ubuntufonts

Top 10 Steps to Beautiful Shell Scripts

2008-09-07T23:50:00.000-07:00

Linux gurus don’t use cut, awk, and sed when they want to replace or strip out a portion if a variable. They use parameter substitution. You can learn parameter substitution in less than 2 minutes. Here is the ten things you need to know:

Shell variables can be specified like $var or this ${var}.
$ var='a.ads,fssd2342%asd234#@.,&%,sdfgsdfgas4352' echo ${var} a.ads,fssd2342%asd234#@.,&%,sdfgsdfgas4352
${#var} is the length of the variable.
$ echo ${#var} 42
${var:pos} substrings the variable starting at pos.
$ echo ${var:10} 2342%asd234#@.,&%,sdfgsdfgas4352
${var:pos:len} substrings the variable starting at pos with a max length of len.
$ echo ${var:10:5} 2342%
${var#pattern} strips pattern from the front or left hand side of the variable. This form is not greedy meaning it stops as soon as the pattern is matched. ${var##pattern} is the greedy form.
$ echo ${var#*,} fssd2342%asd234#@.,&%,sdfgsdfgas4352 $ echo ${var##*,} sdfgsdfgas4352
${var%pattern} strips pattern from the back or right hand side of the variable. This form is not greedy meaning it stops as soon as the pattern is matched. ${var%%pattern} is the greedy form.
$ echo ${var%,*} a.ads,fssd2342%asd234#@.,&% $ echo ${var%%,*} a.ads
${var/pattern/replacement} replaces pattern with replacement once.
$ echo ${var/a/A} A.ads,fssd2342%asd234#@.,&%,sdfgsdfgas4352
${var//pattern/replacement} replaces pattern with replacement globally.
$ echo ${var//a/A} A.Ads,fssd2342%Asd234#@.,&%,sdfgsdfgAs4352
${var/#pattern/replacement} if variable beginning matches the pattern it is replaced with replacement.
$ echo ${var/#a./llll} llllads,fssd2342%asd234#@.,&%,sdfgsdfgas4352
${var/%pattern/replacement} if variable end matches the pattern it is replaced with replacement.
$ echo ${var/%352/llll} a.ads,fssd2342%asd234#@.,&%,sdfgsdfgas4llll

Tux Pumpkin!

2008-05-14T04:11:00.000-07:00

What is Halloween with out tux?

Hackers hit Scientology with online attack

2008-01-28T05:14:00.000-08:00

A group of hackers calling itself "Anonymous" has hit the Church of Scientology's Web site with an online attack.

The attack was launched Jan. 19 by Anonymous, which is seeking media attention to help "save people from Scientology by reversing the brainwashing," according to a Web page maintained by Anonymous.

Anonymous claims to have knocked the Church's Web site offline with a distributed denial-of-service attack, in which many computers bombard the victim's server with requests, overwhelming it with data in the hope of ultimately knocking the system offline. True to its name, Anonymous does not disclose the true identities of its members.

The attacks were spurred by the Church's efforts to remove video of movie star Tom Cruise professing his admiration for the religion, according to an Anonymous video manifesto posted to Youtube.

"For the good of your followers, for the good of mankind and for our own enjoyment, we shall proceed to expel you from the Internet and systematically dismantle the Church of Scientology in its present form," a creepy computerized voice states in the video. Anonymous followed up this dispatch with a second video blasting the media for failing to completely report the group's criticisms of the church. This video was taken down Friday by Youtube, citing a "terms of use violation."

Anonymous has managed to generate a measurable attack against the Scientology.org Web site. Over the past few days, the site was hit with several DDOS (distributed denial-of-service) attacks, which flooded it with as much as 220Mbps of traffic, according to Jose Nazario, a senior security engineer with Arbor Networks, whose company compiles data on Internet attacks.

The Anonymous campaign shows some level of organization. "220Mbps is probably about in the middle of attack sizes," Nazario said. "It's not just one or two guys hanging out in the university dorms doing this."

On average, the attacks lasted about 30 minutes and used up 168Mbps of bandwidth. In the past year, Arbor has seen attacks on other sites hit 40Gbps, or 200 times the strength of the Anonymous event.

Shortly after it was hit with the DDOS flood, the Scientology.org Web site was moved to a server hosted by Prolexic Technologies, according to data compiled by Netcraft, an Internet monitoring company. Prolexic specializes in protecting companies from DDOS attacks.

A Prolexic spokeswoman confirmed that the Church of Scientology is one of the company's clients, but declined to offer more details on the matter. The Church of Scientology did not answer questions relating to the online attacks, but in a statement it said that the controversy over the Tom Cruise video had driven traffic to its Web site.

The secretive Church of Scientology's practices, including its efforts to use copyright law to restrict the dissemination of information about the church, have engendered a lot of criticism within the Internet community. But one Web site set up to criticize Scientology -- called Operation Clambake -- called the DDOS attacks a bad idea. "Attacking Scientology like that will just make them play the religious persecution card," wrote Andreas Heldal-Lund, the Web site's owner. "They will use it to defend their own counter actions when they try to shatter criticism and crush critics without mercy."

If publicity was Anonymous' ultimate goal, the group has had some success. Late in the day Friday, seven of the top 10 stories on the Digg.com news-linking site related to Scientology or to Anonymous' communiques.

Although the group's Web page exhorts participants to "begin bumping Digg," Anonymous did not manipulate the news site's promotional algorithm system, which determines which stories get top billing, according to Digg CEO Jay Adelson.

"They must have done a very good job of bringing in a diverse set of interests," he said. "It just happened to hit a nerve that the Digg community was interested in."

