The hotel the wife and I stayed at for her birthday gave us free tickets to the Warren Theatre in the Old Town district of Wichita. Or rather, I paid a little extra to get a "Date Night" package and a pair of tickets were part of the deal. In either case, with it being the weekend before Halloween, the majority of the offerings were horror films; a genre which my wife has negative interest in seeing. That left us with an action-thriller, a biopic, and Cloud Atlas. By the title of this piece, you may have already deduced we chose the latter. I went into it mostly blind, having never read the book and only seeing a teaser trailer and the cast list.
Do you remember reading Catch-22 for [High School/College] lit class? Tom Tykwer and the Wachowski siblings' screen adaptation of Cloud Atlas reminds me a lot of the style of Heller's classic, if not the substance. The focus jumps around at seemingly random intervals, introducing characters in story-lines throughout different points in history. Each of these different time periods seem to be self-contained and cross-referential; such as a young composer in one time period reading the published journal of a young lawyer in another, or an writer's story in one section having a movie adaptation in another.
Let's get the accolades out of the way: it looks amazing. The movie boils down to four period pieces, a dystopian sci-fi piece and a post-apocalyptic piece: even with the three parts that are supposed to be fairly close in time, there are enough differences in the clothing that if you pay attention you can tell which story you're watching by the wardrobe alone. The makeup effects are also amazing, to be expected when each actor is playing multiple parts. The score is wonderful as well, adding to the story rather than distracting from it.
Now, flip the coin. Remember how I said it reminded me of Catch-22? That's not necessarily a good thing. This movie tends to bounce back and forth between its various stories; filling in blanks, and forming new questions in a way that can be not only jarring but downright confusing at times. We never stay on one character or sequence for very long, which is a trick for a movie that clocks in at just under 3 hours.
I really enjoyed the film. I found it thought-provoking and a decent, if not great film. My wife, not so much: she found it a confusing, jumbled mess. It's like someone took six concept albums from the same group and rotated albums between tracks.
Hopefully, when the movie comes out for home viewing, the disc will have an option to show each of the stories separately. There are six enjoyable stories in this movie; and doing it that way will let more people enjoy all of them.
Saturday, October 27, 2012
Friday, June 15, 2012
Making my old desktop functional
I've been without a desktop computer for just longer than a year now.
My laptop has kept me well enough; but there's just something about sitting down in a roller chair and sliding up to a keyboard and mouse in a space of my own that makes me feel like I'm actually getting something accomplished, even when I'm just watching random YouTube videos or browsing TVTropes.
I haven't had a real desk here at the house for about 6 years. My wife had a desk, but it comes back to that space of my own. I had a WalMart special computer stand, a overstuffed chair, and a tray that I used for a mouse stand/drink holder. While the overstuffed chair was comfortable as all get out, it was not particularly conducive to anything I wanted to do beyond watching videos -- too laid back for gaming, too comfortable for coding, too fuzzy for hardware changes.
Last year, however, my office/spare bedroom was taken over by my mother-in-law, niece and nephew. The story of why is too long to go into here (and the details of it are frankly none of your business, faithful reader); but the gist was if MIL didn't have a place to live, the two kids were more than likely going to end up wards of the state. My wife and I were not willing to let that happen while we had a say in the matter, so instead, we let them use the office.
Over time, things have changed. I got rid of my desktop; selling it cheap to an uncle who needed a working box ASAP. The chair is still here, a little worse for wear; and the stand will be heading for the rubbish bin the next time furniture pickup comes around. And, at the beginning of the month, MIL found the means to move out. After cleaning the office (three people in a single room accumulates clutter, despite the best of intentions), I realized that my wife's old desktop... our old desktop actually.. was sitting here unused.
This old Gateway computer (back when you bought from them and they shipped in Holstein boxes) has been around the block a few times, and I've made some effort to keep it running over the last decade. Yes, I said decade. This was a middle of the road PC when we bought it back in the fall of 2002, shortly after my then-fiance moved in with me. After all my upgrades over the years; it's a Pentium 4 @ 1.8GHz; 2GB of RAM; CD RW drive, and an Radeon 9250 (PCI). It's not much, but it's enough for a web browsing machine, or just to keep the radar up during storms. The problem was it had 10 years worth of crap on there; XP updates, programs that never got fully uninstalled, that sort of thing. But the last thing I want to do is spend more money on this beast -- I'd rather save it for a brand new box. So I plugged in an old IDE hard drive (no SATA for you, it didn't come out until the year after I bought this) and made a fresh install of XP (quickly updating it).
It works, and runs pretty well (especially compared to how it did the last time I used it) considering the age. Hopefully, I'll get my new computer bought and built soon, so I can retire this one to file server status.
My laptop has kept me well enough; but there's just something about sitting down in a roller chair and sliding up to a keyboard and mouse in a space of my own that makes me feel like I'm actually getting something accomplished, even when I'm just watching random YouTube videos or browsing TVTropes.
I haven't had a real desk here at the house for about 6 years. My wife had a desk, but it comes back to that space of my own. I had a WalMart special computer stand, a overstuffed chair, and a tray that I used for a mouse stand/drink holder. While the overstuffed chair was comfortable as all get out, it was not particularly conducive to anything I wanted to do beyond watching videos -- too laid back for gaming, too comfortable for coding, too fuzzy for hardware changes.
Last year, however, my office/spare bedroom was taken over by my mother-in-law, niece and nephew. The story of why is too long to go into here (and the details of it are frankly none of your business, faithful reader); but the gist was if MIL didn't have a place to live, the two kids were more than likely going to end up wards of the state. My wife and I were not willing to let that happen while we had a say in the matter, so instead, we let them use the office.
Over time, things have changed. I got rid of my desktop; selling it cheap to an uncle who needed a working box ASAP. The chair is still here, a little worse for wear; and the stand will be heading for the rubbish bin the next time furniture pickup comes around. And, at the beginning of the month, MIL found the means to move out. After cleaning the office (three people in a single room accumulates clutter, despite the best of intentions), I realized that my wife's old desktop... our old desktop actually.. was sitting here unused.
This old Gateway computer (back when you bought from them and they shipped in Holstein boxes) has been around the block a few times, and I've made some effort to keep it running over the last decade. Yes, I said decade. This was a middle of the road PC when we bought it back in the fall of 2002, shortly after my then-fiance moved in with me. After all my upgrades over the years; it's a Pentium 4 @ 1.8GHz; 2GB of RAM; CD RW drive, and an Radeon 9250 (PCI). It's not much, but it's enough for a web browsing machine, or just to keep the radar up during storms. The problem was it had 10 years worth of crap on there; XP updates, programs that never got fully uninstalled, that sort of thing. But the last thing I want to do is spend more money on this beast -- I'd rather save it for a brand new box. So I plugged in an old IDE hard drive (no SATA for you, it didn't come out until the year after I bought this) and made a fresh install of XP (quickly updating it).
It works, and runs pretty well (especially compared to how it did the last time I used it) considering the age. Hopefully, I'll get my new computer bought and built soon, so I can retire this one to file server status.
Thursday, May 31, 2012
Keyboard rant
I've noticed something about my Microsoft Digital Media keyboard.
