Author: Bob Harrison

Serenity Man. I'd be able to maintain a cool and clear head in the face of any imaginable trouble. I wouldn't be able to do anything about it, but I'd be accepting and calm! 🙂

I’m a sucker for free, especially when it’s something that might prove useful to me. Today’s freebie is the PDF version of the Ubuntu Pocket Guide and Reference by Keir Thomas.

Now I’m a longtime Linux user. I got started with it back in the early 90’s, long enough to remember TAMU and Yggdrasil, though I was a Slackware man for quite some time. I still could be for that matter as it’s still around!
Actually before Linux I tried to get MINIX up and running but honestly, I can’t remember whether I ever did. I think I got it running but for some reason or another never did anything else with it. Even back then I was trying to stay away from Microsoft. 🙂
But no, these days my Linux boxen generally run Ubunutu. It’s an excellent distro and easy to install. The days are past when I longed to hack for hours to get something up and running, much less tuned. Today I’m happy with “it works out of the box.” Ubuntu does – at least on my hardware.
Still a free guide is really only a deal if it’s useful and while this looks geared for the newcomer, I don’t doubt I’ll pick up a trick or two.
Currently my I’ve got a couple machines running Ubuntu. My Toshiba Satellite is a single boot machine running Ubuntu, my MacBook runs it in Parallels, and finally, my Asus EEE PC 1000H dual boots with Ubuntu and XP (and I almost never boot XP – special circumstances only). I have an EEE PC 700 which I have booted Ubuntu from an SD card, but currently it uses the standard distro that it was delivered with (mostly because I’m lazy and almost never use the machine anyway).
So I’ve got a reason to go through book – 3 or 4 depending on how you count these things!
Aloha!

I’m back from Kauai after a very busy weekend of business. There really wasn’t any time for playing around, but that’s okay. It was still a nice time and Kauai is pleasant place to be busy. The weather was good enough to drive around with the top down on the shiny red Mustang convertible I was given…

It did look a bit like that, but I had enough respect for the environment not to drive it around on the beach. Besides, with my luck I’d have gotten stuck at low tide and the car would have been submerged when the tide turned. 🙂
…and Plinky…I discovered this the other day when I read a tweet by Robert Scoble. Here’s an interview he did about Plinky for FastCompanyTV back in January

It’s kind of fun but I’m not sure I’m getting the most out of it. No problem, I’m not getting the most out of Twitter or Facebook either. 🙂 I do like the fact that it adds content to this blog relatively painlessly. I still have to write, but at least I’ve got a target.
And finally, I just love Science Friday on NPR. I generally don’t get to listen to it till Monday when I get the podcast, but that’s okay. If you like water bears (tardigrades), you might enjoy this!Aloha!

At 51 I have not yet come to that realization. I'm hoping I can put off this realization until sometime after my funeral. I'm hoping to put that off as well.

Well I made it to Kauai without incident – well I did spill a mocha at the Honolulu airport because I wasn’t careful and the barista didn’t seat the cover well…but enough of that.
I’d rented a car through Hotwire and had no trouble at all at Avis, the rental agency they picked. If you don’t know, Hotwire claims to have the best prices (don’t they all?), but doesn’t show you the actual rental company till after you’ve agreed to the price. While I don’t know I got the best possible price, it was certainly less than had I gone to any of the rental agencies myself. In addition, because I’d picked a mid-size rather than an economy I got bumped up to a red Mustang convertible. Whew! I won’t be driving much, but at least I’ll have a little style. Yeah Hotwire!

Next it was off to the hotel. I picked the slightly quirky (actually it seems most hotels on Kauai are quirky) Kauai Palms Hotel in Lihue. It’s not a beach hotel and it has about the lowest price around ($75 or so a night). It is IN Lihue, not on the outskirts, but it is down a little sidestreet and it seems pretty quiet tonight.

