Ma and Pa's Blog

random snippets from our world

Computer News

Posted on May 7th, 2009 by Pa

1. Updated http://hickeyhoo.net . This looks about the same as it did before, but I rebuilt it using Drupal. Drupal is an opensource content management application that does alot of the organizational grunt work. It’s a learning process for me, and I’m just getting started. Thought I’d mention it because the site is a good road map to our various family sites. Nobody really cares about Drupal.

2. I came across UNR Ubuntu distribution customized for netbook computers (UNR = Ubuntu Netbook Remix). I’m using it now, and I like it. It is really fast running on a full notebook, and the user interface is very attractive and intuitive. The distribution installs from a bootable, 1GB thumb drive, and you can run (like a live CD) without installing it on the hard drive. My installation is on a 2.5GB partition. The small partition size provides minimal user storage, but it gives me a true netbook (minimal resource) experience.

Time to resume the yard work. 1 more hour today working under my 3 hour rule — anything is possible with 3 hours effort per day / more effort is allowed only if you really enjoy what you’re doing.

Victorious!

Posted on April 20th, 2009 by Pa

After many (too many) attempts, I finally managed to get SketchUp working under openSuse linux — using the linux wine app (Windows program loader / translation layer).   Now I can make my woodworking plans without booting Windows.  I think I last had it running when I was using Ubuntu — and, perhaps, on a previous computer.   It’s been a while.

SketchUp in OpenSuse

PS — Almost as soon as I posted this, SketchUp stopped working. Argh! An update to wine appeared to defeat my fix. After some head scratching (and much cursing) I was again able to celebrate — quietly — at 2 AM.

Eee PC goes Mainstream

Posted on October 28th, 2008 by Pa

Just a quick note prompted by spotting an Asus Eee PC on the shelf at Target.   The $299, 2 lb. laptop (“netbook”) is available with WindowsXP or Linux.    I notice at the Target web site that more models are available.   Actually, the units for $359 look like the best choice — larger screen (8.9 vs. 7″ with 1024×600 resolution vs. 800×480 resolution) and more solid state drive capacity (8GB vs. 4GB).   There are other compact “netbook” computers that include conventional hard-drives in lieu of solid state drives, but the battery life must suffer.  The reviews I’ve read have been very positive, and for web surfing, email, home or school document creation (word processing and spreadsheet), and photo viewing these seem very capable.   An external USB drive or online server could provide archival storage if a full blown computer is not available.  An external keyboard, mouse, and monitor could be connected for desktop (docked) use.     Drool.   Drool.

Click on the picture for a cool demo.

Eee PC

Eee PC

I guess what I really like is the design elegance of these little machines.   By stripping out excesses in hardware and software, they satisfy 99% of most people’s computing needs (my unscientific observation) with an inexpensive, attractive, compact, and energy efficient solution.

OLPC vs ASUS Eee

Posted on December 3rd, 2007 by larry

For anyone who cares, here’s verbose comment from a former TechTV geek on why to chose OLPC (while it’s available).

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