It is unusual for Digg's front page to be so dominated by a single topic, but not unprecedented, Adelson said. Last year's shootings at Virginia Tech and the 2005 terrorist bombings in London achieved a comparable level of coverage. "In the history of Digg, there's no question that the topic of Scientology has been of great interest to the community," he said. "I can't explain why."

Apple Launches 13-Inch Ultralight MacBook Air

2008-01-28T05:04:00.000-08:00

Steve Jobs took the stage to kick off the annual Macworld Expo today. As usual, he brought with him a crushing amount of buzz and a pile of new product announcements. Here's what we'll be seeing from Apple, starting today!

MacBook Air

As widely expected, Apple is launching an ultra-thin notebook called the MacBook Air. At 0.76" thick at its widest point, the three-pound Air has a wedgelike shape that tapers down to 0.16" thick at the front base. LED backlighting on its 13.3-inch screen, multi-touch trackpad (which offers some nifty features like rotating photos, all in the touchpad), and a backlit keyboard. Specs are decent: 1.6 or 1.8GHz Intel Core 2 Duo (on a cleverly shrunken socket), 2GB of RAM, and an 80GB hard drive (or 64GB SSD option). No optical drive (of course), and just one USB port. It'll set you back $1,799, which is on the inexpensive side for ultralight notebooks with specs like this. Ships in two weeks.

(By the way, as great as the MacBook Air sounds, calling this the "world's thinnest notebook" is hyperbole: The Sony X505 was 0.75" thick... and it was released in 2003.)

iPhone Software Upgrades

Apple isn't resting on its cell phone laurels; after selling 4 million iPhones, it's adding new features to the existing software package (including webclips, which will bookmark not just a web page but a specific zoom and pan and then let you place them on your home screen; multiple recipient SMS; and lyrics support for iTunes). Nothing major, but some nice, incremental upgrades to the existing software. iPod Touch gets the same upgrades as the iPhone, but it will cost you $20.

NOT announced: iPhone 2!

iTunes Movie Rentals

As widely rumored, Apple is launching a movie rental service to complement its TV and movie sales service as part of iTunes. All major studios are on board. Titles will be available 30 days after their DVD release and can be viewed on a PC or your iPod/iPhone. You have 30 days to start watching and 24 hours after that to finish. The price: $3.99 for new releases, $2.99 for old titles. Launches today. (Hey, that Netflix deal is looking pretty good!)

Also: The flagging Apple TV will get the same rental features, without the need for a computer. You'll also be able to get photos from Flickr and .Mac, podcasts, and YouTube videos via Apple TV. It will still sync with your computer via iTunes, but that isn't required if you just want to use it to watch web content. It also does high-definition... but rentals will run you a whopping $4.99 each. The Apple TV features will be a free software update to existing boxes (available in two weeks). New boxes drop in price to $229 from $299.

Time Capsule Wireless Hard Drive

Also announced: A wireless external hard drive designed to be used as a backup solution (with Apple's Time Machine backup software). $299 (500GB) and $499 (1TB).

Top 40+ GIMP plugins

2008-01-28T04:55:00.000-08:00

GIMP is the undisputed king of image editing in Linux platforms, and is next only to Photoshop in popularity in Windows and Mac platforms. With a large community of developers and an even larger pool of users, it is no surprise that GIMP is very popular.

Much like Firefox, GIMP’s strength lies in its plugins, which are developed by the open-source toting community. Since the users themselves develop them, they know all the needs and conceive a plugin for everything (well, except making a coffee for you ;) ).

And what better way for me to endorse GIMP than a list of good plugins? Most of them are aimed at web-designers and photographers, the main users of GIMP. There are also some to fix common problems of GIMP.

Web Design

Snow: Generate realistic 3D snow. Caution: Requires large amount of memory and swap memory.

Anti-aliasing: Smoothen and fix straight lines.

Adaptive contrast enhancement: Intelligent adjustment of contrast.

Fourier Transformation: GIMP plugin version of Fourier Transformation.

Refract/Reflect: Refraction effects to simulate falling water drops.

ShapeIt: Bend text or image according to information in map layer.

Borders: Add borders to your image.

SoapBubble: Create bubbles. Contains two versions, for GIMP v2.2 and v2.4.

Aqua Bou: Create web buttons in ‘Aqua Bou’ style easily.

Chrominium: Create a chrome logo with glow and sparkles.

Cloud Generation: For easy creation of clouds. Updated to work with GIMP 2.4, the latest version.

Gothic Glow: GIMP’s version of Gothic Glow action, originally for Photoshop.

Liquid Rescale: Content-aware rescaling. Keeps the features of the image while rescaling along a single direction.

Particle Deposition: simulates particle deposition on a surface. It generates small particles with random size and velocity and lets them fall onto the surface where they settle, increasing surface height in the place a bit.

Stampify: Make your image look like a postage stamp.

Plasma2: Newer version of the original Plasma plugin for GIMP.

SaveForWeb: Find optimal compromise between minimal file size and acceptable quality of image quickly. Useful for designers.

Steel Text: Create a text effect that looks like shiny steel (or gold) and a dropshadow.

Photography

Pandora: Stitch together multiple images to make a panorama.

Film Grain: Add film grain for a classic feel, to BW images.

Black Ink: Transform an image to a B&W drawing made with ink.

DeNoise: Noise reduction plugin using a modified Gaussian blur algorithm.

DustCleaner: Detect and remove the dust spots in digital image.

Astro-plugins: A set of plugins for astronomical image processing.

FocusBlur: Makes an image out of focus with luminosity and depth.

Lomo: Make photos clear, sharp and crisp. Especially useful for outdoor photographs.

