10 Days as a Linux User: A GNU Perspective on things

10 Days as a Linux User: A GNU Perspective on things Posted by Gsurface on 18 Aug 2005 - 14:18 Introduction

I know what you’re saying, and I agree. The idea of spending 10 days in someone else’s shoes certainly isn’t new but do you really think you will ever see Mr. Spurlock record a show depicting a similar situation or setup? You’d fall asleep during the opening credits. Now, it might not be a life or death adventure but at least it’s one that I’ve never heard of or read before and if I could just offer a small taste of how easy or hard the switch would be then so be it. That single reason is why I decided to put my body, mind, time and even lifestyle into harms way by going 100% cold turkey of all Microsoft software for a whole 10 days.

“10 days? Well that hardly sounds hard enough!” Sure, it doesn’t sound so hard but take in account that over 500 million of us use a Windows OS at least once, everyday of the week and you too will see that going cold turkey from XP to KDE might be harder or more limiting than first thought. Not surprisingly, millions of people and corporations are making the switch to Linux or another variant of Unix to save costs or maybe cut their chances of having to resort to piracy to continue to operate but from what we hear daily Microsoft and the news is that Linux doesn’t seem to be any less expensive than the Windows platform and for some could limit the very things that they used to take for granted.

Although I am a tried and true believer of the Windows platform, I do own a Mac Powerbook and have on occasion used Linux when setting up servers or for 3D modeling but never have I thought about using it as my primary desktop; in fact I even told myself that I would have to go insane before I shut the “windows” and let tux in the door

How much of our lives truly run on Windows? Well, if you ever leave your chair (sadly, it wouldn’t surprise me if some of you shrugged just now) and actually go outside then I’m sure that you’ve used Windows at some point and time during your outing. For emphasis, let me explain to you my full day’s schedule on average: I wake up, take a shower and then groom myself. I then head downstairs and turn my television on which just so happens to have a Windows Media Center PC hooked up to it. I then head over to the kitchen which happens to have a Windows powered laptop which I use to somberly browse the net while I eat Captain Crunch out of the box and throw milk down my throat. I run off and get dressed but not before I synch my Windows CE powered pocket PC and then I drive off to school. On my way I forget I have no money on me and so I must stop by the bank to withdraw some and guess what? The ATM machine happens to run embedded Windows! I could go on and on but I think that I would start to freak some of you out with my weird pre-dinner rituals. Anyways, my point was merely to show that many of us use Windows whether or not we even know it.

Now before I go off and potentially alter the very way I live my life, I thought I should do some research as to what the most popular Linux distribution is and exactly what I’m getting into. I looked at the most used and the most supported of distributions and came to the conclusion that I would go with the Mandriva (formally Mandrake) distro. Now, it was a really close call because there are literally thousands of Linux distributions and over a dozen that are primarily used but I chose Mandriva because it was possibly the most likely distro that newcomers into the Linux realm would choose. It’s got 20+ languages in support, supports every processor imaginable, graphical installation and also has buttons that look edible. All of these things are possible “wow” factors that would grab a skeptic in, especially the purdy buttons.

I’m set and I have selected a Linux distro so now I have to lock all of my Windows powered goods into my closet and the next paragraph you read of this will have been written from a Linux box. Be sure to join me and try to keep up as I venture into the land of taboo and exoticism that is open-source!

Well, if you’re reading this then that means I have successfully installed Mandriva! Installation actually went surprisingly well and lasted just about as long as the Windows XP installation did. Within an hour I was starring into the fat stomach of a cuddly cartoon penguin. My first impression was actually of excitement and awe because the environment looked so gorgeous and inviting. It made me wonder, "How could something that looks so good be so very free?"

Although I sort of feel out of place with everything and I miss my old desktop environment I must say that things certainly do, well, they certainly look pretty. Before I go on about my experiences with Mandriva up till now, let me tell you that I chose to use KDE as the desktop environment. Not only is it pretty much the most popular desktop environment available with this distro but it’s also the most recommended to new users as it offers a very clean and attractive GUI (general user interface).

My first mission with this new and alien environment was to locate the web browser and make my “morning rounds” which consisted of 1 shot dig, 2 shots Slashdot and 1 swig of Flexbeta. Now seeing how this is a fresh install of an OS, I was reluctant to just double click on the browser and expect to see anything but surprisingly when I opened up Mozilla it sent me straight to the Mozilla site! Talk about usability! I remember having to spend 5-10 minutes just configuring my network settings after installing XP so this was a definite delight in my eyes. This little event actually made me giggle and shake some worry and doubt that I may have had going into this insane little experiment but it didn’t make me completely assured as I hoped I would be during my first real impression with Linux as my main desktop.

Although I accomplished what goals I set to achieve this morning I still find myself missing my old desktop. You could say that I’m having a bit of “127.0.0.1 sickness” but I’m trying to reassure myself that it’s normal for anyone to go through withdrawal when they are cut cold turkey from something they use so much. Let’s just hope this little personal psychiatry works well as I don’t see a chapter about this in my mother’s Dr. Phil book. For now I’m quite happy with things so far as I can easily go to every site I want to and check all of my email but I wonder what will happen tomorrow when I have to go to class and more importantly, how my instructor is going to deal with my little “Windows diet” in my Computer Science class. For now I can just sleep a bit relieved and relaxed.

Daily notes: Mandriva is a very popular Linux distribution which made its debut in 1998 for people lacking knowledge with basic Linux commands. The distribution’s first and foremost goal was to mix the best graphical desktop environments and contribute its own graphical configuration utilities to make an “ease-of-use” standard. Mandriva has an amazing graphical installation process as well as a very good graphical approach for system administration. With one of the best list of supported hardware, it’s near impossible to find a PC that this distro can’t run on.

KDE (K Desktop Environment) is a free desktop environment and development platform. Although there are many other desktop environments (XFCE and GNOME for example) I found I was more comfortable with KDE. It has everything that I could need “outta the box” and generally just looks really good.

The “Mozilla” term used within today’s account is about the popular open-source internet suite based on Netscape technology. With a counter-part to Outlook, IE and a feature packed “bug agent,” this software is anyone’s true alternative when making the switch to Linux.

Well, it’s been one whole day now since I cast the Windows OS for the Mandrake distribution of Linux and I feel fairly confident that I’ll make it. Today was a very big hurdle for me though in terms of how to actually live in a Windows dominated world. I was nervous my entire drive to school, knowing that I had computer science class today didn’t make me happy like I am on any other school day maybe because for the entire time in class we are demanded to use Windows 2000 machines to do all of our work on and this could possibly jeopardize my entire project all by itself. Could this dilemma cut my experiment from 30 days to just 2?

I was sweating more than usual after my jog to class and my hands were as cold as ice but I somehow worked the courage to enter the dark and nefarious computer room. The projector was on, a sure signal that we would be programming today; I quickly began to go into panic. “What will I do?” I thought. “How can I possibly get out of this? Do I fake a tummy ache or maybe tear my clothes off and run out the door?” All of these things ran through my head, until my professor finally demanded the class to take our lab seats. I quickly shot up and ran up to him, seeing how he is a fairly reasonable gentleman; perhaps he might understand or even laud my unique and daring experiment!

“NO! Absolutely NOT, Mr. Ladson!” he scolded. “Do you think that just because you want to play Mr. Artistic for the month that I would come and support you full swing? Well you better think again and get back to your keyboard.” I was stunned. This experiment has literally put me on the wrong side of the fence with probably one of my nicest teachers (you don’t wanna know about the others) and has put my own grades on the line – what am I going to do? As I somberly walked back to my station I was hit with an amazing idea! This idea was to use nothing other than Slax. Slax is a portable Linux Distribution able to run from a CD which is based upon the popular “Slackware” distro.

What are the chances that I happened to always carry a copy of Slax incase my Laptop lost data or an OS problem? Well, obviously the hope of everything going alright grew bigger and bigger. I reached into my CD pouch, grabbed the CD and ran up to my professor. “What’s this?” he said. “You can’t install software onto the lab PC’s, you should know that if you actually read your syllabus!” And then I explained. After about 5 minutes of explaining he started to show a growing grin and out of nowhere he cut me off and said “If you can use that without installing anything to the hard drive and actually do the same work that your pupils can do, then I say good luck.” My shoulders dropped from tense to carefree instantly and in no time I was sitting next to an onlooking group of peers watch me using Open Office and even connect to the school’s network. Instant respect.

