tux magazine - issue 2 - may 2005

8/6/2019 TUX Magazine - Issue 2 - May 2005

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Can AnyoneUse Linux?

New!

Q&A with Mango Parfait

ISSUE 2 MAY 2005The First and Only Magazine for the New LINUX User

REVIEWED: extendedPDF, AbiWord, Gaim, Rhythmbox,Totem Movie Player

Two KDE Konqueror How-Tos! Linking For Newbies A Comprehensive Guide for the Power User

INSTANT LINUX EASY TO TRY, EASY TO INSTALL,EASY TO USE BECAUSE THERES TUX.

INSTANT LINUX EASY TO TRY, EASY TO INSTALL,EASY TO USE BECAUSE THERES TUX.

PLUS:

Playing Movies and More with Xine Adding PDF Power to OpenOffice.org

Everything you wanted to knowabout screensavers

PLUS:

Playing Movies and More with Xine Adding PDF Power to OpenOffice.org

Everything you wanted to knowabout screensavers


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37 The GIMP

CONTENTSP2P

2 C a n A n y o n e U s e L i n u x ?P HIL HUGHES

5 Vi v a L a L i n u x D e s k t o pR e v o l u c i n !N I C H O L A S P E T R E L E Y

7 L e t t e r s

13 Q & A w i t h M a n g o P a r f a i tM ANGO PARFAIT

HOME PLATE

16 M o v i e s a n d M o r e L i f ew i t h X i n eLEW PITCHER

SUITED UP

21 T h e C u t s a n d P a s t e s o fO p e n O f f i c e. o r g P r o d u c t i v i t yS C OTT S TAHL

TUX EXPLAINS

25 Linking Users wi th Thei r DataJ O H N K N I G H T

28 B e t h e M a s t e r o f A l l Yo uS u r v e y: U s i n g Ko n q u e ro rf o r F i l e M a n a g e m e n t a n dD o m i n a t i o n

LEEN FRI SCH

34 A l l a b o u t S c re e n s a ve r s , a n dW h y Yo u Wa n t t o R u n T h e mM A R C O F I O R E T T I

37 G o i n g G u r u : M i c h a el s To pG I M P Ti p sMICH AEL J . HAMME L

THE LAST WORD

48 T h e L i g h t a n d D a r k S i d e o fL i n u x M u l t i m e d i aN I C H O L A S P E T R E L E Y

ISSUE 2

MAY 2005

REVIEWS

42 A d d i n g P D F P o w e r t o O p e n O f f i c e . o r gSCOTT NESBITT

44 C a p s u l e R e v i e w s A b i Wo r d G a i m R h y t h m b o x To t e m M o v i e P l a y e r XAVIER SPRIET

16 Xine

25 Creating Links34 Screensavers

42

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1www.tuxmagazine.com
http://www.tuxmagazine.com/http://www.tuxmagazine.com/


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The biggest issue preventing Linux from taki ngover the desktop is not a lack of availability ofapplications programs, hardware requirementsor anything technical. The biggest obstacleis fear.

The funny thing is that it tends to be themore knowledgeable people who have thisfear. That is, those who consider themselvesWindows Power Users are more likely to beafraid of Linux than a relative newcomerto computing.

Let me offer an example. When I was firstliving in Costa Rica, my neighbor asked me ifhis maid, Rosa, could use my computer tocheck her e-mail. Rosa speaks no English, andher computer experience has been limited tousing systems in Internet cafs. Her e-mailaccount is on Yahoo and, thus, is Web-based. Itold him, sure, and he and Rosa came over to

try things out.Rosa looked at me and asked if it was inSpanish. I told her it was. (Different KDE loginscan be in different languages, and I had aguest login set up in Spanish.) That was thelast question she asked. She sat down andused Konqueror, the KDE browser, to do whatshe had done in an Internet caf.

This example is not atypical. In fact, ten-year-old kids who have never used a computerbefore are very happy to sit down, run Tux

Paint or Potato Guy and use the system.Telling them that this is a Linux system justgets me the same blank stare as if I had saidSCSI disks tend to be more reliable thanIDE disks.

Now, what about that power user?Although I hear all sorts of concerns fromWindows Power Users, virtually all of them

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FROM THE PUBLISHER

Can Anyone Use Linux?Whos afraid of the big bad Linux? Surprisingly,its Windows Power Users, thats who. But, nobodyshould fear Linux. Phil Hughes explains why Linuxshould be compelling to everyone.

P H I L H U G H E S


PUBLISHERPhil Hughes,[email protected]

EDITORIALEDITOR IN CHIEFNicholas PetreleyEXECUTIVEEDITORJill Franklin,[email protected] DIRECTORGarrick Antikajian,[email protected]

For Editorial inquiries, please write [email protected]

VP OF SALES AND MARKETINGCarlie Fairchild,[email protected]

MARKETINGDIRECTOR OF MARKETINGRebecca Cassity,[email protected] MARKET ANALYSTJames Gray, [email protected]

SALESADVERTISING COORDINATORLana Newlander,206-782-7733 ext. 4,[email protected]

For immediate information about advertising in thisdigital edition ofTUX or for information about bannerand text advertising on the TUX Web site, please visithttp://www.tuxmagazine.com/xstatic/advertising

CIRCULATIONCIRCULATION MANAGERKhris Goldberg,[email protected]

For immediate information about subscribing,renewing, or changing your method of deliveryor delivery address forTUX , please visithttp://www.tuxmagazine.com/xstatic/subscribe.

SSC PUBLISHING, LTD.http://www.ssc.com

A privately held company, SSC Publishing is the leadingLinux and Open Source authority, publishing referencematerials in these fields since 1983. Properties includeLinuxGazette.com, DocSearls.com, TUXMagazine.com,LinuxJournal.com,and the monthly international printmagazine Linux Journal .

Additional information can be found atwww.ssc.com.All product and company names featured in thispublication may be trademarks or registeredtrademarks of their respective holders.
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boil down to its different. Well,

thats trueunless you come from aUNIX background. That likely explainswhy Linux is taking over the Web serv-er business, where UNIX was the defacto standard.

Most of these differences to theWindows Power User are on theinside. That is, the changes in theuser interface are not large issues.Anyone who has been using desktopcomputers for a few years knows

changes happen as part of the naturalevolution of the desktop.Rather than try to explain those

inside differences, let me justify them.Many of those differences are the rea-sons behind the following:

I Linux is much less likely to bedamaged by viruses and worms.

I Linux offers the user a choice of

desktop environments.I Linux offers user-level protection

from mistakes of other users.

I Linux supports interoperability with

many other types of systems.

I have been told that Linux is hardto install. It turns out that the majorityof the people who told me that hadnever installed any operating systemon a computer. That is, the computercame from the store with some versionof Windows installed. If there was aproblem, they brought the computerback to the store. Or, they got theirbrother-in-law or son to re-installthe software.

The good news is that stores will sellyou a computer with Linux pre-installed.Better still, you can choose whichbrand of Linux you want installed.Different Linux distributions offer differ-ent levels and types of support.

Sure, some are free and some costmoney. Once again, thats choice. If

you (or your brother-in-law) are capa-ble of doing your own support, great.The free versions might be perfectfor you. If not, you have a lot ofother choices.

Adoption of Linux on the desktopseems to be happening faster outsidethe US than inside. I see multiple con-siderations driving this trend.

The first is economics. Today, itcosts more to buy a commercial oper-

ating system, office suite and all theother programs you need than it coststo buy the computer itself. People andcompanies just cant afford theseprices. If you dont consider Linux as asolution, you are left with few alterna-

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FOR THOSE WHO ARE STILLAFRAID, YOU CAN TAKE THE LINUXPLUNGE WITHOUT EVEN LOADINGIT ON YOUR COMPUTER.


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tives. You can steal the software or do

without. Or, you can find an alterna-tive you can afford, such as Linux.When I lived in Costa Rica, I saw indi-viduals, companies and governmentpick Linux as the best way to addresseconomics.

Although economics certainly playinto government decisions in Braziland Germany, there are other reasonswhy Linux is attractive. Reliability,mostly in the form of immunity to

viruses and worms, is one big advan-tage Linux has over the competition.So is maintaining control. That is, withLinux, the consumer has much morecontrol over what to upgrade andwhen to upgrade. For example, com-mercial software companies oftenrequire you to purchase and installa new version of their software toaddress problems with the currentversion. This is a costly, risky and

complicated solution. If the companyuses Linux, it could elect to install apatch to their systems to address theproblem instead.

Finally, I see a different attitude thathelps promote Linux more than com-mercial alternatives in other countries.

In the US, advertising is a significant

factor driving purchasing decisions. Ifyou dont believe that, look at thefast-food industry. The biggies in thisfield dont necessarily make betterhamburgersit is just that brandrecognition herds people to theirproducts.

Where I live, word of mouth is themost important factor in getting mar-ket share. For example, more than50% of the vehicles in this area are

Toyotas. This isnt because Toyotahas a big advertising campaign; itis because people talk about theirvehicles, and Toyota has come outway above the alternatives.

