Planet TechShow

O.K., I’ve had my G1 for few days now and have installed some applications for it. Some of the early standouts for me are ShopSavvy, Twidroid(identica and twitter client), Where, Qik, fIRC, ConnectBot, ASTRO, Amazon MP3, Jamendo, Backgrounds, WeatherBug, MetalDetector, Where, AndNav2,TipCalculator and Powermanager. The real standout which is head and shoulders above all others is ShoppSavvy. Basically it lets you scan in the bar code of any item using the camera and then it will go search for the best price either locally or from a web vendor. Absolutely cool. Even iPhone fan boys will get jealous over that. The music store applications for Amazon and Jamendo are both very good. ASTRO is a pretty nice and functional file manager. MetalDetect is very interesting. Somehow the developers have written a metal detector application for Android. I’d love to know how it really works. Where is a very useful as it provides a listing of services (movie times, weather forecast, gas prices, news, traffic reports) for the local area you happen to be in. Qik lets you stream video and have it available from your own page on Qik’s website. AndNav2 is a turn by turn GPS application. Currently it’s not available in Android Market if you’re in the U.S.. I downloaded it directly from it’s website and it seems to be currently setup for European users. This would be great considering the paid GPS navigation app costs $10 a month. Hopefully it will be rolled out to USA users soon. It seems like a really nice application that leverages the openstreetmap project’s work.

So I picked up a slightly used T-mobile G1 phone this week. I’ve been looking to get into the Android pool for some time. The phone was unlocked so I could of went to AT&T if I chose to. The only limitation with using the phone with AT&T is that you won’t get 3G speeds (limited to Edge). I checked the plan prices at AT&T and they only offer the same data plans they have for the iPhone. They won’t let you do pay as you go for the voice plan which I was doing with my old Motorola phone. So with AT&T it costs $70 a month for a voice/data plan. I went to the local T-mobile store and their basic plan is $55 ($29 for voice and $25 for unlimited data). If you have your own device you can do a pay as you go or just sign up for a yearly contract. The advantage of the yearly plan is you won’t get hit with the monthly $5 surcharge (required for pay as you go). The negative with the yearly is that you’ll get hit with a hefty fee ($200) if you leave early. At least you have a choice. Enough with the plans. The phone is great and so far I absolutely love it. HTC just announced 2 new Android phones that T-mobile will be offering very soon. Expect the cost of the G1 to drop below the current $150 price with a two year contract. In fact on Saturday night I was on the T-mobile website and noticed they had the phone listed for $49! The next day it was back up to $149. For $49 the phone is absolute steal. Keep your eyes peeled for that price again. I’ll go into more detail regarding the applications available in coming posts.

Yesterday I decided to stop by Screwattack.com to see if they ever fixed their online players so I can actually watch their content using Firefox under Linux. Well to my surprise I was rewarded at being able to watch the latest Hard News. But Alas, what is this after the show? An Internet Explorer 8 commercial . Before reading on watch that commercial.

Ok, is it just me or is Microsoft thumbing their nose at their entire customer base? “Hey, don’t you just LOOOVE getting those crappy emails with cutesy pictures, political agendas and pass me on chains clogging up your inbox? Want more angels and lolcats and sweet puppy videos to accompany your spam? How about last months internet fad, which has finally made it’s way to your out of touch relatives? Well, look no further, IE 8 is gonna bring it to you.”

So basically what Microsoft is saying is: “Hey, don’t you just hate getting those emails from that interweb surfing lame-o you try your best to avoid? Yeah, well guess what, we are going to make it easier for him to fill up your inbox.” Gee thanks Microsoft. Some how you have perfected the art in giving the world exactly what it doesn’t need: Malware; viruses; crappy, un-inspired software; and now an even easier way for the newbs to brighten our day with useless crap.

I guess what this means is that if you are at all intelligent you should not use Microsoft products. If you are at all technically savy, or even an accomplished computer user by any means, you’re better off with anything but Microsoft products. But don’t worry, no matter how far you run they will always be there, providing the technology to the brainless to ruin your day.

Art was not in the room when we woke up. Chad was anxious to get home and Will was not riding with us, he was going back up North with Klaatu, Beth, and Nick. I snagged some grub at breakfast and had the opportunity to say goodbye to Nick, Klaatu and Allan Hicks. Art could not get into the room with his key so he crashed in the lobby. We loaded up the car, I drove around the parking lot a few times to yell at Klaatu and we finally departed. Linc and Allan were too busy getting their old man rest on and their cellphones were not picking up, so we did not get a proper send off.

Art crashed most of the way back while Chad and I discussed a lot of non-Linux topics. He’s a great guy, that Chad is. We hit a few gas stations on the way back and grabbed some lunch at Taco Bell. Chad had a thing for the volcano tacos. It was a Taco Bell / KFC so I got a twiter wrap. The place was hopping with post-church crowds and it was a KFC buffet to boot. We grabbed grub to go.

