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How is Japan in 2009?

I took way too long to let people know how our trip is going. I thought I would do my best in a short moment I have. It’s late, I have been working on another project and I’ll just do my best with some pics.

The best thing about Japan for me is always the fun and interesting eats. There is an abundance of it at the house. Also we have the best scenery and oddities in Japan too. So it’s no stretch to say that I love it here, even with the boring and lonely stretches as the only foreigner in the area.

To start off, these are lunch boxes (Bento). Mom has been making them for Juri and I on the days we stay at the house. She makes them at the same time she cooks everyone breakfast, meanwhile getting ready for a full day of work. She’s superhuman. We try to do the dishes to make her life easier.

These are the best snacks ever. The first is called a Chocochip MelonPan. Basically a sweet bread with a sugary top and embedded chips. Excellent texture and taste. It looks heavier than it is, but don’t get me wrong, it’s no diet food.

This next one is the best popsicle ever. It has multiple stages, much like the Saturn 5 Rocket. First the outer fruit flavor, then a small pocket of vanilla cream as you can see in the picture, then a larger pocket of the fruit outer layer, only slightly softer. Comes in greentea flavor too. So good.

I did manage to work in the fields some. I laid out bags of fertilizer for Dad to spread it on the field. I did a bad job spreading fertilizer on my first and only attempt. They fired me. But then they rehired me and I did a good job planting potatoes with Mom on the sideyard.

This is our daytrip with dad to a Plum Blossom Festival. Plum blossoms bloom shortly before the cherry blossoms. The same day we also went to a nearby temple by taking a cable car up a mountain. These pictures don’t hardly show anything we saw or did that day. Too bad.

Here is me and the cat “Emma-chan” eating dinner. The cat comes up to the chair next to me because of the fish. Otherwise, both cats in the house avoid and hate me. As you can see, Emma-chan is hoping for a role as Simba in the Japanese version of Lion King.

Here is Mom and Dad at Dinner. Piles of vegatables are on plates along with some meat and squid that will be cooked in the electric fry pan tonight. The sweet potatoe slices are my favorite. Notice the sushi rolls too. Always something extra as a nice starter with a cold beer. Great people. Meals are all different, I never know what to expect. But pretty much Dad and I will drink a beer before dinner with appetizers.  Also a side note. Grandma cannot remember which chair she sits in at the table, so she asks us every day.

Bedtime. Tomorrow it’s Tokyo Disney Sea.

March 18, 2009 at 12:39 pm | general | 3 comments

Show respect for your ideas – Avoid the Top-Ten List

The advice marketers and web experts espouse for writing top-tens might get you bookmarked or twittered or whatever, but that doesn’t mean it holds genuine or lasting meaning for people.  A top-ten list is like dumping your ideas onto the tabletop. It is boring and cheap. It’s boring because when you lay it out, you’re done, what discussion is there with your list of facts? No detours, no need for story or background. I see the man on the street who nudges you before flashing a rack of watches hanging on the inside of his coat hoping you will be enticed by the sparkle. Only $13 will get you a Rolex. You don’t have to dream about it, or even search for a store or go bargain hunting. It’s all right here, he’s handing it to you for practically nothing.

Why should your reader go on a quest if you’ve done it for them? You’ve made genuine effort, you’ve read ten books to get these ten pearls of wisdom. Too bad with precious elements, like gold or gemstones, the more the world has, the less it’s worth. When we read your top ten, we didn’t have the adventure that you did when searching through the books. Your enjoyment and eagerness to scrape away to the absolute essential took something hidden from the reader. Where is our foreplay to this knowledge you give us? Getting right to the meat would be great advice if it actually worked. Does it?

So I say, the hell with these lists. To hell with this writing advice. I say when you encounter information like that, even on favorite websites that get hit upon hit of popularity, reject them. Recently I saw the article at Zen Habits that made an interesting claim. Gain Bruce Lee’s physique without equipment. It contained a list of many two-sentence exercise suggestions. Reading that I felt that even when information is right, it can be wrong. What was written for the masses of readers won’t hook a single one. I’m betting not one reader of the Zen Habits blog will get his physique. It was a reminder for me that these quick reads solve little. I don’t meet people that read a top ten that changed their life.

Too often we are encouraged to write in this mode or medium. The advice tells you that these are the sites with the traffic, the hits the money makers. It’s the best way to write blogs many will tell you. I say, “So what!”  Sure you can be the guy selling cheap shiny watches by on the street and make a decent living. You can be that guy. And year to year you’ve made more money than Shakespeare ever did. But has your shiny advice become an heirloom to a person and family?

