Here are the basics... if you read nothing else, read this. Doing anything with software or music that violates the copyright of that media is stealing. Pirating is stealing.

I recently worked on a project where I needed to get a few hundred machines ready to deploy in only a couple days. This is quite a task, but there are many solutions that help to make this task less herculean.

One of the software solutions I've used for this in the past was G4L (http://sourceforge.net/projects/g4l); more specifically, I use the udpcast solution found on the G4L bootable disk (http://udpcast.linux.lu/). The basics of the solution go like this.

1: Get a computer just the way you want all of them to be.
2: Sysprep the machine so you will be prompted to name each one uniquely.
3: Grab an image of the hard drive and save it as a file.
4: Boot your "server" and feed it the command "udp-sender --full-duplex image_file.img"
5: Boot all your target machines from the G4L cd and choose option "U."
6: Once you have all your targets ready to go, you just hit a key on the server and watch the magic happen.

Sounds like a pretty fool-proof solutions, right? Well, it was in my lab. I did tests to verify the solution and it worked flawlessly. Well, as is often the case, what happens easily in the lab turns into a mess when attempted at a customer site.

I was working with two college students on this project, and their solution for this problem was to run pirated commercial software to do the load. The problem with this is clear, we don't own that software. When I pointed that fact out, they said "what the licensing people don't know won't hurt them."

Wow. How does this mentality come about? The person who owns the software wishes that you not use it in a certain way... but if they don't know about it it's all right? What!?!?! That's insane. It's like me saying that I'd like it if you not take things from my house, but if you do that when I'm not at home it's OK. That's just plain wrong!

So, how is it that people get this mentality? I hate to say it, but I believe the way we learn this is though P2P downloading. The idea of just searching for whatever song you want and just grabbing it through this software. The process is so impersonal that it's easy to put aside the moral issues... hey it's just a copy of a bunch of data, right?

Well, no. It's a copyrighted piece of intellectual property, and that had value. Think of it this way, if you want it enough to search for it, you value it and you ought to pay for it if the owner asks you to.

Now, there is another side to this. I am a firm believer in Free and Open Source Software (FOSS). This is software that has a very specific copyright; you can copy it and distribute it all you want so long as you do not place any limitations on who you've distributed to. Wow, it's amazing! I have a DVD full of stuff that I can put out there for download. You can download it and do whatever you want. The only requirement is that if you give it so someone you can't tell them to not give it to someone else.

Ok, now why hasn't anyone heard of this? Quick test...

1: You want to type a letter, what piece of software do you need?
2: You want to create a spreadsheet for a budget, what piece of software do you need?
3: You just bought a new computer, what is the operating system on it?

Ok, you probably answered like this:
1: Microsoft Word
2: Microsoft Excel
3: I don't know... Vista, I think.

That's why more people don't know about it. It seem like everyone is willing to just take what they are given and be happy with it. Hey, my PC came with a 90-day trial of Microsoft Office, so I'll just pay $300 to buy the full version. This is like saying my car came with some type of tire, so I'll just go to the dealer and pay twenty times what I could get a tire for elsewhere.

WAKE UP! There are other options.

I believe that a perfectly viable alternative to Microsoft Office is OpenOffice (http://www.openoffice.org). It is a full-featured office suite that includes a word processor (Writer to replace Word), a spread sheet application (Calc to replace Excell), a presentation software (Impress to replace PowerPoint), and many other applications. It's all I use, and I am very happy with it.

If you want to take another step and loose your Windows Operating system all together, there are a few options there too. I use Ubuntu (http://www.ubuntulinux.org). It is a Linux distribution that does a great job of "just working" on most computers out there. I've been using it for just over two years now, and I LOVE IT. With Ubuntu Linux, I don't need to worry about catching a computer virus or spyware. It's rock solid too, so my computer hardly ever hangs forcing me to reboot. Hey, I even wrote a story here about some of the cool features (http://www.mrknisely.is-a-geek.org/article.php?story=20070101165513694) and how easy it was to install (http://www.mrknisely.is-a-geek.org/article.php?story=20070917184227873).

