These are some of my technology writings. I am a firm believer in the value of open source software and the culture of openness and cooperation that surrounds it. So most of my written work today is about open source rather than proprietary products. If you are looking for information about Microsoft products or anything Windows-based, then you are probably in the wrong place – though please feel free to look around anyway, if you have a few moments to spare.
“The world doesn’t need lots of different operating systems” seems to be the prevailing wisdom of the moment. But I would question that. Why? Do we also need only one type of car, or one type of television? OK there are those who say the world would be a better place without either. But would…
With all the misery in the world, I think this project is actually quite heart-warming. The XO laptop (AKA the $100.00 laptop), is the brainchild of Nicholas Negroponte from MIT and former United Nations Secretary General, Kofi Annan. It is designed for children in the majority world. The first machines started rolling off the Changshu…
2007-10-18 saw the release of the latest Ubuntu & Kubuntu Linux, version 7.10, also known as Gutsy. Unfortunately a number of users are having difficulties with the upgrade. Seems that either the “Version Upgrade” button doesn’t show in your package manager… https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+question/15370 Or if it does show then you cannot go much further. Adept users…
If you want a version of Ubuntu that looks & feels like more like your familiar Windoze XP then try the free upgrade to Kubuntu. Kubuntu uses the KDE desktop. IMHO KDE is loads nicer and much more feature-rich than either Windoze or the Gnome desktop. As well as being highly customisable, KDE makes extensive…
These days I am more concerned with bangs-per-buck rather than the latest, greatest technology. This kit is so disposable nowadays and the technology changes so quickly that I think you need to adopt a completely different purchase strategy. This is my strategy for consumer durables such as digital cameras and computers… Do some research and…
Well they say absolute power corrupts. On the other hand the two companies are quite different. The corporate ethos and the attitude towards creativity are almost complete opposites. For example, I never heard any Google execs reported as using expressions such a “embrace, extend and extinguish“… http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Embrace,_extend_and_extinguish And I think or at least I…
You can finally dump Windows! Several people people have written in asking questions along the lines of, "why are you dumping Windows and using Linux instead?" The answer is simply that we now have overwhelming technical, financial and perhaps most importantly, moral reasons for no longer wishing to use Microsoft software – if it can…
PHPRunner is arguably the best PHP scripting tool currently available. Trouble is that at time of writing, there is only a version for M$ Windoze. This explains how I managed to persuade it work under Linux using Codeweavers CrossoverOffice 6.1.0 – a comercial implementation of WINE. First, I downloaded PHPRunner 4.0 “Build 264” – the…
At time of writing, we have got all the following Windoze apps running very adequately on Linux – using either WINE or Codeweavers Crossover (a commercial implementation of WINE). Of course we have replaced many legacy Windoze applications with equivalent (or sometimes better) Linux apps. Other Windoze apps are currently irreplaceable. This is an assessment…
We bought a couple of IBM Lenovo 3000C200 laptop PCs in 2007 May. These are fairly average 1700MHz laptops purchased from a UK supplier called eBuyer for around 300 quid a throw. These came preloaded with the basic version of Windows Vista. To describe Vista’s performance as dismal would be understatement of the year. Problems…
This is a crude but effective way to make one of my favourite Windows applications, Cerious Software’s ThumbsPlus! version 6 or 7 work reasonably well on Linux, by using Codeweavers Crossover. This is something of a bodge and it has come about more by trial and error rather than by rational scientific reasoning – so…
The Linux file system can seem a little strange especially for those coming from an M$ Windoze background. This is my humble attempt at debunking it and perhaps making it a little easier to understand. Several main differences… There are some important differences between the DOS/Windows type file system and the system used by Unix-derived…
These days, seems a lot of folks are ringing or emailing me asking how to get their printer | scanner | trouser-press | etc. working under Linux. Surprisingly, some devices actually are very easy indeed to install under Linux. For example, almost any laser printer that has Postscript will work with the generic Linux Postscript…
“10 pc Cybercafé for 30ukp!!!!” was the triumphant claim of a recent post on the Puppy Linux users forum… http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?search_id=326686869&t=12714 Thirty pounds sterling is about fifty US dollars – not a lot of money. Needless to say my colleagues and I were intrigued and perhaps even a tad sceptical. More intriguing was the claim that…
The WebOnCD concept concerns putting standard HTML (hypertext mark-up language) pages on a local removable disc such as a CD ROM or DVD. Simple WebOnCD publications are very easy to create. They require little previous programming experience, and no special software. Any text editor such as Notepad for Windows, KDE KWrite or Kate for GNU/Linux…
Well, join the club! This horrid, resource-hogging monstrosity is the bane of my life. My advice? Dump Norton – if you can manage to uninstall the damned thing! My experience of Norton Antivirus is that it behaves much like the viruses it is supposed to protect you from… Uses lots of processing power. Stops other…
Editor’s note: this was written back in 2006, and it is hopelessly out-of-date. Trouble is that today one is spoilt for choice, manufacturers claims are often difficult to understand or substantiate and prices are tumbling so quickly that no sooner than you take your PC home, you see the same model, with more extras, selling…
Day trip to London to see the lights..
A client has lent me a Palm Treo to play with for a few weeks. The Palm Treo is quite an interesting device, it combines the functionality of a mobile phone with a Palm Pilot. It’s built in camera is rather poor and its design needs some work. But I suspect what I have in…
Editors note: these were our last Windows server builds. These machines were both upgraded to GNU/Linux in 2008, and MS Windows was completely removed. 2005-05-20 New MS Windows NT Server servers in Chieftec cases.
Ever since I was a kid, I have always been fascinated by LEDs (light emitting diodes). Back in those days you could only get red ones. Or green if you were very rich. Today they come in lots of colours and they are brilliant fun to use with a digital camera.
