OK, I fixed the htaccess rules for my wiki so it should be accessible. Now I gotta add more content, sigh. Well at least people like the Best Software round-up I published a while ago. I will get around to updating it, adding a few new diamonds and updating some previous entries.
If you are ever having problems with setting up a wiki on a subdomain so it has nice URLs and doesn’t freak out then check out this post which I unfortunately cannot take credit for. For someone who doesn’t have the time or patience to read up on .htaccess rules it’s useful.
In other news I am reading this livejournal post with trepidation. I haven’t got to the pictures yet, but a sense of disquiet is slowly building in my stomach… that might be heartburn though.
I can’t believe I am posting this but here is an in depth preview of Halo 3 from 2old2game. I guess even my interest has be piqued about what will surely be one of the biggest games to hit the shelves this year. My money is on Crysis though. My money will have to be on the counter to play it though, my current machine is ~5 years old and that just doesn’t cut the mustard these days.
Compiz & Feisty Fawn Ubuntu
I updated to Feisty Ubuntu a few days ago. A pretty seamless upgrade from Dapper it went off without a hitch and left me with a spanking new iteration of what is undoubtedly the most shiny and well thought Linux Distro around. Ubuntu has got it where it counts, and as you can test drive it on a Live CD there’s no need to fear a full installation. You just burn it to CD, boot from it and test drive the system without making any alterations to your PC.
What I’m seriously impressed with this version has to be the inclusion of Compiz. Simply put Compiz takes your Desktop and adds eyecandy, extremely gorgeous eye candy. The kind Vista wished it had.
For instance after Compiz is turned on (called ‘Desktop Effects’ in Ubuntu) all windows wobble when you move them. It even wobbles movies while rendering them in real time, it has to be seen to be believed. Further to that some of the effects and functions have a practical aspect. To put it simply the one effect I’ve fallen in love with the most has to be the Zoom function. With a few click you bind zoom in/out to your mouse wheel and you can dynamically zoom in and out of the desktop, enlarging any area. I can think of fantastic potential for helping people who are partially sighted to make more use of their Computers.
Funnily enough Compiz wasn’t the first place I’ve seen this zoom, it’s around on pretty much any modern Mac which is where I first fell in love with it. Since I first saw it I’ve been looking for a program that adds this kind of functionality to Windows and have yet to find it. The closest I’ve found have been magnifying glass type affairs that are always atrociously out of date and only do set multiples of magnification.
Before I go into propaganda mode I just wanted to link to some Compiz videos on youtube so you can see exactly what you’re missing till you stick that Ubuntu CD in!
It seems every day that Windows sees itself losing more of its lead that it used to be able to proudly boast of in terms of First and Third party software as compared to other platforms. Ubuntu is an extremely accomplished Desktop as is Mac OS X, both of which I would whole heartedly recommend. Of the two Mac OS X is the simpler and also in some ways more accomplished, however if you find joy in tinkering and learning then I would suggest Ubuntu. You get your first introduction to Free Open Source Software, you get the joy of learning something new and the end result is a wonderful, flexible operating system that has almost limitless potential.
