It improves on three major points and one of them is better stability for third-party plug-ins. Good to see Apple doing that.

Tags: 4.0.4, apple, safari, software update

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ZFlick is just one of those applications. It has been designed for Adobe Air and can be executed from the local computer system after startup. The interface displays just a search form at the beginning which can be used to initiate a search for photos at Flickr.

The application will then display 50 thumbnails of photos that are related to the search term entered by the user with the option to browse additional pages with the controls on top. The exact number of matches and pages is displayed next to the controls to give the user an overview of the photos that have been found.

A click on a thumbnail will load a larger view of the photo in the application. It is from here possible to open the photo on Flickr directly or drag and drop it to download it to the local computer system. A left-right click will return to the thumbnail view again.

The photos that can be downloaded are not of the largest size which is really the only criticism that users could have. An option to change the default photo size that gets downloaded would be appreciated.

ZFlick requires Adobe Air which makes it a compatible with different operating systems including Microsoft Windows and Mac OS. It can be downloaded from the developer’s website.

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The interface is different as well. Open Office 4 Kids makes use of less buttons in the interface and divides them into a header toolbar and sidebar. The changes are slim at the moment but the developers have plans to implement additional changes in future releases. The main difference on the other hand is that Open Office 4 Kids is a simplified version of Open Office.

As you probably know, the OpenOffice.org Education Project aims to create a bridge between Educational world an OpenOffice.org, through several actions. One of the results is OOo4Kids

The development release 0.5 of Open Office 4 Kids can be downloaded from the project website. It is available for Microsoft Windows, Linux and Apple Macintosh operating systems.

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The most interesting of the lot are definitely the new iMacs and the multi-touch mouse. The new Quad-Core iMac was heard coming long before, when the first rumors started circulating last month. Now that it is finally here, the differences from the old models are obvious. It has a stunning 27” display, Intel Core i5 (upgradable to Core i7) and has a huge screen space at 2560×1440 pixels.

But the excitement is not restricted to the highest model. The main thing that I would like to bring your attention to is the fact that all models (except the quad core) have Intel Core 2 Duo chips at 3.09GHz and have 4GB memory as standard. Plus, there is the brilliant new wireless Magic Mouse and wireless new keyboard that come standard with every iMac.

The Magic mouse is a brilliant piece of equipment. It has no buttons, is made out of aluminum and is topped off with a capacitive multitouch layer that works just like the MacBook’s glass trackpad. You can touch anywhere and you can scroll the full 360º if the application allows it. The whole surface clicks like the glass trackpad and you can even get it to emulate the two-button mouse. I say this is the best non-gaming mouse till date. Plus the tracking is now optical, so the Magic Mouse can track without a mousepad and on almost all surfaces. Gestures are supported and so is accelerated scrolling. So comparisons to the iPhone’s multitouch features are fully justified.

The MacBook gets a polycarbonate unibody, with the same built-in battery as the MacBook Pro line. So it now has a 7-hour rated battery life. There have been subtle design changes – the most noticeable is the lack of the sharp edge that really bugged people on the previous models. The display is now LED backlit, making the MacBook more eco-friendly and energy efficient.

MacMinis have received speed and storage upgrades but everything else is pretty much the same. There is now a 2.53GHz Core 2 Duo, $999 server edition that packs in two 500GB HDDs, Mac OS X Server Snow Leopard and lacks a DVD burner.

So now that we know what Apple had up their sleeves, it is time to talk about how this will help them in their race against Windows 7 and the slew of new computers that will be released during and soon after the Windows 7 launch.

Apple’s new strategy with iMacs is clearly to give users as much computing power as possible. The new entry point of 3.06 GHz and 4GB RAM is going to be a hit with the crowd because these are above average features at this time. So buying an iMac now would be a great thing because you will not have to upgrade for quite a while.

