Rarsa's Eclectic thoughts

2011-06-21T11:54:00.000-07:00

LulzSec, Hacking and other crimes

If you don't know it by now, LulzSec is a group that took unto themselves to uncover security flaws at several companies and organizations.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LulzSec

Hacking into other peoples data/property is illegal whether they misuse that data or not. But so is the negligence shown by the companies caught with their guard down.

Nobody but me should care if I leave my home unlocked but even if I do it is still illegal for someone to enter without permission. That's my home and my risk.

That's not the same if someone entrusts me with their property. In that case I become responsible for that property and I must make sure it is well secured. If something happens to that property I am on the hook.

In the LulzSec case, it seems that the authorities are only interested in the people that hacked the data, not on the people that didn't secure it properly.

If in fact LulzSec did not misuse the information, I'd say that the companies that didn't secure it properly are even guiltier as they are exposing OUR data to someone else that may misuse it.

Both are wrong, Both should be held accountable but it seems that authorities think that the real problem was the messenger, not the message.

2011-03-05T11:10:00.000-08:00

Are you ethnic?

Harpers Conservative party is trying to attract "Very Ethnic" people.

I've always found that the way the word "Ethnic" is used in Canada is very offensive. As if saying "us vs. them".

Go to the dictionary and check what it means:

"pertaining to or characteristic of a people, especially a group (ethnic group) sharing a common and distinctive culture, religion, language, or the like"

Why then do people refer to "Ethnic food" or "Ethnic people" ONLY when referring to someone that identifies with a non European or Canadian ethnic group?.

How come schnitzels are not referred to as "Ethnic food" but Tacos are?

Are Sikh "Ethnic people" but Christians aren't?

Some people are Very Ethnic, of course, meaning that they closely identify with a common group. But that is regardless of origin. I live in Kitchener/Waterloo, with a quite visible and Very Ethnic German population.

Some other people, whether from European, Indian, Chinese or Mexican origin, do not have that strong ethnic identification. They are not Very Ethnic.

I understand and accept the term "Ethnic minorities". I'm an Ethnic minority, but not Very Ethnic.

I would also accept if, when they say "Very Ethnic", they were also referring to the organizers of the Octoberfest or the Highland games which are Very Ethnic festivals.

Only referring to people of an origin different than our own as "Ethnic" is plain racism.

2010-08-29T20:26:00.000-07:00

Can you downgrade for your next computer?

I was reading a ZDNet blog where the author argued that point.

It was interesting to me how some people totally missed the message. As they didn't feel the need to downgrade, they thought that no-one should downgrade.

Some people can downgrade some people cannot.

Me for example, at work I used to develop, I required all the CPU and memory I could get.

Now, I am a systems integrator, connects to servers. Do project opportunity assessments, proposals, architecture diagrams. I just need as much RAM as necessary to keep open 10-15 applications. CPU does not matter that much. I'd rather have a lighter computer that I can carry to meetings and presentations.

My children are in University: Science. What they need is portability and long battery life. They carry netbooks. They each have a 23" monitor to hook up for when they are at their desk.

Of course, were they in Graphics or Computer science their set up would be very different.

It was funny, when we bought one of the netbooks (i3 with 4 GB DDR4). The guy at the store was lying through his teeth trying to convince us for a larger model: "With that computer you'll barely be able to use the Internet". He didn't know my son and I knew better.

My dad? almost 80, has a Quad core with 4GB and lots of HDD as he likes to do photography. To go to the country club, he takes his netbook and he is happy as long as he has a wireless connection.

My Mom? She is a computerphobic. She just needed a computer to email some friends but didn't want to go into my dad's den to use the desktop. I got her an old Dell C610.

At home I have an older P4 desktop. It has lots of expansion bays, and several HDD. CPU solow, memory, 1.5 GB. It does not matter, It's for storage, media server, casual browsing and preparing my presentations.

I mean. Different needs, different computers. Not everyone needs an SUV, not everyone can get by with a compact.

2010-07-13T07:57:00.000-07:00

Do you need to type to program?

That was the question raised (again) by the news of AppInventor. A visual environment to create applications for the Android.

When reading responses to a blog post I came across one that, I hope tongue in cheek, ranted about how to be a developer you need to type code.

