http://www.ComputerBob.com/journal_archive/2007/12.php .
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If you provide tech support to your friends who use Windows, then you probably already know that there are many free, bootable Linux-based CDs that contain powerful system utilities to make your job easier. But you should also know that there are a few ways to
boot Linux from a USB drive that could make your job even easier. Be sure to read the comments that follow the article.
I've often told my students that it doesn't really matter how much you know unless you can communicate it effectively to others. And just like it's a good strategy to diversify your financial investments, you would be wise to diversify your skills and be willing and able to "wear different hats" at work. Here's a guy who's
a good example of that: Very few companies cared about his sysadmin resume, but a lot of companies were interested in his technical writer resume.
It's easier and cheaper than bombing each other. That's why many governments are
turning to cybercrime to attack their enemies. Insert your own lame joke about criminals in government here.
When you saw the topic icon to the left of this Journal entry, did you think that this was going to be a story about canned, processed pork products? I didn't think so, and the U.S. Trademark Trial and Appeal Board
agrees.
Lately, I've been lurking in several Linux support forums, trying to learn as much as I can about the advantages and disadvantages of various Linux distros. One thing I've noticed is that in every distro's support forum, prospective users ask why they should use that particular distro. Invariably, many of the veterans' responses tell them that the distro has a friendly, helpful community — even when it doesn't — or has impressive-looking eye-candy (which I personally find to be mostly superflous). Most of the time, I get the impression that, at least for slightly-experienced Linux users who are interested in a Linux distro's semi-technical merits, there really isn't very much that distinguishes one popular Linux newbie distro from another. It looks to me like a lot of Linux newbies are drawn to particular distros that they perceive as having some sort of "cool factor" — maybe because that "cool factor" helps Linux newbies feel intellectually superior to all of their Windows-using buddies, even though they really don't know much more about Linux than their buddies do. Unfortunately, the novelty of using a cool distro appears to wear off after a few weeks, sending constant streams of newbies out on distro-shopping expeditions, looking for the next cool distro du-jour that they can rave about in all of the online forums — at least for a few weeks.
The Convenient Fiction of Distributions, says some the same things that I've been thinking about the differences between Linux distros. See if you agree with it.
Tomorrow, I'll tell you why I've been researching the advantages and disadvantages of several distros.
About a year ago, a Journal reader sent me an email message, thanking me for mentioning Linux as a replacement for Windows. He signed off by saying that he'd really like to switch to Linux, but that it's too hard to install software applications in Linux, compared to Windows. I wrote back and described in great detail how most popular Linux distros nowadays come with really easy-to-use GUI tools that let you find and automatically install your choice of thousands of new applications with just a few clicks, making them much, much easier to use than Windows. A few weeks later, the same reader wrote to me again, to respond to a different Journal entry — and repeated his complaint about how difficult it is to install software applications in Linux. Again, I wrote back and explained it all to him. A few weeks later, he wrote again, with the same complaint. I didn't reply. I never heard from him again. If you're one of those people who parrots the idea that it's easier to install applications in Windows than in Linux, then you're still living in the 1990s. Buy yourself a new calendar and take a look at
Windows is !easy, Linux is !hard.
Millions of computer users all over the world rely on MD5 tools to verify the integrity of downloaded software. If the download's MD5 Sum doesn't match the software vendor's published MD5 Sum, then the software is either not authentic, or the download is corrupt. Unfortunately, it now appears that MD5
can be hacked, so it's not reliable.
A few weeks ago, it was depressing to read that this year's most popular Halloween costumes for pre-teen girls were things like "bar wench" and "sexy nurse." Now comes the news that "Cellphones, laptops, digital cameras and MP3 music players are among the hottest gift items this year.
For preschoolers." The inmates have taken over the asylum.
This Journal entry is now part of a separate article called My Debian Adventure. It appears in this site's CB Guides section. I will update it with future Journal entries that will describe my experience with trying Debian Linux.
This Journal entry is now part of a separate article, My Previous Life Is Over. You can find it in the Personal Stuff section of this site.
I've turned yesterday's Journal entry into a separate article called My Debian Adventure. It appears in this site's CB Guides section. I will update that article with future Journal entries that will describe my experience with trying Debian Linux.
How would you setup a Linux PC for newbies to use? A guy who does it all the time describes
how he does it, and asks for people to suggest improvements.
It appears that, every once in awhile, Redmond actually responds to its many unhappy customers: "Microsoft is to withdraw an anti-piracy tool from Windows Vista, which disables the operating system when invoked, following customer complaints."
