Posts in english.
A friend from Australia asked me for a list of some great Brazilian and LA movies. This is what I’m sending her.
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Photo taken in a wedding of a couple of friends at Juquehy beach, São Paulo, Brasil.
The photo is not so beautiful as the real seascape was.
Second day started with Novell CEO Ron Hovsepian presentation. He made it light talking about Lenovo Thinkpads will ship with SUSE Linux, mixed [open and closed] source challenge for enterprises, how is easy to make security with their AppArmor, the role of virtualization on reducing power consumption in data centers.
He put Linux application availability and development in customers and ISVs as his top priority, saying the community must figure out a way to make all Linux distributions to merge some way, or to leverage standards as LSB, otherwise the Linux application market will be very fragmented and weak. Well, I can’t agree more with the idea, but completely disagree in the level of implementing it he is thinking about. Each distribution has its own set of GUI icons, packages organization, configuration files, etc. This is what make all distros different and LSB, FreeDesktop.org etc can’t cover all.
In the new Linux mobile market we are doing the same mistakes. Windriver, Access (the new Palm Source), Trolltech, Motorola, and others were presenting their Linux or OSS platforms and IDEs for mobile. All different, some focused on Linux Kernel, other focused on higher level APIs, etc. This is fragmentation. From an ecosystem perspective, all of them together don’t represent a single force as Symbian or Windows Mobile.
Hope to see a better future in this space.
I asked Ron what is Novell position regarding OpenDocument Format.
He said Novell officially supports and wants ODF to be THE standard for documents, but OOXML support in OpenOffice.org is one of the steps required to achieve that.
1999 was the year I went to a Linux World & Expo event (blog notes in portuguese) for the first time, in Raleigh, NC. The small capital was chosen probably because of the strong Red Hat presence in that region.
A lot of things have changed since then. Red Hat doesn’t have a booth this year, but got a lift in partners as HP. Novell/SUSE has the biggest presence — all green enforcing the SUSE brand more than Novell — in a giant booth full of partners.
This year event has merged with Next Generation Data Centers (NGDC) conference associating Linux much more to an infrastructure tool than to a cybercultural revolution.
This is another thing that changed. All that glamour LWE event had in the past, as a generic real meeting point for Open Source activists that knew each other only through mailing lists, has been moved to technosocial events as FISL in Brazil.
If you want to discuss Open Source politics, social impact, cultural shift, Creative Commons, law, etc with geeks, go to FISL. If you just want to see practical IT solutions mostly delivered by marketing and sales folks, go to LWE.
The keynote speakers were Amazon.com and eBay and their speech was about Grid, Virtualization, NGDC and web services. We know these companies use Linux sometimes, but the presentations’ focus was way out of this.
Most interesting things I’ve seen today:
Other things:
By the way, all computers in the registration area and used by event staff, plus most laptops used in booths and for presentations were running other operating systems. Linux on the desktop is getting more inexpressive everyday.
Folks as Jack Aboutboul, from Fedora, recognized me because of some Planets I participate. Thanks blogosphere.
I noticed Oded’s blog was attacked which makes me remember some things:
I was once invited to analyze a Linux machine that was invaded. I ended up writing an article about it to the brazilian Linux Magazine.
The problem with the machine was a VERY weak root passw0rd. We could also find the tools they used to break that machine, cause they have installed them there to attack other machines.
We could see a file containing about 18000 user+password combinations, a modified SSH client and a script that runs it all based on an IP range. We saw also IRC bots and other stuff.
In the case of that machine, the attack was silent. They just wanted to use the machine to attack other machines. Pretty stupid.
Its easy to learn about this attacks. Just connect to the Internet a machine with a plain Linux installation and “passw0rd” as the root’s password, wait 1 or 2 weeks and your machine will be attacked. One way to verify the crackers are already in is to reinstall the netstat command (because they’ll modify your previous one) and see if there is some connection to IRC ports (around 6667).
If you investigate this IRC bot you’ll able to connect the IRC server, find the chat room, and actually talk to the cracker. I did this once and was not very funny.
More information in Attacks to GRC.com by Steve Gibson.
Andei postando sobre algumas coisas que tenho visto aqui nos EUA, mas não contei o que de fato vim fazer aqui.
A IBM tem um grupo chamado International Technical Support Organization que produz livros técnicos chamados Red Books. Trata-se de livros gratuitos que podem ser lidos ou baixados do site do ITSO. Pode-se também comprar cópias impressas que geralmente damos para clientes. Os autores são voluntários do mundo todo, geralmente funcionários da IBM, mas também clientes, parceiros ou qualquer pessoa que se qualificar na entrevista feita para a chamada do livro na lista do ITSO. O livro é geralmente escrito em Austin, Texas (há também outras localidades) durante algumas semanas de imersão. Todas as despesas de viagem são pagas pela IBM, tem se a oportunidade de trabalhar com pessoas de diversas partes do mundo, e fazer mais turismo que só o superficial.