The new 27” Core ‘5/i7 iMac is clearly an attempt to woo those professionals who want something more affordable than a Mac Pro but something more powerful that the previous generation iMacs. This new iMac is going to be a hit with visual designers and also with musicians. Both have a lot of use for large screen spaces. Designers can do side by side comparisons while musicians can now see more things on screen. I for one would use this with Logic Pro and place the mixer and the arrangement areas side by side during the final mix down.

The two Mac Minis And the MacBook [white] have been through smaller updates. They are not very different spec-wise but the MacBook has changed quite a bit physically. It doesn’t seem like they will make much of an impact on their own but the price cuts are sure to bring in some more sales. To me, it seems like 2010 Q10 will be the bigger quarter for Apple and they will one-up Windows 7 with their tablet device. So this it for now and I don’t think the new Macs and Windows 7 will suffer a lot from each other. That is because the high-end will still go for MacBook Pros and iMacs and the average consumer will be torn between the Mac Mini and myriad Windows 7 systems. However, the MacBook [white] is likely to make it to quite a few stockings this year.

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Users who are interested in testing Open Office 3.2 Beta can head over to the official Open Office website to download the beta version. The beta is available for all supported operating systems and languages. The list of changes and additions implemented in Open Office 3.2 are available at the release notes page.

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In this article I will outline a few of the possibilities that can be used to replace the beloved applications often used in Mac. In some cases their may be equivalents that are nearly identical. In some cases, however, there may be equivalents that miss some features, or even offer better features. Either way, after this article, you should feel much more comfortable about migrating from OS X to Linux.

In the previous article I already mentioned using Songbird as a replacement for iTunes. Personally I prefer Songbird to iTunes. The only downfall is that Songbird can not yet communicate to either the iPhone or the iTouch. Yet. There is another tool that is currently in development that will most likely change that. But for now – you can use Songbird as a replacement for iTunes – just don’t expect Songbird to communicate with your iPhone/iTouch.

Garage Band

For those looking to compose music on your Linux machine, a good replacement for Garage Band is Jokosher. Jokosher is a simple, powerful multi-track recording studio. With this outstanding tool you can import music, record instruments, mix down, set tempos, and more. You will not, however, find a large collection of pre-recorded instruments and sounds to add and manipulate. But, if you have a Freesound account, you can import anything from their. Unlike Garage Band, Jokosher is really more a user-friendly multi-track recorder. So don’t expect to just open up the application and start piecing together music without picking up an instrument.

For more information on other audio creating software take a look at Linux-Sound.org. In my humble opinion, if you are looking for mult-media creation, your best bet is to download Ubuntu Studio which will include so man pre-installed applications for media creation/editing.

iWork

This one should be obvious. If you’re looking for an office suite to take care of all your office needs, look no further than OpenOffice. Although OpenOffice may have a different look and feel, you will find it just as easy to use AND it includes more features and applications than iWork.

iCal

If you like Apple’s stand alone calendar (that also integrates with other applications) you can install the stand alone Sunbird calendar. Sunbird was created by Mozilla so it has a very Firefox/Thunderbird feel to it. Sunbird is very close to a feature-for-feature equivalent to iCal.

iPhoto

My wife uses a Mac and she HATES iPhoto. But it is the standard for Mac photo management. For Linux there is the F-spot photo management tool. F-spot not only manages your photo collections, but will work with your digital camera as an import tool. F-spot is actually easier to use than iPhoto and will not have you fighting to try to get a piece of software to do something you KNOW it should do, but won’t.

Final thoughts

It’s not an exhaustive list, but it will help you get by with the main applications one would use on a modern Mac computer.  If you have a Mac-based application you are looking for a Linux equivalent, let me know what that is and I will attempt to locate an equivalent for you.

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Of course you might be thinking “OS X is supposed to be the most user-friendly OS available, so wouldn’t migrating to Linux be even more difficults?” Not exactly. There are certain elements of OS X that inherently make the process of migrating to Linux easier than when migrating from Windows. Take, for instance, the mounting of images and drives. This task is completely obfuscated from the Windows user, but the OS X user actually knows to unmount a drive before removal. But what about simple, every day usage? How do you make that more understandable for one moving from OS X to Linux? Let’s find out.

