Dhampir Dreams

Is Linux Right for you?

Why that answer is usually going to be yes.

By: LD

Why should I switch to Linux?

This is a question I hear a lot of the time from people who run Windows are are quite happy with it. And for a lot of people, Windows in all it’s incarnations is usually good enough. But do you really want good enough? Do you really want to keep paying $300 every time you upgrade your computer, or the classic Microsoft toll for any system you buy with Windows installed?

If you have an older computer that works okay but can’t handle anything more then Windows 95, Linux can improve the speed and use of that system. If all you are doing is email and web browsing, you really don’t need the major features of Windows. Even music is doable easily in Linux.

What are the benefits?

The benefits of running a Linux system are numerous. For instance, you don’t have to worry about your resources being eaten alive by all sorts of under the hood Windows applications. Not to mention the more efficient and customizable usage of your hard drive.

Also, you have the whole of the free open source software available on the Internet. If there is a Windows program you like, there is a Linux program that will do the job.

You want to play games that are Windows only? Simply install WineX on your linux system. It is specifically tailored to run games from Windows. So you can enjoy fragging your friends and enemies no sweat.

Not all open source software is free though. Some of it you do have to pay for. It’s not all free beer, but it is free speech in that you will be able to look at the source code if you are o inclined to do so. Every version of the Linux kernel is available for download if you want to look at it. This is especially helpful for developers who need that info so they can create applications to run on Linux.

What about my stuff?

Well, if you’ve been a good computer user you have backups. If not, don’t worry. Linux is able to read data from any Fat16, Fat32, and in some cases NTFS partition so you can grab all your stuff without a problem.

Still, there are things you have to give up if you run Linux. Many of your external toys may not work anymore. But not to worry, most of them may have a Linux work around done by someone else who had the same problem. You can always google search and find a site that will help you with this problem.

There are tons of reasons why Linux may be your best choice. But here’s the big one itself. If you don’t want to pay for a distribution, you don’t really have to. Most every Linux Distro is available on the Internet. Just be sure you have a high speed net connection or know someone who does. 600MB is a lot to download.

If you want to try Linux, but don’t want to go all the way just yet, download a distro called Knoppix. This distro boots and loads everything you need for a working Linux system from the CD, without you ever having to touch the hard drive or fiddle with partitions.

In my next article, I’ll go over the various Linux distros and point out the ones that are best for newbies or those wanting to try Linux as their primary OS.

Later.

Ghosts

Nighttime breeze through the broken streets,

shards of glass crushed along the feet.

We walk the boundary between night and day,

forever seen yet unseen in the fray.

The people of day retreating from the rising moon,

they feel the darkness is their doom.

Those who shy from the light of day,

fearing the light will blind their way.

Those ghosts wandering in between,

always seen yet unseen.

They see the coin for what it is,

neither one nor the other but whole and inseparable.

Neither one nor the other,

day and night will not bother.

The ghosts of past and present stand here forever,

watching and waiting along the ether.

Night time predators stalking prey,

Daylight warriors worshiping day.

Ghosts shifting in between,

forever seen yet unseen.

Usually we use this spot for updating about the general site activity and updates. this time though there is a project that has come to my attention through Eric Blair I’d like to post up here.

A group of folk have decided to take fan-based work up a notch. Zeak Studios is producing an entire animation series based on the Re-take Evangelion dojinshi (sp). this is definatly something I hae never heard of in fan based art work of any kind and marks a nice little event in my opinion. Darkscribes.org and Evafics.org will have links posted to his site and hopfully he’ll have his first video out by May 23.

We’ll be supporting this project as best we can. They could use some voice actors, especially females. so if you want to aid these guys head over to his site and take a look. Also the associated youtube page is here.

We wish him good luck in his endevor.

Long time to see,

Decided to reinstall the seti@home project on my home system. Fact is that this was the first project in what became to be known as Distributed computing. THe idea is that by sharing the load with many computers at regular peoples homes they can do more and get more done then just with their super computers alone. And they are right. Since SETI@Home started, Berkley took their original idea and created a frame work any other project could take advantage of. Boinc is a frame work that allows many projects to utilize the dead cycles of your proc when you aren’t doing anything except say… posting to your blog. Writing a fanfiction or novel.

Wasting power while you are at work.

SETI@Home can be found here. BOINC can be found here.

There are many projects using this software, so if you aren’t as interested in Aliens you can find one for your interests rather easily.

Hello,

Today KDE 4 was released, version 4.0.2 to be exact. it’s a lovely piece of programing from what I’ve been able to see so far and hope i will continue to be so. Many of the various apps that make KDE the major DE it is are still being developed to include a stand alone web browser based not on khTml but on WebKit, and other major revamps of programs. However the major shifting of all the newer stuff is still worth the updating even to the developmental branch of KDE 4. If you want to wait, then 4.1 will be the KDE you want.

