Alhamdulillaah, to my pleasant surprise, I discovered that I started using Fedora personally with Fedora Core 4, and not 5 like I had previously thought.  This makes me feel better as I’m glad I started using Fedora earlier, because I like to think I recognized the importance of a completely (or as close as possible) free operating system (free here means freedom, not just free of cost).

At the time, I was content running it as a dual-boot system and just playing around with it.  By the time Fedora Core 5 came around, though, I was giving serious thought to using Fedora (Core, at the time) as my primary OS.  The complete transition happened, I believe, with Fedora 7 (which is also the year that Fedora Core & Fedora Extras combined, creating…Fedora!), where I relegated Windows XP to just being a spare OS for the very few things it does that I am unable to do with a completely free operating system (yet).

My experience with Fedora Core 4 was overwhelmingly positive.  I am sure I was impressed by the sheer amount of Free Software that was available for it as well as the elegance of a system that was not originated in Redmond.  I was and still am very pleased with the way Gnome works, and that was a big factor for me at the time as it is now.  I do wonder, though, if I downloaded & installed Fedora Core 4 today, what my experience would be link….hmm…

I remember seeing Fedora first in use as Fedora Core 2, when I was surprised someone was using it, as the name “Fedora Core” made me think it was the core of an operating system, but not the complete one.  I don’t know how or why I picked that up, but it is likely related to the perception that Fedora is not really meant to be used, and it is just a development platform (a blatantly false accusation).  I do know that I heard of Fedora Core when it came out, but again, my perception was likely incorrect at the time, thus causing me to adopt using it until quite late.  I had been using different GNU/Linux distributions since I was a freshman in college (can anyone say 1999?).  At the time, I recall trying “Corel Linux” – yes, I…don’t know what I was thinking.  I do remember it being based on Debian, though.  I also remember it significantly for a large amount of disk activity.  I don’t remember much else other than me deleting it shortly afterward.    Other flavors of GNU/Linux I tried were Red Hat, and that’s about all I can remember now.

So, anyway, this might be a good idea for a meme.  My first Fedora.  Talk about when you first started using it, why you did, and how the experience was.

I have the bad habit of starting things and not completing them.  This is bad for numerous reasons, just a few of which I’ll list shortly.  I will warn you now that as this post is meant to help me organize my thoughts, it will list-heavy, as I do find lists and other types of grouping structures to be beneficial and help in making relationships (e.g., database schemes).

I already know that as I type this I will revisit this post in the future as I will be unable, in one sitting, to be think of all of unfinished projects.  Therefore, I will come back and add to the list as I recall more things (and find the time and desire, a rare combination these days, to update the blog).

For

• Unfinished projects tend to clutter your mind
  • I tend to turn to unfinished projects whenever I work (i.e., get paid to do something) and hit a stumbling block.  This severely hinders my progress on work, which ultimately leads to less getting done.
  • Time when I could be brainstorming solutions is usually spent wondering about these myriad unfinished projects, which, lacking much focus, tend to yield few to no tangible solutions.  This includes walking/riding to the masjid, showering, and other activities that tend to leave the brain free and, ideally, well-suited for addressing beneficial thoughts.
  • If I try to focus on something, I can have a hard time preventing my mind from wandering to these unfinished projects.  This is related to the point about work above.
  • It’s just not healthy to have so many things on the mind at once.  There is a point at which the benefit of multitasking is overshadowed by the overhead of just trying to keep track of everything.  It’s not efficient.
• Having so many unfinished projects means that it can be hard to pick just one to work on.
• Playing catch-up may give a false sense of achievement, because the value of these unfinished projects are not equal, and therefore, I may complete one that is really not that important while one that is more valuable was never completed.  Therefore, just trying to clear out the backlog of projects may yield a net result of close to zero.
• There are many more, and I may amend this list in the future as I recall them.

So, here is the list of my unfinished projects (at least those that I can recall at one point or another).  I am including some thoughts on the different ideas as well.