Here are
30 Quick Fixes For Windows XP & Vista for those of you who still use Windows. I only use Windows when I am required to, so I can't tell you how safe or effective any of them are.
If you're curious about Linux and you'd like to see a video of how it works, take a look at
An Introduction to Linux — Demonstration Video. Its site says that it's "a walkthrough of what Linux is, how to get it, try it out in Live CD mode, install it as a dual-boot operating system with Windows, and how to use it, including how to set up the most common applications such as email and instant messaging." If you don't want to watch the entire 1:43:00 video, you can read the narration script.
He loves Linux, but he doesn't love everything about Linux. That's why he wrote
What I Hate About Linux.
Are there Linux options that can replace Microsoft Outlook's calendar for a new Linux user? Find out in
The Road From Windows — Time For Change.
Windows fans often brag that their graphical user interface (GUI) is more user-friendly than Linux's choice of several GUIs. They're wrong, of course — they're confusing user-friendliness with familiarity. They also claim that it is very difficult to master Linux's command line (AKA "DOS commands"). Knowing that they say those things, you have to wonder,
If the GUI is so good, then why is Microsoft dropping it?
After I finish writing today's Journal entries, I plan to try to install Debian Linux for the first time. Then, unless I do something really stupid during the installation that borks my whole computer, I hope to update
My Debian Adventure later today, to let you know how it went.
UDATE: I'm riding the Harley without any training wheels! It took a little more than 2 hours, but I finished installing Debian Etch about 20 minutes ago. I've been happily taking it around the block, to make sure that the things that I need are working. I had no problems during the install, and so far, everything is working well! Quanta Plus, my web development tool of choice, was installed by default, so I just pointed it to this web site's computerbob.webprj file on my data partition, and here I am, updating this web site from within Debian! I've got a lot more tweaking and trying stuff to do, but so far, I think I'm going to love Debian! Be sure to check My Debian Adventure later, after I've had some time to enjoy myself and then update it with more information about how my very first Debian install went.
I choose not to use the Linux Kontact PIM suite and its Kmail client, for reasons that I described in detail in my recent article,
Why I Won't Use KMail or Kontact. If you use them, and you also use Google apps, you should read
How To Make Kontact Work With Google Apps.
How do users and web developers feel about Microsoft's support of Internet Explorer 7? In one word: unhappy. In two words:
very unhappy.
If you were teaching high school computer classes, and because of budgetary constraints, you had to choose between teaching the kids how to use either old versions of commercial software or newer versions of open-source software, which would you choose, and why? One high school teacher
wants to know.
If you're planning to give someone a new computer this Christmas, you may want to also print out and include
some good advice for new computer users. It could save you from receiving a lot of panicky requests for personalized tech-support this coming January.
I had to teach last night, and I worked on Debian right up until that time, so I didn't have time last night to fully describe my first Debian installation to you. But yesterday, I took over 6 pages of notes during the initial installation and subsequent tweaking, and I'm going to start working on
My Debian Adventure as soon as I post this Journal entry. Be sure to check back later. (It's going to take me awhile.)
UPDATE: It took me almost 6 1/2 hours to do it, but I just finished updating My Debian Adventure.
If I have time later today, I hope to move my browser and email profiles off of my Mepis Linux partition and onto my shared data partition. If all goes well, that will allow me to do both tasks from both Mepis and Debian. As you can tell from
My Debian Adventure's To-Do List, I've already configured and tweaked Debian quite a bit. I still have several things that I want to do, but it's getting very close to the point where I will start trying to use Debian full-time instead of Mepis. And so far, that looks like a very real possibility.
Yahoo! hasn't admitted to any guilt in the matter, and it has refused to change its behavior to prevent similar incidents in the future, even though it reportedly "helped Beijing's state police uncover the Internet identities of two Chinese journalists, who were handed 10 years in prison for disseminating pro-democracy writings." Now the U.S. House of Representatives is considering a bill that would fine companies who do that sort of thing. Yeah, a fine would probably be the best way to prevent more Chinese journalists from being sent to prison.
Here's some disturbing news: "Hackers have succeeded in
breaking into the computer systems of two of the U.S.' most important science labs, the Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Los Alamos National Laboratory." I think that someone should make it illegal to do that sort of thing.
Here's yet another trusted IT worker who used his powers for evil, instead of good: "A senior database administrator for a consumer reporting agency in Florida has admitted
stealing more than 8.4 million account records and selling them to a data broker." I think that someone should make it illegal to do that sort of thing.