Choose the right desktop

Figure 1

This is just as important as choosing the right distribution for the Windows user. Why? Take a look at the modern releases of the GNOME desktop. Look familiar? It should because it looks quite a bit like OS X. The primary difference between GNOME and OS X desktops is the bottom panel. With GNOME you have a secondary panel that is typically used for only win lists, trash cans, and pagers. With OS X the bottom panel is an application dock for launching application. You can, however, add the Avant Window Navigator and configure the GNOME desktop to look and feel exactly like the OS X desktop (see Figure 1).

Install Compiz

Figure 2

Many OS X users are fond of bragging about their eye-candy. But with OS X it’s not just about eye candy, because the Mac eye-candy always has a purpose. Take for instance the Expose feature. By clicking the hot key all of your open windows are made visible (in small thumbnails) on your desktop. In Compiz you can use the Scale plugin to get the same effect. By clicking <Alt><Shift>Up Arrow you will see small thumbnails of all your open windows (see Figure 2).

There are plenty of other plugins that can mimic many of the features on the OS X desktop. Having these available will make the OS X user much more comfortable on the Linux desktop.

What about iTunes?

This is one area that is a bit tricky. Because the issues with the iPhone and iTouch, you won’t find a software capable of syncing. There is a new mechanism in development (ifuze – which I will cover in a later article) that allows you access to your iPhone/iTouch. There is still no way to add music to either of these devices on Linux. Older iPods? For sure. And to that end you will want to include a particular piece of software that looks and feels very much like iTunes. That software? Songbird. I have covered Songbird in Linux in an earlier article “Songbird in Linux“.

Install the right codecs and plugins

OS X users watch a lot of videos and media files. Because of this you will want to make sure all of the proper plugins and codecs installed. You will want to make sure libquicktime is installed  as well as mplayer plugin. As well you might want to make sure flashplayer is installed and a better video viewer than the default. A good choice is the VLC player.  The last thing you want is a former Mac user who can’t view multi-media files.

Configure all default programs intelligently

When you click on a URL in your email application, you want to make sure the right browser opens. When you double click on a .odt or .doc file in your file manager you want to make sure those files are opened in the right word processor. When in OS X (and in Windows) the default action is a very predictable beast. You want to make sure this is mimicked in Linux. In GNOME you can right click a file, select Open With, and then set that as the default application for that type of file. As much as this might seem second nature, for OS X users this is simply not an issue. Having everything so well integrated is not a feature on OS X, it’s a requirement. So make sure everything works exactly as expected BEFORE the OS X user touches their Linux box.

Final thoughts

I tried not to duplicate the advice on the previous article, but do understand that much of that applies here as well. Combining these two should give you a good guidepost for migrating just about any user from one platform to Linux.

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For both of these needs there is another tool that works as a pretty impressive front-end for the wget command. That tool – Multiget. Now, before you assume Multiget is a Linux-only tool, it’s not. Multiget can be used in Linux, Windows, OS X, and the BSDs. This article, however, is about using Multiget in Linux (in particular – Ubuntu).

Features

Multiget offers the following features:

• Multi-task/multi-thread/multi-server usage.
• User-friendly interface (resembling Flashget).
• Multiple language support.
• Proxy support.
• Extension ignoring/capture.
• FTP anonymous pass.
• Panel icon.

Installation

Fortunately, for Ubuntu users, Multiget can be found in the Universe repository. All you have to do for installation is:

1. Open up your Add/Remove Software tool.
2. Search for “multiget” (no quotes).
3. Select the results.
4. Apply to install.

That’s it.

Usage

Figure 1

To start up Multiget go to the Internet sub-menu of the Applications menu and you will find the Multiget entry. Open that and the main window will start up (see Figure 1). The first step in downloading a file should be fairly obvious – you hit the the New Task button (denoted by the “+” symbol). Simple.