• Redesign the Audio Islam website
• Write a script to automatically tag all the audio files, especially the ones containing Qurʾān recitation, with reciter & sūrah information
• The Fedora Documentation manpage coverage project
  • This is basically an idea I had related to the Fedora Documentation project to ensure that all executables had an associated man page (manual page, a low-level documentation system for Unix-like operating systems such as GNU/Linux).
  • The first step in this is to canvass the existing packages & executables and see what already has a man page.  I have already started on this, but there is much work left to be done.
  • There are plenty of sources for documentation that can be used as baseline manpages, including the Debian project.  So, this project doesn’t require as much work as it does just coordinating and facilitating.
• A Paltalk replacement
  • Paltalk is a voice conference & chat application (video is also supported, but I don’t care about that right now) that is widely used, but terribly proprietary.
  • My goal is to create or synthesize a replacement for Paltalk using only free software and open technologies
    • The best candidates for this are SIP (for multimedia) and Jabber/XMPP (for text chat).
    • The landscape for software that can do this in a simple fashion is rather bleak, but there are some solutions.
    • I’m currently focused on FreeSWITCH as the SIP server and ejabberd as the chat backend.
    • Linking them such that it will be one service will be quite challenging, and still requires a free software client that has solid support for both SIP & XMPP
      • I’ve been looking mostly at Qutecom, SIP Communicator, and Psi
    • • On GNU/Linux, the Empathy client for the Telepathy framework is outstanding, but, is limited to free-software operating systems.  I think Windows support is a long way out still.
• AlMaghrib in Malaysia
  • I am trying to catalyze the establishment of AlMaghrib Institute seminars in Malaysia (almost surely in Kuala Lumpur, at least at the beginning).
  • I’ve already purchased the domains almaghribinmalaysia.com/net/org, and I just need to get the site setup.
    • To start off, I think just a blog with some information about AlMaghrib is fine.  It can be fleshed-out later.
  • Alḥamdulillāh, there is already a lot of interest both within and without Malaysia.  I have several contacts here that are also excited and may be able to facilitate the first few steps.
    • I see the first step being getting a group of excited & enthusiastic locals to get behind the effort.
    • After that group is identified (and it is really an ongoing process), see about getting the support of existing organizations.
      • From an initial perspective, it seems like this is going to be easy, in shāʾ Allāh.
    • With this support, we will want to schedule some kind of event to gain a wider audience interest.  Something like a conference or teaser seminar, perhaps a week-long program with some of the AlMaghrib instructors.
      • Many of the AlMaghrib instructors are already known or well-known here
      • Having Suhaib Webb might be particularly nice, as his wife is Malaysian.
      • Waleed Basyouni has expressed an interest in coming to Malaysia, and some work is already in progress regarding that, but it may have stalled (temporarily only, in shāʾ Allāh)
      • Yasir Qadhi is another instructor that has some reknown here, apparently (from what I’ve been told).
• HidayahTech
  • My own technology consulting business
  • Although HidayahTech is currently the name of my blog, I have also resolved to use this as the name for my own consulting business.
  • Services will include
    • Audio recording, editing, mastering, and production (I did this, for example, for the Texas Dawah Convention in 2007)
      • I am consider splitting this and other audio-related services into it’s own business, namely, Hidayah Audio
    • Web technologies
      • Hosting (this is generally quite easy)
      • Moodle (an open-source learning mangement system, for putting schools online, for example)
      • Audio services, including hosting my “replacement for Paltalk” solution above
    • Consulting
      • This will include a wide variety of services ranging from system administration, general IT, infrastructure, to web development
      • I may take some partners or hire some friends for this aspect of this business, as I will need help for some points of it
• Global Homeschooling
  • This is my premiere project, if I had to pick one.  I consider this to be something great if I can achieve it, by the Permission of Allāh.
  • To sum it up, I want to develop a system whereby Muslims (and truly, anyone) can homeschool their own children easily.  Homeschooling may be too specific of a term, though, because I want the scale to include a plan that can be implemented by governments.  I would like children, and really anyone, to be able to be educated within their own homes, utilizing the bevy of technology that exists.
  • Technology creates options & opportunities, and this is a belief I take strongly.  Therefore, I think we should utilize it.  I see education as one of the most important investments that can be made, whether it is Islamic or related to the worldly sciences, both of which are important.  I actually believe the distinction to be artificial, but it will take time to get there.
  • So, to put it in a few words, I would like to develop a system of education leveraging technology that is globally accessible allowing education to be released from the confines of school buildings.
• Learn the Python programming language
  • I think learning Python has a high return value on the types of applications I would like to write, including graphical ones.  Also, it is quite the preferred language for many platforms, not the least of which is Red Hat & Fedora.
• Memorize the Qurʾān
  • Please keep in mind that this list isn’t in order of importance…;)
  • I think this is a goal every Muslim should have.  I started this goal, seriously, while I was staying in Egypt with my parents, even semi-regularly visiting the imān of the nearby masjid to review my memorization.  Sadly, since arriving in Malaysia I’ve not really resumed, and I am afraid I may start regressing.  This is the kind of project that can be achieved through a little, regular & constant work every day.  I really should commit to something, even if it is as simple as one āyāh per day.  That would be better than none.

