Boxing an Irrational Game in the Rational World.

Boxing an Irrational Game in the Rational World.

1. Muhammad Ali (Cassius Clay)

2. Joe Frazier 

3. George Foreman in Kingston Jamaica.

I admire all three of these yesteryear boxers but I never admire the game as a medical man.

Ali suffers from Parkinson's Disease which is the direct result of Brain Stem Injury due to multiple small haemorrhages.

Later they all will have dementia.

I have pasted some information below to state how brutal was this game.

Both men were in hospital not 24 hours (which is the standard for minor -concussion- head injury observation) 7 and 10 days.

This game is only suitable for politicians in power (not out of power) who can knock each other till everybody except one is left and we the  voter should watch them with thrill and amuse when they kill each other.

While in opposition invariably, they kill each other to get the top contender in the next round of battle with powerful is inciting with the help of the those in power.

Unfortunately both the contender and the defender destroy what is is left of our democracy.

Now they kill each other in power since the war is over there is  a lot of spare arms and ammunition left to utilize internal battle zones.

In that sense, only philosophically, boxing was marginally better than the politics of this country.

At least there is a referee and the trainer will never sacrifice (see below) his guy for the glory.

In politics in this country, there are no referees and Election Commission in headed by a Puppet on a String.

I like a fiddler on the roof play the tune of misery for the average voter  disenchanted since with coming budget we will have to tighten our belt further.

There will be no more pay hikes for another 6 years but we will have 100 fold increase of Living or the Cost of Living (C.O.L).

This is what we call 21st century democracy.

1. When Muhammad Ali was stripped of his championship in 1967 following refusal of the draft to fight in the Vietnam War the heavyweight championship was thrown into a state of confusion.
It was a smart decision when blacks were discriminated and sacrificed in war (white supremacy in the helm then).

2. When the decision was announced it came as no surprise to anyone. Frazier took a unanimous decision. The fight was so brutal that both men were taken to hospital. Frazier spent a little longer in the hospital which allowed Ali to mention about how much damage he had done although a side of his face was badly swollen.

3. Eddie Futch, Joe Frazier’s trainer then made one of the most humane decisions ever not allowing Joe to come out for fifteenth round.
Fearing a fatality he puts one hand on Frazier’s shoulder telling him it’s over.

Ali sensing the fight is over stands up to celebrate but soon collapses with exhaustion.
Following the fight he comments that this was the closest thing to death he had experienced.

It was probably the only way to close the chapter on such a rivalry.

Now it is the time for WHO to move in and ban this game.

In this country still this game (it is not a game but cruel encounter) is played in schools.

Since our guy who won the gold medal was proven that he had taken drugs given to him like one of our Oil Doctors (evil doctor like the one of Michael Jackson's) to enhance performance we should put this doctor guy also in prison for life.

We must follow American example.

PCLinux-Medical-ZenMini-Pocket Medical

Well, well it is on the other day I stated how we medicos deal with facts of life.

Today, I see a Gentleman from Bulgaria has produced a Mini Medical CD based on PCLinux.

In future edition I want it to be named as a PCLinuxPocketMedical in the same way as PocketWriter (it has gone into hibernation) so we can market among doctor using Linux for day to day working.

One thing I really love to have is R package (statistics) for using medical statistics.

It was very slow downloading and i am going to keep my computer run for next couple of days almost 24 hours for others to download an act as a seed.

Seeders are from Russia, Bulgaria and Portugal.

I want you to add UnetBootIn so that i carry it in my Pendrive and perhaps some cloud utility to keep abreast with new development in addition to R.

Thanks a lot I consider this as a Best Christmas Gift I had for a long time. 

Once I run it I will have another feedback.

BIG THANK YOU.

 

This is what he says about the distribution.

Well, I think that there are two different targets on medical users.
The first is doctors that want to keep track (EMR) their patients and the other is bioinformatics.

This ISO aims doctors. 

So I took Gnome Zen Mini and added couple of programs and also openEMR.

The reason of choosing Gnome Zen Mini was the low requirements and also the basic system installed.

The programs I choose to add (please tell me if those are enough):

Keep backup

1. deja dup

2. gnomebaker

Graphics

3. gimp

4. inkscape

Remote management

5. teamviewer

Video

6. vlc

pdf viewers

7. evince

8. pdfedit

Tools to install openEMR

9. mysql-administrator

10. mysql-gui-tools

I didn't add language and Libre office because I didn't want to add my language as default to each one of you testers.

