKE STUFF THAT'S BETTER?

After a week obsessing over whether or not I could get suspend to work properly on the $0 Laptop (Gateway Solo 1450), I'm realizing that suspend isn't everything.

I also had the occasion to use Debian Etch on the $15 Laptop (a 4- or 5-years-older Compaq Armada 7770DMT) and the ex-Thin Puppy (5- or 6-year-old Maxspeed Maxterm VIA-based thin client), and I'm being reminded that there's plenty to love about Debian Etch.

After all, running the same OS on 233 MHz and 1.3 GHz systems -- and looking great on both -- does count for something, as does Debian's stability and long release and support cycle.

Downloaded today: "credit-card" image for Debian Etch, XFCE image for Debian Etch (not sure exactly what this is/does) Vector Linux live CDs for the Standard and SOHO builds.

This thread on LXer is exploding: Members of the site tell how, why and when they made the move from Windows or Mac OS to the free Linux and BSD operating systems. Don't read it all at once -- you've probably got other things to do -- but dip in from time to time and see what the fuss is all about.

Gutsy is running fine -- at times -- on the $0 Laptop (Gateway Solo 1450, 256 MB RAM, 1.3 GHz Celeron).

I say "at times" because sometimes power management works, sometimes it doesn't. That part is a bit troubling. It was going fine for awhile, but then I ran a couple of live CDs, some successful, some not (Mepis 6.5, Ubuntu 6.06, Damn Small Linux 3.3). None of the live CDs ran as well as Ubuntu 7.10, which offers superior hardware detection. But after running Mepis (and the live CD probably has nothing to do with it), I rebooted into Ubuntu 7.10 and the fan kept on running. I put the laptop into suspend mode, and when it came out of it, the fan stopped. A good sign.

So yes, suspend works -- but sometimes not -- on this Gateway. Among the nice new features in Ubuntu 7.10 is the ability for someone to come by while the PC is in suspend and write you a little note that will come up on the screen when you enter your password to end suspend and return to normal operation.

I might have mentioned before that on the Gateway Solo 1450, you have to hit the power button to get out of suspend. I'm spoiled by the Mac iBook G4, where you just hit the space bar.

As to the intermittent power management in Gutsy, it's a bit of a mystery. There are two kernel choices in the GRUB menu: 2.6.22-14 and 2.6.20-16. I initially thought that the power-management problem only occurred in the newer kernel, but I've been able to run 2.6.22-14 with perfect power management. Not all the time. But every time I load 2.6.20-16, I have a flawless session in terms of power management.

When it comes to out-of-the-box power management on the Gateway Solo 1450, Ubuntu 6.06 is way behind. It didn't offer suspend at all, and the fan ran constantly. Ubuntu 7.04 was better -- it managed the fan fine, and suspend sometimes worked. Mepis 6.5 didn't silence the fan, either. DSL 3.3 wouldn't boot at all, no matter how hard I tried.

Back to Ubuntu. The screen color is more dramatic than that in 7.04. It looks more like 6.06, actually. Since this is the kind of thing that's easily changed, there's not much of a point in talking about it.

Other things that I'm happy about with 7.10: Mouse and touchpad detection is better than anything I've seen. This is the first Linux distro I've tried that offers GUI configuration of the Alps touchpad. I was actually able to turn off the tap-to-left-click option -- something I've been unable to accomplish either in a GUI or by hacking at xorg.conf since I began using this laptop. The hardware detection of most distros see the touchpad as the more common Synaptics touchpad. This works only up to a point. If you want to modify the way your Alps touchpad reacts, good luck. The Synaptics utility doesn't work at all.

Until I booted Ubuntu 7.10 for the first time, I thought I'd never get such good control of touchpad function. It may be a small thing if you aren't running this particular hardware, but if you are, it's huge.

I'm still dual-booting Debian, and I fired up Etch just for comparison's sake. I tried to slow down the mouse (I have the touchpad and a USB wheel mouse connected) with the xset m command in a terminal. It slowed it down some, but not nearly enough. And I also discovered that Etch does not support suspend, at least on this laptop, and the screensaver isn't working, either. I do like the many additional apps that come in the standard Etch install (I even use Epiphany), and Etch is just than much quicker than Ubuntu, but so far Ubuntu is pulling even further ahead with the 7.10 release.

One thing that irked me was Gutsy's printer configuration utility. I thought it was going to be somehow upgraded in Ubuntu 7.10, but it looks just as lame. In order to find my favorite network printer, I had to open a browser and go to localhost:631 to start CUPS in order to find it at all. While in the CUPS interface, I generally go to Administration, then hit something like "find more printers." My printer showed up, but I couldn't add it without a password. I've never seen that before, and I doubt that password protection has been added to the internal network, so I'll chalk that up to an Ubuntu or CUPS bug. Again, if I didn't make this clear enough, I find the CUPS Web interface easier to use than the Ubuntu printers utility. Still, I had plenty of network printers to choose from, just not the one I wanted. So I don't see any big improvement in printer configuration.

Other new things (or at least new to me) are the Hardware Information menu under System-Preferences. It had a lot of information, that's for sure. From CPU to every peripheral and chipset you have, it's all there. As I mention above, the additional mouse/touchpad control available in the Mouse menu is very much appreciated, and it is pretty much spoiling me for any other distro where this laptop is concerned.

When I first booted 7.10, the upper panel opened up a small window telling me that restricted drivers were available. Turns out it was a single driver for the Gateway's internal modem. I loaded it, but I don't have a dialup account, so I can't really test it.

Another thing: On the lower panel, another small window opened up telling me that my battery, though fully charged, was only at 21 percent of capacity, and is probably in need of replacement. That's not news to me, but it's nice that this new version of GNOME is keeping track of it.

As part of the upgrade, Ubuntu 7.10 created a bunch of new folders in my /home directory: Documents, Music, Pictures and Videos. It's not like creating folders is a huge chore, but I didn't mind the system doing it for me.

The cheap Airlink101 AWLL3028 USB wireless adapter that I picked up a few weeks back hasn't worked in any Linux distro I've tried. I know that the older AWLL3026 is supposed to work -- in Feisty anyway, but I don't think the 3028 is close at all in terms of chipset. I didn't expect Gutsy to surprise me, and it didn't.

I think I'm going to pick up a refurbished Netgear USB adapter from Tiger Direct -- those are supposed to work. I'd use my Orinoco WaveLAN Silver PCMCIA card, but I haven't yet fully straightened out the bent pins in the laptop to try that. Hey -- you get what you pay for, right?

The thing I'm most eager to try in 7.10 is Gnash -- the open-source alternative to Flash. But I have no idea how to do it, or how to access Ubuntu's supposed new management utility for Firefox extensions. I'll have to investigate. Flash functionality without Adobe's closed-source plug-in would indeed be sweet.

As you might have read previously, the Gutsy install took more than 9 hours due to the slowness of the mirrors on day 1 of the upgrade. If I were you, I'd wait a week or two until things calm down.

I haven't had time to run many other apps besides Firefox, but I was surprised to find that the GIMP in 7.10 is a release candidate. It still ran fine. OpenOffice is version 2.3, but I've been pretty happy with 2.0 in Etch, so I could've stayed with 7.04's version 2.2 and been just as happy. For me, if my "smart" quotes face the right way, I'm good. If I ever figure out how to change the case of letters from upper to lower and back again with a keyboard command, I'll be even more happy. All the problems I've had lately with KOffice have had the effect of making my loyalty swing ever so much toward OpenOffice. We'll see how that holds when the next version of KOffice is released.

Conclusion: I have a feeling that the power-management issues regarding my Gateway Solo 1450 and Gutsy will solve themselves. Either the hardware will stop freaking out at times with the 2.6.22-14 kernel, or I'll just use 2.6.20-16 (and reverse the GRUB entries so the older kernel boots first). After additional testing, I'm not so sure about suspend. But even without that capability, the Gateway is doing well enough with 7.10.

So even with a couple of glitches, Ubuntu 7.10 performs better than its predecessors (7.04 and 6.06) on the test hardware -- and better than anything else I've ever run on it. For other distros that pride themselves on hardware detection and out-of-the-box functionality without heavy hacking, Ubuntu 7.10 raises the bar considerably.

It's Gutsy day, and Ubuntu 7.10 Gutsy is now available. Check the Ubuntu home page for info, or go directly to the 7.10 tour page for everything that's changing in Ubuntu.

Doing a Ubuntu upgrade -- especially trying to get a full ISO file -- on day 1 is, if not pure folly, mostly folly. So recheck this entry throughout the day as I report on my Gutsy progress.

