Google: is it the new microsoft??

I have read today that google is building a new OS called chrome OS. This new OS is based on linux and will be installed essentially on netbooks. With this OS, google aims to produce a secure, fast and reliable OS. But the main goal of google is to make the access easier to the web and its services

The big question is: is google following the same way as Microsoft did 20 years ago ??

I hope that google will not do the same mistake and to keep the Internet open to every one.

The last dance

All good things come to an end!!
This is the last dance of my favourite singer : Michael jackson

amarok and last.fm

I was agreeably surprised today when I find that the last version of amarok support access to last.fm but it downloads the lyrics of the currently played track also. This feature is very nice particulary for music fans.

PS: Unfortunately, last.fm is free only for evaluation. You have to pay 3$/month to listen to last.fm

Fedora 11 is now available

Fedora 11 is now available. Many friends of mine have tested it and the first impression are very good. The trend now is to install x64 version in which more packages are available.

To download the new version of fedora, go to this adress :

http://fedoraproject.org/en/get-fedora

And have fun

Grep with option -o

I have discovered a new option today of grep command which is -o
the standard use of grep returns the hole line in a file with correponds to the the pattern.
with -o , grep returns only the matching pattern

how do we have to expect from Fedora 11

I like fedora very much. I always install the last version as soon as it becomes available. However, I am still disappointed with the fact that Fedora (and more generally linux) does not still support many hardware. I think that at this step, linux commuties have to make a very hard work on this field.

In this period, I am finding great problems to install easycap video adapter on linux.

I hope that things will be easier soon.

reinstall grub

Often, when you use windows you will have to format you system because of virus and spyware.

If you are using linux in dual boot with windows, then, grub will be erased and you will not be able to boot to linux.

Fortunately, it is easy to reinstall grub if such situation happens. Just follow these steps:

1. Boot with the installation media (CD/DVD)
2. Choose rescue existing system
3. The system existing will be mounted on /mnt/sysimage
then, execute the following commands

chroot /mnt/sysimage

and then

grub-install /dev/sda

assuming the your fedora system is installed on /dev/sda. You can check this with fdisk -l.



good luck

Start program automatically after GNOME login

It is possible to start your favourite application automatically when loggin.


If you use the gnome desktop then go to system->preferences->personnel-sessions. The figure below will be displayed. You can activate/desactivate the existing software. You can also add the software you want by specifying the path. You just have to click on "add" button and browse the file system and select the needed file.

Note: On version 2.26, you can find this feature in "system->preferences->startup applications"

Rediscover music with rhythmbox

I have using rhythmbox music player for some time but recently I have discovered the feature related to last.fm. Indeed, you can listen to your favorite music on last.fm using rhythmbox.

Last.fm is a site that enables us to listen to our favorite music. The subscription to last.fm is simple and fast.

Why using rhythmbox ?
If you want to listen to your music on last.fm, you have to keep your browser open. Personally, I don't like such solutions. Then, I have used rhythmbox as last.fm player. In the first use, you have to indicate your login information to rhythmbox and then you can immediately start listen to your music.

Simple to use :)

As you can see in the figure below, rhythmbox offer an intuitive interface to play music with last.fm. You can add your favorite radio tag and the click add button. Then, when you click on of the available item , a playlist will be loaded from last.fm and your music will start playing. You will sure find some nostalgic title that will you touch you! Moreover, the album cover will be shown in the left of the screen

Enjoy

Send free SMS with wadja.com

I have wrote a post to tell who to send sms with skype using fedora(http://ilovefedora.blogspot.com/2009/02/send-sms-with-skype-on-fedora.html) . Now, I would like to share my experience with wadja.com.

Wadja is a site that enables free sms sending. I have use it to send sms for Tunisia and France and I found it reliable. Compared to skype, wadja allows free sms sending but with reduced number of characters.

Planet Fedora

I just write this post because I am bery excited this morning because I have enabled my fedora account and I will start contribute in planet fedora and I fedora docs. I hope that my work will be helpful for fedora community.

