Linux is for nerds and geeks – Part one

Ubuntu - Why would you want to use it?

That might have been true at one time. However today’s Linux is marketed more towards the “regular” user and so with a fresh laptop and a wing and a prayer, I’ve decided to delve into the unknown and install Ubuntu.

I don’t aim to “convert” anyone (including myself!) in the process, but hopefully this article will give some insight into what Ubuntu (and other distributions – or “distros” as their known) brings to the party.

For the purpose of this article I will presume that you know what Linux is and all the difference flavours of it – if not, read this first. It introduces all about Debian/GNU Linux. For those not too familiar with Ubuntu, I would also recommend reading this Wiki.

Ubuntu doesn’t stop you from using Windows

Personally I’ve been a Windows devotee since Windows 3.1. This was for a couple of reasons – price, software, but also because it had games I wanted to play (remember LucasArts X-Wing or Wing Commander?). At that time Macs were expensive and Unix was not really in the mainstream.

However times are a-changing. Operating System are now all about usability with flashy, intuitive user interfaces. Add to that multi-core CPUs, large amounts of RAM, Hard disk space and all singing/dancing video cards. Season with software integration layers and virtualisation means that Windows can run Mac can run Windows can run Linux can run Windows.

(For Linux) When choosing virtualisation typically people use either VMWare or VirtualBox to create a virtual Windows install (or whatever). Alternatively there’s the “integration layer” route through WINE which provides native support for many Windows apps without installing Windows (thus saving money on the Windows license you have, right?…). WINE installs a set of Microsoft type libraries which many Win apps require.

There are pro’s and con’s to each one – mainly WINE can potentially run faster where as Virtual means more support all round. Regardless, running Windows apps is possible. Here’s a good primer talking about the two choices.

RESULT: B GRADE. Ubuntu’s options for running Windows apps are good – but for Virtualisation you need a beefier setup.

Installing Ubuntu

It’s EASY. Select your language, username, password, what sort of install you want. GO! I installed on a clean MPC T2200, 20gb HD, 512mb RAM, ATI R9000 graphics card and a generic USB wireless card with no driver CD (lost). So this system isn’t exactly new (built in 2005 or 2006). Everything was installed perfectly. Ubuntu even made the generic wireless card work without needing anything extra. I did have a Linksys WPC54G PCMCIA card which Ubuntu did choke on. There are ways to install this but it does mean you need to open a terminal window and start typing characters and words oft spoken in hushed terms. Fortunately there’s a healthy Ubuntu forum group which are full of friendly advice to get around these annoyances.

RESULT : A GRADE. Ubuntu’s easy and quick install removes the complication that Windows introduced in XP.

General Performance – Ubuntu vs Windows

Even though the target machine is relatively ancient, the Metacity desktop flies like a dream. From experience I would say there’s significant performance over the Windows XP equivilant (say). I would summise that Vista and Win7 are no better.

RESULT: A GRADE. Ubuntu makes best use of the machines power – alternate distros such as Xubuntu can even help those with low performance boxes.

Installing new software

Good bye Windows “Add/Remove Programs”. Ubuntu comes with an Add/Remove function that has a list of built in repositories (that you can customize) which allow you to install all manner of software – and being internet based, that list can be updated. Each app is rated, described and categorised so you really can understand and find the app you want. Major improvement over Windows.

Pf course you can install packages outside of this – they are mostly with the .deb file extension. Very easy. Very straightforward. Here’s a link to more about the Add/Remove function.

RESULT: A GRADE. Adding applications through the Ubuntu interface is far more accessible than the Windows equivilant.

Playing games on Ubuntu

There are games that are playable on Ubuntu – infact you can play some PC games on Ubuntu including Call of Duty 4 through WINE. However the number of games is insignificant to that of Windows.

RESULT: C- GRADE. It’s not bad, but it’s no gamer platform.

Installing UI Customisations

Many people use Compiz-Fusion to extend their desktop experience. This does require that your computer has enough power to use it – mine didn’t. However the experience is far greater than many Windows users can expect. Check out this great little demo of Compiz Fusion in action. There are alternatives such as KWin which also does a great job, however the net result is that your Ubuntu desktop experience can be extremely comprehensive.

RESULT: A GRADE. Great effects brings the need for great performance. However the desktop extensions really bring it. Windows 7 looks limp in comparison.

Web Browser Support

There are a fair spread of browser available – but it seems the best browser to get is Firefox. At the time of writing, Opera have released a beta version of Opera 10 which apparently wil give Firefox a run for its’ money. To date Opera has been notorious for blocky font rendering. Using the MS fonts (see, there are some dependencies on Microsoft!) can help alleviate this.

