Categories
Linux

Top Linux Headlines of 2007 – A Year In Review

Looking back at 2007 and seeing this website as a fruit of the cesspool that we affectionately call Vista really warms my heart.

I started using Linux as a full-time operating system in September, because I was really fed up with Microsoft.  As an experiment, this website was launched simultaneously to document my adventures in Linux.

If you told me that when I started this blog that this site would see a half-million visitors in four months and be featured on sites like Lifehacker, TechCrunch, TechMeme, Linux Journal, Linux Today, OSNews, LXer, Webb Alert, etc, etc…. and have near every social news media website feature fsckin.com on their respective front pages…  I wouldn’t believe you.

When the Metapixel article became popular this website used 60GB of bandwidth in a day (Note to Self: DON’T post gigantic image hyperlinks on website in future).  The original article was Dugg, then hours later, Lifehacker’s article linking back to me was Dugg as well!

It is a miracle Dreamhost (bless their heart) hasn’t terminated my account. I contacted their support about some unrelated issue, and in their response they mentioned reading the Orange Box / Team Fortress 2 article, which helped them get the game running under WINE. Perhaps the fact that my hosting company actually reads my content helps out a little bit.

Let’s just say that fsckin w/ linux is the kind of accident that turns out not being bad at all, kinda like my little brother. 😉

I hope you all had a great chrismahanukwanzakah and enjoy the New Year.  Meanwhile, back at the ranch, let’s take a look back at some of the headlines this year.

Januarydrevil2.jpg
Novell sues SCO for $26 Million Dollars!
OpenMoko Struts It’s Mobile Linux Stuff
Linux Foundation Formed
Microsoft FAT Patent Upheld
Fluendo Snatches Hard-Earned Cash with Proprietary Format Licensing
Adobe Exposes Naughty Bits with Flash Player 9 for Linux
Microsoft Tries to Pay For Edits to Wikipedia ODF/OOXML
Nokida N800 Internet Tablet is Bigger Hit Than Moses’ Tablets
Install Debian From Inside Windows
Windows Vista Released to Unwashed Masses

Febuary
SCO Tries to subpoena Pamela Jones of Groklawballmer.jpg
Nominations for Debian Project Leader
Steve Ballmer Blows Smoke Up Collective Asses Regarding Software Patents
Dell Gets Hint About Linux
NTFS-3g version 1.0 Released
Sweaty Steve Ballmer Rents Smoke Generator and Mirrors
Show Us The Code Brings IR Goggles To Ballmer’s Party
Dell Listens to Linux Consumers
Shuttleworth: Ubuntu is NOT a Charity

Marchyesno.jpeg
Linux is Desktop Ready?
Free Software Foundation Asks Sun, HP and Dell to “Check Yes or No” after Vista is “Rejected”
Novell releases Office Open XML translator for OpenOffice.org
Xbox Live Patch for 360 Stops Linux Installations
Hans Reiser Will Goto Trial For Alleged Murder of Ex-Wife
German Patent Federal Court Dismisses Microsoft’s FAT patent
Open Office.org asks Dell to Pre-Load Software on Their Computers
Dell Asks Which Gnu For You
Linus Torvalds Blasts the GPLv3
HP Exec: “Linux Desktop is nearing critical mass”
Robert Scoble, Microsoft Technology Evangelist says Nasty Things
Bruce Perens Doesn’t Care For Novell/Microsoft “Protection Racket”
Microsoft FoxPro goes Open-Source, Nobody Cares
Novell Spoofs “Get a Mac” Ads… Badly

Apriltux500b.jpg
Microsoft Sued for “Vista Capable” Marketing
Sam Hocevar is Next Debian Project Leader
Cnet Hints About “Web OS”, Foreshadows gOS
Tux500 Has Eye on Indy 500
Microsoft Admits Vista’s Horizon Cloudy
One Man, 250 Webcam Drivers, Insert Cam Whore Joke Here