This doesnt necessarily mean thata Toyota pickup is better than aMitsubishi. It simply means that thelocal perception is that a Toyota isbetter than a Mitsubishi, and thatperception comes from the personal

experience people have with Toyotas.Even a big advertising campaign byMitsubishi would be unlikely tochange the minds of more than afew people here.

Linux word of mouth tends to bevery positive. It just doesnt take a lot

of people saying Linux solved my

problems and it cost less than thealternatives before you see peoplegiving it a serious look.

For those who are still afraid, youcan take the Linux plunge withouteven loading it on your computer.Multiple Linux distributions will rundirectly from your CD drive. Theywill be much slower than if Linuxwere loaded onto your hard disk,but it may be a good way to address

your fear.The most popular choice is Knoppix.You can find out about it on the Webat http://www.knopper.net/knoppix/ index-en.html . Knoppix is a noncom -mercial choice you can try withoutinstalling anything. Commercial Linuxvendors also offer live evaluations forfree. Novell offers a live evaluation CDfor its SUSE distribution. Go tohttp://www.novell.com/linux/suse/

index.html and search for live ev al.So, in conclusion, I think anyonecan use Linux. But, you dont have totake my word for it. There are free andeasy ways to try it out for yourself. I

Phil Hughes is Group Publisher for SSC Publishing, Ltd.

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http://www.knopper.net/knoppix/index-en.htmlhttp://www.knopper.net/knoppix/index-en.htmlhttp://www.knopper.net/knoppix/index-en.htmlhttp://www.knopper.net/knoppix/index-en.htmlhttp://www.novell.com/linux/suse/index.htmlhttp://www.novell.com/linux/suse/index.htmlhttp://www.novell.com/linux/suse/index.htmlhttp://www.tuxmagazine.com/http://www.tuxmagazine.com/http://www.novell.com/linux/suse/index.htmlhttp://www.knopper.net/knoppix/index-en.htmlhttp://www.novell.com/linux/suse/http://www.knopper.net/knoppix/


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The jury will please turn its attention to the evidence markedExhibit 1. I just finished a monster of a report for Evans DataCorporation. This report was an analysis of data collected fromevery imaginable type of Linux developer. Now I know thatmany, if not most of you reading this right now, arent likely tobe programmers, let alone Linux application developers. But,

the survey data was packed with information that even themost unexperienced amateur of Linux should know. Evanswants to sell this report, so I cant give away all the juicydetails. However, I can tell you enough general informationthat should surprise and delight you.

If there is one bit of data in the report more than anyother that should raise eyebrows, it is the fact that therespondents named Linux as the best operating system forpersonal desktop productivity. In case youre not up withthe journalist lingo, that means they said its better thanWindows as an easy-to-use desktop for getting your work

done. Granted, Windows ranked a very close second, andthe difference fell within the margin of error. But the lasttime we asked a question even remotely similar to this one(about a year ago), Linux hardly showed up as a blip on theradar. For years, these respondents chose Linux as the bestoperating system for everything bu t personal productivity.Until this survey, respondents believed that when it comesto Web browsing, writing documents, working with spread-

sheets, exchanging e-mail, managing your calendar and allthe rest of the things people do, it was all Windows,Windows, Windows. Linux not need apply.

Admittedly, the people who responded to this survey aretechnical people, not home users or nontechnical officeworkers. But aside from the fact that there has been a sud-

den change in their perception of Linux as a platform forpersonal productivity, theres data in the survey that showsthey believe home users and office workers will be adopt-ing Linux on the desktop too.

There are many other results in the survey that supportthis conclusion, but Ill leak only a little more information;otherwise, Evans Data is likely to put bamboo shoots undermy fingernails, drill my teeth with no anesthetic or worse,make me attend a Britney Spears concert.

For the first time, developers are writing more applications forLinux than they are for Windows. More important, a significant

percentage of the applications they are writing representgraphical applications for the desktop. Past surveys indicatedthat they used Linux almost exclusively for writing serverapplications, with very little interest in addressing the desktopmarket. The inference should be obvious. If developers areworking on desktop applications, they must believe now morethan ever that they can sell them.

Okay, enough of Exhibit 1. If the jury will now please

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FROM THE EDITOR

Viva La Linux Desktop RevolucinPrepare for the Linux desktop revolution. Its happening now, and I have evidence to prove it.NICHO LAS PETR ELEY



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turn its attention to the evidence

marked Exhibit 2, which happens toinclude a shameless plug for a book Ico-wrote with a fellow named JonoBacon. The book is called Linux Desktop Hacks , and if it isnt on theshelves now, it will be soon. This bookis published by OReilly, which, if youknow the publishing industry, wouldtell you that OReilly expects people tobuy it. No book idea is a sure thing,but OReilly has a good record for iden-

tifying a market and publishing booksthat sell into that market.

You also should know that the Linux

Server Hacks book is one of their best-selling books. But now OReilly believesthere is enough of a Linux desktopmarket that a book on Linux desktophacks should be successful. (And, it willbe if you all run out and buy it themoment it hits the shelveshint, hint.)

Seriously, Linux Desktop Hacks is

written primarily for Linux users with

varying levels of technical expertise,from competent amateur to experthacker (although some of the hacksprobably are easy enough for grandmatoo). So even though I encourage youto look at it, I wont be offended ifmany TUX readers find it too technicalto be useful. (Of course, you could buyit for some technical person youknowokay, okay, enough of that,I promise.)

Now if the jury will please turn itsattention the evidence marked Exhibit3. Just ask yourself the question, what

does Linux lack at this point? KDE, themost popular graphical desktop, hasfeatures Windows could only hope tohaveand I mean hope, because someof the features Microsoft would neverdare implement. For example, you canpop an audio CD into your CD-ROMdrive, open up a Konqueror window

and create MP3 files of all the songs on

that CD with a simple drag-and-dropoperation. Microsoft, on the otherhand, is a toadie for the music industryand is therefore working hard to pre-vent you from doing things like that,lest you create an MP3 file in order tobreak a copyright.

We have OpenOffice.org, an officesuite with all the features people actuallyuse. If you dont like OpenOffice.org,there are other free and commercial office

suites from which to choose. I daresaythat we Linux users have more office soft-ware to choose from than Windows users,because Microsoft virtually has eliminatedall the competition. And, when I absolutelymust use a program like Microsoft Word(some publishers insist upon it), I run it onLinux with either CrossOver Office(http://www.codeweavers.com ) or Win4Lin(http://www.netraverse.co m).

In summary, dear jury, I suggest you

prepare for the Linux desktop revolu-tion. Its happening now. Trust meyou want to be a part of it. I

TUX Editor in Chief Nicholas Petreley is an author,consultant, programmer, award-winning columnistand Linux analyst for Evans Data Corp.

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FOR THE FIRST TIME, DEVELOPERS AREWRITING MORE APPLICATIONS FORLINUX THAN THEY ARE FOR WINDOWS.
http://www.codeweavers.com/http://www.codeweavers.com/http://www.netraverse.com/http://www.tuxmagazine.com/http://www.tuxmagazine.com/http://www.netraverse.com/http://www.codeweavers.com/


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MS Bashing?First off, I wanted to thank the whole TUX teamfor putting together this magazine. I think thispublication is going to be a great tool/resource forme and the rest of your subscribers. There wasntan article that I couldnt take something awayfrom. Keep up the good work!

My only complaint was the blatant and needlessMS bashing in the opening editorial. Linux stands

up well enough on its own without the need tostoop down to Microsofts level with all the FUDslinging. I would think that people in this industryunderstand that there are choices and that notevery option is best suited to every scenario. Ihave many PCs at home, all but one run Linux,and I wouldnt have i t any other way.--Andrew

We at TUXconsciously avoid bashing Microsoft in

our articles. Our job is to promote Linux, however,and even more importantly its our passion to pro-mote Linux. Sometimes, it is important in an articleto point out the ways in which Linux is superior toits most visible competition, Windows. This can

sometimes be misinterpreted as Windows bashing,but it is simply addressing an important fact thereader should know. Although, I can tell you itsour goal to stay away from bashing in general.

Obviously, opinion columns are not subject to the same rules, because everything in the column isthe authors opinion, with which readers are freeto agree or disagree.

Thanks again for your input, and we hope youcontinue to enjoy the magazine!Ed.

Help with International CharactersFirst things first, a big thank you for such a timely

magazine. The stuffs are great, and I am still try-ing to finish reading your site and the down-loaded PDF (another great) file.

I was a little disappointed in the Web articleEntering International Characters, though.I am hoping to understand how to input cjkcharacters in a mostly English document, forexample, Mr so and so, who happens to beJapanese/Korean/Chinese, with the rest of thedocument in English.

