Now Amarok is a decent player, however I am sketchy on the organization thing it does. It really messes up on the ID3 tags sometimes.

I have a few tunes (1 Andrew W.K. tune, Some “Weird Al” tunes and some Kabuto the Python tracks) which it decided to put everyone in mismatched folders. *sigh*

I hope I can get back to Songbird. I loved that program’s sorting feature a lot better. Also Amarok uses Amazon ONLY for the album art. WTF? Nothing I listen to is on there. BAH!

That’s it for today.

So I installed Cairo Dock. Cairo-Dock is an animated application launch bar for the desktop, comparable to the dock in Mac OS X or Rocket Dock (for Windows). I trimmed out the task tray (still want to use my panel at the moment. But I added a few of the things I use frequently and of course Second Life was added as well. I just wanted to get things off my desktop as far as the icons. Want to add this to your machine? Read on!

I know people will say go through the Software Sources section or edit /etc/apt/sources.list which is done by:

sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

or

sudo kate /etc/apt/sources.list

Either way you add the following repository:

deb http://repository.cairo-dock.org/ubuntu jaunty cairo-dock

This repository needs an authentication key so run:

wget -q http://repository.cairo-dock.org/cairo-dock.gpg -O- | sudo apt-key add -

Then, to install Cairo-Dock, issue these two commands in the terminal:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install cairo-dock cairo-dock-plug-ins

The Cairo Dock will be under System on the KDE Applications menu. Not sure what it is under Gnome. I ran the Non OpenGL one and it’s really smooth under KDE.

After I did the install updates came in for the linux kernel.  So I ran the updates and then had to reboot. This is the only thing I really need to reboot for as far as updates. Suck it Windows! I can’t count how many times I have woken up to my desktop with windows I had left open overnight that were closed because of the autoupdate rebooting my machine.

I installed Inkscape and Gimp. I really need to sit and play with those more. I didn’t install Pixel so I could concentrate on these programs somewhat.

So now I am looking over things I need to get re-installed since the complete KDE install. I need the following things which have slipped my mind:

• SSH
• VLC
• Skype
• Audacity
• LiVES
• Some more Games (like Majhong (sp?) and some of the KDE games)
• Import pictures and other things from External HD

So my little list is still a bit large but I think it will be quick and easy to do for tomorrow’s posting. I think I will start documenting some How-To’s but I will probably open up VooDooStevie.NET to do that. We’ll see. I have a Joomla install going on there with really nothing on it. Maybe I will make it a one stop thing with a bunch of different things on one site. Wheee!

One thing I didn’t mention is that in order to get the updates for the wireless, I actually had to create a network connection in the system settings area to get it going, but it  a real simple thing to get going.

This is a run down of what I did today and a little explanation of some things as well.

After installing Kubuntu I was really impressed with how far it has come since I last used it (but that was over a decade ago so a big duh on my part). The one thing I noticed off the bat is the way it handles the extra appearance stuff. It’s all native. Gnome needs Compiz installed to set up the extra things (like the cubes) and Screenlets installed for the Widgets.

KDE has all that stuff built in with Qt4 it seems. As you saw in the little gallery I had the cube going on. In case you missed it in that last post, I put it here on the left.

One thing I found is that it’s real easy to set up. Make your desktop have 4 desktops and check the cube. Yeah not much different. But you can name the desktops something other than Desktop 1, Desktop 2, etc.

I left them the default because I couldn’t think of anything to put in for now. But the fluidity of this is a lot smoother than it was under Gnome.

Ok enough talk about the extra effects, I am here to state what I had installed on the machine. Of course there is the necessities:

1. Firefox 3.0 (For now. I am going to see about installing the latest one from scratch later) but I also needed the following extensions for my personal browsing right away:
   • StumbleUpon
   • DownThemAll
   • Gmail Manager
2. gPodder – Runs perfect after install. Downloaded my subscriptions flawlessly from gPodder.com I love that little feature and it’s great when you have to reinstall or going to a new machine. You can also do the OPML file method, but this is off site which means if you don’t have your external media (CD, HD, whatever) you can access it over the internet.
3. All the dependencies for gPodder (Python libraries, ID3 libraries, OGG Tools, and Mplayer all needed to be installed for gPodder addons to work).
4. dvd::rip – yes I needed this back for sure. Which of course knowing what I needed for this to work right:
   • Kubuntu restricted extras
   • Kaffeine,
   • DVD libraries for reading encrypted DVD’s.
5. Weather widget for my desktop
6. Adobe Air
7. Tweetdeck

I also poked around and decided that I would like a few more things for software installed:

1. Second Life – installed from GetDEB then updated from Second Life’s website.
2. Super Maryo Chronicles – Installed from SMC repository
3. Extra Screen savers – This is odd that KDE came with Blank screen only. So I added the extras through good ol’ apt-get.