If my experience with downloading the full ISO for 7.04 is any indication, the Ubuntu mirrors will be very busy and very slow. So I'm using Update Manager to upgrade my existing 7.04 install to 7.10. It is slow, for sure, but I've got three PCs on this desk, so I can just keep on going. Yes, I could continue to use the $0 Laptop -- the Gateway Solo 1450 -- while the download is underway. But since I don't have to, I won't.

Here are some of the Ubuntu 7.10 features that I'm looking forward to:

-- Fast user switching

-- Easier handling of Firefox plugins, plus the new Gnash plugin, which is supposed to be an open-source alternative to Flash.

-- Promise of lower power consumption

-- Encrypted drives (hopefully just like Debian Etch, and equally hopefully through Logical Volume Manager).

-- Improvements to GNOME, including an updated Evolution mail client that, among its features, includes a new backup utility; the ability to fill out PDF forms with the Evince viewer; more information in the Nautilus file-manager window; new Appearance control-panel applet (reminds me of Xfce!); Power Manager warns of a worn-out laptop battery (as if I'd ever buy a new one ...); the "leave message" feature in the screen saver (lets people type you a little message, I think ...).

Also, for your perusal, the Ubuntu 7.10 Desktop press release.

p.s. My update is still running ... slowly. Download speeds are between 1/4th and 1/10 of normal.

p.p.s. Now that the half-hour of preliminary setup is done, 1,014 packages are downloading, estimated time 3 hours 23 minutes.

Update, 10:20 a.m. PST: Download speeds are down to between 10 and 18 kb/s, meaning the upgrade will take anywhere from 7 to 15 hours to download. I'm at 42 of 1014 files.

Re: Doing Ubuntu upgrades on the first day -- Why do I do this? It would probably be a good idea to wait a week until the traffic dies down.

I should have re-read my entries on the quest for Feisty in April:

My Edgy but not Feisty day
The elusive Feisty
It's not easy getting Feisty

Want to commiserate? Follow Ubuntu fans on the forum as they report their upgrade tales.

Check out this review of Ubuntu 7.10 from Lunapark 6.

Update, 11:05 a.m.: I'm on file 205 out of 1,014, with an estimated 3 hours, 35 minutes to go. yes, download speed has risen somewhat in the past 10 minutes.

Update, 11:25 a.m.: Download speed is up; only 2 hours, 36 minutes remain. File 418 of 1,014. When speeds were so slow that my estimated download time was 15 hours, I got worried, but now that I'm hitting 60 kb/s, it's all good.

Just in case: I turned off automatic "suspend." I don't want anything to mess up this download.

Update, 1:40 p.m.: I went out to lunch with Ilene and the kid. Now I'm back. The update is at file 745 of 1,014. Estimated time remaining: between 3 and 5 hours (download speed fluctuating between 10 and 20 kb/s).

Read DesktopLinux.com on the 7.10 debut. Steven J. Vaughn-Nichols points out that the new Ubuntu includes plug-and-play support for Broadcom Wi-Fi cards, compiz for those whose hardware can handle it, full external VGA support for laptops (I had no idea this wasn't already a standard feature -- but it'll be good for projector presentations), the ability to write to NTFS partitions and drives, and the Tracker desktop search application.

Update, 3:02 p.m.: On file 894 of 1,014. No estimated time showing. Must be stalled for the moment. But I'm 90 percent of the way done. Again, don't try this at home -- do yourself a favor and wait a week. I don't even know if this upgrade will work when its finished. I did the initial 7.04 install with the express purpose of doing this upgrade, and it's no problem if it breaks the install, but if you actually use your Ubuntu box, I'd proceed with caution. The minimum I'd do would be to copy all the /home files over to another partition or, better yet, another drive.

Update, 3:14 p.m.: Speed just bumped up to 60-100 kb/s, so I'm somewhere between 20 and 50 minutes away. For those who've stopped counting, it's been about 5 hours since I started.

Update, 4:18 p.m.: Speeds have slowed again. I'm at file 968 out of 1,014. One hour to go at this rate.

Update, 5:12 p.m.: I began this blog post over 7 hours, 20 minutes ago, but I'm seeing light at the end of the Gutsy tunnel. I'm at 1,006 of 1,014 files downloaded, with "about 11 minutes to go."

Another review: From PolishLinux.com.

Update, 5:30 p.m. Downloads are finished, and the upgrades are being installed. Timer says 1 hour, 50 minutes to go. I'm scheduled to leave in 30 minutes. I have no problem shoving the laptop into a drawer or under a pile of crap and letting it build while I'm gone, but I'd rather take it with me. But since the minutes are ticking down faster than real time, I have the feeling it'll be done in time.

Update, 6 p.m. The build of 7.10 still has 47 minutes to go, so I'm leaving and will hopefully return tomorrow morning to a fully functioning Gutsy system. Can you go from initiating the Feisty-to-Gutsy update to finishing it in a 9-hour day? Not on the first day of release, that's for sure.

The next day, 9:40 a.m.: The laptop was waiting for me to check the box to remove obsolete files in the system. I check it, and a couple minutes later I'm ready to restart the system with Ubuntu 7.10.

How did Ubuntu 7.10 do? Check the next entry (about to be written).

So far, Ubuntu is outpacing Debian on the $0 Laptop, a Gateway Solo 1450 that I resurrected from the dead by replacing its shattered power plug.

While both Debian Etch 4.0 and Ubuntu 7.04 are doing fine in the power-management department, Ubuntu is pulling ahead when it comes to touchpad and mouse configuration.

Since this laptop has an Alps touchpad instead of the more common Synaptic, there have been problems, but overall the touchpad works better in Debian. When tapping on a menu item in Debian, it flashes quickly and disappears. In Ubuntu, the menu stays open -- as it should.

In Debian, the touchpad was initially slow as molasses. I did find the solution, but that made it way, way too fast. In the GNOME settings, I was able to slow it down, but not nearly enough.

In Ubuntu, however, I can get optimal speed and sensitivity for the touchpad.

The same holds true for an external USB mouse. In Ubuntu, there is a greater range available with the configuration tool. Not so with Debian. Curiously, the xorg.conf entries look surprisingly similar. Even the part of the Debian xorg.conf that I changed was right there in Ubuntu without the change (and, as I say, it works better).

Despite all of this, there is probably some kind of xorg.conf magic I can do that is specific to either the Alps touchpad or the Gateway Solo 1450, but I'll have to look into it. The fact that I can't seem to get the external mouse to behave just the way I want only adds to the mystery.

One area, however, where Debian is ahead is in implementation of the Fluxbox window manager. In Ubuntu, when right-clicking on a link to download a file, the Save As box flutters, with the real box opening below the active window. In Debian, everything works fine.

Most apps are a bit faster in Debian, but it's not enough to make that much of a difference on this hardware.

I almost forgot to mention that when using the Debian net install disc on this laptop, the display gets VERY fuzzy. Even though it's text-based, something funky is happening. I was still able to do the install, but it was made a bit more difficult that it should be. I can't figure out the reason, because once Debian is installed, video performs perfectly. In contrast, the Ubuntu alternate install disc displays its menus perfectly. I guess there's something a little flaky in the initial hardware detection in the Debian net installer. I haven't been able to find out anything about this problem by Googling.

Conclusion: It's not like I haven't spent substantial time using Debian, Slackware, Puppy, Damn Small Linux, in addition to Ubuntu and Xubuntu. It's no secret that when it comes to the full desktop implementation of Debian, it's not all that different from Ubuntu. But for this particular laptop, Ubuntu just seems to handle things better.

One more contender: The Gateway Solo 1450 did pretty well with the CentOS 5.0 live CD. An install of CentOS and/or Fedora is something I'd like to try.

Apple's Leopard operating system -- OS X 10.5 -- hits the street (or at least the racks at the Apple Store) on Friday, Oct. 26.

Does your Mac have what it takes? I'm still running 10.3, so I know mine doesn't. But here, via ArsTechnica, are the specs:

The system requirements are now official: any Intel or PowerPC G5 Mac, or a G4 running at a minimum of 867MHz. Nice knowing you, G3s and sub-867MHz G4s. The minimum RAM is 512MB—but you'll want some more if you intend on actually running applications. And you need a DVD drive plus 9GB disk space. Some of the included applications have additional requirements, such as an external HD (sold separately) for Time Machine.

In case you want to read the official Apple version, go here.

I never read the manual. That can be a detriment in Slackware, baffling at the command line, soul-killing in FreeBSD (OK, that's just my experience) and ... just slightly irritating in Ubuntu.

