Categories
Applications Mobile Web Development

Mobile Development Framework?

Hi all.  Although this post isn’t about Linux, I thought I would put a question to the group.

Can anyone recommend an easy to use and learn Mobile Framework?

I’m looking for an easy-to-use, yet flexible way to develop Web Applications for Smartphones.  So far I have been trying out Sencha Touch and it’s pretty good.  The only hiccup (which is not really a hiccup) is that the level of “paid support” is much better than the ‘unpaid’ support.  I’ve subscribed to the forum and made a few posts, but I’ve been told (on various other blogs) that you might not get a response all-that-soon since the Sencha Team is first charged with assisting the paying customers.

Again, I have no issue with this concept.  Paying customers keep your lights on.  End of story.

Other than that, I have tried jQuery Mobile, which is great, but has certain limitations on what can be scrolled and what cannot be scrolled within a given container div.

The Sencha Framework is open source, and it’s got great examples to look at and use.

If you know of another or better way to do Mobile Web sites that come close to the look and feel of a “Native” smartphone application, then please, please comment here.  Thanks all!

Categories
Command Line (CLI) Learning Linux Using Linux

Untar Several Files to a directory

Today we’re going to talk about the UNIX tar command.

Specifically, how to use tar to extract or unpack several archives (tar.gz files).  Only – instead of extracting them to the same directory, we’re going to extract them to a named directory.

This utility came in handy after downloading close to 10 gkrellm themes from http://www.muhri.net . I have used the Gkrellm Monitoring tool over the years and was always disappointed with the (somewhat) `boring` stock themes.  I mean, if you’re going to have something sitting on your desktop, using resources to report on resources, then why not have it look slick, sick, or at the very least—”easy on the eyes”… right?

Why would anyone want to unpack tar.gz files with the command line in Linux when there are GUI tools available?

Right, the linux OS comes packed with tons of GUIs to handle files and archives.  We have programs such as FileRoller.  I have used it but imagine you have downloaded (oh I don’t know, twelve) archives that are themes for gkrellm.  Would you really want to use the manual effort of unpacking all of them first, directing the GUI (with more clicks) where to save the extracted files to?

What if I told you that you can accomplish the same in the Linux Shell with a basic loop over a set of tar.gz files?  You’d probably want to take the quick way I bet.  I know I did.

Ok, get on to it already.  Right. Here we go.  Firstly, I’d be a bad dude if I didn’t at least name some links that I googled along the way to building the handy-dandy loop I’m about to share with ye.  http://lejalgenes.com/ very simple layout, 2 commands that do the trick.  And http://www.linuxquestions.org/ which has the command, and provides advice too.

Using the basic concept of the command, which unpacks a tar.gz to a named directory:

tar -zxvf tarball.tar.gz -C <directory>

Then, using a loop construct, where the find command provides a list of tar.gz files, we iterate over the list, unpacking each one to the specified directory following the -C.

The setup:

  1. Have all of your (downloaded) tar.gz files in the same directory.  You may want to get rid of archives that are unrelated to gkrellm themes.
  2. CD to that directory.  We will extract to the .gkrellm2/themes.
for fyl in $(find . -type f -name "*gz");\
do tar -zxvf $fyl -C /home/awsmeadam/.gkrellm2/themes; done

And that’s it.  Done.  Did you download more tar.gz themes?  Ok, run the command again.

If I run the command again, the previously-unpacked files will get over-written, won’t they?

Yes, they will.  In most cases, this is bad.  But since this is a theme unpack, you really have little to worry about unless you’ve edited or otherwise customized a theme.

Enjoy, and happy Linux-ing.

 

 

 

Categories
Web Development Your Choice

Love me some jQuery

I’ve been a Web Developer for quite some time, but within the last few months I’ve been using jQuery and it’s so cool that it will most likely find its way into any and every website I work on.

If you’ve visited a website and observed “Wow, that’s a slick-looking info window” (as opposed to those boring and obnoxious framed popup windows that we immediately dismiss coz they are product ads/spam, or other crap) –

the window was quite possibly coded using some jQuery magic.