The point is that to be a developer you need to write everything yourself, not taking from anybody else's code. Quite a funny response, but just in case someone takes it at face value, here is a summary of my thoughts:

If you are using a high level language then you are using someone else's libraries. Even if you are programming in assembler.

When coding is based on someone else's code snippets it is called progress.

Computer Programming is directing the computer to perform a task, whether you do it typing code or moving blocks is irrelevant.

A good programmer knows how to meet the requirements (make the program do what it is supposed to do), in an elegant way (Clean code that is easy to maintain) with the end user in mind (Eliminating barriers for the users to be productive) and in the most efficient manner (Using the resources judiciously).

Yes, someone will still need to write the low level code and libraries. Hopefully to be reused by other programmers that create the end user applications. The main difference between the two will be the area of expertise and who their end user is.

2010-06-15T08:01:00.000-07:00

Alternatives to full MS Office

Today I read the news that MS will release a limited/ad-based version of MS Office to be bundled with new computers.

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/starter/

I don't think that they would have done that hadn't it be for all the users that get frustrated with the "trialware" installed in their computers and opt for alternatives

I know, I've advised several people to install Free applications when their MS Office trial version expires.

For years the MS apologists have been contending that the alternatives weren't good enough because every user needed the advanced features of MS Office. Now even MS is accepting that most users do not need that, and they can do well enough in a limited functionality version.

This means: They've now lost that argument.

This change in strategy from MS gives us, FLOSS advocates, new arguments when explaining Free software on top of the existing arguments of open formats and code

Here are some of them for you to freely use:

MS Office starter only comes with new computers. Free alternatives can be installed in any computer ;

MS Office starter shows adds. Free alternatives do not;

MS Office starter tracks your usage to allow for targeted advertisement. Free alternatives do not ;

MS Office starter has limited functionality by design. Free alternatives are constantly evolving and improving ;

MS Office starter does not include all the Office tools. Some free alternatives include the tools missing, including presentations and email clients ;

MS Office starter has limited functionality but is not light. Some free alternatives are designed to be small and fast, e.g. Abiword and Gnumeric are designed to be light while providing some functionality not available in MS Office starter.

If you reached this page looking for MS Office and want to know what the alternatives are, just ask me. Meanwhile, here are some of the alternatives I've mentioned:

OpenOffice

IBM Lotus Symphony

Abiword

Gnumeric

I see it as a good thing that MS felt enough pressure to strike back. What is not good is that they'll use their market dominance to force it on new computers but that's fodder for another post.

2010-05-04T20:05:00.000-07:00

They are no longer laughing and they are stopping fighting it.

This past weekend I attended the Toronto Code Camp. A free conference organized by people active in the .NET community in Toronto.

I had a great time and here is why: The conference was well organized, The venue was quite appropriate, The topics where relevant and the speakers top notch presenters; and most importantly, no sales pitches, just good information and code.

There was one aspect in particular that caught my attention: There were a lot of references to Free an Open Source Software and Open Standards; and all of them praising them.

Up until a couple of years ago the only references I heard in this kind of conferences were pejorative or about not-so-open "standards".

This time, all the presenters I saw were using either Chrome or Firefox.
I attended a presentation on HTML5 where the presenter showed how the FLOSS browsers were more compliant with standards compared to IE8/9; and another presentation about JQuery where the scripts were debugged using Firebug.

Most of the presentations were focused on Microsoft's proprietary technologies but there were also presentations about HTML5, Jquery, Open Data, IronPython and DotNetNuke (See foot note).

To me, this indicates that the hard work of all the people that participate in Free and Open Source initiatives is paying off and paving the way for main stream developers to realize the benefits of open source and, eventually, of Free software.

So the laughing part seems over. They are still fighting but now they are also embracing. Eventually they will fully realize that the FLOSS model is better.

Note: I am sure we can have a good discussion about what is open and what is not, but at least I see things going slowly in the right direction.

2010-03-10T09:01:00.000-08:00

Solving the systems integration problem is more than putting the tools and plans in place as suggested in this blog

Smarter Integration in Seven Steps

I don't think that the people that are in the position of doing something, do not want to improve integration; but all that planning, aligning and consulting can go just so far.

In my own experience the main failure is with training. But training all the people to follow the standard and use the tools appropriately is expensive and takes time, which is the same as saying that it requires "senior commitment".

