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Dell position XPS M1330 as one of the thinnest and lightest notebooks in its class, as really portable notebook (weight is under 4 pounds or 1.8 kg). On January 23, 2008 it was announced that Spain, Germany, France, UK consumers can purchase this notebook with Ubuntu 7.10 Linux pre-installed. As usually announcement was made at Direct2Dell blog:
Since we’ve began offering Ubuntu on some consumer systems, two clear areas of feedback from the IdeaStorm community and Direct2Dell readers have been: offer Ubuntu on more hardware, and offer it worldwide.This Ubuntu-related post is still the third most commented post in Direct2Dell’s history-many of the 654 comments are asking for it in more countries.
Looking through XPS M1330 technical information (Intel Core Duo up to 2.20GHz, up to 4Gb RAM, 128 MB Video, 200GB HDD, etc.) and price starting from £599, I would like to say that this Dell’s product definitely has future. And it’s too bad I don’t live in Spain, UK… 
Get more information on the laptop here, the next step would be to customize and buy one while notebooks are hot!
Last week both systems Microsoft Windows Vivid Toasting Technology (VTT) 2008 Starter Edition and Heatu Linux 9.06 (Dainty Toast) were released for modern toasters.
Yesterday Linux Screw has an opportunity to test both and the results were demonstrated at the Annual Bread Valley Conference at Jan 17 2008 in Texas, USA. Reactions were mixed as Heatu Linux 9.06 and Windows VTT went head-to-head.
Continue reading…
Date: January 17, 2008. Categories:
tips and unix.
as usual provides us with excellent article about good habits which would help Unix administrators to improve their command line usage efficiency and break away from bad usage patterns in the process. I was impressed by this article and realized my everyday CLI usage is full of “bad patterns”. Nice point to give up them and pick up good style.
When you use a system often, you tend to fall into set usage patterns. Sometimes, you do not start the habit of doing things in the best possible way. Sometimes, you even pick up bad practices that lead to clutter and clumsiness. One of the best ways to correct such inadequacies is to conscientiously pick up good habits that counteract them. This article suggests 10 UNIX command-line habits worth picking up — good habits that help you break many common usage foibles and make you more productive at the command line in the process. Each habit is described in more detail following the list of good habits.
Those 10 good habits to adopt are:
- Make directory trees in a single swipe.
- Change the path; do not move the archive.
- Combine your commands with control operators.
- Quote variables with caution.
- Use escape sequences to manage long input.
- Group your commands together in a list.
- Use
xargs outside of find.
- Know when
grep should do the counting — and when it should step aside.
- Match certain fields in output, not just lines.
- Stop piping
cats.
Full article is here.
Exciting news was published today at Jonathan Schwartz‘ (Chief Executive Officer and President of Sun Microsystems) blog:
We announced big news today – our preliminary results for our fiscal second quarter, and as importantly, that we’re acquiring MySQL AB.
…
This puts products like MySQL in an interesting position. They’re a part of every web company’s infrastructure, to be sure. And though many of the more traditional companies use MySQL (from auto companies to financial institutions to banks and retailers), many have been waiting for a Fortune 500 vendor willing to step up, to provide mission critical global support.
Read full article here and here (official agreement announcement)…
One of my favorite sites recently published entertaining brief article about Linux-based device. Just imagine photoframe with 0.5 Ghz CPU, 128 Mb RAM, up to 16Gb SD memory, MP3/MPEG-4 playback and Wi-Fi. Huh? No jokes, it’s upcoming Agfaphoto’s AF5080W product and below are it’s specs!
- Processor — Freescale i.MX31 SoC with ARM11 core clocked at 532MHz
- Memory — 128MB; 5-in-1 memory card reader supporting up to 16GB SD
- Display — 8-inch, 800×600 SVGA
- Images — JPEG, GIF, PNG, WMF
- Audio — MP3, WMA
- Video — H.264 AVI, MJPEG, MPEG-4 (and via networked STB, MPEG 1 and MPEG-2)
- I/O — WiFi, USB
- Features — slideshow, clock, calendar, alarm, and remote control
- Frame — tripod base with three interchangeable veneers: brushed aluminium, black plastic, and wood effect
As for me, I was impressed and little bit confused: I have internet gateway/proxy with lesser hardware running in our office! That server can’t do animation-enhanced slideshow, doesn’t have calendar, alarm functions and can’t play video or audio. But above-mentioned digital photoframe can do it easily, as well as it can play video from STB (set-top box) and transfer data via Wi-Fi. Nice device among those that aren’t worse buying however potentially are perfect gifts!
The toy is to be shipped by AgfaPhoto and developed by Sagem Communications. Hardware part is based on Freescale Semiconductor’s i.MX31 system-on-chip (SoC). There is no official information on pricing and/or availability, but if you’re interested just wait until it appear at AgfaPhoto’s photoframes page.
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