Alguns livros interessantes que o ITSO produziu:
Bem, vim participar de um livro menos técnico que a média do ITSO. Conta como a IBM criou um programa interno de inovação onde qualquer funcionário pode criar, divulgar e hospedar na Intranet algum software que aumente a produtividade dos funcionários. Qualquer coisa. Desde simples plugins para o Firefox, Lotus Sametime, uma ferramenta de blog corporativo interno, ferramenta de criação de wikis internos, uma aplicação para sincronizar mídia interna com dispositivos móveis, etc.
Dentro da IBM chamamos essas coisas de inovações e são tratadas como beta, para beta testers ou early adopters.
Ao longo do tempo elas vão amadurecendo, viram um serviço padrão da Intranet, e as vezes acabam até virando produtos que a IBM vende. Foi exatamente o caso do Lotus Connections, um produto para ser usado numa Intranet e que tem serviços como diretório de funcionários, departamentos e suas linhas gerencias, blogs, tagging tipo del.icio.us, entre outras coisas. O Lotus Connections reune exatamente o que funcionários da IBM andaram usando e refinando ao longo dos últimos anos, e posso dizer que é o que temos de mais útil na nossa Intranet.
O modelo desse programa de inovação livre é muito parecido com o universo Open Source. As tais “inovações” podem ser comparadas a um software GPL que alguém fez e publicou no Freshmeant.net, este comparável ao portal na Intranet que indexa todas as inovações, mede sua vitalidade, fornece notícias e links para acesso ou download.
Conversei com muitas pessoas que estão em altos cargos globais, entre eles a CIO global da IBM, e é interessante ver como pensam e as informações que tem acesso. As vezes pensamos que eles estão longe do mundo real mas surpreendentemente tem muito mais noção das coisas do que um gerente de nível mais baixo.
As pessoas que criaram esse processo de aceitação e publicação de inovações dentro da IBM tem a sensação que inventaram a roda porque é de fato muito bem sucedido e todos conhecem. Mas na verdade funciona igualzinho a comunidade Open Source. Há um quê de liberdade, de esforço por um bem maior, de comunidade. Copiaram sem saber que copiaram.
A grande inovação está mesmo no fato de que trouxeram a dinâmica da comunidade Open Source na Internet para dentro de uma empresa, para gerar valor de produtividade interna.
O livro conta mais detalhes. Aguardem a publicação.
Crowded Apple store in San Francisco, last Saturday.
Everything is Design. Everything.
— Graphic designer Paul Rand (1914-1996)
Headline of an article on Wired Magazine:
Second Life: It’s so popular, no one goes there anymore. How Madison Avenue is wasting millions of dollars creating ads for an empty digital world.
Thanks Wired, for finally bringing to big media what people with brains know for quite a while now.
Its a Nokia E61i.
The Nokia E Series smartphones are currently the most advanced in the market. Some may say iPhone but there is no more than great usability and fancy-ness on it.
These are a few characteristics I like in E61i:
This last point deserves an explanation. To use VoIP you usually have to install a softphone in your computer and be close to it to make calls. Well, this phone kind of has a standards compliant softphone already installed in the OS. Together with great WiFi support, I can carry my work extension and other SIP accounts with me all the time, to make cheap international calls and also receive free calls.
This is all very geeky and I love it.
In further articles I’ll explain how to configure advanced features I’ve been using in my new Nokia E61i, a very portable computer.
I spend the first week of this trip to US in IBM Somers campus, a set of buildings where most of the company’s head quarters are located.
I went to many meetings with people in the CIO organization, IBM Academy of Technology and others, and surprisingly many high level people have MacBooks as their primary laptops. No Thinkpads, no Windows. I also noticed there is an internal Mac@IBM community with an Intranet home page, forums etc.
Although, for historical reasons, our official platform for desktops and laptops is still Windows, current IBM strategy for this matter is something like “hey, use whatever platform, browser, office suite, etc you want, because we are heading towards an Open Standards way”. This is called [cultural] diversity.
This is good, I like it, and this is the spirit that our internal Linux deployment relies on. Compared to Mac, Linux has a bigger community of users, more fully supported internal applications, and more internal developers. But I can say that Macs are more popular amongst VIPs.