ISO Noise Reduction: Implements an ISO noise reduction, using different methods (masking the edges, then blurring the individual color channels or the lumimance channel only).

Photo Effects: A bunch of scripts brought together in one script-fu file. Contains cartoon, color pencil, conte crayon, cutout, Drawing, ink pen, note paper, paint dot image, palette knife, pastel, stamp, water paint effect, wrap effect, angled strokes, crosshatched, chrome image, cross light, funky color, soft focus, solarisation, brick wall, patchwork, stained glass, texturizer, high pass, scroll effects.

RedEye: Quickly remove red eye effect caused by camera flashes.

ShadowRecovery: Recover image information in darked regions.

Shadows/Highlights: Eliminate shadows and highlights in photographs.

Refocus: Opposite of FocusBlur(listed above), this refocuses images. Provides better results than Unsharp masking which is built into GIMP.

PhotoToolbox: Perform several actions on a photo at once such as defocus, desaturate (several papers emulations), toning, add grain.

Light Filter: Provides basic filtering by adjusting colour levels of each pixels.

Gradient Along Path: Strikes a vector applying a gradient orthogonally to the path.

Landscape painter: Creates interesting paint effect that looks best with landscapes.

EZ Improviser: Improve dull, dingy images.

Edgy: Make an image look edgy.

Digital IR: Simulate a black and white infrared image.

Colour saturation: Change the color saturation of your image.

Blot: GIMP avatar of BlotBrush. Based on blot algorithm and works well with spatter or cloudy image.

GimpPublishr: Publish images to Picassa and Flickr directly from inside GIMP.

Miscellaneous

GIMP Dewierdifyer: (for Windows) Get rid of common window annoyances in the GIMP. It adds a background window that sits under GIMP. It groups other GIMP windows into one, so that when you’re alt+tabbing to other apps, only one icon of GIMP gets in your way.

Turing Pattern: Renders a kind of Turing pattern.

Yin-Yang+: A seemingly useless plugin, but fun nonetheless. Add yin and yang symbols. Also optionally add drop-shadows.

Further resources

Writing a GIMP plugin: Plugin guide in PDF, HTML, archive and XML formats.

GIMP plugin template: A blank plugin template that has the basic structure and reduces the time required to develop a plugin considerably. The direct link is currently here, but may change in future (if it changes, click the link on “GIMP plugin template”.

Writing plugins: Another guide for writing plugins, this one from GIMP.org’s developer site.

Writing Plugin: Another guide at GIMP.org main site.

20 MOST Popular Linux Games

2008-01-27T06:37:00.000-08:00

I spent some time compiling this list and seeing how many nice games are available for Linux I couldnt help but wonder: why are we still using Vista? There are so many Windows advocates who bring as anti Linux argument an “absence” of games for Linux. Well, they are wrong! There are enough games from Linux and the great news is that they are free and fun!

In comparison, almost everything that comes on Windows, with a few exceptions (solitaire and the like) comes with a price.

The Linux games are open source. Than means that they are: free, with no string attached, created by people who love Linux and are painless to install. Besides, they are Windows compatible. So you can enjoy Linux fun on a Windows platform at any time!

1. Do you like cars? Are you a fan of the fast game races? Linux has a free game for that too: Maniadrive. This one even has a cool soundtrack!

2. And let’s not forget TORCS – a game with a tradition of 10 years. Car race simulator as addictive as any other car race game. Linux and Windows compatible.

3. And if you like 3D war games, you’ll have lots of fun with America’s Army. Play it by the rules, or make your own. LMAO!

4. Another fun 3D game is Alien Arena. The newest version of the game was released not long ago.

5. You can play Mahjongg on Linux. Of course you can. It is called KMahjongg and it is one of the most popular games developed for Linux. In many “top ten” tops it occupies the tenth position. Top Hosting Center doesn’t make a top, just a list.

6. Fully compatible with both Windows and Linux The Battle for Wesnoth is a strategy game you will never forget.You have an amazing world to explore and you can play with up to 8 friends (this makes the game a multi-player game too). Enjoy the trailer:

7. Another interesting tactical Linux and Windows compatible game is Crimson Fields. Personally I like The Battle pf Wesnoth more, but strategy games are strategy games. For those who prefer more modern stories, Crimson Fields might be cool.

8. Xbubble is simple and you can play alone or against an opponent, which makes the game perfect for family fun. Besides it doesn’t require too much skill, so even younger players can join the fun.

9. Frozen Bubble has nicer graphics but the principles are pretty similar. This is a clear Linux game (penguins and all) available in several languages. You can play it alone and even with other players in a network.

10. If you like shooter games, Cube 2 is the one for you.

11. True Combat: Elite is really cool. I love the 3D graphics and the features. It is based on Enemy Teritorry so if you are a fun of that game you will never miss it.

12. Or the cool Nexuiz?

13. Pingus runs on Linux and Windows but when you see the little Tuxes you can only think Linux. Cute, cute! And very popular too. What other better revenge against Vista than to play a free Linux game on it?

14. Are you skilled enough to play Neverball? The game has a very popular forum where you can learn tips and tricks to improve your skill.

15. I am not that amazed by GLtron, but some Linux enthusiasts are. Besides the official site has some personal touches of the author that really convinced me to include the game on the list. Love and passion for a dream are always rewarded by the THC team.

16. Frets on Fire works for both Linux and Windows. And even if you are not a musician this game can be addictive. You’ll be playing a virtual guitar. I like the graphics.

17. I almost forgot Tux Racer! This was amazingly popular in 2001 – I remember playing it once at a friend’s house. I have no idea who still plays it, but it does deserve a place on the list.

