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Articles: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

If You Can?t Buy Friends, What Do You Have Left?
2007-12-11 16:08:00
Mandriva, the French Linux distribution, and Microsoft recently got tied into a little drama over in, of all places, Nigeria. And speculation went wild, and when the truth outed, it proved beyond anybody’s guess. So, Mandriva sells 17,000 Classmate PC laptops to the school district of Nigeria, and the laptops will have Mandriva pre-installed. The intrigue ...
More About: Windows , Friends , Left

New Rules for the Dazed and Confused
2007-12-03 21:05:00
It’s such a spin-dizzy time in the blogosphere right now. Who’s a friend and who’s not? Which way should I bet? Who’s got the scoop and who’s just pretending to? In these times of shifting alliances and uneasy power balances, I’d like to use this issue of New Rules to clear up some recent confusion. New ...
More About: Humor , Microsoft , D and C

Online Graphics Tools - part 2
2007-11-28 18:43:00
Continued from part 1, these are some handy online tools useful for graphics artists, whether you’re a Photoshop virtuoso, a Gimp master, or just a working grunt who needs to get this image done already! Big Huge Labs - This one site has dozens of graphics generators - it’s almost like having Photoshop Effects on tap! ...
More About: Graphics , Tools , Space , Online

Online Graphics Tools - part 1
2007-11-23 18:11:00
Web 2.0 promised us the “web as a platform”… so where the heck is it? It’s getting here, but slowly. Despite companies like Google and Adobe spinning lofty plans to provide it, “Photoshop in a browser” is still a long way off. But there are small, scattered graphics tools lying around out there, whose component ...
More About: Graphics , Tools , Online , Part

The Windows 7 Wishlist - I Wish It Were Linux
2007-11-19 21:07:00
What, fix Vista? Why should we? No, we’re just going to let it sink into the tarpit and start working on Windows 7. And so the “wishlist” - the list of features they’re hoping to include in the next release - is published over at Techborge. For once, Linux users can truly afford to be smug. ...
More About: Microsoft , Fire , Wishlist

Linux Distros That Could Take The Lead Soon
2007-11-15 21:27:00
After more than 15 years of Linux development, the last couple of years have seen an explosive spectrum of progress in conquering the desktop. It is as if the world is suddenly waking up and discovering Linux. Ubuntu has a place in the history books already as the distro that pushed to make this happen, ...
More About: Cent , Mandriva , Lead

Linux Link-O-Mania
2007-11-12 21:28:00
When my bookmark folder for the Linux category started to fill the whole screen, I knew it was time to share some of these gems I’ve saved over the years. I hope everybody interested in Linux, veteran and amateur alike, finds something here to like. Packages Tux Finder - a package search tool, finds repositories for most ...
More About: Link , Mania

Why Search Engines Work Like They Work
2007-11-10 21:01:00
A while back, the post “More Evil Things to Type into Google”, which is the current most popular post on my site, got a comment from one “Silex” responding to my assurance that there is nothing illegal about typing in a search string. Silex says: “I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but accessing ...
More About: Search Engines , Work , Search , Engines

Get a ?Copy-too?; a New Way to Protest Intellectual Property
2007-11-07 20:41:00
It’s getting almost tiresome to refer to George Orwell over and over again. We need a new guy. One who can look at some of the new methods of intellectual property control and appreciate their truly gruesome horror. Brace yourself for one scary story: Ars Technica is reporting on the new actions taken by an obscure ...
More About: Property , Intellectual , Protest , Copy , Intellectual Property

Eight Quick Ways To Make Your Network More Secure Than It Was Before
2007-11-06 23:02:00
Whether you have a home server setup or run a small business, anywhere where you have two or more computers connected together, there you have a network. And any point at which that network connects to the outside Internet, there you have a potential security compromise point. While network security is a deep subject, there ...
More About: Network , Quick , Make , Secure

Linux PCs: The State of the Market
2007-11-05 21:57:00
Microsoft (and perhaps even Apple and Sun) may not like it. A hundred A-list bloggers may harrumph their discontent with the idea. But Linux , like a kudzu vine, is slowly insinuating itself into the desktop PC market anyway. First there was the much-blogged “$100 laptop”. The OLPC project keeps plugging along, with a new country every ...
More About: Market , State , The State

