Category Archives: Screenshots

[Reviews]: Fedora 13 Gnome Review

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A lot of Things coming up with the new release Fedora 13 for improving the distribution itself, even extra package added, fixing many bugs reported by the users for many applications such as wine, printer problems with older fedora versions,… “, even more we will fully discuss it now.

Before we go any further let’s check the release Notes, Release announcement for fedora 13, and Download Options.

Release announcement Release Notes

Download Fedora 13: you will find a lot of download options there for Gnome, KDE, LXDE, XFCE Desktops for 32 bit or 64 bit processors

We already make listed the main enhancement and what’s new with fedora 13

Using it as a live session on Virtual machine “sun virtualbox” with this hardware specifications

  • Single core processor 2.1 Ghz
  • 384 MB of RAM
  • 12 MB of video memory

Booting time and loading time to login screen take a while but not that long with this hardware specifications, expecting to get better booting time to get to the login screen.

Looks really good some upgrades added to gnome 2.30 integrated with fedora 13, some changing for time and date menu for better navigation.

Printer manager new upgraded added to fedora 13 to auto identify the printer type and installing the suitable driver for it, that’s solved a lot reported problem with printers for many users.

Pino new integrated package for social media to be able to connect with social media like Twitter, identi.ca and more but you will need to know the API for this social media to be able to use it on pino, remembering me with Gwibber social media application for ubuntu now. But gwibber much more better than pino so far. waiting for more upgrades.

Supporting IPhone and IPod now available to be able to auto sync up with your device to control you music and multimedia libraries.

will be reviewing other desktops for fedora soon.

That’s it for now.

Configurations for FluxBox window manager ” 6 Steps “

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FluxBox window manager is really simple window manager even the configuration for it really easy and you can do more to get the best performance and better looking desktop using a lightweight desktop and that what FluxBox can give.

we already make a post for ” [How To]: install FluxBox window manager on ubuntu 10.04 LTS ” in Here.

First go to fluxbox main menu you will find configuration you will find a lot of options there we will explain it one by one with a quick 6 steps.

1. Focus Model

you can select window by just moving the pointer to it or select the window by your self, become handy some times if you want just to preview the active window in the background.

2. Maximize Options

modifying the full maximizing options, disabling/enabling moving and resizing windows

3. Tab Options

you can control the placement for window’s tabs around the window, integrating the tab within titlebar itself without getting it outside, you can show pictures for this tab or not, and customizing the tab size.

4. Transparency

Control the the transparent for windows even active windows or windows on the background.

5. Slit

slit is almost about adding extra dock applications or in another name toolbar apps, to be integrated with the toolbar itself. and it ‘s fully customizable with slit options for moving it and the size of the dock apps, auto hiding it, even assign it to specific client.

6. Toolbar

You will find a lot of options to customize the toolbar as you wish for changing the width, auto hide it, changing the layers, changing the placement for the whole toolbar in the desktop, and changing the clock, the ordering for the clock and date.

That’s it for now

[How To]: Install LXDE Desktop On Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx

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LXDE is really lightweight desktop and that what this desktop name stand for, a lot of distributions right now using LXDE desktop, if you was a windows user you will feel it looks similar to it a little bit. But this is not the idea, LXDE comes with a lot of integrated packages with it for file manager “PCMan file manager”, and music player LXmusic, and many other packages.

LXDE menu panel

File manager for LXDE

Music player and themes manager for LXDE Desktop, also you will be able to change themes and icons

Installation process:

you download it and install it from  LXDE website This way recommended to other distribution or

for Ubuntu 10.04 LTS

Go To Terminal and type:

sudo apt-get install lxde

## will ask you for the administration password

then it will take some time for the installation process

after the Installation over, Log out and log in with LXDE Desktop

Enjoy LXDE on Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx

That’s it for now.