Want cool Navigation menuing? jQuery got it.  Want to add Client-Side validation to your HTML Forms with far, far less lines of javascript code? jQuery can do it.  A Tabbed interface, transitions, fades, AJAX-Based form posts? jQuery, jQuery,jQuery, and oh… jQuery.

What is jQuery?

jQuery's website is titled "jQuery: The Write Less, Do More, JavaScript Library"

And you can believe it when they say you will be doing more with less (code).  The part about being cross-browser is true, after a fashion.  I say that because, as a Web Developer, it is still incumbent upon you to check your site/application in as many browsers as possible (just like regular javascript).  Now, since I am a recent convert (and definitely a fan of jQuery), it does take the headache out of doing client-side programming.

For close to a year now, I’ve been either modifying existing jQuery UI elements (such as accordions) or have been adding tabbed interfaces or wonderful modal dialogs to my applications.  If you’re not using jQuery (or another library) to help with your code development, I suggest you do so, it will make your life easier.

Are there tools that can help me learn jQuery?

Yes, there are quite a few, and to list all of them would be for another post (or another blog site) for another day.  For now, I’ll share with you two tools that have helped me.

One of them you probably know about, the IRC (Internet Relay Chat) you can join the jquery channel, there are lots of active users there, willing to help.  Like any IRC channel, be prepared to explain what you’re doing, how you’re trying to do it, and of course, don’t be a fool.  These people are there to help you help yourself.  They are not your personal tech/coding support, so don’t foster any expectations of the people there.  In other words, follow the usual IRC etiquette of asking your question to the entire room/channel/group, and not in I-M style to a single individual who has helped you before.  As I have experienced (yes, I’m sharing a lesson learned the “not-so-easy-way” that just because someone helps you out once or twice in the channel, that they are NOT your go-to resource when something else on a project has you stumped.

The other tool that I have found invaluable when testing out jQuery code for functionality and cross-browser support is jsfiddle.  Imagine you’re working on a Web-based project for a Client.  The Client is paying for (among other things) a level of confidentiality that you would not want to violate at any time for any reason.  When asking for help at the jQuery channel, it is highly likely that someone will ask to see your “fiddle” (sounds kinda personal and creepy LOL) and why would they want to see it??  I’ll tell you why.  It’s a way for other developers to see your code and approach, laid out in an easy-to-see (and update) format.  A few times that I’ve gotten help came from someone pointing out (either by comment or by direct edit) a mistake in either my syntax or approach.  jsfiddle also separates your code sample from the rest of your application and that usually lends itself to a faster solution than sharing an entire script file with someone you really don’t know.

Categories
Distributions drive setup Installing Linux MacBook

Ubuntu 10.10 on Macbook 6,2

Hello all, I write this from the OS-X side of the dual-boot Macbook 6,2

For a few weeks now I’ve been trying out different distros to replace Crunchbang 9.04 as my Linux OS.

It has not gone as well as I would have liked.  I first tried Mint Debian and liked that the sound worked right away but there were a few things that I didn’t like about it (or at least the current state of it):

  • I could not get wifi right away.  This was annoying but solved with a cable.
  • It never seems up-to-date due to problems with the update manager (Mint mentions this, but I proceeded anyway).
  • I didn’t think it would crash “that much”.  I’ve been using Linux since 2003 and the last time I remember crashing an OS was when I tried to run Mandrake on a Compaq 7360 with an AMD K6.  That machine ran Ubuntu and even Fedora Core 4 (slowly yes, but without crashing).  I crashed Yellow Dog Linux several times on a Powermac 7300, but I digress. The point is, maybe I should not depend so heavily on Mint Debian right now.  And again, the good people at Mint do specify that things may happen in the way of stability.  That, i guess, is the downside of using a bleeding-edge distro.  Crashes will occur. Hats off to you Mint, it is a cool distro, but not for me right now.

