I’ve moved this web site from a Gentoo based/Apache 2 install to a new Ubuntu Server/LiteSpeed install. We are experiencing some difficulties with the transfer. If you see anything wierd not already mentioned in the comments, please leave a new comment with the particulars.
I’m still running on a virtual system, but response times should increase dramatically.
Well, after a few mishaps and backtracks (yes, 2 years of being a stay at home Dad can effect ones software development skills), I've decided that my latest application is ready for Beta testing. It took a bit longer than I thought to get to this point, but that's the way it is.
I'm now moving my current WIP into it, and we'll see how it goes. I really wanted to get snapshots into it, but that can wait a bit.
Watch the Video: wordslinger-010.htm
Images:
December has turned into one of the busiest months I've had in a long time. With all the Christmas stuff happening, include school concerts, shopping, etc, it was tough. On top of that, I stopped writing novels and wrote some software instead.
My previous post showed a screen shot, and things were actually working pretty good at that point. But, the devil is in the details. I now have something to send to Linux beta testers, but the Mac and the Windows version have a bug or two. One of them may be related, but I have a Mac bug I'm not sure what I can do about. At this point, I'm dieing to get back to writing, so progress on the code will slow down.
Still, the Linux version is in a state I can use it, and that's why I wrote it. I'll use it to outline and write my next novel. I'm also thinking of moving my current WIP (work in progress) into it, and see how I can use it for revision. Hmmm, I'll have to add snapshots…
Anyway, that's taken a lot of my time as well. Oh, and my wife noticed that when I code, I tend to get very snappish and angry, which bleeds over into regular life. When I write, that doesn't happen. Cool.
When NaNoWriMo was over (for me), I didn't know what to do. I'd been in 'the groove' for so long, my days felt empty. I had a lot of normal work to catch up on, but once I did…
So, I decided it was time to write some software. I wrote what I consider an Integrated Development Environment for writers. Previously I looked at Scrivener, Writer's Cafe and yWriter. All of which looked good, especially Scrivener. Still, I wanted my own thing, it's what I do. I also use Linux for my day-to-day work, and none of these products run on Linux (except Writer's Cafe).
I now have a basic application that is character/scene oriented. Here's a screenshot: (click for larger image)
The user basically enters characters and their related information. You can also enter locations where your scenes take place. Once a user is entered, they get a 'timeline' on the corkboard. As a scene is added and given a characters POV, they are given an index card on the corkboard. Each card has information related to the scene associated with it, including the text of the scene itself. Also, each card can be moved to anywhere on the timeline, and even to another character. The entire novel can be rearranged at will.
When editing a scene, the text editor can be made full screen, with no outside distractions. I used Q10 for this during Nano, and I loved it.
All information is stored in standard files, so if a user decides not to use the software, no data is lost. Also, the entire novel can be exported as a whole, for import into a word processor.
It's not done yet, but it's getting usable! All this runs under Linux, Windows, and Mac OS X.
This weekend, on top of all the other things, I tried to get a Video Chat system going with my brother in Calgary. I thought it would be neat to have him at the family party for the kids. Well. Let's just say we need to work on it.
There are multiple apps that do video chat, MSN, iChat, Skype to name a few. So here's the breakdown:
MSN: Video on Linux, no Video on Mac
iChat: Not on Linux, Video for Mac
Skype: No Video on Linux, Video on Mac
So there are some of the 'easy' solutions.
Then we started trying some of the SIP applications. Our best result was Ekiga(Linux) and xMeeting(Mac). We had video and voice working most of the time. But, we could only make a connection with H261, and the video quality really sucked. Big time.
We also had partial success with aMSN on both platforms. Unfortunately, the Mac software needed to be upgraded to work properly, and as soon as that occurred, aMSN refused to sign in to MSN. Hmmm, what's wrong with this picture?
The end result is… cross-platform video chat is still in the dark ages. A lot of work needs to be done to get it to work.
(Holiday Post #1)
I can't remember where I saw this, but I tried it today, and I like it a lot. I took a couple of wine corks and placed them under the back of my laptop, which raises the laptop by about 3/4 of an inch. The keyboard is easier to use and the laptop runs about 2 degrees cooler.
I was worried the laptop would roll around a bit, since the corks are round. But, nothing of the sort. The laptop is stable and it's great so far.
I spent a few hours this morning changing the website to 100% hosted on WordPress. I no longer use or need CityDesk for the site, which is good since it's essentially a dead product.
I still have a static start page, simply because I didn't want Google and other search engines to lose all their links to me. I'll think about it over the next week or so and see if I really care about it though. Maybe I'll look into using Apache redirection to send anybody going to my start page to make things easier.
edit: The Apache 2 redirect was easy, and it's all done.
