Pollywogs!

My work laptop has been acting up recently. Sometimes crashing explorer when working with network shares, sometimes just hanging explorer until I force it to reboot. I’ve installed so much junk on it over the past couple years, used it heavily for work and play nearly every day, taken it around the world…I guess it was inevitable that I would need to reinstall Windows?

However, when that time came today, I thought “wait wait wait, do I really even need Windows?” After a few moments and some time with pen & paper, I realized “no, no I don’t.” I have three programs which I need to run for work which I can’t either do with a native version of the same app or a comparable version of a freeware app. For those three programs, I’m going to work through VirtualBox, a really easy to use bit of software which lets you run a copy of Windows inside Ubuntu. The few times I need my Windows-only software, just fire up that old, expensive and restrictive OS, do what I need to do, and get back out again. The rest of the time that wonderfully easy flavor of Linux, Ubuntu, will do the trick.

Ubuntu installed quickly and easily on my aging Dell Inspiron 6000. One thing I wasn’t sure about was my wireless, it wasn’t immediately obvious how to ‘enable’ it, but a quick look at the Network settings got it up and running. Other than that, nearly everything was fast, easy and effortless. Drivers for everything ‘just worked’, from my video drivers to my modem drivers to my wireless drivers. Battery charging detected, touch pad…Perfect! Desktop effects were even enabled by default, the very basic Intel integrated video adapter has no problem making the animations smooth and beautiful.

Printer install took a minute or two. The only aspect which took some thinking was connecting the laptop to our local network. We have a small network operating around a computer running Windows Small Business Server 2003. I don’t particularly like it, it just makes shit more complicated than necessary. There was some kind of encryption operating which made connecting to network shares fail with an odd message, but a little work with Google turned up the settings on the W2K3 box which needed changed.

One other thing which needed tweaked was when I closed the lid all it did was blank the screen. I changed it to the normal behavior of putting the computer into standby and all was good.

I’m going to expand this post over the next couple days with information that I found helpful during my transition. I currently have bookmarks to the pages where I found help for my network share problem, for example.

Networking

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Trying to mount a share on a Windows 2003 Server gives you this message:

” cli_negprot: SMB signing is mandatory and we have disabled it.”

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=8479

“…Administrative Tools, open Domain Controller Security Settings.
Go to Local Policies then Security Options.

Scroll down to find the entry Microsoft network server: Digitally sign communications (always). Set this to Disabled.

…Open up a command window and type:

gpupdate

This will buzz and whirr for a few moments before confirming that the policy has been reloaded…”

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Mounting a network share so that you can access it through applications such as KeePassX and Thunderbird (say, shared mail folders, shared profile installations, and so on):

sudo aptitude install linneighborhood

Then, right click on the Applications toolbar, hit Edit Menus, and create a shortcut for LinNeighborhood. I placed mine under System Tools. Note that the Create Launcher dialog may spawn behind your active window, so click on it from the toolbar and use this as the command:

gksudo LinNeighborhood

I put LinNeighborhood in for the name and allowed the default icon. Now that it is installed and we have access to our network shares, just a little work with LinNeighborhood. First thing I did was set the Preferences as so:

Under the Scan tab:

• enter my workgroup (actually the first 15 characters of our domain name)
• check off all of the ’scan as user’ buttons
• check ‘use group name on browse’
• check ‘use group name on mount’,
• ‘initial browse on startup’.

Under the Miscellaneous tab:

• Enter the default user with the credentials used to access the shares
• check ’save password’
• check ‘Use RootMountDir/machine/share as default mount point’ and change the location (in my case) to /home/garrett/mnt/
• check ‘Replace spaces with underscores’
• check ‘Memorize Mount Shares / Remount on next Startup’.
• Hit Save
• Hit Close

…and we’re (finally) ready to start actually adding shares…

I restarted LinNeighborhood, and drilled down from the Workgroup entry to the shares I wanted to access. Each time I was challaned for credentials, an ‘Insert User’ dialog box pops up with the default user information ready to go, so I just hit OK.

Arriving at my destination, I want to add the ‘Mail’ share. Right click on the share and hit ‘mount’. With the settings entered into the Preferences, most of this dialog box is already filled out:

Service, Mount Point, SMB User, SMB Password and the check boxes can all be left as default. The file and dir mode can be left as default. The only thing that I changed was that I made the shares accessible by my user account by selecting my UID and GID off the selection box (both near the bottom). Hit ‘Mount’, and the share should appear at the bottom of the LinNeighborhood window under ‘Resources’.

