Switch to Linux: Blue Screen of Death (BSoD) in Apple Mac OS X

Apple seems to be going the way of Microsoft and the rest of the crowd of pedestrian software vendors. First their iPhone 3G failed to deliver the goods. Then there were security issues galore. Then the Mobile Me fiasco. And now the last bastion has also developed chinks in its hitherto impregnable armour. The famed and fabled Apple Mac OS X has been greeting its users with the Blue Screen of Death that has always been associated to Microsoft Windows. Windows, a victim of vicious derision from the Mac fan boys, probably had the last laugh.

With the OS X 10.5.6 update Apple has left many of its loyal customers with unusable machines. Some complain that the only thing they are able to see after start up is a blue screen like the one with which Microsoft Windows users are all too familiar. Many others have complained about an infinite reboot loop, while others have seen their spanking new and expensive systems freeze up. One business customer actually had the misfortune of suffering from seven of his Apple computers freezing up with the update. When he contacted the customer service he was told that the reason for the freeze up may have been due to the number of third party applications that have been installed. WHAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This comes from a customer service that is supposedly the best in the business? So does Apple expect us to only install applications that it has “approved” ? Are we going to see an App Store concept for the computers soon? Imagine Microsoft selling its Office suite for the Mac OS X through Apple’s App Store. That would be a day to remember. )

This is yet another blow to the bloated up egos of the Apple fan boys ? Is Apple’s bubble about to burst? I sure hope so.

To all the people who have been blind loyalists to Apple, WAKE UP!!! Embrace the power of open source. Switch to  Linux.

Kubuntu 8.10 Intrepid Ibex: Kvpnc broken

Kubuntu 8.10 Intrepid Ibex has been out for some time now. This version of Kubuntu sports the brand new KDE 4.1 Plasma theme that introduces a Mac OS like dashboard. The analogy with the Mac OS is just to make sure that people who are less aware of Kubuntu understand what I am talking about. Here’s a screen shot of my dashboard:

Nevertheless, since I run Kubuntu at my home it was very important for me to get my company VPN connection working. In the previous version, Hardy Heron, I had installed Kvpnc for this. Kvpnc is a GUI client for KDE that uses vpnc to connect to VPNs. In Hardy, all I had to do was import the Cisco (my company runs Cisco VPN servers) .pcf file provided by my company. And voila! I was in.

Keeping that experience in mind I tried the same thing in Intrepid. Disappointingly, it did not work. I kept getting an irritating “Authorization failed(Group password)” error. There was an even more cryptic “tun0: Disabled Privacy Extensions” message in the system logs. Initially I thought there must have been some change to the .pcf file. My IT department confirmed that there weren’t any. Puzzled I sat down to get this thing to work.

My previous Hardy installation was a 32-bit one whereas the Intrepid is a 64-bit one. Was that at fault? A bit of Googling did reveal that I might be right. Still not convinced and unready to give up I kept at it. But no matter what I tried I could not get it to work.

Finally when I was on the verge of giving up, I came across an article that mentioned decoding the group password. A bit of digging and I got to a web site that offered to decode the encoded group password that is specified in the .pcf file. Using that web site I retrieved the group password, fired up Kvpnc and specified the decoded value as the new group password and hit Ok. It worked!!!

Wow. So apparently the Kvpnc client does not do a very good job of decoding the encrypted group passwords that are present in the Cisco VPN .pcf files. Here’s the web site that helped me with the decoding.

Fragmentation in Linux hinders mass adoption

A few days back I ran a couple of posts titled Switch to Ubuntu Linux not Mac OS and Mac OS is better than Ubuntu: A myth. Both the articles generated significant interest amongst readers and there were quite a few comments. Most of the comments were in favor of the Mac OS and against Ubuntu. That led me to conclude that the Mac OS user community is extremely loyal towards it. Unfortunately the same cannot be said about the Linux users.