The basic minimal software kit for IBM employees is Lotus Notes for workgroup, Sametime for instant messaging, a standard compliant browser as Firefox, and maybe some office suite. Well, Firefox runs everywhere, Sametime is 100% Java, Lotus Notes 8 is based on Java Eclipse and integrates an office suite compatible with OpenDocument Format (OK, is actually OpenOffice.org 2 embeded in Lotus Notes). So the kit runs everywhere, including Windows, Mac, Linux and many mobile platforms (which are also internally encouraged to be used for supermobile workers). Many employees only use this minimal set of tools.
A few more interesting words about Sametime: its being integrated with our global voice infrastructure through VoIP standards as SIP, so you can call any extension in the world using the IP network. You also carry your extension with you wherever you go. The instant messaging tool is the right place for it because it is already very well integrated with our enterprise directory. So we search people, find and chat (by typing) or talk.
Yes, for historical reasons we also use many products based on proprietary technologies. At the time they were chosen Open Standards were not something in the global agenda yet. Or they implement some sort of needed disruptive technology that didn’t have a viable standards-based equivalent. This is the case for the Siebel CRM used by the sales force. Completely proprietary but unique and fulfills our business features.
Although disruptive and proprietary use to walk together in the ICT front, IBM as a technology consumer has been putting Open Standards in its complex equation of what things to buy and use. This may be easy for a small company, but is a huge step for a big enterprise as IBM. And is, in my opinion, an example to be followed.
You tend to be contemplative and analytical by nature.
Red Hat has proposed a logo for ODF.
Well, I don’t think it is the coolest logo in town, but I was really missing something like this.
So lets use it in campaigns !
Spain standardization body says NO do Microsoft OOXML, according to this story. The country will abstein their vote in the ISO/IEC in September 2. This is excellent for Spain, good for ODF, bad for MooX.
More blended stuff at willitblend.com
I went to this Buffalo Billiards bar in Austin, TX with some friends.
Right in the next table there was some folks playing billiard and wearing t-shirts written Joomla! Day 2007. I asked one of them:
Two minutes later he came back and said:
Later I did some research and I found that Austin was hosting the Joomla! Day 2007 in the next day.
For whom doesn’t know, Drupal and Joomla! are both web content managers, a type of software that helps you build general purpose (or also specific) web sites. You should be mad, or have a very good reason, to start a website without the help of this kind of software.
Amongst these content managers, I have only used for my own blog WordPress.org which is simpler, more blog-oriented and very popular.
Between Drupal and Joomla! — more advanced ones — I can only say that Joomla! has a better name, nicer and more colorful logo and a project manager well tunned with the open mind wing of the Open Source movement.
This weekend I had the chance to try a friend’s LG Shine cell phone. Its a beautifull piece of design.
It was obvious which Microsoft technologies and patents LG used in this product:
I just bought the blogplex.net domain with the donations I got from the Google Maps plugin.
Taken this weekend in Rio Claro, São Paulo, Brazil.
At the entrance of Red Hat office in São Paulo…
When we think all standards, tools and frameworks for web on the client was already invented and now its time to spread its use, Microsoft comes with a “new” thing: Silverlight.
Silverlight has same functionality of Adobe Flash. You install it on your desktop system and it works as a browser plugin. Silverlight leverages proprietary .NET, thus it is proprietary too.
When it says cross platform, read Windows and Mac only.
Development tools are Microsoft only.
My advise is to stay away from Microsoft Silverlight or any Mono reimplementation as Moonlight (as noted by Roberto Teixeira in comments). It will lock you in into proprietary technologies.
These are some alternatives (name in bold) for such an impressive interactive web functionality:
As happened with Real versus Microsoft media formats, and Java versus .NET, it is expected that when Silverlight gets more popular, the Flash plugin will be removed from default Windows installations (forcing users to explicitly install it), considered as non-strategic (or a competitor) for Microsoft.
The Common Craft Show has made excellent videos to explain Wikis and Feeds to the masses. Select subtitle language in last 2 links.
Since I started to write the Linux Font HOWTO I am interested in this subject. Personally I believe that good fonts and good renderer are the top contributors to an elegant and comfortable desktop.
Joel Spolsky wrote an insightful article comparing font rendering approaches of Microsoft and Apple.
And he refered another article by GRC explaining subpixel rendering.
By the way, GRC made history describing how Distributed Denial of Service works.
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In an internal account planning meeting:
Then I had to explain that Intel/AMD is not a platform. Is an architecture.
Linux on Intel/AMD is a platform. Windows on Intel/AMD is another platform. And the last one is probably the one he doesn’t trust for such a critical application. You can trust on the first option, man !
Current Intel/AMD servers are very reliable. Have excellent chipsets, support advanced virtualization, are as fast as hell, and together with Linux are as reliable as any other UNIX server. By the way, Linux is UNIX, in case you didn’t notice.
