Prakash Advani's Blog

Olympus TG-3 is a new release of the popular TG series of waterproof camera. Here is what is interesting:

• Waterproof: you can go diving with it up 15m.
• Shockproof
• Crushproof: you can throw it around and literally jump onto it.
• Has GPS, so you can tag the location of your photos
• Also records altitude/depth and pressure
• e-Compass, to get directions if you get lost
• Wifi with Android application
• 16 MegaPixel
• Wide Aperture: F2.0 for those great pictures in low light conditions
• 1080p video shooting
• fish eye and telephoto lenses options (at additional costs)

Top cities with Tech Skills are: Bangalore, Pune, Hyderabad and Chennai.

These 4 Indian cities are ahead of San Francisco Bay Area.

Read the complete report: http://blog.linkedin.com/2014/06/24/indias-got-tech-talent-cities-in-india-top-list-of-cities-attracting-technology-talent/

The company has pledged to invest $1 billion in open cloud products and services over the next two years, along with community-driven, open-source cloud technologies.

“Just as the community spread the adoption of Linux in the enterprise, we believe OpenStack will do the same for the cloud,” said Hewlett-Packard CEO and President Meg Whitman, in a webcast announcing Helion Tuesday.

Read More

I often get asked this question 32 or 64-Bit? In the past I have told people to stick to 32-Bit because of compatibility issues but things have changed now. Quoting for Phoronix which recently did a benchmark test between 32-Bit and 64-Bit.

Going back years we have run 32-bit vs. 64-bit Linux benchmarks. While the results seldom change, we keep running them as the question of choosing between a 32-bit and 64-bit Linux distribution image is still a popular question… These tests drive in a surprising amount of traffic and I continue to be flabbergasted by the number of people still asking this question when nearly all modern x86 Intel/AMD hardware fully supports x86_64 and it generally means much better performance. Usually the only caveat in not using a 64-bit Linux image is if running a system with less than 2GB of RAM.

In the past there were issues surrounding the Java and Flash support for 64-bit Linux along with an assortment of other possible problems (e.g. with Wine), but all those major issues are a matter of the past. 64-bit Linux is in great shape and as long as you have a decent amount of RAM you really should be running 64-bit Linux.

If you are still in doubt, read the full article for the benchmark results.

If your usage is not much, use LibreOffice and save on your licensing costs.

If new data are true, Microsofthas a big problem.

According to a study done by SoftWatch, seven out of 10 employees don’t use Microsoft Office to any extent.

The three-month study involved 148,500 employees at 51 global firms. SoftWatch found that  most employees were using the applications, largely for viewing documents or very light editing.

Read More.

Thanks you, to all my blog readers.

Today 3rd May 2014, I am celebrating 11 years of blogging! Wow, I too can’t believe it! I still remember, Rajesh Jain with whom I used to work then, encouraged me start a blog. And that’s when it all started. Before that I used to write articles, and found a direct benefit of writing was reading.  I ended up reading a lot. When you need to write, you need to read!

“The man who doesn’t read good books has no advantage over the man who can’t read them”. – Mark Twain

It has been a good blogging 11 years, been regularly irregular 🙂 but still motivated to keep it going.

I first started with LiveJournal which was a good way to start, but soon moved to my own site on 22nd April 2004. I am happy to see that live journal is still live! Thank you LiveJournal for providing me a home 🙂

I was initially suggested Movable Type (MT), as that was the blogging standard then. But it wasn’t open source at that time but eventually did. But I decided to go with WordPress, which at that time was very limited as compared to Movable Type. But on hindsight was a good decision.

My first post, for those who are interested. While there are other older dated links, those were back dated entry added later to cover media coverages.

If you still aren’t blogging, I would suggest you do!

A few suggestions to first time bloggers:

1. Decide where you want to host, there are many blogging sites. I would recommend WordPress.
2. Decided if you want to have your own blog like www.yourdogsname.com or do you like yourdogsname.wordpress.com
3. WordPress.com offers both the options to host your blog.
4. I have chosen Dream Host as my blogging site because I can also host other content and sites on the same account, which is what I prefer. But if you only need a blog, then WordPress.com is a good choice.
5. Be regular in your blogging, that’s how you would build your fan following.
6. Focus on one topic, if its more than one, then they should be related. If you blog about cats and elephants, very few people would be interested in both. if you have more than one idea, would suggest have two different blogs.
7. Social media is your friend, use your social network to publicise your blog posts. there are enough plugins for WordPress which can automatically post to your social network.

Thank you once again to all my readers, special thanks to those who take the time to comment. Happy blogging and happy reading!

