Tag: Linux

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Whoa!

I cannot believe the responses I’ve received and the number of site visits my piece on Ubuntu vs. Macintosh and Windows has received. I originally wrote that as an email to my brother who has followed my Macintosh, Windows and Linux adventures over the past decade and a half. One of the readers of my piece inferred that I must have an older Macintosh. I own a three month old MacBook Pro which I really enjoy and continue to use every day. I purchased it when I began my program of study in Educational Leadership at St. Bonaventure University. Prior to purchasing the MacBook Pro I purchased two MacBooks. One for my daughter and another for my son. I really enjoy the Macintosh interface and I was using a Macintosh Plus and programming with HyperCard over twenty years ago. I’m not an Apple hater. Apple Computer has great products, but that being said, I work in education where there are dwindling dollars and when one can purchase two Dell’s equipped either with Ubuntu or Windows 7 for the price of one MacBook one must make choices.

I’ve been using Linux since 1997 when I purchased Red Hat 5 at Staples and a teach yourself Linux in 24 hours book. I’ve progressed from Red Hat 5 to Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 and I’ve used Centos 3 and 4, Fedora 1 through Fedora 5. I was on a trip Portland, Oregon in 2005 when I attended a Portland Linux User Group meeting at Portland State University and a guy handed me Ubuntu 5.04. At first I didn’t like Ubuntu because of “sudo” but then gradually over the last four years it has come to be my favorite Linux distribution even on the server side of things. I’ve used it on standalone servers, created Linux terminal servers, print server, a Mythbox, several desktops and several laptops. I’ve got my Mother using Ubuntu and she likes its simplicity and reliability. Thanks to everyone who left a reply as I’ve learned something from each of you.

Since I originally wrote that piece I’ve installed Ubuntu 9.10 on my new Dell Inspiron 1545 and it works even better than Windows 7 did on that platform. I will eventually virtualize the Windows 7 that came with the notebook using Virtual Box. Today I drove over to pick up a computer that I donated over a year ago to the Franciscan Friars at Mt. Irenaeus. It’s a Dell mini-tower with Windows XP Home. I’m going to give the Friars the option of installing Ubuntu and then virtualizing Windows in that too. There’s something to be said for a stable host operating system and a virtualized guest OS. I’v benefited more than once from reverting my virtual Windows XP desktop to an earlier state after spyware and or Windows updates caused problems.

One the features of the MacBook that I really enjoy is the ease of converting old video tapes to DVD format for clients of mine. I did some of that over the holidays and helped an old friend recover memories of a deceased brother that were locked away on tape. Peace!

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Ubuntu v. Macintosh and Windows

I’m not bowled over by the Macintosh.  It’s a great OS with some great tools and like a friend said on Facebook when I first got it, it is Linux with great multi-media.  I love Photo Booth, iPhoto, iMovie and iDVD all great software products that work together rather seamlessly. But are they worth double the price of a Dell for the average person. I don’t think so. I think Apple’s future is with the iPhone and maybe their upcoming tablet. They are really a desktop OS and the future belongs to mobile platforms. I think Microsoft has gotten the bugs out of Vista in Windows 7. So far it’s quite easy to operate and doesn’t have all the “yes/no” permission questions of Vista. I got Windows 7 Premium because I wanted to experiment with their multimedia tools too. I bought this Dell Inspiron 1545 because I got a great price. It was a refurb and most of my PCs are Dell refurbs. I save $200-$300 per unit that way. I wanted to install Ubuntu on it from “go” and I also wanted to virtualize Windows 7 and experiment with it. I will use Virtual Box which is really a great product and one that I’ve got almost two years experience with. I bought the machine for the added RAM, more storage and faster processor because I intend to have some more virtual machines running.

One of the things that I’ve discovered in my Mac adventure is that there is no where near the number of great open source applications on the Macintosh side of the house as their is in either Windows or Linux. I missed that. Also, I do some web application development and the tools aren’t there as easily as they are in Ubuntu. I really discovered that over Christmas break when I was building the Eucalyptus “cloud.” Apple has that software on disk that you can load on the Mac, but since its BSD Unix it’s a bit different than Linux and it just makes it more difficult. The other real pain in the butt with a Mac is its real lack of the second button on the mouse even when you are using a touch pad on a laptop. There are keystroke shortcuts you can use, but its just not as easy as with a PC or a Linux desktop. I’m used to cutting, copying and pasting with Cntrl-X, Cntrl-C etc. and with the Mac it’s a bit different. I miss the big screen of the 15 inch and Linux in general and Ubuntu in particular supports virtual desktops. That’s really not supported as well on either Windows or Macintosh.

The other plus with Ubuntu and Linux in general and this is where Linux really kicks both Windows and the Mac is you have the same OS whether mainframe, desktop, laptop or mobile device and it’s just plain stable.  I’ve had no blue screens with Windows 7 and I didn’t with the Mac either. I can run Ubuntu or Linux on darned near anything and have resources to spare. I also think that Apple doesn’t use the fastest DVD/RW drives and the USB ports on the MacBook were noticeably slower than the USB on my nearly three year old Dell Inspiron 6400. Go figure! Not all Linuces are equal to Ubuntu on the desktop. Red Hat is decidedly more server oriented and their development product Fedora (which I used a lot at one time) is not the equal of Ubuntu at present. Ubuntu is more international in it’s flavor which is probably a good thing. Both Dell & IBM are favoring Ubuntu on the desktop and server and much of Amazon’s cloud (EC2) is Ubuntu oriented too.