Although I may have been a tad too lucky today, it does prove that doing schoolwork in a Linux environment is completely and painlessly possible. The only down-side to using a portable Linux distro is that unless you want to lug around floppy disks to save your work on, you need some sort of memory device or in my case, a USB memory key. For now though, I plan to keep looking online to see if there are any other portable Linux distros out there that feature more applications and abilities just to be on the safe side tomorrow in class. Wish me luck.

Daily Notes: Slax is a Linux Live CD that’s only about 190MB in size. It does not need to be installed as it boots and runs from a CD drive. It is possible to run SLAX on a computer without a hard disk. There is also an option to run SLAX from RAM, freeing the drive for other uses, such as for a DVD or music CD. SLAX is based on Slackware Linux. SLAX Standard and Kill Bill use KDE as their desktop environment, while Popcorn uses XFCE. Fluxbox is an option in all versions except Frodo for users with a low amount of RAM. (Information pulled from Wikipedia.com) Check it out at http://slax.linux-live.org/

Open Office (Openoffice.org – Ooo) is an open source office suite based upon the widely popular “StarOffice” Windows Office alternative. Open Office is a very strong alternative choice to Windows Office suite software and also holds compatibility for a large foray of file formats, including Windows Office file formats.

Well, it’s only day three as a Linux user and so far so good. I managed to set my machine up with the Mandriva distribution and I am running KDE as my prime desktop environment but there is one thing I have yet to conquer: entertainment.

I know that there are a lot of people that can stay contempt without watching movies, TV and playing games on their PCs but I’m just not one of them. As a movie/TV/game buff, I absolutely need my fill or I seriously begin to lose it. One could say that Dirty Harry and Battlefield 2 are my “anti-drugs,” hehehe. As a huge multimedia buff, I also have a substantial entertainment system hooked up as well as a large collection of movies and music. I normally would use my Windows Media PC to playback and record all of my stuff but seeing how that’s no longer going to fly and I don’t have a Tivo at all, I figured I should look into alternatives to the Media Center PC software that succeed in all the things that I used to be able to do. This replacement software should be open-sourced, able to run on Linux and should be able to do all of the things my old Media Center PC can do right out of the box.

I did my fair share of searching and found several different options that sounded fairly exciting but the one that seemed the most put together and widely used was “MythTV.” MythTV is a homebrew media center front-end which looks amazingly similar to the media center front end that I’m so used to and seems exceptionally robust for only being in part-time development for two years. I began to download and read up as much as possible before installation time.

After getting back from the store with a brand new hard drive to run MythTV on, I went ahead and installed Mandriva and began the MythTV setup. Using the graphical installer to save me the trouble of running command lines manually, setup was fairly painless but definitely a bit less user friendly when compared to Windows Media Center. After a few gripes I just told myself that this was indeed free and that did alleviate a bit of my tension. The next hurdle was going through a number of configuration pages which helped identify my capture card and even set up my TV programming schedule by using XMLTV and Zap2it.com’s programming schedule, it was all rather easy after reading the documentation provided.

Three hours, one case of Bawls and one pizza later, I had conquered MythTV and had made it mine! I had configured the plug-ins and settings to just the right settings and even got used to the front and backend quite a bit. Now I can watch “Hell’s Kitchen” and “The 4400” while browsing next week schedule like a champ. The really nice feature that I’m still giddy over is the ability to control the entire system from another machine over HTTP. It makes setting up your schedule or recording your favorite show from the other room just that much easier.

Fiddling around with the front-end of MythTV surprised me a bit as I found a menu area where you could actually play all of your MAME roms and etcetera from! Now, this might not be all that big of a deal to most but for me it was an exciting moment. Being a HUGE “Mamer” (one that uses MAME all the time), I have accumulated a collection of over 20GB of pure arcade goodness. Needless to say, I was a very happy man. I could easily go from watching cops to playing Virtua cops on command.

Although the setup wasn’t nearly as easy as Windows Media Center’s, it does offer everything that I needed and a bit more for absolutely free. I can see myself using MythTV now but not for a long-term solution personally due to it’s fairly ruthless need for specific capture cards. If I wanted to enjoy MythTV the way it was supposed to be enjoyed, then I would need to run out and spend $180 hard earned buckaroos and that just isn’t something that this tightwad is prepared to do just yet. Now please, leave me be so I can get back to watching Entourage and Cops in PiP.

Daily Notes: MythTV is a GPL open source application for Linux designed to allow any computer (that meets the specified minimum requirements) to function as a personal video recorder. The project was started in April 2002 by Isaac Richards. Although there are Linux distributions with MythTV already installed and ready to go, chances are that many newbies to the world of the penguin won’t know about such obscurities such as “KnoppMyth.” Of course I probably did things wrong and/or stupidly but in the end it comes down to this: I am a huge goober. I try to embody the intuition and knowledge levels of an ordinary techie with this and fortunately I survived and all turned out well, so don’t e-mail me mad that I didn’t give MythTV the props it deserves because I think that I indeed have!

Another great tidbit to know about MythTV is that because of it’s design which keeps the front-end and backend separate, the abilities to control the machine and settings via another machine in the house is just that much easier. Hell, even though I hadn’t tested it, I’m sure it wouldn’t be difficult to use one’s PSP to control the settings and recordings of their MythTV box! But I think I’ll leave that to another day…

MAME (Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator), for all the people that aren’t so daft, is an arcade emulator which comes written for a multitude of platforms. It allows people with an applicable ROM (binary image of a game) to actually emulate the arcade machine that the game would originally play on right on their computer. The emulator can currently play an amazing 6,000+ roms near flawlessly and is actually one of the most popular emulators ever created.

PiP is an acronym for “Picture in Picture.” PiP is an available feature in many newer model TVs that allow you to watch two shows at the same time by boxing one video to a small constrained size to the corner. Nothing beats being able to watch “Mythbusters” and “Good Eats” at the same time!

I’m waking up today with a few questions about Linux that I don’t think a webpage could convey or answer for me, so I looked up whether or not there were any large/significant Linux user groups in the area that I am and I found out that I was in luck! Just about 40 minutes away in Seattle, there were to my surprise, an amazing number of Unix and Linux user groups. This made me think about how deep the use or Unix is for some people as it actually has hundreds if not thousands of people unite every month in each state just to discuss personal feelings and developments surrounding Unix in general. This was exciting in a few ways because I knew that I was going to be able to gain some insight into other’s lives that strictly use Linux as apposed to any other OS and also probably get a few questions answered.

After a painless search with Google’s map service, I was on the road! Of course I needed a laptop to bring with me, so I made sure to bring along my trusty-dusty Toshiba satellite and a copy of Slax along for the ride. After a grueling, hot and long drive to Seattle, I was finally there: the base of operations for the “Greater Seattle Linux Users Group” (GSLUG), North Seattle Community College. Within a room of 30 or so people I would say, lay a great discussion about the recent Grokster case ruling, I felt the urge to interrupt and say my 2 cents but I resisted the urge. At this point I was a bit uneasy about being there but after a while that feeling sort of lessened and after a while I was able to actually approach someone standing next to the doorway a few questions that I desperately needed to have answered.

His name was Josh and he looked like anyone else you would meet out in the world except for one thing: He uses nothing but Unix in his life. “Life, work, play; They’re no different for me, I tend to only use things that are openly distributed and free because after-all, all information should be free in the end of all.” Inspiring and cool choice of words Josh, way to sell the lifestyle but exactly why would someone in their right mind directly avoid using Windows unless they were doing something crazy such as myself? Well, he had an answer for that as well: “Well, some people are vegetarians, right? That’s a well known and socially accepted lifestyle but why is it when I say I wish to stay “Unix only” I get all the weird looks or laughter? I don’t see the two lifestyles as any different, I mean of course just like with vegetarianism there are some times when you want to just hunt down a boar and just roast the thing and the same thing applies to me where sometimes I just want to use Windows to accomplish a specific action I simply cannot do using my Linux rig.”