The Seven Most Humiliating Moments of Star Wars Fandom
2007-11-04 18:20:00
It’s been a while since the last of the Star Wars movies came out (at least until Lucas’ muse gets the itch again), and yet the cult of Star Wars just keeps chugging right along. The original Star Wars was released in 1977, so it’s celebrating its 30th year. And what the heck, Star Wars ...
More About: Humor , Moments

The Quest for Quake
2007-11-03 21:26:00
I’ll bet there’s dozens of readers out there who have had a similar experience to mine: Here it is, 2007, and I suddenly had a hankering to play the original classic Quake . Don’t ask me where that came from! The original Quake had that great medieval feel to it. So I rummaged around the old CD ...
More About: Games , Quest

Firefox Trivia
2007-11-02 19:27:00
OK, Fire fox fanbois (and fangrrls!), here’s a round serving of facts about the One True Browser to sate your appetite for all things Mozilla -derived! Geek-elite Jamie Zawinski was the first to name Firefox’s predecessor, Mozilla, and he recounts many fun anecdotes from those days on his site, along with his own telling of the open-source release ...
More About: Trivia

Six Exercises to Learn Programming
2007-11-01 21:10:00
So here are our future hackers, who have picked their first language, have gotten through all the intermediate exercises in the book. Right when you finish your first book in your first language, that’s when you feel curiously unsatisfied. You don’t feel like you’ve mastered the art, but you’re not sure where to go next. These ...
More About: Programming , Exercises , Learn

8 Net Users We Can?t Stand
2007-10-30 21:16:00
1. People who don’t know how to mark up a comment or post. How do I make a link? Is it [linkURL: linked text]? linked text [linkURL]? < link > linkURL, “linked text” < /link > ? Ten years ago people at least understood basic HTML. Now, it’s a toss-up whether they manage to type ...
More About: Users , Stand

Linux Has More Phony Friends Than A Pop Star
2007-10-28 23:04:00
Over and over again, you see the mainstream media and corporations treat Linux and open source like that one poor fat kid who always got picked last for dodgeball in school. Software companies refuse to admit that Linux exists, until they’re in financial trouble themselves, and then all of a sudden… oh, all right, we’ll port it to Linux. Big corporations resist open source until their platform is sinking and then at the last minute… oh, all right, we’ll go open source. And of course, media figures will pick on Linux with glee, until they get in trouble for it and then have to apologize to Linux while scuffing their toe, under the watchful eyes of the principal. But they’ll box Linux’s ears again, as soon as nobody’s looking. Case in point: Dan Lyons. That wild rascal who has been amusing the ‘net audience with so much wacky hijinks lately. You’ll remember him from such zany fiascoes as the “Fake Steve Jobs”...
More About: Friends , Star , Phony

Things That Piss Geeks Off
2007-10-28 22:30:00
The Geek community is sometimes one of the easiest demographics to peg. Go to Star Trek conventions, have a level 78 wizard in a MMORG, collect manga? OK, you’re in. Try that with soccer moms or middle managers. You’re likely to end up running into a soccer mom who is a middle manager. One of the most gregarious attributes of geeks is that when you have one geek mad at you, they’re all mad at you at the same time. Here’s something that I think may help non-geeks deal with geeks a little easier: when you have a whole slew of geeks mad at you, and you don’t know why, check this list: Laziness - Number one, and probably numbers two through five as well. I’m not talking about body-lazy; geeks here are indifferent. But mental laziness drives geeks to scream and claw down masonry. If you ever want to get flamed to a golden brown with a side of Hollandaise sauce, just pop into a chat and ask a question that Google could have answered, or post in a ...
More About: Geeks , Things , Piss

Six Ways That Windows Will Never Catch Up To Linux
2007-10-28 00:50:00
Long-term readers of this site will know that I use both Windows and Linux regularly. I appreciate the relative strengths and weaknesses of each. And I admit that there are places where Linux is simply left behind (games, some graphics applications). But one thing I rarely see is a discussion of where Windows is failing ...
More About: Catch

