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FebruaryFeb 13 Friday Fri 09

Find Out What Twitter Users Are Viewing Your Website

TwitterCounter RemoteI've used the TwitterCounter badge that tells people how many followers I have on Twitter for quite a while now. It's nice, but not really useful unless you're a narcissist. They've recently released something much more useful: TwitterCounter Remote. Remote is a small piece of code that adds a widget to your site that tells you which Twitter users have visited your site recently.


All you have to do to set it up is fill in a few fields and have the service auto generate a small piece of JavaScript for you. Take that and paste it wherever you want it to show up on your site and you're done.


I've already found and followed 10+ people who have visited my blog with this thing. I think it's a brilliant way to increase your following on Twitter and to create better relationships with people you know are visiting your site (something basic Analytics can't do).


I will point out that sometimes loading the JavaScript file really hangs when your site loads. I'm not sure if it's because the service is getting so much publicity or because of Twitter, but for now I'll blame the obvious person...The Whale.


It's so easy to setup and get running, I strongly recommend at least giving it a shot.


TwitterCounter Remote




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FebruaryFeb 12 Thursday Thu 09

Why I Love Ubuntu 8.10 After Four Months Of Use

Ubuntu LogoI recently wrote a post about some issues I was having with Ubuntu 8.10 after I've been using it as my primary machine for the past four months. To balance things out, I wanted to write about why I absolutely love Ubuntu as well.



  1. It's Free - I had to get this one out of the way. It still amazes my that an OS as powerful and stable as Ubuntu can be offered for free. Huge kudos to Canonical and the entire community that made this happen.

  2. Community - The Linux/Ubuntu communities are an amazing wealth of information and for the most part, incredibly helpful. The Ubuntu forums are crawling with seriously l33t hax0rs looking to help you out.

  3. Out Of the Box Software - An average user could probably use Ubuntu out of the box without the need to install anything else on it if they wanted to. There's little that it can't do after a fresh install.

  4. It's Not Windows or OSX - I grew up on a Mac, switched to Windows which I stayed on for the majority of my life and now I've completed the OS shuffle by moving to Linux. Using Linux just feels better. I feel like I'm a part of the community and a part of progress. Open Source is the future and dictatorships like Apple will ultimately crumble after the glow wears off and people start to understand how little control they have over their hardware/software.

  5. Anything You Can Do - ...We can do better. No matter what Windows or OSX does, the Linux community can create something just as good if not better (in time of course).

  6. Compiz - It's not just pretty. Once you get Compiz configured, it's mindblowing how customizable it is. If you take the time to get it working the way you want, it can be a key tool in increasing your productivity overnight. I've got my system setup to switch between multiple desktops with a couple key strokes. My window management is handled by Alt + Tab and an Expose-like feature that can be accessed by a simple mouse click or a key command as well as many other tweaks.

  7. Synaptic Updater - How amazing is it that you can update your system and just about every app you have installed is updated along with it? That's bordering on revolutionary IMHO.

  8. Security - I'm not going to get into this too much. Just suffice to say that Linux is vulnerable to attacks just as Windows and OSX, but at the end of the day, having the source freely available actually puts my mind at ease.

  9. Tweakability/Customizing - Other than Ubuntu forcing you to have at least one panel on your system at all times, you can pretty much do anything that you want to your system, and that feels good.

  10. Running Windows Apps - With CrossOver and WINE you can run quite a few of necessary Windows apps (ahem CS2).

  11. Virtual Operating Systems - VirtualBox and VMWare are two amazing free ways to run virtual operating systems right inside of Ubuntu. I'm currently running Windows XP, Vista and 7 inside of VM's as well as Ubuntu 9.04 Alpha 4.

  12. Speed and Stability - I put Ubuntu on a machine that used to run Windows XP. Even though I usually tried to reinstall Windows XP once a year, after putting Ubuntu on, it felt brand new. The OS itself is rock solid.

  13. Hardware Support - I've come across one machine that Ubuntu has had trouble installing on. Considering I've installed it on dozens of machines of all brands and ages, that speaks volumes.