You will be able to argue your point on this. I know many or most of these writers are intelligent, have good intention and are doing what they love. They are also for the most part giving their writing away for free on the web. How could one have contempt for them? I don’t, and this is a fine argument, but you simply can’t convince me that this mode of advice top-ten is effective or capable of creating change. Rather than try to polish the turd, I’d much rather go against the advice, so that my writing and your reading uncovers something that is unique to you. Your discovery and adventure is part of your relationship with books or short stories, or blog entries you’ve read. You don’t flip directly to the conclusion of stories because they, just like life have beauty and offer more because they unfold. And without the chapter heading stating directly what the five interesting parts of the chapter are, you want to find out what is in there, and you love it when you find them. In that, the impression is made. I believe it’s this sort of experience that can create change. But even if I’m wrong about lasting change being created through discovery, I still know that the enjoyment will still be there.

Don’t be silly and conclude that written lists or chunks are worthless. And don’t be foolish and think that lists and chunks are the effective way to share your knowledge. Have a little respect for what you have to offer and look beyond the conventional or default method claimed to be best for modern readers and search engines. Consider and realize how your ideas are best cooked and served. Wrap wisdom in an adventure or a mystery or where it isn’t likely to be found. Surprise people. Stories can be shared person to person, better than a list. Reveal.

March 7, 2009 at 11:12 pm | general | No comment

Wow, articles can actually get this bad

Some guy wrote an article that explained how Compiz on Linux is “cool” and shows how much “cooler” Linux is than the graphic designers who smugly carry their Macs at his office. I understand the author’s intent despite starting with the worst possible examples. Compiz is eyecandy (a lot of it useless and gimmicky) for Linux desktop and the right way to win converts to any tool is to make your tool better, more compatible, and easier. Certain Linux distros are doing that on many fronts, but you still need actual graphic design applications if you are going to do anything but make more than a shallow impression on people. Compiz is great, but it’s not for graphic design.

I started commenting on his shoddy article, but realized that the effort is wasted on it and I could just print here on my site.  I do that a lot. Too far into a comment, I realize that it will be wasted on a crappy article miles down the comment list. So here you go:

This (the article linked above) is the most stupid article I have read in a while for several reasons. Compiz is solving a “problem” that a Mac-toting designer doesn’t have. If you’re talking about a graphic designer at least. Maybe other designers of other things can use Linux. But Compiz is NOT a program that produces design content. The author seems to think that a designer might prefer a Mac only because it is designed well and the OS looks good. They might say they love their mac because of this or that GUI candy, but a designer REQUIRES that certain design applications allow for creating designer content. A designer designs, they don’t just sit there and fiddle with the OS’ overlapping windows, making desktop water droplets, window fire or spinning a desktop cube.

I’ll weigh in to improve this travesty.

1. There is no Photoshop, Flash, After Effects, InDesign, Quark or Corel for Linux. Nothing even close in quality or price. Sure GIMP does a lot, but the latest Photoshop has things GIMP cannot do and won’t for a long time. Photoshop does genuinely great, efficient image editing. Sure you have other work arounds on Linux, (like using Blender for 2D motion graphics for example) but designers have to share files with other designers, print houses, and content reviewers. Linux doesn’t have this kind of ‘juice’ yet. What kind of designer really wants to screw around with these limits? An enthusiast like me enjoys it a little, experimenting with format conversions and such. But time for dollar, it isn’t worth it to create a limit for yourself using Linux instead of Mac or Windows. I have only met one other guy that did some photography and graphic design and wanted to screw with Linux. One other guy besides me and I’ve met a lot of designers. The rest of them buy their PCs or Macs and buy Adobe apps and the Final Cut Studio or Corel suite of progams. They don’t follow the advances of Linux when Windows came “free” with their PCs and will come free again when they buy their next PC.

2. A lot of designers (not me) actually like the way Macs feel. Not the hardware necessarily but the actual mousing cursor. It IS different and I think that perhaps even if you trick out a linux theme to look exactly like a Mac, it will still not have the feel for them.  I don’t like Mac cursor movements, I prefer Windows. Linux is OK for me too, though I’m bothered by the fact that it doesn’t support my special ergonmic mouse buttons out of the box. I have a Mac but it feels funky to me for designing, like I’m mousing through mud. You can’t argue with people’s ‘feel’ for an OS.

