IT Freedom

Where is Linux going?

mail — Thu, 06 Sep 2007 10:09:32 +0000

Linux and other open source applications are finding increasing acceptance in the global marketplace in small and large companies alike. Statistics on the growth of a few open source programs—like Apache, a web server; Linux, an operating system; FreeBSD, an operating system; and PostgreSQL, a database server—show this to be true. In this article, we’ll consider why open source is growing so fast, and what it means to you, the leader of a small company.

Hack Attack: Take Launchy beyond application launching - Lifehacker

mail — Mon, 06 Aug 2007 14:05:07 +0000

Most people know Launchy as a simple and lightning-fast application launcher for Windows, but it’s actually capable of much more than that. Using Launchy, you can append text to files, schedule appointments, add to your to-do list, set reminders, and more—it just takes a little setting up. Today I’ll detail how I use Launchy for more than just app launching.

Hack Attack: Take Launchy beyond application launching - Lifehacker

If you use Launchy you should read this article. If you don’t use Launchy you should read this to. And then discover what you’ve been missing.

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Tags: opensource, windows,

Studio to Go! - Home

mail — Mon, 23 Jul 2007 11:14:37 +0000

The Studio to Go! software series provides a complete introduction to the amazing world of Linux Audio and features a integrated audio and compositional environment on a single bootable disk. The new 2.0 release includes many usability improvements that add up to make this the most complete and best-integrated release yet of the original and finest Linux Audio bootable CD distribution.

Studio to Go! - Home

This looks worth the small fee for downloading. Unfortunately the last time I tried to run an audio distro the soundcard was not detected but then it was a fairly recent realtek hd model.

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Tags: linux, music, audio

Official Google Blog: Overview of our accessible services

mail — Mon, 16 Jul 2007 16:32:46 +0000

We provide a wide variety of services that are mostly accessed with a web browser. People visit Google from a large number of browsers and platforms; in addition, we also understand that every user is special and may have special needs. Accessibility at Google is about making sure that our services work well for all our users — independent of your needs and abilities at any given time.

Official Google Blog: Overview of our accessible services

Web accessibility is a real bugbear of mine. It’s important for so many reasons, not just the moral and ethical but accessible websites tend to do better with search engines. This is a really helpful list of Google services.

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Tags: google, accessibility

Top 10 Worst Web App Names

mail — Mon, 16 Jul 2007 14:27:54 +0000

One aspect of Web 2.0 that continues to entertain is the strange, sometimes awful, names that startups come up with to promote themselves. Some of them turn out to be successful - e.g. del.icio.us - but others prove to be ineffective. Some web 2.0 names have been compared to Star Wars characters and there’s even a Web 2.0 Name Generator, in case you need inspiration.

Top 10 Worst Web App Names

On the one hand, the name of something alway seems secondary to actually having a product that works but I think this shows what can happen if you mess the name up.

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End of an era

mail — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 22:00:09 +0000

I was very saddened to read of the end of free email from Postmaster. It was my first ever personal email address from when I was at University. The web adverts were just not enough to keep it going, so the only option is to pay £15 a year. In all honesty that isn’t very much but with several domain name based emails I just can’t justify the money. I suppose I should have realised this when my emails were deleted because I hadn’t accessed the account for three months.

All good things come to an end I suppose.

Improve Linux with a USB key

mail — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 11:41:10 +0000

Featured Linux Download: Speed up your Linux box with a thumb drive - Lifehacker

SwapBoost is a surprisingly short bash script that increases your virtual memory by the amount of free space on the USB drive. SwapBoost isn’t identical to ReadyBoost since ReadyBoost does more than just turn a USB drive into swap space, however SwapBoost is surprisingly easy to get going:

A very cool idea this one. I’d be intrigued to see if the performance of the USB key needs to be at a certain point for it to give a benefit. I once went through three USB keys before finding one that Windows Vista considered to be good enought for ReadyBoost.

Web hosting, easy to start, hard to do securelylinux

mail — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 13:21:59 +0000

Well, overjoyed with my Bubba server’s web hosting capabilities I’ve decided to set it up for testing the various CMS systems I’ve had my eye on (joomla, CMSimple and Wordpress I’m already using elsewhere, MoveableType and Drupal are on the todo list) as well as trying out some templates for people.
Of course the thing is, I don’t really want it [i]that [/i]visible on the net. I don’t have a domain name, just a fixed IP but I get a little paranoid in these matters.
So I thought, lets just set up a password protected folder on the website. It’s Apache on Debian so htaccess will let me do that.
Well yes, but the only thing the article from About on setting up .htaccess and .htpasswd does not say that you might need to adjust the settings for Apache to enable this feature.
A GUI is not part of the sterling features of the Bubba (there’s got to be some cost for the low power draw ARM CPU) so I’m having to learn vi as well. How complicated can one text editor be?!
Well I’m nearly there but it got to 1am and I decided that it was high time to go to bed.

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Tags: linux, web hosting, bubba

Finding your way around Linux (well *nix)

mail — Tue, 03 Jul 2007 13:57:51 +0000

The most radical change for me when I first started Linux was that I did not know where to look for files. The same thing probably happened when I started using Windows but that was so long ago it is hard to remember!

If this has happened to you, then this article about the Linux, sorry *nix, procedure for naming files and folders will be very helpful.

Microsoft fonts for linux

mail — Mon, 02 Jul 2007 14:58:09 +0000

, or Hindsight is a wonderful thing. Microsoft released its core fonts on a fairly open licence so there is nothing to stop you from installing them, no matter which operating system you use. More explanation from Lifehacker….

A user of the Linux Mint forum demonstrates the two-step process of installing Microsoft Fonts. What are these “Microsoft fonts?” A little known fact to non-Linux users is that Microsoft fonts are (surprise, surprise) proprietary, and hence are not installed in most Linux distros by default. Back in the day when Microsoft gave a crap about interoperability, they released a reusable package of fonts that could be integrated into most any operating system. Well, that package is still used in Linux