Just throwing in the tools because the vendor or consultant can make the pitch, may work for one project; but that's not what integration is all about. Every current staff member must be trained, every new recruit must be trained, not just the people that work on the initial "integration" project.

2010-02-02T13:39:00.000-08:00

Re-thinking the Ubuntu/Yahoo deal.

When I first heard of this deal my reaction was "so what?", Ubuntu either gets money from one private company or another.

I even read a comment that said ""this would seem to mean that Microsoft will be paying people for using Ubuntu.". This due to the fact that Yahoo is now a front for Bing.

That was the comment that made me think. At first blush it seems that that will be the case. Get money from Microsoft to support a competing product.

What I realized later was that it is the other way around! Microsoft will get money from hits coming from Ubuntu. Out of that, a small portion will go to Ubuntu.

This means that Ubuntu will be making money for Microsoft so in a very direct way, supporting the development of Windows and other proprietary software.

Google may not be the beacon of purity they want to portrait but at least they support Free software. They support the Summer of code, a Linux derivative, Free software Conferences and many other Free software initiatives.

Am I missing something here? How does this deal with Yahoo makes sense?

2009-11-23T11:49:00.000-08:00

Has the market rejected Linux desktops?

That seems to be the premise for the following article:

http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/hiner/?p=3372&tag=nl.e550

Here is my point by point response:

It’s still too much of a pain:
Compatibility should be the vendor's realm. To pass the buck to the OS then the device spec should be open. For some vendors this would be unconscionable.

The divide and fail strategy:
First: Linux is not an OS, it's a kernel. Second: The problem is trying to measure success based on proprietary goals. The goal of FLOSS is to be Free. There are actually many other contexts in life where being free is more of a hassle but we still prefer it. e.g. uniforms eliminate the "need" to think what you are going to wear. Does that make them better for everyone?

Not enough innovation:
"The primary value proposition for Linux is that it’s just as good as Windows"
Wrong premise. The primary value proposition of a FLOSS operating system is its Freedom.

There is innovation although it happens in bits and pieces and components that you don't really see. They are transparent to the user. Here are some examples
- Software repositories
- The free desktop specification
- The compiz desktop
- Desktop folders on KDE (easy to access most used folders)
- Print to PDF from any application

I agree that there are many people doing the Windows copycat. Why do they do it? because they can. It's their freedom and their right. There is no right answer. Sometimes true innovation causes confusion as people tend to resist change.

Businesses want someone to blame:
With Linux they can, there is RedHat, Novel, Mandriva, Canonical and many other vendors that will stand up for the FLOSS OS they sell. Many FLOSS software has professional support, actually that's usually the business model for free software. There is a real drive to provide support as no one is ever "captive client" as it happens with proprietary software.

Summary: The market hasn't "rejected it" it doesn't know the benefits as people keep trying to put the benefits in terms of proprietary software. I guess the problem is not with the product but with the "marketing".

In the end "FLOSS" is a counterbalance to proprietary software and formats. A way to free users from vendor and format lock in. That's what, in my view, makes it better. Once users understand that the current lock-ins don't have to be "normal" they'll realize that there are alternatives.

2009-11-04T06:04:00.000-08:00

Karmic Koala: Who's to blame for the issues found by early adopters?

Someone at my LUG's email list pointed to this article:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/11/03/karmic_koala_frustration/

This is not a response or rebuttal to that article as it seems to be quite objective reporting on facts. This is instead a reflection on why being early adopters and expecting perfection is an utopia.

I read the article and it gave a clue of why these issues are popping up:

"Early adopters tend to be the most technical of the technical."

As part of the community and early adopters we should share part of the blame:

First:
There was time to test the alphas, betas and RCs. I'm sure the developers do not have access to all the different combinations of hardware out there. Linux is a community effort. It is only by contributing with testing that we can ensure the release will come out cleaner.

Even other companies with huge resources have extensive pre-release beta programs and beta testers take it upon themselves to improve those companies software.

Second:
It is not common sense, but it is common professional practice that with ANY software for a production environment (This would include your primary desktop) you either:
- test the pre-release versions and felt comfortable before upgrading or
- you wait until other people found the issues and hope you don't have a unique one.

In both scenarios you make every effort to have a way to roll back the change (e.g. data backups or even OS partition image)

Another common practice is to have your production systems at version n-1 and a test system at the level you are planning to move next.

