Easier than giving a business card.
I didn’t forget! (Get it!?). Had an amazing night at Lewes at this years Bonfire celebration, took me an age in terms of uploading this video but it’s now available to look embedded in this post. Pictures coming soon!
Lewes Bonfire 2008 from Calabi on Vimeo.
Really chuffed, got a few e-mails this morning saying i’d made it into Coco’s gallery online from their Halloween Masked Ball party on Friday! I don’t remember either of these being taken!
This will be my second year, if live in the area it’s something you have to see! Regular trains if your in the East Sussex area, an amazing night out. I’ll make sure i upload videos from tomorrow night, in the meantime here’s one i took last year..! Head down to http://www.lewesbonfirecouncil.org.uk/ for all the details.
Lewes Bonfire 06 from Calabi on Vimeo.
I’m a massive fan of Ubuntu Server, for the longest time i was running my own home server on a very out dated version of Ubuntu Server 5.10 Breezy Badger (When the release names where animals you’d heard of!). What got me started on my Ubuntu server’ing was a little guide on the fantasic HowToForge.com, since then i always check back after every release to see whats changed on there, and what do you know they’re quick off the mark to push out a new for the newest release!
If your just getting started with Linux servers and fancy a grea tutorial this is one for your, it includes all the components needed to practically run your own ISP! So there is a lot of stuff in there you may not need, however it’s worth trying all of it and getting your head around all the possible solutions.
So the last couple of days i’ve been reading loads and loads of reports that Windows 7 (the new operation system from Microsoft) will be tailored to enable amazing support for these new NetBook computers which are storming the market.
In it’s current forum i see the NetBook computer as the second PC, the machine you take on the train, the machine you take on the go, fits in your pocket, designed for surfing the web, word processing and very light computing. Thats what we all think right? NetBooks currently ship with a few options thats i’ve seen so far, Windows XP or some flavor of Linux.
This is a plus right? I’ve always been a massive fan of the open source community, geeks love Linux and there is something that makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside when i think about my family and friends all switching to Linux! But for the normal custumer, they’re looking for a name, and a name they know is Windows.
So at PDC this week it was unveilved that there would be catering to the NetBook market by making Windows 7 run amazingly on these new compact machines, this has its ups and downs.
One thing which is a pro, the market is crashing at the moment, people have less money and these NetBooks may be looked at as a cheaper alternative to a more expensive compact machine with higher specs, i’ve read that student numbers are up on these NetBooks because of the price points. Makes sence..
However i think these NetBooks are really generating awareness to Open Source operating systems, i dont think that people in Currys and PC World are really promoting the open source side to these devices and they would sooner steer people towards the Windows loaded version for “compatibility”!?! So is this a good thing or a bad thing?
I really liked the whole linux on a little machine thing, but i think think it’s going to be able to hang on with Windows storming in with support making it look the best option!? How does the open source market have a a come back to this to make it more appealing to the personal market, we know it works, but they don’t…
What a great way to relunch a blog than with a review…! Ok so i’m talking to a good friend of mine Dan on the phone Tuesday night, and he tells me about a great service called iDrive that was featured on the amazing Lifehacker, so i take a look when i get to a friends house, and you know what! It ain’t half bad.
Cloud computing is only getting bigger, although you get 2GB of FREE cloud storage with the iDrive service (with other storage options avaiable with a PRO account), i would only ever use it for essential backup, 2nd line, so that if my Time Machine backup was distoryed somehow, i would still have access to essential documents. So i signed up on http://www.idrive.com/ very nice sign up process valided my account via e-mail and downloaded the DMG (i’m using the mac version at the moment), and it puts a very annoying ‘ID’ icon in my menu bar, but i can live with that if it works.
iDrive for Mac - Menu Icon
So i get it all up and running and it’s a very simple interface similar to that of an FTP client, which lets you select files you would like backed up regually, then set a time and it’s doing it in the background as fequently as you want it too.
My only grip with storing data in the cloud is that i’d need it to be encrypted, it would be a huge mistake to upload document which could be sensetive to a cloud service that wasn’t encrypted, so at the moment i’m putting them though TrueCrypt - a great product for all platforms, then uploading the encrypted file and keeping the pass key on my removable usb key.
I hope to never have to rely on a service like this as i don’t feel cloud computing is a mature enough standard for backup, i like the idea of having a hard drive which i backup and i’ll be testing this service a 2nd line backup, i hope it works well! Been using it for 2 days now and very impressed so far.
The only thing is i wish there was way which i could get truecrypt to automatically encrypt my data via applescript then idrive can upload the file on a weekly basis, maybe i’ll do some digging!
Get yourself an account now before they make you pay for it!
Copyright © 2008 Dave Bradford. All rights reserved.
