Linux
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Linux applications galore
THE baloney detector on my computer went crazy this week when a reader wrote: “When it comes down to it, I still have to go to Windows to get work done because so many apps are just either not available under Linux or the choices and maturity of the apps are far, far inferior.” The comment left me puzzled. What kind of “work” did this guy do that he just had to run Windows? To put this nonsense to rest, I compiled a list of common applications that you might need at work and specific Linux programs that will do the job. And none of the programs I mention here are by any stretch of the imagination “far, far inferior” to their Windows counterparts. In fact, a number of them are not only open source and free, but are cross-platform to boot.
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Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Linux is safer than Windows
Is Linux more secure than Windows? The quick and easy answer is yes. Most viruses and malicious software today are written to target Windows systems and will not affect Linux or Mac computers. If you’re going to work – and play – in a Windows world, you better get protection.
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Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Presenting in Linux
IT’S been more than three years since the Linux Revolution blog declared that we need better presentation software. The call to action for open-source developers at the time certainly seemed timely. In 2006, if you had to create a business presentation on a Linux system, you didn’t have much choice but to use Impress, which came with the free and open-source OpenOffice.org productivity suite.
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Monday, December 21, 2009
A good year for desktop Linux
2010 is going to be a good year for Linux on the desktop. No, tens of millions of Windows users aren’t going to see the light and suddenly switch. Inertia and resistance to change make a massive migration highly unlikely. At the same time, Microsoft has managed to stem the erosion from its Vista-fueled disaster, first by extending the commercial life of Windows XP on netbooks, then by releasing Windows 7. On the other hand, there is no doubt that Linux will continue to make steady gains on the desktop next year, even though most estimates still put its market share at about only 2 percent.
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Monday, November 23, 2009
No luster in Chrome OS
SOMETIMES, less isn’t more – it’s just less. This was certainly the way I felt when I fired up an early open source demo of Google’s Chrome operating system that became available for download last week.
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Monday, July 13, 2009
Who’s zoomin’ who?
THE press loves a clash of titans. Pit the Internet search giant Google against the software behemoth Microsoft and you’ll have them chomping at the bit. So when Google announced on its blog last week that it would be developing its own operating system, most news organizations pronounced that the undisputed king of search was gunning for Microsoft where it lives.
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Monday, May 25, 2009
Do we need our own Linux?
I downloaded a pre-release version of Bayanihan 5, the upcoming version of the state-sponsored Linux distribution, hoping to put it through its paces. Unfortunately, a few technical snags prevented me from making all but the most cursory review of what is by nature a complex product. After all, to get a fair reading of an operating system, you ought to have installed it and used it for at least a week. I only had two days, if that.
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Tuesday, March 24, 2009
Questions Windows users ask
ONE of the geeky things I used to do as a Windows user was to defrag my hard disk to improve its performance. The word “defrag” had an edge to it, and there was something cool about watching the multi-color blinking boxes moving around in a grid, freeing up space on my hard disk for more efficient file handling. So when I shifted to Linux almost three years ago, I asked a question that Windows users commonly ask: How do you defrag in Linux?
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Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Dump Windows, save millions
XAVIER School is demonstrating what most of us have long believed: an organization can safely dump Microsoft Windows and save millions of pesos by replacing it with Linux, a free and open source operating system. The shift isn’t only about cost savings for the Jesuit-run school, which has developed a reputation as a high-quality preparatory school for college among affluent Chinese-Filipino families. It’s reflective of the progressive outlook at the 52-year-old school, which began upgrading its computer systems and network at the turn of the century.
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Tuesday, December 23, 2008
Open source: getting started
OPEN source software can reduce costs and improve security dramatically, yet many people are a bit apprehensive about getting their feet wet. Typical of this concern, reader John Cohon wrote in with a number of questions about shifting to open source. To the extent that my answers to him might help other companies or individuals make the shift, I’m running them here.
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Monday, November 17, 2008
To upgrade or not to upgrade
DECISIONS, decisions. The latest version of Ubuntu, one of the most popular Linux distributions, was released late last month, leaving me with the usual poser: to upgrade or not to upgrade? For Ubuntu users, it’s a decision that that must be made fairly often—a new version of the free operating system is released every six months.
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Monday, July 28, 2008
Ace in the hole
IT’S difficult to write about the Aspire One from Acer without gushing. Out of the box, this mini-notebook is the perfect traveling companion for anyone who simply needs to surf the Web, send e-mail and perform typical office tasks such as typing up documents, working on spreadsheets or giving a presentation. Its compact size—6.7”x9.8” and less than an inch thick—and weight—less than a kilo—make the Aspire One extremely easy to bring along anywhere. The netbook is slightly longer than the pioneering Asus Eee PC, but Acer has put that extra space to good use by building in a larger keyboard that most touch typists will appreciate (about 85 percent of a full-sized one) and a glossy black frame around the LCD screen that makes it look brighter.
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