Being early adopters the "most technical of the technical", you'd think that they either contributed testing the pre-release versions or at least tried it in a separate partition before rendering their main system unusable.

So, if you are technical: don't wait to test and report issues, you may uncover something the developers don't know or you may have a clue on something which is baffling the developers.

If you are not comfortable with this either because you are not technical enough or don't have time to test, then keep using version n-1 until most of the issues of the latest version have been resolved.

I do think that Canonical should be clearer on this and, on the downloads page, advise non technical users to use the LTS version. After all, non technical users don't know about the good technical practices I mentioned before.

Canonical's part of the blame is removing the link to download the LTS.

2009-09-20T12:03:00.000-07:00

Software Freedom day was celebrated world wide on Saturday September 19.

I was fortunate to be able to participate as a volunteer speaker at the event organized by the working centre in Kitchener.

I presented three sessions:

What are we celebrating
In this presentation I walked through some of the current rights and freedoms regarding digital content. The ones we currently have and give for granted as well as some of the existing artificial barriers to enjoy those rights.

Click here to download the impress presentation or click on the presentation to view it on-line.

Don't be afraid of the command line
The main purpose of this presentation is to make users feel more comfortable reading and understanding commands provided by other people as well as using the command line more effectivelly.

Click here to download the impress presentation or click on the presentation to view it on-line.

Linux for Windows users
This presentation shows some of the core differences between Windows and Linux which, when not well understood, become "annoyances" and entry barriers for adoption.

This presentation is not meant to bash Windows in any way or to glorify Linux, but (hopefully) an objective and practical comparison.

Click here to download the impress presentation or click on the presentation to view it on-line.

Hopefully you will be able to attend a local event next year.

2009-06-18T09:58:00.000-07:00

eBoks
What a fantastic technology full of promises and advantages. It has the potential to offer unlimited access to books, allow annotations and reorganizations that would help the students, lighten the backpack load, save trees. What a future!

Unfortunately DRM has shown that there are risks, huge risks.

When I was a kid, students in higher grades would regularly sell their books to students in lower grades. Win-win, One student recouped a portion of the cost for new books, the other student saved on books. It was before widespread recycling so less paper to the landfill. You could also borrow a book for a few days if yours was lost or only needed it as supporting reference for a paper.

If we are not careful, eBooks may do more harm than good if DRM is imposed on them. If we cannot share books, borrow them, even deface them in creative ways.

Privacy may suffer If we leave tracks of who read which book. Censorship can easily get to Orwell's 1984 levels where something may disappear from books at the whim of the publisher or government. Look no further to Amazon's Kill switches

The dystopia presented by Richard Stallman in his "The right to read" short story illustrates very well one of these risks.

Yes, eBooks are full of promises that I would like to see realized. But maybe for that to happen we will have to fight an uphill battle.

2009-03-16T12:05:00.000-07:00

TV and the internet

Integrating widgets into the TV seems like a nice concept, after all, some of our browsing activities are quite passive.

Here is my take on it:

The distinction between TV and computer is one that is quickly disappearing.

You have Home theaters that are PC based, TiVo, Game consoles, etc. which let you have more information than just what's broadcasted.

I can foresee some useful widgets, some of which are already a reality for many of us using HTPC.

A weather widget, Caller ID, chat or video conference widget, RRS News feeds, Personalized stock tickers, calendar and reminder tickers, face book, twitter, web browser.

All controlled with the remote control or wireless keyboard.

People are doing all those things today do while watching TV, even if it is with the black berry, notebook or PDA.

I think that integrated on the TV will be for the "low end" market and Top sets for the "high end" market. You can see that with TVs with integrated VCR/CD players.

Will everybody use them? No.
Will they be useful for people that use them? sure!

2009-01-05T07:36:00.000-08:00

Free software and Capitalism

Some people have the misconception that Free software is anti Corporation, anti capitalists.

When presented with that argument the best response is to recommend reading Richard Stallman's Essays. In particular page 18 and 28

Here the two excerpts:

"Since “free” refers to freedom, not to price, there is no contradiction between
selling copies and free software. In fact, the freedom to sell copies is crucial"

"The free software philosophy rejects a specific widespread business practice, but
it is not against business. When businesses respect the users’ freedom, we wish
them success."

For me it is clear that the main spirit of Free software is neutral. Free software is not a business practice or a business model. It is a social movement.