When you hit the New Task button  a new window will appear that asks for certain information. At least in the Linux release of Multiget, you might find a portion of this window that might stump you. As you can see (in Figure 2) in the Basic Info section you have four bits of information to add. The MAIN URL section is obvious – you copy and paste a URl into the this section. But wait a minute – you will find, if copying your URL from your default web browser, that as soon as you right-click a URL, and select Copy Link Location that URL will appear in the MAIN URL section and then automatically moved down to the Mirrors section. This is actually the only means of getting an address into the Mirrors section.

Figure 2

With that in mind, let’s use a few mirrors to quickly download the ISO image of the latest release of Ubuntu. To do this go to the Ubuntu Karmic page page. The first thing you will do is go to the main download page, right click the download link, and click Copy Link Location. Now go back to the main download page and select a mirror and do the same thing. You can add as many mirrors as you like – understanding the more mirrors you add, the faster the download will happen.

Once you have all of your URLs added (make sure you still have a URL in the MAIN URL section) configure the rest of the window (you should configure the SaveTo section at least) and then click OK.

As your file is downloading click on the Progress section in the bottom and you will see how the pieces of the download are coming together. As you can see (in Figure 3) I have five threads running to download the Ubuntu 9.10 ISO image. You can also see the overall progress bar as the green bar starting right under the icon toolbar.

Figure 3

During an active session you can increase or decrease the amount of threads given to a download. This, of course, can speed up your download. Naturally if you give too many threads to a download you might see your overall performance of either your machine or your general network connection degrade. At this point you can decrease the number of threads given to a download. To increase or decrease the number of threads go to the Task menu and select the appropriate entry.

During the download you can click on the Running section to see the information of your download. You can also pause your download by clicking the Pause button.

Final thoughts

Multiget is an outstanding tool to download large files using muliple mirrors and threads. As well it is just an overall outstanding front end for the wget command.

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Before we get into this you should know the hardware requirements of this game. For it you will need: a minimum equivalent 3DFX Voodoo2 8MB. No ATI Rage cards. You will also need a minimum of a PII 233MHz processor, with at least 96MB of RAM. If you meet those requirements, prepare to install and blow away your opponents.

Installation

Installation of OpenArena is actually quite simple. You will be shocked to know the steps are as follows:

1. Open up your Add/Remove Software tool.
2. Search for “openarena” (no quotes).
3. Select OpenArena for installation.
4. Click Apply.
5. Sit back and watch the progress bar.

I will warn you, the files to be downloaded are quite large, so the sitting back portion of the installation will take quite some time.

Once installed, you will find OpenArena in your Games sub-menu of the Applications menu in GNOME.

Tricks for running the game

Figure 1

It’s not really necessary to get into the mechanics and play of the game. Most people know how to play a first person shooter. There are some things you will want to know when playing this game in Linux.

If you’re like me, you don’t generally play games in full-screen mode. By default OpenArena runs in full screen. To get OpenArena in windowed mode (see Figure 1) you need to hit the the <Alt>Enter key combination once the game has loaded. After you have switched to windowed mode, you will have to manually switch back to full screen, otherwise the game will always run in windowed mode.

Figure 2

When you are running in windowed mode you will notice you can’t get your cursor out of the game window. The only way to manage this is to get the OpenArena console window to drop down. To get this hit the Shift<Esc> combination which will lower the console onto your screen (see Figure 2).

Connect to server

If you want to play some multi-player action all you have to do is, from the main window, click the Multiplayer option and then click the Specify button. From this new window you will enter the address of the server you want to join. For a list of servers take a look at the server listing on the OpenArena site.

Final thoughts

It’s not WoW but at least you can get your first person shooter thrills without having to run a game through Wine or a virtual machine. OpenArena is a fun game that, for many, will be nothing more than nostalgia. No matter the reason, you should give this game a go.

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But is this as easy as it might seem? If you already know how to create a presentation in OpenOffice Impress – yes. If you’re not sue how to create a very basic presentation then you might want to figure that process out before embarking on the creation of flash cards. Either way, you can install the extension so that when you have mastered the basic presentation, you are ready to go.