Where did this guy come from? He put things into such a great perspective for me that I actually understood why many Unix users seem to be spiritually bonded to their choice in OS and from this I gained a spark of pride for using Linux but then again, I haven’t hit any roadblocks that have made me think badly of Linux yet so I better keep my fingers crossed while the pride is still there. Before I left, I thanked him considerably and told a few others who wondered of my presence, exactly why I was there. Three heated one-sided discussions as to why “FreeBSD 0wnz0rs my mother,” I was back on the road and on my way to good ‘ole Tacoma. I left full of cheap chips and soda and also with a sense of understanding for the Unix movement and community. I also pondered whether or not there were any significant Windows user groups out there (later found out there was only one) and whether or not they had people as passionate as the people I had just left. It was definitely a good experience all around.

Getting in the door was definatly a relief but that feeling of relief quickly vanished after I went to check any new IMs that I might have received while being out. Luckily before I left for the Unix group meet-up in Seattle, I had installed “Gaim” so that I could keep in touch with friends and acquaintances and luckily for me, it works. Back to topic though: when I got to my desk, I was instantly messaged furiously from a friend of mine that plays in the same Battlefield 1942 clan of mine, about the release of the Battlefield 2 demo. I nearly passed out from excitement and worry as to whether or not I would be able to play at all seeing how Linux has never been touted as the best environment to run games from. Things certainly have turned for the worst…

Daily Notes: A Unix User group is a local gathering of people that all share the same enthusiasm and love for Unix. With dozens of groups in each state within the US, it is easy to simply Google your “your city+Unix+User+Group” to find one near you. It’s always an eye opening and informative thing to go to so I wouldn’t tell anyone not to experience at least one meeting as the people there are truly great and who knows, you might even meet a friend!

Google Map service is a robust browser/standalone map tool that allows you to easily find directions and or locations for a predefined address, name or business. I use it almost every week to find new and faster ways to certain destinations and it has easily become something I use second-nature. With hundreds of user hacks, the possibilities and functionality of the service is nearly endless.

FreeBSD is a highly advanced and mature operating system based upon a specific strain of Unix developed at the University of Berkeley in California, “BSD.” With an absolutely adorable mascot and a huge community underlying, FreeBSD is a perfectly fine Unix experience that anyone should experience at least once.

GAIM (if you couldn’t tell) is an open source, multi-protocol, instant messaging application which can be used as an alternative to MSN Messenger, AOL Instant Messenger or Yahoo Instant Messenger clients while still retaining all of their core functionalities. Though I don’t really like the whole look and feel of it compared to MSN Messenger, it is definitely reliable and easy to use and does have the option to apply skins so there isn’t much I can complain about there. Whether a Windows or a nix user, you can still use Gaim today!

What am I going to do!?! The game I have impatiently waited over a year for is finally out and I might not be able to even run the damn thing! Calm down. The first thing I needed to do was to calm down and think about some options. I had often heard of using “WineX” to run games native to Windows but it’s been a long time since I ever had to deal with such a situation involving Linux. I googled up WineX and quickly learned that it was no longer known as WineX but rather “Cadega.” With feverish impatience, I installed and prayed for this bloody program to work just this once.

Nothing. That’s what happened when I attempted to install the demo – nothing. I tried everything that I could to install the lumpy 600MB of promised awesomeness but the only thing I was able to produce was a big ole’ “can’t do it” prompt window. I soon sank into a depression and nothing but terrible thoughts about Linux filled my head. In the end of the day though, it’s the developer’s fault for not supporting the Linux crowd. I still can’t get over the fact that by switching to Linux, I wouldn’t necessarily be able to play the most anticipated and prized games coming out in the next year or two.

After wiping away some tears (macho and manly tears), I quickly became overcome with determination and energy. For a male, college student slacker, this was a huge accomplishment. I searched high and low in the Cadega forums and every other largely populated game discussion forum for a possible fix but everywhere I turned I was presented with depressingly bad news. Surprisingly, Cadega lacks pixel shader 1.4 support and surprise-surprise! It just so happens to be that Battlefield 2 supports nothing but pixel shader 1.4. For a lack of a better term: OMFGWTFBBQQFE! Of all the people in the world to do this to it would have to be me because I love to do nothing more than play games with the great people within my clan and now that this roadblock has occurred, it seems if like I might have to be dis-communicated for the next couple of weeks. It’s beyond shameful and more than anything heartbreaking but it seems that at this very moment Linux loses my blessing when it comes to suggesting it to gamers. If you are a hardcore gamer or just a casual one that likes to play the latest and greatest game-wise, then do yourself a huge favor, save yourself a headache and just install Windows. Until basic support for things like shader model 3.0 and pixel shader 1.4, you simply won’t be able to keep up with the current onslaught of amazing and stunning games coming out.

Knowing that I can’t do anything or get anywhere whining, I decided to go ahead and buy Guild Wars and World of Warcraft for the time being as they seem to be highly enjoyable and above all else, playable on Linux. Although I did indeed swear off of any and all MMORPGs after the whole “selling my mom’s new kitten just to by a new tunic in the game of Evercrack,” I do know a large number of friends who said that they truly enjoy playing these two games so why not, right? Anything to help the time pass and who knows, maybe in the end I might become highly attached to them.

Daily Notes: WineX (now known as Cadega) is a custom built strain of “Wine” which only strives to allow people to play games intended for the Windows API on their Linux machines. Though it has a fair share of controversy over its use of Wine’s code to earn a quick buck, it still has an impressive list of supported games.

“OMFGWTFBBQQFE!” is a common term for me, as I tend to use it in everyday situations almost routinely. For example, when I’m at McDonalds and they put pickles on my double cheeseburger after I explicitly explained that I absolutely hate pickles, I just walk up casually to the counter and blurt out “OMFGWTFBBQQFE!” to the cashier. Other situations where it’s appropriate to use this expression are: getting word that you’re the father, learning that your date isn’t Jane but actually John, seeing your parents kissing or the worst of the worst: during a political discussion and someone says something so ridiculously stupid that you have absolutely nothing to say back at them other than that they should just die.

MMORPG = Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game. If you didn’t know this then please send me some fantastic décor pictures of the rock you’ve been living under for the past 5 or so years!

Evercrack = EverQuest (one of THE most popular MMORPGs ever made). If you didn’t know this either, then please do me a favor and just go ahead and crawl back under that rock of yours.

Well, its day six in my quest to see if I can sustain a normal, functional life without Windows and so far, so good. Although there have been some major snags in my way such as the whole Battlefield 2 fiasco, I’m still determined to make this work. Today, my prime objective is to basically go to a nice secluded area, tap into an insecure WiFi network and study up on the basics of Linux and its origins. For this, I have chosen to use my handy dandy notebook and rock on with my trusty dusty copy of Slax to basically acquire some free internet down at my local park; which all on it’s own sounds easy enough but with the recent convictions and arrests of people that bum off of other’s connections, I better play it cool and smooth. Summon the fake moustache and dark clothing!

Equipped with a great inconspicuous disguise and a backpack of Doritos, I made camp under the shade of a beautiful hemlock tree down at the park. The setup has been done and now the real tough part had come: finding a suitable WAP (Wireless Access Point) to tap into. Now, before I left, I went ahead and actually installed a number of necessary tools to the Slax distribution to essentially make it a whole new distribution. I added Kismet, airsnort and a number of other applications which will ultimately make finding and connecting to these WAPs easier in the end. I also went ahead and built my very own “hobo waveguide WiFi antenna” using an empty baked bean can and $5 worth of parts. If you too want to know how I did it then just hang on until the daily notes portion of today. I promise you it’s easy and painless.

Though Kismet gave me some guff over my Netgear WG511T WiFi card, in the end I was able to fix and figure things out to working order. Within 3 minutes of sitting there, I was able to see at least 3 very open and very fast WAPs that I could connect to. I wasted NO time. Within seconds, I was doing my daily rounds to Flexbeta and Slashdot like a pro and as I promised, I began to look into the very history of Linux itself. Though studying and researching give me little joy, I made it a promise that I would at least educate someone to the true ways and roots of the underused operating system that is Linux. Ambitious goals for an ambitious man I know but if I don’t learn the history of something that I’m trying to use then I just can’t have the “whole experience”…or whatever. Needless to say, I walked away with a completely new understanding of Linux and its background.

It turns out that Linux began as a personal rewrite of the old and busted Minix operating system by a man we have all heard of at least once: Linus Torvalds. Seeing Minix as lacking any true personal functionality due to its lack to handle extensions, Linus began work on a terminal emulator (using the C and Assembly languages) that would send and receiving characters from a serial port. Although at this very early point it ran outside of Minix, it was quickly to take a turn to true stability and individual functionality shortly after a large implementation of POSIX system calls to run the Bash shell. Linux as we known it matured into something that far exceeded Minix in functionality and speed and was then able to execute and compile its own source code and after this great milestone came another one as Linus officially made the Linux kernel available free on the internet on September 1991.

