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The Knightcast : KC0015 "The Social Interactive web" 24-6-08.
In Kc0015 we unlock the Secrets of the Social Web and tap into pure peer power. Find out where to find the answers to your questions and put this powerfull medium to work. Where to find information, how to contribute and how to behave. Its all here .. for just 99.59$ .. oh wait .. thats another show :) Enjoy Kc0015 !
Shownotes for episode KC0015 "The Social Interactive Web"
Timestamp
Introduction "why todays topic".
Part 1 : The social interactive web : How do you get there.
Music thanx to Rich.
Part 2 : Dont be a noob, how to behave in the social interactive web.
Signoff
Download the episode by clicking on the Icon.
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There is a point in time where things change, where a balance tips, ever so slightly, from one side to the other. Where a moment in time, even so briefly as a day ago .. seems like an eternity. Where tomorrow becomes today and yesterday becomes a long time ago. Today I feel, is such a day. After toying around with linux for a few years I get the distinct feeling that something has changed. Up until now I have been thinking in terms of " Things I can do with Linux and things I can't do with Linux" Even though I have been tinkering and fiddling with the whole operating system for a few years now, i'm mostly a command line noob skirting the fringes of Linux's true potential. Mildly intimidated by the myriad of commands and switches that lurked beneath the console, I looked for gui alternatives, workarounds and "other operating systems" when it came to solving my problems. There where a lot of things I didn't know about Linux and it felt like I would never be able to learn it all. So i just waddled and waded in the shallow waters of my experience, not daring to peek down the deep end.
But over the last few months that has started to change. Advocating Linux at my new workplace meant putting my money where my mouth is and letting linux do things. I've spent more and more time in the command line. At first copy-pasting manuals from the forums like some scriptkiddy, but gradually (through the process of making the same mistakes 100 times over and following the same manual an equal amount of times) the code mumbo jumbo started to make sense. Where I steered away from a tar.gz file in favor of a .deb installer.. I know ever dare to unzip it and try to do "make install" by myself. Its not that I have gathered a great amount of knowledge overnight, its more that the 'Fear, Uncertainty and doubt" is fading away. Instead of saying " These are the things I can do in Linux, these are the things I can't" I now dare to say 'These are the things I CAN do with Linux.. These are the things I can't do .. yet"
Somehow that intricate system of commands, folders and pipes hold the "possibility of being mastered" instead of the complexity to scare me away. So I think i'm taking another small step in the world of understanding and using Linux. Sure it's not done all at once .. but somewhere along the way, you tipp the see-saw and the whole thing changes.
I take a look at my computer screen and brush my gaze through the
myriad of icons on the desktop. Each one representing a file i'm
working on, a piece of music I like to listen to, or a picture I made
with my digital camera or downloaded somewhere from the internet. Below
my menu bar is filled with countless programs I have downloaded from
the Internet or that came with the heavily tweaked Ubuntu distribution
I have downloaded onto this little laptop. If I take the time to wonder
just how powerful this little machine is, and think of the capabilities
it and its software has, that I haven't tapped into.. It all adds up to
an astonishing amount. Video editing, Word Processing, Blogging,
Programming, Network administration, Audio manipulation and even good
old fun and games .. Its all there. A abundant bouquet of possibilities
waiting to be tapped into. And all of that .. is free. I payed zero
euro's or dollars in software and licensing costs and have been given a
system that does all that I want to do and more. So I peer over my
laptops screen at the slumbering city outside my window and wonder
"Where they are". And with They i mean the open source heroes. The ones
that make this miracle possible. This special brand of superheroes who
are the real legends behind this whole open source movement. Shy,
perhaps a little weird or even a tad nerdy, the wander through the
streets of the real world and go hardly unnoticed by the general
public. Except for the tux sticker on the back of their car, or the
Ubuntu case badge that sticks to the corner of their laptop-lid you
would not think that these are members of an exceptional theme of
superheroes.
No bat caves, Iron man suits, Wolverine like Claws
or spandex suits (at least not that I know of ) are required to join
this special brand of supermen who make open source happen every day.
