Inside Mozilla Foundation | ScobleShow

Inside Mozilla Foundation (the folks who bring us Firefox) | ScobleShow: Videoblog about geeks, technology, and developers

"Recently, I visited the Mozilla Foundation to interview Mitchell Baker, chief lizard wrangler. "

Here is the story of a successful open source company. I wish that mozilla would start talking about XUL a lot more. I'm not sure why their aren't more people who work with XUL?

This is why open is important. Just look at the number of extensions made for firefox.

Controvertial titles...

Dare Obasanjo aka Carnage4Life - Open Source is Dead

"This is why Open Source is dead, as it will cease to be relevant in a world where most consumers of software actually use services as opposed to installing and maintaining software that is 'distributed' to them. "

He is talking about web based software. I don't think that all software can be replaced by web based software. And for that kind of software, just look at the activity at planet kde or dot.kde.org and tell me open source is dead?!? A blanket statement like that makes no sense, unless you want to grab attention.

And as far as web based software, I doubt open source is dead their either. What gives me hope is this bit from Dave Winers blog:

What do you think? Is Twitter important, like web servers, or blogging software, so important that we should have an open source implementation of something that works like Twitter and can connect up to Twitter?

From what I understood from that bit, Dave Winer thinks an important service should be open. That seems common sense to me.

Just the other day I found this cool app called kflickr. Its an open source app linux based application, that uses the open services of flickr to allow uploading pictures. Thats how I uploaded the last few pics to flickr and then blogged them here.

django_open_source.png
Originally uploaded by awasim.

How about the web application framework Django? Just check out the screenshot!

Just look at my last two posts. How is open source dead?

Far from it. Its thriving. And we have to bolster applications that are open source or that have an open API. Not work the other way around.

We have to think of how are we going to create an open thriving environment on the web. We should be thinking along these lines:

... and the solution is probably going to have a lot more to do with Open Data than with Open Source.

Linux: Driver Support is Key

Linux: Driver Support is Key

"Dell recognizes the importance of open source, GPL-licensed drivers which are maintained upstream in kernel.org. They allow users the widest choice of Linux distributions, effectively taking the specific hardware and distribution out of the decision-making process and let you focus on solving your business problems. We will work with our hardware partners to develop, test, and maintain Free drivers, and continue to make progress towards that goal for all drivers. Most drivers are in good shape now, but there's clearly longer-term work to be done. Work that we're doing now at the driver level will pave the way for more Linux offerings in the future. There's no way to please everyone, but I'll continue to share more details around our strategy as we have new developments. Stay tuned."

More awesome Linux news for Dell. This again doesn't say anything specific, but its a step in the right direction.

Dell to Expand Linux Factory Installed Options

Dell to Expand Linux Factory Installed Options

"Dell has heard you and we will expand our Linux support beyond our existing servers and Precision workstation line. Our first step in this effort is offering Linux pre-installed on select desktop and notebook systems. We will provide an update in the coming weeks that includes detailed information on which systems we will offer, our testing and certification efforts, and the Linux distribution(s) that will be available. The countdown begins today.

Many of you posted comments to our Direct2Dell blog, indicating that you were less concerned about a specific distribution than you are about support at the kernel level and open driver support. We are working on this too, and you can read more about our efforts in today’s Direct2Dell post."

Wow! This is great news. Can't wait to find out more!

feisty reviews...

As the date for ubuntu feisty's release gets close I noticed a bunch of reviews/blog posts about it. I thought I'd put them together here:

• WiFi In Ubuntu Feisty Fawn


• What Should You Expect from Ubuntu 7.04


• Feisty performance - Fly like a butterfly


• Ubuntu Feisty Fawn: Desktop Linux Matured


• Beryl now in Ubuntu Feisty repository!

startbar-feisty

startbar-feisty
Originally uploaded by awasim.

I didn't have any real problems upgrading to feisty beta. The one thing that I did notice was gdesklet startbar had transparency problems. At first I thought it might have something to do with beryl, but switching it of didn't seem to help. Other than that though, the system works just fine. I think I'm going to install kubuntu though, since I want to try out kxdocker.

upgrade_feisty

upgrade_feisty
Originally uploaded by awasim.

Upgrading to fiesty as we speak. One of the packages to be removed is beryl. Perhaps I should have looked into how well beryl works with feisty...

