OpenSUSE 11.1 alpha 1 with KDE 4.1

Recently with the rise of KDE 4 and especially KDE 4.1 I’ve kinda wanted to try it just to see whats really going on. Now, personally I cannot stand KDE or qt, I’m a Gnome and GTK kinda guy. So where did I start? I went to Google to find OpenSUSE’s newest alpha which I’ve heard to have KDE 4.1. So I downloaded it, burned it, booted it, and was amazed at the art went into OpenSUSE.

There was one problem at first booting up OpenSUSE on my laptop (Dell Inspiron 1420n), it detected the wrong screen size, but that was perfectly fine since I’m blind anyway, it detected 800×600, but a quick looking for a config tool found out how to change the resolution, got it to 1280×800 which is more suitable for most everyone else. One other problem, it did not auto detect my internet, but after setting up a eth0 connection it worked.

The rest was a pretty good experience, I found most everything worked right, and was pretty. I liked the Oxygen style, but I changed the default Oxygen colors away from default to darker colors (Obsidian Coast) which suit my eyes better. I also liked the New? Oxygen icon set, or at least they’re new to me, last timed I really used KDE was KDE 3.5. I’d have to admit OpenSUSE did a awesome job on the appearance and stability. One thing that gets under my skin though… WIDGETS! I just cannot use widgets on the desktop, they have no meaning, even though I don’t like them I was playing with them a little bit. I deleted the panel and found out that I can do everything without a panel mostly by adding the usual widgets from the panel to the desktop. It was just useless fun though. One thing that is odd is the desktop/folder widget that displays folders in certain areas with the ability to change the size of these areas pretty easily. This widget has a use to me, I can access folders pretty fast, these folder widgets are more of a preview that launches Dolphin.

Which brings me to Dolphin, now last time I used Dolphin, it was a long time ago, but it looks like Dolphin has came a long way from where it was. I now prefer dolphin over Konqueror, only problem I had was trying to figure out how to enlarge my icons.

Remember though this is only a alpha which does make me a little sad, I kinda wanna install it on my laptop and play with it for a month or so, I’d rather wait until the official release with all of the software repositories in it. Which I’ve heard good things about Yast in the next release, before I didn’t really like it, I heard smart? was faster. I’m not big on OpenSUSE, or KDE, but I’m going to keep an eye out for this release. I’m not expecting much from the package manager though, we’ll have to wait and see. I have to say there is no, zip, zoda, comparison compared to Kubuntu, and OpenSUSE, its not eve there.. A few weeks ago I tried the kubuntu-desktop meta package and the kde4 packages on my laptop with Ubuntu 8.04.1, and it wasn’t that good to say the least. I got compiz going on it, and I have to say, there is a big difference between compiz on Gnome and KDE, I prefer Gnome and compiz of course. If I ever did decide to switch, to KDE on my laptop with OpenSUSE I would definitely use compiz though, I have to have the viewpoint mouse switcher plugin.

Using Hardy Heron now

First of all sorry for being gone so long if anyone has been following my blog, been kinda lazy to say the least…

I’m now using Ubuntu Hardy Heron (8.04.1) on both my desktop and my laptop. On a previous post I wrote about how Hardy Heron let me down, now I’m writing about how I’m coping with Hardy now. Most things I wrote about before have either been fixed, or I’ve fixed personally. Totem works now, I found before the reason it was crashing was probably because of the pulseaudio system which is being used in Ubuntu Hardy Heron. I personally dislike pulseaudio, I’m one of the unlucky few people who have had problems with it. I’ve switched everything over to alsa and it all works well.

One of the problems I had before was Firefox 3, it just didn’t ‘whew’ me, and the crashes while playing flash were unacceptable. I’m using Firefox 2 and happy using outdated software. One problem though, and this is more than likely my own fault, but flash cannot run in fullscreen, and this is fine by me. What caused this is probably the main reason for upgrading to Hardy Heron, compiz. I’m 95% that compiz is stopping me from running flash in fullscreen (On my desktop to be specific) but on my laptop it runs fine. This is probably cause I added the new screen saver plugin to compiz, I might be wrong, but my laptop doesn’t have it, and it works fine.

