“When business, education, and governments are cost conscious, they move toward Linux. Even in times of economic strength, they want control od their operating systems. Ubuntu Linux saves money. The open source nature of Linux allows organisations to control and customise their operating systems.

If desired, commercial support is available from Canonical. Even with that support Linux saves money, and provides a higher degree of control when compared to Microsoft Windows.

Linux has proven itself in pressure-filled situations. The New York Stock Exchange migrated to Linux. Major corporations, from Home depot to Toyota, and governments such as Germany, the Republic of Korea and Mexico are making the switch to Linux. When faced with a Microsoft audit for licences, the Portland Oregon school system switched to Linux. Major movie studios such as Disney and Dreamworks use Linux to create the latest motion pictures. IBM has invested billions in Linux-and frequently features Linux in it’s advertising, even though Linux is freely down-loadable, Wall Street Technology reported that Linux server revenue in 2007 approached U.S $8 billion, and has gained substantial market share since”

Author : Michael Jang (Source : Ubuntu Certified Professional Study Guide)

Apple were slated by a few people post the September 9th event for not releasing anything innovative enough. All considered I feel this was a touch harsh but I do realise demand of the gadget hungry innovators from the world of media tech doesn’t get any easier to satisfy so I suppose it was only to be expected.

I personally think Apple have produced quite a pleasing array of products recently. Snow Leopard is a superb remodel of OSX (my MacBook Air loves it), the iPod Nano Video is a great little addition which will most certainly now expand it’s niche and the improvements in iTunes 9 for presenting the way we enjoy digital music are most alluring. The double picture disk LP with gate-fold sleeve will never return but perhaps the digital door has indeed opened for an increasingly improved user experience inviting further enhancement come the release of the mystical Apple Tablet?

Ah yes, the Tablet. Too Much Green have previously blogged about this mythical wonder, highlighting perception and faith for the still unknown element yet to enhance its unrealised dynamic as the next must have device. Steve Jobs won’t disappoint. I recently watched the superb independent film “Welcome to Macintosh” in which various Apple products were mentioned which quite literally changed the world and the way we view computing, we’re talking about the iMac, the iPod, the iPhone, iTunes, Quicktime and the OSX operating system. Each would be a major achievement however for them all to eminate from a single source in such a comparatively short time frame? This is no accident. Critics of the Apple tablet are still viewing it as either an overgrown iPhone or a mini touch screen laptop which is obviously somewhat amusing, they aren’t envisioned enough to look past Facebook into other areas of potential and by writing the tablet off before it’s even released are merely highlighting their own boxed in ignorance. Take a lead, “Think Different“.

Myself and Lesley were sat in Cafe Tous les Jours the other day playing with the recipe spinner on my iPod Touch, the food element got me thinking about the tablet and I realised how useful a larger wipe clean device might be in the kitchen. Recipe programs are already available for “regular” computers but let’s be honest, cake mix and keyboards aren’t a good combination, a sealed wipe clean device could be given the once over with a damp cloth, cake mix gone and no harm done. If it was latched onto Wi-fi you could download new recipes on demand (or just view them on websites), you could pass on links, modify ingredients, share and re-distribute, view and follow videos of food prep methods all whilst listening to your iTunes and Tweeting your friends an E.TA for when the meal you’re cooking them will be ready. A software cooking application would have no problems converting weights and measures, it would provide an on screen timer and could even IM your iPhone with a reminder to take the cake out of the oven should you get too engrossed in the afternoon movie.

The header shot on this post shows potential for such an application (click the image for more details). It was pulled from a strain of development which seems didn’t reach completion as I can find no progressed information past 2007, perhaps it was merely two years ahead of it’s time? I would most certainly urge those responsible to get back on the case as the term “Cook Book” could have a whole new meaning by this time next year.

I’m no Steve Jobs (obviously) and the “CookBook” idea isn’t perhaps the most visionary scenario for Apples latest design innovation, however it does highlight a world of computing outside the box of business and media, an area Apple have already seamlessly re-invented. What’s next?

Open Source? Many people may have no idea what it means, to some it’s a descriptive tag for certain platforms of community developed free software, to others it’s “lab” computing for geeks, at the far end it’s a comprehensive lifestyle ethos and to a select Facebook few on the flip side of phonetics it’s a bottle of HP with the lid off waiting to be plopped onto their soggy fish & chips. What’s obvious is that the term “Open Source” applies to more than a single area or product, however there is a constant and if we dig down we’re going to end up somewhere around root “collaboration”.

