Blog

Google Labs has opened up a beta of their transit trip planning tool at http://google.com/transit. It generates very detailed directions about how to get from one point to another using public transit. It provides transit travel time, walking times and distances as well as a comparing with the cost and travel time of driving. A tool like this could really help people to make a well informed decision about whether to drive or take public transit.

Too bad it currently only works for Portland, Oregon.

I am starting to warm up to Python after my initial issue with indention controlling the blocking of code. My general sense is that it is an elegant, modern mixture of Basic and Perl. I'm sure that experienced Python programmers would cringe at that comparison but that is what initially came to mind.

My next "shock" was in comparison expressions. For instance the expression a < b == c tests whether a is less than b and also that b equals c. I would have coded that a < b and b == c. Another cool comparison is 'ABC' < 'C' < 'Pascal' < 'Python' where each side of each less-than symbol must be true for the whole expression to be true.

I've taken the plunge and started to learn Python. My target is web-based applications so I needed to have this working under Apache 2.0/SuSE 9.3 on my development computer.

I originally had been developing using the XAMPP platform. That was extremely easy to setup on my SuSE 9.3 OS and worked well. Unfortunately XAMPP does not support Python out of the box. I'm sure that I could add it but I just wanted to get going on it. So I removed XAMPP and started install Apache 2.0, MySQL 4.1, PHP 4.3, phpMyAdmin 2.6, etc.

I've done this many times on Debian, Fedora and RedHat systems but this was the first time with SuSE. I very quickly found that the default setup seemed to be locked down pretty well. Unfortunately it took me quite some time searching though the various unfamiliar Apache configuration files to find out where best to adjust the security so that I could run the already installed PHP application on my system.

I finally created my first bit of Python code and was left scratching my head about the syntax error that I was getting. At this point I've done almost no looking at Python syntax so it never dawned on me that indenting of text was important. In my cut & paste from a web page I had not properly indented the code and that was a syntax error. I haven't ran into this kind of problem since I was writing code in Fortran IV that depended on punch card spacing.

I've now gotten Python Server Pages (PSP) working running with my first PSP application and I'm off to the races!

Now it's time to start actually learning Python. I love learning a new language!

In my quest to do all of my tasks under SUSE Linux, getting all of my 15 years of email history moved to Thunderbird from Outlook turned out to be one of the trickiest. At first I tried to install Thunderbird and Outlook 2002 on the same XP machine and then just having Thunderbird import my email. No luck. Thunderbird (or something) would crash about half way through. I tried this many times without luck. I did some internet searches on the problem but did not find a lot to help. Eventually my wife found this story that addressed my issues very well. What seems to work for most people is to import the email into Outlook Express first and then into Thunderbird. This worked well without a crash. This seems to have preserved both my attachments as well as the formatting in any HTML emails.

So I imported my emails in two passes. Once for my recent email and once more for my old archive.pst file. I had to have outlook switch to that old file as it's main .pst file for this part to work.

I also used Dawn to convert my Outlook Contacts folder into an Outlook Express address book. I also then imported this into Thunderbird.

Once I had all my data in Thunderbird under XP I then had to transfer parts of the directory structure from XP to SUSE. This was accomplished by moving the following file from the XP machine to the SUSE machine:

For the address book:
FROM: C:/Documents and Settings/xpuser/Application Data/Thunderbird/Profiles/RANDOM1.default/abook.mab
TO: /home/suseuser/.thunderbird/RANDOM2.default/

For email message:
FROM: C:/Documents and Settings/xpuser/Application Data/Thunderbird/Profiles/RANDOM1.default/Mail/Local Folders/
The files "Outlook Express Mail.msf", "Outlook Express Mail" and the directory "Outlook Express Mail.sbd" are moved to
TO: /home/suseuser/.thunderbird/RANDOM2.default/Mail/Local Folders

I used xpuser to represent the login in account under Windows XP and suseuser as the login account under SUSE. RANDOM1 and RANDOM2 are random strings that Thunderbird associates with the profile directory and is unique for each installation.

Once all of the new email messages are accessible in Thunderbird under SUSE, it is just a matter of cleaning up any directory structure.

When I finished installing SUSE on my computer I found it strange that the Windows Key did not seem to do anything. Ideally I thought that it should pop up the K menu (the main application menu) much in the way that Windows does. Failing that, I would have expected it to do something useful. It turns out that you have to dig into the configuration and explicitly enable this key so that it can be used throughout KDE. I found this out from this article about enabling the Windows Key.

I guess that this is part of the anti-Microsoft sentiment that is behind most of Linux and GNU software but it just seem silly to leave a valid and well placed key unused. For me it just seem practical to enable this key. I guess this is what you get when you look at an operating system in a fanatical way.

To initiate my experiment in running a Linux desktop I downloaded The SUSE 9.3 Network Boot ISO [57Mb] and burnt a CD using it. This CD is enough to install SUSE 9.3 on a system via the Internet. Obviously this only makes sense if you have a good connection to the Internet and you don't have a concern about the approximately 3Gb of files that are downloaded as a part of the install process. I found that the OpenSUSE a great help in understanding the network install process.

The install process went very smoothly and unlike a system like Debian, didn't require answering a lot of highly technical questions. It took about 2 hours to download and install all the components (mostly the defaults offered) and proceeded unattended.