Why did compiz make me switch? Well once I got the compiz sphere plugin working on my laptop (with Hardy) I just had to switch since I needed compiz 0.7.6 for the sphere plugin to work, which comes in Hardy, and I figured what the hell. So I went for it, I really like Hardy Heron now, having the up-to-date stuff is just nice and who else on the block can say they can make their computer turn into a sphere?

Right now I’ve kinda stopped playing with Openbox, mainly because I’m just really liking my system as it is right now.

Intrepid Ibex concepts that I like

I was browsing the Ubuntu wiki and out of curiosity I decided to look into the artwork section for the upcoming release of Ubuntu Intrepid Ibex. What I found I liked, not much has been submitted, but it is early.  These concepts look like a lot of work went into them, I give the authors my approval, I hope both of these make it into the final release.

I really like this bootup concept, It is pretty unique.

I really liked the Clear Intrepid mockup, it is smooth, and creamy.  I love the texture of the brown, its just perfect, the distro-logo is new, looks a bit 3D-ish.

What do robot programmers do when they’re bored?

I’m sure all robot programmers do this when they’re bored, I just love this video. The music is pretty cool also, anyone know the name of it?

Windows Xp, or should I say Xfce?

At school I use a computer for my fourth block class, they obviously don’t care about it, or I would of been told I did something wrong. But I pretty much use that computer for whatever I want. One day I got bored, and thought about making xfce4 look like Windows Xp. I think It looks nearly 95% just like Windows Xp, with compiz fusion on it. What do you think?

I think it looks pretty darn close. I left out the time, but we all know how close that would still look, the only thing that looks off really is the show desktop plugin.

The Round Cube Processor

This is a very creative story I wrote for my Journalism class, I thought I would share it with whoever reads.

It all ended one day in the parallel universe, when Dr. Forgetful came into The Closet through a ssh. He said he had discovered something that can do wonderful things, but at the same time does nothing.

“What are you talking about Dr. Forgetful?” Asked Phase the evil IRC Mage.

“He’s crazy I say.” came from the Knight Crawler, “That just makes no sense.”

“It makes perfect sense,” said Gothic Grammar, “You just need the Magical Penguin.”

“What is the Magical Penguin?” said Phase, with a puzzled look on his smiley.

“You don’t know what the Magical Penguin is?” from Gothic Grammar, “The Magical Penguin is the key to the universe!”

“No, no! You don’t need a fantasy monkey, or whatever the new hype is these days,” said Dr. Forgetful. “This device I made needs a 10,000ghz processor.”

“There’s no such thing,” Phase interrupted.

“Oh, but there is! It’s inside a encrypted network though. That’s the bad part, which is why I came to The Closet to get you people to do my dirty work for me. Anyone interested in the journey?” said Dr. Forgetful.

“Now this is starting to sound good, if its a journey I’m all for it!” said Knight Crawler.

“I’m curious to see this 10,000ghz processor, I’m in!” said Phase.

“What about the Magical Penguin?” said Gothic Grammar, as they walked away.

They went to Dr. Forgetful’s lair to prepare for the journey.

“Gentlemen, you will be going to the lost network of Wonder Land. There are strange things there, so be careful boys. The processor will be a round cube,” said Dr. Forgetful.

“So what does your device do, Dr. Forgetful?” they asked.

“It will have the power to fix everything that’s wrong in this world,” Dr. Forgetful said.

“Now I understand, a round cube? Why didn’t I think of this before, that will have enough power if you do the correct math,” Phase said out loud.

“This sounds like a adventure of a lifetime,” said the Knight Crawler.

“Here is the decoder to enter the encrypted network. Now be on your way.” said Dr. Forgetful

They all connected to Wonder Land and saw a strange motd. “The round cube you are looking for lies in the Cave’ channel.”