RESULT: C+ GRADE. No (proper) support for Google Chrome or Apple Safari leaves a little to be desired for the user looking to have a choice. But the choice they have isn’t THAT bad.

Conclusion to date

I really like Ubuntu so far. It’s a slick, professional package that occaisionally shows some flaws and aspects which might daze and confuse users (editing config files or using terminal commands for example). But these flaws are no more significant than found in other OS’s. I’m going to continue to put it through its’ paces by installing WordPress (with development) and see what I can do compared to an equivilant Windows setup.

Mini Review: Peter Murphy – House of Blues, Chicago. 14th July 2009

Last year I was invited by Mark Thwaite (The Mission, Tricky, Gary Numan, Mob Research and current Peter Murphy guarist) to see him play with Peter Murphy on their US tour as well as help out with photography. The setting was the House of Blues in downtown Chicago, which is a great venue to be at due to its’ intimate atmosphere and classic theatre styling. The show walked us through a back catalog of Peter’s songs as well as some Bauhaus classics, all of which was well received by the eager crowds, however I felt Peter’s performance, whilst still excellent in artistic terms, was a little removed from the audience who clearly were all about him. After the show I didn’t go backstage as it was suggested he wanted some privacy – perfectly understandable, but not what I’m used to with other AAA passes and this just fed to my thoughts that he wasn’t in the best of moods that night.

Cut to 14th July 2009 and we return to the HOB and see Peter in amazing form. The setlist was completely different featuring some new material as well as some excellent covers (such as Bowie’s “Space Oddity”). The star t of the show had a bit of an “oops” as Mark’s main guitar was not working, so he switched to his new Schecter Gold top (Solo 6 Vantage) which was sounding great and very punchy. That minor glitch was quickly forgotten as Peter and co. layed into a blistering set which had the crowd really going and Peter being extremely animated and theatrical which enthused the crowd no end.

As a complete 360 to last years performance his interaction with the crowd served as to build up the great vibe that was happening. His vocal performance was nothing short of remarkable as he paraded the range far more than he did in 2008. The occaisional commentary (particularly the “Oh wait. I’m in the wrong key for you lot” to the band) just added to the whole experience.

Let’s not forget the other folks in the band who all did a stirling job.  Jeff Schartoff on bass was far more confident than last year and this showed in his performance which was flawless (in 2008 this was not so much the case). Nick Lucero seemed to be somewhat down on the experience in manner but his performance was effortless. Lastly Mark Thwaite’s guitart and effervesance and flawless playing proved, if proof were needed, why he has such a high regard in the industry.

Picture on flickr shortly.

A Dad writes….

As some of you readers may know, I became a Dad on the 13th May this year! From the experience from finding out we were expecting through to the birth it’s been a hell of a ride – all good (in the main). Now that our first is here, I’ve come to realise a few things that no “Dad manual” tells you.

Prior to Griffin coming on the scene, my experience of looking after kids was really from 1yr old upwards. At that age range they are cognitive and able to comprehend. So when they misbehave you explain why we don’t do that, they can (usually) walk and have some degree of independence.

However, a newborn is bereft of these developmental skills and is pretty much at the mercy of what the parents have to offer, with the only communication being largely down to crying – and variations therein.

So with this in mind I have experienced a few things when looking after Griffin in public.

People (predominantly women) who look at you like you don’t have a clue

Let’s face it. Men are different to women in many ways and one of those ways is that we just don’t have the boobage that babies seem to enjoy when you cuddle them. That’s fine. I get that. That doesn’t mean I don’t know what to do in order to pacify a crying child. It’s just a bit harder because they know you’re not their mum and you have nothing on tap to sooth (unless you’re bottle feeding – we’re not at this point). I know I have to try putting him in different positions, that he may have done a doosey in his diaper, that it might be feeding time, he may be uncomfortable or a myriad of other reasons. I am working on it, OK lady? If I look at you like I just shat myself, then I need help.

People (predominantly women) who offer well meaning advice

Following on from the above, I’ve been faced with a situation where Griffin was crying and I was mid-pacification (he was hungry and Rach was tied up with her hair) and a woman said “I know it must be hard for you as you might not know what to do – my husband was also awkward with our first baby”. SERIOUSLY? I might hit you right now. He was quiet for the last 30 minutes prior to you sticking your nose in my beeswax. He’s HUNGRY and I do not posses LACTATING TITS. OK?! (that’ll probably up my hit rate for people searching on those terms ;>). Now if she’d pre-empted this by saying “I know you’ve probably got things under control but…” then I would have been more receptive. As it stood the look she got from me can only be described as “There will be e death in your family”.