They are the secret army that moves the free software movement. No
balding overpaid middle aged men, swaggering across a podium, yelling
some kind of mantra as sweat pools underneath their armpits. These are
the real heroes. Some of them code, some of them fix bugs, some of them
even podcast or publish a magazine. And others help. No flashing
business cards with "developer of this and that", no " Space : been
there done that" stickers on their windshield.. No amazing piece of
software on their repertoire. No .. these heroes just help out the
average joe like you and me.
When I got into Linux they told me
about " The Community " which I, at first mistakeably dubbed
"Nerdville". I was in the misconception that this was just a big bunch
of super intelligent nerds who mostly talked among themselves and
patted each other on the shoulder, ensuring one another they where very
cool. But as I said. I was wrong. " The Community " is not only a
powerful race of supermen who make it all happen, It is also built up
by those who help those who don't have the hang of it yet. They fight
the FUD every day. Help out those who are stuck. Give solutions to
those who are without hope and patiently direct some of us to at least
try to use the search function of the forums before asking the same
question for the gazillionth time.
To me .. these are my heroes.
I"m an open source advocate. Trying to push Linux wherever I can.
Saving a lot of money in the process for companies, schools and for the
average user. Not to mention I convert the occasional Windows user to
see the light. I tend to babble that Linux can do just about anything
they want and am right most of the time. But I'm not an advanced Linux
user. Sure I know what open source software can DO .. I just don't
always know HOW. This week for example i had suggested to move some of
our old servers to Linux so we could use them as VM-ware host systems.
An ideal solution for using older hardware to virtualize all the beige
boxes we test stuff on at work. Explaining the pro's of the whole
"Linux instead of something else" scenario I managed to get my boss
pretty enthusiastic for the idea. (although I must say : When it comes
to selling .. I have this bridge for sale ...) Wired up about the
prospect he said : Ok .. DO IT ! I looked around for the Linux guru
that must be standing behind me .. cause he didn't real mean ..ME ?
Turns out that he did. So with limited Linux skills I took to the
challenge. The old server fought me every step of the way .. but i had
powerfull friends in the right places. Its now three days later and
everything is working just fine. The chief is happy and I have learned
a lot about Linux.
But the real kudo's go out to the
community. Whenever I stumbled or had a question .. they where there.
Pretty soon I had found out that Google is not the answer to
everything. So I went to the forums. I explained my problems and people
helped me out .. just like that.. For Free ! They pointed me in the
right direction and took the time and effort to help a noob like me
bring Linux to yet another computer. And if all of that was not enough
.. there was Twitter. I asked and I did receive answers from total
strangers who took the time to help me out. And when all of that failed
and the FUD was ready to send me packing .. The people at IRC pulled me
through. Holding my hand step by step. A few hours of their time went
up in helping me get through it all. Helping this noob get it all
done.
So today I salute my heroes ! These guys at the forums who
help us out when we are stuck. The guys making the howto"s, sharing the
knowledge they have found. I bow my head in tribute to they guys at IRC
( Thank you Popey of #ubuntu-uk ) for being there for me. These guys
are the heroes that saved the day.
When I look at the
closed-source world and the prices for support, the openness to share
and the ability to grow .. I just know that Linux is going to be very
very big. All thanx to the Open Source Superheroes who have helped me
see that, with linux AND with the Linux community, there is nothing we
cannot achieve.
I have seen one of these little projectors a while ago on the web. A complete R2D2 media system : Very Cool. But these guys have taken it to the next level and pushed the geek factor up a little. The Little ARtoo unit is rigged to their Nagios Server Monitoring software and "alerts the helpdesk guyz" when something is wrong. Don't mind the poor acting , take a look at how this 3000 dollar gizzmo wakes up the guys in the helpdesk. Now I do wonder : What IT department has 3000 dollars to spend when it comes down to a gadget like this ? And who sold THAT to their IT Manager ? " Now Seriously Mr Conichiwa , We need to hook up a mobile R2-Unit to the Nagios System for advanced server monitoring" .. Wait .. to a manager guy thats all technospeak anyway. He might as well approved it right away ! Wait until I catch the boss today ! :)
The Knightcast : KC0014 "Virtual Insanity" 7-6-08.