Now, any time you want to access this share, you simply navigate with your software to /homedirectory/user/mount/server/share (in my case /home/garrett/mnt/pcsserver/mail/). Easy, but not quite effortless…

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The Asus eee PC. A 2 pound laptop which starts at $300. Tiny, sexy, sleek, light, awesome…the size of a small hardcover book!!! Surf the internet, work on Word and Excel documents, chat and more. I want a black one ooooh hot hot hot! Add a Logitech VX Nano mouse and oh la la baby!!

It runs a flavor of Linux, so it boots up very quickly from its solid-state hard drive. Asus is working on versions with larger displays, the current model has a 7″ 800×480 display, which is decent but not great. Of course it is a subminiature fully capable notebook for $300. Very likely there will be a small pile of the original models on eBay once the larger displays are released.

Stepping up to $350 gets you a larger hard drive (from 2 GB to 4 GB (as in, you’ll want to stick your movies and music on flash memory regardless of the hard drive size)), $400 adds a built in webcam, and so on…

From what I’ve read, practically everyone who gets one loves it.

Pic from the HardwareCentral Review

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Reviews:

http://www.hardwarecentral.com…

http://www.downloadsquad.com…

http://arstechnica.com…

http://www.notebookreview.com…

http://www.pcper.com…

http://www.hothardware.com…

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Manufacturer’s website:

http://eeepc.asus.com/global/product.htm

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Probably the most promising alternative OS (it will run Windows XP but what is the point in that???):

http://wiki.eeeuser.com/ubuntu:eeexubuntu:home

Forbes Magazine is filled with some of the most vile shit I’ve read recently. And some of the most misinformed (see Poisoned Bulbs). Does Steve Forbes, the fucking retard, think that florescent bulbs are a new invention? That people haven’t had them installed in their homes for decades upon decades now? That bulbs haven’t been breaking the entire time?

Folks trust Forbes when they can’t even do the most basic research on a topic (much less one that was thoroughly debunked a couple months ago)?

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You can fit an 8′ baseboard heater in a Prius up between the two front seats. If you put the passenger seat down in the front, you could bring home a stack of 2×4s.

Speaking of baseboard heaters, an 8′ current costs about $70. The end caps cost $11 each. When I picked up the pieces in Lowes and saw the price, I literally dropped the F-bomb right then and there. Ahh, the familiar burning sensation of getting raped in the ass. Wonderful…

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Vote fraud? Rigged elections? What do you think this is, some Banana Republic??

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Perfect timing, really, considering the Public is as dissatisfied with the Legislative Branch as they are with the Executive Branch. The decider (mouthpiece #1) is apparently going to have his installed official (mouthpiece #2) in the Treasury announce his decision by Thursday? Oh wait, no, let us pretend all of the ‘deciding’ is going on between the ‘two’ parties, the “Democrats” and the “Republicans”. The same two parties that refuse to impeach Bush or Cheney for innumerable legitimate offenses. Fuck you Reid. Fuck you Pelosi. Fuck you.

Economy souring, the dollar worth less every minute, potential war, war on terror, war on civil rights, endless war…

I’d highly suggest if you do get a rebate to put it in a savings account, because whoever is going to have to clean up this steaming pile of shit that George Bush and Dick Cheney are leaving behind where America used to stand…well, let’s just say that getting things back on track isn’t going to be cheap.

So it looks like the rest of the world is finally starting to wrestle with the realization that the United States is spinning out of control with a madman who does not give a fuck at the wheel. Global markets are in decline, the US markets are down 10-15% (actually back to about the same levels they were spring of 2007), and the Fed is clutching at straws trying to ‘prevent a recession’. Record deficit spending, tax cuts, a dollar which has been losing value faster than they can print new bills…

But don’t worry, the rich are doing just fine. Look at ExxonMobile. Most profitable company in the history of mankind last year. You aren’t getting gouged at the pump though, they are making those astronomical profits fair and square. You can trust them. Just like the media.