People who glare at you when the baby is crying in a public place (e.g. store)

This is split into two groups:

• Women in stores
  You know who you are, you’re the subset of the first group I described, except you don’t give “Awww – poor male who hasn’t a clue”, you have the “Well what did the mother think by letting the child out with the father in the first place?”. Fuck you and the horse you rode in on.
• People in general who don’t fall into the first category
  Yeah, I admit I have been one – haven’t we all? I kept my annoyances to planes, trains, buses and certain restaurants.  Babies crying on a transatlantic plane? Invest  in some medical supplies and shut that shit up. Babies crying in McDonalds? What do you expect? It’s just the way it is so suck it up. Rach discussed the possibility of us going to the UK next year. I said unless Griffin demonstrates the ability to hold it together for a long period of time, the furthest flight we’d take is 3-4 hours. The trip to St Louis in the Fall/Autumn should start to prove his mettle.

Dads: If you thought you were going to be in anyway shape or form giving 50% or more input into the first few months of the childs life, you’re either on crack or a single parent. Or both.

I think that says it all. Recognising the maternal instinct and stepping away from any well meaning advice, unless asked for is a good thing. Reading up about baby care, offering suggestions about different ways of doing things without being asked fall into the same category as “Using live grenades as baseballs”. It will not end well and to all intents and purposes, you’re sleeping along tonight. Welcome to a Siberian bed.

But it’s all fun in the end. We have a great little boy who seems to love us both (we both get smiled at in the morning, which is an awesome thing to see), so I try to approach these things with some humour. Writing about them in a blog helps too.

Movies everyone (of my children) must see

Weeks to go (?) before the birth of number one child and I have been thinking  ”What movies would I want my children to see?” – Think of it as an education of sort. So here’s my list of “Movies Everyone Must See: Version 2009″ in no particular order:

1. Star Wars 1-6 (question – should I start them at episode 4?)
2. Airplane
3. Top Gun
4. Blazing Saddles
5. Leon – The world’sbest car chase sequence
6. It’s a Wonderful Life
7. Life Is Beautiful
8. Blade Runner
9. Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949 version)
10. The Man with Two Brains
11. Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid
12. White Christmas (but only once)
13. Pulp Fiction
14. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off
15. The Breakfast Club
16. Unforgiven – Eastwood is the only actor that makes Westerns enjoyable
17. Dirty Harry
18. Where Eagles Dare
19. A Fistful of Dollars
20. For a Few Dollars More
21. Great Expectations (1946)
22. The Ladykillers (1955)
23. Our Man in Havana
24. The Dam busters (1955)
25. Battle of Britain (1969)
26. Highlander
27. Zulu – Great acting by Michael Cain
28. Alfie – Cain again (1966)
29. The Italian Job (1969)
30. The Eagle Has Landed
31. Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
32. Clue
33. Trains, Planes and Automobiles
34. Austin Powers I, II & III
35. Wayne’s World
36. Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure
37. The Great Escape
38. Sound of Music
39. Ghostbusters
40. Scrooged
41. Caddyshack
42. National Lampoon’s Vacation
43. National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation
44. Heat – Pacino and De Niro rock
45. The Shawshank Redemption
46. 300
47. Beverly Hills Cop
48. Ocean’s Eleven / Twelve / Thirteen
49. Bourne Supremacy / Identity / Ultimatum
50. The Departed
51. Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back
52. Men In Black
53. Die Hard 1-4
54. The Fith Element
55. Leathal Weapon 1-3
56. Braveheart
57. Spaceballs
58. Batman – The Dark Knight
59. Fight Club
60. The Usual Suspects
61. The Matrix Series
62. North by Northwest
63. American Beauty
64. Amelie
65. Forrest Gump
66. Monty Python and the Holy Grail
67. Apocalypse Now
68. The Big Lebowski

Some of you may say “Goodfellas”, “Godfather part XIXX” or “Scarface” – Classic films maybe, but not “must watches” IMHO. Other than that, I’m sure I missed some!

Using XAMPP and IIS together – Easy Solution

(this is becoming a popular post, so if you like it please let me know)

If you have IIS installed on your Windows environment and want to run XAMPP (the windows flavour of Apache, MySQL, Perl and PHP) then here’s an easy way for both applications to co-exist. There are two ways to solve thie – either change IIS or change the Apache config – either way you’ll achieve the same thing. Personally I went the Apache route and here’s how I did it (using XAMPP v1.7.1):

Change the Port Defaults

By default IIS uses ports 80 and 443 for HTTP and HTTPS access respectively. By default, Apache also assumes these settings. By altering two config files in apache you can easily over-ride this:

For the purpose of this article I’ll assume you installed XAMPP to the default location.

