Xigga

Let me bring up the main selling points for Linux: free, stable, runs on many different platforms, millions of applications, very large user base. Those are the major benefits of Linux. What’s missing is ease of use. Sure you can install Linux and use it as it is, but when it comes to installing software it’s a pain in the butt.

They do have package systems such as RPM, Debian packages, and the Gentoo portage system. Gentoo’s portage system is the best of all. It will handle the dependencies for you. And when you are installing any thing on Linux you will be in “dependency hell.” Try to install any software that doesn’t come with the distribution and it will require 10 other things to install. RPM and .deb packages will not handle that. They will just give an error. Then off you go finding the missing dependencies. But wait! You start to install those dependencies and you will find those dependencies also have their own dependencies. It’s like a pyramid. The portage system solves the issue, but it’s not for the average Joe. The average Joe wants a point-and-click system, and no one can blame him. Not everyone is technically inclined or has time to learn/troubleshoot problems. They have work to do.

The craziest thing I don’t get is why distributions don’t install the kernel source by default. They know, at one time or another, the user will have to build a software from source. Not all software is going to come in a RPM package. Some users encounter this very early after installing the OS. They try to build a driver and it won’t build without the kernel source.

Drivers are a huge issue in Linux. If all the drivers come with your distro, then you are good. But if you happen to have a device that the distro doesn’t have drivers for, then you are screwed. I think more people are in the latter category, including me. The two most important drivers you would need are video and network. I was able to build the driver and load it, but it still did not work. I quit, and formated the partition back to NTFS. A few months later I tried it again, this time they had the driver for my network card. Yay! But now I needed to install the driver for my video card (nVidia). My video card is supported. I built the driver, and tried to get the X Window system to use it. Somehow it killed the X Window System and I was never able to get it to work. So it was formatting time.

My attempts at using Linux before this have been the same. Whenever I try to customize my OS, it breaks! Very f***ing annoying when you spend 3 hours installing it thinking you picked all the packages and settings right. This is why Windows keeps winning. Window is far from perfect, but it is easier for average Joe’s to use and easier for administrators to fix issues. Need to install a driver, just download it, right click the .inf file, click “Install”, and reboot. I can live with rebooting, as long as I can get back into my system.

I am technically inclined, but I don’t want to spend hours or days trying to figure what why something is not working. I know a lot of Linux users are going to be pissed off at me writing this article, but it needs to be done. The driver installation and the X Window System need to be addressed. They need to be standardized. Most people don’t want to know the inner workings of an OS to use it. Would you want to know the inner workings of a car to use it? It would be something like this: you get in, turn the fuel injector on, turn the radiator on, try to start the car, find out why didn’t start. Two hours later, try to start car again, find out why it won’t go into reverse gear, and on and on. Screw “freedom to choose”, just standardize the damn thing. This is why some hardware manufacturers don’t make Linux drivers. They have to design the driver for billion different user options. And if the driver doesn’t work on some weird idiot’s “customized” box, they would have to support it and spend hours finding the freaking problem.

I would love to use Linux. I like the features you can get with it and all the free software, but it’s just not worth the effort. Even the Ubuntu/Kubuntu distros are a pain in the butt. I’ve tried Redhat, SuSE, Debian, Gentoo, Kubuntu, Mandriva, and Knoppix. Couldn’t get any to work write.

Remarkable discovery! I wish I was a woman right now.

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I upgraded to v2.5 last week from v2.3. After the upgrade, the “pages” don’t work for permalinks. If you click the “About” link above, it will return an error saying no posts were found. But if I do it without permalinks, and add a “preview” parameter to the query string it works.

• Works: http://www.xigga.com/index.php?page_id=2&preview=true

• Doesn’t work: http://www.xigga.com/index.php/about/

I have submitted this to the feedback forum on wordpress.org here.  We’ll see what happens.  I don’t feel like going around and fixing it myself so we’ll just have to sit tight until a fix comes out.

Sorry for the downtime.  I got spyware on my server and had to wipe the OS clean and re-install it.  The system crashed, and I was able to get it back up and running but it was too much work to get the Spyware off.

I got MySQL server up and running and Apache in no time, but getting effing PHP up with MySQL is a freaking hard task.  My servers are installed on a separate hardrive so there were no changes to any config files.  The hardrive letter stayed the same.

I added my PHP folder to the PATH variable.  Still didn’t work.  I made sure that libmysql.dll was in the PATH also.  php.ini didn’t need any changes, the extenstion=mysqli.dll was already uncommented.  I tried copying libmysql.dll to my system32 folder, still no luck.  I did several reboots, and it still wouldn’t work.  It was 3:00 AM in the morning and I had to goto work at 9:00 AM, so I went o sleep ticked off.

It’s always and issue with PHP and MySQL.  I’ve had to wipe my OS clean at least once a year and everytime it’s the same issue.  I started searching the web for it and found some information on things to try.  I’d tried all that, but I saw one requirement that I didn’t do.  I didn’t copy php.ini over to the C:\Windows directory.  PHP was working fine, so I didn’t think I would need to copy it over to the Windows directory.  And also because I had added the PHP directory to my PATH variable.  I copied it over anyways and it worked… go figure.

I’m starting to use SQL Server for a project at work. I’m learning new things about it everyday. Yesterday I learned that SQL Server doesn’t have an ENUM field type, which MySQL has. Today I learned that SQL Server 2005 doesn’t have support for the LIMIT keyword, which is an SQL standard. Instead you have to use 3 nested SELECT queries to get the job done in SQL Server 2000 or before. In SQL Server 2005 you can use a different query, which is still not as simple as having the LIMIT keyword.

SQL Server 2000

SQL Server 2005

MySQL

Which one do you like more?

Source

Toshiba Quits HD DVD Business, Handing Victory in Format Battle to Blu-Ray Disc Technology

TOKYO (AP) — Toshiba said Tuesday it will no longer develop, make or market HD DVD players and recorders, handing a victory to rival Blu-ray disc technology in the format battle for next-generation video.

Read more…

I will be gone for 3.5 weeks.  So no new articles or updates…

I’d love to meet this guy.

Bush has figured out a cheap way of find a reason to attack and invade Iran. Whether the Iranian boats were harassing the US Ships or not, I don’t know, but apparently there is a protest by the US on it. WTF!? These people are playing stupid kiddie games. Grow up! “Ooohh, you tried to touch my little boat.” Quite childish. Wouldn’t US, or rather Bush ask for a detailed explanation first?

You can read about the [silly] protest here.

Need to download the latest desi movies and songs? Here are some desi torrent sites:

DesiTorrents — Largest fish in the ocean. It went down for a month, because of financial problems. It’s back up an running.
iDesiR — Going strong as the second largest. Always has new torrents.
IMTorrents — Was out of service because of financial problems, but is now back up and running. Registrations are open so hurry up!
BBrG — Big Baby Release Group… Nah just kidding. Not sure what BBrG stands for. Not very active. Most torrents here are from the two bigger sites.

All these sites are ratio sites, so you must upload as much as you download. This keeps the sites alive. Another benefit to you is that it prevents AIDS.

* Above mentioned sites are not FDA approved.