I was riding (bike riding that is) in to the office this morning and had the strangest feeling that I was not alone.

Then I thought I heard something just over head, so I looked up to discover....

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So, for the past few days I've been giving the Kompose task manager a try on my KDE desktop, and I have to say that I like it. I also recently learned that Kompose is going to be playing a part in the next release of KDE (aka Plasma), which is good news. I can see how Kompose could really help provide a truly innovative environment for future KDE/Linux users.

Looking forward to what the KDE team all have in store for us.

Well, finally, all of my repedative bagering finally payed off. Pat, from the Linux Link Tech Show (aka TLLTS) finally got around to giving Kanotix a try.

Not surprising to me, he discovered that he likes this distribution better than Ubuntu and Mepis, the two most popular "newbie friendly" Linux distributions today.

Pat mentions in his post on the TLLTS forums that he'll be discussing his findings with Kanotix on this Wednesday's broadcast of the show. I'm looking forward to it and am pleased that Kanotix has another satisfied user.

Do I know a good thing when I see one, or what?

Just out of curiosity, I've started playing with a desktop manager that comes with the KDE environment called Kompose.

What it is, is a virtual desktop manager that shows you scaled down versions of each application window in use on all of your virtual desktops within KDE.

It allows you to group your application windows in different ways, depending on the style that best suites your needs. It also uses little, in the way of system resources, and quite frankly, is an interesting way to navigate through your desktop.




In this example, I've got two applications running in my first virtual desktop session and two others in my second virtual desktop. The third and fourth sessions are empty at the moment.

I like the idea of having a bird's eye view of all of the applications I currently have running. However, I think this tool is better suited to a person who's in the habit of having several applications open at the same time. I usually only have open applications I'm immediately using, so rarely do I have more than four windows to switch between at any one time.

There are a few ways in which you can switch to the Kompose view. You can configure a hot-key, use the KDE system tray launcher icon, or set it us so it appears when you move your mouse pointer to a particular corner of your screen.

In practicality, I really don't see Kompose as a required replacement for your standard KDE task bar, it's just a different way of managing and navigating through your desktop environment.

To be ignorant about something is one thing. But to base an opinion - and voice that opinion - on such ignorance always seems to put a knot in my shorts.

Case in point: The boys over at The Linux Link Tech Show last night interviewed Eric Raymond, of the OSI and I was interested to hear what I had to say.

The first question they asked him was what he thought about Linux and it's readiness for the desktop of the "average Joe". Well, that's where my respect for his opinion kind of burned up on take-off.

His opinion was that the Linux desktop was not quite yet ready for the main stream, and estimated that it probably wouldn't be there for the next couple of years.

Okay, I can respect that, even though I think differently. However, what I can't respect is the answer to the next question he was asked.

"So, have you had a chance to see Linspire or Mepis?" Well, surprise, surprise, no he hasn't. And that's where my opinion of Eric's opinion took a nose dive.

My question is, how the heck can he sit there, commenting on a system he obviously has never even tried for himself? If you haven't been working with the latest advancements in Linux desktop software then you sure as hell shouldn't be commenting on it, other than stating "I have no experience on the subject so I cannot comment at this time."

If he's pulling opinions out of the air on this subject, then what other topics is he purely bull*hitting about?

Basing an opinion on hear-say and speculation is not a very professional thing to do. It certainly doesn't gain my trust or respect.

Okay... got that off of my chest. Back to reality.

Just as I suspected, Microsoft "Longhorn", now called "Vista", doesn't offer anything more than what I can do with my Linux and KDE system TODAY, let alone in a year's time.

In fact, it's actually going to restrict its customers even more and offer less, from what I've read here. And it's still a year away.

Just think how far more advanced the Linux desktop will be next year at this time.

I think this is the beginning of the end for Microsoft. All they seem to be doing now is playing catch-up. And strangely enough, people will be forced to pay for their substandard service. Shameful.

Last night I was channel surfing and in doing so, came across the movie "Star Trek: First Contact."

I'm not a real big Star Trek fan, but I did watch the original T.V. series as well as some of the Next Generation run. I've also seen the movies up to, and including, First Contact, but it's been a while since I've seen it.

I caught the movie at the part just after the Borg took control of the Enterprise and Picard is somewhere in the bowels of the ship with Lilly, the woman from 20th century they brought back to the ship for medical care.

As they're running from the Borg, Lilly asks how large the ship is and how much it cost to build. Then Picard replies with a line that suddenly lit a light bulb in my head. Picard said something like, "Earth's economy is different in the future. We don't have money. Instead of pursuing personal wealth, we strive to better ourselves and humanity...." or something to that effect.