Of course there were a few Linux users who defended Linux against the onslaught of comments from the Mac users, but they were far outnumbered. I thought that the Linux users were a loyal and dedicated group of people who were passionate about the technology and had a unified voice against proprietary systems. Sad to say but that apparently is not the case.

Why is that so? Probably the answer lies in the fragmentation that exists in the Linux community. There are a whole lot of Linux distributions available in the market and each have their own base of loyal users. But these users will not come to the defense of a Linux distribution or flavor which is other than their own. So with Ubuntu/Kubuntu, SuSE, Fedora, Linux Mint, Mandriva, and a plethora of other distributions around this fragmentation in user loyalty is hurting Linux and open source as a whole.

What is needed is a set of standards that would abide all the Linux distribution vendors together. Most versions of Linux run either Gnome or KDE as their windowing system. Most use a kernel that comes from a single source. But the package management systems do vary from flavor to flavor. We can argue the merits and demerits of each of these but we have to reach a standard approach. Proprietary systems like Windows and Mac OS do not have this problem. Apple and Microsoft can dream of any “feature” and then incorporate that in their system. Loathe it or like it those “features” remain with you. In case of Linux the user is the driver. He/She decides what they want to keep or discard. Though this choice makes Linux a lot more attractive to many, it appears  intimidating to others. This is where we have to make things happen. This is where Linux needs to change.

There is not doubt that technically Linux is probably superior to both Windows and the Mac OS, but unfortunately user adoption rates are dismal. One of the major reasons is the lack of standards and the sooner the Linux community understands this the better for them.

The most common response to a proposal to use standards is “how are the vendors going to make money?”. Presence of standards does not tie vendors up. Rather it opens up newer opportunities for them. For instance if Linux comes up with a standard for package management, that would enforce a uniform binary distribution format for all Linux flavors. This is good because vendors do not have to release versions of their products for .deb, .rpm and other formats. Where Linux vendors can make their offerings more compelling is in defining good UI features, making file management easier, making program management better, etc. The opportunities are endless.

Standards are needed. Lets think of them as a common minimum program to which every Linux vendor subscribes. This would lead to greater interoperability between different distributions and also make it easier for people to choose. A common minimum program would guarantee certain features in all Linux systems. The rest is up to the Linux vendors

Mac OS is better than Ubuntu Linux: A myth

My post on switching to Ubuntu and not Mac OS generated a lot of interest both amongst Linux and Mac OS users. There were many comments on the post and some valid points were raised. Also there were a lot of myths that were put across. Here I try to dispel some of those:

The myths

• Ubuntu does not have a good UI : This is absolutely rubbish, checkout the new KDE that comes with Ubuntu.
• To install software a user has to use a command line on Ubuntu : Another false claim. The Synaptic package manager is brilliant and does not require interaction with the command line. There are some software that do need command line usage. Then again those won’t be ones an average user is going to use.
• You have to build software from source code on Ubuntu. This is not something an average user would be able to do : The software that come in source code form are definitely not intended for the average user. The ones that are meant for the average user come in binary formats that are easy to install.
• There are hardly any games on Ubuntu : For that matter how many games are there on Mac OS compared to Windows? So if it is ok for Mac OS users to run Windows through Parallels and play games on it then the same can be done on Ubuntu.
• Mac OS is great and thats the reason we have Hackintosh systems : Well Ubuntu comes free and can be installed on virtually any hardware. So the need for hacked systems does not arise.
• Multimedia playback support is not good in Ubuntu : Excuse me but could you define what is exactly meant by multimedia support? If its the capability to playback different file formats then I guess Ubuntu, for that matter Linux in general, has the most plug-ins. The reason they are not supported out-of-the-box is because of licensing problems. Yes Mac OS supports that, but then again you pay to get it. If you pay and get a commercial desktop Linux version you would get all the support you need.
• Mac OS “just works” and Ubuntu does not : What do you mean by that? What is this “just works” thing?
• Hardware support is limited on Ubuntu : The number of hardware components supported by Linux today is probably the second only to Windows. Check the HCL for Ubuntu.
• There are no Ubuntu based laptops available from the large PC vendors : Dell has a line of Ubuntu based laptops. Check them out. The fact that others do not sell them has no reflections on Ubuntu but on Microsoft’s licensing agreements with them. Dell is the only company who has the balls to take Microsoft on.
• I suffer from Apple envy : On the contrary actually. I love the Mac Book Pro and wanted to buy the new 15″  one. But then again I did not see a point in investing in something in which I would be locked in. Yes lock-in is a problem. Face it. The number of apps on Windows far outnumbers those on the Mac OS and that is one of the reasons why many people cannot switch to other operating systems from Windows.

