E3 – R.I.P.

Well, it appears that E3, the Electronics Entertainment Expo, is dead.  Something about cost vs. return for the participants was out of kilter.

Check out the story on Joystiq here.

Looks like I fell victim to the rumor mill.  40 lashings for me.

Trying Linux again… :::sigh:::

Will I ever learn?

I was reading a thread about how OpenSuSE 10.1 is buggy as hell, particularly when it comes to installing the bootloader (duh!) A few people had said that 10.0 was a much more stable release, so I fired up the bit torrent client and grabbed the OpenSuSE 10.0 .iso file. 

Got it installed, and indeed, it wrote the bootloader without an incident.  Played around in it for awhile, but really wanted to go to 10.1 so I could reinstall XGL, so I did the update routine with a bit of trepidation.  Amazingly, everything worked just fine and I got XGL working again.

Only, after getting XGL working, I was unable to launch Firefox from the desktop shortcut.  Jeez – is anything going to go correctly when it comes to Linux?

Vista – I’m so glad the bitch is gone…

Well, was finally able to get Vista fully removed from my machine.

Decided to install Kubuntu 6.0.6. Amazingly, it didn’t fry the MBR during installation, but something else odd happened (Although, I now know why.)  For this particular attempt, I decided to install Linux over the top of the Vista install. After installing Kubuntu and rebooting, I was presented with the Linux bootloader (don’t recall whether it was LILO or GRUB, but it doesn’t matter.) So, I boot into Linux to make sure everything is working correctly.  After getting the networking set up, I reboot to check that XP works.

Thank you, Norton Ghost!

For some strange reason, I decided to do a Norton Ghost “backup” of my active system drive this morning.  Don’t ask me why, I just got a wild hair, I guess.

 So, then I have the whole “Linux debacle.”  Unable to boot into Windows after Linux screwed the MBR (see previous post below.)

Here’s what I tried:

Linux is pissing me off…

Well, attempted to reinstall Linux today, and guess what?  It fucked my MBR again(!) so now WinXP won’t boot anymore.  :::sigh::: And Linux supporters wonder why the masses won’t use it?  Could it be because of occurances like this?

Actually, it’s probably not Linux’s fault in this case.  It was working once before, but now, it refuses to correctly write the MBR.  If anyone has suggestions (real, legitimate suggestions, not smartassed comments,) please comment.

XBox 360… 361… whatever it takes.

Jeez, everyone’s blogging these days…  even my XBox 360!

ScannerRob

ScannerRob

Originally uploaded by okiegeek.

I’ve been digging on the trailer for the upcoming movie, “A Scanner Darkly” for a couple of months now. I’ve really grown to love the animation style. My wife says that one of the major insurance companies has a television ad campaign with graphics similar to “A Scanner Darkly,” but I can’t remember who it is.

I found a Photoshop macro/script HERE that creates a comic book styled image. After removing the color halftone, this is what’s left. It’s in the vain of Scanner, but not exact.

XGL Screenshots

XGL Screenshot 1

Originally uploaded by okiegeek.

That’s my blog on the left, and Gmail on the right, each in one of Linux’s multiple desktops. Hold Ctrl and Alt, left click and drag right or left to change desktops with 3D acceleration.

xgl_desktop2

Transparent windows. Each window’s transparency can be adjusted on the fly. You can also make windows become transparent when moving them on screen.

xgl_desktop3

Similar to Apple’s F9 command, a user-defined hotkey will shrink all onscreen windows and display them so you can easily navigate from one window to another. Very handy when you have multiple windows buried on your desktop.

xgl_desktop4
Not a “productivity booster,” but interesting all the same. OpenGL and 3-D hardware can produce some interesting results. This is a window that’s being moved onscreen.

(UPDATE) XGL on OpenSUSE

Let me start out by saying this: So-called “non-destructive” partitioning software is anything but non-destructive.

After watching the latest episode of Digital Life TV, I downloaded and burned the GParted live linux distro because it was recommended as being one of the best non-destructive partition editing solutions out there (and it’s free!)

When I had installed OpenSuSE, the default “idiot proof” partitioning scheme made my root partition to be right at 5 gigs. After installing both Gnome AND KDE for desktop environments, I was pushing 94% of the disk capacity. So, I tried booting from GParted to shrink my home partition and increase my root partition.

First, I shrunk the home partition. Then, I tried to take the unallocated space produced from shrinking the home partition and add it to the root partition. Nope, didn’t work. So, I exit out of GParted, and boot back into OpenSuSE, only to find that all of the title bars have disappeared from all of my windows and apps. :::sigh::: So, I reinstalled everything from scratch, including XGL. Much easier the second time around. I even used the links from the linkdump at this blog’s previous entry to navigate to my info sources, so I’m sure they’ll work for you too. One thing, though. When you install OpenSuSE, make sure you install the kernel development. You’ll need it for installing the nVidia drivers.