Due to the two months of being unemployed I’ve been less then interested in my writing. I’m hoping that now that I’m employed again I’ll be able to get more into things like that again. I want to continue on with Imperium and try to get more stuff working on that. eventually I’ll have a nice full on novel with a PDF download and maybe self publish the damned thing. Anyone interested in assisting me fiscally on that to take some worries off my brow and allow me to focus on my wiritng is more then welcome.

I have found a new job finnaly, I’m working in a security company. It’s not Dell computer stuff, but it’s something I’m used to, working with appropriate authorities to make things safer for people even if it’s through people who are subs and not everyone. Wish I had some more money and made a bit more, but for now this is good enough.

Shift work for the win folks.

Well, anyone who knows me closely already knows this news. I recently got laid off from my job, so i’m in the middle of reassessing my life… again. I’m not sure if I want to go back to school on the GI Bill or if I want to just get back to work. Right now I’m tempted to just do the whole school thing, get a degree in Compi Sci with a minor in creative writing and go from there. It would be interesing.
Writing wise, I’m still working on my fanfics some, and pouring some effort back into Imperium Nocturna. I’m still needing some assistence with some things there, and anyone willing to assist in what is on the help wanted section are more then welcome.
I’m also trying to work on some more original work, maybe some short stories which will be posted here and on Darkscribes. I’m still really more interested in keeping my original work seperate from my fanfiction, but DS is still the best place to post for me. Either way, you’ll have a choice of where to go.
I’ve been toying around with skins recently for both DD and Imperium. I think I’ve got he color scheme themes I like and the layouts, though some specialized headers and images would be nice. Anyone willing to assist would be welcome on that as well.
No ill will towards Dell, they just didn’t have anything for a phone tech anymore. I’m just going to keep going. Thanks for any support you feel you would like to give.
Laters.

Fox News.com

AP news

BBC

After 50+ years, North and South Korea have signed a real peace treaty. No longer a cease fire, no longer a need for the Demilitarized zone.

The Longest Cold/Hot War in history is at an end.

I have been a big proponent of FOSS software and projects based on them. The Nokia n800 is marketed as an internet tablet by Nokia. It actualy functions well as a PDA. I’ve had no issues with the standard pim functionality. If anything I would say pim is something only the truely awful screw up.

Now, the n800 has some sweet features, to include a builtin webcam, fm tuner, wifi, bluetooth and an onscreen keyboard. The big thing however is the already substantial catalogue of available apps. One need only check the Maemo project page to see.

There are several good addons being developed to include a screen graber, skype, and a program called WordPy. I’m using WordPy to write this entry. Now this is the one thing that could be better. Idon’t like the onscreen kb for stuff like this. It does okay, but it’s difficult to get stuff out right.

All in all I like it.

Well,

Seems Theo De Raadt doesn’t have an issue with people taking and using BSD licensed code anyway they want, from completely locking up and not even saying it’s used like Microsoft does, or saying it’s used but giving absolutely nothing back to anyone like Apple does.

But if someone, say a Linux Kernel dev, does to BSD licensed code what he doesn’t apparently have an issue with closed source proprietary people doing he gets pissed.

Here’s the post on kerneltrap.org

No I’m not a lawyer, and while I want to start learning to code I’m no programmer. But this seems to me that he’s basically pissed that any project that uses the GPL’d license might try to do the exact same.

Fact is, the issue is a non-issue as fact is the code in question was duel licensed and the confusion is basically does the nature of dual licencing  allow someone to basically just go with over the other. I’ll leave that question to the lawyers as I have no idea.

My question, and my feeling is, that if this BSD licence, supposedly freer then the GPL. which allows people to lock out anyone from seeing their changes unlike the GPL which requires the receiver to give the same rights to code they got to whomever they distribute to, then why the dust up?

BAsically these guys gave all their code out under a licence that except for having attribution to the original just screams as Captain Jack said, “Take all you can, give nothing back.”

Please, if I’m wrong someone clear it up for me.

So I decided I wanted to try to learn to code. And as nuts as I am I chose C++ as the programming language I would go with. Mostly because this is the most used language out there for binary programming. I should hopefully be able to apply what I learn in C++ to anything else. Or at least be able to figure the good stuff out.

Fact is I want to get a Nokia n800 and then create a program to use as a MythTV remote on it. If I ever get around to learning how I’ll post the source code here under GPLv3 or 2 for others to help and contribute to.

One thing I want to eventually do is actually go back to school and get a degree. but that is probably a long ways off.