  14. It's Gaining Steam - Most applications that come out have a Linux version, or a Linux alternative. The community has been amazing at making sure that Linux has all the software you need to use your computer (out of the box even) no matter what you're using it for.

  15. It's Vision - Mark Shuttleworth deserves some type of award. The work this guy has done is tremendous and cannot (unfortunately) be measured because of all the ways and places his software is being used. He has somehow taken a fragmented community and given them a reason to come together to create something amazing. That in and of itself is a monumental task that no normal human should have been able to accomplish. While Apple is busy trying to stifle innovation, Ubuntu is doing everything it can to make serious progress on all fronts of technology.

  16. FOSS Is the Future...and the Future Is Here - I constantly hear that there is no innovation in the Open Source community. I think these people are dead wrong. Obviously Ubuntu. How about WordPress? Firefox? Android? Webkit? VLC? So many more. Companies are finally realizing the power of Open Source and some are even moving to Open Source models to stay alive. Do you think you would have heard that years ago?


I know there is a ton of other stuff that needs to be noted, but I think that's a good start of why I think Ubuntu is the future and why I'm going to continue using it for the foreseeable future.


What do you like about Ubuntu?




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FebruaryFeb 11 Wednesday Wed 09

WordPress 2.7.1 Released

WordPress LogoWordPress 2.7.1 was released today. It's the typical bug fix release that they always do. What I think is really interesting about this release is that normally, the .1 bug fix comes about a month after the initial release. This time, however, WordPress 2.7 was released two months ago. I think that really lets you know how amazing 2.7 has been. I can't remember a release of WordPress that has been this solid.


Now the decision is, do you manually upgrade or use the built in auto-upgrade feature? I just got done upgrading this blog and I did it manually and everything went perfectly (which bug fix releases normally do since the structure of the code isn't really changing).


Anyway, get the new release of WordPress 2.7.1 or check out the list of fixed bugs




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FebruaryFeb 10 Tuesday Tue 09

My Issues With Ubuntu 8.10 After Four Months

I switched to Ubuntu about 4 months ago after my Windows XP system crashed and I had the choice of taking an entire weekend to reinstall, or finally make the jump. Overall I've been incredibly happy with Ubuntu. I mean how much can you really complain, it's free right?


I just want to highlight some issues I've been having since the switch. I don't want this post to be taken as a gripe session about Ubuntu, but to point out the flaws that average users are going to come across, and could ultimately hurt adoption. I think how few issues I've had and how minor they are actually speaks for how far GNU/Linux has come and more specifically, how far Ubuntu has come.


I also want to make clear that a lot of these problems aren't necessarily Ubuntu's fault, but these are things that people will expect to work normally, as they did in Windows.



  1. The Linux community can be as hurtful as it is helpful - I love the Linux community. It's the reason Linux is where it is...but they seriously need to relax. They're all going to have ulcers if they don't take a step back and breathe. The perfect example is the girl that got an Ubuntu laptop from Dell and said she dropped out of school because of it. How did the Linux community react? By helping her through her troubles and showing her the power of Linux? No, they tarred and feathered her not knowing how to write BASH scripts. Was she in the wrong? Yes. Stupid? probably. But Open Source is suppose to be about COMMUNITY. These are the chances to show people that anyone really can use Linux instead of turning them off by becoming an angry herd of rabid fanboys.

  2. PulseAudio is really bad - I have to reboot my system at least 3-4 times per week simply because my audio dropped out. Yes I could switch to ALSA, but if this is the path Ubuntu decided to take, I'm going to try and ride it out with them.

  3. AWN Dock crashes on boot - Everytime I reboot my system, AWN loads, then immediately crashes. I have to sit and keep starting it (sometimes 10+ times) before it loads and keeps working.

  4. Firefox is crashy - Firefox crashes on me at least once a day.

  5. There is only one good browser - It's not necessary, but sometimes it's nice to have a couple browsers to choose from. Firefox is the only good one IMO. The other's aren't terrible by any means, but I could never use them on a daily basis.

  6. There isn't a good alternative to Camtasia - Right now I'm using gtk-recordMyDesktop which is an ok screen recorder. It took me hours and several bouts with death to get audio working correctly. It also outputs to .ogv which no one supports. I have to convert it through the command line after I record with it.

