A little note about Ubuntu 8.04 a.k.a Hardy Heron
My overall comments is “not bad”. I rather disappointed with this release although this release is a Long Term Support (LTS) release. I don’t know if this happens because I’m upgrading from Gutsy Gibbon. I though I must be fresh install everything from scratch (oh my, should I do this option? Come on, I have so many applications with different custom settings, I don’t want to re-configuration all over again, and waste my time to do that :D)
My inkscape is unstable, don’t know. I didn’t have much work to do with Inkscape anyway, but it is still annoying. Since this is an UI bugs, I don’t know how to submit it via bug-buddy or go to inkscape bugzilla/ubuntu launchpad?
Well, too much dissapointed but.. I’m very glad that working with remote files are easily than before. GVFS saves my day. I don’t need ugly gFTP anymore (sorry gFTP developers) because it doesn’t reflect file changes when file are changes on current local directory. I’m using nautilus now for FTPing, I just type: ftp://kutucape.com and the nice nautilus browse my remote folder seemlessly.
GNOME 2.22 has some TODO on GVFS transitions from GnomeVFS, some works on Pulse Audio and move some libraries into GTK+. I thought that GNOME 2.24 is promising. I hope that Intrepid Ibex, a next Ubuntu code name after Hardy Heron will be rock solid and all “TODO” will be finished on this release. My personal opinion, Ubuntu Hardy Heron doesn’t deserve to be a LTS version, it must be Intrepid Ibex.
GNOME 2.22 has released
Gnome 2.22 finally released. This ‘lucky’ and ‘nice’ number version bring joy to open source community. Some features, a lot of bug fixes and performance speed has added. Gnome developer has replaced Gnome-VFS. GVFS is new network-transparent virtual filesystem layer for GTK+. GVFS is designed to overcome the shortcomings of the older GNOME-VFS system. Improvements over GNOME-VFS include remembering login credentials for the entire session and being more resilient to failures. Many GNOME applications are already using GVFS, including all of the core applications.
Although GVFS is not covered by all applications, they plan to migrate all applications and make it much better on 2.24 release. I tested this release with my Ubuntu Hardy Heron Alpha 6. If you upgrade to this alpha release, you notice that almost all Gnome desktop related packages has a 2.22 version already.
The one I mostly love is a weather integration on clock applet. It gives me a current temperature, sunrise and sunset time 
On this release also, finally they include say cheese, an application to capture or make video from a webcam.
Ubuntu Hardy Heron Alpha 5 Review
I’ve upgraded my notebook today from local mirror repository. I don’t know which is an Alpha 4 or Alpha 5 release. Alpha 5 is released today, look at this release announcement and get the iso image here. From this review, I’ll update some features from this review and from the Alpha 5 announcement.
- Firefox 3 beta 3. Look at the pop up window. Instead of displaying “an annoying” pop up, Firefox display an “inline” pop up, which is on my opinion is cool.
- Application default to open some certain files. Cool
- Tracker pop up. Tracker can be invoked from notification tray. You can search from this pop up too.
- Metacity as composite manager, you can get some eyecandy the same as compiz (well, not compare to compiz, some features like drop shadows, translucency is perfect for me). Try open gconf-editor, then digg into /apps/metacity/general then tick “compositing_manager”. Voila, you got drop shadows now ;). Watch the video here.
When I was upgrading my Ubuntu Gusty to this alpha release, some errors occurred. This is what I’ve done to solve the problem:
- Change directory to python support directory
cd /var/lib/python-support/python2.5/bootconfig/ - Delete all .py files, but first you must check by ls -l command. Some .py files are missing, so we must to remove it first
rm -f *.py - Download python-support:
wget http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/p/python-support/python-support_0.6.4ubuntu1_all.deb - Install python support
sudo dpkg -i --force-all python-support_0.6.4ubuntu1_all.deb - Then reinstall ubuntu desktop
sudo apt-get install ubuntu-desktop
Don’t ever do this command!
Reading an interesting announcement on ubuntuforums.org. Please don’t do this command if you know what you are doing!
rm -rf /
rm -rf .
rm -rf *
rm -r .*
It will PERMANENTLY destroy your data. So from now on, read carrefully when you read tutorial, howto, tips or trick. The author must be emphasized in red mark to show how serious this command. Don’t ever execute a script you have downloaded from the internet blindly. At least take a look for this dangerous command before you go.
The server infrastruture and additional components to build a website
Many of my clients ask some specifications about server infrastructure, what operating system they use, where we host the website, web applications to build the website, etc. Here are some brief explanations about server infrastructure and additional component to build the website.
Operating system
We use Linux operating system. Linux is a robust, secure and reliable operating server especially for servers. It is widely used as server on the datacenter or intranet. The combination of apache as web server, MySQL or PostgreSQL as database server and PHP as scripting language make this operating system is popular as the server infrastructure.
Based on netcraft.net (http://www.netcraft.net) survey, apache http server get 50.61% market share on the internet. MySQL is widely used as database server, it¡¦s fast robust and reliable as database server on the internet. Even Google use modified MySQL as their database servers.
PHP is no doubt as the most popular scripting language to build web applications. It is fast and easy to learn.
Web Hosting
Hosting is available on local server (Indonesia) or on USA.
The advantage and drawbacks
| Item | Local server | USA |
| Access speed | Faster access from local market but so slow accessed from outside Indonesia | Moderate access from local market and faster access from outside Indonesia. |
| Stability | 99% stable and 99.5% uptime uptime. Downtime occurs only by electricity failure | 99.9% stable and 99.9% uptime |
| Security | Moderate. Depends on operating system and firewall setup | Mostly monitored and hardened with additional fees. |
| Backup | Good backup but need additional fees for external backup to ensure data is safe if hard drive server is crashed | Good backup but need additional fees for external backup to ensure data is safe if hard drive server is crashed |
| Support | Good support from datacenter and we can go there directly to fix things | Good support but can not go there directly to fix things |
Note: uptime is calculated by how many times server up or online in one year.
Content Management System
Popular content management system are:
- Drupal, the most extensible, robust and secure content management system. Drupal is designed for community websites, web 2.0 enabled website, company website even for personal use. It can be extended by modules for various needs.
- Wordpress, the most popular content management system. This is the widely used by personal for blogging because its functions as blogging tool. Wordpress can be used as company websites or another needs. It can be extended by plugins.