I am using SUSE 9.2 (5 CD) and had to surf theNet for weeks but to no avail. In fact, I had foundthat many people are asking the same question,but it seems like nobody takes notice. Any chanceof a small article to explain this little trick? Again,a million thanks for the great stuffs!!--Michael

ShortKeys for Linux?First off, thank you for TUX magazine. I havemy electronic subscription and love it. Thankyou very much.

As a Windows refugee, most of the MS pro-grams I used are a distant memory; however,there is one I miss and would really like to seeeither ported to Linux or mimicked. That pro-gram is ShortKeys. It is simple. I set up the key

shortcuts and it types the word for me. As anexample, if I want to type my company name,MobileMaster of Austin, with ShortKeys, all Ihave to type is mmm, and it happens. I havelooked at khotkeys but not only is it very com-plex, there seems to be some real problemswith the software. I have been in contact withthe author of ShortKeys, and he has told mehe has no interest in Linux. Is there anythingcomparable in Linux? Can you help?--

Ken Starks

We will forward this question to Mango Parfait,the author of our new Q&A column, Q&A withMango Parfait. It was too late to get it to her for this issue, but perhaps shell elect to addressit in a future issue.Ed.


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LETTERS


9/51

Thanks TUX I just wanted to say that you guys at TUX maga-

zine are doing a great job. Its nice finally to see amagazine tailored to the new Linux user. I also likethe fact that it keeps the Linux spirit and is free toanyone that wants it. It has a nice format; its veryprofessional looking, and I also think its a greatidea for the issues to be on-line. Keep up thegreat work guys, I hope to read more!

On a side note, I think it would cool to see some-thing on the different methods of installing pro-grams. I mean, theres dependencies, .rpm files

and .deb files just to start off with. And maybesomething on the future of installing programs onLinux.--Schuyler

Congratulations, But...I would like to congratulate you on your first edi-tion, it was a change to see basic straightforwardarticles rather than those that start of showingyou the latest development program assuming

that all Linux users are developers.But (you knew there was a but coming), I found itvery heavy going reading it on-screen. I dontknow if articles I have read on-line in the pasthave been lightened text-wise to make it easierto read, but yours is more of a magazine that hasbeen put on-line. Sorry if that sounds like statingthe obvious.

I will eagerly await the next issue with anticipation--Tim Henley

KDE vs. GNOMEThanks for the new on-line edition of TUX . I thinkthat its a great concept. As I was browsingthrough the magazine, I noticed that the articlescovered were for software designed for the KDEenvironment. While I think that this is a goodidea, it would be great if there was more balancein covering the software for those users that useLinux desktop environments other than KDE (such

as GNOME). While it is true that much KDE-ori-ented software will work with GNOME, it is still agood idea to have articles for those of use whoare using the GNOME desktop environment.--Jeffrey

Our authors are instructed to include GNOME-related information whenever it is useful, and wewill certainly print some GNOME-centric articles.The fact is, however, that KDE has the largest

market share, and that means the majority of our readers probably use KDE most, or use only KDE.That is the reason for our emphasis on KDE.Ed.

For the Average JoeI personally would like to thank you for providinga magazine for the average joe. I used to loveMaximum Linux and was distraught when itended. I have been looking forward to a new gen-eral-user Linux mag since.

I have been using Linux on and off for a fewyears now (since Mandrake 7.0). Generally, I try

each new release for a while, decide its not quiteup to snuff yet, then go back to Windows.Finally, with Mandrake 10.0, I seem to be able tosettle in with Linux. Linux seems VERY close tobeing a complete Desktop OS.

As a small home-business owner (just starting up), Iam very interested in keeping Linux for my businessneeds (for cost and security reasons). For the mostpart, I am happy. I run OpenOffice.org, Mozilla andNvu (kind of slow) for my general office and Web

design stuff, and I use Cadsofts Eagle Schematic andPCB layout package for my design work. As you cansee, I am very careful to pick software applicationsthat are available for both Windows and Linux. I pur-chased a copy of Netraverses Win4Lin 5 andinstalled an old copy of Windows 98VERY nice!!!!It works very well for the various software items thatI cant find for Linuxmainly QuickBooks, AveryLabel Software and TurboCad.

Sorry for the above monologue. The main reason

for this e-mail is to request a topic. An article onusing Linux for a small business would be great. Ihave had quite a bit of trouble finding informationon accounting packages and how they compare tothe Windows equivalents. My personal main inter-ests are accounting software, voice-mail/Fax soft-ware, Web design software and label software.--Craig Lindholm


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10/51

RequestsLet me start by thanking you. This magazine is fill-

ing a very important void. As the driver, notmechanic-type Linux user youre targeting, I havefound a dramatic lack of information I can use. Imlucky not to have been told too many times toRTFM, but most the manuals and articles Iveread require a background knowledge that Im hav-ing to fight to build for myself. Im really lookingforward to a normal-user-oriented magazine.

I wanted to suggest an article idea. The variety ofLinux distros available can be pretty overwhelm-

ing. Everyone I talk to has a preference, thoughnot many can tell me why they prefer this overthat. How about an article describing what thedifferences are at the user-level . There is plenty ofinformation on Knoppix and Ubuntu beingDebian-based, while Mandrake evolved fromRed Hat for instance, but I have no idea whatthat means. Im interested in a few paragraphson each of six to ten different distributions tellingme what differences Ill see in them that wouldmake me prefer one over the other.

Another article Id love to see is a how-to list (cheatsheet?) including how to install a .tar application,how to find and use CD burning software, andother everyday activities that most computer peopletake for granted. In making the transition fromWindows to Linux, all of that changes somewhat. Aconcise list of the most commonly performed tasksand how to do them in a Linux environment would

be really helpful. I hope these are useful to you, andthanks again for setting up the magazine.

--Donovan Hoggan

Thanks for your input. We are discussing how tocreate cheat sheets like the ones you suggested,and whether or not to publish them separately or inTUX. We will also do what we can to schedule anarticle that sorts out the differences between distri-butions and puts the information in laymans terms.See next issue for an article on CD burningEd.

More GNOMEJust wanted to write a quick note to say that Ireally enjoyed the first issue. I am only about threemonths new to Linux and have been enjoying mynew Microsoft-Free environment throughly.

In future issues I would love to see more articleson GNOME-based applications rather than strictlyK-based ones. Or, just have authors clearlyspecify that the application is installable andusable under the following desktops: GNOME,

KDE and so on. Additional topics Id love to seecovered would be how to sync the PocketPC withLinux; running a Linux distro on the PocketPC (yes,I know, kind of advanced for newbies); and morereviews and info of Linux-based devices likePepper (for example, the Sharp Zaurus). Best ofluck with the new publication!!--Jeffrey

The New Cell ProcessorId like to see an article on the new cell processor pro-

duced by Sony, Toshiba and IBM. The article wouldstart out something like this: The new cell processorprocesses graphics ten times faster than the bestPentium. IBM says it will incorporate the chip in anew workstation later this year. Wonder which oper-ating system. Could it be Linux? Is this the start of anew empire? Lincell instead of Wintel?--Ralph Paidock

Bravo

Bravo on your first issue! It was way more than Ihad hoped for! I now feel confident that I canswitch my home PC over to Linux in the nearfuture, except for two questions:

1) How do I set up DSL on Linux? Could you puttogether a tutorial on that, along with some trou-bleshooting tips? I cant be isolated from theInternet for very long before I get the DTs!

2) How do I set up printing? I have a Brother MFC

6800 that I will probably have a hard time findingLinux drivers for.

Maybe you can start a new column answering ques-tions like these from subscribers and call it somethinglike, Ask Dr Tux (or something wittier).

Thanks for the help. I showed a printout of yourmag to the guys during our local Linux Users


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11/51

Group meeting ( http://mgalug.or g), and they wereimpressed, too. I cant wait for the next issues,

especially the one about personal finance s/w!Thanks once againyou guys are yet anotherexample of the excellence I see all over the placein the Linux community!--Bill Chaney

Screensaver to ShareI have created a screensaver for Windows systemsthat will display a tutorial for Linux commands, andwish to share it with the world. I am going to use this

tool at our school to beef up CLI knowledge, and amalso sharing it with the world. This is the first version,and there will be more releases that will teach differ-ent objectives aligned with system administration. Theaddress is http://waskillsusa.tstc.edu . The program islocated in the news section (right above a link to yourWeb site).--WY

More Thanks

I just finished reading (cover to cover) your firstissue of TUX magazine. All I can say is Wow. Iwant to thank you for creating such a useful, pro-fessional and FREE e-zine. I appreciated the clear,

jargon-free directions (which is often lacking inman pages). I especially enjoyed your look at TheGIMP. I have spent years becoming (somewhat)proficient in Photoshop, so I have been reluctantto begin a new learning curve. Your article has

convinced me to take another look at The GIMP,and I will be looking forward to future articles and

collecting them for future reference.Although I have a few years of experience withLinux, I found useful tips throughout the maga-zine, even for programs I have been using forquite a while.

