No Speaker: Intro Music
DW: Welcome to the Ubuntu UK Podcast. This is episode two, you are greeted by me, Daviey
TW: And I'm Tony
CD: I'm Ciemon
AP: And Alan
TW: What have we got coming up today folks?
DW: We've got Ubuntu Open Day interview with Dianne Ruby and Ciemon
AP: A chat with Dave Murphy
TW: Ah Schwuk
AP: Yes
CD: We're going to talk about hardware and we're going to talk about the feedback that we received from the first podcast.
TW: Okay, let's get on with it
No Speaker: Bumper music
AP: So last week we mentioned an Ubuntu Demo Day at Swindon Musem of Computing was it?
CD: That's right. I went along to see Dianne and have a chat with her.
AP: Cool, shall we have a listen to that?
CD: Ok, so Dianne why are you you having a Ubuntu demo day here at the museum of computing in Swindon
D: Originally, somebody on the Ubuntu UK mailing list asked about doing a geek-athon here and that was something at the time that was before Christmas. I didn't have time to organise then but in the spring I thought it would be a good idea to give the mailing list members a chance to meet up in person, if they wanted to, and also a good chance to publicise the museum
CD: Ok, so why an Ubuntu Day, rather than a Linux demo day was it just because it came from Ubuntu UK mailing list?
D: Yes, that was the main. The only Linux I've ever used is Ubuntu and I've only been using that for eighteen months. So I'm really not an expert. Somebody had emailed me and said, "Why Ubuntu, what about all the rest?" and i thought i can hardly expect to talk about something that I've never even used and I'm not in a position to say to my fellow volunteers, "You know about Redhat, run a Demo day". So that's basically why I've chosen Ubuntu.
CD: But there is going to be other people there that can talk about other distributions if necessary. Whilst it is aimed at Ubuntu, we can of course talk about other demo's and distributions during the day.
D: Yes, there will be other people bringing laptops with other distros on and also the Wiltshire LUG will be there. So there be a chance to look at other distro's - talk about them if you want to.
CD: Ok, excellent. So who is actually going to be there? Have you got anybody specific coming. I know there's people from the Ubuntu-UK local community, will there be anybody else coming.
D: We've got Wiltshire LUG, as i've said; and we've also got the Wilthshire computer users group are going to be coming.
CD: Ok, so what is it you hope to achieve by having a install/demo day here at the museum?
D: It'll be a chance for us all to meet each other in flesh, as it were and to look at each other desktops and admire our graphics. And also it will be a chance to tell local people about advantages of Linux and free software in general and also from my point of view, of course, I want to promote the museum and i want to let people know about the museum.
CD: So Dianne, tell me about the museum.
D: We've been here in the university of bath in Swindon for about four or five years. Although the university are planning to leave Swindon, so were not sure what will be happening from June. But we're hoping to find somewhere else to go. We've had great times here, we've had lots of interesting visitors including Sir Clive Sinclair, you might have heard of him. And His Royal Highness, The Duke of Kent came last year - we put on lots of interesting displays to for the science museum and for Intel who are our sponsors. We've also provided lot of resources for people like ITN, BBC, CNN when they have computer based news. They like to come here and film a bit, to slip into their news casts. So you have have seen us on the television and not realised. We've got about three thousand items of hardware and about two thousand books and about two thousand items of software. So as you can see, only a tiny bit is on display at any one time and our Pong-to-Playstation expedition which has been very popular is going on tour from April next yea, so that will be around the country to different museums so if you can't make it to Swindon you may be able to to see it in a museum near you soon. It's called Pong-to-Playstation, but in-fact we have a Wii there that pong-to-wii just doesn't have the same ring somehow.
CD: Ok, fantastic facility you've got here. Stacks and stacks of old computers and great for people like me to remember the past times. So what is the actual plan, what are we going to see on the demo day itself?
D: I've got some of the Ubuntu screencasts on DVD, we'll be running those the day so people can look at those if they want to. We'll have some demo machines up and running so people can try out what Ubuntu, and the other variations on it, on a machine so they can sit down and try it out. See what it is like, see what it does. There will be chances for them to meet up with people who are using it and ask questions about things like graphics, things like sound, 'will my digital camera work?', chance for people who have only used Windows really to look at the alternatives.
