Ubuntu From A Beginner’s Perspective

Stop what you’re doing and watch these! I found these series of Ubuntu videos on the ‘net titled First Impressions, Office Functionality, and Multimedia Support, and it’s unique because of who made them. John Bradbury is a, quote, “long-time Windows user and a Windows System Administrator” who is “pretty comfortable with all things Microsoft”, and so he’s out of his element as he reviews Ubuntu.

And it actually works in favor of Ubuntu as you watch how a completely newcomer to Ubuntu figure his way through the interface without getting really got lost and ask such questions like “why is the ‘Shutdown’ button located in the ‘Start’ menu?”

The Multimedia Support video actually highlights improved codec handling, one of the features introduced in Feisty. Well, I’ll let you watch the video for yourselves to get a clearer picture.

You have to watch these.

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New Photo Gear Page

I’ve added a new page to this blog, the Photo Gear page. Over there, I’ve written some insights and opinions on what type of gear you’ll need to start off shooting. Nothing specific, really, just what kind of gear, what to look for, etc. Hopefully, you’ll find something useful there. I’ve also upped some of my own gear over there in the form of photos. If you wanna know more about them, just click on the thumbnails. I’ll be uploading more of ‘em as soon as I get around to taking shots of them, so check back often. That’s it for now, need to rush to my day job. Till next post!

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Techno Tokyo Trip (Part 3)

As I mentioned last post, I bought myself a real goodie from Akihabara. Something I’ve long been working for so it was high time to reward myself with this, ehem, investment.

Ta da! Introducing the D200 from Nikon’s prosumer line. This hefty monster feels right in my hands, and the magnesium alloy body really feels solid, sturdy and can take a real beating before giving up the ghost.

I was able to pick one up from Sofmap in Akihabara second-hand for a price almost half off of a tag price on the cheap price range (Hint: brand new body-only price is around Y160K). So why did I pick up a 2nd hand D200 instead of a brand new D40x which I could get for even less, lens included (I think I could have also afforded the D80 kit as well)?

I was not looking for an entry-level camera. I’ve had prior practice on film with my trusty, if not comparitively simplistic, F55D film camera. So, while I knew that a ton of features do not a good picture make, at the very least I needed camera that can keep up with my needs.

The D40 was also much more pickier with lenses, since their lens mounts do not have the built-in focus drive motors, and since I had a few lenses already, I did not want to put them out of use and invest in new AF-S and AF-I lenses. And while I often do manual focus, you will have to love the autofocus speed and control you get with the D200’s 11-area TTL focus.

The D200’s built-in flash can also be used as a commander unit for use with Nikon’s Creative Lighting System. In other words, you can control an SB-600/SB-800 flash remotely without the need for additional equipment, save for the flash unit itself of course. The only other cameras that can do this is the D70, but it was already aging and has a smaller LCD screen.

So why buy a 2-year old product second-hand? Simply put, it gets all the technology I need in my hands at the right price. Since the D300 just got introduced, people who have lots of money or people who think they need features that the D200 lacks would be strolling off with their new buys. I on the other hand have done my homework and am confident to say I don’t need those 3 or 4 bells and whistles for more than twice the price. Besides, I’m in Japan so I’m pretty confident when the tag doesn’t indicate any damage that the previous owner took care of this D200. Plus Japanese are known to be prone to upgrade quickly, so that’s good enough for me.

Edit: I just found out that my D200’s shutter actuations was only less than 28K when I bought it! Yippee!:D

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Techno Tokyo Trip (Part 2)

Well, so I was in Tokyo, THE big city of Japan.

First stop, of course, as the owner of this blog, has to be one of the key destinations in Tokyo, Akihabara Electric Town or Akiba for short. Well, actually, we were supposed to go to Tokyo Disneyland first but tickets were sold out so…

Anyway, it was just after Christmas, and right before New Year and me and my girlfriend’s 3rd Anniversary (yup, same day), so for a gift that can cover all three bases,

the Canon TX1 more than just handles that requirement, topping off even the Sony T70. Both had face recognition and image stabilization. It wasn’t an easy decision, with the ultra-sleek design and touch screen of the T70, and being cheaper by Y10,000 further compounded the difficulty of that decision. But ultimately, it came down to the nitty-gritty specs and practical capabilities of the Canon TX1 that subdued all the glitz and glamor of the T70. While it sounds cool to control your camera via a touch-screen LCD, it’s use was just not practical enough to replace solid physical controls, of which the TX1 has plenty. The TX1 not only had better optical zoom and larger optics, a separate video record button, the capability to record 16:9 videos, a solid body and a form-factor most suited for taking steady photos and videos. And while the LCD screen is smaller, it can however swivel around, useful when you’re shooting above your head, shooting yourself, or if you just need a mirror. Of course, the Y10,000 discount we got was certainly a big bonus and bumped the T70 out the window.:)

