Please say a prayer for Joel Mclaughlin, one of our authors here, and his family in their time of loss. He recently received news that a family member has left to be with the lord.
Mailing List
Due to some unfortunate circumstances beyond my control, the mailing list is currently down. I expect it to be functioning again very soon, so please hang in there and thanks for your patience.
Bye Bye KDE, Hello XFCE
Perhaps I’m just being petty, but I’ve never liked Gnome. Maybe it’s the initial Mac-like layout or maybe it’s that hideous foot that befouls every corner of every widget and application built for it. (In case you hadn’t noticed, I despise the Gnome Desktop foot logo.) Then again, perhaps it’s the fact that Gnome doesn’t have any schemes as visually appealing as the Active Heart or Thin Keramic (or is it Keramic Thin?) from KDE 3.X That being said, I had always noticed that KDE had been a fairly large drain on resources compared to Gnome, but figured that was just the price you paid for visual beauty.
Being the KDE-phile that I am, I just had to install KDE 4 once it became available with my distribution of choice. (PCLinuxOS in case you’re wondering.) Part of my reason for waiting for it to come out on the distro rather than geeking out and installing it from source or trying to force external RPM’s into my system was two-fold. First, I’m lazy and didn’t want to do all that work. I was perfectly happy with the current version of KDE 3.5. Second, and more important, I knew if I waited until it came out on the distro, and even had a few version updates, that it would be stable with my version of Linux. I had tried doing something like that before and screwed up my system to the point of having to wipe and rebuild, not something I was looking forward to.
My first download of KDE 4 was actually version 4.3.1. I expected that it would have a slightly larger impact on system resources, but I didn’t really expect it to be significant. (Keep in mind I was running KDE 3.5 with Compiz Fusion turned on.) I downloaded it on my laptop first and visually, it kept up with the preloaded version of Vista nicely. The only downside I had was that my favorite button schemes were no longer compatible, and in their place were ugly flat Gnome-like buttons. I checked multiple schemes, and all looked like bad GTK or GTK+ themes. (Come on people? Where’s the visual interest of KDE that set it apart from the other desktops?) Oh well, what was done was done. I could live with it, and the rendering was better than KDE 3.5 with Compiz Fusion. I decided it was time for the real test. I downloaded it to my desktop machine. It’s a little older than my laptop, not as much memory, and not quite as fast, and it showed.
At first I didn’t notice any difference in quality of performance, but then I realized that none of the composting effects were occurring. Sure enough, when I opened up the settings, they had all defaulted to off. So I turned them on, and left them at the basic set-up, which is very Vista-like in behavior. I tried to change desktops. You would have thought I asked my machine to calculate Pi to one-million decimal places. Bringing up the system menu took as long as bringing up GIMP usually takes. If I can’t have all the nifty effects, I might as well go back to KDE 3.5 with Compiz Fusion.
As a result of my recent disappointment with the newer version of KDE, namely due to it’s apparent drain on system resources, but also because of the lack of appealing styles, I began to investigate alternate desktops. I narrowed it down to three. Fluxbox, LXDE, and XFCE. While FluxBox might not be a bad choice if it’s your only option that will run on your system, I wouldn’t recommend it. Likewise, while at first glance, LXDE seems to be KDE light made with GTK instead of QT, it also seems to be lacking in some customization features. Despite my initial reaction to XFCE being a Gnome-clone, it has proven to be the most outstanding of the three, and in many ways, superior to Gnome, if for no other reason, I personally find it far easier to find all of the configuration options in XFCE than I do in Gnome, plus, I don’t have to look at that stupid foot.
ShepherdPup
It’s amazing the things you find when browsing around the internet. I usually am under the impression that I have a good idea what is happening with Christians and Linux but there are days like today where I am completely and pleasantly blindsided.
I just stumbled across ShepherdPup Linux, which claims to be a ” Self Contained Freely Distributable Bible Study System.” It looks great and I am excited to check it out. Their press release follows. Check them out!
It is natural when examining new Bible study software to explore it in terms of ones self. How will I benefit from this? How does this compare for me to that? It is the built in consumer within us that judges feature for feature what will work for us personally. I suppose this tendency is good to a certain respect and to fight this tendency might well be futile. But, amongst my Christian brothers I certainly will fight the notion to another much greater respect.
When I introduce ShepherdPup to most tech aware Christians their very first reaction is predictable. “Have you tried X”? “I’ve just purchased Y”! “Why should I use Z when 90% of computers run Microsoft”? My response most often is totally unforeseen by them and is oppsite to a consumer’s intuition. “This is not just for you, this is for the many others that you will be freely giving this to”.
The simple often overlooked fact is that Christianity is meant to given.