Some truths

• Adobe CS3 and other Adobe multimedia applications are not available on Ubuntu : Quite true. But then whose fault is it? Ubuntu’s or Adobe’s? My take is that Adobe is being extremely short sighted in ignoring Linux. If they continue to do so they would pay dearly.
• Ubuntu does not have iTunes : True, but that affects people who are locked into Apple. Also Apple does not offer that on Ubuntu. And who is responsible for iTunes? Is that enough to not switch to Ubuntu? Someone wanting to use Google Chrome exclusively should then not consider Mac OS at all. Yeah we know that a Mac OS version is in the pipeline, but lets talk when it releases.

There is one thing that I have realized and that is Apple users are extremely loyal to Apple. Kudos to Apple to have achieved that. Windows does not have that. My previous article attracted comments from a lot of Apple loyalists. I was surprised that not an equal number of Linux supporters voiced their views. The only reason for this is the different Linux distros that are out there. Its probably time that they realized that even though it might be Fedora or OpenSuSE or Ubuntu or any other Linux variant, at the core they are all the same.

Switch to Ubuntu Linux not Apple Mac OS

For the past few years Apple has seen an increase in its laptop business due majorly to the dismal failure of Microsoft’s Windows Vista operating system. Umpteen number of reports have been published telling people why they should consider switching to the Mac OS now that Vista has failed, but not a single one has surfaced that spells out the merits of switching over to a variety of Linux.

Linux on the server side is pretty well established with Red Hat Enterprise Linux being the dominant flavour there. It is on the desktop that there is an ongoing war mainly between three parties – Microsoft, Apple and the host of Linux vendors. The availability of a large number of Linux distributions may initially confuse a user but a harder look quickly separates the wheat from the chaff and Ubuntu/Kubuntu emerges as the best.

Traditionally Linux adoption on the desktop has been plagued by the notion that it was difficult to handle. Its really a misconception. Ubuntu has changed the face of Linux ever since its launch. The current versions are sturdy, have very good UIs and are intuitive. Program management no longer needs knowledge of the various packaging systems but is driven by an elegant UI. Productivity applications on Linux have come a long way and the crown jewel in this category has got to be Open Office. Not only do you get a great word processor, a brilliant spreadsheet program, a fantastic presentation tool and a good desktop database but you also get compatibility for Microsoft Office documents. In the majority of cases, MS Office documents can be opened in Open Office without any changes. For e-mailing, there is Evolution that offers connectivity to Microsoft Exchange and also Mozilla Thunderbird. Calendar applications are galore. There are a host of commercial and open source tools for multimedia authoring,image manipulation and desktop publishing. Applications like Scribus, Blender 3D and GIMP are the best-of-breed and have the capacity to rival their commercial counterparts. For web browsing, Mozilla Firefox comes pre-installed.

If you are a developer programming in open technologies like Java/JEE or C/C++, adopting to Linux is really easy. All major JEE vendors support Linux as a platform for their offerings. Eclipse, NetBeans and IntelliJ are some of the best IDEs around that have Linux versions. For C/C++ there is KDevelop, Anjuta and many more IDEs offering best-of-breed features. Microsoft .net developers might have it a bit more difficult. Although Mono allows you to run .net applications on Linux, tooling support till now is not the greatest. In any case, if some one is going to use Microsoft technology for development, its much more likely that she/he would stick to Windows. So thats not really a great problem.

