Monthly Archives: November 2008

WordPress Stickers

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I’ve been a big fan of WordPress since I started using it in about 2004. It has grown into such a great blogging platform since those early days, and they’re continuing to push the limits of how blogging software should run. Whether you have your own private blog like I do or you have a free blog hosted on WordPress.com, they give you everything you need to get to make a killer blog.

Since I got my new laptop, I’ve been trying to decorate the plain black lid with some stickers from my favorite software. I got some stickers when I became a student member of the FSF, but I really wanted a WordPress sticker to show my love for the best blogging platform. I was sad to see they don’t sell any in the WordPress store, but they give them out at their conferences. Eventually my web search led me to Maya Desai’s WordPress.com blog. If you leave her a message explaining why you’d like some schwag, I think she might be able to help you out. My request for “a sticker” was fulfilled today:

I got a boatload of WordPress schwag!

I got a boatload of WordPress schwag!

Windows 7 finally catching Ubuntu?

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There’s been a lot of talk since Microsoft’s PDC about what to expect from Windows 7. It’s due out in late 2009 or 2010, but MS gave a taste of what’s to come at their PDC. Gina Trapani over at Lifehacker posted a good list of the new features they’re working on for Windows 7. Usama and I have talked a little bit about some of the new stuff since he’s very excited about the next product out of Redmond. I’m not trying to be cynical, but as I read through the list of their “latest and greatest” improvements for Windows, I kept thinking to myself, “Sounds like they’re playing catch-up with Ubuntu and Linux.”

10. Ding-dong, the Sidebar is dead.
Windows is losing Vista’s “sidebar” in favor of a desktop-wide “Gadgets“. Doesn’t this sound strikingly similar to Screenlets? I mean there’s no optional hidden “widget layer” in Aero, but at least they’re trying.

9. Calculator, WordPad, and Paint got overhauled.
They stripped out “useless” built-in programs like a photo gallery, movie maker, and calendar. I guess if you can’t make worthwhile programs, you should probably just quit trying. Oh, but they added “useful” features to the Calculator and added their famous “Ribbon” view to many of their built-in programs. Many people love this “Ribbon” view that debuted in Office 2007, which explains its further incorporation into Windows programs. I can’t say much about it because I haven’t used it. Maybe it’s great. I just don’t think many average users appreciate them trimming down their built-in software when adding interesting new features.

8. Windows 7 will run longer on your notebook’s battery power.
Improved battery life. Apparently Windows 7 is making it easier to control the power usage for your laptop. Hmm, I bet something like powertop would really help you pinpoint what’s eating your power. Of course, if Windows was fully customizable, I’d be able to do things like disable my dvd drive, bluetooth, USB ports, and PCMCIA port whenever I’m on battery like I do in Linux.

7. You can switch between Wi-Fi networks in one click from the system tray.
Clicking on the “wireless icon” brings up a list of available wireless networks. Wow, I can’t believe they didn’t already have something like this. This has been available in every version of Ubuntu I’ve used, and now with NetworkManager 0.7 they’ve even added things like Mobile Broadband and VPN connections to the “wireless icon.” Maybe Windows will get there some day. While we’re on the subject of networking, shouldn’t you have proper Zero-Configuration Networking for all types of devices like Linux has with Avahi and Apple has with Bonjour?

6. You can decide what you do and don’t want to see in the system tray.
This one cracks me up. When I first read it, I thought, “Well that’s not such a bad idea.” Of course, I’m able to customize panels in Gnome and tell it what stuff I want on there and where I want it. Yet, if I’ve got the “Notification Area” applet displayed on my Gnome Panel, I can’t pick and choose what programs I want it to display. I don’t ever normally have more than 3 or 4 things on there at once. Then I started wondering why I’d want to hide the 2 programs I currently have running that show up in the Notification Area. Isn’t that its whole purpose? That’s when I remembered the Windows system tray and all the crap-tastic applications that put icons in there that you can’t get rid of, and this all seemed much more reasonable. I guess I just got used to programs that actually gave me an option on whether I’d like an icon in my tray (like gnome-do) and an OS that let me easily customize what applications start when I boot into my system. Of course, there’s also no need to have 50 different icons telling me I have updates for my PDF viewer, printer, and antivirus. I just get the 1 icon from Update Manager telling me that all these things need to be upgraded. But the real kicker here is that Windows isn’t actually disabling these programs from running. It’s just hiding them. That sounds like a great way to fool people into clogging up system resources with a bunch of applications running in the background so they never see them.