If you're a Linux user or fan, here's something to add to your Christmas wish-list:
A talking Tux penguin. He connects to the Internet through a fish-shaped wireless transmitter, and when he finds new information, he lets you know "by dancing, flashing, flapping his little wings or spinning on the spot."
I'm very happy to report that I am now "riding the Harley to work." As of very, very late last night, I am a full-time Debian user. I'm completely exhausted, but feeling great about the accomplishment.
My Debian Adventure explains everything that I've done and everything that I've learned about Debian in the past few days.
Lonely Russian men have reportedly been having their identities stolen after visiting online dating chat rooms and unwittingly sharing their personal information with artificial intelligence software that's programmed to act like
a loose woman. Like the computerphile dog confided to a friend in a New Yorker comic a few years ago, "On the Internet, no one knows you're a dog."
If you're about to go "under the knife," you may want to put it off a little while: "Loyola University Medical Center is the first center in the Midwest to utilize a new technology that is helping its surgical teams
keep track of all sponges used during a surgical procedure."
New research appears to finally shed some light on the age-old question, "Do these genes
make me look addictive?"
I've been staying up until very late every night, working on my Debian To-Do list, and now I only have a couple of laughably minor things left to do. My computer is running great, and I've been using Debian full-time for the past couple of days. I can hardly believe how much I've learned in the past week. Even though it took a lot more time and a lot more work to do it, I'm really glad that I documented everything that I did. From now on, I'll have all of that information for future reference, and anyone who's interested in trying Debian will have it as an installation and configuration resource. See
My Debian Adventure for the whole story.
I only have one task left to do to finish my whole Debian To-Do List: Backup my entire installed, fully-configured Debian root partition. I may do that later today, or I may wait a few days, just to see if I tweak anything else or install any other apps as I continue to work full-time on Debian every day. Once I make that full backup, then if I ever mess things up really badly, I'll be able to restore everything back to this current "Last Known Good Configuration," and everything will look and work exactly the same way it does right now. Of course, I'll continue to document everything I do, in
My Debian Adventure.
Wind is free, so why not use it? That seems to be the thinking behind this effort: "Business Secretary John Hutton says he wants to open up British seas to allow enough new turbines - up to 7,000 —
to power all UK homes by the year 2020." Brill!
According to researchers, "Human evolution has been moving
at breakneck speed in the past several thousand years, far from plodding along as some scientists had thought." I don't know about the entire human race, but I think I've personally evolved quite a bit in just the past year.
How would you like to see
photos and QuickTime videos of a laser harp, a smoke gun, a 3D environment created with an LCD projector and fog, and a water bridge? They were all created by students in a "Weird Science" class at the University of Texas at Austin.
Last night, I made two separate backups of my fully-installed, fully-configured Debian root partition. If you'd like know why, or if you'd like to see what my new Debian desktop looks like, take a look at
My Debian Adventure.
See if you agree with phoronix's choices for
The Greatest Linux Innovations Of 2007
You don't have to be a tech-support provider to understand (and maybe even enjoy reading)
The 5 Users You Meet In Hell (And One You'll Find In Heaven). Slashdot's readers certainly understand, and they
have a lot to say about it.
It probably wouldn't be worth it for you to figure out how to do it as an individual, but last year, package-delivery service UPS saved "roughly three million gallons of gas" by
eliminating left-turns from its delivery routes.
Early this morning, while walking to the kitchen to make some breakfast, I heard a truck drive up and park on the street in front of my house. I stopped and looked out the window, to see if someone was coming to visit me that early in the morning. It turned out to be one of my neighbors, parking at my house to make room for some workers to pour a new concrete driveway at his house, a few doors down. He got out of his truck, and as he walked up my driveway to the sidewalk, he noticed my newspaper sitting near the end of my driveway. In a spontaneous act of kindness, he bent over, picked it up, and tossed it further into my front yard. Unfortunately, the newspaper slipped out of its protective plastic bag, the bag stayed in his hand, and the newspaper exploded onto my lawn. The poor guy — he was just trying to do something nice and then that happened. I don't think he was able to get it all back into the plastic bag, and he was probably too embarrassed to ring my doorbell that early in the morning and hand it to me, because I got dressed as quickly as I could and went out to help him a few minutes later, but he was already gone — and so was the newspaper. I guess it was just another example of "no good deed goes unpunished."
And no, I'm not going to embarrass him even more by telling him that I saw him do it.