May
Ubuntu & Dell Join Forces
Microsoft Siverlight For Linux by “End of Year”
Tux500 Grabs $10,000 in Donations!
Microsoft Patents “Sudo” Command (aka User Account Control)
Zimbra Runs on Linux
SUSE Asks 27,000 Linux Users To Share Porn Thoughts
Microsoft Coupons Have No Expiration Date
Digg Censors HD-DVD, BluRay Decryption Key Needed For Playback On Linux
Microsoft Still Pushing the Patent Button, Bloggers Push Back
Microsoft Wont Sue End Users of Linux
Try To Save A School District $$$ By Switching to Linux, Loose Your Job
Motorola Releases ROKR and RAZR2 Powered By Really Small Mice Linux
Creative Labs: Vista Drivers Really Hard To Figure Out… Linux Pushed to Back Burner
Microsoft Becomes “Linux Distributor”, Liable Under GPLv3
Shuttleworth Debunks Microsoft Patent Claim Threat
Sun CEO Will Use Their Patents To Help Linux
Groklaw Tells Us What We Already Know: Microsoft Cherry-picks Sponsored Survey Results
VA Software Becomes Sourceforge
Ironically The Tux500 Indy Car Crashes First

Junenelson.jpg
Google Has Microsoft In Half-Nelson, Puts Pressure on Desktop Search Functionality
GPLv3 Released via Carrier Pigeons
Xandros Joins the Dark Side With Microsoft Patent Protection
TiVo complains about GPLv3 “hurting business”
Emacs Version 22 Released, Six Years Since Last Update
Nero 3 Provides HD and Blu-Ray Disc Burning Capabilities to Linux Users
Parallels Ships Supporting Linux, Fake Steve Jobs Dies A Little Inside
LG Signs Patent Pact with Microsoft, Celebrates with Kool-Aid
AppleTV Runs Linux
Politics Plays Part in Google vs. Microsoft Antitrust Dealings
OpenOffice.org Worm hits Linux, Mac OSX, Windows
Linus: Kernel Under GPLv3? Over My Dead Body! Or When OpenSolaris Pisses Me Off, Whichever Comes First
Microsoft Hires Director of Linux Interoperability
Microsoft Patent FUD Debacle
Linspire Signs Microsoft Patent Deal
Google Linux Released is a 9/11 Conspiracy
Motorola Expects 60% of Mobile Phones Will Use Linux
Ubuntu and Redhat Refuse Patent Deal with Microsoft, Kool-Aid Tastes Funny
Vista is Number 1 Reason For Emo Culture
Windows is “More Secure” Because Fewer Vulnerabilities Are Patched
Songbird Sings First Tune
Firefox, Google Team Up for Offline Applications
OpenMoko Promises “Mass Market” device by October
Redhat Talks Dirty With Microsoft for a Year

Julytumbler.png
No Joy For Google Desktop Search vs. Microsoft
Nokia Gives Skype & Flash Lovin to N800 Internet Tablet, Biblical Moses Sues
Samba Moves to GPLv3
IBM Releases 150+ Upset Vista Users Patents Into Wild
Apple Buys CUPS Source Code, TUMBLER is Next
OOXML Format Slapped About With A Large Trout
Asus Eee PC Will Run Xandros
Walmart gOS PC Rumors
Skype Convicted of Violating GPL
Businesses Don’t Tango With Vista
Torvalds Sucker Punches Con Kolivas

August
Fewer Companies Planning Move to Vista, Nobody Surprised
Fake Steve Jobs Real Identity Revealed as Batman Forbes Journalist
SURPRISE! UNIX Belongs to Novell, Not SCO
SCOX Stock Plummetsscox.jpg
Best (Possibly NSFW) Bug Report Ever!
Novell Wont Sue Over UNIX
Google Pack Adds BitTorrent RSS Downloader StarOffice
Gnome Turns 10, Wants a Skateboard for Xmas
Richard Stallman: Reports of My Death Are Greatly Exaggerated
Convicted Pirate Forced to Use Windows by Court Order
Microsoft “Get The Facts” Campaign Isn’t Working
Windows Genuine Advantage Not So Advantageous
Microsoft Apologizes About Cheating on ISO for OOXML’s Approval
More Evidence of Microsoft Playing Games
Super-Duper New Improved ATI Drivers (Still Not as Good As nVidia)

September
Microsoft Looses ISO OOXML Vote, Ballmer Whines Like Little Baby
Eric Raymond May Reveal He Is a Ninja Loosing Patience with Microsoft Over OOXMLninja.jpg
Richard Stallman Taunts Torvalds Regarding GPLv3 Adoption
Linux Voids Laptop Warranty
SCO Files for Chapter 11 Bankrupcy
Creative X-Fi Soundcards Supported. In Other News, Hell Freezes Over
Donate Linux PCs, Get Investigated by California Government
Darl McBride Blames Imaginary Friend Linux For SCO Failure
Gnome 2.20 Released
First Ever GPL Lawsuit in USA
WSU Linux User Group Auctions Off Nerds
Microsoft Pushing Vista, Businesses Demand XP
First Ever GPL Lawsuit Settles, Pontius Pilate Upset!

