Latest articles & site news

updated September 1, 2010, category: Computer games

Today, I decided to try something new, which is to show you a lovely collection of funny and monumental screenshots taken in the original Flashpoint game, accumulated in the last decade, unlike any you've seen before. Rather than sticking to the pure fighting elements of the game, this article shows all the quirky and odds things that can happen when a bunch of people sit down for a LAN party.

We talked about the multiplayer mode in the game review, but now, I'm going to show you the dark side of what happens when several geeks meet for a shooting treat. Thus, this article is not quite a review, although it gives you a good impression of what you can do in the game.

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updated August 30, 2010, category: Software & security

On paper, StormOS is an excellent technological concept: it is based on Nexenta, which itself is based on Solaris, and packaged with Ubuntu user-land and package management system. In theory, you get Ubuntu-like behavior on top of a UNIX kernel. Sounds like a healthy marriage.

But can it really be the magic blending of the super-advanced ZFS filesystem, the advanced Solaris dual-architecture and the simplest package manager? Can it compare with Linux seamless live CD experience and hardware detection? What about the default choice of the Xfce desktop? How does it fare in the overall scheme of things?

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updated August 21, 2010, category: Reviving old games

It's been a long while since I wrote parts one and two, so I decided to freshen up the collection a bit and add several more titles to the list of successfully tested and played games using DOSBox. Of course, you can find a more bigger, more complete database on the official website, but some personal touch and a short review do not hurt.

Well, let's take a look at a few more games. If you've never used DOS or played this, your curiosity will probably not peak the critical level. But if there's an emotional attachment that goes beyond simple computing power, you will definitely like to know some of your old, treasured goodies still work great.

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updated August 20, 2010, category: Software & security

When IBM is concerned, a software product is going to be either a revolution or total failure. There's no middle ground. From a de-facto desktop operating system king to the largest IT company completely disinterested in the desktop market, IBM has always made breathtaking business decisions. When they released OS/2, it was make it or break it, but we all know that part. Black or white, no middle ground.

Is there? IBM Lotus Symphony may just be the product that could be somewhere in between, neither the killer nor the victim of a crazy technology tempest. Apart from the name, the software is otherwise unrelated to Lotus products from mid-80s, although the word Lotus evokes a very clear, very office-like connotations.

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updated August 19, 2010, category: Life topics

Since no one in the industry wants to interview me, I decided to interview myself. The reason is probably the fact I'm either too interesting and hence too intimidating, too boring, which seems highly unlikely, or just plain simple open and honest, so there's no need for any interviewing.

Anyhow, I could not wait any longer. Therefore, I've compiled this interview. You may find the fact both the interviewer and the interviewee are one and the same person somewhat problematic, but it's not really. If you've worked in high-tech industry, you know that most engineers talk to themselves. So having a self-conducted interview is not much of a fuss.

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updated August 16, 2010, category: Software & security

Some time ago we talked about Zoho, a Web-based office suite. Zoho provides the home and business users with a wide range of office and productivity applications, including word processing, spreadsheet, presentation, drawing, project management, database, and other tools. Most of the services are free, but some features are limited and require a fee to be unlocked. And, as always, there's the matter of privacy and trust in storing your personal data in the cloud. All in all, I was quite pleased with Zoho Office Suite, from the purely functional perspective. Not my cup of tea, but it could definitely be your mug of beer.

Today, I would like to present Google Docs, a similar solution created in Google forges, albeit with a few distinct differences.

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updated August 14, 2010, category: Reviving old games

We all know that Caesar III is probably the best real time strategy game ever created. It had everything: an extremely beautiful portrayal of Roman architecture, a tiered society revolving around constant and varied food supply, entertainment and sanitation, beauty and grace of parks and marble statues, temples for gods, and education.

However, problems started with Windows XP SP2. A change in the support for legacy code made Caesar III, a game designed in the heyday of DOS and really intended for DOS-based version of Windows, like Windows 98, to stop working. If you were running Windows XP pre-SP2, you were lucky. But SP2 broke things down.