With this FOSS software a community has developed for the sake increasing awareness and adoption of free software. You can interact with this community in many ways. Most FOSS websites have lively forums where you can post questions and get responses from others who use the software. I would caution you that some of these sites can seem a little abrasive to someone new, this is simply a method of getting users to "RTFM" (google if you are unaware of this acronym) before posting how-to posts. I know this seems harsh, but in order to server everyone better, they attempt to focus on actual issues, and help those with simple how-to type questions become more self-sufficient in learning new skills. One of my favorite sites for general questions is Linux Questions (http://www.linuxquestions.org). They have forums for almost any topic, and searching there almost always reveals a thread discussing your exact question.

Another great way to meet up with others using FOSS is through your local Linux User's Group (LUG). I am a member of the North Central Ohio LUG (http://ncolug.org), and we hold meeting the first Thursday of each month. Our purpose is to help others learn more about FOSS and use it in their every-day lives. To find a LUG in your area, I'd suggest http://www.google.com as a good place to start.

An amazing truth I've noted is that those who use FOSS tend to be much more respectful of the copyright limitations placed on software. In fact, the limitations are the exact reason we chose to go with FOSS to begin with. Many of us using FOSS had been willing to use somewhat less functional software, when compared with its commercial brethren, for the freedom that comes with FOSS. Fortunately for us, the days of the commercial software being more functional are, for the most part, a thing of the past. Most of the commonly used applications have a FOSS counterparts that are as functional or even more functional.

Where I am headed is that there are three ways of obtaining the software you need.
1: Buy it, however overpriced it may be.
2: Steal it, using the P2P programs... and I hope you get caught, prosecuted, and fined.
3: Use the FOSS counterpart and enjoy all the features with none of the cost.

I hope that you choose option 3; coming from a professional geek, that's the option I've chosen. I'm happy with my decision, and I know you will be too.

Linux, how difficult is it really?

There have been quite a few articles of late talking about how desktop ready is the Linux, well here is my go at it.

I've been needing to work on a friend's machine FOREVER (sorry Chas). Well, I moved the data off it, reloaded the OS (came w/ ME but I put 98se back on), and moved the data back. Then I got to thinking... wonder how Linux would run on this?

Well, due to the nature of the project, I know next to nothing about this system. The MS drivers were on a driver recovery disk (except for sound and modem, which I haven't tracked down yet). What I do know is that this is a somewhat old AMD 1.?Ghz system that runs Halflife Counter-Strike marginally well... that's about it.

Here's my process:

1: Tossed a drive in the only place it would go and connected it the only way the cables would fit. (CS/Slave on the primary IDE channel)

2: Tossed in the Ubuntu 7.04 CD.

3: Booted the machine to a menu that had a few options, but the default said to Start Ubuntu / Install... Looks good to me.

4: Once the system booted to a familiar looking desktop I clicked on the Install option on the desktop. (Side note: How AMAZING is it that one can do this in Linux? Most of us take it for granted now, but it is STILL not available in MS, why?!?!?)

5: Nexted through some basic questions like what language my keyboard is setup for and where I live. Pretty basic here.

6: Drive partitioning. Yikes, but wait. I tossed in a Samsung drive, I can still see the label. The other one is a Maxtor, so I'm pretty sure that's the one I want. It's got an automatic option, and I like that.

7: Setup my username and password.

8: Set back and waited. (While I waited for the progress bar to complete, I opened Firefox and typed this far in the article. NICE!)

9: Rebooted the system and HERE I AM!

Everything loaded fine. No X issues. No major calamity. Just a very nice and functional desktop interface.

I browsed to a website that needed flash, and boom... Installed.
I hit a site needing Java. Nojoy on the auto-install but it took me to the Java page. Instead of using that I hit my applications menu and chose the Add/Remove button. I did a search on Java and there it was. It also explained to me exactly why it was not able to be included by default.

