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Archive for April, 2007
Intel working on ultra-mobile Linux device
Intel have, according to a number of reports, primarily by Engadget and Betanews, revealed their plan to go ahead with a new UMPC device. The initial collaboration with Microsoft resulted in various devices, initially codenamed Origami. Now, Intel is planning a device based on a Linux operating system and open source software, including the Mozilla browser’s core and Java. The device is not a UMPC (Ultra Mobile PC), but rather a MID (Mobile Internet Device). Similar to the Nokia N800 Internet tablet, perhaps?
Get Joost
My highly anticipated invitation to join the Joost beta testing program finally arrived yesterday. If you haven’t yet heard about Joost, it’s a new startup by the same guys that gave us Skype. By using a fairly similar technology, Joost streams TV to the Internet. There is some content available that will be enhanced in future. Unfortunately, a lot of the programming is region-specific. Joost has no proxy settings, so it remains to be seen whether or not some workaround is possible to make the backend servers believe you’re not where you say you are. Such a hack may enable region-locked content to become available.
Then, you’ll need access to a fairly speedy Internet connection, and ideally one without too much of a cap. Streaming video is neither a cheap nor speedy process in ZA!
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Full Circle – The Ubuntu community magazine
Full Circle is a PDF magazine for the Ubuntu community. If you’re keen to see what all the fuss is about, you may want to download and read it. At only 17 pages, it won’t take you too long to get through. The first issue contains some history of the Ubuntu releases and versions that have been available, as well as providing a glimpse of the latest release, Feisty Fawn. That should be enough prodding to get you excited about installing at least one copy!
As with most successful community initiatives, this one will work only if everyone contributes!
VMware on Xubuntu
5 years ago
by manfred
in Linux/Unix
Virtualization is in. With more and more companies starting to optimize their hardware infrastructure by installing software on virtual machines. VMware has a fairly mature product that has recently been certified for use in SAP environments on Linux. For years, the VMware software has been available for personal use – free, to boot! So, you can try your hand at virtualization and run a number of different operating systems on top of one base operating system. Excellent if you want to run a SAP Mini Basis system or play around with various Netweaver components.
My solution is a lightweight distribution: Xubuntu and the Linux VMware Server, though you can achieve the same using Windows and the Windows VMware server. Though fairly straightforward, the VMware server installation for Linux did present a challenge or two…
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Palm going Linux
5 years ago
by manfred
in Linux/Unix
Microsoft has a way of creeping its way into industries and becoming a standard. Not necessarily due to the quality of its solutions, but often simply due to its presence and ability to buy out or bankrupt the competition. Windows Mobile is a case in point. Make no mistake – I enjoy using my JAMin running Windows Mobile 5.0, but it’s far from perfect. Memory management is an issue, for example. Instead of really pulling out the stops, Windows Mobile 6.0 is a mediocre step up from 5.0, focusing on looks rather than substance. Instead of the ability to ActiveSync multiple Exchange accounts and have access to a decent, built-in browser, we get a different way of looking at our agenda. A similar issue to Vista, I guess. Unable to provide real technological advances, such as an improved file system, we’re stuck with a resource hungry, flashy looking interface that requires 3GB of RAM to actually do anything. But I digress.
Palm has had many ups and downs in the past. The Palm OS mobile operating system was lightweight and easy to use. Maybe not keeping track with modern applications, it certainly did its job well. I fondly remember my first Palm Pilot. The Treo was eventually launched with Windows Mobile to cater for a growing audience and application base. Probably also due to the fact that Palm OS lost its way and didn’t cater for a wide enough set of devices. But there is hope. A number of initiatives are underway to provide alternative operating systems. The Apple iPhone is one example, running a cut-down version of OS X, based on the Free-BSD kernel. Access Linux is a development by a former part of the Palm organization, Palm Source.
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100000000
In anyone’s language, that’s a lot of 0′s. Imagine lining up one hundred million iPods end to end…
That’s the number of iPods that have been sold since the first model went on sale in November 2001. The first player has morphed into a selection of sleek devices. All of them have one thing in common. They’ve changed the way we enjoy audio.
It’ll be interesting to see how the new iPhone affects sales of the music player – media playback is built into the phone and it’s likely that many people would prefer a single device over two.
via 
Apple
XP Updates
5 years ago
Forgive my indignation: a 1.2MB update that has the ability to tell me whether or not my copy of Windows is genuine or not. I’m certain it is genuine. It came pre-installed on the notebook I bought. For others in this country, it means waiting half an hour on a dial-up to get a piece of software that adds no value.
Is it really there to tell me whether my copy of Windows is genuine, or is its purpose to spy on what I’m doing and what I have installed? No thanks, Microsoft! I don’t need this or any of the other DRM crap you’re trying to pull! Windows updates -> Off!
Xubuntu
5 years ago
by manfred
in Linux/Unix
I literally had 15 minutes spare this morning. Decided to overwrite my existing Ubuntu installation with a lightweight operating system. Non other than Xubuntu. The idea is to install VMware and then run a variety of operating systems inside separate virtual machines. The benefit of doing that is to be independent of disk layouts and partitions and to be able to easily back up a configuration for later re-use. Already, there are a bunch of virtual appliances available for download: get a complete LAMP or NAMP stack without going through the pain of configuring and installing software, for example!
But the amazing thing is still the ability to install an entire operating system in less than 15 minutes. Windows XP takes hours to install, and then requires a collection of various drivers to be loaded. Vista, I don’t even want to know about.
Xubuntu is decidedly light, dispensing with Gnome or KDE by providing the efficient Xfce Desktop environment. If you have an underpowered machine or a thin client, this is one distribution you may want to try out.
The Internet’s birthday
Maybe, or maybe not entirely. In any case, on 7 April 1969 the RFC (request for comments) memoranda containing research, proposals and methodologies applicable to internet technology were made available. RFC documents provide a way for engineers and others to kick around new ideas in a public forum; sometimes, these ideas are adopted as new standards by the Internet Engineering Task Force.
Happy birthday, Interweb!
Goosync’ing
5 years ago
A few days ago, I covered how I gain access to a one page view of my calendar and email accounts using the mobile version of Netvibes. Synchronizing my WIndows Mobile calendar with Google Calendar has been a bit of a battle. I’m always scared that any synchronization method could cause inconsistencies or modify dates. It’s happened before – how would you like all birthdays to be shifted forward by one day? And that was ActiveSync’s doing!
I’ve settled on GooSync as a solution to update my web calendar. Initially, things didn’t work too well, but that was resolved by testing a few options.
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