2 x laptops, 1 x HP microserver, 3 x routers, 1 x Raspberry Pi given to a charity to go to Kenya to help provide Internet and other services for an NGO. The house has the fewest working desktop computers it's ever had - but it is for a good cause.
Somehow, I suspect that £50 / $100 Android tablets that are starting to be common won't be quite as useful in a couple of years as this lot may be today. For those of us that have good access to technology, fast connectivity as a given and computers to give away - maybe it's time to share the benefits of prosperity with others. If nothing else, it is sharing Debian and Raspbian since I made sure that they were all working well with Debian 7 and Raspbian operating systems respectively before they went. The routers were also running OpenWRT - so it's all FLOSS :)
Saturday, 15 June 2013
Saturday, 16 March 2013
UK Government suggesting the use of FLOSS for some projects.
Seen on Slashdot
https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/making-software/open-source.html
UK Government appearing to suggest a preference for developers that they should use open source where feasible for future UK Government projects for "Digital by Default" deliveries to UK Government and citizens.
This _is_ a beta version, but it is interesting to see this.
https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/making-software/open-source.html
UK Government appearing to suggest a preference for developers that they should use open source where feasible for future UK Government projects for "Digital by Default" deliveries to UK Government and citizens.
This _is_ a beta version, but it is interesting to see this.
Wednesday, 13 March 2013
Kali Linux - Debian derivative for penetration testing/security
New Debian-based security distribution. The company behind BackTrack (Offensive Security) have just launched Kali Linux which will be tightly coupled to Debian and use Debian security updates, for example.
See also: http://www.kali.org/ and Raphael Hertzog's more informative post on Planet Debian.
See also: http://www.kali.org/ and Raphael Hertzog's more informative post on Planet Debian.
Friday, 22 February 2013
Wheezy RC1 installer
Just installed using Wheezy installer on an older IBM Thinkpad Z61and a newer Lenovo Thinkpad X121 The Z61 needs no firmware to work out of the box.
The X121 was installed using UEFI (over a previous UEFI install) so not partitioning the disk ab initio.
The X121 needs libdrm1-radeon and nonfree firmware (brcm80211 to cope with the Broadcom wireless chipset).
The new UEFI installer splash screens worked very well indeed and I'm very impressed. An expert install extended to also install a KDE desktop worked like a charm. Many thanks indeed to all who've been so hard working on this especially Steve for the initial UEFI work.
The X121 was installed using UEFI (over a previous UEFI install) so not partitioning the disk ab initio.
The X121 needs libdrm1-radeon and nonfree firmware (brcm80211 to cope with the Broadcom wireless chipset).
The new UEFI installer splash screens worked very well indeed and I'm very impressed. An expert install extended to also install a KDE desktop worked like a charm. Many thanks indeed to all who've been so hard working on this especially Steve for the initial UEFI work.
Sunday, 25 November 2012
Sunday, 26 August 2012
Ken Starks - immediate need for help is over for the moment - but
From Ken Starks, of Helios Project / Reglue
From the desk of just-so-you-know.....
Thomas Knight and I have agreed that the fund drive to aid in paying for necessary surgery for me should be halted. I will do a full blog about this entire effort this Monday but suffice it to say, you have donated more than enough to take care of my immediate needs and those down the road. Asking for anything more would be taking advantage of a loving and generous community. While it is far from adequate, the only thing I can offer you is my eternal thanks. It just seems so....small of a thing to give in return.
They will not stop the Indiegogo campaign until it reaches its time limit unfortunately so that will remain in effect for the next 30-some hours. Please do not donate anything further as I have more than enough to cover my expenses. I will explain more about that on my blog Monday.
If you helped spread the word about this campaign, please pass this posting along with the same intensity. I would deeply appreciate it.
See also now: update from Ken:
http://linuxlock.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/of-roller-coasters-cancer-and-linux.html
==
Donations for Ken himself may be over: the work of Helios/Reglue still remains good, important and useful - the world benefits for investment in education. I would urge that this is still a worthwhile charity to contribute to as you get Linux into the hands of young people and the disadvantaged who can then USE it.
From the desk of just-so-you-know.....
Thomas Knight and I have agreed that the fund drive to aid in paying for necessary surgery for me should be halted. I will do a full blog about this entire effort this Monday but suffice it to say, you have donated more than enough to take care of my immediate needs and those down the road. Asking for anything more would be taking advantage of a loving and generous community. While it is far from adequate, the only thing I can offer you is my eternal thanks. It just seems so....small of a thing to give in return.
They will not stop the Indiegogo campaign until it reaches its time limit unfortunately so that will remain in effect for the next 30-some hours. Please do not donate anything further as I have more than enough to cover my expenses. I will explain more about that on my blog Monday.
If you helped spread the word about this campaign, please pass this posting along with the same intensity. I would deeply appreciate it.
See also now: update from Ken:
http://linuxlock.blogspot.co.uk/2012/08/of-roller-coasters-cancer-and-linux.html
==
Donations for Ken himself may be over: the work of Helios/Reglue still remains good, important and useful - the world benefits for investment in education. I would urge that this is still a worthwhile charity to contribute to as you get Linux into the hands of young people and the disadvantaged who can then USE it.
Sunday, 19 August 2012
Raspberry Pi - Debian Wheezy rather than Raspbian
I note that the Raspberry Pi folks are recommending the Raspbian fork of Debian for the Pi. This is the hard float port to ARM version 6 undertaken by Mike Thompson and Peter Green (who is also a Debian developer).
That being said, though, they have also released an armel copy that is fully binary compatible with Debian Wheezy for use with software that can't readily be rebuilt e.g. Oracle Java. This is understood to be slower than Raspbian but otherwise contains identical software.
The changes made by the Raspberry Pi folks are fairly minimalist: /opt contains some of the graphics example code which takes advantage of the non-free GPU and the raspi-config script under /usr/bin which allows initial configuration at first boot.
The /etc/apt/get/sources.list refers solely to Debian repositories and the software supplied by the Raspberry Pi project can be readily updated to latest Debian Wheezy. All in all a nice way to have a silent Debian machine in a tiny case.
That being said, though, they have also released an armel copy that is fully binary compatible with Debian Wheezy for use with software that can't readily be rebuilt e.g. Oracle Java. This is understood to be slower than Raspbian but otherwise contains identical software.
The changes made by the Raspberry Pi folks are fairly minimalist: /opt contains some of the graphics example code which takes advantage of the non-free GPU and the raspi-config script under /usr/bin which allows initial configuration at first boot.
The /etc/apt/get/sources.list refers solely to Debian repositories and the software supplied by the Raspberry Pi project can be readily updated to latest Debian Wheezy. All in all a nice way to have a silent Debian machine in a tiny case.
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