SMICK.NET | Website of Mike Smick Graphics and Web Developer

Am I too quiet to be a blogger?

I added “blogger” to my email signature over the past few months. But I’ve been wrong on that.  A blogger is one who keeps the conversation going.  I jump across topics and go through very quiet periods because either I don’t feel anything is worth sharing, or more likely, the effort to share is  more than what I feel the outcome is worth. I’m no blogger. And tonight I decided, I don’t care either. I’m happy to toss out the title.

I’ve seen a lot of people in my circle quit their sites because they decided that they couldn’t keep up. Even I threw in the towel once. Have you been there?  If you started and then quit a blog, it’s probably because you had an expectation for what  you thought this whole blogging lifestyle was about.  And when your habits caused you to veer further and further from that initial picture your mind drew, the tension built and it was easier to cut the rope than climb up it at that point.

You envisioned you had the time and had tons of ideas to share. (And you saw dollar signs right? Well I admit that I did. ) But when it comes to going through the motions, blogging isn’t all that fun. Staring at the computer screen, editing yourself over and over, finding that your idea was not as funny or original as you thought.  It’s a challenge to create a projection of what you want to share in the form of a written piece.  That’s why micro blogging is suitable for more people. Because you are constrained to a thought instead of a big concept and you are easily forgiven for posting stupid crap. You know at the beginning you won’t be consumed by constructing a tweet, you’ll just fire it off. You never get that feeling of dread that you’ll be trapped by it for hours or days.

It reminds me of those mind tricks you play on yourself to stop procrastinating.  The idea that you don’t need to dwell on committing to a whole hour to your upcoming project. Commit to 5 minutes only. And the mind trick is that your momentum will take you through the next 35 minutes and your procrastiation melts and is reborn into progress. Tweets and micro posts work because you don’t procrastinate on them. They’re so easy it’s sick.

Where am I going with this? Well it’s a message to myself and to you. Don’t get hung up on what you think a blog needs to be or the expectation that your blog needs to be something like popular or constant. Just be. If you have a desire for a site or blog or curated collection, look within and watch the downside of what your attachment to what you think it should be too early.  Better  just build in a direction and see what forms. Like drawing.  Shade a little here, a little there. Let the image emerge instead of kicking yourself because it’s not what was how you hoped.

May 5, 2011 at 12:51 am | inspiration, learning, writing | No comment

Concatenate cells in OpenOffice & LibreOffice

I have fairly simple needs when I do spreadsheets. Concatenation and Sums are about all I do. I’ve had trouble with concatenation before. What is concatenate? It’s when you have cells like  “Mary” and “Watson” and you need to push the data in those cells together inside a separate cell to be “Mary Watson” combined.  Why? I don’t know, maybe you’re doing a mail merge and putting  “Dear ‘Mary Watson’ you owe us back debt.  You need the space between her names for her to take you seriously.

Here’s how it’s done in OpenOffice.org and LibreOffice. You have the spreadsheet set up and you select the cell where you want to have the combined name. Either type the equal sign in the cell or click in the formula bar.

=CONCATENATE(D2;" ";E2)

Notice the two semi-colons right?  This was always hanging me up. I kept getting Err508 or Err509 or something when I’d do this. Thankfully a little playing around worked.  You want to know what else?  LibreOffice can use commas instead of semi-colons in this formula, but OpenOffice cannot.  Also there’s a shorter way to do this too. You don’t need the word CONCATENATE or the parentheses. And you can use & instead of semi-colons. Short and sweet.

=D2&" "&E2)

Concatenate cells with spaces in OpenOffice and Libre Office

What else? Well just in case you haven’t done this, if you have a big spreadsheet, you can duplicate your formula where it will replicate itself properly and use the correct cell numbers. To do this, you just select the cell with the formula and click on the lower right square dot and drag downward as far as you need. Your formula will regenerate properly for the rows beneath it.

Duplicate a formula instantly on a spreadsheet


	      
February 13, 2011 at 12:50 am | computers, learning | No comment

          
How to link to a GPS coordinate on a webpage using geo url

     
Since smart phones are all smartypants these days, many of them have preloaded map system or are hooked to Google Maps. And with the popularity of mobile sites, it’s nice to think we can share our locations with people to quickly find us on GPS.  I discovered through a few sources that you can actually link in a webpage or email a link to GPS coordinates.  This is pretty cool and I think has some use cases.