The next distro that I tried was Crunchbang 10 or “Statler” as I have grown to adore the lightweight Openbox environment and since I ran Crunchbang 9.04 already on this machine, I was thinking “this was the one” for a few other good reasons:

  • It was a newer version of Crunchbang
  • It changed from being Ubuntu-based to Debian-based (Ubuntu-based is NOT a bad thing)
  • Historically-speaking (9.04) was very stable, even though the #! site mentions it might make the system go “Crunch Bang”

So I downloaded the iso, checked its MD5 sum, and burned the installer.  Had some kind of issue where it would not boot after the HD install (maybe the media was a bad CD? dunno.  Maybe I’ll try it again on a new cd).

Next, I was thinking of trying out a different, unknown flavor of Linux altogether: Archbang Linux, which is basically Arch Linux with an Openbox as its default environment.  The only issue, is that I was surprised to find a text-based installer.  I’ve used text-based installers before, but since this is a macbook, there’s a “gotcha” when it comes to installing the boot loader.  You need to install it on the same partition that holds your distro (and not the MBR). So if you do install it on MBR it’s a bit of work to get the system back to where it was before.

The Archbang partitioner just seemed clumsy to me, and I did not want to lose time by accidentally hosing the MBR or deleting any of the mac partitions, so I just bailed out on Archbang.  I can always use the LIVE CD part of it, but I don’t think it’ll help much because it was really the package manager difference that I was planning to learn my way around.

Thanks for reading all the pre-amble (or pre-ramble).

Even though ubuntu has a planned release next month, I needed an OS immediately, so I went with Ubuntu Maverick.  I was impressed right away. I have not used Ubuntu since 7.04 in favor of trying other distros, getting away from GNOME in favor of speed.  I did need to run a cable to get connected to the Internet, but I knew this “Up-Front” as the installer GUI requested that I connect, plug in the AC Charger, etc.

So, I’m happy with 10.10 and will use the onboard tools to upgrade to next version when it’s available.  The boot up time I think could be faster, and for some reason I get a blinking dash for 5-15 seconds before I get to the login prompt.  But I think that’s the worst of my issues for now. It hasn’t crashed at all.

Previously, any ubuntu-based distro needed tweaking to get the sound working on this macbook.  This time, with Ubuntu, it was as simple as running apt-get on the command line to install gnome-alsamixer and the sound was good-to-go!

Cheers, and happy Linux-ing.

Adam

Categories
Distributions MacBook Your Choice

Fix Wifi: Mint Debian on Macbook

Hi all, welcome to my first (I think) post for the year 2011.

I have been planning to replace my Linux OS (Crunchbang 9.04) with a more “modern” OS for my Macbook 13.3 which dual-boots Snow Leopard 10.6 and Linux.  Of course the choices of distros are nearly limitless, but since my “free time to tinker” is not what it used to be, I chose to install the Linux Mint “Debian” Edition (as of this writing, it’s a few months old).

Why Debian from Mint?  That was easy.  Mint is a relatively stable product in general.  I have used it over the last few years with very little problems.  The “Debian” choice from Mint is a “rolling” distro.  The theory is, you install it, and the updates come to you.  Neat eh?

While there are advantages to refreshing your Linux OS once per yer (or so), as I mentioned, I like having a somewhat stable environment for those hours/days that I do have available to tinker.  Also, Crunchbang 9.04 is out of date, although I used it with much success.  They also do not plan to make it a rolling distribution.  A rolling distro would cement my vote.

If you’re reading this, you made it past the intro, (thank you) your patience will now pay off.

After installing Mint Debian 201012, wifi was not working.

Yep, this is a real headache.  Since a Macbook is a LAPTOP, you would think wireless connectivity would work out-of-the-box after installing the distro. HA!. Not so my friends…not so.  This happened to me when I tried out Mint 8 about a year ago, and since I didn’t have time to troubleshoot it back then, I immediately re-installed Crunchbang, who had support for the onboard Broadcom wireless hardware in my Macbook.

I was determined to make my rolling distro get wireless (wifi) connectivity.  I googled. Not much helpful info, other than to preload drivers to a USB.  I suppose this is helpful if you are not able to physically connect a cable to a router.

Get WIFI working on Mint Debian on a Macbook:

  1. Get an Ethernet cable after you have done the install.  Sorry to admit this, but nothing else seemed to work.  More on this in a bit.
  2. Once connected to the internet, use Synaptic and search for any applicable (or all) items matching the search “Broadcom” and either select them for upgrade (if they are marked) or select them for install.
  3. Use Synaptic to “apply” the changes to the system, thus installing (or updating) any Broadcom firmware for your Macbook under Linux.

