Since my last posting (Weird X freeze on Ubuntu 9.04, part umpteen), the problem with X freezing still seems to be present, despite the bug report saying it was fixed in development versions of Ubuntu 9.10.  I upgraded to 9.10 on Friday, and have had a couple of freezes since then.  Just now, I have just over 40h on the uptime meter.  I think this is because I'm logging out before suspending the computer.  Anyway, logging in is better than having freezes which require a reboot!

Well, I know this is tempting fate, but I've got 48:03 on the uptime monitor, so perhaps the recent Karmic xserver updates I've recently installed have sorted out the X freezes (see here, here and here).  If so, I am mighty relieved, as this was a bit of a show-stopper for me.

Update: now 61h14m, but sometimes it logs me out when I resume from suspend.  Guess that's a risk one takes when one is using the alpha version of Ubuntu GNU/Linux 9.10?

This story popped across my screen this morning:Microsoft patents phylogenetic comparative methods. . . say what? - Dechronization blog  (hat tip, PJ over at Groklaw).  Bizarrely, Microsoft appear to be patenting a method for Clustering Phylogenetic Variation Patterns.” The authors of the blog article are understandably a bit agitated about this (see this neat graphic).  The author of the Dechronization blog article, Liam Revell, writes:

The patent filing, by Stuart Ozer, claims invention of a variety of techniques already in wide use by systematists and evolutionary biologists – and (so far as I could tell) none of these inventions are original in quality. The whole patent filing can be read (at one’s own risk) in its entirety here

Apologies for the intermittent service over the last 24 hours.  I appear to be having database issues, which I'm trying to rectify.  I'd expect access to the site to be a bit flaky for the next day or so until I can get this fixed.

I've been using Joomla! quite extensively over the past few years, and at the moment have four websites built in Joomla! (version 1.5.11 at the time of writing):

Flies&Bikes (this site - uses the commercial blogging component MyBlog)

Well, I now have an embryonic website.  And I've got to grips with the document structure (actually, it makes a lot of sense to me).  User access permissions seem to be more configurable than the default state in Joomla.

Unfortunately my Ubuntu laptop threw a wobbly this morning while I was editing menus, and that had the effect of damaging the database.  Had a bit of trouble repairing the damage, but all seems to be well now.  

OK, so installing the FCKeditor (see part 1) was quite fiddly.  I've now installed a couple more add-on modules, and they were pretty easy to do.

Taxonomy Menu - I'm hoping to be able to list key words for research topics as a menu or tag cloud.  Not had time to play with this.

Installing Internet Exploiter 8* on a laptop that dual boots Linix and WinXP...it's checking for malicious software**...will it spot Windows?

*Need this to check development websites.

I have just upgraded this site's blogging software from MyBlog version 2 to version 3 (from Azrul), everything seems to be working OK, but let me know if there are any issues.  I have noticed cosmetic changes, most notably the raindrop panel on the front page, but there seem to be significant improvements in the system's functionality (this posting is mostly to see how they work!). 

The Internet seems to be abuzz with a new "natural language" search engine called WolframAlpha, widely touted as a Google-killer.  But what the heck is it, and how does it work?  More to the point, how much will it cost?

There's a video from WolframAlpha which seeks to explain it...though it looks pretty spiffy, I guess they've chosen topics they know will produce visually arresting output.   Cnet News has a useful article (Wolfram Alpha shows data in a way Google can't) featuring opinion from several users.

The latest release of Ubuntu linux (Ubuntu 9.04 - Jaunty Jackalope) was released a couple of days ago.  In case you were wondering, this is a jackalope (by "Albrecht Durer" - published here on April 1st, 2008): 

So, all four upgrades completed, with absolutely no problems or hitches (at least none that have manifest themselves so far).  Now, I'm fairly competent at running my computers, but I wouldn't class myself as a serious "under-the-hood" mechanic.  That's to say, I'm happy enough to mess around with config files, set up hardware and all that, but I don't have the sophisticated understanding that would allow me to appreciate subtle changes between Ubuntu releases. That being said, presumably there must be some evidence of an upgrade?

Gnome - this is my preferred desktop environment, and with Compiz effects is quite flashy enough for me.  (I've always found KDE a little garish for my tastes.  I did give KDE4 a whirl when it was released, but it seemed a bit flaky at that time.  I'll try it again in the coming months as I hear it's  a bit more stable now, and it's quite possible that it offers a fresh new way of using the desktop.)  Gnome seems to be characterised by small incremental changes - here we have version 2.26, which on the faceof it seems pretty much the same as before.  You can read about the main changes at the gnome website.

 xkcd on Windows 7.  Actually, I'm looking forward to seeing Windows 7 - my experiences with Vista were rather unsatisfactory.  Mind you, I'm a confirmed Ubuntu user these days...