Getting and installing

Installing this extension is like installing any OpenOffice extension. The first thing you need to do is download the extension file. Once you have that file downloaded open up any of the OpenOffice tools (or even the main OpenOffice window), go to the Tools menu and click on the Extension Manager entry to open the Extension Manager tool.

Figure 1

From the Extension Manager window (see Figure 1) click the Add button and then navigate to where you saved the OpenCards extension file. Once you have found the file click the Open button to install the extension.

When OpenCards is installed it will be listed in the Extension Manager window and you will need to then restart OpenOffice to complete the installation.

Now fire up OpenOffice Impress and create a new presentation.

Presentation as flash card

Instead of spending too much time into creating a too-fancy presentation, here’s what you need to do. When you create a presentation you can use whatever style you want. But as far as the data is concerned you only need to bits:

• A title.
• A bullet point in the body.

Figure 2

OpenCards works like this: It will start a special slide show with your presentation. For this slide show it will present you the title of a slide (which will be in the form of a question or however you want to use your flash cards) and, when prompted, will present to you the answer.  Let me show you an example. After you have completed your presentation go to the OpenCards menu and select the Last Minute Learning entry. This will open up a smaller window and alter your presentation window to show the first slide as a flash card (see Figure 2). As you can see, the title of the card is the only portion presented to you. When you are ready to see the answer you just click the “Show Completed Card” in the smaller window. When you click that you will see the answer in the body of the slide and the smaller window will change asking if you remembered the card “Perfectly” or “Not at all”.  When you answer this question it will automatically go on to the next card. Repeat this until you have completed the rotation of the cards.

You will notice, once you have mastered all of the cards in your presentation, you can not start the presentation. In order to restart the presentation you have to click the Reset Learn-State button in the Last Minute Learning window.

Final thoughts

OpenCards also contains a Long-Term Learning feature which will be covered in another article (as it is far more complex than the Last Minute Learning). This extension is an outstanding means to learn facts for school, work, training, etc. If you’re looking for a free flash card solution that has the ability to retain your learning statistics, OpenCard is your tool.

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It can be somewhat cumbersome to capture a screenshot in Grab, and then have to move it into a program like Photoshop to manipulate it. And if you want to share the image, you have to change its format.

An alternative piece of software is Skitch, screen-capturing software for OS X. Skitch provides screen-capturing facilities similar to Grub, but integrates some editing tools and also provides tools to share the images.

Skitch allows users to draw on screenshots and annotate them, through placing arrows and text. One can also make images have a transparent background, crop images, add a drop shadow to them or rotate them.

One of the cooler features is the ‘drag’ feature. When a screenshot has been captured and edited, if you click ‘drag me’, you can drag the image to a folder, an email or to open in another program.

Skitch can export images as JPEGs, PNGs, PDFs, SVGs, TIFFs, GIFs and JPGs. It can also upload images to Flickr, FTP servers, WebDAV folders and skitch.com, their own image hosting service.

The software boasts many features and I find it much better to use than Grab, as there’s no need to have to use other pieces of software.

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If speed is the main issue the relatively new pdf file viewer MuPDF could be an option. MuPDF is a bare-bones pdf file viewer with a low memory footprint and the fastest pdf loading times that we have experienced until now. The pdf reader is a portable Open-Source cross-platform program for Windows, Linux and Mac OS operating systems.

Users can either execute the program which will open a small file browser to pick a PDF document or link the pdf file extension to the program so that it will be automatically the viewer of choice for pdf files.

MuPDF is perfect for users who want a portable resource friendly pdf reader. It comes with a few keyboard shortcuts to navigate documents more easily but lacks the functionality of Foxit Reader or Adobe Reader.