5. You get more control of User Account Control.
Let’s admit the UAC was just a really bad implementation of sudo/gksudo that incessantly nagged people trying to do even some simple tasks. Well it looks like Windows 7 has “fixed” that issue. Of course, instead of implementing a proper sudo knock-off and opting to make users understand the importance security, they let you customize how much UAC nags you. Many people will say, “Don’t ever bug me” instead of giving proper credence to the warnings. It doesn’t matter how many security features you add if people just disable them all.

4. Libraries group similar content; Homegroups to make sharing libraries easier.
I see now that Windows has given some thought to networking. If I’m understanding “Libraries” correctly, they will be able to dynamically scan multiple folders for certain types of files (like music), which can then be shared on a network. I’m not able to tell whether this dynamic scanning would have to be manually set up (I would assume) or if it would automatically scan your entire User directory for music files. That’s actually a pretty good idea (assuming it’s manually configured). Of course, none of that does you any good if you can’t easily connect to other computers on your network, which is where Windows drop the ball. Instead of implementing a proper Zero Configuration Network utility, it looks like “Homegroups” replaces the useless “Workgroups” with “Zero Config Windows 7 only networking.” So that sucks if you have other devices, Mac or Linux systems, a network printer, or even an “old school” Vista computer on your network. Networking will still be a pain in the ass. I guess you’d better be ready to shell out some cash to upgrade everything you own to Windows 7 so your networking works better.

3. You can instantly snap your windows to size, and clear the desktop in one motion.
This one kind of leaves me at a loss. Clear the desktop by shaking a window? So does that mean that every time I start moving a Window around, Windows will think I’m “shaking” and minimize everything? Sounds great… Why not just implement something like Compiz’s ADD Helper, where I can press Win+p to activate it? That way I don’t have to worry that every time I move my window I’m going to minimize everything behind it. Then, there’s the “instantly snap your windows to size” feature. It’s actually not a bad idea if you’ve got a big enough screen where having multiple tiled windows open at the same time might be beneficial. I don’t think I’d use this feature much on my laptop, but if I ever get that 24″ HD monitor I’ve been after, maybe this would come in handy. I’d also worry that someone just meaning to drag a window would accidentally have it’s size and position changed without meaning too. Talk about something to confuse novice users. With more and more users on laptops whose screen sizes are shrinking, I wonder how much use it will get. I think a much better idea would be to implement multiple virtual workspaces, but I’ll touch on that more in a minute.

2. Windows 7 starts up faster.
Whoa, faster boot time? Sounds an awful lot like what I’m going to be getting in 6 months. “Let’s see if we can make booting or resuming Ubuntu blindingly quick.” And as a recent proof of concept demonstrates, I think Linux will be winning the “boot time” battle in a few months.

1. You can do MUCH more from the Windows 7 taskbar.
We finally come to the Windows 7 topic of the week: a reworked taskbar. This definitely has been the hottest topic in news about Windows 7. There are at least 2 big features under this heading. First, they’ve made the task bar much more “Dock-like” by combining the quicklaunch icons with a traditional window list. It’s obvious that Windows needs a feature to compete with the Mac OS X Dock, which is beautifully emulated in Avant Window Navigator for Linux. It’s also obvious that they want something of their own, not just a Dock for Windows. The new task bar shows “live previews” of windows, like can be achieved with Compiz and even using Aero with Vista. One nice feature is that you can close windows using the live preview. It’s also interesting that when having multiple windows open for the same application, they get condensed down into one icon that has multiple “live previews” when you hover over it. Both of those seem like worthwhile ideas.

The second big feature is called Peek. Basically whenever you hover the mouse over an application in the new task bar, all other windows will turn temporarily transparent. It’s meant to be non-interactive, just if you need to glance at another window. There is also a built-in Desktop button so that you can peek at the desktop with all your Gadgets on it. This also seems like an interesting feature. I’m not convinced it could replace the quickness of Alt+Tab for me, but for the point-and-click crowd, this could be a time-saver.

It looks like the new Windows 7 task bar is adding some interesting new features to the Windows desktop. My question is, “Is it enough for Windows to save face?” They’re working on making more efficient use of desktop space. Linux and Mac OS X are already doing an OK job of that with their Dock applications, but they’re also giving the option to have multiple virtual desktops for people who want to separate their applications. On my Ubuntu installation, I can have up to 32 virtual desktops. Of course, I normally have only have 4. This makes it easy for me to keep a word processor open on one desktop and my instant messaging client and web browser open on another.