18. Scorched 3D is something I haven’t tried yet but I think it would be fun to play.

19. Tremulus is as interesting as any other shooter game could be – I am not very fund of those.

20. Last, but not least, FlightGear – a flight simulator I am sure you will enjoy.

5 Leopard GUI Gripes

2008-01-07T03:44:00.000-08:00

The current beta build of Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard, released to developers at WWDC ‚’07, is not as polished as what people have come to expect of Apple’s design team - users are still left with at best several disagreeable changes, and at worst a hideous hodgepodge of HIG contradictions. I have broken down 5 onscreen blunders that detract from the user experience and make Leopard the ugliest and most uncharacteristically ‘Apple’ OS to date.

Giant Shadow

The drop shadow should be one of those subtle interface nuances that you never consciously notice, and it was, until now. Apple must think we have serious issues identifying the current window, because they took the liberty of giving us an enormous drop shadow to indicate it; it’s far too obtrusive, almost to the point of obstructing windows that it overlays.

Glowing Dock Dots

The little black triangles show the currently running applications, and again, are an unobtrusive part of the UI that blends into the background, only noticeable when you need it. The new, neon-blue ‘magic’ dots are so out of place, they’re hard to describe, almost like a mystical throwback to Aqua.

Translucent Menu Bar

There is absolutely nothing wrong with the current menu bar, so why introduce another confusing, superfluous effect? I can understand what they’re trying to do conceptually by trying to minimize the impact of the menu bar, but when another window is open, it actually ends up emphasizing the menu bar, which creates some sort of visual chasm between the top of the screen and the top of the window. Either way, it serves to make the bar harder to read, and might be confusing to the seasoned Mac user. Finally, it almost seems like it’s a half-hearted grasp at imitating Aero Glass, and it hardly needs to be said that that isn’t a good subject for imitation.

Spotlight Menu

I’m not sure what Apple was smoking when they thought that combining a translucent menu bar, black menu icons, and bright blue accents was a good design decision, but that’s what you get when you access Spotlight in Leopard. Admittedly it seems to work 3-5x faster in Leopard, but it still LOOKS atrocious.

New System Icons

Now, these might still grow on me, I haven’t decided yet, but they do seem a bit goofy right now. As you can see in this QuickLook screenshot, there is now almost a ‘grain’ to the folders, reminiscent of recycled paper. A weird change, although I do like the fact that the folders are now watermarked with an icon that indicates their contents.

The reason for the inclusion of this slew of new GUI elements in the beta was to get feedback from users (developers, in this case) before they rolled it out. So, if you don’t like the new look, let Apple know by Digging this story and bringing it to their attention.

The Future of Publishing with Linux Magazines

2008-01-07T03:32:00.000-08:00

Not too long ago, I subscribed to a Linux magazine for beginners called Tux. Fantastic magazine, but the last I heard they were "headed out," so to speak, due largely to a lack of funding. However, unlike bigger publishers, which include Linux Magazine, Tux was special because they were giving away the magazine in the PDF format. That's right, they provided a free copy of their magazine in hopes of generating enough revenue in ad sales alone. Unfortunately, it did not work out so well for them to that degree.

Today, I stopped by only to discover that they are still around and kicking, but only with old reposted content setup as PDF attachments. It's sad to see this once great magazine fall on hard times. This got me thinking, though - could it be that their advertising model was flawed? Who knows, it's merely a speculation anyway you look at it.

Out With the Old, In With the New. Today, there is a new magazine on the PDF publishing block titled Full Circle. Wisely picking the most widely used distribution method and sticking to it, Full Circle really impressed me with their content. I believe the two most entertaining pieces that I have read include Ubuntu for grandma and the illustration of just how simple is was to get a Mac Mini running Ubuntu using BootCamp - very well done.

Now we are presented with the question: will Full Circle Magazine fall victim to the same fate as the once beloved Tux Magazine? Not likely. Why? For two basic reasons:

1. The online magazine is specifically targeted at a single distribution.
2. Full Circle is not in this to turn a profit. Actually, there is not an ad to be seen anyplace.

And that is why the life of Full Circle could potentially be a lot longer than many skeptics have given it thus far. It's a fairly solid argument, although I'm certainly open to debating it to some some extent if for nothing but to defend the fantastic job they have done putting this together.

The Future of Online Publishing: Pushing PDF Documents? At first, this sounds like a novel idea. After all, it is really simple to get various podcast-ready software, such as iTunes, to pickup PDF documents as podcasts and deliver them directly to users. However, RSS without the enclosures already does this, so this defeats the purpose aiming PDF files at users in a podcast enclosure.

I would also suggest this to be the problem with Tux Magazine, since it limited their ability to properly advertise, and why it will not be a problem for Full Circle as they appear to be a nonprofit institution. Of course the hindsight is 20/20, but it still doesn't do a lot for those who enjoyed Tux's content.

At the end of the day, the future is not in publishing PDF magazines unless they are merely created for community benefit. There are some exceptions out there, since a print Linux magazine could easily offer PDF editions, while remaining well monetized from their print edition. Until magazines featuring operating systems can get a better handle on generating a viable advertising scheme from within the PDF format that allows for dynamic options to utilize pay-per-click options, taking the Tux approach again would be too risky. All the more reason why Full Circle came at the first time for the entry level Ubuntu user.