To test LiveCD, run Firefox or Chromium. It will open a DEMO environment (you need Internet). You can check how the program works. There's a DEMO that the patient can see his visits.

Can one be anonymous in the wider web?

Below was comment to a dad who was trying to keep him and his son in anonymity which is impossible.

Moment one open page one loses one's privacy and also integrity it one writes something sadistically.

Causing pain to an animal who is defenseless whether at home or in sport is a sadistic behaviour.

I agree with for him being anonymous for the sake of his son but his I.P. address is known by all and sundry.

One cannot hide it unless one has a virtual network but that again is in relative sense and the virtual network's outlet is visible.

What I am saying is that the browser watches your every move.

In the web one cannot protect the privacy.

Then there is Cyber crime at global scale.

I have coined a word Cyberpranoia today.

One should not be paranoid to the extent that one shuns the use of Internet and humour like music is essential human ingredient but unfortunately some kids cannot take gross and cruel humour.

No son can give degree to the pain it causes to the animal it is illogical.

Pain is pain whatever the degree.

My dog hate even the slightest of pain.

I have never hit him or punish him.

He has learned what is good and what is bad and unlike human behave more appropriately.

Lapses are very rare.

Nobody at my home ill treat him and he grew up with them.

From the time he inhabited our house there had not been any  violent arguments.

He takes the side of the oppressed and has become our trusted and good referee.

He hates pain (every living  being's entitlement) and violent arguments.

Visit my site parafox and asokaplus for Cyber crimes (posted today).   

Tux, STUX, D.E.F.T, M.A.D and C.W.F (Cyberwarfare), Cyberparanoia and Stuxnet

New vocabulary is entering general use with Cyber attacks  becoming preemptive at international stage. I am not going to be expressive here  since hackers (they) might think my IP address is some defence attache and attack with D.O.S (Denial of Service Attack).

Cyber space is free but it is not is not a fair play ground for a simple academic like me to engage in, who is nearer to the grave by natural causes and  do not need any interference to my intellectual exercises unless of incapacitated by natural illness or loss of memory.

I am disturbed by the use of TuX in Stuxnet and this Simple Linux Guy (S.M.G) whom I adore. His girls are Penny and Gown.

Stuxnet is the Virtual attack that was directed at Iran's nuclear reactors.

Tux is a penguin character and the official Mascot of the Linux kernel. Originally created as an entry to a Linux logo competition, Tux is the most commonly used icon for Linux, although different Linux Distributions depict.

Tux in various styles. In video games featuring the character, female counterparts, named Penny and Gown, accompany him. The character is used in many other Linux programs and as a general symbol of Linux.

STUX

STUX is a bootable CD with a collection of software, automatic hardware detection, and support for many graphics cards, sound cards, SCSI and U.S.B devices and other peripherals.

STUX also contains an installation wizard on the Live CD for putting the distribution on a Pendrive and thereby booting from it. However, a 1GB pen drive is required to do this which is far larger than other U.S.B Linux distributions.

DEFT is a Linux distribution with Digital Evidence and Forensic Investigations tools attached. It is not at military level bu at simple desktop or server level.

I was trying to download (point to point) it and I have failed in 5 attempts now due to abrupt termination of service.

MAD is Mutually assured Destruction

Mutual Assured Destruction is a doctrine of military strategy and National Security Policy in which a full-scale use of high-yield Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) by two opposing sides would effectively result in the complete, utter and irrevocable annihilation of both the attacker and the defender^. becoming thus a war that has no victory nor any armistice but only effective reciprocal destruction.

C.W.F is Cyberwarfare.

There are very interesting articles and one who interested in can browse but suffice is to say even an innocent device like Play Station can be used for an attack.

Other interesting point is that proprietary operating system with the O.E.M guys can use a device to send secret message to the company or the country's National security for spying on your web activities.

This is why I am strongly against Windows 8 attempt to invade and intrusion of One's Freedom of Use (O.F.U).

Cyberparanoia is the word I coin today to describe this phenomenon from a doctors point of view.

That is my contribution to the jargon and vocabulary.

Cricket and Corruption

Cricket and Corruption

C in cricket stands for  corruption.

It is high time we change the name of Cricket to something like Picket (then we can use Paga-the bribe to get a place in the national team with political help like National List M.Ps.) or Ticket (lotto ticket) or even Wicket or Wicked Game.

