The New York Times touts Linux
"LINUX runs the Google servers that manage billions of searches each day. It also runs the TiVo digital video recorder, the Motorola Razr cellphone and countless other electronic devices." Read more here.
The Broadcom 1390 Wireless card under Fedora 7
I spent quite a while this weekend trying to get a Broadcom 1390 wireless controller connected to a wireless access point via WPA2 encryption under Fedora 7. Hindsight is always 20/20, so this is actually fairly easy to do as long as you know what to change. If you don't know what to change, however, you'll end up with a few more gray hairs after spending hours troubleshooting the connection. Let's begin...
Just so you know the type of hardware I'm using, when I run an lspci|grep Network command in a terminal I get the following:
0b:00.0 Network controller: Broadcom Corporation Dell Wireless 1390 WLAN Mini-PCI Card (rev 01)
xmms-itouch RPM for Fedora 7
I compiled the xmms-itouch RPM earlier today for Fedora7, from the source RPM over at Dag Wieers. Even though there are quite a few newer audio players out there, such as Audacious and Amarok, I find myself always going to back XMMS.
I think the main thing I really like about XMMS is how well is can handle very large playlists. I like the updated interface on Audacious, but it tends to choke when dealing with huge playlists.
Anyhow, I have a Logitech Elite keyboard, and I like to make use of the media keys on it when I use XMMS, so in order to do so I compile the xmms-itouch plugin. If you'd like a pre-compiled version for X86_64 machines running Fedora 7, you can grab that xmms-itouch-0.1.2-5.rf.x86_64.rpm.
*Note* If the plugin crashes on you, with the following error:
Gdk-ERROR **: BadAccess (attempt to access private resource denied)
serial 7 error_code 10 request_code 33 minor_code 0
be sure to use the gnome-keybinding-properties application to remove any multimedia shortcuts you already have defined, such as "Volume Up" and "Volume Down". For some reason having these enabled caused the plugin to crash for me. I haven't quite debugged that yet, but if you have issues try that work-around.
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Daniel, a fellow Linux aficionado, sent me the following information which could be quite helpful, so I thought I'd post it here:
"A small addition: you can find out exactly which keys to disable in the gnome-keybinding-properties panel.
First enter the keys you want to use in xmms-itouch config-screen and translate the keycodes (e.g. 234) to their hexadecimal value using gnome-calculator for example (scientific mode). Now you can enable the itouch plugin. You probably already know this, but maybe some readers find it useful and don't have to disable all their keyboard shortcuts."
Fedora 7 X86_64 RPMs for Pidgin
I've compiled a Fedora 7 x86_64 RPM for Pidgin, which allows it to connect to the Openfire Jabber Server. Grab them if you need em: pidgin-2.0.2-4.x86_64.rpm and libpurple-2.0.2-4.x86_64.rpm
32-bit versus 64-bit: Benchmarking
I'm running a number of servers using the standard release of Fedora, and was curious as to how much performance gain I would get by switching them over to the x86_64 version.
After Googling around a bit, I a found a nice PDF that does a benchmark comparison of Ubuntu under x86_64 and the 32-bit flavor, performed by Artyom Tonkikh. You can download it here.
Conclusion: It does appear that the performance boost afforded by the 64 bit version would be noticeable under most applications. I was kind of hoping it wouldn't, because now I have more work to do...
Pidgin + OpenFire + Not Authorized
I posted a quick write up and some RPMs that help resolve the "Not Authorized" message that you can get when using Pidgin with the Openfire Jabber server under Fedora Core 6 and Fedora 7.
I had placed this article on the fedora.thelinuxpimp.com site originally, but I have now decided to fold that information back into this site instead, so it's no longer available. The crux of the matter, as far as I understand is that Java's CRAM-MD5 implementation and Cryus SASL's implementation (used by Fedora, and perhaps Ubuntu) differ slightly.
In order to resolve the problem, I usually just rebuild the official source RPM provided by the Pidgin project. Here are the links to my i686 compiled RPMs for Fedora Core 7: pidgin-2.0.2-4.i686.rpm
libpurple-2.0.2-4.i686.rpm
Solaris could nudge Linux to GPL 3
"Linux leader Linus Torvalds has finally found something that could convince him that the forthcoming version 3 of the General Public License is worth adopting: open-source Solaris." Read more here.
Who gets hurt by anti-piracy measures?
I own a retail copy of Office 2003 Professional that I am using on a single machine. I just swapped out the motherboard on this machine, so I had to re-validate the software. I initially had a faulty motherboard on this machine, so this is the second time I've swapped out the motherboard..so I can't re-activate over the Internet. When I did this two weeks ago, I started my effort to call Microsoft tech support and have them re-validate my software over the phone.
I've called Microsoft now 12 times, and my legally purchased software that I am attempting to use on a single PC is still unusable at this time. I've been hung up on now 4 times, told to call back in 30 minutes 2 times, told to call back in 24 hours 3 times. I've spoken to managers who told me they would be calling me back and never did...this is the single worst tech support experience of my entire life..hands down. If I needed a better reason to hate Microsoft before, well..here it is.
*Update*: 13 seems to be my lucky number, because I was finally able to get an Installation ID from Microsoft today that validated my copy of Office 2003.
Xandros Linux Server First to Receive LSB Certification
"Xandros, the leading provider of intuitive end-to-end Linux desktop and server solutions and Windows and Linux cross-platform interoperability tools, today announced that Xandros Server 2.0 is the first product to be certified by the Linux Foundation through use of the LSB Distribution Testkit " Read more here.
Create a Customized Live Linux CD
"Earlier this year, I was asked to find a bootable CD that would allow PCs in a special purpose lab, many of which had bad hard drives, to access our Citrix environment. Basically, we wanted to turn these PCs into thin clients to extend their life. I had been experimenting with Knoppix and decided it was time to try customizing my own Knoppix CD for use in the lab. Ultimately, the CD proved so useful that I created a bootable USB thumb drive from it for my own use -- mainly accessing Citrix and Windows Terminal Servers. In this article, I will provide step-by-step instructions on how to create a customized Knoppix CD and how to use that customized CD to create a bootable USB thumb drive." Read more here.