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20020709 Lockergnome Penguin ShellÂ  07.09.2002 PenguinREPORT
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today!I don't usually spend much time explaining metaphors. They are, after all, 
metaphorical. They can be filled with whatever symbolism you choose. Written 
well, we all come to some similar understanding of their meaning. But, I'll 
depart today, contrary to my normal practice, to take a few minutes explaining a 
recent metaphor.I'm a Linux guy through and through. As a user, I see myself as right about at 
the average on the curve. For love of the language and open source attitude, 
though, you'd be hard-pressed to find anyone with quite the same level of 
enthusiasm. Put simply, there's very little about the Linux and broader open 
source worlds that I don't like or believe in.Take, for example, the practice of recursive acronyms. GNU ("Gnu's Not Unix"), 
HURD ("Herd of Unix-Replacing Daemons"), WINE ("Wine Is Not an Emulator"), even 
PHP ("PHP Hypertext Processor") - all carry on the tradition of recursion in the 
Unix/Linux world. Goofy as it sounds, I love this stuff.So it is that I set out to create a recursive metaphor last week. It could only 
have happened on or about the 4th of July. In fact, it happened in the edition 
of the 3rd. I wrote a piece about how we Americans spend more time over the 
course of a year talking about what's wrong with our system than what's 
right. I wrote it knowing full well that many of the responses I'd get would be 
a) from readers outside the US and b) in sharp disagreement to my comments or 
those of citizens of other countries. You're following me, right? People would 
disagree with an article that said we spend much time disagreeing. This, of 
course, would prove my point in a somewhat metaphorical way - the perfect 
recursive metaphor. The point was to be made yet more perfectly by the eventual 
inclusion in Penguin Shell of the comments of someone from outside the US 
disagreeing with my take our argumentativeness as Americans. Ideally, they would 
be comments that disagreed with our collective American perception of being 
disagreeable. They would, of course, point out things about which citizens of 
other countries can disagree with Americans on. By exercising the right to 
disagree, we'd subtly agree that we have that right. Yet another level of 
recursion and a final layer of metaphor.The response to both my own and Johan Sauviller's comments was overwhelming. In 
the main, I believe both were appreciated. Many commented on the balance of the 
two pieces. Some readers were surprised, I think, to see a dissenting opinion 
published so quickly, if at all. Overall, the ability to express honestly held 
opinions, to agree and to disagree on a global level closed the circle on the 
metaphor in a perfect way.Things have, however, gotten a bit more ugly in the past few days. I'm not sure 
whether some were slow in getting to the July 3rd issue, or whether it's just 
been stewing since then. Take, for instance, these comments by a reader who will 
remain mercifully nameless:
We get enough
America bashing from our left-wing whacko extremist press and schools here
in the USA that we don't wish to hear some (insert favorite adjective here)
from Belgium whining too!
Followed by:
... please don't let Tony single-handedly tarnish the fine reputation
of Lockergnome. I'm sure there are other articulate Linux experts out there who 
would be able to replace him.
... and, in a later note on the topic ...
Censorship is to be encouraged in a
free-market society whenever and wherever it doesn't come from the
government.
Clearly, the metaphor just whizzed right over the heads of some.
Chris 
has been great about allowing all his authors plenty of room in the editorial 
piece at the beginning of each newsletter. This particular piece is no 
exception. He's shown a quiet confidence in the face of some very shrill 
comments. While we all generally stay focused on technical issues, Chris has 
shown unwavering support for the notion that we geeks are, in the end, humans 
with opinions and thoughts to share. I think it's one of the things that makes 
the Lockergnome newsletters stand out from the pack - the personal touch.So, despite the irrationality of some of this week's comments, I'll continue to 
occasionally throw in a personal aside with the technical stuff.Just watch out. Recursive metaphors are only funny until someone puts an eye 
out.
Tony
Steidler-DennisonÂ Â Â Â Â Â Â Â GnomeTWEAK
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your set TODAY, ONLY $29.95!Win Apps in Linux?Yesterday, I mentioned an interesting review of two products for Linux by CodeWeavers - CrossOver 
Office and CrossOver Plugin. You've probably heard of both by now, as they've 
garnered quite a bit of publicity both in and out of the Linux world. You'll 
recall that I promised to try to secure copies for review this week. With the 
help of a friendly sales rep at CodeWeavers, I was able to accomplish that task 
this morning. True to the second half of the promise, we'll spend the next few 
days looking at these two products and how they might impact your Linux use. 
