Kuki is a Linux distro that’s designed for the Acer Aspire One. It’s one of the distros I’ve found that claim to have fast boot up times and low usage on the HDD or SSD. The nice thing about it is that they’ve been doing some tweaks in the kernel so that everything works for us Acer Aspire One users. And I didn’t know that the project went on a hiatus for a while due to personal reasons. I am just glad that the project has resumed albeit in a slower pace but that’s understandable. If you’ve got the skills and time, and if you’re interested in Kuki, why not join? ; ) As leak wrote on the Kuki blog:

Also i would like to keep my request for developers. We need programmers, FAQ and wiki experienced people and finally graphic artists that are really good with icons and such designs.

In other news, Moblin’s been released! I was away at camp when it happened. My bad was that I didn’t really subscribe to Moblin news either. Argh. I think I was too fixated on the Ubuntu Moblin Remix. But looking at the screenshots of Moblin makes me drool all over again. It simply clean and usable. And the last time I used Moblin, it was overall a good experience. It’s just that for the moments I need an extended screen, I’m not sure if that’s fine. I think that I’ve got to really spend some time during the break to make sure that I’d have time to back up all my files and then probably switch over to Moblin. Or Kuki, whichever ends up working better to suit my needs and preferences. Right now, Karmic Koala doesn’t look like it’s all good on the netbook. But I think it’s best to give all of them a test run sooner. Although with Moblin, I’ve got a number of things to look forward to. A netbook optimized mail and calendar app, in particular.

Post from: New Linux User

Access your applications this way. Image credit: Jolicloud

With Jolicloud you’d have your netbook running Jolicloud and you sync it with your Jolicloud homebase. So that implies you’ve got your entired set up somewhere else. Somewhere in the cloud perhaps, hence the name? I don’t have any way to test it yet though but it looks interesting. gadgetmix.com has a review of Jolicloud.

Interestingly enough the review points out it’s basically Ubuntu with tweaks and the synchronization of your set up in your Jolicloud homebase. It makes everything work out of the box for those with netbooks. So it’s not entirely a rebranding of Ubuntu Netbook Remix.

For new Linux users it could be quite a good experience for the looks of things because there’s no need for other configuration and installation of things they need for multimedia especially. Although of course there’s always Ubuntu Netbook Remix but it depends on the user experience he/she wants to have. Ubuntu Netbook Remix is ready for you to use on a regular basis already. So if you want to use Linux on your computer right away maybe you wouldn’t want to wait for Jolicloud to be mature. But for others who are still thinking about it, Jolicloud could be worth the wait so you have a better idea of what it’s like to use Linux. It could be interesting to try. It’s still in private alpha so it could take a while to try it out.

Post from: New Linux User

Sometimes I get ideas from other Linux bloggers to try out other applications. That’s why there are times that I have a series of guides on using certain applications. Those are usually the applications that fit my needs. But each of us have different needs. I definitely can’t help some of my friends in the academe and research fields who use specific tools because I can only touch the surface of their fields and the FOSS tools I could find might not suit them. I’d never know until they try and sometimes it’s not always practical.

Another reason for blogging your Linux experiences is that you could share the highs and lows of using Linux and FOSS. I know that Linux and FOSS applications are not always shiny and good but here’s the thing: how do you get to use those tools well? Or did you end up with a proprietary solution? Why did it happen? These stories might not end up as formal case studies but they still show a better picture of what does happen and how people deal with them. And sometimes other people can help you with those issues too.

Do you have a blog? Are you blogging your Linux experiences too? Why/Why not? Is there anything that holds you back aside from time to write?