The global announcement of AMD’s first ARM-based server SoC (system-on-chip), otherwise known as the Opteron A1100, happened end of January 2014 with Suresh confirming that the first samples would be shipped by end of March 2014 with full production happening by the end of the year.
Née “Seattle”, this part, which is part of the top-bin (i.e. the fastest parts from a particular batch) is built around eight 64-bit ARM Cortex-A57 cores clocked at 2GHz and fabbed at 28nm. Other useful titbits include a TDP of 20W, 4MB L2 cache and 8MB shared L3 cache.

 

Read More: http://www.techradar.com/news/computing/servers/more-details-emerge-about-arm-based-amd-opteron-a1100-processor-series-1223236

The Short answer is No. Ubuntu was patched on 7th April 2014 and the bug was widely reported on 8th April, 2014. If you are using other operating systems,  you need to worry. Especially if its non-Linux based.

Read More: http://news.softpedia.com/news/Dear-Ubuntu-Users-Stop-Saying-the-Ubuntu-Is-Unprotected-Against-the-Heartbleed-Exploit-437846.shtml

The Heartbleed vulnerability that was discovered just last week took the world by surprise, but most of the affected services and operating systems have been patched. Unfortunately, some of the Ubuntu users haven’t understood how the patching process works and have started to flood the forums and other social media with the message that Ubuntu is vulnerable.

Before the OpenSSL issues has become known to the general public, most of the Linux distributions affected by the issue were patched. Most of the media reported on the problem on April 8, but the patch for the Heartbleed vulnerability was already in place on April 7. This is how the security notification looks like in Ubuntu.

There aren’t that many Tesla Model S owners around, but those who are do seem to comprise of people who have a different way of seeing things. Apparently, some Tesla Model S owners have already tried to hack their ride by wiring into the Model S’ communications system. A forum user who goes by the moniker of “nlc” managed to locate a number of ports and tap into the data which flows straight to the center console and navigation screens. It seems that these “hackers” found out that the sub-system actually ran on a version of the Ubuntu operating system, which so happens to be a variant of Linux.
Heck, there was even someone who managed to circumvent this discovery in order to have Firefox up and running on the center console touchscreen, although it does not seem as though there are other more invasive efforts to be made via the Ethernet entry point.

Read More: http://www.ubergizmo.com/2014/04/tesla-model-s-owners-hack-own-cars-discover-ubuntu/

The Communications-Electronics Security Group (CESG), the group within the UK Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) that assesses operating systems and software for security issues, has found that while no end-user operating system is as secure as they’d like it to be, Ubuntu 12.04 is the best of the lot.

In late 2013, the CESG looked at the security of the most popular end-user operating systems for desktops, smartphones, and tablets [PDF Link]. This included: Android 4.2, Android 4.2 on Samsung devices; iOS 6, Blackberry 10.1, Google’s Chrome OS 26, Ubuntu 12.04, Windows 7 and 8; Windows 8 RT, and Windows Phone 8. These were judged for their security suitability for OFFICIAL level use according to the UK Government Security Classifications (PDF Link). This is the UK’s government lowest security level.

 

Read more: http://www.zdnet.com/uks-security-branch-says-ubuntu-most-secure-end-user-os-7000025312/

Ubuntu 14.04 LTS is here.  Torrent is the preferred method for me.

Other releases.

http://releases.ubuntu.com/14.04/ (Ubuntu Desktop and Server)
http://cloud-images.ubuntu.com/releases/14.04/release/ (Ubuntu Cloud Server)
http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/netboot/14.04/ (Ubuntu Netboot)
http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/edubuntu/releases/14.04/release/ (Edubuntu)

As always Have fun 🙂

Operating system Ubuntu is set to release another Long Term Support (LTS) version Ubuntu 14.04 in India tomorrow.

“In April 2012, Ubuntu 12.04 LTS was launched and it is slated to release another LTS version Ubuntu 14.04 globally, including India on April 17,” Canonical Asia-Pacific Regional Manager Prakash Advani told PTI here.

http://www.business-standard.com/article/pti-stories/ubuntu-to-release-lts-version-in-india-tomorrow-114041601243_1.html

Mozilla Thunderbird is one of the most powerful email clients. However I used to find that it used to keep the active window open while sending emails. This was a bit irritating specially if the email has large attachments.

On searching for background send, I found that the feature exists but doesn’t show up in the preference. You need to enable it.

After enabling it, it works very well. The only thing you need to be careful is not to send an email and immediately close your email client or shut down your PC. What happens is that email will not go as it take a few minutes (depending on the size of the email) for the email to go. The good part is that the email don’t disappear, they still in the Outbox.  It will try to re-send the next time you start Thunderbird, but there is no way for you to know if its gone or not, unless you check.