Alhamdulillaah, I’ve just managed to produce my first HDR (high dynamic range) image the results of which I’m pleased with.  Once again, I have CHDK to thank for enabling this feature easily.

Note:  I begin this post with a mildly detailed explanation of the human visual system, HDR & LDR images, and the process to create HDR & tone-mapped images.  The pictures themselves are near the bottom of this post.

First, a little background about HDR.  The way our bodies capture and process imagery is, to put it lightly, amazing.  Starting from when light first hits the cornea through to when we perceive the visual object (not to mention how our brain’s store such visual images, which is far from just keeping a “bunch of bits”), the Words of Allāh resound with truth regarding His Creation:

And it is He who spread the earth and placed therein firmly set mountains and rivers; and from all of the fruits He made therein two mates; He causes the night to cover the day. Indeed in that are signs for a people who give thought. (Alqurʾān 13:3)

Thus, in the way that they are created, our eyes can capture an amazing amount of detail and range in their own way.  The range of regular (so-called “LDR” – low dynamic range) images is quite limited in comparison.  And this is, actually, the vast majority of image-related technologies, be they cameras, display devices, or even image formats such as JPEG.

HDR images, however, are those which do or have the ability to capture image details, specifically color & brightness information, at a much higher level than normal technologies.  Since normal technologies, such as our digital cameras and screens, can not capture nor display HDR images, we have to take a different route to get the information.  One technique is exposure bracketing where one takes a picture of the same scene at different exposure levels, one after another.  The reason for doing this is that, while the normal dynamic range of a camera may be unable to capture the bright, medium, and dark details of an image all at once, it does have the ability to capture these details separately with different settings.

Alhamdulillaah, there is also software that exists that allows you to take these separate LDR images and combine them into one now-HDR image that contains the details from all the separate exposures.  Doing so is not trivial, and it may take one multiple attempts to get something that looks good.  More often than not, the result is eery, because of a technique called tone-mapping.  Tone-mapping is a technique whereby the colors and range of an HDR image are brought down into a simulation of what our eyes would perceive in the scene.  In reality, that’s all but impossible, but it yields some interesting, beautiful, and sometimes striking results.

The specific software I use is the unpronounceable Qtpfsgui (I just say it one letter at a time).  Qtpfsgui is a front end for pfstools, which is an outstanding image toolkit for these kinds of images.  It takes care of aligning, merging, and finally tone-mapping the images one step at a time.  I short-circuited the first two steps (because Qtpfsgui can be fussy sometimes)  by using the command-line tool align_image_stack to align the different exposures (since I moved a bit between exposures) as well as creating the HDR image from the three separate images.  Then, I used Qtpfsgui just for the tone-mapping stage.

The first row of pictures are the original images, taken at -4, 0, & +4 EV settings.  Looking closely, you’ll notice that each range brings out different details: the darkest shows details in the clouds, the middle shows details in the sea, and the brighest shows details in the sand.  These are the separate LDR images at different exposures that I talked-about above.

The second “row”, containing only a single picture, is the result of the several steps I mentioned above to produce an HDR image.  I make no claims into how “real” this image looks, but it does show the details that I was looking for – from the clouds to the sand – in one image.  I also think it looks cool. 

This is the first HDR image I’ve created that I’ve wanted to share, and so I took this opportunity to explain the process too.  If you have any questions, then by all means, please post a comment and then subscribe to the comments so you’ll know when I’ve replied.

Alhamdulillaah, while reading about integers and, subsequently, prime numbers last night, I decided the time had come for me to write a primality calculator in PHP.  The test I use in my implementation is about as a naïve as one can possible get, but it was fun, nonetheless.

Interestingly enough, I discovered that there already exists a primality calculator for *nix-based systems – primes.  It comes with the bsd-games package for Fedora.  I assume the same is true for other distributions.  Mine isn’t quite as fast yet…but it does accept, optionally, one or two arguments. If there are two arguments, then it will calculate all primes starting from the first going until the second. If there is only one argument, it will calculate from PRIME_START (defined to be 2) through to the largest integer PHP can handle on your platform (usually the maximum value of a signed int on your machine).

