The Ubuntu 8.04 Beta Is Out!

I'm pretty excited. Ubuntu 8.04, due to come in late April, has reached into a beta stage. Most features are well implemented, and development is focused on fixing bugs and such. The cool thing is that they give people the ability to use a counter. This counter counts the days left to the Ubuntu 8.04 release. So, get ready! I'm a little disappointed that there aren't as many new features that are coming to this new release. But keep in mind, Ubuntu 8.04 is the Long Term Support (LTS) release. It will have support for 3 years on the desktop and 5 years on the server. So new features aren't as important as minimizing the bugs on the release. I can understand that.

There is some interesting news for the people who like Kubuntu, the version of Ubuntu with the K Desktop Environment (KDE). Because of the recent release of KDE 4.0, Kubuntu will not be a LTS release. Instead, there will be a Canonical-supported version of Kubuntu with the latest 3.5.x series, which has been used thoroughly. There will also be a community-supported version of Kubuntu 8.04, which will feature the cutting-edge KDE 4.0. So, if you like Kubuntu, be aware of that.

I am pretty excited about the new release that will come out soon, but I would not download the beta for now, unless you want to test it out. Also, try not to download Ubuntu until the new release comes out.

A Quick Review of Windows Live Mail

I recently obtained a Hotmail email account. I never had a Hotmail account before, but I wanted to see what the fuss was about. I had never used Hotmail before, but due to a personal issue, I decided to create one. This review is mostly about the desktop email client, Windows Live Mail than the actual email service, Windows Live Hotmail, but I wanted to tell you why I randomly decided to install it.

I gave Windows Live Mail a try about a few months ago. It didn't work out for me, mostly because I used webmail all of the time. I tried Thunderbird, and I was convinced to keep using a desktop client as my email client. I decided to try Windows Live Mail again, and I like it. I find that the three pane column view, as opposed to the other view that was used in Thunderbird. I also like how it intergrates with other Windows Live services like Windows Live Messenger, Windows Live Writer, and all of the Windows Live online stuff. I also prefer the Vista-ish look that appears in Windows Live Mail. It has been treated as an upgrade to Outlook Express (for Windows XP) and Windows Mail (for Windows Vista), and I agree with that. There are some downsides to it though.

My main problem with it is that it requires Windows Desktop search. I don't have any problem with that tool, but I already have Google Desktop. Two programs indexing my hard drive can really slow down slower computers like mine.

I recommend it if you like Windows Live and need a desktop email client, but if your happy if Thunderbird, or something else, then there is no reason to switch to this.

OpenOffice.org Marketing From The Java Updater

The Java updater asks me to update Java. So I update it and, what do you know? It looks like Sun is giving some neat little ad space for the open-source OpenOffice.org office suite. I'm glad to see that some people may see that when they update their Java and say, "An office suite for free?" Yes, OpenOffice.org is free, but you may be wondering... "What's the catch?" Well, just enter the coupon code "GREATBITBUCKET08" and get 75% off your puchase of OpenOffice.org!

Let's see... Free - 75% = Free!

Anyway, I'm really glad to see that OpenOffice.org can get a little bit more publicity. It's good to see that people can get a capable office suite for free. I'm not saying Microsoft Office is bad or anything. In fact, if I had the money, I'd probably purchase Microsoft Office. But, that's something to think about another day, especially since OpenOffice.org is only getting better and better.

You can get OpenOffice.org at, you guess it, http://www.openoffice.org/.

Why I Switched From AVG Free Edition To ClamWin Antivirus

I used to use (and recommend) AVG Free Edition. What's to say? It was free, it did a good job. It was recommended by other people. I pretty much used it as well as Windows Defender. However, after my recent mess with my computer, I decided to give ClamWin a shot at defending my Windows PC. I am still getting used to it, but one thing really sticks out. Updating the antivirus database is quicker than me typing the end of this sentence. In AVG Free Edition, the updating took forever and actually slowed down the startup of Windows. I can understand that, after all, it is the free edition. That's why I like open-source software like ClamWin. They don't really have an incentive to give you a crippled version of the software. These people throw the best of their skills into forging such software. For this reason, I recommend ClamWin over any other free anti-virus software. If I were to pay though, I would recommend something else, but I don't like to pay for software (who does?), but I am not a software pirate. So, for any person who wants a fast and free antivirus should check out ClamWin.

My Thoughts On Linspire

Linspire is a Linux distribution that tries to be the "world's easiest desktop Linux." It has been criticized heavily because it has extensive use in proprietary software. I don't see much wrong with proprietary software in general. In fact, I like proprietary software, but I also like open-source software. I simply like what software works for me. Now, I haven't tried Linspire, and I don't plan to. I don't have a major problem with Linspire, except for a few things.

For starters, it costs $50 US. That's a good deal when you compare to Windows Vista Home Basic, or even Mac OS X Leopard, but for a Linux distribution, you would still need to justify the cost. I don't see much that I can't get from, let's say, Ubuntu 7.10. Linspire 6.0 is even based on Ubuntu 7.04, the previous release.

Some Linux distributions have similar systems in place for when you need to install certain codecs or hardware drivers. For example, PCLinuxOS, at least when I had previously tried it, could play a ton of propritary formats, it even played Quicktime videos, something I couldn't figure out.

Maybe it's just me, but I don't like their Click 'N Run package managment system. I tried it on my Ubuntu installation a while back and it never worked. But maybe it works our for Linspire, but I like using the Debian and Ubuntu way of handling packages, either by apt-get or through a GUI tool like the Synaptic Package Manager. The RPM format from Red Hat is also something I do like.

With so many new distributions like PCLinuxOS, Linux Mint, and more established distributions like Ubuntu and Fedora stepping up on polish, and even since the community edition of Linspire is available, Freespire came out a while back, why buy Linspire?

What do you guys think about this?

My Computer Is Alive!

I managed to fix my computer by turning it on again, however, I had the urge to restore the computer. I did restore my computer, and I decided to not install anymore programs on this machine, except for the basics. What I mean by that is having OpenOffice.org, Firefox, Thunderbird, WinZip, Paint .NET, iTunes, and ClamWin anti-virus. Pretty sad, huh? My computer runs faster than a cheetah, but only after I restored it, removed all of the "crapware" that comes with the PC, install ALL updates, critical or not, installing all of my open-source programs (nearly all of my programs are open-source, with the exceptions of iTunes, QuickTime, WinZip, Adobe Reader and of course, Windows. For those of you who need to know what software I run, I'll just give you a quick rundown of what I've got.

• ClamWin Antivirus
• Firefox
• Thunderbird
• iTunes
• QuickTime
• Adobe Reader
• PDFCreator
• OpenOffice.org
• Paint .NET

I personally think that it is a little pathetic that my computer can run so fast, but only if I have just a few programs.

I'm gonna backup my data more often...