[Reviews]: Linux Mint 9 Isadora Review

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Linux Mint 9 Isadora is one of the best Ubuntu based distributions, a really cool distribution if you used Ubuntu 10.04 LTS you find out it has many things on common with Linux Mint Isadora with extra packages installed on it. before we go any further will list the release announcement and download options for it here

release announcement and download options so far it’s available to download with Gnome desktop on CD, DVD for different CPUs AMD, intel, 32 bit or 64 bit

Download

Using Isadora on virtual machine ” virtual box ” with this hardware specifications:

  • single core processor 2.1
  • 384 MB or RAM
  • 12 MB of Video memory

Same great look for linux Mint with green color, and many new wallpaper we mentioned it on this post

Featured improvements in this release: 30,000 applications catalogued and reviewable both online and in the new software manager, brand new incremental backup tool for both data and software selection, menu transparency and editable items, USB and Windows installers, 3 years support, look & feel improvements.

A lot of new features and software packages integrated with linux mint 9 isadora check this release announcement for more information.

Using live session on the virtual machine, so it’s not expected to know exactly if this good booting time or not. but overall working good.

a really cool backup tool for linux mint some kind like apttocd application, to backup specific packages installed on the machine and you can restore it later.

also improves linux mint main menu with extra look for transparent, and same other features usually see for 3d and cube and fading…

Awesome software manager a really cool organized way to pick your applications you would like to install, and optimized with different categories and subcategories. also you can add your own review on the listed applications there and make a vote for it.

Overall it’s a great distribution working great, and still waiting for FluxBox window manager version that will come from Linux Mint community soon.

That’s it for now  :)

[Reviews]: Puppy Linux 5.0 Review

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Puppy Linux 5.0 or called Lucid Puppy it a minimal distribution based Ubuntu 10.04 LTS release, built on binary packages on Lucid Lynx. comes with a lot of installed packages even you can get more using “Puppy package manager”, using JWM desktop really cool window manger ” Joe’s window manger ” to get more information about JWM desktop follow this link

Using it as a live session on SUN VirtualBox with this hardware specification

  • Single core processor 2.1 Ghz
  • 384 MB memory RAM
  • 12 MB Video memory

First Impression

Really quick release with a really small size distribution just 128 MB it’s not the smallest distribution released but it comes with a lot of installed great packages and internet applications,

Graphics packages ” light inkscape application “, Network manager, Multimedia applications “burn ISO to cd/dvd, Pburn for cd/dvd/blue-ray, ISO master to modify ISO files. and a lot of multimedia application ” Asunder audio CD ripper, Gxine media player, Pmusic player, Pcdripper CD songs ripper, Zmixer audio mixer, mhwave edit audio recorder/editor ” default writing application abiword, Gnumeric spreadsheet application.

First run configuration window comes up with first time boot up that help you out to modify you keyboard layout, languages, Location, time and date, and resolution setting.

when first used it felt it’s messy a little bit with all these icons on the desktop and after using it  for a while and getting used to JWM desktop you will find out that distribution is really cool.

Chthemes GTK themes chooser with GTK+ 2.0

Installing extra packages using Puppy packages manager. you will find a lot of recommended applications listed under many categories and Repo s ” Ubuntu lucid-main, Ubuntu-Lucid- multiverse, puppy-woof, puppy-5″

before turn off the live session it will ask you to save your files and settings you already done on the live session.

Who should use this distribution

This distribution is really light weight distribution, if you have an old laptop or any machine with really low hardware specification this will be a really good choice for you, cause it’s totally awesome and quick. that’s not mean decent computers can’t use it. working great on all.

More information, release Notes and Download Options Follow this link

Direct Download link for Linux Puppy 5.0

[How To]: Convert Multimedia files using VLC

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VLC  is free opensource applications for playing multimedia files and working as server for streaming. and there a really cool feature available on this application to convert multimedia files with different extensions. Before I go any further Download VLC from here if you don’t have check the compatible version for your operating system.

Open media then convert/save or press ctrl+R

1. select the multimedia file you want to convert

2. select convert or press Alt+c

select the output destination and and the file the extension you want to convert to.