Seeing I want to use Firefox as the default instead of Konqueror I had to make a few changes so that could happen. In the System Settings area there is a place you can set Default Applications and that seems to work perfect. But there is also a command that you should run in terminal that will make it completely the default:

sudo update-alternatives --config x-www-browser

After putting in the root password you get the choice. And voila!

The one thing I like is how you can put the icons on the desktop and I am contemplating removing the desktop folder widget. Also how things appear in the bottom bar. I will customize this more soon I am sure, but the default layout is good enough.

I am not going to put Conky on here. It’s not really needed. I just need to adjust to how KDE handles things and the Software administration is kind of clunky in the regards to if you need things installed as dependencies it doesn’t prompt you to install them. So most of my administration of programs has been handled by command line. Go me.

I got this setup from the Ubuntu Blog website which it was very helpful, but seeing how I am wireless more I needed more variables to add to my setup. And this information was easily obtainable from Conky’s Sourceforge site more specifically the variable section.

The one thing I have been finding out about conky is that is is very tedious to really set it up. There is no “user friendly” GUI to configure it like the Screenlets so you have to do a lot of text editing to get it to work right. And you have to really ignore word wrap.

Another little thing about conky is when you make changes you can kill the process (I use top in the terminal to kill it) and restart it, reboot the machine, or log out of your Gnome session. I have used all three and logging out seems to be a little quicker than the other two. Go fig.

Also I learned that gPodder has an option to skip podcasts when syncing them to your iPod. So the Ubuntu Podcast has been set to that because of the file format issue with the iPod.  You can also set up an autodelte ever 30 days or whatever you want. I prefer to manually do it, but that’s just me. Also you can save the files somewhere else if you please. This is  a nice option because some shows I like to archive or edit to get bits for my show (ala “This is Why we’re Fat” from Nobody Likes Onions being inserted into my show).

I have been shutting down the machine lately so I don’t log in from work too much. But I still think I got some things done in the short time I did them.

I am now trying to think of what I should remove or tweak next. I find it funny that with all the programs and files I have on the system now it’s only 20GB used and a large portion of that is the documents and files I have in my home folder Can we say Bloatware?

I am looking back on the things I have been doing through this experiment and it pleases me to see I am able to do a lot of things I was able to do under Windows just fine.

Netflix REALLY needs to get on the ball with the instant streaming stuff because this is a pain in the nuts having it be Silverlight 2.0 only. That is primarily one of the only things I miss so far.

Speaking of streaming I need to think about finding info about how to get my DirecTV DVR and this machine to talk so I can stream movies or pictures. I got it going under windows before. I also will have to hard-wire the laptop so I can get a decent connection for that as well.

It would be awesome to be able to stream videos off of the lappy because I have a ton of AVI’s I backed up onto DVD-R’s that I could easily copy onto the hard drive to play better. Maybe I will do this later today.. Or start that.

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!

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!

I am still sorting out music. I said I had a large collection, didn’t I? Well now we are up to the T’s now. Hopefully I will be able to finish this up real soon. :O

Aside from sorting out the music files I decided to try out a little monitor program called Conky. The screenshot may be tough to view as a thumbnail so boost it up. Awww, Emma’s still playing with Daddy’s iPod… Oh wait this is about Conky, not Emma. Sorry was distracted.

Conky is a free, light-weight system monitor for X, that displays any information on your desktop. You can find more about it on their website.

Configuring this thing is a little tedious, but there is a lot of things you can do with it. I am considering a different layout than what I put here. This is basically a single line bar that shows info about my system, the Wifi connection (yeah the laptop is in my bedroom so the signal strength is kind of low there), My internal IP, and the Mail thing is a python script that checks one of my Gmail accounts.