When I choose to open an MP3, it took me to a list of applications that would help me open such a file and even had a star system to let me know how popular with others those applications were.

For those of you wondering... I'll edit this later and post an "lspci" to show you the exact hardware, but for the most part what is listed above is a realistic example of the situations I run into when installing Linux.

A friend of mine, Ryan Smith, recently posted on his blog (http://relevantfollower.com/?p=156) an article dealing with Pornography and The Church today.

Here are my thoughts:

The topic of pornography is not very well covered in The Church, and when it is it’s a “SHAME ON YOU” sort of a message. To me, it is almost treated like Tithing. There is an expectation that God has and you need to meet it. About once a year there is an awkward service directed at reaching out to those who are not meeting God's expectation, but that's as far as it goes.

We need to realize that it needs to become an issue dealt with constantly. Instead of the "shame on you" a “Shame on us as a society” message should be presented. We, as a community of believers, need to STOP CONSUMING this stuff. By that, I mean not only the pornography but the mentality that sex sells.

We need to get our minds around the idea that companies are preying on us. They know our flesh desires for the carnal in nature and celebrates the beauty of the body. Because of this, sale experts try to use this lust to distract us from our logical evaluation of what they are really trying to hock... Doesn't that bikini-clad woman just make you want to go buy a bass boat?!?!?

We need to let them know that this is not acceptable. The best way that we can do that is by not buying their junk and letting them know the reason for us not buying. We need to develop a habit of reacting to these images with the understanding that they are attempting to distract us from our walk with Christ and nothing, no matter how gratifying in the moment, is worth that.

I believe that if we start our focus here, we will be much better equipped to deal with things easily define as pornography. It’s the slippery slope of society that makes it such an easy thing to wind up in the hands of the enemy via pornography. We need to realize that it starts with Superbowl halftime shows, moves on to “Girls Gone Wild,” and leads to permanent separation from God.

Here's a quick link to the slide show that Laura put together.

http://www.mrknisely.is-a-geek.org/dad70th.swf

This was done using OpenOffice, a free office productivity suite. Think if it as doing all the things that Microsoft Office (R) does, without having to pay $500 for a copy. Open Office has a function that allowed me to save the slide show as a Shockwave Flash file, which is what you're seeing there.

I must admit that I thought long about posting this. I do not want to IN ANY WAY pat myself on the back for this; I was simply God's tool. I just wanted to see a friend, and God used that for way more than what I had planned.

I hope that this will show how God uses ordinary situations to do extraordinary things. Also, I hope others will see that we do not need to be confrontational to be "Good Christians." It is through love that God works, not hate.

I got his permission to post this, too.

###### Mr. Tee's Response ###########

God spoke to me through you because you are a kind person, and you never once tried to force your religious beliefs on me. You did, however, be a true Christ-ian. You showed me love and compassion; you went out of your way to make me comfortable in a city that I knew nobody in. I feared having to sleep in an airport untill Tuesday; not only did you offer me room, but you offered me food. You literally took me in out of the cold. God, I know, spoke through you because He gave me a flight out in the morning; but not without having us meet first...

I believe God interacted with me through you because you were truly kind. You drove hours out of your way just to entertain someone when you could have gone right home...

I have a much easier time thinking that God tried to talk to me through you than to me through someone demanding I convert or burst into flames and go to the hell I so rightly deserve (his words, not mine). You showed me love and compassion, not intolerance.

I pity the foo,
Mr. Tee

#################

It should be noted that I did pull out a few inside jokes from the text above. The content of his message regarding the conversations was not altered in any way.

Mike K.

I had an interaction with a friend of mine on Saturday 3-17-07 that has brought this question to the front of my mind...

Did God use me to try to touch this person?

