Review: Excito Bubba home server - Personal Computer World

The Bubba server is the closest we have seen to a computer that fulfils this dream of sharing files, networking a printer, streaming media, downloading files and Bit Torrents as well as organising emails and acting as a web and ftp server.

This server has had me excited in a way that no hardware has managed for many years. Small, quiet, plenty of storage space and very low power requirements make it everything I’ve wanted from a home server. And it runs Linux. I almost hesitate from saying this too loud because the words server and Linux too close together scare most ordinary users but the Bubba is a triumph of intelligent design. It can be controlled entirely through a well designed web interface so the underlying OS is not such an issue.

Of course, this does not mean that the OS choice is unimportant. Linux reduces the cost and delivers performance way beyond what I would expect from Windows on a similar platform.

Read the review for the full story, I’m off to try and calm down!

Kevin Ham, the $300 million master of Web domains - June 1, 2007

Kevin Ham is the most powerful dotcom mogul you’ve never heard of, reports Business 2.0 Magazine. Here’s how the master of Web domains built a $300 million empire.

Now I rarely click on add links, infact I’ve been known to click on the link in the main part of Google rather than the add link before now. So I’d never really come to terms with just how lucrative this market can be. The figures here are quite mind boggling. But not enough for me to emigrate to Cameroon (all becomes clear in the article)

» Five crucial things the Linux community doesn’t understand about the average computer user | Hardware 2.0 | ZDNet.com

Why is it that the average computer user still chooses to spend hundreds of dollars on Windows or Mac when there are countless Linux alternatives that they could download, install and make use of completely free of charge?

It’s always tempting to praise articles you agree with, but bear with me. The reasons here match with my own experience, especially concerns about the number of distributions. Sometimes it is not just the number that is the problem but the intensity that people defend their choice. Surely this is just missing the point of Linux. What’s more important is that people try rather than whether they agree on distribution.

Mark Shuttleworth » Blog Archive » Microsoft is not the real threat

Much has been written about Microsoft’s allegation of patent infringements in Linux (by which I’m sure they mean GNU/Linux ). I don’t think Microsoft is the real threat, and in fact, I think Microsoft and the Linux community will actually end up fighting on the same side of this issue.

I’m in favour of patents in general, but not software or business method patents. I’ll blog separately some day about why that’s the case, but for the moment I’ll just state for the record my view that software patents hinder, rather than help, innovation in the software industry.

Beyond knowing he is behind the Ubuntu distribution I didn’t know much about Mark Shuttleworth but I’m very impressed by this article, not least because it is one of the most reasoned approaches to co-existing with Microsoft I have read in a long time.

Sadly, I still worry that the only people who will benefit from a patent war will be the lawyers. Still given the cold war analagies flying about over Mutually Assured Destruction patent policies, at least someone will compared to nuclear war….

9 Little Known Ways To Sleep So It Counts at Ririan Project

Can’t sleep? You may have tried medication. You know you have to stay away from bad guys like caffeine, alcohol and nicotine. And you’ve probably heard it’s not wise to exercise too vigorously or eat too big a meal a couple of hours before bedtime. Perhaps you’ve even tried to stick to a regular sleep-wake schedule. Still have problems getting a sound sleep? Try these snooze tips you may not have heard before.

I found the arrival of two small children into my world an excellent cure for the hour or so that it used to take me to go to sleep!

The Internet Tough Guy is a feature in all Internet social forums. These are people who poison discussions with anger, hatred, and threats. Some are malicious. Some are crazy. Some are just afflicted with a rotten sense of humor. Whatever their motives, they’re a scourge. It takes precious little trolling to sour a message-board.

Some helpful advice here. I’ve been on forums where some people take offense very quickly despite having made far worse comments about other people. Tempting as it is to try and take people down to size, it’s better to try and defuse the situation. Still I get far more satisfaction from knowing I have beaten the other person intellectually. There have been several threads that have dried up when the agitator has been asked for actual proof of their claims.

Microsoft claims software like Linux violates its patents - May 28, 2007

Microsoft claims that free software like Linux, which runs a big chunk of corporate America, violates 235 of its patents. It wants royalties from distributors and users. Users like you, maybe. Fortune’s Roger Parloff reports.

Finally a number. Looks like this will get very messy very quickly if this does kick off. Still I’d rather a cold war of software than the old sort with nukes.

Stop the distractions

Anyone that says they are great at multitasking is lying … all the research (like this) on “interruption science” shows the human brain is most efficient when dealing with a single task. Several articles show as much as 15-25 minutes for the brain to get back to optimal focus on a complex task after even a simple interruption! Wow!!

Even though I sometimes go into denial about this, I can’t avoid the fact it’s true. A recent example was a little coding project I’ve been trying to get finished for months. I eventually sat down and ignored all other distractions and got it finished in an afternoon.

The problem, as Jason points out, is that computers just make it too easy to get distracted: Instant Messenger, email clients checking every 20 minutes, RSS feeds, news tickers, even writing blog posts, the list just goes on and on.

Well I shall do my best to stay focused and stop looking for distractions rather than getting on with real work, just after I check the forums….

Ubuntu Linux 7.04 Feisty Fawn Review: Problems with Ubuntu Fiesty Fawn

The good stuff aside, I had a number of problems with this release. Fiesty Fawn was supposed to make multimedia easier. Strangely enough I ran into some difficulties with multimedia, as well as with some of the other new features. Here’s a list in no particular order: [I’ve editing for brevity, click on the link for the full text - TS]

1. Firefox does not have Flash installed by default.
2. My Nvidia drivers were not installed by default.
3. When I popped a DVD into my computer, Ubuntu did try to search for the appropriate codec. However, I was not able to get the DVD to play.
4. The Windows Migration Tool did not detect my Windows Vista installation and account settings.

There has been a lot of talk about Ubuntu on the forums I lurk in but I still find it hard to see what the fuss is about. Both OpenSuse and Mandriva have impressed me more although some of the issues quoted above still apply, including the graphics drivers.

I know it sounds overly harsh but sometimes I wonder if the whole Linux community REALLY wants to go mainstream. Perhaps I’m too ready to accept a free but non opensource solution when I should be holding out for true opensource, but I can understand Nvidia (and other hardware manufacturers, let’s not single any one particular company out) wanting to hold on to trade secrets.

Still lets be positive, Ubuntu has done sterling work in raising the profile of Linux, especially with the free delivery offer.