Ok, I realize that the solution to this problem kinda defeats the purpose of WiFi in the first place.  Many of the blog posts from users experiencing a similar issue (no wifi after installing Linux on a Macbook) described the scenario and there seemed little in the way of resolution. It’s somewhat difficult (if not impossible) to update software if you cannot connect to the internet.  One blogger mentioned that he tethered his iPhone to get “an outside line”.

Since I had access to the router, and an ethernet cable, I figured “why not”.  I know it’s not the most “clever” solution, but I’m sure I’m not alone in deciding to just “GET R DONE” and use the cable to connect to internet and let Synaptic do what it needs to do.

The version I installed is ‘201012’, and there is an earlier version is available if you want to try it out and see if wifi works out of the box.  I don’t recommend it though, because (in general) a later version is better than an earlier version (bug fixes, security patches, etc.)

Best of luck out there. Linux Mint Debian is proving to be a great distro so far.  Openbox is a bit buggy, (wearing “crashy-pants” to coin a phrase) but I can live with that for now.

Categories
Applications Command Line (CLI)

cygwin error loading shared libraries

If you’ve been using Cygwin for a while, particularly imageMagick functions such as convert, you may notice some breakages on updating your cygwin version.  Errors such as:

convert: error while loading shared libraries: ?: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

– it’s (Cygwin) telling you that there are some libraries missing.  You’ll need to find out which ones and then run the setup/installer to fix it.

To Fix it, first use the cygwin utility ‘cygcheck’ to reveal the names of the missing DLLs.   Since this post references the convert function of imageMagick,  run the command:

cygcheck convert

to generate a list of the missing libraries/DLLs.  For more information, you can check cygwin’s documentation site.  If you’re having trouble with “montage” : then in cygwin run:

cygcheck montage

and it should list out for you the libraries that it cannot find, one such library had the word “gomp” in it.  In the cygwin setup/installer, you’ll find the library just by putting in the last few letters (gomp) should find a match for you (or at least close enough) and click the checkbox to install the library.  Another missing library was TIFF- related.

In my case, it was missing the exact same libraries as cygcheck convert.  Once the install was complete, then the ‘convert’ function was back and running as expected.

HOO-RAY!!!

Categories
Applications Using Linux Your Choice

Linux and MS Word Documents

I’m going to discuss something that’s a tad awkward.

It’s a call to improve on the Office Suite software available for Linux.  Is this really something worth writing about? It is, and I’ll tell you why.  After nearly 3 years at the same job, I find myself in a position shared by many—seeking work in a struggling economy.

The first thing I did was find a recent electronic copy of my resume.  Good news!  The most recent version just needed a little touching up.  Since I don’t own Microsoft Office software, updating an MS Word doc should be simple using Open Office dot org, yes?? Supposedly Open Office does the job for Word Documents.  Well, in my case…No.  Abysmally, failingly, No. Broke almost all formatting of the original document.  Caused me two to three times the work just to get it back to a ‘normal-looking’ state.  Mind you my resume was not heavily formatted to begin with.

But what about the FONTS?

Yes, fonts are a big deal when saving the document.  For resumes, it’s important to use a highly-readable font and keep the font size nice as well.  Chances are the resume will be scanned (for keywords) and also printed, faxed, and emailed to users of various Operating Systems.  Keeping the font as generic as possible will help.  Using exotic fonts that only come with Mac will not.  To make my text documents play nice, I installed the msttcorefonts (Microsoft TrueType Core Fonts) package.  This package will let you use fonts commonly found on the MS Windows Platform.

Ok, so is Open Office a total waste?

No, it is not.  I happen to like the Spreadsheet implementation.  For basic spreadsheets, it works great.  I have not tried to edit any MS Excel sheets with embedded macros (yet).  This is (from what I’ve heard) is the tricky part where Open Office has to do a lot of extra work to try and match all the macro languages and formulas—and on that—I’ll give them some leeway.