#### Edit ####
See Mr. Tee's response below when you're done reading this story.
####/Edit####

Now, my simple answer is, "Yes!" I know without a doubt he did; unfortunately, I think that my friend might not see it that way. So, this is somewhat a personal letter to my friend, but I think it might be helpful to others so I'll post it here too.

We'll call my friend Mr. Tee. Why? Because he'll know I'm talking DIRECTLY to him, and none of you know who he is.

Here's the story. I got a call letting me know that a friend of mine was stuck at Celveland Hopkins Airport due to a winter storm hitting the east coast. His flight had been canceled and it looked like he was going to be stuck in Cleveland until Tuesday.

I talked to my wife, and we agreed that we would do whatever it took to make sure he was shown hospitality and God's love. Unfortunately (well sort of), we were involved in my father-in-law's 70th birthday party and could not leave right away to pick him up. I began to pray for God's intervention and comfort in his situation.

As I kept in contact with him through the night, his Tuesday departure changed to Monday... changed to Saturday morning via a 1st class ticket.

The more we talked the odder the idea of picking him up from Cleveland around 12:00am, driving him to Mansfield, OH, and having him back on a plane at 10:00am sounded. So, we decided to just spend some time just hanging out in Cleveland until the following morning.

Well, Laura and I met up with Mr. Tee at the airport and headed off to dinner, and that's when I knew I was being used by God. The conversation went to religion and the believability and trustworthiness of the Bible. Conversation also turned to the interaction of a young married couple. Specifically about interaction and frustrations of being newly wed.

Enter the open letter to my friend, Mr. Tee

Mr. Tee,

Well, Laura had a great time with you. The conversation was great, and we did our best to answer your questions without being too overbearing. I hope what we had to say was helpful.

We spoke a little with you about some of the education we had received on the topics discussed. As I meditated on it, I though it might surprise you to learn more about how God prepared us for your arrival. Here are links to the last three weeks of sermons delivered at our mid-week service at Crossroads Community Church where Laura and I are members.

Message on the Divine Inspiration of the Bible: 2-28-07
http://www.crossroadswired.com/media/audios/20070228.mp3

Message on the Inerrancy of the Bible: 3-7-07
http://www.crossroadswired.com/media/audios/20070307.mp3

Message on the Believability of the Bible: 3-14-07
http://www.crossroadswired.com/media/audios/20070314.mp3

As you can see, we were WELL prepared for your arrival and questions concerning Biblical truth and the subject errancy.

Regarding how young married couples should relate, Laura and I just attended a weekend retreat called "Connecting the Dots." It dealt with the differences between husbands and wives and specifically was focused on young married couples that were still learning about the interaction of the dynamic between our two, very different, selves.

Out of that retreat, Laura and I are now leading a small group which is currently studying methods of bettering communication and understanding between husbands and wives. The Saturday previous was our group's first week meeting, one of the main themes discussed was the frustration that comes from ineffective communication between husbands and wives... Sound familiar?

I think you can see by the above that Laura and I were well prepared.

Now, lets look at your travel circumstance. Why in the WORLD would you have a lay-over in Cleveland of all places? Cleveland Hopkins.... why not Chicago's O'Hare? It turns out that Cleveland is one of only Three hubs for Continental airlines. Care to guess how many other airlines use Cleveland as one of their hubs? NONE! Yep, that's right. You happed to be on the ONLY airline that would use Cleveland as a layover spot for you. Had you flown any other airline... ANY OTHER, you would have been stuck in Chicago or flown direct.

Now, how about that little "apartment hunt" your dad suggested? Interesting how that placed you in the air at the right time to get stuck, right?

Hey, I'm all for a simple answer... but I'm seeing a plan here, are you?

Mr. Tee, you mentioned your amusement at the idea that someone would know that God was using them to talk to you... I know that God used me to talk to you. I hope that I've shown you enough proof to at least let you consider that I might be right.

May God bless you and your marriage. May it grow in ways so wonderful that you can only attribute it to God working in your life. If you let Him, I know it will happen.