SAP is trying to drive customers IT budget to their pockets, instead to the infrastructure guys pockets (as IBM). They are advising customers to switch to cheaper architectures (as Intel and AMD) so they have more money to spend with SAP. This is an opportunity for Linux.
If a company is making changes to their IT infrastructure, is hard to find a good reason to not switch UNIX servers to Linux on cheaper architectures. (By the way, total cost of ownership for Linux on System Z can be even cheaper for big datacenters.)
Main reasons for customers to insist on UNIX are legacy applications, culture, and a damn good UNIX sales force.
I can’t sleep, so I configured a better feed for my blog.
I spent the day in an Office Open XML conference in Brasília with many colleagues from companies in the industry, including Red Hat, Novell, 4Linux, ODF Alliance, IBM and Sun Microsystems.
For Sun, I was able to confirm they have ODF as their standard format for all documents, globally. OK, this was pretty much expected, but its exciting to hear it as an official statement from a Sun executive.
I met a friend that works on an investment bank and provides advisory to his customers about companies that are good to invest now.
He has Sun Microsystems on his short list.
He didn’t make any organic research about this company. He only analyzed the behavior of their graph.
Anyway, I told him Sun Microsystems is a company that I would not invest nowadays. They were very innovative in the past, but their future, in my opinion, is uncertain.
Yesterday, in a meeting on the beutifull Novell office in São Paulo, I was able to confirm that ODF is their document standard. Globally, for all Linux and Windows users. If they need to exchange documents with customers, they send in PDF.
I supose Red Hat, a 100% Linux company, is also in this direction. I just didn’t have the chance to confirm this with the folks I know in Red Hat. But I’m pretty sure its the same. By the way, Red Hat, together with IBM and Sun, is member of our local ODF Alliance Chapter Brazil.
broader article about Java on Linux.Just to make more generic and to simplify Liquidat’s good howto about this topic, here is a better way to install Sun, IBM or BEA Java/JVM/JDK on any modern Linux RPM-based distribution as Fedora 7, Red Hat 5, SUSE, Mandriva, etc:
bash# rpm -qpi java*nosrc.rpm Name : java-1.5.0-ibm Relocations: (not relocatable) Version : 1.5.0.2.3 Vendor: JPackage Project Release : 3jpp Build Date: Tue 15 Aug 2006 Install Date: (not installed) Build Host: tortoise.toronto.redhat.com Group : Development/Interpreters Source RPM: (none) Size : 395165271 License: IBM Binary Code License Signature : (none) Packager : Thomas Fitzsimmons URL : http://ibm.com/developerworks/java/jdk/linux/download.html Summary : IBM Java Runtime Environment Description : This package contains the IBM Java Runtime Environment.
bash# cd /directory/where/binary-SDK/was/downloaded bash# cp ibm-java2-sdk-50-linux-i386.tgz /usr/src/redhat/SOURCES bash# cp ibm-java2-javacomm-50-linux-i386.tgz /usr/src/redhat/SOURCES
In SUSE, copy to /usr/src/rpm/SOURCES.
bash# cd /directory/where/nosrc.rpm/was/downloaded bash# rpmbuild –-rebuild java*nosrc.rpm
bash# cd /usr/src/redhat/RPMS/i*86 bash# rpm -Uvh java*rpm
and the JVM is installed.
(All but step 5 may be done as a regular user instead of root, but explanations would be longer and more complex)
Later, you may also want to install the javaws package to have Java Web Start integrated on your browser.
By the way, JPackage Project has standarized how Java software should be packaged on Linux. And they are doing it with RPM (but the concepts may be ported to other packaging systems). It is such a great and well done standard that all RPM-based distributions such as Fedora, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, SUSE, Mandriva, etc are using it for their own Java works. It all starts with a package named jpackage-utils, probably already installed on your fresh system.
You may find many Java software as JBoss, Apache Geronimo, Ant, Eclipse, etc packaged in JPackage web site.
My blog feed was included in one more of these planet-like web sites.
Welcome Planet Fedora readers.
I was already being read by Pandemonium and Planeta GNU/Linux Brasil readers.
I guess 90% of high quality readers and comments I get come from these community planets. OK, I have some very popular posts with 470+ comments but they are terrible.
For new readers, I blog a lot about Linux, Open Standards, Open Source, ODF, business related to all this stuff together with SOA, Web 2.0, and all those buzwords. At work I was asked to start blogging, to keep a connection with the community. So I can say to blog is officialy part of my job.
I also enjoy writing about travels, food, metaphysics, music, politics, and this is the place I store my published articles and presentations I use to deliver in events. Most of that in portuguese, but many technical stuff are in english.
Welcome all.
Inspired by an old post by Rui Moura, I’ll maintain here the plain commands needed to setup a freshly installed Fedora or Red Hat system, to include essential softwares they don’t ship by default due to legal issues.
