My name is John Bokma, and this is my web site. I am a freelance Perl programmer, born in the Netherlands, but currently living with Esme and our daughter Alice in Xalapa, Veracruz, Mexico.
Today I decided to write about two small Ubuntu tips. Note that "Ubuntu tips" is a misnomer, because both tips surely work on other GNU/Linux distributions as well, and even beyond.
The first tip shows how to create several directories, and even a complete directory tree using just a single command: mkdir.
And the second tip shows how you can use gnome-open
in a similar way as the start command on Windows XP.
Today I had a discussion via Pidgin with Els on the merits of using a command line interface over a graphical interface and vice versa. I argued that one big advantage of a command line interface is that it's easier to blog on how to do something. Visitors can copy and paste commands to a terminal without having to read long winded instructions, often accompanied by several large screen shots, explaining where they have to click, and which menu they have to open. And I also guessed that the former is easier on the ear for visitors using a screen reader than the latter.
Els argued that a graphical user interface promotes discovery, by thinking logically one can often figure out what settings do, etc. She also remarked that she couldn't imagine that operating systems were written with lazy bloggers in mind, which made me laugh out loud. And I argued back that while I understood her point, I am also convinced that the ease of copy pasting commands from a terminal to a forum or blog post is a major reason why it's used over screenshots of a GUI (assuming it can be done via a GUI, of course), implying that it's easy to get the wrong impression.
On the other hand I agreed with her that there is still quite some work for Ubuntu (read: GNU/Linux) developers: some tasks still have to be done via a shell because there is no alternative.
However, I am quite comfortable with the command line, and I prefer it for a lot of tasks over a GUI. And I guess that a lot of GNU/Linux developers are way more comfortable with the command line than I, which might explain why GUI wrappers are missing here and there. Moreover, it might also explain that if a GUI is present, it's now and then horrible. Interacting with a GUI is not the same as specifying a bunch of options on the command line. And I've the feeling that some developers don't get this.
Anyway, in the evening - somewhat to make a point I guess - I burned a video DVD via the command line instead of trying to figure out how to do this via the GUI using Brasero. I used discovery via Google, using Firefox, to find out how to do it on the command line. The point? I prefer to have both a GUI and a CLI available.
Today I learned that Adobe had, finally to say the least, released a 64-bit Flash player for GNU/Linux earlier this month. While the download page makes very clear that it's an alpha version, I had no problem downloading, installing, and actually using it in Firefox on Ubuntu 8.10. And so far, no problems. I couldn't say the same about the 32-bit version running inside nspluginwrapper on Ubuntu 8.04, so thank you Adobe, and keep it up.
Talking about Flash; Alice, our daughter loves to watch Pocoyo on YouTube. Never heard of Pocoyo? If you have young children, or still cherish the inner-child, check out Pocoyo on YouTube. But back to Alice. Like I wrote, she loves to watch Pocoyo, and most of the time she does so on Esme's Dell Inspiron 1525. But after some time the notebook blanks the screen. And today Esme and I both got a huge smile when Alice moved her little fingers over the touch pad to get Pocoyo back. She learns so fast.
Today I had planned to fix a small issue that - not unexpectedly - was caused by the migration of Subversion repositories from my trusty Compaq SR1505LA, running Windows XP, to my Dell Vostro 200 ST, running Ubuntu 8.04 LTS: after I had checked out the repository for this site, all files got new timestamps. While this might not be a problem in general, it was for some of my files, namely the ones containing the Perl programs (or other source code) I include in HTML pages on this site, mainly in the Perl help, examples, and tutorials section. When I generate the over 2,200 HTML 4.01 strict web pages for this web site from over 70 XML files, using an in-house developed Perl program, the timestamp of some files that are included are used to add a "last updated" comment. And due to the changed check out date (and time), this was now no longer correct.
At first I was considering to use the touch command to set the timestamps
back to the same value as on the Compaq, using the values shown after Last updated in the
code samples on my site. But that looked like too much work. After some reading
on the Internet, I was looking for an easy way to get a timestamp from Subversion itself,
I came upon Subversion properties. After some more reading I decided to use the svn:keywords
property to have Subversion automatically insert dynamic information, including a
time stamp, using keyword substitution in files containing the code examples. While the "last updated" would
still be wrong, it would become right soon; I've plans to review all the Perl programs
published on this site, and update each to follow closer the coding style promoted in
"Perl Best Practices", which is one of the
five must have Perl books.
In my opinion, that is.
In the morning, while taking a shower after spinning class (indoor cycling), the doorbell rang. I was expecting books from Amazon to arrive today I had delayed the shower a bit, but not enough. I grabbed a towel, and when I looked out of the window, dripping water from my hair, it turned out that I was right; some books had arrived.
Later, I joined a discussion on Usenet on Google Chome, released yesterday. The start of a new browser war? I don't think so.
Also today I configured my router, a Linksys WRT54GL, to use DHCP with static IP addresses. I had installed OpenWrt's Kamikaze 7.09 on it last Monday for exactly that reason. And it turned out to be much easier than I had expected. I also extended the hosts file on the router as well in order to be able to access websites on my development machine - running the Apache web server with virtual hosting - on other computers connected to the local network.