Mike

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I must admit that I thought long about posting this. I do not want to IN ANY WAY pat myself on the back for this; I was simply God's tool. I just wanted to see a friend, and God used that for way more than what I had planned.

I hope that this will show how God uses ordinary situations to do extraordinary things. Also, I hope others will see that we do not need to be confrontational to be "Good Christians." It is through love that God works, not hate.

I got his permission to post this, too.

###### Mr. Tee's Response ###########

God spoke to me through you because you are a kind person, and you never once tried to force your religious beliefs on me. You did, however, be a true Christ-ian. You showed me love and compassion; you went out of your way to make me comfortable in a city that I knew nobody in. I feared having to sleep in an airport untill Tuesday; not only did you offer me room, but you offered me food. You literally took me in out of the cold. God, I know, spoke through you because He gave me a flight out in the morning; but not without having us meet first...

I believe God interacted with me through you because you were truly kind. You drove hours out of your way just to entertain someone when you could have gone right home...

I have a much easier time thinking that God tried to talk to me through you than to me through someone demanding I convert or burst into flames and go to the hell I so rightly deserve (his words, not mine). You showed me love and compassion, not intolerance.

I pity the foo,
Mr. Tee

#################

It should be noted that I did pull out a few inside jokes from the text above. The content of his message regarding the conversations was not altered in any way.

Mike K.

My wife and I are experiencing something with our daughter as of late that has completely changed my life. Our little lady is coming into her own and realizing that she has things that she wants and she does not quite get that she cannot always have exactly what she wants when she wants it.

She also realizes that some things make her happy, and when she is feeling sad she wants all the things that have made her happy in the past all at once. When she realizes that she can't have it all it just makes her even more sad.

Even worse are situations where she is so tired that she doesn't want anything but to be happy, and the last thing she wants is what Mommy and Daddy want for her even though we know only her resting will make her happy again.

During these times Amilia is inconsolable. She asks for good things.... "Daddy, read me a book." "Daddy, snuggle with me" "Daddy, sing me a song." "Daddy, play kitchen with me." These are all very good things, but what she really needs is sleep. No matter how much I try to make her understand that what will make her feel better is some rest, it just aggravates her. A few times I have given in and read to her or sang to her, but when these things do not make her feel better, it just makes her more frustrated.

On top of this, I've been doing a lot of thinking about my relationship with God, and specifically my prayer life.

I know that God always wants what is best for me; I know that. I realize that most of the time I ask for good things, but how often is what I'm asking for not what God wants for me? How often does He relent and give me what I am asking for just so I can realize that it is not what I need?

For those of you who do not have children, I'll not be able to describe the next part well enough for you to understand. For those of you who do have children, this description will be completely unnecessary. There is this feeling in your soul when you child is upset that tears at your very being. You want nothing more in the world than to take away any pain your child has and when you are powerless to do anything to ease the pain there is this aching within yourself that is unlike anything you have experienced before. As best I can understand, it is love reaching out through your body wrapping itself around your child holding them in it's arms telling them everything it will be all right.

Given my pain at not being able to help my child, how much must it pain God when I do not realize what is best for me? He has exactly what I need and is just waiting for me to realize his plan. He is constantly telling me exactly what will give me the joy I am looking for, but I'm too busy begging him for the things I want. The things that have given me joy in the past; immaturely, I believe that it will give me joy again. How much must that hurt God? When I cry out for Him and all I need to do is be quiet and listen... He is there. He is telling me exactly what I need to hear, if only I would listen.

With this too are the times when our daughter does something we have told her not to do and she gets hurt. We have educated her; she may have even done it in the past an been hurt then too... but for some reason, the pain from the last time has gone and so have the education received from that last experience. As a parent, there is the awful feeling of a hurt child, and added to that is the feeling that you could have done something more the last time to make the lesson stick. If only I had explained more clearly...

