“Outlining everything you need to know to get Ubuntu up and running on older computers, the latest free PDF manual from MakeUseOf isn’t one to be missed.”

The original iPad was an interesting device, and was great for consuming media. Tech pundits pointed this out numerous times and pondered whether Apple was intentionally trying to stifle ‘creation’ by popularising such a device. I can see now the rationale behind the functionality of the first generation iPad. They wanted to create, for starters, a media consumption device, which they nailed. Once that was done, they could focus on adding other functionality, instead of doing both of those at the same time and failing.

It’s an incremental update, much like the updates to the iPod touch and iPhone line. What started as a phone with web browsing and music ended up being the mainstream platform for mobile computing. I’m writing this on my iPod touch and publishing it without the need of a computer, which is pretty awesome for what was 2 years ago an mp3 player. In a way posting from my iPod touch is better than posting from my computer; Safari managed to crash on me while I was writing in WordPress more than once. PlainText has an auto-save feature that automatically syncs what I’m writing to my Dropbox folder.

Once again Apple has successfully pushed computing in the right direction, towards innovation. For all it’s failures in App Store revenue policy, I still think Apple is doing technology and us a big favour.

Banshee for Mac Beta 1.8.0

However, there are good things to say about Banshee. It will import your iTunes library, even correct and add metadata such as BPM and cover art automatically in the background. It supports plugins such as Last.fm, eMusic and Amazon which are killer features from my point of view. Using the Last.fm plugin you can view related artists and tracks as well as listen to your personalised radio stations.

The interface is clearly something they need to overhaul. It wouldn’t hurt to use default OSX UI elements instead of the default Gnome resources. Its simplicity however is commendable. If you’re so inclined, download it and help the developers kill some bugs. If you want to have a good alternative to iTunes, one that’s free and open-source, this is what has to be done.

Science is unlike religion through its constant pursuit of knowledge and information about the phenomena. We are ready to accept new findings, reconsider scientific canon as we gather new information. The Big Bang theory might be wrong, but we are ready and willing to find a better explanation. We are looking into it, and trying to explain what happened and what is happening now in the universe. Our belief is not unconditional. Like Gregory House said, nothing is unconditional, there is just unconditional need. For religious people, there is a need for certainty, a sort of mental ‘security’, something that science cannot offer. Instead, we have probabilities. And I’m okay with that.

Mission Control

• The user interface elements are not consistent throughout the OS. Some elements, such as the login window still have remnants of the old UI, which look out of place. While a fresh coat of paint is always something neat and to be expected of a new release, I wouldn’t exactly decide in favor of the new desaturated approach to visual design, or the buttons that look transplanted from GNOME. Don’t get me wrong, GNOME is an awesome window manager, but I’d prefer Aqua any day.
• The new ‘About this Mac’ application is a commendable effort and stays true to the ‘it just works’ mantra.
• Launchpad is buggy, slow and superfluos to desktop computing. I understand that they want to get rid of the Dock, maybe even Finder, but instead of making things easier to access, they implanted a mobile UI paradigm into a full-blown OS. You can fully replace the Dock with Spaces, Mission Control and Launchpad, but why do I need three things to do what one small application does?
• I’ve wanted for so many years to get back to the MS-DOS days of single tasking, and full screen applications do just that. Aside from photo and video editing, which already had full screen views, why would I want to fill my entire screen with just one application? To make use of the Spaces feature and distract myself with beautifully rendered smooth transitions… .
• They’ve implemented Sessions, which means that when you restart, the n-th applications that you had opened, will be restored, which does an amazing job at simulating how time would pass if you were in the accretion disk of a black hole.
• The new Mail app is wonderful from both a design and functionality standpoint. I’m sorry for the developer of Sparrow.app which will have its user-base significantly diminished.
• FileVault had its security significantly boosted, with whole disk encryption now implemented.
• Scrolling is bass-ackwards. They’ve removed the open application Dock indicators by default. The WiFi status icon is always animated, even when connected (AirPort Express) and options like show time connected don’t do anything. You can now reset your account password using an AppleID and use iChat with your Yahoo! Messenger ID. FaceTime is installed by default. Accounts for services like Gmail, Yahoo and MobileMe are available to all applications that make use of the API. For example, if you set up your email account, those settings will be available to chat applications.

It saddens me greatly to hear that for the first time in more than a decade, Stargate will not be on air anymore. Although every series had its strong points and faults, it always managed to capture my attention unlike any other show on television. In my opinion, the Stargate franchise is up there with Star Trek, Firefly, Star Wars. It’s in a very exclusive club in the mind of most fans of science fiction. Although all good things must come to an end, I don’t believe it’s time to give up on Stargate.