You asked for suggestions for future articles,and I would like to request a simple look intosecuring a Linux box, from firewalls and networkscanning tools to keeping up with security

patches and updates.I also am running an Apache Web server, so infoon configuring and securing Apache would behelpful for me. I realize that this may be a littlemore advanced than your average newbie willuse, but perhaps a section of your mag for slightlymore advanced users? Again, I would like tothank you all for your excellent publication. It ismuch more than I had hoped for. Keep up thegreat work.

--Michelle Blowers

KAudioCreator ArticleI have just signed up, downloaded and printedout the TUX magazineI can only say thank you.This is just what I have been looking for, I have noproblem downloading and installing Linux distri-butions, but I have very little experience when it

comes to using the system. Your magazine pro-vides me with some clear guidance.

The first issue contains something that I need. Iam trying to turn an old laptop into a music boxfor my camper van. Your piece about ripping withKAudioCreator has given me a big head start withmy project [see Rip Your Audio Files Down toSize with KAudioCreator by James Gray, TUX ,March 2005].--Paul Stephenson

James Gray replies: thats terrific, thanks for letting me know. I had a great time putting thearticle together, and Im so pleased it helped

you, too. Good luck!

TuxScoutId like to let you know about a new job-searchsite I recently developed thats dedicated tothe Linux and Open Source community:http://tuxscout.com .

The goal of TuxScout is to provide a comprehen-sive resource to job seekers and employers seek-ing to scratch their respective open-source itch-es. The site includes almost everything youdexpect of a modern system, such as a powerfuland sophisticated search engine, discussionforums, news feeds, links to career resourcesand an updated calendar of Linux/open-sourceevents. TuxScout is completely free to job seek-


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ers and employers, which makes it a greatresource for many small businesses looking tohire top Linux talent.

Id greatly appreciate it if you could support thiseffort by spreading the word in any way you can.The site is only a few days old and is just startingto gain some traction. With your help, TuxScouthas the potential of being an employment hub forthe entire Linux/Open Source community.--Sharif Alexandre

Ah, the IronyI find it quite ironic that you have used anadvanced version of PDF for your Linux magazinethat cannot be displayed by the versions ofacroread that are available for Linux systems!I will have to try viewing the document with aWindows version of Acrobat Reader. I find this tobe in extremely poor taste.--Collins Richey

If you try to read TUXwith a browser and an Acrobat plugin, it will not display the magazine.Were not sure why the plugin fails. If you down-load the magazine as a PDF file and view it withthe Acrobat 5, you will get a warning that somefeatures may not be available. We do not use any features that arent available, so it displays themagazine perfectly after you close the warningdialog box.

By the way, at the time of this writing, you canfind version 7 of Acrobat Reader for Linux at thefollowing FTP address: ftp://ftp.adobe.com/pub/ adobe/reader/unix/7x/7.0/enu .Ed.

Not PDFI originally began to sign up for a subscriptionwhen there was going to be a hard copy of TUX . Iwas disappointed that you decided not to go thatroute. But I thought I would give it a try with mis-givings. I dont have cable/broadband. In my area,getting 46k out of the connection is good. Tryingto download anything that takes more than ten

minutes is impossible due to flaky lines andbounces breaking the connection. So I just tried tolook at the March issue. I cant get to it. There hasto be a better or more diverse solution than PDFif you dont want a hard copy, why not XML orHTML so at least those of us who would like tosupport/look/read it could do so?--Jay

Bad Documentation?

I just ran across your magazine today, and sub-scribed immediately. This is an excellent idea. Ihave concluded that a lot of programminggenius is wasted because of bad or non-exis-tent documentation. I have tried a number oftimes to do, or find out how to do, things withGNU/Linux. Many times I have not been able tofind out, I have found something and tried torun it and have had it not run at all, or I have

run it and gotten a screen full of buttons thatmean nothing.

I like the idea of organizing things by tasks,such as, I want to burn a CD, or I want to syncmy Palm Pilothow do I do it? For me, person-ally, if I can get a foot in the door by findingout how to do some basic function, I can helpmyself to more. On the other hand, if I have tostart from nothing, with no documentation andnot even any idea of IF I can do something, orwith a program that requires some obscureconfiguration, I just get nowhere.

--Steven White

PDF ProblemsI just heard about, subscribed to and downloadedthe March issue today.

My first impressions of TUX magazine are awful.

1) You FORCE OPEN the magazine in full screenand then lock down the PDF so I cant make the

change to prevent this in the future.2) The dimensions are terrible. Stick with US Letteror A4, but stick to standardsso I can more easilyprint the darn thing.

3) Even if you stick with the screen-friendlydimensions, the magazine is i n LANDSCAPEmode (UGH!) Reading documents in landscape


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can only politely be described as awkward.

And, I havent even gotten to the content yet.If this is going to be your primary means of dis-tribution, you need to make the magazinefriendlier to the people reading it and notassume that everyone will want to read yourmagazine only on-screen. Forcing someone todo something YOUR way is not in the spirit ofLinux or Open Source and is certainly not goingto keep me reading.

Although the concept is sound, the execution isterrible. Ill be looking forward to improvementsin future issues before I decide to cancel mysubscription.

Thanks for your time, efforts and consideration,--Michael Potter

Once the magazine expands to full screen, youcan press Escape to get back to a window view.We are aware of some of the problems of pub-

lishing in PDF format, and were working hard at solving them.Ed.

For DriversThanks for the Magazine for drivers of Linux.I am an emerging newbie in Linux and justlove it. One thing I found was a frustration interminology for the new user. Words like terminaland shell simply dont make sense to a common

Windows user. I believe that its this technical jargon (and not its use as it is actually easy touse) that makes the common computer userafraid of Linux. What we need is less Linuxmechanics explaining the how-tos and morecommon users, former Windows users at that,telling the skinny on what is what in Linux. Oncewe build the terminology bridge to the Windowsuser, then we will see the converts start rollingacross it. Linux gets better by the day, and I amvery happy with it. It works; its stable; despite mybest efforts you cant break it! As they saythough, perception is 9/10th of reality. Yourmagazine will go a long way to helping teardown those false perceptions.

Would love to see some more info on appsWine is a biggie!

PS: Great look and feel to the magazine. The PDFwas awesome in my new Adobe 7.0!--Andrew Brown

Need HelpI enjoyed your first issue, especially the article onmanaging your desktop, assigning icons and so on[see Customizing Your KDE Work Environmentby leen Frisch, TUX , March 2005]. That wasimmediately useful, as I had Firefox as a nasty-looking script icon and my kids refused to use it!Theyre starting to use Linux (SUSE 9.1) now asIve made the icons and desktop background the

same as what they had on XP.

Anyhow, we really like our free games and gamestrials, and were always downloading and tryingstuff out on XP. So I thought, I bet theres loads ofgreat stuff to play on Linux. But...what the heck isOpen GL? Whats configure, make, makefile, X11?Do I need to install compilers? Its not exactly anunzip and run install program is it?

As with all things, Im sure theres a straightfor-ward way to download games and play themwithout needing a certificate in UNIX scripting.Can you help/advise?--Kieran Caulfield

Great DesignJust grabbed your first issue after seeing the ad inLinux Journal . Though I havent had time tobrowse through all of your content, Id like toquickly mention two things. 1) The design is gor-geous. Its nice, simple, friendly and clean. 2)Youve done a nice job targeting your content. I ts

accessible to new desktop Linux users, but usefuland informative to a more experienced user likemyself. I look forward to future issues. Im a bitbummed out by your decision not to offer a printedition at this time, but Id like to say I wouldalmost certainly subscribe were you to offer oneagain in the future.--Mike Baehr I


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Q&Awith Mango ParfaitMango Parfait introduces herself, answers her own questions with astounding facility and invitesyou to ask her your own questions. Dont be shy. There are no stupid questions, only stupid answers.BY MANGO PARFAIT


Hi. My name is Mango Parfait, or Mango-Pafe in my native language. The publisherof TUX wisely hired me to answer anyquestions you have about Linux. Ask any-thing about using Linux, installing Linux,how to fix things when they dont workin Linux and anything else. In fact, feelfree to ask me anything at allexcept myage. Thats not polite.

I will try to answer as many questionsas possible, but I humbly apologize inadvance that I cannot answer questionsby e-mail and that some questions may

not make it into this column. Im a busygirl, and there is only so much room inthis magazine.

Here are my qualifications. I startedusing Linux before Linus Torvalds eventhought of it, so I know more than mostof the dweeb boys I meet who gush allover me when they find out I use Linux.

Eewww, guys, buy some Benzyl Peroxideand learn how to talk to a girl withoutusing the word siskittle (how they pro-nounce the term sysctl) in every othersentence to try to impress me.

Speaking of being a girl, let me warnyou. If you dont think I can answeryour questions because Im a girl, youbetter not say that to my face. Im amaster of Jew Jitsu (a style of martialarts I picked up during my many visits toIsrael, New York and Florida), and Iwont hesitate to teach you a lesson in

black and blue. And, I dont mean thatIll draw your picture with the graphicsprogram called GIMP. Truly, GIMP willtake on a whole new meaning when Imthrough with you.

