Posts Tagged ‘Linux’

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Netbooks and Ignorance

Sunday, October 26th, 2008

Netbooks

I’ve been thinking about getting a netbook since I first laid eyes on the Eee PC, and with the next UDS fast approaching the thought of lugging my current laptop (I’ll give you a clue as to why - it’s called Treebeard for a reason) has moved me from just thinking about it to deciding which one will become “my precious” soon. (Sorry - I’ve been watching the extended Lord of the Rings box set.)

Current favourites are:

Dell Mini 9 - This one scores bonus points for coming with Ubuntu pre-installed, but I fail to see why paying an extra £30 for the Microsoft Windows version also scores you an additional 8GB storage and a better webcam Asus Eee PC 900 - Eee PC may be the original, but is it the best? On the good side lots of people have them, so support is good, and there’s a dedicated Ubuntu community. On the bad side I find their styling a little… bland Acer Apsire One - Good points: cheap (see below), nice styling. Bad points: Not 100% with Ubuntu (even Intrepid), cringeworthy advert

I was this close to picking up an Aspire One (this morning after calling into PC World on the way back from fixing my mother’s wireless card. They have the A110AB in store for £179.99 - very, very tempting if it wasn’t for the incompatibilities listed on the Ubuntu wiki.

Ignorance

Unsurprisingly the netbook “aisle” (more of a large shelf really) was very popular, with a number of families looking at the various offerings, and one guy testing his phone with an Eee PC to see if mobile internet worked (it did, but he was testing on a Microsoft Windows model).

There were various conversations about which make/model was best and whether they should go for the Linux or Microsoft Windows version, and  - of course - I couldn’t help being drawn into these. Fortunately the Schwuklets were kept busy with Frozen Bubble on one of the display Eee PCs.

Nuggets of wisdom being imparted from the PC World staff to potential purchasers:

Linux is for basic users Microsoft Windows is more advanced than Linux Linux is “sort of” compatible with Microsoft Windows, but not vice versa (OK, this is “sort of” true, but they put it in such a way as to steer the customers towards Microsoft) If their kids get used to Linux, they will have trouble using Microsoft Windows If you buy a Linux model, you can install Microsoft Windows on it provided you have your license key. They even offered to do this for a fee

Whilst the last one might be true, it would presumably only apply to bought copies of Microsoft Windows - I’m almost certain OEM licenses are non-transferable, and I’d be surprised if any were (especially with the activation rigmarole). This seems particularly bad advice to be giving to people, especially the sort who are shopping in PC World in the first place, as they have probably never bought an operating system in their life!

It was disappointing to see most of the interest in the Linux models were purely based on price and usually followed up with the inevitable “can I get Microsoft on it?”. For the vast majority of people buying these types of devices Linux will more than meet their requirements, but it seems like we have a ways to go on convincing people of that.

The fun part was when I was getting involved in these discussions, one of the “assistants” had the cheek to ask “what makes [me] such an expert?”. If only PC World still had a decent section of books…

Note to self: I must not bait staff in computer shops. I must not bait staff in computer shops. I must not…

Tags: acer, asus, dell, Linux, netbook, pc world, ubuntu
Posted in Linux, ubuntu | 20 Comments »

bzr status schwuk

Saturday, September 13th, 2008

Well it’s been a while I wrote here (if you ignore the Twitter spam :)) - in fact July was the last time I blogged in earnest - and a few things have changed, so I thought I’d talk about some of them.

First of all I’ve moved to the Distro QA team here at Canonical. This means that I’m now working directly on Ubuntu, and my work will be much more visible - both in the distribution and here on this blog. I’m working with a great team here within Canonical - Henrik, Leann, Brian, Steve, Ara, Pedro, and Marc - and the wider Ubuntu QA community, as well as the rest of the Distro team and of course the whole Ubuntu community. At the moment I’m focused on hardware testing, and you’ll be seeing a lot more attention given to testing in Ubuntu over the next few releases.

Apart from working I attended the “last” LugRadio Live - see you all again next year! - and had a great holiday in the South of France. I also spent a long weekend in the woods in Wales at the Bushcraft UK Bushmoot where I got the chance to meet Mors Kochanski who is an amazing, inspiring and above all friendly guy. The ‘moot itself was well worth the trip, just like LugRadio Live is, but meeting him made it absolutely worthwhile.