A lot of the buttons go unused.
I'm not talking about the big three that very few people use (PrtScn/SysRq, Scroll Lock, and Pause/Break). For me, the Print Screen button actually gets a workout, because I like to document stuff (especially when something breaks). So does the Windows/Super/Start button. Heck, even the quick start button for the Calculator gets into the act -- even if the other program quick-keys don't.
I do miss the media player control buttons, though I suppose with a little tweaking in Debian or actually loading the drivers in Windows, I could set the ominous 1-5 buttons that sit unused to actually do something. But at least my volume controls and mute button work. The zoom lever's function is a mystery to me, though I haven't tried it out in GIMP or IE yet.
But in designing this keyboard, Microsoft added 12 new keys. But the problem was, they didn't actually add them to the keyboard. That would imply a new block of keys to ignore. No... they took a cue from laptop designers and overlayed the function keys with new functions.
Adding new keys to a keyboard -- especially mutlimedia keys and quick start keys -- is not a new thing. Heck, I've got an old IBM-branded keyboard with a quick-start button hand-labeled Lotus 1-2-3. Overwriting -- more accurately modifying keys so the original function now requires a meta-keystroke (i.e. Alt+, Ctrl+, or Win+) -- is a bit harder to get used to.
So I have a new favorite button: the "F Lock" button. The F Lock button's purpose is simple: toggle between the traditional F1-F12 keys and the new ... Office-related? ... keys. Truthfully, the keyboard reminds me of that chipboard keyboard template that used to come with WordPerfect and flight sims, that described what each key did. Because now, instead of F4, you get "New". F10 is Spell, which I assume is spell checker.
Now, don't get me wrong. I don't have a problem with these functions being mapped to their own buttons. And on this keyboard, it's easy enough to treat it like I have the Number Pad for years: make sure NumLock is on when I sit down, and go like normal. Even better, the new key behaviour is clearly marked, with the new function names printed on top of the button, and the traditional F Keys on the side as fits the demoted status. The F Lock key makes it possible for touch-typists to continue to use the keyboard unimpeded -- especially those of us used to using keyboard shortcuts that included the Function Keys. So kudos to Microsoft: you extended the functionality of a design while leaving legacy functionality accessible to power users.
So why am I praising Microsoft in this; even if it is a bit backhandedly? My wife just (past 6 months) bought an HP Pavilion laptop, and I had to use it to look something up for her right quick -- specifically needing to refresh the page to check the information. Being a touch-typist, I set up on home row and hit the F5 key. Which promptly took me back to the browser's home page.
The keyboard on her laptop has also overwritten the function keys; and the F5 is now a globe, which is really my second complaint with the design: I know there's limited space, but why the icons instead of
words? On my keyboard, there is a browser launch button: it's icon mirrors the "Home" button from IE, but it's still labeled "Web/Home". In fact, the only buttons without an explicit label are the big silver 1-5 buttons, which I still assume are programmable; and the volume control buttons. But the globe button -- which is a good representation of "start a browser", not so much "return to the home page" -- being where the Refresh button should be? For anyone not already familiar with the way HP designed their keyboard, they're going to be frustrated and upset.
And it doesn't have an F-Lock (or, with their labeling convention, an "fn-Lock") key. [In fairness, the MSFT keyboard doesn't have a single-use key; so you can't easily switch between functions.] So now, a hard refresh (Ctrl+F5) is a three-finger salute (fn+Ctrl+F5). Same with closing (fn+Alt+F4) or maximizing (fn+Alt+F10) a window. I would wager that while this point was raised with someone on the design team at some point, the response was "But who actually uses the function keys?" And truthfully, they're probably right. For the rest of us, though; instead of Ctrl+S, Alt-F4, I may go back to ":wq" instead.
A lot of the buttons go unused.
I'm not talking about the big three that very few people use (PrtScn/SysRq, Scroll Lock, and Pause/Break). For me, the Print Screen button actually gets a workout, because I like to document stuff (especially when something breaks). So does the Windows/Super/Start button. Heck, even the quick start button for the Calculator gets into the act -- even if the other program quick-keys don't.
I do miss the media player control buttons, though I suppose with a little tweaking in Debian or actually loading the drivers in Windows, I could set the ominous 1-5 buttons that sit unused to actually do something. But at least my volume controls and mute button work. The zoom lever's function is a mystery to me, though I haven't tried it out in GIMP or IE yet.
But in designing this keyboard, Microsoft added 12 new keys. But the problem was, they didn't actually add them to the keyboard. That would imply a new block of keys to ignore. No... they took a cue from laptop designers and overlayed the function keys with new functions.
Adding new keys to a keyboard -- especially mutlimedia keys and quick start keys -- is not a new thing. Heck, I've got an old IBM-branded keyboard with a quick-start button hand-labeled Lotus 1-2-3. Overwriting -- more accurately modifying keys so the original function now requires a meta-keystroke (i.e. Alt+, Ctrl+, or Win+) -- is a bit harder to get used to.
So I have a new favorite button: the "F Lock" button. The F Lock button's purpose is simple: toggle between the traditional F1-F12 keys and the new ... Office-related? ... keys. Truthfully, the keyboard reminds me of that chipboard keyboard template that used to come with WordPerfect and flight sims, that described what each key did. Because now, instead of F4, you get "New". F10 is Spell, which I assume is spell checker.
Now, don't get me wrong. I don't have a problem with these functions being mapped to their own buttons. And on this keyboard, it's easy enough to treat it like I have the Number Pad for years: make sure NumLock is on when I sit down, and go like normal. Even better, the new key behaviour is clearly marked, with the new function names printed on top of the button, and the traditional F Keys on the side as fits the demoted status. The F Lock key makes it possible for touch-typists to continue to use the keyboard unimpeded -- especially those of us used to using keyboard shortcuts that included the Function Keys. So kudos to Microsoft: you extended the functionality of a design while leaving legacy functionality accessible to power users.
So why am I praising Microsoft in this; even if it is a bit backhandedly? My wife just (past 6 months) bought an HP Pavilion laptop, and I had to use it to look something up for her right quick -- specifically needing to refresh the page to check the information. Being a touch-typist, I set up on home row and hit the F5 key. Which promptly took me back to the browser's home page.
The keyboard on her laptop has also overwritten the function keys; and the F5 is now a globe, which is really my second complaint with the design: I know there's limited space, but why the icons instead of
words? On my keyboard, there is a browser launch button: it's icon mirrors the "Home" button from IE, but it's still labeled "Web/Home". In fact, the only buttons without an explicit label are the big silver 1-5 buttons, which I still assume are programmable; and the volume control buttons. But the globe button -- which is a good representation of "start a browser", not so much "return to the home page" -- being where the Refresh button should be? For anyone not already familiar with the way HP designed their keyboard, they're going to be frustrated and upset.