Back after quite some time its time to delve back in into the world of virtual machines. We show you what software there is out there, what tools you can use and what the demands are of running virtual machines on your system. But more importantly we show you how virtual machines can work for you. Lets turn that powerfull machine in the corner into your own virtual computerfarm shall we ?
Shownotes for episode KC0014 "Virtual Insanity"
Timestamp
Introduction "What happened after the move".
Part 1 : The power of virtual machines. What is it ?
Having installed hardy heron on my little EEE-pc I was very pleased to have a complete version of Ubuntu running on my little white companion. Gone are the native Xandros days where I would have to poke and pry to find a snippet of useful ( or interesting ) software in the EEE-repositories they had put online, With Ubuntu running on ' the little one ' I have the same luxury I have when using my heavier linux machines : Complete access to the Ubuntu software repositories. One of the packages I found there a while ago is called ' open arena ' This one source clone ( our should i just say 'copy) of the immensely popular QUQKE 3 game is one of the things I tend to select when poking around in the Synaptic package manager.
Not that I'm an avid gamer anymore, but quake 3 was just one of these games I grew up with. I mean that in the sense that it was one of the first multi player fps shooters I came in contact with. There was of course Duke nuke'm 3d which we played to smithereens on the first pentium 1 systems we owned but Q3 was the first networked multi player shooter that deprived me of a lot of sleep around the turn of the century. At the time i was working a a junior sys engineer at a multimeda company that had a GAMES TESTING department. Mostly these guys would be testing boring games but, when quitting time came around the large testing room, filled with computers, would turn into a corporately sponsored lan party. The guys who thought me the game where, even then, already competing in online tournaments. So little me got to 'play along' being mostly cannon fodder in the beginning. I must go fragged more time then i could breathe in those first games , but gradually ( playing with the big boys ) I got better. After some time the action packed Q3 made room for the more tactical counter strike that I enjoyed to play into the wee hours as well.
The funny part of the story is that , back then we needed ' high speed, fine tuned gaming machines ' to run the Q3. Good graphics cards, enough ram and so on. When I was playing around with my EEE-pc I decided to install 'open-arena' on it, and guess what ? it works like a charm on what is considered a 'low end' laptop these days :) So when the opportunity i will give 'sarge, bones and all the other bots a serious run for their money on the smallest computer I own.
Having moved recently I find it peculiar to see how there are small but subtle differences between cities in the same region. We have moved south about 20 miles from Hasselt ( District capital of our province ) to a smaller town near the border. Where Hasselt can be described as a modern thriving city , our current place of residence might be called ' moderately conservative ' when it comes to following along in the latest trends. The fact that it IS the oldest city in the country might just have something to do with that. As a result things are not 'that cutting edge' around here when it comes to fashion and technology and stuff. No major computer store around every corner, no pda carrying yuppies crossing the street.. stuff like that. So as a EEE-pc wielding technology enthousiast I tend to stand out just a little. But one of the areas where this ( dare I say 'backwatered') city does have an inkling of progress over Hasselt is by the way its inhabitants deal with their wifi.
In Hasselt wireless access points where abundant. Even from the comfort of our own living room I could scan and find several wifi hotspots, at least half of them unsecured. Walking into the city center it got even better : Free wifi was a guaranteed service for me. Just about every coffee shop, sandwich bar or bench that I would use would have some kind of open wifi available. Watching seesmic, using pidgin, doing some blogging .. No matter where I went .. some wireless DHCP server was waiting to give me some free wifi love.
Down here however its a different story. True , I must do some ' war-walking' through the town centre to make a good assessment of the open-wifi situation, but what i've seen so far is a little disconcerting. First of all : the sheer number of wifi access points is lower then in Hasselt. This is a 'lower tech' area so that can be expected. BUT : Almost ALL of the wifi spots I detected are secured. So for a low tech area the 'knowledge level' of the owners of these hotspots is higher then in uptown Hasselt ? That is indeed a very peculiar observation.