“Hey, come to our office open house party where we have hidden buried treasure! [inserts multi-line street address]“


Now my Nexus One is smart enough to detect some addresses on a page or email and send to Google Maps. But that doesn’t mean all phones are, nor does it mean that Google Maps is the recommended GPS app. If you were writing an email or a website that could help assist someone finding your place, why not link right to the location for GPS as well as typing out your address? And for good measure, underneath that you could link to the Google or Bing Map as well to give them choices. OR you could even use a QR code to link to it from a paper flyer. (Yeah you like that idea don’t you!)


Here’s how you write a GEO URI in HTML for use on a webpage:


<a href="geo:38.62464092991612, -90.18476128578186">go here</a>



But wait, that’s a fine bit of knowledge however, how does one get the coordinates to a location in the first place?


Good question! Is it something in Google maps you can easily get? Unfortunately it’s not an “out-of-the-box” feature of Google Maps, but I’m going to make it simple to get GPS coordinates using a quick Javascript hack on the Google maps webpage.


    

  1. Find your location on Google Maps, right-click on the map and choose “Center on this location”
    2. 

  2. Paste this code snippet into the browsers address bar (all by itself) and press enter.

    javascript:void(prompt('',gApplication.getMap().getCenter()));
    

    3. 

  3. You’ll get a popup that returns the GPS coordinates: (38.62464092991612, -90.18476128578186)
    4. 

  4. Remove the parentheses and construct the geo url as I did above.

    <a href="geo:38.62464092991612, -90.18476128578186">go here</a>
    

    5. 



That was the full HTML code. If you were writing an email to people, you’d want to write in Rich Text mode and then do a hyperlink to just the geo:38.62464092991612, -90.18476128578186 part.


So let’s try it together shall we? Crank start your mobile browser and… Here goes nothing!.. GPS LINK GO!!!


Note: If you tried to click that GPS link from your PC right now, it will likely fail because your home PC / laptop doesn’t have a GPS program to launch. So come back here with your phone and try it when you get a moment.


More Information / Sources


GEO URI Wikipedia Article

Javascript Google Map Coordinate Hack

Dive Into HTML5 Geolocation

	      
January 16, 2011 at 5:54 am | learning, webdev | No comment

          
My plans for 2011

     
I’ve had a great 2010. I watched my beautiful son in his first year, did some home improvements, had a lot of fun riding my bike. Went to Japan again. But I also have a lot of empty spaces. Well intentioned things left undone. And I want you to know, I write this up not because I think I need to somehow be more of a person to be worthy or loved, but because life is short and a little more pressure and alignment with my life goals is a great thing.


So here’s my list of things to crank on for this year under my chosen categories.


Health, Fitness and BMX


I used to run pretty frequently, and I  did run a couple miles maybe 2 weeks ago, but I’ve started to let that  slide. Mostly because winter kills my motivation. Luckily there’s a new  image of motivation helping me during this winter… This.




It’s a photo  of a guy in Belarus, a republic in eastern Europe. I don’t need to  explain what’s going in this pic do I? Not only does this make me laugh  thinking about it. It’s also an example of some of the eccentric badassery in the  world that is unfortunately in short supply around me. So I’ve got my  plan to do winter runs. Do them because they suck, but also because they are a  small form of badassery. Much more rewarding afterwards than during.  (Well except for the part where the thick air made you taste like  you’re coughing up blood for 2 hours afterwards.)


BMX. My passion is Flatland BMX, no  doubt. Running is fun, but nothing beats coasting on the front wheel of  my flatland bike, spinning, switches, scuff tricks. I’m extremely excited to say I ramped up my riding in 2010 to levels not seen since college. But it’s not enough. I’ve got a few  stunts to pick up and practice from that I demand from myself in 2011. Not that most people care, but  making gains in this sport matter to me, even if I know I’ll likely  never be a Matt Wilhelm, Simon O’Brien or Matthias Dandois.  (Video links of those guys in action)  I believe that to get good, you  have to go out with a mission every day, an agenda of what to accomplish. Usually I  figure that out once I get there, or I’m just on fire in my mind,  something burning to be learned that I’ve been visualizing over and over. That  needs to continue and be exploited. I’ve had a hard time riding in this  weather, so getting around that problem is next. By warmer weather, I intend to participate in more shows just like I did in 2010.