3. Both the iMac and the Macbook’s are not that expensive as the author suggest. They are highly capable computers priced in range of many other computers. In other words, they are affordable, dare I say reasonably priced, not mind blowingly overpriced as the author suggests. I believe the Macbook Pro is a huge unnecessary price jump which I have yet to understand, but as long as people are willing to pay for it, Apple will sell at the highest price they can get. With software, Apple is priced pretty good. iWork, iLife and OSX overall are priced really well. GarageBand and Comic Life are great programs that come with a new Mac free.

4. GIMP, Blender, Scribus, Inkscape are the players on Linux for design. Add to that maybe a video app or two. I think Cinelerra was big for a while, and Maya runs on Linux if you want to buy Maya. But you have issues with nearly all of those. GIMP requires relearning with a couple major quirks Photoshop users trip on right out of the gate. Blender is difficult. Scribus is simply never done and is quirky in many ways. Inkscape crashes like hell (for me at least, and the page refresh is funky). You can do Flash with Flex tools, but it’s programming over graphic design, so that’s a stopper for many designers too. I could complain more about these apps. And I could complain about the Adobe suite, but it is very strong and complete at the same time with a massive and deserved following, especially now more than ever.

5. Until software development is more accessible or cheaper, companies haven’t been able to justify developing design programs for Linux. They don’t see an ROI. That’s it!  Otherwise I think many companies are platform agnostic.  Game makers are the same so this isn’t a surprise. Just ask Adobe. They don’t create Photoshop for Linux despite it being the most sought-after Linux application because of the ROI problem. Otherwise they say they would do it. And with their new GUI development and the AIR and other Flex tools you will see some changes in the direction that makes Linux a possibility. Just not right now. I have stated before that I believe Adobe could create their own optimized Linux distrobution and smash a bunch of Microsoft’s market share. But they probably need to see how to properly deal with the conflict of theirs and the GPL license.

6. I liked Compiz for while, but much of it was useless to me. Still it has NOTHING in it that helps me actually design, other than maybe switching between apps. Since Mac has a nice Expose feature, Compiz isn’t going to convert many people on its own from OSX.  And you know what, this is all coming from a Linux and open source fan. I can’t program in C++ for , but I understand the purpose and philosophy and try to contribute to the advancement of open source programming where I can. It takes a person who a.) knows about open source b.) cares about it enough to avoid attractive commercial software and c.) accepts and wants to work through the problems of Linux and lack of standard design software. Plus dualscreen, printer driver and other buggers.

7. There is a category of software that looks great and has gems only on Linux. I’m referring to the audio editing programs that have emerged in the past few years such as Rosegarden, Ardour and many others including live DJ tools. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_audio_software  This category is interesting in that you can justify converting to Linux because these full featured programs are there and work well. The categories of graphic software, office tools, video editing programs do not have this kind of leverage at the moment to convert people to a Linux desktop.

8. It continues to surprise me that more general office workers care about Windows. I believe it comes down to 2 main reasons. Outlook/Exchange/working with others AND just being used to MS Office. Some people need MS Office for specific efficiencies too, whether it’s Access capabilities or Excel or they just like Word and will part with their money to get it.

9. The world is waiting for some great 2D animation, page layout, multimedia authoring, and graphic design programs for Linux, free or not. The world is also waiting for more games for Linux. You want a purpose in life, there you go. Get to programming graphic software and games for Linux. You will make a difference in peoples’ lives.

March 5, 2009 at 10:44 pm | general | 1 comment

Olympus is not cool.

Last night in Tokyo, I was given the opportunity to view a couple cameras I’ve had my eye on for a while. Ones I can’t get in the United States. The Ricoh G600, which is a type of heavy use contruction or utility working camera and a newly released water and shock resistant Olympus uTough 8000. I believe Olympus has equivalent models in the United States but this one is brand new as of this writing.

I was so disappointed while looking at the the two. They are, among the very few water resistant cameras. There have been just 3-4 cameras like this which is astounding to me. Just like the lack of water resistant phones.  I wonder why just these companies have created a minimal number of products that seem to me to have a greater demand. It’s one thing to say “well our customers aren’t asking for water resistance” but we have to assume that durability is in of itself good design and not necessarily a way to lose money (because our product never needs replacing.)  If anything, right now, you can win market share with durability and continue to sell cameras with advancing technology. Plus the cameras are not absolutely impregnable, they are just resistant.