Once SUSE was installed I was surprised at how well the default KDE mimicked the Windows user interface. While some might not see that as a good thing, it sure makes the transition from Windows a lot easier.

The first piece of software that I had to figure out how to use was YaST (Yet Another Setup Tool). This controls the installation of software and the configuration of software and hardware. This tool is somewhat akin to Window's Control Panel. It was easy to go and do a system update to make sure that I had the latest versions of all the software components using the "System Update". I also setup automatic updating on a nightly basis to keep my software as current and secure as possible.

Once the general software management was set up it was time to start exploring the system and testing of various devices to see how well they work. I also started testing my ability to do what I was doing under Windows in SUSE.

The first problem that I noticed was that I wasn't getting any audio. There were no errors and it looked like there were drivers installed for the audio hardware that I had but no sound. After lots of looking through various audio related programs, I found in YaST under Hardware/Sound and clicking on the Volume button that most of the volume levels were set at 0. That seems like an odd default setting. Once that was set properly I got audio using the associated Test button but other programs still had problems at times. For instance, I installed Skype and it worked when I started to chat with someone but later other programs generated "unable to find a sound card" or similar errors. After a couple of system reboots (for other reason) I noticed that the audio seemed to be working more reliably. I'm not sure why it's working right now but I will see as I get into a more typical usage mode if the audio really is working completely.

I was happy to say that my LG GSA-4040B DVD drive was accessible and was able to read burn disks. One of the things that I really liked about this is that I didn't have to find/buy additional software to make this happen. This is one of the great things about open source software -- most of the software that a typical user needs comes as a part of the basic installation.

My Radeon 9250 video card can handle two video monitors, one VGA and the other DVI. Under Windows I had a CRT and a LCD panel connected to my computer and was using them as two desktops. I was running them at different resolutions that were the most appropriate to their size. The 15" LCD's natural resolution of 1024 x 768 but the 17" CRT looked best at 1280 x 1024. This worked pretty well under Windows although you had to get used to the mismatch of cursor location across the boundary between the two desktops.

When I installed SUSE, the two monitors were working in "clone" mode where the two monitors showed the same desktop. The problem was that under YaST only showed a single graphics card even though this card effectively has two cards. It took a while for it to dawn on me that all I had to do was to "Add new card..." in SaX2 that is the same type as the first card. Once that was done I used the multihead component in SaX2 and set the mode to Xinerama mode that allows windows to be dragged between the two windows. Unfortunately this mode seems to require that both monitors to run at the same resolution, or at least I've not been able to set the resolutions independently. Maybe I will fix this with a little more work.

The first thing that I had to do in switching to Linux is to decide on which distro to use. In the past I've used several distros in text-only mode but I've only had limited experience with the running the Gnome or KDE graphical environments. The distro that I have the most experience with is Debian. I currently have 3 servers running Debian. I chose it mostly for security reasons. I felt that it was the most secure of the popular distros and I liked it's automatic handling of security updates.

In thinking about a desktop Linux I had a very different set of criteria. I had two main goals:

• have a desktop that I would be happy with without having to tweak it too much
• experiment with a desktop that I could provide to people that I support

Obviously these are two very different goals but a common thread is that the desktop must be easy to use. Ideally it should also be easy to transition to from Windows.

I won't go into my whole thought process of choosing SuSE but it came from listening to other people's thoughts on good desktop distros and from my own trial an error. In truth, my selection really depended on which distro I got far enough with to not bother looking any further.

I've been threatening to switch from Windows to Linux for my main desktop computer for a long time. I finally got the initiative a few days ago. I've decided to post a few blog entries that describe my experience in making the transition.

First I should layout my general experience with Windows and Linux to better put into context my comments.

I've been using and developing software for Windows since the first beta version of Windows 1.0. Some version of Windows has been my main desktop OS for most of that time. I support various friends and family's use of Windows.

I started using Linux as a web server technology in 1998 when I saw the limitation and vulnerabilities of Windows as an Internet platform. I've been administering Internet connected servers and developing various technologies on these servers ever since. In all that time I've never given up on Window to attach my local keyboard to. It's hard to give up the comfort of my familiar tools.

As time has gone on the hurdles to switching to Linux have been falling and the advantages have been increasing. I've made half-hearted attempts to make this switch many times over the years. Each time some issue would prevent me from making the transition. This time is different. This time I've committed to move as much of my day-to-day computing to Linux.

To make the transition a little easier, I've kept an old computer that is still running Windows XP if I need it for any reason. This has allowed me to move over to Linux has I have time to transform things. I've set up this XP machine to run VNC so that I can VNC into it from my desktop without really having to change keyboards and so that I can cut & past between the two systems.

Future posts will get into the transition itself and the issues that I've come across.

This weekend we took a visitor to Grouse Mountain in North Vancouver. Grouse Mountain has a great view of Vancouver and surrounding cities as well as Vancouver Island, Mount Baker and well into the US. You get to the top of Grouse Mountain on a tram call "The Skyride". Grouse also has some exhibits and a couple of small shows. What surprised me most was the price. $30. Last year it was $20 or $24 and I thought that was excessive. I think that this new pricing truly turns Grouse Mountain into a tourist trap.

Message testing.