And it doesn't have an F-Lock (or, with their labeling convention, an "fn-Lock") key. [In fairness, the MSFT keyboard doesn't have a single-use key; so you can't easily switch between functions.] So now, a hard refresh (Ctrl+F5) is a three-finger salute (fn+Ctrl+F5). Same with closing (fn+Alt+F4) or maximizing (fn+Alt+F10) a window. I would wager that while this point was raised with someone on the design team at some point, the response was "But who actually uses the function keys?" And truthfully, they're probably right. For the rest of us, though; instead of Ctrl+S, Alt-F4, I may go back to ":wq" instead.
Friday, May 11, 2012
Installing Debian Wheezy (testing) w/GNOME 3
Debian (currently available in Squeeze (stable), Wheezy (testing) and Sid (unstable) branches) is one of the most basic Linux distributions at the moment. Not basic as in simple, but basic as in the foundation of a bunch of others. Debian is also available with FreeBSD and Hurd, but this will be based on the Linux kernel version. Without Debian, there'd be no Ubuntu, at least not in its current form. I am also a major fan of the APT package management (compared to both RedHat's RPM and Gentoo's Portage systems).
This walkthrough / review is for installing the Testing version from USB. I downloaded the Mini ISO image from my Ubuntu machine and (following the easy directions from here) I made a bootable USB drive from a 64MB flash memory stick.
One quick F12 (to give the USB stick priority for this boot) on restart, and I was presented with the Installer boot menu. Now, a couple of things. First, since we're booting from the mini image, you need a network connection (preferably wired).
Second, if you want to start with Wheezy, instead of getting Squeeze and "upgrading", then you're going to have to use the Expert Install option. The mini iso also has options to install KDE, LXDE, and XFCE desktops instead of GNOME. Really, there's not much difference between the Expert Install and the standard; just a few more options here and there.
Answer your standard questions (country, language, keyboard type, which network interface to use) and where to download your packages from to get some packages downloading. Then we'll input a root password and a primary user; and time zone. When you're asked which version, go with Testing. After this, if you've installed Ubuntu, you know what to expect; not surprising since Ubuntu's installer is based on the Debian one. What you will notice if you are installing from the mini.iso like me is a much longer setup time. The reason is simple, and it actually ends up being less of a time sink than a time shift; from when you download the iso (16MB vs 720-ish for a standard ISO) to the actual install process. Depending on the time difference between when the ISO was released and now, this will save you time on updates after you finish the install. That said, if you're doing multiple machines rather than a single one; definitely grab the full install disk rather than a net-install or mini iso; the time difference will thank you.
The mini-iso's partition manager does not have NTFS capabilities; so you are going to have to futz around a bit after installation to read-write from your windows partition if you choose to dual-boot. Otherwise, the partition manager is partman; if you're setting up manually be sure to choose the file system you want from the list; and note that the EXT file system versions are in no particular order.* Also, make note of your hard drive device name in the partition editor, depending on what name , you may have to specify which drive to put GRUB on.
And really; that's all you're going to see out that's "Debian". One of the things that people tend to gloss over is that when done right, the distro you choose is going to be fairly invisible. Outside of a treatise on the differences between apt, rpm, portage, and the various front-ends of each, pretty much the only thing left to talk about is the default loadout.
The one thing you'll probably notice for Debian is Iceweasel vs Firefox. Their built from the same code; Iceweasel doesn't have Firefox branding because of a difference in licensing philosophy. So, let's take a look at the default GNOME 3.
After entering your login information, you'll be presented with GNOME 3.2's desktop with a Debian wallpaper. Across the top are the Activity menu, Calendar, accessibility menu, volume manager, network manager, battery life (this is on a laptop), and your user menu. I'll get to that user menu in a few minutes.
This is the Activities menu; open it by either hitting the top left hot corner, clicking on Activities, or pressing the Super key (Win-logo). On the right are virtual desktops; if you use them, great, if not, it stays out of the way.
Virtual desktops spawn when all the existing desktops have windows open on them; and self-destruct when everything closes on them. In other words, you'll always have a clean workspace to choose from, as long as your processor and memory can handle them.
On the left are your "Favorites", basically a quick launch bar. You'll start out with Epipahny (web browser), Evolution (mail and calendar), Empathy (a messenger), LibreOffice Write, Nautilus (file manager), and Gnome Help already pinned.You can add any program from the application pane to the Favorites bar, and any running program can be pinned as well.
I will give Gnome props for one of the better all-in-one setups I've found. Under the User Menu, there's a option for Online Accounts (You can also get to it through the settings menu). If you have a Google account, enter your account information, check the appropriate permissions, and it will automatically set up both your gmail and google calendar. The next time you open Evolution, you'll be asked to OK a security certificate from Google, and you're done.
The best part is, this is optional; and can be removed easily at any time through either Evolution or the Online Accounts menu. I haven't tried the Windows Live nor the Facebook integration, but if it works anything like the Google, I'll be impressed.
It's a pretty lean lineup of apps for the standard install. That's not a bad thing; and it falls under the philosophy of letting the user choose their tools. In addition to the aforementioned favorites, it's actually a short list of graphical tools:
With its full-screen "Start" menu, hot corner menu, and online account integration, you could be forgiven for thinking GNOME 3 was trying to copy parts of Windows 8... if it hadn't come out over a year ago. And I'll have to say, the virtual desktop system seems to work better for the way I like to work than MetroUI did.
So what are the good points, what are the problems?
The full screen Activities menu is still a bit of a put-off, and for the same reasons that the Metro's full screen Start Menu was. It also works in the same way that Win8 did; hitting Super (Win-logo) then typing the name of a document, program, or someone in your contact list filters the list quickly. Gnome adds two buttons at the bottom of the screen for Google and Wikipedia search. The major difference I see is in how "busy" the screen is when you open the menu. Metro presents a wall of information with your applications in the mix. You can arrange it however you want, but it's designed to be a lot of big boxes of info on screen at once. Gnome divides the screen into "What you usually do" (the favorites menu), "Stuff you've set aside" (the virtual desktops), and either "What you're doing now" (open windows on this desktop) or "What you want to do" (the applications menu). It's cleaner, and it works as expected.
The biggest difference I see between the two system seems to be where they expect you to spend the majority of your time. In Win8, the impression I got was the Start Screen was intended to be your "home base", where you rest between short bursts of activity. Gnome, uses the Activities screen more as the road to get where you're going; while still going away from the older folder-style menu so maligned these days. On the other hand, the top-left and bottom-right are both hot corners, which is a technology I was really hoping would fade away.
Still the biggest complaint I have about look and feel of Gnome3 are the large title bars and the lack of built-in theme support; the gnome package mentioned earlier includes gnome-tweak-tool, which is able to change the look of the UI.
The thing I like about the command line/NCURSES program Aptitude (# aptitude) is the ability to look at meta-packages -- packages of packages -- and choose what you want to install. Take the "gnome" metapackage. It has a lot of programs available, but I don't necessarily want all of them on my machine. For example, I don't have a webcam or a scanner for my laptop, so programs like Cheese (a webcam controller/viewer) and Simple-Scan would be useless. I selected applications for document viewing (gnome-documents), network tools (gnome-nettool), photo management (shotwell), bittorrent (transmission-gtk), the aforementioned gnome-tweak-tool, and a tool to let me install local deb files without going to the command line (gdebi).