Read more: http://woikr.com/howto/send-emails-in-background-in-thunderbird-tips/

If you are still on XP, whats your plans ?

11% of the (admittedly small) 641 companies queried stated they intend to switch to Linux. The low-cost, robust security and growing reputation in enterprise use are likely key factors informing such plans.

Perhaps more shockingly is that 37% of those asked intend to stick with Windows XP past the expiry date. Of those, 40% reason that as ‘it works’ there’s little need to change, while 39% claim software they rely on depends on XP.

Read More: http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2014/02/windows-xp-users-may-switch-linux

Many schools in Romania today are using proprietary software like Microsoft Windows and Microsoft Office — most of which are either unlicenced copies or old unsupported versions, for which the schools may face legal issues, according to the Education Ministry of Romania. To tackle this problem, the Ministry recommends the schools to either purchase newer, licenced copies of these software, or switch to open source solutions like GNU/Linux, particularly Ubuntu and Edubuntu.

Read More: http://www.muktware.com/2014/02/romanian-edu-ministry-recommends-ubuntu-schools/21844

Huawei’s MediaPad X1 is not only a good alternative to an iPad Mini but also has phone capabilities. Announced at Mobile World Congress and expected to be launched in March 2014.

Claimed to be the slimmest 7″ tablet, Here is what is cool about it:

• 3G with calling facility
• 4G LTE (optional)
• Quad Core Processor
• 2 GB RAM
• 7″ Full HD, IPS panel
• 13 MP camera (sony lens), with 5 MP secondary camera
• 16 GB Internal storage
• Expandable MicroSD slot
• 5000 mAh battery, which is powerful enough and can also be used to charge other devices
• WiFi  b/g/n, Dual Band in the 4G version
• Active Noise Cancellation
• Bluetooth 4.0
• Just 239g lightweight and slim

Here are the limitations:

• No Android KitKat, there is no plans or commitment for Huawei.
•  Little awkward to use a phone because of the large size.

Since today’s phones don’t even last a day, you should use your primary phone for voice only, and use this device for all data activities. The X1 could be good tablet device but little awkward to hold as a phone. Could be used with Bluetooth as a phone.

 Google is currently in the best position to challenge Amazon because they have the engineering culture and technical abilities to release some really innovative features. IBM has bought into some excellent infrastructure at Softlayer but still has to prove its cloud engineering capabilities.

Amazon has set the standard for how we expect cloud infrastructure to behave, but Google doesn’t conform to these standards in some surprising ways. So, if you’re looking at Google Cloud, here are some things you need to be aware of.

Read More: http://gigaom.com/2014/03/02/5-things-you-probably-dont-know-about-google-cloud/

Outernet will provide Free WiFi, across the globe. Will be accessible in all areas, including the difficult terrains and will bypass all the Censorships and Firewalls of different countries.

Developers say they are less than a year away from deploying prototype satellites that could someday soon broadcast free and universal internet all over the globe from high in orbit.

The “Outernet” project being bankrolled by the Media Development Investment Fund (MDIF) of New York is currently in the midst of conducting technical assessment of the project, but say by June they hope to develop test satellite in order to see how long-range WiFi would work if beamed down by a tiny 10x10x10-centimeter payload called a CubeSat.

Read More: http://rt.com/usa/outernet-cubesat-free-internet-153/

Demand for people with Linux skills is increasing, a trend that appears to follow a shift in server sales.

Cloud infrastructure, including Amazon Web Service, is largely Linux based, and cloud services’ overall growth is increasing Linux server deployments. As many as 30% of all servers shipped this year will be cloud services providers, according to research firm IDC.

This shift may be contributing to Linux hiring trends reported by the Linux Foundation and IT careers website Dice, in a report released Wednesday. The report states that 77% of hiring managers have put hiring Linux talent on their list of priorities, up from 70% a year ago.

Read More: http://www.computerworld.in/news/demand-for-linux-skills-rises

“Indians prefer to be in the services sector and would not want to get into experimenting on products business, which is a high-risk, high-reward proposition,” says Prakash Advani, Regional Manager, Asia Pacific, Canonical.

‘It all depends upon the DNA. If you need to be in the space, you need to have the mindset of taking the risk for high rewards. Even if one is willing to take the risk, the company needs to be incorporated in the US, so that VC funding becomes easy,” says Prakash.

Read More: http://www.dnaindia.com/money/report-facebook-s-acquisition-of-whatsapp-why-indians-are-not-in-the-big-idea-space-1963802