Knowledge


I want to read one book a month. That’s reasonable right? There are a few classics I need to get to as well as some newer books that I own that have been untouched. Couple classics to mention, Great Gatsby, Art of War, and biographys of Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson. Some newer ones to enjoy, Where ideas come from, Hitch-22 and something by Seth Godin.


I also want to write a book this year. Doesn’t need to be awesome, it just needs to be a contribution. I think I want it to be a book to my son, so far anyway. And it can include pictures / photos or not. Actually I’ve already started this book, but it’s not had a direction. That’s all it needs, focus and continuous contribution.


The last part of knowledge I’m stealing from a writer, Steven Johnson. In a book he wrote (and I’ve read this before.) he said most of the great idea people always had their notebook with him to record their ideas, document their experiences and work and their findings. I’ve started to do this already. It’s no masterpiece, but I found the book I like and filling it in has been helpful. I feel better knowing that interesting quotes and observations are slowly making their way into my little archive. I’ve always wanted a book like that to pick up 40 years later to say “wow” this is a fun little legacy keepsake. I’m not gonna lie here, basically I want my own grail diary from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. I’ve always wanted one of those. Or my own DaVinci notebook.


Freelance


The bottom line on this topic my freelance work needs a reboot. I’ve tired of my web company name, SmickWorks. Too many company use the word “Works” in the name and I need something that feels a little more fun and unique. I don’t mind changing things up and I think the right name will draw the right clients. I don’t take on too many clients because I’m too busy in life, but I desire to keep my company strong and to always have it ready for when it can take an uplifting turn to something bigger. Let me quote Steve Jobs, I want to make a dent in the universe with this one, but despite not always knowing how, I’ve gotta set myself up that way. And if it’s my son who ends up building from a foundation here, then I’m more than happy to let him make the dent.


Not to get too far off course here because this is more important in the short term. I’m ashamed to say it, but I’ve allowed the clutter around me to drain me and to let my freelance projects slip. I’m embarrassed to say it and if you’re a client who has suffered waiting for things longer than you should have. I can only say I’m sorry and I don’t mean to put anyone through that. The road to good intentions is paved with milk and cookies, or however that saying goes. BUT I realized that I don’t have a simple enough way to keep my project tasks in order. Emails, phone calls, text messages. My requests come in and I just can’t seem to keep it all in my mind when I need it.


To combat this, I’ll be installing a very cool Issue Tracking app on my website. What this will do is allow me to post project and bug fixes to the database. And I always know where to look. Not only that, but I can set up my contact form on my websites to auto-generate an project request. So it doesn’t have to be a complicated extra step or require sending logins to clients.


I have a few freelance projects I intend to do. Both are actually secret, but they are 2 websites I think need addressing. And this is all doable. Nothing amazing required except for the desire and follow through.


Learning in my field of web and design.


Outside the regular book reading I want to do, there are gains I want to make in my work. I’ve never been a trained artist or a programmer. I’ve tried to fill the shoes wherever I could. Sometimes that meant looking for the right solution premade because I couldn’t do it myself. And that will get you pretty far, but I have a few areas where I think I can be more helpful (and enjoy my work). That would be learning Javascript (JQuery) and PHP. There are a massive number of resources to do this. Too many actually. But the key is to stick to something and practice. That’s it.


Other than Javascript, I want to dabble a little in IIS web server so I understand how it works. And install a few instances of Dot Net Nuke to see where it will help me, if at all. At work we have a need for one-off microsites and it might be a good way to deploy them. Or not. But I’ll never know if I don’t jump in.


Besides Dot Net, there are a few Content Management Systems I want to work on. I’d like to work more with ModX CMS, Mediawiki, and MindTouch Deki. I’d also like to continue to use WordPress and maybe try out WebGUI.