The recently announced Microsoft patent action against TomTom has brought the Groklaw blog out of its semi-retirement.  Groklaw made it's name by documenting, often in surprising detail, the SCO vs Linux debacle, which is still continuing with SCO in bankruptcy protection (actually the case was a series of legal actions involving SCO, IBM, Novell, Red Hat to name a few).  Since the SCO vs Novell case, upon which much of the rest of this legal fiasco depends, is essentially over, with SCO sitting in the bankruptcy courts, Groklaw has been in semi-retirement with its prime author, PJ, taking time out to consolidated the library of posts and documents she has acquired over the last few years.

Over the years, Groklaw has followed a variety of cases where Open Source Software (OSS), and in particular software released under the GPL, and in many cases the shadowy presence of Microsoft has been inferred by contributors.  Now it seems that Microsoft has finally decided to direct the big guns of the broken US software patent system at the GPS manufacturer TomTom.  This is a complex action, including the use of the FAT file system.

Quite a few postings on internet tech sites tell us that the new MS browser, IE 8, is nearing release.  The Register tells us that the marketing strategy seems to involve MS employees being asked to send out enthusiastic emails to to 10 friends each, in a sort of chain letter style.

This isn't of much direct impact to me as a Linux user, but I am amused by its reported dual function mode: the default mode being adherence to web standards, and a "compatibility mode" that will work with all those websites that were built for use with earlier non-standards-adhering versions of IE.  So, I suppose that's progress of sorts. 

For those of us who've been following ill-fated and badly led software company SCO's ill-judged crusade against Linux (see Groklaw for a full history), The Register has an amusing story (SCO boss to customers: 'Blah. Blah. Blah') - pointing out that SCO's website features a rather bizarre message from Company President Jeff Hunsaker.

Just in case SCO wake up to this cockup, those cheeky chaps at El Reg have saved a copy.

Over the weekend I've been playing around with Wordpress, having set up a blog over at wordpress.com, where you can set up a blog spectacularly quickly (as you can over with Google's blogger.com).  As a fairly experienced Joomla! user, I found the hosted blog slightly restrictive (for example I would have to pay a daily rate of $0.04 just to be able to edit the theme's css file).

I ended up doing a test installaion on my notebook, firstly using a dedicated database, then trying out incorporating its database within my main Joomla! database.  It turns out to be pretty straightforward to migrate content (though I imagine one would exceed the import limit quite quickly on an active blog).

The Windows Internet Explorer (Pre-Release Beta 2 Version 8) Privacy Statement makes for interesting reading.  Some excerpts follow (emphasis mine)

Suggested Sites

Ars Technica reports that SCO, the bankrupt (both morally and financially) company with a tangled history of amalgamations and renaming, and which has been fighting a losing battle against Linux (via courtroom debacles with Novell, IBM, Autozone and Red Hat) has filed a fourth reorganisation plan.  The whole sorry saga of how SCO's deluded CEO Darl McBride dragged the company into a legal morass can be read at the famous and excellent Groklaw blog.  With SCO's claims mere dust in the wind, Groklaw appears to be entering a phase of consolidation, as it sorts through the astonishing quantity of court filings and other documentation and comment the site has generated over the last four years or so since SCO launched is big action against IBM.  During that period, the story has been spectacularly convoluted, ultimately revealing that not only does SCO not own Unix copyrights, but that they actually owed Novell a significant wad of cash (still unpaid as SCO use it to bankroll continued legal action).

As far as I know, and despite his role in the company's looming demise, McBride seems to remain at the helm and is presumably one of the four top executives in line for continued remuneration.

There's a rather depressing article in Ars Technica (UK ISPs playing Grinch with P2P throttling, surf data, video?)about ISP attitudes to the service they provide (or not) in the UK.  AT focusses on  three areas in which the ISPs want to maximise their profits, in some cases by restricting costs (throttling P2P services), selling our data (by deep packet inspection, such as the vile Phorm system), and by demanding payments from broadcasters such as the BBC (because they have the temerity to introduce a very popular service such as iPlayer).

I'm not a BitTorrent user, but I feel rather anxious that a legal application like BitTorrent, which can of course be used for entirely legal activities such as legal downloading of videos, games, and software can be throttled back on the basis (or rather the explanation used to deflect criticism) that some people abuse it for illegal activities.  Of course this is a bit weasly, the real situation is that the ISPs have pitched their services at a price that doesn't cover the bandwidth people use.  Their solution seems to be to throttle back P2P services under the guise of copyright protection.