I feel like the Ricoh camera is simply overpriced for the offering. I think it’s a decent camera, and the fatter controls for gloved hands are lovely. However for the price I would expect some sort of alternative imaging capability included such as infrared or some other specialized spectrum. I’m not imaging scientist so I don’t have the vocabulary for a suggestion at the moment. I just think given that the camera seems more basic in controls, the durability is worth more, but not THAT much more in materials.  However, I can only suggest that it feels to me expensive. My money guage is for me alone I suppose.

The olympus is simply aggravating. Because it’s so close. Sure it’s not a perfect camera and neither are any of the others. But it has fun features that standard olympus cameras have, plus the water, cold and shock durability It’s hampered by something which to me is absolutely unforgiveable. The problem results from memory cards. Olympus uses XD format. This camera can also use Micro SD. Along with being more expensive, a non-standard and inferior out of the gate with limited storage space, it seems to me that it is unnecessarily small. You might find it strange to hear somebody say that a card is smaller than necessary because we think technology should advance smaller, lower power and lightness, however devices like cameras and phones still need to be at a human scale. Our hands aren’t evolving as fast as cameras, so we have to operate them and be able to locate their cards. The SD card could fit in this camera. The same SD card that last I saw could be found at 32 gigs. That’s a far cry from the 2 gig XD card I found. Micro SD was better at 8GB, but it was more costly and while in the camera, hampered the video clip length. These are needless problems and limitations.  Why give us the problems when you don’t have to?

This is why I’m unhappy with Olympus and decided last night that I won’t buy their camera even at 1/3 the price I found it. And believe me, I was torn last night.

But I’m so happy that I made that decision. Because today I learned of Canon’s spring line. They include a camera called the Powershot D10 which is nearly the same specs in water depth and shock and uses SD. Plus is has some of the Auto mode bells and whistles that Canon does so well.

This is why it’s great to have choice. This is why we should vote with our money and not settle and keep our eyes open. Because sometimes a purchase is about not compromising, about going with what is more open. The sad thing here is that Olympus could have won this. I don’t care about the brand name. I care about the capability for the need here. Olympus might have won my confidence for many other products, but they failed. It’s a shame really because when a standard like SD is demonstrably more flexible with more storage, to go against that with something not as good for aesthetic reasons or stubbornness Olympus is just not cool. Cameras and photos are for sharing. Sharing requires compatibility. Enough said.

Wait there’s more.  I may actually get a camera before I return to the U.S. after all. In April, Panasonic is releasing an updated Lumix.  I used to have a Lumix and I loved it. Unfortunately it fell in a river and disappeared. This Lumix has a 28mm wide lens, and shoots video in AVCHD lite, which allows for longer sessions. The Lumix might be the winner here if it can handle macro shots like my older one did. It will go 10 feet in water, unlike the Canon’s 30 feet, but I think the shape of the camera and features may make it my choice over Canon.

March 4, 2009 at 8:52 pm | general | No comment

Some Sweet Science

I thought I might add to your day by showing you some Popular Science articles from September 1920. You can find this and other issues on Google Books. If you haven’t heard of Google books, it’s going to change the world. I’ll have a follow-up posting about it because there is about to be a publishing and knowledge revolution underway and I feel obliged to participate.

You might think that our science news is deteriorating and things just aren’t like they used to be. Well take a look at how things used to be and then compare.

Is the Toothbrush Harmful?

Why do we have more trouble with our teeth than our ancestors did? Today there are improved tooth-pastes and toothbrushes—and yet the amount of decay has increased.

The food we eat is generally blamed for it, but now there is a scientist who suggests that the very toothbrushes we use in order to preserve our teeth are causing the decay! He says that the toothbrush is an unnatural instrument, which damages the teeth and is not very effective for cleaning the interstices. He recommends rubbing the gums with the forefinger instead of using brushes.

(Yes we must always avoid “unnatural instruments” of any kind if we are to keep our teeth and bodies clean and healthy. Also the “interstices” or spaces between teeth are definitely not cleaned more effectively with your finger so the logic is terrific. Since this scientist is unnamed, we can’t verify his statements or ridicule him unfortunately but, I’m mostly just curious about the first sentence of the article. Did the people of the time really think their ancestors had better teeth? I’d think it’s just that people were finally addressing problems like poor hygiene that were previously ignored for centuries.)

How to Keep Hot Pipes Hot

“Will an asbestos-covered pipe keep hot longer than an uncovered pipe?”
“Yes,” you say. And we answer, “Not necessarily.”