I did install one game, as well. Einstein is both a clone of the old DOS game Sherlock, and an implementation of the "Einstein's Puzzle" style of logic puzzle; something I did a lot when I was younger, and still enjoy.
* This is probably a lie. I imagine that they are listed in order of Preferred (Ext3), Usable (Ext4), and Legacy (Ext2); then all the other choices.
This walkthrough / review is for installing the Testing version from USB. I downloaded the Mini ISO image from my Ubuntu machine and (following the easy directions from here) I made a bootable USB drive from a 64MB flash memory stick.
One quick F12 (to give the USB stick priority for this boot) on restart, and I was presented with the Installer boot menu. Now, a couple of things. First, since we're booting from the mini image, you need a network connection (preferably wired).
Second, if you want to start with Wheezy, instead of getting Squeeze and "upgrading", then you're going to have to use the Expert Install option. The mini iso also has options to install KDE, LXDE, and XFCE desktops instead of GNOME. Really, there's not much difference between the Expert Install and the standard; just a few more options here and there.
Answer your standard questions (country, language, keyboard type, which network interface to use) and where to download your packages from to get some packages downloading. Then we'll input a root password and a primary user; and time zone. When you're asked which version, go with Testing. After this, if you've installed Ubuntu, you know what to expect; not surprising since Ubuntu's installer is based on the Debian one. What you will notice if you are installing from the mini.iso like me is a much longer setup time. The reason is simple, and it actually ends up being less of a time sink than a time shift; from when you download the iso (16MB vs 720-ish for a standard ISO) to the actual install process. Depending on the time difference between when the ISO was released and now, this will save you time on updates after you finish the install. That said, if you're doing multiple machines rather than a single one; definitely grab the full install disk rather than a net-install or mini iso; the time difference will thank you.
The mini-iso's partition manager does not have NTFS capabilities; so you are going to have to futz around a bit after installation to read-write from your windows partition if you choose to dual-boot. Otherwise, the partition manager is partman; if you're setting up manually be sure to choose the file system you want from the list; and note that the EXT file system versions are in no particular order.* Also, make note of your hard drive device name in the partition editor, depending on what name , you may have to specify which drive to put GRUB on.
And really; that's all you're going to see out that's "Debian". One of the things that people tend to gloss over is that when done right, the distro you choose is going to be fairly invisible. Outside of a treatise on the differences between apt, rpm, portage, and the various front-ends of each, pretty much the only thing left to talk about is the default loadout.
The one thing you'll probably notice for Debian is Iceweasel vs Firefox. Their built from the same code; Iceweasel doesn't have Firefox branding because of a difference in licensing philosophy. So, let's take a look at the default GNOME 3.
After entering your login information, you'll be presented with GNOME 3.2's desktop with a Debian wallpaper. Across the top are the Activity menu, Calendar, accessibility menu, volume manager, network manager, battery life (this is on a laptop), and your user menu. I'll get to that user menu in a few minutes.
Virtual desktops spawn when all the existing desktops have windows open on them; and self-destruct when everything closes on them. In other words, you'll always have a clean workspace to choose from, as long as your processor and memory can handle them.
On the left are your "Favorites", basically a quick launch bar. You'll start out with Epipahny (web browser), Evolution (mail and calendar), Empathy (a messenger), LibreOffice Write, Nautilus (file manager), and Gnome Help already pinned.You can add any program from the application pane to the Favorites bar, and any running program can be pinned as well.
I will give Gnome props for one of the better all-in-one setups I've found. Under the User Menu, there's a option for Online Accounts (You can also get to it through the settings menu). If you have a Google account, enter your account information, check the appropriate permissions, and it will automatically set up both your gmail and google calendar. The next time you open Evolution, you'll be asked to OK a security certificate from Google, and you're done.The best part is, this is optional; and can be removed easily at any time through either Evolution or the Online Accounts menu. I haven't tried the Windows Live nor the Facebook integration, but if it works anything like the Google, I'll be impressed.
It's a pretty lean lineup of apps for the standard install. That's not a bad thing; and it falls under the philosophy of letting the user choose their tools. In addition to the aforementioned favorites, it's actually a short list of graphical tools:
- Add/Remove Software (along with Software Sources, Synaptic, and Update Manager)
- Eye of Gnome, Evince, and the GIMP
- Desktop Sharing and a Remote Desktop Viewer
- Totem movie player
- Calculator, Character Map, Brasero to burn discs, Find File, Screenshot utility
- Command line, Contact Manager and a bunch of settings.
For me, the most glaring omissions are a graphical text editor, a file compression utility, and a dedicated music player. The third isn't a big deal for me, but can be for others. That said, installing the "gnome" package (# apt-get install gnome) will fix all three omissions, as well as add in a VoIP program, a CD ripper, scanner software, photo management software, webcam software, games, and a host of other stuff.
The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly
With its full-screen "Start" menu, hot corner menu, and online account integration, you could be forgiven for thinking GNOME 3 was trying to copy parts of Windows 8... if it hadn't come out over a year ago. And I'll have to say, the virtual desktop system seems to work better for the way I like to work than MetroUI did.
So what are the good points, what are the problems?
The full screen Activities menu is still a bit of a put-off, and for the same reasons that the Metro's full screen Start Menu was. It also works in the same way that Win8 did; hitting Super (Win-logo) then typing the name of a document, program, or someone in your contact list filters the list quickly. Gnome adds two buttons at the bottom of the screen for Google and Wikipedia search. The major difference I see is in how "busy" the screen is when you open the menu. Metro presents a wall of information with your applications in the mix. You can arrange it however you want, but it's designed to be a lot of big boxes of info on screen at once. Gnome divides the screen into "What you usually do" (the favorites menu), "Stuff you've set aside" (the virtual desktops), and either "What you're doing now" (open windows on this desktop) or "What you want to do" (the applications menu). It's cleaner, and it works as expected.
The biggest difference I see between the two system seems to be where they expect you to spend the majority of your time. In Win8, the impression I got was the Start Screen was intended to be your "home base", where you rest between short bursts of activity. Gnome, uses the Activities screen more as the road to get where you're going; while still going away from the older folder-style menu so maligned these days. On the other hand, the top-left and bottom-right are both hot corners, which is a technology I was really hoping would fade away.
Still the biggest complaint I have about look and feel of Gnome3 are the large title bars and the lack of built-in theme support; the gnome package mentioned earlier includes gnome-tweak-tool, which is able to change the look of the UI.
What I Added
First, I picked up the Google Chrome package from http://chrome.google.com. I could have used the Chromium-Browser package already in Debian, but I'll take the branding this time. Nautilus did not want to install via double-click -- probably a permissions problem -- so I used the command line (# dpkg -i ./filename) and after a single dependency error (fixed with # apt-get install libcurl3 libxss1), I had Chrome up and running.The thing I like about the command line/NCURSES program Aptitude (# aptitude) is the ability to look at meta-packages -- packages of packages -- and choose what you want to install. Take the "gnome" metapackage. It has a lot of programs available, but I don't necessarily want all of them on my machine. For example, I don't have a webcam or a scanner for my laptop, so programs like Cheese (a webcam controller/viewer) and Simple-Scan would be useless. I selected applications for document viewing (gnome-documents), network tools (gnome-nettool), photo management (shotwell), bittorrent (transmission-gtk), the aforementioned gnome-tweak-tool, and a tool to let me install local deb files without going to the command line (gdebi).