If you do ask something I dont know,which is really not likely, its only becauseI forgot. In that case, I have lots of

friends to call who can help me. One ofthem is ex-boyfriend, Otaku, who buildsand pilots huge fighting robots. I thinkhe calls them Powerful and HumungousAggressive Robot Thingies or somethinglike that. Anyway, these PHARTs are pow-ered by super-computing Linux clusters.He not only wrote the programs to con-trol the huge fighting robot, he pro-grammed an artificial intelligence systemthat helps him pilot, helps him fix therobot after battles, gives him fashionadvice and can answer questions about

Linux that even he doesnt know.This being the first Q&A with MangoParfait, I have no reader questions toanswer yet. But, I still can answer ques-tions in this issue. Some of them arequestions I hear all the time, and some Iwill just make up.

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QI am a Windows user and I dontknow anything about Linux. What

is the easiest way for me to try it?Saku Shamishou

A There are some versions of Linuxthat you dont have to install inorder to use them. They run right fromthe CD. Linux runs slower than usual ifyou run it from CD, but it is the easiestway to find out if Linux is for you. Youcan install most of these run-from-CDversions of Linux on your computer ifyou decide you like it. Then it will runmuch faster and you will have a lotmore you can do.

My favorite run-from-CD versions ofLinux are MEPIS and Knoppix. You canfind out more about MEPIS by visitinghttp://www.mepis.com . You can ordera MEPIS CD fromhttp://store.mepis.com/ home.php for only $9.95 US. You canget MEPIS for free if you download aCD image file and burn your ownMEPIS CD. If you are a beginner user,you may not know how to do that, so

just send in your $9.95. It is easier andyou get a much prettier CD than oneyou make yourself.

You can find out more aboutKnoppix at http://www.knoppix.org .

The Web page comes up in German.Saku Shamishou doesnt sound like aGerman name (I know, because I madeit up). So when you get to the Knoppixhome page, click on the flag that rep-resents a language you understand, likeEnglish. I like to pick flags with lan-guages I dont understand. I like Polish,because it has all kinds of funny look-ing letters and words without any vow-els except maybe y, which can save youa lot of money if you play Wheel of Fortune on Polish TV. Russian lookseven better, and all those backward let-ters in Russian makes me wonder if thelanguage was created by a four-year-old. The Japanese site should be thebest, but it isnt written in Japanese. Itdoes have two fun Java applets,though.

Scroll down to the bottom of theKnoppix home page. You will find alink where you can download Knoppixand make your own CD, and a link thattakes you to a page with lots of storeswhere you can order a Knoppix CD anddo a lot of other fun shopping whileyoure there. Knoppix is cheap. Onestore sells it for $3.95 US.

Naturally, you need to know how tostart up your computer with the CD

instead of the hard drive. Thats a goodquestion, and some real person outthere should ask it.

By the way, if any of this soundsinteresting, make sure you read the col-umn by the publisher Phil Hughes,Can Anyone Use Linux? (page 2).

Q Which Linux distribution do youuse? Pittsa Feisu

AI use many distributions. My favoriteis Gentoo. Gentoo is not for begin-

ners or for people who want their desk-top to be fast and responsive. It is forpeople who like to watch their computercompile software for hours and hours andhours, which is what slows down thedesktop. (The desktop is fast if you dontcompile programs when you use it.) Idownload the latest unstable Gentooupdates every day and watch my comput-er compile programs all night when I haveinsomnia. You risk making Gentoo unsta-ble when you update all the time. Themost thorough way to cure the problemis to recompile the entire system fromscratch. It takes days for Gentoo to com-pile everything. I like to watch all thecompiler messages scroll off the screenday after day. It is hypnotizing.

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QWhich desktop do you recommend,KDE or GNOME?Nakaguri

Shitsugi

A Definitely KDE. It is much prettierthan GNOME. You can changeanything about the way KDE looks,including the colors for every detail. Icreated a color theme for every outfit Iown so that I am always color-coordi-nated with my desktop. GNOME does-nt let me do that, so I dont useGNOME unless I must.

Q When I open folders within foldersin GNOME, it leaves the parentfolders open and my screen gets clut-tered with lots of open folders. How canI prevent that? Hakuchi Purogurama

A There are at least three ways todeal with this problem. You canedit the GNOME registry to change theway folders work. You can right-clickon a folder and choose Browse Folderfrom the menu, which opens a folderwindow that is easier to navigate.

The third would be my favoritemethod. If you hold down the Shift key

when you open a new folder, GNOMEcloses the old folder when it opens thenew one. I said it would be my favoritemethod, not that it is my favoritemethod. I am happy to be delicate andfeminine and want to remain so. I donot like to strain my finger by double-clicking everything. So I configureGNOME to let me open folders with asingle mouse click like KDE. The Shiftkey trick doesnt work when GNOMEopens folders with a single mouse click.

Q I changed the clock on my KDEpanel to a 12-hour format withAM/PM, but it doesnt work. It is still a24-hour clock. Carlotta Tendant

A It works. You wont see thechange until the KDE panelrestarts. The next time you log in, youshould see the new time format.

QOkay, now I see it is in 12-hourformat, but it doesnt show AM

or PM.Carlotta

A You wont see AM/PM if yourclock type is anything but a Plain

clock. Digital, Analog and Fuzzy themesdo not display AM/PM. Heres a trick toget around the problem and still usesomething other than the Plain clock.Your clock reads 1:00. Look outside. Isit light outside? If so, then it is either1:00 PM, or you live somewhere veryfar to the north and its summertimeand you should really move to a placewith a warmer climate where you getto wear shorter skirts.

QAre you sensitive about anythingelse besides being patronized

because youre a girl? Macho Mann

A Yes. I do not like the increasinginvasion of our privacy. Did youever notice how those maps in mallsand other buildings mark a place thatsays You are here? How couldthey know that without secret hiddencameras? I

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Mango Parfait is a Linux expert, and a cute one too; just ask her. If you want to ask her something shecan answer for Q&A with Mango Parfait, send yourquestions to [email protected] .

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Im a child of the sixties. I grew up withmovies on late-night TV, at the drive-in, inthe theatre, Super-8 home movies projectedon a portable screenmovies everywhere.Well, not everywhere, but everywhere thatcounted. As I got older, movies migratedfrom late-night TV to video tape. Instead ofdepending on the whim of the local TV sta-tion, I could now go rent (and later, buy) amovie, and watch it on TV any time. Laterstill, movies transitioned to DVD and digitalfile format, and with the right hardwareand software, I could even watch them onmy computer.

My laptop included a DVD drive, so thefirst major test of my Linux-based laptopwas a movie. I went back to my roots,loaded a DVD of an old spaghetti westernmovie into my machine, sat back and re-liveda small bit of my youth. Since then, Ivewatched many movies on my laptop. In thattime, Ive tried a number of video applica-tions, and I always come back to the oneI started with, Xine.

WHAT IS XINE?So, what is Xine, anyway? Xine is an open-source multimedia player for UNIX-like sys-tems, including Linux. It can play a variety of

video and audio media, including DVDs(assuming you have a DVD drive installed inyour computer), CDs and VCDs, as well asvideo and audio media files in a variety ofcommon formats, including MPEG, DIVX,Quicktime, Ogg Theora, Ogg Vorbis andWAVe. In other words, Xine is a very versatileaudio and video multimedia player.

You can start Xine from the command line(the program name is xine), but the usual wayto start it is from a menu. You probably willfind Xine in the Multimedia tab of your desk-top menu, labeled as a Video Player orMultimedia Player.

The first time you start up Xine, you arepresented with a multimedia control panel, avideo window and a setup menu. The controlpanel is skinnable, and starts up in the xinetictheme. On this panel, which looks like thecontrols of a DVD player, you will find all thecontrols and information you need to viewmovies or listen to music.

The video window is the screen on whichthe video (from your DVD, VCD or video file)or visualization effects (generated by Xinefrom your music) appears. It always starts upwith the Xine logo, which is later replaced bythe video content when you start playing yourmovie or listening to your music.

Movies and MoreLife with XineEverything you wanted to know about using the program Xine to watch DVDs on yourLinux PC, plus lots of information for people who want to tap the hidden power of Xine.

LEW PITCHER


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Figure 1. Starting Xine from the KDE Menu

Figure 2. xinetic-Themed Multimedia Control Panel

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Finally, the setup window is where youcustomize Xine for your system. As abeginner, theres not much you can (orneed to) change, and it is fine simply toclick the Close button and dismiss the win-dow. If you feel like changing the setupoptions, you always can get the menuback with a mouse click on the Setupwindow icon in the multimedia controlpanel or by using a keyboard hot key.

Once youve rid yourself of the setupmenu, Xine is ready to go. From this pointon, Xine does not show the setup menuunless you explicitly ask for it.

