Eatfeed - Simple Desktop RSS Reader
30-Jun-2009

Posted by Joey Tuesday, June 30, 2009    

Tags: apps

Gnome-Do .0.8.2 Released - Best Linux Dock Yet!

The Gnome-Do team have pushed oyt the latest version of their popular application launcher (and so much more than that!) which hits it's 0.8.2 release.

The new version comes with a literal HEAP of new features, bug fixes and what-not including vital additions to it's 'dock' appearance allowing it to intelligent hide behind fullscreen windows, the ability to drag around launchers to organize them - as well as dragging off ones you don't want and the inclusion of brand-spanking new docklets! And that's just the start!

You can find out more from this handy run-down: -
http://pengdeng.com/blog/2009/06/30/do-0-8-2-released/

And you can

Posted by Joey Tuesday, June 30, 2009    

Tags: apps, eyecandy

Firefox 3.5 Released Today

Just to add to the rest of the seemingly endless blog posts sitting around the web about Firefox's latest (and greatest) release, i too just want to inform you that version 3.5 should be hitting the servers today.

What's new? Check out the short video below to discover...

Posted by Joey Tuesday, June 30, 2009    

Tags: apps, firefox

"Clever Windows" - Better than Gnome 3?
25-Jun-2009

Gnome3 - aka 'Gnome Shell' - has been met with a mirth of derision within the Linux community for various reasons. Some don't like progress, some don't like the way it handles windows and some don't like it's emphasis on more symantic use of search for both online data and stuff on the file-system. Some just hate it because, well, they're bored!

Below is a brainstorm idea by Gnome-Look user Crantisz and its presents an intriguing, and delicious, concept for managing windows that doesn't stray too far from the current way of managing windows, but also has a great wedge of new and intuitive ideas in it to appease others.

Posted by Joey Thursday, June 25, 2009    

Tags: brainstorm, eyecandy

5 Short Karmic Updates
24-Jun-2009

Take a deep breath, here come 5 short updates about Karmic Koala!

Ready... Set... READ!

Grub 2.0 Will be Default for New Installations

Grub2 will replace Grub 1.5 in all new Karmic releases from current Alpha's on. What is Grub2? Basically a nicer version of Grub that you currently use - It has a slight visual refresh as well meaning that it is easier to fix and reinstall it should you need to.

Banshee or Rhythmbox?

It's still up-in-the-air as to which will be the default music player in Ubuntu. At UDS it seemed Rhythmbox was settled on, however Banshee advocates have piped up and the default media player for Karmic is, as of Alpha 2, still undecided...

Vrooooooom... ....10 Second Boot

Ubuntu have a 10 second boot goal for Karmic - and so far they're making excellent progress on it. As such they've decided NOT to use the 'Plymouth' boot-splash (looks fancier) as the computer won't be booting long enough to really notice it...

EXT4 As Default

Karmic will use the EXT4 filesystem as default meaning a significant sped boost for Ubuntu when writing/reading files and applications.

No Major New Theme/Revamp

Despite being planned for Januty but pushed back to Karmic Ubuntu's big interface revamp has been pushed back to 10.04. Reasons include the maturing of the Ayatana project and it's projects.

Posted by Joey Wednesday, June 24, 2009    

Tags: karmic

Preview Chrome/Chromium's New Tab Page

Chromium (Google Chrome's test-bed version) is now sporting a new tab page with a rearranged look and a hint at extras to come later!

Removing tabs is a simple 'hover over, choose 'x') affair; you can also 'pin' sites and 'edit' their URL, too.

Browsing history and recent downloads now sit at the bottom of the tab page alongside a brand-new "recommended" section. This currently onl has the title "Even more" and "What will we put here?" as it's body. Intriguing!


The site thumbnails now have different viewing options - you can have the standard 'thumbnails', change to a list view (above) or hide them completely. The 'History' and 'Recommend' sections at the bottom can also be hidden so no worries about over-the-shoulder snoopers!

It seems that the thumbnails can be dragged around into a different order/to rearrange them. it's not actually implemented yet but the mouse lets you 'grab' each thumbnail so expect this to pop up in later snapshots!

To enable the new tab page add --new-new-tab-page to your shortcut command.

E.G. From a terminal run chromium-browser --new-new-tab-page

Posted by Joey Wednesday, June 24, 2009    

Tags: chrome

UbuntuOne - My Thoughts
21-Jun-2009

I finally received my invitation to Ubuntu One a few days ago. Since then I've been using it daily, and i have to admit that it's integration with Ubuntu is, as expected, second to none.