The word collaboration is invariably linked to production of an end result and is further described as being inherently positive (except, interestingly, during wartime), its corroborated companion, “cooperation”, is apparently always positive and the staunch anti-thesis of both comes to us as the dark deceitful back-door concept of “collusion”.

A perceptually large amount of the Open Source community relish the apparent notion we may indeed be at war, a war (for them) against a certain monolithic software giant (who shall remain nameless) and I must admit it does feel like that at times, although in war don’t you have to have two sides fighting each other? If not I believe there’s an escalating scale of aptly applicable descriptions for such systems one could pull on, leading up to virtual despotism! But hey, let’s not get too extreme here, after all we’re the ones sporting beards and sandals remember (or is that just me?) and that’s most definitely not what Too Much Green is about, life is a choice and it’s all about options, ideally

What’s more important in life to you? Security? Purpose? Status? Family? Can they be separated? I don’t think they either can or should, for if you factor in our flair for social interaction you complete the full package for endorsed happiness, with life, as a result, becoming substantially more than the sum of it’s contributed parts thanks to increased benefits attained through a collaboration of needs.

Positive energy flows from collaboration and through open collaboration it flows even freer, you know how nice it is when someone helps you out purely because they want to? Indeed, aside from being the basis for friendship it could even be the crux of potentiality for a truly evolved future of our species (we really have to stop trying to blow each other up). There’s no doubt the production of anything is instilled with a certain something extra if it’s been created from passion and goodwill rather than on the back of a single focused drive to capitalise and make money (remind you of anyone we know? I could pick several examples but if we stick with computers I think you get the picture).

So, where is this going and what does it mean to your daily email and web surfing? Well, maybe you should tell me, all I’m saying is that Open Source software is so much more than just a great way of saving money.

Our choices in life define who we are.

The world according to Google isn’t a bad thing from where I come in, it’s all very well and good me sat here relentlessly crusading for Linux through Too Much Green but hard as I try I’m obviously never going to attain anywhere near the exposure and reputation of the Google God (unless something really bizarre happens), as such I was (am) more than excited at the prospect of a Linux OS being instantly catapulted into the mainstream Google *globe* and the repercussions it’s going to have for Open Source Solutions and those who offer them (Too Much Green – obviously), which is more than can be said for Microsoft, yes indeed, the dance for the desktop has a new contender and they’re not afraid to stand on a few toes, even if they are attached to the feet of a corporate giant.

Whether or not Microsoft can dance doesn’t really come into it, they may indeed be too big to don a tuxedo and glide elegantly across the sprung floor under a slowly rotating glitterball of end user applications but their size provides a hefty advantage in other areas, they can (and do) fight and in this case instantly responded with a sharp uppercut to Google Docs in the shape of a free online offering for their ubiquitous Office suite (albeit a trimmed down and ad-supported version), nice shot, above the belt too (just), however online is still online and although an internet perma-connection you’d think was a statutory modern day daily service what with the always connected iPhone culture it’s also a modern day delusion, iPhone’s don’t use their Wi-Fi for permanent web linkage, they use a mobile telephone network, so, what happens to your online docs when you’re not….online….well, unless you use a mobile dongle on your laptop (and are able to catch a signal)….they just sit there, and so do you.

Do yourself a favour, don’t believe the hype, Open Office is free to download, use and distribute, with no internet connection required once it’s installed.

It’s incredibly reassuring and inspiring to come across like minds, especially when they’re based in ones home country (& county) and especially when they’re on such a professional level. I’ve recently linked up with Open Source For Business (OS4B) based in Leeds (West Yorkshire, UK) who are just this, and more, to quote…

“Open Source for Business (OS4B) is the exciting joint venture from Yorkshire Forward and nti Leeds, designed to help regional businesses make the most of open source technology to benefit from cost effective and flexible open source IT solutions”

…sound familiar? I was most gratified when they listed Too Much Green on their providers page, a fresh link up for increasing exposed visibility of our combined cause is a real plus to start any day with.