2007 Top Ten Free and Open Source Legal Issues

2008-01-03T08:08:00.000-08:00

The year 2007 has been the most active year for legal developments in the history of free and open source (“FOSS”). In fact, you would have been hard pressed in past years to enumerate even five important legal developments. However 2007 permits the creation of a traditional “top ten” list. My list of the top ten FOSS legal developments in 2007 follows:

1. Publication of GPLv3. The GPLv2 continues to be the most widely used FOSS license, yet the law relating to software has developed significantly since the publication of the original publication of the GPLv2 in 1991. The first revision of the GPLv2 had a number of drafts over an 18 month period. However the new GPLv3 license is much more comprehensive than GPLv2 and addresses the new issues which have arisen in software law in the last 15 years.

2. SCO’s Attack on Linux Collapses. SCO filed lawsuits claiming that Linux infringed SCO’s copyrights in UNIX. These suits suffered a fatal blow when the court in the Novell litigation found that SCO did not own the copyrights in UNIX. The ownership of the copyrights is essential to prosecute cases for copyright infringement. The melt down of SCO’s strategy was complete when it filed for bankruptcy soon after this loss.

3. First Legal Opinion on Enforcing a FOSS License. In August, the district court in San Francisco surprised many lawyers by ruling that the remedies for breach of the Artistic License were in contract, not copyright. Most lawyers believe that the failure to comply with the major terms of an open source license means that the licensee is a copyright infringer and, thus, can obtain “injunctive relief" (which means that the court orders a party to cease their violation). On the other hand, if the remedy is limited to contract remedies, then the standard remedy would be limited to monetary damages. Such damages are of limited value to open source licensors. The district court decision has been appealed.

4. First US Lawsuit to Enforce GPLv2. The Software Freedom Law Center filed the first lawsuit to enforce the GPL for the BusyBox software in August. Subsequently, it filed three other lawsuits. Although the first three lawsuits were against small companies, the most recent lawsuit was against Verizon. These lawsuits represent a new approach for the SFLC which, in the past, has preferred negotiation to litigation. SFLC has settled two of the lawsuits. Each of the settlements has required that the defendants pay damages, another new development. These suits may be the first of many.

5. First Patent Infringement Lawsuit by Patent Trolls against FOSS Vendors. IP Innovation LLC (and Technology Licensing Corporation) filed suit against Red Hat and Novell in what may be the first volley in a patent war against a FOSS vendor. Acacia is a well known patent troll which has been buying patents for some time and works through multiple subsidiaries. The FOSS industry provides a tempting target because of its rapid growth. These suits could slow the expansion of FOSS because many potential licensees express concern about potential liability for infringement of third party rights by FOSS.

6. First Patent Lawsuit by a Commercial Competitor against a FOSS Vendor. Network Appliances, Inc. (“NetApps”) sued Sun Microsystems, Inc. (“Sun”) for patent infringement by Sun’s ZFS file system in its Solaris operating system. The ZFS file system posed a challenge to NetApps products because it permits the connection of less expensive storage devices to the operating system.

7. Microsoft Obtains Approval of Two Licenses by OSI. Microsoft Corporation continues its schizophrenic approach to FOSS by simultaneously asserting that the Linux operating system violates Microsoft’s patents and submitting two licenses for approval by OSI. In October, the OSI Board approved the Microsoft Public License (Ms-PL) and the Microsoft Reciprocal License (Ms-RL) as consistent with the Open Source Definition.

8. German Court Finds that Skype Violates GPLv2 The enforcement of the GPLv2 in Germany continues with a Munich court finding that Skype had violated GPLv2 by not including the source code with the binary version of the software (instead, Skype had included a “flyer” with a URL describing where to find the source code version). The suit was brought by Harald Welte, who has been the plaintiff in virtually all of the German enforcement actions for GPLv2. Harald runs gpl-violations.org, an organization which he founded to track down and prosecute violators of the GPL.

9. New License Options. Two of the most controversial issues in FOSS licensing, network use and attribution, were addressed in new licenses adopted this year. A “network use” provision imposes a requirement that when a program makes functions available through a computer network, the user may obtain the source code of the program. Essentially, it extends the trigger requiring providing a copy of the source code from “distribution” of the object code (as required under the GPLv2) to include making the functions available over a computer network. An “attribution” provision requires that certain phrases or images referring to the developing company be included in the program. This provision was very controversial on the License Discuss email list for OSI. The Free Software Foundation published the Affero General Public License in the fall which expanded the scope of the GPLv3 to include a “network use” provision. A limited form of attribution was included in the GPLv3. And OSI approved the Common Public Attribution License which included both the “network use” and “attribution” provisions.

10. Creation of Linux Foundation. The Open Source Development Labs and the Free Standards Group merged to form the Linux Foundation. The FOSS industry is unusual because of the extent to which it depends on non profit entities for guidance. These entities include the OSI, Free Software Foundation, Mozilla Foundation, Apache Foundation and Eclipse Foundation. This merger provides a much stronger platform to promote Linux and open standards.

Transform Linux into a Talking Companion

2007-12-29T08:52:00.000-08:00

Text-to-speech is really convenient, especially when you are lazy like me. Festival enables us to achieve a TTS system with limitless possibilities thanks to our Linux bash shell. I will show you some ways that we can use Festival as an enabler to our laziness and also produce some really cool and useful effects when coupling this technology with common things like PHP, cron, dnotify, or login scripts.

Remember the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey? I’d like to think that I am Dave, I just hope that my PC doesn’t turn on me (Although, I think it has in the past).

Credit were credit is due - some ideas from xenocafe.com and linuxgazette.net.

image via link

Installation

You need to install Festival. su root if need be.

Ubuntu:

sudo apt-get install festival festvox-kallpc16k

festvox-kallpc16k is the male american voice. Ubuntu doesn’t install a voice unless you specify which will cause the program to crash. Look in synaptic for other voices and language support.

