Practical Technology

for practical people.

June 20, 2012
by sjvn01
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Shuttleworth on Ubuntu Linux, Fedora, and the UEFI problem

If you buy a Windows 8 or Windows RT computer or tablet, yes even Surface, it will come with secure boot enabled by default in their replacement for the BIOS, Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI). I doubt that will actually make them more secure, but it’s always crystal clear that it will make it much harder to boot Linux or any other operating system, such as Windows XP or 7, on them. Fedora came up with a way to get around this problem and Ubuntu Linux has come up with its own solution to the Windows 8 lock box as well (PDF Link). Fedora’s developers, however, don’t like Ubuntu’s answer.

In a blog posting Matthew Garrett, a developer for Red Hat, Fedora’s parent company, wrote Ubuntu’s UEFI requirements are “basically the same set of requirements as Microsoft have, except with an Ubuntu key instead of a Microsoft one.”

Shuttleworth on Ubuntu Linux, Fedora, and the UEFI problem. More >

June 19, 2012
by sjvn01
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Fast, Faster, Fastest: Linux rules supercomputing

A few decades back I was working at Goddard Space Flight Center. I’m sorry to say that I left just before some people I’d met, Don Becker and Thomas Sterling, built the first Linux cluster, Beowulf. They didn’t know it, but by making a cheap cluster from 16 486DXs processors and 10Mbps Ethernet, they were creating the ancestor to today’s Linux supercomputers. Now, not 20 years later, well over 90% of the world top 500 supercomputers are running Linux.

The new supercomputer champion of champions, according to the TOP500 list of the world’s top supercomputers is Sequoia. This IBM BlueGene/Q system installed at the Department of Energy’s Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory achieved an impressive 16.32 petaflop per second (Pflop/s) on the Linpack benchmark using 1,572,864 cores.” That’s 16.32 quadrillion floating-point operations per second). The operating system? Linux of course.

Fast, Faster, Fastest: Linux rules supercomputing. More >

June 19, 2012
by sjvn01
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It’s 2016, and Chrome OS is ascendant

The very first PCs were just appearing when I started using computers. We had already seen the advent of microcomputers and minicomputers. Those machines were designed for people who loved technology, not people who loved getting work done with technology. For work, you used mainframes and midrange Unix and VMS computers with a terminal on the client end. The CP/M-80, Apple II and IBM PC changed all that. Fat client computers took over the world, and they’re still reigning, in the form of Windows PCs and Macs.

But the PC is no Queen Elizabeth II. Its reign, half the length of hers, may be coming to an end.

Google thinks we’re ready to say goodbye to fat client systems and move to cloud-based operating systems, such as its own Chrome OS. Instead of PCs, it wants us to use Chromeboxes and Chromebooks. We’re resisting, but I think we’ll come around to Google‘s point of view in a few short years.


It’s 2016, and Chrome OS is ascendant. More >

June 19, 2012
by sjvn01
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Microflops: Microsoft Surface RT and 8 tablets

Here’s the best part of Microsoft’s lame attempt to surprise us with a significant announcement:

Windows Embedded, Drone Edition
IPad for Xbox
Clippy for Metro
Minesweeper 2013
Windows Vista 8 Metro Edition
Microsoft Works for Blackberry 10
Vista, Second Edition

Those are among the names that the bored tech press came up with for Microsoft’s new product on Twitter while we were waiting for Microsoft to get its act together and make its announcement.

In the Los Angles-based event, Steve Ballmer announced Microsoft is selling a Windows RT and Windows 8 tablets, the re-branded Microsoft Surface. It’s a 10.6-inch—about an inch bigger than an iPad–tablet with a keyboard and touchpad on its built-in cover.

That sounds cool, but I really wonder just how sturdy it can be in real life. In addition, I’ve seen hybrid laptop and tablet before and I’m still waiting for one that actually delivers. One thing I will note to its credit is that Microsoft promises that it will work with both a stylus, for fine detail work, and with your finger when you’re trying to use the Windows 8 klutzy Metro’s interface.

Microflops: Microsoft Surface RT and 8 tablets. More >

June 19, 2012
by sjvn01
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Microsoft supports Linux desktop

No, that’s not my prediction for Microsoft’s mysterious Monday announcement. No, it’s what Microsoft is already doing with last week’s unexpected release of Skype 4 for Linux. Microsoft–Microsoft!–of all companies has just shipped its first mass-market, end-user Linux desktop program.

It really wasn’t surprising that Microsoft saw the light of Linux on servers when they started supporting major Linux distributions — CentOS, openSUSE, SUSE Linux, and Ubuntu — on Windows Azure. Ballmer and the rest of Microsoft’s brass may not like it one darn bit, but they know that people want Linux servers on the cloud so they had to give it to them.

In fact, Microsoft itself is using Linux for its services. Ironically enough, Microsoft has moved Skype from its peer-to-peer (P2P) architecture to one built around… wait for it: Linux servers.

Microsoft supports Linux desktop. More >

June 18, 2012
by sjvn01
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It’s the end of books as you knew them: E-books out-sell hardbound for the 1st time

If you follow the book trade, you knew this was coming. E-books, no matter whether you read them on an Amazon Kindle, a Barnes & Noble Nook, or your iPad are selling like crazy. We may complain about their high prices and even take eBook publishers to court for their prices and hardware lock-in, but we love our e-books. In fact, we love them so much that for the first time adult eBook sales were higher than adult hardcover sales.

It wasn’t even close. The Association of American Publishers reported that in the first quarter of 2012, adult eBook sales were up to $282.3 million while adult hardcover sales came to only $229.6 million. In last year’s first quarter, hardcover sales accounted for $223 million in sales while eBooks logged $220.4 million.

So where are the eBook buyers coming from? The answer is trade and mass-market paperbacks.

It’s the end of books as you knew them: E-books out-sell hardbound for the 1st time. More >