• Edit file C:\xampp\apache\conf\httpd.conf
• Change line 63 to :
• Listen *:81
• this gets apache listening to all IP addresses on port 81 (you probably don’t need the asterisk but I did for safeties sake. You could also change to another port of choice, e.g. 8080)
• Change line 175 to:
• ServerName localhost:81
• Again – if you chose another port, update witht that. Save the file and close.
• Edit file C:\xampp\apache\conf\extra\httpd-ssl.conf
• Edit line 42 to:
• Listen 442
• This changes the SSL (HTTPS) port to 442 (or again, your port of choice).

That’s it!

XAMPP reports the wrong values

When you start XAMPP through the console, it will say starting Apache on port 80. This is just a hardcoded status message it displays; the key piece is that you get a “Running” message through the console.

If you have this all running as a service you can just assume it’s going to work – unless you check the console.

Proof of the pudding – testing XAMPP

Go to http://localhost:81

If all’s well you’ll see the XAMPP Logo; if not, check you updated the configs to use ports that are not already in use. You can also see what apache thinks of your install:

Go to Start > Run > type “cmd” > type “cd c:\xampp\apache\bin” > type “httpd“

If Apache has a problem with one of the port configs it will tell you. Otherwise, if you don’t get a response and the window appears to be “hung”, apache IS running!

If you’re still getting stuck, try stopping the “World Web Web Publishing Service” (right click “My Computer” > Manage >Services), try accessing http://localhost:81 – if it works you know that IIS and Apache are still clashing.

Great MooTools intro

http://www.consideropen.com/blog/2008/08/30-days-of-mootools-12-tutorials-day-1-intro-to-the-library/

Pretty easy intro – check it.

jQuery and MooTools

Building faster TTL sites with Frameworks – jQuery and MooTools

About a year or so ago I decided to peg my web work against a framework model to save reinventing the wheel for every site I developed – the two frameworks I chose were:

• Blueprint CSS - For its’ ease of implementation (rapid TTL) and customisation
• MooTools Javascript Framework – For its’ mature function set. capability and support

Selection Process

During the selection for the JS frameworks I also looked at

• Dojo – Excellent but rather large and not as well structured. IBM has since got involved with this project and it promises many good things.
• Scriptaculous – Good implementation but the features were seeming to head in the wrong direction (for me at least).
• MochiKit – Same as Scriptaculous
• Prototype – The granddaddy of them all – solid but not as extensive.
• ExtJS – Great library but not truly opensource
• Spry – Coming from Adobe it has to be pretty good, however compared to the other libraries seemed a bit bloated and less well supported from the community.
• jQuery – Great framework that still had some performance issues and lacked some functionality that MooTools provided.

Even though MooTools won,  it would be foolhardy not to keep one eye on the competition and see how they grew. In the last quarter of 2008 there seemed to be an increase of jQuery posts both on Digg and dZine. Shortly afterwards jQuery 1.3 was released and my attention turnedto the explosion of articles that popped up on this framework.

jQuery grows up!

jQuery’s implementation of a frame work is slightly different to that of MooTools e.g. extensive promotion of chaining (moo can do this too); its’ community approach seems to be more about plug-ins into the 15k core script to expand its’ capability (MooTools currently weighs in at around 68k with lots of the options turned on). If you search many of the agggregate developer sites (e.g. dZine) you’ll find there’s more article son jQuery than MooTools.

That’s not to say that MooTools is irrelevant – far from it. It’s still an impressive and comprehensive framwork with lots of community support (check out ClientCide or the MooTools forum), and the development team for MooTools is extremely passionate about its’ development. However I now think that jQuery has done significant work to make it a very mature, production level framework, just as MooTools.

Today I checked out the jQuery tutorials and am now in the position of deciding whether to implement my next site design on MooTools or jQuery – both offer advantages and very little disadvantage (when you add all the plugins I’m looking to use there’s not much difference in filesize. I’ll post again when I’ve had chance to check both out head to head.

Conclusion

There’s no one perfect framework – each site you build needs to have a set of goals and that will help you drive the framework of choice. That being said 80% of the time it will probably be MooTools or jQuery.

Regards the CSS framework choice – again Blueprint is not for everyone – there’s lots of other options out there; Tripoli looks great; Yahoo UI (YUI) is really solid (but crosses into the Javascript framework field too – when you add all those together it gets really bloaty)… you’ll have your own weapons of choice, but regardless of which one you choose, you’ll be building compelling websites much quicker than handcranking.

