JH at Linux in Exile got a new laptop with the wrong version of Windows installed on it. So he had his tech department wipe the drive and install a new version of Windows, and they kept track of how that went. Then, JH installed Fedora 13 on the same computer.
Here is a description of the outcome of that test.
Tag Archives: Linux
Making the window controls go back where they belong in Ubuntu
In the latest version of Ubuntu, the development community decided that they needed to look more like a Mac, so they randomly decided to move the window controls (to close, maximize, minimize etc.) a window, to the left (incorrect) side of the window rather than the right (correct) side of the window.
In order to fix this “feature” here’s what you do.
Run gconf-editor (enter that phrase into a terminal). Find apps, then metacity, then general, then within that find “button_layout”. Double click on that.
It will say “close,minimize,maximize:menu”
Change that to “menu:minimize,maximize,close” and click OK. Instantly, you will be fixed.
Linux in Schools
This is an excellent guest post by Scott Rowed on the use of Linux in K-12 schools, including strong evidence that school districts that do not have students using the Linux operating system are placing their students at a disadvantage, as well as a description of one outstanding success story in British Columbia.
Continue reading Linux in Schools
Linux for Professional Photography
This is a guest post by professional photographer Scott Rowed, describing his experience in switching from Windows to Linux.
Continue reading Linux for Professional Photography
Migrating the Enterprise from Windows to Linux
Linux in Exile has a new post on the approach an organization may take in moving to Linux. The post is here, and I recommend reading it.
I have a few comments on JH’s commentary. I won’t quote what he says (you should just go there and look at it), but my responses correspond to his numbering system.
Continue reading Migrating the Enterprise from Windows to Linux
Ubuntusci: Nice idea but you may be doing it rong
I like the idea of an edition of Ubuntu for scientists. I like the idea so much that I wrote a blog post about it a while back.
So I was very pleased to see that there is a project called Ubuntusci that is moving along nicely and that may fill in this niche.
But, when I went to look at the web site to find out more about it, I quickly discovered that there are two things wrong with the project that I’d like to suggest that they fix.
Continue reading Ubuntusci: Nice idea but you may be doing it rong
Introducing … Ubuntu Science Edition…
Wouldn’t that be great? Hey, there’s an Ubuntu Christian Edition, an Ubuntu Muslim Edition, and another Ubuntu Christian Edition. Why not an Atheistubuntu? Or a Skeptibuntu? or, more usefully, I would think, Sciencebunutu with Atheistic tendencies?
(And for those of you who like to cross certain boundaries there could be a Science Fiction Edition. Called, of course ….
Continue reading Introducing … Ubuntu Science Edition…
A nice gesture for open source
There will be a Linux based iPad equivalent (I hesitate to say clone for obvious reasons), and it will have touch-technology on the ‘screen.” Mostly, it will have this technology because when people started touching their computers … that way … Linux developers fashioned software so it could be done in Linux too.
But, nonetheless, it now appears that Synaptics, the makers of the “gesture library” that is widely used to make touch screens work, have made it possible to use it with Linux distros.
Nom nom nom (that’s the sound of Linux programmers eating this up).
Technology Rants
Well, maybe more like tidbits than rants. This is all Linux or ani-Windows stuff, so everyone else you get the clam-hand*.
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Linux Fedora 13 Beta
There are many versions of Linux, but the two biggies seem to be Debian (on which Ubuntu and many other distributions are based) and Red Hat. Red Hat uses a commercial support model, so it is an example of a very different approach than Ubuntu. Many of the commercial applications of Linux are Red Hat. I suppose because of the support, but I’m pretty sure most VP’s in charge of things would alway pick the paid over the free version just because, well, they’re morons that way.
Anyhow, a fedora is a kind of hat (like Indiana Jones and Nick Danger, Third Eye wear) and the hat in Red Hat is a fedora. Therefor, Fedora is a version of Red Hat Linux. It’s the version that you don’t get with the paid support … rather, it is, more or less, the NEXT version of Red Hat. The test bed. The bleeding edge.
So, Fedora 13 Beta is tomorrow Linux, at least some times. And, according to the Mysterious JH of Linux in Exile, it rocks, more or less.
Read JH’s Fedora 13beta mini-review, at Linux in Exile.
Meanwhile, I’m going to go check out Shotwell, as per JH’s suggestion.
How To Actually Get the Kindle Reader To Work on your Linux Desktop (UPDATED)
UPDATE: GO HERE.
UPDATE UPDATE: I no longer have that file, because it is not the most current one. However, people who want to read their Kindle books on their Linux machine need only to use the browser-based Kindle Cloud Reader. It’s pretty nice.
There is a Kindle reader application for the PC (and the Mac and the iPod touch). But not Linux. Which makes us sad because without Linux, your Kindle wouldn’t even turn on.
But despite this deeply insulting unforgivable slight by Steve Bozo or whatever his name is, diligent supergeeks have solved this problem temporarily. The problem is, as usual, the Intertubes are full of people who know diddley squat but don’t seem to understand that, so you will find ample instructions to make the Kindle for PC work on your Linux computer, and you will have very little success.
Unless you know two secrets that I know.
Continue reading How To Actually Get the Kindle Reader To Work on your Linux Desktop (UPDATED)
It’s the 21st Century. Do you know where your files are?
I would wager that you don’t know where many of your most important files are. If you are into music, and use iTunes, you can’t find a particular song file using your file manager. You would need to locate it using iTunes. iTunes would then give you limited access to that file. It does not let you do the same thing your file manager would let you do. Many of your most important pieces of information are in emails or attached to emails. Where exactly are those things? Can you access them with your file manager with little effort, print, copy, delete, duplicate, or otherwise work with these files? Probably not.
Continue reading It’s the 21st Century. Do you know where your files are?
My windows box inches its way towards …. the window.
A while back I would have said that I have three reasons to maintain a Windows computer.
1) iTunes;
2) a couple of games;
3) tax software.
Yes, yes, I know, these things can be done with Wine or an emulator. But really, having the relic Windows machine sitting there has simply bee easier.
Continue reading My windows box inches its way towards …. the window.
The iPad and Skeptical Computing
I’m going to make an argument that you should buy an Apple iPad despite widespread rumors of hardware problems and despite widespread criticisms of its design as funky and flawed.
And by “you” I mean yooz guyz who are skeptics.
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Interesting Wiki-Notetaker-Pim Thingie for your Linux Desktop
This might be a little over-determined for my taste, but it does look interesting, and as far as I can tell is currently maintained.
Continue reading Interesting Wiki-Notetaker-Pim Thingie for your Linux Desktop