I did install one game, as well. Einstein is both a clone of the old DOS game Sherlock, and an implementation of the "Einstein's Puzzle" style of logic puzzle; something I did a lot when I was younger, and still enjoy.
* This is probably a lie. I imagine that they are listed in order of Preferred (Ext3), Usable (Ext4), and Legacy (Ext2); then all the other choices.
Monday, April 23, 2012
Back to the Grind
If we hadn't determined this already, my tastes don't align with a lot of people. In a lot of things I'm behind the curve; just take my laptop if you really need an example. Other things will just tickle my fancy for no apparent reason. And of course, I think about other things way too much.
One of the things in video games that I actually kind of enjoy is grinding. I don't mean farming quests like "Collect 10 of the widgets that sometimes drop when you kill a certain type of enemy." I mean good old-fashioned Final Fantasy-style level grinding: beat the crap out of randomly spawning enemies to beef up your character.
There are games that do it well, and some that do it poorly. So, what's the difference?
The games that do it poorly smack down the player who doesn't grind. I'm talking one-hit total party wipe; the only way to get past the point is to reload an earlier save file and level up a few dozen times before you can even hope to damage the boss.
In part, this is tied to a mechanic that's referred to as "binary damage"; either an attack does full damage, or it does either one point or no damage at all, depending on the system. Usually binary damage is based on the attack stat (or whatever the mechanical equivalent in your game is called). If ATK is less than a certain level -- usually the defense stat of an enemy -- you're lucky if you do a single point of damage per round/attack; if you hit at all instead of getting the "Miss" animation. Binary damage can be thought of like you're in a D&D-like pen and paper RPG; you have a "to-hit" or attack roll to see if you hit or miss, and a separate calculation determines damage.
The games that do the grind well -- at least in my opinion -- are the ones that reward, but don't require. These are the games that if you play straight through the story mode, you may not be able to go toe to toe and trade blows with the end boss; but... if you manage the fight well, with a little luck you will win. In these games, grinding makes the fights easier, rather than making the fights winnable. And that's a thin distinction, but I think it's an important one.
A lot of these games work around "scaling" damage. To extend the pen and paper metaphor, it would be a system where attack and damage were determined a single roll. If you don't hit; you still have the Miss animation, but a character whose attack is barely more than the to-hit minimum will be doing a lot less damage than the character whose attack blows the defense out of the water.
We're not talking "elemental affinity"; where certain enemies are strong or weak against specific types of attacks. As a mechanic, "Elemental" affinities are a staple of RPGs in general, and really the backbone of strategic or "tactics" RPGs. These usually take the form of a rock-paper-scissors contest: Axes are strong against Spears are strong against Swords are strong against Axes. Some games take type-pairing to the extreme, like Pokemon's 17 types of moves, each of which is either deals normal, half, an extra half (1.5x), or no damage to the other types. Again, there is a difference in a game mechanic that makes certain units/styles ineffective by their nature, and one that penalizes you for not being strong enough to be in an area.
Now, it's a fine line to walk for a game designer. How much work (or time, same difference to the consumer) is the gamer going to be willing to put into your game? Games like the Disgaea series bank on the fact that their consumers already know what they're getting into; grinding not only individual characters but also weapons are a selling point of the franchise. I don't have the answer. Until I do, I'm going to keep playing the games I like to play, and celebrate when the random encounters I struggled so hard to beat my first time in a new area are running up against the same binary damage wall I put the time in to avoid.
One of the things in video games that I actually kind of enjoy is grinding. I don't mean farming quests like "Collect 10 of the widgets that sometimes drop when you kill a certain type of enemy." I mean good old-fashioned Final Fantasy-style level grinding: beat the crap out of randomly spawning enemies to beef up your character.
There are games that do it well, and some that do it poorly. So, what's the difference?
The games that do it poorly smack down the player who doesn't grind. I'm talking one-hit total party wipe; the only way to get past the point is to reload an earlier save file and level up a few dozen times before you can even hope to damage the boss.
In part, this is tied to a mechanic that's referred to as "binary damage"; either an attack does full damage, or it does either one point or no damage at all, depending on the system. Usually binary damage is based on the attack stat (or whatever the mechanical equivalent in your game is called). If ATK is less than a certain level -- usually the defense stat of an enemy -- you're lucky if you do a single point of damage per round/attack; if you hit at all instead of getting the "Miss" animation. Binary damage can be thought of like you're in a D&D-like pen and paper RPG; you have a "to-hit" or attack roll to see if you hit or miss, and a separate calculation determines damage.
The games that do the grind well -- at least in my opinion -- are the ones that reward, but don't require. These are the games that if you play straight through the story mode, you may not be able to go toe to toe and trade blows with the end boss; but... if you manage the fight well, with a little luck you will win. In these games, grinding makes the fights easier, rather than making the fights winnable. And that's a thin distinction, but I think it's an important one.
A lot of these games work around "scaling" damage. To extend the pen and paper metaphor, it would be a system where attack and damage were determined a single roll. If you don't hit; you still have the Miss animation, but a character whose attack is barely more than the to-hit minimum will be doing a lot less damage than the character whose attack blows the defense out of the water.
We're not talking "elemental affinity"; where certain enemies are strong or weak against specific types of attacks. As a mechanic, "Elemental" affinities are a staple of RPGs in general, and really the backbone of strategic or "tactics" RPGs. These usually take the form of a rock-paper-scissors contest: Axes are strong against Spears are strong against Swords are strong against Axes. Some games take type-pairing to the extreme, like Pokemon's 17 types of moves, each of which is either deals normal, half, an extra half (1.5x), or no damage to the other types. Again, there is a difference in a game mechanic that makes certain units/styles ineffective by their nature, and one that penalizes you for not being strong enough to be in an area.
Now, it's a fine line to walk for a game designer. How much work (or time, same difference to the consumer) is the gamer going to be willing to put into your game? Games like the Disgaea series bank on the fact that their consumers already know what they're getting into; grinding not only individual characters but also weapons are a selling point of the franchise. I don't have the answer. Until I do, I'm going to keep playing the games I like to play, and celebrate when the random encounters I struggled so hard to beat my first time in a new area are running up against the same binary damage wall I put the time in to avoid.
Am I really saving money?
Comments I read elsewhere on a article about membership club shopping (i.e. Sams, Costco) got me to thinking about how I spend my money on groceries.
Living out here in the country (or rather, in a rural area, since I do live within the "city limits" of my town), I basically have 3 options for buying stuff; depending on what I need and when I need it. The first is local shops. Now, like many small towns, I'm limited in selection here; especially with the closing of the local general/small department store. In fact, shopping local for me is pretty much groceries (which I include the butcher and the farmers market), auto parts, prescription drugs and specialty items.