As for those against frameworks – yes, you don’t get optimized code, but the trade off is well tested, well supported code which most people access using high enough speed networks, so the difference to the end user is negligable.

Technology bites its’ own ass

I have been working in the IT industry since 1997. At that time it was a sure thing that you were in a good position; you knew you had a skill that which attracted a premium for – and if you were a contractor then you could really go to town on rates … GBP 500 per day was not unheard of.

Today we see many IT related companies shedding their IT resources and bringing in offshore resources as an alternatve. With the ever-expanding web/interconnectedness of things we’ve all talked about has brought the situation where your location is almost irrelivant to what you can do. Therefore Indian, Chinese, LATAM (et al) IT professionals are now picking up the work local resources were used to.

In some ways we have ourselves to blame; we got greedy and demanded more and more. That strategy means eventually someone will say “no” and then the dominoes fall. In 2001 I took an transatlantic flight and attended a 1 day meeting. Today, I would be lucky to get a Hertz car on the current corporate policy.

So what happens next?

Currently we’re facing a tough economic climate and companies are using this opportunity to shed thousands of IT “local” positions and either making those positions redundant through re-organization or using offshore resource to provide a cheaper alternative. In the short term this will provide better return on investment and companies will report that their EBITDA is improved. Long term however is  a different story.

Like many things in life, these things go in cycles. Offshore will be the defacto for many companies. These companies will see a slow down of deliveries (the last offshore <> onshore time to complete efforts study we performed showed that offshore effort had to be multiplied by 1.8 to get the same output as onshore), reduction of intuitive capability and intellectual property (IP). In turn their clients will notice the difference and either demand that the price of these deliveries reduce or that there’s more value for service…something that the offshore model can’t support.

I have been working with offshore resources now for 2 straight years. To date I have very few individuals who could offer me creative and intuitive solutions when challenged; in the main it’s a standard to revert to old patterns and fall back to “process” when it challenges are ahead. This in turn causes frustration from the non-outsourced resources who then spend time either proving that thought wrong or are the ones who need to be the creative ones (which i guess is a positive for them as they’re the asset).

Please don’t take this as some xenophobic or racist statement – I believe offshoring has its’ place, but equally deployed on a large scale without thought and strategy it can have a negative effect on an organization. The current company I work for is seeing that it will increase for a good 12-18 months. However at some point the balance will start to tip.

I’ve locked this post now.

Yahooooo!!! Anyone want to buy Yahoo?

Since the acquisition/merge of Yahoo and some of its’ services was on the table – predominantly with Google and Microsoft – Yahoo seem to have done no good with their strategy. When Microsoft offered a generous price per share to acquire, Yahoo turned around and suggested that their stock was worth far more … possibly hoping that MS had options to increase this offer. As it turned out Microsoft told Yahoo it wasn’t interested in any further talks.

Yahoo’s stock price is in the toilet, rumours of an AOL take-over never seemed to surface, Microsoft is now sayng it’s only interested in acquiring the search part of the business, Yahoo’s CEO, Jerry Yang, has now quit the board and job losses abounds. All in all, not a great time for the once giant of the internet.

“We Need Plans – and Damn Good Ones!”

Clearly Yahoo needs to be revitalised – but how? Any take-over by Microsoft, AOL, Google or whomever will distill what Yahoo have built – and they have built or bought many great things. The problem is that their income / revenue streams aren’t quite what they should be. For another corporation to take over Y! would probably kill the brand off quietly (just like Geocities – remember them?) and asset strip – the kind of thing Microsoft would surely do.

From a consumer point of view this could be a great thing as it would see increased interconnectedness of applications and services. As a means of innovation and competitiveness this would not be such a great thing as without folks like Google, Microsoft and Yahoo competiting in the same spaces (Search, Email, etc.) it reduces the need to push innovation. Finally from an employment standpoint it would reduce the number of folks involved in making all the wonderful things happen.

That being said, there is suggestion that Yahoo needs a re-org; Rumour that projects are started and not completed being commonplace to name but one. Clearly a strong management team is needed.

Enter the Dragon

There is a rumour that a new player is on the scene; Johnathan Miller is a former head of AOL and is apparently intending to raise enough venture capital to privately buy Yahoo. By making Yahoo private, this could take the pressure off and allow the company to restructure without the added pressure of shareholders.

If Miller were to step up then this could be either the making or the breaking of the business… of course this too could be a bad strategy from somewhere in Yahoo to try to force another offer for their business… if it is, it smacks of desperation and I’m sure is something Microsoft for one won’t bite.

Some of you may not believe this…

Apparently I’m a safe driver I told you!!!!