I like the last name, the Wicked Game (it make the players, administrators, referees, umpires, managers and the politicians with wicked intention, making money on the sly and using sport as a vehicle of dissemination of corruption).

It used to be

Multipurpose Cooperative Societies (MCS)

Ceylon Wholesale Establishment (C.W.E)

Ceylon Transport Board (CTB)

Ceylon Electricity Board (CEB)

Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC)

That all the Cs in those five (5) institutions stands for corruption but the level was very low compared to Cricket.

Then we changed Ceylon to  Sri-Lanka expecting it to be corruption free.

Once we changed to Sri-Lanka corruption increased by 1000 folds.

In Ceylon or Sri-Lanka, corruption is the only thing that competes with Cost of Living (C.O.L) and cricket has overtaken all others.

There is no attempt by those involved to get rid of corruption and therefore, I propse the following remedies.

1. Now to stop corruption only think we can do is to stop playing cricket for 10 years.

Then these fellows will get involved in other corrupt practices. 

They can join the above institutions.

In fact some of the yesteryear cricketers have entered those institutions and have make Crime in Cricket (C.I.C) a mockery with hedging deals of ill repute.

2. If not we start boycotting cricket for good and not for 10 years.

This is very easy and no loss to the social well being and  which I practice now religiously and watch Rugby (except Sri-Lankan Rugby) especially the brand New Zealand and France play.

The way our boys are playing and also they are not paid (according to BBC), not playing cricket for 10 years is the best option we have.

Save money too.

I hope Sanagakkara and Mahela give up cricket sooner than late.

Then we can see the Real Development team (might take another 10 years to peak) and we will be not watching cricket for 20 years.

I thank Murali and Vas retiring in their good shape.

We will remember them for good but not the failing cricketers of today.

The latest C to inter the fray is C of Cyberspace.

Internet is inundated with Cyber-crimes

Dreams 12-Royal Wedding

I sent a copy of my digital book "Dreams" for proofreading by Maha Brahma.

Just to avoid the fact that I had not sent a dream for a long time for his interpretation, I sent the following dream as an attachment.

I was bit worried that he might be little cross with me for my delay.

The time equivalent of  last three months (without a dream) is just the time he takes to have a cup of tea in Heaven, any way.

I got a return email and a chat.

He was very very very happy.

I could not believe his response in spite of me not sending any dreams for his interpretation.

He started with pleasantries.

You got your salary increment?

No Sir, we have to wait for the budget.

Then he asked me why I put the dreams in digital form and I told him that is to supplement my meagre salary.

That's good, he said.

Why?

You have to write a another volume he said.

Why?

You won't get the salary increment that you were anticipating, he said.

Then, I said it is bad news for me know?

But it is good news for me know?

Why?

You got to dream and dream and make another digital volume.

Or, I see.

You just told the president not to pay a salary increase to get more dreams from me?

Bit naughty, ah.

No my boy.

I won't do a thing like that.

We gods do not do underhand things.

I knew you won't get any salary increase from the very beginning but to avoid hurting your feeling, 

I just dodged that fact.

Did you take any loans anticipating a salary increase?

No, Sir.

That's good.

So you knew I will come back to you all along.

Yes dear, you have no option.

Why did you put a monkey on the front cover.

Is it to remember the deadly muted monkeys?

No, Sir.

Just monkeying!

Just to remind that monkeys also have a right to live, Sir.

Some of them were poisoned in Kandy, recently.

It is a good think you put the dreams in digital form.

Why?

You don't know?

No.

I am very bad in memorizing unlike you.

Or, I see.

Is it a problem with other gods?

Yes.

But it is very different here we make enormous effort to keep records and memorize every little detail.

That is very stupid in heaven.

Don't con?

We live so long in heaven and if we keep records like you it will be a problem like plastics on earth.

We might need more computers than the number of gods.

I got your point.

You know I read it 3 times but I still remember only the Ape story. 

That is also because of your front cover.

In the next volume you must put lot of pictures, will you.

I cannot.

Why?

We put pictures for children's books.

Never mind, put some pictures will you.

Yes Sir.

The dream

Royal Wedding.

I put the dream in list form to cut the long story short.

