OpenSource
gregladen | September 8, 2009The next version of the Linux Kernel will be very noticeably faster on computers with limited memory.
Most "improvements" of certain unnamed operating systems (such as Microsoft Windows) involve more demand on hardware, so upgrades slow your computer down and eventually you have to throw it out and buy a new one.
It is not the primary objective for Linux to make each major improvement include improved rather than degraded performance, but it is a side effect of excellent OpenSource engineering.
The latest?
Currently desktop software slows down when its path jumps to a part of the code…
gregladen | August 14, 2009I thought I was done with the command line for the week, but then I did something cool that I thought I'd share with you. Linux users only ... others will think this is silly ... join me below the fold.
OK, are we alone? Good. It's nice to be away from all those Windows Symps for a while. Oh, I see there's a couple of Mac OSX users lurking in the back of the room. Come right over and join us, this will probably work for you too!.
Here is my problem. I use twitter to promote my blog, and I therefore follow almost 3,000 people on twitter. That means that every few seconds there is an…
gregladen | August 13, 2009I am told that all Macs come with a three button mouse. I'm not sure I believe that, but it is what I'm told. But to me the three button mouse on a Mac represents one of interesting cultural features of Mac users. Years go, when I was arguing with my friend Mike about which was better, Windows or Macs (Linux was not really an option at the time), he kept insisting that Macs were better for all sots of reasons. After he listed a long list of made up (I assume) reasons that Macs were better, I said to him: "Mike I've got three words for you that make all that irrelevant. 'Three button mouse…
gregladen | August 2, 2009btrfs (pronounced as in the title) is the next gen linux file system (you can tell it is a file system because it ends in "fs" which means "File-related stuff."
Valerie Aurora nee Henson gives us "....a behind-the-scenes look at the design and development of btrfs on many levels - technical, political, personal - and trace it from its origins at a workshop to its current position as Linus's root file system ..." here
gregladen | July 23, 2009Our desktop support folks couldn't do anything with it. When I told them my story about what happened (at least I'm honest) they realized it would be easier to re-install the machine with a fresh image of Windows Vista.
Read this sad but unsurprising tale of woe at Linux in Exile. And find out how Windows Update and system management in Linux are different. Also, you Linux users, please do visit Exile and check out the comments. It appears to me that numerous Microsoft Symps are trying to take over. Go kick some ass.
gregladen | July 15, 2009According to a recent survey, most companies will not deploy Windows 7. They just think it is going to suck and they are not going to have anything to do with it. YouTube will not be supporting IE6 any longer. Once again, an unpatched Microsoft Expected Feature, er, I mean Bug, is causing major problems. And, already, the Post Office is switching 1,300 of its servers to Linux.
It is only a matter of time...
gregladen | July 13, 2009CNN is supposed to be a professional news outlet. But even the editors and writers at CNN's Fortune desk are no match for Microsoft's' Stupid-Ray Gun.
This piece is virtually giddy about the fact that the next version of Microsoft Office will be just like Google Office. Free and on line .
Now, think about that for five seconds and imagine yourself to be a writer for CNN. Do you actually believe that Microsoft Office is going to be available for free? Like, me, Greg Laden, can just decide "Oh, I've had enough of Google Docs ... I'm going to switch to the online version of Microsoft…
gregladen | July 9, 2009VideoLAN's VLC media player, arguably the world's best media player, hit version 0.9.9 in early April. Three months and more than 78 million downloads later, VideoLAN has announced VLC 1.0.0, or "Goldeneye."
Your media will never be the same.
In fact, with VideoLAN's VLC media player for Windows, Mac, and Linux, it doesn't have to be. One of the amazing things about VLC is that it can play anything that you've ever even thought about playing. That random media format that one site in Ecuador requires--VLC likely plays it, while Windows Media, Apple QuickTime, etc. likely will not.
source
It…
gregladen | June 28, 2009DOS stands for Disk Operating System.
In the old days it was how you ran your PC. You booted up the computer and you had a prompt much like today's Linux command line in appearance. If you typed "wp" at the command line, a text-based non-GUI version of WordPerfect would run. If you typed "dir" you'd get a list of files in the current subdirectory. If you typed "nc" you'd get norton commaner. Maybe. Can't remember exactly. And if you typed something like "term" .... well, you were on the internet, checking your mail in pine and maybe mining data with gopher.
