Shallow Thoughts

Akkana's Musings on Open Source, Science, and Nature.

Thu, 20 Nov 2008

Handling Long URLs in Firefox

I have a new Firefox Tips article up on Linux Planet: The Plague of Ridiculously Long URLs (note I didn't choose the title). It discussees how to handle long URLs broken over several lines, of the sort we so often see in email messages.

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[ 09:43 Nov 20, 2008    More writing | permalink to this entry ]

Thu, 06 Nov 2008

Linux Planet: Why Firefox Rocks on Linux

My latest Linux Planet article, Why Firefox Rocks on Linux, discusses Linux-specific Firefox shortcuts involving the middle mouse button, the URLbar and the scrollbar. It's getting good Diggs, too, and comments from people who found the tips helpful, which is great. A lot of people don't know about some of these great Linux time-savers, but these are the sort of things that make me love Linux and stick with it even when it gets frustrating. I hate to think of people missing out just because there's no obvious way to discover some of the shortcuts!

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[ 20:44 Nov 06, 2008    More writing | permalink to this entry ]

Sun, 26 Oct 2008

Two articles: Linux Bookmarklets

I've been writing a new series for Linux Planet, on Firefox Tricks. The first two articles cover bookmarklets, something I've mentioned a few times in this blog):

Simple Bookmarklets: The Power of the Command Line in your Browser
and
Roll Your Own Custom Bookmarklets In Firefox, part 2: Javascript Bookmarklets.

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[ 22:32 Oct 26, 2008    More writing | permalink to this entry ]

Mon, 22 Sep 2008

Linux Planet: Linux Astronomy part III: Stellarium and Celestia

Part III in the Linux Astronomy series on Linux Planet covers two 3-D apps, Stellarium and Celestia.

Writing this one was somewhat tricky because the current Ubuntu, "Hardy", has a bug in its Radeon handling and both these apps lock my machine up pretty quickly, so I went through a lot of reboot cycles getting the screenshots. (I found lots of bug reports and comments on the web, so I know it's not just me.) Fortunately I was able to test both apps and grab a few screenshots on Fedora 8 and Ubuntu "Feisty" without encountering crashes. (Ubuntu sure has been having a lot of trouble with their X support lately! I'm going to start keeping current Fedora and Suse installs around for times like this.)

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[ 21:10 Sep 22, 2008    More writing | permalink to this entry ]

Fri, 12 Sep 2008

Linux Planet: Linux Astronomy part II: XEphem

I have a new article on XEphem on Linux Planet, following up to the KStars article two weeks ago: Viewing the Night Sky with Linux, Part II: Visit the Planets With XEphem.

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[ 10:50 Sep 12, 2008    More writing | permalink to this entry ]

Thu, 28 Aug 2008

Writing for Linux Planet: Stargazing with KStars

I have an article on Linux Planet! The first of many, I hope. At least the first of a short series on Linux astronomy programs, starting with the one that's easiest to use: KStars. It's oriented toward binocular observing, with suggestions for good targets for beginners.

Viewing the Night Sky with Linux, Part I: KStars

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[ 21:46 Aug 28, 2008    More writing | permalink to this entry ]

Tue, 25 Jan 2005

GIMP course started

I've started my "GIMP for Beginners" course on the Linuxchix Courses mailing list, topic "gimp".

Anyone reading this is welcome to join in!

Here's the first posting, Lesson 0.

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[ 10:10 Jan 25, 2005    More writing | permalink to this entry ]

Wed, 01 Dec 2004

"Wireless on the Road" in Linux Journal

My article on Wireless on the Road, based on experiences getting wi-fi connections on our recent southwest trip, is in Linux Journal online, with a reference in Linux Today. My first official byline, Yeehaw!

Master wordsmith Carla Schroder helped, with both encouragement and proofreading. Thanks, Carla! (BTW, Carla's new book, The Linux Cookbook, just came out. I saw a couple of early pre-production chapters, and it's already solved several Linux problems I was struggling with. I'm sure the rest of the book is just as good, and I'll be buying it. Don't confuse it with the other book by the same name but a different author.)

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[ 13:17 Dec 01, 2004    More writing | permalink to this entry ]