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updated August 13, 2010, category: Software & security

Windows Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) is not something you want to see on your computer monitor, unless you're using a certain screensaver or testing software. But now and then, Windows users do experience the ultimate software failure case, that of the kernel itself, which results in a complete system freeze and eventually a crash.

In Linux, this kind of situation is known as kernel panic. In Windows, it is called BSOD. But it amounts to the same thing: a critical, unrecoverable exception in the core of the system, the kernel and accompanying drivers.

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updated August 12, 2010, category: Software & security

With Internet lines growing fatter by the year and disk space bulging up, home entertainment is flourishing. Woe a TV that does not support Wireless or has no USB ports. Many of us having large, colorful catalogs with hundreds of high-definition movies stored on a disk. Streaming movies live is another pasttime commodity many of us all take for granted. Mostly, we do this on our computers, far from the leisure of the big plasma in the living room. But how about doing that with style?

Would you like to transform your television into a powerful media center with Internet connectivity, network sharing, video and music playlists, photo albums, weather forecast, maybe even games? Enter XBMC.

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updated July 26, 2010, category: Software & security

A few days ago, I bored you to death with Windows. Today, I'm going to bore you to death with Linux. All right, I've already written two rather prosaic articles debating the Linux security model, in direct relation to Windows and associated claims of wondrous infections and lacks thereof. However, I have not shown you even a single program that you can use on your Linux machine to gauge your security; all of the solutions were conceptual, which makes them universal - a good thing.

Today, I will focus on specific vectors of security, within the world of reason and moderation that I've created and show you how you can bolster a healthy strategy with some tactical polish, namely software.

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updated July 24, 2010, category: Software & security

For those wondering, FRAPS is a Windows program that can be used to record video streams of applications running on your desktop, most often games. For instance, I've used FRAPS to grab a handful of cool videos while playing Live for Speed.

Being able to record your desktop activities has many aspects - educational, tutorial and sometimes sheer bravado. There are circumstances where nothing short of a video demonstration is going to work.

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updated July 23, 2010, category: Software & security

Have you noticed a disturbing trend in the recent years? Yes, I'm talking about ridiculous names given to technological products released in the last couple of years. These products have lots in common: an extreme, almost abstract simplification of usability aimed at the common, modernistic, Web 2.0 user, lots of eye polish, and yes, a name that sounds something taken from Tolkien's books, only adapted to 21st century.

Without blasting this article with a spam list of brands, which I'm sure you can derive on your own, MeeGo is one such product. The successor to Moblin, which stood, more logically for Mobile Linux, without ever uttering the dreadful geek words aloud, MeeGo is a joint effort by Intel and Nokia at creating a sleep, slick, youthful operating system for low-power devices, including netbooks and smartphones.

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updated July 21, 2010, category: Software & security

I'm probably boring you to death by now with my slightly revolutionary preachings, but the best way to hone in a message is by repeating it incessantly, with only small variations in the general tone. After all, that is what politicians do all the time. Seriously, I've been giving the whole security thingie a lot of thought lately. Not so much as follow the well-known, well-oiled mantras, more like taking a very good look at the security arena and filtering out the crud. And there seems to be quite a lot of it.

Today, I'd like to take another step forward and make your security model even more efficient and foolproof than before. Don't panic, read the whole thing before you judge.

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updated July 19, 2010, category: 3D art

Welcome to the Lateral! This is my (Dedoimedo's wife) dream of a little piece of paradise on the Adriatic coast, somewhere in Central Dalmatia. The Lateral is an eco-friendly aparment-hotel situated on a steep seaside bluff. The terraced structure allows for private and independant apartment-units, each with an unobstructed view of the Adriatic.

This gallery is unique and different from the others in that it incorporates work in two different 3D design programs. Google SketchUp was used to create the external mockup. Chief Architect Better Homes and Gardens was used to create apartment-units. Final touch to sea and beach was added in GIMP.

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updated July 17, 2010, category: Software & security

The latest Ubuntu release is very good and does not need any major fixes or improvements. Still, during my recent testing spree, which led me to no less than five separate installations of Lucid, I encountered a few small issues that Ubuntu could happily live without. Then, I thought of a few more things that could be added/removed and so, this article was born.