Speaking of trust, the White House has been doing whatever they can to incite war with Iran. And FUCKING CONGRESS is helping them. Stupid, worthless piles of shit. When will we wake up and remember that the Public is in control of this Republic, not criminals and cunts who we ‘elected’ to a temporary position of representation. FUCK. You can’t tell, but that fuck was filled with as much contempt and derision as possible. The kind of contempt which makes you huck a rock at a corpse hanging at a gas station. The same kind of contempt the White House has for “We the People of the United States“:

“The White House “does not know if any e-mails were not properly preserved in the archiving process,” said the statement by Theresa Payton, chief information officer for the White House Office of Administration. “We are continuing our efforts,” said Payton, whose staff is responsible for the White House e-mail system.

If the e-mails were not saved, the White House might have violated two laws requiring preservation of documents that fall into the categories of federal records or presidential records.

White House spokesman Tony Fratto said that “there is no basis to say that the White House has destroyed any evidence or engaged in any misconduct.”

No basis? Really?

And just in case you had any delusions that this isn’t the New Fascist Republic of America, please re-read the definition of fascism and keep in mind the policies of the last seven years which have stripped the heart out of the Constitution:

“Fascism is an authoritarian political ideology (generally tied to a mass movement) that considers individual subordinate to the interests of the state, party or society as a whole. Fascists seek to forge a type of national unity, usually based on (but not limited to) ethnic, cultural, racial, religious attributes. The key attribute is intolerance of others: other religions, languages, political views, economic systems, cultural practices, etc. Various scholars attribute different characteristics to fascism, but the following elements are usually seen as its integral parts: nationalism, statism, militarism, totalitarianism, anti-communism, corporatism, populism, collectivism, and opposition to political and economic liberalism.”

Yes. The government is suddenly more important than the people? Since when, again? Oh yea, since the New Pearl Harbor…

Mission Accomplished!

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2012. The first year the Northern Artic will be ice free, based on the latest data. Global what?

“This week, after reviewing his own new data, NASA climate scientist Jay Zwally said: “At this rate, the Arctic Ocean could be nearly ice-free at the end of summer by 2012, much faster than previous predictions.”

So scientists in recent days have been asking themselves these questions: Was the record melt seen all over the Arctic in 2007 a blip amid relentless and steady warming? Or has everything sped up to a new climate cycle that goes beyond the worst case scenarios presented by computer models?”

Oh. Thank goodness. See, no one actually KNOWS. That is the great thing about science, we can just pretend it is all ok by saying that it isn’t a fact that it is our direct fault the world in ten or twenty years is going to look nothing like the world of today. “How could we know it would be so bad, no one told us, we were helpless to change, it wasn’t our fault” and all the other bullshit that will be paraded out…

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This is an interesting compare and contrast between the “US and Iraq” and “China and the US”.

“It’s been eight years now. Eight long years. Sure, initially I was glad when China toppled the Bush regime and executed the “retarded tyrant” as I love to call him. It wasn’t that bad at the start, but as time wore on and I realized they weren’t leaving, it started to gnaw at me.”

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Here is an organization I’ve become a member of recently, because of this article:

“Days before the first presidential caucuses in a medical marijuana state, the Marijuana Policy Project today doubled its offer to presidential candidates Rudy Giuliani, John McCain and Mitt Romney to back up their statements opposing medical marijuana with scientific evidence. If any of the candidates can prove his statements are true, MPP will donate the legal maximum of $10,000 to his campaign ($5,000 for the primaries, $5,000 for the general election), plus an additional $10,000 donation to the candidate’s favorite charity.”

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Don’t use the your cell phone before bed. Seriously, no lulz here:

‘Published by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Progress in Electromagnetics Research Symposium and funded by the Mobile Manufacturers Forum, representing the main handset companies, it has caused serious concern among top sleep experts, one of whom said that there was now “more than sufficient evidence” to show that the radiation “affects deep sleep”……The people who had received the radiation took longer to enter the first of the deeper stages of sleep, and spent less time in the deepest one. The scientists concluded: “The study indicates that during laboratory exposure to 884 MHz wireless signals, components of sleep believed to be important for recovery from daily wear and tear are adversely affected.”‘

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A hacker group declares war on the ‘church’ of scientology. Can fucking Tom Cruise get any crazier or creepier? And how about the brainwashed Katie Holmes? If either of them actually mattered in this current clusterfuck of existence, it would be sorta sad. As it stands, they are the latest flavor to distract and numb you of the truth of the situation.

Ignore the man behind the curtain…

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Finally, on a slightly lighter note, a roundabout literally from hell…