SongBird 1.0 Review

Earlier, we saw the release of SongBird v.1.0 and a lot of people were extremely impressed with the RC1 release and so when the final release came out, I made use to download it as soon as possible and I've been using it ever since. In a nutshell, this application has got to be the best music player I have ever used in my entire life. I used to be a pretty die-hard Winamp (windows) and Xmms (linux) user but with the maturing of SongBird, it has officially taking the number one spot on my list of music players. It has a full load of features, from basic music library organization to streaming audio. Thanks to it's ability to accept plug-ins just as easily as Firefox does, it can be expanded to do just about anything else you want as well. Most notably, it has plug-ins to add album artwork from Last.FM and there are even plug-ins to give you twitter feed access and a web browser right inside your music player. Now, this isn't to say it's without faults. It's not the fastest loading or lightest playback application around and it also doesn't yet have support for ripping or burning CDs, however, they are expected to be implemented in future releases and I'm sure there will be a number of 3rd party developers making plug-ins to add these features in this release. So, if you're interested in giving it a shot for yourself, it's available cross-platform from GetSongBird.com, make your own opinion on it and let me know what you think of it by leaving a comment at the end of this post.

I will also make a note that it's currently not available on the Ubuntu/Debian app sources and the getsongbird.com site only offers it in a tar.gz format for the linux platform so it can be used on multiple distros. If you want the .deb package for it, point your browser over to this post on Ubuntu Forums where you'll find a link to the deb package made by a third party, I used it, worked fine.

Linux Hits the iPhone

Gotta love this video. I still have personal issues with [Cr]apple and and their pricing and strict limitations on the iPhone and most of their products, but I will say that they come out with some really slick devices sometimes. I'm just glad to see that Linux finally made it to the iPhone...now, if someone could take this idea and try to drop android on it, we would be all set.(See boot video below)


iPhone Linux Demonstration Video from planetbeing on Vimeo.

Google Calendar Now Supports iCal

So, in a googlemac blogspot post Google announced today that they would start supporting iCal to synchronize it with google calendar. And, while that is a great thing for all the iCal users, I have one question...why do you still not support two way syncronization with google calendar through Mozilla Thunderbird without installing a third party plugin, yet you support it with iCal, a program that is used by only a niche market of people who can afford a Mac?

Either way, I'm not bashing Mac or Google for this, I just want to know why it's so difficult? Is there some mechanism that makes syncing iCal easier than Thunderbird? Come on Google, you have software that is free for the public to use, so start supporting those who continue the trend of free software use by Thunderbird users the same pleasure that the rich Mac users now have.

Steam Linux: Updates

So, I found some info on Arstechnica today that helps re-enforce my claim from the other day that Valve is on the way to porting the steam platform (and with it, the games) to the open source platform of Linux. This could be a huge boost for the popularity of Linux as a gaming OS, as the argument for many people not making the switch is poor game support on the operating system. Now, before I continue, I'm not making the claim that Microsoft should be shaking in their boots (but you know they are). However, I will say this, and that is that with this, comes Valve's virtual stamp of approval that the Linux platform is now a viable desktop operating system that has the potential to be a new market for them and considering the influence that Valve is in the gaming community, that could push some of the other gaming companies to start following suit and publishing more games on the Linux platform, and if nothing else, that should start giving Microsoft the chills and the hair stand on the back of their necks if not but just a little bit. So, to say the least I'm very happy about Valve's decision to do this and I wish the best of luck to them in this undertaking, it's not small task to port a game over to run on a new platform, let alone the mammoth empire of a gaming ecosystem that Steam has become, but I'm excited and can't wait to see what the future holds once this becomes official.

Imagining the Tenth Dimension

Found an interesting video on Youtube today, actually, I found it through my digg feed, but you know what I mean. The video is called "Imagining the 10th Dimension" and it shows a very interesting concept that personally, I had never considered before. The idea that there are not a mere 3 or even 4 dimensions, but that there are a whopping 10 possible dimensions. It gives a great graphical explanation of how it works and it's really fascinating to think about. While I was watching that, I found another video that was in the related sections on the page that went to a video titled "Why Stop at Ten Dimensions?" which is an interesting v-blog from the author of the "Imagine the Tenth Dimension" blog. Props to him for elaborating very well on the topic of the tenth dimension and why you almost certainly have to stop there unless you can imagine the possibility of there being existence beyond the beginning and the end of all matter and the universe.