Some people on the Free Software community may be anti capitalist, they may even be loud and radical but that doesn't define the whole community.

I personally believe that it reinforces the capitalistic principles of private ownership of, production and distribution of goods. Anyone that has the inclination and wits can join the Free enterprise taking advantage of Free Software. But it also reinforces the socialist principle of cooperation. It levels the playing field encouraging innovation. Success of Free software is based on supply and demand, and even there success is relative.

Regarding the Competition: What if in a marathon it were valid to put obstacles to your opponents, to make them trip and throw sand to their eyes, to have a "secret private shortcut". Would you consider it a fair competition?

Regarding Ownership:
Ownership is very well established in the Free software movement. The main point of contention is "What can you own?": Can you own Ideas?. For a good reflection on this issue I recommend listening to Who Owns Ideas?

Regarding Cooperation:
Capitalism does not have to be a win-lose equation. Free Software is always a win-win situation. What's even more important: It does not matter how much you contribute your own work and ideas, It is an absolute truth that you will get back many orders of magnitude more. Free software reinforces the principle that it does not matter the size of the slice, what matters is the size of the pie.

In conclusion: Neither socialist nor capitalist. Free software is a social system and whose resulting product may be distributed and controlled using any number of business and economic models.

2008-12-12T07:49:00.000-08:00

When Good may not be so

The other day I was reading some news that NetFlix was laying off support people due to the fact that their application was more stable since they started using Silverlight.

Are Netflix layoffs Microsoft's fault?

This made me reflect on "how good is .NET and Silverlight".

In this case "Good" is a relative word and that relativity prompted me to write this blog.

As an architecture I really like .NET it is a first class runtime platform. As a developer I love working with Visual Studio .NET. I think it's the best development environment around. As a designer, Silverlight provides all the flexibility to achieve the look and feel I want. So on that regard, the tool set is good.

On the other hand as a consumer and software user I don't understand why I should be installing runtimes to view a web page. Why I'm not able to view that same web page on my hand held or on my PS3. Why do I have to user Windows when the web was built platform-agnostic. In that regard, the tool set is bad. very bad.

But there is no surprise here. Microsoft bases his commercial practices on a monopoly (or quasi monopoly if you like) and while they enjoy a huge advantage on the desktop, they know, as any other person following the evolution of personal computing, that the next grow potential is on ubiquitous computing. Handhelds, TV set tops, kiosks, on-car access, etc. where they don't enjoy that advantage.

When companies decide using a development tool, they should not only look at the developer productivity but mainly at the business opportunities out there. By using .NET/Silverlight they are playing in the hands of Microsoft which may have one of two outcomes:

If most companies do it, they will enable a Microsoft monopoly on the ubiquitous computing space with all the bad consequences that entails

If most companies realize that there are more opportunities than just the desktop, they will be left with an application that can only run on a small percentage and will be out of the market.

Either scenario is bad, either for the consumers, for the company or both.

In summary:

Companies creating internal applications where they control the platform the users are using, will get great gains from going Microsoft.

Companies that rely on external users are shooting themselves in the foot especially knowing that there are many other development platforms that rely on open standards to achieve the same effects.

2008-12-01T12:07:00.000-08:00

Why hacking the iPhone?

After I read some news about hackers being able to run Linux on an iPhone, I went to read the reader's replies.

I was surprised to see that there were many people asking "why?" as if this was a useless exercise.

For them, here are some answers;

Because it is there.

Because it was fun for the people that did it

Because they may have learned something while doing it

Because it proves one of the benefits of an open environment: portability.

Because that is how we've gone from scavengers to hunters, to farmers, by trying things that aren't status quo, as futile and useless as they may seem.

Will it have a practical application down the road? who knows, that's not the important news here.

Why do people climb mountains and swim across a channel?

Because that is a challenge that can be conquered

Why is there a "Perimeter institute for theoretical physics" where people research and think about science without a clear application?

Because that's how knowledge is acquired and transmitted. That's how we've evolved.

I'm not expecting those dinosaurs to understand this but I am still surprised that they haven't gone extinct.

2008-06-06T07:26:00.000-07:00

The need for variety

In his blog, Dana Blankenhorn raised a very good question

Do we need two open source office suites?

This is a very common question from people that still "don't get" OpenSource

While we could all be using the same tool for "compliance" reasons (that's why most of us use MS, isn't it?) there are many reasons not to.

