Category: Linux

Linux is my primary operating system. I used it on the servers, desktops, laptops, netbooks, and even mobile phones since approximately 1997. I’ve tried a number of distributions over the years, and even created a couple myself. I still look around sometimes to see what others are up to. But most of my machines are running some sort of Red Hat – either a quick and easy Fedora Linux, or a stable and secure Red Hat Enterprise Server, or a cheaper CentOS alternative.

And while by now I am very comfortable in the Linux environment (both graphical and command line), I still discover a lot of new and interesting things about it. When I come across something worthy, I usually share it with the rest of the Open Software world, using this category.

Going for Fedora 8

A new version of my favorite Linux distribution has been released recently – Fedora 8.  I got my hands on the installation DVD (thanks bro!) and tried it straight away.

It didn’t go very well – the installation was hanging up during dependencies check.  I thought maybe it was something simple to fix and checked it with strace, which showed that the installation was looping constantly creating some temporary files and then removing them.  I tried to create these files by hand, but they were immediately removed.  I asked around on #fedora IRC channel, but it was over a weekend and it was rather empty.  No tips were given.

Then I came across Michael’s post that reminded me that I could do an upgrade using Yum package manager, bypassing the installation altogether.   Following the steps in the guide was simple and soon yum started downloading the new packages.  But my Internet connection is pretty slow, it would have taken me about two days just to get the files.   Not much fun to wait.  Instead I decided to copy files from the DVD to /var/cache/yum/fedora/packages/ directory and restart the upgrade process.  Now all I needed to download were the updates that were released since the distribution went public.

A couple of hours later I rebooted into Fedora 8, running the new tick-less kernel (the biggest reason for me to upgrade).  I also noticed that a few fonts packages were updated – fonts are sharper and cleaner.  NetworkManager was upgraded.  And a few other things improved.

I’ve heard a lot of people complaining about sound problems due to a new sound server, but I didn’t have a chance to test it yet.  Other than this though everything seems to be running just fine.

… and the award for the original web site goes to …

Chiefy for the www.f0bia.org !!!

I’m browsing through hundreds of web sites every day, and it’s been a while since I saw something that struck me as original. f0bia did it for me. With dark background, blinking cursor, and keyboard navigation it closely resembles UNIX command line. Yet it’s not just a show off, but a real blog with posts, search, RSS feeds, links, pictures, etc.

Well done!

Update: for those of you interested in technical details, the blog seems to be running WordPress and WordPress CLI theme.

The Microsoft experience

I smiled after reading this post.  It reminded me of the fact that in our office, designers use my laptop to test web sites on Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.  We have two guys doing the designs, and one of the uses Windows Vista, which runs MSIE 7.  Another one uses, I think, Windows XP, but with MSIE upgraded to version 7 too.  I heard it’s possible to have several versions of Internet Explorer running on the same Windows installation, but nobody around here knows how to do it or cares enough to experiment.

But the funniest thing in this whole story is that my laptop is running on Fedora Linux.

New Skype beta for Linux

If you missed the announcements, Skype has released a new beta version for Linux (1.30). It has a long expected ALSA support, which can solve a whole lot of sound problems. Also, there are now many options in the Sound tab of Configuration menu. It is possible to set your favourite WAV files as notification alerts and even a ringtone. Hopefully, one day there’ll be an option to set per contact ringtones… There are a few other small changes here and there, which might be more imoprtant to you, than they are for me. So, you should check it out yourself too.