Force links to open in a new tab

Why would they remove this absolutely must feature from firefox 2?

clipped from nanda.satukubik.net So here is how you can set this in Firefox 2: Open about:config and set: browser.link.open_external -> 3 browser.link.open_newwindow -> 3 browser.link.open_newwindow.restriction -> 2 And you’re done!

sysinternals

Now this should be a really interesting interview. Downloading it right now.

clipped from channel9.msdn.com If you write code on Windows or like to know what goes on under the hood in Windows, then you've no doubt heard of Mark Russinovich. He's an OS kernel expert and a co-founder of Winternals; a company that produced must-have operating system and development utilities for Windows (Winternals is now a Microsoft subsidiary as we purchased them in July, 2006. Yay!).

directory stuff

I was looking for the equivalent of open on OS X and start in windows. To open my current directory in a graphical file browser. For KDE you can do:

kfmclient exec .

Opens the current directory. Very convenient.

And for gnome:

clipped from ubuntu.wordpress.com gnome-open . This will open the current directory you are in, using Nautilus

Kubuntu Fiesty beta

I don't have kubuntu installed, using Ubuntu at the moment. So help them out if you're using Kubuntu!

clipped from www.kdedevelopers.org Kubuntu Feisty now has a Beta. We need testers for the Edgy to Feisty update tool, please give it a shot and comment on the bug mentioned.

Funny...

Aclockalypse Now

Yes, he is holding a Thinkpad and calling Dell tech support. :)

Oh, the contents funny too!

searching code

Open Source Programming Language Zeitgeist

"Java developers search for 'java' when searching Java code? How many search results does that produce? However, also in the top are the terms string and file."

I see a reason for such a search. A person getting familiar with a code search engine, might want to look at what kind of java code they can find. If java is used together with some other search terms, it might be used to narrow the search down to just java code. Just some thoughts on why the term 'java' might be searched for by java developers.

Graphics in articles

Windows Administration: Inside the Windows Vista Kernel: Part 3 -- TechNet Magazine, April 2007

"Figure 1 System registry hive TxR logging files (Click the image for a larger view) Enhanced Crash Support"

I've noticed while reading some articles at microsoft (I'm not sure if its just technet or msdn as well) that they have a different method to displaying images within articles. Generally, when an article includes graphics, its a small thumbnail that links to the actual graphic file. You click on it, and it will open the graphic, blowing away the article. Middle click and it will open the graphic in a new tab.

In the article linked above if you click on an image, it will expand the image within the article. This threw me of at first. I'd middle click the image but the tab would have no contents. If you click on the image in the article, it expands the image, within the article. Which means you don't have to go back to the article or anything.

Their are other forms of displaying images as well now. I guess it will take time for the dominant form of displaying images in the new, more dynamic world to take hold.

In the mean time, we're going to have to experiment each time. Try to open the file the old fashioned (standard?) way, and lose focus on the topic being read when that fails. Get irritated for a second, realize the advantages to the new method and then try to get back to what you were doing.

Now where was I, oh yeah, back to reading the above article.

Twitter / Robert Scoble: Question for developers: wh...

Twitter / Robert Scoble: Question for developers: wh...

"Question for developers: which is going to win? MSFT's WPF or Adobe's Apollo? Why?"

I would like to add a new entry to this list? How about Mozilla's XUL? Go here to see some example apps. I think this is a serious contender. If you think not, let me know why in the comments.

Oh, and Adobe released Apollo last night. The SDK seems to only be available for Windows and Mac. No Linux.

Two trick ponies

Here is an interview of Steve Ballmer talking about google growth strategy. I find it interesting that he says that M$ has two trick ponies, and then goes on to say that those are desktop and server. I would've thought Windows and Office. He says online and consumer electronics and third and fourth they are working on.

twitter changing habits...

Twittering Your Home - O'Reilly Mac DevCenter Blog

"Interest in the messaging service Twitter is clearly on the rise (see this Wall Street Journal article if you’re not already familiar with it), and while most people are figuring out how to use Twitter for its intended purpose–social networking–I’d like to share a few notes on my more prosaic experiment of using it as part of my home automation system."

Its funny, but the use of tinyurl.com must have skyrocketed since twitter started getting famous. The funny thing is, that the link above to the wall street journal article is also a tinyurl.com article! Use of tinyurl.com in an oreilly blog! Now that is twitter influence, already causing change in peoples habits (its arguable whether those changes as a whole would be good or bad though).

