I found that Kubuntu uses a lot of the same apps I was using before, Open Office is still there.. Oh wait, no it doesn’t no FireFox. It uses Konqueror as it’s web browser by default. But check this out, all those nifty things I was doing under Gnome that required extras, it’s all native here under KDE 4. Here’s some of the screen shots. I will report more about what I had installed and stuff tomorrow. Read on for the little gallery of pics.

I still have the ability to transfer stuff to my iPod with no issue, but I can’t listen to MP3′s on the laptop or even watch videos for that matter. What did I do wrong? I know I must have killed something, but I cannot find out where. BACKUP TIME!

So I moved the new pictures, music, and videos I ripped and transcoded onto the handy dandy external hard drive… And now the big decision. Do I attempt a reinstall over this installation and hope it fixes the issue that way or do I try out another flavor of Linux.

I chose that I would stay with the Ubuntu family. But I will try Kubuntu unstead. For those who do not know what this is. It’s Ubuntu with KDE as it desktop instead of Gnome. Now I have used KDE a LONG time ago with Mandrake Linux. When Linux was still kind of a clunky and not so userfriendly Operating system. Although there is some things you still should install via terminal there are a lot of things you can use the GUI to install things onto the system. But you always have the terminal (aka command line) to help in doing things quicker.

So I basically began downloading Kubuntu from it’s main site and burned the CD under Gnome. Did a completely clean install of Kubuntu and did the updates.  Tommorrow I begin reinstalling some applications or poking to find what I can use that I used under Gnome.

However the other one was correct and things went fine. More movie backups made. Go me.

I updated to a new version of Firefox that the name escapes me as I write this, but it’s a ubuntu based fork of 3.5 that seems to work fine. I also imported all my old bookmarks that I exported when I was under windows.

Also I found the Ubuntu Vidcast site. But the thing doesn’t play on my iPod because it’s in Ogg Vorbis. Dernit! And the video link for the ipod is a iTunes link. GAH!

I didn’t really pick up the laptop except to check the weather and search for the phone number for a pizza joint that we got pizza from a while back. Also I updated my ipod as I do every day and did a little stumbling (StumbleUpon) using the firefox bar extension.

I also installed the Trillian smiley set for Pidgin. I forgot I had it on my external HD. There is still some things that are on there I have to decide on keeping on there.

Looks like MySQL stopped working for some reason. I don’t know why. Looks like I am going to have to research this crap now. *sigh*

I also found that Songbird has an iPod add-on but it looks like it’s geared more towards earlier generation iPod’s. It picks my iPod up but it’s not seeing my playlist on there. Also I tried subscribing to some podcasts and it didn’t pick up anything when I added a subscription (Distorted View was my test subject for this). Let’s hope the next day is better.

Again I am happy that I am able to organize a lot better than under Windows. I feel like it’s Laundry day!

Yes that is Linux Detergent you are seeing in the picture to the right. Micro&Soft is the maker? I have seen this picture floating around the interwebs for quite some time now. I still think it’s funny.

Ok let’s get into the final day of sorting and also there are some links to some more resources I wanted to share with you all. So please, read on…

The funny thing about this is I am finding a ton of duplicates and tag errors from when I was under iTunes. WTF?

With Linux there is a huge difference between a lowercase and uppercase letter so if you have tunes from a band where the tag is different by 1 letter it will be sorted into multiple directories.

For Example, on the last batch of music, I had songs by the group VAST however they were tagged Vast or VAST so I had 2 directories for VAST because of this. Under Winduhs, they omit the case if the primary directory is one name. So even though VAST was the folder name under that old OS, I had Vast in there as well. So, re-tagging the files will fix that all up. And behold the duplicate entries!

I also found some helpful resources as well. I added them to the links on the side, but here they are:

• ClubUbuntu – Here you can read articles about Ubuntu.
• Linux Linx - The Linux Portal
• Linux Starter Pack – A free e-book to help you get started with Linux
• Bash Guide For Beginners – Helps learn the terminal a little more
• Grokking the GIMP – Learn to use The Gimp image editor
• Linux Documentation Project – Tons of free ebooks and web based guides for Linux.