There are loads of potential optimizations that can be performed, and this was just something written on a whim as a proof of concept. It seems to be accurate, however. The code, released under the GNU GPL v. 3.0, can be found below.

#!/usr/bin/php
< ?php

define('PRIME_START', 2);   //  One, by definition, is not prime

if (isset($argv[2])) {
    $start = (int) $argv[1];
    $max = (int) $argv[2];
} elseif (isset($argv[1])) {
    $start = (int) PRIME_START;
    $max = (int) $argv[1];
} else {
    $start = PRIME_START;
    $max = PHP_INT_MAX;
}

if ($start < PRIME_START) {
    $start = PRIME_START;
}

if ($max < PRIME_START) {
    $max = PHP_INT_MAX;
}

echo "Using $start as start value and $max as max value\n";

$int = $start;

while ($int < $max) {
    $start_time = microtime(true);
    if (is_prime($int)) {
        $total_time = round((microtime(true) - $start_time), 2);
        echo "$int is prime (calculated in {$total_time}s)\n";
    }
    ++$int;
}

echo "All possible primes lower than $max have been calculated!\n";

/**
 * A very naïve test to determine the primality of a given integer
 *
 * @param int $int
 * @return boolean integer is prime
 */
function is_prime($int)
{
    if (! is_numeric($int)) {
        return false;
    }

    $int = (int) $int;

    $test_divisor = PRIME_START; //  By coincidence, the first divisor to determine prime numbers is also the first prime number

    while ($test_divisor < $int) {
        if (is_divisor($int, $test_divisor)) {
            return false;
        }
        ++$test_divisor;
    }

    //  If we are here, then that means no divisors were found
    return true;
}

/**
 * Very simple function to determine if one integer is the divisor of another
 *
 * @param int $dividend
 * @param int $divisor
 * @return boolean $divisor is divisor of dividend
 */
function is_divisor($dividend, $divisor)
{
    if (0 === $dividend % $divisor) {
        return true;
    } else {
        return false;
    }
}

Alhamdulillaah, my good friend Belal Khan of Leechon Films fame has started (a while back, actually) a program called Message Mastery.  You should get the full explanation from the website, but the basic gist of it is that it is a training seminar focused on developing masterful messages through the medium of video.

He’s released a few videos that are freely available that are samples of what the entire program entails.  I found the one entitled “Three POWER Principles of Filmmaking” to be quite refreshing in how simple, yet effective, such techniques can be.  Even more beneficial is that the tips he provides, while framed around the production of video media, are general enough to be beneficial in almost any context.

Give his site a check-out and leave some comments as he’s very keen on getting & responding-to feedback from his visitors & members of his program.

Disclaimer:  Belal is just my friend – I am neither associated with Message Mastery nor am I enrolled in the program…yet.

Alhamdulillaah, I’ve been able to take an enormous amount of pictures during my stay here in Malaysia until now.  And while the actual yield of shots with any value may be low, the sheer volume of photos means that I have plenty I would like to share.

The sheer amount of work to upload these and present them in anything close to an appealing way through WordPress has made me decide that I am going to seek an alternative method for disseminating the videos.  I am hoping I can leverage my Gallery installation, in shaaʾ Allaah, but it’s support for alternative media types has not impressed me to date.  And don’t even dare suggest that I use a Flash-based solution…

Read on for the feature presentation(s)!  As usual, make sure to get a copy of the free-and-open-source VLC player if you don’t have it or another media player that can play Ogg Theora videos.

Kuala Lumpur Downtown Time Lapse

VGA

720p HD

Balcony Sunset Time Lapse

VGA

720p HD

VGA

720p HD

VGA

VGA

720p HD

VGA

Quick links to all video downloads

• kuala-lumpur-downtown-time-lapse-vga
• kuala-lumpur-downtown-time-lapse-hd720
• time-lapse-balcony-sunset-vga-24fps
• time-lapse-balcony-sunset-720p-24fps
• balcony-sunset-time-lapse-vga
• balcony-sunset-time-lapse-2-hd720
• time-lapse-balcony-sunset-3-vga
• time-lapse-balcony-sunset-interrupted-vga-30fps
• time-lapse-balcony-sunset-interrupted-720p-30fps
• time-lapse-balcony-sunset-interrupted-epilogue-vga-30fps

Enjoy!

