LincolnBlogs
From the twisted mind of me!

I saw the news mere minutes after I got my newest mac. I just picked up a nicely used 17″ iMac. I may even have to name it “jobs”…

Much as many of my opensource cohorts are occasionally at odds with Apple, the company, I believe whole heartedly that we have lost a real visionary. He had a big hand in not only making personal computing a reality, but also beautiful. Apple has always pushed the idea that not only should functionality be a consideration but aesthetics as well. I can only hope that Apple can keep up with his legacy.

In continuation, somewhat, of my last post and a brief review on the last TechShow, I wanted to jot down some notes about my newest encounter with ESXi and Subsonic.

I wanted to try out Subsonic, so I really needed to put together a new machine to play with it a bit. As a RL System administrator, some things carry over into my home computing environment, and paranoia is one of them. I just *have* to test things outside of my “production” servers at home too. Since I run my servers in a virtualized environment, this shouldn’t be too much of a problem.

I run ESXi at home for my virtualization platform, and the norm there is to use virtualcenter (or the vic) to create and manipulate VMs. The problem there is I am just not a Windows fan (no kidding). I had gotten around this problem initially by creating a VM on VMware Server (running on Linux) and then using VMware Converter to move that VM to my ESXi machine. This time, I did a little more digging on the subject of using the command line to create those VMs natively and I actually found some great information that let me do just that. What I found was these two links that contain all the information I needed:
ESXi – creating new virtual machines (servers) from the command line
and
http://www.vm-help.com/esx40i/manage_without_VI_client_1.php

Without rehashing a lot of the detail provided in those two sites, the basics are using vmkfstools to create a disk image for you to use and then building a small minimal vmx file with enough info in it to get things going. To do the install, make sure have your vmx start an iso image from the cdrom drive and turn on vnc for the box. From there it’s quite easy to get an install working.

The server I decided upon installing is CentOS 5.5. I chose the standard server install and the only things that were required to get Subsonic working on it were:
yum install java-1.6.0-openjdk
and then to download and install the rpm from Subsonic’s website. A little later on I found that Subsonic would not stream my ogg files and that was easily fixed by:
rpm –import http://apt.sw.be/RPM-GPG-KEY.dag.txt
wget http://packages.sw.be/rpmforge-release/rpmforge-release-0.5.2-2.el5.rf.i386.rpm
rpm -Uvh rpmforge-release-0.5.2-2.el5.rf.i386.rpm
yum install lame ffmpeg

After all that, pointing your web browser to http://:4040 and you are rocking and rolling with the big boys. The thing that really impressed me with the setup is when you tell Subsonic where your music is. On every other music server install this is the part where it takes a while to scan and index your music. With Subsonic this was surprisingly almost instantaneous! You tell it where the music is and *whamo* your music shows up, ready to be played. Fantastic! The other great piece is the ability to add album art. You can just tell subsonic to change your album art and it finds some suggestions on the web and will let you pick the correct one and save it to your collection. It’s very nice and a complete time grabber

   Early last week I had another burst of reading activity on my Kindle 3. Reading for me tends to come in spurts when the rest of my life doesn’t interfere and it had been a while. I loaded up the Kindle with some new goodies (Sh*t my dad says is hilarious, btw) and started peeling through not only the books but also the menus, setting things up just the way I like them.

RANT: As a side note here, why the heck are collections so freaking difficult to setup? I mean come on Amazon. Make them work by directory structure or something easy, or at least fix it so that when you add to collection, you are only shown books not already in another collection by default. OK, rant done

   Anyhow, as I was reading and setting up different collections, etc. I noticed a familiar recurring problem. The short history is when I got my Kindle 3 I noticed every so often the e-ink would not fully display, but only display VERY faintly. I called Amazon and they had me update the firmware but ut was really hard to tell if that fixed it as it was not a constant thing. Queue up last week and I notice this a LOT more. Not only while reading the books, but now in the menus, etc.. So, I called Amazon right up as they instructed me to do the last time I noticed this. They IMMEDIATELY sent me out a replacement. I mean I had it the NEXT day, during a snowstorm. There was no arguing, no listening to some low end tech worker flip pages on the other end of the phone, no shipping or return costs, no hassle whatsoever. THIS is what customer service is all about and it’s easy to see that Amazon stands behind it’s products. This is why I will always recommend the Kindle. I don’t know what the other guys service is like, but Amazon is absolutely tops every time I have had to deal with them.

   Shortly after I got my new Kindle (read hours) I got horribly sick (sinus infection) and have been that way for 4 or 5 days now. During my occasional bouts of lucidity and while waiting for the NyQuil to kick in again I was reading through my facebook posts and noticed Tom Higgins mentioning that he was enjoying using Subsonic, which is a new (to me anyway) software that manages your music collection for you. It’s a server side app with some seriously nifty clients you can run on you android phone, which made it catch my eye. I have (and still do for now) been using Kplaylist for quite some time and I really like it, but, hey, nothing wrong with checking out new things, right?