So far, there's been only one thing about Mepis Linux that I've really missed having in Debian: the ability to conveniently right-click on any system file as a normal user and choose "Edit as Root" from the KDE Service Menu (and have it prompt me for the root password). I'm happy to report that about 2:00 this morning, I added that feature to my Debian system, by downloading and installing a package called "Root Actions Servicemenu" that also adds several other convenient root actions to that same menu. You can learn all about it in My Debian Adventure.
Now that my computer is successfully running Debian Linux (and Mepis Linux too, though I haven't used Mepis for the past several days), and everything is configured just the way I like it, and everything is completely and safely backed up to a separate hard drive, I decided that it was time to clean my computer. Using a toothbrush and a vacuum cleaner, I very carefully cleaned its fans, its "inhale and exhale ports" and all of its inside and outside surfaces, including the cooling fins of its CPU cooler. Despite being very careful, I managed to disconnect two tiny sets of wires from my motherboard (one for the power light and one for sound). Luckily, when I built my computer 4 1/2 years ago, I put a sticker on the inside of its case that shows where everything connects to the motherboard, so all I needed was a bright light and a magnifying glass to get everything plugged back in correctly.
It's been almost 3 months since I told you about Bruce Byfield's blog entry,
Why I'm Staying With Debian, and I had consciously forgotten all about it. Apparently, my subconscious continued to mull it over though, along with several of the thought-provoking readers' comments that follow it, because several days ago, I finally got up the courage to install Debian Linux (Etch, AKA Stable) on my PC, and I absolutely love it. See My Debian Adventure for the details.
The attention-grabbing headlines all say pretty much the same thing: "KDE 4 Uses 40% Less Memory Than KDE 3." That's great news, except that it may not be true — there's
a lot of controversy over whether the guy who did the measurement knew what he was doing or not. From all reports though, the one thing that appears to be clear is that KDE 4 does use less memory than KDE 3 — I guess time will tell exactly how much less.
A few weeks ago, I told you that early testers of Windows Vista Service Pack 1 had been disappointed in it. Now it looks like Redmond agrees with them: "Microsoft is warning customers that the soon-to-be released service pack for its Windows Vista operating system
won't fix the application capability issues that have plagued the software since its release in January." Insert your own lame pro-Linux joke here.
Coming soon from Toshiba: Batteries that recharge to 90% in only
five minutes.
Scientists say it's a good thing that they've been able to clone
cats that glow in the dark.
Today, I'm really, really busy, trying to solve a couple of Internet connection problems. If you're interested in the details, you can find them in
this thread that I started in the Debian support forums.
Wow! Yesterday (and until very early this morning), I sure did a lot of work on my computer! If you check
My Debian Adventure, you'll see that I added, completed and documented my Debian To-Do List's tasks 72-78 — a few of them took several hours apiece. Now that they're done, I'm feeling great, and everything is looking, running and working even better than it did before. Debian Linux can be a lot of work at times, compared to more "newbie-friendly" distros, but I'm learning everything I need to know, and I absolutely love being a full-time Debian user!
Like many unhappy Windows users, here's a guy who finally decided to upgrade his computer from Windows Vista to
Windows XP.
I started using personal computers in 1980. If you've been computer-literate for more than a few years, you'll appreciate the fact that The Computer History Museum now has
its own YouTube channel. And here's a funny blast from the past: Comedian John Cleese selling a Compaq "luggable" computer in a commercial from the early 1980s.
It's obviously no longer a laptop, or even portable, but that's OK — I'll bet you've never seen a computer like
Datamancer's Steampunk Laptop before.
Whether you're a Linux newbie or not, there's a really good chance that you'll find lots of good tips and information in
The Ultimate Linux Newbie Guide.
Like many unhappy Windows users, here's a guy who finally decided to upgrade his computer from Windows Vista to
Ubuntu Linux.
If you're like me, you're always looking for ways to make a good thing even better. You'll find some ways to do that in
Slim Down and Speed Up Linux. But even if you're a seasoned vet, be sure to make a backup of any file before you edit it, to make it easy to fix things if you make any mistakes. Then, if you're feeling really confident about tweaking your Linux system, take a look at
Comprehensive Linux System Services List: Explanation and Recommendation.
It's not surprising at all that PCWorld would put Windows Vista on one of its yearly lists of influential technologies. But I'm a little surprised that it put Vista at the very top of its list of
The 15 Biggest Tech Disappointments of 2007.
