Posts Tagged ‘Linux’

Initial thoughts on Prism

Monday, January 7th, 2008

Prism – from Mozilla – tries to integrate web applications with your desktop by giving you an icon and dedicated browser window for each application you configure. That’s it.

I saw Prism when it was first announced, but never got around to looking at it. Then a recent post by Lee Tambiah reminded me about it and I actually got around to looking at it just now.

Installation is simple:

  1. Download the tarball from here
  2. Extract it to a folder in your home directory (e.g. /home/you/prism)
  3. Then for each site you want to “applicationise”, run /home/you/prism/prism and give it a URL and name, check the options and ask it to create a desktop icon
  4. When you want to re-open the application, double-click the relevant icon on your desktop

Nice and simple, eh?

There’s not really a lot else to say. It’s Gecko based, so it will work as well as Firefox. There’s no tabs, Extensions or Flash – I’ll let you decide if that’s good or bad.

For sites like Twitter, Pownce or Google Calendar (and at a pinch, Facebook) it’s great, but without tabs I couldn’t imagine using it for Google Reader, or Launchpad.

Nokia N800

Monday, December 31st, 2007

After a rather late (or more accurately early) night, I was awoken by a text from my friend asking when my Nokia N800 was arriving. I forewent answering him in favour of more sleep, only to be woken again, but this time by a delivery man with the item in question.

After upgrading it to OS2008 (thanks mrben), I started playing with it properly. So far I’m loving it, but I’ve not done that much with it besides surfing, mail and Skype but then it is an internet tablet.

Things I would like to see:

  • Being to synchronise contacts with my N95 or Evolution
  • The webcam being supported by Skype/Flash

Are there any apps I should check out?

On a semi-related note yesterday I debranded my N95 and updated it to the latest firmware.

Oh, and of course this was posted from the N800! :)

Dear lazyweb: 64-bit or not?

Sunday, November 25th, 2007

My laptop contains – amongst other things – a dual-core AMD Turion™ 64 X2 which is unsurprisingly a 64-bit processor. When I purchased the machine and shoved Vista to the side to install Ubuntu I opted for the 32-bit version because, well, basically I’m lazy.

One upgrade, multiple updates, and various package installs/removals later and I think things are starting to get a bit crufty. Combining this with my growing resentment of Vista hogging a part of the hard disk that I rarely use, and I’m thinking it’s time to re-install and do it properly this time.

This leaves me with one question though – should I go 64-bit or not? I’ve heard various stories with varying degrees of horror and wonder, and I just don’t know if it’s worth it or not.

Nokia N800 or Apple iPhone?

Thursday, September 27th, 2007

Earlier this week I was in New York City (it’s a helluva town), and as well as the usual tourist attractions I stopped by the Apple store in Soho so I could play with the iPhone and iPod Touch.

Both devices are very slick – Safari and WiFi access are excellent – but I see little point in getting a Touch when the iPhone is just around the corner in the UK. Even better, the iPhone is exclusive to my current mobile provider.

However, I have a slight dilemma. I like Apple products, and I really want an iPhone when my contract is up for renewal. The problem is that I don’t like the direction Apple is going with shutting out direct access to their devices, nor can I properly sync my Evolution calendar and contacts to the device if I get one. Thirdly, I already have a phone that is pretty good (as a phone).

So I started focusing about what I really like about the iPhone, and apart from the whole shiny Apple experience it boils down to two things: Browser and WiFi. This got me thinking again about the Nokia N800, which also has the added bonuses of being a) open, b) hackable and c) supports VoIP.

What I really want to know from N800 owners is two things:

  1. Are you happy with your device?
  2. Are you planning to replace it with an iPhone?

Answers on a postcard please.

Multimediocre

Friday, August 24th, 2007

Nik Butler put out a vlog, vodcast, video today commenting on the state of multimedia in FOSS. This is my response.

(more…)

Bring it on

Thursday, July 12th, 2007

Yes, that’s my handiwork. So is the tagline sworn in the USA. I also suggested the land of the chin and home of the beard, but sworn is better.

No idea if I will get to LRLUSA’08, or even if it will be as good as the originals but the simple fact that a drunken idea has managed to spawn a popular podcast, an annual event and now an international event deserves to be recognised.

For the record the logo was created in Inkscape, and if you wish to pimp LRLUSA’08 yourself, you can grab some images here:

If you want to do some remixes – I’m sure the LugRadio boys will appreciate it – here’s the source:

Unlike the rest of this site, these images and source file are released under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License. Attribution should be done by either my name (David Murphy) or nick (schwuk) and a link back to this entry (preferable) or this site. If you can’t abide by the license, don’t use the files.

As Aq. rightly points out, these need to allow commercial use so that they can use them to promote LRLUSA’08 in good faith. Therefore I have revised the license under which they are made available (this is why Creative Commons is so good). I could have given the LRL guys separate permission, but this way is cleaner.