Fedora - CentOS - Redhat:

yum install festival

openSUSE:

yast -i festival

The Basics

Now that we have Festival installed, lets start with the basics.

Make Festival say something:

echo “My talking Linux PC efin rocks” | festival --tts

Make Festival read a text file:

cat -A file.txt | festival --tts

Make Festival say the time:

date ‘+%I, %M %p’ | festival --tts

Festival and PHP Programming

Combining the Power of PHP and Festival we can do some cool things. You need to have a PHP CLI installed.

Make Festival say a random quote:

Contents of rquote.php (minus the PHP tags):

PHP [Show Styled Code]:

$quotes[] = 'Nothing is faster than the speed of light...To prove this to yourself, try opening the refrigerator door before the light comes on.';
$quotes[] = 'The FBI is watching YOU.';
$quotes[] = 'Vote anarchist.';

srand ((double) microtime() * 1000000);
$random_number = rand(0,count($quotes)-1);

echo ($quotes[$random_number]);

PHP [Show Plain Code]:

$quotes[] = ‘Nothing is faster than the speed of light…To prove this to yourself, try opening the refrigerator door before the light comes on.’;

$quotes[] = ‘The FBI is watching YOU.’;

$quotes[] = ‘Vote anarchist.’;

srand ((double) microtime() * 1000000);

$random_number = rand(0,count($quotes)-1);

echo ($quotes[$random_number]);

php rquote.php | festival --tts

Back to the Real World

You might be thinking,”Well that is great and dandy, I can make my PC talk. Woopty friggin doo.”.

We can do any number of other things that could be useful with desktop shortcuts, cron, dnotify, reading man pages, and more.

Create a desktop shortcut. You can then drag files on top of it to have Festival read the file (Yah! No more command line):

Create a file with the following contents named readit.desktop:

[Desktop Entry]
Encoding=UTF-8
Version=1.0
Type=Application
Terminal=false
Name[en_US]=festival
Exec=festival --tts
Name=festival

Remind yourself of the time on the hour with cron:

crontab -e

Enter the following into the file:

0 * * * * username ~/time.sh

Contents of time.sh:

#!/bin/bash
date '+%I, %M %p' | festival --tts

Make it executable chmod u+x ~/time.sh.

Make Festival talk when a file has been accessed or changed using dnotify (HINT: You might have to install dnotify):

dnotify -CD /home/shane/Desktop -e echo "A file has changed on the desktop" | festival --tts

Make Festival read man pages to you:

Lets face it, no one likes to read man pages:

man lsof | festival --tts

The possibilities are endless

I hope you see all the possible things that you can have your computer talking to you about. I am acually going to have Festival (It would have been cool if they would have named it HAL 9000) read this article to me to check for grammar and spelling. The voice isn’t the greatest, it just takes a little getting used to. Check your repos for more voices. Let me know if you come up with something interesting in the comments and I will add it to the list. Now you should feel a little bit more like Dave Bowman!

Boot Linux Faster With An Open BIOS

2007-12-25T04:17:00.000-08:00

Linux device designers looking for faster boot/reset times should consider alternative BIOSes, suggests Peter Seebach in a technical introduction to open BIOSes published on IBM’s DeveloperWorks website. Among other benefits, open BIOSes can save the time wasted by proprietary BIOS legacy support for MS-DOS and other unnecessary functions, Seebach notes.

According to Seebach, the proprietary BIOSes typically found in off-the-shelf PCs and boards often account for more than half of total boot time. And, much of this time is spent loading drivers and compiling information useful to legacy OSes such as DOS, but largely useless and redundant when using a modern OS such as Linux, which tends to do its own hardware probing, and load its own hardware drivers.

The solution, according to Seebach, is to replace proprietary BIOSes with open BIOSes. Open implementations can be configured or customized to perform only those initiatialization tasks that really are required, before bootstrapping the OS.

Seebach begins with an overview of Open Firmware, which he says provides a much more hacker-friendly alternative to proprietary BIOSes. Although developed by Sun and Apple for PowerPC, Open Firmware also has a lot to offer other architectures, including x86, writes Seebach.

Another interesting approach involves using Linux itself to initialize the hardware. The LinuxBIOS takes the approach of loading a small Linux kernel directly into the boot ROM. This approach is increasingly practical now that boards have 1-2MB of flash ROM onboard, according to Seebach.

Seebach notes that reflashing a board’s BIOS carries risk, because if the new BIOS fails to bring the board up, there will be no way to further reflash the BIOS without expensive, specialized equipment.

To read more about open alternative BIOS projects, read Seebach’s introductory article, here.

Top 20 Linux Apps for 2007

2007-12-24T05:59:00.000-08:00

It seems like every blog on the internet has one of these, so here’s my picks for the top 20 Linux applications. I’ll be covering programs from all different categories that I think stand out and shine as true wonders of Linux and will be presented in no particular order. I’ll even go over a few that I think could use some work but have potential to be something great.

Audio/Video

1.K3B

K3B is KDE’s cd burning application and it has nearly every feature you’d want. It has an interface similar to Nero and its capabilities are on par with Nero. I use this application for all my burning needs. It is a standard program and should be in all major distributions’ package managers.

2.Audacity

Audacity is an audio editing software that lets you edit audio tracks quickly and easily and gives you a nice selection of default effects to modify your tracks. This is an excellent program for beginners that need to edit some audio for a home movie. It is also excellent for bands with low budgets to get some experience mixing and mastering their own tracks, I’ve heard some excellent sounding cds come as a result of Audacity.

