It’s quite an exciting time in the FOSS graphics world at the moment. After a long, long wait, GIMP 3.0 is finally at RC1 (first release candidate) stage. Debian 13 (Trixie aka Testing) users have just received the long-awaited KDE Plasma 6 desktop – with full Wayland support. Which I have to say that after…
While the Clownstrike fiasco rumbles-on in the West, and people in our particular part of the planet can’t even purchase a train ticket, it seems both Russia and China are almost completely unaffected. Editor’s note 2024-08-17: Seems we’re not the only site referring to Cloudstrike as “Clownstrike”. Crowdstrike has issued several takedown notices to a…
Today our planet is suffering what appears to be Microsoft’s biggest ever outage. Seems the culprit is a piece of buggy “security” software provided by a company called Crowdstrike. Or is that Clownstrike? It sends Microsoft Windows computers into a never-ending boot loop, from which users cannot escape, without going into “safe mode” and removing…
The GNU/Linux family of operating systems (e.g. Debian, Fedora, KDE Neon, Kubuntu, LinuxMint, Red Hat, Ubuntu, Xubuntu et al) are not permitted to use the UNIX trademark. Instead, they are described as “unix-like“. In fact, the “GNU” in GNU/Linux (c/w the “G” in GIMP) is a recursive acronym meaning GNU’s not Unix. In a nutshell,…
Seems there is quite a lot of buzz about a “new” image format called “WebP” that is seeing increasing use on-line recently. Although it is attributed to Google, WebP was not strictly a Google invention. It was originally developed by On2 of New York as part of its VP* series “Truemotion” video codecs. Google acquired…
IBM is not one of Microsoft’s biggest fans, particularly after it was well-and -truly shafted in the OS/2 fiasco. So it seems very surprising that its subsidiary Lenovo refuses absolutely to provide any refunds for unwanted Microsoft Licenses, thus completely ignoring the Microsoft EULA. 2009-11-26 12:57 Good afternoon Garfield Unfortunately we are unable to advise…
On 2009-11-26, I wrote to Acer UK to establish what its policy was regarding the Microsoft Tax. This was its response:- Hello, Thank you for contacting Acer. Regarding your enquiry, The value would be £33.95 for vista home premium. This can only be refunded within 30 days of purchase and to get it refunded you…
This is a relatively quick and very effective way to beef up your (K)Ubuntu installation. In other words, it’s how to install all your favorite Ubuntu apps all in one go! Note this primarily applies to (K)Ubuntu 9.04 & 9.10 (Jaunty & Karmic), 64 bit versions. For (K)Ubuntu 8.04 please visit earlier (and possibly outdated)…
This is the fourth article in a series of case studies illustrating the difficulty one has purchasing a PC in the UK without being forced to pay a “Microsoft Tax”. We use Linux on all our PC’s and have done so for several years. Therefore we do not need, nor should we be forced to…
We eventually did hear back from Laptops direct. Amazingly, its sales team openly admits that it ignores the Microsoft EULA! So nil penguin points! But if there were a category for honesty then it would get plenty of penguins! The emails are in reverse order and since I guess the sales person is just “following…
Rationale At the moment, everyone who buys a PC from a UK supplier has to buy a Microsoft Windows license whether they want it or not. One has no choice, it is included in the price one pays. So, even if you are using one of the many free alternative operating systems such as Ubuntu,…
This is an update to the Dell OS-free laptop fiasco:- http://www.garfnet.org.uk/joomla/index.php? option=com_content&view=article&id=182&Itemid=331 Seems that whilst Dell cannot be bothered to respond to our enquires with regard to buying laptops OS-free, or whether it is prepared to refund customers for unused Microsoft licenses as per Microsoft’s EULA, it is however perfectly happy to spam its customers…
This is the second article in a new series of case studies illustrating the difficulty one has purchasing a PC in the UK without being forced to pay a “Microsoft Tax”. We use Linux on all our PC’s and have done so for several years. Therefore we do not need, nor should we be forced…
This is a new series of case studies illustrating the difficulty one has purchasing a PC in the UK without being forced to pay a “Microsoft Tax”. We use Linux on all our PC’s and have done so for several years. Therefore we do not need, nor should we be forced to pay for any…
This is the third article in a new series of case studies illustrating the difficulty one has purchasing a PC in the UK without being forced to pay a “Microsoft Tax”. We use Linux on all our PC’s and have done so for several years. Therefore we do not need, nor should we be forced…
I’m a big fan of WINE and an even bigger fan of CrossoverLinux. This is the commercial implementation of WINE by CodeWeavers. For many Windows apps it works very well indeed. In many ways I prefer it to using a virtual machine (VM) because firstly one does not have to start a VM just to…
I’ve had cheapo cards that I dropped, kicked, trod on, used a squillion times, paid the proverbial tuppence ha’penny for and they are still going. Others, even the expensive ones have failed or become flaky within a few months – or worse, clapped out just outside the warranty. Similarly hard disks can fail in the…
Editor’s note: since writing this article, I have had huge problems with RTools spamming me. I have asked them many times to stop, yet still they persist. My advice is do not use any RTools product. Or that if you must use RTools, do NOT register, otherwise they will pester you forever. Using the free…
Microsoft has been in trouble for some time – but has taken its executives quite a while to realise it. Vista has been a massive flop. And M$ is becoming increasingly perceived as a company that has ruthlessly exploited its monopoly – fleecing its customers for vast sums of money whilst providing poor quality, insecure…
[Reproduced from DEOSS ] Seems that Micro$haft’s corporate enslavement permeates far beyond the English-speaking world. A long and complex legal battle is currently raging in the former Eastern Bloc state of Hungary. APEH (the Hungarian Tax Office) has decided that all Hungarian businesses now have to submit their tax returns on-line. This would not be…
It seems that with a little determination, the CS-R20 for the Icom IC-R20 software can be persuaded to run on Linux. I eventually made the CS-R20 software load under Kubuntu Linux using Crossover (a commercial implementation of WINE). The method in this article should work with many other Debian-derived Linuxes too, perhaps with a little…
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…