The general principle of continuous improvement is valid for just about any operating system, so singling out Ubuntu seemed a little unfair and skewed, but given the facts it is the most popular desktop distro and Lucid being the three-year LTS release with a radical new interface, this is a good opportunity to think of features and concepts that could be brushed up toward the next version.

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updated July 16, 2010, category: Software & security

Do you know what will happen in 2017? RedHat Enterprise Linux 6 will still be officially supported, seven years after being introduced in late 2010. This is a good thing. But do you know what's even better? CentOS 6, the free version of RHEL 6 lacking the commercial vendor support, will also be available to Linux users, offering super long support, stability and enterprise-grade quality. Sounds great.

The only thing you need to ask yourselves is: how good is (or will be) RHEL 6? I hope to answer that question today. At least partially, since we're talking Beta release, after all. And since testing beta versions is tricky, I promise a full, detailed reviewed once the operating system is officially released. I will probably focus on CentOS and show you all kinds of desktop things, in addition to core technology improvements. But that's future. Now, we have a chance to get to know RHEL 6.

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updated July 14, 2010, category: Software & security

You must have heard of Nir Sofer. He's the cool dude behind nirsoft.net, the website containing approx. a hundred small-size, portable, effective, highly useful tools for the Windows operating system. Not without a reason is nirsoft.net listed as one of my favorites on the Greatest sites page.

Any self-respecting Windows nerd has used Nir's tools now and then. Whether it is a disk issue, a privacy issue, something to do with the shell context, network traffic, autostarting processes, or lost passwords, there's a handy tool available. And in the stunning variety of dedicated tools lies its Achilles' Heel. There are so many of them.

But now, problem solved. You no longer need to download them manually or keep track. Nir has released a new tool called Nirlauncher, the one toolbox to find them all and in geekiness bind them.

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updated July 12, 2010, category: Software & security

If you're not familiar with the acronym BDSM, I recommend you wiki for it first. Make sure you do this in a quiet, peaceful place, preferably with no wife, children or coworkers around. It's not that your eyes are going to melt, it's just that some might find your newly acquired taste in leather, whips and punishment a little odd. So what's my angle?

Well, making an operating system that works on the principle of sin and punishment sounds like a darn good idea. Today, computer users use and misuse their machines any which way, with no regard to their digital health. There's no accountability, save for really dire things. Most of what we do with and to our computers is whim, accident, monkey-learned habit, and maybe, just maybe, a bit of productivity.

It's time for the software to strike back. Introducing BDSM operating system.

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updated July 10, 2010, category: Software & security

Google SketchUp is one of my favorite applications. It's a free 3D software that I use to create my fabulous 3D models. It works well and lets my imagination and fingers do their magic. It's an excellent therapy for mind and soul. There's only one problem, so to speak. It has been designed to work on Windows and Mac only, with no Linux version in the offing.

All in all, it's not a tragedy, since I believe in using any software and/or operating system that meets the requirements. If you need to draw a bit, you power Windows and do what needs to be done. But some people may not have the privilege to make the cross-platform choice. For them, Google SketchUp is on the wish-list. Or is it?

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updated July 9, 2010, category: Life topics

In the last several weeks, Facebook has undergone massive privacy-related changes that seemed to have triggered a wave of shock, outrage and, most importantly, blog posts worldwide. While most Facebook users are largely ignorant of the changes and most bloggers foam at the mouth and panic away at this blatant misuse of users' privacy, I think that both groups are in the wrong.

Facebook should not be used, period. Not because of privacy changes or deliberate experiments done by the company in an attempt to see how naughty they can get before getting spanked on their e-tush. There is a number of far simpler, more fundamental reasons. Now, let me tell you why you should not be using Facebook.

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updated July 8, 2010, category: Computer games

Oh, we did talk about top payware games, but which ones are truly the best? If I had to narrow the list down to just five games, which ones would those be? And how do you decide? Well, the price is one thing. If you're willing to shell out a few drachma without hesitation, then it's the first good sign. There's the excitement, of course. Nostalgia factor plays a lesser part here, compared to free games, but it might just be the extra incentive you need.