Dana's argues that competition should only exist in the proprietary world. I disagree. In a commercial word it makes sense to make all the users use your tool thus the goal for each one is the less options the better. Knowledge sharing shrinks with competition.
In the open source world it's totally the opposite.

In the open source world, variety encourages innovation. Competition is just competition in a friendly way, where if your "competition" comes up with something awesome, you are free to grab it and include it in yours. Or study it and improve it. This is a two way street: knowledge sharing grows with competition.

What's more, successful projects have benefited from other projects that have flopped.

So, Answering the question:

Do we need two (or more) office suites, desktop environments, email clients, chat applications?

Of course we do not need them if we want to keep the "status quo", but they are invaluable to foster innovation, to try different things, and to help us realize that we are not all the same. Some people prefers A and some people B. And eventually people will realize that's OK.

2008-04-06T05:53:00.000-07:00

Email etiquette: The BCC field

Is the friend of my friend, also my friend? I don't know but it seems that most people think that when forwarding chain emails. What's worst, maybe now I'm also friends with the spammer of my friend!

We all receive chain emails, jokes and funny videos from friends. Nothing wrong with that except that they put our email address and all the addresses of their contacts list in the "To" field. Most people do this because they are unaware of the "BCC" field. This post will explore the problems and risks of the "To" field along with suggestions for proper etiquette for chain emails. I've been lecturing people (one by one) about this topic, and I've found that once they understand, they change their ways.

So if you (yes you) have ever forwarded a chain email to your list of contacts, please read the following:

Adding all the addresses to the "To" field makes them visible to all the people that receive the same email. This, while apparently innocuous, leads to some very nasty consequences:

1. Considering that once the chain starts, you don't know where it will end, there is a high probability that all those email addresses will end up on a spammer's "gold list" of addresses that have been confirmed active. What's more, I suspect that most chain emails are initiated by spammers trying to harvest addresses, specially the ones advising to "send it to all of your friends including the person that sent it to you"

2. Email addresses, like phone numbers, may not always be "public". Some people may have confided their address to you but not to others. Imagine the following scenarios:

You have two friends that are a couple, they break up and one decides to start using a different email address that doesn't want the ex to know. You forward a joke to her address and to some other close friends. Well, now one of those friends forwards it to their own list which includes the ex! not good eh?

Some people have different email address for different purposes, for example a friend or coworker provides you with his/her work's email address where he does not want/ should not receive jokes or chain emails. Now, after you've forwarded it to everyone, he'll start receiving jokes to the "wrong" address.

I'm sure you can imagine other situations where this may have quite undesirable consequences.

3. Frequently the address' list is longer than the message itself, making it difficult to read the actual message.

So, these are some of the reasons for not using "To" when forwarding chain emails

Keep the "To" field for occasions where you explicitly want every person to know who else received the same email.

It's my opinion that web email (hotmail, yahoo, gmail, etc) should have BCC as the default or at least make it more visible than what they do now.

As you can see, using the BCC field is as easy as using the "To" field but better in many ways helping you protect your friend's privacy, protect them from spam and make it easier to read the emails

Next time you receive a chain email, politely advise your friend about the problems and risks of using the "To" field. It may be as easy as pointing them to this blog's post.

2006-12-18T07:03:00.000-08:00

Windows Vista the new ME?

I was discussing the pros and cons of vista when I came across this article

25 Shortcomings Of Vista

Here are my thoughts:

As an IT/IS professional I attended the Windows Vista Launch with the idea of understanding what was new, what was better or as the article says find a "must-have" reason. They failed at that.

In the professional space I couldn't find a single reason why migrate from XP to Vista. Home users may be enticed by the Aero interface but I don't see how that can sell to corporations.

Throughout the different sessions during the Launch, it was obvious that Microsoft was trying to pair all the cool and really usefull new technologies (WPF, WCF, WF, etc) with Vista... the only issue with that is that all those technologies can be run under XP.

I found quite offensive that even when you identify yourself as an administrator, Vista keeps popping up those confirmation windows. I totally agree with locking down accounts to prevent viruses, trojans or unintented changes, but always second guessing an administrator is plain wrong.

Vista is starting to look pretty much like the infamous Windows ME, Just bloat, no meat.

