Chris Kelley: Linux

Issues relating to Linux deployments

Fri, 27 Dec 2002 09:42:05 GMT

While reading the slashdot discussion for Govt move on to let in Linux, I came across a link to the problems faced by the Mexican government's Linux experiment. One of the deal-stoppers for them was limited device support, especially for WinModems, which are mostly dependent on Windows drivers. Device support for Linux is much much better now in 2002 (soon to be 2003) than in 1998, when this Mexican project was started. I think this project was possibly hamstrung (crippled) by the fact that the PC's were not purchased for this Linux deployment - the PC's could have been spec'd easily to conform to Linux device driver availability. Lack of Linux-trained techs was also a big problem.

Largo Loving Linux

Tue, 10 Dec 2002 11:43:58 GMT

An update to Largo, Florida's Linux-based network. Although the typical city spends about 3-4% of their budget on IT, Largo spends only 1.3%, thanks to a frugal IT strategy.

Linux Stories List

Tue, 10 Dec 2002 10:00:19 GMT

I'm having my own Adventures in content management thanks to Jon Udell: My Linux Story List

Calendaring Integration

Sun, 24 Nov 2002 15:39:09 GMT

I installed pHp iCalendar on my webserver - it was remarkably easy. When I post my public calendar file using Mozilla calendar, it is instantly readable from a web browser. Cool! pHp iCalendar even provides an RSS feed. I have created a small primer for using Mozilla calendar. Alarms do not work very well in Mozilla calendar. Ideally, I should receive alarms for events even when Mozilla is not open, perhaps provided by a cron job that runs whenever my calendar file changes. This job would look for any changes and add/delete items from the crontab. When an event comes due in cron, it would trigger a small system beep or biff-like notifier.

Self-healing documentation: Installing SpamAssassin

Sun, 24 Nov 2002 11:53:31 GMT

Installing SpamAssassin. - [Russell Beattie Notebook] - This is an example of why I think blogging is so great! By using weblogs and Google, documentation on the web can become self-healing after a while - people issue their own revisions and caveats to how-to's that are already available. One thing I would like to see is a "documentation mode" for Google - making sure that I see the most recent version of a how-to, as well as ranking and comments/edits by users. A "stale" indicator on pages returned by Google showing that there is an updated version of a particular how-to would also be helpful.

Industry Briefs: Tux Fights Bux for the Soul of India

Thu, 21 Nov 2002 14:37:22 GMT

An interesting comparison between India's growing interest in Linux and Microsoft's growing evangelism in India.

LEAF Bering 1.0 Released!

Wed, 20 Nov 2002 15:52:19 GMT

I have been using LEAF Bering Linux distro for my firewall/bridge for a couple of months. Instead of taking the easy road and using a switch, I'm using the bridging capabilities of Linux to enable my workstations/server/cable modem to connect. (Yeah, I could have bought a $25 hub, but where's the fun in that? Plus, it's cheaper to buy the nics than buy a switch.) I just added a new workstation to the fray, so I had to update some of the modules to accomodate the new NIC. While browsing the docs on Bering, I noticed that Bering v1.0-stable has been released. I plan to test it out real soon...

Fri, 01 Nov 2002 09:52:48 GMT

The Register: Simputer Linux Handheld for Developing World Finds Builder. "India-based PicoPeta Simputer Private Ltd has struck a manufacturing deal for its Simputer mass market computing device, and expects to have the 1,000 first batch to come off the production line next month..."... [Meerkat: An Open Wire Service]

Open IT - Govt to rewrite source code in Linux

Thu, 31 Oct 2002 09:49:39 GMT

My colleague Gordon e-mailed me this post, which is from the IndiaTimes. the title of the article is misleading - it's really about the Indian goverment's interest in promoting the use of Linux.

"The Department of Information Technology has already devised a strategy to introduce Linux and open source software as a de-facto standard in academic institutions, especially in engineering colleges through course work that encourages use of such systems."

During my last trip to Belgaum (central India), I visited the local tech college and checked out a nice Linux-based computer lab that used inexpensive black boxes that gave the user GUI sessions that were hosted on a Linux server. The campus had a t-1 connection to the internet.

