Nikhil Dev

I tried Digsby after reading about it on a website. This is one Instant Messenger that exceeds expectations for me. I dont have a Mac so have not tried Adium that people talk about so much, but I compared Digsby to the features that Adium had to offer and there are hardly that these people have missed out on. Beautiful skinning, ability to reply from the pop up and not have to deal with the main window. Support for almost all the popular protocols, Video chat and many more. What else would you want.

When I tried it, it was open for download for a restricted group. But it is open for download for all here.

It is totally worth at least one try.

P.S: Its available for dowload for all platforms. Windows, Mac and Linux.

This is something that people have been waiting from a long time. The next LTS version of the most popular Linux distro might soon be released in another months time. The beta is already up for download here.

Looking at what all has been talked about this new distro, this definitely pushes up the expectations. Let me just highlight some of the new features that are offered in Hardy Heron.(thats the code name for 8.04)

Brand new Xorg - People at canonical have the latest xorg 7.3 put into this baby. It allows greater customizability with minimal effort.

Linux Kernel 2.6.24 - Thats an impressive effort of upgrading the kernel. For some reason when I upgraded from 7.04 to 7.10 on my laptop, the new kernel refused to work on my laptop. Hopefully, the new kernel works this time.

Gnome 2.22 - I’ve heard great things about the new gnome. Still have’nt had a look at it. Lets see how good it is.

PulseAudio - People say this is the best thing that ever happened to Ubuntu. They have upgraded to a lot more stable audio handline software.

Firefox 3 Beta 4 - I use the new version of Firefox and it simple kicks ass. It was an obvious thing for Ubuntu to include the new Firefox.

Transmission - I have used Azureus on Ubuntu and its an absolute wastage of effort and is very ineffecient. Transmission was an obvious thing to include.

World Clock Applet - One of the most noticeable changes is the world clock applet which provides a lot more information than the previous one.

There is one huge upgrade in the 8.04 Hardy Heron. Its called Wubi. This is what the Ubuntu website has to say about it.

There is a new installation option for Windows users. Wubi allows users to install and uninstall Ubuntu like any other Windows application. It does not require a dedicated partition, nor does it affect the existing bootloader, yet users can experience a dual-boot setup almost identical to a full installation. Wubi works with a physical CD or in stand-alone mode, by downloading an appropriate ISO to install from. It can be found on the root of the CD as Wubi.exe. A full installation within a dedicated partition is still recommended, but Wubi is a great way to try Ubuntu for a few days and weeks before committing dedicated disk resources.

I am waiting to lay my hands on this thing. There are lot of things that the new version would be teaching to other distros.

My previous title was misleading but its just the beta which has been released. Sorry for the misguiding information

A really interesting and very true to its description graphic.

This has always been my biggest concern. Windows is always an over bloated operating system. For me an operating system needs to be just an empty box. The user should then have the option of filling it up with things.

Just a while ago, Nash sent me this amazing graphics and I burst out laughing in the office.

I am sure anyone who sees this will.

Was going through this article and found something that really interested me. This is a short list of some of the things that you can do on a Linux machine but not on a PC or Mac.

1. Upgrade to the newest version legally and without paying money
2. Have the latest version of the operating system run faster than the previous version on the same hardware
3. Easily install and run different graphical interfaces if I don’t like the default setup
4. Install twenty programs with one command
5. Have the system automatically update all my installed programs for me.
6. Install the same copy of my OS (Ubuntu) on multiple computers without worrying about license restrictions or activation keys
7. Give away copies of the operating system and other programs that run on it without breaking any laws, governmental or ethical or moral, because it was all intended to be used this way
8. Have full control over my computer hardware and know that there are no secret back doors in my software, put there by malicious software companies or governments
9. Run without using a virus scanner, adware/spyware protection, and not reboot my computer for months, even when I do keep up with all of the latest security updates
10. Run my computer without needing to defragment my hard drive, ever
11. Try out software, decide I don’t like it, uninstall it, and know that it didn’t leave little bits of stuff in a registry that can build up and slow down my machine
12. Make a major mistake that requires a complete reinstallation and be able to do it in less than an hour, because I put all of my data on a separate partition from the operating system and program files
13. Boot into a desktop with flash and effects as cool as Windows Vista on a three year old computer…in less than 40 seconds, including the time it takes me to type my username and password to login
14. Customize anything I want, legally, including my favorite programs. I can even track down the software developers to ask them questions, contribute ideas, and get involved in the actual design/software writing process if I want to
15. Have 4+ word processor windows open working on papers, listen to music, play with flashy desktop effects, have contact with a largely happy community and have firefox, instant messaging, and email clients all open at the same time, without ever having had to beg someone for a code to make my os work, and without the system running so slow it is useless
16. Use the command “dpkg –get-selections > pkg.list” to make a full, detailed list of all software I have installed, backup my /etc and /home directories on a separate partition, and you are able to recover your system any time, easily
17. Run multiple desktops simultaneously, or even allow multiple users to log in and use the computer simultaneously
18. Resize a hard disk partition without having to delete it and without losing the data on it
19. Use the same hardware for more than 5 years before it really needs to be replaced…I have some hardware that is nearly 10 years old, running Linux, and still useful
20. Browse the web while the OS is being installed!
21. Use almost any hardware and have a driver for it included with the operating system…eliminating the need to scour the internet to find the hardware manufacturer’s website to locate one
22. Get the source code for almost anything, including the OS kernel and most of my applications