Google Drive is much, much, more than just another storage option. Let’s look it over shall we?
April 25, 2012
by sjvn01
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April 25, 2012
by sjvn01
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The 16 Linux Shell Commands Every Desktop Linux User Should Know
Some people still have a silly notion that to use Linux you must know Linux shell commands and syntax like the back of your hand. What nonsense! With any modern Linux desktop distribution, you no more need to use Linux commands like ps, grep, or ls than you need to use DOS commands in Windows today.
Except, of course, just as in Windows, every now and then it is helpful to use the good, old ASCII command-line instructions.
Mind you, 99% of the time desktop Linux users are fine with Linux desktops such as Cinnamon, GNOME, Unity, or KDE. For system administrators, it’s a bit different. Linux sysadmins use shell commands all the time.
But, once every blue moon, its handy to know some Linux command basics, so here’s what you need to know.
The 16 Linux Shell Commands Every Desktop Linux User Should Know. More >
April 24, 2012
by sjvn01
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Hands on with Google Drive (Review)
It took Google long enough. We’ve been hearing rumors for years that Google was going to release personal cloud storage, the Google Drive. Well, wait no more, the Google Drive is here. But, it’s much more than just that. It’s a nearly seamless integration of free and cheap storage with Google Docs.
To install Google Drive as a local client—ala the Dropbox model where the cloud drive appears in your operating system’s file manager as just another directory—you need to have either a Mac or Windows system. Mind you, Google Drive also will work just fine with Linux… but only from your Google Drive Web page. I’m not happy about that.
To get the program, or to use it on the Web, you’ll need to have a Google account. With Google’s recent privacy changes, not everyone will want to do that. Personally, I don’t have a problem with Google’s new policy. But , as Zack Whittaker points out, nothing on anyone’s cloud drive should be regarded as being all that private when push comes to shove.
If you’re OK with all that, the first step is to go to the Google Drive Start page.
Hands on with Google Drive (Review). More >
April 24, 2012
by sjvn01
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Free storage for you: Google Drive to arrive today
The rumors were true. Google’s personal cloud-based storage service, Google Drive, has been released today with 5GB of free storage. It includes both free and commercial versions. The minimum free service will include 5GBs of free storage, and you’ll be able to buy additional space for up to, brace yourself, 16 terabytes of storage.
In addition, Google Docs’ available storage for your documents has moved up within the last twelve hours from 1GB of storage to 5GBs. You can see if you have this additional storage for yourself by going to your Google Docs setting page. You’ll see about half-way down the page a listing for storage. This seems to be, for the moment, only available if you’re using the English language version of Google Docs.
Gerwin Sturm, an Austrian developer and Web designer, spotted the Google Drive smoking gun on a French Google Web site this morning: a prematurely released Google Drive announcement.
This early French-language posting, which appears to have been an early draft, is no longer available on the Google site, is from Sundar Pichai, Senior Vice President, Google Chrome & Apps. In it he states: “Today we launch Google Drive, a centralized space where you can create, share, collaborate and store all your documents. You establish a budget with your staff that you develop a presentation with a working group or hosting a seminar, you can now do it in Drive. Download and access all your documents, videos, photos, Google Docs, PDF, etc.”
So, this is more than just a Dropbox replacement. Far, far more.
Free storage for you: Google Drive to arrive today More >
April 23, 2012
by sjvn01
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IPv6: It’s the end of the Internet as you know it, and I feel fine
On June 6, many Web sites and Internet providers will start supporting Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6), the next generation Internet protocol, as part of their regular service. But, don’t get into a panic; most users won’t have a thing to worry about.
To get you up to speed, IPv4, and now IPv6, are the core protocols that the Internet uses for pretty much everything. Without them, we wouldn’t have the Web, e-mail, YouTube, you name it. There was only one little problem with IPv4: it’s 32-bit 4.3 billion addresses, which looked like so many in the 1970s, aren’t even close to enough for today’s Internet. Those mobile devices that we love so much like Android phones, iPads, etc. etc. have been sucking down IPv4 addresses like a gas guzzling car from the time of cheap gasoline. For the longest time, we managed to avoid running out of IPv4 addresses with the use of technologies like Network Address Translation (NAT) and Classless Inter-Domain Routing (CIDR), but those haven’t been enough.
How to check on your Internet connection
As early as 1994, though, the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) saw that we were going to run out of Internet gas. So, they came with IPv6. And, how many addresses can it handle? With its 128-bit address space it can have up to 2^128 addresses or 40,282,366,920 billion billion billion usable addressed. Come the day we need to thinking about interstellar Internet, we can start worrying about an IPv8.
IPv6: It’s the end of the Internet as you know it, and I feel fine. More >
April 23, 2012
by sjvn01
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Facebook + Instagram = one big acquisition flop
I know, I know. Facebook’s acquisition of Instagram hasn’t even been finalized yet and I’m already calling it a complete waste of a billion dollars. How can I say that? Easy.
Let’s look at the facts, shall we? Facebook paid about $28 for each of Instagram’s 35 million users. As such things go, that doesn’t seem so bad
— as long as Instagram’s users stick around. But the reality is that faithful fans of the photo-sharing program are royally ticked off by the deal. Those who are frantic to get their pictures out of Instagram before Facebook takes over may well be wary of Facebook’s lousy privacy record. If you don’t want your Instagram photos used in Facebook ads, you’d better make sure you have your privacy settings adjusted properly — and then hope Facebook doesn’t change its privacy settings yet again.
Moreover, $28 per user is cheap only if Instagram’s users aren’t already Facebook users. In its pre-IPO S1, Facebook claims it has 845 million active monthly users. I strongly suspect that there’s a good deal of overlap between that 845 million and Instagram’s 35 million.
So when you boil it all down, what Facebook has really bought is some Web 2.0 software for tweaking pictures.