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If you're missing Dee-Ann LeBlanc, don't feel bad - so are we! She's been up to her eyeballs in keeping busy with multiple endeavors, which leaves her unable to continue running this newsletter. If she can't give you, her readers, her all, then she'd rather leave it in the care of someone who can. We hope she'll find the time to contribute the occasional article as her schedule permits, but in the meantime we must make do.
She realizes that her predecessor left in a similar hurry, but she wants to make it clear that her departure was due to a decision made, with much deliberation, by necessity over desire. If she could do as she wishes and not as she must, she'd still be cranking out the good Linux newsletter stuff we've come to love here at Lockergnome and the words here would be hers, not mine.
Perhaps you know someone who might be able to help us with this newsletter so it might continue to bring Linux-loving Gnomies the news, tips, downloads, products, books, and overall chit-chat we all look forward to? Perhaps you are that someone? Drop us a line! We'd love to hear from you.
Without further ado, here's the very belated, most recent issue of Linux Fanatics! We hope to return to a more regular schedule once we can give you the quality you deserve.
Yours Digitally,
Chris Pirillo
Peter Galli's November 3 article in eWeek, Longhorn Pitted Against Linux 2.6, compels Ryan Dawson to write:
This is an interesting read. However, Windows doesn't compete with Linux. Yes, they are both in the same Operating System market. But, when it comes down to it, both environments pursue different things. A notable example is Windows Server 2003: it drastically outperforms Linux on a 4, 8, 16, 32-way system. But, on the other hand, Linux beats Server 2003 on the small server. The reason is because Server 2003 optimizes for the larger systems, while Linux does the opposite. Ask anyone on the kernel team, I guarantee you they will say the same thing. As a matter of fact, I had a talk with Rob Short last night, so I am predisposed to the outcome of the question. The same is true for the desktop market. Of course everyone's dream is domination, but Linux makes business decisions just like Microsoft and they choose to pursue certain things. In lieu of the current security debacle with Windows, Apple and Linux have been extra careful to dot the Is and cross the Ts. This is a simple example. Linux fights for the secure, stable market position. Like I said, Microsoft wants it all (don't we all), but they chose to pursue usability the most, which they are known for. That said, I am not sure what this author is trying to stir; by reading the article, he didn't even pit Longhorn against Linux 2.6, for the most part.[Miguel de Icaza's Web log provides us with] another interesting read. I actually got to spend some time with the Mono crew at the PDC, and I got to look at their thoughts for domination. Someone at the conference said something about the open source guys being "feature f&%#$ers." Excuse my language. For the most part, I don't know too much about it, but Miguel is saying the same thing. They go after the coolness effect. For a long time, we have all heard Microsoft execs speak about the unique ability for Open Source to have no problem producing software against commercial vendors. It looks as though Mono is starting to reach that point. I think the same is true for Linux. They are good at what they do, but it gets to a point where they are just confronted with too much to compete with. Microsoft pays people to take care of the grunge work, where the Open Source has no such mechanism. It will be interesting to see how they are going to keep up. I have heard some frustration on their part, since the preview of longhorn. Their eyes are starting to wander back to Windows.
Secondly, Linux is very much becoming a business, if it already wasn't. Look at the Novell, Ximian (Mono), SuSE trio. I thought it was all about free software, but Novell is actually pursuing an interesting business plan. They are providing open source software, but by the same token, they are stamping their name and approval on it. Their money is going to come from the support and add-on services. I think Linux has naturally drifted this way for a long time. However, this is the same reason I don't think there is much Linux appeal on the desktop. It plainly will have a lot of trouble competing with Windows, at least at present. These are just some of my thoughts of late.
And this compels Paul Becker to add:
Hmm, Ryan Dawson must not have read this article, also in eWeek.
D'oh! Well, it's worth checking out, to be sure.
Domo Arigato, GoriTech! A few of you have written to us asking for directions to decent mp3 players for Linux. Here's a spiffy one called Domo as described by Tucows:
This program is a music organizer which indexes digital audio sources including CDA, MP3, OGG and WMA directories and CDs. It also supports PLS, B4S, M3U and TXT playlists. It can extract information and insert it into a MySQL database. The database can then be queried, exported to TXT, PLS, M3U, B4S and HTML, and compared with other digital audio sources.