I’ve been using Linux for a long long long time. My first kernel was 0.9 something in 1992. During that time I’ve switched distributions based on eye candy, support, stability, etc. For the last few years I’ve settled on Gentoo. I like the control, I like (for the most part) the upgrade path. I like the ease of use in getting things running. True, it took about a week to finally get all the tools necessary to get my laptop running nicely, but when it ran, it was sweet.
When I finally screwed up my laptop install (trying to get Windows Mobile 5.0 to sync), I figured I’d look for something else. I ended up installing Sabayon, a Gentoo based install. I had a perfectly working laptop (very stable) with great eye candy in about 1/2 hour. Very Schweet.
In all, I have 4 boxes that run Gentoo or a Gentoo based distro. On that I have a Gentoo based VMWare session for my email/web/etc server. I also have a CarPC that I just converted to Windows XP, just because it was easier.
So, where is all this going? I guess right back to the distro of choice. There are so many people out there that bash an OS based on who makes it. They bash a distro because it’s not what they want. But really, who cares? My opinion is that the distro should be picked based on what you need it to do. For my car I needed a distro that had great GPS software and a good music program. For a long while, I used Gentoo with software I wrote myself, and a separate Garmin GPS. Now I use a new ‘distro’, Windows XP. The GPS is integrated with the music software, and it just works.
I’ve wanted a really good web based email/calendaring program for a long time. For the last year I’ve been using eGroupware, which worked very well. For a while I used Outlook and egwosync to sync my calendars/contacts/todo’s with the web based system. When I moved the laptop to Linux, I lost that. Interestingly enough, eGroupware syncs better with Outlook than with any Linux based app I’ve seen. Now for the main reason for this little rant. I’ve been looking at Zimbra and Scalix for my web based solution to replace eGroupware. Mainly because the eGroupware email reader does not handle filters on email. Filters move email from one folder to another based on who its from, or part of the title, or… whatever. eGroupware relied on some separate perl scripts to do it’s filter/moving. Ugh. And then there was spamassassin, which I used for spam catching. After training it on thousands (yes, that many, I still have emails from 2000), it still let spam through. It never took good email and marked it as spam, but I still had about 20-30 spam I had to handle manually every day. It caught about 80% of my spam. I just wasn’t happy with the overall solution.
After doing some research, I decided to try Zimbra. The problem was that it wouldn’t run under Gentoo. Damn. Oh well, it did run under RedHat, Debian, Ubuntu, and one other if I recall. I started a new VMWare session and installed Ubuntu Server. It installed clean and ran great. I gave it a 25 GB HDD and 320 MB of RAM. Once Ubuntu was installed, I downloaded the Zimbra Community Edition and installed that. Another clean install. Now, after two days of running Ubuntu and Zimbra, I’ve completely moved over to it for all my email and calendaring needs. I use to use Thunderbird to access my email, but honestly I haven’t fired it up in days. Zimbras WEB/AJAX based interface is so sweet, that I don’t miss it. It accepts all the standard keystrokes, does drag and drop, has great filtering. I just can’t say enough about it. It catches 95% of my spam with no false positives yet. It also does virus scanning. And Ubuntu Server is great. Will I switch to Ubuntu for my other systems? I don’t think so. I still like my Gentoo. Still, Ubuntu did the job it was supposed to, and did it well.
The summary of this is: Why the wars on distro’s or OS’s? Just use the one that does the job for you. It should do the job cleanly and efficiently with the least amount of hassle. I can honestly say that all my choices do exactly that.
Now if only I could get Windows Mobile 5 to sync.
Here’s a list of my current systems:
1. AMD 64 3400+ (1GB RAM, 1 TB HDD, Gentoo)
– main MythTV Back End
– VMware Server System
- Blog and Web Server (256 MB RAM, 17 GB HDD, Gentoo)
- Email (320 MB RAM, 25 GB HDD, Ubuntu)
2. Celeron 2GHz (512 MB RAM, 200 GB HDD, Gentoo)
– MythTV Slave Backend
– MythTV Frontend (living room)
3. Pentium 4 3GHz (2 GB RAM, 250 GB HDD, Gentoo)
– Temporary MythTV Frontend (bedroom)
4. Athlon XP 1800+ (256 MB RAM, 40 GB HDD, Gentoo)
– MythTV Frontend (basement)
5. Via 533 MHz miniITX (256 MB RAM, 250 GB HDD, Windows XP)
– RoadRunner CarPC Frontend
6. Pentium M 1.7 GHz (2 GB RAM, 100 GB HDD, Sabayon)
– my main machine/laptop
7. Athlon XP 1800+ (512 MB RAM, 250 HDD, NO OS)
– unassigned unused box. Used to be my CarPC.
William C. Mills
J. E. Taylor 
Ian Barker 
EJ Knapp