Gnome as default desktop

Recently, I have decided to migrate to gnome desktop. However, I'll remain faithful to KDE applications. The main problem that I used to find with Gnome, is that the look is unusual. I have made these steps that I report below:

• First, right click on the panel in the bottom of the screen and remove it
• Move the panel in the top of the screen to the bottom
• To Add the desktop selector, right click on the panel and choose add to panel. Add the workspace switcher applet
• right click on the panel again and choose add to panel. Add the window selector applet
  

Finally, your desktop will look like this:

Desktop view on KDE 4.2

Fedora fans are certainly very happy to see their kde desktop updated to KDE 4.2. The new version is really more attractive than ever. In this version, you can put a folder view for you desktop by selecting apparence setting

Play radio with Fedora

Some radio website allow you to play the live radio station with an embedded player as for BBC 2. However, this may be embarrassing for some people how probaly like listen to radio with application minimized in tray zone.

If the link is not proposed, you can follow the following procedure to play your favorite radio:
1. install videodownloadhelper plugin for firefox.
2. open the radio in the embedded player
3. the videodownloadhelper will capture the stream. You can download the file and obtain the source download link (tools-> downloads-> copy download link)
4. Play your radio in your favorite audio player (amarok and realplayer for my case)

Exemple: play BBC 2 radio channel with this command:


realplay http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio2/realmedia/fmg2.ram


ps: thanks to Tom Horsley for his help

send SMS with SKYPE on fedora

We provide a set of commands that permits to enable sending sms on linux FEDORA. Note that sending SMS with skype is not free.

Requires:
1. Download and install skype
2. install python and python-devel
(as root) : yum -y install python python-devel

Installations steps:

3. As root, execute the following commands

wget http://heanet.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge\
/skype4py/Skype4Py-1.0.29.0.tar.gz

tar zxvf  Skype4Py-1.0.29.0.tar.gz

cd Skype4Py-1.0.29.0/

python setup.py install

cd ..

4. From your account, Lunch skype:
skype&

5. Execute the following set of commands in your account

wget http://www.kolmann.at/philipp/linux/\
skysentials/skysentials-1.0.1.tar.gz

tar zxvf  skysentials-1.0.1.tar.gz

cd skysentials-1.0.1/

./skysentials.py

6. have a fun

Using the webcam with kernel 2.6.27

After updating you kernel to version 2.6.27, some applications like skype and cheese may crash or not be able to play webcam videos. This is due to the incompatibility between V4L1 and V4L2.

Note that drivers gspca has been integrated in the kernel starting from 2.6.27 and use V4L2 instead of V4L1.

The solution for this problem consists on downloading the compatibily labraries and then to load them before starting the application.

On Fedora, this can be done with the following commands (as root):

For i386

wget http://kojipkgs.fedoraproject.org/packages/libv4l \
/0.5.4/1.fc9/i386/libv4l-0.5.4-1.fc9.i386.rpm

rpm -ivh libv4l-0.5.4-1.fc9.i386.rpm

LD_PRELOAD=/usr/lib/libv4l/v4l1compat.so cheese

For x86_64

wget http://kojipkgs.fedoraproject.org/packages/libv4l \
/0.5.4/1.fc9/x86_64/libv4l-0.5.4-1.fc9.x86_64.rpm

rpm -ivh libv4l-0.5.4-1.fc9.x86_64.rpm

LD_PRELOAD=/usr/lib64/libv4l/v4l1compat.so cheese

How to change the mac adress in Fedora

Some people may need to change the mac address of their ethernet network cards. This can be easily done with fedora with command line. Just follow the steps below:
1. Log as root on a textual console (ctrl+F2) or through "su -" command in your console
2. Print your network configuration with ifconfig

[root@localhost ~]# ifconfig
eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:23:8B:6A:7E:9E
inet addr:10.1.128.244 Bcast:10.1.255.255 Mask:255.255.0.0
inet6 addr: fe80::218:8bff:fedb:7e9e/64 Scope:Link
UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1
RX packets:79086 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
TX packets:40319 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000
RX bytes:72461556 (69.1 MiB) TX bytes:5245562 (5.0 MiB)
Interrupt:17


Here, eth0 is the ethernet interface of your system. The mac address is put in red.

3. Change your mac address using the following syntax

ifconfig eth0 hw ether 00:18:8B:CA:7E:90

The new value (in green) must be hexadecimal

4. if you have a dhcp server that distributes the adresses automatically, then request a new adress for your eth0 interface

[root@localhost ~]# dhclient eth0

5. Now, your interface is up and have a new mac and IP addresses. This feature may be useful if the network administrator ban you according to the mac adress, for example .........