Post from: New Linux User

• It’s the common interest that drives people to go together.
  Sometimes just having a common interest drives people together. It could be that they meet each other online and then start talking more often. And from that they get an idea if they could get a community going. Sometimes it could be that they want to achieve a particular goal which is to have events that are related to free and open source software advocacy. Or it could be the general goal which is to start with a small group of people who are passionate about FOSS who can continue to advocate Linux and other FOSS out there.
• It’s not always about numbers. Numbers of members on forums and mailing lists don’t always count. Why? There are people who sign up mainly to lurk and learn but not necessarily share what they know/learn/experience. Then again, it can’t be helped. Some people could get easily intimidated. That or some people are lazy to write. Or there are simply those who stay on the lists and forums to get help as needed.
• Not everyone gets along but sometimes those disagreements are pushed aside. Why? Because at the end of the day, everyone’s a FOSS user and/or advocate. There are still things that they agree upon. Just not all the nitty-gritty details. So even if there are some very, uh, flaming emails flying back and forth, it might not always be an indicator of how mad people are with each other but it’s a matter of voicing out different opinions. As long as no one takes it personally, that is. And I think that it might not be easy but people should learn to take things in stride.

In connection with the last point, there are times when I see people face to face in those community meetings or maybe release parties and they pretty much get along in person. It’s just that sometimes they get really passionate and end up being argumentative when trying to get their point across. I guess it’s also about the honesty people express that makes them act like that online but it also contrasts with how warm they really are as persons.

So there are many different kinds of personalities in FOSS communities, really. And that does show what ecosystems there are. It could be that you will feel that you don’t belong in any or you might immediately feel like belonging to one. But definitely it takes time to grow one and for people who got together to grow into a community because of the different factors involved like what goals they have, how they are growing the community, the demographics of the community, etc.

Post from: New Linux User

Joomla is a great tool you could use to create your website. It could take your site to another level. If you already have a blog, well, you could keep using that. But Joomla has a lot of features for its users.

Some features that I find are usually used in projects I encounter:

• Article posting. You could post various articles and categorize them too.
• Blogs. If your organization would like to have blogs, then there’s also a way to do that within Joomla. No need to get a separate blogging software.
• Custom menus. You could move things around and put them in different menus and make them behave differently, in terms of which items could be seen even if the user is not logged in, etc.
• Setting access levels. This one is pretty much default in Joomla so it’s possible for some articles to only appear for users with a particular access level.
• Embedding a page in an iframe. Well, it’s called a wrapper in Joomla but basically that’s what it is.

And the nice thing about Joomla is that there are many extensions out there for it. Extensions are the additional features that users might be looking for. Although that is a good thing, they say that too much of a good thing is bad. For me, having too many extensions is also painful. Why? That would mean additional things to research on and test. And that could be what’s overwhelming.

As a tool for getting a person or organization’s message across, Joomla is most likely to be considered as one of the interesting things. After all it’s very versatile. And I think that counts for something.

Post from: New Linux User

Well, most things have been nice and shiny with Dom and Ubuntu. But not with Karmic Koala. He experienced kernel panic – not synching. His search for an answer led him to the ubuntuforums with this issue posted three weeks ago: Wubi – Kernel Panic – Not Synching – VFS…. Another place where this showed up is in Launchpad: Wubi/Karmic boot: kernel panic – not synching: VFS.

This mainly affects those who have installed Ubuntu via Wubi. That’s tough. Some people would rather install via Wubi than the regular installer. If there’s this bug that’s affecting them, then that would just be sad. And how would everyone else deal with it? I suppose one could back up all the files then just do an install from the desktop/Live CD or the alternate installer.

If I recall correctly, Linux Mint is based from Ubuntu. I wonder if this will affect their users too or if they’d do something about it to make the Linux user experience better. Well, I am not very familiar with how Mint4Win works but it’s basically Wubi but for Mint. If ever, I do hope that it will work just fine and maybe the two projects can learn from each other. I certainly hope this bug will get resolved soon.

Post from: New Linux User

Reaching out to ask for help could be intimidating because it might make you feel a bit insignificant. But what is life without other people being with you to experience things? As cliche as it may sound, no man is an island. For that matter, maybe you don’t necessarily have to be the type to broadcast to the entire world that you are a new Linux user. But just one or a few people with you in this makes the experience fun as you learn new commands. And who knows? The terminal might feel like a better place to deal with commands. Feeling like a wizard chanting a spell? Maybe that’s the thrill of the command line for some people. Others might be more of the type to find good things in new shiny packages — new applications that are useful, something more than they imagined.