I was recently put the question “What does Open Source mean?”, obviously it’s a big subject and the term can mean different things in different areas and correspondingly to different people from different professions, however for me, even in it’s predominantly perceived area of I.T, it means so much more than just free software. Aside from a presently unrealised global financial safety net for the underpinning business technology of enterprise I.T the whole movement reflects the positive advantages which open collaboration can bring to our battered world, it’s ‘hope’ (I know, I sound like Obama…!), seriously though it really is, the underlying energy flow is literally the flip side of what’s being destroying society for many years. The human race can and does work well together, and when it does so by choice and with passion the results are even more amazing, most anything is possible, even free software.

So, you’ve registered your domain and have your Linux VS ready to roll, what’s next? Well, rather than wrestle with the bottomless world of hardcore geekdom at the convoluted CLI you could do a lot worse than install the ECHP domain management tool.

EHCP is open source and thus free to download and use, it comes very well supported and the website supplies what could be THE all time best procedural “How To” for installation I have ever come across (if you excuse the ‘interesting’ english) with clickable “Yes/No” confirmation checks and resulting problem resolves after each stage (admittedly the ‘concept’ sections aren’t as yet fully complete). Install is as follows..

sudo apt-get install wget
wget www.ehcp.net/download
tar -zxvf ehcp_latest.tgz
cd ehcp
./install.sh
#

..it’s an incredibly long old install (seemingly at least three to four times longer than a base server install alone) and you’re asked various bits and bobs along the way so pay attention (MySQL passwords etc), however it’s all nothing too major and to be honest if you’re at a stage of wanting to manage your own domain hosting you’ll more than likely be at an easy level of suitable technical knowledge to cope with both the install and later domain import and configuration, if not you’ll work it out.

Once installed you access the admin interface through http://”your IP number“/ (if you haven’t fully configured base domain & DNS access it will tell you and either click through or use http://”your IP number“/vhost/ehcp/ then once in resolve things alongside the main domain config), username is “admin” and the password will be one you created during the setup.

An interesting point of note which could speed things along during later LAMP installs is that EHCP installs phpMyAdmin for you, which is useful, useful also are the included modules for eMail, FTP & MySQL services & config, however it’s the “Easy Add”, “Bulk Add” and “DNS Only” domain click throughs which are the bread and butter, or there again, you could always wrestle with the command line for days on end (personally I’d rather use the time more productively to drink beer and watch TV).

Optimised I.T ‘Virtualisation’ is finally becoming the realised norm across the carbon hungry server rooms of today, and not before time either.

For those who aren’t fully aware the term basically describes a method of installing multiple software ‘machines’ on a single hardware unit (a server) and saves untold amounts of previously wasted, and increasingly expensive, electrical energy. Contrary to what you may think the vast majority of server operating systems don’t need all encompassed access to the full power of the hardware they’re installed on, those expansive arrays of hard disks and fans which suck up the amps are there merely to provide resilience and scalability than contribute to any high end processing delivery, plus, unlike that desktop PC of yours there’s no requirement for the pull of high end graphics engines either.

Although already widespread across internet hosts thanks to the lucrative cost effectiveness of being able to rack up (and sell) a box with umpteen virtual servers installed on it it’s in the business enterprise where the necessary attention has been seriously lacking up until quite recently. I know from first hand experience that it was far from unusual to have a room full of energy hungry high end servers sat sucking up electricity and air-con resource whilst ticking over at 5% load (maximum), most certainly. You’d have your mail server, your storage array, a domain controller (or two) and quite possibly several more disparate database units and/or ad-hoc legacy departmental W.H.Y’s all just sat there in the rack happily gorging through enough power in a week to keep several third world communities in light and heat for substantially longer than anyone would care to believe or be bothered about even if they did, a blinkered, inefficient and shamefully decadent state of affairs to say the least.

However times are changing and needless to say the progressive world of Ubuntu is once again smoothing the way for us, as of version 9.04 (Jaunty Jackalope) Ubuntu Server comes combined with a ‘Virtual’ install option, previously (up to 8.10) this was a seperate download tagged as the jeOS version (pronounced “juice”).

jeOS (and now the Virtual option) was (and is) an efficient variant of the full server OS optimised for installation inside virtual environments from the likes of VM Ware or KVM, benefits include a substantially reduced footprint, better performance and fewer updates (resulting in less maintenance), not only that but the option for installing it couldn’t be simpler, seriously, check this out.

• Pre-configure your virtual destination drive

• Boot as usual from the regular Server CD (or .ISO / .DMG file).