Ever since then, developers and enthusiasts alike have built and built on top of the kernel to make it arguably the most stable operating system in existence and development never slows. Originally only able to run on an Intel 386 processor, it now sits as one of the most adaptable operating systems on the planet. Having been ported on everything from game consoles to simple calculators, there’s no bet that the driving force to Linux’s success has been the absolutely amazing user base. Who would have thought that a small hobby project only containing 10,239 lines of code would turn into a 5,929,913 lined giant!

Some extra little knowledge that I had absolutely no idea about was that the name “Linux” wasn’t actually conceived from Linux Torvalds but rather an FTP server admin, where the file was first hosted, Ari Lemmke. Apparently he combined Linus’ first name with Minix to make “Linux” and the name has stuck from then on out. Another interesting fact I just found out was that Tux (the very well known and popular Linux mascot) wasn’t actually debuted until mid-1996 and his very creation was merely an entry into a simple Linux logo contest. The man who submitted the fat and content looking penguin was Larry Ewing who merely took the suggestion of Linus’ that the mascot would be a penguin and ran with it. Though there was a slight joke behind Tux (that Linus had an illness that made him coocoo for penguin!) Tux was quickly adopted and till this day stands as one of the most identifiable and liked of software mascots.

See? Interesting stuff indeed and there is obviously more but I simply can’t drag today on any longer. I urge you to research Linux and its various spawns and distributions whenever you get the chance because it really is some interesting stuff.

With today pretty much over, a full stomach and a full mind, I must bid adieu until tomorrow as I am plainly tuckered out. Be sure to check my notes as I wrote an exceptionally long list of clarifications and definitions for all the things we covered today.

Daily Notes: Wardriving is the act of driving or traveling with a Wi-Fi enabled device and searching for available wireless networks (see WAP below). Though Wardriving has received a bad name mostly due to a large number of individuals that are only out to be malicious and prying, the majority of wardrivers simply look out for a little free internet access on the go. Linux users have Kismet, Windows users have Netstumbler and Mac users have Kismac, either way they all get the job done at the end of the day. There are a number of services, including GPS services, that map and keep track of notable and friendly WAPs in your area and all you have to do is look!

WAP or “Wireless Access Point,” is a device that "connects" wireless communication devices together to create a wireless network. Think of it as a super-sized router.

WiFi/Wi-Fi is short and sweet for “Wireless Fidelity” and is basically a set of compatibility standards based on IEEE 802.11 for WLANs (Wireless Local Area Networks). Though originally intended to be a new standard of data handling for cell phones and for LANs, WiFi has now been primarily used for internet access use. An “insecure” WiFi connection is simply one that has not been locked or protected with encryption of by password.

Minix is a Unix “like” operating system originally created in the late 1980s to run on IBM PCs and was later ported to SPARC and early Macintosh machines in the early 1990s. As the prime influence over Linux’s inception, Minix differs with it’s use of a microkernel as apposed to Linux’s use of a Monolithic kernel and in all accounts hasn’t truly been active or supported since late 1998.

Kernal is an acronym for “Keyboard Entry Read, Network And Link” and is basically the core of the operating system. It holds interpretations and routines for all code which is handled and is mainly responsible for the entire operating system’s handling behavior.

And last but not least, you wanted to know about how I made my “hobo WiFi antenna.” Well, simply head to the guide maker’s site: http://www.turnpoint.net/wireless/cantennahowto.html

He has a very thorough and easy to follow guide and with his help, I was up and running like a champ within moments. It only costs a maximum of $5.00 USD if you already don’t have the stuff already and even though there is debate as to their efficiency, I have had extremely good results so I don’t know what to say to the nay-sayers.

One Week. It’s been one whole week since I took on the momentous (well for me) task of ridding myself and my surroundings of any Windows OS or Microsoft products and so far it has been a mixed bag. Although I have faired well with setting everything up, I still had overall trouble with MythTV and the ability to keep up with my gaming habit. Though many would argue that I’m an idiot or a goober, I must point out that I have as much if not more knowledge about Linux as any other computer enthusiast does and if I happen to have bumps along the way then I expect others to also take the same tumbles. That being said, I decided that today would be a day for me to make the last device running Windows into a lean, mean, penguin lovin’ machine! That device is none other than my fantastically painted and modded Xbox.

Now before some of you start saying that the Xbox isn’t really running any Windows OS on it, I must educate you. The user interface (UI) that you are used to browsing to rip your CDs or change settings on is actually running over a highly stripped and modified Windows 2000 kernal. Though you could say that its so modified that its entirely different, I would like to say that this experiment was written to be very strict and if this particular device is running any sort of released Windows OS, it would have to be converted to Linux as soon as humanly possible. Harsh I know but for me to do this right it just has to be done and of course, I would love to educate anyone that doesn’t know how to do this already!

I had originally written a guide on how to do this specifically for you and for use within this paper but seeing how I tend to overly complicate things, I thought it would be best to learn from the best and go from there. First thing you will need to do to get started is get your Xbox modded and for guides on how to achieve this, simply go to http://xbox-scene.com/tutorials.php?p=0|#481

Now there are tons of guides to choose from there but I thought I would help you out a little with some pre-knowledge before you go out and buy anything as to save you time and ultimately make you wiser. First thing that you should do is to find out what version Xbox you have by following this guide: http://xbox-scene.com/versions_1.php . Once you know what version you Xbox you have, you can now determine which method is the best to get your Xbox modded. Now there are three ways of going about it but the only one I can solemnly and safely recommend to everyone is the modchip method. It works for all Xbox users regardless of Xbox version and is generally a lot safer and faster for the majority of people when it comes to starting with little knowledge. I also suggest that you buy a 4th generation chip such as an X3 or the Xenium ICE as they have very intuitive menus to them as well as large and active community bases. The last thing to decide on is whether or not you want to solder or not. Many of us that have no past experience with soldering or simply lack any and all confidence with soldering anything to your Xbox, should seriously consider buying a “solder-less adapter” for their modchip as it could potentially save you grief and/or repair costs. The only down-side to using a solder-less solution is that the adapter costs a few extra bucks and once installed, it might be prone to wiggling out of place after extremely heavy system movement.

Once we have everything setup and running, then we can go ahead with installing Linux! Just like the PC, there are tons of flavors of Xbox Linux distributions and each one has their strengths and weaknesses. For the sake of ease and stability, I chose to go with the most popular and widely used Xbox distribution: Gentoox. Shallax, the main Gentoox developer and founder, has truly made Gentoox the most stable and easy to use Linux distribution you can find for the Xbox and I personally found extremely impressive in terms of its maturity and packaging. Once you have the distribution downloaded, all you need to do is burn the disk image to a CD-RW/DVD-R using a disk burning utility of your choice (I used NeroLINUX) as an image, no multi-session and finalize the compilation. Though I haven’t had an issue with disks burned at a high speed, it is a good idea to burn the disk at the lowest possible burn speed for a lesser chance of a junk disk. (At this time, please make a complete backup of your Xbox’s HDD to your PC via FTP. Tons of methods on how to do this so just read one from Xbox-scene.)

As soon as the disk is complete, cool it off and stick it straight into your Xbox (have modchip or otherwise enabled). You should be presented with a pretty screen with two choices, just choose “Stardust” and move on. Now you should see a beautiful sight: Linux being ran for the first time on your Xbox! You will be presented with a pure text filled screen which will very intuitively guide you through installation and don’t be too discouraged when trying to select and past text with your Xbox controller as I myself had a bit of trouble myself. After all the back flips it makes you do, it should begin formatting and transferring files. Success! Now just go off and get yourself something to eat, maybe read the newspaper or catch your local news as installation time could take up to thirty minutes to complete. Just, whatever you do, don’t sit hunched towards your screen expecting the bar to suddenly fill up because it won’t. All you’ll have it thirty minutes wasted and a sore back. Once everything is installed, it should restart all on its own and you should be happy with your Linux powered Xbox!