Let's take them in chronological order, starting today with CrossOver Plugin.A bit of background is in order. CodeWeavers is, in their own words, " ... the 
leading corporate backer of the Wine Project. Wine has been, for the past several years, an 
ongoing project to port Windows applications to Linux. It's a tough goal, but 
it's also one that's been undertaken by others in the past year or so. Though the progress has been 
slow, the Wine project has managed to stay at the front of this development 
realm.
CrossOver 
Plugin marks a change in the philosophy of the Wine Project. Prior to its 
release, Wine had taken a "full system" approach. Running Windows applications 
in Wine required the installation of a sizeable daemon and no small amount of 
configuration work. CrossOver Plugin has moved Wine away from the system-wide 
approach to one that's much more modular. Rather than executing at system 
startup, Wine is called as-needed, with the virtual Windows path to the called 
program. When the program is closed, so is Wine. CrossOver Plugin has focused on creating Linux functionality with one related set of Windows 
applications: browser plugins.The results stand as a clear indication that the change in philosophy is a 
success. Off the top, CrossOver Plugin bundles QuickTime 5, Windows Media Player 6.2, Shockwave 8.5, Flash 6, and RealPlayer 8 into a Linux-accesible browser 
plugin package. Throw in more esoteric apps like IPix, Trillian, Authorware Web 
Player 6 and eFax Messenger 2, and you've got virtually every need plugin need 
covered.But this package doesn't stop there. Included in the CrossOver Plugin package 
are viewers for Word, Excel and Powerpoint, as well as several 
Microsoft-oriented fonts. Honestly, I was stunned at the range of applications 
offered by the CodeWeavers developers.Having had some experience with Wine, I was a bit leery about the install 
process and about the ability to get all these great applications to work with 
my RedHat setup. I've never been completely successful with Wine, but I hoped 
for the best when I started the CrossOver Plugin installation. I really did want these apps to work.The installation was quite easy. By running the install-crossover.sh script from the command line, I was able to install the installers for both CrossOver Plugin and CrossOver Office, which we'll talk about tomorrow. I started the plugin 
installs with QuickTime, a tool I've admittedly missed in Linux. In the 
background, CrossOver Plugin had already created a virtual C:\ drive on my 
machine. I clicked on the QuickTime install and immediately saw a familiar sight - the Vise installer in its Windows format. CrossOver Plugin first checked for 
feedback from the Windows binary, opened a virtual Windows window, then stepped 
out while the Vise installer took care of the rest. Though the install failed 
four times, it appeared to be a server failure rather than a failure of the 
CrossOver program. I kept "retry"ing and, with some persistence, managed to get 
a full QuickTime 5 install downloaded from the Apple servers. Quite literally, 
the install looked and performed exactly as I've seem many times in Windows. 
When the install was completed, CrossOver again checked for the Windows binary, 
located the appropriate .dll files in the virtual C:\ drive and dropped the 
plugins into the /home/tony/.netscape/plugins and /home/tony/.mozilla/plugins 
directories.The process was so smooth that I had to check the plugin listings in these 
browsers - "Help", "About Plugins." Sure enough, the CrossOver QuickTime plugin 
was listed. Quickly, I ran out to the Apple site and opened the "Men In Black 
II" movie trailer. QuickTime performed flawlessly.I followed with the Windows Media Player, Shockwave, Flash, IPix, and eFax 
Messenger installs. Of those, the only ones that weren't self-contained in the 
CrossOver install were IPix and eFax. Even at that, the installer pointed me to 
the Windows download then found the .exe file when the download was done. Within a half-hour, I had all installed and tested.Then, just for grins, I installed RealPlayer 8 via CrossOver. This was despite 
the recommendation in the installer screen to use the Linux version. It went as 
smoothly as the others with one caveat - the player played media files at a much faster speed than that in Windows. Fast enough to make me laugh, in fact, 
reminded of Dave and Alvin the Chipmunk. Ah well, six out of seven is pretty 
strong given my previous troubles with Wine.I also installed a few fonts - Arial, Times New Roman, Trebuchet, and Veranda. 