If you want to convert with specific scale, different “video, audio” codecs, or adding subtitles to this videos press the small settings button beside the profile menu.

then it will take some time to convert the file.

That’s it for Now.

6 Multimedia Applications for Maemo 5

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Maemo 5 is open source operating system, this platform working on many devices such as Nokia 770 internet Tablet, N800, N810 internet tablet, and Nokia N900. Maemo platform developed by Nokia depending on my linux Kernel, Gnome, Denbian, …..

Maemo platform developed really quickly, with maemo 3 release webcam and VOIP using Wireless LAN supported, then with Meamo 4 developed the Mozilla technology based on internet web browser, finger touch-UI, full QWERTY keypad, google talk supported, and GPS on board. And finally with the last release Meamo 5 supporting redesigned finger-touch UI, cellular phones. and supporting live multitasking on the dashboard. such installing full Debian operating system on the Nokia N900 working in the same time with Maemo 5 by multitasking.

anyway guys, Here is the list of multimedia applications tested on Maemo 5:

Jamaendo Player V0.2.5-2

This application is a streaming media player that plays music from jamendo.com

Jamendo is a community of free, legal and unlimited music published under Creative Commons licenses.

Download

MediaBox Media Center V2010.01.05

Media Center for Nokia Internet Tablets

MediaBox Media Center was built to handle large collections of media and lets you browse and play your music and videos and show your photos either from your memory cards, or remotely over the network via UPnP/DLNA.

Downloads

Recorder V0.3.4

Voice Recorder, A simple graphical utility for recording audio from microphone.

Download

Vagalume V0.8.3-1fremantle2

Client for Libre.fm-compatible radio services

Vagalume is a Last.fm/Libre.fm client designed for the GNOME desktop environment. It’s small and provides the basic Last.fm features, such as scrobbling, tags, recommendations, etc.

Note that the Last.fm terms of use don’t allow streaming music to mobile phones, so you are not allowed to use Last.fm in a Nokia N900

Download

Knots 2 V0.2.8-5

Stream media from your desktop computer

Access your media collection automatically from anywhere. Stream high quality video through wlan or lower quality video through 3G. Requires additional software for your desktop computer. Please see http://wiki.maemo.org/Knots2 for instructions. Supported operating systems: – Windows XP/Vista/7 – OS X 10.5 Leopard or newer – Linux – FreeBSD

Download

Extra Decoders Support V0.3.4-1

Support for additional video and audio decoders in the Media Player

Uses GStreamer decoders and tracker mimetype registering tool * AC-3 audio in video files support * Vorbis OGG and FLAC support (via ogg-support) * Musepack support * Flash video support * RealMedia formats support * Matroska container support (most video formats used for Matroska unsupported!) * MPEG2 Transport Stream support

Video resolution over 848×480 pixels is still unsupported!

Download

10 Empathy Themes

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Empathy is a messaging program which supports text, voice, and video chat and file transfers over many different protocols. You can tell it about your accounts on all those services and do all your chatting within one application.

Themes listed down there working for Empathy and Adium, Empathy supports Adium Message Styles starting from 2.27.3 (if built with WebKitGtk support).

How to install Empathy Themes:

This on ubuntu 10.04 LTS

paste the theme folder to this directory “/usr/share/adium/message-styles”

Renkoo

Renkoo and Renkoo Naked have custom background support!!!! Dreams do come true!!

Download

Paraphernalia

This message style is the realisation of design ideas I’ve had in my head over the past few months. It builds on the basic stripped-down code of a previous, unreleased theme.

Download

Modern

This is the first version released and I have set it at v.8 because there are still a number of things I have not touched as of yet. You will probably get unexpected results with.

Metal Chat 2

This is the child of the first Metal Chat, a messageview created for Proteus a long, long time ago. Metal Chat 2 blends more of the Tiger Spotlight feel into the mix, along with a slight gleam to the metal itself. Several color variants included,with and without the top header bar.