Peculiar or not : It leaves me , Knight-'can i have free wifi with that latte'-wise with a little bit of a problem. Am i going to have to revert to off-line life when on the move in the town centre ? Am i required to boot into Windows in order to activate my 3g UMTS card ( it doesn't work under windows ) who will know. Talking on #freshubuntu yesterday I was informed that their are umts-cards supported under Linux but the chance they will be available here ( and work with my provider ) are slim.
Perhaps it IS time to take my rather innocent transgressions of hitching a ride on an open wifi spot a step more towards the dark side and look into a slice of AIRCRACK to gently pry my way into the net.. or would that be a walk on the dark side ?
There is a point in time where things change, where a balance tips, ever so slightly, from one side to the other. Where a moment in time, even so briefly as a day ago .. seems like an eternity. Where tomorrow becomes today and yesterday becomes a long time ago. Today I feel, is such a day. After toying around with linux for a few years I get the distinct feeling that something has changed. Up until now I have been thinking in terms of " Things I can do with Linux and things I can't do with Linux" Even though I have been tinkering and fiddling with the whole operating system for a few years now, i'm mostly a command line noob skirting the fringes of Linux's true potential. Mildly intimidated by the myriad of commands and switches that lurked beneath the console, I looked for gui alternatives, workarounds and "other operating systems" when it came to solving my problems. There where a lot of things I didn't know about Linux and it felt like I would never be able to learn it all. So i just waddled and waded in the shallow waters of my experience, not daring to peek down the deep end.
I take a look at my computer screen and brush my gaze through the
myriad of icons on the desktop. Each one representing a file i'm
working on, a piece of music I like to listen to, or a picture I made
with my digital camera or downloaded somewhere from the internet. Below
my menu bar is filled with countless programs I have downloaded from
the Internet or that came with the heavily tweaked Ubuntu distribution
I have downloaded onto this little laptop. If I take the time to wonder
just how powerful this little machine is, and think of the capabilities
it and its software has, that I haven't tapped into.. It all adds up to
an astonishing amount. Video editing, Word Processing, Blogging,
Programming, Network administration, Audio manipulation and even good
old fun and games .. Its all there. A abundant bouquet of possibilities
waiting to be tapped into. And all of that .. is free. I payed zero
euro's or dollars in software and licensing costs and have been given a
system that does all that I want to do and more. So I peer over my
laptops screen at the slumbering city outside my window and wonder
"Where they are". And with They i mean the open source heroes. The ones
that make this miracle possible. This special brand of superheroes who
are the real legends behind this whole open source movement. Shy,
perhaps a little weird or even a tad nerdy, the wander through the
streets of the real world and go hardly unnoticed by the general
public. Except for the tux sticker on the back of their car, or the
Ubuntu case badge that sticks to the corner of their laptop-lid you
would not think that these are members of an exceptional theme of
superheroes.
Having installed hardy heron on my little EEE-pc I was very pleased to have a complete version of Ubuntu running on my little white companion. Gone are the native Xandros days where I would have to poke and pry to find a snippet of useful ( or interesting ) software in the EEE-repositories they had put online, With Ubuntu running on ' the little one ' I have the same luxury I have when using my heavier linux machines : Complete access to the Ubuntu software repositories. One of the packages I found there a while ago is called ' open arena ' This one source clone ( our should i just say 'copy) of the immensely popular QUQKE 3 game is one of the things I tend to select when poking around in the Synaptic package manager.
Having moved recently I find it peculiar to see how there are small but subtle differences between cities in the same region. We have moved south about 20 miles from Hasselt ( District capital of our province ) to a smaller town near the border. Where Hasselt can be described as a modern thriving city , our current place of residence might be called ' moderately conservative ' when it comes to following along in the latest trends. The fact that it IS the oldest city in the country might just have something to do with that. As a result things are not 'that cutting edge' around here when it comes to fashion and technology and stuff. No major computer store around every corner, no pda carrying yuppies crossing the street.. stuff like that. So as a EEE-pc wielding technology enthousiast I tend to stand out just a little. But one of the areas where this ( dare I say 'backwatered') city does have an inkling of progress over Hasselt is by the way its inhabitants deal with their wifi.