I’ve already kinda mastered 2D graphics software, but my art still needs a lot of work. That’s why I’m so happy my wife bought me this sketchbook called 642 Things to Draw. It’s a book of blank pages, but it has labeled spaces for certain things to sketch in the spot. So it narrows focus. That is awesome. I want to make a big dent in this, getting about 80 drawings into their spots. When I was little, I remember my dad helping me with a drawing, he did a really good job. I think having a sketchbook to give to my son might inspire him to learn how to see and practice the craft too.


Another end to exploit is video. I’m actually pretty flipping good at video when I eventually get onto the editing suite. I’m NOT good at thinkng about video projects because the amount of footage overwhelms me before I even open the tapes or files. I procrastinate on that. The difference now is, well I’ve got a kid and a life and an opportunity to share things with his family overseas. So video is the way to do that properly. And it’s a skill I want to teach him and I want to document our experiences that way. So I’ll be adding short videos to my monthly projects. Not enough to overwhelm. But things to get done.


Lastly in terms of planned learning, I want to get my head around the latest incarnation of Blender 3D. I haven’t worked with 3D for a while. I’ve played around a bit, but there is a lot to enjoy when you can get around the software. Since Blender changed so much I’ve avoided it to see where it finishes. But it’s pretty much where it’s going to be in terms of interface and so I need to dig in. Plus it will help me contribute to projects and solve visual problems.


Finishing projects


I’m ashamed to say it, but I’ve got a lot of half-finished projects I must address. These are videos and websites. I’ve made some promises, but kept the deadlines as soft. This has got to stop. Because if you’ve ever read anything about Getting Things Done, there’s a premise in that book that says projects that are unfinished make your brain always have to work harder because it’s always looping back to them. The more things in the done pile the better you’ll feel. I’d venture to say that unfinished projects even pulling softly at you could even affect your health.  Time to knock out those. Most if not all could be finished by March if I don’t pile anything else on them.


Family


My son is almost one years old. My wife has spent most of the year cooped up in the house and not seeing a lot of outside. Some by choice, but I think introducing activities will help Andrew’s brain and let us enjoy our lives more. So I’ll be cooking up at first, monthly outings and then maybe increase that. Part of the things that can help a lot are family home projects that also need addressing. I’ve never been particularly good at them, but it’s not that I can’t work on them. I just too often choose not too. I have a basement to get situated, and a few wood projects and trim work. Those will be done in 2011 even if I have to enlist my dad.


Blogging in the ole notebook


A hundred thousand people will be resolving this year to write in their blog in order to make something meaninful. I’ve kept mine for years and several times made commitments to fill it up daily or weekly. BUT what I never did was create an editorial calendar to schedule blog posts. And that’s what I just did now. I used a google doc spreadsheet that lists the 52 weeks of the year. And I’ve made columns for each of those weeks to list a 1st blog topic and a 2nd blog topic. Two blog posts a week could be one post covering graphics, design or other area of my interest. Topic 2 can be related to family or photo post, or could be a contribution for my upcoming book. Filling in these areas on the editorial calendar is the important thing. I already know I can write. It’s the habit I need. I’ve already made twitter a habit by using a few tools and slightly modifying my routine. That will be helpful to lead into expanding tweets into full posts. Not only that, but I’d like to see my blog be a little more relevant and interesting to friends, family and colleagues. It’s always been challenging mixing the 2 topics, but 1 post per week of both types will let me do that. One challenge will be that I also operate 2 other blogs, Snackhunting.com, and Readerwar.com. Trying to contribute to all of those is probably too much on a weekly basis. I think that’s ok though. My editorial calendar will help me iron out how to space those as well.


Sleep


Most of my issues in life are the result of a degree of discipline, focus and being energized and ready when I need to be. Sleep has always been hard for me because my cycle seems to be longer than most. Meaning I don’t get tired at 11pm, I get a second wind, that can take me to 4am without any effort. But I admire more the ability to wake up early being prepared to handle tasks. I’d like to beat a few people into work each day and even do morning exercise before breakfast, like the runs I mentioned earlier. I can do that if I make a habit of sleeping a little earlier. A fresh routine with the proper sleep-wake, wake-sleep transitions will help. This might be the hardest though. Because I tend to love the quiet of the night. But when you go to bed earlier, actually you can still get the quiet stillness of the night, just that it’s the after you’ve had full nights rest this time. I need a few tools for this one I think. On my own I’ll probably fail. If any of you have suggestions, please send them along!