Personal Bible study is one thing; communal study and evangelism quiet another. I can’t give a Microsoft OS away; I can’t give “Y” away; therefore they were not even considered. There is a version of “X” called “Z” and “Z” is very nice but, it takes up a whole lot of room, room that could be used for providing as many Bible resources on one CD as possible. And one intention should be made clear: “ShepherdPup is meant to be self contained” “set apart from the host’s normal OS”; how then is that to happen with X Y or Z?
And while a great many have studied the Bible until they became blue in the face with these products, few are any closer to sharing God’s Word to others than they were the day they started. Few have developed the resources to “Win” a new believer to the Word, the resources to “Disciple” a maturing believer in the Word, the resources to “Send” a prepared believer with the Word armed and ready into this unbelieving world. And to be able to freely hand over these resources? And for them to be able to freely give from that? We are talking about the difference between consumerism and the hand of God here…how shall we compare them?
These are the consumer perceptions ShepherdPup must be able to fight. Your word of mouth is how we intend to fight that fight.
If this is the tool or resource that you chose to give (one of many I hope), then you should familiarize yourself with it; not only it’s parts and pieces, but, also some of its underlying evangelistic possibilities. Think of the friends and family and coworkers that this could be given to and how you could approach them. Think of the groups and congregations that this could be given to and how to approach them. Think of the total strangers and how you could approach them.
Be prepared to share your testimony. Be prepared to share His Word in any form. Be prepared to show it on ShepherdPup if the opportunity arises. Have your notes with you on USB flash. Be ready to make copies on demand. Search out the leading of God amongst the people you are with each day. And follow up with the people to whom you’ve witnessed to.
Please help spread the word…Please help spread the Word!
“http://shepherdpuplinux.us/”
Are You Registered?
A while back, (shortly after I stared using Linux on a regular basis to be exact,) I registered my system with Counter.Li.Org. I was perfectly happy and willing to throw my hat into the ring and be counted when it came to showing my preference for operating systems. “Take that, Bill & Steve!” rang through my brain. Just recently, I got a new laptop, and what did I do? I repartitioned the hard-drive and made it dual-boot with my personal favorite Linux distro! What did I do shortly after that? I went right back over to Counter.Li.Org and added my laptop information to my registration info. When someone asks me about my computer, I don’t hesitate to expound on how I put it together and how great Linux is. This is all well and good, but what difference does all this fervor truly make?
The name of this site is, Linux for Christians. All too often, especially for me, the fervor seems to focus on the Linux part. While it would be nice if everyone could see the “light” and use Linux, isn’t it more important that they see the Light of Christ? Forget about being a registered Linux user for a moment and refocus on being registered in the Lamb’s Book of Life. It may sound trite and silly, but that is ultimately what is most important. If we are more concerned about winning people to Linux than winning people to Christ, it doesn’t really matter what operating system we’re using, because our priorities have become misaligned.
Free L4C NT?
Here’s a thought. I go to the Ohio Linux Fest each year for The Linux Link Tech Show, but it occurred to me, why not be there in L4C capacity as well? Wouldn’t it be a nice idea to be able to perhaps hand out L4C New Testaments or some such thing while I am there? I mean, people just LOVE the giveaways. Think this is a good idea? Possible? Can you help? Contact me soon, it’s less than a month away.
Christians Murdered for their Faith
This sort of thing is really a daily occurrence in some places, particularly those places under Islamic law. The disturbing part is it gets very very little press. Maybe we Christians should start demanding a little better coverage?
http://www.sunnewsonline.com/webpages/news/national/2009/aug/06/national-06-08-2009-01.htm
UCE Lives!
New Ubuntu CE available now!
http://desktoplinuxreviews.com/2009/07/20/ubuntu-christian-edition-5/
Donations
A few people have asked about a way to make a donation to help with the costs here on any of the lincgeek.org sites (tllts.org, linuxforchristians.org, linuxplanet.org, freelinuxbox.org, etc). Since it’s time to re-up for another years worth of bandwidth and *I’m broke* I figured it’d be as good a time as any to put up a paypal donation button. You can find it at http://lincgeek.org. If you can see fit to help out at all, you get my eternal thanks and a promise for me to keep things going on my end 
FreeLinuxBox.Org
Give the gift of Linux! That’s what I say!
There is a great way to not only spread the love, but help your fellow man and the environment at the same time. All you need to do is load Linux on your old computer and put it up on http://freelinuxbox.org.
FreeLinuxBox.org is a site that aims to connect individuals who want to give away fully functional computers running open source software to individuals who need a computer, free of cost. The deal is, you give away your old *running* computer with some Linux on it to someone who needs it, and they pay the shipping or pick it up, whichever you prefer. Think of it as sort of a cross between a linux craigslist and freegeek.
Pull your old system out of the basement today and load it up with Linux and put it up on FreeLinuxBox.org. You could be helping someone who really needs it. You cold be learning on another Linux install. You could be freeing up some space in your garage, basement or attic. It’s even better than recycling, it’s being a good steward!