After I dropped Chad off Art and I made some decent time getting back to my place. I got busted in one of the speed traps outside of Exmore. That whole area is known as speedtrap alley and I should have paid better attention. Art had some really cool stories to tell, he’s also a great guy. I am a bit bummed that we will probably never drive like that again as his location is not conducive to him coming all the way down to my place for a drive. He’ll probably go with Murph next year.

We made it back to my place around 3:30 or so I think. He used my bathroom and destroyed it. Hats off to you big guy.

SELF was awesome, I look forward to next year. Happy day! Next up – OLF.

There has been a lot of pro-Mono and anti-Mono arguments assaulting the community of late. The debate is not new but both sides have taken up arms since some distrobutions have decided to either remove Mono or include Mono by default. On one side, Ubuntu has proclaimed that Banshee will replace Rhythm box as the default audio player in Ubuntu. Opponents see that as yet another forced requirement to adopt Mono, regardless the fact that F-spot and Gnome-Do are included by default requiring Mono. Fedora has taken steps to remove Mono completely from their repositories for the next release. Opponents decry that Fedora is taking away their choices and spreading FUD.

Now I have made no bones in the past that I am wary of Mono; that is true, but I am coming around to thinking that Mono is extremely important to FOSS, I’ll get to that in a minute.

Opponents of Mono believe that it is a Trojan horse riddled with intellectual property bombs and patent infringements. Their side is bolstered by the comments of Steve Ballmar threatening suite against Linux for violating Microsoft’s IP, including .net technologies. Proponents of Mono point out that c#, cli and other Mono technologies are all published, open standards and that Mono itself is released under OpenSource licenses including the GNU approved LGLP. Furthermore, Mono does not make use proprietary technology and if it was proven to, said technology could easily be stripped out and recoded. Mono proponents proclaim that Mono is no more a risk than using C or Python. Which side is correct? Who knows, push the arguments to the side.

Some opponents of Mono feel it is bloated, has performance issues, and is a poor technological choice. Proponents counter claiming this is not so and in many cases Mono out performs Python or Java. But these arguments are no better than vi vs emacs or kde vs gnome. Push them to the side, they are nice for irc debates or BOFS at festivals.

Mono makes use of technologies developed by Microsoft. Opponents point out Microsoft’s extremely pernicious history, the company’s anti-competitiveness, and the woes that have befallen any company or group that enters into deals with them. Proponents are quick to point out that there are elements in Microsoft that are changing, they are becoming cooperative with FOSS and that we should embrace the good side as the bad side fades into the past. Regardless, again, Mono is based on OpenStandards and is not a complete endorsement of Microsoft technologies. Just because the company that founded the technology, released the standard, and promotes their own version – .net; is a convicted monopolist does not mean we should toss aside this wonderful tool – throw the baby out with the bath water as the saying goes. Is Microsoft evil? Is the use of Mono promoting Microsoft? Possibly, or maybe not. Push that to the side.

We can go through all the arguments and compare them side by said but what is the point. Push them to the side and what is left? Mono is a tool, a tool that is desired by many developers and has produced applications that users love. Furthermore, it has done so while maintaining the philosophy of FOSS. Mono promotes the hacker ethic to build, take apart and explore. In that sense Mono is great and should be welcomed.

But taken in context of the arguments above, Mono can serve an even more important purpose. Let’s say the fears of the opponents were to come true. Let’s say Microsoft did decide to come after a company for using Mono. That my friends would be the greatest thing that could happen. Because that would be the final spark we need to challenge this whole ordeal of patents and intellectual property in software that has caused the whole Mono debate, amongst many other debates.

So if you feel software patents, or patents in general, need reform. If you feel that intellectual property claims are getting out of hand then let’s stop bickering about whether or not we should fear technologies such as Mono and set to attacking the core problem. Until someone fires the first shot and one company takes another to court over these issues, all we are doing is wasting our time on debates as to whether Mono is safe to use or a trojan horse primed to bring GNU/Linux to its knees. The debate is not whether Mono should or should not be included in distrobutions; whether it should be banned. The debate should be what application represents the best of breed and should be included by default. Be it Banshee, Rhythmbox or Amarok as the default Ubuntu media player; the choice should not be based solely on the language it was written in if all three languages promote the ideals behind GNU/Linux, but which one rises to the top functionally.

If you don’t like the choice, then install something else, that is what is great about Linux and FOSS. You have so many choices, but let’s not limit those choices. Let us not bicker amongst ourselves over these trivial, outlying issues, but attack the problem at the heart. Who knows, Mono could be the spark the lights the fuse to bring down this albatross that has been hanging over the FOSS community for so long.