With Stargate Universe, the writers and producers made a leap of faith, and brought something new and fresh to the storytelling. I believe this is no small feat to accomplish. The fact is that Stargate Universe put the characters in the foreground, bringing up morality, values into the mix, not just great space adventure. It certainly makes for a more interesting journey.

There will always be a push back from people used to the old approach. Insert Galileo Galilei’s struggle here. This is not to condemn the criticism as pointless, as there were a few instances where the focus shifted to heavily to the human drama. Every side has reasonable reasons to support their stance.

If anything, the shift in the way we consume media is at fault for the seemingly low ratings. Its audience tends to be at the cutting edge of technology trends, and advertisers are lagging in realising the potential of online distribution methods. Sticking with this series might be a leap of faith from an economic standpoint, but one that will surely pay off in the long-run. Giving up on a great show like SGU might make sense in the short-term, but how can you afford to give up on an audience that’s been there, more or less growing with Stargate, for more than 10 years?

An audience that’s still there, a community.

A free download from the App Store, PlainText uses your Dropbox account to store and sync plain text files between your computer and mobile devices, anything that works with Dropbox. Because it allows text input from mobile devices, you can use it for everything from to-do lists/reminders, short notes, expenses list, and even writing blog posts on the go (which I’m doing right now). Since it has a local cache and no bells and whistles to drain the battery, it is the perfect companion for the mobile blogger.

Create a stack from your PlainText folder and have every file only a click away.

If you’re proficient enough with the onscreen iPhone keyboard you could easily use this application to take class notes, keep track of homework and anything you can think of. Why carry your MacBook on campus when you could just pack your iPhone or iPod touch? Add a stand, an Apple Bluetooth keyboard and a charger for those long sessions and you’ve got yourself nothing less than a workhorse for modular mobile computing.

Revise your notes on the bus, or write your next novel, PlainText is a stroke of genius that’s there whenever you need it. Get it from the AppStore.

Sometimes I don’t even feel tired and while I should probably study, I end up watching Stargate, surfing Reddit for hours (AskScience, Physics, Technology, Apple), reading random Wired articles or reading wikipedia articles about biology and astrophysics. Ostensibly doing things that won’t help me get better grades, or help me in a way I am aware of.

I envy those people I hear about from my teachers that solve entire exercise books or grasp advanced math and physics with the ease of reading a news article. Is there a switch in the brain that tells us things of consequence are boring?

Why does one rebel against its own judgement? Could this be what separates human beings from machines?

HideIP VPN creates a secure encrypted tunnel between your computer and their servers in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Netherlands or Germany. By doing so, any traffic originating from your computer will appear to the receiving server as coming from the HideIP VPN server you choose when creating an account. This means that you will be able to use services such as Spotify, BBC iPlayer, Hulu or any other service that associates IP addresses to geographical location in order to block usage.

There’s no need to worry that your Spotify won’t work when you’re visiting your family overseas. Or that your web traffic will be captured, analyzed and attacked at a unsecured public WiFi access point. You will be able to use websites and forums completely anonymously, as the servers will register information about the VPN server instead of your machine. It even bypasses throttling of VoIP services such as Skype, that your ISP may employ in order to deter its use. No longer will your ISP know everything you do on the internet, as the contents of the data transmission are completely obfuscated by encryption.

The service provides an array of tunneling options, through PPTP, OpenVPN, L2TP/IPsec and Proxy. Personally, I’ve found that OpenVPN provides the optimal balance between speed and security, allowing you for example to watch HD streaming videos, granted you have an appropriate bandwidth plan from your ISP. However, be aware that P2P traffic is not allowed, and as a Terms of Service violation, your account may be suspended. This means that torrent downloads among other peer to peer sharing technologies (such as Limewire, Gnutella) are not available while connected to the VPN server.

HideIP VPN is a very useful tool to have if you want to make the most out of your internet connection. You can learn more about the service on the company website. A comprehensive article on VPN technology is available on Wikipedia. You can even get a free account if you subscribe to the blog and keep an eye out for announcements.

Colds seem to have an interesting and useful aspect. Instead of sleeping, you try to catch your breath while reaching for the nazal spray at 3:12 AM. And a lot of stuff just pops into your brain randomly. For example, I was second guessing my decision to switch to the Mac in 2009. Then I asked myself, what makes Macs special, better than other personal computers, if that’s even the case.

That train of thought finally led me to the conclusion that it’s the design; to a lesser extent, functionality.

I remember when I bought my first laptop, a Windows machine. Sure, it was fine in the computer shop; it booted up relatively fast, it had all the tools I was accustomed to, and pretty much all the same features my Mac has: speakers, display, trackpad, an OS and so on. I could say that “it just works”.