CD: Are they going be able to walk away from your demo day with Linux and are they going to have support. I mean if somebody gets home, and installs Linux - Ubuntu and they can't quite work it out where do they go from there?
D: We have information on the various places you can go to get help, and that will include of course the Wilshire LUG, and the Wiltshire Computer Users Group who are both local. There will also be information on where to get help online, for instance the forums, the IRC channels, places like that, the mailing list. So hopefully they will be able to feel they can take this away and try it out ad if they want to install it, they can go ahead but still have support there.
CD: You've aimed the day at computer users or people interested at looking at Ubuntu. What about their families, if somebody - if Dad comes down in his car and wants to look the museum, check out Ubuntu, what is here for the family. I gather you have put a sheet together for things for the family to do. Whilst Dad is getting bit of a look at the computers.
D: Yes, we have got some items in the computer museum for children, we've got quizzes and we've got a chance to design your own games characters, build it out of Lego. But also I've created a sheet of things to do locally in a twenty minute drive or which are on the bus routes that serves the campus. Covering shopping, activities for children and in-fact the local cinema are ten to fifteen minutes walk away and that had children cinema on Saturday for a pound(£) a go. And there is a shopping centre for you to look around if you don't want to go to the cinema with them. I haven't included sporting activities, but there are several sports centres within a short distance to, if you don't like shopping or children's activities. We've got Cote country park a short distance away, which has got plenty for children and young people and adults to do, So that is what i was trying to do. I know it is a big problem for families. One parent wants to go to something and the other parent says, "Your at work all week, i never see you!" There is plenty of other things to do here in Swindon. So don't feel that you can't come and bring the family, because you can.
CD: Ok, Dianne. Thanks very much.
AP: So it sounds like there is a lot to do. Where is it? When is it again?
CD: It's on the 26th April at the University of Swindon.
AP: Ok, Where can they get more details?
DW: www.museum-of-computing.org.uk
TW: And is Dianne looking for people to help out?
CD: Yeah, we've been on the email lists and she's got a lot of people offering up their help. A lot of people taking along their laptops and things with different distros and that sort of thing. There is lots of parking their, it's a great venue actually it's quite big, big school hall lots of space.
AP: Excellent.
TW: So what bits of kit did you see that were particularly interesting?
CD: Loads of really good old geeky stuff. Everything, ZX81's, Spectrums.
AP: Is it all on show?
CD: No, They've got only a small amount of it actually on show and you can get to see that when you are there.
No Speaker: Bumper Music
AP: We've got a guest us today who has travelled a very long way just to be here, isn't that right Dave?
DM: Yes, and i've brought the entire LUG with me.
AP: <Laugh>; Yeah, this is Dave Murphy who on IRC is known as schwuk. When you say you brought your whole LUG with you, you haven't brought anyone with you?
DM: I AM Cumbria LUG.
AP: You ARE the smallest LUG in the world.
DM: No, but this isn't fair there are other members of Cumbria LUG. It's just that it's become a joke over time that Cumbria LUG consists of me. It is also known as Schwuk LUG.
AP: So where does that name Schwuk come from?
DM: Well when i first wanted to get onto the Internet, I was looking around for nicknames, because everyone else had one, all the cool guys had one. I just didn't know what to go with, all the interesting ones were already taken; so i started trying to think of something different and i eventually settled on Schwuk which stuck in my mind from a few years previously. It actually comes from a film called "She's having a baby" by John Hughes, and at the end sequence of a film they are discussing babies and they have lots of celebrities and random people on talking about different names and the one that stuck in my mind was Bill Murray who said "Schwuk, I don't know what it means, but i heard it on the bus the other day".
AP: Cool, Excellent
DM: And the other thing i want to say, is that it's Schwuk there is no 'M' in it.
AP: What?
DW: Schmuk
AP: Oh I see.Took me a while there, sorry about that. So, you've come all the way down from Cumbria LUG
DM: Sunny Cumbria!
AP: Sunny Cumbria, and you were kind enough to do the graphics for the podcast website
DM: I've been a member of the Ubuntu-Uk community since it started and I did the original logo for the LoCo team and when you said you wanted to a similar logo or theme for the podcast I decided to help out.
AP: You turned it round pretty quick as well
DW: What tools did you use to do the artwork?
