RHEL (and clones) does not come with very much multimedia capability. It has to do with politics, copyrights, and philosophical debates. Even if we tried to outline all the issues here, chances are quite good you don't care a whit. You want to play your music and videos, and there is no good reason you shouldn't. There are plenty of Linux developers willing to join you in seeking to play what Windows can play, and a lot more besides, but Red Hat is being careful and sticking to their commitment to the corporate client base.
The email message was a happy surprise. A fellow in California, at something called the “L.A. Theatre Works,” was putting together a project (he did not say what) and wondered if I still have the original tapes (I don’t) from a radio report I did in 1983. His email note to me was above a long series of messages and replies he had sent to and received from others, in pursuit of the missing audio.
How secure is “secure”? Nobody can decide for you. What I offer here is the measures I take before browsing the Net. From what I can tell, these measures are effective in that the data-mining and marketing industry has a very poor idea of who and where I am. Try looking yourself up on sites like Spokeo or Zabasearch to get an estimate of your online data trail. While your webbrowser is not the only source, nor even a major source, of such information, it is a part of the bigger effort. The whole idea is to make those data mining sites as inaccurate as possible. And maybe you don't care, but for those who do, I'd like to suggest a few configuration changes to improve things.
As we have just passed through Holy Week, we reflect on one of the strangest juxtapositions of events a person could encounter. A Jewish carpenter turned preacher goes from being hailed as the next king to being brutally tortured and executed in the span of five days. Then, completely against the normal way things are supposed to happen, the tragedy becomes a celebration when that apparent victim returned to life triumphant. That’s not just the “good news” the church is called to preach, but also what it is called to live.
My cousin Alan in Missouri sends news that Harold Biellier has died. The report made me sad. Not because it was a tremendous surprise: Mr. Biellier was 90. Nor was he someone critical to my day-to-day existence: I doubt I’ve seen him even once in the last 40 years. I know I haven’t in the last 35.
In today’s discussions of religion, we often forget how radically different the idea of a single, all powerful God, espoused by those faiths that hail back to Abraham, really is. What might a typical member of the “more enlightened” Greek culture during the time right before the fall of Judah in 587 B.C.E. have thought about the monotheism of the Bible? OFB’s Timothy Butler “listened in” on such a discussion.
The hot new word of 2011 is “bespoke.” If you listen, you’ll suddenly hear it everywhere. It used to be a perfectly good word, but by midsummer it will be threadbare and tattered from overuse. The wear is already showing.
Last time, we got the basic Linux system set up. Now, you need to orient yourself. Things may look a little different here than you are use to on other systems, but nothing is nearly as mysterious as it might seem. The main menu system is in the upper left-hand corner. In the upper right is the notification area (“Systray”). On the lower toolbar, the left is where the open windows are listed, and the lower right is an iconic representation of multiple desktops with your desktop “trashcan.”
Back when the world was young, there were mechanical devices in newspaper, radio, and even television newsrooms called “teletype machines.” The precursor to modern electronic printers, these things were very noisy. They had letter keys inside them, on arms, and in response to electrical impulse they would type the (usually) correct letter in the fashion of a typewriter.
This week’s attacks on Libya were summarized well by one Phineas X. Jones, who tweeted, “If I told you in 2007 that in 2011 we'd be killing Soc. Security, torturing Americans & bombing Libya, who would you guess won the election?” The Obama Doctrine is taking shape, but suddenly it is looking more like the Bush Doctrine Remixed. Is it?