“So its in a Cave?” said Gothic Grammar.

“Not sure if we can trust this message,” said Phase.

“Why would a motd have a reason to lie? I say we should just go for it, that’s what we came here for is it not?” said Knight Crawler.

“Maybe one person should go in first to make sure its clear,” said Gothic Grammar.

“I agree,” Phase voted.

“I will go then,” said Knight Crawler.

When Knight Crawler joined the Cave’ he was met with a huge bot net. He fought the bots as they flooded. Phase, and Gothic Grammar both joined to find that Knight Crawler was ghosted. After Phase hacked into the Cave’ he banned all of the bots. Gothic Grammar looked down to his surprised there was a odd looking round cube.

“Phase! I found it,” Gothic Grammar shouted in surprised.

“No way,” Phase replied. as his face was shocked. “You mean we went through all of this and you just find it laying on the ground?”

“Umm, yeah?” Gothic Grammar replied as Phase beats his head against something.

They all met up back at Dr. Forgetful’s lair.

“So Dr. Forgetful what are you going to do with this round cube processor?” Knight Crawler asked.

There was a short period of silence.

“I forgot,” said Dr. Forgetful.

“I told you we shouldn’t of listened to the forgetful scientist, didn’t I?” said Gothic Grammar out loud.

“No you didn’t,” as Phase steals the round cube processor laughing evily.

Gothic Grammar and Knight Crawler looked at each other.

“I guess Evil IRC Mage should of gave it away in the first part of the story.” said Gothic Grammar.

The End

KDE-mod fbpanel profile

I’ve done, something like Mac, Ubuntu/Gnome, now its time for KDE. This was one of the easier profiles for me to make, The menu’s have the same amount of entries as the Ubuntu-top profile has, just rearranged. For this you will have to download the KDE-logo (download) for it to work. Put the KDE-logo in /usr/share/icons/ as k.png for it to work without editing the code itself, you should use sudo to put the KDE-logo in /usr/share/icons/.

For my GTK-theme I’m using gtk2-engines-qtcurves.

$ sudo apt-get install gtk2-engines-qtcurves

For my rox-filer icon set I’m using Mac4Lin.  As for my system wide icon set I’m using nuoveXT.

View howto install this theme into fbpanel

Bottom profile:

# fbpanel - config file
# Profile name - KDE-mod
# Profile position - bottom bar
# Filename - KDE-mod
# Author of this profile  - chris4585
# see http://fbpanel.sf.net/docs.html for complete configuration guide

Global {
edge = bottom
allign = left
margin = 0
widthtype = percent
width = 100
height = 45
transparent = true
tintcolor = #ffffff
alpha = 300
setdocktype = true
setpartialstrut = true
}

Plugin {
type = space
config {
size = 3
}
}

Plugin {
type = menu
config {
image = /usr/share/icons/k.png
systemmenu {
}
menu {
        name = System
        image = /usr/share/icons/gnome/scalable/devices/computer.svg
        menu {
            name = Preferences
            image = /usr/share/icons/Human/scalable/categories/gnome-control-center.svg
            item {
                icon = gnome-settings-theme
                name = GTK Theme
                action = gtk-chtheme
            }
            item {
                name = Openbox Theme
                icon = preferences-system-windows
                action = obconf
            }
            item {
                name = Obmenu
                icon = stock_file-properties
                action = obmenu
            }
            item {
                name = Change Wallpaper
                icon = preferences-desktop-wallpaper
                action = nitrogen Pictures/
            }
        }
        menu {
            name = Administration
            image = /usr/share/icons/Human/scalable/categories/applications-system.svg
            item {
                icon = gnome-dev-memory
                name = Hardware Drivers
                action = gksu -D /usr/share/applications/jocky-gtk.desktop /usr/bin/jockey-gtk
            }
            item {
                name = System Monitor
                icon = gnome-monitor
                action = gnome-system-monitor
            }
            item {
                name = Synaptic Package Manager
                icon = synaptic
                action = gksu synaptic
            }
            item {
                name = Update Manager
                icon = update-manager
                action = update-manager
            }
        }
}
menu {
        name = Places
        item {
            icon = gnome-fs-directory
            name = Home
            action = rox-filer
        }
        item {
            icon = gnome-fs-directory
            name = Documents
            action = rox-filer Documents/
        }
        item {
            icon = gnome-fs-directory
            name = Music
            action = rox-filer Music/
        }
        item {
            icon = gnome-fs-directory
            name = Pictures
            action = rox-filer Pictures/
        }
        item {
            icon = gnome-fs-directory
            name = Videos
            action = rox-filer Videos/
        }
        separator {
        }
        item {
            icon = computer
            name = Media
            action = rox-filer /media/
        }
        }
separator {
}