From a recent Humorix:
PROVO, UTAH -- Nearly two hundred humor writers, fake news reporters, and tongue-in-cheek columnists descended on SCO's headquarters yesterday to protest the company's continued slide into unreality."Humor writers have very active imagination. But none of us -- absolutely none of us -- could ever have imagined the kind of ludicrous and inconceivable things that SCO has decided to pursue," explained a reporter for the New York Times, the world's leading source of spurious news. "You simply can't make this stuff up... a fact which represents a great hardship on humorists everywhere."
Read the rest here.
Sitting on the Fence in Canada writes:
Gary Bazdell of Canada writes:
I would like to add a couple of points relative to the recent channel chatter regarding Linux not being as useful a desktop product as XP. Well, I run both. My Mandrake 9.1 is a bit more feature-rich than my XP. My old ATI TV card is not supported by XP nor is XP able to play all the hobo movies that friends have lent me. These movies seem to have been liberated from a Web point and need [many] different codecs to run them. My XP had none that could have made that possible and nearly a dozen were obtained and installed. Still, many movies just didn't play. All of these movies play on my Mandrake right out of the box. Yes, I did buy the Mandrake as I also bought XP Pro, Win2K, and Redhat 9 (someone has to buy this stuff)! My point is that the Mandrake surprised me with this newfound ability and had I known that, I would not have bought a new TV card that was XP-compatible! Sitting on the fence in Canada.
Randy Clowes writes:
I started with you some time ago. At first I thought you might be able to help me in my search in getting Linux to work for me. I've bought 20 - 30 copies of different distros and still haven't found any way to get on the Net with it yet. You're correct if you're saying that if I had spent as much time with Linux as I have searching for drivers for Micro$haft, I'd have been there already!At various times over the last four years, I've tried Linux installs. They always configure themselves (for the most part) easily, while I tear my hair out with a $138.00 legitimate copy of Win98s second try. It's just the modem/Internet that hangs me up after I have to dig for the left out solutions on how to enter some vague command to reboot into KDE.
Wouldn't it be great if I could start all these new users out on Linux without them ever having to know how to use Windows? Where/how do I find someone from whom I can learn about Linux (without being a pro-typist)?
We're researching online shopping carts and merchant transaction companies and would like to know what your experience is with specific companies. How easy or hard is it to set it up? How do the fees compare with other companies? What are its strengths? Weaknesses? How do they ensure the process is secure? Features? Many small businesses are overwhelmed by the choices and don't know what to look for in such a product. Plus, they can't pay exorbitant fees especially when first starting out. We heard a few people complain about CardService International and want to help others to avoid bad experiences. Send your notes to Meryl at lockergnome.com. We'll share feedback in a future issue. [Meryl]
If you're new to Linux and trying to wean yourself away from Windows, you might want to see what nice things Lee Schlesinger at NewsForge has to say about Win4Lin.
"I was disappointed with Wine and CrossOver Office. I noted that VMware was a better, if more expensive, solution. Readers quickly told me I was missing something -- Netraverse's Win4Lin, which lets you run Windows from within Linux. And, after playing with Win4Lin for some time now, I see how right they were."
Read the rest of the report here.
http://www.httrack.com/page/2/en/index.html
This is a neat and fun program. Just to give you an idea of its speed, I'm on a cable modem here in AZ and I was able to grab 205 pages of Lockergnome in about 2 minutes. This included some PDFs and Word documents that are found on the site. Browsing LG from my desktop was nice, but there were a few missing items that were probably found in the LG CSS file but couldn't be grabbed by this program. I also didn't configure it to go and grab from other LG domains, such as channels, or help.
Okay, we know we were gone for a while - some of you thought we'd never return! Well, here we are! Maybe you missed us, maybe not, but did you know that we've missed you? So it wasn't for a whole summer or even spring break, but trying to get things into working order from a complete overhaul takes time!
What we'd like to know here at Lockergnome Central is: How have you been spending your time, lately? Do you work at finding new ways to make technology more of a friend than a foe? Or have you been cursing it with every breath and searching for answers to a vexing computer problem? Don't keep it to yourself - talk to us! We'd love to hear about your experiences and share them with our fellow Gnomies through this very newsletter! Long stories, short anecdotes, cries in the wilderness for advice, advice for those crying in the wilderness, you name it! Drop us a line! Lockergnome needs you!