Linux Tips: Move, Shade Window

In Kubuntu or KDE (I think...at least with Beryl), a window can get positioned so that you can't grab the title bar (the bar up top that has the menus on the left and right). To move it, hold down ALT and click anywhere on the window and drag.

Shading a window will collapse it into the title bar. To do this, double click on the title bar on top. You will be able to fit a ton of windows on a desktop and not have to go to the task bar, or use the ALT + TAB combination to cycle them. Simply double click them to "unshade??" them.

The Housing Market Bubble

The housing market in Washington State is terrible as it is in many places around the company. Real estate prices are skyrocketing out of control in this area (the greater Puget sound), way beyond what most people can afford. There are "condos," glorified apartments really, selling for $175,000 in some of the worst areas in these parts (Casino Road for the locals). These apartment conversions were built in the 60's, are barely 1000 square feet and are, as mentioned, located in one of the worst parts of this area. A house is going to set you back $300,000 dollars minimum.

MySpace Thwarts Parental Control

After a comment from a reader, I have finally realized the major flaw in the way MySpace does business, especially with minors.

A concerned parent wrote asking about access to her child's private MySpace profile. Her child does not login to the computer at home, but in other places such as friends' places. But because her daughter has a private profile, she can not access it.

As I thought about the reader's problem, a major issue with MySpace finally became clear.

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Dell Offers Ubuntu Linux!

C|Net News.com is reporting today that Dell is now offering Ubuntu Linux as an option for new computers. The article reports that Dell has attempted this before with little success. However, after actually listening to the consumers and realizing that Ubuntu has made great strides towards being a contender for the operating system of choice for the average consumer, Dell is giving it a try once again.

Linux Tip: Get Real Time System Information

To get real time system information from most Linux systems, use the command top. Open up a command prompt and type top. You'll get a updating readout of processor percentage used, memory percentage used, the amount of memory used by process. There are many ways to sort the list and you can kill processes as well (if you run the command using sudo or root).

Top Command

Open Source Alternatives: Quanta Plus

A must have tool for web developers is Quanta Plus, a multi-purpose development tool. It supports code highlighting for many languages and applications, FTP, projects, plugins and much more. To be honest, I have barely scratched the surface of it's capability. Half the time, it is easier to open a document in Kate and edit it. Kate is the notepad of Linux, but on steroids.

Get Your Own Blog

Every wanted your own blog with your own domain name (like john-smiths-blog.com)? You can have one now for $5 per month plus $10 per year for the domain name.

You don't have to know programming or HTML. The only thing you have to know is how to enter a username and password and you can be blogging on your own website in no time. Blogging is changing the world and gives everyone a worldwide forum. Don't miss the boat.

Open Source Alternative: GnuCash

GnuCash Financial Management is a free, open source alternative to highly priced commercial accounting software.

GnuCash provides the tools necessary for personal and business financial management. GnuCash includes everything found in commercial software costing hundreds of dollars including the double entry accounting method, customizable reports, invoices and customer management, job management, budgeting and much more.

Linux Tip: Get Hardware Information

Here's a good way to get hardware information on a linux system. The proc directory holds the files which store the hardware and system state information.

The command ls /proc/ gives me the directory listing. Most of these are files that you can look at.

jsteel@jsteel-desktop:~$ ls /proc/
1 4446 4751 5287 5720 5843 6017 driver mounts
106 4447 4755 5295 5721 5848 6019 execdomains mtrr
132 4450 4768 5306 5735 5849 6042 fb net