  7. GIMP is quaint, but not Photoshop - I still have to use Photoshop for designing. GIMP isn't even close to replacing PS for me.

  8. Screenshot software is weak - The default screen capture program is very limited. I would love to see something like Greenshot ported to Linux and bundled into Ubuntu.

  9. Copying files from cd to desktop - When you do this, Ubuntu only gives you Read access to the files. Easily fixable? Yes. Again, the average user isn't going to know how to fix it, however.

  10. Mounting external drives - Although this is done automatically and I even forced them to mount through the fstab, I still ended up having to go into the command line again to find the UUID in order to force them to mount to the same location. The reason I had to do this is because I have a playlist referencing files on an external drive. After I would reboot, the drive would be mounted to a different location and therefore making my playlists useless.

  11. Adobe AIR still seems a bit wonky - Several AIR apps still work a bit weird. When TweetDeck is maximized, it moves to desktop 4 on my Compiz Cube. Also, if you're updating Doomi and you try to do something else, you get an error that says it can't get a lock on your mouse and fails. This wouldn't be an issue if the dream of AIR was to build one app and have it work the same across platforms.

  12. Songbird isn't quite there - I still use iTunes to manage my iPod, mainly because of Songbird's lack of podcast support. I've tried several different apps to manage my iPod, but nothing worked the way I wanted it to.


I'm sure there are other things, but this gives you an idea of what I'm having issues with. They're very specific issues and some that the average user would never be doing in the first place, but issues nonetheless. I'll be working on a post about all the good things about Ubuntu as well, which should be much longer http://www.randyjensenonline.com/blog/wp-includes/images/smilies/icon_smile.gif' alt=':)' class='wp-smiley' title=My Issues With Ubuntu 8.10 After Four Months" />


What problems are you having with Ubuntu? Or more importantly, what good experiences are you having with it?




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FebruaryFeb 9 Monday Mon 09

Web Standards Plugin For Adobe Dreamweaver

Jeffrey ZeldmanIf you don't know who Jeffrey Zeldman is, he's the web genius behind sites like A List Apart and Happy Cog. He's also written several books and is pretty much just an overall web genius with a strong background in web usability.


About a month ago he released a plugin for Dreamweaver that makes writing standards compliant code much easier. He says that it is for pretty much anybody who codes, from n00b to l33t web haxor and even said he found some errors on his site with it. I haven't had the chance to play with it yet simply because I don't mind spending the extra time to check my work and validate it...oh, and I don't want to spend $50 on it yet.


He does mention that "It will help coders at any level (including expert) who use Dreamweaver as a primary web development tool, and who know about web standards but don't spend all day thinking about them". I definitely don't want to be thinking about web standards all day, but for the most part, compliant coding has just become second nature for me in my newer projects.


I'll probably go ahead and get it when I get around to it. Mainly to test it out and see if it does make things so I don't have to constantly validate and then revalidate after major changes. When you're working with sites that have 5,000+ pages, it's gets to be just about impossible to make sure every page validates. If this thing makes that easier, I'm in.


Once I buy it, I'll come back with a review for you guys.


You can read more about it here.


Learn more about Jeffrey here




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How To Beat the Recession Without a Government Bailout

Odd that Saturday Night Live would hold the key to beating the recession, but I think they've finally solved America's woes. If you're in debt and having trouble getting out, you may want to watch the video below.



I have a feeling the name of the book was changed to 'Stuff' after the shitheads employees at the FCC got ahold of this skit.




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FebruaryFeb 6 Friday Fri 09

Refresh Your Windows Or Mac Wallpaper Automagically

DesktoptopiaI never used to be a big wallpaper kind of guy until I started using John's Desktop Switcher. It's a seriously cool app that has a ton of features like rotating your wallpaper as often as you'd like, or make a collage or photobook from your pictures. I found another app today called 'Desktoptopia' that is similar, but a bit more stripped down and straightforward.