Aside from the TX1, I also bought myself my own Christmas/New Year/Anniversary present, but I’ll tell you more about it in my next post. For now, here’s a picture of Akihabara at night, taken from the TX1.

(Click on the thumbnail for the bigger picture)

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Techno Tokyo Trip (Part 1)

Three weeks ago, during the New Year break, I had the best vacation ever, which started with the fulfillment of a dream I’ve long had and ended with new gear in tow.

Note: This is going to be a two- or three-part story, I’m not really sure yet.

While I can’t talk in detail about my vacation, I will provide highlights on the cool tech that I’ve encountered and/or brought home. Firstly, as I had mentioned earlier was a lifelong dream fulfilled: to be able to ride the incredibly fast Shinkansen, more famously known as the Bullet Train.

Its popular English name came from the literal translation of Dangan Ressha (弾丸列車), a nickname given to it while the project was still being planned in the ’30s. The train pictured at the left is a 300 series Hikari train on the Tokaido Shinkansen line (東海道新幹線), and it’s capable of running at 270km/h, which got me to Tokyo in a little bit over 3 hours. The 300 series boasts being the first Shinkansen with a 3-phase AC traction motor. It’s super fast and it’s quite quiet, allowing for a comfortable afternoon nap. But it’s also super expensive, costing twice a domestic flight to from Manila to Davao via Cebu Pacific, for an ordinary unreserved seat. Luckily, seats were abundant coming from Shin-Osaka station.

The Tokaido line to Tokyo also carries a bit of a history with it. The Shinkansen project was put on hold during the second World War and the Tokaido line was where the project resumed in 1958 and opened in time for the Tokyo Olympics on October 1, 1964.

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Geek-break! Wild Birds in Trouble!

While this blog is mainly geared towards tech-stuff, environment conservation is also quite high up my list of interests. And so, allow me to take a brief pause to tech to give an appeal to all those that would read this blog.

Here in my half of the globe, a small nation struggles to protect it’s natural resources. Meanwhile, a group calling itself The Bacolod Air Rifle Hunting Club shoots innocent wild birds for fun, and has the audicity to smile for a picture with their kill!

And so, avid readers, I urge you to STOP THIS PHILIPPINE ENDEMIC BIRD MASSACRE by signing on in this online petition. Once it gets enough signatures (10,000 signatures), it will be sent to the media and the government, and hopefully urge the Philippine government to action against this decidely illegal past-time.

There’s more than one way to offset carbon emissions, let this be one of our contributions. Thanks for taking time to read this far.

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The Kitchen and Your DS

I recently had to go to Japan, and as as consequence forego the luxuries of having my meals cooked for me, which meant that I had to eat out for all my meals, which isn’t exactly cheap here, or learn to cook. And I had no experience with the latter. Ok, maybe I know how to boil an egg and fry some bacon. For those of you with the same opportunity that I have, Shaberu DS Oryouri Nabi　(しゃべる DS お料理ナビ) comes to our rescue. Armed with a knife, a pot, and my DS in one hand (Ok, maybe not. You’ll find out why), I set out to try if I can really learn how to cook with this software.

“Shaberu” has a total of 200 dishes, ranging from snacks to complete meals, Western or Oriental, and can even be filtered of ingredients you have to avoid, say, due to allergy or your doctor’s advice. And among the different dishes, Shaberu offers you different ways to search for a recipe. Of course, you have the basic option to browse the entire list, but you can also specify what ingredients you have, by set menus, keyword search, or by filters. Personally, I found the filter feature useful; I filtered for dishes that were easy to prepare and can be done in 10 minutes, but you can filter it for other criteria like calories as well. I decided I wanted seafood and picking one from the results, chose Clams Steamed In Wine.