Penguin Powered Gaming: Wormux

Tuesday, May 29th, 2007

Today I finally stopped putting off upgrading the schwuklet’s computers to Feisty, and actually did it. Sort of. The story actually started yesterday when I started looking at schwuklet #1’s computer which it transpired never completed an upgrade to Edgy several months ago and whilst it would still work, it would not under any circumstances talk to my network. After numerous attempts and much head scratching I gave up, loaned it a working CD drive and did a fresh install of Feisty. Schwuklet #2’s computer was still on Dapper, and although I got it upgraded to Edgy it ended up being much quicker (on a slow machine) to also do a fresh install.

So two clean machines, almost ready for grubby little fingers. Of course I needed to install their games which are the usual suspects like GCompris, Childsplay, Tuxpaint et al. Whilst selecting the packages to install I scanned past all the other games available and realised that a) I’d never heard of most of them and b) if I hadn’t, then it was likely others hadn’t either.

This leads us to Penguin Powered Gaming. My collection of (brief) reviews of games that meet the following strict criteria:

  1. They are available in any of the official repositories for the current (at time of writing) release of Ubuntu
  2. Er, that’s it

I do not intend to cover every game, in fact I’ll be avoiding the better known ones (e.g. BZFlag, Armagetron). I want to explore new titles and hopefully share them with others who have overlooked or remained ignorant of them.

Here ends a lengthy introduction to our first title: Wormux.

Current Version 0.7.9
Packaged Version 0.7.9
Ubuntu Version 7.04 (Feisty Fawn)
Repository universe
Install $ sudo apt-get install wormux

Wormux - Title Screen

No prizes for guessing this is a clone of the 2D variants of the Worms games – which should need no introduction – with the usual Free/Open Source slant. Worms has been a firm favourite of mine since the original on the Amiga, although I’ve tended to generally play it on various consoles – in fact Worms is my most played title on Xbox Live Arcade.

Wormux Gameplay

Gameplay remains almost identical, although weapons do differ slightly. Graphics and sound are both well done. Most importantly, it is fun. If you liked any of the 2D Worms titles, you’ll like this.

Overall Rating: Worth installing

I know I hinted these might be brief, but this was briefer than I intended. Wormux builds on such a well known game style that there is little to judge apart from how well the developers have done implementing it and I’m happy to say that they have succeeded in making a fun and enjoyable game.

The job is dead! Long live the job!

Friday, April 20th, 2007

It’s finally here!

Today marks the last day of my employment with CSC. After 9 years (originally a freelancer, then the last 4½ years as a permanent employee) it is time to move to pastures new.

On Monday I will be joining Canonical as a developer on Launchpad (any comments about (open|free)ing of said product should be directed to Matt).

The best bit? Getting to work with a passionate group of people who believe in what they’re doing. The worst bit? Having to explain to non-technical family and friends what Canonical do. The best bit of the worst bit? Starting to explain it to the schwuklets, realising who I’m talking to, tell them they help make Ubuntu and schwuklet #2 (who is only 5 years old) knowing exactly what I’m talking about! :)

Of course every silver lining has a cloud, but you have to take the (dog) rough with the smooth. (I’d put a ;) in here, but you know how much he likes those…)

Introducing WebDev Control Panel

Friday, April 13th, 2007

Once upon a time there was a little project called the XAMPP Control Panel. An associate of mine had a hankering for a similar application to control specific services used for web development on his local machine, so I looked to adapt Jono’s project to his needs. However, as is often the case in these scenarios, I ended up scrapping the vast majority of his code and starting from near-scratch.

In a very short space of time a working result was achieved, but said associate no longer had a requirement for due to a change of platform. Rather than let it languish, I started adapting it to be more generic and removed some additional (and not fully implemented) functionality to create the WebDev Control Panel.

A project which promptly vanished into the depths of my hard disk and was mostly forgotten about. I fetched it out from time-to-time and tweaked a bit here, changed a bit there, but overall it sat collecting dust. I fully intended it to be released as Free software, but was loath to release in its current form.

Jumping forward to a couple of weeks ago, I needed to re-acquaint myself with Python, so I dusted off the project and started polishing it. I made the code more object-oriented; I converted it from a fixed list of services to a dynamic one (controlled by a config file); and finally I made it ready for translation.

Finally the time had come, and I could find no decent reason for putting it off any longer. I had to release it.

So, after that long introduction, here is the WebDev Control Panel. Enjoy.

WebDev Control Panel

Anonymous Cowards

Thursday, March 29th, 2007

Communities – by definition – are made up of different people, who will act differently even though they have a common interest. However when the actions of one reflect on the community as a whole, they need to be called out.

Within the Ubuntu community we have the Code of Conduct to define acceptable behaviour, and – in my opinion – the community is better for it. Recently there was a ‘joke’ posted to the Ubuntu-UK mailing list, which one member responded to describing it as breaching the Code of Conduct. Unfortunately Caroline did not explain her reasoning, but nonetheless a minor flame war heated discussion was triggered.

Jump forward a good few days, and some anonymous coward – who presumably was involved in the aforementioned discussion – decided to target Caroline for swearing on her blog. Following this she has removed herself from both the planet and mailing list.

The departure of any member from a community should be reflected on. In this case I don’t blame Caroline for leaving as she was not made to feel particularly welcome recently, but I hope she will reconsider her position. The actions of this one anonymous coward however are inexcusable, and by remaining anonymous make the rest of Ubuntu-UK look bad.