But the story took a turn for the worse when I got home. Of course, when I got home I started inspecting every inch of the device, and almost everywhere I looked, I saw something that crippled the experience in one way or another. For example, the USB ports were so close together that I couldn’t use the keyboard and an USB stick at the same time. There was a PCMCIA slot – virtually useless in the present peripheral ecosystem. The fan was quite loud and if you tried to use it your lap, it would block the vents almost completely. It was bad.

The 2009 MacBook Pro 13inch has only one obvious flaw to it, that doesn’t bother me that much. There’s only one audio jack, that serves as both input and output. But I soon realized I don’t really need the small improvement in quality I would get from the external microphone in a Skype call – it would have been nice, sure, but most of the loss in audio quality comes from the connection rather than the actual input device. Of course, I wouldn’t record a high-quality podcast on the integrated mic.

In a way, design this good doesn’t fare well in the marketplace. My laptop is over a year old, yet I don’t feel any urge to replace it. My cousin is the same way, and she has a 2007 white MacBook. Using her laptop, I do notice a slight drop in performance and the trackpad seems a bit cramped, but other than that, its pretty much great. The conclusion would be that good design gives Macs a longer useful lifetime.

Okay, the brain crash-dump is complete. Back to bed, time to take command of my WBCs in an effort to kill off the rhinovirus.

In comparison with the original LG Cookie, the Fresh has a lower resolution 2MP camera, lacks a gyroscope for automatic screen rotation as well as the 2GB microSecureDigital memory card. It does however appear to have an improved touchscreen/interface responsiveness. Although better, it’s still a notch down from any iOS device, and writing a longer SMS can be sometimes a little frustrating. Depending on how slim your fingers are, you might end up calling Grandma instead of Girlfriend, and there’s no stylus to help those of us who are touchscreen impaired.

Released in April 2010, it feels like a downgrade from its older, more capable brother. The LG Cookie fresh works on 2G networks, comes in at 108 x 52.9 x 12.5, weighing 89g. It has a decent 3 inch resistive touchscreen at 240 x 400 pixels which is not that bad for showing off the admittedly low resolution snaps you’ll take with the camera. There’s no flash of any kind, or autofocus, so don’t count on it for documenting your a trip or graduation ceremony.

This phone allows you to to do pretty much everything a smartphone should do. It’s got MMS, Push Email, a web browser, Java MIDP 2.1, Calendar, widgets, even Twitter and Facebook clients. But it feels like the developers were more keen on ticking checkboxes off of a list than actually implementing usable features. If you’ve ever used an iOS, or any recent Windows Mobile device, you’ll feel like you’re trying to repair a Asgard beaming transporter with scotch tape and superglue. You can do it, but it rapidly turns into a very frustrating experience. On the other hand, you could give this phone to a teenager in an effort to curb your telephone bill. (It might motivate him or her to take a part time job in order to buy an iPhone.)

If there’s one redeeming quality to this phone, it’s the music player and the integrated FM radio, which will work even without plugging a pair of headphones in the 3.5mm jack. Buy a decent pair of in-ear headphones and a 16GB microSD card and you’ve got yourself the next best thing to an iPod Classic. You won’t be able to use iTunes to sync your music though, so if you’ve bought a lot of DRM-ed music, you’re out of luck.

The LG Cookie Fresh has a Li-Ion 900mAh battery which according to their estimates lasts for up to 390h in standby or up to 5h and 30 minutes talk time. If you want a decent phone and don’t want to invest in an iPod, then this is for you. But don’t expect more, because you’ll be disappointed.

U-Pouch

If you want to keep your iPod or iPhone safe, and have style at the same time, then you should check out the U-Pouch series from UNIEA. I’ve had the chance to get one, and I can vouch for it: it’s light, feels well built and looks great on your device. A slide in case like this one fits easily in your jeans or jacket pocket, which I cannot say for silicone or some hard cases. It’s slightly elastic, so your device will fit snuggly inside, with no risk of accidentally slipping out. It’s also very cheap, with a price tag of 19,99$ from the uniea.com store.

Sample provided by Michael Nace from UNIEA (Twitter and Facebook).

I use a mid-2009 unibody MacBook Pro 13-inch, which has a 2.5Ghz Core 2 Duo, 250GB hard drive, 4GB of RAM, an LED-backlit keyboard and display, with around 5 hours of battery life doing actual work. I use this machine to write for MakeUseOf and Tux Geek, for school assignments, for listening to music and watching movies.

