New Blog address

The new blog is here

The first new post is here

We moved everything over to blogger because unlike wordpress, blogger allows AdSense.  This will help generate ad revenue, so please visit the ads.

Blog Changes

I am highly considering moving the blog over to Blogger.  This will allow me to run AdSense and hopefully garner some ad revenue.  WordPress doesnt allow AdSense to be used.

What about server…new addition to the family

PC/OS OpenServer System is by far the most popular release and some have asked “You spend so much on the desktop what about server.” While yes, a majority of my forum users are desktop users that does not mean I dont focus on the server.  The reason server has been so quiet is because of the audience and because lets face it, server systems are mostly untouched and dont get updated a lot.  I still have many server users who still use PC/OS Server System 7.10.  Nonetheless I work with a lot of my local server users and here are some changes coming down the pipe for OpenServer System.

Encryptfs will be added, this helps with users who want encrypted filesystems.  A full tutorial will be posted in the howtos’s

All updates and app updates will be added.  The mono environment will be added as well,

EBox may replace webmin.  Its being thourougly tested right now.

The official name will be PC/OS OpenServer System 2008u3 as in update 3.

Opera will be replaced with Firefox.. This is per user request.

Since very little is changing in the way of core system an update pack will be offered for this release.

Now a new addition.

PC/OS Virtual Machine.  PC/OS Virtual Machine is a distro that has only one purpose.  To be a host for virtual machines, yes I have had a request for this and several of my Server users do strip OpenServer System and install Xen, this will be easier for them to manage and to deploy.  The reason it doesnt have a release integer is because this release is not meant to be updated as much as the other releases.  Just a note, the guest systems will need to be updated.  PC/OS Virtual Machine will only be updated when a new LTS is released.  It wont have a web browser or any client apps installed by default so it will be extremely small and fast. Of course when a critical fix is needed you can get it through Synaptic.  Its based on OpenServer System.

This will be released around the end of October

Rethinking the command line

One of the things people have come back at me with is that the UI for PC/OS is solid enough.  So what about the command line?  When a user types delete filename what happens?  Absolutely nothing.  What about if they type get-process, what happens? not a thing.  Why cant I type install package name and nothing happens.  How about a dumbed down command line.  Well folks,  I have set about to do this.  Im not recreating another shell just doing something to dumb down the command line a bit.

Stay tuned

Status and outages

Ok Im back online.  I made one little change to network manager and it was ass raping me.  It didnt like that change at all, oh well everythings back up and kosher now.  No, to probably many question “did you have to reinstall” no I didnt.

This weekend, the third to the 6th I wont be on at all.  Im upgrading hardware and I wont be on.  The build machines for insiders wont be online either.

Some more coming in PC/OS 2009

There a a couple of kernel and support package updates to PC/OS coming.

Most notable is the inclusion of VLC 0.9.3

Also coming.

Likewise update

PPPoE now included

The broadcom firmware updates

Floola replacing GTKPod *

There are a couple of more changes in the works and right now they are being ironed out so stay tuned.

* Floola is replacing GTKPod because not only does it work with all iPods, it is constantly updated.

VLC 0.9.3 and PC/OS 2009

PC/OS will have the new VLC.  I started getting e-mails from my users last night that they wanted VLC 0.9.3 so I spent my saturday compiling and creating a deb package, I may release the deb package.  It was a rough build so if you have PC/OS OpenWorkstation all dependencies may be satisfied, under OpenDesktop they may not be so use at your own risk.  Here is a screenshot of it running playing a WMV file.

PC/OS 7.10 availability

As of December 1, 2008 PC/OS 7.10 will be removed from the download site as will torrents.  One last ISO will be produced for Client and Lite during this time and if you want PC/OS 7.10 for whatever reason it will be reactivated on on-disk and you can purchase this release for $9.99.

No new functionality will be introduced in the new ISO’s, simply bugfixes.  7.10 is still in use by a few people.

The addons CD for PC/OS 2009, Changes in Store for OpenWorkstation

People have asked, with PC/OS OpenWorkstation going for sale how will we handle Openoffice.org for the home user and how will we handle delivery of certain apps and still maintain the offline capabilities of PC/OS?  Well, we will be delivering an Addons CD similar to what we did with OpenServer System which has been very popular.  This will include OpenOffice.org and several apps and Firefox Extensions that we the team find useful.  We may combine the two in an archive file so that the user only has to download one file and not 2.  Once again this is in planning stage.

After comparing different distributions we have decided Thunderbird will be removed from PC/OS OpenWorkstation and replaced with Evolution, this allows interaction with Microsoft Exchange servers, the MySQL client package will be added by default so that users may begin working with MySQL databases out of box.  Mono will also be reintroduced in OpenWorkstation as will Monodevelop.  Users of RealBasic will have the option of opting for a pro license or the standard license and as in OpenDesktop Exaile and VLC will replace Audacious and Gnome-Mplayer as the default media players.

Once again these are all in the planning stages and will be ironed out in the coming months leading up to the release.

Web apps in PC/OS 2009

Most of the Google Apps will be stored with Prism.  Prism is making its debut in PC/OS 2009.  Google Mail, Calendar and Docs will now be located in the corresponding menu entries for example, Google Docs and Google Calendar will be in the Office Menu, Google Talk, Gmail and Facebook will be located in Network.  The Mobile menu entry will contain links to Wikipedia, Box.net and Google Maps as well as Live mail.  More people use Google Maps than live Maps so Live Maps will be removed.  Google Gears will still ship with PC/OS as part of Firefox 3.

Talking it over with the development team and the continued silence of the Flock team, PC/OS will go back to a themed Firefox 3 for its default browser and we will be enhancing that similar to what we did with Thunderbird, so think of it as Firefox Enhanced.