There are 3 basic steps to do when cooking:

Prepare the ingredients and tools
In this step, you can choose how many people you’re cooking for, which automatically adjusts the shown amount of ingredients you will need. And you can also check off items you already have, like in a checklist, and Shaberu saves this data so when you turn on your Shaberu the next time you’re in the groceries, you’ll know exactly what to buy. Shaberu also tells you what tools are needed.

Go over the cooking process
Of course, before any cooking actually begins, you have to make sure you’re ready by reviewing each step of the cooking process, from preparation to finishing touches. You can of course skip this part if you wish.

Guided cooking
Here’s where the real fun begins, and where Shaberu, as well as the capabilities of the DS, shines. First of all, Shaberu means to chat in Japanese. Naturally, you can’t be holding your DS in one hand will you’re holding your pan and vigorously stirring with your spatula! Shaberu talks you through the dish so you don’t need to hold it. Just place it somewhere in the kitchen, preferably on a location where you won’t accidentally cook your DS, and listen to the instructions while you cook.

Although you can set the speed of the synthesized voice, for inexperienced cooks like me, I need a way to sort of pause it without having to touch my DS (specially not my touch screen) with my potentially dirty-from-handling-raw-food hands. Here’s where Shaberu’s show-stealer function comes in. Like I said, Shaberu means to chat, and chatting is a two-way thing. Using the DS’s mic, you talk to your DS to tell it to go to the next step, go back a step, repeat the step, and even to ask it for more details (Err, so how exactly do I clean these clams?). Of course, you can still navigate it with the touch screen if you so wish.

After cooking the dish, Shaberu confirms if you were abe to successfully make it and celebrates with you with confetti while showing you how your dish should turn out. It also takes note of the dish that you cooked in its calendar, so you have a record of the dishes you’ve made so far.

Ok, now onto the Cons. As you might have probably guessed, Shaberu is a Japanese title. Naturally, it speaks Japanese and you can’t change languages. And even though Shaberu uses simple language, unless you’re well-versed in Japanese kitchen and food terms, or you have another DS running Rakubiki Jiten, you’re gonna have a bit of difficulty following the steps.

Overall, Shaberu makes full use of the multimedia capabilities of the DS to deliver a really effective cooking guide for both beginners and intermediate cooks alike. For expert cooks, I suggest going for the sequel of Shaberu, where you’ll be instructed by no less than 7 hotel chefs.

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Linux-Capable Mouse

I bought myself a new mouse a while back. It’s an Okion Mokoto retractable optical pocket mouse for my laptop. The shape and size was just right, and unlike other retractable mice, the cord retracts inside the mouse, so there are no dangling wires. It’s no expensive fancy-dandy mouse, but it does its job well. Hey, who really needs a mouse with two mouse-wheels and a double-click button anyway.

One thing that caught my eye though are the three OS-capable logos on the box. Yes, three. No longer are products only”Windows compatible” or “OSX compatible”, they’re now also “Linux compatible”!

While that may sound good for Linux users, it is quite silly to me to hear these marketing ploys; it’s a well-known fact that standard mice and input devices like these (as well as a wide range of hardware) has long been supported by (and many times perform better in) Linux for a long time, and you won’t need any driver discs either (I do give them credit: the Linux logo most likely means they actually did some testing in Linux). It’s almost as silly as seeing a USB extension cable labeled “Vista compatible”. It’s a piece of wire! It’s no more OS-compatible than your wall outlet is “electricity compatible”!

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Video Phoning

I bought a webcam for my laptop for an overseas trip so I can make video calls cheaply, without researching first about the webcam’s compatibility with Linux. It’s an A4Tech Notecam Clip-On. So before any of the fun stuff could happen, I needed to know if it was working or not. After a bit of searching, I stumbled upon Camorama (it’s in the Ubuntu repositories). The good thing is that it worked! No installation, no pop-up dialogs, nothing, just plug it in, and it’s in. It came with a driver CD for Windows; take note, Windows users, my Linux box doesn’t need driver discs.

Camorama can be used to test if your camera is feeding video information to your computer, and also for taking pictures or recording videos. However, for my particular camera, it couldn’t adjust the color correctly. I was worried that the linux driver for my camera had a problem. Well a badly-colored videocam feed is better than no feed at all.

