Microsoft Reaches Out To Linux - Says Happy Birthday!

Microsoft and Linux have been long term adversaries. While the comparison may not be logical - since one is a corporation and another an operating system, it has not stopped people in either camps to lock horns with each other.

However, on the eve of Linux celebrating its 20th birthday, Microsoft is reaching out to Linux via a video that says - "Happy Birthday Linux!".

Watch the video below.
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1 Second Linux Boot - And It Is No Gimmick !

It is said a picture is worth a 1000 words. In this case, instead of a picture, the following video demonstrates Linux booting to a GUI in a mere 1 second.



And this is what the people who implemented this awesome feat have to say about this exercise (and I quote).
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Google Launches Open Source YouTube Channel

Google has launched an open source channel on YouTube. The aim is to collect and organize all the videos related to Google and open source projects in one location.

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All you want to know about Google Chrome OS in a Nutshell

Google recently lifted the curtains on its soon to be flagship product Google Chrome OS - a heavily customized Operating system which runs on top of the Linux kernel. Google did this with great panache by releasing the source code of the operating system under an open source license. The open source part of the operating system is known as Google Chromium OS.

Since a lot has already been written about the Google Chrome OS, I thought of doing something different. I collected the details of the project and created a mind map providing a birds eye view of Google Chrome OS.

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Google Wave Explained in Plain English

I was raring to try out Google Wave but havin't received an invite yet. So I did the next best thing which is to scrounge the Net for more info on Google Wave. Thus I chanced upon this wonderfully made video explaining in plain English what Google Wave is all about. Read more »

Screencast - Install OpenSolaris in VirtualBox

Installing OpenSolaris on your machine may require some gentle hand holding if you are a first time user of the operating system. More so if you are thinking of installing OpenSolaris in VirtualBox. But help is at hand. I came across an exceptionally done screencast which walks you through installing and configuring VirtualBox in Windows, and then installing OpenSolaris in VirtualBox.
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VideoLAN - VLC 1.0.0 has officially been released

VLC media player - A universal media player which plays video and audio files of any known format has reached the version 1.0 milestone. I especially have a liking for this media player because it is available for Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, BeOS and BSDs. And, in my experience, I never ever had to hunt for media codecs once I installed VLC on my machine. Heck, it even plays Flash (.flv) video files.Read more »

Firefox 3.5 released with support for the HTML 5 Video Tag and much more

Firefox team is striving to remain in the cutting edge of technology. The newest Firefox release namely version 3.5 is considered by many to be one of the fastest web browsers leaving its competition far behind. Mozilla claims Firefox 3.5 is over 2 times faster than Firefox 3.0 and 10 times faster than Firefox 2.x.Read more »

What does it mean to be free ? - We're Linux contest winner announced

Linux is Free. Do you know what that means ? If you don't, the following video will teach you the true meaning of Free.Read more »

Get a Free 1 Year Subscription to Linux Journal Magazine

Linux Journal is a premier Linux magazine which has been around for around 15 years now - and still going strong. This monthly print magazine publishes articles on Linux and open source software that are considered to be a few notches above it's competition in terms of quality and content.

Costing $29.50 for 12 issues, here is a chance for you to win a yearly digital subscribtion of this fabulous magazine for free.

What you have to do

Watch Linux Journal's daily tech video for this week starting from this one. That is one video a day.

As the video progresses, watch out for, and note down any letter that the hosts will anounce. Once you have watched all the videos in order, and have collected all the letters, in the last video you will get to know the email id to which you have to send the letters. Everyone with the correct answer who responds by 11:59:59PM U.S. Eastern Daylight Time March, Friday the 13th of 2009 wins a free digital subscription to Linux Journal.

Linux Journal has named this week the "Tech Tip Video Contest Week".

A visual walkthrough of the enhancements in KDE 4.2

The main emphasis of KDE 4.2 release has been drastic improvement in desktop effects. KDE has its own composite window manager called KWIN which received a huge graphical upgrade, with composite and GL support.

Lucas Murray has put together a collection of videos showcasing all the improvements in desktop effects that have found its way into KDE 4.2.

The desktop effects being - Present windows, Snow, Desktop grid, Invert, Box switch, Cover switch, Magic lamp, and of course a slew of subtle features which makes KDE 4.2 a major release in itself as far as the end user is concerned.

All the videos are in high definition format and can be viewed here.

Enable DVD playback in Ubuntu

I am sure any Ubuntu user will swear by the fact that it is a piece of cake getting multimedia to work in Ubuntu. In fact Ubuntu walks a fine line in ensuring that the users who are passionate about freedom and those who are keen on functionality are provided for.

But playing encrypted DVDs is a bit trickier. Tech-recipes.com provides a simple way of enabling DVD playback in Ubuntu.

In fact there are just two simple steps namely,

$ sudo apt-get install totem-xine libxine1-ffmpeg libdvdread3

and

$ sudo /usr/share/doc/libdvdread3/install-css.sh

Keynote address by Aaron J Seigo at the KDE 4.0 release event

On January 18th 2008, Aaron J Seigo, President of KDE e.V. and its lead developer gave a keynote address at the KDE 4.0 release event held at Google campus in Mountain View, California. This is a video recording of this august event. In his talk, Aaron gives a birds eye view of the different features in KDE 4.0 as well as a glimpse into the future of KDE 4.

The video is in streaming format and unfortunately Google has not provided a download link with it. So for those who are interested in downloading the video to view it in their free time, can do so using the 'wget' utility as follows :

wget -c --output-document=kde4keynote.mp4 "http://vp.video.google.com/videodownload?version=0&secureurl=twAAANo77xYbVm8VXV5rhG_qPPpRNCbSEwfixV2tMd2j4Uo4ntmtDVLDPHv8b_tQPoUJLJU8lvIfj47OgHJ7bJ4RRwep_TFHvSGSreO8JGQSiA1OxXR4qiGM8upVqU__NCUyGZLbQ1xofY2aPsatvJBqPpJjooYujsvezZduVlne8N2e2jgrjNJkf5JlwHBHpMBkCbzReaQPOoPrQMFpRTM9jkLcsAGjye2-MJbx_0ydYM3cfayiofNm3hE1SmvOtnBW8g&sigh=eklYkc_l10OrI60da0Ybj7O8_oY&begin=0&len=466236"

Those who have a broadband internet connection can watch it below.

Also take a look at the talks given by a number of other delegates at the KDE 4.0 release event.

Blue-ray vs HD DVD Format war move closer to an end

Blue-ray and HD DVD are two divergent high-density optical disc formats for the storage of digital information, including high-definition video. For a couple of years now there has been a war of sorts going on between the Blue-Ray and HD DVD camps to gain dominance over how people would view future digital entertainment.

Of late, the HD DVD format has taken a beating with Warner Bros. deciding to release all its movies exclusively in Blue-ray format. Now only Universal, Paramount Pictures and a few minor ones from the movie industry are still in the HD DVD camp with 20th Century Fox,New line, Sony Pictures, Buena Vista and of course Warner Bros firmly entrenched in the Blue-ray camp. This means that over 70% of Hollywood's movie output will be released in Blue-ray discs.

Fig: Industry support for HD DVD and Blue-ray formats

Blue-ray discs sales in the US is ahead enjoying 65% of the market over HD-DVD's 35% which is another factor which pushes Blue-ray closer to becoming the industry standard.

Fig: Blue-ray enjoys a 65% market share at present

HD DVD specifications

• Capacity : 15 GB (Single layer), 30 GB (Dual layer) and 51GB (Triple layer)
• File systems supported : ISO9660, Universal Disc Format (UDF)
• Region encoding : None
• Backward compatible : Yes
• DRM : Optional but can be incorporated.
  

Blue-ray specifications

• Capacity : 25 GB (Single layer), 50 GB (Dual layer)
• Region encoding : Yes (Divided into three regions)
• Backward compatible : Optional. Left to the manufacturers.
• DRM : Support for several layers of DRM
  

As you can see, Blue-ray has a clear advantage as far as the specifications are concerned. As an end note, here is a funny video clip featuring none other than Hitler ranting over the imminent demise of HD-DVD format.

Nursery Rhyme Video - Humor

Here is a Nursery rhyme video in which, a lovely lass working in a flower shop help avert a crime. Produced and directed by an Australian named Michael Demosthenous. This video of about 8 Minutes duration won the Best Short Film award in the NAFA Film Festival. What struck me the most was the play of words that has been inter weaved into the plot.

I doubled up laughing when I watched this nursery rhyme video clip. You would too, it's that funny.

Massive list of free educational video lectures - courtesy Berkeley and MIT

A couple of years back, MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) released a press note revealing their intention to make available free of cost the study notes which includes lectures, tutorials, video and audio of lectures of all their courses online. This was big news then and was welcomed by aspiring professionals and institutions the world over. And MIT Opencourseware was the platform chosen to deliver on their promise.

In fact you can find a huge collection of video lectures (which this post is about) on the MIT opencourseware website. The lectures are divided into their respective sections which makes it quite easy to find what you need.