October
Novell Thanks Microsoft for Patent Agreementqsol_com.jpg
Novell Uses Microsoft FUD as Marketing Material
Linux Journal Runs Offensive Blowjob Ads
Linus Torvalds Gets Pissed Off And Kills People About SMACK
Skype 1.4 Goes Gold
Linux Doubles Market Share
Ballmer Steamy About Patents (Again)
Ballmer Wants Redhat Users to Pay Up
IP Innovation Files Patent Suit Against Redhat & Novell
Mark Shuttleworth Fires Back. Ballmer Quoted as Saying, “You Sunk My Battleship!”
Nokia 810 Internet Porn Device Tablet Released
Oh SNAP! TurboLinux signs with Microsoft
Mandriva Club Isn’t A Champagne Room
Linux Loosing Market Share
Linux Not Really Loosing Market Share
NY Times Publishes Swimsuit Edition Opens Up Codebase
Microsoft Really Wants Windows on XO PC
Laptop Magazine Reviews Eee PC Laptop, 4/5 Stars

November
Turn Webapp Monster into gOSnigel_lold.jpg
Mandriva Upset with Microsoft/Nigeria 419 scam Classmate PC Linux Reversal
Microsoft Denies Involvement in 419 Scam
Say Hello to Chumby, the Linux Clock!
IBM & Novell Block Sale of SCO Assets
Google’s Android (aka gPhone) Gives Street Cred to Mobile Linux
Symbian CEO LOLs When He Heard About Google’s Android
Novell Sells Bunch More Microsoft Support Coupons
Six Floor Labs LLC Launches (Hoax?) Ransom Model for Linux Video Games
OMG! New Theme for Hardy Heron!
Only 600 UK Visitors to BBC Website
BBC Rethinks Linux Visitor Numbers
Mandriva Wins Back Nigerian Classmate PCs
OLPC Forgets Simple Math.. Buy Two One, Get One,
Walmart gPC Sells Out
Walmart Will Restock gPC at “Really Low Prices”
OpenMoko Pushes Mass Market Date Back
Obama Supports “Open” Document Format
Amazon’s Kindle Launches
Torvalds: Strength of Linux Lies in Contortionist Ability Flexibility
BusyBox Sues Xterasys and High-Gain Antennas
Asus Eee PC Laptop Violates GPL
One Year In, Vista Still Not Budging in the Business Market
Cheap Laptops Perfect Fit For Linux, Vista Miffed
Torvalds: Microsoft Can’t Stop Linux
One Laptop Per Child Sued for Patent Infringement
Asus Releases GPL Code
Lucky Fresno Kids Get Asus Eee PC Laptops

December
nVidia and ATI Users Green With Envy
KDE 4 Is Late To Dinner
Verizon Sucks Down GPL Lawsuit, Belches Loudlyburp.gif
MPAA University Toolkit Violates GPL
OLPC Does the Needful in India
OpenOffice.org in a Browser
Bazaar Version Control System Released
Opera Thinks Microsoft Should Distribute Their Browser
Dell Offers Ubuntu with Legal DVD Playback
Xterasys Settles GPL Suit
BBC Website Compatible With Linux
Schestowitz Interviews StallmanMicrosoft Hands Over Protocol Documentation to Samba
Redhat CEO Removes Red Hat
Ex-Delta COO Has Redhat Flying High Again
350,000 Tiny Eee PC Laptops Sold This Year

Categories
Games Linux Video

How To: Run World Of Warcraft (WoW) in Linux Using Wine

intro.jpg

World Of Warcraft is one of the most successful games in history, with 9.3 million subscribers and counting. Believe it or not, the beta test of World of Warcraft actually had a Linux client. It’s true! When the game shipped, support for Linux was dropped and the game never shipped with a Linux client.