item {
name = Run
action = gksu
}

menu {
name = Logout
image = /usr/share/icons/gnome/scalable/actions/application-exit.svg
item {
icon = gnome-session-halt
name = Shutdown
action = gksu poweroff
}
item {
icon = gnome-session-reboot
name = Reboot
action = gksu reboot
}
item {
icon = gnome-session-logout
name = Logout
action = gksu killall openbox
}
}
}
}

Plugin {
type = launchbar
config {
button {
icon = gnome-fs-directory
tooltip = rox-filer
action = rox-filer
}
}
}

Plugin {
type = launchbar
config {
button {
icon = gnome-terminal
tooltip = Terminal
action = xfce4-terminal
}
}
}

Plugin {
type = launchbar
config {
button {
icon = firefox
tooltip = Browse the web
action = firefox
}
}
}

Plugin {
type = wincmd
config {
icon = gnome-fs-desktop
tooltip = Left click to iconify all windows. Middle click to shade them.
}
}

Plugin {
type = pager
config {
showwallpaper = true
}
}

Plugin {
type = taskbar
expand = true
config {
ShowIconified = true
ShowMapped    = true
ShowAllDesks  = false
tooltips = true
IconsOnly = false
MaxTaskWidth = 150
}
}

Plugin {
type = space
config {
size = 3
}
}

Plugin {
type = launchbar
config {
button {
icon = audio-volume-high
tooltip = Adjust volumes
action = xfce4-mixer
}
}
}

Plugin {
type = space
config {
size = 3
}
}

Plugin {
    type = tray
}  

# Digital Clock
Plugin {
    type = dclock
    config {
        ClockFmt = %r
        TooltipFmt = %A %x
        Action =
    }
}

Ubuntu fbpanel profile

This profile is based off Ubuntu, It’s very hard to tell at first, but this is Openbox people, I assure you, check my pstree -n. I spent nearly a whole night of my free time coming up with the profiles to make fbpanel look like this, of course I changed the wallpaper to Guty’s default. The main differences in fbpanel and gnome-panel is that fbpanel only auto manages the Application menu, even then you have to restart fbpanel to update that menu. If you use rox-filer your Places menu should work by default if you have the file system Ubuntu gave you, other words, make sure you have a Pictures, Videos, Documents, Music, etc.. in your home folder. The System menu isn’t as large as it normally would be, this is because not everyone that uses openbox has everything gnome installed.

So in the Preferences menu I have Nitrogen, obconf, obmenu, gtk-chtheme, these are usually associated with Openbox. Nitrogen is a wallpaper changer, If you want to download Nitrogen, here’s a deb, I found it hard to find. These profiles work perfectly with Human, if you want to try a dark theme though you may need to change alpha - 300 to something smaller to like 50, otherwise the font may be hidden at the top left. These profiles rely mainly on gnome-icons and human icons, I’m sure they may work with other icon sets, if you don’t have those I suggest you install them. Other little differences you will notice, in Applications > System/Settings some programs repeat, I can’t fix this, this is a part of fbpanel. If you want your menu’s perfect you should edit them to your programs. I may edit this in the future.  So that all you have to do is uncomment the current Application’s menu to a hand made one similar to Ubuntu’s Application menu. I might even make a Favorite’s Plugin for this profile. The trash icon currently does nothing, I couldn’t find a trash folder function for rox-filer, so you’re on your own there.