These instructions are currently optimized for Fedora 14, 15 and 16, but most of it should work on any other Fedora and modern Red Hat Enterprise Linux too. Good suggestions provided as comments bellow will be added to this guide.
Terms highlighted in red should be changed to match your system.
This step will allow you to issue some administrative commands without having to be all the time logged in as root — the system administrator.
bash# echo 'your_plain_loginname_here ALL=(ALL) ALL' >> /etc/sudoers
Note that this is the only command throughout this guide that shows a root prompt (bash#). All other commands are indicated to be run as a regular non-root user (indicated by bash$).
After configuring sudo, every time you execute an administrative command with its help, a password is requested. This is your password (the regular user’s password), not the root password.
Install the following packages so updates will come faster:
bash$ sudo yum -y install yum-presto yum-plugin-fastestmirror
You can also get e-mail notifications about system updates:
bash$ sudo yum -y install yum-cron bash$ sudo chkconfig yum-cron on
Then make sure your /etc/sysconfig/yum-cron file has the following lines:
CHECK_ONLY=yes
MAILTO=YOUR-EMAIL@address-com
You will get one e-mail every day with a list of updates available. E-mail delivery will only work if you configure your system for that.
After all the steps below and from time to time, update all software installed on your system with the following command:
bash$ sudo yum update
RPM Fusion is a repository of many essential multimedia and general purpose software for Fedora and Red Hat systems. It is a good idea to have it configured so you can easily install players for DVDs, MP3s amongst other useful things.
bash$ sudo rpm -Uvh http://download1.rpmfusion.org/free/fedora/rpmfusion-free-release-stable.noarch.rpm http://download1.rpmfusion.org/nonfree/fedora/rpmfusion-nonfree-release-stable.noarch.rpm
bash$ sudo yum -y install vdpau-video-freeworld libva-freeworld libva-utils vdpauinfo libva libvdpau kmod-nvidia xorg-x11-drv-nvidia
bash$ sudo rpm -Uvh http://linuxdownload.adobe.com/adobe-release/adobe-release-i386-1.0-1.noarch.rpm bash$ sudo yum -y install flash-plugin --exclude=AdobeReader\*
On 64bit systems (x86_64) use this:
bash$ sudo rpm -Uvh http://linuxdownload.adobe.com/adobe-release/adobe-release-i386-1.0-1.noarch.rpm bash$ sudo yum -y install flash-plugin nspluginwrapper.x86_64 nspluginwrapper.i686 alsa-plugins-pulseaudio.i686 libcurl.i686 --exclude=AdobeReader\* bash$ mkdir -p ~/.mozila/plugins; ln -s /usr/lib/flash-plugin/libflashplayer.so ~/.mozila/plugins
Restart your browser to activate the plugin. For reference: Flash Player for Linux home page.
There are 2 ways to install Chrome or Chromium:
bash$ sudo wget -O /etc/yum.repos.d/google.repo http://avi.alkalay.net/articlefiles/2011/01/google.repo bash$ yum -y install google-chrome-beta
You can also find Picasa on the same repo but is 32 bit only and not on the latest versions.
bash$ sudo wget -O /etc/yum.repos.d/fedora-chromium-stable.repo http://repos.fedorapeople.org/repos/spot/chromium-stable/fedora-chromium-stable.repo bash$ sudo yum -y install chromium
You can access servers and machines on you LAN by name, instead of using their long IP address using the Zeroconf standard (implemented as Avahi in Linux). This is so useful and works out of the box in Ubuntu. The setup in Fedora is easy too, but not automatic.
bash$ sudo yum -y install avahi-tools nss-mdns
Now, instead of accessing local hosts by their IP, you can use the .local domain appended to their names. Just like this:
bash$ ssh 10.0.0.5 # stop using the IP address of dbserver bash$ ssh dbserver.local # start using its hostname
Evnetually this will only work if you correctly configure or disable packet filtering (firewalling). To disable:
bash$ sudo service iptables stop bash$ sudo service ip6tables stop bash$ sudo chkconfig --del iptables # disable even for next reboots bash$ sudo chkconfig --del ip6tables # disable even for next reboots
Tip grabbed from Fedora Project wiki.
bash$ sudo yum install freetype-freeworld
Logoff and login again your graphical environment to this update take effect.
To understand why you need this update read this section on the Linux Font HOWTO.
The freetype-freeworld package uses a technique described in this bug report.
These packages include popular fonts as Arial, Times New Roman, Tahoma, Verdana, as well as new Windows Vista and MS Office 2007 fonts. Learn more.
bash$ sudo rpm -Uvh \ http://avi.alkalay.net/software/webcore-fonts/webcore-fonts-3.0-1.noarch.rpm \ http://avi.alkalay.net/software/webcore-fonts/webcore-fonts-vista-3.0-1.noarch.rpm
Then, configure your desktop as described in the Linux Font HOWTO, for KDE or Gnome.