Your resume broke in OO.org; Can’t you use another app?

Usually, the answer to this question (when put to a Linux user) is yes.  With open source linux there are usually a plethora of substitutes available to try out.  However, when it comes to professional documents, it “just has to work” as the cliche goes.  I tried some text document office-suite alternatives.  First I tried Abiword.  Abiword also broke the formatting and made it’s own arbitrary decisions on font rendering, even though I had the correct MSTTCOREFONT installed (in this case, “Times New Roman”).  So, with the correct Font installed, it didn’t matter.  Document got very messed up.  Other alternatives include purchasing a licensed CD of MS Office and to make it work in Linux, Crossover Office (by Codeweavers), which I would consider purchasing.  MS Office (however) is not high on my list of things to buy.

Abiword is not a bad program.  I’ve written college term papers with it.  This was a start-to-finish document saved as *.doc as opposed to a document created in MS Windows.  I would just like to see Linux have the ability to inter-operate with .doc files that have a table as part of their layout.  I’ve used and recommended Open Office both on the Linux and the MS Windows platform and it usually works great.  Maybe I expected too much out of it?  Maybe tables in an MS Word Doc are not consistently imported into Open Office.

Although I like the idea of the Open Document Format, it’s not something I can count on for across-the-board compatibility with the business world.  This is critical.  If an employer can’t open your resume because it’s in .odt format and their version of MS Word is earlier than 2007, they will simply discard your resume.  They will not bother to read a file they can’t open.  It’s also possible that the .odt file format will make someone (not in the know) uneasy.  They are expecting a .doc file, so to keep yourself “in the game” it’s probably best to send them a .doc file for a resume.

Summary: how can we overcome these limitations?

Use whichever word processor program you want to (as long as it can save as MS Word format *doc).  Send your document to a friend or family member that has the “real” Microsoft Word on their computer and let them open, view, and print your document.  If it looks good, and prints as you expect, then you’re all set.  If not, then try another program or possibly take some time to reformat your document.

What did I wind up doing?

My final solution was to create the resume in iWorks for MAC (as I now use a macbook dual-booted with Linux).  Even if you’re writing your resume on MAC, remember fonts.  The Times New Roman font is recommended as the “generic” font most widely used for this purpose.  Do you have to use it?  No, you don’t.  Just remember the person receiving your resume will need to have the font on his/her computer or else your resume runs the risk of breaking while they see it or print it.  Not a good idea.  Resumes are typically given very little attention to start with as they are quickly scanned.  If a resumeI know Linux users typically do not lean towards conformity, but this is one time when it will work to your advantage.

For the Linux side of the computer, I rebuilt the resume, not relying on tables for formatting in cases where you want to “right-align” dates on the job.  This I felt was a safer “universal approach” and this version became my “default” resume version for better performance on as many platforms as possible.

I put the dates on their own line and right-aligned that line. But again, I was trying to get this done in short time to aid in job-hunting.  What works for you may be something altogether different.  Good Luck

Categories
Command Line (CLI) Using Linux

Cygwin rename command help

Rename files in cygwin, overcoming a limitation

Cygwin is a Linux-like environment for Windows.  It comes in handy when you’re at work, or at home, and your only operating system happens to be Microsoft Windows.  Cygwin allows you to issue Linux commands in a console in Microsoft Windows.  I find it easier to use than the DOS CMD prompt when I’m using a Windows OS.  It’s a great way to get things done quicker, and can be scripted—in a similar environment to a Linux Terminal.

So, let’s say you’re seasoned in the Linux shell.  You’re now at work, using Cygwin, and you want to rename a lot of files based on their name matching a pattern of letters or numbers or both.  This is where cygwin has some trouble.

By default, cygwin does not come with rename ability.  The package util-linux is required.

Cygwin’s rename command renames files if you tell it the exact name of your target file.  This is the same as the mv command. I’m no Cygwin expert, but this is the experience I’ve had.

In Linux, you can rename files using wildcards or pattern matches.  Cygwin’s rename command cannot seem to handle regexes in the same way.  I’ve tried a fair amount of googling to see why this command has limited behavior in cygwin.  I haven’t found a usable solution or add-on to cygwin to overcome this limitation.