I really hope you enjoy these profiles I worked hard to get this to work nearly perfect.

View howto install this theme into fbpanel

Top profile:

# fbpanel - config file
# Profile name - Ubuntu
# Profile position - top bar
# Filename - ubuntu-top
# Author of this profile  - chris4585
# see http://fbpanel.sf.net/docs.html for complete configuration guide

Global {
    edge = top
    allign = left
    margin = 0
    widthtype = percent
    width = 100
    height = 26
    transparent = true
    tintcolor = #FFFFFF
    alpha = 300
    setdocktype = true
    setpartialstrut = true
}

Plugin {
    type = menu
    config {
        icon = start-here
        name = Applications
        systemmenu {
        }
        separator {
        }
        item {
            icon = gnome-app-install
            name = Add/Remove..
            action = gnome-app-install
        }
    }
}

Plugin {
    type = space
    config {
        size = 8
    }
}

Plugin {
    type = menu
    config {
        icon = gnome-fs-directory
        name = Places
        item {
            icon = gnome-fs-directory
            name = Home
            action = rox-filer
        }
        item {
            icon = gnome-fs-directory
            name = Documents
            action = rox-filer Documents/
        }
        item {
            icon = gnome-fs-directory
            name = Music
            action = rox-filer Music/
        }
        item {
            icon = gnome-fs-directory
            name = Pictures
            action = rox-filer Pictures/
        }
        item {
            icon = gnome-fs-directory
            name = Videos
            action = rox-filer Videos/
        }
        separator {
        }
        item {
            icon = computer
            name = Media
            action = rox-filer /media/
        }
    }
}

Plugin {
    type = menu
    config {
        name = System
        icon = computer
        menu {
            name = Preferences
            image = /usr/share/icons/Human/scalable/categories/gnome-control-center.svg
            item {
                icon = gnome-settings-theme
                name = GTK Theme
                action = gtk-chtheme
            }
            item {
                name = Openbox Theme
                icon = preferences-system-windows
                action = obconf
            }
            item {
                name = Obmenu
                icon = stock_file-properties
                action = obmenu
            }
            item {
                name = Change Wallpaper
                icon = preferences-desktop-wallpaper
                action = nitrogen Pictures/
            }
        }
        menu {
            name = Administration
            image = /usr/share/icons/Human/scalable/categories/applications-system.svg
            item {
                icon = gnome-dev-memory
                name = Hardware Drivers
                action = gksu -D /usr/share/applications/jocky-gtk.desktop /usr/bin/jockey-gtk
            }
            item {
                name = System Monitor
                icon = gnome-monitor
                action = gnome-system-monitor
            }
            item {
                name = Synaptic Package Manager
                icon = synaptic
                action = gksu synaptic
            }
            item {
                name = Update Manager
                icon = update-manager
                action = update-manager
            }
        }
        separator {
        }
        item {
            icon = gnome-session-halt
            name = Shutdown
            action = gksu poweroff
        }
        item {
            icon = gnome-session-reboot
            name = Reboot
            action = gksu reboot
        }
        item {
            icon = gnome-session-logout
            name = Logout
            action = gksu killall openbox
        }
    }
}

Plugin {
    type = space
    config {
        size = 8
    }
}

Plugin {
    type = launchbar
    config {
        button {
            icon = firefox
            tooltip = Firefox Web Browser, Browse the world World Wide Web
            action = firefox
        }
    }
}

Plugin {
    type = launchbar
    config {
        button {
            icon = evolution
            tooltip = Evolution Mail, Read and write emails
            action = evolution --componet=mail
        }
    }
}