What a shame! The good news is, there’s been some positive collaboration between members of the Linux developer community who work on and contribute code to projects like Wine, Cedega and CrossOver. Because of this, installation and configuration of World of Warcraft is a snap for those of you who are interested in getting rid of your Windows partitions lying around if WoW is your game of choice.

We have 8 steps to complete to play the game:
1. Configure 3D drivers with Envy.
2. Install WINE and fonts.
3. Configure WINE.
4. Download (or install from media) the actual game.
5. Edit config.wtf
6. Create a Registry key
7. Install a Linux specific AddOn
8. Launch the game!

1. First, we need to check to see if we have correct and working video card drivers that will work with the game. Open a terminal and type in this command:
glxinfo | grep rendering

It should return with something like this:
direct rendering: Yes

If it says “no” then we have to install the right drivers.

If you have an ATI or nVidia card, the quickest way is to use Envy. Head on over to the website and snatch a copy of the script. Scroll about halfway down and you’ll see the link that ends in .deb – that’s what you want if you’re running Ubuntu or Debian.

Open up the Envy .deb file once it’s done downloading, and we should be prompted with an installer program, just hit the install button and follow the prompts. After it’s installed, we will need to start up the script by going into the Application Menu, then System Tools, then select Envy.

screenshot-envy.png

Select “Install the NVIDIA driver” (or ATI driver) and press Apply. This process takes about 5 minutes to complete, so go make a sandwich and reboot your computer when it prompts you to do so.

Don’t worry if it seems like it’s not making progress – just be patient. After rebooting, run the glxinfo | grep rendering command again, and this time it should respond “yes” this time.

2. Then, we are going to install two items before we can actually start installing the game.
a. WINE allows us to run Microsoft Windows executable files
b. To make things look pretty, we need to download two different font packs.

In Ubuntu 7.10, the following command will install all three items in short order. You can open a run dialog box by pressing Alt+F2 simultanously (or open a terminal), then paste in the following:

sudo apt-get install wine msttcorefonts ttf-xfree86-nonfree

Type in the password for your user account, and follow the prompts. After that command completes, we’re just about done preparing the system and can install the game *almost* as easily as in Windows.

3. Configuring Wine
By running the winecfg command, we can choose which sound driver to use (OSS or ALSA), and also switch compatibility modes – just like XP and Vista have done for quite some time, WINE allows us to switch between different operating systems to allow for better compatibility with various programs.

Some users have reported that switching WINE to use NT 4.0 compatibility, issues with patches or installations have been resolved. If you run into problems, you may want to try here first. I left it on Windows XP mode the entire time and had no problems, but your mileage may vary.

4. We need to download and/or install the game from media.

I personally have an old account that has been sitting dormant for approximately a year, and I’ve thrown away my installation media. The easiest way to install WoW and TBC is using the original CDs, but if you don’t have them, or have a pretty fat internet pipe, Blizzard helpfully provides online downloads via BitTorrent, so that’s the method I’ll document here today.

Since I’m showing how to install via download, here’s the two links you need. The first one is to download the original WoW game installation files, and the second link requires you to login to verify that you actually have The Burning Crusade expansion enabled on your account before you can get the BT download program for TBC from Blizzard.

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/downloads/files/pc/wowclient-downloader.exe
https://www.worldofwarcraft.com/account/download/clients/pc/bc-downloader.html

Both of these files utilize BitTorrent technology to allow users to download the entire game, except for the latest patch. These files are updated pretty often, so you usually don’t need to install more than one patch after you’ve got the game installed.

To run them, just open them up just like you would on a Windows computer. They should automatically open up in WINE, and after you select a download destination, you’ll have a pretty familiar window staring you right in the mullet.

screenshot-browse-for-folder-1.png

screenshot-0percent-blizzard-downloader.png

NOTE: Your internet bandwidth is going to be sucked up completely by the download client. If you need to browse the web or anything in the meantime while you download over 4GB of data, select the View menu in the download program and select preferences, then uncheck download from peers.

When these are done downloading and installing, we can go and get a few tweaks setup so that everything will run smoothly once the game is downloaded.

