Fox on Fire

Firefox is a cool web browser. It has been my main browser since release 1.0 (latest 1.0.6).

Different people switch to firefox for different reasons, be it better security, cross-platform support (including ubuntu Linux), custom skins, the "cool" factor, etc. A more recent motivation is viability. If you are a Windows user, you need to ask this question: will IE 7, the upcoming version of IE, still run on your current Windows platform? If you are running Windows 2000, then you should be sweating.

Tomorrow, I will go over a helper package that I definitely think you should download if you are using firefox: a download manager.

Linux galore

If you want to keep up-to-date on Linux but you only have time to regularly monitor one web site, then I highly recommend this one:
Linux Admin Portal

While Linux is clearly its main focus, it also features articles on general computing, system administration, and software development. It has reviews, how-tos as well as news articles. I found something useful almost every time I visit that site.

Unfortunately, it does not provide a RSS newsfeed. But, the contents still keep me going there every day.

Digital camera. Now what?

Now that I had finally purchased my first digital camera, and took
some pictures, I looked for some cool things I could do with the image
files.

How about editing them with gimp2?

If you run a recent Linux distribution (e.g., ubuntu), most
likely, it already pre-installs GIMP for you. For the rest of us,
installing GIMP 2.2.8 on Windows was fairly straight-forward. The
stuff you need to download can all be found
here. You will need to first download, unzip, and run the install of the GTK+ Runtime Environment (the graphical library that GIMP uses). Then, you need to do the same for the GIMP for Windows Installer. While there, you may as well download the GIMP Help package file (the on-line GIMP help file).

For someone like me who was not much of a graphic artist,
and did not have much experience with drawing software, it took some getting used to before I became somewhat proficient. The best way to learn was probably go through the excellent tutorials on
the web site. Of special interest to me was the Photo Editing section
of tutorials. A quick search on google listed many other tutorials on
gimp.

I found the time invested in learning GIMP was well worth it. Happy photo-editing!

ubuntu Linux LiveCD

Recently, I've heard so much about ubuntu ("linux for human beings"), and Linux LiveCD. So, I decided to give it a try. Why Not? Especially, the word around was that they give out ubuntu CDs for free, and even pay for the postage.

By the way, a Linux Live CD is where you can run Linux completely off a CD like a RAM DISK, without having to install anything on a hard drive.

Order those free CD sets here

After about a month, the CDs arrived - to my great delight (who says there is no free lunch in this world). The shipped version was ubuntu 5.04 (codenamed Hoary Hedgehog) for Intel x86. Each set comprises of 2 CDs - a LiveCD and an Install CD. Use the LiveCD unless you want to install ubuntu the traditional way - on your hard drive.

The boot up using the Live CD took about 5 minutes on my computer (AMD Duron 850MHZ, 256M RAM). This was a little bit too long for me to use regularly.

One interesting note was that you should connect the computer to the Internet (plug in your LAN cable) while you boot up the LiveCD. For one, I noticed that it connected to some ubuntu server to synchronize the time.

After booting up, I was in Gnome desktop. I could immediately use some familiar and some useful applications like Firefox, OpenOffice, GIMP. Good!

The screen resolution was set by default to 640 x 480, and I could not change it using the gnome tool. I guess the install somehow had trouble with my graphics card.

The time was set to the correct GMT but not adjusted to my particular time zone (the install never asked about what time zone I was in). I used the clock display to specify the time zone. However, the correct time was not reflected in the clock display.

I wanted to sign on as root (default is ubuntu account which was empowered to sudo). This simple task was apparently made difficult by design. You cannot login as root directly to the desktop. You can open a root window while logged in as ubuntu. You can also do sudo.

All in all, the ubuntu LiveCD is definitely a no risk and pretty good way to feel out Linux as a Windows replacement. As a power Linux user, you may want to look elsewhere. Also, ubuntu is really geared towards the Linux desktop. If you are looking for a Linux distribution to run as a server, look elsewhere again.

Counting the Dead (Pixels) on your LCD

So, you just shelled out the big bucks ($) for a brand new LCD screen. You brought it home, and set it up. You recalled coming across this thing called the Dead Pixel Policy from the manufacturer (or your friend might have mentioned it to you). Most manufacturers have a warranty policy for a display that has more than a certain number (typically 0 to 8) of dead pixels.

What is a dead pixel, and how do I know if a pixel is dead?

An LCD screen is composed of hundreds of thousands of pixels or dots on the screen. Each dot relies on 3 valves (red, green, blue) to display color. A dead pixel is simply a defective one that does not display the intended color properly.

To determine if (or how many) dead pixels there are on your LCD,
download this Windows-only tool:
Dead Pixel Buddy

Extract the only file dpb.exe from the zip file. And simply double click it to run it.

Click the 5 colours in turn on the left hand side. Say, you click the colour black. Then, visually examine the screen, and count # of dots that are not of colour black. To pick the next colour, hit Esc, and then click next colour.

I found the tool very user friendly.

BottomFeeding my Own Blog

It just dawns on me that Bottomfeeder should feed on my own blog. First, I needed to get the newsfeed URL for my blog. I clicked on the Site Feed link, and then just copied the URL from the browser url field.

Then, I fired up Bottomfeeder, and added the feed to My Subscriptions.

Simple, and it works.

RSS Reader - Bottom Feeder

I wanted to finally install an RSS viewer on my Windows desktop. After using Google to see what other people are using, I decided to give bottomfeeder a try. My requirements were pretty simple: it must work, and it must be simple. I don't subscribe to that many newsfeeds (only 4). I was attracted to it because it runs on both Linux and Windows. The fact that it was implemented using Smalltalk raised a flag initially. Does it run fast enough? Will it install easily on Windows?
It turns out that the answer to both questions are YES.

I just have one small beef against it regarding the installation/configuration. The default configuration subscribed me automatically to TOO MANY newsfeeds than I cared for. I had to manually delete all but one newsfeed.

This software is loaded with features. I must admit that I did not spend much time in learning all the features. I did not need to because I learned what I had to in 5 minutes. I subscribed to 3 additional newsfeeds by right-clicking My Subscriptions and chose Add Feed.

At the beginning of each work day, I start bottomfeeder up. Those newfeeds that have unread articles in them are automagically highlighted in RED. I click on the newsfeed to display the article titles. Again, individual unread articles are highlighted in RED. I can view a summary of an article by clicking once on the title. I can render the entire page in my default browser by double clicking the title.

After I am done with a newsfeed, then I click on the newsfeed link with My Subscriptions, and choose Mark Feed, then Mark all feed items as Old. Then, I am ready for my next dose of RSS news.

I have been using it daily for 1 week, and I am happy with it. Overall, the software installs easily, and is fairly user friendly. It is good enough for me.