While year 2010 is far from being over, this article lists my prime choices of payware games currently available for Linux. I believe they offer the best overall experience in terms of fun, completeness, detail, and depth. In other words, these games are a creation of well-crafted, well-executed professional work. Plus, most importantly, at the end of the day, you feel good about playing them. While they cannot compete with twenty years of ancient sainthood that OpenTTD or Scorched 3D have, they still are a very decent bunch.

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updated July 6, 2010, category: Software & security

In the past several years, I've written about a handful of office-related programs and utilities, all revolving around desktop usage. However, I have not yet shown you any Web-based office service yet. Well, in the age of the unstoppable growth of the Internet, the blurring of the boundary between a plain browser and a multipurpose Web tool and the rising popularity of low-power netbooks, having a static office suite installed on your machine is so yesterday. Why not have it all online, in the big shiny cloud?

Personally, I do take a more conservative approach to office productivity. However, online Web-based services do make a lot of sense. You have all your stuff available, always, anywhere you go, provided there's electricity and an Internet connection, that is. Furthermore, the offsite storage of your documents means your stuff is safely backed up. If you have a low-power computer or must travel around the globe, you need not worry about programs, compatibility, file formats, languages, or anything of that sort. You're mobile and flexible and you make sure the online service does all the hard work for you.

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updated July 3, 2010, category: Software & security

Every now and then I head into my favorite local computer store and buy a handful of gadgets, mainly disks of all kinds. Just a few weeks ago, I bought a 640GB Western Digital 2.5-inch Passport external USB drive, which I started using for multi-booting various Linux distributions off my RD510 laptop, including Ubuntu, Linux Mint and others. As the machine was already clogged with a quadruple boot, exploring new operating systems would necessitate wiping some of those away or using a second hard disk.

Well, I knew the device would come preformatted with NTFS and loaded with all kinds of garbage utilities that no one needs. However, I did not expect a hidden partition to be included, one that most conventional partitioning tools could not detect or delete.

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updated July 2, 2010, category: Hillbilly physics

This is something that often comes to mind, albeit at a frontier of a thought already conceived. How fast are our thoughts? Are they physical? Or maybe a by-product of simple physical things like electric current and suchlike? Can thoughts be measured? If not, are they bound by physical laws? Could a thought be faster than the speed of light? If so, what happens when that happens? Is there such a thing as premonition? Can we forethink our thoughts? How does telepathy fit in here?

In this article, I'd like to be creative and discuss the delicate mechanism of our thinking. I'll try to answer all of the questions above without getting philosophical; just pure speculated physics. Well, the beauty about discussing phenomena that science has no formal definition is that anyone can talk about them any which way and sound smart, provided they use reasonably plausible arguments for their dissertation. Which is exactly what I'm going to do.

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updated June 30, 2010, category: Software & security

Linux Mint is a very popular, Ubuntu-based Linux distribution. It's Ubuntu with extra polish and more features for new and less experienced people, making it friendly and usable out of the box. For me, the general sentiment has always run true. Mint has shown good behavior and never fell short of the expectations. Funny though, for an unknown, cosmic reason, I have always tested the even-numbered Mint releases, Daryna, Felicia, Helena. Today, I'll break the rule and have a go at Mint 9, codename Isadora.

Linux Mint 9 is a very important, very critical release. Why, you ask? Well, first, it is based on Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx, a Long Term Support (LTS) release, which will offer updates and patches till mid 2013; this is a good thing for people who do not fancy upgrading every six months. Second, Isadora has a daring task of being better than its parent. That's the rule; Linux Mint comes out a month after Ubuntu, pimped up with all the little details and features that are not included in Ubuntu by default. Now, if Ubuntu 10.04 were a bad release, this would be an easy task. However, as it turns out, Lucid Lynx is the best Ubuntu release yet.

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updated June 28, 2010, category: Computer games

Best is subjective. My best may not be your best. Still, I wanted to share with you my perception of the best Linux games you can have installed on your machine, in year 2010, Gregorian Calendar. These games offer an unrivaled mix of storyline, attention to detail and a balance between realism and plain ole fun. These are more than just games you will play for a few minutes and then toss away forever. These are games that you will keep returning to, even if they sit abandoned on the digital shelf for a a few months or even years. They are special.