Some time today, I hope to get NTP time synchronization installed and working correctly on my PC in Debian Linux. I got it all set up and working last week, but then I deleted it after I discovered that my PC's hardware clock (in BIOS) and its system clock (on my desktop) were several hours apart. Since then, I figured out that that problem was probably caused weeks earlier, when I used Mepis Linux LiveCD that has been since reported to change the hardware clock to the UTC time zone. My PC doesn't need to constantly be updated to within a millisecond of the correct atomic time, so I'm probably just going to install and configure the Linux ntpdate client with a daily cron job that will automatically connect to a time server and set the system clock once each day, and then synchronize the hardware clock to the system clock. As always, I will document my efforts in
My Debian Adventure.
You may have noticed that I've added a "Digg It" icon to the left navigation column of each of this site's pages, to make it easier for people to submit my site's articles to Digg, as well as to "Digg" previously submitted articles. The Digg icon is a JavaScript that has to load from Digg.com each time it appears, so it makes my web pages load slower than normal. I'm going to leave it up for a few dasy, to see if people use it, but if it turns out that they don't, I'll remove it.
The Christmas season always seems to bring out both Santas and Scrooges. See which one comes to mind when you read
Ten Things About Tech I Really Hate — And Maybe You Do As Well.
It doesn't have the same bitingly witty edge as its predecessors, but
Apple's Christmas Ad is cute, sort of funny, and very nostalgic of 1960s children's animated Christmas specials.
Why did I reinstall Debian Linux four separate times last night? Find out in today's update to
My Debian Adventure.
Well, that didn't last long: I've already removed the JavaScript "Digg" icon from the left navigation column of this site's pages. Because it had to load from the Digg web site each time it displayed, it made all of my web pages load slower.
I'm still making plenty of progress on redoing all of the tasks in my Debian To-Do List, as I described in yesterday's update to
My Debian Adventure. Of course, I did all of the most important, functional things first, like configuring my email and browser, and installing the nvidia drivers. Now I'm just taking my time, redoing all of the non-essential tweaks, like adding shortcut icons and adjusting the thickness of the window borders.
the debian user is a blog that has lots of interesting and useful information for Debian Linux users, as well as people who use distros that are based on Debian, like Ubuntu. And I would've been happy to tell you that even if the debian user hadn't praised
My Debian Adventure on December 18, 2007.
If you've spent any amount of time sitting through IT workshops of dubious value, you'll enjoy
Your Worst IT Workshop.
I mentioned them before, but now they're becoming a reality: small, neighborhood
nuclear reactors.
What's the best way to keep world-class athletes from using performance-enhancing drugs? Two Olympic gold medalists think that they should be required to have computer chips
implanted into their skin and GPS devices on their training bags.
As I'm continuing to describe in My Debian Adventure, Debian Linux has been filling both my days and my nights with troubleshooting and problem-solving tasks that are often challenging and sometimes complex, but are always enjoyable. Yesterday, I finished redoing all of the tasks on my entire Debian To-Do List, and today, everything is all configured, updated and backed-up again. It's been a lot of work, and I realize that there are several "more-"newbie-friendly" Linux distros that wouldn't have required all of that work, but as always, I've learned more than I ever thought I could learn about Linux, and it's been a lot of fun! And I'm still very, very happy to be a full-time Debian Linux user.
If you're an unhappy Windows user, should you download a free Ubuntu or Mepis or PCLinux CD and replace Windows with Linux? You could try doing that, but it sure wouldn't be the best and smartest way to go about making a major change like that. If you want to increase the chances that your switch to Linux will be successful like mine was, you should really take the time to educate yourself and plan not only what you're going to do, but how it's going to affect you. You may want to start by reading
How To Make The Switch To Linux.
What's the best way to surf the web safely? The CTO of a security firm suggests that you should
use two separate browsers.
If you run Windows on an HP or Compaq laptop, you need to be aware of a new attack code that could turn it into
a very expensive brick.
If you take your computer to a repair shop, is it legal for the shop's employees to look through the private files that you've saved on your computer's hard drive? You may be surprised to see what the Superior Court of Pennsylvania
has ruled.
Here's one of those end-of-the-year lists that we all love to read: "Overall, the industry did several things right and wrong this year. But here's what Network World readers, columnists, bloggers and testers say are
the absolute smartest and dumbest moves of 2007 — and why they matter."
This morning, I installed
Xsnow, a free little toy that adds falling, blowing snowflakes and Santa in his sleigh to my desktop. If you click on the thumbnail, you can see what my desktop looks like right now. After living the vast majority of my life up north, including 17 1/2 years in the Frostbite State, Xsnow is about as close to real snow as I'm willing to be any more.
