Thursday, February 21, 2008
Open Source Software - Overview
Open Source Software - Overview: "Even if you don’t know what Open Source software is, you have undoubtedly interacted with it in the last 24 hours. If you have been on the Web in that time, most the pages you saw were almost undoubtedly served by a Linux (Open Source) server operating system running Apache (open Source) software. If you looked at a blog (weblog), it was almost certainly presented to you by Open Source software, probably WordPress, although there are a number of other Open Source blog programs."
Weird History | The Best Article Every day
Weird History | The Best Article Every day: "Next time you’re washing your hands and the water temperature isn’t just how you like it, think about how things used to be. Here are some facts about the 1500s.
Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May and still smelled pretty good by June. However, they were starting to smell, so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the body odor.
Baths consisted of a big tub filled with hot water. The man of the house had the privilege of the nice clean water, then all the other sons and men, then the women and finally the children — last of all the babies. By then the water was so dirty you could actually lose someone in it. Hence the saying, “Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water.”"
Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May and still smelled pretty good by June. However, they were starting to smell, so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the body odor.
Baths consisted of a big tub filled with hot water. The man of the house had the privilege of the nice clean water, then all the other sons and men, then the women and finally the children — last of all the babies. By then the water was so dirty you could actually lose someone in it. Hence the saying, “Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water.”"
Monday, February 18, 2008
101 Ubuntu Tips, Tricks and Tutorials : lxpages.com blog
101 Ubuntu Tips, Tricks and Tutorials : lxpages.com blog: "In this article we’ve compiled 101 list of Ubuntu tutorials. If you’re thinking of switching to Ubuntu from Windows, don’t waste your time thinking too much. Switch to Ubuntu now and you’ll never think about going back. Windows maybe more popular but Linux isn’t too far behind and Ubuntu distro is one of the main reasons. Ubuntu is the simplest, easiest, and a very stable Linux distribution to switch to from Windows."
Personally, I recommend that you start by installing Kubuntu, the KDE desktop version of Ubuntu.
Best Restaurants In Raleigh-Durham | Where The Locals Eat
Best Restaurants In Raleigh-Durham | Where The Locals Eat
A good list of highly rated restaurants in the Triangle.
Sunday, February 17, 2008
An Amazing Mind: Why Linux Doesn't Spread - the Curse of Being Free
An Amazing Mind: Why Linux Doesn't Spread - the Curse of Being Free
An interesting insight into the mindset of a consumer...
Linux isn't very popular on the desktop. It's a far third behind OS X, which is a very far second behind Windows. Most people cite pre-installed operating systems as the reason. But as a student of psychology, I see something most people don't. There's one big factor in why Linux isn't popular on the desktop. Linux is free. I know this sounds like complete dog's bollocks, but hear me out before judging my sanity.
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
What is the coolest thing you can do using Linux that you can't do with Windows or on a Mac
Copied from the website...
Someone asked me this recently. I don't have just one answer. I compiled a list of things I thought of and emailed it to my friend...then I thought I would post it here for future reference. Feel free to add to the list! There is also a forums thread on the same topic, that I remembered as I complied my thoughts, so I stole some of the ideas posted there.