The main feature I loved about it was it came preloaded with RSS feeds to their site which is a wallpaper submission site. Now John's DS can do this too, but this one just works out of the box. It's nice to get fresh desktops without having to search around and find them, then download them to your computer and then put them in the correct folder. You can also tell it how often to switch the wallpapers on your desktop and it understands dual monitors so you can have different wallpapers on each monitor.


Setting it up is dead simple. Just download the app and install it. Once it's installed, open it and give it some time to update it's RSS feeds (it crashed a couple times on me, but I think it was because I didn't let it update itself before I started playing with it :). If you like it, right click the icon in the system tray in Windows and tell it to auto start. I'm not sure how to do it on the Mac, but it should be similar.


Check out Desktoptopia now


Also, if you're a serious wallpaper ninja, John's Desktop Switcher is a must have as well.




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FebruaryFeb 4 Wednesday Wed 09

YUI Compressor Gets An Awesome Online GUI

Yahoo YUI Compressor and jQueryI use YUI Compressor to compress all my JavaScript files and up until now, they only way to do it was via the command line. While this is fairly easy for me, I think the majority of people don't compress their JS files because they're not sure how (or this practice hasn't permeated the masses of average web developers).

Rodolphe Stoclin has come up with an incredibly useful online tool that takes the YUI Compressor and adds a web GUI to it, making it dead simple to use. It looks like he's using jQuery to do everything on the fly with no page reload and it even tells you the compression ratio.


I tested the tool with an uncompressed version of MooTools and it works exactly as you would expect. If you're not compressing your JavaScript files, now's the time. It's not going to get any easier than this.


Check out the web version of YUI Compressor now.




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FebruaryFeb 3 Tuesday Tue 09

Computer Basics 101: Phishing

I think everyone should have to take a test to use the computer. Think: Driver's Training, but for computers. There are just far too many people out there that have absolutely no idea what they are doing and that will click on anything they see that even looks remotely interesting. What confuses me is why intelligent people who would never go down a dark alley on the wrong side of town at 2am and ask for directions but will go to some shady website that they've never heard of and click on anything they're told to? Why is there such a disconnect?


Enough ranting. Please make every one of your relatives watch this video. You know, the one who still thinks that 'blue e' on their desktop IS the internet. The one who downloads anything and everything that is sent to them and then asks you why their computer doesn't work. You know, the guy who tried to help that Nigerian king last year. That guy.


Phishing Scams in Plain English





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FebruaryFeb 1 Sunday Sun 09

Awesome Interactive Photo Game On YouTube

Just came across this on BoingBoing. It's an interactive YouTube game using images of Oscar movies. After you press play you will see two of the same image, but with one difference. The screen on the right is divided into 9 sections. You simply click on the section that has whatever is different between the two images. Pretty much the same as any of those games you see at bars, but just on YouTube.


There are 30 levels to it. How far can you get?





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JanuaryJan 29 Thursday Thu 09

More Passionate Inspiration From Gary Vaynerchuk

I'm a huge fan of Gary Vaynerchuk. I posted a video a while ago here that is one of my favorite inspirational videos ever, even though it's not really an 'inspirational' video by definition. Well, Gary recently spoke at the Future Of Web Apps in Miami and he was once again, amazing. Here are the two videos of him and below are some quotes from the videos that I love.


Part 1



Part 2



We live in a 'brand' world


Content is King. Marketing and branding are Queen...and you know who runs the household


Before you worry about the community, make sure it's in your heart


You have to love your community more than you love yourself


Communities know everything. They spread. But they also care




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JanuaryJan 28 Wednesday Wed 09

The Cobbler's Kid Finally Gets New Shoes

I've finally gotten around to redesigning Randy Jensen Online. The last time I redesigned it was probably around 4 years ago and it was a rush job for a job interview. I feel much better about this design. Leave a comment and let me know what you think!


Randy Jensen Online Site Redesign

The only 'major' issue currently is with rendering of the typeface.js I'm using to render the text in Opera. For some reason Opera doesn't display it at all. Luckily, such a small percentage of my traffic uses Opera that I decided to just launch and get it fixed as soon as I can.