Ubuntu has a large number of hardware drivers in it making it very close to being the best distro for plug-n-play. In fact in a few areas it surpasses the great Apple Mac OS. Here’s an example. The Linksys WUSB54GC USB Wireless Adapter worked out of the box on Ubuntu 8.04 whereas in Mac OS it did not.

Security wise both Mac OS and Ubuntu are equally good though some would argue that Ubuntu is probably better. There are GUI tools available to tweak the security settings in a system. 

In the look and feel department, Linux has improved in leaps and bounds. In Gnome and KDE you have two of the best windowing systems. With the KDE 4.1.1  environment, users get a light, responsive, and aesthetically appealing desktop that can rival even the Mac OS. Also with Compiz it is possible to extract effects from a Linux desktop that were hitherto unavailable on any other system. I doubt it exists in the Mac.

So why are people not going over to Ubuntu? Beats me. If you are looking for commercial technical support, Ubuntu does offer that. If you are looking at extreme personalization options Ubuntu offers that, probably even more than the Mac OS. If you are looking for easy upgrades to future versions, Ubuntu offers that. If you are looking for ease of use, Ubuntu offers that. If you are looking for robustness and security, Ubuntu is the best. Ubuntu can be installed on all types of hardware and even on older hardware. Mac OS does not offer this flexibility.

The more I use Ubuntu, the more I fail to understand the lure of the Mac OS. Is it the snob value or stupidity that make people consider a Mac over Windows and not Ubuntu?

First impressions: Kubuntu 8.04 KDE 4 Remix

I tried out the latest 64 bit Kubuntu 8.04 KDE 4 Remix distribution recently and had a very mixed experience. This is not something that I had expected out of Kubuntu since I have had a pretty long and hassle free experience with it.

Firstly, the installation process somehow switched to an all-text mode without even telling me so. That is not something that happened when I try to install the non-KDE4 version of the same operating system. And yes the box I was installing on is the same. The keyboard auto-configure feature is a real pain in all the wrong places. It keeps on asking a seemingly unending series of questions. Of course there is the option of doing the configuration manually too. But still, the auto-configure could be done a lot more elegantly, maybe like the Mac OS. The problem with the text mode is that during partition it appears to be very unfriendly. A nice GUI is always more welcome.

Installation over, I logged into the new system running KDE 4.0. My poor PC is really low on graphics muscles and it was telling rightaway. The effects, once enabled, were jerky and not seamless enough for my liking. Disabling them did not make a huge lot of a difference. There are some nice features of KDE 4.0 of course. The Plasma UI looks good and with the supplied widgets you can actually get rid of the ugly panel at the bottom of the screen. That being said, removing the panel is not something for the faint at heart. You would have to edit a KDE configuration file. So if you are not comfortable with that idea, let it just be there. I moved the panel to the top and the icons just changed automatically. And they were meaningless. The KDE application launcher button changed to the Konqueror down arrow key and remained that way. Not good.

With add/remove programs I added a few essential software. To my surprise and unlike the non-KDE4 version of Kubuntu, the new applications did not appear automatically in the application launcher menu!!! I thought of editing the application launcher menu but just could not find out a way of doing it (of course you can again tinker around with config files, but that apart). Till now things were not looking good and I was very very disappointed. 

What next? There was an announcement on the Kubuntu website that KDE 4.1.1 could now be used with Kubuntu 8.04 and reportedly that had a lot of improvements. Very well then. I followed the instructions available on the Kubuntu website and installed KDE 4.1.1.

So in comes KDE 4.1.1 and things changed. Things changed for the better. Suddenly the UI seemed a bit more responsive. The effects worked better. The panel could be removed without making changes to cryptic configuration files. Newly installed applications showed up immediately in the application launcher menu. The menu editing option was back. There are still some issues with disabling/enabling effects, but nothing major. 

There was one small quirk though, the System Settings menu option appeared on the favorites section of the application launcher, but did not appear in th System menu. Odd. I checked through the menu editor and the option was there, but just did not show up. Is this something deliberate?