• L, R Rotate page in 90° increments
• +, – Zoom in and out
• W Shrink wrap window
• N, space Next page
• B, backspace Previous page
• Shift-N Skip 10 pages forward
• Shift-B Skip 10 pages backward
• M Mark page for snap back
• T Pop back to last mark
• 123G Go to page

Not everyone needs advanced functionality but some users might miss options to copy text, search for text or print a selection of the pdf file. MuPDF on the other hand is probably the best solution for users who want to view – and only view – pdf files on their computer system without having to download and install a software program. A Firefox add-on is provided by the developer as well to view pdf documents on the Internet.

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Deployment could not be easier. The network administrator needs to install KontrolPack on all computer systems that should be managed or used to manage the network. The client systems then need to be started in client mode while the administrative systems need to be started in administrative mode.

Network administrators can then, among other things use functionality like:

• Handle remote shell command execution.
• Share files between remote computers.
• Manage your network: LAN (Local Area Network).
• Get an overview of the workstations on your LAN.
• Lightweight XML based message exchange between client and server.
• Handle each client with a personalized tab panel.
• Send commands simultaneously to all computers on your LAN.

You can manage your computers and execute the same shell commands on them regardless of the operating system. On top of this, it provides an easy interface that can be used to view your LAN activity and manage your network without difficulties.

Users who are using this software on any supported operating system will be able to perform administrative tasks remotely on multiple computers that run on different operating systems without any technical issues.

For example, from a machine running a GNU/Linux distribution you can send an order to a hundred computers running MS Windows telling them to restart or to defrag their root partition. You can also retrieve IP addresses and routing tables from a variety of computers in order to help manage a network. Sometimes single commands are not enough, and it is possible to execute batch files and scripts simultaneously throughout the network

All different platform releases of the network management software KontrolPack are available from the developer’s website.

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FreeRapid Downloader is a downloader for several dozens free file hosting websites. It uses a plugin based system to enable support for the different file hosting websites. These plugins are automatically checked and updated from within the program’s interface.

One interesting aspect of the file hosting downloader is that it is available for Windows, Linux and Mac if Java is installed on the computer systems. There are multiple ways of getting links into the downloader. The downloader automatically monitors the clipboard to become active whenever a link that is pointing to a file hosting website is copied into the clipboard. That’s a very comfortable way of handling downloads unless multiple links need to be added to the software program.

The second option is available in the program itself. It is possible to copy one or multiple links into the interface which are then processed by the software. The free file hosting downloader will then automatically start downloading files that are in its queue. It can check for availability and will display an error message if files are not available anymore.

The options are quite extensive ranging from automatic update options to proxy servers to alerts and error handling. The main benefit of using this program is its simplicity. It works really well and the only downside that users might find is the missing support for premium accounts that are offered by some of the file hosting websites. FreeRapid Downloader can be downloaded from the developer’s website. Check out the Rapidshare Search article for some options to search the popular file hosting website.

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Mantis is an open source bug tracking tool that is as feature-rich and stable as it is free. It is written in PHP and works with MySQL, MS SQL, and PostgreSQL databases. Mantis can be installed on Linux, Windows, and OS X and can use nearly any modern web browser.

Features

Naturally, before you try a bug tracking software, you will want to see the feature listing. Mantis Bug Tracking includes such features as:

• Simple or Advanced issue pages.
• Multiple projects per instances.
• User access levels.
• Projects, sub-projects, and category support.
• Built in reporting.
• Custom fields.
• Email notification.
• Issue monitoring.
• Sponsorship support.
• Issue report via email.

And much, much more (for a full list see the Mantis Feature List page). But enough said with the what, let’s get on with the how.

Getting and installing

The first step is to download the file. You can download the latest, stable release from the Mantis Sourceforge site. Once you have that file move it into the Apache document root with the command:

sudo mv mantis-XXX.tar.gz /var/www/

Where XXX is the release number.

Now unpack the tar file with the command;

sudo tar xvzf mantisbt-XXX.tar.gz

Where XXX is the release number.

Now change the name of the mantis directory with the command:

mv mantisbt-XXX mantis

Where XXX is the release number.