This isn't meant to be a critical blow-by-blow account of using Ubuntu One because you pop files in folder, it syncs them to your online storage. What else is there to say, really?

Instead it's just a quick rundown of what Ubuntu One installs and how it works.

Integration

Ubuntu One places a folder in home/username called 'Ubuntu One'. Inside you have "My Files" and "Shared With Me". A shortcut to this folder is placed in your "Places" menu.

When viewing the Ubuntu One folder there is a dialog along the top (similar to that in the 'Deleted Items') allowing you to connect and disconnect from the service. This makes connecting really easy. Successfully uploaded items gain an emblem next to them.

Ubuntu One also has a tray icon/applet. The icon animates when connecting or syncing files, and has a red cross when it is disconnected.


Left clicking the tray icon will open your Ubuntu One folder, and right clicking gives you an easy access menu for connecting, reporting a problem, opening your Ubuntu One folder and going online to view your files.

Overall

Having already used DropBox (a very similar service) i much appreciate Ubuntu's tight integration. I also find that Ubuntu One sync's much quicker than the same files in my dropbox folder - this might be dependent on server traffic for each serivce, however.

Canonical have said that Ubuntu One will expand and boast new features along the way - vital if it wants to succeed as a subscription based option. Currently for the same $ per month you get far more storage from Dropbox than Ubuntu One.

Both offer 2GB for free options - which is what I'm currently using on both.

Posted by Joey Sunday, June 21, 2009    

Installing Picasa Photo Viewer In Ubuntu
17-Jun-2009

Anyone who has used Picasa on Windows will be aware that it comes packed with an awesome photo viewer that is both feature packed and very easy on the eye.



From Google Photos Blog: -

We designed Photo Viewer to be a better, faster image viewer. A quick double-click on any photo will give you a beautiful full-screen view (with Picasa edits applied) and puts a select few options at your fingertips: you can quickly rotate an image, star it, upload it to your Picasa Web Albums drop box, or play a slideshow with other photos from the same folder.

What else can it do? Tap the scroll wheel on your mouse to discover how nice it is to have a fast, smooth zoom at hand when reviewing your photos, or try the 'More Options' button to bounce an image to your printer, blog, or favorite photo editor.

Unfortunately, Google didn't package the viewer up for Linux as part of Picasa 3 which disappointed a lot of Picasa users.

Thankfully an awesome chap called Irakli Gozalishvili kindly ported it over to Linux and another enterprising soul known as caiacoa fixed it up again to play nice with with Jaunty.

Install Picasa Photo Viewer by dowloading the .deb below and double clicking it.

http://www.caiacoa.de/Transfer/PicasaPhotoViewer-1.0.3.deb

Set Picasa Photo Viewer as your default photo viewer by right clicking a photo/picture file
Click Properties > Open With > Add and enter "PicasaPhotoViewer". (Minus quote marks, obv.)

And you're done!

Posted by Joey Wednesday, June 17, 2009    

Tags: apps, eyecandy, google, picasa

Google release Chrome Developer Preview
05-Jun-2009

Google have released the first official 'Google Chrome' for Linux! Woo! Etc!

In all honesty, there is very little that distinguishes this official build from the regular Chromium builds that are released almost daily, bar a different logo and the word 'Google' slapped on it.

Google do warn the following on first start up: -



To download this Google blessed release, head on over to http://dev.chromium.org/getting-involved/dev-channel and scroll down to 'For Linux' for the download links.

Posted by Joey Friday, June 05, 2009    

Tags: chrome

PiTiVi 0.31.1 Released; Transitions, Effects Coming In July
27-May-2009

The PiTiVi team today announced the release of the latest version of their impressive video editor - the first in the unstable 0.13 PiTiVi series.

This release sees a number of improvements made, most notably: -

• core rewrite
• multi-layered timeline
• trimming features
• audio waveforms and video thumbnails in timeline
• picture support
• New project file format support

The PiTiVi team strongly recommend that users have all the latest gstreamer libraries and plugins installed for the best user experience possible, and whilst i would not recommend novice Ubuntu user try out this version yet (wait for a .deb!), you can find all source and packages via the official PiTiVi site @ http://www.pitivi.org/wiki/Downloads

The team have released this version in memory of those who lost their lives, friends, houses in the April 6th 2009 earthquake in l'Aquila, Italy.