The biggest change I noticed was in the Dolphin file manager. Now its a pleasure to use. The previous version was just too unwieldy and I had dumped it in favor of Konqueror. But this time it has a lot of promise. Oh yes, Konqueror still remains.

These are just the initial impressions about the operating system. The only thing I felt was the need of a more powerful graphics processor. I strongly recommend using one that has at least 256 MB of video memory. Unfortunately I was running on a Intel G33/G31 with 64 MB of shared memory.

Kubuntu 8.04 KDE 4 Remix with the KDE 4.1.1 update gives us a glimpse of what the boys and girls at KDE are upto and needlessly to say that whatever they are doing is impressive. I for one am not complaining.

Google Chrome breaks Kubuntu 8.04 download: WebKit to blame?

Kubuntu has launched a KDE 4.0 version of its operating system. The KDE 4.0 environment sports a new UI also termed as Plasma which gives a refreshing new look to Linux systems. Even though the new UI needs a bit more on graphics power, I decided to try it on my humble PC.

First step was to download the ISO image. My PC that has a DVD burner runs Windows XP (unfortunately I cannot change that since its a shared one ). So I opened up Google Chrome and punched in http://www.kubuntu.org/ . The Kubuntu website came up with a big download icon on the left as shown in the following screen shot:

When I clicked on the “Free download” buttion nothing happened. Initially I thought that the click did not register properly. So I clicked again. Nothing. I kept on trying and it just did not respond. I tried the same on Firefox and it immediately took me to the download page.

So what’s going on? Is this because Google Chrome is based on WebKit unlike Firefox? Looks likely. I tried the same thing on Apple’s Safari and faced the same problem. So probably its the WebKit software that is to blame here and not Chrome.

Here’s the version of Google Chrome that I am using:

Ubuntu to take on Apple Mac OS: Says Canonical CEO

The desktop computing world has been dominated by Microsoft’s Windows family of operating systems for a long time. In North America, Apple’s Mac OS is also popular but nowhere near to the point of dislodging Windows from its position. Popularity of the PC further strengthened Windows since there were no viable alternatives available. Things started to change with the advent of Linux.

Though initially perceived as an operating system for the geeks and nerds, Linux has come a long way. What started as an intimidating system with just a command line has grown into a full blown consumer operating system with a very capable and good looking graphical user interface. Of course its still nowhere near to the Mac OS. Well if Mark Shuttleworth, CEO of Canonical, has his way then things look all set to change once more.

Canonical backs the Ubuntu/Kubuntu Linux flavors. These flavors provide the best bet for an alternative to Mac OS and Windows at the present moment. Ubuntu offers an elegant UI, easy management of programs and has made the command line almost redundant for users who are less technically inclined. The number of software available for Linux has grown exponentially as the open source movement gained momentum. 

The main reason that the desktop computing world hasn’t adapted quickly to the Ubuntu versions is because the systems are still not perceived to be user-friendly enough. And rightly so. There are still moments when you would need to go the command line and punch in a few commands. The very thought of doing this is enough to take Ubuntu out of the wishlist of many people.

Mark Shuttleworth wants to change all this, and his target is not Microsoft Windows but Apple Mac OS. The Mac OS has long been regarded as being the end word in user friendliness. All this time the numerous other attempts at bringing Linux to the mainline desktop has concentrated on making it more Windows like. I have always maintained that Linux has to be more compelling to a user than Windows to force a switch in allegiance. So the best bet would be to target the Mac OS rather than Windows.

To realize this, Mark Shuttleworth writes in his blog:

We are hiring designers, user experience champions and interaction design visionaries and challenging them to lead not only Canonical’s distinctive projects but also to participate in GNOME, KDE and other upstream efforts to improve FLOSS usability.

Whether his approach would be good enough to challenge the Mac OS in a span of 2 years is not known. At least he has the right ideas about this.

Our best wishes are with you on this Mark.