This desktop widget is now available for Windows, Mac, and (are you ready for it?) Linux! Yes, it’s available for Linux, so all of us Penguinistas can enjoy our Hulu as it was meant to be enjoyed. And best of all, it’s easy to install. Let’s see just how easy the Hulu desktop client is to install and use.

Distributions and installations

As of now the only distributions Hulu is available for are Ubuntu 9.04 and Fedora 11. So if you’re not running either of them you’re out of luck. Hulu does hope to, over time, support other distributions. But both Ubuntu and Fedora make sense. Now, I will tell you that I did successfully install the Hulu client on Elive Compiz which is a Debian-based installation. So – if you can install a .deb package on your machine, and you meet the requirements, you might be golden.

Let’s take a look at the installation process. The Hulu client depends upon:

• GTK+ 2.12 or higher
• GLib 2.16 or higher
• LIRC 0.8.2 or higher (required for remote control functionality)
• Adobe Flash Player 9.0.124

Most likely, if you are running either Ubuntu 9.04 or Fedora 11, you already have everything you need installed (minus Flash). Installing Flash is as simple (at least in Ubuntu) as visiting a site that requires Flash, and then walk through the steps for installation when prompted. To install Hulu you will need to download the file from the Hulu Linux page. When you have downloaded that file you will need to issue one of the following commands (from within the directory the file was downloaded).

For Ubuntu:

dpkg -i huludesktop*

For Fedora:

rpm -ivh huludesktop*

Once the command finishes up, you are ready to run the client.

Using Hulu desktop

To start up the desktop client, issue the following command:

huludesktop

Figure 1

You will most likely find Hulu desktop in your Audio/Video menu. If not, you can always add it. When the client opens (see Figure 1) you can immediately begin searching and watching your favorite television episodes.

The menu and overall interface are amazingly simple and sleek. More than likely you will be surprised just how well done this Linux client is (considering it is still in beta).

Figure 2

As you can see (in Figure 2) the player runs seamlessly on the Linux desktop. What you can not see is that the client requires very little in desktop resources. In fact, it’s no more noticeable than running a browser.

Final thoughts

The Hulu Linux desktop client makes watching TV (and movies) a breeze. I am thrilled that Hulu has brought out a Linux client without making the Linux community wait as the Windows and Mac community enjoy it’s services.

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The television is sold in different sizes (as usual) including 46″ and 55″ with all models sharing the same feature set which includes energy efficient backlighting (lead and mercury free, energy star compliant), 1920×1200 Full HD support, 120 Hz Auto Motion Plus refresh rate and Internet connectivity.

The ultra slim design of the LED 7000 makes it an ideal candidate for a wall mount. Only one screw needed to mount the TV which makes the process easier and more efficient. A wireless or wired connection is available to connect the television to the network and the Internet. It can display widgets on screen that can display news or websites. Not sure if that is a killer feature but it might come in handy in certain situations.

What makes me consider buying the TV is the energy efficiency, the image quality and the wall mounting capability.

Which TV would you buy if you could select one?

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The service currently requires a plugin to work properly but this need will fall away in the coming month according to Techcrunch when the Joost Standard service is introduced. The plugin is still needed for live and high definition broadcasts while all other shows are available for users without plugin as well. The Adobe Flash plugin will still be needed but this is pretty much a standard plugin on most computers nowadays.

Rumors are that Joost will stop development on the software client to concentrate fully on the Joost website which they are trying to establish as a video based social network type of website that comes with all the usual features and functions of those websites.

The move will surely see an increase in usage numbers but the real question is if it will be enough to keep the service alive. Taking it to the web means that it now has to compete with many already established video portals such as Youtube, Dailymotion or Hulu.

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This is basically a collection of free streams that are available on the internet and can’t be compared to programs like tvu player that stream popular tv channels like ABC, Comedy Central and FOX. The only advantage you get with streamick is that it displays the streams directly from within their website.

To be honest, many channels that are offered at their website are crap. Local channels about Miami or New Orleans don’t appeal to a world wide audience. Neither do many of the other channels offered there Boardriders TV and High TV for example.

My suggestion would be to give it a try, take a look at the offered streams and see if they offer any that might be of interest to you.

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This is slighty complex but you should get used to the procedure. All you need is a http proxy that is hosted inside the USA and does not spill your IP address. To achieve this you need a application that checks proxy servers for those variables. I recommend Charon for this task but you could use other tools as well.

Download Charon from the website mentioned, you don´t need to install it at all, just extract the contents to a directory of your choice.

Fire it up, you have no proxy list yet so you could use google to find some lists or let charon do that for you. Simply select Check Proxies and then Scan Search Engines for new Proxies. Charon will find some proxies that are then displayed in the table. Those are unverified, now select Check Proxies and Check Anonymity of all Proxies. This might take some time. If you only recieve bad and timeouts you have to change one option in charon.

Select Connect Options and chose Use External Judge(s).

Let it test the proxies. If you have enough good ones or a finished test sort the proxies by the Country tab. Only USA proxies are working so we need one of those. The Anonymity tab should state YES. If both are correct right click the line and select Copy to clipboard and Copy selected IP:Port.

Open your browser and paste the proxy address into its proxy settings. For firefox you select Tools >> Options >> Connection Settings >> Manual Proxy Configuration and add the proxy and port there. Close the options and visit the abc streaming site. If you see a Launch button you are ready to enjoy the tv shows. If not try another proxy from the list.

I checked the service with this proxy and it worked flawlessly: 192.104.67.250 port:8080

Enjoy the shows.

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