I need to be able to review applications that run on various Linux distributions (mainly Ubuntu) as well as Windows, so having enough horsepower to run another instance of an OS turns out to be very useful. There’s another advantage to using a virtual machine instead of a dual or triple boot setup – I can easily review operating systems, no need to mess with partitions, boot-loaders and corrupted data. I also very much enjoy taking photos and editing them in Adobe’s Lightroom.

I also need Photoshop on a daily basis for cropping, adjusting and compressing screenshots for articles. And while I do all this, I like to have the possibility of listening to music and having a web browser run at a decent speed. So you see, I do actually benefit from having that extra horsepower. Even if I don’t use it to the max today, it’s future-proof. Or at least that’s what I tell myself.

• For writing short pieces, mostly under 1000 words, I seldom use anything other than TextMate. TextMate is also the prima-ballerina when it comes to writing any kind of code – CSS, C++ or Python – mainly because of its excellent markup capabilities.
• However, I write longer essays and ebooks in Microsoft Word 2008 because of the extended formatting functionality.
• Apple’s Keynote is a must have for anyone who wants to create beautiful presentations in a snap.
• For web browsing I strongly recommend Google Chrome which works incredibly well on the Mac despite its current beta status. It’s fast, minimal and can be themed.
• Adium is by far your best option if you’re looking for a multi-protocol, versatile instant messaging client. It supports all the major protocols and services you could possibly want. Of course, if you’re looking for VOiP, you’ll want to download Skype.
• Backup?! Who needs backup? Apparently I do. I’ve lost data so many times due to partition errors and various misguided experiments that I lost count. I use Wuala to back up my photos and documents to the cloud for free. I also have Mozy running and doing the same thing. In the unlikely case something happens to the data-center of one of the services, I’m in the clear.
• Parallels 4 works like a charm with the latest versions of Ubuntu and Vista, and that’s just what I need. It’s a bit expensive but you do get the best performance available.

• Staying true to the faith, I manage my own web-server and thus need a capable FTP client. Cyberduck is free, open source and absolutely great.
• Caffeine keeps the computer from going to sleep when you don’t want it to. I wind up using this little app more than I thought at first. It’s free and comes in handy.
• ShoveBox, another permanent resident in the Finder bar, is a fantastic little app that can store snippets of information you need to remember but don’t need right now. I use it to store little bits of text and bookmarks when researching articles. It can also store photos and files.

• Transmission is the best bit torrent client on the Mac and a trusty companion when you visit the pirate bays, with its integrated IP blacklist feature, great UI and performance.
• The Unarchiver handles all your RAR and ZIP needs without the overhead of Stuffit Expander. Double-click to de-archive, that’s all it does.
• TuneUp Companion fixes your music tags and automatically adds cover art.
• I also use Perian (handles 99% of audio/video codecs), Twitterrific, Last.fm and Appfresh (updates your software). iStat Pro monitors various system indicators within the Dashboard. For my limited scheduling needs, iCal suffices. And lastly, NTFS 3G ensures I can mount, swap and write to NTFS volumes.

I also have a 1st generation iPod touch which I absolutely love, and a Microsoft Arc notebook mouse. While its design is so beautiful it’s uncharacteristic of Microsoft, it sometimes disconnects for no apparent reason. Battery life is somewhere around 2 months and it is very accurate even on glossy surfaces. It works on the Mac without drivers – unlike Apple’s own Magic Mouse. The only major downside is the wireless dongle – which blocks one USB port.

For articles larger than 1500+ words I usually pull out the low-end Microsoft ergonomic keyboard from the closet. Nothing fancy, but it is a lot more comfortable than the integrated keyboard.

I’d like to give a warm plug to MinimalMac, SimpleDesktops, and Prettify, sites which will guide you on the path of minimal geek nirvana.

I would first look at the general look and feel of the blog. Is it logically organised? Are the topics clearly delineated? Is the design eye and user friendly? Does it cater to people that are potential buyers? I would also check for grammar, spelling and clarity of language. Is the content original? Does the blog use a regular posting schedule? Is the reader base stable, or does it spike for just a few of the articles?

I’d like to think that Tux Geek scores well on all points except maybe at the  regular post schedule. I personally consider that writing an interesting article is more important than sticking to a rigid schedule.

Is popularity a measure of value? I’ve had articles that had many thousands of pageviews and articles with mere hundreds. The ones that made it to sites like Digg and Reddit aren’t necessarily what I consider to be the best. They aren’t necessarily the most well written either. I wish I could say it’s one way or the other, but I really can’t make up my mind.