1. All ready for the wedding and lot of guest arrive.

2. Queen driving the prince to the Wedding.

3. Problems with the car and queen cannot start it and late for the wedding

4. Prince falls asleep and forgets the wedding ceremony

5. Princess fall asleep too

6. All attend the wedding but no prince and princess.

7. Everything freezes in time and in Ice Age

8. Princess's female friend / Aunt is late for the weeding and arrives late.

9. How long the time freezes I did not dream.

10. When she arrives (very very late) everything frozen in time.

11. Gradually frozen guests come to life.

12. Queen gets the car started and Prince arrives.

13. Princess wakes from the sleep and jump into the vehicle.

14. All well and ends well.

Interpretation

1.No Royalties in future.

2. Richest person of the world owns a Cloud (IT industry) Consortium.

3. He has a private island of his own where all the Cloud Computers are farmed

4. His daughter gets married.

5. Enact the Royal Wedding of yesteryear

6. Invitees are all connected to the island by cloud of videos and Internet communication.

7. World’s first Internet Wedding telecast on Cloud and captured in Cloud Computing.

Time frame not known and frozen.

The ice age in the dream symbolizes that feature.

Then Maha Brahma asked me what is this Cloud Computing ?

It is bit tricky to answer in short, Sir.

I am writing a book on Cloud Computing now and the moment I finish I will send it to you digitally, yes digitally, Sir.

Is it technical?

No Sir.

Why?
i do not like technical stuff, O.K..
O.K.

Shall I make the name "Cloud computing for Good, Gods and Heaven".

Please don't?

Why? 

Ordinary people might think we do not have common sense.

Do not worry, if you do not get a salary increment but I will see that your book will be popular in heaven.

Any copyright Sir.

No you stupid, this is heaven.

See you soon with a dream.

SuSe 11.4 and Sabayon 7 LXDE

This is something I posted to a friend who had a problem of loading images from a Camera with SuSe.

I am bit lenient on SuSe this time,

As a part of my archiving I downloaded SuSe 11.4 (new version is out soon with lot of changes) and tested it on one of my old IBM (used for testing) and it is pretty good.

I have been critical of SuSe and vociferously and they seem to have listened to the user (not necessarily me). They have included ORCA (for visually handicapped)

It is better to download (not CD but DVD) it using torrent (not point t point) and keep it as a archive copy if you continue to use Suse. In few years time they will remove the iso when the new one is taken root.

I am not currently using it but this time thought of running it till January.

Mind you SuSe was one of my favorites till Microsoft got involved.

Like Microsoft it does not recognize other Linux derivatives (except windows) in my hard drive and I had to configure it myself.

I am currently downloading 64 bit image.

BUT if you do like to change there is a very lovely distribution called Sabayon 7,LXDE the latest (good for keeping your picture library), which is clean but have a problem with old graphic cards.

It is only 2 GiB and Suse is 4.3 GiB (bul has 7 desktop types including LXDE).

Sabayon has XMBC (media center which is a derivative of Gentoo Linux) and that is its virtue.

P.S.I am posting this SuSe booted up for a change.

Revealing Facts

This is reproduction of part an article for those who do not have access.
Hope Scientific American spare me.
Facts are revealing.
There were only one billion people on the planet as recently as the turn of the 19th century and only a few hundred thousand just 10,000 years ago. In fact, there may have been as few as 15,000 of us, roughly 70,000 years ago.
With both more people and longer lifetimes, humanity's absolute numbers continue to rise, even though the number of children per women has halved since 1950. In fact, the absolute growth rate in human population peaked at 2.1 percent between 1965 and 1970, according to Cohen. "We're now down to 1.1 percent per year," he said, although that still means roughly 150 babies born every minute.
Consumers
The world's richest 500 million people produce half the world's carbon dioxide emissions—the primary greenhouse gas responsible for climate change—whereas the poorest three billion emit just seven percent. The average American—one of 312.5 million—uses up some 88 kilograms of stuff daily: food, water, plastics, metals and other material goods. Americans consume a full 25 percent of the world's energy despite representing just 5 percent of global population, and the band of industrialized nations combine to waste 222 million metric tons of food per year, according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization.
"Population doubled while the economy grew by 15 times, cars by 16 times and fertilizer-use by sixfold," said geographer Ruth DeFries of Columbia at the same event. "There is no end in sight for that increase in consumption," particularly as it is emulated by people around the globe.
All this consumption requires a host of natural resources, from vast copper mines scarring the landscape to ever more land for food. More acreage was converted to growing crops between 1950 and 1980, than from 1700 to 1850, and arable land is one of nine "planetary boundaries" that scientists have identified—limits past which humanity should fear to tread. The others include: climate change, biodiversity loss, nutrient cycles, ocean acidification and freshwater use, among others. "Slowing population growth does not solve all the problems but it makes it easier by slowing demands," Cohen said.

