Practical Technology

for practical people.

October 10, 2011
by sjvn01
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Everything You Wanted to Know About USB 3.0, But Were Afraid to Ask

If you’ve been in the computer business for a while, you can painfully remember when serial RS-232 ports could barely handle 28Kbps (kilobytes per second). The RS-232 serial port standard was loose enough that you could have “compatible” devices that you could never, ever physically connect with each other. How things have changed! Now, USB 3.0 can wheel and deal up to 625 Mbps. So, why is it so hard to find USB 3.0 ports and devices?

You already know that Universal Serial Bus (USB) is now the universal interface for computer peripherals, whether that’s a local printer or a USB-powered jellyfish mood lamp. Many devices only have USB ports.

The USB technology has come a long way since 1995, when USB 1.0 could only transfer 12 Megabits per second, and Windows NT lacked support for the new “standard.” It was only when USB 2.0 showed up in 2000, with its 480Mbps data transfer, that the days were numbered for other interfaces, including PS/2, serial, parallel, and even FireWire. Today, USB 3.0, also known as SuperSpeed USB, with its 5 Gigabits per second (Gbps), is finally catching on.

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October 10, 2011
by sjvn01
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How to check on your Internet connection

If there’s someone on the planet who hasn’t had trouble with their Internet connection at one time or the other I don’t know who it is. So, if you’re having trouble with your network connection, here are some simple tricks to find out what’s what with your Internet and maybe even fix it.

First things first, if your Internet connection is as dead as a doornail, check your network cabling. It may seem dumb, but I can’t begin to count the number of times what appeared to be a major network problem just turned out to be an unplugged network connection.

This isn’t just for people who are using Cat-5 cable to hook your their networks. If your Wi-Fi Access Point (AP) or cable or DSL modem have had their power cords unplugged you’re not going to connect with anything. My all time favorite failure of this sort was when a friend called with a dead network connection and it turned out the problem was he’d unplugged the AP while vacuuming and he forget to plug it back in. You should always look for the simple answers first.

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October 9, 2011
by sjvn01
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KDE takes on Android, Apple’s iOS on smartphones and tablets

If another group was trying to take on Android and Apple’s iOS on smartphones and tablets, I’d dismiss them. RIM, BlackBerry’s parent company, is having a heck of a time getting anyone to buy into PlayBook and while HP TouchPad users loved it,HP killed the TouchPad after only a few weeks. So, why should anyone think that KDE, makers of one of the two most popular Linux desktops, should stand a chance with Plasma Active? Well, because KDE has a long history of delivering the goods with minimal resources.

So what is it? Plasma Active is not, like Android, iOS, or webOS, an operating system. It’s a KDE 4.x style interface and application programming interface (API) designed for touch devices. The Plasma Active Team states that “Plasma Active is innovative technology for an intelligent user experience (UX). It is intended for all types of tablets, smartphones and touch computing devices such as set-top boxes, smart TVs, home automation, in-vehicle infotainment.

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October 7, 2011
by sjvn01
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Free software founder, Richard M. Stallman is glad Jobs is gone

Some stuff you can’t make up. While many of us sorrow at Apple founder Steve Jobs’ death, and others acknowledge Jobs’ genius while also admitting that he had his flaws, Richard M. Stallman, aka rms, founder of the Free Software Foundation (FSF), stated on his blog that “I’m not glad he’s dead, but I’m glad he’s gone.”

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October 5, 2011
by sjvn01
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Between Apples: Steve Jobs’ NeXT Years

Most of you reading this knew the Steve Jobs who always had “One ore thing” miracle up his sleeve to dazzle Apple’s fans and leave Apple’s rivals wondering what they could do to keep up with him. Others will recall the Apple of the two Steves and the pre-Mac Apple II series. Me? I knew the Steve Jobs who founded Next Computer in his exile from Apple

I’ve already written about NeXTStep, the first Unix desktop meant for a mass market, which lives on today in the form of its great-grandson Mac OS X, so I’m not going to rehash the company, its works of modern art that were also computers, and the operating system. Instead, I want to tell you about the Jobs I knew.

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October 5, 2011
by sjvn01
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Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.2 Beta is out now

When you’re talking serious server Linux, chances are you’re talking Red Hat’s Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) , so it’s good news that the beta is now ready for the next edition: RHEL 6.2

Coming on the heels of the news that Red Hat is acquiring Gluster, a cloud-storage software company, it should come as no surprise that it will offer improved cloud deployment support. Of course, there’s a lot more here than just better cloud support.

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