Speaking of Gimp, I am thinking of playing around with that some more soon.  So I looked up some more things for it, check out these pages:

• GimpShop – GIMPshop is a modification of the free/open source GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP), intended to replicate the feel of Adobe Photoshop. Its primary purpose is to make users of Photoshop feel comfortable using GIMP.
• Gimp Stuff – A community site for Gimp Users. Tons of extras for The Gimp

I am sure there is more out there, but this is what I found recently.

Ok now that I have sorted tunage,  I am going to create my first podcast under Linux! w00t!

Ok, that was lame. But seriously I have tried a new AIR app called Mixero and it’s pretty nice. Not as extensive as Tweetdeck, but very compact. A nice feature is you can make “channels” out of search items or hash tags

And you can group your contacts a litttle easier than Tweetdeck in my opinion. But at any rate this has nothing to do really with Linux because AIR is crossplatform. I thought I’d just share this little finding.

Today I learned that with my installing and uninstalling of some applications I inadvertently disabled the MySQL server somehow. Nothing a re-install couldn’t fix. Now it’s back up and running and I can start figuring out how I am going to set up apache to get it out of the default directory for testing sites locally.

I connected remotely to my desktop again to update my podcasts after I listened to a bunch in the middle of the day. So basically another day of not much done. When I got home from work I had dinner and watched TV and passed out around 10PM on the loveseat.

The issue I had with ripping movies in the past is the sound didn’t sync with the video. It was like watching an old Kung Fu movie but more annoying for the audio. You”d hear a bang and then see it 5 seconds later. Not good.

I looked around for some more games to play. I downloaded a RTS game called Warzone 2100. Here’s a blip from the developer:

Warzone 2100 is a real-time strategy game, originally developed by Pumpkin Studios and published by Eidos Interactive, now developed by the Warzone 2100 Project. Compared to other real-time strategy games, it has a greater focus on artillery, radar, and counter-battery technologies, more frequent in-game cinematic updates as game play progresses, a massive research tree, as well as a vehicle design system.

Now the only way to install this under Linux is to compile it so I have to do that… Later.

There is a windows based client so I can play with you Windows folks if you wanna.

So not too much done today, I had to look at a co-worker’s home computer for him. They were getting a lot of poor performance on their machine. Hrm WinXP and only 512MB of Ram?! BAD!

I post these the day after I do them. In other words, all this that I am posting here on Thursday was actually done on Wednesday. In case you hadn’t figured it all out yet.  Oh and today (Thursday 8/13) is my birthday. I don’t know what I will be able to do when I get out of work so Day 14 will be real short.

I downloaded a game called PlaneShift which is a free MMORPG. Not as good as Rapellz… Man I am missing that game. I should just install it on the Windows machine to play it. But I digress…

I said I wanted to Rip and Burn DVD’s as one of my points of usage for a computer, so I played with that. However I ran into some issues.

Stupid me forgot to get the package to read encrypted DVD’s (which is basically EVERY movie DVD out there) so I had to install it. If you are trying to watch movies, do this:

After that fail, decided to play around with the screenlets and AWN some more.

Opened up Audacity and made a quick opening sound for my next show (which I need to work on). I was able to recreate and improve on the walkie talkie sounding thing that you hear in the opening. Originally that is made with Audition’s Multiband Compressor Filter but seeing I am not using Audition anymore, I have to take more steps. Annoying to some extent, but the outcome I think is AWESOME.

I also played a little with torrents which work fine… Yo Ho!

Nothing much today, maybe more later on. But I so far have not returned to Windows.

I think I need to try out Banshee to see how well it handles podcasts. gPodder works, but just trying out some other things to see what feels better. Banshee was recommended as an iTunes replacement. We shall see.