Practical Technology

for practical people.

September 16, 2009
by sjvn01
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Shh!!! HP sneaks Linux in on new laptops

Except for Dell, the major PC vendors are reluctant to admit they actually sell and support Linux. For instance, HP supports Linux quite well on its servers but is very reluctant to support it on its desktops. They have trouble even admitting that they’re now shipping DeviceVM‘s instant-on Splashtop Linux on their new notebook lines.

HP had started quietly shipping Splashtop on its new business laptop, the HP ProBook 5310m. Curiously, HP is continuing to ship its Windows/Outlook-based QuickLook on the ProBook as well. Why would you bother with that, since Splashtop could support the full-featured Evolution e-mail client? You can also use Gmail or any other Web-based mail system with QuickWeb. Perhaps HP wants to stay on Microsoft good side. After all, that also would explain why HP has been so hesitant to make it easy for would-be buyers to get Novell’s SLED (SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop) 11 on HP desktops.

Nonetheless, QuickWeb is also going to be available on HP’s high-end consumer notebooks: the MacBook-like ENVY 13 and the ENVY 15, and the not-yet-shipping Windows 7 HP Mini 110 netbook model.

Buyers who want the Mini 110 should make sure they’re buying exactly what they want with this model. HP currently sells a version of the Mini 110 with Ubuntu Linux, which I recommend, and another version with XP. The 5310m, which isn’t available yet, will come with Windows 7 Starter Edition. While Windows 7 Starter Edition is no longer crippled by a three-application limit, it’s still easily the weakest member of the Windows 7 family.

QuickWeb is really just a subset of Splashtop. While HP could have offered a full Splashtop Linux desktop, they’ve elected to only offer the Web interface. Still, it’s a good Web browser. Not only does it boot up in 20 seconds or less, it can view and play multimedia files in such common formats as Adobe Flash, Adobe PDF documents, and MP3 music files.

While HP isn’t going to let you get the full Splashtop Linux experience, the Web version is quite impressive. I can see many users never actually using their laptops’ installed operating system. After all, with just some Linux and most of the Web, what else do you need?

A version of this story first appeared in ComputerWorld.

September 16, 2009
by sjvn01
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Your XP-to-Windows 7 upgrade path: Buy a new PC

Microsoft’s leaders really, really want you to forget about Vista and move right on to Windows 7. And who can blame them? Vista was a train wreck. No one who knows what they’re doing runs Vista, not even the Microsoft faithful. Windows 7, on the other hand, is a worthwhile desktop operating system. There’s only one little problem. There’s no good way to get from XP to 7.

Actually, that’s not a small problem at all. According to Net Applications’ Market Share report, in August 2009, 71.7% of all desktops were running XP, compared to a mere 18.8% running Vista. So, that means the great majority of Windows users will have to try to migrate from XP to 7.

I use the word “migrate” deliberately instead of “update” or “upgrade” because this will be a migration. If you are among the small minority using Vista, you can upgrade to 7 without any fuss or muss, so long as the move is between equivalent versions, like Vista Home Premium and Windows 7 Home Premium, or you’re jumping up, to Windows 7 Ultimate, for example.

I only wish that were the case for XP. The only way you can get from XP to Windows 7 is to do a clean install. Period. End of statement.

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September 15, 2009
by sjvn01
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Archos 5: The Linux Internet tablet for everyone

I honestly didn’t expect much from the Archos 5 Internet tablet. I was wrong. This Android Linux powered device is more than just another would-be iPod Touch competitor; it’s a powerful touch computer in its own right.

The Archos 5 is a do it all hand-held device. While it’s no iPhone, it does everything else. Personally, as a long time iPod Touch fan, I’m just fine with devices that don’t include telephony.

What really impressed me though about the Archos 5 is its 4.8-inch 800×400-pixel display. You might not think that it being a bit bigger than Touch’s 3.5-inch display or the Microsoft Zune HD’s 3.3-inch display, would make that much of a difference, but it does. It’s simply much more pleasurable to watch TV episodes or, even a movie, on the Archos 5.

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September 15, 2009
by sjvn01
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Open-source software may unify the medical-records realm

Open-source medical software has been around for over 30 years. Unless you are in healthcare IT, however, chances are you’ve never even heard of it. But that’s poised to change.

With the passage of ARRA (the American Recovery And Reinvestment Act of 2009, also called the federal stimulus package), some $19 billion dollars have been earmarked for Medicare and Medicaid technology incentives over the next five years. This program is known as HITECH (PDF), short for Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health.

The program will use carrots, in the form of several million dollars per hospital and up to $44,000 for individual doctors, and sticks, in the form of Medicare reimbursement cuts, to get hospitals and doctors to move to EHRs (electronic health records), also called EMRs (electronic medical records).

This may be the start of a sea change in medical IT. In the past, the field has been a patchwork of feudal states: Dozens of companies produced an endless parade of programs using incompatible data formats that covered different parts of the healthcare world. Now, if EHRs become widespread, hospitals and other medical providers will be finally able to tap into each other’s work.

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September 15, 2009
by sjvn01
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Fake virus infection Web pages are everywhere

Everyone has seen a fake virus infection Web page from time to time. They pop up on your screen looking like a perfectly normal Windows page except they tell you that your PC is infected by a virus and you need to click here to either fix the problem or download a program that will clean out the bug for you. The only problem is it’s a lie. It’s actually an attack designed to get you to download malware.

Usually these fake Windows pages-they’re actually Web pages-pop up when you’re visiting a dodgy Web site. But, even the New York Times isn’t immune to attacks like this. Over this last weekend, September 12-13, I was startled to see an apparent Windows page show up that read, “Warning!!! Your system requires immediate anti-viruses scan. Personal Antivirus can perform fast and free virus malicious software scan of your computer.”

Now, I wouldn’t fall for this, but I can see how many people would. At a glance, it looks real and the last thing most people expect to see coming from the New York Times is malware. But, that’s exactly what it was.

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September 14, 2009
by sjvn01
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Linux 2.6.31’s best five features

Lately, most of the improvements in the Linux kernel have been for server users. In the latest release though, Linux 2.6.31, most of the best goodies are for Linux desktop users. Here’s my list of the top five improvements.

1) USB 3 Support. This is the big one. We’ve been connecting our devices to our PCs with USB ports instead of serial or parallel ports for some time now, and that’s been good. USB 2.0 has a maximum throughput of 480Mbps (Megabits per second). That’s fast, but these days, when you might want to move a gigabyte plus of movie from one device to another, it’s not fast enough. So, the USB vendors have been working on USB 3.0, which is almost 10-times faster than USB 2.

How fast? USB 3 can run at an effective throughput rate of 350MBps (Megabytes per second). USB 2.0 maxes out at about 32MBps. That’s faster than the SATA hard drive you are almost certainly currently using in your PC. USB 3 devices, which will go by the trade name of SuperSpeed USB, will start appearing by the year’s end.

What’s especially interesting about Linux supporting these new devices is that Linux is actually ahead of Windows and Mac OS X in supporting these super-speed hard drives, USB-flash drives and the like. Neither Windows 7 nor Snow Leopard currently supports USB 3.

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