The blog redesign is next on the list, but one big project at a time http://www.randyjensenonline.com/blog/wp-includes/images/smilies/icon_smile.gif' alt=':)' class='wp-smiley' title=The Cobblers Kid Finally Gets New Shoes" />


Check out Randy Jensen Online




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JanuaryJan 26 Monday Mon 09

Mount ISO Files Virtually On Windows

I recently needed to run an ISO file on Windows Vista. I could have burned the file to a CD/DVD and run it from there, but since I only needed to run it once, it's far easier to mount it virtually. Here's how to do it.


Installing Virtual CloneDrive



  1. Install Virtual CloneDrive from SlySoft. The download link is the last one on the list or here's a direct link Virtual CloneDrive


    • I left all the settings as their defaults. You may want to take some time to decide which files you want CloneDrive to associate itself with.



Opening/Mounting .iso Files Virtually



  1. After CloneDrive is installed, it's incredibly easy to mount an ISO file. If you left CloneDrive as the default program for managing .iso files, you can simply double click it.
    Virtual CloneDrive

  2. If you chose not to make CloneDrive the default program for .iso files, no problem. You can either right click it and choose 'Open With...' or in Vista, there is an option that is added to the toolbar (I'm not running XP, but I would assume there is a similar feature)
    Virtual CloneDrive


That's All! ...Right?


Technically you're done. If you want to configure CloneDrive there are a few options you can play with. Open the actual CloneDrive program (via the shortcut that was placed on your desktop, or through the Start menu).


The main option you may change is the number of virtual drives that it can mount. If you need several .iso files to be mounted at once, CloneDrive can handle up to 15 (no idea why...). For the most part, 1 is fine, but there are some cases where it's nice to be able to mount several files at once.


Number Of Clone Drives






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JanuaryJan 25 Sunday Sun 09

cForms Plugin Gets Removed From WordPress.org

cForms LogoI woke up this morning to find I had a plugin that needed to be updated. Not a big deal. It was the cForms plugin which is constantly being updated. This time, however, it came with a special note:


In light of special circumstances, cforms will not continue to be available on wordpress.org. Future updates may only be available on http://www.deliciousdays.com/cforms-plugin.


(image)


That's odd. This is one of the best plugins the WordPress community has to offer. Why would WordPress.org being pulling it down? Clicking further took me to the official cForms plugin site with another 'special' note:


cforms has been removed from wordpress.org as a result to this post. Future updates may be released on the main cforms home page, chances are that support and further development will end with version 10.2


In light of the circumstances, the forum is currently closed (read-only), until further notice.


Being curious I had to see what amazingly terrible thing someone could have written about cForms that would have gotten it pulled from the mighty WordPress.org site.


Testing it out, I noticed a link at the bottom of the contact form. It pointed to Oliver Seidel's web site. He's the developer for cforms II. I didn't like the placement for the link (my friend has a credits page where I would put it). So I immediately Googled how to do this. Lo' and behold Mr. Seidel has deliberately made it difficult to remove the link. That's fine. His software... sort of.


See, here's the thing: All plugins on wordpress.org are supposed to use GPL-compatible licenses. That means that users get the source code, and they can do nearly whatever they want with it. Turns out that Mr. Seidel never actually included a license in the download (so far as I can tell). And on at least one page on his site, Mr. Seidel claims the license for cforms II is not open source or GPL compatible. Specifically, he says that users may not modify or redistribute the plugin or it's source. That's not GPL.


Actual Post

.txt File


It seems that this guy was pissed because every plugin on the WordPress site must be licensed under the GPL license and cForms was clearly not.


I'm not entirely sure how I feel about this. I'm a big open source advocate myself, but plugins like this are major reason why I can comfortably tell someone to use WordPress and not some other blogging platform. I suppose this thing will die down shortly, but this is a bit of a blow to the WP community.


Just Say No to CrAppleThis also feels a bit Apple-appstore-ish. Why was the plugin ever allowed? If it was a small obscure plugin, I can understand. But just about everyone I kknow who is serious about WordPress is using cForms.