What makes them special?

Well, for me, it's a combination of legacy, reminiscence and nostalgia combined, plus damn good fun. Some of these games are reincarnations of childhood titans, games that have kept me plastered to the chair and playing, playing, playing until pixels ran out. Then, all of a sudden, you get a mega-upgrade, however unlike movie sequels that come a decade too late, these were a tremendous success. The rest are just plain good games, as simple as that. Fun, with a good mix of solid gameplay, system requirements and graphics.

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updated June 26, 2010, category: Software & security

It is a well known fact, right? Windows operating system is easy, whereas Linux is a frightening tool for geeks. Whether this is a misconception created by fear and ignorance, a culmination of many years of real life experience sprinkled with some aggressive advertisement or just a buzzword, well, it has yet to be seen - in this article.

I have already shattered some myths about the easiness and intuitiveness of usage models in my multimedia codecs article, but it's time to up the ante and give you some really cool examples why the phrase easy when juxtaposed to operating system is nothing short of nonsense.

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updated June 26, 2010, category: Advertise on Dedoimedo

In honor of Dedoimedo's fourth birthday, I have decided to offer a few bargain advertisement deals.

The first two eligible software vendors, companies or website owners to contact me by mail will receive one month free slot on either the homepage or the Software & security page.

Likewise, the first three bidders to purchase a six-month lease on advertisement slots will receive a whole year deal. That's six months, for free!

First come first served. Have fun, fellas.

updated June 26, 2010

With great pride and joy, Dedoimedo celebrates its fourth birthday today. Wow, the lad is growing fast! And already he has chest hair. With Google Pagerank 5 and some 400,000+ monthly visits, Dedoimedo is becoming an ever more important slice of the big online world. This is a great opportunity to thank you all for your support and loyalty.

May we enjoy many more fruitful years together!

updated June 25, 2010, category: Software & security

I started getting mildly interested in boot time performance and benchmarking after I purchased my RD510 laptop and installed four instances of Jaunty on it. Very soon, I learned that the default installation, with no tweaking or modifications, yielded a handsome 18-second boot on the third installed system, located on the slow end of a fairly standard 5,400rpm laptop disk. The results on the first disk were even more encouraging, just 15 seconds. I believed that if my laptop were equipped with a 7,200rpm disk, I would have broken the 10 second barrier.

I skipped Karmic on my production machines, but Lucid is a different story altogether. I love the distro very much; it's slowly replacing Jaunty as the major Ubuntu flavor on my various machines. This begs the question, does Lucid bring in any improvements required to break the 10-second barrier?

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updated June 23, 2010, category: Software & security

Wine is an important software applications that aims to allows UNIX-like operating systems to execute programs designed for Windows. Wine is the most prevalent method of bridging the cross-platform gaps of finance, licensing, usage models, and expectations that people running Windows and UNIX-like systems might encounter. Along with full-blown virtualization, it offers the benefit of flexibility that you might not natively have.

Working with Wine takes patience and some basic knowledge, though. For one, you're most likely to use Wine by executing commands in a terminal, which does not come easily to less knowledgeable users. Then, you may sometimes need to hack a file or two, download missing libraries and additional components, figuring out the error messages and trace logs, all in all not a friendly tasks for anyone just peacefully wishing to enjoy their Windows software - and games - in Linux.

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updated June 21, 2010, category: 3D art

Ever wished that the rooms of your home were like lego-blocks, and you could shift and rearrange them to better suit you and your needs? Sometimes something that sounds very reasonable like a two-bedroom-one-bathroom can turn out to have one of the craziest layouts, that makes you wonder what were they thinking ...

In this design I treat each room like a lego-block. Combined, they can be arranged into any number of different layouts. So, I created a list of all the rooms I would like to have in this house: all the must rooms and some extras like a library, a pantry and utility room and a summer kitchen.