€250,000 European Commission Linux migration study

Thu, 31 Oct 2002 09:38:24 GMT

In this report on the EC Linux migration study from the Register, "Countries represented included: Finland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Italy, Spain and a representative from the European Commission." Why are they looking at Linux? "Microsoft's recently introduced licensing changes have added weight to this concern but Bleasdale said an even bigger issue was the rate of change that Microsoft is imposing on customers, and many are struggling to deal with it." - Brussels to spend €250k on Linux migration study. Major architectural rethink [The Register]

A nice tool to aid Linux Migration

Wed, 30 Oct 2002 10:09:01 GMT

The Codeweavers product mentioned in this article enables you to run most MS Office products (except for Access) on Linux and is pretty good price: $54.95 for the download version. A WinXP pro license is $150. Hmmmm. - SuSE Linux makes its pitch for the Windows desktop. Enterprise version on the way [The Register]

Building a Tivo clone

Thu, 24 Oct 2002 18:29:57 GMT

Article on Slashdot, Could CDRW Disks Replace Videotapes? kindled interest in building my own PVR. After scannning the Slashdot articles, here are some useful links:

MythTV.org - "Yes, I could have just bought a TiVo, but I wanted to have more than just a PVR -- I want a webbrowser built in, a mail client, maybe some games. Basically, I want the mythical convergence box that's been talked about for a few years now."
dvd::rip - "a full featured DVD copy program written in Perl."

Secure Linux desktop begins shipping to UK police force

Mon, 21 Oct 2002 09:45:46 GMT

Nice cost savings on this project - "The user-facing part of the system consists of an ultra low cost machine being supplied by the Telford office of Taiwanese company GCI, price £299, including a smart card reader." They are using OpenOffice for desktop applications and VNC for access to legacy Windows applications.

XML::Comma

Wed, 16 Oct 2002 09:46:39 GMT

While checking out Allafrica.com's website, I noticed that it is powered by a perl-based open source content management system called XML::Comma. Content is created and stored as XML files, and then indexed by a relational database such as mysql. Nice approach that is quick and easy to maintain. And it's perl!

Radio E-mail in West Africa: The Complete Version

Tue, 15 Oct 2002 11:47:09 GMT

I love solutions like this: using 2-way radio to build a network in Guinea, West Africa, for offices over 375 miles (600 kilometers) apart!

Reaching Content Management System Nirvana

Fri, 04 Oct 2002 09:00:22 GMT

Just caught this article this morning: PHP and PostgreSQL Open Sesame I really dig what they are doing with php and postgresql. But approaching the topic of content management from a sustainable coding perspective, I am looking harder at the approach taken by the apache coccon folks. The problem I see with markup language approaches such as pHp and Cold Fusion is that the logic easily gets mixed-up with the presentation layer. To their credit, projects like fusebox are attacking that problem. Still, I am looking fascinated by Xopus, a "browser based in-place wysiwyg XML editor", and how it could tie into the Coccon framework. The demo crashes and burns in my Mozilla build (Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US; rv:1.2b) Gecko/20020930) but works brilliantly in IE6. If this really works, a few of my must-have bullet points will be there:

Separation of logic and style (Apache Coccon)
Nice user-friendly in-place editing (Xopus)
Open source goodness

I am also following the mozdev.org Composite project, which "is a chrome overlay which enables a streamlined Mozilla Editor for html composition in textareas." It does not work in-place - yet - and is a tad buggy in my build of Mozilla, but it certainly shows promise.

Sun is shining again!

Wed, 02 Oct 2002 11:41:09 GMT

Rain - egads! We're pretty waterlogged here in Sofia. The nice cablemodem connection I just got could not handle it - service has been slow - unuseable for days. But the sun is out this morning, and after Lachko argued with the CableBG tech, I finally got a DHCP lease. Yippee! My Bering distro firewall is working pretty good. Neat feature: bridge. Instead of buying a $30 switch, I bought a $7 Realtek-clone NIC, and have my music workstation on my network along with my laptop. Alot to learn about bridging in Linux, but so far so good.

LEAF Bering firewall distro

Fri, 27 Sep 2002 14:34:05 GMT

I am currently using the Bering Linux distribution from the LEAF Embedded Network Appliance project for my firewall, which I have build using Lachko's old 233 MHz AMD K-2 box (32 MB RAM). It is pretty neat because it works on one diskette/no hard drive, uses 2.4.x Linux kernel (currently 2.4.18), and supports netfilter/iptables. I was planning to use Astaro firewall, which I have deployed in one site; however, they are now charging for the recent version and I think it's time I got my hands a tad dirtier with Linux firewalling. BTW - Astaro is a pretty nice product - their VPN support is pretty spiffy, and their user forum is great.