SO, WHAT DO YOU WANT TO WATCH?Right from the start, Xine can play yourDVDs and CDs and (for those of you withthe technology) your VCDs. All you have todo is put your DVD, CD or VCD into thedrive and click the corresponding button onthe multimedia control panel. Xine loadsthe appropriate media driver and startsplaying your media immediately.

If hard plastic isnt your thing and youprefer your entertainment in files, Xine easi-ly can accommodate your needs. The OpenLocation button on the multimedia controlpanel launches a file selection window sothat you can find and select the exact audioor video file you want to experience.

Each file that you select from the OpenLocation window is added to a Playlist offiles. This playlist can name files and some-thing that the Xine developers call MediaResource Locators or MRLs. These MRLsare like Internet URLs; they name a selec-tion by media and location. So, using the


Figure 4. Xines Initial Setup Menu

Figure 3. Xine Video Window

Figure 5. xinetic Media Selection Buttons

Figure 7. xinetic Playlist Dialog

Figure 6. xinetic Open Location Dialog

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Playlist, you can set up a continuous show of files, DVDchapters, CD tracks and network data streams.

Valid MRLs include the names of local files, in yourLinux systems path-naming style:

I file: for input from a file.

I fifo: for input of the output of anotherprogram.

I stdin:/ for input of the output of another program.

I dvd:/[.] for a DVD.

I vcd://[|][@[letter]] for a VCD.

I cdda:// for an audio CD.

I mms://... for input from a network MMS serv-ice.

I http://... for input from a network WEB service.

I tcp://: for input from a network service.

I rtp://: for input from a network service.

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A left-click on the video window dismissesthe menu.

Most of the Xine controls can be execut-ed through the keyboard as well as themouse. This makes it easy for you to con-trol the playback of your movie or musicwithout interfering with the video portionof your entertainment. If the default keyassignments dont suit your needs, you canchange them to your own preferencethrough the built-in key map editor. Ivelisted some of the handier keyboard com-mands in Table 1; there are more than onehundred keyboard commands, governing allaspects of Xine operation, and the tablelists only a few of them. Did I mentionskins? Actually, I did mention skins. Skinsare components that, when installed,change the appearance of the Xine graphi-cal user interface (GUI). Xine has manydifferent skins that can be downloadedand installed on demand.

From the Settings entry in the Xine pri-mary menu, select the Skin Downloaderoption, and if you are connected to theInternet, Xine retrieves and presents a listof skins available for your use. As youscroll through the list, an example of thehighlighted skin is shown in the previewwindow. When you find a skin you like,click the Load button, and the skin isdownloaded and installed immediately.

Once you have a collection of skinsloaded, you can switch between skins with-out connecting to the Internet. From themultimedia control panel, select the Controlbutton, or select the Video option from the

Xine primary menu. Xine opens a multipur-pose window that allows you to adjustsome of the video settings (Hue, Saturation,Brightness and Contrast) and select the skinyou want Xine to use. Remember, from thiswindow, you can select only a skin that youhave downloaded previously, so dont panicif the window shows only the xinetic skinto start.

CHANGING XINES SETTINGSYou may need to change how Xine doesthings. This could be because it cant locateyour DVD or CD reader, or because the play-back needs to be adjusted. In any case, youwant to look at the Setup menu for all thesesorts of adjustments. This is the menu we socasually dismissed when we first started Xine,and now we need to get it back with a clickon the Setup window button.

What Xine shows us in the Setup menudepends on our expertise level. The GUI tabof the Setup menu has a drop-down box list-ing the four expertise levels, ranging fromBeginner to Master of the known universe,with levels in between. The Beginner level canadjust only certain superficial aspects of Xine:things like which visualization plugin to usefor music or whether to use the Stereo 2.1audio decoder, or which region code to usefor DVD decoding and playback.

Advanced expertise gives you more controlover the GUI and more audio parameters totune. It also populates several tabs that areleft empty in the Beginner level. From here,you can adjust some of the video parameters,as well as change the devices used for DVD,


Figure 9. Xine Skin Downloader

Figure 10. xinetic Control Window for Skin Selection

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VCD and CD playback.With the Expert level, you can adjust

the XVideo video overlay colour key valueused by Xine to project video onto theVideo window. This becomes necessary ifyou find that the video signal bleeds intoother windows on your desktop. A changeto the colour key here makes Xine select adifferent colour for the Video windowbackground and prevents the video imagebleed-through. Expert level also gives youthe ability to specify the location of anyMicrosoft Windows DLLs that Xine can useto decode MMS media streams with. If leftat its default, Xine looks in the

/usr/lib/win32 directory for all MMScodecs, and this might not be the correctdirectory on your system.

Finally, Master of the known universelevel gives you utter and complete com-mand of every tunable parameter thatXine offers. If you go this far, the effect ofany change you make is between you andthe Xine developers; most of these param-eters arent meant to be changed by acasual user.

CLOSING CREDITSXine is not a monolithic application; it bothincludes other applications and can beincluded in other applications. For mostusers, the Xine package that came withyour Linux distribution has everything nec-essary to view videos and listen to music.On the off chance that your distributiondoesnt include or supply Xine, you canfind it at http://xinehq.de . The Xine userinterface weve demonstrated isnt theonly way to run Xine; a large number ofalternate user interfaces also are availablefrom http://xinehq.de , ranging from thosespecifically designed for KDE and GNOME

to character-based ASCII art interfaces thatdo not need X and plugin interfaces forWeb browsers.

If you run Xine under the X windowinterface, you need to make sure that yourX server supports either the XVideo exten-sion or at least supports the MIT-SHMshared-memory extension. Both the cur-rent X.org and XFree86 X servers supportthese extensions.

Xine uses software written by other

open-source projects, including liba52,libmpeg2, various ffmpeg decoders, libmadand the FAAD Freeware Advanced AudioDecoder. Your Linux distribution or Xinepackage will include these packagesamong its libraries. Finally, you may findthat you cannot play DVDs that have beenprotected with the Content ScramblingSystem. If this is the case, and you live in a

jurisdiction that has not outlawed theOpen Source CSS descrambling packages,you can download and install libdvdcssfrom freshmeat.net and your CSS problemswill be solved.

CURTAIN DOWN, HOUSE LIGHTS UPSo, like the hero in the movie, Xine savesthe day for Linux multimedia users by givingthem easy access to their movies and music.If your leading character is Xine, your movieenjoyment is virtually guaranteed.

Now, if youll excuse me, Im going tograb a bowl of popcorn and my laptop,and spend some quality time in Deadwoodwith the man with no name. I


Lew Pitcher isCanadian by birthand lives inBrampton, Ontario.He is a career techieworking at a majorCanadian bank. Formore than 27 years,hes programmed onall sorts of systems,from Z80 CP/Mhome computers upto z/OS mainframes.Primarily, he designsz/OS MVS applica-tions for bankingservices and hasincorporated Linuxinto his developmentenvironment.

The Xine user interface weve demonstrated isnt the only way to run Xine; a largenumber of alternate user interfaces also are available from http://xinehq.de, rangingfrom those specifically designed for KDE and GNOME to character-based ASCII artinterfaces that do not need X and plugin interfaces for Web browsers.

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OpenOffice.org is the mainstay productivityapplication of the Linux desktop. Proficiency inOpenOffice.org directly equates to productivityin professional life. The main components ofOpenOffice.org consist of the Writer wordprocessor, Calc spreadsheet and Impress pres-entation designer. This article demonstrateshow to share information between the differ-ent applications starting from the simplestof editing.

The most basic editing function is copyingand moving text around in a document. Theprocess of manipulating text is referred to ascutting and pasting, or copying and pasting.Cutting or copying and pasting of text is a sim-ple process. Here is the copy process in a nut-shell. Start up OpenOffice.org Writer and opena sample document. If you dont have any sam-ple documents, write a few paragraphs, even iftheyre just nonsense.

THE HIGHLIGHTSHighlight some text that you want to copy ormove. Heres how to highlight portions of a

document, spreadsheet or what have you.Highlighting, or selecting text, is the way theuser communicates to the computer what textto act on. You can highlight text with themouse, keyboard or both.

If you want to use the mouse, move the point-er to where you want to start the selection. Clickand hold the left mouse button, then drag themouse pointer over the text you want highlighted.The text turns black as you progress. It is impor-tant to note that you can drag the mouse forwardor backward with equal facility.

Keyboard highlighting is performed usingthe keyboard, of course. Position the cursorwhere you want to start highlighting. Use thearrow keys that are found on the lower right ofnearly every PC keyboard in existence to movethe cursor. Once the cursor is in place, holddown the left Shift key. We use the left Shiftkey simply because it is easier to use two handsfor this operation. Now that the Shift is helddown, use the arrow keys to move the cursor.The text will turn black as you progress.

