So for those of you who don’t know or follow my twitter feed, my aunt is a IT Pro Advisor at Microsoft Canada. You may also know that my opinion of Microsoft hasn’t been the highest (as expressed often in this blog).
The purpose of my visit was to ask successful people how they got to where they are in their field, which holds my interest. The people were incredibly kind and interesting and really let me pick their brains. Continue reading
OMG! Ubuntu (a blog you should certainly be reading if you don’t already have it in your reader) has the complete guide to tricking out XSplash, the new bootscreen manager in Ubuntu 9.10.
One of the great things about XSplash is that it starts XServer, what displays good graphics on your screen in Linux, BSD, and OS X systems, a few seconds into the boot instead of near the end. This means that you no longer have to really know your stuff to change the bootscreen; all you need to do is follow some very simple instructions.
First off, if you just want to change your bootscreen, play with the files in /usr/share/images/xsplash
But I’m not here to talk about that: I’m talking about a seamless boot experience that changes your login window and XSplash background to be your normal wallpaper. Continue reading
The latest release of Ubuntu has hit the streets. The much-acclaimed “Karmic Koala” (Ubuntu 9.10’s codename) is now out in earnest, bringing many usability enhancements as well as technical ones.
Make sure to use the torrents if you can, just to relieve server tension.
Because I can’t update incredibly often, I’ll use this post to point you to OMG! UBUNTU!, probably the best Ubuntu blog I’ve seen out there. Regularly updated, OMG! UBUNTU! gives you the low-down on everything Ubuntu-related, including upcoming plans.
It has come to my attention that the public is not educated about the intertube’s latest sensation, FilmRiot, the Revision3 show that shows you how to pull off the techniques you see in the movies without having to sell your soul for an FX budget.
So I present this Public Service Announcement for the betterment of my readers.
So I was thinking about one particular thing that I wrote about in my review of the GNOME shell, when I said that you should drop the ideas you have about how a desktop should look. This was how artificial the “desktop” concept is. Back in the Stone Age we came from the desktop paradigm: it’s what we understood in terms of productivity. However, a computer is much different, much more powerful than a desk. On a desk you have a finite space which contains only the information and objects you put on it. It doesn’t fetch data, tell you anything, give you opinions or options. It’s a tool. A computer is different in that it has the power to fetch information, to move it, and to bring it all together and present it to the user. It can handle any type of media: where a desk could only handle text and photos (unless you put a boom-box on it) the computer can do text and photos and sound and video and social interaction through Twitter and other feed-based services. We need to embrace a paradigm that suits the computer. Continue reading
For starters, throw away all your conceptions about desktops. They no longer apply.
Also remember that I am reviewing a highly experimental piece of software. It may look unwieldy but that’s because it has no customization options yet (or at least, no GUI).
And lastly, remember that because there is a whole new paradigm introduced here it may seem that GNOME Shell’s whole concept is flawed. However, after playing with it I can safely say that I can’t wait for it to arrive and believe it will increase my productivity.
So what am I talking about? This (click for full view).
I can’t honestly say I’m surprised, but I can say I’m dismayed as I’ve heard good things about Bing…
However, Microsoft has been found to be skewing results in it’s Bing Decision Engine, which now provides search for Yahoo as well and provides 20% of the search market.
In the examples given, a search for “Why is Windows so expensive?” turned up results for asking why Macs are so expensive. Similarly, when asked if Microsoft is evil, it would link to articles where Google was portrayed as evil. Google queries – including asking if Google was evil – did their job and returned appropriate results.
Microsoft has cleaned up these certain examples, but what worries me is Microsoft’s tampering with the results which may be as of yet unnoticed. Could they hide a PR faux-pas? Could they hide news of more bugs?
I had been tempted to try Bing as I’ve heard some good things about it (mostly “It’s better than Live Search”, but I’d have to give it a fair shake before knocking it) but this has trampled this temptation. Too bad Microsoft.
Since I find nothing better to write about (ie I don’t want to talk about the whole Google Voice thing), I’ll write about my favourite things. Yes, this is for my family. Let me be subtle:
This is assuming that the government of North Korea *is* behind the attacks against South Korea and the USA. The question implied in the Wired article is whether such a cyber-attack should be considered an act of war (for the record, the North Atlantic Treaty Alliance is starting to shift towards considering it one, based on experience in a 2007 attack by a Russian botnet against the entire country of Estonia). Personally, I believe that a government-sponsored attack against cybernetic infrastructure should be considered an act of aggression, no different than bombing hydroelectric dams or poisoning the water system. In the West – especially in the West – so much is done over internal, national networks that to take those down would be *more* dangerous than poisoning the water main of a major city (think about it: if Canada’s internet went down East-West-North communications would be severely curtailed, and that’s the least of it: Provincial health authorities would be unable to relay important information, traffic would stop flowing in many urban centres, news services would be down as well as cellular networks (upon which Canada relies heavily), the Canadian Banks would be down, the RCMP and Provincial Police Forces would have to enforce order, and so forth. A state the size and population density (or lack thereof) of Canada can not function without its communications networks. America has a more modular political system – each state could assume responsibility for their own wellbeing; as I understand it, each state has their own military force of some kind (state troopers?) and has an executive which has wide-ranging powers. Canada has one military, one executive. The only way a provincial authority can exert force is through its municipal and provincial police.
So yes, a government-sponsored cyber-attack should be grounds for war or at least very very very strong sanctions and a retaliatory cyber-attack (which I’m sure Canada could mount much more effectively than North Korea and the US even more effectively)
Getting involved in cyber-warfare is one of the career possibilities I am possibilitiatizing right now with the Canadian Forces, so this is particularly interesting.
On a lighter note, Wired has a list of 100 *basic* skills for Geeks. I do #44 and I should show #77-79 to my Computer Science/Engineering teacher who runs KCVI’s robotics club (and is very good).
This is a reference to Ubuntu’s famed Bug 1: Microsoft has majority market share (“Microsoft has a majority market share in the new desktop PC marketplace. This is a bug, which Ubuntu is designed to fix.”)
The writer references another writer who identifies (correctly) Linux to be at GhandiCon3 (from the famous Ghandi quote promoting non-violent revolution: “First they ignore you. Then they laugh at you. Then they fight you. Then you win.”). Linux has certainly been ignored. Then laughed at (“Linux? Nothing runs on Linux!”). When Microsoft is issuing Get the “Facts” campaigns and trying to sue Linux supporters into submission (like TomTom GPS), we’re definitely at GhandiCon3 (Then they fight you). Whether we will win, well, that’s to be determind. I am hopeful, however, that the Google Chrome OS will go far to helping us win.
Do I think Microsoft will lose majority market share (Note, this is not wiped out) by June 2011? Not really. Do I hope they do? Yes. Remember, it’s not just Linux that needs to make the dent, but Apple’s OS X (which poses little threat to Linux as long as it stays bound to the Apple Macintosh). As far as crises that would percipitate this go I see US Antitrust breaking up Microsoft, Microsoft flopping with Windows7, or computer manufacturers refusing to put up with the grief that Microsoft gives them (like defining what a “netbook” is despite not actually making computers, Per-Processor Licensing Fees, and the like). Microsoft’s market share is dependent on its stranglehold of the manufacturers and if that collapses, Microsoft would collapse (in relative terms, of course).
Until then, the open source community can just keep making the best software they can and wait for GhandiCon4.
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