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updated June 19, 2010, category: Software & security

Yes, everyone. Even the most hardcore Linux hater should run Linux. While this sounds absolutely contrary to simple logic, it aligns perfectly well with cunning logic, as I'm going to elaborate here. We're not talking politics, ideology, zeal, Borg-like assimilation, or anything of that sort. We're not talking cutting your costs in dire situation caused by some would-be financial crisis. We're not talking freedom, free software or replacing existing business models with one that revolves around open-source. We're talking money. Your money.

Oh, you won't get any money from running Linux, per se, not in most cases, anyway. But you will save money. And not by spending less on Linux. You will spend less on Windows. Sounds tricky? It's not. Follow me.

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updated June 19, 2010, category: Perks

I am not going to lie to you. I do not need money to help me cover the website costs. I do not need help making a living. Website business, so to speak, and the day job are doing just fine, no worries there, touch wood. But I could do with some extra extra money for perks, which is where you step in. What am I trying to say?

If you like Dedoimedo and feel this compelling urge to donate money, let me tell you what I intend to do with donated funds. I'm going to buy myself a hot hatchback, a small-sized, mid-range sports car. Specifically, we're talking Volkswagen Golf GTI.

updated June 18, 2010, category: Software & security

Testing Fedora is like stuffing a badger down your trousers; you don't really know when it's going to bite. On the same note, Fedora is the mirror unto Linux community. It's the most popular distribution among veteran users and reflects the society as well as the technological advancement of the geek-o-sphere. You get a very fast release cycle, only free software and lots of bugs in return for the bleeding edge of technology and the sensation of superiority. Now, Fedora 13 Goddard has been released several weeks ago. At first, I considered skipping the spring edition.

Reading the release notes, I found of wealth of goodies in there, except that very few concerned the desktop user. Most of the changes are underneath the hood, in kernel space, where the geeks abide. For the casual user, the desktop remains virtually untouched.

But then, reading some more, I decided to give Fedora 13 a chance. I must say it was a good decision. You will discover why after reading through the review.

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updated June 17, 2010, category: Computer games

Linux games are many and varied. You can find pretty much anything you need, from simple arcades via racing all the way to expansive and elaborate tactical shooters. Still, one aspect of the Linux gaming scene is underplayed, this being the Real Time Strategy (RTS). For whatever reason, there's a lack of great strategy games for Linux. You will find some, but not as many as you would hope for. However, that is about to change. The magic words: Heroes of Newerth.

Heroes of Newerth (HoN) is a game created by S2 Games, the company behind Savage and Savage 2 shooters. Since I really liked the previous titles, I was really pleased when the open beta was released about two months ago. I promptly downloaded the game and started exploring.

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updated June 14, 2010, category: Software & security

Finally, the big moment has come. Reading the information displayed by the crash utility, understanding what those curious lines mean and hacking your way through the problem to the other side.

We have learned how to configure our systems for kernel crash dumping, using LKCD and Kdump, both locally and across the network. We have learned how to setup the crash dumping mechanism on both CentOS and openSUSE, and we reviewed the subtle differences between the two operating systems. Next, we mastered the basic usage of the crash utility, using it to open the dumped memory core and process the information contained therein. But we did not yet learn to interpret the output.

Today, we will focus on just that. Read the vmcore analysis, understand what the entries mean, perform basic investigation of the problem, examine the source code, and derive an efficient methodology for handling kernel crash problems in the future.

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updated June 12, 2010, category: Software & security

Occasionally, I go through my various so-called spam email accounts, which I use for registering to all kinds of products I do not really want, I do not really need or just plain wish to test software, without bombarding my more important inboxes with tons of mails.

To cut the long story short, I came across an email sent by a security vendor, reminding me, no urging me with the liver-transplant sort of urgency, to renew my subscription to their product, lest my pixels perish. I spent a minute or two staring at the email, thinking about all the poor souls out there who do not have the comfort of being a geek and who may actually take the advertisement seriously. And then I decided to write this article. And maybe a few people will heed it and make some good.

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updated June 11, 2010, category: Software & security

You all know that I absolutely love Linux Puppy. I've tried Puppy years ago and instantly loved it, loved the precise art of fitting so many great, useful programs and tools into such a tiny package. After Puppy 2.1, I tried version 4.1. Again, so much improvement, so much pleasure. I've also tried a number of puplets, specialized, remastered versions of this phenomenal distribution, including Macpup and TEENpup. Without a doubt, Puppy has always been the king of small distros. And now, there's a new reason to love it even more. Version 5.