Now, I personally installed Gentoox as an application so I will need to run the Cromwell bios to get to it without running any portion of the Xbox’s original code but because I have a Xenium, it isn’t easy to just switch to Cromwell and go at my very whim. I chose KDE as my desktop environment and it’s just as pretty as it is on my desktop but I must warn you that unless you have an Xbox with 128MB of memory like mine, then your Xbox is likely to run like molasses with KDE so just use XFCE. With a few minutes of tinkering I was also able to get my old wireless keyboard and mouse up and working and after another hour I was using Gentoox as easily as I was using Mandriva on my desktop. It was an exciting and exhausting experience but in the end I learned a lot, so it was all worth it.

Although the entire operation from start to finish can easily eat away 3 or more hours of you life, it is still pretty neat seeing your Xbox become a fully operational Linux desktop. Some gripes about it overall though would have to be the slow speed at which it seems to operate when on an Xbox with a stock amount of 64MB system ram (understandably) and the lack of a graphical installation but those things are nothing near detrimental enough to caution against it’s use. Running Linux on your Xbox is a great way to explore Linux for one and also a great way of broadening overall system functionality which is just so easy that it’s almost inexcusable not to give it a go at least once if you own a modified Xbox.

Daily Notes: *I decided to add on some vocabulary pertaining to the subject of modding an Xbox. It should help someone out there that’s lost or confused.

The “BIOS” (Basic Input Output System) of the Xbox acts exactly like the bios within your desktop computer does. It basically resides on a small flash memory chip on the Xbox’s motherboard and initializes the chipset and memory subsystem. Although it sounds like it does very little, it is also responsible for detecting and diagnosing all input devices and or connections as well as a set of permissions that control what can and cannot be executed. Because the original Xbox Bios has a certain set of permissions that only allow the machine to execute specially signed executables (XBE – description below), it is necessary to replace it with an altered version with those set of permissions stripped or altered in order to run homebrew/unsigned code and/or game backups.

.XBE (Xbox Executable) is the Xbox’s own executable format. Just like a Windows PC would have an .exe for executable files, the Xbox has its own executable file which acts like any executable you might have on your desktop.

A “Softmod” is a software based modification of the Xbox. It basically works by exploiting certain security holes and vulnerabilities within the loading procedure of dashboard specific fonts or audio files allowing it to boot and run a hacked bootable from media bios. Because this type of modification requires either physically taking the Xbox’s hard drive out and interfacing it with your PC or the combination of a memory card, action replay and copy of an older Xbox game title, it is usually faster and easier to flash the Xbox’s TSOP or simply install a modchip. Also note that if you use the Softmodding method, you will not be able to play on Xbox Live.

A modchip is basically a small device that when connected to the system’s mainboard, hijacks the BIOS chip’s function and runs its own specified BIOS. Although there are dozens of modchips on the market, they all do the same basic job of hijacking the boot-up and running a modified bios (stored on itself) before the normal bios initiates. Some personal suggestions for purchase are as followed:

Xboxes version 1.0 though 1.4 (All of the following chips, besides the SmartXX OPX, requires a $5-$10 LPC rebuild board) DuoX 2 modchip ($11.50) DuoX2 lite modchip ($8.50) SmartXX OPX ($28.00) Xecuter 2.6 CE ($33) If you don’t care about price then go with a… Xenium ICE ($43 – No solder package $58 | Recommended) Xecuter 3 ($50 – No solder package $77 | Recommended) SmartXX v.2 ($55 – No solder package $70 | Meh.)

The distribution of Linux I used is based upon the desktop distribution of Gentoo and is called “Gentoox.” It’s an amazingly feature packed distro and has everyone that one would need from the get go. Mozilla, Open Office and a slew of other handy applications make it a great beginner’s choice for exploring Linux and since it’s maturity and development is so advanced, there are nearly no huge bugs or hang ups in performance. Be aware though, that there are two flavors of the distribution, Home and Professional. For newcomers or regular users, all you need is Home (includes the most applications as well) but if you are a novice Linux user then go for the Professional flavor as it includes far more networking options as well as certain server hosting applications and options. Grab it from Shallax.Gentoox.com

For FreeBSD users out there, there is currently a ported version of 5.4 and 6.0 beta 1 in Live CD and root installation formats. If you don’t quite like Linux but still want to use Unix, then I strongly encourage you to look this up as the porter has spent an amazing amount of time making this distribution possible. http://freebsd.ilse.nl/xbox/

NeroLINUX is simply put a native port of the Nero Burn Rom we all know and love. It’s amazingly easy to use and has just about every option you could possibly need for burning something to a disk. Grab it up here: http://www.nero.com/en/NeroLINUX.html

Well, another day and another fight. I have so far been able to turn each and every single Windows OS running device within my home into open source masterpieces and yet I still have so much more to do. Sure I might have been able to physically make my surroundings run on Linux and all but what about maintaining a somewhat normal lifestyle as what I had while running Windows? Let’s face it, I’ve been literally too busy to get back into the old habits that I used to have on the net and one of those habits, whether you protest or not, was P2P. Now, I’m not going to encourage piracy but I will say that if I want to download a television show that I happen to want to watch on my laptop or desktop monitor, then I’m downloading it. I pay about $140 USD to Comcast Inc. every single month and by me downloading a few shows a week that I get and pay for respectively already, isn’t going to make me lose not one minute of shut eye at night. Aside from my tendency to indulge in downloading my favorite TV shows, I also need to keep up with my undying appetite for anime! I mean, this stuff simply cannot be found over here no matter where you look and the FBI can come and pry my Bleach, Naruto, Yakkitate!! Japan and Full Metal Panic 2nd raid from my cold and clammy hands!

When I conversed to possibility of starting an entirely GNU world (commence the giggling) with my friends, the most common question aside to whether or not they would be able to continue playing World of Warcraft was whether they could continue to download their favorite shows. After being a fairly large P2P community leader of a few years, I already knew that the P2P options for Linux are just as vast as those found for Windows but since I had never truly had hands on experience with any of the Linux solutions, I simply couldn’t look them in the face and tell them that they would be any better than what they currently had. Faced with this feeling, I decided to try to kill two birds with one stone by incorporating my little adventure into Linux P2P options with this little adventure of being completely immersed with Linux. Rock on! Learning and downloading the latest episodes of Rescue me and Six Feet Under. Let’s get started, shall we?

Being a personal fan of the Bittorrent protocol, of course I already had a favorite going into things. Since I already have a considerable knowledge of the protocol and the various clients out there, I decided to start there. Already being a devout Azureus Bittorrent client user on Windows, I knew that there would be no need to look around for any other client. I have always been a fan of the Azureus Bittorrent client on the Windows platform and I know that for me to feel more normal and in control of things that I would have to use Azureus on my Linux desktop as well.

First and foremost objective for getting Azureus up and running on Linux is installing Java. Thinking it would be a painful process, it went surprisingly smooth and easy. Two minutes and one reboot later, I was installing Azureus and already beginning to bookmark the torrent sites that I frequently visit. For the sake of testing things out, I went over to Flextorrents.com and downloaded the latest CVS of Xbox Media Center as well as a few, ahem, other things. Now, I don’t exactly know why I was dancing on my desk with excitement over things working but I know now that it’s never necessary to dance a jig when something does something it’s already supposed to do. With the assurance that using Bittorrent on Linux is completely feasible and somewhat faster than it’s Windows brethren, I was able to breathe a sigh of relief over the fact that I would still be able to keep all of my old downloading habits painlessly during the next three weeks and also gave a spring to my step for my next challenge of setting up and using an IRC client.

Surprisingly, when I googled “Linux IRC client,” I was only returned a handful of recent or kept programs and only two of those had a decent GUI. Sure, I could always just use GAIM for my IRC needs but I wanted a stand-alone option with a more robust feature set specifically for IRC and the best one I found had to be XChat. A close second was “Konversation” but I just found XChat to be more tailored towards me and it also has a fairly large community behind which always means more plug-ins and scripts!

The options for installation is pretty straight forward as you can either compile it to run directly under the GNOME or over the X Window System using the GTK+ toolkit. Of course, because I have KDE currently as my environment, I chose to run XChat over X Windows and contrary to what you might hear, it wasn’t painful at all. Though I do have some complaints and issues surrounding how, well, void the settings all seem, it does deliver on all of its premises. I would much rather like a native version of mIRC but we can’t always get what we want so I can live with XChat for now.