Old Linux users might not feel as enthusiastic about the community before. Why? Because there are those who keep on conducting flame wars in community mailing lists. That or they’ve come to hate the “RTFM”/”RTM”-like replies to newbies. Or maybe they’ve gotten tired of reading newbie emails. Well, it might sound like those questions are being popped over and over and over again so I guess it’s hard to blame them for losing interest in those community mailing lists and forums. Oh and there’s also the problem with sexist remarks. Women sometimes have difficulties dealing with those issues. But there are times that it does turn women off from the community.

However, it is interesting to note that despite such issues that might be around not so new Linux users, there are friendships that do form among them. And it goes beyond the mailing list or forums. And sometimes those friendships lead to collaborations online and offline. There’s still discussions that do happen as time goes by. Which isn’t a bad thing and it could help as they continue to grow in terms of their personal development and their skills in using Linux and free and open source software.

I do hope that in the coming years, I’d see richer interactions among people in the community. I mean, I might not be as active in the local Linux community but I still have those friendships that I have developed over the years and it still keeps me interested in the technologies and the projects that are happening here. It’s just that I can’t help but hope for more so that the community will keep on growing.

Post from: New Linux User

• Managing your information
• Migration
• Broadcasting your information
• Community building

Participants shall be joining in a track to interact with fellow participants in order to learn something new from each other. Whatever they learn from this camp will hopefully be very helpful for them when they go back to work in their respective organizations.

I was able to talk with some of the participants here and they have different backgrounds and needs. But they are quite interested in the tracks they have signed up for and as early as now they have many questions. And there are also many interesting stories from them as they share why they are interested in FOSS and why they will be participating at the camp.

The next five days will be packed with activities that aims to empower each participants so that they have knowledge and practical skills. Whether it’s all about managing their information online or offline, collaboratively or what; whether it’s people learning something new about Linux there’s an opportuity for everyone who has an open mind and an attitude to learn.

I am looking forward to an awesome camp at Asia Source 3.

Post from: New Linux User

It’s the combination of the hardware you have with whatever you’re installing. Whether it’s any particular Linux distribution or maybe even Windows, there’d be times that you will hit some snags. Some inconveniences might be greater than others. You can not always tell. (This is also based on my personal experience.)

There will be times that everything is going to work out of the box. Seriously fine and dandy and happy. Right? I get those times. But there are moments that there are unexpected kinks. It could affect the sound card, it could be the video card. It could be something else like wifi. There are those sweet moments that I know people are happy about, including myself.

I’ve read the acronym YMMV on a mailing list and I wondered what it was all about. And someone just explained it to me that sometimes people don’t have the same experiences when it comes to installing things or trying out new applications. It often grounds me to the reality that not everything about x distro will be all bad or all good. That’s why even if I do read that x distro (in this case Ubuntu 9.10) isn’t quite as perfect, I still would give it a try once I can. After all, I do read good stuff about it too.

No distro is perfect. Exaggerated reports or isolated cases will not be very helpful either in assessing these things. So just keep in mind, YMMV for each time that you want to use something.

Post from: New Linux User

So yeah, everybody seems to have Ubuntu 9.10 or Karmic Koala already. Well, except for me. Tsk. Next time I will check my things before leaving a building, just to be sure this doesn’t happen again.

Back to business.

And everyone but me has Karmic Koala. By this time it’s more practical for me to start looking for the rest of the world’s blog entries and screenshots. The Debian Admin blog has a 37 screenshots. You get to see the different aspects of Karmic so this is a good set. It also gives you a better idea of how things work in Karmic now, at least have a general idea. Also there are chances that other loco’s have probably pushed through with their release parties for Karmic already. Yes, I am envious that almost everyone has the latest Ubuntu release.

Because of that forgotten charger everything else could gloat to me about not having Ubuntu Karmic yet. Thankfully not everyone in the community thinks that way so I don’t feel so bad.

Others have given tips on what should be done first to your machine after installing Karmic Koala. One of them is to select download mirrors and set them up for your future needs. After all, you never know when these things will be handy. There’s also setting up folder sharing. This is especially for those who rely on shared files within the office network. One more thing you should do: synchronize time with atomic clocks. Just so you won’t find yourself in a different timezone all of a sudden. Great right?

Enjoy Ubuntu Karmic Koala!

Post from: New Linux User