Eward Hervey, PiTiVi developer, also relayed some awesome news via his blog: That the next release of PiTiVi (due in July!) will bring with it the much desired transitions, mixing, effects, etc! Fantastic work guys!

For PiTiVi newbies, or those who haven't heard of this excellent video editong application before, Jean-François Fortin Tam has made this informative video-demo on the new release. Enjoy and spread the word about PiTiVi!

Posted by Joey Wednesday, May 27, 2009    

Tags: apps, pitivi

Ubuntu Moblin Remix - UPDATED

Some exciting tidbits coming from the in-session UDS...

The Ubuntu Mobile Team will be prepping a 'one time' release of 'Ubuntu Moblin Remix' - combining the sexy new Moblin 2 interface with the stability of Ubuntu 9.04. This 'one off' release will allow developement and experimentation "for those interested in the next generation of user interfaces for Mobile computing."

Also related, the entire Moblin interface will be packaged and available in 9.10 Karmic Koala.

For those that have yet to see the Moblin 2.0 interface in all it's glory - hit up the video below.

UPDATE JUNE 3RD

Seems i was one of the very first with this news as it's only just starting doing the rounds on big tech sites!

Canonical have also released the very first image of Moblin running atop UNR: -



Looking pretty sweet! As soon as it's available for testing you'll be the first to know!

Posted by Joey Wednesday, May 27, 2009    

Tags: moblin, netbookremix

Rhythmbox to remain default Music Player in Karmic
26-May-2009

Rhythmbox will remain the default music player in Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala.

For those that don't know, the Ubuntu Developer Summit is currently taking place in Barcelona. During many of the discussions that are, and will, take place, the prospect of replacing the current default music choice in Ubuntu 'Rhythmbox' with the popular alternative 'Banshee' was mentioned. However, it has been decided that Rhythmbox will remain the default choice in Karmic Koala.

Posted by Joey Tuesday, May 26, 2009    

Tags: karmic

CoverGloobus 1.4 Brings New Themes, Desktop Sexiness

I've blogged about the pure freakin' gorgeousness of CoverGloobus before, but the developer has really stepped it up a gear with the latest release.

CoverGloobus 1.4 fixes some bugs, but - and more importantly for eyecandy lovers - also brings with it four awesome new themes!

CoverGloobus 1.4 still has all the features of previous releases such as the ability to show lyrics for the now playing track with a simple middle-click on the album cover, play controls and ratings (in banshee).

Grab it from the developers deviantart page @ http://jordihp.deviantart.com/art/CoverGloobus-1-4-123762457

(Be sure to throw him some love over there because aside from creating two of the most gorgeous desktop additions for Linux, he also has immensely good taste in music! ;-P )

Posted by Joey Tuesday, May 26, 2009    

Tags: eyecandy

Chromium Hits Alpha Release!
24-May-2009

Chromium - the browser which is created by Google and whom will slap their logo on and call it Chrome - finally reached it's Alpha milestone today, having been available as a pre-alpha for the past few months.

The browser makes clear that the Alpha release is missing some functionality such as plug-in's, google gears and 'complex text', whatever that is!



You can test out the Alpha build of Chromium by adding the following lines to your 'Software Sources': -

deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/chromium-daily/ppa/ubuntu jaunty main
deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/chromium-daily/ppa/ubuntu jaunty main

Right click here and save to the desktop, click on the 'Authentication' tab of 'Software Sources' and 'add' it.

Then update your packages and install with: -

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install chromium-browser

Tip: To get Chromium to open without a terminal window, edit it's shortcut (System>Preferences>Main menu>Internet>Chromium) and change the 'type' field from 'Terminal Application' to just 'Application'.

Posted by Joey Sunday, May 24, 2009    

Add-On To Make Firefox Use Jaunty's Notifications
21-May-2009

Firefox currently uses it's own notification pop ups to tell you that something has finished downloading but you can get it to use your sexy new Jaunty notifications by installing a plug-in.

Namely this one: -

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/9622

This solves one part of the notification problem: it will use Jaunty notifications, but also still show it's native Firefox pop-up notification, too. Wanna fix that?

Type about:config into Firefox's address bar.
Agree to any alert.
Search for the following preference: -
browser.download.manager.showAlertOnComplete.
Set the value to false.

Restart and Firefox will solely use Jaunty notifications!

Posted by Joey Thursday, May 21, 2009    

Tags: firefox, jaunty, tips