I also think this leads to a bigger issue of Open Source in general. This exact problem is something that could be considered the Achilles Heal of the OSS community. Mark Shuttleworth has already taken tons of heat for including code that wasn't 100% open source in Ubuntu...but this is some of the code that makes Ubuntu usable by average people.


Will removing cForms from the WordPress.org site kill WordPress? The Community? All the other amazing plugins for WP? Of course not. But this is where the average user knows they can go and get good, quality plugins and install them incredibly easy (even more so with 2.7). This plugin repository is the iTunes for WP Plugins. If you don't exist there, you don't exist to the average user.


What do you think about cForms being removed? Who's fault is it? The post author? WordPress for allowing it in the first place? cForms for not GPL'ing it?




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JanuaryJan 22 Thursday Thu 09

Adding a Right-Click 'Open With Adobe Photoshop' Command In Ubuntu

Thought I'd create a quick video to show you how to add 'Open With Adobe Photoshop CS22 command to your right-click menu in Ubuntu. It's my first video tutorial and the quality seriously sucks. If people like these, I'll start doing more and spend more time on the QA side of things. Until then, here ya go...





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JanuaryJan 20 Tuesday Tue 09

Why Marketing Still Works...Because You're So Damn Predictable

Predictably Irrational Why Marketing Still Works...Because Youre So Damn PredictableI just finished reading the book Predictably Irrational by Dan Ariely. This book is amazing. It details how we continually, and seemingly predictably, make the same 'bad' decisions over and over again. Ariely focuses on 'The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions' and conducts several experiments proving this 'predictably irrational behavior'.


If the opportunity presents itself, will you cheat? ...Probably.


In one of the experiments, he has several groups of students take a test. The first group (the control group) must take the test and then hand it in to the proctor. The second group was asked to recall 10 books they read in high school and then take the test. Once they are done, they checks their answers with the correct answers. They then shred the test and tell the proctor how many they got right. The final group is asked to write down as many of the Ten Commandments as they can and then are asked to take the test. Once they're done with the test, they do the same thing as the second group of students.



The control group got 3.1/20 questions correct. The second group that recalled 10 books they read in high school got 4.1 questions correct, or 33% more than the control group. What happened with the final group? They answered on average 3 questions correctly, even though they had the same opportunity to cheat as the second group.


How can you use this information?


I can't tell you exactly how you should use it, but as a higher ed marketing expert, here is where my mind takes this example. During peak registration times, no matter how many people you have working, the line of students always overwhelms even the most seasoned advisor. How about this: Crossword puzzles filled with words related to 'patience' and 'success' for the students to do while waiting in line.


Will it work? After this idea is passed through enough committees and sub-committees to make the Federal Government look amateurish, I'll hopefully report back with my finding.


Conclusion


This is just one of the many brilliant experiments that are documented in this book. I would strongly recommend this book to just about anybody, especially marketers. I would go as far as to say you MUST read this if you're serious about marketing and want to better understand what your customer is thinking.


Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions Why Marketing Still Works...Because Youre So Damn Predictable




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JanuaryJan 19 Monday Mon 09

Using Desktop Flickr Organizer To Manage Your Flickr Account In Ubuntu

Flickr Desktop Organizer LogoBeing a pretty avid Flickr user, one of the first things I looked for when I switched to Ubuntu was a good Flickr Desktop app. I looked everywhere and ended up settling on an app conveniently named 'Flickr Uploader'. Although this app only did one thing, it did it quite poorly. The upload button didn't work, but the upload option in the drop down menu worked fine. The app overall was clunky and poorly designed.

For some reason I decided to look around again and stumbled upon something much nicer and more robust. It's called 'Desktop Flickr Organizer'. I will mention that this is more than just an 'uploader', it really is a way to manage your entire Flickr account from the desktop. With this added functionality, comes the added complexity. It took me a bit to find my way around the app, but once I did, everything made sense for the most part.


Installing Flickr Desktop Organizer


Search for 'flickr' in Add/Remove. Choose the 'Desktop Flickr Organizer' and click 'Apply' in the lower right hand corner
Flickr Desktop Organizer


Setting Up DFO


Now that we have DFO installed, let's get it setup with our Flickr account.