Steam in Linux Today

So Linux has come a very long way since the first time I used it. The first version I had a taste of was SuSe 9.1 and since then there have been thousands of improvements made to SuSe and all the other distros out there. Well today I'm happy to announce that I've reached a new milestone in completely leaving Microsoft Windows behind.

About 30 minutes ago I successfully installed Valve's Steam application on Ubuntu 8.10 in Wine (Windows Application Emulator). I had tried this many times in the past but each time got hung up somewhere along the way, whether in the installation or the running of the app once installed, but today I was able to install it and open it without any problems and I'm now installing Counter Strike Source inside of Steam. As I write this it's at about 5% completion for the download and should be done within the next hour or so.

It still disappoints me that you have to run it inside of the Wine and that it doesn't natively run, but there were plenty of rumors abounding this year that Valve was porting the source engine to run under Linux and with it the Steam Application. So, as the year 2008 nears a close, I am glad to see that the Linux Gaming community is finally starting to gain some ground and I hope that next year will be even better as Valve releases (or at least prepares to release) Steam and other Source Engine based games natively onto Linux. And in the mean time, I will just use it in Wine and patiently await it's arrival.

IE 8 Beta 2 Goes Public

Ok, so I'm making this post from IE 8 Beta 2. I just downloaded it and installed it and overall, I'm going to just go out and say it, I'm really impressed with Microsoft this time. They did an overall good job with IE 8 and they fixed a lot of the things I had taken up issue with in IE 7...HOWEVER, that is not to say that I have found my fair share of things that really just piss me off.

Thing 1: Addons (biggest pet pieve thus far)
I'm not sure what it is, but for some God forsaken reason, Microsoft feels it's necessary to make their addons actual installed programs on your computer. This is a terrible, terrible idea in my sincerest opinion. Firefox had the grand idea of making addons and extensions only a part of firefox and they were installed as such, but for some reason Microsoft thought that making them programs that isntall on your computer like every other program was a good idea. All I know is that this is annoying. The first thing I did when I got IE8 was to install some extensions to see the new line up and I found one called Adblocker...I'm thinking of ABP (Ad Blocker Plus) on firefox and I said ok...it isntalls like a normal executable program and puts a TASKBAR ICON ON MY COMPUTER....WAIT WHAT!?...o no, the extension just infested my computer and then wanted me to buy it or have a 15 day trial of the adblocker...HELL NO...extensions, just like IE, should be free...way to go on that one...

Thing 2: Accelerators
Ok, these are a great idea, great concept but they were poorly executed...or possibly just still buggy but it seems all too convenience of a problem to be accidental. Whenever you use one of these accelerators, whether it be the Blogger one like I'm using to post this or Google Maps or whatever, if there is a search box or a text input field available on the page it pulls up, it will automatically fill it in with a link that goes to the "ieaddons.com" page and yes, you can just erase it, but WHY??? If it's something that's there to create a convenience, why on earth would you put something in it that everyone will clearly find to be a nuasance? Is this Microsofts new policy or something, "for ever convenience there has to be an equal and opposite inconvenience"...no, sorry Microsoft, you're not Sr. Isaac Newton it doesn't work that way for you.

My list of issues goes on for a few more, but I realize this is a long post, at least in terms of my posts, so I'm going to leave it there. But just to list a few more of my issues: tab coloring; why is it randomized whenever I open a new one? Address bar, the whole address other then the main "urlhere.com" is faded out...wtf? And of course, the ever present "Smart Screen Filter" formerly known as Phishing filter or whatever it was in IE 7...pointless and it blocks some legitemate sites so it doesn't relaly need to be there...O yea, and pardon any spelling errors in this post as well because in version 8 they have still failed to include spellcheck like Firefox has had for several versions now...

Till later...