DM: All open-source of course. All the graphics were done in Inkscape, the original logo for Ubuntu-Uk was done in Inkscape so I adapted that within Inkscape. I now use 100% open-source tools for all my work, I used Inkscape to do the Wordpress thing which is PHP all edited openly.
AP: Excellent
DW: I thing we didn't mention, you actually work for Canonical don't you. That was a very careful on pronunciation there
DM: Yes, I do work for Canonical have done for almost a year now. My main job is developer on the Launchpad team but I'm also currently working with the hardware certification side, commercial certification
AP: One thing we're definitely not going to ask you is when Launchpad is going to be open source because its a tired old question which you probably get asked an awful lot
DM: Yes, and I can't answer it, it will be open sourced when its ready.
AP: Good, right move on. As well as working for Canonical and doing marvelous graphics for free for people like us you spend time writing don't you
DM: Yes, I've written two books now, one myself and I help co-author the second edition of the official Ubuntu book
AP: What does the book contain, because I've not actually seen it
DM: You haven't! Why haven't you bought a copy?
AP: I was expecting you to send me a review copy
DM: The book covers everything about installing and running Ubuntu. It comes with a copy on DVD, not the CD version
AP: What does the DVD have over the CD version?
DM: It has additional software packages which you don't have to go on the internet to install
AP: Oh, ok. You said theres two books, whats the other one?
DM: The other book is my own which took me about a year to write, which is "Managing Software Development with Trac and Subversion"
AP: Sounds geeky
DM: Its very geeky and also came out after I started working on Launchpad and Bazaar so not the best timing in the world. I started it when working at my previous job when I was working exclusively with Trac and Subversion and I built a development system around them
AP: Trac is the thing with a wiki and a request tracker built in
DM: Again, its open-source, written in Python, its developed by the Edwall(sp?)guys its an excellent product. Its a wiki, its a source code browser, its a ticketing system and its a project planning application. It allows you to manage your software from end to end
AP: Does it link with Subversion
DM: Its integrated very tightly with Subversion but you can use other version control systems with it. Subversion is the most common one used with it.
AP: Thanks for talking to us about those projects, are you going to stick around for the rest of the show?
DM: Yes, happily if you'll have me
AP: Cool, yeah. You'll have to go and make the tea thoughI'll do it<music>
AP: We've all installed Ubuntu on laptops and desktops and servers but I wanted to ask about what other, maybe weird, maybe small, maybe different hardware you've installed Ubuntu on to. Ciemon?
CD: I've got my Eepc with Ubuntu on it and Debian on my linksys slug thing
AP: How did you install Ubuntu on that eepc?
CD: USB stick
AP: and it works fine?
CD: Great no problems
AP: Fast enough
CD: Yes
AP: I know some people complain that Ubuntu is a little bit slower than Xandros that you get on the EEPC
CD: I didn't bother with Xandros, I turned it on and put Ubuntu on it straight away
DW: No complaints using it or boot up time and shutdown time?
AP: Boot up and shutdown initially, I know you can trim down the programs that start upThe thing is, GNOME isn't a lightweight desktop is it. Its going to be slow on any slow PC.I've tried putting it on slower machines myself and given up and gone to Xfc
AP: Is that what you're using, Xfce?Once Hardy is released then I'm going to put Hardy on it
AP: Hardy Xfce?No, GNOME
AP: I run GNOME on mine and I think its a little bit bulky but I've got more memory in mine
DW: I'm running Xubuntu with Xfce but the only thing I've found that bugged me is the resolution, because its an 800x600 resolution a lot of the applications don't quite fit into that space
AP: Its 800x480
DW: <laughs> Ok, 800x480, I stand corrected, but has anyone else found that applications don't fit very well.Thunderbird being a big one for that
AP: Yes, Evolution doesn't fit either. Thats one of the things, the logical progression over time has always been bigger bigger bigger screens and now we've suddenly taken a step backwards thats actually smaller than anything because I don't recall many desktops or laptops that have ever had that resolution. Its a widescreen resolution which you don't get on laptops
CD: Small, but its whatever you're used to
AP: You can work around it, you can drag the windows around. So, you would say its a successful install
CD: Absolutely, goes everywhere with me
AP: Use it all the time?