Keyboard highlighting has some neat short-

cuts for quickly selecting text. Hold down theCtrl and Shift keys while you move the cursorwith the arrows in order to select entire wordsat a time. While holding down the Shift key,use the Page Up/Page Down keys to selectlarge blocks at a time. Use the Ctrl-A keycombination to highlight the entire document.

There is a small drawback to highlightingwith the mouse. Once you get to the endpointand release the mouse button, you can nolonger increase or decrease your selection. Thisis where keyboard highlighting comes in handy.Try selecting some text with the mouse, andthen use the keyboard to add to the highlightedtext. The keyboard also can give you finer con-trol over what is selected.

COPY OR CUT AND PASTEGiven any combination of the above methodsof highlighting text, highlight a section of thetext that you want to copy. Now, hold the Ctrlkey while pressing the C key at the same time(Ctrl-C). The text is then copied to a temporaryplace called the clipboard. Move the cursor to

The Cuts and Pastes of

OpenOffice.org ProductivityAfter a lesson on the bare basics of cut and paste, heres how to snip a piece ofanother application, like a spreadsheet, and embed it into another documentwhere you can continue to treat the snippet as a spreadsheet.

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where you want a copy of the text. Then pressthe paste shortcut sequence, Ctrl-V. A copy ofthe text is now in the new location.

If you want to move text, you have to high-light the text you want moved, cut it from theold location, and then paste it in a new loca-tion. Try this with your sample document.Highlight the text you want to move. Thenpress Ctrl-X to cut that text. You should see thetext disappear, but it was moved into a tempo-rary place known as the clipboard. Now movethe cursor to a new location where you want tomove the text. Press Ctrl-V to paste it there.Voilyou have just cut text from one locationand pasted it into another.

CONTROL PLUS

The Ctrl-then-C key combination is referred to inprint in many ways, including Control-C, Ctrl-C,cntrl-c or even the obscure ^C. The point is simplythat you hold down the Ctrl key and then pressthe C key, or whatever other key is necessary foryour Ctrl combination.

Other key combinations are written the sameway. Here is a table describing the cut and pastekeyboard shortcuts. The mnemonic at the endmay be useful, but it is by no means essential thatyou memorize the combinations by the sometimesobscure mnemonics (Table 1).

THE CLIPBOARDYou may be wondering what it means thatThe text is then copied to a temporary placecalled the clipboard. The clipboard is bestthought of as a magical place where you canstore things and retrieve them later. The catch isthat you can put only one thing in the clipboardat a time. As we will see later, the clipboard is

capable of handling much more than merelytext, and the clipboard is not limited toOpenOffice.org. Text placed in the clipboard isavailable to any other application in KDE orGNOME. It must be noted, however, that cer-tain applications cannot handle the clipboardfor one reason or another. In that case, nothinghappens when you try to paste the contents ofthe clipboard into an incompatible application.

The primary purpose of cut and paste maybe for editing, but the real beauty of thesystem is apparent only when you need toaggregate small amounts of data from differentdocument types in one place. If you need manydifferent types, or simply a lot of data types, inone document, OpenOffice.org has a MasterDocument feature that is beyond the scope ofthis article.

All OpenOffice applications can cut and pastedata beyond simple text. In fact, OpenOffice.orgis designed to share program functions wherever

it is possible to do so. Because of this functionsharing, the way some things get pasted maysurprise you.

A common source of data is numeric, like thatfound in Calc, the OpenOffice.org spreadsheet. Ifyou cut or copy a selection of spreadsheet cellsfrom Calc and place it into another OpenOffice.orgapplication like Writer, what you get looks like atable representation of the spreadsheet data. Butwhat you really are placing in your document is asmall version of Calc.

It is important to note that the data you pastein the Writer document is not connected in anyway to the original document. Any changes youmake to the Calc data that is pasted in yourWriter document will not be reflected in the origi-nal source Calc spreadsheet. Any changes youmake in the original Calc spreadsheet will not bereflected in the data you pasted from that spread-sheet. Once the Calc data is in the Writer docu-ment, it no longer has any connection to the orig-


Table 1. Cut and Paste Keyboard Shortcuts

Key Sequence Action Mnemomic

Ctrl-C Copy selected text Control Copy

Ctrl-X Cut (delete) selected text Control eXcise

Ctrl-V Paste buffered text Control View

Ctrl-A Select all text Control All

Ctrl-Z Undo last action Control Zinger

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inal spreadsheet.You still can manipulate the spreadsheet

data you pasted into the document almost as ifyou were using the Calc spreadsheet. Simplydouble-click the pasted area of Calc data, andyoull see it transform into a spreadsheet-likemini-window, with rows, columns and cells.Even your toolbars at the top of Writer shouldchange to include Calc tools.

Here is where caution is warranted. Whenyou are finished modifying the Calc data, clickoutside the area on a blank area of the docu-ment or on a spot where theres regular text.This exits the special Calc mode and returnsthe data to the form of a table. Writer will dis-play the Calc information exactly the way you

left it. If you scrolled down a column so thatno numbers appear in the spreadsheet, nonumbers will be displayed in Writer. Thisbehavior is confusing at first, butOpenOffice.org was designed this way to makeyour life easier in the long run. The importantlesson here is that the default cut and pastebehavior is actually to bring a part of theapplication along with the data.

Now, we look at ways to modify the way topaste objects or text. If you have ever used acomputer-based word processor, you probablyare aware that cutting and pasting can beaccomplished by using more than the keyboardor mouse. We have ignored the menus untilnow because they function a bit differentlythan people may be used to. Dont worry, thebasics are the same as other programs.

Choosing a feature from the Edit menu, or aquick click of the shortcut buttons, does exact-ly the same thing as the keyboard shortcuts.But wait, theres more!

Look closely at the paste shortcut button onthe toolbar (it looks like a clipboard with somepaper attached). There is a little green arrow inthe top-right corner. That arrow is there to letyou know you have more options to choosefrom. You can access the other options bywhat is called a long click in OpenOffice.orgparlance. Click on the toolbar button, but holdthe mouse button down until the options dropdown in the form of a menu. Dont worryabout trying to get the mouse on the greenarrow; it works if you click anywhere on the

icon. The same options are available from theEdit menu by choosing Paste Special.

Sometimes you do not want to bring all thefull-blown Calc features along for a few numbersor some other trivial bit of information. Lets lookat the Paste Special features that are available forpasting a small column of numbers from Calc intoWriter. The Paste Special menu is aware of thetype of data on the clipboard and presents onlyvalid options for that data type. Our column ofnumbers consists of simple text and thus has themost features available for use. Look at the fol-lowing list of choices on the Paste Special menu.Dont worry right now if some of the jargon doesnot make sense, or if the list and order variesdepending on the version of OpenOffice.orgyoure using:

I OpenOffice.org Spreadsheet

I GDI Metafile

I Bitmap

I HTML (Hypertext Markup Language)

I Unformatted text

I Formatted Text (RTF)

The OpenOffice.org Spreadsheet choice is thedefault behavior you see when you do a simplecut and paste operation. Remember, this is thechoice that brings all the features of Calc along to

your Writer document.GDI Metafile is probably the most complex

thing on the menu. Fortunately, you need toknow only what it does, not what it is. Whenyou paste a GDI Metafile into a document, animage of the clipboard contents is the result.The GDI Metafile image is scalable, meaningthat you can make it appear larger or smaller,without losing image detail. Pasting the GDIMetafile type works especially well in theImpress presentation application.

The third option, Bitmap, is a rudimentarygraphics format. Bitmap graphics do not scalewell and are best left at their default pastingsize. The benefit of a bitmap is that it is awidely used format. Nearly every other non-OpenOffice.org application can recognize anduse a bitmap.


All OpenOffice applications can cut and paste data beyond simple text.

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The last three options are all vari-ations on simple text objects. In eachcase, you get the text with specialformatting codes. Hypertext MarkupLanguage (HTML) is the lingua francaof World Wide Web pages. HTML isdesigned to look good on your com-puter Web browser screen and maynot be suitable for printed docu-ments. The Unformatted Text optionis the lowest common denominator.Pasting unformatted text is the exactsame thing as typing it in yourself.The last option, Formatted Text, usesanother widely known and under-stood document format called RichText Format (RTF). Rich Text is a niceway of preserving the table structurealong with the data in our example,so that any cosmetic changes youmade to the data in the spreadsheetshould appear when you paste thedata into the document.

Using one of the features fromthe Paste Special menu usually givesthe effect you desire.

LIVE DATA CONNECTIONS

When you cut or copy data from oneapplication and paste it in another,the copy you pasted is no longeraware of the original data. It has beencut off from its original source andwont change to match any changesyou make to the original source.

Data in a document that is stillconnected to its source is generallyreferred to as live data. In

OpenOffice.org for Linux, cut andpaste does not give you live databetween applications, but there areways to achieve this feature.