NoteBoard


NoteBoard! is a beautiful modern Message Style for AdiumX. It’s the first Message Style that fully represents what WebKit is capable of, ie. CSS Animation (http://webkit.org/blog/130/css-transforms/).

GoneDark

Glossy, simple, dark… and light.

Changes

.53
Added 2 new variants to GoneDark: Crimson & Steel.
Added new style called GoneDark Polarized, the albino brother of GoneDark.
GoneDark Polarized contains 5 themes: Arctic, Cosmos, Firelight, Margarita & Standard.
Added Service name to message window.
Fixed issue with long strings not wrapping to the next line.
Fixed the ability to change the background. Changing fonts still an issue.

GAIA Messageview

Exclusive release of the messageview included in the GAIA suite.
Graphics by Imrik, updated and reworked by myself.

Eclipse

Transparency abound, Eclipse can stand in front of anything. It’s fun, subtle, beautiful, utterly kick-ass, and any other adjective you want it to be.
Now with more variants and cleaner code.

Download

Candybars

Candybars is a simple message view style without buddy icons and other unnecessary distractions. It comes in 25 different color variations.

Download

Adium Matte

Adium Matte is the Adium version of iChat Matte. It simulates iChat’s bubbles but instead of the default aqua appearance, it uses a matte appearance that is more subtle and appealing.

Because of the limitations of Adium Message Styles and my own time, I was only able to make incoming variants. Your message color will always be aqua. Feel free to change this to anything you want with the main.css stylesheet in the xtra. It will accept any color and mask it accordingly.

Download

6 Things I like about Ubuntu 10.04 LTS

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With the new release of Ubuntu 10.04 LTS many changes comes up, using it for 3 days so far and it’s working great, even after I installed many applications still working great, really nice looking themes with it ” Radiance and Ambiance “.

so here are things I like about Ubuntu 10.04 LTS

1. Nautilus upgrade comes with Gnome 2.30

that help you to split your windows. using extra pane to activate it press F3 or go to view and choose extra pane.

The good thing about it you use it to easily move or copy files and folder form pane to other.

2. Social Drop down menu

a quick access to change your empathy or Pidgin status, also access your empathy accounts, Gwibber accounts and ubuntu one.

also you update your twitter, facebook, or any other social media by typing there any thing there it will be automatically updated by Gwibber to you active accounts there.

3. Gwibber Social broadcast messages

you connect to your social websites easily using Gwibber such as Facebook, Twitter, Identi.ca, Flickr, Digg, Feedfriend,….

I had a lot of problem with in ubuntu 10.04 beta 1, but now it working great. I love it.

4. Ubuntu one Music Store

Ubuntu one Music store integrated with Rhythmbox, really cool you can listen and download music using it.

5. Themes and background

” Radiance and Ambiance ” new themes comes with Ubuntu 10.04 LTS, both of them looks really good. comes with a really cool wallpapers collection. this link for who want to download ubuntu 10.04 LTS wallpaper.

6. Booting time and ext4 performance

Really awesome booting time, even after I installed many applications still booting time is great. processing time for many applications is quick. installed on ext4 formate partition. I used to use ext3 on ubuntu 9.10. but with this release ext4 performing really well.

That’s it for now. enjoy Ubuntu 10.04 LTS it’s for HUmans :)

7 Distributions based on Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Released

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Ubuntu fans every where, now you can choose your flavor for Ubuntu 10.04 LTS distributions, with more new distributions releases based on ubuntu 10.04 LTS for your Desktop, Netbook, light wight distribution with simple desktop interface like Xfce, Gnome, or with extra options for glassy windows and fading wobbly for that you will need a decent machine. Studio release, educational release.

With the main Distribution: Ubuntu 10.04 LTS

it’s a Debian based distribution with Gnome Desktop, you can download the “desktop, laptop” version, Netbook version, server version.

check the Ubuntu 10.04 LTS tour here

7 Distribution based on Ubuntu 10.04 LTS released so far. so here we go

1. Xubuntu

really good distribution with Xfce desktop, light wight distribution work great on laptop, desktop, also check the Xubuntu tour here

Download Xubuntu 10.04

2. Edubuntu 10.04

Is really good choice for children, kids, teacher, school, comes with a lot of installed educational applications.

