FOSS.IN/2007: INDIA'S PREMIER FOSS EVENT

For those who came in late (or were just living under a rock for a while):

FOSS.IN in India's largest and probably best known Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) conferences, and is now spoken about as one of the the four primary, grassroot-level FOSS conferences in the world, the other three being being linux.conf.au, OLS and linuxconf.eu.

The conference sees thousands of participants coming together from across India and from many parts of the world, to listen to talks on cutting edge FOSS technologies, given by leading FOSS developers and contributors from across the world. They also participate in discussions, BoFs, workshops and just a lot of honest-to-goodness fun, meeting people, exchanging ideas, hatching plans for world domination.

FOSS.IN differs from other conferences by being completely developer and contributor focused. There are no "preaching to the choir" evangelism talks, no bandwidth-robbing introductory talks, no boring "I could have read this on the web" talks - this conference is hard-core developer/contributor oriented.

FOSS.IN will help professional and student developers, who have development experience but no prior FOSS experience, to become successful FOSS contributors, by exposing them to the minds of some of the most brilliant developers in the world. They will learn about cutting edge technologies that come out of the FOSS community to literally change the world, and they will learn what it is like to work in a team of geographically dispersed people.

And existing FOSS developers and contributors will get together and fine-tune ideas and projects, learn new and interesting ways to change the world they live in, and help new developers to come up to speed.

The newly introduced Project Days give you a chance to get involved with eight of the most talked about FOSS projects on the planet, and will learn to contribute to them.

But most of all, participants at FOSS.IN have an unbelievable amount of fun.

At FOSS.IN, you are not artificially kept at the fringe by unreal, self-serving commercial interests - you are mainstream. This is one of the most anticipated technical events every year, and there is a good reason for this.

So how do you participate?

Simple.

If you are a FOSS developer/contributor, you should submit proposals for sessions for the Project Days and/or the Main conference. But you better hurry up - the last date for submission is October 8th, 2007.

If you are not (yet) a FOSS developer/contributor and want to learn how to be one, you attend the event as a delegate - i.e. part of of the audience of thousands of people who are there to learn, interact and have fun.

If you are an organization that would like to see India producing more and more FOSS contributors, whose razor sharp skills will also show up in their work in your organization, then you should consider sponsoring the event. While many of the sponsor slots are already filled, there is room for a few more.

And finally, if you are a member of the FOSS community, and want to be at one of the most happening (technically and socially) FOSS events in the world, then make sure you have your calendar marked for December 4th through 8th, 2007.

We guarantee that you will have the time of your life.

You can find lots of information about the event on the FOSS.IN website.

See you at FOSS.IN/2007!

Tutorial: Install Ubuntu Studio Theme

The Ubuntu Studio theme is a cool and amazing theme for your Ubuntu!


Recently, I described how to get your Ubunto to clone the Vista glass effect and other effects introduced by M$. However After an experience of beryl and Ubuntu Studio, I was convinced this is more stylish!


Ubuntu studio is generally targeted at users who need to be creative and productive. And its got the added style factor to it too. (Although many are content with standard beryl effects, which outperform vista's aero any day :)).
Here is a better description:

Ubuntu Studio is a variant of Ubuntu that concentrates on three creative tasks: video editing, audio recording and graphics.

Ubuntu Studio is based on the Feisty Fawn release of Ubuntu but does away with Ubuntu's default orange/brown theme in favour of a sexy charcoal gradient affair with highlights of a nice neon blue.

Certainly for audio recording, people should pay Ubuntu Studio a look-in. There is a large array of tools preconfigured on a low-latency kernel making real-time recording and processing manageable.

Well that was about Ubuntu Studio itself(Read more abt it here); this tutorial will tell you how to install the "theme" on Ubuntu 7.04.

Get to the good old terminal and follow these steps:

1. Add a new repository:
   

   $ sudo su -c 'echo deb http://archive.ubuntustudio.org/ubuntustudio feisty main >> /etc/apt/sources.list'

2. Get the key and Install it:
   

   $ wget -q http://archive.ubuntustudio.org/ubuntustudio.gpg -O- | sudo apt-key add -

3. Update the repository:
   

   $ sudo aptitude update

4. Install the new theme:
   

   $ sudo aptitude install ubuntustudio-look

...And that should just about do it! Enjoy!