   Well, the thought of me trying out some new music collection software got me looking at my music collection. You know what this is like. I have been hanging on to my music in digital form for better than 10 years, so, it’s substantial / sizable, in different formats, mixed up, formatted and named badly, bad mp3 and ogg tags, etc.. What’s a guy to do? Well, I searched around a bit and found a whole lot of programs for Linux that will let you manually fix tags. Ick. With thousands to do I kept searching. I found a bunch of programs for windows and mac that will help you reorganize and fix your collection, and, eventually, I found ONE that will do the same on a Linux box. It’s name is MusicBrainz Picard I have been using it here and there (still sick) for a couple days now, sicking it on a directory of my music collection here and there. It sure beats doing this all by hand! It’s not perfect software by any means, but it sure will be a timesaver compared to the alternative and the more people that use it and update those databases, the better it’ll work. Check it ut, I think you’ll like it!

Some days things just go right. It’s been a while since that happened to me, hence the lack of posts lately. Well, that changed tonight…

I decided it was high time to get a new printer. I have been using used HP LaserJets for years and my last, a LaserJet 5 was finally starting to show some wear, not to mention hogging enough electricity to power a small city. I have also endured about 4 years of complaints that we didn’t have a color printer.

I checked out the stock of some local electronic stores online and spent an hour or two googling whether this or that model printer wold work under Linux. I actually wanted to grab the same printer Dann bought, just because I knew that one would work, however, I couldn’t find a local source. I settled on buying an Epson Workforce 520 from the local BesyBuy.

Setup was an absolute breeze. I unpacked it, followed the setup instructions to add it to my local wireless connection via the printer’s control panel. Then I headed to openprinting.org to grab the driver and installed it. It’s just a deb (or rpm) package so it was a click or two to install. After that I headed to Linux Mint’s printer config utility, told it to search for network printers and it was found and installed automatically with no fuss, no muss whatsoever.

Everything works, and I mean everything. This is one of those multifunction printers that not only prints, but faxes (actually I haven’t tried that and probably won’t), copies AND SCANS! After my initial test print, I fired up Mint’s “Simple Scan” which scanned a document I had on the printer easily and perfectly. I was amazed!

I believe I may have found the perfect wireless printer/copier/scanner to run under Linux Mint (yes, it’s wireless too, did I mention that). I know Linux printing has come a long long way, but this was trivially easy. If you are looking for a great new printer addition to your Linux setup, this is it!

Got an email through the FreeLinuxBox.Org site today:

Hello,

My name is ***** and i a computer science major at the University Of Georgia. I have been a linux fan for about two years now and i am in need of a computer.I really don\’t have enough money right now to buy a computer. I am willing to pay shipping costs. Thanks for considering me.

Thanks

Obviously this kid is slightly confused on how the site works, but his email is not wasted on me. I understand that he is in need of a machine, a Linux box. He’e even willing to pay shipping. Can’t SOMEONE help this kid out? I am betting there are lots more like him too. Please take a couple minutes to inventory your stash of old computers you know you will never use and put them up on the site for donation to someone needy!

Head on over to http://freelinuxbox.org and click the “Login/Manage/New Entry” link on the top right of the webpage. Create a new account on there if you do not already have one (new accounts do not put a password – it’ll be emailed to you). Post your free linux box and go about the rest of your day happy in the knowledge that you are doing a good deed for a fellow human and linux user.

Wow, what a trip. Allan and I drove to SC from my place in PA in the middle of the night, which took up 10 hours. It was a nice drive compared to last year where it was foggy and rainy the whole ride there.

The conference was great. It was 2 days long, and, contrary to what I heard from some people, I thought it was just right. During the talks/conferences there was hardly anyone in the hallways. This tells me that there was something interesting there for everyone. I, however, only got to see Dann’s talk about the linux boot process. It was quite good I thought. The only real downside there was the vendor/hallway track, which was spread out a little too much.

Mordancy made us some SELF ’10 TLLTS shirts, which turned out great and were a hit. We do have some left as well and will be announcing how you can get yours on the show. Gorkon brought cookies and chex mix which were also greatly appreciated. And, of course, there were the books by Prentice Hall (Pearson Ed), APress and the wickedly cool Neuros Link and Nexus One we had to give away. I had a great time talking to all of you who stopped at the booth and I even got the chance to install Linux on a visitors laptop! I also enjoyed visiting with the other vendors and dot org booths there. I still really enjoy being a part of this community. You all are a bunch of great folks!

Probably the best “conference track” there was one tat was totally unannounced and impromptu. On Sunday night, after all was quiet and we were relaxed, Dann, Allan and I had time for a good executive TLLTS meeting. It was really nice to go over a lot of TechShow information, ideas, problems and solutions, face to face, so we could all get on the same page. We are coming up on our second season and we have some interesting things in store.

All in all I had a great time, which was exactly what I expected. I cannot wait for OLF this year nor can I wait for SELF next year. They just keep getting better and better!

How do you know that Linux is becoming main stream? You start running into it in the strangest places.