Last November I pondered moving to 64-bit. Last week after a few stability and performance problems (entirely self-inflicted) I decided to bite the bullet, wipe Vista from my hard drive forever (it came with the laptop, and I left it around “just in case” but it never really got used) and perform a fresh install. This was my first “real” install (if you ignore my testing work) since I first put Feisty on the laptop when I got it, and the install experience is really nice these days. Since I had the opportunity I decided to go with 64-bit, and I’m pleased to say that I’ve had zero problems with it. Flash is commonly criticised as being difficult under 64-bit, but it installed via the package in Synaptic and has worked since. If anything Firefox + Flash has been more reliable than it was under 32-bit.

In August I succumbed and got myself an iPhone 3G, even though I’m months away from the end of my current contract with my N95. So far I have been seriously impressed with it - browsing is excellent, and it is by far the best e-mail experience I’ve had on any mobile device to date. Oh, and it’s a decent phone too! :) I’ve not really encountered any of the performance/stability problems many others have complained about, except when I had it configured to sync OTA with Google via NeuvaSync when it would occasionally get a bit sluggish. That was with the 2.0.2 firmware, and I’ve not re-enabled OTA syncing since upgrading to 2.1 yesterday. This is my first iPod as well - the only other current iPod in the house belongs to Schwuklet #1, although Schwuklet #2 has put an order in with Santa Claus for a 4th generation Nano. The iPhone has increased my podcast consumption as well, which can only be a good thing.

That’s it for now, but I’m sure I’ll think of more things to post soon.

Tags: 64-bit, canonical, iphone, Linux, person, ubuntu, ubuntu-qa
Posted in Browsing, Bushcraft, Linux, Listening, Personal | No Comments »

Epic fail, but optimistic

Monday, June 9th, 2008

So my attempt to listen to every LUGRadio episode ever failed big style. :(

However LUGRadio Live 2008 approaches, so the time for planning is afoot. My hotel is booked (as of today), and it’s time to get the word out about the event.

LRL - Crew Member

(The things I’ll do for a yellow t-shirt!)

Tags: Linux, lrl, lugradio
Posted in Linux | No Comments »

Stuck on you

Tuesday, April 1st, 2008

It was remiss of me not to mention it at the time, but during that traditional British pastime known as Easter Weekend I left the comfort of Cumbria and ventured south. After a completely uneventful journey (although there was KFC of the boneless variety) I found myself in the company of Alan Pope, Dave Walker, Ciemon Dunville, a significantly svelter (than the last time I saw him) Tony Whitmore, Laura Cowen, a bunch of audio equipment, several EeePCs, an Openmoko Neo 1793, and cake (no lie).

Such a gathering could only mean one thing…

No, not that!

It was the recording of the second episode of the official (because we said so) Ubuntu UK Podcast which, thanks to certain stars and planets being aligned (and the fact I was in the area anyway), I was able to take part in.

This was my third attempt at participating in a podcast - the first two involved (separately) a phone and attending the Linux User and Developer Exposition - and was very enjoyable. It took me bit to get used talking into the microphone and not at whoever I was talking/replying to, but I got there. I’ve met all except Ciemon numerous times in the past, so it really was more like getting together with friends than recording a show. Considering this is only their second episode, it all felt very professional.

I’d love to take part in more episodes, but geography is against that, so I’ll continue to be involved in planning, promotion and the site of course.

We’ve added a Twitter account for the show where we’ll announce items of pertinence. If you’re a Twitterer make sure you follow us.

Anyway, go listen, (hopefully) enjoy and more importantly let us know what you thought.

Tags: Linux, podcast, ubuntu, ubuntu-uk
Posted in Linux, Listening | No Comments »

Keypad Restored

Tuesday, April 1st, 2008

After upgrading to Hardy I noticed that my numeric keypad was no longer working. Not a huge inconvenience, but when you’ve got one you like to be able to use it don’t you?

This morning - after trying to use it again - I decided to have another go at fixing it. A quick Google provided me with the solution:

Go into the Keyboard Preferences (System >Preferences > Keyboard) Switch to the Mouse Keys tab Uncheck the box for Allow to control the pointer using the keyboard

Grammar excepted, a logical procedure but why (oh why) is it enabled by default?