As a boutique ad agency, Fusion Ads has to hand pick sites for its closed publishing network. Although small in comparison to other more conventional ad agencies, they feature some great sites like note&point. Chris Bowler, ‘the man behind the curtain’ shares some of his insight into the matter of perceived value:

We receive about ten times as many requests as we could ever accept. The idea of a boutique ad agency means that we simply cannot grow for the sake of growth. We would lose the things that give us our value: quality and relevancy. Add too many sites and suddenly you have to earn a lot more revenue. In order to do that, you have to start accepting advertisers that don’t meet your standards.

And then you are on the slippery slope to where your users/readers view you like all the other advertisers — in a poor light.

A big part of accepting a site is whether or not we’ve heard of it. We can make a much quicker decision if we’re familiar with author (and therefore some of the items you mention in your article: post regularity, quality of writing, subject matter). If we are not familiar with the site, than we take a quick look around.

And to be perfectly honest, we can often disregard a site in 20-30 seconds. If the overall look and feel of the site is not aesthetically pleasing or does not speak “quality”, than it’s safe to say that the overall quality of the body of work is poor. But if the design looks clean and the content looks like it fits with our audience, we’ll dig deeper.

The last thing we look for is sphere of influence. Seeing as our model is more cost-per-influence (stealing this term from the Deck) rather than cost per click, it makes sense that we look for industry leaders. How many twitter followers does this person have? Who are their followers? Are they respected in the design/development community?

If we can answer some of these questions, then the decision is easier.

Overall, because we get such a high volume of requests, the answer is “no, but thanks” 90% of the time. But I tell people this: the best way to get an invitation to be on our network is to produce great work. You’ll get noticed if you focus on that.

— Chris Bowler, Fusion Ads @ 05/01/2010

I can say that the review model is sound from my point of view, and I hope we learn something from it. Ultimately, it’s the reader who measures value. What’s the most important thing for you?

Fonera 2.0g next to an iPod touch 1st generation, a Sony Ericsson W910i, a Microsoft Arc mouse and a (standard size) 2 pencil.

Yes, believe it or not, this little stylish box will actually take the load off your computer. Whether YouTube, Facebook, Picasa, Flickr, BitTorrent, RapidShare, or Megaupload is your favourite web 2.0 app, the Fonera 2.0g will take care of upload and download, without keeping your computer turned on.

For example, connect an external USB 2.0 hard drive to the port on the back, select the torrent you’d like to download and leave it do its job. By the time you get back from work or school, the file would have been already downloaded and waiting for you. You can connect to the the router’s file server wirelessly from any Windows, Mac or Linux machine and even stream video files. The second Ethernet port allows you to connect any computers without WiFi to the Fonera (if you have more than one, you can use a cheap switch to interface).

The NAS (Network Attached Storage) functionality can be accessed by either a local FTP, a Samba share or  web interface, which goes to show how versatile this device is.

The way the router is built allows for its functionality to be extended by using small plugins, much like the ones you use in Firefox. Fonera 2.0g comes pre-loaded with a bunch of these, including one for wireless printing support, live webcam streaming, music streaming, and backup – like Apple’s Time Capsule. Adding more is very simple, by simply clicking to the + sign next to the description. The router also supports VPN, QoS and can be used in conjunction with 3G/UMTS modems.

For example, let’s say you’re at a conference or party and want to share some WiFi? An AC plug, a Fonera, your standard USB mobile modem and ta-dah: internet connectivity for the whole floor. This feature also works for people who use the internet for just email and browsing, allowing them to ditch their home wired connection and use the modem with the Fonera to provide wireless internet to the whole house. Don’t forget though, that many of these mobile modems have bandwidth caps.

The back of the Fonera 2.0g: Two Ethernet ports and one USB. You can have more ports by using connecting an Ethernet switch and/or an USB hub.

You’d expect such a feature rich device to have a gloriously complicated interface. Well, it’s beautifully simple and logically constructed. You can check out a live demo of the Fonera Web User Interface over at FON. The router itself has a simple and inconspicuous design with a white shiny finish that resembles the polycarbonate MacBook. LEDs on the front will point out the status of the power, local connectivity and internet.

For the specification oriented folks, here are the numbers:

• 93.5 mm x 25.5 mm x 110 mm (excluding antenna)
• 1 USB 2.0 port that can be expanded by using a hub (preferably self-powered).
• External detachable antenna (1,5dBi)
• Encryption methods supported: WEP 64bit/128 bit, WPA, WPA2, WPA mixed with cyphers: TKIP, AES, Mixed.
• 2 SSIDs, one public (for sharing with the Fonero cummunity) and one private, for your personal use. You can disable the public signal, but you will lose you Fonero status and won’t be able to use free wifi at any Fon hotspot worldwide.
• Range 20-70 meters depending on your surroundings.