Then, one day, it became…
gregladen | June 1, 2009A repost, continuing along the lines of bashing the shell.
Having examined Learning the bash Shell (In a Nutshell (O'Reilly)) (see here, here, and here), it is now time to turn to a more advanced reference to help you geek out on your Linux computer. If you want to have only one book on bash, get Classic Shell Scripting by Robbins and Beebe. This book has an excellent mixture of history, philosophy, rigorously described details and creative solutions.
For instance, after giving a brief history of Unix (required in all such books) the authors layout the basic principles of what is…
gregladen | May 30, 2009I swear, you are all a bunch of pod people, you consumers. You take whatever crap is dished out, and pay extra for it. When the DVD was produced to replace the tape (VHS) there was a significant down grade in performance in every single way but one. These downgrades were entirely unnecessary. The downgrades were implemented for two closely related purposes: Marketing and marketing.
You know what I'm talking about. You can't pop a DVD into a player and fast forward to a spot and watch the movie. You can't even watch the movie, in many cases, until you've watched ads. You can't que a…
gregladen | May 29, 2009... or so it would seem.... UPDATE: Or, this could be a fake. See comments.
The Asus PC Eee PC was designed specifically to run LInux. The idea is in part to make a very inexpensive globally (more or less) accessable open source system so all the poor children around the world who happen to have a hundred bucks could have a PC just like you do.
Now, Microsoft and Asus have teamed up to produce an ad campaing providing what amounts to a series of lies about the hardware/software combo, claiming that "Windows is Better" on this PC (better than Linux, that is).
Is it Ethical? No doubt.…
gregladen | May 27, 2009Why would you want to install Ubuntu as a "server" rather than as a desktop? The simple answer is: If you need to ask, you don't want to do it. But, there is a more nuanced answer as well: By installing a server, you get to a) have loads of fun installing a server; b) learn things about the system you never thought were even there to learn; c) have your own server, so serve stuff in your very own home, so when The Internet goes down you can continue to pretend like there's an internet. Just a much, much smaller and less interesting one.
And, if you happen to have anything to serve up in…
gregladen | May 12, 2009Not all proprietary software is actually evil. However, very few people who prefer proprietary software over OpenSource software will admit how evil it can be. So this is like having two societies. In one, by convention and social norms we don't hit the kids. In the other, we spank the kids now and then, and this is acceptable. In both societies, there is violent abuse of children but it is never accepted.
Then, in the no-spanking society, violent attack on children that annoy us continues to be shunned and illegal, but in the spanking society, spankers defend all violence against children…
gregladen | May 5, 2009We have been discussing the relative quality of support in OpenSource v. proprietary software, and I am reminded of some other issues that we've spoken of before. We had a fight here some time back (in November) over the question of Black Boxes in research software (I won the fight), a topic which has been touched on in the present discussion. The code has to be exposed. (see also this for a specific example)
Another argument we've had is how a system like Linux is maintained vs. a system like Windows. Developers argue about this, but the truth is that since Linux and most of what is…
gregladen | May 3, 2009Is software support that you pay for better than software support you get for free? Are you going to do better, for instance, with Microsoft Office vs. OpenOffice.org Office when you need to fix something?
The answer is obvious. But still, many of you manage to not understand. But this can be helped...........
.......... CLICK HERE NOW.
gregladen | April 24, 2009Well, a person who edits. Are editors passe, no longer of use, old school, in the New Media of the Internet?
Maybe. Maybe not.
Here is a post suggesting that Editors have a role, and an important role, and I have a feeling that this is going to be the beginning of an interesting discussion.
gregladen | April 13, 2009It is a ground breaking company, it is a bookstore that is mega mega like few other companies are. It is a bookstore that is a huge corporation. Think about that for a second. Think about bookstores in the old days then think about this thing, Amazon Dot Com. A bookstore that is leading the way in mega cloud computing. It has one of the most effective ways ever of interfacing with its customers. It has become the go to place for many people for the purchase of almost anything one can imagine being delivered by mail. Amazon Dot Com is a thing the likes of which we have not seen before…