Edubuntu is an educational operating system that is a part of the Ubuntu family. It aims to make Ubuntu, the popular Linux-based operating system, a great choice for the computing needs of children, students, parents, teachers, and schools.

Download Edubuntu

3. Mythbuntu

Using Xfce desktop, and myth open source software digital video recorder (DVR)

Mythbuntu is a community supported add-on for Ubuntu focused upon setting up a standalone MythTV based PVR system. It can be used to prepare a standalone system or for integration with an existing MythTV network. Unlike similar projects, Mythbuntu keeps close ties with Ubuntu and all development is given back to Ubuntu. This architecture allows simple conversions from a standard desktop to a Mythbuntu machine and vice versa. The development cycle of Mythbuntu closely follows that of Ubuntu, releasing every six months along side Ubuntu releases.

Download Mythbuntu

4. kubuntu

One of the most popular distribution based on ubuntu with KDE 4.4.2 desktop, also comes with two version for desktop and netbook

Download Kubuntu

5. Ubuntu Rescue Remix

Version 10.04 (Lucid Lynx) of the very best Free-Libre Open-Source data recovery software toolkit based on Ubuntu is out.

This release of Ubuntu-Rescue-Remix features a full command-line environment with up-to-date versions of the most powerful free/libre open-source data recovery software including GNU ddrescue, Photorec, The Sleuth Kit and Gnu-fdisk. Packages new to the Rescue Remix include aoetools, array-info, ext3-grep, gptsync, kpartx, and scrounge-ntfs.

Download Ubuntu Rescue Remix

6. Lubuntu

This is still beta version last release so far 10.04 beta 3, using LXDE desktop, you can use this distribution on old machines, with really low hardware specifications.

The Lubuntu Lucid Beta 3 is now available released by Julien Lavergne. We are now close to the final release, this beta should be the last one before final release. The status of this final release is not determined yet (“beta stable”, “rc final” …), that’s why its a beta and not a rc like other *buntu. However, final release is still planned for the end of this month, or in very early May.

Download Lubuntu

7. Ubuntu Studio

Gnome desktop with a lot of really good applications for editing and modifying multimedia files.

Ubuntu Studio. A multimedia creation flavor of Ubuntu.

Ubuntu Studio is aimed at the GNU/Linux audio, video and graphic enthusiast as well as professional.

We provide a suite of the best open-source applications available for multimedia creation. Completely free to use, modify and redistribute. Your only limitation is your imagination.

Download Ubuntu Studio

That’s it for now. will keep you up to date :)

[How To]: Get the best performance with SUN VirtualBox

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Sun virtualBox one of the best virtualization applications you can use to run multiple operating system in the same time, but it need some dependencies to get better performance in your operating system whatever the operating system is Ubuntu, Mandriva, Fedora, Centos, …… I am using it now on Ubuntu.

Ubuntu Swap, ” check your operating system Swap ”

really important because it used as same as your installed memory RAM, check this post for ubuntu Swap improvement, just make sure your swap size at least as same as your installed memory RAM.

for system setting you raise to the half memory you already have, for that if raised more than you have the Swap will help to keep you system stable.

also you can use multiple cores if you have multiple core processor. If you have a decent machine you can active full acceleration.

set the display memory depending in you graphics card performance, if you want to get 3d, 2d visualizations it might slow down the virtual machine.

that’s it for now.

[Download] : 30 Default Backgrounds for Ubuntu 10.04 LTS

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A really cool collection of 30 backgrounds comes with the new release of ubuntu 10.04 LTS .

Dark background I liked the most, awesome collection of dark wallpaper. also comes with many bright wallpaper.

These wallpaper for who aren’t using ubuntu 10.04 LTS

you can download the whole pack in .zip file.

enjoy it