“No happily ever after ..” as Google reader gets shut down.
Mar 14When I opened up my window to cyberspace this morning, the news was all over the web : Google announced the termination of Google Reader starting June 1st. This extremely handy service that has been a major source of information and content filtering for me over the last couple of years , is about to return a ‘404 not found’ page when summer rolls along. Suggestions for alternatives are abundant and possible “replacements” for Google Reader see their servers crumbling because of the massive exodus off yet another Google product that is sinking. As I fret to find out a way to sustain my automated information scripts .. I fearfully glance towards Feedburner and their single basket holding all my podcast feeds (and the only link to my subscribers). As cries of outrage (in the form of animated gif images) fill the web .. the sets in : The cloud fairy tale has no “happily ever after”.
After the collapse of the web 2.0 bubble and the zillions of startups that had no sustainable business model (aside from burning venture capital) we thought that “The Cloud” had come of age. Surely the big players like Microsoft and Google with their countless free services would be a “Safe bet” for our internet needs ? So we laughed at the nerds who ran their own mail servers. We scuffed our local ISP’s with their POP3 accounts and shoved our entire digital communication stream towards Yahoo, Microsoft or Google. As these giants lured us in with extra services and functionality .. that “webmail” account soon started to become a part of an ever growing ecosystem in which we entrusted our data and our workflows. Pretty soon “Sign up here” became the surrogate for “install now” and we watched our laptops turn into nothing more then pimped out Thin Clients. Office in the cloud, Mail in the cloud, Storage in the Cloud, Backups in the Cloud.. everything was possible and we thought it would last forever.
But there is no such thing as happily ever after.
As a cross platform slider who moves from OS to OS (and from device to device) the cloud was a great solution. The downside is that it is not one that is going to last forever. Somewhere, cloud based solutions from big players got the status of being eternal, but they are not. Google Reader brings another name to the list of soon to be terminated services, Hotmail and MSN Messenger being other A-listers here. As we signed up to yet another free service we boldly shouted : ‘If they ever make us pay .. we will leave’. Today I hear people offer cold hard cash to keep their Google Reader (or IGoogle service) alive.
So not every fairy tale has a happy ending and you don’t always get a chance to pay. Sometimes free services don’t stop becoming free, they stop becoming anything. Think about it next time you sign up for an online backup server to house the pictures of your newborn, or as you drag your tax papers onto Dropbox. Will they still be there tomorrow, and if not .. where can YOU go ?
Thus we dig frantically through our mailbox for the address of that geek who runs his own mail server , we hope its not too late to ask him if he ever built an RSS Reader on his own machine. For as this grey cloud crawls across the sky .. we know Google Reader isn’t going to be in it much longer.
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kw506 : Sliders academy part 2 : Linux Everywhere.
Mar 13We take up part 2 of our Sliders Academy series and take the Linux system we installed in lesson one a step further. Follow the tutorial and learn how to connect to your Linux machine from any operating system and with multiple users. Build your own terminal server or “slide” from Windows to OSX while taking your personal Linux desktop with you anywere. Using the NX Server and the NX client we slide another powerful tool into your Sliders toolbag.
Shownotes.
- Installing SSH
- Installing NX Server
- Installing the NX Client on Windows
- Installing xQuartz on OSX.
- Installing the NX Client on OSX.
Part one of the series : Installing the Ubuntu system.
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Get Metro on your Android device with Launcher 8
Mar 10
I did however leave the table with a sense of envy to the nice tiled metro interface on his phone. Clutching my Android enabled Aladdin lamp (I have an LG Nexus 4) I knew that the Android Marketplace would be able to make my wish come true. Rub the lamp and …
Tadaa : Launcher 8. The Metro interface for your Android device. If you think this would be a cosmetic overlay lagging down your phone in favor of showing off to your friends .. you are wrong. Its a cute little app that does play the part of “launcher” quite well. You get a tweakable tile interface (with ‘live tiles’) and a “vertical launcher” for all of your applications. The app is free and lets you play around with something highly resembling Metro on your Android phone. Give it a spin and confuse your friends.
Link : Launcher 8
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Why I like Windows 8 (And why you should not care).
Mar 09As I’m punching out this blogpost on my older but trusty HP Pavilion dm1, I’m somehow overpowered by a sense of nostalgia and … irony. I remember getting into computers years ago, starting out on machines like these (back in the days they were home built beige boxes) using a predecessor (or should I say forefather) of the operating system that is running today. The last couple of years I have swayed from that path of using a ‘Redmond Based’ operating system on my primary machines in favor of the one created in Cupertino. The last year or so I have even moved away from that one, to start using the ‘pengiun’ full time. For those of you baffled by my ramblings : I’m a slider. I move from operating system to operating system and use the one that works for me. From Android to Ios, from Windows to Osx to Linux … and today .. back to Windows again.
The new Windows 8 Metro interface was not something that stalked in quietly in the night. The press had seen this one coming and had been tooting their horns on how “different” it was to Windows 7. The Redmont company had had rough times. The ‘Vista disaster’ had left its mark and even though Windows 7 was a descent project, the flame of innovation was lost in Balmers ranks. Windows was going the way of the Blackberry … or were they ?
Windows 8 brought a unified ‘metro’ interface that was radically different then anything they had done before. Not only did they launch a version for the PC, there was also a unified interface for the mobile world and their own tablet device. Microsoft being Microsoft did make a simple strategy like this very complicated to explain and pretty soon you had Windows 8 Pro, RT, Phone and we even thought we would get an oreo-flavored version of the OS sometime later this years.