Saturday, the official day of the South East Linux Fest, was a rough start for me. I had not drank like that since OLF so I was a bit under the weather. Couple that with the antics involving pockets of meat and Klaatu the night before and I had felt better mornings. After getting to Clemson I took a bit of time to recuperate, thanks to Allan and Linc.

Back on my feet I did the usual hanging out at the table meeting new people and catching up with old friends. I managed to sit in on two presentations – The Networking Stack by Allan Hicks, and Chad Wollenberg on FOSS in Education. Both did a fantastic job and when they videos are released in the near future I recommend these be at the top of your list.

I hob-nobbed with the Fedora guys and touched base with the Ubuntu LoCo members running the booth there. Int Eighty was at the Dual Core table, he’s a great guy and very talented. We got to meet the stars of the Ubuntu Pod/Video cast, they are really cool guys. I wish we could get together with them more often.

The raffle at the end of the show was huge, compared to other shows. SELF merged their swag with ours and we went over by about 20 minutes announcing tickets, making a few souls really happy, and a lot a bit disappointed. The closing keynote over we headed back to the hotel and then to Rockhoppers for the post party.

The food was great, the company was even better, and I only sucked down one beer. Dual Core put on a fantastic set and I spent the rest of the night outside with Klaatu, ThreeThirty, Pegwole, Murph and others. I finally got to met Hethenex, he is a great guy.

The bonus of the night was that we got an early listen to three songs off the next Dual Core album to be released at Defcon. Great stuff.

We ended the night with a quick run to Taco Bell. The town closes up pretty early there as blue laws still in effect requires bars to stop serving at midnight. That really bummed Chad out who wanted to go back to the place we were the night before.

We all crashed about 2:30, except for Art, who was still outside Rockhoppers hanging with some geeks. He never made it back to the room as his key would not let him in. Instead of waking us, he decided to crash out in the lobby. What a nice guy.

Next time, the wrap up and drive home.

Today the kids left for camp grandma, my sister-in-law was kind enough to come pick them up. Whoohooo! I kissed them goodbye and left for work. All day I was getting psyched to come home. The wife had school and possum had plans to start running again at Sandy Bottom Park. I could not wait. Even though the weather was threatening, it looked like it was going to hold out.

I came home and putzed around a bit more than I would have liked. I had to find my arm case which was buried under a stack of boxes. I decided to throw some more podcasts on there and be off. Out the door I went and starting down the street I realized I forgot my headphones. I turned around, passed the neighbors partying out front and back into the house to grab them. Off once again I flipped on the Insignia and it blew up reading the files. It just sat there looking at me with a twisted up face, some static-y graphic, dead. A hard reset would not recover it. I drove back home past the neighbors and hooked it up to my box. Nothing, I could not even mount it. I was bummed.

A quick search on Google indicated other people having this problem and most advocating it was now bricked. But one guy, after having dug through some ancient burial site in Korea found out how to wipe the flash card. Just hold the menu button in while powering it on and it will ask if you would like to format the nand. As I looked at the broken English I had no other choice. Everything went, but the Insignia was alive again. I threw some of the podcasts on there and the Andrew WK Japanese covers album and tested to see whether all was right with the world. Luckily it was. Out again I ran, driving past the neighbors still partying and to the park. I did 2.5 miles my first night out. I will start increasing that as the weeks go on. I suspect back to 4.5 – 5 miles by next weeks end.

I wonder what show blew it up. I should probably test that out and skewer the culprit.

OK, everyone else has now had time to review S.E.L.F. and now it’s my turn.

My trip started out on Thursday night around 11pm when Allan arrived to pick me up. The trip was long, 12+ hours, and mostly uneventful. Driving at night through Virginia is murder. Nothing to look at for literally hours at a time. Luckily Allan was in rare form and kept on singing show tunes at full pipe

Once we finally arrived in Clemson, SC around noonish, we were told that out rooms were not quite ready so Allan and I ventured out for some food at the local Wafflehouse and then to BestBuy, where I picked up a neoprene sleeve for my Acer Aspire One, and Allan picked up a Sansa Fuse. Hey, boys gotta have their toys right?

Finally we were able to get into our room and after showers and naps (hey, we’re old guys), we headed over to the bar to join in the pre-show festivities. Much merriment was had there as everybody trickled in from their trip. Most people were enjoying their beer and I even got Allan to man up with me and hit the scotch. It was a great time. I just want to pause here and say that I feel soooo sorry for Danns wife. He must put her through hell with the wash. While we were eating, I watched him take 2 equal sized portions of fat and gristle, and put one in each pocket to save for later. Don’t ask. This is life with Dann At around 11ish I decided it was time to hit the sack so that I could function the next day. Remember, I am old

Believe it or not, Allan and I were beat to the conference by Dann and crew. I was astounded to learn he was there before we were, but the tables turned when we arrived and saw Dann horribly ill. He thought it was something he *ate* Anyhow, he went off to rest up for an hour or so. He looked so bad after a while I went back to poke him and see if he was still alive. He was and recovered in no time. I also learned that in SC you can still get Mellow Yellow. I really love Mellow Yellow and you cannot find it in PA except in the movie theater on tap. Bummer, but I did enjoy some while I was there.