So, here’s a shell script that uses sed, mv, and find to overcome the limitation.  I was unable to attach it, so I copied and pasted it below.

Please understand and accept the following disclaimer:  YOU MAY USE & MODIFY THE SCRIPT.  AUTHOR ASSUMES ZERO LIABILITY.  SCRIPT INTENDED FOR USE IN CYGWIN WITHIN A WINDOWS OS. SCRIPT COMES WITH NO WARRANTY, USE AT YOUR OWN RISK. Thanks.

#!/bin/sh
# cygrename : A Program to overcome limitation of cygwin's "rename" function.
# Author: Adam Teller
#
# Cygwin's "rename" doesn't work same way as *Nix "rename"
# because it cannot use wildcards. So, what can we do?
## Get the basename of the file if it matches search pattern.
## If 4th argument is set, change file to that suffix.
## else, match pattern within file name and keep same suffix
#
## Arguments: [search pattern] [replace pattern] [in suffix] [to new suffix]

LIST1=$(find . -type f -name "*${1}*\.${3}")
if [ -z "${LIST1}" ];
 then
   printf "Did not find any file matches, program will exit\n"
 exit 1
fi

for found in $LIST1;
 do
   MATCHEDFILE=$(basename $found);
   NEWFILENAME=$(echo $MATCHEDFILE | sed -e "s/${1}/${2}/");
   NEWFILENAMENOEXTENSION=$(echo $NEWFILENAME | sed -r "s/\.${3}//");

   ## TEST if $4 has been set, it means want a new file suffix
   if [ -z "${4}" ];
     then
       printf "$MATCHEDFILE :to be renamed as: $NEWFILENAME for files of type ${3}\n";
       mv $MATCHEDFILE $NEWFILENAME;
     else
       printf "${NEWFILENAMENOEXTENSION}.${3} will get $4 as its suffix, ";
       printf "and be renamed to ${NEWFILENAMENOEXTENSION}.${4} \n";
       mv $MATCHEDFILE "${NEWFILENAMENOEXTENSION}.${4}"
  fi
 done

 exit 0

Ok, I’ve copied the script and saved it, how do I use it?

  • Run your script from the same directory that has the files that you want to rename. I’ve named my copy “cygrename” (short for “cygwin rename”) but you may save your file with another name if you wish.  Make sure your script is executable. Use the cd command to get to the correct directory.
  • It accepts 3 or 4 command line arguments.
  • Invoke it in the shell using sh cygrename “what-to-find” “replace-it-with” “file extension” “new file extension” (optional).
  • The “file extension” argument does not include the dot (.), just use letters such as txt or doc or gif.
  • 3 arguments is the minimum and I’ve omitted the argument counting, you may however wish to add it into your program so that the 3 argument minimum is enforced.
  • In the even that the program does not find a match, the program exits.
  • The script uses the find command to look for files matching your pattern.  The result of a “find” usually includes the path information.  This is why we use the basename directive.  We just want the actual file name.  For example, a call to find might result in “./file1.pdf” and what we really want to use is “file1.pdf”
  • If the optional 4th argument is used, it indicates a desire to change the file suffix.  Otherwise, you can rename files and keep the file suffix as is.

Here’s a way to store & use the script.  This script is yours to use & modify as you wish.