So that’s a big list, but nothing too crazy, and it aligns with what I want to do just fine. I think that it will make a great year for me. Just have to read it over, stick to it.

	      
December 31, 2010 at 8:19 am | family, inspiration, learning, publishing, writing | No comment

          
Simplify all your social networking with Tweetdeck

     
I was pretty late to Twitter. Now I enjoy it the most out of all the social networking sites. It was when I got a smart phone that I started looking at social networking beyond just having a Facebook account. For several reasons, being able to check in with your phone makes social networks make more sense. Just on the PC, they seem very wasteful.  On the home PC, checking Facebook once in a while is OK for me, but I don’t see the point of living there. Still want to share some things and add new friends occasionally.  And I realized it’s nice to be able to set up a business fan page that people can press “Like” on and make you feel somehow desirable.


TweetDeck is Free!




Then I realized that I might want to separate business tweets from personal ones. And some new initiatives I’m working on such as my ReaderWar website made me want to create more separate accounts.


Too much redundancy though. I can’t be logging in and out all the time. Too much room for mistakes. I can’t be wasting that much time on them to say the same things twice and 3 times. Maybe it’s better just to post under one umbrella and let things fall where they may.  I thought that until I found TweetDeck.  It’s a cross-platform application that let’s you read tweets on your subscription and see in multiple columns your retweets and direct messages and user profiles.  It doesn’t let you read facebook postings, but it DOES let you post to both your facebook accounts, AND the business or other ‘fan’ pages you set up for yourself. If you’re an admin or owner of a fan page, you can post JUST to that page only using TweetDeck.




How do you post separately?  When you set up multiple account profiles for Twitter, Facebook, Linked-In etc., you can toggle them on or off when writing the tweet. See illustration below.




What you can do with TweetDeck


Post updates to Twitter, Facebook, Linked-In, Foursquare, MySpace, Google Buzz

View updates from these sites

Post to Facebook Fan pages (that you own or administrate)

Retweet comments from Facebook

Send messages to Facebook users

Look at Twitter user profiles

Attach Photos

Automatically shorten URLs (bit.ly is default URL shortener)

Quick Preview shortened URLs just in case

View embedded Youtube video links in tweets

View Facebook photos and through galleries

Global Filter posts or topics you don’t want to see (e.g. Justin Biebr or #fail)


So TweetDeck does a lot, it’s a fantastic app for your PC, Mac, laptop. They also have an iPhone and iPad version.


Other Applications like this


Hootsuite

Seesmic

CoTweet

Tweetie

Echofon

	      
June 13, 2010 at 1:41 am | friends, learning, media, tools | No comment

          
Ted Talk – Secrets of Longevity

     
My latest favorite snippet of valuable learning once again comes from a TED Talk.  I’ve been watching these for years.


In this talk, to find the path to long life and health, Dan Buettner and team from National Geographic study the world’s “Blue Zones,” communities whose elders live with vim and vigor to record-setting age. At TEDxTC, he shares the 9 common diet and lifestyle habits that keep them spry past age 100.


http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_buettner_how_to_live_to_be_100.html




No surprise, Japan and Italy include one of the blue zones where people in a certain community share a long life. And we find out a little bit of why that is. It’s not all what you might think.

	      
January 10, 2010 at 2:59 am | family, friends, inspiration, interesting, learning | No comment

          
Millions of Ideas, questions, strategies

     
Ever have a raging amount of enthusiasm from ideas, and you need to share them right now? You must get somebody else in on this right away? You can’t rest until something is answered? The idea is just too spacey until you can get another persons mind into it. I’ve been plagued with this for the past few weeks. Sometimes I want to get on the phone and call my friends and clients, even ones I haven’t talked to in a while. Or jump in the car and just drive over to one of their houses unannounced. Show up and say, “Hey I gotta run this by you, see what you think.” Or “I need your help, how do you….?”