This too must be the feeling I give God when I continue to go back to my earthly sinful ways. When I just seem to forget that the road that leads away from God leads toward a life of pain; a life without joy. How many times must I learn this? How many times must I put my Heavenly Father through the pain of watching me turn from Him?

Having a child has been the most amazing experience of my life. It has taught me so much about love and relationships. It has given me a better understanding of my role as a husband. Most importantly though, it has given me a more clear understanding of how the relationship between me and my Heavenly Father should be.



Thank you, God.

Well, I've been using Linux for a while now. In the past I've been asked why I like it better than the "free" operating system that came on my computer when I purchased it. The answers that I gave never seemed to impress those who were asking.

Normally I would lead with security. This sometimes got a decent response; though, many would say "If Linux were as popular..." and it never went well from there.

Next I would talk about cost, but nobody seemed to understand that there is a cost to running that OS that was pre-loaded on a machine. They pay $200 for every upgrade or steal an upgrade when one is available.

Sometimes I hit them with the FOSS movement, the tools available to me and being part of the community. This often makes them feel like they need to be uber-geeks to use Linux, so it's not something that I talk about too often outside of my work contacts.

Well, now I have a new reason... the SEXY desktop! Yeah, you're reading right. Linux is more sexy than that drab Windows. Just check this out!



This is my new desktop called Beryl. This is a full 3D desktop that allows you to rotate between many desktops like flipping a cube. It's beautiful!

There are many other amazing features of this desktop too; though, attempting to describe them in words would be an exercise in futility. The shadows drawn to give the 3D look are fantastic and there are many effects that make closing a windows and exciting thing. It's amazing.

Oh, and you can even make it snow on your desktop.


So, why do I use Linux? Because Windows is a boring drab OS that just doesn't make using a computer fun.

This was my first year attending the Ohio LinuxFest, and I must say it was amazing. This conference had some of the top minds in the Free and Open Source community there to talk and the cost was $0 to get in. (Donations strongly suggested, we want this conference going for a long time to come.)

The conference was located at the Columbus Convention Center in downtown Columbus, OH. Parking was no issue, and the facilities were wonderful.

For the the conference went this way:

Showed up at about 8:30 and went through registration. All I can say about registration was it was probably the smoothest and most eficent registration of any conference I've ever been to. This includes Cisco Networksers, $1500 registration fee there.

Once I was through registration I was told to report to a checking desk for those who purchased the "All Conference Pass." I STRONGLY recommend this if you go next year. The cost was $65, and it came with some nice perks, such as a swag-bag. WOO HOO!

Once I compleged this check in, I surfed the booths. There was a very nice variety of people pushing their wears, service providers, non-profit groups, etc. It was a good mix.

I was impressed with Asterisk/Digium's booth. They had some very sharp guys talking about all the wonderful things you can do without giving loads of dough to the telcos. NICE!

IBM was showing off their virtualization hardware.

Novell had SLED10.1 demo CDs.
Fedora was giving out Core5. An ISP out of

Cuyahoga county was there; if you live/work in that area PLEASE CONTACT THEM: http://www.n2net.net/ .This company gets what FOSS is all about, and they offer a managed Asterisk system to their customers.

Http://freegeekcolumbus.org/ was there, I suggest that if you live/work in the Columbus area, get involved with these people. They to a fantastic service for both the Columbus area and for the environment.

After visiting the booths, I hit the morning keynote. Unfortunately, Jeff Waugh of Canonical fame was delayed due to some connecting flight issues. In his absense Chris DiBona of Google spoke about how FOSS is used in Google. It was an interesting presentation with lots of pictures of how Google's server farm has grown over time. There was a good discussion about Google's Summer of Code program.

Next up, I sat in on "Integration the Holy Grail" presented by George Castro of Oakland Universigy in Michigan. This presentation was a case study of his implementation of a 2003 Server AD and getting all his Linux boxes to authenticate to the AD. I'm amazed by how simple the solution was. There was also a short talk about the upcoming Samba4 Vampire project.