I have saved network settings for home (dynamic IP) and the office (static IP) -- a feature that didn't work at all in Xubuntu but is operational in Ubuntu 7.04 -- but I was baffled as to why, when changing from one of the saved settings to the other, the change would not go into effect unless I rebooted.

Was it an Ubuntu bug?

No. It was yet another case of Ubuntu by Dummies, in which I am ... the dummy.

Here's how you change between network settings:

First, this assumes that you have more than one set of network settings. You get them after entering your settings -- or accepting the DHCP settings as configured automatically -- by hitting the little disk icon on the window (under System-Administration-Network) and giving your settings a name. Mine are the self-explanatory "DHCP" and "Static IP," one for home, the other for the office.

Use the Location tab to select the setting you need.

Here's what I was missing:

After choosing a new setting, click on the check-mark box in the upper right corner of the window. Notice how the check mark turned green when you selected your new network location?

Once you click on the green check-mark box, you can close the window -- your network settings have been changed. And no, you don't have to reboot.

P.S. I made the image above using Applications-Accessories-Take Screenshot and cropped it with The GIMP.

From the Ubuntu by Dummies desk, this is Dummy No. 1 signing off.

After months of intermittent use of Xubuntu on my less-capable converted thin client (I always liked Xubuntu, for the record), I decided to put the standard Ubuntu on my new, old $0 Laptop in anticipation of the 7.10 Gutsy release of the popular Linux distribution in, at this writing, three days.

It's pretty much a coincidence that an even more hotly anticipated operating-system release -- Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard -- will also debut this month. It's concidental because Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu and its brother/sister distros (Xubuntu, Kubuntu, Edbuntu) has committed to releasing an update of its Linux OS every six months. Yes, like clockwork.

There are also new releases from openSuse (out now) and Fedora (on the way), and the new Red Hat Global Desktop expected in November, so it's high season for Linux distribution releases.

I've written reams about Xubuntu, as well as Puppy Linux, Damn Small Linux, Slackware, Vector Linux, CentOS/Red Hat, Zenwalk and Debian over the past year, but I've only had the $0 Laptop -- a Gateway Solo 1450, circa 2002 or so, with a 1.3 GHz Celeron M processor and 256 MB RAM -- in working condition for a couple weeks.

But even though the $0 Laptop has specs that seem similar to the thin client (originally named the Thin Puppy due to its continuous month running Puppy Linux 2.14 without any storage except RAM), performance of the Gateway laptop has been much better, and I can run GNOME- and KDE-based distros with much more ease.

Actually, I've said for awhile that GNOME is much faster than many give it credit. And when it comes to KDE, there are fast (Slackware) and slow (SimplyMepis) implementations.

On slower PCs, you feel it enough that running Xfce and Fluxbox as the window managers in X really gives you an advantage in terms of application launch time.

One of my first "official" acts in Ubuntu 7.04 was to download Fluxbox, create a menu for it and see how well it runs. So far, there are problems. For one thing, the Nautilus file manager doesn't play well with Fluxbox. Once you load it, the screen background gets GNOME-ized -- colors change, the Fluxbox panel usually disappears and desktop icons from GNOME appear.

My solution: using ROX-filer instead of Nautilus. I learned to love ROX when using Puppy, and it works well in Ubuntu under Fluxbox.

Another problem I have had is that when doing a "save target as" for a Web link to a file, the display gets a bit hinky -- the "save as" box begins to flutter, and there's a usable "save as" box on the window below. It's a pain. It could be a quirk exclusive to my Gateway laptop, but I'll try the same thing soon in Debian to make sure.

That reminds me. I'm dual-booting Ubuntu 7.04 and Debian Etch 4.0r1 on this machine. I gave up using the same /home partition for both. Why? Because at one point, I already had Debian installed, and when I installed Ubuntu, half of the damn thing was broken due to conflicting config files in the /home partition. I couldn't get networking to work -- and couldn't even load Firefox. So I'm keeping separate /home directories for both Ubuntu and Debian in the same partition as the OSes themselves. I cleared out the former /home partition, which for now I'll use to backup /home files in case I need to do any reinstalls.

Ubuntu broke a couple of more times -- but it was all due to the dual-booting, I think. My sense of it is that if you are going to dual-boot Ubuntu with anything else, it's better to use the /boot/grub/menu.lst file in Ubuntu, as opposed to the one generated by, in my case, Debian, in order to keep both partitions bootable.

Cool thing: When I did a kernel upgrade for Debian (not my idea -- it was suggested by the Update Manager), it looks as if Debian found the menu.lst in the Ubuntu partition and updated it along with Debian's own menu.lst. A nice touch -- and yet another reason why Debian is as ready as just about any distro for duty on the average user's desktop.

As I say, I've been primarily a Xubuntu user due to my hardware circumstances, but now that I've got a laptop -- even though it's 5 years old -- that can "handle" GNOME really well, I'm enjoying being in that environment -- and running Ubuntu.

I like the way the type is rendered in Gedit, which I've been using heavily. And the Nautilus file manager (when used in GNOME) responds well and is pretty intuitive.

I've had a few glitches when changing network parameters. I have a DHCP connection at home and a static IP at the office, and sometimes when I change from one to the other, it doesn't work right away. I shouldn't have to quit Firefox, let alone reboot, to make networking work right after changing the configuration, but that's what I've had to do. It merits more testing, and now that I have both configurations saved (that feature didn't work on my previous Xubuntu 7.04 install), maybe it'll work better. I haven't had this problem in Debian, by the way.

I've said before that this Gateway Solo 1450 laptop seems to like the power management settings of both Ubuntu and Debian better than that of Slack-based distros. I also gave the CentOS 5.0 live CD a spin, and the laptop performed equally well. I just might add CentOS (or Fedora, for that matter) to the nearly empty former /home partition.

Back to power management. Suspend does work on the Gateway. To get out of suspend, however, you can't just hit the keyboard or mouse. Instead, you have to hit the power button. It's not as elegant of a solution, but the fact that suspend works at all is a huge deal, and I'll take it.

I also looked on the Ubuntu Web site for wireless adapters that work "out of the box" in Ubuntu. One of them is Netgear's WG111 USB 802.11g adapter-- some versions at least. Tiger Direct is selling refurbished models for $14.99 each. That's cheap enough to take a chance on. I've never been successful using ndiswrapper and pretty much hate the idea of having to kludge it like that, so I'd be happy to find an off-the-shelf USB adapter that "just works" with Linux.

I don't know enough about Linux kernels and what modules are loaded or not, but I'd be happy to roll specific modules that I needed into the kernel instead of having it packed with a bunch of junk that I'll never need. I know that Zenwalk has a nice GUI application that allows this to be done, and it also has a GUI for ndiswrapper. Even though they're GUIs, I don't think of screwing around with the kernel and ndiswrapper within the realm of the average user, but I feel that, in some way, it should be.

However it's accomplished, I think that every wireless adapter out there -- past, present and future -- should work (with working encryption) in Linux. And they should work without resorting to a bunch of command-line hacking, either. It's a total deal-breaker for users new and old, as far as I'm concerned.

And I'm not assuming that all wireless adapters work with all Windows -- or any Macintosh -- boxes, either. I've had plenty of wireless problems in Windows 98 and 2000, that's for sure. Linux needs to be better -- and better than Windows, that's all I'm saying.

I did manage to play an MP3 in Ubuntu. Why the Totem movie player is set as the default is something I don't understand -- it's a messy solution, as far as I'm concerned -- but it did work. When I tried to play the first MP3, a message popped up about codecs, along with the potential for illegality. I downloaded all of the codecs. I understand why Ubuntu doesn't ship with the ability to play every type of multimedia, but I'm glad it's easy to add the capability.

I'm not downloading Flash because I want to wait and see if the open-source Gnash works when Gutsy is released in this many days:

Am I using this countdown thing enough? Probably.

This time around I haven't added anything to Ubuntu. Since I've got acceptable speed with the standard GNOME tools, I didn't need Thunar or Mousepad. I still use AbiWord a lot, and I may throw that on here, but even the GIMP runs well enough that I won't need MtPaint.

So thus far I'm enjoying my time in Ubuntu 7.04. I hope the honeymoon isn't over when I do the Gutsy upgrade.

I don't use my DSL Extreme e-mail all that often. Even though the mail service is part of my ISP service -- and I've been with DSL Extreme since before I even had DSL (they still offer dialup) -- I've hesitated using it because I want to have an e-mail address that I can keep forever.

But what is "forever" in the online world? And does it matter?

And now that I discovered that DSL Extreme's e-mail Web portal uses a secure connection all the time -- not just during login -- I'm thinking about using it more.