Before you move on to the web-based installation, you need to create a database. I use phpmyadmin to do this (Read how to set this up in my article “Install phpmyadmin for easy MySQL administration“.) Create a database called “bugtracker” (no quotes). Once you have done that you then need to go to the file /var/www/mantis/config_inc.php.sample and edit the Database Settings variables. You will need to edit the variables:

• g_hostname
• g_db_username
• g_db_password

Make these reflect your particular installation. Once you have that finished change the name of that file to config_inc.php and you are ready to check your installation.

You are now ready to point your browser to:

http://ADDRESS_OF_SERVER/mantis/admin/

Where ADDRESS_OF_SERVER is the actual IP or URL for your server.

You will see four links:

• Check your installation.
• Upgrade your installation.
• Modify stylesheets.
• System utilities.

Click on the Check your installation link. This address will take you to the page that will check your server for all the necessary requirements for installation. Once that passes you are ready for the installation.

Web-based setup

Figure 1

Now point your browser to http://ADDRESS_OF_SERVER/admin/install.php This page will walk you through the steps for the database setup (see Figure 1.)

Oddly enough it looks like you are being asked to create an admin acccount here. You’re not, for the Admin Username/Password you will want to use the same Username/Password that you used for the Database user.

Fill that information out and click the Install button. The next page will greet you with a bunch of information that informs you (Hopefully) that everything passes. At the bottom of that page is a small link to continue with login. Click that link and you will find yourself at the Mantis Log In screen. The default username/login for a mantis installation is:

Username: administrator

Password: root

The first thing you will want to do, upon logging in, is to change the account information for this login. Click on the My Account button and make the necessary changes.

You are now ready to start using your Mantis Bug Tracking system.

Final thoughts

I have found the Mantis Bug Tracking system to be one of the easiest to use in a category that is often filled with overly complicated tool (either to install or use). I think you will find that Mantis meets (or exceeds) all of your bug tracking needs.

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Media Transfer Protocol (MTP) is utilised on a range of devices, but especially so by Creative. Creative Zens (and their variants) utilise the protocol. Whilst the Creative NOMAD isn’t MTP, it too uses an awkward protocol not natively supported by OS X. The infamous Zune (in the eyes of an Apple fanboy) too uses MTP, however, Microsoft make it very difficult to transfer data to.

XNJB is a piece of software that provides a graphical front-end to a libnjb and libmtp: free and open source libraries that allow communication with devices like Creative NOMADs and Creative Zens. Unfortunately, neither support the Zune, due to additional restrictions Microsoft put in place. The libraries work on other POSIX operating systems, like Linux, but XNJB does not.

XNJB allows users to upload and download songs from their media players, for ID3 data to be edited and devices searched. All of this has to be done within the software; it is not integrated into iTunes or Finder.

The transfer of data felt a bit slow to me, but I expect this is primarily due to the messiness of my library and the nature of Media Transfer Protocol.

This software is, however, a useful tool when you first got the Mac. I do, though, doubt you could realistically continue to use a MTP device successfully with OS X. Naturally, you could use it inside Boot Camp or a virtual machine, but in my opinion, that too is not an ideal option.

Compatible devices are listed on their website.

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The Google desktop is available for Linux, Windows, and Mac. In this article I will discuss installation and use in the Linux operating system. In Linux, Google Desktop works in both the GNOME and KDE desktop environments. The installation is simple and the use is just as simple. Let’s take a look.

Getting and installing

You will not find Google Desktop in the repositories for your distribution. What you can do is head over to the Google Desktop Download page and click to download the version that is right for your distribution. Currently Google offers x86 and x86-64 RPMs (for Red Hat, Fedora, SuSE, and Mandriva)  and x86 and x86-64 DEBs (for Debian and Ubuntu). Make sure you click on the correct type and architecture for your machine.

Most likely, when you click on the download link, your distributions package installer will open to install the file. If it does not just download the file  and then install the package via command line. If you have to install via command line open up a terminal an issue a command like this:

For RPM:

rpm -ivh /path/to/download/*rpm

For DEB:

dpkg -i /path/to/download/*deb

Where /path/to/download is where you downloaded the file.