The conference itself was fantastic. I can’t believe this was the first one. I did not, myself, get a chance to attend any of the talks, save the ending keynote, but I hear they were all really good. That Dave Yates fellow sure puts on a good show! Seriously though, I don’t want to diminish anyones involvement or contribution. They all did a really good job! There were, by my estimates, roughly 400-500 people there, and most wandered by the TLLTS booth at one time or another. We, of course, held our raffle/giveaway and had great prizes from our great sponsors Neuros Technology and Prentice Hall, along with a bunch of goodies from S.E.L.F. sponsors including APress, O’Reilly, and more. We even gave away a Google Phone from Chris DiBona. What a guy! Of course we had a sea of people lined up for the giveaway and I made them yell and scream like always. It was a blast and a huge success!

The after-show party was at the same bar as the pre-show and, once again, a good time was had by all. There was much reveling, eating and drinking and I enjoyed every minute of it. I particularly enjoyed having the time to catch up with my friends like Dann and Chad and Dave and the gang.

This brings us to the ride home. I had anticipated that the ride home would be slightly more fun in the daylight. It felt even longer, probably because we were already worn out. Allan and I did have some fun watching the crazy people that stopped in to eat at the same time we did at iHop in NC, and afterward we stopped to see what JR was all about. It’s a giant discount type store which just happened to have a big old cigar store attached. I could spend a lot of money in there! Other than that, the drive, particularly through VA, seemed absolutely endless and I was supremely happy to be home at the end.

The bottom line, though, is I had a great time and am looking forward to going again next year!

Many of you heard me giving rave reviews about my new Sansa Fuse earlier. Well, I just saw that Woot.com has the Sansa Clip (smaller version of the Fuse) on sale RIGHT NOW 6/17/2009 for just $15. Go get one now. You’ll be mad if you miss out.

‘Nuff said

Well before I continue on with my feelings on SELF 2009 I figured it would be nice to post a link to the pictures I took. Using digikam created a simple html album using the Matrix theme which you can see on my here or on my facebook account. Yeah, Digikam allows you to export to facebook amongst other things.

I left for the South East Linux Fest around 5:00 a.m. Friday morning. Artv61 had driven down from Northern Jersey and was parked outside when I awoke. What a nice guy Artv61 is and incredibly enthusiastic. We drove out to South Hill to pick up Chad and Will (snkmchb). Along the way I got to know Artv61 a bit better and boy did he tell some interesting stories. Great stuff.

Chad and Will were ready to go the minute we got there. After saying good bye to the dog we set off for Clemson S. Carolina. The five hour trip was filled with some great FOSS and technology talk, none of which we recorded. Suffice to say we learned that Art does not want choice and he doesn’t want to be told what to do. He wants nothing until he knows what he wants and then he wants choice. That took about three hours and the rest of the show to fully grasp.

We met up with Dave Yates and the rest of the SELF crew preparing for the show. Our room was not ready so we bid a fond adieu and trotted off to Rock Hoppers for some lunch. Now I was told there were penguins at this place and I was bummed to find out that there were not real penguins hobbling around, but stuffed penguins and what not adorning the walls and such. Oh well, the food was good.

After lunch we returned to the hotel to help out with some of the remaining work for SELF. Our room was still not ready so we went back to Rock Hoppers for some drinks, until our room was ready. We did not get much time to settle in before we were back over at Rock Hoppers for the pre-show party. I think we spent more time there than the festival or our room.

It was great meeting up with all the good friends on IRC – Pegwole (who looks about 13), Threethirty, Threethirty’s brother (who is like the anti-threethirty), Verbal, Mrs. Verbal, BethLynn (olf fame), Jeremy (distrosource), the two guys from the ubuntu podcast, Nick, Klaatu, Murph (he showed up from Northern Jersey too, sweetness) and of course Linc and Allan! It was really great to hook up with the other tllts guys, too bad Pat could not make it (nor Chess). We had a great time. I drank too much and ended up at some college bar downtown. Dave drove us there in my car so we had to take a taxi back to the hotel. I was beat and inebriated.

I did make it to the show early the next morning, but I was in such bad shape and something I ate did not sit well with me. I do recall at one point the night before snickering as I wrapped up two hunks of fat from my juicy, rare Prime rib. Why did I do this? Well I wanted to relish the yumminess in Klaatus face. Not the best idea I ever had and I recall actually doing it. I am sorry Klaatu, but revenge was to be had. I crashed on a comfortable chair for about an hour after which I felt so much better.

Next up, I will talk about the show.