CD: Yes brilliant
AP: What was the other thing you've got, a slug
CD: The slug, the nslu2 linksys, its a fileserver, you plug it in to your network, plug a hard drive into it and share files across your network. Its flashable, you can put Debian on it and I use it as a gateway into my home network
DW: So in essence its a mini computer in what is a hard drive enclosure is it?
CD: Its about the same size as a full size hard drive but yes its a mini computer
AP: They're pretty tiny aren't they
CD: Yes, no fans, completely silent, sits in the corner on top of the router and you don't even know its there.
DW: How hard would you say it is to install Debian on that because it doesn't come with Debian as default
CD: It wasn't a doddle but it wasn't incredibly hard. Of course you can ask people in the community and they let you know how to do it and whats going on
AP: What about you Dave, what have you got?
DW: I've got in front of me here the OpenMoko Neo 1973 phone. Its a mobile telephone which is Linux based and I should say thank you to Andy Loughrin(sp?) for sending it down to me at such short notice. Its running a version called Utopia. When you first switch it on you get greeted by a flashy boot screen and then it falls back to the kernel black screen, giving out kernel messages
AP: Is it not just under development
DW: It is but I think thats nice. I like the fact that its actually a computer that fits in the palm of your hand. I think thats brilliant and the fact you can SSH to it, you can run any software on here that you can run on a low powered computer. Theres people running webservers on them
AP: Is that not a real geek thing. Your average user isn't going to want SSH on their phone
DW: Everything has a geek thing, think of the iPhone people were jailbreaking them and they're doing custom things on them themselves because it appeals to people who want pretty things and the geeks. A lot of manufacturers are realising that there is a big geek thing. Linksys latched on to this quite early on with their Linux firmware and they found that geeks wanted to buy them as well as regular users. So I think that having it appeal to both side of the market is brilliant.
AP: I don't suppose the geek market is that big.
DW: I don't know, I think you'd be surprised really, you know I think there are a lot of geeks that who will buy the first Linux phone which becomes stable, I know I will.
AP: yes, but you're a geek, and everyone else in this room is a geek and probably 90% of the people who listen to this will be geeks
DW: Exactly so i think all of you should be buying one <laughter> Support freedom!
AP: Ok, I'll buy one, actually I'll just take yours before you leave
DW: I think Andy would be a bit displeased with that. Its got some bugs, trying to make certain phone calls seem to fail. It isn't ready for public release yet but when it is I think it will be a really good phone. As I understand it, it doesn't have 3G on which is a real shame and I think if they had included that and got it out before the iPhone I think it would have been a gopod contender for the iPhone, I really do
DM: No.
DW: No?
DM: No, it wouldn't have been, not at all. Everyone I know who has seen an iPhone wants one and trying to compare that to the iPhone, it wouldn't have happened. The iPhone hasn't got 3G either, its the user experience that selling it for people
AP: Actually you've got a tiny device that runs Linux haven't you Dave.
DM: Tiny device? I used to have an N810 I also used to have a zorus(sp?) so I've been a big fan of Linux based PDAs and devices for a while but I've not found one I'm very happy with yet
AP: Isn't that the problem, its a great idea in concept to carry around a Linux machine in your pocket but nodody has quite got it right
DM: I think the Nokia N810 is pretty near perfect, sorry its the N800 I have its the N810 I want
AP: The N810 isn't a phone though
DM: None of them are phones but they will act as an internet phone they do come with Skype and Project Gizmo
DW: See, that to me is crazy. Nokia which is probably the biggest telephone manufacturer in the world have made a device which isn't a phone
DM: Its very specifically not a phone, its an internet tablet, it is a web-enabled device purely for accessing the internet for emails, for video, for audio, its a great media device but its not a phone even though I used it extensively as a Skype device when I used it.Its got SIP built into it its got the jabber protocol xmp
DW: Earlier on you said you got rid of it, why was that?
DM: I love the device, my wife loved using the device as well, she used it more than I did but the problem was simply that I've got a laptop so I don't need a little portable device and because I work from home I don't travel a lot so I didn't really need it.
DW: What future projects have particularly interested you?
