The author of Ubuntu Pocket Guide and Reference, Keir Thomas, made his book available for free in PDF format today (click here to download). If you tend to like your manuals and books in tangible book format, click here to get the $9.94, 166 page book version from Amazon.
A news story from the BBC broke today describing Obama’s invitation to Sun Microsystem’s CEO, Scott McNealy. Obama asked McNealy to present a report on the benefits of Open Source software. Already many national and state government entities in the United States and many over-seas governments successfully use Linux and other Open Source software. What do you think? Should the United States government go on a software diet?
This week’s email video brought to you by questions from Papa, Amy, Diana, Dan, Firat, Paul, John, Tina, Ernie, Sheila, Dave, Lisa, Bob, Shirley, and Iris. Their questions ranged from wanting to start a fan club to moving to Ubuntu and from nasty virus infections to how to install a DVD and much more!
If you use AVG Antivirus, you will be presented with the above screen at some time or another. Don’t immediately push the Move to Vault button or the Heal button. Instead, check the box labeled Remove as Power User, then click the Heal button. Checking that box first yanks the legs out from the virus and disposes of it immediately.
I’m experimenting with an online database collection service and thought it would be interesting to put forth a practical question; How fast does your computer boot up? To measure the boot-up time of your computer, time it from the moment you turn the computer on until the desktop and all background applications are fully loaded (i.e. no hourglass present and no hard drive activity present). Click the title of this article above or the read more below to get to the form.
Tons of Q&A this week covering a myriad of different topics…brought to you by: Don, Laura, Ron, Pete, Anthony, Donna, Jose, Marina, Ken, Corinne, Emily, Sharon, Elmer, Marilyn, Barbara, Joyce, Judith, Hank and Robert.
If you ever have the need to create a PDF file so you can share it easily with others, or have the need to convert a PDF file into a word processing file, then I recommend giving PDF Online a try. In just a few steps, you can upload a file you want to convert to a PDF or upload a PDF file you want converted to a Word file. Once the file is uploaded, it takes just a minute or two for the service to perform its magic and give you your finished product. Amazingly simple and amazingly accurate.
If you are a Microsoft Windows user, of any flavor, I recommend that you download and use the free CCleaner utility once per month. Our computers create thousands of small files that we never see in order to perform the computing tasks we ask of them. Visiting web sites also creates thousands of files including the oft misunderstood cookies. All these files are called temporary files and are completely expendable. Over the course of time, these small temporary files can build up to such a significant amount that they can drag down the performance of even the fastest system.
CCleaner offers a quick, easy and thorough tool to clean all these files in a single click. After downloading and installing the product (I un-click the option to add the Yahoo toolbar during the install), you will have a CCleaner icon on your desktop like the one pictured (large red C with a blue whisk broom). Double-click it, and click the Run Cleaner button. In just a few minutes, the cleaning will finish and present you with a report detailing what was deleted and how much space was recovered.
IF you don’t want your web history or cookies or recycle bin to be automatically cleaned (deleted), you can uncheck the appropriate box before clicking the Run Cleaner button.
I just finished installing the Windows 7 Beta version released by Microsoft on Friday. I installed it on my Toshiba Intel dual-core processor with 4 GB of RAM. It was running Windows Vista which took more than 4 minutes to fully boot (I consider the boot up process to be finished when the hard drive stops spinning and I don’t have to compete with a still booting computer to do what I want to do), and running any applications was like walking through molasses. I can say that my expectations were pretty low, but I am pleasantly surprised…so far.
A great question this week about how to fill out a paper form using your computer. Many other good questions as well including my answer to a writer who downloaded an illegal copy of Photoshop. This week, the Videocast is brought to you by questions from: Terry, Fern, Marcia, Sudarshin, Richard, Gayle, Kim, Bernie, Bill, Azumah, Jack, and Mike.