Important, please read!

I'll need this report done by Saturday morning.

Oh, and I'll need you to come in this Sunday.

Thank you,
James the Manager

M A B -- Mozilla Amazon Browser

M A B - Mozilla Amazon Browser

"MAB Screen Shot Mab is a Rich Web Application to search products on all 6 Amazon-branded sites (com, ca, co.uk, fr, co.jp), showing results in a handy interface, typical of desktop programs. MAB lets you search within one window without distracting you with plenty of images and texts not concerning what you are effectively looking for. MAB can make you feel like the world's most powerful bookstore clerk!"

I am surprised that their are not more applications that are similar to this. ajaxWrite uses XUL as well. Firefox is not just a browser but a platform. I wish they would begin marketing as such!

Their is a remote application version you can try, that doesn't require any installation. Try it!

How to run Vista legally without activation ... for at least a year

How to run Vista legally without activation ... for at least a year

"Windows Vista can be run for at least a year without being activated, a serious end run around one of Microsoft Corp.'s key antipiracy measures, Windows expert Brian Livingston said today"

(Via Del.icio.us Tag: software.)

Wow! Now thats a major flaw if I've ever seen one!

Ubuntu on a Dell E520

I installed Ubuntu on a Dell E520, and the installation went quite smoothly. I had to struggle to get the proper drivers for nvidia and the screen resolution of 1920x1200 on the 24 inch Dell screen. Nvidia drivers were quite easy to get going once I found envy and beryl installation was even easier.

The friend I installed it for liked it, but he has been having problems with random crashes. I'll be trying to debug the problem soon.

RHEL 5 - from the new, more open Red Hat

RHEL 5 - from the new, more open Red Hat :: Linux Format :: The website of the UK's best-selling Linux magazine

"In case you didn't realise, Red Hat has launched its Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 operating system at Cebit and, more importantly, overhauled its corporate infrastructure to more closely involve the open source community."

Its interesting that RHEL 5 is supposed to be more open to the open source community. It seems while everybody was trying to be more open to the open source community Redhat was going the opposite way.

The trend for me has been redhat was the linux distro I started working with. Then moved to SuSE. Then in between came a bunch of distros like yoper, and lately its been Kubuntu.

I tried gentoo, but when I had time, I didn't have a machine that I could compile gentoo on in a timely fashion. Now that I have the machines, I don't have the time. Sigh. The first thing a coworker of mine did when he joined the company I worked for in the past was install Gentoo on his machine. Three days it took him to get things right. I just don't have that kind of time, at least not yet. One of these days...

Now Redhat is too enterprise centric, and SuSE has that cloud hanging over it with the Microsoft deal. I have no problems with Kubuntu and am sticking with it, both as a desktop OS and a server OS. I wonder if yum solved the dependency hell problem?

Twits Twittering for the sake of Tweets: or that’s not why I twitter

Twits Twittering for the sake of Tweets: or that’s not why I twitter

"Remember this? Probably many don’t, but I’ve been a member of Twitter, since last May or June. Previous to Jabber integration. Previous to the funky tricked out personal landing page. Previous to the vowels. (oh and that was the first recorded ‘twitterquake’ btw)"

Reasons why twitter might be worth checking out for personal use, as opposed to corp use.

(Via ::HorsePigCow:: marketing uncommon.)

Here is something that might help with the question: how do I twitter?!

Robert Scoble: Really great beginner's guide to Twitter: http://tinyurl.com/2gchre

(Via Twitter / Robert Scoble.)

more twittering...

Damn, Dave Winer jumped onto twitter!

I wonder how twitter fits in to corporate life? I'm not sure how smart it would be to twitter from a meeting. It could be dangerous even. You need to think before you write or you might leak something!

I'm not sure how good it is to twitter links. Isn't it better to del.icio.us them? You have tags and all these tools to handle your links, which doesn't exist with twitter.

Shuttleworth Tells Linux Users to Stop Being So Fussy For OEMs

Shuttleworth Tells Linux Users to Stop Being So Fussy For OEMs

" 'Mark Shuttleworth says Linux users may need to stop being so fussy when putting demands on OEMs for pre-installed Linux PCs. CRN finds a response to Shuttleworth that seems to be both amusing and telling at the same time.'"

This is exactly what I was saying in my last post about the Dell Survey.