My next stop on the road of file swapping was none other than Usenet. Why less people talk about newsgroup as a viable and good medium of P2P is anyone’s idea but it almost seems like people try to keep it “hush-hush.” Despite being fairly quiet and little known of, Usenet has been around since 1979 and was originally meant to be a sort of “bulletin board system” for users to leave and reply to each other’s posted messages. One would think that for something that’s been around even before the true internet we all use and know now would at least be the talk of the town but alas, things that want to stay to themselves usually tend to do just that – stay to themselves.

Trying to find a good newsreader for Linux was like finding a needle in a haystack. I didn’t want to use Mozilla’s ability to use Usenet because that’s not my goal, my goal was to find a usable and well designed Usenet newsreader equal to those found on the Windows platform but maybe I asked for too much. The only application I found worthy of even trying to use had to of been Knode. Even though it has been inactive for over 5 months (much like it’s competition), Knode still was able to do everything that I essentially needed to be done but I still wasn’t happy with things.

I know my standards might be high or near-impossible but I just can’t lie to you about the state of the current software out there for Linux in regards to P2P. Sure Bittorrent can be ran and used like a dream but what about the other protocols of P2P millions still use everyday? I was definitely disappointed today for sure. For this round of encounters, I would have to give the win to the Windows side of the fence, which is understandable seeing how the more users you have for an OS means the more you will see users and groups develop for that said OS. It’s basic logic, unfortunately.

Maybe I’ll have more luck with things tomorrow. I figured that since I brought up the subject of using Wine, that I would explore it and run it through the course and give it my take. I figure that if I can’t find the applications I need for Linux out there and for the taking that I might as well resort to using open-sourced applications originally designed for Windows. Should be exciting in the very least of all things!

Daily Notes: P2P is an acronym for “Peer to Peer” or “Point to Point.” The term basically used to describe any system that utilized users sharing files amongst other users. Examples of P2P: (digital) Bittorrent / (analog) Christmas! [hehehe]

Bittorrent is a P2P file distribution protocol (and tool) which was debuted in 2002 by Bram Cohen. The way Bittorrent works is breaks files down into small pieces, typically a quarter of a megabyte each. As the fragments are distributed to the peers in a random order, they can be reassembled on a requesting machine. This is particularly beneficial to those with download/upload speeds on any end of the speed spectrum. The hash/tracker information for a particular file is called a “.torrent” file and there are dozens are very popular and widely used trackers where torrent files may be downloaded or even uploaded for those interested in sharing their own file(s). http://www.Bittorrent.com/

Azureus is a client for the Bittorrent protocol which is Java based. Azureus allows a user to download/upload multiple files in a single GUI and also packs one of the most comprehensive configuration backend out there in terms of other Bittorrent clients. There is just simply too much for me to say about this gem, so just head to its website and discover more! (Windows/Linux/Mac OS X/Unix/FreeBSD) http://azureus.sourceforge.net/

Java (platform), or rather Java VM (virtual machine), is an environment from Sun Micro that can run applications developed using the standard Java programming language and set of development tools. In this case, the platform is not a specific hardware or operating system, but rather an execution engine called a virtual machine, and a set of standard libraries which provide common functionality. Due to the use of this, the portability factor for Azureus is pretty much only limited to platforms that can’t run Java VM.

CVS is an acronym for “Current Version System.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concurrent_Versions_System

IRC (Internet Relay Chat) is one of the first great forms of instant communications utilizing the internet. It works by allowing great groups of people to join a server and then from there enter a specific forum called a “Channel.” From there, users are freely able to converse to one another privately or collectively and even send or receive files from one another. A protocol and system with a dark past involving use by the Soviet coup and even Iraqi/Kuwaiti forces during the Gulf war, IRC was originally made by Jarkko Oikarinen to replace the then limiting “MultiUser Talk” program which used BBS. Inspired by the “Bitnet Relay Chat,” the protocol has taken new heights by becoming of the most used form of instant communication online today and with this huge base of users, there are an equal base of users using IRC for the sheer purpose of distributing and sharing files. Because the pure promise and rule of P2P is the element of sharing, many like to label users of IRC “leeches” humorously because they tend to take and take yet never give back. The last statement could be contested seeing how many people do share files over IRC collectively but then again, I should have my fair share of haters after I release this lengthy ordeal of an article.

Konversation is an IRC client for the KDE desktop environment. As of the moment I am writing this, it is currently at version 0.18 [July 29th, 2005]. http://konversation.kde.org/

XChat is also an IRC client but is more mature and branched than Konversation. Running on a dozen different platforms, XChat is a feature packed and attractive IRC client to use but don’t get me wrong, it’s no mIRC. Just because it’s not as great as mIRC doesn’t mean it won’t do everything you need it to do as it has dozens of user-made plug-ins that add additional functionality and usability to the program. Although I had to run XChat over X Windows doesn’t mean that everyone does – users that use the GNOME desktop environment can enjoy the native packaging of the program as well as additional tweaks such as transparency effects that can only be found when run over GNOME. Definitely worth a check out, so head to its site: http://xchat.org/

GNOME (GNU Network Object Model Environment) is yet another Unix desktop environment. Started in 1997 by Federico Mena and Miguel De Lcaza as an alternative to KDE, its user base and corporate adoption have swelled to great numbers and continue to do so each year. One of the biggest corporate adoptions of the desktop environment came from Sun Microsystems when they replaced the aging CDE user environment of their flagship Solaris OS with a customized variant of GNOME. Having been ported to most Unix based operating systems and Cygwin, it’s safe to say that no matter what side of the OS fence you’re straddling that you can still use GNOME happily and effectively. http://www.gnome.org/

GTK+ (GIMP Toolkit) was originally written solely for the use of the image manipulation application “GIMP” but was later found that one could create user interfaces systems utilizing the “X Windows System.” Gnome isn’t the only desktop environment that utilizes GTK however, KDE, XFCE and even Windows are able to run it (albeit a few tweaks). http://www.gtk.org/

Day nine was to be a day of more study of Linux and its long list of notable distributions but since I didn’t really feel like a day full of reading, I figured I would at least cover the base of running applications native to windows on a Linux OS. We all are attached to a certain program or set of tools that can only be found for Windows and I will never argue for someone to sacrifice that bond just to switch to Linux. Just because you’re giving up Windows doesn’t mean you have to give up that special program that helps you get through the day and in fact, most times than not, these applications run at the same speed as they would on a pure Windows environment. While we already touched on bases with Wine as a viable layer to run Windows games on but I never really examined its use with applications so let’s dig in, shall we?

Now, before we get into the dirty stuff, I think I owe you a pretty fair explanation as to what exactly Wine is. In essence, Wine is an open source Windows API emulator (Ha ha! I know that’s gone make a few of you red) which allows Unix users to execute Dos and Windows binaries on their desktop. Now, just because I just so happen to deal with the Linux install of Wine doesn’t mean that FreeBSD and Solaris versions run any slower nor does it mean that the installations are any trickier but I doubt that too many of you actually use Solaris’ OS anyways. Described as a “layer,” it essentially runs silently on top of X and Unix to do it’s thing and is this way more-so to give the feel that there is no Wine in the background running all your favorite Windows stuffs! If you thought that the developers of the project have a secret love for wine that ultimately subdued all other ideas for names, well you’d be wrong. Officially speaking, Wine is an acronym (what isn’t these days) for “Wine Is Not an Emulator” and while technically true because it’s a compatibility layer, its sole purpose is to copy the Windows API and that just makes me more comfortable with calling it as what I see .

Now, what could I possibly want to run now that I can run most Windows applications out there? A video game? Naw, I have Cadega for that. Maybe I should install Windows apps such as Office and IE just for the sake of showing off to my imaginary friends? Hrmph, tempting due to the low moral amongst “those” friends of mine but just not practical seeing how I have OpenOffice and Mozilla; so what to choose? Personally, the choice was a simple one after those two ideas and it served a practically purpose for me: Photoshop. Don’t get me wrong, GIMP is a marvelous and powerful image manipulation tool but I simply can’t for the life of me get used to it. Believe me, I’ve tried and I’ve been using Photoshop so long that doing things within it comes near to second nature to me.

As I might be the only person on the face of the planet to actually own a legal copy of Photoshop 7 and 8 (CS), I think that Adobe should actually start supporting the Unix platform for their Photoshop and multimedia franchises but then again, being a company that loves to charge over $300 for a single application also means that producing an application for people that think everything should be free isn’t so fiscally intelligent. Who cares though seeing how Photoshop 7 seems to install and run poy-fectly fine under the latest release of Wine though I can’t exactly share the same elation with CS since it only sputters and dies during initial install. Aside from having to use an older version, all things ran fine aside from not being able to print things out but then again, I can always use GIMP for that!