Tests have recently been held in the research laboratory of a large electric plant, and these have shown that if asbestos is not applied properly it will tend to dissipate heat rather than conserve it. The layers of asbestos should be put on loosely. Three layers having a thickness of thirteen thousandths of an inch will reduce heat loss considerably.

(if one could only go back in time….)

Poison Gas Kills Germs

A large quantity of poison gas-which Germany introduced to us as a weapon of war­­­‪—was left over when the war ended. But now some of it is being used to kill typhus germs.

A small epidemic broke out among the refugees in Paris. Most of them were wearing second-hand clothes and the authorities decided to fumigate the clothes, mattresses, blankets, even combs and brushes. The germ-laden clothes were hung for twenty minutes in a cylinder containing a mixture of chloropicrin­­­‪—one of the poison gases used in the war. The epidemic soon died out.

Typhus is spread by the feces in lice often found in the deteriorated conditions of wartime and poverty. Even just normal laundering in soap and hot water kill lice in bedding and clothes. But it was the people who were really just as needy for a wash and healing any open wounds. That and removing and quarantining sick and dead individuals in their camp. But hey if the “authorities” made the decision, it must have been the best one.

It’s hard to say that it was a stupid idea as a refugee camp is going to create huge strains on time and energy, which is exactly the reason why many chemicals are created in the first place. However, both handling the chemicals daily and being nearby this makeshift cleaning cylinder was dangerous. Also looking at present day regulations for Chloropicrin when used as a soil pesticide, many cautions are taken. One of which is to “Discard clothing and other absorbent materials that have been drenched or heavily contaminated with this product’s concentrate.  Do not reuse them.” Oops.

One other amusing thing to point out is this is just one issue. I’m not cherry picking these from over a year or decade. I’m scared what other advice was available at the time.

February 11, 2009 at 4:16 pm | general | No comment

Nice Primer Video on Digital Photography

A new favorite website of mine, Academic Earth is attempting to compile and make more efficient, the university open courseware sites video content. I was obviously interested in what kind of classes might be available in design and related computing. There is a category of computer science, but not design. Fortunately due to overlap, a few classes in my field are there to enjoy even though they don’t exactly hit the mark.

I think you’ll like this workshop on Digital Photography given by David J. Malan at Harvard University. It’s quite detailed, but not out of range of the novice.  I appreciated some of the examples and analogies given. It’s nice to be clear on technical equipment and it’s limitations. Particularly, since cameras are products nearly all of us buy, we all benefit from knowing a little more before we buy.

Workshop – Digital Photos by David Malan via AcademicEarth.org

Dear Universities offering open courseware. Please add design, typography and more. It’s fun, and valuable and useful for so many people. I suppose it would involve a lot of screen capturing which might not be as easy as video production, however, that doesn’t mean it’s not viable or not worth the resources to try.

February 1, 2009 at 5:12 am | computers, gadgets, graphics, photography | No comment

This is your captain speaking

Chelsey Sullenberger was the pilot of US Airways Flight 1549 that went down in the Hudson River January 15th, 2009. Everyone lived. Everyone survived with minimal injury.  Sullenberger in just a few short moments proved that not only does he possibly have the biggest pair in America, but also we common people are a bunch of smartass idiots. Everyone of us who has looked at those safety cards, and said something smug and sarcastic.

By the end of the day, he had his own Wikipedia page. And you should see his fans on Facebook all 300,000 of them.

I was thinking just now if I were him what I might say over the P.A. to the passengers on my next flight. “…We’d like to welcome you today folks, looks like we have clear skies all the way to Charlotte. Oh by the way, funny story. The last time I got behind the controls here, oh man…”

Regardless of what embellishments are in the Wikipedia page, we know one thing for sure, he has the most secure job in the nation right now.

January 18, 2009 at 4:05 am | interesting | No comment

Holiday Linux for Aunt Judy

Two posts ago, I attempted to lay out whether Linux could replace Windows sufficiently for most people. Some rewarding field work today proves it can and does happen. My Aunt was complaining about viruses again after we reinstalled XP less than a year ago.  Imagine my surprise hearing of this.  But it got me thinking about what I could do about it this time for a more permanent fix. Refreshing Windows is annoying for sure, but worse is the way people respond to their infected computers. They feel uncertain if they can properly use a computer, that maybe they caused the problem. Some feel guilty for wasting money on an lemon, even though their PC is probably fine.