Mark says:

Second, we free software fans are a fussy crowd, and very hard to please. You know what you are like - you sit and configure that Dell system down to the finest detail

I know I am like this. The reason why I like kubuntu is that it makes it real easy to configure my system just the way I like it, in a matter of minutes. This helps me get down to what I want to do with the system. Write code, setup subversion and so forth.

BTW, Robert Scoble was asking me who he should speak to about Ubuntu. Mark Shuttleworth would be your man Robert. I think he is the founder of Canonical, the guys who make Ubuntu. And the best part is that he has a blog! And seems like he has had it for a while!

(Via Slashdot.)

1st Match, Group D: West Indies v Pakistan at Kingston, Mar 13, 2007

Cricinfo - 1st Match, Group D: West Indies v Pakistan at Kingston, Mar 13, 2007

We didn't do so well. Here is to hoping second match will be better.

test post

Corruption at the end of my blog!

Hmm... the only new thing I've done is post with marsedit.

Apple Releases 10.4.9 Update

Apple Releases 10.4.9 Update

"Apple has finally released the Mac OS X 10.4.9 updater to users through the Mac OS X Software Update tool. The 10.4.9 Update is recommended for PowerPC and Intel-based Mac computers currently running Mac OS X Tiger version 10.4.8 and includes general OS fixes, as well as specific fixes or compatibility updates for a number of apps and technologies"

Their was also an iPhoto 6.0.6 update for me. I'm updating right now.

(Via digg.)

Dell Opens a Poll On Linux Options

Dell Opens a Poll On Linux Options

"'In response to overwhelming user demand for Linux, Dell has posted a survey on a company blog that asks 'PC users to choose between Linux flavors such as Fedora and Ubuntu, and to pick more general choices such as notebooks versus desktops, high-end models versus value models and telephone-based support versus community-based support.' Votes will be collected through March 23, and Dell plans to use the feedback to begin selling Linux-based consumer PCs.' The poll is pretty minimal. Wonder how much it will really guide Dell's choices."

Lionel told me about this pole on my meetup yesterday, and this is definitely interesting. Dell seems to be seriously interested in Linux after demands from customers. Personally I don't really care what distro gets offered. What I am more concerned with are Dell systems that are certified to run Linux. Which means that you no longer have to pick and choose the hardware.

For instance, when I buy a laptop, I have to make sure that the hardware in the laptop will have Linux drivers, and drivers that work well. Now I should be able to just select a system without worrying about the level of driver support. For example, I always choose a system with the Intel 3945g wifi, since it has the best driver support in Linux as far as I know.

(Via Slashdot.)

MarsEdit 1.1.4

MarsEdit 1.1.4:

"It's so nice to see MarsEdit resurrected."

Finally, support for the new blogger with Gmail authentication! :)

(Via Del.icio.us Tag: software.)

dinner at salt lick with robert scoble

I just had the most amazing dinner at saltlick here in Austin. Robert Scoble was their and so was Lionel Menchaca from Dell, and Chris Aarons from AMD. I got sit next to a Vice President from AMD on one side and cunning_femme on the other!

I didn't take any pictures :( but hopefully some will crop up that I can blog!

Robert is as amazing, open and fun to talk to as he is in his videos! I wanted to show him a Dell XPS M1210 with kubuntu and beryl in all its glory, but didn't get a chance. Oh well, maybe next time!

Lionel was another fun person to talk to. Glad to see we have an excellent blogging team at Dell!

And thanks to AMD/Chris Aarons/all others from AMD for the great dinner!

LinuxBIOS demo videos

Amazing.

Frak!

(Spoiler: close your eyes and don't read any further if you haven't seen the latest episode!)

I didn't see this coming either! Frak me!

clipped from www.ew.com

TAKING KARA HERSELF Starbuck's sacrifice is a little puzzling

I mean, I'd heard the Internet chatter saying that something major was coming that had to deal with Kara Thrace, but I didn't quite expect, you know, death. (More later about whether I really believe she's dead.)

daily usage problems with vista...

I use an old version (1.5) of utorrent with Vista. Downloading a video torrent in vista suddenly stops. I'm using the older version as I like it for its small size (200kb or so), and I read somewhere that some tracking bits were added to the newer versions (I can't confirm this right now). For some reason it seems that vista wants to create a thumbnail for the video, and this causes utorrent to stop downloading because another process is accessing the file.