Ten or more things I did not know about the Pineapple Plant.

Story of My Pineapple Plant

After about two years the stem of the original plant is flowering now.
It was almost dead due to competition of a robust weed.
I took the weed with diffuse roots away and the stem of the pineapple plant was rotten due to competition for nutrition.
I thought it might die and just placed it between other plants and put plenty of water.


Below are things I did not know but discovered during the last two years.


1. Even though I knew that the crown of the fruit can be used to grow it, I did not know what happens to the mother plant when the fruit is separated.


2. I did not know its leaves can be used to make a fine silk like thread (it is in fact finer than the silk thread) and prepare fabrics.

3. It grows very slow and one can have only one fruit a year.

4. It has a very beautiful flower.The colour varying from lavender to purple to red


5. Its roots do not go deep.

6. I did not know from which part of the tropics it originated. Now I know it is from South America.


7. Mother plant produce shoots called suckers once the fruit is removed. They can be used to grow new plants.


8. I do not know how many shoots / suckers it makes certainly more than one.

9. I did not know other plants with diffuse root system compete with its growth and lot of chemical are used in commercial growing.

10. I did not know the fruit is rich in manganese.

Resume for Heaven

Resume for Heaven

If one wants to go to heaven one has to sacrifice some of the earthly things we are used to.

1. One cannot gossip in heaven.

2. This reason cell phones are banned totally in heaven.

3. One has to make personal errands in heaven but this has changed with my friend becoming the Chief's Assistant.

3. One cannot think in heaven lest one try to create some new heavens.

4. They have a high scrutiny when people like Steve Job tries to enter heaven. 

I  cannot talk about it here, now. 

His application is pending approval.

5. Email was introduced (this is where I got involved in) recently with the present Maha Brahma's Assistant taking Office.

6. There is only outgoing mails only.

7. Onward post from Earth is banned.

8. I have a Virtual Email Facility by the courtesy of present incumbent.

9. They are not allowed to sleep or dream except the highest of the order of gods when on duty. 

The reason for this is that the gods have to be watchful all the time to prevent any undesirable from Earth enter. 

This is about the only job they have to do in heaven.

10. Leave is abundant in heaven one can take as much leave as possible and then one can dream as much as possible. But unfortunately most of the gods cannot dream well, especially the Chief himself. 

Most of the gods, the last dream  they had before entering from any sentinel point in the Universe was going to heaven and once one achieves that target there are no dreams left for them to indulge in.

11. Games are plenty and allowed  all the time but betting is completely banned. Apart from email facility one of the reasons they introduced computers  was to play games but war games are completely banned.

12. They are now considering touch system tabloids (without phone facility) to play games and on that ground alone they might consider taking Steve Job to heaven but the entry is still pending and waiting for the approval from the real Maha Brahma on vacation.

So if you think of going to heaven read my resume carefully before one makes an entry.

Urea (Urine) Treatment

Urea (Urine) Treatment

Some of my visitors are nosy and ask some silly question.

Especially when they see my flowering plants.

Most of them take no time to learn some basics in biology or gardening.

They know I do not use artificial manure.

If they ask what I put in, for them to grow healthily.

I promptly say Urine.

Usually, they do no go ahead with a second or third question.

If they probe a second question,
I promptly say it is my dog who does look after the garden and I rarely use other method but there are other reliable supplies.

At that point most of them stop asking any more question expecting me to say human supply.

So far nobody has gone beyond that point but my real supply come from my pet fish.

With temperatures over 95 degrees Fahrenheit, I have to empty the water frequently to get rid of the algae which is a perennial problem and  I have not found a solution yet to the algae including toxic varieties.

Rest is banana skins (I have discontinued using banana skins since there is a poison in them that prevent plant growth sprayed by the CIC and vendors) and tea leaves.

In this country our farmers inject UREA to the  flower stem (Banana) to make them grow bigger.

The UREA they use contain heavy metals and I have been trying to educate the consumers not to eat them or the vendors to not to buy or sell them injected with urea.

There is cadmium too.

It has become a problem since banana growing is not done on a commercial scale but as a supplementary vegetation.