DM: Well, the OpenMoko is very interesting to me and I will probably be picking up one of the consumer devices when they come out. The Nokia N810 is also very interesting and the future versions of that device when they come along will also interest me. We've got Ubuntu Mobile Edition coming out in the future which should bring some interesting devices with it but apart from that I'm not sure what else is out there. Trolltechs phone is taking a long time to come and its now changed completely from when I last saw a developer release
AP: I've got a couple of machines in the garage, running, that are running Linux. Ones running IPCop and the other one is just an install of Ubuntu Server. They're both fairly low power machines, both Pentium II 400mhz with 192mb of RAM, tiny, and they run perfectly fine, they're notunder heavy load. The IPCop is my gateway firewall to the outside world and does all my DHCP and the network stuff that it needs to and I've had those running for a couple of years and they're perfectly fine. If I tried to run Windows on them, or anything else I think I'd have a bit of a problem.
DM: So what spec machine have you got IPCop on?
AP: It's the same as a Pentium II 400MHz. You run IPCop as well don't you Dave?
DM: I do, yes. It's running on a very, very old machine. A Pentium 133 MMX with about 128MB RAM and a 2GB hard disk as well.
AP: Your low spec machine trumps mine, if we're aiming for the lowest we can get.
DM: I think it might actually be the first computer that I owned and it's still running after all this time. It's been running IPCop for about 3 at least years now.IPCop made me a fan of the specialised distributions. Before that I didn't see the point as with Linux you can do anything so I thought 'why even bother'. But IPCop does the job it's designed to so well, it really shows the power of Linux which you don't get when you're just comparing things like Fedora and Ubuntu.
AP: That brings us back round to all the other machines like the Asus EEE PC has a customised version of Linux, it's Xandros but it is customised for that machine. The Nokia N810 has a customised version of Linux, the OpenMoko has a customised version of Linux. So things like IPCop which are specific for one purpose are showing off the best of Linux in some ways, but in other ways it's a problem as noone ever sees it as being Linux - it's just another piece of software that works.
DW: I think that is especially true of the routers which you can buy off the shelf. A good proportion of them are running Linux but you wouldn't know that just by using them which doesn't help when you spread the word, so I certainly agree with you there.
AP: And you sound like a really nerd when you say to your friends "have you ever used Linux?" and they say "no" and you say "well actually you have, your router's running Linux" and you sound like a real idiot... well I do.
No Speaker: Music
AP: So we had a comment on the last podcast, which stood out to me, which was somewhat of a complaint about the way that I pronounce the name of the distribution which I happen to use which is "Ubuntu". I know some people pronounce it differently, some people say "Ooo-buntu" and "You-buntu".
DM: I've heard "You-buntu" as well, I'm a "Ooo-buntu man".
AP: And what do you feel about that?Being criticised for pronouncing things "wrong"?
CD: Everybody's got their own opinion haven't they?
AP: Don't sit on the fence Ciemon, say what you really feel. You hate them don't you? You hate these people?
CD: It's "Ooo-buntu", it's not "You-buntu". I know that people over the pond call it something different.
AP: "Oooooboooontoooo".Yes, it's like I had a couple of American guys pronounce the 3 letter extension on our website "dot oh ar gee". We always pronounce it "dot org", I mean I say "dot org" but the American's always say "dot oh ar gee" they never say "org".
CD: So what about OpenOffice? Do they call that "Open Office dot oh ar gee"?
AP: Theres another one, some people call it OpenOffice and some people call it OpenOffice.org and some people get really ratty if you only call it OpenOffice because the official name is OpenOffice.org.Isn't that a bit like GNU/Linux?
AP: Oh, don't get me started on that one.
AP: Yes, theres the GNU/Linux but theres also Linux itself. Some people call it Linux some people call it 'Lye-nux' or Linooks
CD: Listen to the man, there are files on the internet where you can listen to Linus (Torvalds) saying Linux
AP: Ah, you see you've contradicted yourself because you said it doesn't matter and yet now you're saying you should enforce it with a sound file of a man who created the product.
CD: But if you want to get an idea, the guy has obviously been asked so many times he's just said 'Well I say it like this'
AP: Ok, so do you carry round that .wav file?
CD: Yes, its on my phone
DM: So what you want is Mark to record a similar file for you
CD: Good idea yeah, that would be awesome
CD: You said GNU but what about GNOME? Is it G-NOME or is it 'NOME'?
DW: Well its 'NOME'Its G-NOME but everyone calls it 'NOME', I call it 'NOME'
AP: I think I call it G-NOME, but now you've put me on the spot I don't know. Earlier on when we weren't recording I said i pronounce Ubuntu 'Oobuntoo' and everyone said that I said it different ways so I can't think now, do I sayd 'G-NOME' or 'NOME'?