At the end of  the installation a window will appear where you will have to agree to the license. This window will also give you some brief instructions on how to get started with the Google Desktop. Basically it instructs you to log out of your desktop and log back in. Once you have logged back in you only have to double click the Ctrl key to open up the Google Desktop tool.

Using Google Desktop

There are three ways to open up the Google Desktop tool:

Double click the Ctrl key.

Double click the Google Desktop icon in the system tray.

Click on the Google Desktop menu entry you will find in the Google Desktop sub-men of the Applications (or “K”) menu.

Figure 1

When you do open up the Google Desktop tool you will see the small window you see in Figure 1.  To use this tool you simply enter your search string in the text area.  By default the Google Desktop is set to

Figure 2

search the web. You can change this setting by right clicking the Google Desktop icon in the system tray (see Figure 2). When you right click this icon a menu will appear that contains a sub-menu titled “Default Search Type”. In this sub-menu are:

• Web
• Desktop
• I’m Feeling Lucky
• Images
• Groups
• News
• Maps

Obviously this is geared toward Google.

Figure 3

When you enter a search term you will be presented with a partial listing of matching items on your PC. Figure 3 shows the results of searching for the string “linux” (no quotes).

What is really nice about this tool is when you click on a search result the appropriate tool will open. For example: If I were to select the first result in Figure 3 (google-desktop-linux – which is the Google Desktop deb file I just downloaded) it will open the package installer to install the tool.

Configuring the tool

When you right click the Google Desktop icon you can also select the Preferences entry. When you do this a browser window will open to a local preferences page for Google Desktop. In this window you can configure:

• Local indexing.
• Define local folders to include (or exclude) in searches.
• Remove deleted items from search results.
• Configure your Gmail account for searches.
• Display results.
• Change your hotkey.

Final thoughts

If you do a lot of searching on your desktop and the web, you should considering adding the Google Desktop into the mix. It’s easy to use, reliable, and searches just about everywhere (especially Google!)

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The program will display on word and five definitions at a time. The user selects an answer with the 1-5 keys on the keyboard. It is also possible to press ESC to see the result. Pressing ESC will count as a wrong answer on the other hand.

Words will then let the user know about the correctness of the answer. The program will furthermore display the pronunciation of the word, its meaning(s),synonyms and links to the definition at dict.org.

The m key on the keyword will add the word to the list of words that have been mastered by the current user while the enter key will display the next word that has not been mastered yet. All words in the database will be tested by default. This can be changed in the program’s options to only test words that are starting with a specific letter or fall into one of several categories.

Words is a good program for users who want to prep for GRE, GMAT or SAT tests and those who want to improve their English vocabulary.

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Okawix now offers a solution to download the full Wikipedia archive (and the archives of all sister sites) to the local computer system. The software offers its own web browser that can be used to navigate the websites normally once they have been downloaded to the local hard drive. This is an excellent solution for situations where no online connection is available.

The software program displays all supported languages in its interface on the first startup. The user can then select one or multiple languages to download contents in these languages. Okawix will then display the available Wiki websites and their size. Included are Wikibooks, Wikinews, Wikipedia, Wikiquote, Wikisource, Wikiversity and Wiktionary. The size of each download ranges from a few Megabytes to astronomical 6 Gigabytes for the English Wikipedia website.

A click on the download link beneath each entry will initiate the download of that database to the local computer system.

Okawix will ask the user to select a path for the download which can be saved so that it will be automatically picked for additional downloads. Images can be downloaded optionally. This will increase the size of the download.

The main interface of Okawix will then display the downloaded Wiki websites in the left sidebar offering a search engine and web browser. There are also options to print a page and find words in the page.

Okawix provides an easy way to download Wiki websites to a local computer system. The integrated web browser is responsive enough to offer a great offline working experience. It would be nice if the developers would add an option to automatically update the downloaded contents with new content that has been added to Wiki websites. Okawix is available for Windows, Linux and Mac.

via Instant Fundas

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