Welcome to my world

Oh poor Fedora, don’t worry we still love you, even if you do keep cocking up. It’s been a hard few months for my favourite distro. First we had the security problem with the gpg key for the updates, then we had the evil dbus update which broken F10, and now we’ve got the odd day-of-the-week bug for the UK.

The bug is simple, according to the gnome clock applet our week starts on a Tuesday. Opps, but that shouldn’t be too much of a problem to change. Digging around the net, I found some references to locale files in /usr/share/i18n/locales. Although they looked correct, I tried changing them anyway. To absolutly no effect. The answer? To recompile glibc-common! Oh for fucks sake, the bug for this has been opened since Novemeber, should I really have to recompile what is a massive RPM, just for this? Why aren’t these files read at login, or better still, why can’t I used system-config-date to change my preferences.

Anyway for those of you who are interested, you can track the bug on bugzilla or Sourceware.

I’m also rebuilding the glibc-common RPM now, if it works, then I’ll post an updated version when it’s finished

As you probably guessed, I love Linux in all it’s distros. OK, maybe I have a small hatred for Ubuntu but that because of the fan boy users thinking they invented everything. Anyway, I also know that all Linux users harbour a dark secret. A secret we’ve tried to keep quite for many years. A secret that if we actually admitted all Windows users would laugh and kick sand in our faces. Well I’m not scared! The secret is…. Linux driver support isn’t as good as Windows. You know that new feedback steering wheel – probably won’t work. That sexy new Laptop card reader – Wouldn’t hold your breath.

We’ve just got a shiny new Brother MFC-7820N printer/copier/fax/coffee maker in the office. Great, I thought, the printing will be fine as it’s postscript but I probably won’t be able to use the scanner or the fax part over the network. I’m OK with that and I don’t want to make a fuss else the M$ boys might get wind of our dirty little secret.

So when it arrived, it was with some trepidation I poking around the Brother website and found a Linux section. CUPS drivers, SANE drivers, LPR fax drivers. Wahoo! Even better when I went to install the printer in cups avahi had already spotted it and installed it. The SANE drivers are supplied as a couple of RPMs and a single line to activate then it works just like any other SANE driver. The fax part isn’t quite as polished, but still works. Absolutely amazing. I really am impressed with Brother. The whole ‘install’ took around 30 seconds.

The best thing about all of this was that when we tried to install everything on Windows, it too about 30 minutes to install and then uses a nasty GUI and tray service.

As my regular reader will know, I love Apple and everything they do. I especially love the iPhone and it’s over priced, over hyped shinyness. I actually do love Opera, it works great on my phone, renders all pages perfectly and is small and quick to use. Oh and it’s free.

I got the following video from their site. I love to see Apple’s propaganda machine working against them

Opera 4 is out in beta now so go download a copy!

I really wasn’t looking forward to the office this morning. Was it because I’d had hardly any sleep? No – Was it because of that whoshing sound deadlines make as the fly by? No. So why wasn’t I looking forward to the office? Because I knew I’d have to listen to the gushing from the Apple-philes about Steveo’s keynotes speech yesterday.

So Apple have finally revealed the iPhone, probably the worst kept secret in the world!

The specs seem fair enough, 3.5 inch screen, 4-8GB, Quad band, Wi-Fi. A couple of nice functions I like is the accelerometer so as you turn the phone from portrait to landscape the screen also flips and the proximity sensor which locks the phone when you hold it to your ear. So no more excuses that “…my cheek hung up on you!”

The reason it’s not rocking my world is that I’ve seen it all before. The Sony Ericsson Walkman already does a lot of this and more. And more importantly it’s doesn’t cost an absolute arm and leg, which no doubt the iPhone will.

Well done Apple, your shiny new product has already been copied, release and sold cheaper before you’d even announced it!

I received this e-mail from HSBC earlier today telling me that I’d given HSBC my e-mail address but not the permission to use it. Yes that’s right HSBC. I haven’t given you permission to use my e-mail address.. SO DON’T FUCKING USE IT!