Banana is a very healthy fruit but our fellows are poisoning it with Urea contaminated with heavy metals including cadmium.

There is no quality control in this country only money making.
Edited on the 30th of April, 2012.

Linux and Graphic Card Compatibility

Linux and Graphic Card Compatibility

I just did a survey on graphic cards and there are excellent technical articles on graphic cards but none of them go into the Linux compatibility.

I expect somebody who has used Linux and who is versed with technical aspect of graphic cards should write a review.

I will only write a few lines on technical aspect of graphic cards and my personal experience with NVIDIA cards only.

 I was the generation of 16 and 32 Memory and even they were difficult to find and expensive those days. Linux was able to work with less graphic intensive architecture those days.

New Linux distributions are graphic intensive.

Only few Mephis, AntiX and Debian support lot of graphic cards.

1. 3D acceleration came later.

2. Graphic cards use lot of energy.

The type depends on the mother board.

1. AGP (old )

2. PCI Express (new)

AGP is being replaced by the PCI Express interface on new motherboards, but AGP 8x (and even AGP 4x) still offer sufficient bandwidth for contemporary video cards.

All AGP 8x cards will work in both AGP 4x and AGP 8x slots.

3. It is very important to find at least 128 Memory card if one is using Linux.

4. New distributions do not support old cards.

5. So if you download a new CD/DVD and if it does not work check the Hardware compatibility List (HCL) by an appropriate card to support the distribution.

It is the only change you may have to do with an old computer.

Mind you they are very difficult to find even secondhand nowadays.

I bought old netVIsta with only 16 AGP (do not confuse it VGA which is related to the monitor) and could not find a 128 memory card for about one year. 

Luckily I had several 64 AGP cards till I found a 128.

Expensive graphic card is necessary if one is playing games and  3D modeling in 3DMax / Maya (very expensive).

So even if you are using blender make sure one has a good graphic card.

For ordinary photo editing I do do not think one need an expensive graphic card.

I only do some photo editing (that is also not frequent-it was passion in good old days) and even 64 memory is OK.

I never had problem with NVIDIA and I stick with it.

It had a little problem with  400 series but then I had over 100 Live CDs to test. I run LIVE CD/DVD  first and then  pick the distribution second.

I cannot speak of other graphic cards including ATI and IBM has been slow to support Linux.

So if you have problems do not blame the Distribution but change the Graphic card to suit your distribution.

This is something I should have written long time ago but I always say even Linux is now graphic intensive and go for a good graphic card.

On board graphic cards are also pain in the neck and do not buy a secondhand computer even it is cheap unless it can be upgraded with graphic card (mother board should have a graphic slot) and when one fix a new card on board graphic is automatically switched off.

Remember to change the BIOS too (PCI/AGP output).

Puppy is now Cloud Ready-Slacko- Slackware Based

It very nice feeling to announce that Puppy is cloud ready.

Once it is booted up on the desktop click the slickpet and one gets to  an alternative software manager to download cloud utility.

In seconds it downloads the cloud utility and one has window with all the current cloud utilities (except Ubuntu One) including Puppy web desktop, meebo, twitter, yahoo, Google and Dropbox (one has to download it.

It downloads Adobe Flash in few minutes (remember all these are in RAM) and one is instantaneously in the web.

Its Flash drive simulator can even simulate Floppy or a hard drive when using Flash Drive mode for booting.

It has all this in 124 of MiB.

It is only few weeks ago I wrote that Puppy should be cloud ready.

Thanks guys and girls in Australia and getting Slackware also into the fold with the Wolfer build.

This Live CD is amazing if one is should of hardware and money download and use it till you earn.

Mind you I got a  secondhand graphic card from a secondhand dealer (my graphic card is very very old-I am now ashamed I am still using it and most of the new Linux distributions are not supporting very old graphic cards) and I want it to be tested before installing newly downloaded Linux.

I use this computer for downloading and not for daily routines.

Internet and O.E.M (Original Equipment Manufacturers)

Internet and O.E.M (Original Equipment Manufacturers)

With cloud computing making a big impact, I am a believer  that all O.E.M computer products should have Internet utilities as a default system even without an Operating System. That is the next best thing that can happen to customer base. Internet is the most widely used utility.

My only reservation is that there should be some protection for vulnerable children.

That protection can be adequately dealt with by a password system when one buys an O.E.M system as a bundled package. Only one user should be allowed the full system access.