Another nice feature of the Fonera 2.0g is that you can easily replace the MAC of the router, directly from the Web UI. This is useful because some ISPs tend to lock the account to a single computer, to limit the use of WiFi unsecured networks, that tend to rack up bandwidth from all neighbours in a 50 meter radius. The firewall is another treat, with settings for enabling and disabling FTP, Samba, port forwarding, UPnP, WAN-LAN access and so on.

For the less tech-savvy, the wiki page provides walkthroughs and information an all of the features in plain english.

The Fonera 2.0g is without a doubt the swiss knife of routers and gets you free WiFi access around the world from the Fonero community. The only thing better is its bigger brother, the Fonera 2.0N, which shares the same features and adds the faster 802.11N wireless chipset. I have one, and I love it.

Thanks to Inouk from FON who kindly provided this review unit for testing.

How’s that for a sensationalistic headline? In all seriousness now, after pondering the issue for a good part of the evening, I realised how fine a line Firefox is walking, even more now than in the past.

Think back to mid 2005, early 2006, the days of Firefox 1.5. That’s when Firefox became a solid alternative browser. As more and more tech-savvy people were getting sick and tired of Internet Explorer 6, Firefox was the right thing at the right time. It promised less crashes, better performance and most importantly better security. Along came the extensions and themes, and as their number grew from tens to hundreds – now thousands – the user base expanded further and eventually trickled down to people less interested in tech. Three versions later, it’s 2009, and Firefox has 25% of the market-share according to a Net Applications survey.

What has essentially changed from three years ago?

• We’ve got ubiquitous wireless internet access via 3G networks and WiFi at pretty good throughputs, sufficient even for video streaming.
• Fibre-Optic and high speed cable connections are more accessible.
• Web applications seem to be quickly attacking the current computing paradigm. It could turn out to be the second coming of the thin-client.
• Whereas in 2006, we would accept pretty much anything to get rid of IE 6, we now have something called competition.

First of all, Firefox lacks any sort of meaningful leverage. It only comes preinstalled on a number of Linux distributions. Which as much as we’d want to, doesn’t amount to more than 1,6% machines. On comparison Internet Explorer is preinstalled on millions of Windows machines, from netbooks to gaming PCs. Even Safari, which is based on the same underlying technology as Chrome, benefits from more leverage by being preinstalled on Macs, not to mention the millions of iPod touches and iPhones. So, I guess this is strike one. (Nay-Sayers out there, my mom isn’t going to be installing a browser anytime soon. Being ‘there’ is very important for a large sector of the market.)

Second of all, Firefox isn’t revolutionary anymore. It’s no longer the fastest, the most stable or secure, the most open. Does anyone have any doubt that by next year, every single one of Firefox’s add-ons will be ported to Chrome? I for one, do not. And the trouble is, it’s the only thing that separates Firefox. If anyone out there has leverage, then Google has it, with its millions of hits every day. They already have a message for IE 6 users browsing YouTube, asking them to upgrade their browser to either Chrome, Firefox or IE 8. And how much would it cost them to give Chrome a plug on the frontpage? Or AdSense links?

Lastly, think about more devices like the ‘alleged’ Apple tablet and netbooks running Chrome OS. Is Apple going to let Opera publish its browser on the App Store? I don’t think so. More than that, Google can choose to end its search engine referral deal with Mozilla, which nets for 91% of all the revenues. Who’s going to promote and sustain active development, at a level that would allow them to compete with Google’s resources?

I’m not saying this is a good or a bad thing. That’s for each of us to decide. More than anything else, it should be a message to the developers working on Firefox that there’s still a window of opportunity to make Firefox relevant once again.

But did Microsoft come through with a stable computing platform, with decent hardware requirements and a hardened security model? The definite answer is yes. I’ve been running Windows 7 on my laptop for over a month, installed all the applications I’d normally use – iTunes, Office, Firefox, Mozy – and they all worked fine, without any compatibility settings or whatnot.

While my computer is far from being state of the art, it is able to run Firefox, iTunes, Word and Photoshop at the same time, with decent speed. On just 1GB of DDR2 RAM and a 2,2Ghz AMD Turion 62 single core processor. The visual effects are fluid on a two year old ATi X200M graphics chipset with just 64MB of RAM. What they did under the hood, optimizing the code to run faster, is simply amazing. Running Vista on this laptop was like swimming with cement boots, even with the visual effects turned off.