The second option is driving into the bigger cities; in theory, that's a choice between about 35 miles or about 130. In practice, I can get from my front door to the shops in Dodge City and back in 75 miles, which makes travel time about an 1:10 (or 1.15 hrs). Figuring gas cost at $3.50 (a little cheaper than what it is right now; but about I was paying a month ago), and a slightly generous 30 mpg (highway my car usually gets about 29.6), that's $7.50. Since I get oil changes free for the life of the car at the dealer I bought it at, I'm not going to worry about that portion, nor am I going to figure tire life into it. I will figure in my drive time, at a modest $15/hour. Feel free to change that for your own calculations, depending on your pay rate and how much you value your time away from work. That brings the cost of my trip to $24.50 to make a run to Dodge. To get to Wichita, it's a little more than $90.
But what do the numbers actually mean? That's the difference I have to get to in what I spend there and what I would have spent here -- or spend on items that are not available in town -- to be able to say "I saved money." If I don't have a cost savings of $25, then I would actually be saving money by spending a little extra at home.
The third option is shopping online. Unfortunately, outside of a few specialty foods companies whose ads we've all seen one place or another; grocery delivery for me is out of the question. If I was in a bigger city where such a service was offered, then I might consider it. Much like travel time when shopping out of town, the difference between buying locally and online is in the shipping (working with the assumption I would spend the same amount of time "shopping" for a particular item). Is a particular item different enough from local offerings or the savings on the total order great enough to cover the cost of shipping? The first is subjective, but the second is firmly objective.
Does this mean you should always shop at home? No. But it does mean that in small communities, you should work with the local businesses to make sure they know what the types of goods you have to go out of town for; and what they could be carrying to make sure your money goes to them.
Living out here in the country (or rather, in a rural area, since I do live within the "city limits" of my town), I basically have 3 options for buying stuff; depending on what I need and when I need it. The first is local shops. Now, like many small towns, I'm limited in selection here; especially with the closing of the local general/small department store. In fact, shopping local for me is pretty much groceries (which I include the butcher and the farmers market), auto parts, prescription drugs and specialty items.
The second option is driving into the bigger cities; in theory, that's a choice between about 35 miles or about 130. In practice, I can get from my front door to the shops in Dodge City and back in 75 miles, which makes travel time about an 1:10 (or 1.15 hrs). Figuring gas cost at $3.50 (a little cheaper than what it is right now; but about I was paying a month ago), and a slightly generous 30 mpg (highway my car usually gets about 29.6), that's $7.50. Since I get oil changes free for the life of the car at the dealer I bought it at, I'm not going to worry about that portion, nor am I going to figure tire life into it. I will figure in my drive time, at a modest $15/hour. Feel free to change that for your own calculations, depending on your pay rate and how much you value your time away from work. That brings the cost of my trip to $24.50 to make a run to Dodge. To get to Wichita, it's a little more than $90.
But what do the numbers actually mean? That's the difference I have to get to in what I spend there and what I would have spent here -- or spend on items that are not available in town -- to be able to say "I saved money." If I don't have a cost savings of $25, then I would actually be saving money by spending a little extra at home.
The third option is shopping online. Unfortunately, outside of a few specialty foods companies whose ads we've all seen one place or another; grocery delivery for me is out of the question. If I was in a bigger city where such a service was offered, then I might consider it. Much like travel time when shopping out of town, the difference between buying locally and online is in the shipping (working with the assumption I would spend the same amount of time "shopping" for a particular item). Is a particular item different enough from local offerings or the savings on the total order great enough to cover the cost of shipping? The first is subjective, but the second is firmly objective.
Does this mean you should always shop at home? No. But it does mean that in small communities, you should work with the local businesses to make sure they know what the types of goods you have to go out of town for; and what they could be carrying to make sure your money goes to them.
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
Thoughts on an Anniversary
Yesterday was Machel's and my 8th wedding anniversary. We didn't really celebrate; but we never
really have. It's not in our either of our natures to make a big deal out of time. But it has given me reason to think back over the past year and the good fortune we've had.
In a time when people have been stuck underwater in their mortgages, we've paid off the note on our house; when credit has been hard to come by, we've improved our credit scores and financed our first new car.
Chel graduated college, and in a job market that's tight in her field picked up a full-time job. When a lot of people have been struggling to make it, she's been able to use her hard-earned skills to monetize her hobby.
I'll be the first to admit, it hasn't been all wine and roses; but with the majority of the bitter has come sweet. We found out that the chances of us having a child were slim to none; but we learned we will become Aunt Chel and Uncle Deege to a fourth child on my side of the family, my baby sister's first. My mother-in-law moved in with us after taking custody of my sister-in-laws youngest two and subsequently not getting her rental agreement renewed, and hasn't left yet; but we've gotten to spend time with them we otherwise wouldn't have. {And yes, I'm trying very hard to find something good for us that has come out of the situation. Because otherwise, I probably won't be able to play peacemaker when Chel finally snaps and issues a great big FU to that side of the family.}
This year hopes to be better; we've got a week in Vegas planned for Chel's birthday in October with a couple of friends. But I wanted to do something a little sooner. We've both been really stressed, and definitely lacking in "alone time", both by ourselves and with each other. So, not this coming Saturday but the next; I'm stealing my wife and taking her to Wichita for the weekend; ostensibly for our anniversary, but more just to get away for a little while.
I had thought about staying at the new Hampton Inn attached to the casino in Dodge City; but chose the Hotel At WaterWalk instead. Wichita has better shopping and a wider variety of dining than Dodge, and for the same nightly rate as the Queen room at Boot Hill, we are getting a King Suite instead. Besides, we've already got the Vegas trip planned, no need to blow all our fun money before we get there.
We don't do stuff all that often. Partly because money has been tight the past 10 years -- with the house paid off the belts can loosing a tiny bit -- but more because we've always been happy to sit at the house and enjoy each others company. With that option... limited right now; I'm gonna take every chance I get to give my wife the opportunity to unwind.
In a time when people have been stuck underwater in their mortgages, we've paid off the note on our house; when credit has been hard to come by, we've improved our credit scores and financed our first new car.
Chel graduated college, and in a job market that's tight in her field picked up a full-time job. When a lot of people have been struggling to make it, she's been able to use her hard-earned skills to monetize her hobby.
I'll be the first to admit, it hasn't been all wine and roses; but with the majority of the bitter has come sweet. We found out that the chances of us having a child were slim to none; but we learned we will become Aunt Chel and Uncle Deege to a fourth child on my side of the family, my baby sister's first. My mother-in-law moved in with us after taking custody of my sister-in-laws youngest two and subsequently not getting her rental agreement renewed, and hasn't left yet; but we've gotten to spend time with them we otherwise wouldn't have. {And yes, I'm trying very hard to find something good for us that has come out of the situation. Because otherwise, I probably won't be able to play peacemaker when Chel finally snaps and issues a great big FU to that side of the family.}
This year hopes to be better; we've got a week in Vegas planned for Chel's birthday in October with a couple of friends. But I wanted to do something a little sooner. We've both been really stressed, and definitely lacking in "alone time", both by ourselves and with each other. So, not this coming Saturday but the next; I'm stealing my wife and taking her to Wichita for the weekend; ostensibly for our anniversary, but more just to get away for a little while.
I had thought about staying at the new Hampton Inn attached to the casino in Dodge City; but chose the Hotel At WaterWalk instead. Wichita has better shopping and a wider variety of dining than Dodge, and for the same nightly rate as the Queen room at Boot Hill, we are getting a King Suite instead. Besides, we've already got the Vegas trip planned, no need to blow all our fun money before we get there.
We don't do stuff all that often. Partly because money has been tight the past 10 years -- with the house paid off the belts can loosing a tiny bit -- but more because we've always been happy to sit at the house and enjoy each others company. With that option... limited right now; I'm gonna take every chance I get to give my wife the opportunity to unwind.
Sunday, April 8, 2012
Win8 and Workflow
In the little time I've spent working with the Windows 8 Consumer Preview; I've noticed something very important. The Metro apps do not work with my writing workflow.It seems like there should be a way* to tile a Metro app, pinning it to the side of the desktop; or at least splitting between two Metro apps. And when I grab the top of a Metro app, it shrinks the page, and goes to what appears to be a positioning screen. This may just be for dual-monitor setups; because I can't get two of the things to appear at once, nor can I drop it on the "desktop".
This causes a problem for me, especially with the "Reader" app. When I'm writing, I'll often have a reference document open to the side. Sometimes it's a web site; usually, it will be a PDF or more recently an XPS document (hooray for free Print to File drivers). I like to have facts straight (or my character depictions consistent, at least), and the easiest way to do this is to splitscreen.
Now, I will say that this isn't a problem if you use the XPS viewer or Acrobat Reader from the desktop.
I can't seem to get this to work on Win8CP. I wonder if this could be partly due to my older hardware. I mentioned in the last post that Win8 automatically loaded a generic VGA driver for my laptop, instead of a specific driver for the GMA 900 (910/915). After more research (the first post was only meant to be first impressions), I found out that particular chipset does not have drivers available due to the changes in the graphics subsystem in Win7.
So what does that mean to me? I take a performance hit. Because Win8 cannot take advantage of the graphics hardware, the CPU has to pick up the load. And the Celeron M was not made for heavy lifting. I'm also limited in available resolutions to 1280x800 and 1024x768. Which means games like Civ4, which was playable at lowered resolutions under XP on this machine decides to spit, stutter, and pretty much become unplayable under Win8.
More importantly than gaming, the transition screens sometime glitch out; hiccuping when you switch between Metro apps. Which means swiping back and forth between, say, the IE Metro App open to Google Docs or Blogger.com, and the Reader app (which is the default display for both PDF and XPS) is not only time-consuming; but it can result in crashing (and then reloading) both. Hopefully, it will be more stable on supported hardware.
*As in, I was pretty sure I saw it happen in the preview video.
This causes a problem for me, especially with the "Reader" app. When I'm writing, I'll often have a reference document open to the side. Sometimes it's a web site; usually, it will be a PDF or more recently an XPS document (hooray for free Print to File drivers). I like to have facts straight (or my character depictions consistent, at least), and the easiest way to do this is to splitscreen.
Now, I will say that this isn't a problem if you use the XPS viewer or Acrobat Reader from the desktop.
I can't seem to get this to work on Win8CP. I wonder if this could be partly due to my older hardware. I mentioned in the last post that Win8 automatically loaded a generic VGA driver for my laptop, instead of a specific driver for the GMA 900 (910/915). After more research (the first post was only meant to be first impressions), I found out that particular chipset does not have drivers available due to the changes in the graphics subsystem in Win7.
So what does that mean to me? I take a performance hit. Because Win8 cannot take advantage of the graphics hardware, the CPU has to pick up the load. And the Celeron M was not made for heavy lifting. I'm also limited in available resolutions to 1280x800 and 1024x768. Which means games like Civ4, which was playable at lowered resolutions under XP on this machine decides to spit, stutter, and pretty much become unplayable under Win8.
More importantly than gaming, the transition screens sometime glitch out; hiccuping when you switch between Metro apps. Which means swiping back and forth between, say, the IE Metro App open to Google Docs or Blogger.com, and the Reader app (which is the default display for both PDF and XPS) is not only time-consuming; but it can result in crashing (and then reloading) both. Hopefully, it will be more stable on supported hardware.
*As in, I was pretty sure I saw it happen in the preview video.
Thursday, April 5, 2012
First Impressions: Windows 8 Consumer Preview
I was a bit surprised when I looked at the system requirements, my old laptop was robust enough to run the Windows 8 consumer preview. So, with a fresh install of this public beta; what worked, what didn't?
First, the specs for my test machine. It's an Acer Travelmate 2420, a 5+ year old machine running a 32-bit 1.5 GHz Celeron M processor with 2 GB of RAM. I guess I really shouldn't be surprised that I can get Win8 to run, since the Windows 7 tester said it would run that as well, just without Aero.
The Atheros wireless chipset worked out of the box, even prompting me to choose my network and supply the password during setup. With the public emphasis being placed on providing a seamless experience among traditional PCs/laptops, phones, and tablets; it should really only be a shock when an wireless chipset does not work as expected.
Sound worked no problem, even installing the AC97 audio control panel without my intervention. The monitor was detected, and a reasonable 1024x768 resolution was chosen. I probably could have gotten better results (and more options) from something other than the generic VGA driver, but either Win8 didn't recognize the earlier Intel graphics chip, or just didn't ship with a driver for it. I'm not going to complain about the available 1280x800 resolution.
The only thing that didn't go off without a hitch on the initial install was the Synaptic touchpad. Win8 identified it as a PS/2-Compatable mouse, and that was all she wrote; so no edge scrolling or tapping tricks for me, I guess.
Leave it to my mother-in-law, though. While Win8 was starting up for the first time, I wondered aloud what a fish had to do with Windows. And she mentioned that it looked like one of those "fighting fish", and I facepalmed at the pun.
When I boot up, I'm immediately reminded that this OS is designed with touch-screen interfaces in mind. The "lock" screen requires* a click and drag like a smart phone screen saver before I can log in. Really not that big of a deal, though a keyboard shortcut would have been nice.
After logging in, I come to the now-infamous Start screen. For the most part -- minus some "could not connect to service at this time" hiccups you're going to have to expect from working "in the cloud" -- everything that came with a live tile started up. The Pinball game didn't; but I'd wager that was more because of my lack of graphics horsepower (or even lack of a specific driver) than a problem with the game itself.
The Mail app also disappointed, both failing to connect to my GMail account and not having an option to use a standard POP3 account. When it finally did show that I had a Gmail account, it failed to show any inbox messages; though the send functionality worked perfectly. The Calendar app also seems to derp out a bit when syncing Google Calendar, especially when dealing with custom recurring events (i.e. every 2 weeks instead of every week). Both worked fine in Thunderbird on XP and Evolution on Ubuntu Linux, so I'm thinking its a glitch with how the Calendar app reads the recurrence data.
The Messaging app is a bit hard to test for me, since I don't use Live Messenger, I'll have to test out the Facebook functionality later on. The Map app worked fine, though it was a little slow; that may be my graphics again. The two things I noticed were lack of a "favorites" for locations; and no way to change the default "My Location" from inside Maps. You can add and remove locations from Weather, but from what I can tell, after the initial place look-up, Maps never double-checks the current My Location. (And yes, it's not using my IP address, that would put it 200 miles away instead of the 35.)