Alhamdulilllaah, there are some outstanding opportunities for views of the downtown Kuala Lumpur skyline from the roof of our apartment here.  Some of the shots are clearer than others due to the conditions at the time I took theme.  These are my first attempts, as well, so keep that in mind.  Click the link to see them!

Just yesterday I purchased a tripod specifically so I can take more steady shots.  It will also help me in taking more clear & even panoramas, because with a tripod I can have a more even axis of rotation – as opposed to the rotation happening due to me twisting my waist with the camera held in front of my face.  I think this will yield even better & more accurate panoramas, in shaaʾ Allaah.

Look to a future post where I explain how I created these images.  It’s amazingly more simple than it seems, alhamdulillaah.

Okay, so I have an addiction. Here are some more time-lapse sequences I took this past weekend and Monday. I’m now dabbling with alternative frame rates and sizes, including, by “popular” request, HD resolution videos.

I’ve learned a few lessons from these sequences, and I’ll elaborate a bit more on each one.

Sunset 1

This time-lapse sequence is composed of 900 images, taken with an approximate interval of 5 – 8 seconds (it’s not very precise due to a few factors).  As happened with at least one other sequence, something interesting started to happen just as the sequence finishes…you’ll have to watch the whole thing to find out…

Highlights include seeing the contrails of planes transform into high-altitude cirrus clouds as well as shadows from individual clouds sweeping across the sky!

Bonus points if you can identify the embedded subliminal message about lawn care. 

Lessons learned: Capture more!  If something looks interesting in real-time, then it almost certainly will be more so in time-lapse!

Sunset 2

Possibly my best sequence yet, it is composed of a whopping 1500 images, taken with an approximate interval of 2 – 4 seconds (the setting was 1 “second” in CHDK).  This is cropped to 720p HD resolution after I resized the sequence a bit to make it more manageable.  For an uncropped sequence, see below.

Highlights include very detailed view of cloud structure as well as cloud formation & dissipation.  Additionally, more cloud-shadow streaks are visible.  Finally, there is some interesting stuff happening at sunset that appears to be some very high-level development, such as waves within the clouds.

Lessons learned: Fix the exposure and other settings so that there is a consistent feel throughout the whole sequence, unless that changing exposure settings are intentional (which they are not, in this case, but it’s not so bad, either).

Sunset 2

(VGA resolution)

This is from the same image sequence as above, except the original 4×3 images are resized to VGA (640×480) resolution.  It should be easy to identify where the crop took place (somewhat below the exact middle of the frame, poised just above and between the non-sky parts).

Windy Day 1

Windy Day 2

These two image sequences (Windy Day 1 & 2) are real gems, alhamdulillaah!  I really liked them.  Sadly, they are also the shortest.  And why, might you ask, are they the shortest (and most irregular in length)?  Well, the sequences are titled quite appropriately – they were taken on an exceptionally windy day.  So windy, in fact, that my lightweight plastic tripod (that came more-or-less free with my camera from Newegg) was blown over by the wind…twice (once per sequence, thus the abrupt endings)…with the camera still on it.  The first impact was on concrete.  The second was grass.

Highlights include some stunning sun rays sweeping through the holes in the clouds.

Lessons learned: Have a basic understanding of physics (especially the aspects of mass, force, leverage, and thus, torque) before undertaking photography in averse conditions that lend to beautiful photo ops.  Additionally, should one’s understanding of above-mentioned topics not be sufficient, at least retain the common sense to place the camera in an area where damage from falling would be minimized.

Windy Day 3

Windy Day 4

These last two image sequences were done on a different windy day, but with a heavier tripod (an old, well-built metal one belonging to my father).  There really isn’t as much inspiring about these sequences.  The quality of the images was outstanding, but nothing particularly interesting happened.

Lessons learned: Place the camera in such a way as to minimize unwanted obstructions (in this case, the trees didn’t add much).  Also, a deeper field of view would make for a more interesting shot – more time to see the cloud formations develop and dissipate.

So there you have it!  I’ve been working on these sequences (both making & processing them) all weekend and until today, so I am happy to finally be done with them so I can share them.  Comments most welcome!

Time-lapse sky by Basil Mohamed Gohar is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

As I’ve already alluded to in a previous post, I’ve been using the CHDK firmware supplement with my Canon PowerShot A550, which on it’s own is an outstanding camera, alhamdulillaah. This firmware add-on, though, really takes the cake!

