Of course, you know what open source and free software means. Or you would not visit this blog and reading his articles in the first place. But it is always nice to get the viewpoint of one of the main stream media. And if the media in question is the BBC, then it is all the more sweet.

I was an avid fan of the technology of the BBC program called "Click" formerly known as the "Click Online". In the last episode, Spencer Kelly - Click on the presenter shows you how to build a functional machine working for nothing. The BBC published an article by Kelly called "Open Source alternative" which gives an overview of how FOSS can enrich our lives for information zilch. The article also a short interview with Paul Allen who is the editor of Computer Active magazine.

Read the article to bbc.co.uk.

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XML also known as Extensible Markup Language is a language created the structure, transporting and storing data or information. But who is the simplest explanation. In reality, there is still much to the semantics of XML. When you embark on the path to mastery of XML, you're still having terms such as XLink, naming, DTD, Schema, and so forth.

To obtain a fair idea of what it means XML, see the following article explaining XML in 10 points. It took only 15 seconds to read the article. Put in a word, they are the main points without explanation -

1. XML is for structuring data
2. It looks a bit like HTML
3. It is text, but is not intended to be read
4. It is wordy by design
5. XML is a family of technologies
6. XML is new, but not that new
7. He led the HTML to XHTML
8. XML is modular
9. XML is the basis for RDF and the semantic web
10. It is without a licence, platform-independent and well supported.

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There is still time for a major new version of Fedora Linux. The latest avatar of Fedora namely version 9 is the code name of sulphur. If you are bitten by the strange name of Fedora, then you should read this article to get a better perspective. So what is in store for all fans of Fedora? A number of things.

To begin with, Fedora has obtained what is known as PackageKit. It is a cross distribution management solution packages with a complete backend Yum. Then, Fedora comes with the latest and greatest version Gnome Desktop namely 2.22. KDE 4.0.3 is also the repository and can be installed on the hard core fans of KDE. But the biggest news is that Fedora is now shipped with the Sun Java that Sun has released Java under an open source license. For the full set of features, read this article that explains all the features in more detail.

And after reading the features, if you're quite excited (which you will be), then visit the download page and start your download Linux distribution Fedora alias 9 sulphur.

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Suppose that you are obliged to create a partition of 10 GB on your server running Linux, you have two options:

• Create a partition of unpartitioned space on your machine or
• Add a new disc drive.

If you opt for the latter, it is a simple matter of connecting the new disc, allowing the system to detect, through a partitioning tool to create the necessary partitions, formatting the newly created partition and finally mounting. But if it is the former namely, the creation of a partition of the non-partitioned space, the task becomes a little more difficult.

Joey Prestia explains the steps necessary to add a new partition to an existing system. The task can be broken down into the following steps:

1. Determine what partitions must be created and where.
2. Create partitions (I use fdisk here, but Linux partitioning tool should work)
3. Re-read the partition table with either "partprobe" or by a reboot
4. Make a file system on the partition, label and create mount points
5. Add the entries in "/etc/fstab" so that the partitions are mounted on restarting

See Joey notes to know exactly the commands used to accomplish the above tasks.

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I am sure that all users of Ubuntu swear by the fact that this is a piece of cake to get multimedia work in Ubuntu. In fact Ubuntu walks a fine line to ensure that users who are passionate about freedom and those who are willing features are planned.

But reading encrypted DVD is a little tricky. Tech-recipes.com provides a simple way to enable DVD playback in Ubuntu.

In fact, there are just two simple steps namely,

$ sudo apt-get install totem-xine libxine1-ffmpeg libdvdread3

and

$ sudo /usr/share/doc/libdvdread3/install-css.sh

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The following is a list of approximately 100 best open source applications, that help make Linux more usable for people. This list is intended to show the potential Linux users is that there really a lot of large, efficient, productive and usable range of free, open source applications. This list has tended to look to tools that are invaluable in the development related to the Web.

Read the entire list of 100 applications open source. You'll find very useful applications that you did not know existed.

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Once I read a book titled "7 Habits of Highly Effective People" by Stephen Covey explaining the qualities that a person must immerse themselves to be very successful in life. It is a great book that inspires people to act and make positive changes in their lives.

Guess what, Rami Taibah has compiled a set of 7 habits of Linux users can use to be very effective which makes a great reading. The list goes as follows:

1. Never login as root - This is redundant if you use a Linux distribution such as Ubuntu using sudo to raise a user temporarily fashion super-user. However, a valid argument.
2. Name your files correctly - I usually stick to it, but even if you have spaces in the names of your files, bash helps you get the completion of the names of files.
3. Place / home in its own partition - I agree with that without.
   
4. Good management crash - Use xkill to close abnormal behavior.
5. Try many distributions - You have a very large number of them to choose.
6. Brush your skills command line - Learn to use the command line tools to perform complex tasks. It is a great time saver. Do not forget to take some scripting skills bash on the track.
7. And finally, always be ready to unleash the power inside - in other words experience.

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Would you like to have all major Linux and FreeBSD commands with examples are a couple of pages? If you do, then you got your wish.

Colin Barschel brought together what he calls the Toolbox Unix. It is a fabulous piece of the compilation, which will contain all orders often useful in Linux and their equivalents in FreeBSD. This document covers a wide range of subjects divided into 22 sections such as system, processes, file systems, network links, VPN, cryptography, installation and management software and so forth.

What I really on Unix toolbox is that it is well structured, each section has a Linux paragraph immediately followed by a paragraph that explains FreeBSD equivalent commands in FreeBSD. Secondly, the document is available in several formats to PDF, HTML page booklet version able to be printed and put in a small booklet and so forth.

A very good source for Linux / FreeBSD amateur. It is also an added bonus. Visit the homepage of this site and you get a console FreeBSD right within your Web browser. From now there are 30 commands that can be used. Colin termlib used the library to create the virtual terminal.

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