XGL on OpenSUSE

I’ve been toying with Linux since 1999 when I bought Caldera Linux at the local CompUSA. I had just built my first PC after using Mac’s for 6 years and I had blown my budget on hardware and didn’t have an OS to put on the machine. So, rather than having the machine sit there until I had a spare $200 for Windows, I spent $30 on Linux. Let’s just say the experience was less than enjoyable. Hardware detection was no where near where it is today, and installing applications or drivers was a certified pain-in-the-you-know-where. But, it let me do SOMETHING with the collection of hardware I had just assembled, so I looked past the “issues.”

I later got into Mandrake. You know, they say that the best learned lessons are the hardest, and in the case of linux, it was certainly true for me. I roached my Windows install while trying to install Mandrake because I didn’t understand the partition naming conventions, but lo and behold, I eventually got it sucessfully dual booting and living in harmony with my Windows install. Only problem was, I was using a USB DSL modem (the tech guy who took my order over the phone asked what OS’s I used, and either a.) didn’t listen when I said, “Linux AND Windows or b.) didn’t know that Linux didn’t recognise USB network connections… idiot.) and Linux wouldn’t see my modem. So, no online for me.

About six months ago, a friend introduced me to “live Linux distros.” A cool concept… boot off a CD/DVD, and run a fully functioning Linux system without worrying about partitioning. One of the distros he brought over was Ubuntu, which, is one of my favorite distros of all time. Runs “live” or installs off the same DVD. And, due to the ongoing maturity of Linux, is much easier for someone to use. Check it out here.

A week or so ago, I was perusing Digital Life TV and found an episode where they were doing a segment on 42″ plasma televisions. Since I’m in the market for one, I downloaded the show. In this particular episode, they did a story on XGL, a new technology for using 3-D acceleration in the GUI. They were running it on OpenSUSE, but since I had already dedicated my “extra” hard drive to a Vista beta install, I started searching for a “live” distro with XGL already installed. I found Kororaa, downloaded it, and booted off of it. It worked…sort of. The only “effect” I could sucessfully use was the window wobble effect. Having seen more on DL TV, I decided to follow their path and install OpenSUSE.

Installation of OpenSUSE was effortless. I used the auto-partition option on my spare hard drive (which, if I had it to do over again, I would use the “custom” partition option… my home partition is too big and my root partition is too small for my tastes, but, oh well,) and left it to do its thing while I played some CoD2 on the 360. After about 45 mins, I came back, configured some basic stuff, and booted into OpenSUSE.

Now, the other part… installing XGL. According to DL TV’s show, they got a lot of really good help from OpenSUSE’s XGL site. Check that out HERE. So, away I went. Downloaded the 4 packages and installed them, only to discover that my aging GeForce3 card isn’t in XGL’s database. :::sigh::: I had heard/read somewhere that my card was, indeed, acceptable for XGL, so off to Google I went to do some investigating. I learned that the default “nv” driver for nVidia cards does not work with XGL, so I went to nVidia’s site to grab the updated graphics driver. Okay, so I run the driver package file from the console and learn that it won’t install with XServer running. So, back to Google to figure out how to kill the XServer. So, I kill the XServer, run the driver install, and then run the “control panel” to enable XGL. After creating a couple of shell files, placing them where they need to go, making them executeable, and then running the XGL control panel thingy again, nothing. Still no 3D effects, but I can select/deselect options for the 3D desktop. After a bit more reading, I discover that I have to jump out of KDE and log back in. Okay, so I do that, and then…

Wow. Some of the effects are pure eye candy (ripple, wobbly windows, etc) but some of them serve an actual purpose. Adjustable window transparency, a feature similar to Apple’s F9 thing in OSX (can’t remember the name of it,) and interesting desktop switching.

The process took me a couple of hours from start to finish, but I could probably do the same thing in 15-30 minutes now that I know what I’m doing. When it comes to linux, I’m a complete idiot, but I was able to figure it out. And, OpenSUSE’s XGL site is an excellent resource.

I’m pretty sure that I’m going to install Ubuntu back onto my hard drive and see if I have the same success with installing XGL there as I did in OpenSUSE. Stay tuned for that.

LINKDUMP:

OpenSUSE’s XGL Page:

How to install nVidia drivers on OpenSUSE

XGL Troubleshooting on OpenSUSE

Tidbits for nVidia driver installation (This was very helpful to me!)

General info for XGL on OpenSUSE: