ZachSchneider [dot] com

Ubuntu 8.10 is coming and it will be here soon so make sure you download your copy. Can’t wait Download the Beta!!

Well I am not running Windows much anymore besides at work and I came across this new application by Gnome called Blog Entry Poster.

* Clean interface doesn’t get in the way of what you’re writing

* WYSIWYG styled text support

* Entries can be written gradually over the course of a day, popping gnome blog open and closed as you have thoughts to jot down and then posting at the end of the day

* Operates as a panel object/applet or a standalone application

* Supports many different kinds of blogs

* New Spell checking

* New Drag and drop images into your blog entry (if your blog supports it)

Download Gnome Blog

oh and this was posted by Gnome Blog

“I am Linux”

Well how do you makes these two Operating Systems operate on the same machine, well it is a little tricky and you need at least 2 HDD. This shouldn’t be too difficult.

1. Make sure BIOS can change the boot sequence of drives (if not this trick will not work)

2. Now all you need to do is install Vista on your 1^st HDD

3. Reboot and change the BIOS setting to boot to the 2^nd HDD

4. Install Linux

Over and done with and now that you have Linux on its separate HDD you can install multiple other Linux distros on that drive since you have Grub or whichever boot loader you have chosen to install. This way Windows has its own HDD it is happy and if you can just change BIOS setting depending on which OS you would like to boot into.

I would like to give a thank you out to John for the inspiration.

Prerequisites

In all likelihood, you are probably using either two PCI graphics cards or one AGP card and one PCI card. Either way, it is quite quick and easy to make a new xorg.conf or XF86Config for your new cards.

First, of course, make sure you are using a recent version of X for best results. I’m using X.org 6.7.0, and I’ve also had this working with XFree86 4.3.x. XFree86 4.2.x should also work, but I wouldn’t recommend anything older than that.

Now backup your existing X configuration – things could go wrong, or you might need it for reference later.

Disable X from starting at boot (rc-update del xdm default), shut down your computer, insert both graphics cards, and boot the computer back up again. The screen that your bios information shows up on is your “primary” monitor. If this is the wrong one, and you are using an AGP and a PCI graphics card, there should be an option in your BIOS that lets you choose which one to use.

• In AWARD BIOS (v4.51PG), menu: Integrated Peripherals -> Init Display First -> [PCI Slot / AGP]
• In AMIBIOS (v 08.00.08), menu: PCIPnP -> PCI Bus Scan Order -> [Ascent/Descent]
• In other BIOSs it’s called: Bios First Boot -> [AGP/PCI]

Configuring X

In most cases, it is simplest to let X do as much auto-configuring as possible.
It can usually detect your graphics cards, at least.

As root run,

X -configure

This will make your screen blink a few times, before returning with a message saying that it has created a test X configuration file at /root/XF86Config.new or /root/xorg.conf.new and giving the command line to test the X server using this config file.

With a bit of good luck, this should be a working X configuration.
You may have to edit the mouse, monitor, or resolution settings. This is done in the same way as with a single-monitor setup, but there will be two “Monitor” sections, two “Device” sections, and two “Screen” sections.
The “Screen” sections connect a monitor to a graphics card.

It is probably a good idea to change the Identifiers of the device and monitor sections so you can tell them apart, e.g.

...
Section "Monitor"
  Identifier   "NECMonitor"
...
Section "Monitor"
  Identifier   "VSMonitor"
...
Section "Device"
  Identifier  "NvidiaCard"
  Driver      "nvidia"
...
Section "Device"
  Identifier  "AtiCard"
  Driver      "ati"
...
Section "Screen"
  Identifier   "LeftScreen"
  Device       "NvidiaCard"
  Monitor      "NecMonitor"
  DefaultDepth 24
...
Section "Screen"
  Identifier   "RightScreen"
  Device       "AtiCard"
  Monitor      "VSMonitor"
  DefaultDepth 24

At the top of the file, there is a section called “ServerLayout”.
This section specifies the layout of your monitors.
In my configuration, I have two monitors beside each-other–”RightScreen” is to the right of “LeftScreen”.

The layout can be specified using keywords or absolute pixel positions (useful for odd layouts, or even overlapping layouts!?)
E.g.

Section "ServerLayout"
  Identifier     "XFree86 Configured"
  Screen      0  "LeftScreen" 0 0
  Screen      1  "RightScreen" RightOf "LeftScreen"

“LeftScreen” is located at position 0,0.
I then have “RightScreen” to the right of it.

The useable keywords are “RightOf <identifier>”, “LeftOf <identifier>”, “Above <identifier>”, and “Below <identifier>”.
A special keyword is “Relative” – it is used to specify the position in pixels of a screen in relation to another screen.
E.G.

  Screen      0  "LeftScreen" 0 0
  Screen      1  "RightScreen" Relative "LeftScreen" 1024 40

In most cases, the LeftOf and RightOf keywords are what you want.

So, try starting the xserver using your test configuration file again.
Verify that the mouse can move from screen-to-screen in a relatively intuitive manner, and that your resolution and refresh rate is right.
You can then copy your configuration file overtop of your old /etc/X11/XF86Config or /etc/X11/xorg.conf.

I came across this new application called Synergy and it is amazing. I used the application all day today. I have it setup on my iMac and my Windows XP laptop and well it worked flawlessly once I had it setup correctly. I couldn’t get it working with using the hostnames but ip addresses work just as good. Now my challenge is to get it working with my linux box and iMac since my laptop is a dual boot system. Download your copy now at http://synergy2.sourceforge.net/