I have a weather script that works but I can’t use it here on the single line. So I am going to need to figure out how to use multiple configs, or use a different layout. Here’s my current .conkyrc file:

#avoid flicker
double_buffer yes

TEXT
${voffset -1} CPU: ${color e0e0e0}${font}$cpu% ${cpubar 8,8}${color} | Mem: ${color e0e0e0}${font}${mem} ${color} | Battery: ${color e0e0e0}${font}${battery}:${battery_time}${color} | ${color} Up: ${color e0e0e0}${font}${uptime_short}${color} | ${color} Wifi: ${color e0e0e0}${font}${wireless_essid wlan0}: ${wireless_link_qual wlan0}%${color} IP: ${color e0e0e0}${font}${addr wlan0}${color} | ${color}Free: ${color e0e0e0}${font}${fs_free /} ${color} | Email: ${color e0e0e0}${execi 300 python ~/scripts/gmail.py}${color}


As you see it’s still a work in progress, but this originally was supposed to use a different weather script, but I couldn’t get that to work right at all.

Oh well, back to playing with it some more and sorting the music. Tomorrow. Possibly working with Audacity to get a podcast out this month.

When Transmission opened I chose where to save the download and voila torrent downloading.  Simple.

While waiting for the torrent to do it’s thing I moved some files from my external hard drive to my home folder to sort out things that I have floating around. Some music I put into the Music folder and when I launched Songbird it sorted it for me. YAY!

I really need to reorganize the HUGE collection of music I have on the large External and  catalog them all as well. I think I will look for a program that can help me with that soon.

Poking around the Add/Remove Programs application I poked around for some more programs I wanted to check out. I tried Ardour which is a audio editor that has been

Installed Kraft which is a small business program for creating invoices and tracking inventory.

I also install Internet DJ Console which for some reason isn’t running. Hmmm.. Looking into that later.

I also installed a game called Open City which seems to sound like another SimCity clone. I will check this out because LinCity-NG seems totally different than expected.

I want to get my Razr set up to get pictures and sounds off it so I installed gMobileMedia to see if that is something that will help with that. I know moto4lin is supposed to handle that as well but I need to dig deeper into configuring it to work.

I am thinking of trying to get some vector graphics made for designing stuff so Inkscape was the next thing I installed. It’s a replacement for Adobe Illustrator.

I like putting pictures on my iPod from time to time and GpixPod is suppsed to handle that

I installed an app called Camera which is listed as an app to aid in getting pictures off of digital cameras. If I can’t get the card reader going (yeah I haven’t tested that yet) I am going to see how this works out.

I am thinking of making my own Fonts sometime so I installed FontForge

For some web development I figured I’d install MySql Manager to help with databases. I think I am doing something wrong because it won’t connect to any database I use (local or remote).

Yet another test of an audio application that can sync podcasts and handle my music library, I checked out Exaie Music Player, which I installed some of the extras but didn’t play with it that much.

I am trying to see if I can connect to this site from my desktop rather than loading up Firefox and logging into my site so I installed BloGTK which supposedly connects to WordPress blogss.

I have a TON of pictures of my daughter and I saw a lot of picture mosaics out there  and think I would like to make one of her. I found a program called Pixelize that is supposed to do exatly that. Take a bunch of pictures and make a mosaic of them to produce 1 picture.

I Removed Gwibber because I am using TweetDeck and it seemed redundant to have 2 programs to tweet with.

I had another DVD I wanted to rip (for backup purposes, yeah that’s it) so I decided to try dvd::rip this time. It was getting late so I started the rip of the main movie and hit the sack. More on this tomorrow!

Evolution is the native mail client for Gnome. I prefer using GMail via web lately but I think I might use Evolution here and there. I also added a few contacts from Google’s mail which was an easy export and import. The nice thing about the contacts is it helps create a full adress book that you can add important dates and mailing info as well. This might be handy for other reasons as well, i.e. Family functions and mailing lists for holidays.

Aside from that I did my usual syncing of podcasts, general browsing, played a few games of Same Gnome and looked around for some MMO’s to check out. I installed PlaneShift to try it out. I haven’t created an account on their site to do so yet, but I heard a good write up of it. I will review it later on. There are a few others I am going to try out. Of course Second Life is available for Linux, but I sooooo want to stay away from that for some reason. I think primarily it’s because there really is no point to that game. I mean no level ups, no fighting beasts, you just fly around and talk. It’s a chat room on meth and just as addictive.