  1. Store the script (assuming you’ve named it cygrename) in the “bin” folder in your user’s home folder.  In a windows environment, this is usually C:\cygwin\home\userName\bin.  When you first see this folder, it should be empty.  There is a cygwin “system” bin that will be full of executable files. THIS IS NOT what you’re looking for. You are looking for your user’s bin folder, which will be empty until you start putting files into it.
  2. Once you’ve used the cd command to get to the folder where the target files reside, you can invoke the script.  The script can be more easily invoked if you change the PATH variable in Cygwin.  Find instructions here.  Adding your user’s bin directory to your search PATH is recommended because it will allow you to call the script just by its filename, and won’t require the entire path name of the script.
  3. In this example, for simplicity, I’m assuming you have several files in the same “bin” directory as the script you have saved.  You have 4 image files named “picture1.jpg” “picture2.jpg” “picture3.jpg” and “picture4.jpg” .  You want to change “picture” to “img” and keep the files as *jpg  -From within the “bin”directory, Call the script as sh cygrename “picture” “img” “jpg”
  4. Your 4 jpg files should now be named “img1.jpg”, “img2.jpg” and etc.
  5. If (based on previous example) you wanted to change some web files (html) AND their file suffix, you could call the script as sh cygrename “website” “site” “htm” “html” and it would rename files such as “websiteLocation.htm” to “siteLocation.html” because you used the optional 4th argument.
  6. Please be aware that simply changing a file extension DOES NOT CONVERT a file.  What I mean is that if you change a file suffix of “img2.jpg” to “img2.gif” you are not converting to the gif file type.  The file becomes a jpg file named with an incorrect suffix.  This is not recommended.  However, changing an extension from .htm to .html is ok because it is a text-based file.  Image files, office suite files, and multimedia files should only have their suffix changed by using another application to convert the files.
Categories
Linux Discussion

Linux Action Show Podcast

Linux Action Show – a Linux-based podcast

Hello all.  Today I’m going to use my blog space to promote one of my favorite Linux podcasts, known as “The Linux Action Show”.  Hosted by 2 righteous and knowledgeable dudes named Brian and Chris.  Their episodes are available as audio and Video files in numerous formats at www.jupiterbroadcasting.com.  I find it to be a great resource to learn what IT Industry professionals have to say about Linux.

They abbreviate their show as “LAS” (for Linux Action Show).  The show itself, (in my opinion) is a discussion based show “about” linux, its uses and usefulness in the real world.  The show also discusses compatibility, technical issues, reviews of various Linux distributions, and comparisons to features found in other operating systems.

Here is the LAS OGG audio feed, and the LAS MP3 feed.  While you can get to the files in a variety of ways, the RSS links above are a quick and easy way to get a quick synopsis of each show before you download.  You can also subscribe to lots of other Jupiter Broadcasting shows using the iTunes Subscription button.  One of my favorite non-technical podcasts from Jupiter is called Radio Revolver.  It’s a collection of old-time radio broadcasts.

Enjoy, and remember, Linux has a learning curve.  But then again, so does anything worthwhile.

Categories
Command Line (CLI) Learning Linux Using Linux

Using Linux at Work

Use Linux at work—even if your PC runs Windows.

When I started using Linux, I wondered when I would get to actually use it “on the job”.  It wasn’t easy sometimes to work with a Windows-based computer—when there’s a skill set available that can help you do things faster on the computer.  This skill set is the Linux command shell, but as mentioned your computer runs Microsoft Windows.  What can you do??

At one job, I was able to install Perl.  At another job one had to submit a request (with business justification) to add software to a workstation.  Instead of Perl I thought “why not Python?”  Since both times it was a Windows XP Environment, I used the DOS command line (or “CMD” app) to execute the Perl or Python programs.

I used the DOS CMD because (at that time) I did not know about Cygwin.  Using the DOS CMD to execute programs is easy.  The difficult part is dealing with case-insensitivity (which hurts portability) and using a shell to navigate folders with spaces in the names is a real pain.

Using the DOS shell to execute programs is not the same as using Cygwin.  Cygwin is command shell that emulates a working Linux environment.  Installing Cygwin with the base packages is simple and will provide a good “starting point” for learning some shell commands.

Want to use Linux but your work computer is Mac OS-X?

OS-X (like Linux) is Unix-based.  It has a shell that’s known as “Terminal” and it is in the Applications/Utilities folder.  You can also (if the OS is 10.5 or later) use keystrokes (apple + Space bar) to show the “spotlight search” box at the top right and start typing Terminal.  When search finds “Terminal” then press ENTER and voila!  Say hello to the Darwin Terminal.

Darwin handles the basic stuff really well.  It’s capable of helping you learn Shell commands.  But it doesn’t do everything that a regular Linux distro does.  Darwin’s limits can be overcome by installing apps and libraries.  Most likely you will need your System Administrator’s help to get and install X11, MacPorts, or Fink to augment the BSD-derived Darwin environment.