Plugin {
    type = launchbar
    config {
        button {
            icon = gnome-help
            tooltip = Help, get help with Ubuntu
            action = yelp
        }
    }
}

Plugin {
    type = space
    expand = true
    config {
        size = 11
    }
}

Plugin {
    type = tray
}

Plugin {
    type = launchbar
    config {
        button {
            icon = audio-volume-high
            tooltip = Adjust volumes
            action = xfce4-mixer
        }
    }
}

Plugin {
    type = dclock
    config {
        ClockFmt = %r %A %x
        TooltipFmt = %A %x
        action =
    }
}

Plugin {
    type = launchbar
    config {
        button {
            icon = gnome-logout
            tooltip = Logout, or switch user 
            action = killall openbox
        }
    }
}

Bottom profile:

# fbpanel - config file
# Profile name - Ubuntu
# Profile position - bottom bar
# Filename - ubuntu-bottom
# Author of this profile  - chris4585
# see http://fbpanel.sf.net/docs.html for complete configuration guide

Global {

edge = bottom
allign = center
margin = 0
widthType = percent
width = 100
heightType = pixel
height = 26
roundCorners = false
transparent = true
tintColor = #ffffff
alpha = 300
}

Plugin {
type = space
config {
size = 2
}
}

Plugin {
type = wincmd
config {
icon = gnome-fs-desktop
tooltip = Left click to iconify all windows. Middle click to shade them.
}
}

Plugin {
type = space
config {
size = 7
}
}

Plugin {
type = taskbar
expand = true
config {
ShowIconified = true
ShowMapped    = true
ShowAllDesks  = false
tooltips = true
IconsOnly = false
MaxTaskWidth = 150
}
}

Plugin {
type = space
config {
size = 3
}
}

Plugin {
type = pager
config {
showwallpaper = false
}
}

Plugin {
type = space
config {
size = 3
}
}

Plugin {
type = launchbar
config {
button {
icon = emptytrash
tooltip = I've looked and looked, and I think rox doesn't have a trash can.
action = rox-filer
}
}
}

Plugin {
type = space
config {
size = 3
}
}

Mac-like fbpanel profile

This profile looks a little like how the mac-dock looks like on the bottom bar, but the top bar does not look like the mac’s top bar.  This is the profile I use, simply because of the bottom panel is not fully extended.  I just can’t work with fully expanded bottom bars, I need to be able to switch workspaces with my cursor.

I’ve changed some things in this profile, I did not notice before but some of the icons might not of shown up.  Now they should work.  If you have any problems please let me know.

View howto install this theme into fbpanel

Top profile:

# fbpanel  config file
# fbpanel - config file
# Profile name - Mac-like
# Profile position - top bar
# Filename - mac-like-top
# Author of this profile  - chris4585
# see http://fbpanel.sf.net/docs.html for complete configuration guide

Global {
edge = top
allign = left
margin = 0
widthtype = percent
width = 100
height = 26
transparent = true
tintcolor = #ffffff
alpha = 68
setdocktype = true
setpartialstrut = true
}

Plugin {
type = wincmd
config {
icon = gnome-fs-desktop
#image = /usr/share/fbpanel/images/gnome-fs-desktop.svg
tooltip = Left click to iconify all windows. Middle click to shade them.
}
}

Plugin {
type = pager
config {
showwallpaper = true
}
}

Plugin {
type = launchbar
config {
button {
icon = gtk-cancel
tooltip = Kill a unresponsive program
action = xkill
}
}
}

Plugin {
type = taskbar
expand = true
config {
ShowIconified = true
ShowMapped    = true
ShowAllDesks  = false
tooltips = true
IconsOnly = false
MaxTaskWidth = 150
}
}

Plugin {
type = space
config {
size = 3
}
}

Plugin {
type = launchbar
config {
button {
icon = exit
tooltip = Exit session
action = killall openbox
}
}
}

Bottom profile:

# fbpanel - config file
# Profile name - Mac-like
# Profile position - bottom bar
# Filename - mac-like-bottom
# Author of this profile  - chris4585
# see http://fbpanel.sf.net/docs.html for complete configuration guide

Global {

edge = bottom
allign = center
margin = 0
widthType = percent
width = 65
heightType = pixel
height = 49
roundCorners = true
transparent = true
tintColor = #ffffff
alpha = 39
}

Plugin {
type = menu
config {
icon = start-here
name = Applications
systemmenu {
}
}
}

# Digital Clock
Plugin {
    type = dclock
    config {
        ClockFmt = %r
        TooltipFmt = %A %x
        Action =
    }
}

Plugin {
type = space
config {
size = 8
}
}

Plugin {
type = launchbar
config {
button {
icon = audio-volume-high
tooltip = Adjust volumes
action = xfce4-mixer
}
}
}

Plugin {
type = launchbar
config {
button {
icon = firefox
tooltip = Browse the web
action = firefox
}
}
}

Plugin {
type = launchbar
config {
button {
icon = gnome-terminal
tooltip = Terminal
action = xfce4-terminal
}
}
}

Plugin {
type = launchbar
config {
button {
icon = gnome-monitor
tooltip = System Monitor
action = gnome-system-monitor
}
}
}

Plugin {
type = launchbar
config {
button {
icon = synaptic
tooltip = Synaptic Package Manager
action = gksu synaptic
}
}
}

Plugin {
type = launchbar
config {
button {
icon = text-editor
tooltip = Editor
action = gedit
}
}
}

Plugin {
type = launchbar
config {
button {
icon = gnome-fs-directory
tooltip = rox-filer
action = rox-filer
}
}
}

Plugin {
type = launchbar
config {
button {
icon = media-playback-start
tooltip = Music
action = rhythmbox
}
}
}

Plugin {
type = launchbar
config {
button {
icon = applets-screenshooter
tooltip = Take a screenshot in 5 seconds (output /home/user/)
action = scrot -cd 5
}
}
}

Plugin {
    type = tray
}

Gnome to Openbox and why?

Very recently I’ve made a drastic change from using Gnome as my main DE (desktop environment) to using Openbox, which is just a WM (windows manager). But why? I really do love Gnome, I’ve been experimenting with Openbox and found out how much I like it more than Gnome. Gnome is my second favorite right now, as I’m still learning Openbox, for the most part I understand most everything.

What I like so much about it though is the ability to make your desktop as you would make your own DE. What do I mean? Openbox is just a windows manager, and a menu, with a set of hot keys, you make everything how you like it, and I mean everything. From the menu, which took me 3 hours to custom fit my applications, to what kind of panel you want, and everything in between. I chose fbpanel for what kind of panel I use, and I adore it, sooner or later I’m going to make some fbpanel styles and put it on my wordpress. I’ve got a few ideas in my head and I’ve came up with a Mac-like theme, which looks exactly how I would have my panel setup in Gnome.

The bottom line is that Openbox isn’t as resource intensive as Gnome is. Openbox is very stable and rock solid, and the fact that I can run mIRC with wine under Openbox flawlessly doesn’t hurt. (yes I know there’s xchat, and irssi, but please understand that I’ve grown up in IRC with mIRC. I know someone will thinks this )

Hardy Heron, disappointment for me.

We’ve all been waiting for it for a long time, Ok, only 6 months but for me it was a eternity. When it finally came out I was beyond happy until I fresh installed it. What? Hardy doesn’t have a bottom panel?? Oh, I have to auto align with my monitor just to know there was a bottom panel. That was a easy fix, just install the restricted drivers for my Nvidia Geforce 6100, then it worked just fine. Firefox 3 beta 5, what’s that you say? Ok, I wont get on FF3B5 too much, since that was a easy fix, remove it and install Firefox 2, probably what we all did, or most of us did, watching youtube there was an average crash every 15mins. Now lets watch a video, Grr why are you freezing totem? you never did this to me before?