The easiest way to work with livedata is to use the OpenOffice.orgMaster Document type. Insteadof trying to shoehorn data typesto fit, simply assemble them underone roof. You then can work oneach piece separately or evendelegate author duties to otherpeople. When all the pieces arecomplete, the whole thing can beprinted for a professional appear-ance. This approach is not at allintuitive, and it has some unfortu-nate limitations at this point. Forexample, you cannot make aspreadsheet a part of a masterdocument, so this does not let youinsert a live link to an externalspreadsheet, such that any changeyou make in the spreadsheet isreflected in the master document.Master documents currently aredesigned more for constructingbooks, where the sub-documents

(chapters, for example) are stillonly text documents.

A more expert approach toworking with live data is to use adatabase to house the information.OpenOffice.org comes with a multi-tude of features that allow manip-ulation of database data. Admittedly,these features are generally for thepower users of OpenOffice.org. Thistopic deserves its own article, as it ismore complex.

As we have seen, cut and pastecan be as simple as a basic editingfeature or a gateway to much morecomplex documents. We startedwith the basic features that willallow you to become productive inOpenOffice.org immediately. Usingthe basic building blocks, we thenprogressed to using more complexmanipulation of data types.Hopefully, seeing these tools willencourage you to branch outbeyond correcting mistakes andreordering thoughts to unleash theproductivity found in many otherOpenOffice.org features. I


Some people really need live data, so they can paste a copy ofsome numbers from a spreadsheet into a document, and expect

the numbers in the document to reflect any changes made to thespreadsheet. EIOffice does this extremely well. If you are open tousing a non-free office suite in addition to, or instead ofOpenOffice.org, visit http://www.evermoresw.com to see if EIOfficecould be right for you.

Tip

Scott Stahl is a professionalsystems administrator and Linuxinstructor with more than 15years of experience. After writingtechnical documentation all ofthose years, he finally decided to

write things that someone mightactually read.

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One of the most common problems new usersof Linux and Windows alike encounter is thatits often hard to manage your folders.Microsoft attempted to address this problem bycreating a My Documents folder where youwould store your documents by default, a MyPictures folder and so on. The problem withthis approach is that people tend to fill upthese folders with dozens if not hundreds ofunorganized files, which makes it difficult tofind anything. The solution? Organize your filesby creating folders within folders, by category.

Most of us like to organize the data wehave. For example, you might create a Musicfolder under which you will organize all yourmusic files (MP3 files, perhaps). You dont wantto put all the files in that specific folder,because it will be difficult to find the songsyou like best as it fills up. So you create morefolders within Music to sort out the songs.Perhaps you will decide to organize your collec-tion by music style, artist, album and file type(MP3, wave file and so on).

Lets say you create a Jazz folder (music type)within your Music folder, and then create aSteps Ahead folder (band name) within the Jazzfolder. Finally, you create a Magnetic folder

(album name) within your Steps Ahead folder.Everything is organized neatly, so you can navi-gate through your music files by genre, artistand album.

Heres the problem. Organization like this cre-ates folders within folders within folders, and itbecomes frustrating to get to what you wantbecause you have to navigate through all thesefolder categories over and over again.

Heres an example of what you may want todo to solve this problem. Perhaps Magnetic is yourfavorite album for now, and you want to listen toit frequently. Wouldnt it be nice if you could getinstant access to the MP3 files for that albumwithout having to navigate through all the foldersand sub-folders you created in order to organizeyour files?

Its actually quite simple to do this withoutdestroying or rearranging the way you organizedyour files. Simply create a folder on your desktopthat links to your Magnetic folder.

By placing links to your most common desti-nations on your desktop, you can cut workingtime and frustration down by a huge margin.In this article, we look at desktop linking, howit can benefit you and other ways linking canbe useful with Linuxs two main desktops, KDE

and GNOME.For the following sections, we use the above

example for the sake of easy reading. Once youunderstand the ease with which you can createlinks on the desktop that point to deeply buriedfolders, simply substitute your own buried foldername for Magnetic in our example and createyour own links to your favorite folders.

Our goal is to create a link to the Magneticfolder that appears on your desktop, so you canopen up this folder of MP3 files without having tonavigate through all the folders, for example,Music Jazz Steps Ahead Magnetic.

EXERCISE WITH KDEOf the two desktops, KDE has the easiest methodfor creating links on your desktop that point tofolders buried under the plethora of folders youmay have created to organize your files.

If you want to try this exercise with the samplefolder names we are using, heres how to createthe set of nested folders:

1. Move the mouse pointer to an empty space onyour KDE desktop background. Click the buttonon the right side of your mouse (right-click) andhold it down until you see a menu pop up.

Linking Users with Their DataThis article describes how to make your life easier by creating links to com-monly used folders and placing these links on your desktop for easy access.

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Point your mouse to the Create New option onthe menu. This should make another menuappear. Move the mouse to highlight Folder...,and click the left button on your mouse. A dia-log box pops up asking you what you want toname this folder. Name the folder Music (unlessyou already have a Music folder on the desk-top, in which case youll have to choose anoth-er name). Do not type quotes around Music;simply enter the word Music. You never have totype in quotes when naming folders.

2. You now should see a Music folder on yourdesktop. Click on that folder with your leftmouse button. Now were going to repeat thesame process we described in step one. Right-click on the empty space in the Music folder,select Create New and then Folder. Name thisfolder Jazz. Left-click the Jazz folder. Right-clickon an empty space, select Create New, andthen Folder. Name this folder Steps Ahead. Left-click the Steps Ahead folder. Right-click on anempty space, select Create New, then Folder.Name this folder Magnetic.

3. Finally, close the file manager window. (Youcould leave it open, because were about tonavigate right back to this spot, but you shouldclose it if you want to follow the instructionsexactly.)

You should be ready to follow the exercise exact-ly as described in our example. If you are confidentenough with the Linux KDE Desktop, feel free tocreate your own hierarchy of folders with whichevercategories you like, and then simply follow theinstructions using your own folder names.

CREATE THE DESKTOP LINK IN KDE

1. Open your home folder with Konqueror andnavigate your way through the category folders(Music, Jazz and so on) until you get to thefolder that you want linked (in this example itwould be Magnetic).

2. Make sure you dont navigate into the foldernamed Magnetic. In our example, you wouldstop navigating when you reach the StepsAhead folder, which contains the Magneticfolder. The Steps Ahead folder is called the par-ent folder to the Magnetic folder.

3. Click on the Magnetic folder with the leftmouse button, and keep holding down themouse button. Drag the folder from theKonqueror window to an empty space on yourdesktop and then release the mouse button.

4. A dialog box now pops up with the options:Copy Here, Move Here and Link Here. ChooseLink Here, and you now should have a desktopshortcut that points to Magnetic. Now, when-ever you want to get to those particular songfiles, all you have to do is click on the desktoplink. It is no longer necessary to wade throughmultiple folders and categories to get to thisalbum.

GNOMEGNOME has a slightly more difficult method andis covered here in two parts: linking from a Linuxfilesystem and linking from a Windows filesystem.

1. Open up your home folder with Nautilus, and navi-gate your way to a folder that is buriedsome-thing like the Steps Ahead folder in our example.You should see the Magnetic folder there (orwhichever folder you plan to link instead).


Figure 1. The Ease of Creating Links with KDE Figure 2. The newly created link before its finaldestination with Nautlius.

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2. Right-click on the Magnetic folder, and chooseMake Link from the pop-up menu.

3. Nautilus now creates a new folder called link toMagnetic and places it in the same folder asthe original. Left-click and hold down themouse button, and drag the new folder calledlink to Magnetic onto the desktop. You shouldnow have a desktop shortcut under GNOME toyour favorite album.

FURTHER USESLinking isnt purely for making shortcuts to com-mon folders on the desktop, it has many otheruses too.

Linking to your home directory can be just asadvantageous, if not more so, than linking to yourdesktop. With links in your home directory, youcan access your most important files and foldersquickly from any window manager, any file man-ager and even from the command line. WheneverI install Linux, the first thing I do is make homedirectory links to my most important folders; thismakes the process of getting off the ground muchquicker and easier.

In order to make a home directory link, simplyfollow the steps for making desktop links, butopen a new window with your home directory anddrag the file or folder into your home directoryswindow, instead of onto the desktop.

LINKING FILESSo far, weve covered only linking folders, or direc-tories (theyre the same thing, folder is simply aGUI term for a directory), but you also can linkfiles using exactly the same method describedabove. Linking files can be useful for all kinds ofthings, like accessing a file that is used daily or

simply having a file in two places at once,whether it be for working on it from several dif-ferent places or for having a file exist with twodifferent names. This kind of usage can be handywhen it comes to programs and their configura-tion files, but this is quite advanced and beyondthe scope of this article.

RECOMMENDATIONSWhen it comes to linking to your home directory, Irecommend linking only folders, and only the mostcommonly used folders at that. Home directoriescan get cluttered very quickly; moving around in afile manager with a cluttered home directory candefeat the whole purpose of linking in the firstplace. For files or folders that you use a lot, butonly temporarily, try linking them to the desktopinstead. If what you are chasing is only a folder orso away, i