If it makes the Windows fans happy, though, I’ll give them that the new taskbar design in Windows 7 has some potential to be a good new feature. The rest of its new features still make me feel like the folks at Microsoft are trying to catch up with some of the innovation taking place in Linux and Mac OS. With the rapid progression of Linux in the past 2 years, how will the comparison look when Window 7 is released (theoretically) in late 2009? By that point, Gnome should be well on its way to the transition to version 3.0. That will mean a significant change to the user experience by attempting to rework the idea of the desktop, including making the desktop more task-based and less application-specific. For example, imagine having desktop-wide “contacts” that you could email, instant message, chat via video, follow on RSS feeds, and more. With that information built into the desktop, it wouldn’t matter what application you used for a feed reader or email client. Plus, there are other ideas floating around, like Long Term Vision. With the amount of development and innovation going on with Linux, Gnome, and Ubuntu combined with an aggressive 6 month release schedule, I think it’s going to be hard for Windows to keep up!

Now an OpenID

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I used a nice piece of PHP software called phpMyID to make encephalosponge.com an OpenID.

If you’re not sure what that means or if you never understood OpenID, you’re not alone. Up until recently, I didn’t either. I always saw the opportunities to use them, but I never had a full grasp of what they were. Basically, an OpenID is a way to make yourself a central “online identity” that can be used on other websites. This way, instead of insisting that you register for a blog or website in order to be able to leave a comment, their website can just request your OpenID. Then you don’t need to worry about keeping track of a username and password for every site under the sun. Seems like a logical solution, doesn’t it? The confusing part is actually that you would think that an OpenID is just an all-encompassing username and password. Yet, when a website asks for your OpenID, they’re really asking you for a URL. What they’re looking for is a website that will vouch for you and act as your “identity.” When you’re on a website and it asks for your OpenID, it’s saying, “Point me to a website that will tell me who you are.” That may still be a little confusing, so keep reading.

There are (at least) 3 ways you can get yourself an OpenID. You can sign up for a free OpenID account at any number of websites, like myopenid.com. This is less than ideal for most people who already have an “identity” established online. Even if you don’t, is a profile on a simple website really what you want to point people towards when they ask, “Who are you?” In fact, (as a second way) many of you probably already have an OpenID if you have an account at many popular web services like AOL, Blogger, Flickr, Yahoo!, or WordPress.com. To use them, you just need to know what URL to use when a site asks for your OpenID. For example, if you’ve got a blog on wordpress.com, you can use username.wordpress.com as your OpenID. If you’re on Flickr, you can use www.flickr.com/photos/username. This means that if you already have an account at one of these popular websites, you never have to make a username and password at any other website if they’ll let you use an OpenID. Plus, a Flickr photostream, a blog, or even a list of your favorite links on Technorati is probably a good representation of “who you are” online.

The third option for getting yourself an OpenID only applies if you have your own website. This is the method I’m using. It seems kind of redundant to sign up for “yet another free account” on myopenid.com to manage my identity when this website is already my identity online. I just had to “teach” my site how to properly identify me. “This is Jonathan, who runs encephalosponge.com.” Plus, what if I don’t feel like I can trust the myopenid.com service? Or what if they decide to close, and I “lose my identity”? I set up a nice PHP script called phpMyID, which is able to identify me to other sites.

Regardless of what service hosts your OpenID identity, if you have your own website, you can turn the URL into an OpenID. You just need to add 2 lines of HTML code to your site. Then, when you’re on a website and it asks for your OpenID, you can use something like encephalosponge.com instead of myusername.myopenid.com. You might ask, “What does it matter?” Well almost anywhere I use my OpenID, a link will be generated with my name, and that link is supposed to point to “me.” It matters because why should some plain, lackluster profile on a site like myopenid.com represent my “identity” on the web? This site is my “identity,” and when people click on my name somewhere in the blogosphere, I want them brought to my website, not to some profile on myopenid.com.

Since I’ve set up my site as an OpenID, it will be easier for me to leave comments on other people’s sites. In order to facilitate the use of OpenID on this site, I’ll be adding an OpenID plugin for WordPress so that anyone who wants to leave a comment can easily do so using their OpenID.

One of the real pitfalls of OpenID is that they’re not currently ubiquitous. That means that you probably will still have to register for an account at many places. The more sites that support it, however, the less you’ll have to worry about making a million new accounts any time you want to contribute a comment on a website. It will help promote participation in discussions, which is a hallmark of the Internet.