5. We need to setup the config.wtf file inside your WoW folder, by default it is located in the ~/.wine/drive_c/Program\ Files/World\ of\ Warcraft/ directory. If it doesn’t exist, login to the game once, and just exit right out. The game will create a default one for you.

We need to append a few items to this file to use the OpenGL rendering engine (instead of DirectX or Software rendering) and make sure we have everything setup to run properly under WINE.

You can run this command to edit the file:
gedit ~/.wine/drive_c/Program\ Files/World\ of\ Warcraft/wtf/Config.wtf

Then paste these lines at the end:

SET gxApi "opengl"
SET ffxDeath "0"
SET ffxGlow "0"
SET SoundOutputSystem "1"
SET SoundBufferSize "150"

6. Next, we create a registry key and value.
The following instructions to modify the registry are taken directly from the Ubuntu wiki page and is licensed under CC-BY-SA.

a. Find this key HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Wine\
b. Highlight the wine folder in the left hand pane by clicking left on it. The icon should change to an open folder
c. Right-click on the wine folder and select [NEW] then [KEY]
d. Replace the text New Key #1 with OpenGL
e. Right-click in the right hand pane and select [NEW] then [String Value]
f. Replace New Value #1 with DisabledExtensions (Notice it's case sensitive!)
g. Then double click anywhere on the line, a dialog box will open.
h. In the value field type GL_ARB_vertex_buffer_object

It should look like this:
regedit.png

7. Now we can install a Linux-specific AddOn for the game so that the graphics options are able to be modified in-game without crashing. Download this file and unzip it.
applytoforehead-4.zip

Copy the entire extracted ApplyToForehead-4 folder into the following location:
~/.wine/drive_c/Program\ Files/World\ of\ Warcraft/Interface/AddOns/

If the Interface or AddOns folder do not exist, go ahead and create them.

8. We can launch the game from the desktop shortcut, or create one pointing to the wow.exe file within the WoW folder.

You should end up with the launch executing flawlessly:
fonts-installed-screenshot-world-of-warcraft-v2006080.png

Now just hit the Play button and enjoy the most addicting game since slot machines. On the character selection screen, make sure to enable out of date AddOns so that ApplyToForehead is loaded properly.

That’s it! If you have problems with running the game, please leave a comment and I’ll attempt to answer it, or look for support channels via the following wikis:

Ubuntu: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WorldofWarcraft
Anything else: http://www.wowwiki.com/Linux/Wine

And for your enjoyment, here’s a video. 🙂

Categories
Games

Unreal Tournament 3 Linux Server Available… Finally!

About 30 days late, but judging from the response on the UT3 mailing list, everyone is really excited to finally have a Linux server for UT3.

From the mailing list:

Thanks for your patience, everyone.

The Linux server is now available for download. It is built from the 1.1
patch, and is network compatible with all retail UT3 clients.

We feel pretty good about this build, but it should be considered beta
for now, as it hasn’t had the full wrath of the Internet applied to it
yet. 🙂

Here is the news release: http://icculus.org/news/news.php?id=4104

I’ll even pitch in. Here’s my mirror: http://fsckin.com/UT3-linux-server-12172007.bin

File size:
1744621651 bytes (1.6 gigabytes!)

md5sum:
70149f802efc087455a87f92c1485982 UT3-linux-server-12172007.bin

So, who feels like comparing this to the original beta demo server for Linux and figure out who caused the delay – other than Epic.

Categories
Games

Unreal Tournament 3 Linux Status

For those of you who are not subscribed to the mailing list, here’s the email verbaitim from Ryan Gordon, the man behind the curtain who is responsible for the Linux port of UT3 Linux server and client binary distribution… which still hasn’t happened yet – but they will be available “as soon as possible.”

The most interesting piece (in my opinion) is that he believes that it can be determined what the cause for delays in the final release of the Linux server by comparing the binaries. I better brush up on my assembly.

In other news, Tyler in chilly Wisconsin won my copy of UT3 Collector’s Edition. Congrats bud, it’s in the mail. 🙂

I’m going to answer a few emails here, but I haven’t got anything to
announce at the moment. I also haven’t read most of this mailing list in
the past week or so; I don’t need to be reminded that people are still
waiting for Linux binaries. You’ll get them as soon as possible, honest.