Puppy Linux has reached its fifth incarnation, with Ubuntu Linux Lucid LTS release as its core. This is an important and smart change. On one hand, you get Puppy's lean, mean ingenuity, tightly packed with awesomeness. On the other, you get Ubuntu's heavyweight simplicity and usability, which has made it the easily most popular Linux distribution over the years. Do you know what this means? The best live CD distribution.

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updated June 9, 2010, category: Software & security

OMG, what? My refrigerator, that thingie that keeps all them foods and whatnot cool and edible can run Linux? Well, definitely. And in this article, I will show you how.

First, let's make things straight. Your ultra-modern fridges already have micro operating systems installed. Their firmware is quite smart and will do lots of nifty things, like regulate air flow, prepare ice cubes, etc. But what about the old machines? Aha!

All right, I have your attention. Now, follow my recipe to having your fridge rev Linux like a good sport, in just five dead-easy steps.

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updated June 7, 2010, category: Computer games

Who said Linux games have to cost nothing? Well, quite a few people, actually. But just as you pay, or at least, are expected to pay for Windows games, there's no reason why you should not do the same thing in Linux. Creating high-quality games takes lots of work and effort. While many of us believe programmers are photosynthetic and live on PC screen emissions, the truth is they also need to earn money and provide for their families. If a game bears a price tag, then it's no reason to skip it, just because your operating system is free.

Payware games do not necessarily have to be better than free titles. In fact, there's no clear relation between price and quality. For any number of half-finished, amateur-looking free games, there's the equal number of overpriced garbage titles. Similarly, you can find exceptionally well made freeware games, just as some of the best Linux games require than you pay for them.

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updated June 5, 2010, category: Software & security

Desktop users with geeky tendencies are mostly familiar with the VMware line of products and VirtualBox, which has changed parenthood three times in the past few years, from innotek via Sun to Oracle. Then, Linux users also have KVM and Xen, which are a little more complicated and not quite so mainstream; a big thing in the enterprise world to be sure, but not something most home users will try. Microsoft also has a product called VirtualPC, but it's not quite on par with VMware or VirtualBox.

Now, there's another competitor on the rapidly growing virtualization market.

It's called VMLite. Truth to be told, it's not a brand new technology; VMLite is based on VirtualBox. But its goal is a bit different. Rather than being an all-around virtualization program, VMLite caters mainly to Windows users looking for an improved productivity, sandboxing applications securely and bridging compatibility issues between Windows XP and Windows 7, all without having a fancy, modern CPU with VT extensions.

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updated June 4, 2010, category: Software & security

For those wondering, ni hao is hello in Mandarin. It's only befitting because YlmF is a Chinese derivative of Ubuntu. All right. So why should you care about yet another Ubuntu fork? Well, YlmF is not just any fork.

YlmF is a distribution specially developed to cater to Chinese market, a huge and underestimated pool of computer users, currently running mostly a pirated version of Windows. And how do you wean off all those users off their ignoble operating system? Well, very simple. You offer them a free version of what they're using. Almost.

YlmF is Linux, so it's not Windows. But it's designed to look and feel like Windows XP, including the classic looks. For less knowledgeable users, it as near as makes no difference.

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updated June 2, 2010, category: Computer games

Great computers games are like love at first sight. The moment you power on the game, you know it's something different and you know you're going to love it. This is what happened to me with Live For Speed. While reading about VDrift, a cross-platform racing simulator, on Wikipedia I noticed a reference to Live for Speed (LFS). The game had a free demo available, so I downloaded it. Five minutes into the tutorial, I was hooked. Ten minutes later, I headed to the official website and bought the full version, S2, which unlocks numerous other cars and tracks and allows online multiplayer mode.

It's the best digital investment I had in a long, long time.

Finding the right adjectives to describe LFS is not easy. Calling it a game would be unfair. The mere fact it takes place on your computer screen does not make any less realistic than actually driving. As pompous as that sounds, it's the sheer truth. LFS is the closest you will ever come to experiencing proper driving without sitting in a car. And the difference is not that big.