One of the features made possible by CHDK is the ability to run scripts which take the enabled features of your camera and do interesting things with them. One such script enables one to take a sequence of images of a fixed interval over a period of time – i.e., time-lapse photography! So, over the past two days, I’ve gone-ahead and played with this feature a bit by just collecting images from my office window while I diligently “worked”.

Through the script menu, I was able to setup the time-lapse to take one photo every second. As my office is on the 4th floor of large cubic structure in the suburbs of Columbus, Ohio, I had a nice view that combined parking lot-and-street activity with some nice cloud shows. That both days were signficantly overcast actually proved to make the videos more interesting – so much so that the last image sequence was pointed more towards the sky to capture the natural splendor up above.

Note: All videos are in free and open source Ogg Theora format.  If you do not have a player that supports this already installed, then I recommend the VLC free and open source player.  Most users of a GNU/Linux or other *nix-based systems will probably not need anything special to player, so this note is mostly for Windows users.

Time-lapse view from my office window by Basil Mohamed Gohar is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

work-window-time-lapse-1

This was my first image sequence out of my office window. The white balance is really off, unfortunately, because I didn’t attempt to adjust it at all. Subsequently, the entire image sequence has a color hue due to the tinting of the office building’s windows.

work-window-time-lapse-2

My second image sequence came out a little better with regards to color, because I set the white balance to “overcast”. This is still not as accurate as it could be, however.

work-window-time-lapse-3

The third image sequence is the longest, and first one from the second day. This is a sequence of 600 images in total! I manually adjusted the white balance for this and the next sequence, and as such, the color appear much more natural & realistic in these two sequences.

work-window-time-lapse-4

The last & final image sequence for this batch was really just something I did without giving it much thought. Amazingly enough, it turned-out to be the most interesting until the end when it gets cut off (due to lack of space on my SD card) – the direction of the clouds began to change! This sequence in particular encourages me to try to stake-out a day with excellent cloud activity and just setup the camera to capture as long a sequence as is sane.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this post and these clips as much as I did making & manipulating them. I’ll make another post explaining how I captured the images & converted them into videos. Feel free to post comments and/or questions should you have any.

Alhamdulillaah, I’ve been playing around with CHDK, which is a free firmware add-on (note: it does not require flashing your camera’s firmware) that enables a multitude of features on your ordinary, run-of-the-mill Canon PowerShot digital camera. In short, it’s amazing. I haven’t had enough time to truly “unleash the POWER” yet, but I’m already amazingly pleased with what I can do so far that I was unable to do prior to this.

Amongst its amazing features includes the ability to save images to a RAW format, full control over shutter speed & exposure settings, fine-grained control over video quality settings, HDR photography, and an amazing BASIC-based scripting language that enables, among other things, time-lapse photography (examples in an upcoming post, in shaaʾ Allaah).

Expect myriad future posts relating to images & videos I’ve been able to capture with these new features, especially in combination with

Okay, I know that title is a pretty pretentious statement by itself, as much of Fedora 9′s awesomeness isn’t unique to it. So, I’ll grant that much of the coming awesomeness is related to Gnome 2.22, which is not limited to Fedora 9, nor is Pulseaudio, Upstart (props to the Ubuntuees for that), or a plethora of other things. So, in reality, Fedora 9′s awesomeness is a celebration of Free & Open-Source software and its universal community.

The following is pretty-much ripped from the wiki. The witty banter is added by me. Also, I know I’m not the first (actually, I hope I’m quite close to the last) to have done one of these things. What follows are the features that I consider to be cool and important, but this list is obviously by no means exhaustive or even appropriately representative of Fedora 9. It’s simply a list of what I think will make Fedora 9 so awesome, in shaaʾ Allaah.

Okay, that should be enough flame retardant for now…onwards!

Unified Dictionary Support

This feature is really nice because I tend to use words that aren’t in the stock dictionaries of Pidgin, Firefox, or OpenOffice.org, including transliterations of Arabic that I frequently throw into the mix (already, above, there are two examples). So, I frequently have to add these customized spellings and/or rarer words (or just plain preferred spellings) to the existing dictionaries numerous times. Fedora 9 now unifies these dictionaries so I should, technically, need only one. Awesome!

Ext4 Filesystem Support

Ext4 is the successor to the successful stable ext3 filesystem. Personally, I’ve been using this on both a fresh install of the Fedora 9 Beta and Preview releases, and I have not had any problems. On top of that, I have actually seen some significant performance enhancements, particularly when dealing with both very large as well as large numbers of files. Of course, ext4 has a laundry list of features to it, so don’t just take it from me, check it out!