I have to say that I just love using Linux full-time instead of Windows. I loved using Mepis Linux for 15 months, and I've loved using Debian Linux for the past three weeks. For all of you Linux users out there (24.5% of this site's visitors, the last time I checked), here are
Five Desktop Linux Highlights Of 2007.
I remember that it was a big deal back when we started using 5.25" floppy disks with our PCs, instead of a cassette tape recorder. Since then, 3.5" floppies replaced the larger disks, rewritable CDs pretty much replaced the smaller floppies, and writable DVDs pretty much replaced CDs. If you're looking forward to squeezing even more than 4.7 GB of data onto a DVD, then you're in luck: "At the upcoming CES conference in Las Vegas, one company plans to demonstrate the ability to store
half a terabyte of data on a DVD disc that is made of a polymer similar to Plexiglas."
Will you be looking for a new job this coming year? If so, you may want to make sure you know the
25 Things You Should Never Include On A Resume.
For the past couple of days, I've been trying to solve a "mystery" that involves my OpenGL screensavers in Debian Linux. Since I never use a screensaver (I have Debian configured to power-down my monitor after 5 minutes of inactivity), it's not an important issue to solve, but it's one that I'm curious about. If you're interested in following my progress, as well as seeing the type of excellent help that I've received in the Debian User Forums, take a look at
this forum thread.
What types of computer users are most likely to use Linux? See which group you think you belong to, and whether or not you agree with the author of Where Can Linux Leap Ahead,
Part 1 and
Part 2 and
Part 3.
Because I use the
NoScript add-on in my Iceweasel (Firefox) browser, JavaScripts on web sites that I visit can't run unless I specically give them permission to run. A nice side-benefit of using NoScript is that Flash content on the sites that I visit can't run either, unless I specically allow JavaScripts on the site to run. That's why I'm not worried about this announcement: "Researchers from Google have documented
serious vulnerabilities in Adobe Flash content which leave tens of thousands of websites susceptible to attacks that steal the personal details of visitors." If you want to prevent Flash content from automatically running on the sites that you visit, but you don't want to use the NoScript add-on, then you should install the
FlashBlock add-on instead.
The FBI is hoping to build "the world's largest computer database of peoples' physical characteristics, a project that would give the government unprecedented abilities to identify individuals in the United States and abroad." Are you comfortable with that idea?
If you ask one of your friends to "make a muscle," they'll probably show you one of their biceps. If you ask NASA to make a muscle, that organization literally
makes a muscle.
The mystery of the past few days has been solved, thanks to a lot of excellent help from my new friends at the Debian User Forums. All of my over 70 OpenGL screensavers are working now, and it turned out that the only thing I had to do was install xscreensaver-gl. For the whole story, see
this forum thread.
Sure, it's fun to get new data storage technologies that store incredibly huge amounts of data, but what are the long-term implications of constantly switching to new media and using proprietary data formats? If you think that there will be serious problems in the future, you're right, and they will affect all forms of data,
including video.
I had never heard about this before, but I think it's fascinating: "More than 200 years ago it was already possible to send messages throughout Europe and America
at the speed of an aeroplane — wireless and without need for electricity."
I listen to his financial-advice radio show sometimes — that's the only connection I have to Dave Ramsey. But if you go to this web page of a service provider that he recommends, they'll prepare a state-specific will for you for only $15 (USD). Now you just have to figure out who you want to leave your fortune to.
Every year, we are bombarded by thousands of advertisments that self-servingly try to convince us that Christmas is all about giving and getting gifts — especially expensive, high-tech gifts. Popular culture tells us that Christmas is all about spending time with your family. Or romantic, antiquated customs like roasting chestnuts on an open fire, baking Christmas cookies or going door-to-door in a group, singing Christmas carols to strangers. Or telling stories about a morbidly obese, bearded man who wears a red suit and sneaks into everyone's homes during the night. Or putting up the most expensive, most impressive display of Christmas lights and decorations in the county.
Of course, all of those things can be fun, but unfortunately, far too many of us concentrate on those activities so much that we allow ourselves to become distracted from the real "reason for the season."
What Christmas is really all about is one simple, profound truth — a truth whose importance completely overshadows all of the Christmas traditions, customs and activities, and completely changes the lives of those who who truly believe it in their hearts.
In fact, it's what I'm thinking about every single time I tell anyone "Merry Christmas!"