Couple that with the fact that DSL Extreme offers, in addition to Web-based access, both IMAP and POP service, and it gets even better.

But for me, the main selling point is the secure connection.

My company's e-mail is not secure. Neither the login nor the mail itself is on a secure server. Now we're not dealing with national security here, but why not use a secure server if its available.

I just feel better about it.

Even though Yahoo Mail is my "main" account, I haven't been checking it all that often. I've been using my Daily News e-mail for business correspondence, but the lack of security -- and the fact that I don't want to use it for personal e-mail -- is a drawback.

I've always had good luck with DSL Extreme e-mail when it comes to configuring mail clients (including Mutt and MSMTP on the Linux console), so it just might be time to start using it more.

At least I'm thinking about it.

I suppose it's not entirely kosher to blather on about how popular or unpopular your blog is, but I'm ignoring that sentiment and forging ahead.

Click is pretty much treading water. Yeah, I've been writing less. But still plenty.

And I haven't done a full-fledged distro review in awhile, nor have I gotten a link at Distrowatch for said reviews.

I'm still posting Linux and free-software entries to LXer, but since what seems to be a significant percentage of the people there can't get past the IP block to see the Insidesocal site that hosts this blog, I'm not doing so great there, either.

I got my first Distrowatch link -- and didn't even know I had it for awhile -- for a Puppy review that I happened to write just around the time that Ubuntu was releasing its 7.04 release (and for those not in the know about Ubuntu release numbers, the 7 is for 2007, the .04 for the fourth month of the year, which is April to you and me). Since the frenzy over Ubuntu coincided with a link to my Puppy review appearing on the Distrowatch home page, I was hitting 2,000 page views a day for awhile. And around here (the Los Angeles Daily News), that gets you noticed.

I managed to get a few more Distrowatch links over the past few months, plus regular postings on LXer, and was able to maintain 500 to 700 page views a day -- enough to be in the top 50 Web pages in the Los Angeles Daily News oeuvre. (Sorry to use the word oeuvre).

I've been wanting to branch out. Recently I've been trying to write more about Windows and Mac topics, and that's just not as popular (or as easy to promote) as Linux.

But I can live with 100 or so page views a day (it still spikes to 500 on a good LXer day), and while my main motivation for doing this blog under the auspices of the Daily News is that I can work on it during my regular workday, that's not a situation set in stone.

I guess I'm saying that I want to take this whole "writing about technology" project to another level. The whole tech thing is an intense love-hate thing for me. I'm both a geek and a Luddite at the same time. I don't have cable, my cell phone is years old, I just about don't have a computer made in the last five years (the Gateway laptop is circa 2002, so it's borderline).

And I don't spend much money on technology (hence my attraction to Linux in its many, many forms).

Also, I believe with great fervor that the technology we use, be it Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, iPod, MP3, MS Office vs. OpenOffice vs. whatever else, and more, represents choices that are economic, moral, political and personal. That's what motivates me.

And I have other things going on in my life (and want even MORE to happen outside the realm of "I tried this new Linux distribution and my wireless doesn't work, blah, blah, blah.")

Back to the blog: In my experience, the only way to get any kind of blog traffic is to get links. Search is another way to get traffic, but it's never that much unless you have words like "Britney nude" in your post. (My apologies to all those who came to this entry because they want to see Britney nude -- there's no nudity and no Britney here).

LXer enables me to create links to this blog myself, and for that I am grateful. LXer remains one of the best Web sites out there, with a great community and a unique site design that encourages sharing and discussion of free-software news. (Disclaimer: I'm a contributing editor at LXer.)

The hardest thing to do is get people to visit your blog directly -- without going through a link -- on a regular basis. I've been blogging in one form or another for more than two years now, and while getting readers is a motivation, it's not the only motivation (I feel like I've typed these exact words before). As long as the compulsion to do so continues, I will.

For now, this rant is over. Catch you next time.

Since Macs are now mostly Intel-based, and since it's pretty well established that you can run Windows on a Mac, I began wondering what the possibilities were for running OS X on a PC -- a Windows PC, if you will, except without Windows or any other BS programs that you have to pay for.

I've just started poking around, but one of the places where people are trying to do this is InsanelyMac, where there is news, plus blogs and forums, dedicated to what it calls "the evolution of OSX86."

Many have said that the reason OS X runs so well is that it's tuned to and configured for a very specific and small set of hardware platforms. I'm sure that's true, and while there are plenty of Linux and BSD distributions that run on PCs (hundreds, in fact), the ability to run Apple's OS X on any platform you choose would be a game-changing development.

Plus there are no shortage of people who want to hack everything Apple makes, from iPods to iPhones, AppleTV and more. So why not OS X itself?

A better place to get started than InsanelyMac is the project's OSx86 Wiki, specifically its FAQ. Here's a sample:

Do I need Apple hardware to run Mac OS X?

Not anymore.

Projects such as OSx86 have succeeded in allowing the Intel-based version of Mac OS X to run on non-Apple hardware largely by bypassing the TPM in software.

The "Trusted Platform Module," or TPM, is a computer chip embedded inside Intel-based Macs to prevent the Intel-based version of Mac OS X from running on non-Apple hardware. (during installation of Mac OS X, Mac OS X interfaces with the TPM. If Mac OS X finds that the TPM doesn't exist, Mac OS X refuses to install or run.)

In building your "Hackintosh" however, you may want to keep as close to the hardware configuration of Intel-based Macs for the best compatibility. Intel Macs use (or have used) either a Core Solo, Core Duo, Core 2 Duo, or Xeon processor. For graphics cards, Intel Macs have seen Intel's GMA950; ATI's Mobility Radeon X1600, Radeon X1600, and Radeon X1900 XT; and nVidia's GeForce 7300GT, 7600GT, 8600M GT or Quadro FX4500.

Will Apple sell OS X for PCs?

No. Apple has repeatedly stated that OS X for Intel will only run on Apple hardware.

Of course Apple may change its mind at any time. Remember that Steve Jobs stated there would not be a video iPod anytime soon!

There could be many good reasons for Apple to let OSx86 spread on non proprietary computers. It could boost Apple's Hardware sales via a halo effect similar to the iPod one or simply allow them to up their OS market share. We'll see...

Of course, this is a big debate within the Mac community, because the release of Mac OS X for normal PCs could lead to many problems. Apple's primary reason for selling their computers is the huge profit margins on the hardware. If their operating system was available on any regular PC, they wouldn't make nearly as much profit from hardware sales. Drivers are not the issue however, as it is the responsibility of the hardware vendor to write drivers that are compatible with any given operating system.

I love this part: "... it is the responsibility of the hardware vendor to write drivers that are compatible with any given operating system." Pause for laugh.

But I like the word "Hackintosh," and will use it with impunity.

But is this illegal? I don't think any laws are being broken by the downloading of the various programs, images and the like, but it's certainly not kosher in terms of the Mac OS X user agreements. But I don't think the people engaging in this kind of activity think they're doing anything wrong. It's all in the service of hacking and bringing OS X to a platform that deserves it.

It goes like this: If Apple ported OS X to PC, we'd buy it, but they refuse to do so. The reasons are murky but probably wouldn't hold up to antitrust scrutiny, should such scrutiny be brought to bear (and it won't be). Apple is keeping OS X a Mac-only product in the interest of profit and not pissing off Microsoft (also known as "more profit").

But throw a hacker a bone, and s/he will chew it. You pay for Mac OS X (and Windows, for that matter) but you don't "own" your copy -- you're pretty much just renting it -- and your use of that code is severly restricted by the companies that really own it. With free open-source software -- including the Linux operating system -- under the GPL, you can modify the code and try to run it on any kind of hardware you please. If you offer that modded code to others, you must include the source so people can see what you're doing and make further improvement, if they so choose.

It's all about innovation and freedom.

And it's natural for people to bring that innovation to OS X, which uses BSD (Darwin, specifically) as its base. BSD is not under the GPL. It has a license that allows for modification of the code without sharing the source with others. That's one reason why Apple chose it instead of Linux, I imagine.

But to get a start on running OS X on your PC, Darwin is freely available (though not the same thing as the full OS X by a long shot).

Depending on the distro, the Alps touchpad on the $0 Laptop -- a Gateway Solo 1450 -- reacts completely differently.

It usually allows a tap on the touchpad to be interpreted as a left-click. At first it's annoying, and later it becomes semi-useful. Some distros don't recognize the tap at all.

Truth be told, while the tap is nice, it causes more problems than it solves.