I’ve managed to keep it subtle. Friendly and casual emails. Thankfully some of my friends have been responsive too, willing to help.  But when it’s 6:30 am on a Sunday morning and you just want to ‘strategize’ with people, even on something not that exciting, it’s humorously painful.  This need that is terrorizing me, I’m chalking up to being a little too reclusive in my lifestyle. It’s good and bad I suppose. You can’t learn without focusing on your own away from distraction, and if a side effect is a sensation that’s igniting a fire, I appreciate its usefulness. No matter what, you need others at points to build up excitement and carry it through. It takes groups of people more often to invent something vastly important or helpful and rewarding.  But it’s 6:30 in the morning!  Why must I be so energetic at the strangest hours?  Why can’t my friends, for no reason just be up and ring my phone right now and say “Hey I’m listening, what can I do?”


I suppose this could be a cue for me to remember that I can be a source of energy and ideas and answers when my friends and family want to do something new and special, give them support, help inspire it to actually happen for them. See the idea, help flesh it out with them. Get excited about it.

	      
July 19, 2009 at 7:54 am | inspiration, interesting, learning | No comment

          
What to do on your birthday

     
There is a speaker guy named Seth Godin. Everybody likes him. Me too. And I read his site today, about birthdays. He was asking, what should we do on your birthday? Because mine is this coming week, it got me thinking about how I’ve been the past few years. Gifts have been really difficult to give and receive. I don’t take giving lightly in most cases. It’s hard for me, because if it’s going to be a thing I give, I want it to be special because it really will represent something, it acts on my behalf when I’m not there.  Certainly I’m not better at receiving, because people ask me what I want for my birthday and I really can’t bring a certain object I want. I really just want to be better than I am. I want to see continuous improvement both slow and steady and through wild bursts and revelation. Projects I want finished, objectives I want conquered. Because it seems that when these things have happened, all the other gifts just flow in. But I don’t just want them done. I want to be engaged throughout the process. Nobody can do that for me, can they?


And yet when I think about that. It sounds like I want to rush through a segment of my life to get it where I expect I should be. As if I’m not quite complete yet. Not good enough. Analyzing that is kind of fun at this moment, because it’s a good reminder of how ridiculous it is. I’m happy that I don’t really believe that. And I’d be sad if others did for themselves.


If someone’s birthday is a day to be celebrated, it’s because of a person’s uniqueness and celebrating it because before that date, they weren’t here. The world before them didn’t enjoy their personality and contributions, their silliness, their ideas, and the things they do for others. At their moment, the pebble struck the water’s surface and the ripples began. The sequence of events in our world without their existence is difficult to imagine. Maybe even lonely.


And because they are here, often so briefly, it is one day a year where we remind them that it has been important that they are here, important to us, many of us. That’s the best thing we can probably do for people.  And if we are all too distracted on that day to know or remind ourselves of the reason, that’s ok too. Because even if we realize it on another day, it’s that moment we appreciate somebody for who they are, we are bigger, we have grown.


So how do you celebrate someone’s uniqueness? I wish I could give a perfect answer, but I’ll try. I think the best you can do, is knowing them, you know what they like, what they do, want to be, or accomplish. Do your best to imagine what it takes to get there or to do that. And if you find your own personal way to help them do that, that day, I think it would be a hero’s gift, without a doubt. If you are close to them and already doing that, then maybe just a small surprise is something that’s needed. If you are far away, a card sent or a friendly phone call, can encourage and help and just tell them how much you and the people in their world appreciate them. You can also try to engage in their world a little more too. If you only saw them twice this year, try for five times over next year.

	      
July 4, 2009 at 9:18 pm | family, friends, learning, nostalgia | No comment

          
Will Linux work for you so you can dump MS Windows?

     
ABC news has a story called Imagining a Microsoft-Free Life.


So many stories like this are written, usually not by the MSM, but they trickle in every year.  They rarely get to the most important points. They are rarely written by people who are able to compare their experience with most people.  These articles usually center around the fact that you can install a free Linux Operating System such as Ubuntu and just use that, no longer having to worry about the expensive Windows upgrades.  This option sounds attractive, but nearly every article (except by those who are Pro-Linux) will typically end with “Yeah it sounds great right, but it’s actually not likely to work for you.”


I will enter this cesspool with my best effort.