"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him." (The Bible, John 3:16-17)
My Christmas wish for you is that your relationship with our creator will be the most important one in your life, and that your life — now, every day of the year and forever — will be profoundly changed by God's gift to you of eternal life through his son, Jesus Christ.
Merry Christmas!
My wife and I have very few family members any more, which pretty much frees us from Christmastime's "normal" family obligations. That leaves us with a surprising amount of free time to spend on other activities. So, yesterday, I went to my first Linux users group meeting. It was a lot of fun and I learned a lot from other people's experiences. Here's
a snapshot of our whole group. That's me in the middle of the fourth row, wearing a tuxedo.
Years ago, I liked to shop at Best Buy stores. They had a good selection of computer items at decent prices. Nowadays, it seems like they dropped all of the lower-priced brands and models, and only offer mid-to-high-priced merchandise that I'm not interested in. If you're still a Best Buy customer, you should be aware that
Best Buy is still using deceptive in-store kiosks. Best Buy admits to the deception but says that it is unintentional — and keeps using it.
When I was a kid, our family had a set of Jarts, and we kept using them at family occasions, even years after they had been recalled for safety reasons. Jarts are just one of
The 5 Least Surprising Toy Recalls of All Time.
Depending on whether you have kids, and how well-behaved they are, you may find
this comic to either be really funny, or really depressing.
Mike and Annamarie next door are the best neighbors that my wife and I have ever had. In fact, Mike knows that I think of him like a brother. Last night, Annamarie told me a really cute story about Mike, two of their grandchildren, and a magical moment that they shared with
Max's Lighthouse. As you may remember, every year at Christmastime, I decorate Max's Lighthouse to make it light up every night and play Christmas music from a hidden FM radio. Then, every Christmas Day, I leave the lights and music on all day long. On Christmas Day this year, Mike took two of their preschool grandchildren — one in a stroller — for a walk around the neighborhood. Of course, they stopped at Max's Lighthouse so that the children could "visit" with Max. When they finished their visit and started walking away, the kids called back to Max, "Bye, Max! Bye Max!" Just then, the Christmas song that was playing on Max's hidden radio ended, and the DJ loudly called out, "Merry Christmas!"
If you use a Linux terminal often, you really should take a look at
Yakuake. As I described in today's update to
My Debian Adventure, Yakuake has one flaw that keeps me from using it yet, but its developer plans to fix that flaw in the near future.
Do you have any idea what the technological future holds for us? IBM, a company that has always been pretty good at inventing the future, thinks it knows
Five Innovations That Will Change Our Lives Over the Next Five Years.
I just know that you're going to want to get one for every Linux user you know, especially after you see
this video (and this video) about it.
My Debian Adventure has gradually evolved into my first mega-article — its 37+ printed pages are exceeded only by my Masters thesis on creativity training. Google's Webmaster Tools reports that there are currently 1319 web pages that link to My Debian Adventure — which makes it 1319 times more popular than my Masters thesis — and on top of all of that, I'm still updating it.
Today's update to that article describes my first visit to the Debian Support IRC channel last night. If you're a Debian user who's never used IRC before, you may want to see how I connected to IRC and what it was like to use it.
By the way, if you've written to me lately, you've probably noticed that it's taking me longer to reply than it used to. Lately, I've been hearing from so many friendly Debian users that I've had to spend a couple of hours every day, just replying to email messages. But don't worry — I really like to hear from you.
If you're a Debian Etch user, here's something that you should be aware of: "The Debian project is pleased to announce
the second update of its stable distribution Debian GNU/Linux 4.0 (codename etch). This update mainly adds corrections for security problems to the stable release, along with a few adjustment (sic) to serious problems."
Rea Maor writes a tech blog, and has some strong feelings about other tech blogs. For example, he thinks that
People Who've Never Run Linux Shouldn't Write About Linux. I think that's a very reasonable request — and most tech bloggers will probably ignore it.
A guy named Alex pretty much summarizes how I feel about the Ubuntufication of Linux articles and discussions, in his blog entry,
There's More To Linux Than Ubuntu.
As a full-time Linux user for nearly 18 months, I'm well aware of the reasons why I switched from Windows to Linux, and why I'm so very happy to be Microsoft-free. That's why I put so much effort into educating others about how Linux is a viable alternative for many (but not all) Windows users. But I've learned that, whether you're talking religion or talking operating systems, people who are happy with their current one generally aren't going to be very interested in converting, and you should respect their wishes.
Others take a little more evangelical approach, like the one described in the tongue-in-cheek article, How To Convert A Friend To Linux. Read it and see if you feel called to become a missionary.