3.Amarok

Amarok is an advanced media player for KDE. It features playlists, an equalizer, iPod support, video support, the Magnatune music store, album art, Wikipedia information for the selected band, Lyrics, a file browser to open tracks not yet in your library, last.fm support, custom themes, and alot more. Amarok is a full-featured product and can stand toe to toe with Windows Media Player.

4.DeVeDe

DeVeDe is a DVD ripping application with one of the simplest interfaces I’ve ever seen. You can burn it to disc, to an iso, or convert your video files to MPEG files. Quick and easy way to rip DVDs.

File Sharing

5.Deluge

Deluge has become my default torrent application. It has a simple interface but respectable options under the hood including encryption, plugins, and torrent creation. The protocol implementation in Deluge is impressive and transfer speeds are fast. Azureus is a good client, it has nice features and a well-designed interface but it is a memory hog. Deluge is the best Linux torrent client I’ve found and runs much faster and consumes far less resources than Azureus.

6.Tribler

An interesting combination of file sharing and social networking. It exists as a network of people who share their torrents and files and you can search for torrents right in the client. It’s basically taking web trackers out of the equation and creating a decentralized tracker. Features are a bit lacking and its still fairly buggy but its an interesting concept and could work if the app is nurtured well.

VoIP

7.mumble

mumble and murmur are open source alternatives to Teamspeak and Ventrilo. mumble is the client and murmur is the server. The interface is simple and intuitive, user management is handled in the client as of the latest svn release, and the sound quality is fantastic. The major kicker for this one is its efficient use of bandwidth. mumble uses significantly less RAM and bandwidth than either Teamspeak or Ventrilo. It is built on QT4 so you’ll need to get those extra libraries. This program could quite conceivably dethrone the big boys in their gaming VoIP dominance. mumble is available for both Linux and Windows so no matter which OS you game on, you can communicate with the rest of your friends.

Graphics

8.GIMP

The venerable GIMP has been around for a long time and has evolved into a serious competitor to Photoshop. I personally prefer to work in GIMP rather than Photoshop as most of the functions that I do alot are more easily accessible and the Script-Fu scripting language makes for easy creations of additional plugins. The interface can be a nuisance for some but once you get used to it, it’s hard to go back to Photoshop. Available for Linux and Windows.

9.Blender

Blender is a 3d modeling program in the vein of 3D Studio Max and Maya but with a unique interface which is daunting at first glance but very intuitive and easy to use once you get the hang of it. Many game designers that have worked with commercial programs for years prefer Blender’s interface and the output is of the same quality as any of those expensive commercial offerings. Blender is a masterpeice of open source enginuity and really shines in its field. Available for Linux and Windows.

10.Inkscape

Inkscape is an open source illustration app that rivals Adobe Illustrator in terms of both functionality and features. Some of the best freelance vector artists on the net use Inkscape and their work is amazing.

11.Xara LX

Xara is another vector illustration program that some would say is even better than Inkscape. For most people, either will do but the hardcore vector artists have made their choice over either Inkscape or Xara. If you’re looking for an open source vector graphics program, you should try both to see which fits your needs better.

12.Scribus

Yet another illustration oriented application focusing on page layout. Many people swear by this app and for good reason. Its slough of features such as CMYK color make this a valid alternative for anyone, not only people who can’t afford Acrobat Pro.

Games

13.Alien Arena 2007

AA2k7 is a first person deathmatch shooter based off the Quake 2 derivative CRX engine. CRX is an advanced engine rivaling the Q3 and UT2.5 engines. It is set in a Sci-Fi world of Martians and Humans battling it out for control of the galaxy. AA2k7 features some of the fastest, most brutal deathmatch action ever created. It sports a large community of battle-hungry fraggers ready to take you down anytime. Tournaments and clan matches happen fairly often (Martian Mayhem Tournament is every Sunday at 6 PM EDT) but more clans are wanted. This community uses mumble for their in-game voice chat solution. This game is available for both Linux and Windows.

14.Nexuiz

Nexuiz is another deathmatch brawl but it stems from the Darkplaces engine, a Quake 1 derivative engine that features many of the same eye candy as more advanced engines. The developers have done a good job making the Q1 engine look so good and the game play so well. Gameplay is reminiscent of Quake 2 and the weapon selection is decent. The Nex community is also very skilled and very active.

15.Warsow

Warsow is a Quake 2 derivative but feels more like Quake 3. It sports cell shaded graphics, trick jumping, and lots of steady action on the servers. Gameplay is deathmatch speed and features nice weapons balance. This game is a member of the Esports Reality Gaming League and has received lots of attention from serious gamers. Most of the players are based in Europe and for Americans, it can be rather challenging to find suitable servers sometimes.

16.Neverball

Neverball is an open source Super Monkey Ball clone that will keep your attention for weeks. It takes a steady hand to maneuver your ball through the various levels and once you get to the harder levels, you’ll be gritting your teeth and sweating with suspense. There are some insanely difficult levels for Neverball called Mehdi’s levels that I cant even begin to get through but there are some raging fanatics out there that do speed runs through them! Neverball is pure fun and should accompany anyone’s game collection.

17.Neverputt

Neverball’s companion game, that concentrates on that oldest of family traditions, mini golf. It is simply a mini golf game set in the Neverball engine with some very fun and very challenging holes. This one is a great one for Dad if he’s a golfer and likewise should be a part of anyone’s gaming collection.

18.Unreal Tournament 2004

That’s right folks, Linux DOES have commercial game support! UT2k4 is one of the largest multiplayer games in existence and for good reason. Its fast deathmatch is classic and it sports lots of other very fun game modes. I won’t go into much detail about this one since it is such a big game and obviously well known. You can pick this sucker up on Amazon for less than $15 and comes with a Linux binary installer.