> Questions:

(I don’t speak for Epic, and have no real insight into why technical
decisions were made. But here are my best insights.)

> Why did Epic choose GameSpy this time?

My guesses would be a) because the master server was a huge pain from
ut2003 onward (and maybe as far back as Unreal 1), and b) GameSpy gives
them cross-platform tech roughly analogous to Xbox Live or Games For
Windows Live.

This is about more than just getting a list of servers. There’s a lot
more competition for a baseline feature set nowadays. The fact that
Valve added “achievements” to the Steam version of The Orange Box titles
suggests that this competition is only going to get more fierce. If I
were you, I’d go figure out who the major competitors are, and get the
login name you like on their services before someone else takes it. 🙂

> Why did Epic choose Bink for videos? (Even the load screens!)

Almost every game you’ll see on a console uses a prerendered movie for
load screens (including static copyright text, like ut3 does).

Partially because it’s quick to throw in contractually-obligated logos:
usually there’s a prebuilt movie from these companies they just have to
convert to Bink. Also, it’s probably easier to put a movie together in a
movie making tool, than make the equivalent set of pixels light up in
the engine…especially since, say, Intel Corporation doesn’t keep
people with UE3 mapmaking experience around to make logos.

Also, rendering a movie is dirt cheap from a CPU viewpoint; lots of
games show them because Sony/Microsoft/Nintendo won’t certify your game
if the load time is more than X seconds…but the stopwatch doesn’t
start until all the logos are displayed. Many games show the movies on
one thread, and then use this extra time to load the game on another. I
don’t know if UT3 does this, but lots and lots of Unreal licensees have
done just that.

Also, darn near every UE2 licensee tends to license Bink, and uses the
same piece of third-party code off the Unreal Developer Network to
integrate it, so it probably made sense to just do the integration in
the official UE3 codebase, since Epic would still get bug reports from
it anyhow.

> As for PhysX I won’t comment.

It’s amazing to me how much hatred there is towards Ageia…I wonder if
that’s just spillover from ut200x’s MathEngine contracts.

Then again, there’s a lot of hate towards every piece of middleware,
depending on what a given forum’s personal conspiracy theory is. Someone
posted a petition on this mailing list about removing GameSpy. You don’t
have to _like_ GameSpy, and I’ve certainly had my problems with them in
the past, but I don’t think it’s fair to play Kangaroo Court with them
when there’s really no actual evidence that they are the problem.

Likewise for Ageia.

Likewise for Bink.

> Lots of other routine middleware floating around in there too probably.

I have no doubt that people will compare the final binaries with the
beta demo server for differences. It’ll be interesting to see if the
incorrect parties will amend their petitions and apologize to those they
slandered.

–ryan.

Thanks for the updates Ryan, you’re the man – behind the curtain.

Categories
Humor Video

Microsoft Products Can Be Hazardous To Your (Mental) Health

Read more to see dozens of videos… some users complained of high loading times and crashing browsers. 🙁

Categories
Games Rant

Win My Copy Of Unreal Tournament 3 Collector Edition

Fsckin.com is giving away a copy of Unreal Tournament 3 Collector’s Edition. Just make a comment on this post with a valid email address and I’ll randomly select the winner. I’ll have it to your door by Christmas.

Want to know why I’m giving it away? Keep reading….

Categories
Linux

Generate Awesome Photomosaics On Linux With Metapixel

Ok, I admit. I thrashed the Digg.com servers for a little while using an open source website mirroring tool, which I wont mention, but it’s easy to find. 🙂

About 30,000 user icons later, I present to you a product created by a couple very short and sweet command line tools.

1024x768.png

1024×768
1280×1024
1680×1050
1900×1200

On an unrelated note, I’ll be disabling hotlinking of images shortly, so if you’re going to steal my content, please rehost these images yourself.

So how can you make your own mosaic? Simple! Download and install metapixel, if you’re running Ubuntu, it’s located in the universe repository.

Then we are just a few commands away from generating sweet photomosaics. First, we prepare the images.

metapixel-prepare -r source destination --width=48 --height=48

This copies all images from the “source” folder, (recursively) searching into every folder within, and dumps every image it finds into the “destination” folder after resizing them into 48×48 pixel images. You’ll want to modify the width and height to fit the source images. This took a LONG time for me, since my library of images was so gigantic – but once we’re done preparing the images, you don’t have to do it again. Woohoo!

