chrishansenhome

I have been having difficulties with Windows lately. The keyboard has become flaky; when I type, sometimes a letter does not appear, or a backspace doesn't happen. There is no rhyme nor reason (it happens with two different keyboards) and unpredictably (so it's not a dirty keyboard issue). I've tried everything, including checking for viruses and searching for other people who have had this difficulty. Nothing has helped.

So I have been trying to get my older computer to work for a while now. It had Vista on it, but that's buggered, in many different ways. So I decided to install Ubuntu on it. I got a PCI wireless card with a good external antenna, as I'm not satisfied with the Ethernet bridge I had upstairs. I installed Fedora 10 on it just so that I could get to the Internet and download Ubuntu. I had to un-RAID my hard drives as they didn't seem to play well with Ubuntu (and I didn't have time to make them do so), So I installed the card and switched the computer on, expecting to have to search for a driver.

No driver necessary: the PCI card was recognised instantly and all I had to provide was the password. Downloaded Ubuntu, burned a disk, and then installed it. It's v.12.04, and it installed quite easily.

I'm exploring what's available as far as software is concerned. I have a browser (Firefox), an IM program (Pidgin), a Twitter program (Turpial), and a journal editor (Drivel) so far. Drivel isn't very satisfactory as it doesn't seem to pick up my tags, so I'll have to type them in. Will continue searching.

Any suggestions for software I ought to have? Email will be Thunderbird, but I'm not ready to switch over entirely so I have to be careful about installing it just yet.

To be continued.

I haven't blogged much since I got back from Southeast Asia. I apologise.

The blister on my foot from Singapore turns out to not be infected. They gave me scads of antibiotics anyway. One good thing: at least they didn't give me the one you can't drink alcohol with. I asked the foot clinic for advice on how to prevent such blisters when I visit hot climates. They said that well-fitting lace-up shoes/trainers are probably best and that slip-ons like crocs may cause rubbing that can end up in a blister. Taking along a supply of antibiotics to take if I do get a blister is also a good idea. I go to the Diabetic Clinic at St. Thomas's a week from tomorrow. I expect that some change in my medication will happen then.

I have not yet been able to connect my Skype Wireless Phone from Belkin to our router. This seriously pisses me off. I don't know whether it's the router, the phone, or a combination of both. When I try to update the firmware in the phone, the computer complains that the phone isn't connected to it (by USB). Nothing I do gets it to connect. The firmware upgrade doesn't work with Apple (I tried, believe me). I may try with Ubuntu (see later item).

I have not heard anything from work since I got back. People tell me that I shouldn't worry, but should be pleased that I have nothing to do but get paid for it. This is quite scary, actually, as my job may at any time just be eliminated (me not having anything to do makes that more likely, in my view). I will be starting to study for my ISEB Practitioner's exam (scheduled for Dec. 12) this week, so that, in a way, is work. We will be OK even if I lose my job, and I think I would be able to get contract work in training and consulting. But, no one wants to lose their job; more importantly, having something to do helps to keep one sane.

I have more than 500 pictures of the temples around Angkor Wat. I need seriously to get them categorised and put up on Flickr.

I have been bitching about Vista for quite a while. Thus, when someone suggested Ubuntu 8.10, I decided to give it a try, but on my older laptop. My immediate verdict is: apart from the fact that it wouldn't partition the (60 GB) hard disk to dual boot with XP, everything else was a dream. Installation was easy (once I conceded that I would have to give up the hard disk entirely to Ubuntu--I didn't keep any data on it anyway) and, more importantly, Ubuntu runs like greased lightning on this rather elderly (probably around 4 years old) laptop. It was a gaming laptop, so it's got memory to spare, but I was surprised at how fast it was. For example, downloading this .pdf newsletter from St. Michael's Church in Marblehead took about 6-7 seconds on Vista. The download on Ubuntu was almost unmeasurably fast.

Also to note is this fact: when this laptop was running XP, it was almost impossible to get the Netgear PCMCIA WiFi card to work correctly and connect up to our wireless router. Now that it's running Ubuntu, not only did the installation not need a separate driver, but it connected up first try (with the WPA key and SSID) and has continued to connect up seamlessly ever since. While downloading the aforementioned newsletter, I was also listening to a Hearts of Space radio program, and doing both over the wireless connection, not Ethernet. There were no dropouts on the music, and the newsletters continued to download quickly.

I still haven't tried all the features of Ubuntu, but I'm thinking that it might actually be a viable alternative to Vista and Windows generally. The price (free) is also right. The Register review was generally favourable. If you want to try it, the download site I used is here.