Hello folks. I know I’ve been negligent keeping the blog up to date but I’ve been busy. Finally got the writing bug back for some of my fanfics and got some new stuff posted on DS. Always a good spot to go for Fanfiction if I do say so myself. I’m trying to get back in the mood for Imperium as well, so expect SOME movement on that site here in the mid-range. I really probably should take some time to outline Imperium and hope that helps me move it a bit faster.

A lot of stuff has happened since I last posted. The big thing though is pretty good news for us linux nuts. SCO’s claims of Copywrite on the Unix and Unixware trademarks were summarily found to be property of Novell and the SCO was obligated to obey the Novell folk when it comes to ending their copywrite suit against IBM. SCO’s case has pretty much been eviscerated from this ruling. When the Nazgul are finished with them well… the executive board may beg the SEC to throw them in jail.

Vista has been a nightmare to deal with at work. Too many things are incompatable, too many people wanting to use five year old hardware with the new OS, and too many programs just out last year that are wholly incompatable. Just way too much going wrong here. Hell, DX10 and DX10.1 are really hurting me, since neither Nvidia or ATI have a stable DX10 driver for their DX10 compatable hardware.

MS added another headache when they said that the DX10 compatible hardware out now will be completely unusable and incompatible with DX10.1. And People wonder why I push Open Source, OpenGL, and OpenAL as the way to go.

MS also seems to be trying to buy standardization for OOXML. Way too many people being bribed into supporting this abomination of a standard. We already have a truly open and extensible ISO supported standard. There is no reason to fast track OOXML especially with all the many flaws built into it. Too many requirements that the OOXML format support bugs from older binary versions of Office. Just drop that first off and actually change the standard to fix those problems.

That’s my opinion though. I’m no expert.

Fanfic wise I posted two new fics. Exile which can be found here, and the first chapter of a short comedy fic called Neko-Waffers, which can be found here.

Most if not all of my older fics are slated for MAJOR revisions before their next chapters come out. I’ll be working on those chapters over time, but they will all be revised before I post their next chapters. FFN also has my current work.

I’ve been working hard the last month with TRParky over on Darkscribes.org trying to rearrange and reestablish the way we do things over there. We’ve basically wiped out the forums and started from scratch, brought in new blood for the moderation of the forums, and have got some new blood on the main page.

I’m interested in knowing what you guys think about the changes to www.darscribes.org and some ideas to help make it better. We’ll be adding some stuff from cafee press hopefully, which will give us some good and bad on the site.

Let me know what you think when it’s all said and done folk.

If you are reading this message then you are pulling this site up from the new server.  This new server is a giant step up as far as hardware is concerned compared to the old server.

Processor: Dual Dual-Core AMD Opterons (OH YEAH!  MORE POWER!)
Memory: 6 GB
OS: CentOS 4.5
Kernel: 2.6.9-42.0.10.ELsmp

Hourly snapshots of the server’s hard disks are done automatically to the server’s data vault.  This makes it so that even if the all of the hard disks in the server died at once (I know, so horribly impossible of happening), the web host just swaps out the box and the server is reloaded from the data vault as if nothing happened.

In the continuing Saga of SCO versus the Open Source and Free Software world at large, the folk at SCO have summoned PJ from Groklaw to be deposed in relation to SCO v Novell. What possible reason they could have or think they have for trying to pull this sort of bullshit is anyones guess. One big piece of crap that has been thrown out by these folk is that Miss Pamala Jones is in fact a conglomeration of IBM lawyers working a rather detailed PR campaign.

Even though every bit of data put forth on Groklaw.net is in fact public record, and court room events are pieced together by eyewitness testemony from people in the gallery. PJ has been reporting on this entire legal debacle for the last three years and posted almost daily, totalling up to 3000+ articles on the subject. Hell, in order to maintain her integrety she left a perfectly good paying job with the OSRM instead of allow FUD to be spread by her work there.

It’s not right for SCO to be able to strip a person of income, and the folk on Groklaw have been extremely helpful to her.

Thing is with all this work she’s been doing, last Saturday she left a note on Groklaw saying she was taking a break to deal with some health issues and get back on her feet physically. After working three years straight I’m surprised she hasn’t had a break down already. However the moment she decides to take a vacation this happens. Well, there is no information on GLN for us to really look at, as PJ isn’t around to defend herself.

Personally the girl has my support. I hope she gets through this and that someone at the EFF is already working to quash this supenoa.

Steve Jobs recently put out an open letter saying that Apple would be more then happy to drop all DRM… if the record industry would let them. Fact is I want all DRM gone from everything as it is little more then a constant infringment on my rights as a person, and I refuse to support anyone who agrees with it’s nescessity. This means the RIAA and this means the crap the content industry got put into Windows Vista. My freedom and my rights trump pretty.