In every case, the install was quick and absolutely painless.Wine has always held great promise. At times, it's been painful to watch the 
tedious pace of development, only because that promise was so alluring. With the backing of CodeWeavers and a fundamental change in the approach to development, 
Wine has finally realized the goal of integrating Windows applications 
seamlessly into the stable Linux environment. The results are so strong that, if I didn't know better, I'd swear that a few of these plugins actually run better 
in Linux than in their native Windows. Honestly, I didn't realize how much I 
missed them until I started using them in Linux today.Tomorrow holds a few surpirses, with a look at CodeWeavers' CrossOver Office 
package.
Recommend It!
Send us a 
GnomeTWEAKÂ GnomeCORE
Kernel Configuration - Part IXWe're nine parts into the kernel configuration series, with quite a bit yet to 
go. If you haven't been following along, we're breaking out the configuration 
screens one at a time in an attempt to shed some light on the purpose and 
function of each. With that knowledge, you should be able to make a clear 
decision as to how to configure each section.Today, it's the Parallel Port support section. This is pretty simple. If you 
need parallel port support - such as for a printer - select this option either 
as a driver built into the kernel or as a loadable module.Most will use the PC-style hardware option in conjuction with a Windows printer. But that's not all the parallel port can be used for. As an example, the builds 
I did with the telescope company required parallel port support, as the 
telescope cameras were attached to this port.Be aware - this kernel configuration option only makes a driver available for 
the parallel port. The computer's BIOS sets the mode for the port - ECP, EPP, or Auto. On the majority of modern computers, the Auto mode is the default and will work just fine. However, if you have problems communicating with your printer 
following a kernel recompile, try changing the mode of your printer in the 
BIOS.Tomorrow, it's Plug and Play configuration.
Recommend It!
Send us a GnomeCORE 
tipÂ GnomeFILE
Netics 2.0http://www.citi.umich.edu/u/marius/netics/"Netics is an extensible network statistics collector. It puts the network 
interface in promiscuous mode and reads the data stream (after it strips off the appropriate protocol headers), then displays the results at specified intervals, either in a "progress bar" mode or as raw statistics. Currently, it supports 2 
statistics, both involving entropy: LZW compressability and Ueli Maurer's 
universal statistical test. Maurer's test is a very good and comprehensive 
measure of entropy, but requires a large amount of data. The LZW statistic 
requires much less data."
Recommend It!
Send us a GnomeFILE 
suggestionÂ GnomeVOICE
Helping Hand
Scribbled by Karl Steenblik"Dear Linux community at Lockergnome."I am the web master for largest health care camp in the State of Utah. 
No not Cancer camp it is the Diabetic camp."The Foundation for Children and Youth with Diabetes serves about 900
diabetic children a year and their families.  We have education, family
support, diet planning and most important is camp.  The place where kids
can learn about how to better manage their disease."We are a totally non profit camp that puts all money from fees into our
camp.  We pay no salaries to Physicians, Dietitians, Social Workers,
Nurses and educators that make our camp possible.  Yes even me the lowly
web master donates his time and web space at ATT to the cause."ATT recently decided to pull access to our photo page due to a password
protection.  We give out a password to all parents so that they can see
photos of camp while the sessions are happening.  We do not however what
the creeps of the web to have access to photos of our kids."We are looking for someone in the state to help our camp by donating web
space.  Now it may not be your organization, but I know Linux people and
Lockergnome and I think someone there may know someone who would be able
to help us."You can still have access to the public part of our site that ATT has not
shut down at www.fcyd-inc.org."Please I have the parents of 120 diabetic kids wanting to see photos of
their children.  They are all e-mailing me and I have no one to turn to."Hoping to hear from someone soon."Karl R Steenblik
Webmaster FCYD camp
Salt Lake City.
Help Karl.Recommend It!
Speak your 
GnomeVOICEÂ GnomeCLICK
Mobilix.org
http://mobilix.org/Mobilix.org is a full site related to using Linux on mobile devices, including 
PDAs and laptops. It includes information for subsctibing to the linux-laptop 
mailing list, information on Linux-powered wearable computers, WAP enabled 
access, and Linux on cell phones. Mobilix looks to be a great resource for all 
kinds of tips, tricks and useful information for taking your Linux on the 
road.
Recommend It!
Suggest a 
GnomeCLICKhttp://www.lockergnome.com/issues/penguinshell/20020709.html
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page. Use of the Gnome moniker by Penguin Shell does not imply endorsement of 
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Shell is an equal-opportunity desktop employer. For further information, please 
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