Problem: If you have the Synaptics touchpad, it's usually configured as Synaptics Touchpad. If you have the Alps touchpad, it's usually configured as Synaptics Touchpad.

See what I mean?

Anyway, I have full functionality in Ubuntu. In Debian, I needed to tweak the xorg.conf settings to take it from slow as mud to normal.

But when I tap on a menu in Debian, it opens for a split-second and then closes. I have to left-click for the menu to remain open.

I don't know if this can be fixed, but my solution just might be disabling the tap-to-click, or whatever it's called. This solution is for Ubuntu, and it'll probably work just as well in Debian.

But will it work for the Alps touchpad, even though it's meant for the Synaptic? That's what I intend to find out.

Update: This doesn't work for the Alps touchpad.

So I installed Ubuntu 7.04 in anticipation of the release of Ubuntu 7.10 Gutsy, which is now a mere seven days away (see the counter below -- great marketing, Ubuntu).

I wanted to add the Fluxbox lightweight window manager (not the entire Fluxbuntu package, just the window manager itself).

I added Fluxbox in Synaptic, but when I clicked on Options on the sign-on screen (GDM for those who know it), changed my session from GNOME to Fluxbox, then logged on, I had a Fluxbox screen with no menu. I couldn't even get a terminal open.

What to do?

I hit ctrl-alt-backspace to kill X. That took me back to the sign-on screen. I changed session again. I could've gone into GNOME and done what was needed, but I decided to opt for the "failsafe" terminal instead. Once I changed session to the Failsafe terminal, I logged on.

At the prompt, to create menus for Fluxbox, you usually do the following at the prompt:

fluxbox-generate_menu

But that didn't work.

I found the answer, and it's doing this at the command prompt instead:

sudo update-menus

When prompted, I entered my password, then hit return.

Then ctrl-alt-backspace to get back to the login screen. I went to Options, changed my session to Fluxbox and logged on.

Once in Fluxbox (damn, it's fast!), a right-click anywhere on the screen brought up a fully populated menu.

Thanks, Ubuntu community!

When all of the many bugs get worked out, the vast Los Angeles Daily News/Los Angeles Newspaper Group blogging empire, home of Inside USC and lots of other blogs that for the most part don't do anywhere near as well, will be moving from Movable Type 3.2 to the 4.0 platform.

Who else uses MT 4.0? Why, I'm glad you asked. BoingBoing recently moved its operations to MT 4.0. I didn't think they could do it, but the whole thing, with tons of archives is now in MT land. That says a lot about the platform, I think.

I say "I think," because I suspect that WordPress has probably surpassed Movable Type in terms of functionality, and for me, I prefer Blogger, on which I can zap out entries much faster because the database structure of the Blogger platform (and WordPress as well) doesn't require blogs to be "rebuilt," ever. They are built on the fly as people click on the various URLs. For the blogger, that means nearly instant saves and less pain when features or templates are upgraded and changed.

But I will be giving Movable Type 4.0 a chance. For one thing, we have a very complex setup here, with probably somewhere around 100 blogs, many of them intertwined, with entries appearing in more than one place.

I don't need to tell you, over 500 entries later on this blog alone, that I believe in the whole idea of blogging as one of the best ways to present content on the Internet. It's the most human -- from the point of view of both reader and writer -- that I've seen. That's why this is so important.

Anyway, back to the technology. One thing we are getting, at some point in the near future, is word verification -- more popularly known as captchas -- for commenters, meaning all this TypeKey stuff should go away, and commenters will be able to participate with nothing more than typing in a squiggly word.

And the best part is that the IP block on the server, which seems to be shutting out half of Click's regular readers, will be removed.

And since comments have gone from many to ... none since we put the Typekey authentication into service, it'll be nice to hear from readers again.

On the $0 Laptop, the Gateway Solo 1450, Xubuntu is running pretty well. The laptop likes Debian and Ubuntu better than anything else I've tried (gotta throw CentOS on it still ...), especially when it comes to the all-important power management, meaning that under Debian-based distros, the fan doesn't run constantly and only starts blowing when needed. I'm pretty much ready to start writing up cron jobs to take care of the fan and cpu frequency, but why do that when you a) are not much of a hacker and b) don't have to?

Since I have had problems with the panels in Xubuntu 6.10 and 7.04 not appearing, I used my tried-and-true install method: Use the Xubuntu 6.10 disc and bump it up to 7.04 with the Update Manager.

One thing is not working so well. In the Network Settings, there is a provision to save multiple instances of networking parameters to, say, change between a home DHCP and office static-IP network. At least that's how I want to use it. That feature doesn't work. I can't seem to save anything, and even changing the settings manually is pretty much a crapshoot. Sometimes they take, others they don't.

Not an ideal scenario.

Is this a problem peculiar to my install, or is it more widespread? Who knows. And will it be fixed in 7.10, due in a few days at this writing? Again, who knows (but probably not).

One thing I've learned in using Ubuntu and Xubuntu for the past nine months or so is that problems in Ubuntu (with the GNOME desktop) are both fewer in number and addressed more quickly than those in Xubuntu (Xfce desktop).

So I'm planning to do an Ubuntu 7.04 install from scratch on the $0 Laptop in the next few days to prepare for Gutsy's debut. I'll probably add the xubuntu-desktop package to be able to switch between environments. I wanted to add ubuntu-desktop to the Xubuntu install, but Synaptic told me that Thunar was going to be removed from the system, as would the system tools. I bet that doesn't happen when you put xubuntu-desktop on Ubuntu. And I'd rather have Thunar than Nautilus (and the Xfce terminal over GNOME Terminal, Mousepad over GEdit, etc ...).

New problem on the horizon: I bought an Airlink101 AWLL3028 USB wireless adapter for $11 at Fry's a couple of weeks ago. Since it's so new, I didn't expect it to work in any Linux distros, and so far I haven't been plesantly surprised. I think it's a different chipset than the AWLL3026 (thanks, Airlink101 ...) and so far I haven't been able to even get it recognized as a wireless adapter so I can use Ndiswrapper. Now, I'm no champion Linux hacker, so maybe I don't have the skills, but I'm hoping that this adapter starts to get some support at both the kernel level and above that. Still, it was only $11, so I can wait.

I still have my Orinoco WaveLAN Silver PCMCIA card, which has never failed to be functional at first boot in any and every Linux I've ever run.

Now that I'm running a 1.2 GHz Celeron-equipped laptop with way better video support than my 1 GHz converted thin client -- both with 256 MB of RAM -- for my Linux and BSD tests, I'm finding that Windows XP isn't as fast as I once thought it was on my work-provided Dell 3 GHz Pentium 4 with 512 MB of RAM.

Yep ... a fast Linux (Debian, Slackware, Puppy) on a slower system easily beats Windows XP on a faster box when it comes to many common tasks, from rebooting to shutdown, loading Firefox and OpenOffice, all the way down to switching between windows and having their graphics fully rendered.

I've previously been skeptical about claims that Linux and BSD offer speed advantages over Windows, especially because different Linux and BSD distributions, depending on a large number of factors (window managers, services running at startup, different kernel parameters, etc.), run on the same hardware at widely different speeds themselves.

But take one of the faster Linux setups and compare it to Windows and and Mac OS X, and I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.

When it comes to Firefox alone, my 1 GHz/384 MB RAM iBook G4 loads it way slower than both 1 GHz/256 MB RAM PC-compatible laptops. FF is still pretty fast on the 3 GHz Windows box, but that doesn't account for the nearly tripled clock speed, doubled memory and a front-side bus nearly five times faster than the FSB on these lesser boxes.

And don't get me started on my 233 MHz Compaq laptop that runs a stripped-down Debian Etch with Fluxbox in 64 MB of RAM.

Unless you've been under a computerless rock, you know by now that the corporate world in particular, and the rest of the world in general, has been avoiding Windows Vista like the plague and opting to stick with the tried, true and driver-rich Windows XP until Redmond's people pry the install disc from their cold, dead hands.

And now those XP stalwarts are about to be rewarded. According to ArsTechnica, Windows XP Service Pack 3 -- release date uncertain -- will backport a number of Vista features into the XP system.

Among them:

-- Network Access Protection, which enhances the security of corporate networks

-- The New Product Activation Module, which allows Windows installs without entering a product code

-- "Black Hole" Router Detection, which I don't understand and for which I will quote Ars:

A black hole router is a router that drops packets without returning the specified Internet Control Message Protocol (ICMP) response. This feature aids in detecting and protecting the end user from such a problem. Previously, according to Microsoft documents, reliable detection of a black hole router involved use of an appropriately configured "ping" command, followed by further manual commands for working around the problem.

-- Microsoft Kernel Cryptographic Module, which, judging from its name, enables the use of cryptography within the OS kernel.

It's all about security, people ... and for Microsoft, it's about admitting that customers don't want to run Vista until it's really, really ready.

And I understand that Windows users are reluctant to relearn the programs such as Office that they've been using for years. I tried out a Vista-equipped PC at the Dell kiosk the other day, and I couldn't even figure out how to save a Word document. I'm sure it's not that hard, but who wants to relearn how to use something as old and moldy as MS Word?

Microsoft doesn't want you to think this way, but for the majority of us -- at least those of us who don't want to tinker, fiddle and break stuff, it's not usually a good idea to do a major upgrade of the operating system on an older computer.

My rule: Never upgrade Windows to a wholly new version unless things are broken in your current Windows environment and you know that the new version will fix them.

Good examples: Windows 98 had better networking than Windows 95 -- and way, way better USB support. Windows 2000 made both networking and peripheral support even better and gave the OS a stability it didn't previously have. I'm not quite sure what Windows XP added to the mix, but it has become one of Microsoft's longest-lasting OSes, according to my hazy memory.

Basically, keep the OS that brung you ... until it stops working.

Warning: If your new PC comes with Windows Vista Home Basic instead of Windows Vista Home Premium, Windows Vista Ultimate or Windows Vista Business, your new PC is underpowered for the Vista experience, and you'd be better off with XP. Remember, the word "Basic" means "hobbled."

At least Dell acknowledges this (and the general Vista skittishness) by offering XP on many systems. In fact, a recent national newspaper ad exclusively featured XP-equipped systems.

According to NPD, via Microsoft-Watch.com, a full 20 percent of retail sales of Microsoft Office these days is the Macintosh version. And even more startling, 10 percent of the U.S. retail sales for Windows Vista Business and Ultimate also come from Mac users.

What's the deal? Macintosh users love MS Office. And ... OpenOffice is weak on Mac OS X, Apple's own iWork isn't making much of a dent ... and the student-teacher edition of MS Office retails for a very reasonable $149..

The article from Microsoft-Watch.com muses over whether Microsoft wants to be in the business of boosting a rival platform (OS X over Windows). What is unsaid is that Microsoft could play hardball and cease support for Office on the Mac, as it did for Internet Explorer years ago. But that would only strain the now-cosy relationship between Apple and Microsoft, one that pretty much splits the market between them both and chokes out other competitors in the software space.

No doubt, MS Office is a major factor in allowing Mac to be chosen for corporate and other office environments, but you can bet that Apple would pump a whole lot more juice into iWork if MS Office weren't available. Running Windows (and Office) in Boot Camp wouldn't be as desirable, especially for the non-technically minded.

In a way, it's a mutual-aid society -- both Microsoft and Apple hedge their bets and keep their businesses going with the kind of cooperation that keeps Microsoft's Office on the Mac, Apple's iTunes on Windows ... but curiously doesn't give Mac users the same MS e-mail program or Web browser. Again ... if Firefox weren't available, Safari would have to be better -- and be supported by the code at untold numbers of Web sites that currently only offer partial functionality to Safari users.

But when it comes to MS Office, the rock and hard place, between which both Apple and Microsoft are caught, is made less rocky and hard by all the money they use for profitable padding in between.

The new KOffice 2.0, sometime in the first half of next year, according to reports, will run on Linux, BSD and -- for the first time -- Windows and Macintosh platforms.

For those who don't know, KOffice is the office suite meant to complement the KDE desktop environment used in many Linux and BSD distributions.

Well, KOffice isn't new, per se, but it's new to non-Linux/BSD users. While I've had a hell of a time getting the typographical quotes to face in the right direction in KWord, the word-processing component of KOffice, I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that, overall, KOffice is a better-written piece of software than the big dog in free office suites, OpenOffice. The reason: Java. OO uses a lot of it, and it's dog slow. I'd like to say it's OK for Web apps, but even there Java gets its butt kicked by Flash. KOffice is faster and that's the lack of Java talking. At least that's the way I, a non-programmer, sees it.

And what is the No. 1 reason that OpenOffice has seen such growth over the past few years? It's Windows port. Not everybody has MS Office -- either paid for or stolen -- and OpenOffice is the only thing keeping Microsoft at bay. And with KOffice on the scene for Windows users, it's just another choice that is a) free and b) not Microsoft.

And while OpenOffice has full implementations that run on Linux, BSD and Windows, the suite's Mac OS X port is still in its not-ready-for-prime-time stage (they'll never get that Aqua version done). But with KOffice available sometime next year for the Mac and Windows, the one thing the computing industry needs to be healthy -- choice -- will be in more abundance than we've seen since the days that non-MS programs like WordPerfect and Lotus 1-2-3 had market share, relevance and the loyalty of PC users.

From the Linuxworld.com.au article written by Rodney Gedda of Computerworld:

With OpenOffice.org receiving a lion's share of commercial support and market awareness for a free office suite, KOffice 2.0 has the potential to challenge its dominance with innovative features and a leaner code base.

"KOffice is much more lightweight," KDE project spokesman Sebastian Kugler said. "One often hears that OpenOffice's codebase is quite complex and rather large. While KOffice is lacking some functionality compared to OpenOffice, it's certainly catching up - and eating less valuable developer time in the process."

"Mid- to long-term I think this will make a huge difference. Having a clean code base makes bridging those gaps and implementing new and innovative ways of working in the office space much easier. KOffice is also much easier on your system resources."

The KDE project pitches KOffice as "the most comprehensive office suite", as it consists of 11 applications - from the standard word processor and spreadsheet to the Krita image manipulation tool and Kivio flowcharting application. KOffice even has its own database creator and alternative to Microsoft Access, dubbed Kexi.

While some claim that the availability of free, open-source applications to Windows and Mac users hurts open-source operating systems, I completely disagree and contend that giving a Windows or Mac users free apps provides both a great advertisement for the all-open-source environment of Linux as well as easing their transition away from proprietary OSes entirely. If they're using OpenOffice, Firefox, Thunderbird, Abiword and the like on their PC, it's that much easier to throw a Linux distro on the box and use the programs they're already familiar with.

And the arrival of KOffice on Mac and Windows desktops will only speed that process along.

Just like Linux, OS X gives us the one feature we've been pining for: multiple desktops. Apple, being apple, calls them "spaces."

It's called Time Machine, according to all-things-Mac guru Tom Gapen.

It makes the upgrade to OS X 10.5 well worth it:

More than a mere backup, Time Machine makes an up-to-date copy of everything on your Mac — digital photos, music, movies, TV shows, and documents — so you can go back in time to recover anything.

Set it, then forget it.

You can start using Time Machine in seconds. The first time you attach an external drive to your Mac, Time Machine asks if you’d like to use that drive as your backup. Say yes and Time Machine takes care of everything else. Automatically. In the background. You’ll never have to worry about backing up again.

Time Machine keeps an up-to-date copy of everything on your Mac. That includes system files, applications, accounts, preferences, music, photos, movies, and documents. But what makes Time Machine different from other backup applications is that it not only keeps a spare copy of every file, it remembers how your system looked on any given day — so you can revisit your Mac as it appeared in the past.

Enter the Time Machine browser in search of your long-lost files and you see exactly how your computer looked on the dates you’re browsing. Select a specific date, let Time Machine find your most recent changes, or do a Spotlight search to find exactly what you’re looking for. Once you do, click Restore and Time Machine brings it back to the present. Time Machine restores individual files, complete folders, or your entire computer — putting everything back the way it was and where it should be.

It can even do the backups in encrypted form and over a wireless network.

Thanks, Steve Jobs!

Now that I have a good ISO of PC-BSD, I'm ready to give it a try.

Why?

PC-BSD 1.3 showed so much promise. Aside from not being able to get the monitor resolution I wanted (1024 x 768 instead of 640 x 480), the system is blindingly fast, even with the KDE desktop, and there is plenty of flexibility when it comes to software installation. You can install apps with easy-to-use PBI files -- exclusive to PC-BSD -- or go with the traditional FreeBSD Ports system. Since I blew out my FreeBSD install when adding software via Ports didn't work at all, I'm happy to have a choice.

So if PC-BSD installs on the $0 Laptop and allows me to use the optimal screen resolution, I will be a very, very happy camper. In the ideal world, over the next month I will have Ubuntu on one partition to test the new 7.10 Gutsy update (coming in 10 days now) and PC-BSD on another partition. We'll see.

You know how I'm always preaching the religion of backups -- and double- and triple-backups?

Well, I started hearing some strange noises from the nearly 5-year-old iBook G4, and while we have most of the critical files backed up on CD-R, we really needed at least one (if not two) backups of ALL the user files.

For the Mac, Superduper is the go-to backup program, even though I'm not its No. 1 fan. I only say this because I can't seem to figure out how to do different kinds of backups on different days (say ... a full system backup weekly and user files every day into separate partitions to provide a daily snapshot of the drive over the course of a week). But Superduper works well enough. I've been using it on my mom's G5 for quite awhile now.

But I wanted to do something different. I didn't want to buy a backup drive.

I wanted to use my iPod. You see, I have a 30 GB iPod Video that only has about 3 GB of stuff on it. And I'm not exactly a daily iPod user. Most of the time in the course of my daily life, I need to hear what's going on around me, and I pretty much only listen to music in my car. And the el-cheapo iPod FM modulator that I bought for about $9 worked like total crap. My occasional workout lately has been swimming -- no iPod there. So I pretty much never use it.

So that spare 25 GB is fair game for an essential system backup. My iPod was already set up to be used as a disk for data files, so I figured I'd try Superduper. I downloaded it and dragged the proper image into the Applications folder (ah ... the simple pleasures of Mac app installation -- it should all be this easy). Then I selected the "to" and "from" drives.

I was only doing a backup of the user files. I don't believe in "full" backups -- with a Firewire drive you can even make a bootable backup with Superduper, and many modern Windows PCs can boot from a plain old USB drive. I think an occasional rebuild of the entire OS from scratch is a good thing -- it clears away the cobwebs.

And it takes way less space and time to backup the user files only.

So when I started Superduper, it warned me with something like, "the drive in this iPod will be TOTALLY erased to make this backup." And I wanted to keep my music files on there, so I stopped the process immediately.

I then did it the quick and dirty way. I opened the iPod's Finder window, opened up another Finder window for the Mac's hard drive, and then dragged the Users folder into the iPod's Finder window. The backup began and took about a half-hour. I can't do an easy incremental backup like I can with Superduper (only moving new or changed files), but at least all my essential files -- this is our main computer, after all -- are backed up.

I do plan to get an external drive or two -- probably USB if I can get them cheap enough -- and back up the users files with Superduper, continuing to do so on a regular basis.

But having an additional backup on an iPod is, indeed, a great thing.

Soapbox time: The Mac is already f'n expensive. Apple should include an easy-to-use GUI backup utility. When you get into the Unix-y guts of the Mac by opening up the Terminal program, there is not only one way to backup files, but FOUR (thanks for this info goes to O'Reilly's MacDevCenter -- and get "Learning Unix for Mac OS X" already!).

For me, either I'm thick as a brick, or the "easy to use" claims that every other Web site seem to attach to Superduper are overblown. I think Apple can -- and should -- be doing way better and giving its users a FREE backup utility that is integrated into the GUI. Will this be included in the forthcoming OS X 10.5 Leopard?

Once again, not holding my breath. But if Steve Jobs and Co. were to come through, it'd be nice.

Morale of the story: You cannot master Mac OS without getting deep into its Unix base. Get the book now! Sure, there will probably be an update for Leopard, but just get it now and get your hands dirty.

I almost never check the integrity of the ISOs I download for Linux and BSD installs. But I should.

While I was able to install PC-BSD 1.3 without trouble on my $0 Laptop (the Gateway Solo 1450), the install for

version 1.4 kept crapping out.

Then I checked the ISO by doing its MD5 sum. It was bad.

What is MD5? Here's what SearchSecurity.com has:

MD5 is an algorithm that is used to verify data integrity through the creation of a 128-bit message digest from data input (which may be a message of any length) that is claimed to be as unique to that specific data as a fingerprint is to the specific individual. MD5, which was developed by Professor Ronald L. Rivest of MIT, is intended for use with digital signature applications, which require that large files must be compressed by a secure method before being encrypted with a secret key, under a public key cryptosystem. MD5 is currently a standard, Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) Request for Comments (RFC) 1321. According to the standard, it is "computationally infeasible" that any two messages that have been input to the MD5 algorithm could have as the output the same message digest, or that a false message could be created through apprehension of the message digest. MD5 is the third message digest algorithm created by Rivest. All three (the others are MD2 and MD4) have similar structures, but MD2 was optimized for 8-bit machines, in comparison with the two later formulas, which are optimized for 32-bit machines. The MD5 algorithm is an extension of MD4, which the critical review found to be fast, but possibly not absolutely secure. In comparison, MD5 is not quite as fast as the MD4 algorithm, but offers much more assurance of data security.

Whew! More than we all wanted to know.

At any rate, we think the files that we download are always perfect, and they should be. Remember the pre-Internet days when we downloaded files from BBSes and had about six different protocols to use? Some had more error-checking than others, and as a result were slower.

I don't know the strength of error-checking in a standard Internet TCP/IP download, but if we have MD5s to check, it must not be 100 percent all of the time.

So here's how to check.

In Linux, it's easy. Just open up a shell and do this:

% md5sum filename.iso

then wait for the longish output, which will look something like this:

defbcfc51c1e05ad908198d669bf159b

If that matches the MD5 that comes with the file you downloaded, you're good. By the way, the "good" MD5 is usually printed somewhere on the same Web page from which you found the file, and is almost always contained in a text file accompanying the full ISO on the FTP site.

But what if you're downloading and burning in Windows -- something I do all the time? Use winMD5Sum, a great program that checks MD5s on your Windows box.

Soapbox time: Why can you check an MD5 sum on ANY Linux box but not on Windows until you purchase an additional program? Because Microsoft doesn't want you to even be tempted to download huge files of operating systems that lessen your dependence on Windows. Hmmmm ... they want to keep you as a customer by giving you less? Sounds like a plan, all right.

If you've never even seen a Linux desktop before, have a Windows PC and don't want to mess with it, give Puppy Linux a try. It runs as a live CD, meaning you boot your PC from the CD instead of the hard drive, and your Windows setup remains untouched.

Puppy -- now at its pivotal 3.00 release -- is designed from the ground up to be used as a live CD. And since it runs totally in the PC's RAM in most cases, it's blindingly fast. It remains the fastest Linux I've ever run.

And if you're unfamiliar with Linux distributions, you'll learn a lot with Puppy. As is customary for Linux installations, distribution means that in addition to the core operating system itself, there is a complete array of applications, from Web browser to word processor, spreadsheet, multimedia, e-mail program, and all the utilities you'll need, all loaded with the CD.

And one of the great things about using Puppy as a live CD environment is that when you shut down the system for the first time, you are prompted to create a "save" file of up to 1.25 gigabytes on your hard drive. Do that, and all your settings -- as well as any files you've downloaded or created -- will be stored in that single huge file. When you boot into Windows, you can see the pup_save file, but you can't read it until you run Puppy again. And have I said enough times that you won't, in any way, "break" your Windows setup this way?

It's a way to have your Linux cake and eat it (i.e. still use Windows) too. And you'll wonder why a Windows PC comes virtually naked -- bereft of useful applications -- and, in turn, why Linux users pretty much start out with everything they need and then some.

Ubuntu has been offering free CDs of its Linux operating system for some time, but until now that has meant the 6.06 Long Term Support version. But now Ubuntu is offering to send you, free of charge, a CD of the upcoming Ubuntu 7.10 Gutsy Gibbon release. Remember, you can use this "live CD" to both test out the system without installing anything (albeit more slowly than with an actual install) to see how your hardware reacts to Ubuntu's rendition of Linux. And the same live CD environment has an "install" link on the desktop to allow you to put Ubuntu on your hard drive.

But there's one problem. If your drive already has Windows on it, chances are its disk is made up of one huge partition. To install any kind of Linux, you need to create a separate partition on the drive -- and that means backing up your Windows data before you start. You ARE doing backups, aren't you? Now is a good time to start.

I don't know whether or not the Ubuntu installer will shrink the Windows partition for you -- and if it does, I'm sure it will provide the customary warning and admonition to have a backup of your data. But if it does handle the partitioning for you (or you do it yourself with a free tool such as Parted Magic or Gparted), Ubuntu is VERY good about setting up a dual-boot system in which you can choose to run Windows or Ubuntu every time you start your PC. If you're not yet totally sold on open source software, burning ISOs into discs and all that, you can use a commercial product to partition your drive. The only one I know of is Partition Magic, but I'm sure there are others.

But if you've never downloaded a huge (they usually run 600 MB or so) ISO file that must be turned into a bootable CD in your burner before loading Linux, Ubuntu's ShipIt offer is a great, great thing.