Starting out.  Microsoft sucks in so many ways.  In particular, from XP to Vista. What a joke. Vista came out and had a new glossy black look and thats about it. Not only that, it was unnecessarily bulky and worse, very expensive.  For a small number of new features and eye candy, you pay a lot of money. Also that eye candy which was a heavily pushed and highlighted feature (see task switching on every vista commercial) it’s actually not that great.  The menu update is OK, but also a little difficult to navigate. The amusing thing is that all the glossiness is easily done in Linux. Linux users laugh or shrug their shoulders when they see that flashy Windows stuff shown.  Because it’s free, faster and more flexible in the Gnome or KDE desktop environments of Linux.  Before I move onto those, I’ll mention one more important feature of Windows Vista. DirectX 10 is an update to a 3D graphics framework only available in Vista. Clearly done purposely to influence gamers to upgrade. Many people said that it was a very pretty update to games, making things look more realistic, such as reflections and light and texture effects. But not worth it given the strong system you’d need to run it and the sacrifice you’d be making on overhead with Vista just running by itself.


So it must be known that there are some high quality free operating systems available using the Linux kernel.  When it’s Linux, they call these operating systems “distributions” and in a lot of ways, they are similar.  They have the start button menus you are used to, even if they don’t say “Start” on them.  They have folders and files you can open and rename. They run programs such as office spreadsheets, image viewers, and solitaire.


I’ll center this around Ubuntu because it’s popular and very heavily worked on by both the community and a company called Canonical. Ubuntu is a distribution of Linux that uses as a default the Gnome desktop environment (controlling the menu / folder / window look).  Certain things are branded Ubuntu, certain things work the way the developers wanted, that slightly differ in other distros of Linux.  These are the core things of Ubuntu I guess.  In the details, you have things like support for Wireless laptop cards, easy configuration of devices (hopefully) and lists of things that make Ubuntu unique as a distribution of Linux.  Ubuntu is free, it has a very straight forward CD install and can replace Windows and work well for many people for a long time. It has many simple auto updates which means it keep itself up to date for you. And like most distros, it’s very extendable.


Will Ubuntu or another Linux distribution work for you? The significance or usefulness of these free Linux distributions come down to how you answer three questions.


    

  1. Are you tired of Windows or having trouble with it and prefer not to upgrade to the new Windows, and instead would like to take a shot at something new and slightly different?
    2. 

  2. Are your computing needs general such as document creation,  web browsing, photo viewing, watching videos, playing CDs?
    3. 

  3. Are you willing to forego certain things such as specific games and applications in case they aren’t available on Linux due to the difference in program structure?
    4. 



Most articles that are written about all this don’t cover this issue properly because the experience of computing is always unique to each computer user. The fact is you can dump windows easily replacing it with a dead-simple experience in general computing on several variants of Linux. Where things get a little hairy are some specific things that some people might like. for example:



I said earlier that whether moving to Linux is a good idea depends on the individuals unique needs. So let me give you a short case study of myself. I don’t like Windows all that much.  I don’tcare about it.  I own a Mac but I don’t like doing a lot of my graphic work on it because the mouse handling feels mushy to me.  The actual cursor, not the mouse device.  I’m not alone here even if you think I’m nuts saying that. Trust me ok. I also despise Windows Vista and the entire campaign with the seven different versions, the limits placed on cheaper versions and the audacity they had of complicating Vista instead of simplifying it.  I’ll say again SEVEN VERSIONS to figure out which one to buy?  What the hell Microsoft.  People all along the chain of that decision need to be stabbed.  And during that time, Apple releases one version of it’s OS X operating system. That’s how you do it. One option that handles it all./end rant.


So you’d think I’d be the likely candidate to try Linux.  And I have.  But there are problems that prevent me from being ‘Microsoft-Free.’ Those problems aren’t due to a lack of computer experience. They are genuine limitations.  I want to use the Latest Adobe software on a system that feels non-mushy. Because Linux can’t run Adobe CS4 Photoshop, Flash, AfterEffects, Premiere and more, that leaves Windows. I also enjoy the game franchise Call of Duty.  I also like being able to print photos with my Canon scanner / printer. I also like to use certain wireless mouse and keyboard features that only the windows drivers support (switching buttons)


Linux can probably get me pretty close to my goal.  Despite Canon not making Linux printer drivers, somebody else has written them. I might not get every printing option or be able to see ink levels in the system tray like I can on Windows XP, but still if I can print good prints on the right paper, I’m happy.  Whether I can do that without a nightmarish install process is a question though. Because anyone configuring their mother’s computer knows that seeing you five hours into it, they are frustrated with Linux without having touched it. My mom might reject Linux because it SEEMS complicated, even though I take care of the difficult one-time stuff.