Fortunately aunt Judy has a small set of needs for computing. Webmail and Internet searches and maybe the occasional letter document. She added pressure by surprising me with her dysfunctional printer that could only spit out blank pages. And we needed to give one more critical device a closer look. She hopes to one day see her grandkids on her new webcam before they graduate college.

I only had a disc of Ubuntu Studio 8.10 on hand that I had planned to eventually use at home. It would work fine, though it has too many programs Jude has no use for. Oh well. Either I could spend two hours removing stuff in the package manager or She could simply ignore some of the menu clutter. After a briefing, she assured me she didn’t have anything on the computer she was keeping so I went with an overwrite install on the hard drive. A nice clean slate. Cool!

Ubuntu Studio didn’t come with office, so I installed OO.org. Then I added MS Core fonts and Flash Player 10 for a better web experience. Of course the Ubuntu auto updates were dying to join the party so we let them in.

This “Studio” distribution of Linux is centered around media creation and it’s really beautiful. I loved the startup animation and login screen. The main menu bar and empty desktop are dead simple. I replaced the wallpaper with a fun 3D graphic I created last year and some nice big essential desktop icons. Then I reinstated some of their web favorites. Judy was pleased I didn’t delete Google and returned it to its proper location. Everything was going well, but I still had that feeling that I’d be abandoning them tonight and something they expected wouldn’t be there. I think they voted for Bush so maybe they’ll appreciate security and overlook any of the liberties I accidently might have taken away from them. ;>)

Next I installed the latest skype from a .deb installer file on skype’s homepage.  The webcam and video test worked, but later we got an audio io error when I rang her from Skype at home. Add to that, her printer managed to still only spittle out blank pages. This makes me growl. Sure we haven’t lost anything that wasn’t disabled before, but I can’t stand loose ends.

What is great though? Once prolific virus code on Windows will wither and die trying to execute on Linux. Plus the addition of a hardware router (I can’t believe I missed this the last time.) helped us close the door on ancient history.

Now for the absolute best thing about today.  Spending some fun time with Jude and Sammy chatting about everything. Family, politics, past Christmas’ and listening to old tape recordings of me, my sisters and my cousin Jen when we were 4-7 years old. I hope she had fun like I did. Judy apologized that it took six hours to do everything, but I could have been out of there in just two hours if I really wanted to just get it done. I loved introducing them to some of the fun stuff I do with computers such as discovering favorite music on Pandora.com web radio. They had no idea something like that existed. We also watched part of a feature film in full screen on Hulu.com and looked at all the free movies and TV shows Hulu has. It was a good test for Linux Flash player too. Judy’s old Dell was performing well and I think it might have long life ahead of it.  I’m hoping now there are some new activities that will be enriching for them.

Next mission: Give Judy my old (yet very booming) Cambridge speakers so they have even better radio sound. And we WILL conquer the webcam and printer troubles eventually.

January 5, 2009 at 3:44 am | computers, family | 1 comment

Great little bookstore

I’m giving a little promotional shout-out to a cute little store in Webster Groves, St. Louis.  If you are in the neighborhood, stop into Pudd’nhead Bookstore.  The reasons I appreciate this store and want to give the owner Nikki compliments is because they are doing a great job picking out a very enthralling collection for retail.  It makes browsing fun, and where many small book stores bore me, she seems to be able to sync with people’s characters. Also she’s very excited about the best books and hopes others will get the enjoyment too. That’s love.  These days you can get almost anything online, so it’s important that when a local store inventory is smaller that a store can still put a smile on your face. The books really need to grab you.  And you can’t just stock the popular books that are at the grocery store, you have to take risks.

Pudd'nhead books logo

Noteworthy items on the shelf, The Anarchist’s Cookbook, which probably frightens off some, but it reminds me that it takes strength to not censor yourself and face danger and reality head on. Books can be powerful and dangerous and still we shouldn’t hide knowledge from people even when it seems like a book has little redeeming value. A design book by Ellen Lupton was another gem. My favorite by far was the entire section called “Economic Meltdown.” That is class my friends.

Visit Pudd’nhead Books on the web and I hope you can appreciate them as much as I did. Sometimes places are best when you discover them yourself.  So forget I said anything and next time you’re in Webster, go where the wind takes you. Maybe get a coffee there while you’re at it.

December 11, 2008 at 3:45 am | books, interesting, publishing | 1 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. Are your computing needs general such as document creation,  web browsing, photo viewing, watching videos, playing CDs?
  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?

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 | 2 comments

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