For Gnome and GStreamer:
bash$ sudo yum -y install gstreamer-plugins-ugly libmad libid3tag id3v2
For KDE:
bash$ sudo yum -y install kdemultimedia-extras-nonfree id3v2
bash$ sudo yum -y install amarok-extras-nonfree
bash$ sudo wget -O /etc/yum.repos.d/atrpms.repo http://avi.alkalay.net/articlefiles/2011/01/atrpms.repo bash$ sudo rpm --import http://packages.atrpms.net/RPM-GPG-KEY.atrpms bash$ sudo yum --enablerepo=atrpms -y install libdvdcss
bash$ sudo yum -y install gnome-mplayer
bash$ sudo yum -y install mencoder mkvtoolnix mkvtoolnix-gui ffmpeg avidemux subtitleripper
bash$ sudo yum -y install vobcopy
Now, thanks to libdvdcss installed above, you can use vobcopy to clone DVD while removing their protections like this:
bash$ sudo mount /dev/dvd /mnt bash$ cd /some/directory bash$ vobcopy -m /mnt
See an updated post about it, ready for Fedora 20.
bash$ sudo yum -y install ntfs-config
Then run the ntfs-config-root graphical tool and configure your partitions to be writable and mountable.
bash$ sudo /usr/sbin/ntfs-config-root
An example of my system:
After you configure the tool and quit, your NTFS partitions will be mounted in the specified place. In my case /media/Windows and /media/Work.
This tip is for the text console.
bash$ sudo echo 'SYSFONT="lat0-08"' >> /etc/sysconfig/i18n # set a ISO-8859-15 font
bash$ sudo echo 'fbset 1024x768-60' >> /etc/rc.d/rc.local # set console resolution to 1024x768 @ 60Hz
These settings will take effect after a reboot, but you can test them before rebooting executing the following commands:
bash$ sudo setfont lat0-08
bash$ sudo fbset 1024x768-60
Note that you can set different resolutions than 1024×768 if you have a video card and monitor that will accept it. A full list of modes can be listed with the command:
bash$ grep "mode " /etc/fb.modes
Download the blog icons. including SVG source code and exported to PNG GIF and JPG.
This is a collection of high quality vectorial icons to represent common ideas and actions of the blogosphere.
They were based on the SVG work from FeedIcons.com. The base button is the same, but mathematically simplified on the XML level. New buttons were added based on other popular icons found on the web or created by myself. Also some redesign was made for new shapes to make the icons look better when exported to smaller image sizes.
By the way, I am not a designer nor an artist. I just know how to use SVG-creation tools as Inkscape or make good XML. Or I just have a blog demanding for these icons. So I’m sure people can contribute better color mixings an outlines. Let me know and lets integrate your ideas into this project in the right way.
Please share alike this icons. They have a Creative Commons license. I appreciate if you can link to my blog when using them.
Icons for Feed and OPML
These icons where the base for this work, specially the feed icon as found in its website. They were probably created with proprietary tools such as Adobe Illustrator and then exported to open formats such as SVG or PNG. The original OPML icon can be found at opmlicons.com
The versions here are visually identical to the original ones, but mathematically simplified. They are now being maintained in an open format — SVG — here, and are a better option because of its open source code and formats, and distribution.
Icons for Trackback and Share
These icons can be found sometimes in the blogosphere. I don’t know who designed them but they are a good representation of the Trackback and Pingback ideas.
The Share icon is not my preferred but for now it is just a copy of what can be found around.
Colors and shapes are identical and based on the feed icon button. I never saw these icons in a size bigger than 16×16 pixels. Now, in a scalable format, they can be rendered at any size you want.
Icons for Permalink
These are original creations and come in several options. I am still not sure which one is the best. You can also suggest other shapes.
As you can see, I am using this icon to identify that each section on this post has a permalink.
Other Icons
Other original icons: Comments, Edit, Cancel, Tag, Download, Upload and Clock (to represent date and time). I’m open to suggestions for better shapes.
Challenges for Icon SizesThe original design of these icons (from feedicons.com) looks wonderful on sizes bigger than 22 pixels, but most people will use them on small sizes as 16×16. So this package delivers also shape design that look better on small sizes as 22×22, 16×16, etc. I am using these sizes all around my blog as you can see.
Converting the SVG Files into ImagesIn the Blog Icons ZIP file you will find the XML:SVG source code for all icons. Additionally you will get all icons in PNG (preferred), GIF and JPG formats, in common sizes from 10×10 to 128×128 pixels. If you want a specific size, you can import the source SVG file in some graphical tool as Inkscape (on Linux), or CorelDraw, Adobe Illustrator, etc and export them into any format and size you want.