I really think the future is mobile and Microsoft understands that well and is positioned to support that with mobile devices. Ubuntu and Linux in general is mobile oriented too. Motorola, Google and a host of other vendors are or have developed mobile devices using Linux and Apple Mac while cool is really a desktop OS and although the OS is inexpensive at $29 a copy it is very proprietary after that point. Their real mistake in my opinion is not opening up their platform like Microsoft did with Windows, but that’s because they are desktop or laptop oriented. Apple is a great company and I have always loved their innovative products, but they are pricey too.  Well those are my thoughts. In short you can get two computers for the price of one if you use either Ubuntu or Windows 7. In this day thrift the $1200 Mac has a tough row to hoe. If Microsoft got smart and put Windows on a Unix core the game would be up for Apple.

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Rebel with Cause

This is a cross posting from my other blog.

James Dean made a name for himself in the 1950’s movie, “Rebel Without a Cause.” In the past almost four years I’ve been determined to show that Linux and in particular Ubuntu Linux is a viable desktop operating system. I’ve proven it to myself time and again but still it remains an outlier in consumer circles. In the last week I’ve rebuilt three Windows computers that had been virtually destroyed by malware. In two of the three cases the individuals let their virus protection lapse, in the third the lady was using a well known anti-virus and security solution and she still was victimized. When I returned the computers to their owners I suggested how they could work to keep their machines from becoming infected again.

Lately, I’ve taken a more active stance promoting both Ubuntu equipped personal computers and Macintosh computers because Windows seems more vulnerable than ever. I can’t think of anything I do other than iTunes and Quicken which couldn’t be accomplished on Ubuntu. I’m able to read blogs, write blogs, send and receive email, participate in social networks, write HTML, and create and update websites. Have I left anything out. That’s a pretty complete listing. In any event I’m able to do all of that from my Dell Inspiron 6400 with Ubuntu 9.04. I am definitely plugging Ubuntu, but for you could do the same with Fedora and OpenSuse, PC Linux OS and the other Linux distros. Ubuntu just happens to be my favorite.

Recently I bought my son a MacBook for his home. Why a MacBook and not Ubuntu? Simply so that he could keep up with the Joneses in his life. All his friends have Macs and I thought what the heck. But, really there is no real difference in operating efficiency on Linux or Macintosh OSX. Both are open source at their core and Unix and Linux are much more secure and stable. I have to admit that the Macintosh GUI is compelling, but I still like using two and three buttons on my mouse or touchpad and that’s not possible with a Mac. In fact that two button dilemma is driving my son a bit batty. He’s used Windows most of his life and those of us who use Windows and Linux know that a mouse has more than one button and nearly all of our keyboard shortcuts are the same.

I am going to keep pushing Linux and Ubuntu in particular because it’s the most stable, least costly and most fun operating system on the planet at this time.

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Vacation

Today is the first day of my winter vacation.  Last year I went to Arizona and I miss not going there, but I will travel soon to Washington, DC for DrupalCon. This morning I went to the gym with our daughter, Dara. Dara’s home this week because she’s been student teaching in the nearby Hamburg Central School system.   I worked out on the eliptical machine, which I’ve been using religiously lately. This morning I did 4.5 miles in forty minutes. I was happy with that. I compete with myself, trying to improve each day. I did the math and that’s less than nine minute miles.  After getting home and showering I had my a bowl of rice krispies with milk and honey. Today I’ve been relaxing, watching “Dances with Wolves,” and napping. What a life.

I haven’t written here as much lately, but I’ve been busy.  I researched and built a new Ubuntu Linux Terminal server on our network. It is a virtual server. That means that it resides inside one of our VMWare ESX servers.  Because it has been virtualized it can be shared more easily with others.  It is one of my ways of contributing to the open source community. The teachers and students who came to rely on our older Linux terminal server and who waited patiently while this one was built and configured are very happy.  I’ve also been learning how to use and deploy Drupal.  My life has always been about reading and learning. It’s been my passion and it continues to consume me.

Yesterday a friend wrote a very nice recommendation. I had asked him to recommend me on LinkedIn and I was humbled by what he wrote.  It is nice to have friends who think highly of you.  Here is part of what my friend Frank Pirrone wrote.

Don is one of those creatures who by temperament or by choice inhabits the cutting-edge of whatever he finds himself working on or engaged by. He has done tremendous work implementing novel technology solutions for the Franklinville school district as well as the surrounding community.

There is a chance I might retire from the school district. I don’t have to, but I’m eligible.  I hope that those of you who read what I write will pray for God’s will to be done. I will try to listen to his will. I’m trying to determine what that is in all of this.   Next month I will have worked at school district for thirty years.  Add to that a couple of years of military service and some other public service and I will have nearly thirty-five years of service. I suppose that is enough,  but I don’t want to sit around collecting dust. Life is to be lived.

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Humanity to others

I’m a Ubuntu Linux user and a Ubuntu affiliate. I’m always looking for ways to use open source software and I’ve often thought that the open source philosophy is very biblical. There is a real tie to relationship with others in the open source community. Today in my reading I came across a wonderful story about how a poor man in San Francisco was helped at St. Anthony’s, a Franciscan mission to the poor and homeless much like St. Francis Inn where I volunteered last summer.  St. Anthony’s networks with some other Bay Area ministries and tries to help the less fortunate gain the skills they need to obtain a higher paying job. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=awrK28aV-Rc]

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Thanksgiving

Tomorrow will mark the day most folks in the United States celebrate Thanksgiving. It’s the official holiday. I try to remember to be grateful more often than once a year. I don’t remember to give thanks everyday, but when I do I remember that I have much to be grateful for. Continue reading “Thanksgiving”