The People app is a nice little stand-in for a Facebook & Twitter timeline; though very basic in appearance; I prefer the originals (and no, I never thought I'd say that about facebook). Finance is nice for what it does, but it stopped working for me about halfway though my first test session; just crashed and would not reopen.
I'm also not a fan of the Internet Explorer Metro interface.** The large black bar that pops up at the bottom of the screen is annoying; it's a pain to get anything done in the tabbed browsers; and its just an all-around unpleasant experience. The one thing I will give credit (where it is due) are the Next/Previous Page buttons that pop in when you change pages.
As for quirks... the majority of my laptop special function buttons work as you think they should; the ones that don't are the numeric keypad. For some reason, Windows 8 (unlike both Ubuntu and Windows XP on the same machine) treats my virtual "numeric keypad"*** as having Number Lock off... moving the cursor instead of typing numbers. Also, even though the screen Brightness setting on the settings widget says unavailable, the brightness control keys work. Go figure.
Overall, I would have to say I am mildly impressed. Win8 acts like it would be a great on a tablet or a phone screen. However, as a desktop machine I'm having serious doubts. Despite trying to focus on using the Metro Apps, I find myself drifting back to the Aero versions (or whatever you want to call the Win7 style). Part of it is because the hardware I'm using is showing its age, and the pretty of the Metro apps seem to take longer both to load and to respond to input than the Aero counterparts. But part of it is from a consumer standpoint as well. Will the Mail, Calendar and People apps be able to replace Outlook, or even Windows Live Mail (Outlook Express)? Are the Music and Video apps really a better front end to your media files than iTunes or even Windows Media Player? Because that's what adoption is really going to hinge on; having better interfaces to do the stuff we want to do.
*I say "requires". I should probably say "seems to require" instead. Remember, these are first impressions, and I haven't had time to figure out how to do things in an "other" way yet. So whenever I say "requires", just assume I mean "seems to require" or "I haven't found an obvious way to do it differently yet."
** Writing this from the (Aero?) traditional interface.
*** i.e. the calculator tacked on to the right side of standard keyboards.
First, the specs for my test machine. It's an Acer Travelmate 2420, a 5+ year old machine running a 32-bit 1.5 GHz Celeron M processor with 2 GB of RAM. I guess I really shouldn't be surprised that I can get Win8 to run, since the Windows 7 tester said it would run that as well, just without Aero.
The Atheros wireless chipset worked out of the box, even prompting me to choose my network and supply the password during setup. With the public emphasis being placed on providing a seamless experience among traditional PCs/laptops, phones, and tablets; it should really only be a shock when an wireless chipset does not work as expected.
Sound worked no problem, even installing the AC97 audio control panel without my intervention. The monitor was detected, and a reasonable 1024x768 resolution was chosen. I probably could have gotten better results (and more options) from something other than the generic VGA driver, but either Win8 didn't recognize the earlier Intel graphics chip, or just didn't ship with a driver for it. I'm not going to complain about the available 1280x800 resolution.
The only thing that didn't go off without a hitch on the initial install was the Synaptic touchpad. Win8 identified it as a PS/2-Compatable mouse, and that was all she wrote; so no edge scrolling or tapping tricks for me, I guess.
Leave it to my mother-in-law, though. While Win8 was starting up for the first time, I wondered aloud what a fish had to do with Windows. And she mentioned that it looked like one of those "fighting fish", and I facepalmed at the pun.
When I boot up, I'm immediately reminded that this OS is designed with touch-screen interfaces in mind. The "lock" screen requires* a click and drag like a smart phone screen saver before I can log in. Really not that big of a deal, though a keyboard shortcut would have been nice.
After logging in, I come to the now-infamous Start screen. For the most part -- minus some "could not connect to service at this time" hiccups you're going to have to expect from working "in the cloud" -- everything that came with a live tile started up. The Pinball game didn't; but I'd wager that was more because of my lack of graphics horsepower (or even lack of a specific driver) than a problem with the game itself.
The Mail app also disappointed, both failing to connect to my GMail account and not having an option to use a standard POP3 account. When it finally did show that I had a Gmail account, it failed to show any inbox messages; though the send functionality worked perfectly. The Calendar app also seems to derp out a bit when syncing Google Calendar, especially when dealing with custom recurring events (i.e. every 2 weeks instead of every week). Both worked fine in Thunderbird on XP and Evolution on Ubuntu Linux, so I'm thinking its a glitch with how the Calendar app reads the recurrence data.
The Messaging app is a bit hard to test for me, since I don't use Live Messenger, I'll have to test out the Facebook functionality later on. The Map app worked fine, though it was a little slow; that may be my graphics again. The two things I noticed were lack of a "favorites" for locations; and no way to change the default "My Location" from inside Maps. You can add and remove locations from Weather, but from what I can tell, after the initial place look-up, Maps never double-checks the current My Location. (And yes, it's not using my IP address, that would put it 200 miles away instead of the 35.)
The People app is a nice little stand-in for a Facebook & Twitter timeline; though very basic in appearance; I prefer the originals (and no, I never thought I'd say that about facebook). Finance is nice for what it does, but it stopped working for me about halfway though my first test session; just crashed and would not reopen.
I'm also not a fan of the Internet Explorer Metro interface.** The large black bar that pops up at the bottom of the screen is annoying; it's a pain to get anything done in the tabbed browsers; and its just an all-around unpleasant experience. The one thing I will give credit (where it is due) are the Next/Previous Page buttons that pop in when you change pages.
As for quirks... the majority of my laptop special function buttons work as you think they should; the ones that don't are the numeric keypad. For some reason, Windows 8 (unlike both Ubuntu and Windows XP on the same machine) treats my virtual "numeric keypad"*** as having Number Lock off... moving the cursor instead of typing numbers. Also, even though the screen Brightness setting on the settings widget says unavailable, the brightness control keys work. Go figure.
Overall, I would have to say I am mildly impressed. Win8 acts like it would be a great on a tablet or a phone screen. However, as a desktop machine I'm having serious doubts. Despite trying to focus on using the Metro Apps, I find myself drifting back to the Aero versions (or whatever you want to call the Win7 style). Part of it is because the hardware I'm using is showing its age, and the pretty of the Metro apps seem to take longer both to load and to respond to input than the Aero counterparts. But part of it is from a consumer standpoint as well. Will the Mail, Calendar and People apps be able to replace Outlook, or even Windows Live Mail (Outlook Express)? Are the Music and Video apps really a better front end to your media files than iTunes or even Windows Media Player? Because that's what adoption is really going to hinge on; having better interfaces to do the stuff we want to do.
*I say "requires". I should probably say "seems to require" instead. Remember, these are first impressions, and I haven't had time to figure out how to do things in an "other" way yet. So whenever I say "requires", just assume I mean "seems to require" or "I haven't found an obvious way to do it differently yet."
** Writing this from the (Aero?) traditional interface.
*** i.e. the calculator tacked on to the right side of standard keyboards.
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