Or use the Makefile like this (on Linux you will need Inkscape and ImageMagick installed):
Make all default sizes of all icons, in PNG, GIF and JPG:
bash$ make all
Make Feed icon in GIF format, at 40×40 pixel size:
bash$ make SIZE=40 feed.gif
Make all icons, all formats at 40×40 pixel sizes:
bash$ make SIZE=40
Yesterday was announced the ODF Alliance Chapter Brasil, being the fourth country to create this initiative, after US, India and Poland.
The founder members are the Brazilian offices of IBM, Red Hat and Sun. Jomar Silva, the director, told me this:
My understanding is that the Brazilian [ODF Alliance] operation has the mission to execute the work proposed by the ODF Alliance in our country. We are partners and fight together the same battle, exchanging experiences (and this is a very important point) so lessons learned with migration and adoption of ODF in other countries (governments and companies) may be used here.
Many software support today reading and writing of documents in the OpenDocument format, being OpenOffice.org the most popular. The user gains freedom of choice, becomes able of negotiation, and can choose for the best price-benefit performance. This user-suppliers dynamics works as a fuel for innovation.
ODF, being based on open standards as XML, plus having a free license, plus to be already and ISO standard (two steps ahead of OOXML, proprietary competitor by Microsoft), is a mark in IT’s history, when for the first time the user is truly the independent owner of his documents. This is simply a very powerful idea.
The Brazilian chapter of the ODF Alliance will focus, in its first days, to setup its web site — probably at www.br.odfaliance.org —, and to define policies to accept new members as companies, institutions, user groups and communities.
Last weekend we traveled to the Paraty bay area, a place that I visit since I was a kid. But this time was very special because I knew a new paradise: Saco do Mamanguá.
They say there is only one fjord in Brazil, which is the Saco do Mamanguá. To get there we traveled by car to Paraty Mirim, then took any traineira (a small and slow fisherman’s boat) that was siting on the beach waiting for tourists. You don’t have to setup an appointment or pay in advance. Just go. They use to charge R$35 per hour, for any number of persons up to about 10. We did everything in 4 wonderful hours.
Mamanguá is an 8km-long arm of the Atlantic ocean, far enough from Paraty to look as an almost untouched paradise. It has small clear water, isolated beaches, perfects for snorkeling, or simply for relaxing. In addition we were blessed by a beautiful shiny day, thats why I can’t avoid using the “paradise” word all the time.
The whole region deserves a visit, and thats why I’m writing this in english, to inspire non-brazilian folks come visit my beautiful country. But instead of a stream of words I invite you to explore the interactive map below. Click on the markers (
) to see more information and local photos.
Fazenda Graúna. Go to Le Gite D’Indaiatiba, a beautiful pousada and restaurant by Olivier and Valerie. This restaurant is very expensive (about R$150 for two, no wine), but very good too. This place is in higher altitudes so in clear sky days you can have lunch contemplating the wonderful ocean down there.
Trindade and Laranjeiras. Trindade was a small fishermen’s village that turned to be a place that many hippies go nowadays. Larangeiras is a village of very expensive and big cotages.
Tarituba. Used to be a small village and beach where simple fishermen live and work. They still live there, but all their wives opened simple restaurants along the shore and around. Due to the excess of fishermen boats (called “traineiras” in portuguese) this beach is dirty and not apropriate for swiming. Nowadays you may find some nightlife in Tarituba on weekends or holydays.
Fazenda São Gonçalo. A private farm with a calm beach, good for children, easily accessible only from certain points. You’ll find places to park your car and walk for 3 minutes to the beach. If you want, you can pay R$7 per person to a fisherman and he’ll take you and your family to the Breu (the picture) or Pelado island, right in front of the beach. You will stay on clear water beaches with big stones full of aquatic wildlife. Bring your diving mask and snorkel. There is also a rustic restaurant there, where you can chill out having a caipirinha de maracujá (passion fruit caipirinha) or água de côco (coconut water) with fried fish. Don’t miss their mandioca frita (mandioca is something similar to a potato but only available in Brazil).