Note: As the Ext4 filesystem is not nearly as long-in-the-tooth as ext3, you may consider not using it if you have only one copy of data on the filesystem. I feel comfortable and confident about using it for myself, but as people tend to be very conservative when it comes to their choice of filesystems for good reasons, just consider reading-up on it before you commit to it. And when you do, you’ll probably also think it’s awesome!

Firefox 3

Firefox has long been the poster child for the positive impact that a free and open source model can have on software. Taking the world by storm, Firefox has given a good knock to the stalwart of the Internet Age, Internet Explorer 6, and has driven innovation on the Web to new heights, not the least of which is driving Microsoft into releasing newer versions of Internet Explorer at a previously unheard of pace just to keep up with the pace of the Web.

Firefox 3 delivers yet another knock-out blow with amazingly enhanced performance (especially under GNU/Linux), excellent features (like the…wait for it…AwesomeBar…), and all-around slickness such as better cross-platform native integration (don’t think about the logic of that for too long…it’s good, trust me…).

It seems like Firefox is still in Beta for now, but as I’ve been using Firefox since version 0.7, I’ve grown accustomed to the stability that comes with the positive & productive attitude of release early, release often.

(Mandatory “awesome” reference can be found two paragraphs above.)

Gvfs

One of the beauties that Gnome has brought for us is the outstandingly flexibly and featureful Gvfs. Continuing in Gnome’s tradition of just pushing forward to improve the desktop experience, Gvfs offers a new virtual filesystem interface that allows amazingly easy & flexibly file-level access to myriad new platforms, be they of a network, device, or other type of nature. Read the link to the Gnome website for specifics about this nifty new feature.

jigdo

As one of the mirrors of the Fedora Unity Re-Spin project, I’m sort of proud of this one, even though, aside from hosting, all I’ve really done is impeded the progress of releases by asking inane questions at inappropriate times (note to self: check release schedules before hounding people for assistance). It is largely through the work of the fine folks at Fedora Unity that jigdo has now become a mainstay in the Fedora distribution model.

So why should anyone bother with jigdo when there’s already BitTorrent? I used to wonder the same thing, but then I used jigdo for the first time. To vastly over simplify it, with Jigdo, one need only download the bits they are lacking in order to get a full ISO, be it DVD or CD. So, if you already have a Fedora 9 Beta or Preview release, using Jigdo, you’d need only download the packages that have been updated since then.

Contrast this with BitTorrent, where one would need to download the entire ISO, regardless of what bits you may already have of a previous release. Yes, BitTorrent is peer-to-peer and jigdo isn’t (at least, not yet?), but you still have to download the whole 3+GB worth before you have something to install. Jigdo can save you a lot of bandwidth if you already have a previous release available, whether as an ISO file or burnt directly on a disc.

On top of that, if used intelligently, a widespread adoption of jigdo as a distribution method would also alleviate the burden of hosts from having to hold large ISO files which are really just composed of myriad packages already present on the mirror. As a host myself, I think that is just awesome!

If you’re interested in learning more about how to use Jigdo for getting Fedora, check out Fedora Unity Jigdo howto.

KDE4

Although I do not use the KDE aside from a few choice apps, I think it would be rather rude and inappropriate to neglect the awesome efforts of the Fedora KFE SIG in making Fedora 9 the first major distribution release to feature KDE4

As I am not as familiar with this awesomeum as I am others, I will leave the absorption of the full details as an exercise for the reader (note: their release annoucement page is…yes, that’s right…awesome…).

PackageKit

It has been called the OPMtRTA (perhaps only by me). I’ll admit that PK has had it’s growing pains, but I have to say, Richard Hughes (and anyone else?) has done an awesome job pulling this one together. I think this is something that necessarily will have to continue to evolve as the scope of PackageKit is just amazing. How far it’s come is even more so, and I am really looking forward to seeing where it goes and what innovative solutions are found for the plethora of problems present with package procurement (okay, that last one was a bit of a stretch, I know…).

I would like to take this time to say that Richard has one of the fastest turnaround-times I’ve seen in any kind of a project, whether it is related to bugs, features, or implementation. And, given the amount of heat that’s been thrown his way, his demeanor has always been calm, collected, and courteous (that one was better, wasn’t it?).