One more case study: My wife.  Linux helped her a lot because of an older laptop and a missing Windows disk. We weren’t able to legally load Windows for her after a hard drive failure left her with a blank slate.  We recovered files, loaded Ubuntu Linux and I did my best to configure it nicely.  She was used to the “My Documents” folder and where it was located.  With a little walkthrough, she learned the new best location to save files.  Her problems with the webcam were evident, and her favorite greeting card software wasn’t available. We couldn’t find an alternative to that.  One big problem for her might be small to somebody else, but when we were able to Install Windows again, she was ready to because of it.  For whatever reason when she wanted to attach a photo to an email, she could not view thumbnails of the photos for attaching to Yahoo mail.  Maybe a silly small thing but that was her need.  And you can’t argue with that.  She did really well for the few months Linux was running, despite some printing challenges, which again would have been perfect with the Windows driver.  It’s nobody’s fault, it’s just personal preference and in a lot of ways, expectations.


It must be known though, that Linux kicks Windows behind in so many areas too. Such as the sheer number of free applications, many chat channels for help, ability to learn new things, ability to make many massive theme changes with less overhead. And it’s only gonna get better with the cross-platform Adobe AIR and the slow migration of favored programs.  Some pressure is on companies like Canon and Logitech and Nvidia to create drivers for Linux users. It’s in their best interest to support as many as they can.  There are also some Linux-only programs that are exquisite and you’ll take advantage of those.  e.g. Rosegarden which I mentioned previously.  There’s a lot more there to be discovered.  And Linux can be installed with a ready-to-use webserver. Admin tools are strong, as well as programming tools.


In conclusion, whether you can enjoy Linux, Mac or Windows depends on your expecations, your individual needs and what software supports those needs.  I cant’ tell you how many small needs I have that NO computer meets.  So to say that Windows is better than Linux, or Mac is better than any of them is just ignorant and biased. I think being free and supporting old hardware is a big advantage of Linux. Wouldn’t it be great to spend $90 on a used laptop and outfit your college student with free office, browsing and learning tools? That is very possible and that may be an enormous significance to people who are willing to try it. I love that Linux gets better constantly, Ubuntu releasing new versions every six months and people are trying to get things to work with popular devices.

	      
December 10, 2008 at 6:12 pm | computers, learning, mac | 3 comments

          
Stepping out of politics for a while

     
For several months, I was hoping that some of the political postings I made might be read and affect people, at least to look candidates in a way that the mainstream media wasn’t.  But all that’s nearly over, and I was happy to delete all that crap from my site.  Because the election is mostly on its own freight train and though I have some affect at any point of the ride, I’d rather get back to things I care about.  Years ago, I decided that if I was going to write something here, it should be as timeless as possible.  Otherwise I could go nuts talking about all the latest happenings.


Been thinking a lot lately on how open the world is to us when we get to a certain level of intelligence and skill, or at least belief of that.  Not that I always display a lot of intelligence or skill, but still I begin to really see the power of what you can accomplish with no fear and a few hours work.  Success, both in feeling and financial seems to really hang in the balance with people having a constant choice, rather than some sort of destiny.  You may have read that kind of statement before, but it’s much different than really experiencing it first hand.  I think working for myself, I am able to see it a lot easier.  Were the last few hours used to make something new, significant or interesting, or were they wasted on something that’s not in my actual goals.   So many fun things intrude on your focus and your long term goals. It’s really hard for me to manage it, without getting help from my two maniacal friends, fear and urgency.


Sometimes I think the most important moments of our lives are when we write letters.  In most letters, we are either asking a question, or giving thanks.  Both are very powerful and significant things we can do.  They are actions of growth I think.


Focus has been a challenge lately, so it’s a matter of walking the long-term path as often as possible.  No self-help stuff here.  Just a few thoughts.

	      
March 12, 2008 at 9:24 pm | learning | No comment

          
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