Facebook Gets Assimilated into the Microsoft Collective.
2007-10-26 01:55:00
Ah! Where did all these Facebook stories come from all of a sudden? Wired sniffs about it haughtily. O’Reilly Radar beeps frenetically. Programmable Web makes a pithy observation. The Register snarks about it. Read-Write Web wrings its hands over it. Are Technica reports the facts. ZDNet looks alarmed. Search-Engine Watch watches the deal like a hawk. C-Net makes some analysis. Munchkins. Nothing at all to ...
More About: Microsoft , Collective

Firefox 2.0.0.8 Review
2007-10-24 18:27:00
The new Firefox just came out five days ago, and I’ve had the opportunity to get an early peek at it. This update is important, because it fixes a whole slew of security and stability issues, in both Windows and Linux. It also now has official support for Romanian and Georgian languages. Given how many Romanians ...
More About: Mozilla , Review , Firefox 2 , Themes

Eight Linux Command Lines That Anybody - Even Grandma - Can Do
2007-10-23 21:33:00
Welcome back to your old nemesis: the command line! Scary and inscrutable, this dark, looming environment will be yours to tackle. While many guides out there start you off with the basics of viewing and navigating the file system, I thought I’d provide an alternative beginning point: simple one-word commands that are benign and couldn’t ...
More About: Linux , Grandma , Lines , Command

Firefox Plugin Review - Hebrew Calendar
2007-10-21 21:08:00
The Hebrew Calendar plug-in for Fire fox puts the current Hebrew date on the lunisolar calendar right in your status bar, and also comes with a set of nice features. One of the handy features is a full-size calendar that opens in your browser, showing a handy co-relation between the Hebrew date and the goyim calendar date. ...
More About: Review , Plugin

Firefox Plug-In Review - Chatzilla
2007-10-20 23:29:00
You can keep your AIM, MSN, and Yahoo chat clients with the flashy graphics and the bloated features… IRC has been around almost two decades (it’s 20-year anniversary will be August of 2008.). It is still going strong because simple text with a few commands and features is basically all you need. It is also ...
More About: Firefox , Review , Fire , Plug

Other People With An Axe To Grind Against Linux
2007-10-19 19:05:00
There may indeed come a time when Microsoft goes down at last, and all the little FOSS penguins can hoist their swords in the air and “Hurrah!” for bringing down the Gulliver. But will that day really be victory? Don’t get your hopes up; if it seems that getting Linux accepted into the mainstream is ...
More About: People , Grind

The Son of Demotivational Posters
2007-10-16 20:17:00
Ha! After Marco Folio published a list of favorite demotivational posters,I decided to try my hand at them. Well, the addiction has set in, and now I can’t stop. I’ll try getting some counseling for this. Meanwhile, enjoy the fruits of my latest obsession, and be sure to post a link to any other archives ...
More About: Posters

Another Linux Patent Suit
2007-10-15 23:39:00
Living outside the US, I’d like to lead off with one, big, fat wake-up call to commercial software companies: the rest of the world doesn’t give a weak hoot about what goes down in the US state of Texas. The last time people in other countries paid attention to a drama in Texas was when ...
More About: Linux , Microsoft , Patent , Tent , Suit

Demotivational Posters Revisited
2007-10-14 22:04:00
Oh, look! Marco Folio has published a list of favorite demotivational posters! I scanned through the list, and decided that this meme could do with some fresh blood. So I’m taking my own shot at them… Anybody desperate to stop me before I do it again? Note: These images come from Davezilla. Who’s such a nice guy ...
More About: Posters , Photoshop , Gimp

An Up-close Look at Avot Media
2007-10-13 18:08:00
In a cave somewhere in dinosaur-land, there is a caveman. This Neanderthal, living in the Stone Age, is the last person watching video on a television set. But when mobile devices get good enough at video, he’ll switch, too. Mobile devices have now gotten good enough at video. Meet Avot Media . Avot is a new service ...
More About: Video , Movie , Tube , Cellular

Free Software Graphics Programs That Aren?t Gimp
2007-10-12 20:03:00
As follow-up to my rant over how Gimp vs Photoshop is a stupid flamewar, I’d like to take a post to link to some other free software graphics programs besides Gimp. So many people who go looking for an alternative to Adobe’s expensive creative suite are directed to Gimp, and yet Gimp is only the ...
More About: Software , Graphics , Blender , Programs