2006-09-14T12:31:00.000-07:00

Linux is not just for geeks anymore

Today someone brought to my attention this osnews article with the title "Why Desktop Linux Will Not Take off, and Why You Don't Want It to".

Although the author makes some very good points describing geeks (at least it described my geek side perfectly). He makes the wrong assumption that Linux is still just relegated to geekdom.

Linus Torvalds criticism of Gnome, for example is actually its praise.

As a geek I think that one can use Gnome for the every day things and still have access to 'under the hood' stuff using the command line console (actually as a geek I don't like Gnome limitations either so I use something else).

Linus displays the clear traits of a geek. So what? Some other people that aren't technical geeks have joined the Open Source movement and are slowly making their mark obvious. They are layering simplicity on top of the complexity.

Linux is very fast approaching the "Easy for beginners to do easy things, Easy for experts to do complex things".

2006-06-12T20:55:00.000-07:00

The next revolution
Many people are asking: What's the next big thing?

In the past it has been the fire, the wheel, written laws, democracy, the radio, the automobil, TV and most recently the Internet.

These are things that have change the way we live, the balance of power. They've revolutionized society in ways that could have not been predicted before they happened. So... What's next?

Here is my prediction: Video glasses.

Not that they are new. The internet was more than 20 years old when it started changing the world thanks to the WWW.

With the ability to provide a personal video space the possibilities for the video glasses are far reaching:

They can revolutionize medicine, entertainment, transportation, social interaction and many other human activities.

Here are some simple examples:

Driving:
What if the glasses were connected to rear view/cameras or front infrared cameras in your car?
What if they provided a driver with 360 degrees view as they do in combat aircraft?
What if important dashboard information was presented through the glasses?

Medicine:
Looking inside a body in full 3D while operating
Having a close look at organs and injuries (Even from the other side of the world)

Entertainment:
3d "video" On demand, any time, anywhere
Full immersion electronic gaming.
Concert goers with a personal close up of the artist on the stage.

Social interaction:
Video conferences as common as today's cell phones.
Business conducted in a virtual meeting that feels real.
Real time information.
Subtitled real time translation.

These examples just extrapolate what we already imagine. In reality they will have applications we cannot currently even dream about.

For now I'll dare to dream. I hope to come back to this blog in a few years and realize I was right.

2006-05-05T06:59:00.000-07:00

Rationalizing beauty

Today a fellow member of the Puppy Linux forum had this comment on the topic of external appeal:

I am like a fickle teenager, if the guy is cute I will date him, if he is a cute dork I will dump him, if he is cute and cool I will keep him, but if he is cool but "homely" I would never have gone on the first date.

This made me reflect on the topic at a more basic level. I am convinced that this is directly related to the way our brains are wired: Attractiveness is associated in the most primitive areas of our brains with healthiness. In the wild, the healthier specimens are more successful. Attractiveness=Health=Survival Success.

That translation is subconsciously extrapolated. We make that association looking at a car and we make that association looking at a user interface.

Even more, we are a gregarious species, wired in our brain is also the inclination to associate ourselves with the successful. If we hung around the best hunter we might get a better share. It's the primitive emotional reaction that comes naturally to us.

On the other hand, it takes a conscious effort to accept the externally unattractive that has good internal qualities: We make rationalizations "but He/she is a good/intelligent/hardworking person", "the system is more stable", etc.

Emotions are instantaneous; rationalization takes time and as the quote implicitly puts it: If we get to choose, we would prefer the one that meets both.

2006-04-28T13:42:00.000-07:00

In defence of beauty

Yesterday I had an epiphany during a Billy Hollis's Avalon presentation at my.Net user's group.

During the presentation he said something like the following (not a direct quote):

Pretty interfaces are important as the interface is the only thing the user sees

This may sound obvious, but until that time I had always relegated prettiness as a useless attribute of an interface.

For me a user interface had to be functional and usable. This is: it should allow the user to perform all the required tasks in a non intrusive, intuitive way. Having a nice color gradient or round buttons or pretty picture was only a “nice to have”

The extrapolation of Bill’s statement is that the only way a user has to evaluate the quality of an application is through the interface.

Here I have a close analogy. The average car owner will prefer, a functional car that looks awesome to a beaten up car with a perfectly tuned, supped up engine and perfectly balanced tires.

A car aficionado may prefer the beaten up car because he sees the beauty in the engine. The car does not run with the chassis.