Also check out this web page which features links to over 177 video lectures from the Berkeley University as well as links to other online educational resources. A very good resource worth bookmarking.

Social bookmarking explained in plain English

Social bookmarking has literally changed the way people aggregate and bookmark content. Gone are the days when you relied exclusively on bookmarking interesting sites you visit in your web browser's bookmarks menu. Now a days, the trend is to maintain all your bookmarks at a central location online and then share them with like minded people. Thus you have a process where by you never lose track of the interesting sites at the same time get to explore new sites which cater to your tastes but which has eluded your eyes.

One of the premier social bookmarking sites is del.icio.us which is a Yahoo venture. Here you can create an account and then start bookmarking your sites. What is more you can also tag your sites and enter short descriptions about it thus making it much more easier to manage.

Well if you didn't understand the concept behind del.icio.us by reading my short explanation, then I don't really blame you. A better bet would be to watch this Youtube video.

A word about the creators of this video

This video is shot by two enterprising individuals (couples actually) by name Sachi LeFever and Lee LeFever. They run a company called Common Craft and their job is to create educational (or promotional) videos such as the one shown above explaining various concepts related to technology and as you can see, they have done a pretty good job of it.

What I really find unique about the video is the way it is shot, where they explain things using pictures printed on paper with a little bit of animation thrown in and of course using neutral accent English thus bringing it down to the level of a child's understanding. You can also find many other videos on their site. And if you have some spare change, you might be interested in hiring them to do a similar video of your site too ;-).

A collection of best rated videos on C++

Here is a collection of best rated videos on C++. These videos have been collected from a variety of sources such as Stanford university, reconnectworks and even a lecture by Dr. Bjarne Stroustrup the creator of C++.

The Stanford University lectures are very clear and start with the basics in an attempt to teach C++. Each lecture is about an hour and a half long.

It starts with the very basics and ends with sophisticated example of tracking code. The content of each lecture is roughly the following…

1. session 1: basic declarations, conditional structure, operators.
2. session 2: pointers and functions.
3. session 3: introduction to classes including operator overloading using 3-Vector from CLHEP (class library for high energy physics) as an example.
4. session 4; more on classes with arrays and lists and including templates.
5. session 5: introduction to inheritance and some thoughts on class design and dealing with legacy code.
6. session 6: polymorphic inheritance with a large example taken from a simulation code.
   

These series of lectures are not a "hands-on" style ones. Only few practical exercises are suggested in the lectures. The students are expected to take their own initiatives in getting started.

By the end of the course, one should be able to read most C++ code written by others and be on their way to using C++ in their own work.

Link to the video lectures

How to create a custom DVD from multiple video formats

I have always found it a hassle to convert a video file from one format to another in Linux for lack of (or rather, not being aware of) a good Free video conversion suite. I have tried converting an Avi file to another format such as mp4 using some software but the results were far from satisfactory. I take it that it has more to do with the settings I selected than the fault of the software I used.

Axel has written a quite detailed article explaining how to create a custom DVD using a Free video conversion software called DeVeDe. What is really interesting about his article is that he shows the exact settings he used in the conversion - a big factor if you want your converted video file to have more or less the same quality. In fact my experience shows that you need to get the ratio of number of frames per second with respect to resolution of the video right else the quality of the video might suffer.

Fig: DeVeDe software interface

He has used the Windows version of DeVeDe but this is a software which is available for Linux as well. For example, in Ubuntu, you can install this software using the command :

$ sudo apt-get install devede

You need to have Mplayer, Mencoder, DVDAuthor, VCDImager, MKisofs and all the proprietary codecs installed though since DeVeDe is just a front-end. More over since DeVeDe is a Python script, it requires Python as well. For more details on the actual steps required to convert a video file from one format to another, do read the guide.

September to be one Ubuntu screencast per day month

September 2007 is going to be a special month for the Ubuntu enthusiasts and would be converts. In this month, you get to view videos of accomplishing various tasks in Ubuntu at the rate of one screencast per day.

Each screencast will be made available through the Ubuntu Screencast site in three sizes and two formats (OGG and Flash). The screencasts are licensed under the permissive Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 License, so you're free to modify, pass on, sell or otherwise distribute them so long as the attribution stays intact.

In fact, you do not have to wait for September to begin as the Ubunut screencast website already has a collection of videos which explain topics such as Samba file sharing, Printing in Ubuntu, Customizing Ubuntu desktop and many others as well.

So do check out the screencasts and bookmark the site as well for future reference.