• Select the F4 (or fn F4) “Mode” Option

• Choose “Install a minimal Virtual Machine”

• Proceed as normal selecting your required server components.

That’s it.

Due to the lack of an OSX version for the (apparently) swish and whizzy new browser from Google (Google ‘Chrome’) I thought I’d give the multi processing session concept a tryout for myself by installing the beta of Stainless on to the MacBook Air.

Stainless started out merely as a technology demo for Mesa Dynamics however due to it’s rapidly growing fan base and corresponding list of evolving features it’s continuing on toward a fully fledged release (V1.0). The present version (0.6) is still only at beta development stages however it’s already offering some nice touches above and beyond Chrome itself, to quote from the site -

“A prime example is parallel sessions, which allow you to log into a site using different credentials in separate tabs at the same time. This new technology is woven throughout Stainless, from the private cookie storage system, to session-aware bookmarks that remember the session in which they were saved”

Most useful, especially for those of us with a few Twitter accounts

Stainless is most obviously still in the development stages with no RSS menus or further extended browsing capability, however it does already have one very nice feature which virtually (for me anyway) negates the enhancements of missing technicality, namely the icon driven ‘Bookmark Shelf’ (see header image). I absolutely love it, just drag the web icon (favicon) over from the selected page into the leftside window strip, quick, easy and a nice simple alternative to those endless drop down lists of cascading bookmarks. I used to think the tab bar in Firefox was a cool idea but this takes it up (or sideways) to another level of lateral simplicity.

I’m a huge fan of graphics over lists and personally find it much easier to zip through visual recognition formats rather than by searching text, is that the same for everyone else I wonder? And if so what does it tell us about ourselves and the way *business* predominantly works with information? Take CD’s for example (yes, I hear some people do actually still own vast libraries of this antiquated physical media, however didn’t we all at some stage?), the question is how did (or do) you organise your collections? Alphabetically? Or further split down into genre? Such granularity always seemed too labour intense for me so I dropped into lining them up by colour, i.e starting with all white spines, moving into cream, to light yellow, to orange, to shades of red and flowing on into each other as the hue dictated ending with black (you get the idea?). I always knew the colour of the box and the corresponding album art (see previous post ‘Listen in Colour‘) so found it an incredibly quick method of finding the CD I wanted to listen to, not only that but there was a double bonus of the collection looking groovy and colourful racked up across the wall. Leading on from this is (I think) an interesting point regarding the inherent facility for colour tagging files and folders under the AppleMac operating systems of new and old, something which I believe says untold amounts about the Apple vs *PC* mindset.

Anyway, yes, my colour matched image freindly brain really rates the Bookmark Shelf concept and I can’t believe nobody’s thought of it before, or have they? Have I just been stuck in Firefox drop down/tab world and missed a whole new area of simple clickability? I know Safari 4 offers coverflow and the eye popping panorama view of the ‘Favourite Sites’ window but even that involves an extra click or two (clicks are a valuable commodity) and still lists the site description as text in a space hogging sidebar. The only drawback of course is that (as yet) there’s no specifically legitimate reason for every site to have it’s own bespoke web icon (although I think they should, and any site worth it’s salt actually already does) and as such you could just end up with a few generic globes. The site name does pop into view at mouse over, and you can easily drop a custom image in with a quick right click & ‘configure’ so I suppose it’s no real biggie to get things looking swish and organised if you only have a few dozen main faves (like me).

I believe it’s worth the extra effort just to fill in a few blanks for the resulting overall effect and I’m looking forward to seeing how slick the finished version is.

Download Stainless HERE

Due to an increase in project work lately I’ve had to review and produce various bits of documentation sent to me in MS Word format, and nice as iWork 09 is (and it IS nice) you have to face it that the two still aren’t 100% compatible regarding the finer points of formatting (very close, but just not 100%), so, last week I gave the groovy little MacBook Air the shock of it’s iLife by by installing MS Word on it just to see how it compared to the open source offerings, I should have known better, from the *word* go it just didn’t feel right.

Firstly you’ve got the general size of the app itself, bloated is an understatement, not only that but after install it decides it wants to update it’s updater (?) then proceeds to hog all your bandwidth by downloading the actual SP update itself, which at 180mb is certainly some service pack (indeed, and some).