A very important aspect for Windows users, security, has also been addressed in many ways, and while most of the technologies were present in Vista, they have been improved in Windows 7. The UAC (User Access Control) dialogs are less frequent and not so annoying, executables are scanned for digital signatures of their vendor, you are notified about files downloaded from the internet as well as an improved firewall and notification center. DEP (Data Execution Prevention) is enabled by default, we still have the KPP (Kernel Patch Protection) and a significantly improved Autorun. Also, the privilege level of your account is not root, which would grant you unlimited access to system resources, but a member of the Administrators group. To affect changes that may affect system integrity and security you have to accept an UAC prompt. In addition to this, all start-up items that access critical system areas are also required to be manually approved via an UAC prompt. Checks and flags are implemented all around, to the point that you would have to ignore multiple security warnings in order to get infected. These are all significant changes from Windows XP. All around, you can see that the engineers have dedicated a significant amount of time to securing the operating system.

From such an important aspect as security,we go on to examine the improvements in the user interface department. The taskbar, part Mac OS X dock, part Start menu is an elegant and comprehensive UI element. The functionality offered is simply amazing; We have quick access to commonly used applications, an amazing way to find the window you’re looking for with Quick Look, a streamlined notification area which is clean yet retains usability and instant search from the Start menu. I’m sorry to disappoint the Linux and Mac OS fans, but Windows 7, as it is today, has the most advanced and usable UI.

With Windows 7 Microsoft has changed the game. I for one was saving money for a MacBook, which from a Windows XP viewpoint is an incredible upgrade. But compared to Windows 7, not so much. We have performance, stability, a not too shabby security model, an incredible selection of hardware and software. If lastly, we consider the price – free until June next year – we have an incredibly attractive offer. The ball is at Apple and the pitch is going down at WWDC. Unless something amazing comes out, it’s going to be a homerun for Windows 7.

As always, I’d love to hear what you think about this topic. You can check out How To Install Windows 7 on a Virtual Machine with VirtualBox and Test Windows 7 RC on a Virtual Machine written by Guy McDowell.

Today’s article is a bit technical and abstract but nonetheless interesting. Read our interview with David Zhao from Zumo Drive.

S.N.: What prompted you to start ZumoDrive?

D.Z.: We started ZumoDrive because online storage wasn’t usable. Most of the storage services consist of a web page with a upload button. We saw the vision where online storage would be seamless integrated with the operating system so that all of the applications can connect to the cloud.

S.N.: What are the primary goals for your product in terms of user interaction?

Our primary goal is to provide transparent access to the cloud to the users. We want to free people from thinking about backup, syncing files across different machines, and running out of space on their devices. They should be able to install ZumoDrive and be able to take full benefit of the cloud right away.

S.N.: Could you give us some info on the back end tech/logistics/team of running ZumoDrive?

D.Z.: We’ve built our technology from the ground up. One of the key piece of it is a virtual file system that integrates directly with the OS. It handles caching, random access, and direct streaming from the cloud. The server side is built on top of Ruby and other open source technologies. We use Amazon as the backend cloud.

S.N.: The proportion of free/paid accounts?

D.Z.: We have a very healthy paying to free ratio.

S.N.: What effect did Techcrunch have on the service in terms of new accounts and user retention afterwards?

D.Z.: TechCrunch was great, it introduced ZumoDrive to a huge number of people. While I can’t disclose numbers, I can say that retention ratio for the service is very good.

S.N.: Plans you could share for future developments of the service?

D.Z.: Better web interface, better performance on the client, Linux, and more mobile devices soon.

S.N.: Who do you think are your primary competitors in this space? What’s Zumo’s advantage in your opinion?

D.Z.: There are a few players in the space, namely Dropbox and SugarSync. One of our main advantages is the ability to provide access to files without having to first download them onto the device. This creates a unique value proposition for devices that don’t have a lot of local storage. We also have a stronger focus around media and have unique capabilities for dealing with these type of files.

S.N.: Is the PaaS concept going to affect ZumoDrive or is it already implemented?

D.Z.: Yes, it definitely will be. It’s of great interest to us. More information about ZumoDrive is available here.

“Linux doesn’t have viruses at all!”

Most of the time this is just a case of over simplification made by ‘Linux people’ in order to convince Windows people to try Linux. The truth is that there are about 30 viruses for Linux. I know this number sounds extremely large, but bear with me.

The trick is that there aren’t any viruses in circulation – that can currently infect systems and are present on USB sticks, malicious servers, etc. In fact, most of those viruses are gathering dust somewhere on a floppy disk. How come there are so few viruses for Linux? Linux is radically different from Windows because:

1. The source code is freely available, which means more eyeballs are staring at the code, ever since the 90’s, continually improving it. On the other hand, it’s a felony to decompile or reverse engineer any component of Windows. Which means only  Microsoft employees and hackers see the code.
2. Linux was built with security in mind. Windows started paying attention to security well after Windows NT. Like putting the money into the bank and installing the safe afterwards: the robbers came and went.
3. And even then, they set the combination on the lock to ‘1234’.
4. On any modern Linux OS, you get updates for the system as well as for the apps, automatically. On Windows, every app has its updater program, which isn’t as robust or reliable.
5. Multiple Linux package managers means that a Debian virus can’t infect a Mandriva system. To cover all the major Linux distributions, a virus programmer needs to write the same virus about 5 times.