As for me, I just plunged right in, got ISO Recorder for Windows XP and began burning my own ISO CDs straight away. It's no secret that Windows makes it hard to make bootable CDs -- probably because Microsoft doesn't want you to even think about using another operating system, especially Linux or BSD.

And when you do get Linux, it's extremely easy to turn the huge ISO files that make up Linux distributions into bootable CDs.

Even the Mac allows you to turn an ISO file into a bootable CD without adding additional software. Only Windows tries to keep you from doing this essential task with your CD-R or DVD-R drive. ... But it you have Nero on your Windows box, that program does allow you to burn bootable CDs from ISOs.

The bad part about the free Ubuntu CD deal: It takes up to 10 weeks for delivery.

Ubuntu Gutsy 7.10 is coming. How soon? Look below:

At least according to MacRumors.com, with information via Apple Insider and Think Secret.

Meanwhile in the world of Linux, the new openSUSE 10.3 is out, Fedora 8 is on the way, as is Ubuntu 7.10.

Tuaw.com reports, via Mac OS Rumors, that the Mac Mini -- Apple's diminutive, somewhat less expensive PC -- will be replaced in the product line by an even smaller computer dubbed the Mac Nano. It's supposed to be no bigger than the space needed to contain the hard drive (most likely a 2.5-inch notebook model.

Also in the rumor mill: A smaller Mac notebook and an enhanced Apple TV.

Mac OS Rumors on the Mac Nano:

We have the privilege of being able to exclusively report on information provided to Mac OS Rumors by one of our oldest and most reliable sources in Cupertino: the Mac Mini is dead.....Long Live the Mac Nano!

The exact naming and marketing details are not as firm in our sources' estimation, since he's not an Apple Marketroid(TM)....but the new Mini will be as small in the horizontal as an internal optical drive will allow, and a little over 2/3 the height. Overall volume will be shrunk almost 25%, weight by about 20% and an all-new enclosure will be strikingly different from the design that has been the Mini's defining feature since its introduction.

On my dual-booting Gateway Solo 1450 with Alps touchpad, it is.

I didn't think I'd find the solution so quickly.

One good thing about the Alps touchpad in Debian -- tapping it DOESN'T initiate a double-click. Some people probably like this feature. I'm on the fence. I hope this "fix" doesn't break the one gift Debian has given me -- a non-touchy touchpad.

After being disappointed by Puppy 2.16 and Damn Small Linux 3.3's lack of ability to run on the $0 Laptop -- a Gateway Solo 1450 -- and then being able to run Zenwalk 4.6.1 but neither Vector 5.8 nor Slackware 12, I didn't hold out much hope that the new Puppy 3.00 -- said to be compatible with the current release of Slackware -- would run at all.

But I downloaded and burned a CD anyway.

Pleasant surprise.

It does run, with the usual excellent hardware detection of Puppy. It got Xorg right (that's what's screwing me up in Slackware and PC-BSD), detected the internal modem (and Ethernet, which I'm using right now). I'll have to try it tomorrow with the Airlink101 AWLL3028 USB wireless adapter.

It's nice to put in a CD, boot in a couple of minutes and have the Puppy environment I love right there for me. Abiword, Geany, Seamonkey, Pidgin, ROX-Filer, MtPaint. Every one works great and loads quickly.

Another plus: The "touchy" Alps touchpad on the Gateway works normally -- tapping on it doesn't mimic a left-click, so I'm not clicking links all over the place when I don't want to.

The only thing I need to work on: power management. Since Debian and Ubuntu do so well with this laptop -- allowing the noisy fan to turn off most of the time -- power management isbecoming a litmus test for Linux and BSD distros on this PC. PC-BSD 1.3 got this right, too, even if it could do no better than 640 x 480 on the display.

I'd even be willing to set up a cron job to manage the CPU heat.

Gotta close out this entry while the battery is holding out (forgot the AC brick).

Puppy -- you've made my day!

Since reading Jan's 30-day PC-BSD test, I poked around a bit and found this well-done review on Debian:

Overall, the default Debian install ‘feels’ fast. Firing up OpenOffice.org took only seconds and Abiword came up almost instantly. Synaptic, GIMP and Scribus also ‘felt’ faster than I am used to under Ubuntu. The only downside was that it didn’t add Scribus to the menustructure. Feelings are not a good measure of performance, I know, but the impression stuck that the desktop is really fast.

It's no secret that BSD isn't as ready for prime time (meaning the desktop) as Linux. There just isn't enough critical mass, not enough hardware supported. I've done a few BSD installs in the past week, some successful (PC-BSD), some not (DesktopBSD, FreeBSD). But I haven't spent 30 days living in BSD, as did Jan Stedehoude of the Ruminations on the Digital Realm blog.

While I ran PC-BSD 1.3, it was super fast -- probably the best implementation of KDE ever. But I couldn't get any resolution above 640 x 480 on my Gateway laptop that ran the installer at the normal resolution of 1024 x 768. My FreeBSD install -- after going through lengthy menus ticking off what packages I wanted -- died because I didn't use a big enough partition (you think the installer could've figured that out BEFORE it began the whole process?). DesktopBSD installed, but it came pretty much software-free. I went into the package manager, grabbed a bunch of stuff, had it install, got about 100 error messages about outdated packages, and then had none of the apps work.

One thing: BSD has a LOT of apps. Everything I ever wanted was available. I just couldn't get it to run.

Then the new PC-BSD 1.4 crashed during its install. It's enough to send me running at full speed back to Debian and Ubuntu.

Still ... that KDE speed ... it does tempt.

After futzing around with the $0 Laptop for the past week or two, I'm tired.

So I left the damn thing in the car (it's running Xubuntu 7.04 after display issues made me give up on Slackware 12). I don't quite know what to run on it. I'll probably put Ubuntu 7.04 on it in anticipation of 7.10.

So I fired up the converted thin client -- the Maxspeed Maxterm with VIA C3 1 GHz and 256 MB RAM -- and ran Debian Etch. It's like a comfortable, old shoe.

Everything works, it's faster than most, even running GNOME.

Remember my PCMCIA pin-straightening project? I managed to get them pretty straight I'm not ready to pop the Orinoco WaveLAN Silver card in there yet (an 802.11b card that runs on pre-OS-X Mac notebooks and on PCs with Windows, Debian, Puppy and Damn Small Linux). I'll have to pull the keyboard (I already have the PCMCIA housing cover pulled), guide the card in and hope that the pins line up and don't bend again. Or maybe I'll try to find a VERY small metal tube with which I can do some additional straightening. All I know is that PCMCIA pins are too fragile.

But back to Debian. It remains a towering achievement for both the server and the desktop. If they had money to market it ... aw ... never mind.

Thanks to Ryan Garfat, Dailynews.com guru, and Josh Kleinbaum, Los Angeles Newspaper Group Interactive guru, comments are back. And at this point you don't even have to sign on to Typekey. But the comments will be "held" until I can approve them. Beats the Comments now are handled by the Movable Type surrogate Typekey, where you can sign up to be an authenticated commenter. E-mail me if there's any problem.

Yes, the Typekey-carrying Loot made a comment an entry ago and wonders where the comments have gone?

Well, even I can't make a comment. Yes, I am the blogger, and I cannot successfully make a comment.

Comments work on the most popular Daily News blog, Inside USC, so it can be done. And it will be done.

Here's a great tutorial on how to configure Wine to run iTunes in Linux.

Wine -- the Linux emulation program that allows you to run Windows apps without running the Windows OS itself is notoriously difficult to run successfully, and tutorials like this are a great help. While there are other ways to manage music on the iPod under Linux (Amarok comes to mind), it makes sense to have iTunes as a choice.

And for those who really don't want to get their hands dirty with Wine, Codeweavers' Crossover Linux automates the nasty bits of the Wine experience and costs only $39.99. Well worth it. And there's a trial version so you don't have to fork over the money until you know it works.

But if you do want to learn the ways of Wine (and not pay anything, ever). the tutorial above is a great way to get started.

Other Windows apps that generally run under Wine: Microsoft Office, Internet Explorer and Photoshop. So if you're somehow wedded to the commercial apps over the free alternatives (OpenOffice, KOffice, Firefox, the GIMP), you can have your free OS cake and eat it, too, with Wine.

Traffic is down between 50 percent and 90 percent, with other Daily News blogs suffering similar losses. Could it be the sysadmin closing off the server to the IPs of entire countries as a scorched-earth spam-fighting solution? Nobody's saying anything about comments not working, either.

Hell, I started doing this on Blogger a couple years ago, and on a good day I'd get 30 hits, so it's all gravy at this point.