There should be a separate O.E.M for children (with protection included by default).

In other words, the user should be able to the browse Internet by default. There are enough small utilities and free software available now, for one of them to be included by default in an O.E.M. System.

The user should also be able to select his or her operating system as a cloud utility or as an independent operating system without having being hooked to a proprietary Operating System by default.

The operating wisdom should be that the customer has a choice.

Of course, to make matters easy proprietary system/s should be available for those who wish to purchase. That is also a freedom of choice.

How one sells the product is not the vendor's preempt but the work of the sales person.

Until such time, all the O.E.M. products should be allowed to boot up with a Flashdrive or micreSD card.  They can even sell it with a smart-card option.

Smart-card option

It is an easy alternative. 

Developers have already created special microSD for the E-reader Nook Color, that allows one to dual-boot the Nook OS and a specialized version of Android. In other words, just pop one of these cards into the Nook's microSD slot, and presto!

Instant Android.

If the Android environment is not needed any longer, just turning off the Nook, popping out the card, and rebooting will get one to the Nook.

Actually, the card need not be taken out, as one can choose the OS from a boot menu.

That means one is not voiding the warranty.

A very popular Android ROM Card CyanogenMod  marketed by N2A (Nook to Android) has stocks of applications that include Amazon Kindle, Angry Birds, and Words with Friends.

One is not locked into reading only Barnes & Noble e-books.

Following is an advertisement selling microSD cards

"Turning your Nook Color into a terrific Android tablet is easy--and legal.

No warranty issues, no changes to your ereader:

It just works.

And we've chosen SanDisk microSD cards:

The tech industry's best storage solution to be sure your tablet works perfectly today and tomorrow".

In that context, Debian's Iceweasel (or even Dillo) should be the one that should be ported with the O.E.M with all the unnecessary cookies removed and probably something similar to Dropbox (or a cloud entity) as an accompaniment with the basic (minimal) kernel.

This is one piece of writing in my next book

My Selection of Linux Utilities that make a Feature Packed Linux Distribution

 

LyX

Advanced open source document processor

Alongside Kile, LyX is another tremendous powerful LaTeX GUI. It allows you to create impressive documents in HTML, PS or PDF format rendered with unbeatably beautiful Computer Modern fonts. LyX is also available for Windows and is a little less difficult to use, in my opinion. I have reviewed LyX not that long ago.  

User-friendly LaTeX source editor and TeX shell and KDE.

LyX - Word processor.

LyX is an advanced open source document processor that encourages an approach to writing based on the structure of your documents, not their appearance. LyX lets you concentrate on writing, leaving details of visual layout to the software. LyX runs on many Unix platforms (including MacOS X), OS/2, and under Windows/Cygwin. Note that all these ports use the same xforms interface and therefore need an X server. LyX produces high quality, professional output -- using LaTeX, an industrial strength typesetting engine, in the background; LyX is far more than a front-end to LaTeX, however. No knowledge of LaTeX is necessary to use LyX, although it will give a user more power. LyX is stable and fully featured. It has been used for documents as large as a thesis, or as small as a business letter. Despite its simple GUI interface (available in many languages), it supports tables, figures, and hyperlinked cross-references, and has a best-of-breed math editor.

New Zealand All Blacks-Thank You

New Zealand All Blacks-Thank You

I did not watch the match fearing New Zealand might do another hara-kiri in the finals.

Yes they did beat France by 20 points.

Yes they were 15 points clear pre-match.

But French do some unbelievable things come finals (like Football World Cup).

I new it was going to be close context.

I cloud not take it if New Zealand lost in the final again.

Weepu had a bad day but the wonder boy Stephen Donald who was catching whitebait  two weeks ago kicked the penalty to get one point ahead was great.

He was a replacement for a replacement (for Cruden).

But the captain cool  Richie McCaw took the troops over the line but just.

Thank you all blacks.

Thank you les blues for your spited fight.

Rugby the winner.

I this country Rugby is played differently.

My home city players beat  another team the players (one was school boy) of the winning team were beaten by political thugs.

All our games are politicized and in fact one cannot getting to a team unless one has a political touch or a pass (French Pass- no insult to French or France).

I want to write few words (mot) in French but I am lost for words with the excitement.

Only English comes out!

They won by one point.

All Blacks your victory will remain in my mind for a very long time.