1. Upgrade to the newest version legally and without paying money
2. Have the latest version of the operating system run faster than the previous version on the same hardware
3. Easily install and run different graphical interfaces if I don't like the default setup
4. Install twenty programs with one command
5. Have the system automatically update all my installed programs for me.
6. Install the same copy of my OS (Ubuntu) on multiple computers without worrying about license restrictions or activation keys
7. Give away copies of the operating system and other programs that run on it without breaking any laws, governmental or ethical or moral, because it was all intended to be used this way
8. Have full control over my computer hardware and know that there are no secret back doors in my software, put there by malicious software companies or governments
9. Run without using a virus scanner, adware/spyware protection, and not reboot my computer for months, even when I do keep up with all of the latest security updates
10. Run my computer without needing to defragment my hard drive, ever
11. Try out software, decide I don't like it, uninstall it, and know that it didn't leave little bits of stuff in a registry that can build up and slow down my machine
12. Make a major mistake that requires a complete reinstallation and be able to do it in less than an hour, because I put all of my data on a separate partition from the operating system and program files
13. Boot into a desktop with flash and effects as cool as Windows Vista on a three year old computer...in less than 40 seconds, including the time it takes me to type my username and password to login
14. Customize anything I want, legally, including my favorite programs. I can even track down the software developers to ask them questions, contribute ideas, and get involved in the actual design/software writing process if I want to
15. Have 4+ word processor windows open working on papers, listen to music, play with flashy desktop effects, have contact with a largely happy community and have firefox, instant messaging, and email clients all open at the same time, without ever having had to beg someone for a code to make my os work, and without the system running so slow it is useless
16. Use the command "dpkg --get-selections > pkg.list" to make a full, detailed list of all software I have installed, backup my /etc and /home directories on a separate partition, and you are able to recover your system any time, easily
17. Run multiple desktops simultaneously, or even allow multiple users to log in and use the computer simultaneously
18. Resize a hard disk partition without having to delete it and without losing the data on it
19. Use the same hardware for more than 5 years before it really needs to be replaced...I have some hardware that is nearly 10 years old, running Linux, and still useful
20. Browse the web while the OS is being installed!
21. Use almost any hardware and have a driver for it included with the operating system...eliminating the need to scour the internet to find the hardware manufacturer's website to locate one
22. Get the source code for almost anything, including the OS kernel and most of my applications
I could go on, but that's long enough. :)
Someone asked me this recently. I don't have just one answer. I compiled a list of things I thought of and emailed it to my friend...then I thought I would post it here for future reference. Feel free to add to the list! There is also a forums thread on the same topic, that I remembered as I complied my thoughts, so I stole some of the ideas posted there.
1. Upgrade to the newest version legally and without paying money
2. Have the latest version of the operating system run faster than the previous version on the same hardware
3. Easily install and run different graphical interfaces if I don't like the default setup
4. Install twenty programs with one command
5. Have the system automatically update all my installed programs for me.
6. Install the same copy of my OS (Ubuntu) on multiple computers without worrying about license restrictions or activation keys
7. Give away copies of the operating system and other programs that run on it without breaking any laws, governmental or ethical or moral, because it was all intended to be used this way
8. Have full control over my computer hardware and know that there are no secret back doors in my software, put there by malicious software companies or governments
9. Run without using a virus scanner, adware/spyware protection, and not reboot my computer for months, even when I do keep up with all of the latest security updates
10. Run my computer without needing to defragment my hard drive, ever
11. Try out software, decide I don't like it, uninstall it, and know that it didn't leave little bits of stuff in a registry that can build up and slow down my machine
12. Make a major mistake that requires a complete reinstallation and be able to do it in less than an hour, because I put all of my data on a separate partition from the operating system and program files
13. Boot into a desktop with flash and effects as cool as Windows Vista on a three year old computer...in less than 40 seconds, including the time it takes me to type my username and password to login
14. Customize anything I want, legally, including my favorite programs. I can even track down the software developers to ask them questions, contribute ideas, and get involved in the actual design/software writing process if I want to
15. Have 4+ word processor windows open working on papers, listen to music, play with flashy desktop effects, have contact with a largely happy community and have firefox, instant messaging, and email clients all open at the same time, without ever having had to beg someone for a code to make my os work, and without the system running so slow it is useless
16. Use the command "dpkg --get-selections > pkg.list" to make a full, detailed list of all software I have installed, backup my /etc and /home directories on a separate partition, and you are able to recover your system any time, easily
17. Run multiple desktops simultaneously, or even allow multiple users to log in and use the computer simultaneously
18. Resize a hard disk partition without having to delete it and without losing the data on it
19. Use the same hardware for more than 5 years before it really needs to be replaced...I have some hardware that is nearly 10 years old, running Linux, and still useful
20. Browse the web while the OS is being installed!
21. Use almost any hardware and have a driver for it included with the operating system...eliminating the need to scour the internet to find the hardware manufacturer's website to locate one
22. Get the source code for almost anything, including the OS kernel and most of my applications
I could go on, but that's long enough. :)
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Tesseract OCR How-To, by Dr Stupid; Scripts by Fred Smith
Groklaw - Tesseract OCR How-To, by Dr Stupid; Scripts by Fred Smith
I have recently discovered Tesseract, the OCR software used by Google for its books.google.com offerings. I have used a number of open source OCR packages in the past, but this exceeds them all. I believe Tesseract will become the main stream de facto Linux OCR program once some GUI interfaces are written for it. Perhaps the Kooka team will incorporate it.
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