19.Quake 3 Arena

Another quality commercial game available for Linux that everyone knows. Q3A is arguably the best deathmatch game ever created. It set the standard for future deathmatch games and remains one of the most popular FPS games on the Internet. Whether it be an online game with a bunch of strangers, a clan party with your best buds, or arch rivals in a competition, Q3A is a timeless classic that will be played for years to come. You can pick this up for $10 if you look hard enough.

20.Cedega

Cedega is a fairly controversial application in the Linux community. It’s based off the open source Wine but charges a $5 monthly fee. While some think this is unfair to the Wine developers, Cedega contributes alot of code to their product and its not just a frontend. This is known to run many Windows games including Counterstrike, World of Warcraft, and Madden 07 along with hundreds of other games that I wont list here. Lots of gamers don’t realize that they have this option or are reluctant to pay the price but I assure you its worth it. For hardcore gamers, this is a great tool to have as it plays those Windows games better than Windows does much of the time because it doesn’t quite have support for some of the fancier things that DirectX can do so you get better framerates as a result.

I know this is only 20 apps and there are many more out there just waiting to work for you. Share your favorite Linux/OSS applications!

if you are interested check some more lists of linux games:
Top Ubuntu Linux Games

Top 21 Linux Games Of 2007

300+ Easily Installed Free Fonts for Ubuntu

2007-12-20T02:11:00.000-08:00

Ubuntu offers a lot of fonts, in addition to the defaults installed, and the MicroSoft msttcorefonts package, in its repositories. All these fonts mentioned here are provided as packages, which can easily installed using command line tools like apt-get or using Synaptic. These fonts will come in handy for designing flyers, or for designing headers and graphics for the web using the Gimp. Also, some of these fonts are pretty commonly used to render pages, like Lucida.

I will save the packages with the biggest collection of fonts for the end here. Since I have included screenshots of most of the fonts, and this article is sorta long, please read on by clicking the “More” link below.

Gentium

This is one of my favorite fonts. Gentium calls itself a “Typeface for the Nations”, and looks beautiful. You can install Gentium by doing a:

$sudo apt-get install ttf-gentium

The design is intended to be highly readable, reasonably compact, and visually attractive. The additional â€˜extendedâ€™ Latin letters are designed to naturally harmonize with the traditional 26 ones. Diacritics are treated with careful thought and attention to their use. Gentium also supports both polytonic and monotonic Greek, including a number of alternate forms. These fonts were originally the product of two years of research and study by the designer at the University of Reading, England, as part of an MA program in Typeface Design.

Fonts from Dustismo

These designer fonts were designed by Dustin Norlander of Dustismo. Here’s some sample of the fonts:

You can install all of Dustin’s fonts using:

$sudo apt-get install ttf-dustin

George Williams’ Fonts

George Williams is a font developer (with his own Wikipedia page, no less!) who provided the fonts Monospace, Caslon, Caliban and Cupola. Check out the samples below:

You can install these fonts using:

$sudo apt-get install ttf-georgewilliams

Some Juicy Fonts

The ttf-sjfonts package provides the two fonts, Delphine and Steve Hand which are also available from sourceforge. These are two handwriting fonts, as seen below:

You can install these two fonts using:

$sudo apt-get install ttf-sjfonts

Sun Java6 Fonts - Lucida

Installing the sun-java6-fonts package installs the Lucida fonts and also installs the java6 binary package - so if you install the font package you get Java6 for free! This seems to be weird, but this post is about fonts. The package install Lucida Sans, Lucida Bright and Lucida Typewriter:

You can install these three fonts using:

$sudo apt-get install sun-java6-fonts

Caution: This will also install sun-java6-bin etc - so you will have a working Sun Java 6 if you choose to install this. This is not a “bad” thing, but it can take some time to download and install.

Larabie Fonts

Ray Larabie has been “making fonts and giving them away since 1996″ on the popular font destination LarabieFonts.com. We have three packages in Ubuntu that provide the Larabie fonts, or at least the ones that are free. These three packages provide the “Deco”, “Straight” and “Uncommon” Larabie fonts. Since there are way too many of these fonts, 300+ ? I lost count after a hundred :-), I will link you to a pdf file with samples of all the fonts. Click on the preview below to see the Larabie Fonts Catalogue (Size: 2.5 MB):

You can install all of the Larabie fonts using:

$sudo apt-get install ttf-larabie-deco ttf-larabie-straight ttf-larabie-uncommon

Of course, you could just install one of these packs by removing the names of the other two packages.

Summary

If you want to get all the fonts in one go, use the following command:

$sudo apt-get install ttf-gentium ttf-dustin ttf-georgewilliams ttf-sjfonts sun-java6-fonts ttf-larabie-deco ttf-larabie-straight ttf-larabie-uncommon

These fonts should together provide enough gunpowder for the novice graphic designer in Ubuntu. If you are wondering how I took the sample screenshots, the answer is gnome-specimen, which provides an easy way to preview the fonts installed on your system. It can be installed using:

$sudo apt-get install gnome-specimen

To see more free fonts that are available for Linux systems, visit the Free Font Resources for Open Source OSes Page - it seems to be current since I can already find the Red Hat Liberation Font listed there.

If I missed any TrueType font packages in Ubuntu here, please let me know in the comments.

Update: If you add Seveas’ feisty-extras repository, you can get your hands on the ttf-fossfonts package.

ttf-fossfonts is a collection of 108 GPL/Public-Domain licenced .ttf fonts. Included are the Tuffy family with extended members, and the Open Bar Codes project fonts. The package suggests several other worthwhile font packages.