Next, we actually generate the output file(s) with this one liner:

metapixel --metapixel input.jpg output.png --library destination --scale=35 --distance=500

This takes input.jpg and increases the output size by 35 times (i.e. REALLY BIG IMAGE), uses the library destination and does not repeat any images found in the library closer than 500. It’ll spit output.png after a little while. If you don’t care about repeating images, removing the distance flag will result in MUCH, MUCH faster generation times.

Here’s a another I generated, this HUGE image was scaled down from about 228 megapixels.


starrythumbnail.png

In related news, here’s a groovy post over at Kristen Symonds’s blog with a ton of GIMP/Photoshop brushes, check it out, good stuff. 🙂

Which images would you like to see rendered in Digg user icons? I’ve got lots more ideas but not much time to use them, since I’ve got some holiday shopping to do. 🙂

I’m back, here are some more…

Bill:
billy.png

Imogen:
imogenthumbnail.jpg

StumbleUpon:
stumblethumbnail1.png

Reddit:
redditthumbnail.png

Ok last update, promise… this is actually pretty darn fun.

Last Jedi Supper:
The original was a 460 megapixels PNG file (30720×15040 – 370MB) scaled down to 7680×3760 – only 28MP, saved as 70% quality JPEG ended up as about a 7MB file… still HUGE! The GIMP was using about 1.2GB of RAM (Thank god I upgraded last week to 4GB!) while scaling the image.

lastjedisupperthumbnail.png

Categories
Humor

Need A Reason To Upgrade To Linux? How About This: Double Your Money Back Lifetime Guarantee!

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For one easy payment of zero dollars and zero cents, Linux can be yours today! Don’t wait, download it now!

Categories
Off-Topic

To Catch A Content Theif

I’ve been running Vista for about a week – because Unreal Tournament 3 hasn’t released a Linux client yet. Don’t worry, you aren’t missing very much! Since there’s no Linux server either – you end up only a few popular windows-based servers that never fill up and are pretty boring… the game is great, no doubt… but with nobody to play with, what good is it?
I’d rather be playing Team Fortress 2, and since it runs in Wine… well – I don’t have much of a reason to keep running Vista, other than the fact that it was completely free (as in beer). I guess Microsoft can’t give away their operating system, since I’m going to perform a 7-pass-wipe to make sure I completely rid my computer of Vista.

So…. except for some sweet revenge there hasn’t been much to write about. Other than some content theft (par for the course when you’re a popular website) …

Long story short, some guy decided to steal my content and images, and I sent google a DMCA request to remove their advertisements from the page, they didn’t respond in a timely manner….. so I sent them a quick note that went something like this:

“Sup Google, thanks for the check this last week, I owe you one – stop by and check out my new tattoo, it’s badass personified. Oh yeah, also I faxed you a request about providing advertising for this jerk who is stealing my content – would you cut it out?”

Google replied something like this:

“If you would like to report a copyright infringement, please send us a properly formatted request.”

I replied,

“Don’t taze me bro! I already sent it to you.”

Google replied something like this:

“If you would like to report a copyright infringement, please send us a properly formatted request.”

So I figure the DMCA request is going nowhere fast, what is a guy to do? Enlist the help of his readers….

Not you guys!

I’ll enlist the help of the folks who just happen to be reading content that’s been stolen. I deleted my old image pointing to the entirely nasty HP Vectra slimline computer that runs my network (now running IPCop 1.4.18 to test out the latest release – trust me, it’s nothing special) and replaced it with a message to the readers of websites who steal my content.

And the thing that REALLY sucks… when searching for the name of the article, the website of the content theif shows up first. I guess it’s a bad case of Google’s algorithm for determining “duplicate content” and my website has been penalized… what a pain in the neck!

For your enjoyment… I’m not providing a hyperlink, since that would be kinda silly, but I bet you’ll enjoy this stuff.

http://linuxcult.blogspot.com/2007/11/seven-different-linuxbsd-firewalls.html

http://www.dralnux.com/2007/12/03/seven-different-linuxbsd-firewalls-reviewed

It doesn’t quite fit with their website theme… but ah well, what can I do?