Debian Linux vets — and those who use Debian-based Linux distros like Ubuntu and Mepis — know that you can backup all of the packages that you've downloaded and installed by copying all of the .deb files that are in your /var/cache/apt/archives/ directory. Then, if you ever reinstall Linux, you can restore those .deb files and save yourself the trouble of having to re-download those packages all over again.
AptOnCD makes those tasks a little easier by letting you "backup and restore your .deb packages and store them in a CD or DVD or just in an ISO image in your USB Drive."
If you're a Windows user who's thinking of jumping ship, you might want to take a peek at one of your former comrade's experiences, in
The Migration Of A Fussy Windows User To Linux.
Now that the next Consumer Electronics Show is nearly upon us, it's time to take a look at how the new products from last year's CES turned out, in
Scorecard: What Came True, What Didn't In 2007.
Some Windows users get very defensive of their chosen OS, and take every opportunity the bash Linux — even though it appears that many of them haven't tried Linux in years, if ever. In the same way, some Linux users are almost bitterly vocal — in an ex-spouse sort of way — about wanting to see Linux "beat" Microsoft in the marketplace.
I'm guessing that "the silent majority" of Linux users is probably more like me: they're really, really happy to be Windows-free, but they don't really care if everyone else uses Linux or not — they just want Linux to continue to be the very best that it can be. That's the gist of a thoughtful and thought-provoking piece, Winning By Not Competing At All.
If you use Microsoft's Windows Home Server, you should be aware that, according to Microsoft, "When you use certain programs to edit files on a home computer that uses Windows Home Server, the files
may become corrupted when you save them to the home server." At least Redmond's not trying to convince us that "it's a feature, not a bug."
I'm happy to say that it's been so long now since I've had to install Windows that I had totally forgotten about problems like
this one. If I were still a Windows user, stories like that would make me angry — but as Linux user, they make me even more happy that I'm Windows-free.
A man recently paid $6,000 (USD) at an auction, for a poker visor that was supposedly worn by a character in an episode of a Star Trek spinoff. When he tried to get it autographed by the actor who had worn it, he was told that it was a fraud, so he's suing the auction house for millions of dollars. Here's
a lively discussion that brings up some interesting points and clarifies some of the facts of the story. Assuming that the auction house didn't intentionally defraud the buyer, I just have to wonder if the real crux of the problem is that there are people out there who are willing to pay thousands of dollars to buy a poker visor from a TV show.
It's often a lot easier to look back at life than it is to go through it in real-time. I once calculated that, years ago, while I was an undergraduate, on top of being a full-time student, working half-time at a TV station and doing homework, I spent nearly 3 hours every day, just driving back and forth between those things and commuting my wife to and from her job in our one car. If someone had told me, before I started college, that I was going to have to do all of that, I might have chosen not to even go to college at all.
But, if you're smart, you do whatever needs to be done at the time, and you don't make things worse by thinking about how difficult or frightening it is. It's like the old saying says, "If you're going through hell, keep going." And like I've said here, "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. Followed by 2,639,999 more."
This year has turned out to be a great one for me to look back at. A year of challenges to be happy to have survived; of situations that I had to choose to see as "glasses half-full" in order to get through them. A few of the highlights that I was willing to share here included:
I feel very, very blessed to have my childhood bride, a woman of great faith, whose patience, forgiveness and enduring love aced every test that my life burdened her with this past year. I'm also very grateful to have a small group of close friends who have chosen to encourage and support me through everything, and as a result have become more of a family to me than most of my biological relatives ever were.
And, as always, I'm grateful to my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, for helping me through another year. Over and over, I am reminded that life is hard, but God is good.
You turn the key
Then close the door behind you
Drop your bags on the floor
You reach for the light
But there's darkness deep inside
And you can't take it anymore.
'Cause sometimes living takes the life out of you
And sometimes living is all you can do.
Life is hard, the world is cold
We're barely young and then we're old
But every falling tear is always understood
Yes, life is hard, but God is good.
You start to cry
'Cause you've been strong for so long
And that's not how you feel.
You try to pray
But there's nothing left to say
So you just quietly kneel.
In the silence of all that you face
God will give you His mercy and grace.
Jesus never said
It was an easy road to travel
He only said that you would never be alone.
So when your last thread of hope
Begins to come unraveled
Don't give up, He walks beside you
On this journey home and He knows
Life is hard, the world is cold
We're barely young and then we're old
But every falling tear is always understood
Yes, life is hard, but God is good.