But never mind all that : Windows 8 is here and this week I decided to dive in deep and install it on one of my laptops. After poking it with a stick in a VM on my Linux machine, I was confident (or should I say ‘Daring’ ) enough to try out a full install. And I must say : I’m quite impressed with Windows 8. Because it is radically different then anything Microsoft has done the last couple of years. It is BOLD ! The Metro interface takes some getting used to, and everywhere I hear people spouting tips and tricks on how to get “passed” it and crawl back to the Start Menu .. but I say to you : Embrace it. Give it a try for a couple of days and give your human brain (that has been accustomed with the Start Button approach for years) a chance to adapt. Because even beyond the ‘in your face’ start menu the operating system preforms fast enough and lets you do what you want to do. So as a passionate Mac and Linux user I dare to say : I like Windows 8.
And now for me to tell you why :
Windows 8 has one specific quality that is very VERY important to an operating system. You hardly know its there. Once you are working in your application full screen (or in a window) you do not notice the operating system is there. When you NEED it, all you need to hit is the Windows button to bring up the menu , or poke the sides of your screen with your mouse. And the rest is business as usual. Using cross platform applications like Chrome, Firefox, Thunderbird don’t even give you a clue that there is in fact a ‘different’ os running under the hood then the Osx or Linux flavour of your choice.
So whats the deal then ?
Human kind is genetically designed to gang up on a certain individual and make fun of him. Microsoft-bashing is SO OLD , that its first instances are now the subject of historical re-enactments at county fairs. Its easy to bash on Microsoft .. We always did, so why not now. The problem with this approach (and the scuffing of anything that is ‘different’) is the fact that it is somewhere based on bias. And bias is a self-inflicted restriction of personal freedom. You decide to dislike something (or some-one) without getting to know it.
A lot of this bias is based on the fear for change. The uproar when Ubuntu decided to go for the Unity interface, has still not died down. The rage against Microsoft because of the Metro interface will surely echo into eternity. The reason for this ? We are afraid of change. We are the generation that is in the transition between the ‘Classic OS’ with the tiled windows (not Windows) and the start buttons. You can find the back in rock-paintings of the very first version of Xerox-OS through many versions of both Windows and Linux. But that ship has sailed. We are going to have to adapt and learn how to work with our computers differently. The age of the “visible” OS is over and with the advent of ‘full screen applications’ comes the clear message that the OS is but a means .. not a goal.
So put down your pitchforks and step away from the angry mob to take a good look at Windows 8. A product from a very ‘old’ company that has been bold enough to innovate and to change. To bring something to market that is not perfect (it has its flaws) , but DIFFERENT from the competition. And in times of economic crisis that takes balls.
And before you decide to burn ME on the stake for my heretics .. let me round up and get out of here. Computers are about YOU. They are the enablers of your digital power. They are coated with the fine slime of an operating system that should facilitate the smooth interaction between you and your applications. You applications should be your tool set to interact with your Data .. and whatever you do with that data should be directly tied to whatever personal goal you have. Nowhere .. nowhere in this process should you hinder yourself by making an uninformed choice why you should not want to use X or Y. Computers are about YOU .. not about computers.
So let my slide back to another computer lying around the house. Whether that be my Macbook air running Ubuntu, My Macbook Pro running Mountain Lion. I might get a call on my LG Nexus 4 (running Android) or pick up my book where I left off on my iPad .. I don’t care .. an neither should you. Windowss 8 might be your thing, or not (you should at least try it) As for me it has one good quality of a good operating system : it is invisible. In the end I forget what device runs what OS .. in the end it does not matter anymore.
Pitchforks, angry mobs and stakes in the comment section 🙂
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The Sky is the limit with Skydrive and ‘office for free’.
Mar 05You have heard us rave and rant about several “Office” alternatives on the Knightwise.com blog many, many times. To be honest, anything that could get us away from the highly OS-centered clusterf*ck that was called ‘Office’ was a good excuse for an article. We’ve taken you on journeys to the cloud and explore GoogleDocs, we have given you amazing alternatives like Openoffice and Libreoffice .. we have even herded you towards the command line to type out your contribution to this existential plain using a command line only application. Let’s face it : Ever since that nosy paper clip told us like it “LOOKED” like we were writing a letter .. we have gone off the deep end. .
So to be consistent we are going to do something completely different today. We are going to chase you back into the cloud towards the plains of Redmont to get the most out of you free skydrive. Yes, that magical place in the cloud where you can store your favorite cartoons of Bill and Balmer dancing in pink tutu’s, that place where you store those “pie in the sky”-charts away from the wretched claws of your dying harddrive .. that place .. that you have hardly visited after opening up an account 6 months ago. However .. that is about to change because we are about to tell you some cool things you can do .. with your skydrive (aside from storing documents in the cloud .. of course)
Create documents : The coolest feature that Microsoft would like you to not know about is that you can create and edit documents in your skydrive for free using the web based versions of Office. This is a pretty spiffy alternative for those among you who don’t want to spend the 100 dollars a year on Microsofts new SUBSCRIPTION based model of office, but still won’t go that far as to use GoogleDocs or another product.
Share and collaborate with others : Just like Google Docs skydrive gives you the ability to work together with others as you are writing the next Twilight-killer novel. Because you still want a Social life you can use some granular security settings to define who you want to be able to access those documents.
Access files on your home computer : For this one your computer needs to be ON and needs to be a Windows machine running the skydrive client. You can log into the skydrive web interface and rummage around on your home harddrive without ever having to leave wherever you are at that very moment. (That IS the whole point of working remotely.)
So you ready to get started ? Get your skydrive account here and dive into this PCWORLD article on “Getting started with Skydrive” and embrace the power of clippy once more.