I might be one of the lucky people which have no problem installing Photoshop 7 but you might not be. When I cruise around for comments related to the installation and operation of PS 7 using the latest Wine release, I found that a lot of people had either a mix of graphics errors directly correlated to their video card/drivers or errors that would appear when trying to save or open files. If you happen to fall into either category then please don’t fret because there are literally dozens of configuration/registry fixes and hacks for Wine that will have you running in no time but it could be seen as frustrating in the very beginning. Just remember that you can’t give up and in no time you’ll be cutting and pasting yourself in exotic locations that you wish you could have visited and then show them off to people you’re eager to impress! Wait, isn’t that what everyone uses Photoshop for anyways?

Daily Notes: Relatively uneventful day today so I don’t have too many notes for you that haven’t already been covered in a previous worthy mention.

Windows API is an array of application programming interfaces (thus “API”) available within Microsoft Windows OS which in conjunction with an SDK can be used by developers to create software to associate with the various Windows OS abilities and technologies. Because the Windows API is Microsoft’s complete property, the developers of Wine were required to basically rewrite an equal substitute using GNU language to stay legal and compliant. Even though there are some limitations with the open source rendition of the Window API, Wine allows users to actually use genuine Microsoft DLLs to enhance overall performance and compatibility.

Photoshop is a powerful and feature rich image-manipulation studio from Adobe. Although commercial, I find Photoshop to be hands-down, the best image manipulation tool ever created and I swear by it almost daily. There are currently only Windows and Mac flavors available at this point and I honestly have no clue nor idea as to Adobe’s true attitude of bringing this great tool natively to *Nix anytime soon but I can say that when ran over the latest Wine (giving you have <1GB system memory) it runs like a champ.

Last days are always the hardest to get through because it’s a mixture of anxiety and that you somehow forgot to experience something. I know that I didn’t cover the vast and amazing potential of the Unix side of things but I think that from what I actually did and accomplished is fairly close to anyone who is looking to make a fresh start with Linux and hopefully I gave some hints or at least pointers to those people along my way.

I made a promised to myself that I would make a definitive decision on day 10 as to whether or not I could condone someone switching from Windows to Linux and I feel like I have a fairly good answer: it depends. Vague? Sure, but it’s the truth as far as what I can see. If you rely on your computer or laptop as purely a word processor and a device for sending e-mail or surfing the web then by all means, please go over to the Linux side of things but if you heavily use your computer for large amounts of gaming or device interfacing, then please do me a favor and stay with Windows. You don’t have to listen to my opinion, you could always make your machine dual boot if you have an extra hard drive lying around or at least 10-20GB left over on your current drive but if you are just looking for Linux to do things “better” or more “efficient” than Windows then I say it’s not worth the trouble. I’m sure a lot of you (mostly slashdotters that like to flame 24/7) will strongly disagree with me and even cite how it costs more to have Windows in your life opposed to Linux but seriously, I would rather invest $99 into an operating system that is guaranteed to be compatible with nearly every single piece of software/hardware out there then to risk the chance of having to rely on random people to make or develop a special driver or work around for me if an incompatibility issue would arise.

I had my good and my bad experiences with Linux thus far and either way, I have no hard feelings. I guess I just sort of absorbed the hype that Linux is better than Windows which has been chanted nearly everyday on all technology sites but one thing I learned from the dedicated group of guys that run the Seattle Linux user group is that it’s all just a fad right now and so is the hate people have for Windows. I’m amazed that they would say that but it made me think for a while about all the reasons why I considerably denounced Windows before and they all turned out to be either bunk or the pressure of being on the popular side of the argument. I’m sure that Linux or it’s Unix brethrens will work out masterfully for a large majority of computer or device users out there but in my current situation, I have no strong need for it other than to have it around for Wardriving here or there and that it’s fine to simply be a Windows user.

Now, just because you’re a Windows user doesn’t mean you can’t be pro open-source! There are tons of methods and alternatives to the pricy and absurdly irritating applications that are offered to use which cost you absolutely nothing. In fact, a majority of the applications I discussed earlier either already run on Windows or are in the midst of being brought to the Windows platform. I figured that the least I could do would be to make a short “1,2,3” list on things you can do to free yourself from expensive and often slow applications and to embrace the open source community!

1. Download Firefox right now -- Let’s face it, if it wasn’t for the horrible security holes and vulnerabilities of IE, many of the hatred that people seem to have with Windows would probably just be none existent. For years now, IE has been the gateway for malicious worms, virus’ and other annoying malware/spyware programs which have boosted the capital for Norton and McAfee and alienated the trust that consumers have with Microsoft as a whole and many businesses (rightfully so) have spent millions of dollars switching to Linux just to gain stability and calm of mind from the headache that a major infection can easily create. Now only is Firefox safer but it’s also faster and has an astounding user base. There is no reason NOT to switch. By the way, if you’re worried about losing your bookmarks, don’t be. Importing your old bookmarks into Firefox is a snap. For more information and for a download link, just go to www.getfirefox.com

2. OpenOffice.org is your friend -- You see this entire thing I wrote out over the course of the last 11 days? Yeah, well, it was all done on probably the best office suite there is out there: OpenOffice.org. Way back in the year 2000, I spent over $300 for Microsoft’s Office 11 suite and had nothing but trouble exporting or doing things with it. It was clumsy, unreliable and a real threat to my sanity seeing how it would often crash just about 2 minutes before I finished a paper and normally lose the pages data, leaving me with having to remember entire chapters of ideas all over again. Well, when time came to update my Office suite to Microsoft Office 2003, I found an amazingly attractive substitute to it by the name of “StarOffice.” Soon later it shed that name and informally became OpenOffice which then changed again (due to legal issues) to OpenOffice.org or OOo. Being a user for over 3 years now, I can confidently tell you that the thing does everything that I could ever need it to and even supports many file types that Microsoft Office can’t even support. It’s truly an amazing application which I wholeheartedly recommend to anyone. www.Openoffice.org is the place to go if you’re looking to find it. 

3. Watch a lot of movies? Get VLC then -- I poked around in a dozen or so forums dealing with video playback and conversion and the number one issue people tend to have on Windows is not being able to play a video file they may have acquired. Now, of course this is a codec issue but in some (many) cases, no matter how many times a codec is installed, Windows Media player simply refuses to playback the file so I can only suggest to them the single most reliable and best performing media player I have ever ran and that is VLC. VLC (VideoLAN Client) is one of the most compatible and portable media players out there and even has the amazing ability to stream the video you might be watching to anyone else currently on your network or otherwise. All I can say is that if you currently have playback issues or simply a codec issue that you can’t seem to straighten out, then look no further than VLC. www.videolan.org

See? Harmless and not as hard as you thought it would be, huh? I know that the list is short but believe me, there are tons of other amazing open source applications out there for Windows that save you the hassle and burden of having to cough up a couple hundred dollars for the same functionality. If there is one thing I have learned, it would be that no one can just dive into a situation of an environment that is alien to them all at once, rather it’s better to take baby steps and slowly integrate yourself and your daily habits into the vast and fast growing world of GNU because I can guarantee that you won’t be disappointed.

A compilation of what I deem “useful information” collected from the daily notes of each day’s account. Enjoy.

Mandriva is a very popular Linux distribution which made its debut in 1998 for people lacking knowledge with basic Linux commands. The distribution’s first and foremost goal was to mix the best graphical desktop environments and contribute its own graphical configuration utilities to make an “ease-of-use” standard. Mandriva has an amazing graphical installation process as well as a very good graphical approach for system administration. With one of the best list of supported hardware, it’s near impossible to find a PC that this distro can’t run on.