Anyhow, I installed it and despatched the documentation off in both Word and PDF format (I love PDF’s, but that’s another story, ask me about archive Digitisation formats sometime), and as it all went OK I decided to have a butchers around Entourage too, just out of curiosity, and just to see how the other half lives (as you do), I fired up the .DMG and tried to add it to the installed packages, but it didn’t want to know, nope, not playing at all. It seems if you do a selective install of only certain packages and upgrade to the latest service pack you’re snookered for adding the remainder as they’re seen to be from an older version of Office (which I suppose they now are of course), there’s no way round it other than to de-install, sift through and manually remove all the operating system and preference entries (a laboriously challenging job in itself) and run through the whole process again (complete with huge service pack download to update), hmm….no, I don’t think so, Neo Office it is then.

Neo Office is an evolved version of the superb open source office suite “Open Office“, it’s ported and tuned for the Macs (OSX), is free to download and drops in substantially smaller than the service pack alone for Mac Office 2008. It offers true and seamless cross compatibility and if you don’t use it you honestly must be some sort of retard, seriously, why on earth anyone would shell out $250+ on a piece of software which does exactly the same as a similar application which you can download for free is beyond me (I’ve even seen Mac Office 2008 listed at $499, come on now, you really HAVE to be kidding here people).

Once again it’s merely down to monopolistic marketing and fear of the unknown, imagine the cost savings gained throughout all our schools and hospitals if each computer ran an Ubuntu desktop operating system with an accompanying open source office suite, even with *educational discount* you’re negating license costs of at least $200 per unit, money which could be re-purposed into infrastructure and service upgrades rather than lining the pockets of a presently self perpetuating monster who seems aggressively intent on extending its global dominance through forced software upgrades and extortionately priced software, software which as oppose to being intuitive is convoluted to use and without adequate patching (at further cost) is no more than a frustratingly unstable and dangerous security risk rather than the enabler it professes to be.

There shouldn’t even be a considered choice here for anyone with at least half a brain. Ubuntu is a free and uber stable operating system for your computer, Mozilla offer their Firefox web browser and superb Thunderbird e-mail client also for free, couple both with the free Open Office suite and you have a robust, scalable and inherently secure platform for any and all variations of enterprise I.T, and all for nothing.

Software can get quite expensive, as such it’s always nice finding alternatives to save a few quid. As much a fan of open source as I am GIMP is still a bit weird for people and hasn’t taken much hold, Adobe Photoshop is therefore predominantly perceived as the one and only for photographers, web heads and as a complimentary tool to Illustrator for most design studios, it’s feature set is deep and extensive…..however so it is it’s price at around £400-£500 (unless you qualify for educational discount)……however there is an alternative, and an extremely capable one at that – we’re looking at Adobe Photoshop Elements 6.

Being a long term photographer myself and having also provided professional heritage digitisation support for the Science Museum group (for 9 years) I’ve had exposure (no pun intended) to the depth of features required for both personal, contemporary (artistic) and archive image processing. Full blown Photoshop is ideal for all areas, and more, but it’s the ‘and more’ which the vast majority of users up to semi-pro level (and perhaps even beyond) don’t really need to pay for (e.g Curves, CMYK options and a few correction tools).

Photoshop Elements 6 is available for around an 8th of the cost of full blown Photoshop (CS4), yes, quite a saving indeed, and you know, I really like it, I also really rate it. The interface has a nice grey Lightroom-esque feel and offers not only an almost full Photoshop feature set but presents the regularly used tools for general editing via groovy ‘one-stop shop’ side bar access. The side bar too offers a range of really useful ‘home-usery’ wizard stylie bits and bobs like photobooks (hey, we all enjoy a bit of fun here and there..!), the Project Bin viewing bar along the bottom of the window is again also great and offers a direct share link for creating a Web Gallery, Emailing images, ordering prints or burning onto CD/DVD….dead nice, it really brings out and simplifies many of the deep rooted Photoshop actions, PDF slide show creation for example is another easy accessible quick feature, as is batch processing.

Even without the huge price differential I would strongly recommend Elements as an image editor of choice, however at such a saving it’s a no brainer (unless you’re a GIMP), I have both on my Mac and to be honest I invariably fire up Elements.

*NOTE* - iPhoto I haven’t mentioned – although both intuitive and useable with great integration into both the iLife suite and resulting Mac world it’s more of a happy snappers application than a tool for *real* image processing.