CD: I say 'G-NOME'
DW: It doesn't matter how you say it, if someone knows what you are talking about thats fine.
AP: Yeah, get the message acrossIts like ASUS<babble> who makes the e?
AP: You said yourself it doesn't matter if I get the message across although I clearly didn't because you all looked at me puzzled when I said 'Ah Zeus' Eee PC
CD: I figured somebody was copying them<laughter>
AP: Oh dear!
CD: I use Xfce on the Eee PC so is that X-ubuntu or 'Zoobuntu'
DW: Oh it's 'Zoobuntu'
AP: Yeah I'd say 'Zoobuntu' but is that laziness, I think its partly laziness that I say 'Zoobuntu' because its easier, I'm saving myself one syllable than if I say X-Ubuntu its longer than saying 'Zoobuntu', same with GNOME, if I say 'NOME' its one less syllable than 'G-NOME'
DW: Do you know where I think all this discussion comes from, its that fact that I first heard of Ubuntu by text, IRC mailing lists things like that. The trouble with this is sometimes you can use words for maybe a year or so in text, and then ahen you talk to people you think 'Hang on, how do you say that?' I Don't think we would have this problem if maybe we heard of Ubuntu from TV adverts and things like that. Where we actually hear it, which we would then reproduce.
AP: That doesn't always work either because if you watch a TV advert for a Nokia phone some people call it Nokia and some people call it 'Nohkia' and some people call Nike 'Nike' and some call it 'Nikey'
DM: <unknown> on yesterday with Nike and 'Nikey'
AP: See, it happens its not just geeks, its not just the geek pronunciation and evil people who jump on you for pronouncing something right, it happens in real life as well. I was guilty of one of these in the last podcast because someone said less watts and I jumped in and said fewer watts
DW: Which really threw me off spot
AP: Yes it did and that worked well because grammatically, less watts is incorrect and fewer watts is right but that was just me being anally retentive
DM: Bordering between geek and nerd
AP: Yes, it is
DW: I must say I haven't actually got round to contacting the person who posted that and telling them they need to correct their grammar.
AP: Its ok because someone when Intel set up the lesswatts.org website someone else was equally as miffed and set up fewerwatts.org and pointed it to lesswatts
DW: Someone actually paid money to do that, that to me is crazy
AP: So I think we've knocked pronounciation or how do you say it Dave?
CD: Pronounciation
DW: Pronounciation!
AP: Pronounciation...on the head there
No Speaker: <music>
DM: As a professional open source worker I use Linux on a daily basis I don't use any other operating system now and when I do go back to Windows for whatever reason I find it very difficult to actually get anything done because I've been using Linux professionally for a couple of years and I've been using it personally for a huge number of years, since the early 2000s so I was interesting in how other people got on going back to Windows and whether they would actually go back or not.
CD: I use it at work. I have to use it at work although I try not to. I've got a Ubuntu box sat in the corner, I try and use that as much as I can. I use the work box for email and everything else I do on the Ubuntu box. I don't have any, I was going to say at home but I do but thats purely my sons PC for games. The whole family has converted to Ubuntu completely and they all love it.
DW: I think for myself I don't think i could go back. I feel very trapped actually, its funny being trapped by freedom, now I'm quite into it I don't think I could go back to closed source software but in some ways I'm jealous of people who do use that and are happy with it because I don't think I could go back to it.