In Linux we have the same attitude; we find the beauty in the engine. Many developers still finds prettiness as a distraction.

It’s great to see that some people are paying attention.

Enlightenment
KDE
Gnome
and the awesome XGL.

From now on, I will be sure to include prettiness in a close category to usefulness, not just as an afterthought “if time permits”.

2006-04-23T22:24:00.000-07:00

What's a distribution?

The first question most people have when they start working with Linux is "what's a distribution?"

Here is my simple explanation of what a Linux distribution is:

A distribution is a collection of applications and configuration utilities built around the GNU/Linux Operating system.

But, what does this really mean? Why not a single distribution with all the same applications and configurations?

Different people need their computer to perform different tasks: Some write programs some others write documents and prepare presentations some others use them as a web server or to unfold the human genome.

A home computer needs different programs than a web server. Home users are used to GUIs while a web server may not even have one.

What's more even among home users some are experts and some are novice. Some have new and fast computers while some others have older and slower computers.

So, if you want to configure your computer exactly as you want or need, you could search for all the applications you need and install them. In practice only a few masochists (and experienced) people dare to start from zero. Some people have already prepared a collection of applications for different "user profiles". They distribute this collections, some free, some commercially. These are the "Distributions".

That does not mean that you can only use the applications provided. Think of a distribution as your starting point. The better you choose your distribution according to your needs, the closer you will be to have a computer configured specifically for you.

As an example of distributions, RedHat (the company) has the following ones:
- Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS : This is a distribution geared to enterprise servers with all the tools to administer a network and its applications
- Red Hat Enterprise Desktop : This one is geared to Desktop users in an office environment.
- Fedora Core : This is a general purpose distribution assembled with 100% free software.

There are 'purpose specific' distributions, for example your TV top-set may be using Linux. Many cell phones use Linux as their underlying OS. There are distributions to configure computer clusters (Groups of computers working as if they were a single one)

Here you can find a list of distributions. Search based on your needs or curiosity and read the descriptions:

http://www.linux.org/dist/index.html

2006-03-06T06:11:00.000-08:00

Learning new tricks

Today I saw this comment from someone looking for advice on Linux tools:

The more Win like the GUI the better for Linux noobies like me.

My response is: If you are already used to Win GUIs you are a noobie no more.

Moving from one OS to another implies relearning and adapting. It's harder to teach an old dog new tricks.

The same happens when switching applications on the same OS. The more knowledgeable you are about a tool, the more complains you will have about a new one. Many people were still using WordPerfect for DOS long after there were Windows tools available, just because they already knew all the cryptic WP key combinations.

Even user friendliness is on the eye of the beholder. Some people find GUIs less user friendly than command line because GUIs rarely allow automation for repetitive tasks.

What is true is that the more tools and ways-of-thinking you learn, the easier will be to learn something different if nothing else just because you will be already conditioned to accept change.

2006-03-02T18:22:00.000-08:00

The joy of working on what you really like

It's funny how coincidences happen. Today I was chatting with a coworker wondering why people complain about not liking their job. Latter today I found this post with someone doing exactly that.

What struck me the most was the following quote:

a [IT] career that is stressful, demands never-ending BORING study".

Actually that summed the reason for most of the complains about working in IT but also most of the reasons for enjoying it

We, that like what we do, find studying new things very exciting and rewarding. It actually becomes boring when you don't move on to other technologies.

That aside, with so many different jobs and careers out there, why would someone stay in something that he/she finds unrewarding?

Do what you really love and you won't find it boring. If your circumstances change and you no longer enjoy what you are doing, then move on. The sooner the better. Don't let the inertia kill you.

The post ends with "I've decided to plan an exit strategy to leave the field because I've had enough". Good for him! That is the best thing it can happen to him and to his co-workers and company.

I hope he finds something fulfilling to do.

What about you? Do you like what you do? I know I do.

2006-03-02T17:13:00.000-08:00

Finally a space for my ranting

I finally decided to create my blog.

This should be an eclectic collection of thoughts, sometimes related, sometimes unrelated. As my main interests are Software development and Politics, that should be the main focus but I won't know until it's all written.

I decided to create it because as with everybody else, sometimes I have thoughts that seem very interesting, or opinions that seem completely accurate. I wonder how many times I would go back and laugh at them or maybe, just maybe marvel at how right I was.