Slax is a Linux Live CD that’s only about 190MB in size. It does not need to be installed as it boots and runs from a CD drive. It is possible to run SLAX on a computer without a hard disk. There is also an option to run SLAX from RAM, freeing the drive for other uses, such as for a DVD or music CD. SLAX is based on Slackware Linux. SLAX Standard and Kill Bill use KDE as their desktop environment, while Popcorn uses XFCE. Fluxbox is an option in all versions except Frodo for users with a low amount of RAM. (Information pulled from Wikipedia.com) Check it out at http://slax.linux-live.org/

MythTV is a GPL open source application for Linux designed to allow any computer (that meets the specified minimum requirements) to function as a personal video recorder. The project was started in April 2002 by Isaac Richards. Although there are Linux distributions with MythTV already installed and ready to go, chances are that many newbies to the world of the penguin won’t know about such obscurities such as “KnoppMyth.” Of course I probably did things wrong and/or stupidly but in the end it comes down to this: I am a huge goober. I try to embody the intuition and knowledge levels of an ordinary techie with this and fortunately I survived and all turned out well, so don’t e-mail me mad that I didn’t give MythTV the props it deserves because I think that I indeed have! Another great tidbit to know about MythTV is that because of it’s design which keeps the front-end and backend separate, the abilities to control the machine and settings via another machine in the house is just that much easier. Hell, even though I hadn’t tested it, I’m sure it wouldn’t be difficult to use one’s PSP to control the settings and recordings of their MythTV box! But I think I’ll leave that to another day…

WineX (now known as Cadega) is a custom built strain of “Wine” which only strives to allow people to play games intended for the Windows API on their Linux machines. Though it has a fair share of controversy over its use of Wine’s code to earn a quick buck, it still has an impressive list of supported games.

MMORPG = Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game. If you didn’t know this then please send me some fantastic décor pictures of the rock you’ve been living under for the past 5 or so years!

Evercrack = EverQuest (one of THE most popular MMORPGs ever made). If you didn’t know this either, then please do me a favor and just go ahead and crawl back under that rock of yours.

Wardriving is the act of driving or traveling with a Wi-Fi enabled device and searching for available wireless networks (see WAP below). Though Wardriving has received a bad name mostly due to a large number of individuals that are only out to be malicious and prying, the majority of wardrivers simply look out for a little free internet access on the go. Linux users have Kismet, Windows users have Netstumbler and Mac users have Kismac, either way they all get the job done at the end of the day. There are a number of services, including GPS services, that map and keep track of notable and friendly WAPs in your area and all you have to do is look!

WAP or “Wireless Access Point,” is a device that "connects" wireless communication devices together to create a wireless network. Think of it as a super-sized router.

And last but not least, you wanted to know about how I made my “hobo WiFi antenna.” Well, simply head to the guide maker’s site: http://www.turnpoint.net/wireless/cantennahowto.html He has a very thorough and easy to follow guide and with his help, I was up and running like a champ within moments. It only costs a maximum of $5.00 USD if you already don’t have the stuff already and even though there is debate as to their efficiency, I have had extremely good results so I don’t know what to say to the nay-sayers.

P2P is an acronym for “Peer to Peer” or “Point to Point.” The term basically used to describe any system that utilized users sharing files amongst other users. Examples of P2P: (digital) Bittorrent / (analog) Christmas! [hehehe]

CVS is an acronym for “Current Version System.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concurrent_Versions_System

Konversation is an IRC client for the KDE desktop environment. As of the moment I am writing this, it is currently at version 0.18 [July 29th, 2005]. http://konversation.kde.org/

Well, in the true spirit of being “Open Source” these past days, I stuck only to www.Wikipedia.com for my research and project information. Though nothing in this paper is plagiarized or copied word for word from any one source, I did get a large amount of information and historical background on each note from Wikipedia, so much kudos to them and the amazing people that work ‘round the clock to make it probably the best resources on the net for information.

Flexbeta for giving my ass a reason to actually write something longer than 3 pages (I’m sure some of you scratched your eyes out around page 2 anyways).

Slashdot for hosting the flamepit which will devour these writings. Even though I might cry for an hour due to some pre-pubescent children criticizing my writing style, I must tell you this now: YOUR MOCKERIES MAKE ME STRONGER!

Seattle Linux User Group for unknowingly letting me observe a meeting and sneak way with half of the snacks on the table.

About the author Clarence Ladson is currently a college student in Tocoma, Washinton and works in robotical and anatomical engineering. His hobbies include contributing programming skills to various console homebrew developements and orchestrating local LAN gaming events.

OSS PING

If you are interested in the OSS ping list please mail me

Long but interesting read

2 posted on 08/23/2005 6:44:44 AM PDT by N3WBI3 (If SCO wants to go fishing they should buy a permit and find a lake like the rest of us..)

Was this experiment 10 days or 30 days? He mentions both in the course of his article. Also, GUI is NOT "general user interface", it's "graphical user interface".

Minor quibbles.

I actually think the fact he is probably not an informed computer user is a plus..

4 posted on 08/23/2005 6:59:25 AM PDT by N3WBI3 (If SCO wants to go fishing they should buy a permit and find a lake like the rest of us..)

WAP or “Wireless Access Point,” is a device that "connects" wireless communication devices together to create a wireless network. Think of it as a super-sized router.

Well, I think a WAP is more accurately a wifi switch, since they do not all have router/firewall functions.

Well, I think a WAP is more accurately a wifi switch, since they do not all have router/firewall functions.

Depends on who is selling it, Lynksys is pretty good about calling only things a WAP which are access points for wireless networks. But there are other products out there that market waps that can route and do firewall...

6 posted on 08/23/2005 7:22:17 AM PDT by N3WBI3 (If SCO wants to go fishing they should buy a permit and find a lake like the rest of us..)

Yeah, it's a minor quibble. I only meant to point out that if a WAP has router/firewall functionality, those are extras, and that a WAP without that stuff is still a WAP.

Thanks!

I'm exploring whether or not I can replace Windows with Linux, and the author's opinion helps a lot.

Has anyone here used OpenOffice? I've got to either purchase Office2003 (or 2004) in the near future, and wonder whether OpenOffice might be a better selection. As an independent consultant, I'm concerned about compatability with my clients --- who are universally in the "Windows Slut" category.

8 posted on 08/23/2005 7:53:08 AM PDT by StoneGiant (Power without morality is disaster. Morality without power is useless.)

Has anyone here used OpenOffice?

I use it all the time, I cnbt remember the last time I had any issue communication with people who use MS office. Version 2.0 (if it is ever released) should fix some things like access to password protected xls files....

9 posted on 08/23/2005 8:11:41 AM PDT by N3WBI3 (If SCO wants to go fishing they should buy a permit and find a lake like the rest of us..)

i agree with N3WBI3--I use OOo all the time, and it will produce docs and presentations that are compatible with Office.

The only thing I'd warn you about is Excel/Calc macros. The macro languages are different between the two, so they won't transfer.

Other than that, I'd say 99.9% of anything done in OOo would be readable in MS Office. And vice versa.

I'm using OO pre 2.0 release that came with SuSE 9.3Pro.

I can say that it is about 99% compatible with MSOffice. As mentioned macro's are different. OO 2.0 (and the pre 2.0) release I'm running will finally have a database application (called Base) to counter Access. While I haven't done much with it yet, it can read and write any number of DB formats including Access and also SQL.

Go for it and see what you think. It's free and if you don't like it, you can uninstall it.

GNU? Isn't that the anti-business group put together by that radical leftist Richard Stallman?

http://www.stallman.org

http://www.stallman.org/archives/2005-may-aug.html

15 posted on 08/23/2005 9:57:27 AM PDT by N3WBI3 (If SCO wants to go fishing they should buy a permit and find a lake like the rest of us..)

You already know what "Red Flag" is, even though you'd like to claim you don't. It's the communist Chinese government's network operating system, that they got legally for free from Richard Stallman through his GNU group. Lurkers are welcome to read the "GNU Manifesto" for more details, while of course you already know all about it.

http://www.gnu.org/gnu/manifesto.html

17 posted on 08/23/2005 10:16:22 AM PDT by N3WBI3 (If SCO wants to go fishing they should buy a permit and find a lake like the rest of us..)

18 posted on 08/23/2005 10:17:47 AM PDT by N3WBI3 (If SCO wants to go fishing they should buy a permit and find a lake like the rest of us..)

Why, you already know, he's a communist that studied in Moscow for years, now lives in Washington D.C. Are you now going to try to deny it, or deny that you already knew? Probably, LOL.

Just thought I would be nice and give you a chance to throw out your usual tripe early on this thread...

I am obliged to you for your gracious cooperation... thank you

20 posted on 08/23/2005 10:34:42 AM PDT by N3WBI3 (If SCO wants to go fishing they should buy a permit and find a lake like the rest of us..)

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