Next up was research. What program do I use with my webcam for video calling? Gaim/Pidgin is a multiple-IM client capable of connecting not only to Y!Messenger, but also to MSN, AIM, GoogleTalk, etc., but couldn’t do video because these companies use private and proprietary protocols with their networks they want to keep private. I wanted to be able to call Yahoo! Messenger clients, so like what I usually do when I’m clueless about something, I hit the Ubuntu Forums and do search (or post a question if search results aren’t fruitful). Sure enough, there was a thread that answered my question. After a conversation with Loell, another UF member, I tried the following applications to see which best suited my needs.

Kopete

Kopete is a multiple-IM for KDE, though you can still use it in GNOME. It has a nice, clean interface which I think looks better than Gaim. Trying out the webchat feature, I was able to connect to my Y!M buddies. However, while the person on the other end could see my video stream, all I got was a single frame. The first frame of what is supposed to be a video stream (at best, I managed to get another frame a few minutes later). Also, there was no audio with the webchat.

Gyachi

First of all, I would like to state that this is my personal opinion: I really hate Gyachi’s interface. The first screen you see looks like a mess, or at best an old, unsophisticated Win95 program. The buttons are cluttered, and I really can’t make sense of the interface. But I was able to try out the webchat feature, and it worked. But like Kopete, webcam with audio was a no-go. Supposedly, you have to start audio chat aside from your webchat do get around this, but I never was able to make audio chat work either. So either I use Kopete or this for webchat without video. And I’d rather the clean Kopete interface than this. As a small saving grace though, Gyachi notifies you when your buddies sign in as invisible, so there’s no hiding from a person with Gyachi.

Wengo and Ekiga
Taking a different approach, why not just use a softphone for VoIP? Ubuntu has Ekiga by default, and unlike Skype which uses its own proprietary protocol, Ekiga is SIP-protocol compliant. In human terms, Skype can connect to Skype only, while Ekiga can connect to ANY SIP phone. Linux Skype can’t make video calls by the way, so that’s automatically out. So why not Wengo instead of Ekiga? Wengo is more fully featured than Ekiga. Wengo can be installed in Windows, Mac, and Linux, it can make SMS as well as calls to real phones anywhere in the world (I loaded it up with 10euros, which is the minimum. Calls and SMS are really cheap by the way), and it’s also a multi-IM client.

In conclusion, while I never got webcamming with Yahoo!Messenger solved, it was a good learning experience, without which I would have never learned about Wengo, to which I’m casting my vote. It solved the day for webcam with voice, I just have to convince whoever I need to talk to to download the client, but it’s not that hard since Wengo is really a good client, better than Skype. It still has some kinks, which I’m sure will soon be solved by the open source community behind it as more and more people start using it.

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Big PC Makers Start Offering Linux

Some time ago, I wrote about Dell answering to consumer wishes by selling computers pre-installed with Ubuntu. Recently, Dell announced that it will also start offering Linux computers to UK customers in response to feedback from open-source enthusiasts. Now, Acer and Lenovo are looking set to join in on the game.

Acer has already started offering Acer Aspire computers loaded with Ubuntu in Singapore and is considering offering it in the UK as well. Meanwhile, Lenovo will start offering Suse-loaded versions of their T-series Thinkpad notebooks which are aimed at business users. Lenovo has had a long working relationship with Novell in the past, and has Linux-certified its notebook PC line for years now. Lenovo will also start offering Linux on select Thinkpads in Australia.

Why has demand for Linux risen enough for these big, highly-respectable companies to even consider adding Linux-powered desktops to their line-up? It just means that more and more consumers are learning that there exists another viable alternative to Windows.

Actually, it may have been Microsoft’s own undoing by releasing Vista. Windows XP was a tough OS to shake, but loyal Windows XP users themselves may have very little incentive to “upgrade” to Vista. As one writer put it, “When something is good enough, its successor or replacement has to be a whole lot better to succeed”. The auther also cited other reasons why he believes that Vista is “broken”. Some are even calling Vista Windows ME 2. XP users wary of the end of the XP lifecycle and customers looking to buy an XP- powered PC may find out they have no choice but to upgrade. Which is also why Dell brought back its Windows XP desktop offerings. DRM, its implications, performance impact is also a hot-topic causing consumers to think twice about Vista, but that’s a whole different story altogether.

In the end, it may seem that Linux is finally coming out as a mature and viable alternative to the predominant operating system, while Microsoft, on the other hand, seems to be steering a bit off course.

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