Although I knew that this was the sort of society that Star Trek has always suggested to be in our future, the idea never occurred to me until last night.

Gene Roddenberry's idea was that after Wold War III, the people of Earth finally put their differences aside and built the foundations that ultimately lead to the Star Trek you know now. But with all that is happening with our current economy and technology, I'm wondering if Gene may actually envisioned not a war of rockets and bombs, but a war between business practises. I'm talking about the current "war" between the philosophies of Capitalism and Open Source.

Consider, for a moment, the ideas behind Linux, Open Source and the free software movement. Are they not very similar to the ideas behind the Star Trek universe and how their society is to benefit humanity as a whole, not just to make more money for a corporation?

I mean, that's what Open Source is all about (at least in my mind). Someone writes some code, distributes it to the world, where others then contribute to it to make it even better, and then the entire community benefits from it. And so, on and, so on......

Maybe the world of Star Trek is really the Open Source movement at its pinnacle, and rather than its birth coming as a result of World War III, Gene saw the foreshadowing of free software and the defeat of the corporate monopoly.

Do you think it's possible that the Enterprise's main computer is running some sort of advanced version of Linux? Kernel version 212.3.12, perhaps?

It never ceases to amaze me at how powerful, innovative, and fun the Linux desktop environment is. Okay, it's mostly due to the talented folks of the KDE desktop environment. But, it's still thanks to Linux and the open source movement.

I'm not expecting to see anything "innovative" coming from Microsoft anymore. What ever they come out with when "Longhorn" comes out, it's only going to be re-hashed from what's already available under Linux.

Take this blogging / Wiki stuff for example. Recently I created my own Wiki site and have been posting information to it. To do this, you simply use a text editor from within your web browser. However, if you're using something like IE, you have to do your own spell checking with either a plug-in you find somewhere or use an external text editor that has spell checking capabilities (which you then have to copy and paste your text from into the wiki editor).

Now, I do my updating using KDE and Konqueror. One of the nice things about this is that Konqueror has it's own in-line spell checker that watches my typing all of the time. The spell checking is built in to the browser! It's a small thing, but it's a useful thing.... an innovative thing. Something that Microsoft wasn't cleaver enough to include themselves. But not only that, I didn't have to pay the KDE folks for this feature. People pay Microsoft for their software, and it still can't compete with what's available from the open source community.

Linux; Kanotix; KDE.... it's all what Microsoft aspires to be, but has no hopes of reaching. If you're paying for and using Microsoft, you have my sympathy.

Been playing around (and learning a lot) about PHP, Apache, and the valuable use of Wikis. So, I decided to try, once again, to approach our office management and suggest that we adopt something along these lines to help promote better office management skills.

Every time the topic has come up in meetings, everyone agrees that our management's capabilities of document control and information exchange has been somewhat outdated and causing us to spend more time and money than necessary. We all agree that something should be done. However, try and suggest something to our IT dept. on what we can do to get this ball rolling, and you're stopped dead in your tracks.

"We've looked into that option already," or "we're looking into it and will decide later," are the responses you get. Nothing has moved forward in over a year.

Well, we have a new general manager in the office and he's agreed with what I've been trying to tell him.

To make a long story short, I've been given the opportunity to do what I've been wanting to do since I started working for this firm. In just two days, I've set up a Linux Apache MySQL PHP (or LAMP) web server, installed Wiki software and have begun to build the infrastructure that will help our management team do their jobs better... all without the help of our egocentric IT department.

Every time I've asked them in the past to just provide me with the resources (server and set up) to do this, the answer's been, "we don't have the resources or budget to set this up at the moment." Well, guys, I did all of this in a couple of days (not knowing much of anything about how to do such a thing) and the system works. I'm even using hardware that the all powerful IT dept. deemed out of date and un-usable. That was thanks to Linux, as it will basically run on anything... and run well.

No, I'm no Microsoft Certified systems administrator, and I think that's my biggest strength. The so-called IT professionals that I have to deal with at times don't seem to have the capabilities of thinking for themselves. Either that, or their egos have been inflated so much that they've blinded themselves.

I mean, I've been able to build this useful system for the cost of some old PII PC in less than two days with no experience in doing so ever before. Yet, our IT dept. seems to think this sort of thing takes a huge amount of resources, time and expertise. If I was corporate management, I'd be questioning the amount of money we were paying these so called professionals for the level of service our offices where getting.

In any case, I really don't have much respect for the entire IT industry. At least when it refers to Microsoft-centric infrastructures.

I'm a Linux user... and I will control the world. :o)