I just took my kid out to get some food at a BBQ place that I have passed several times. The place is called Jimmy’s BBQ in Malvern, PA. Man oh man, this place has got some good BBQ and the Mac-n-Cheese is to die for! While I was placing my order at the counter, the proprietor looked at my Official TLLTS T Shirt (buy one now) and says, “Hey, do you know Eric Raymond?” I said that in fact, I have met him before and he says that Eric likes to frequent the place as well. Well, after having some of the BBQ there I can see why (yummy).

Unfortunately, Eric didn’t show up while I was there or I would have bought him a sandwich, but my daughter and I enjoyed ourselves anyway. Perhaps sometime Eric will take me up on that sandwich offer (Whatcha think Eric?). Until then I will continue to go to Jimmy’s for some good BBQ, and continue to be impressed that not only did those guys know something about Linux, but were even familiar with Eric too (although I suspect he may have had something to do with the former)

Prey is a lightweight application that will help you track and find your laptop if it ever gets stolen. It works in all operating systems and not only is it Open Source but also completely free.

That’s what their website says anyway.

You have to admit that it sounds quite intriguing. There are a lot of utilities around that you can *pay* for that offer some reasonable facsimile of helping you track your stolen laptop and get it back, but this is the first open source one I have come across.

Further inspection shows this to be “the real deal”. At least as far as I am concerned. I cannot yet comment on the mac/win versions of the software, but the Linux version is pretty slick.

Essentially, Prey runs through cron every 10 minutes by default, completely in the background, hidden from view. It checks for the existence of a specific website and if it doesn’t find this website (gets a 404 message), it starts grabbing information from your machine like ip addresses, screenshots, pics from your webcam, etc., and sends them either to Prey’s website for you to view, or directly to your email account. This is all information designed to help you track down where your laptop is, and identify who might have it.

I tried it on my Ubuntu work laptop and the client is literally a drop-in dmg package. It installed and asked me to run a control panel applet for configuration. This only really asked me for 2 pieces of identifying information, the API key and the device key, both of which were available to me after I registered (for free) on Prey’s website at http://preyproject.com.

Once you are registered and get your device (laptop) listed on the website, you can tell Prey, via the website anytime, that your laptop is missing by going to http://control.preyproject.com (and after logging in) clicking on the appropriate device listing (they let you have 3 for free btw), changing the “Missing” slide switch to “on” and hitting the update button at the bottom of the page. There are other options in there you can change as well to suit your needs. The next time your laptop can find an internet connection and check in, Prey will have it sending reports out so you can find it. I was pretty happy and impressed with how well it worked actually.

The only con I can think of with this program is the fact that I run Linux. Not that people won’t steal laptops with Linux on them, but that I imagine that anyone who would steal one of my laptops would immediately install windows on it, thus rendering Prey useless. If I were to employ the use of that auto-login stuff, that could perhaps stave off a would be thief long enough for Prey to do it’s job, but I do like having to log in to my machines (just makes me feel more secure). It’s something to think about, and I will look into what other people have to say on the subject in Prey’s forums. That being said, however, I am still putting the software on my laptops. Hey, it can’t hurt right?

I have been using Google Chrome Unstable now for some time. It has been a pretty interesting browser and pretty quick. The only issues I ever had were no flash and java support. Well, recently I noticed that flash was working just fine, and after some digging, found that you have to have Java 6.10 to get Java working, although I honestly haven’t tested that yet.

On 12/8, Google released it’s Chrome browser for Linux in Beta (no longer unstable). I quickly uninstalled my Unstable version and added the Beta. WOW is it FAST! I thought it was fast before, however, it literally starts the browser now almost as fast as I can click on the icon. Other than that, it works exactly as you would expect it to, clean and quick. If you have been running Unstable as I have, the only difference I noticed is it is way faster. I don’t have a clue how you did it Google, but good job and I can’t wait to see what this is going to be like when it’s out of Beta!

Now if I could only convince Google to make a mail client to replace Thunderbird!

WOW! Dann pulls through again!

I have had my Sansa Fuze for quite a while now and I completely dig it. It’s just simply one of the best “mp3 players” out there. Of course it does much much more than that . It plays Ogg natively and other formats too, and it’s not DRM magnet either. It also has a great fm radio tuner and does slot radio to boot.

The only thing I have not gotten it to do is video. It has some wacky format that it uses and no matter how many attempts I have made at it with ffmpeg or mencoder I get bupkis. That is, until last night.

You see, Dann broke his Sansa Clip a couple weeks back and for a replacement he ordered a Sansa Fuze. He received it and was reviewing it on the TechShow and mentioned that the video worked great. When I asked him how he got it working under Linux he pointed me to http://code.google.com/p/video4fuze/. Absolutely Brilliant! I downloaded this software and tried it right away, and, just as Dann had said, it works flawlessly. This truly completes and rounds out the Sansa Fuze for OpenSource users.

There really is nothing bad I can say about this little player now. I highly recommend it. I also highly recommend trying out Video4Fuze to encode a couple videos for your new player.

Almost time for me to go watch a movie!