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updated May 31, 2010

Usually, I start the Greatest sites section update with a somewhat prosaic intro, with the hope of filling up enough space to create a presentable news item. Well, today, I'd like to try a slight different approach; a snippet of the entry for one of the new candidates. Indeed, we have one in the General category and one in the Humor category. Now, the promised snippet of goodies about to come.

Working with media files can be a difficult task. Basically, you have music and video, but things get a little more complicated than that. There's MPEG-1/2/3/4, there's AVI. What's a difference between a container format and the actual codec? Is there any difference at all? What about OGG and MKV? How can you stream that raw video from your camera to your DVD player? Then, you have encryption, DRM, subtitles, shrinking, ripping, a ton of topics that are not as trivial as one might expect. What do you do? Which site do you go to?

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updated May 29, 2010, category: 3D art

I got hit by a wave of inspiration while reading an excellent book on Soviet-era ekranoplans. One of the concepts mentioned in the book was a lunatic proposal of creating a flying aircraft carrier, a 10,000-ton platform that would skim low above the Caspian Sea or the Black Sea, carrying weapons and aircraft. While it was never realized, Russians did go ahead with Beriev Be-2500, which is no less impressive when it comes to pushing the limits of aerodynamics to new, insane levels.

What I decided to do was take the classic carrier concept and turn it into a flying fortress. Instead of creating a lighter-than-air machine with huge wings, I went for a combination of classic aircraft design and VTOL capabilities on gigantic scale, spawning what is essentially a Harrier-like aircraft carrier.

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updated May 28, 2010, category: Software & security

Recently, I've come across a few interesting, yet misleading articles debating the pros and cons, mostly pros, of using this or that Linux distribution as the ultimate solution to Windows security problems, including frequent malware infections and reinfections and other related issues. While the overall conclusion might be correct, the specific analogies used to prove the point and bring you to said conclusion are most erroneous.

As a rational, logical and rather impartial Linux user, I would like to give you a sanity check regarding your security habits and computer usage models, using the neverending Windows vs. Linux analogies as the stepping stone for crossing the bridge of confusion.

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updated May 26, 2010, category: Software & security

Sometime last year, when an 8-year-old vulnerability was found in the Linux kernel, Microsoft fans were having a party. They called Linux insecure and whatnot, spewing fire and accusations left and right. Forget for a moment the fact it was only a local privilege escalation thingie, hardly something to fuss about it. It was a golden moment for any anti-Linux lobbyist worldwide. Alas, the world of geeks is a cruel one.

The tables turn before you can say Ivanov Ivanov Fardjev graph. Lo and behold, not that long ago, a 17-year old vulnerability was found in Windows. Yup. Not just mere eight years. We're talking almost two full decades. And to make it all that much sweeter, the vulnerability is as valid for Microsoft's latest darling Windows 7 as it is for the now extinct Windows 3.1. It was time for Linux geeks and anti-Microsoft fans to go wild with cruel glee.

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updated May 24, 2010, category: Software & security

Recently, I received an email from a user asking how to install new themes in a Gnome-based desktop, in one of the popular Linux distributions, like Mandriva, Linux Mint or others. I have considered this setup to be trivial, but it turns out it is not.

Today, I will show you how to install new themes in a typical Gnome desktop and how to customize them, including changing windows decorations, colors, icons, and more. We will also talk about the best online resources for finding the themes, plus a few useful tips about browsing and using the varying content. So let's do-oo-ooooo it, as Captain Flashheart would say.

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updated May 22, 2010, category: Software & security

Like many a geek, I waste my CPU cycles thinking how the computing world can be improved, made more secure, more efficient, less vulnerable to human errors, more attuned to the varied and dissimilar needs, desires and skills of the myriad users. There's no easy answer, including the paradoxical fundamental truth that computers are made by geeks for geeks. For thirty years the desktop has existed, no one has yet found the golden formula of making computers usage wise. I have.

The solution is very simple: Make computer users accountable for their actions. Anchor the usage in the bedrock of law. Introduce civil and criminal punishment for digital misdeeds.

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