AP: You think that people who are using Windows and Mac or whatever are in some way happier because they're ignorant of all of this stuff so they don't have to worry about it
DW: Yeah, you know there is software on Linux that isn't available and I have to put up with that but if I was using more of mainstream platform then I wouldn't have that same problem but I can't go back to that because I'm so in to Linux now
AP: I see what you mean. It depends how long you've been into it because for us, we've all been into it for a while, 1, 2, 3, 5, or 10 years or however long but there are people who've only been using it for 6 months, they try it out and they think its not for them and they quit for want of a better word so its probably easier for someone who's not been
CD: My kids use it a lot, my wife as well and initially they were frustrated by the lack of things that they had in Windows but it was only when they sort of understood and we're educated and I said "What is it you actually want, what is it that you're missing?" and they realise it was actually nothing at all. My wife has had to go back to Windows recently, I've had to install Windows at home because she wants to do the ECDL
AP: Is that ECDL the European Computer Driving Licence
CD: Thats the one, its for work and in theory she would be more employable if she had the ECDL. She initially started using Windows, we've been using Linux for years now and then I put Windows back on and she can't stand it, absolutely hates it
AP: Brilliant
CD: And having read the ECDL book she can't believe that people put up with viruses, spyware etc when Linux is free, it does it and all these things disappear
AP: There has got to be something that would make you go back. What would it be, if Ubuntu crashed and burned, you know Mark Shuttleworth got bored and disappeared and the Ubuntu Foundation ran out of money and Ubuntu stopped development and then Debian crashed and burned so your 2 major options, ok there are other distributions available but the 2 that you're most into what would you do? Would you switch to another distro and carry on as normal and focus your attention on that?
CD: Yes I think so, definitely
DW: I honestly don't know what I would do, when I do have to use a Windows computer I feel frustration and I don't think I could. I might explore Mac I'm quite a Mac newbie, I might have to persue that.
AP: A friend of mine was told at work you can have a new PC but it has to be a Mac and hes a Linux fan and very technically competent with Linux and his boss said "I want you to spend time working so i want you to use a Mac and I don't want you to spend time fiddling about" because if you're using Linux you probably wil lspend a certain portion of your time fiddling about with the machine. Hes a pragmatic kind of guy, I remember he runs a Windows machine purely for gaming, he boots it up to play games and then shuts it down again and never boots it for anything else. So if you're open minded enough to say I like free software and I like the freedom that free software gives me but equally I also want to play games so I'm going to have this machine dedicated to running Windows, i'll sacrifice my freedom on that machine and the I've got this other machine at work where they provide it and I'm sacrificing my freedom on that machine because it running closed source software. Should we be a bit more open
CD: Open to being closed?
AP: Yeah, I know it sounds a bit bizarre but should we be more open to accepting the closed source software. Is there any philisophical reason that you would go back, would you give up on free software, is there any compelling reason where you would say ok, enough is enough I'm just going to switch back to Windows or OS 10 or whatever the other platform is
DM: Prior to my current job i was always very tempted, I still am very tempted by OS 10 but the thing that stops me every single time is its not freee, I'm happy to pay for hardware and I would love the features of the software, don't get me started on iTunes, iTunes is the one reason I still have a Windows box in my house is to manage the various iPods we have but the choice of choosing a non-free openatin system over a free one I would have trouble with, philosphically.
AP: you've touched on the other reason why I booted into Windows the other day which was to run iTunes in order to see if this podcast had appeared on iTunes and verify that it did in fact when I put a blog post up saying "This podcast is now available on iTunes" one on the first comments was "Who's the freedom-hater that put it on iTunes" and that was you!
DM: <laughter> It was yes I did post on iTunes. iTunes is the one app that I really miss from Windows and I would love to see a native port of it, running through Wine would maybe just about cut it but I would love to see it natively running on Linux. It interests me because I've been using linux for years now, unfortunately one of my previous jobs involved Windows, I was a .Net developer so I used Visual Studio on a daily basis. I had to use Microsoft Office on a daily basis. I kept trying to switch to Linux at work, messing around with Windows and vmware but it never worked but whenever I did switch back from using Linux to Windows I would automatically go to all the open source applications and end up thinking "Why he hell am I running Windows to runn all this stuff when I could just do it on Linux" because the bits I did have to do were very little so i had one machine that was purely for development and my desktop ran Linux completely. I flip-flopped for so long between the two until I finally settled in Linux and only use Windows when I have to for my job. Which I don't have to anymore <whoop!>
AP: I had an issue at work related to this where I installed Ubuntu on a company laptop and we had a security guy come round and have a look at it and tell me that it wasn't company policy and that escalated up to my boss who came over and said "Well, so long as you can support your own machine and you can get the job done I don't really care what you run on your laptop as long as its secure and updated" I've used Ubuntu in company situations instead of Windows and it works well for me I find it very difficult going back to Windows much like the rest of you.
AP: Any of us probably wouldn't switch back permanently
CD: No, its difficult to see a situation where all free software ever would just disappear and you wouldn't have any access to it anyway
DW: I think its actually uncontrollable, once the genie is out of the bottle I don't think it can be closed back in. Free software will keep going.