Linux can however store the Windows virus executables without getting infected itself. Which is why the bad guys use Linux themselves. Smart, isn’t it?

The structure of Linux makes writing a virus very difficult as it requires root access to do anything of significance. For a virus to run it would have to be granted root access with a password request. If you fail to give it root access then the most a virus could do, if anything, is damage your home directory. It is unlikely it could even run again so it would die there in your home directory. Most smart Linux users grasp the power of root access and would question why an unknown program is suddenly requesting root access. (You don’t enter your password for just ANY prompt do you? Only for programs YOU have called up, right?) –BrunoLinux

There’s a Linux antivirus called Clam AntiVirus. Which is completely useless, because finding a Linux virus in the wild is like finding a unicorn in your backyard.

Windows fanatics, please leave angry thoughts using the comment form below. Yes, make the pain go away.

His other project, the Wiimote powered interactive whiteboard, is just as impressive and twice as useful. It turns any projector, monitor, or laptop screen into an interactive display.

Here is an eye-popping video by Dr. Lee giving an example of his interactive whiteboard technology:

After you build the infrared LED pen (detailed later in this post), you can use it just like you would your mouse. Move around windows, draw diagrams, and distract annoying kids by opening Microsoft paint and letting them have at it. It is not only a simple software toy, but it can be immensely useful as a presentation tool.

Connecting your Wiimote via Bluetooth

The first step in both of these projects is to connect your Wiimote to your PC via Bluetooth. You have two choices with this, you can connect using a 15 day free trial of a program called BlueSoleil, or you can trust windows to connect to your Wiimote and handle the connection. I have had terrible luck with BlueSoleil so I used the Windows Bluetooth connection suite. If you choose to use BlueSoleil here is a page showing what needs to be done.

I’m not a fan of trial software, so here is how I did it in Windows:

With the Bluetooth dongle of your choice (I chose a Linksys USBBT100) inserted into your computer, the new hardware wizard should detect and automatically install your dongle. When that is done there will be a Bluetooth symbol in the bottom right hand corner of your screen. Double click it and this screen should come up:

Click on Add… and the Add Bluetooth Wizard will come up. Make sure to click on the option showing that your device is ready to be connected.
After that, hold the 1 and 2 buttons on your Wiimote, this puts it in discovery mode. After the Wizard sees and adds your Wiimote, this screen will pop up:

Double click on the Nintendo peripheral:

Make sure you choose ‘Don’t use a passkey’! This is crucial. Hit next:

And you are now connected with your Wiimote. It will show up in your Devices list and all four blue lights on your Wiimote should be blinking. They will stay blinking as long as it is connected to your PC.
With that over with, 90% of the pain and suffering you will most likely have with this project are over. The first time I tried to do these projects it took me over an hour to connect my Wiimote using BlueSoleil. Finally fed up, I worked out the Windows version you see above.

Materials Required for Interactive Whiteboard

• A Windows computer* with Bluetooth and a monitor or projector
• One Wiimote
• One Infrared LED
• One AA or AAA single battery pack
• Around a foot of small gauge wire
• A pushbutton momentary switch
• Body of a pen
• Soldering gun and solder
• Wire cutter/stripper
• Electrical Tape
• Latest Wii Interactive whiteboard software

*There are some hit and miss issues with Vista. When I did this project I used XP machines; your results may vary.

Creating Interactive Whiteboard Hardware

In this section you basically create something from scratch. It’s a very simple circuit involving a power source, a switch, and an infrared LED.

Here is a preassembled pen light. It shows the simple circuit before it is compacted:

A good place to start would be to solder both of the wires onto the switch:

Then threading those wires into the body of the pen:

And then soldering the LED to both of the exposed wires. Take care to either hot glue or tape one of the terminals so that you don’t get a short circuit:

When that is completed tidy up the pen however you like, but you should have a final product:

Connect your Wiimote to your PC and place it at a distance and an angle that allows it to see all of the whiteboard. Launch the whiteboard program and go through the four point calibration. After that you are good to go!

I hope you have enjoyed this tutorial, if you have any issues with setting up either of these projects please visit Dr. Lee’s homepage and forums. There are a lot of resources there that can help with Vista issues and hardware incompatibility.

Here are some links that may prove useful: Johnny Lee’s Wiimote Project,  Interactive Whiteboard FAQ, Head Tracking FAQ.