Gambas

Gambas

Gambas is a free development environment based on a Basic interpreter with object extensions, a bit like Visual Basic™ (but it is NOT a clone !). Read the introduction for more information.

With Gambas, you can quickly design your program GUI with QT or GTK+, access MySQL, PostgreSQL, Firebird, ODBC and SQLite databases, pilot KDE applications with DCOP, translate your program into any language, create network applications easily, make 3D OpenGL applications, make CGI web applications, and many more robust work

The Gambas project aims at making a graphical development environment based on a Basic interpreter, so that the language is as easy as Visual Basic under Linux but much better and less bugs.

The phenomenal quantity of bugs and inconsistencies in Visual Basic had persuaded developer me to start a fresh project. It seems that Microsoft was aware of the poor quality of its language, as VB, dot-Net (.Net) was not made backward compatible with older versions of Visual Basic.

Gambas does not try to be compatible with Visual Basic, and will never be. Its syntax and internals are far better than the one's seen in its proprietary cousin.

The author who had very good understanding of Visual Basic from childhood, took from Visual Basic, the Basic language, the development environment and the user interfaces and dropped the bad practices in common use of Visual Basic program and made Gambas coherent, logical and reliable as possible.

Features

Below are the main features of Gambas and what sets it apart from the other languages.

Gambas is a Basic language with object extensions. A program written with Gambas is a set of files. Each file describes a class, in terms of object programming. The class files are compiled, then executed by an interpreter. From this point of view, it is very inspired by Java.

Gambas is made up of the following programs:

A compiler.

An interpreter.

An archiver.

A graphical user interface component.

A development environment.

The development environment is written with Gambas itself, so that I can show the abilities of the language and is useful for debugging.

What are the features that set Gambas from the other languages?

1. A Gambas project is stored under one directory. The archiver transforms the project directory structure in one sole executable file.

2. Compiling a project only requires the compilation of the modified classes. Every external reference of a class is solved dynamically at the execution time.

3. Gambas has a component architecture that allows it to extend the language. Anyone can write components as shared libraries that dynamically add new native classes to the interpreter.

Components can be written in Gambas too. The component architecture is documented in the Wiki encyclopaedia.

4. By default, the Gambas interpreter is a text-only program. The component architecture is used for writing the graphical user interface part of the language.

5. As the graphical user interface is implemented as a component, Gambas is independent of any toolkit!

One will be able to write a program, and choose the toolkit later : GTK+, Qt4, etc.

6. The graphical user interface is the Qt4 toolkit. The GTK+ component which is not finished will have almost the same interface as the Qt4 component.

7. Gambas projects are easily translatable, in any language.

8. Its object model is simple but powerful.

About the Author

Welcome to you, curious!

You're going to know almost everything about me...

My name is Benoît Minisini.

I am a French man born in 1972, living in Paris. Programming is one my passion since I was twelve, and is now my job for many years now. This passion started with the Basic language on a CPC Amstrad 464, and later on an Atari 520 STE. Of course, now, I am using many other languages, but I never forgot that I have learned and done a lot with Basic.

I was always fond of writing languages, compilers, assemblers, and interpreters. I wrote a Z80 assembler on Amstrad and an interpreted language that consumed all its memory.

Later, during my studies at the E.P.I.T.A., I wrote a Lisp interpreter under Windows. During six months, I discovered its stupid memory model, the Microsoft compiler, and its numerous bugs.

Today, I keep on raging with the Gambas

Thanks to my boss, I have a half-time job, so I have worked actively on Gambas for the last years.

But I have other passions too, that burns lot of my time. That is music .

I'm playing flute for a long time - and theatre.

So, the development of Gambas is not as fast as it could be.

I hope your curiosity was satisfied...

Acknowledgment

Gambas is build on top of many free softwares, and could not exist without them.

So I would like to thank every people involved in the following projects:

Linux

KDE

GCC and all of the GNU tools, of course.

The Qt4 toolkit.

The GIMP and its toolkit GTK+

Libre Office.

The MySQL, PostgreSQL and SQLite database management systems.

And any other libraries used by Gambas.

That is enough for as an introduction to language packages.

I pronounce it as Gon (a bull) Bass (is unskilled workman) in Sinhala which is the phrase we use when the workman does a shoddy job. But that reference has no slur on this wonderful package which love the most. Unfortunately only few of the distributions port it as is. That is why I was very expressive here.

It needs to be there for the young newbies to take root in Linux.