Adventures in openSUSE Linux

Here is a link to download the RPM for Kingsoft Office so you can try it, and not wonder if this is vaporware... it isn't. Lately I've been seeing more and more buzz surrounding Kingsoft Office for Linux. KSO has been gaining a rather devoted following despite it's Linux port still being in alpha and not near to release. My first familiarity with Kingsoft Office was reading about their Android offering which has had rave reviews and a devoted following. Across all platforms, people praise it for its interface and its exceptional compatibility with Microsoft Office formatted documents. So with all the buzz, rumors, and conflicting information I wanted some clear answers for myself and to share with you. On May 5th I had the opportunity to interview Jin who serves as the Chief Software Architect for  +Kingsoft Office  . Before I dive right into the things we addressed in the course of our interview, I wanted to give you a brief background for Kingsoft and their of...

In late March 2012 I gave  +openSUSE  12.1 a second chance with +GNOME  3 after having a horrible experience with the version of KDE that shipped in that version. By April 4th I was a true believer in the GNOME Shell and the new user experience paradigm that was evolving in GNOME 3. Indeed, each version of GNOME since has been more exciting than the last, bringing massive improvements in performance, stability, reliability, workflow, and aesthetics. Indeed, a true tribute to the GNOME developers is that I hadn't been so sold on an environment since I left Apple's Mac OS X behind in 2010. Each version of GNOME has shown refinements as dramatic as anything I'd seen in Mac OS X, but at a breakneck pace. The latest GNOME 3.12 is not merely an incremental improvement like previous versions, but rather a shocking advancement. In this article I will allude to some changes that happened in recent previous versions since they deserve comment. Elegance I love an elegant de...

Since Microsoft announced Windows XP end of service , +Linux   and Free Software enthusiasts have been dancing a celebratory jig and promoting Linux as the preferred upgrade path. Though a user can continue to use XP, Microsoft will no longer be releasing any updates to it and it will thus gradually become more insecure than it already was. Microsoft's recommendation is to migrate to Windows 8.1 or buy a new PC. Frankly, most people running XP have computers that are running up to being a decade old seeing as Vista became available late 2006. Linux is a common solution for people wanting to squeeze more life out of an old computer, but is it the right one? In late 2011 I began working as an independent repair technician and IT consultant. Due to my unusually low prices and geography I typically get people running older hardware. Though I will work on solving issues with various Windows versions, I do attempt to upsell  +openSUSE  Linux to these clients wh...

"It’s not an interface adjustment or tweak. It’s not a bug fix. It’s a complete re-envisioning of Firefox’s user experience, and it’s been brewing for the past five years," +Jennifer Morrow   says in her blog. Jennifer serves +Mozilla Firefox  as the senior designer at Mozilla. This will be the biggest redesign since version 4 which brought us a much cleaner and faster Firefox experience and retired the 3.x design. The new aesthetic is being called Australis, and has already been released to all platforms though as of this writing it is not yet packaged by +openSUSE , though it can be found in the Mozilla community repository. Australis has been designed to address some idiosyncrasies and deliver a consistent user experience. Users familiar with +Google Chrome   will see some strong similarities in the redesign such as the tabs and menu placement. I feel however, that's about where the similarities end. Jennifer Morrow says, "This is when user experience...