Now the RIAA is saying sure Apple can figure out a way to make thing interoperable with DRM. Granted they could, but the fact is it shouldn’t be happening. The RIAA is simply wanting a way to limit how you can use music you purchase and if possible, make you buy it again and again. It’s profiteering, and along with their litigation is rauqeteering and even as far as criminal anti-trust. So you know what I have to say to these guys?

Bite Me.
I buy my music on CD’s, and I rip them to flac so I can have top quality on my entertainment center. I don’t share with anyone, I don’t do anything illegal and I don’t share my stuff with people mostly because I can’t convince people to switch to open and free formats.

I very much would urge anyone reading this to start petitioning their states Attorny’s General or the US justice Department to start an investigation into these illegal acts by the MPAA and the RIAA. It’s time we took a stand and said no more. Our computers and the information on them are OURS. They don’t belong to MS and they certainly don’t belong to the tyrannical lot in Hollywood.

If it could happen I would like to see a civil case against the whole lot for various actions against the people of the US.

Found this review of Sabiyon Linux and thought I’d share. This distro is a varient on the Gentoo distro that I use at home. It’s basically an attempt to get a nice more easy to install out of the box experience from the basic gentoo install.

Anthony Cumia shares his Windows Vista Loading experience.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LxQm3IsSKAo

Nvidia customers are suing Nvidia for crappy Vista driver support.

Now, why can’t we in the linux community sue for non-existence linux support? Oh, cause then we first try to do it ourselves.

For the folk who care. J.K. Rowling has announced that the seventh book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows will be released July 21, 2007. Get your idea hats on.

I think it’s pretty obvious where I fall on this issue simply by who is supporting which format. Fact is I feel ODF is superior to OOXML is all ways as it relates to platform independence, interoperability, and content fidelity. OOXML is ladden with a buch of crap from Word 1.0 on, and in order to completely implement the spec you have to include bugs that were never fixed in previous office formats. As well the 6000 page spec only says you have to implement it, with no indication of HOW you should implement it.

Why the HELL should this spec include a thosand depreicated constants and bugs from previous versions of the doc format?

Rob Weir goes into details about the flaws in the process so far that has allowed OOXML to fast track through the ECMA rubber stamp to ISO.

Grokdoc.net has a listing of objections to the OOXML format that have been or will be submitted to ISO in order to prevent the standards body from adopting the OOXML format as a standard.

Fact is that the OOXML spec is only going to be able to be fully implemented by Microsoft. No other implementation will be possible due to the pure volume of depricated crap and purposfully left in bugs in the spec. IBM has already made public statements against the OOXML spec.

For more information on the ODF format check out Opendocument.xml.org for more details on the ODF format.

Anyone who has read this blog knows I dispise using MS software. It’s buggy, it’s insecure, and it’s horribly devoted to locking me out of my computers inner workings. Vista has come to replace XP, and the issues that sent me away from XP swearing are back in full force and worse in some cases with Vista.

To start, if you are concidering Vista and haven’t read this article by Peter Guttman on the DRM built into Vista. Basically what this means is if you don’t spend a shit load of money to get all the DRM approved hardware into your system you will have reduced and degraded quality, BY DESIGN, of all premium blu-ray and HD-DVD content on this system. MS decided that the desires of the Content industry trumped the peoples rights to fair use. More issues will provide lock in to windows of consumers, and lock OUT of competitors.

All legal and above board due to DMCA I suppose. It’s still illegal for me to watch a DVD, key word in this is WATCH, in Linux due to DMCA. Needless to say I find this abhorent.

Lets not forget the hardware requirements to pull off Aero. For the cost to get a vista ready system where you can use aero you get… Multi-Color selections and transparency of said colors. You can’t change ANYTHING ELSE. Sorry, but when you’ve used Beryl or Compiz and have gotten as good or better effects on substantially lower end hardware you become harder to impress. My E1505 with it’s intel 945GM card would be prohibited from running Aero.

Well… if I need that much hardware just to pull off transparency then explain to me why the same can do shit like this:

I suppose I may be a little hard to please. Perhaps I’m jumping the gun here. But when I have an os that tries it’s hardest to take my rights to my data stores away from me like Vista does I get pissed.

My professional recommendation is that reguardless of who you buy your next system from, refuse to accept windows at all. And if they won’t sell it to you demand a Windows refund and install a linux os like Ubuntu or Fedora Core. You’ll be getting better reliabilty and graphical ability then you will with Vista. You won’t have to deal with the DRM lock-out. The only reason I could say anything other then this is if you are a hardcore gamer and can’t live without your worthless World of Warcraft or what not… even though WoW is completely supported in Cedega.