100% Free and Open Source

This isn’t new…it’s always been there. Yes, Fedora, by directed and intentional policy, is a 100% Free and Open Source GNU/Linux distribution. While it is possible to get non-free bits into it, you’ll not find one shipped with it. I think this is, by far, the greatest feature of Fedora (at least, as an OS – I consider the community to be the best part of Fedora in general). Take us back a decade or two, and who would have thought that such a functional and polished product could exist free from the enslaving shackles of proprietary softare? Alhamdulillaah!

So, there you have it! A quick view of the upcoming Fedora 9! I’ll be doing my best to mirror the torrents of Fedora, both the i386 and x86_64 releases, in shaa Allaah. Please feel free to share your own comments and experiences with Fedora 9 and/or free-and-open-source software in general!

I’ve been keeping my eye out for tapeless (e.g., hard drive or flash memory instead of tapes) HD camcorders for a while, because of the obvious flexibility of being able to transfer the recorded video directly rather than “recording” it via IEEE 1394 (i.e., “FireWwire”) – while an IEEE 1394 link is definitely fast, any tape-based camcorder usually only transfers the video at regular playing speeds by actually playing the video.

Having said that, here are a few that have caught my eye:

• http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/519149-REG/Sanyo_VPC_HD1000BK_Xacti_HD1000_HD_Camcorder.html
• http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/521864-REG/Panasonic_HDC_SD5BNDL_HDC_SD5_AVCHD_Digital_Camcorder.html
• http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/539291-REG/Canon_2708B001_VIXIA_HF_100_AVCHD_Flash.html
• http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/537788-REG/JVC_GZ_HD5_GZ_HD5_60GB_HD_Everio.html
• http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/537789-REG/JVC_GZ_HD6_GZ_HD6_120GB_HD_Everio.html

The important issue, of course, is how easy is it to work with the video once it’s recorded.  Most of the video formats are MPEG-4-based, usually the controversial AVCHD.  There are some advantages & disadvantages, of course, but ffmpeg really helps with most of the issues.  I’ve been playing a lot with it (ffmpeg) this past week, and the sheer flexibility of it is astounding.  I think the woes of multimedia flexibility under free operating systems is slowly going away, as even the GUI applications (avidemux, PiTiVi, Kino, etc.) are at a level of refinement I wouldn’t have expected.

Naturally, I am loath to use nonfree versus free solutions, so I am pleased to let you know that there are many free software codecs available through ffmpeg – that is the topic for another article, perhaps.

Obviously, there’s still a lot of work to be done, but I’m really excited to dive into open-source content creation!

Updated with relevant linking and a few spelling fixes.

Your Brain Usage Profile:

Auditory : 66%
Visual : 33%
Left : 58%
Right : 41%

Basil, you are mildly left-hemisphere dominant while showing a slight preference for auditory processing. This overall combination seems to indicate a well-working blend of logic and judgment and organization, with sufficient intuition, perception and creativity to balance that dominance.

You will at times experience conflict between how you feel and what you think which will generally be resolved in favor of what you think. You will find yourself interested in the practical applications of whatever material you have learned or whatever situation you face and will retain the ability to refine whatever knowledge you possess or aspects of whatever position you are in.

By and large, you will orient yourself toward intellectual activities and structure. Though not rigid, you will schedule yourself, plan, and focus on routine and continuity of operations, rather than on changes and disruptions

When changes or disruptions occur, you are likely to consider first how to ensure that such disruptions do The same balance is reflected in your sensory preference. You will tend to be reflective and measured in your interaction style. For the most part, you will be considered objective without being cold and goal-oriented while retaining the capacity to listen to others.

Preferentially you learn by listening and maintaining significant internal dialogues with yourself. Nevertheless, you have sufficient visualization capabilities to benefit from using graphs, charts, doodles, or even body movement to enhance your comprehension and memory.

To the extent that you are even implicitly aware of your hemispheric dominance and sensory style, you will feel most comfortable in those arenas which emphasize verbal skills and logic. Teaching, law, and science are those that stand out among the professions, along with technical sales and management.

I can’t really argue with the conclusions drawn from twenty mostly-visual questions, however, does it seem to anyone else that this is written in such a way as to make it agreeable, even if it is not very accurate? Also…it seems like parts of the third & fourth paragraphs are missing. Does anyone have them completed?

It was fun, nonetheless, and a nice distraction from things I actually get paid to do.