No Speaker: <music>
AP: In the last episode we asked for some feedback to our email address, or comments on ther website and we got some, we got a fair amount in fact and a couple of them I thought I'd mention. We were asked by Matthew Daubney if we could do hardware reviews which we've talked about already in this podcast
CD: Yeah, if people send us their hardware we'll review it.
AP: Hey, thats a good idea, ooh yeah free stuff!
DW: For keeps?
AP: Well, for review purposes and to do a comprehensive review you got to keep it for the lifetime of the product really.
CD: 2-3 years minimum
AP: Easily
DW: I should say thank you to Andy for letting me keep your OpenMoko phone<laughter>
AP: And thanks to anyone who wants to send me free hardware, that would be lovely.
AP: We also had an email from Sean Anderson about pronunciation which we've covered earlier on (or pro-NOWN-ciation as Dave says) <laughter> You're never going to live that down
AP: And we had a lot of people comment about the audio in the last podcast, Tony?
DW: We had a few
AP: Quite a few
TW: Quite a few, a substantial proportion of the people who did comment were commenting about the audio levels
AP: But thats the only negative feedback we've had isn't it?
TW: I prefer to think of it as an area for improvement rather than negative
DW: Sorry, is that your /only/ area that needs improving<laughter>
TW: You're a swine Dave Walker!
TW: Yeah, there were lots of people who wrote in and lots of people who gave us feedback on IRC. It wasn't all that bad, come on guys cut us some slack it was our first episode
TW: It was a little bit wonky but it was the first time we did it so hopefully we're going to get things slightly better this time and I'm sure it will improve every show as we go on but it is appreciated even feedback like that.
AP: Negative, yeah its fine
DW: Constructive criticism
AP: Yeah, absolutely. To be fair we've got a lot right I think in the first episode, we got content, length that kind of stuff right
TW: Lots of people said they liked the length of the show which was really good, we're going to try and keep it about that 1/2 hour to 40mins tops. Something that will fit into a lunch hour or a short train journey
AP: We also should at this point remind you how to get feedback to the show. You can leave a comment on the websiteYou can get in contact with us via email which is podcast@ubuntu-uk.org or by phone which is current manned voicemail number which is 08455081986 r via IRC which is #ubuntu-uk which is on the Freenode network. The other way is via twitter
AP: Dave, tell us about twitter
DM: Twitter is what is popularly called micro-blogging which is absolute rubbish term just like everything else you hear like Web 2.0 but its very small messages, 140 characters, so the same as a SMS message but you send it to the twitter site and it gets published in the timeline like everyone else and you can follow other people and you can publish your own things and we've set up an ubuntu-uk one which is twitter.com/uupc
AP: So people can follow that uupc person
DM: The can follow that uupc person, they can see what we're doing when we're recording because we'll twitter when we've started recording, we twitter when we're not recording and we'll twitter when new posts come out or something interesting is happening and if anybody is using twitter they can follow us and we can see how popular we are.
DW: Presumably they can send us suggestions via twitter
DM: They can send us suggestions via twitter, either directly to us, with twitter you can send messages directly by putting @ in front of their name
AP: So they put @uupc and then say something it will come straight to us
DM: It will show up in our replies list or they can send us a direct message by putting 'd uupc' and then the message, that will come through to us as well but that will be private
AP: They have to sign up to twitter to do that
DM: They have to be signed up
AP: ok
AP: If you don't want to sign up to twitter you can just visit the site and view the updates directly on the website, twitter.com/uupc or you can contact us as Dave said in the traditional way via phone or email or IRC<music>
TW: Ok, that just about wraps it up for another show. Its worth just saying that we do make the entire show on Ubuntu, its processed in Ubuntu, the website's all done on Ubuntu and hosted on Ubuntu
AP: The first episode we hosted on just one server but now we've got a few mirrors provided by Dave, myself and also Andy from BitfolkThank you very much Bitfolk
AP: Yes, they're providing 2 mirrors, one over here and one in the States
TW: We hit about 2500 downloads on the first episode
AP: Yeah, that was pretty good, quite high and its tailed off a little bit of course since the first episode was released nearly 2 weeks ago
TW: The mirrors are much appreciated, thank you very muchThats it we'll see you next time, Bye!<music>