Cachoeira do Iriri. Coming from Paraty to Rio, right before the São Gonçalo farm complex, there is an almost unaccessible beach that you will see from a hill on the road. A reference is a red and huge cellular antena. On the other side of the road there is a bus stop and a trail into the forest. A 3 minutes walk will take you to a beautiful clear water river with a natural pool and waterfalls. You will see a closed house but you are not transpassing. Just chill out there the whole afternoon after the beach. You can stay under the waterfall to heal your backs. If you feel adventurous, look for a jungle trail right on the side of the pool, going uphill. It will take you to the second floor of rocks, but there is nothing there. Keep on going up until you find the river again on the third floor. Look down and you will see your non-adventurous friends that stood on the first waterfall. Say hello and goodby, because we are not finished. Walk by the river for 3 minutes until you see a huge natural water pool with another waterfall. You’ll be probably alone there. This is a window to paradise. Just don’t miss this point.On January 25th the OSDL released their 2006 Linux client survey analysis, which identified the following barriers for Linux deployment on desktops:
It is not that applications don’t exist for the Linux desktop, but users grow accustomed to certain applications that they just can’t live without.
Users report they are missing applications as Microsoft Office (OpenOffice.org is the alternative), Adobe Photoshop (which has The Gimp as the closest, but still far alternative), AutoCAD (with QCad as a very far similar) and others.
For peripherals, this is the list:
However, it is still difficult to buy a printer at your local electronics store and expect it to work out of the box on a Linux machine. While most printers are supported on Linux, there is still a lag from the time when a printer hits the market to when the driver driver is available and automatically installed on your computer by a commercial distro update.
And as a Linux user, I must add that when the device works, it usually won’t work with its full set of capabilities, because drivers are usually written by third parties on the OSS world – and not by their manufacturers, which are expected to have a much deeper knowledge (and project commitment) on these hardware capabilities.
So the problem is a committed application and drivers development. Well, how can companies commit themselves to develop desktop software (which means friendly to non-technicall users) in a world that had not decided yet about some elementary standards? Yes, there is the FreeDesktop.org initiative but the standards they are focused on are more related to KDE-Gnome interoperability.
Most important standards that must be defined will find their home in a layer bellow: LSB. But unfortunately, the Linux Standard Base still has a big job to finish and still seems to have difficulties to catch up with ISVs.
As an example, there is no de facto standard defined for things as trivial as a configuration files format for the whole system, not only for desktop apps. This is particularly important because configurations are what makes software run in a specific way. They are the soul of any software (while code is the body). A popular standard for configurations will provide ways for any software to collaborate with, and auto-configure any other software. On Windows, this was successfully achieved with its registry. On Linux, similar but broader and better alternatives exist (as the Elektra Initiative), but this is a subject that seems to not inspire the OSS community.
Standards bodies can’t do everything alone. The community must be ready for changes, adaptations, and have courage to throw away code that was not choosed by the standard, and start focusing on what was selected to be part of it. Courage to stop reinventing the wheel. For example, on a vanilla KDE installation you will find about 4 different media players (Amarok, Juk, kboodle, noatun, etc) and 3 different plain editors (kate, kedit, kwriter). If you have Gnome installed on same system, add a few more to each class of applications (and to the icons that will appear on your menus). This is confusing, fat and bad.
Another important fact on the analysis is a 49% desktop share for Canonical’s Ubuntu Linux, against RHEL and SLED with 16% each. RHEL and SuSE are more popular on servers and are essentially and structurally different distributions, but both use RPM as their packaging system. While Ubuntu is radically different from both, based on Debian, with the DEB format for packages. A well known and well used packaging system is very important on a desktop world, because this is what guarantees an easy, painless software installations and upgrades. So if I am an ISV with limited technicall staff and time resources, how should I package my software for easy deployment? DEB or RPM? If RPM, should I focus on Red Hat or SuSE flavors? Though questions.
Application vendors cannot afford to develop, distribute, and support applications across a fragmented Linux market.
Red Hat and Novell should look at their future server market, paying attention on what is happening today on the desktop. History shows that people tend to bring to work (and to servers) what they like and use on their desktops at home. This is Ubuntu’s long term strategy and they seem to be succeeding, at least on their first phase.
The brazilian Viola Caipira has nothing to do with the orchestral Viola, used mostly in classical performances. It was brought to Brazil by the first portuguese people, and modified and evolved, making it almost a genuine, Brazilian-only instrument now.
It is used mostly on country-side small cities or farm regions of Brazil. And songs played with Viola Caipira sound like these places: home-made food, green landscapes, country life.
Almir Sater is a well known violeiro that used to be more active with the viola, and as an example, one of its beautiful compositions, Luzeiro, was used to open an old TV show focused on farming.
There are other excellent violeiros, as Paulo Freire [blog], Roberto Correa, Ivan Vilela, Braz da Viola and many others. Levi Ramiro is one of my favorites, with its Estiva Grande.
Songs played with Viola use to be accompanied by a Rabeca, a sort of simplified violin. Luis Eduardo Gramani was one of our masters in Rabeca compositions, writing beautiful songs as Deodora.
Do not forget to right click on each song link to download the hi-fi MP3 file.