Another problem I've noticed is that when I access a directory with a lot of media files, it takes a long time for the explorer to make thumbnails for the video, and the whole system seems to slow down. Further, if you want to delete items in the directory, updating the windows is slow, as its still trying to identify media files, create thumbnails and what not. This is really irritating.

In fact, their have been two occassions where explorer stopped responding and the system restarted explorer. This may also have to do with the codecs for the media files causing explorer problems.

More than a cube...

I've been looking for this, I usually prefer to have six workspaces on my desktop.

clipped from randomsegmentsofcode.blogspot.com

To add more desktops, just go into Beryl settings, general tab, scroll down and change the value of horizontal virtual size.

Python faqts...

All variables passed in Python is by reference. It might not look like that and you can read at source for the reasoning.

clipped from www.faqts.com

Python does everything by reference, including parameter passing.

Platform usage...

I've noticed the use of Linux by University students is quite high. If you read dot.kde.org, or planet KDE you might notice a high number of writers are students. And I've noticed this first hand.

I have a couple of friends who are physics researchers, and they seem to prefer using Linux for their tasks. I've installed Kubuntu for a few of them. When I worked for the Center of nonlinear dynamics, most of the workstations had been running Linux.

Perhaps the scobleizer might want to cover this aspect of computer usage...

start pages

My start page is usually about:blank. I was trying to see what might be different in PageFlakes from netvibes, but I don't see much difference.

I notice OS choices of people a lot. And I've noticed on the scobleshow their are two main contenders. Windows XP, and OS X. I don't think anybody has used Vista, or Linux for a Demo. Sucks.

Wish I had a company. Maybe I could do a demo of Kubuntu or beryl when Scoble is in town!

clipped from www.podtech.net

Here Dan Cohen, CEO of Pageflakes, demonstrates his new service, which makes a killer start page.

beryl

I'm finally using beryl on my main machine, and its beautiful. I'd been using it on and off, but now I have it turned on all the time. Despite being really beautiful it really does provide a boost in productivity. Especially when coding. Try F8 or F9, and see if it helps you too...

Ok, I'll tell you what F8/F9 does. Its Linux equivalent for OS X's expose. I really like the feature since it makes it much more easier to work with open windows/workspaces.

Texter troubles...

After reading the little intro by lifehacker for Texter I was really looking forward to giving this a try. But on an Xp box, it just doesn't seem to work. The program installs fine, and runs. But the replacement just doesn't happen. The word when triggered gets replaced by nothing, instead of the text I want. Not sure what I am doing wrong. Perhaps its an early release they still need to get the bug fixed?

Update: I just upgraded that same machine from XP to Vista, and Texter started working! :)

Uninstalling Powershell...

While upgrading an XP installation to Vista, the Vista compatibility check informed me that Windows Powershell must be uninstalled before installation can proceed. Going into Add or Remove programs did not show any entry for Powershell.

Turns out Powershell installs as an update to windows. You have to click on "show updates", and scroll through tons of security fixes and hotfixes. You'll find an entry for Windows Powershell 1.0, and your Vista upgrade should then install after that.

Cloning drives

I wanted to clone a 40 GB hard drive, on to another drive. At the same time, having the image saved as a backup for later use could also be beneficial. The easiest way I could think of was through dd. This was a sata laptop harddrive, and I couldn't take it out and hook it up to a desktop machine. I decided to start up ubuntu from a CD and dd the drive over the network as a file on another hard drive. The only problem was that mounting the drive via samba imposed a 2GB limit on the file. The cloning failed.

Instead of smb, I decided to use netcat. The desktop was a windows machine, on which I downloaded netcat for windows, and dd for windows. Opening up a command prompt I gave the following command:
nc -l -p 9000 | dd of=backup.img

On the system that contained the hard drive to be cloned I had booted up into a ubuntu cd, I ran:
dd if=/dev/sda | nc host_ip_to_connect_to port_no

This seems to have worked nicely, and I had a 40 gig image saved on the server. Writing it back, was even easier. Since the file had been created, you could just mount the server as a share, and use plain dd to write the file to the drive on the system you want the hard drive cloned.

Booting into the system, everything seems to be fine, and the system seems to have come up without any problems.

Disclaimer: Your mileage may vary, and you should be careful. Playing around with your hard drive like this can be dangerous, can cause loss of data/hardware...