Of Freedom and Trademarks

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I read an article this past weekend that brought up some interesting issues that I tend to forget about concerning free software. Most people these days are familiar with Firefox. While Firefox is open-source and “essentially” free software, the key area that makes it non-free is in its trademark and copyright. The brand name “Firefox” is a trademark of the Mozilla Foundation, as is the Firefox logo. Since the logo is artwork, it also falls under copyright restrictions.

Trademarks are a funny business. Unlike copyright, which is inherent from the minute that pen touches paper, a quotation is voiced, or a blog post is published, a trademark is not inherent. As such, copyright is enforceable in general. If you find a person violating that copyright, you are empowered to make them stop, but if you choose to ignore it, that’s your decision. Trademarks on the other hand are a “branding” and are not inherent. If you find someone in violation of your trademark, you must act to stop them (or help them to comply). Otherwise, you are forfeiting your right to the trademark.

In general, this is thought to be a good thing because trademarks are “branding” used to ensure quality. I probably don’t want to install just any piece of software on my computer, but if it’s “Mozilla Firefox” then I will. This is especially important when discussing open-source software. With proprietary software, it would be difficult to distribute a “fake” copy without people noticing a difference. But with open-source software, everyone has access to the application’s source code. This means that anyone could build it, modify it, and tell it to collect all of your private information for them. If they can convince you to install “their version” of your favorite program, that’s a major security threat. Sharing code is also the hallmark of free and open-source software, and users are encouraged to modify it. But it doesn’t mean that after doing that, they deserve to still call it “Firefox”. Of course, Firefox should be credited as the basis for the work. It’s good to know when something has been stamped “Mozilla Firefox” because it tells you that it’s endorsed by the Mozilla Foundation and you can trust it.

Now you might be sitting there, scratching your head, and asking, “What’s the big deal? Can’t I just assume that anything I get from mozilla.com is what I want?” For many people, the answer to that is “Yes, you can.” But according to its license, Firefox is free to distribute under its brand name as long as any changes to it have been approved by the developers. This is something that many GNU/Linux distributions take advantage of so that they can package “Firefox” as the official web browser of their operating system. This helps user-friendly distributions like Ubuntu because potential users instantly recognize the brand Firefox and are comfortable with it. This works well for just about everyone involved.

Debian is another GNU/Linux distribution. It has roots as one of the first GNU/Linux distributions, and it defines itself by its commitment to being free. You may have developed a great program that a lot of people like, but if it’s not free software, it’s not good enough to be called “Debian” and included in their operating systems. They would like to be able to use Firefox as their default web browser like other, less “freedom-oriented” distributions do. If it were just a trademark issue, there would be no problem. Debian could easily show Mozilla exactly what changes (if any) are in their version of Firefox. Since the Firefox logo is also under restrictive copyright protection, however, Debian can’t include it. They also can’t just exchange the logo for a non-copyrighted one because the Firefox logo is part of the trademark. This copyright could be changed to a more permissive license by Mozilla, but it looks like their theory is that Debian could just as easily bend their rules. This is where Debian has taken a stand. Since they’re committed to providing a completely free operating system, they do not include Firefox as their browser.

Firefox is a good browser, and Debian doesn’t want to try to code another browser or use a less popular alternative. Since the only real problem they have is with the trademark and artwork, they’d much rather keep the rest of the Firefox code intact. Plus, with the number of Firefox plug-ins available, a lot of users want to use it. So what does Debian do? Since Firefox is open-source, they just strip out the copyrighted logo and come up with their own. This means that they lose the “Firefox” branding, so they chose the name IceWeasel (and a free logo) to replace it.

Now it may seem like kind of a moot point in the long run, but it makes me proud to see that a distribution like Debian will stick to their guns in a situation like this. It may not be for everyone (I’m still using Firefox on Ubuntu), but they chose not to back down on the ideals of their organization and their users when it would have been very easy to do so. So kudos to Debian and IceWeasel.

Congrats, Theora

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Xiph.Org announced the release of the Theora 1.0 video codec yesterday. A video “codec” is a program that allows you to play a particular type of video file on your computer. Theora is significant because it is free and unencumbered by patents, which would require developers to pay patent owners large sums of money in order to develop a program that will play their video type. This is in stark contrast to the patent-encumbered MPEG video codecs, which underly many video (and audio) files that you’re probably familiar with. For this reason, Theora playback will appear out-of-the-box with future releases of the Firefox and Opera web browsers.