The place is inexpensive, clean, the staff is very friendly, and the bed is comfortable. There’s no A/C in my room but I hate that stuff anyway – makes my arthritis flare. I’m not going to recommend this place for honeymooners looking for a romantic get away in a tropical paradise, but if you need to be in Lihue, don’t want to spend a lot of money, and are comfortable with the weather it’s a steal. I’d stay here again in a heartbeat.
I should mention they claim WiFi in the lobby, but it’s working fine in my first floor room several doors down.
My meetings start tomorrow and I’m looking forward to seeing everyone I know. I’ve not seen many of them since last August when we were in Waianae. I missed our November sessions because I was off in Mexico City! I’ve got to get back there!
Anyway, it’s time for a bit of shut eye!
Aloha!

Barry Obama
Because he was a couple years behind me at Punahou and with his new superpowers I figure he could watch my back.

I’ve a bit of business to do on Kauai this weekend and I’m looking forward to the trip. I haven’t been there for a couple of years and, while it’s not “pleasure” trip, Kauai has always been pleasurable for me.

I spent several summers there as a child, off in Hanalei on the north coast. It wasn’t nearly as built up then as it is now, but it’s still nice.
I won’t be on that end of the island this time, instead I’m more or less stuck in Lihue. Still, I’m hoping I can at least see a bit of the island.
Aloha!

I got to watch the inauguration via the CNN/Facebook feed this morning and really enjoyed watching Barry, as he was known in his Punahou days, take the oath of office.
I never met Barry when I attended Punahou. He was three years behind me and for the two years I attended Punahou we were effectively in different schools – intermediate for me, elementary for him. I know folks who knew him though and we are all very happy for him and for our country.
There’s really not much to say as the proof is in the pudding as it were. I hope and pray he will do a fine job as president.
Go Barry, go!
Aloha!

Today I didn’t ride to work. Indeed Oahu seems to be shutdown because of expected high winds. There’s been nothing on the Honolulu side of the island so far as I can tell, but I was told the windward side has had gusts.
But that’s not really what I’m interested in today. Nope, today is a Drupal day. I’m thinking of moving the website I’m the caretaker for from WordPress to Drupal.
It’s not that we’ve yet outgrown what WordPress can do, but I’d like to be able to open up each distinct area on the website to the stakeholders for each. There are fourteen distinct geographic areas and around a dozen committees as well as a group calendar. I’d like to be able to allow folks to play in their own sandboxes without disturbing any of the others. Plus, and this is a big one, I like learning new things. Drupal, I might add isn’t what’s new – I believe it’s eight! No, I’m what’s new to it. 🙂

My interest in Drupal got started in a couple of different ways. The Borders Rewards program sent me a birthday coupon for 25% off any one item. I haven’t been to Borders for quite some time. I’ll admit that lately my books have come through Amazon and many of them on the Kindle.
The other influence turned out to be an email from O’Reilly Media. They’d just published (okay, published way back in December of 2008) a book called Using Drupal.

I checked to see if it was in stock at my local Borders and got started.
The book essentially walks one through a number of scenarios and introduces concepts and tools along the way. It’s gotten some praise so far, and I’ll add my decidedly unprofessional opinion to the mix. I’m learning a lot more about Drupal then I did the first time I tried it a couple of years back when I only used the online docs. Nothing wrong with them, but I generally try to see what O’Reilly has to offer when learning a new tool and I’ve not generally been disappointed.
My only complaint so far is that the demo copy of Drupal, with the modules and themes used in the book, is at version 6.4 and Drupal is now at 6.9. I’ve tried upgrading but have been stymied by a few incompatibilities along the way.
The solution, since I’m not using this for production, is to run everything under MAMP (or xampp – which I’m having a bit of trouble with on my Mac, though none on my Ubuntu boxen). The problem centers on using .htaccess which I’ve never bothered to figure out in the past. It looks like it’s time for that too. Sigh.
Aloha!