What I’m getting at is, none of this happened in Gutsy, which made my Hardy experience very disappointing. I wasn’t shocked to find out that my new laptop works perfect with Hardy concerning the video issue I had with my desktop. Right now for my desktop I’m using Gutsy since I have no problems with it what so ever.

What I did like in Hardy was awn was in the repo’s, and I also like bmpx, but why did they remove beep-media-player package? That was a awesome player which I’m still enjoying in Hardy, I use it mostly for playing single files, its just perfect. What I liked in bmpx was the radio section, there were a massive amount of radio stations I enjoyed the African section even though I had no idea what most of the languages they were singing in.

My conclusion of Hardy is, maybe great for you, but not me, I now see why some people stayed with Feisty between the Feisty, Gutsy upgrade. Sooner or later I’ll test Hardy on my laptop to see how well it works with it.

Bzflag

Bzflag is a tank shooting game, I didn’t expect it to be as addictive when my friend told me about it. Basically you’re a tank and the object is to kill your opponent, but there is a twist, there are flags on the ground, when you pick them up you either gain something to help you, such as invisibility on the radar, or something bad happens, such as you can only go in reverse.

The controls are pretty easy, this game can be played online, or on a LAN, and there is a chat box on the bottom of the game, so while you’re chatting with your friend he will shoot you while you’re not looking. It took me a while to get the hang of the game, but it was pretty fun after I played about 20mins. In the game you can have computer bots for extra enemies.

You should check out this game, if you want to, this is how you install it:

sudo apt-get install bzflag

Once you get it up and running, and wanna join a game with me and my friends check us out at irc.icq.com #Geeks my friend who own’s the server is Phase, and I’m Chris|. The server is bzflag.deop.org, your callsign is your nick, leave the port the same, and hit connect.

This is a fun game, and I think everyone should play it.

Linutop

What is Linutop? A very very very [ok you get the picture?] small computer, even smaller than those Mac Mini’s, or Aopen’s miniPC. Yes there is something smaller than those amazing computers. I was surfing on youtube and I don’t even know how I spotted this tiny thing.  This little PC does not come with a internal HDD, it uses a 1gb flash drive for its stripped down xubuntu OS.

How tiny is it? Well there’s two different Linutop’s the Linutop1 and the Linutop2. On the top middle alignment we have Linutop1 in white, weighing in at only 280gr, with 256mbs of RAM. Linutop1 sizes are 9.3 x 2.7 x 15 cm (3.66×1.06×5.9 in).

And on the bottom middle alignment we have Linutop2 in black, weighing in at a whopping 580gr, with the capacity to hold up to 1gb of RAM! The Linutop2’s sizes are 14 x 14 x 3.5 cm (5.5×5.5×1.38 in).

You can find more photo’s here.

The Linutop1 costs only 250 Euros (394 USD), and the Linutop2 costs 280 Euros (442 USD). I just might talk my parents into buying this.

Youtubes

While looking through Ubuntu Forums, I found this post about commercials. I really like the IBM commercials, those are more professional. but this video is the top of the cake.

To additional to this Youtube video, I’m going to be adding more Youtube videos to my blog. To find more on my blog, please go here.

This is just a funny video, I thought I’d share.

Liquid War

Liquid War is one of my favorite Linux games, it’s also for DOS, FreeBSD, Windows, and Mac OS X. What I like so much about Liquid War is what makes it so unique from other games. You control a army of liquid dots, and you try to eat your components, as stupid as this may sound, its very addictive. Want to play with a friend? Liquid War comes with the capability to play online. This game has so many level’s its not funny. Liquid War is timed, but it gives you enough time to devourer your enemies. This game has the option to have up to 5 other teams, either CPU, Human or, Off. I recommend everyone to try this game out!

It is in the Ubuntu Repo’s:

sudo apt-get install liquidwar

No, it’s not the prettiest game ever, but hey neither was Super Mario?