Tags: gnome, keyboard, keypad, Linux, ubuntu
Posted in Linux | 4 Comments »

Counting Down to Hardy Heron

Saturday, March 29th, 2008

The other day I upgraded to the Hardy Heron beta, and the experience - as expected - was mostly flawless.

I inititated the upgrade last thing at night and left it downloading. The next morning it was waiting for me to answer a question, which I did and then continued working while it proceeded in the background. It needed input from me a few times concerning configuration files, but for the most part no interaction was required. A while later it was complete and asked me to reboot. I did because it was a convenient time for me, but throughout the whole process I just carried on working with no problems at all.

I’ve no experience of upgrading (or even installing) OS X, but I know the same experience would be difficult to replicate on Microsoft Windows, especially when you consider that all my applications were upgraded at the same time as the Operating System.

Once Hardy is formally released - and I’ve got the opportunity - I plan to completely re-install this machine and wipe all traces of Microsoft Windows from it forever (Vista is still lurking around on here, wasting space along with a defunct recovery partition).

So if like me you’re waiting for the release of Hardy, add the counter to your website. Find the massively complicated installation instructions here.

Tags: hardy heron, Linux, ubuntu
Posted in Linux | 4 Comments »

Media Management Misery

Wednesday, March 12th, 2008

I’m sure I’ll get some heat for this, but here goes…

Why is managing media so painful under Linux?

I have a significant amount of audio on my laptop, and a phone that is a fairly capable music player. However if I want to copy some of that audio to my phone, I have to resort to manually copying and arranging the files, as well as ensuring the tags are right (as the N95 relies on these). It’s an awkward, but manageable process that I don’t do so often.

Podcasts are a different story though. My phone is capable of downloading podcasts itself, but they are slow to download and awkward to manage. Copying podcasts from the laptop to the phone can be fraught with peril.

By contrast I had to reset my daughter’s iPod today after I tried to manage it under Linux.  The reset and re-population through iTunes was painless. I know it is because Apple control the software and hardware, but it can’t be that hard to get right can it?

Don’t even get me started on photos and movies…

Tags: audio, Linux, media, n95, phone, podcast, ubuntu
Posted in Linux, Listening, Viewing | 13 Comments »

Ubuntu UK Podcast

Tuesday, March 11th, 2008

Some folks from the Ubuntu UK Local Community team have got together and made a podcast:

Ubuntu UK Podcast

Tags: Linux, podcast, ubuntu, uk
Posted in Linux, Listening | No Comments »

Giving up on AWN, for now

Thursday, March 6th, 2008

I’ve shutdown AWN and reverted my GNOME desktop back to the usual top and bottom panels. Although AWN is great, and could well be the interface of the future, I guess I’m just too used to GNOME now.

I suspect GNOME Do is here to stay though. :)

Tags: awn, gnome do, Linux, ubuntu
Posted in Linux | 4 Comments »

Experimentation

Wednesday, March 5th, 2008

A change is as good as a rest, or so they say. Well this week I’ve been making quite a few changes.

It started off with a post from Jorge about integrating Launchpad with GNOME Do. I’d been aware of GNOME Do for a while, but never got around to trying it. Well now I have, and I love it. I do have to keep reminding myself it’s there, but I’m getting used to it.

A quick side note - PPAs rock. Major props to Celso, Julian and Kiko for making them part of Launchpad. They make obtaining packages for new projects so much easier.

I can’t remember what prompted me to try it, but I’m now using the Avant Window Manager (also known as AWN). This combined with GNOME Do lets me have a minimalist desktop.

Following a discussion about Flock I’m now trying that out again (see here and here for my previous experiences with it). I’ll post some updated opinions in a few days, but at the moment I’m ambivalent. As always when playing with a new toy, this post has been written with Flock.

Finally I’m back on Jaiku again thanks to Jaiku Invites. I’m not quite sure why when I’m getting increasingly bored with social networks, but we’ll see what happens.

Another side note - my machine hung completely while I was originally writing this post. After the reboot both Firefox and Flock restored their sessions as I have become used to. I was also pleased to the see that Flock restored this post.

Blogged with Flock

Tags: awn, Browsing, flock, gnome do, jaiku, launchpad, Linux, ppa, social netowrking, ubuntu
Posted in Browsing, Linux | 1 Comment »

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