Slideshow on KDesktop Background (KUbuntu)

This is for the Linux users out there. (Im on KUbuntu now..so thats the reference Ill use)

If you want a little variety in your desktop background without continually having to change it yourself, use a slide show for your KDesktop Background.
You can set the time interval that you want the background to change, the order and the images that the slide show will use.

• - Right-click the desktop and select Configure Desktop.
• - Select Background from the left pane.
• - On the right, in the Background section, select the Slide Show radio button.
• - Click the Setup button.
• - Select the time interval (in minutes) that you want the desktop background to change.
• - To show the images in random order, check the Show pictures in random order checkbox. Leave this unchecked if you want to determine the order that the images will be displayed.
• - Click the Add button.
• - Browse to the directory containing the desired images.
• - Select the images. You can select multiple images by holding down the ctrl key while selecting.
• - Click OK.
• - You will then see the images that you selected in the list for the slide show. Use the Move Up and Move Down buttons to place the images in the order that they are to be displayed.
• - Click OK to close the Setup Slide Show window.
• - Click OK to close the Configure KDesktop window.

Make Ubuntu look like Vista

Get the best of both!

Whats so good about Vista besides the **grafix**? Arguably, not much.
And we all know whats so Good about Linux, dont we? Everything.
Get the best of both - The Vista Grafix on you Linux Distro! Since ive been using Ubuntu as my lean, mean and reliable OS, here are some steps for getting the 'Aero' glass effect on Ubuntu:

1.Get Ubuntu

If you are not already using it,
download Ubuntu from ubuntu.com.

2.Get the Vista fonts

You need the microsoft segoe UI font.
Look at the second post in this Forum

Unzip the downloaded archive and place the two .ttf files in your .fonts directory.
You can find it in your user folder ./home/$USERNAME/.fonts/
For example: /home/kimmik/.fonts

If the directory .fonts does not exist, create it.

3.The Aero Clone Theme

Download the Aero-clone theme from Gnome-look.org

Go to the download site >>

Install the Beryl and GTK theme as usual

4.Icons

Download the nuoveXT-aero iconset

Go to the download site >>

Install the nuoveXT-aero iconset

5.Panel

Change the gnome-panel size to 32px height

6.Vista Start Button Screenlet

Download and install "Desktop Screenlets"

Go to the download site >>

Install the "orb" screenlet (The orb screenlet is included in the .tar.gz from gnome-look.org).

Place the orb screenlet above the main-menu button and lock the position.

7.Wallpapers

If you want to make the experience complete download some Vista wallpapers for your desktop.
I found very good wallpapers on this forum:

WinMatrix-Forum: Overview of Vista Wallpapers >>

WinMatrix-Forum: Official Vista Wallpapers >>

WinMatrix-Forum: Vista Wallpapers which aren't included in Vista per default >>

As for me, Im content with my enlightenment e17 on my Ubuntu. Will try out the vista effect later. Tell me about it if u tried...or if I missed out some further customizations.

Fedora 7 - comments of a spectator

Fedora 7 helps to convince me that the time when the major GNU/Linux distributions were distinctive is rapidly passing. These days, innovation seems centered on the desktop or the individual program. Major distributions have become so mature that their role is mostly integration, and they are starting to look increasingly the same.

Not long ago, Fedora was known for such firsts as implementing a philosophically free Java that allowed users to take full advantage of OpenOffice.org's features, and adding SELinux for enhanced security. Now, Fedora 7 is simply a well-rounded distribution designed for beginners, and its technical innovations are mostly minor.

Not that innovation isn't happening behind the scenes. At the release management level, Fedora 7 is the first release to merge the Fedora Core and Fedora Extras package repositories under one set of packaging policies (which explains the change of name from "Fedora Core" to plain "Fedora"). Moreover, according to Fedora chair Max Spevack, Fedora 7 is the first release in which all the software used is released under a free license, and all decision-making is made in public. In addition, Fedora 7 is the first release to benefit from the fully organized testing sub-project that was established last year under Will Woods.

However, little of these changes are observable to the average user at the desktop. If Test 4, the release candidate used in this review is any indication, what Fedora offers from a user's perspective is a mature product at every stage, from installation to the desktop through to software installation and security. Rather than being radically new, much of Fedora 7 is a legacy of features -- many polished, a few flawed -- that has been slowly built up during successive releases.