Practical Technology

for practical people.

March 22, 2012
by sjvn01
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Say hello to Canonical’s new Linux desktop: Ubuntu 12.04 beta review

Canonical’s next long-term support release of its flagship Linux distribution, Ubuntu 12.04 is in late beta. This next release, due out on April 26th, is in beta now. I’ve been using it for several weeks now and so far, so good.

Indeed, the new Ubuntu is good enough already that I’ve it on my default Ubuntu system: a 2009-era Gateway DX4710. This PC is powered by a 2.5-GHz Intel Core 2 Quad processor and has 6GBs of RAM and an Intel GMA (Graphics Media Accelerator) 3100 for graphics. No, it’s not fast, but unlike Windows 8’s beta, you don’t need a fast computer for Ubuntu.

Installation:

To do all this I first, of course, had to download a copy of the early release from the Ubuntu beta site. Once I had it hand, I burned the image of the operating system to a CD. With it, I then booted my computer off the CD.

After I booted it from the live image I tinkered around with it long enough to make sure that the basics worked-primarily making sure that live version could connect to the Internet-and then I installed it on my hard disk.

I’ve also been running this pre-release Ubuntu on a VirtualBox virtual machine. The one trick you need to know before running it on VirtualBox is that you’ll need to enable Physical Address Extension (PAE) under Settings/System/Processor to run it successfully.

In both cases, there was really nothing else to do except hit a few keys and give myself a user name and password. If you can put a CD in a computer and type you can install Linux these days.

Say hello to Canonical’s new Linux desktop: Ubuntu 12.04 beta review

March 21, 2012
by sjvn01
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Chrome: The people’s Web browser choice

Yes. It’s true. For one day, March 18th, 2012, Chrome, and not Internet Explorer (IE), was the most popular Web browser in the world. It won’t be the last day. While the start of the work week put IE comfortably back on top. When users aren’t chained to their desks, they’re choosing to use Google’s speedy Chrome.

StatCounter, the Web-site analytics company research arm StatCounter Global Stats found that Chrome was the number one browser in the world that day. StatCounter data comes fron over 15 billion page views per month (4 billion from the US) to the StatCounter network of more than three million websites

“While it is only one day, this is a milestone,” said Aodhan Cullen, StatCounter’s CEO in a statement. He added that Chrome still faces a battle to unseat its main rivals including IE and Firefox in many regions. While Chrome is often number one in Brazil, India, and Russia Chrome remains in 2nd or 3rd place in China, United States and Germany.

Chrome: The people’s Web browser choice. More >

March 21, 2012
by sjvn01
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Securing Your Printer with IEEE P2600

Once upon a time, we didn’t even think about securing the information on our printers. Oh, certainly we didn’t want someone on the help desk printing out a Dilbert cartoon on the executive suite’s prize color laser printer, but making sure no one could read a recently printed document from the printer’s own queue? Why bother?

That was then. This is now.

Today, as Mike Howard, Worldwide Security Leader for Managed Enterprise Solutions at HP, recently said, our “printers are essentially servers and they need to be treated and protected as such.”

It’s not just printers, though. Modern office copiers and multi-function peripherals (MFP) also keep documents, names, email addresses, and fax numbers on their hard drives. That means such data has to be protected to keep your company’s data safe.

Furthermore, you may be legally obligated to make sure no hackers get into your printer or other hard copy device (HCD) storage.

The list of laws that require you to keep your HCD’s documents safe from hackers goes on and on. A short list includes the U.S. Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, Common Criteria, and Sarbanes–Oxley (SOX).

Securing Your Printer with IEEE P2600. More >

March 21, 2012
by sjvn01
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Oracle’s Google Android patent lawsuit cut down to size

Instead of extracting billions from Google for violating its Java software patents in Android, Oracle will be lucky to get over a $100-million from its intellectual property (IP) lawsuit. That’s chump change by mega-company standards. Taking into consideration the legal costs, Oracle could have made more money if it had just offered Google an open-ended Java license in the first place. Larry Ellison, Oracle’s God-King and CEO, will have to wait another year before buying the sharks with lasers on their heads to guard his mega-yacht.

Back in 2010, Oracle sued Google for Java copyright and patent violations. At the time, Oracle’s Java lawsuit was a shocking move. Oracle, a founding members of the Linux Foundation, was suing a company over Android, which is a mobile Linux distribution. As Stephen O’Grady, one of the founders of Red Monk, the developer-oriented analysis firm, said at the time, “This is simply a case of Oracle being less concerned than Sun about being perceived as a bad actor. It is interesting, however, that Oracle appears to be willing to trade short-term transactional gains for long-term ecosystem health.”

Still, the Sun insiders who were still on board as Oracle took over the company saw this coming. As James Gosling, Java’s creator, said at the time, “Oracle finally filed a patent lawsuit against Google. Not a big surprise. During the integration meetings between Sun and Oracle where we were being grilled about the patent situation between Sun and Google, we could see the Oracle lawyer’s eyes sparkle. Filing patent suits was never in Sun’s genetic code.” Suing companies, however, is in Oracle’s genes.

Oracle’s Google Android patent lawsuit cut down to size. More >

March 19, 2012
by sjvn01
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Android and Linux re-merge into one operating system

Android has always been Linux, but for years the Android project went its own way and its code wasn’t merged back into the main Linux tree. Now, much sooner than Linus Torvalds, Linux’s founder and lead developer, had expected, Android has officially merged back into Linux’s mainline.

The fork between Android and Linux all began in the fall of 2010, “Google engineer Patrick Brady stated that Android is not Linux” That was never actually the case. Android has always been Linux at heart.

Android and Linux re-merge into one operating system. More >

March 19, 2012
by sjvn01
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Apple’s new iPad display is better than most HDTVs

Some people think that Apple’s new iPad Retina Display is a game-changer. Others say that, yes it is better but its “isn’t quite like the jaw-dropping jump,” they’d been led to expect. So, which is it? h Dr, Raymond Soneira, president of DisplayMate, the world’s leading display and display tuning company, has put the next-generation iPad to the test bench and found that the “The display on the new iPad decisively beats (blows away) all of the Tablets we have previously tested.

How so? Well, for starters, the new iPad really does meet Steve Jobs’ Retina Display specification. To do that, “an iPad Retina Display only needs 240 ppi (pixel per inch) – and it has 264 ppi. So according to Apple’s own definition, [which is based on 20/20 vision] the new iPad is indeed a true ‘Retina Display.’”

Apple’s new iPad display is better than most HDTVs. More >