  1. Go to 'Flickr' -> 'Connect'
    Connect DFO to Flickr Account

  2. This should open a browser window and ask you to login to your Flickr account. After you login, you will be asked if you want to allow DFO access to your Flickr account. Hit 'OK, I'll Allow It'
    Allow DFO Access To Flickr

  3. If all went well, you will see a success screen next. Close this window and go back to DFO
    Flickr Success

  4. Once you're back at DFO, click the 'Done!' button
    Desktop Flickr Organizer Done

  5. Now that you're connected you should see DFO updating itself in the lower right corner
    Updating DFO Account


Conclusion


Overall, this program is definitely the way to go if you're running Linux and want to organize your Flickr account from your desktop. It has a bit of a learning curve initially, but after you've figured it out, it's a very nice program.


Desktop Flickr Organizer




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JanuaryJan 16 Friday Fri 09

Update ClamTK Virus Definitions

ClamAV ClamTK LogoIf you've decided to run antivirus software on your Ubuntu machine, it's more than likely ClamAV aka ClamTK (the GUI frontend for ClamAV). I went to update the definitions just for the fun of it the other day and I got this...
ClamTK Update Signatures
ClamTK Must Be Root




Luckily this problem is easily remedied. Open a terminal and type...


sudo clamtk


You should now see a green ball next to the Update Signatures field, letting you know that you are currently running as root, and able to use this option.
ClamTK Update Signatures As Root




That's about it. However, this does raise an issue that I will be covering in much more depth in a later article: Why Linux Is Still a Hobbyists' Operating System. Flame on.




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JanuaryJan 14 Wednesday Wed 09

SSH Host Verification Failed Error Fix

Ubuntu LogoA couple weeks ago I showed you how to share files between two Ubuntu computers. Well yesterday I decided to install Windows 7 Beta on my secondary machine, that was running Ubuntu and had the share I created in that post. Since the computer is pretty old, I decided to just wipe the drive and install Win7 natively, rather than in a VM.


After I was done with some testing, I threw Ubuntu back on the machine and setup my shared folder again with the exact same name. Then I reconnected my main machine to the share with SSH, but was greeted with this error
SSH Verification Failed


Basically what's happening is that when you create an SSH connection, 'authentication' keys are created on the host machine (the machine with the shared folder on it). Since I had wiped Ubuntu and reinstalled, I obviously reinstalled SSH and then created my share again, but with different keys since they are randomly generated. So now when my main computer is looking for this share, it's finding it, but not able to verify the keys that it currently thinks are correct and then create the secure connection...and SSH is pretty worthless with the 'secure' part:) Luckily, there is an incredibly easy fix for this.


If You Have Only One SSH Connection


If you are only running one SSH connection you can simply run this command from the terminal
sudo rm .ssh/known_hosts


This command is going to go into your SSH folder in your Home directory and delete the Known Hosts file that tells the server connection what the keys for the shared folder should be. Again, these keys have changed because we reinstalled SSH on our machine and the keys were once again, randomly generated.


If You Have Multiple SSH Connections


Run this in the terminal
sudo gedit .ssh/known_hosts


You will be presented with something similar to this the image below. Delete the connection that you no longer want to use (in my example you would be deleting connection 2)
SSH Connections


That's pretty much all you have to do. Your connection should now work again.




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Enable Num Lock On Boot In Ubuntu

Optimus KeyboardOne of the things that instantly annoyed me the first time I really started using Ubuntu was that the num lock was turned off by default at boot. A very small thing, but one that seems odd they wouldn't fix since it's so incredibly simple. Here's how I did it.



  1. Once you're in your Ubuntu desktop, make sure your num lock is on (I don't think it really needs to be, but I did it just in case)

  2. Open Synaptic Package Manager and search for 'numlockx' and install it (or open a terminal and type 'sudo apt-get install numlockx')
    numlockx Enable Num Lock On Boot In Ubuntu


Reboot your computer to see if num lock stays on this time. If it doesn't, there are some more configurations on the official Ubuntu site that you can follow.




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About

Currently a graphics and web designer in Dallas, TX. I also run my own technology blog at http://www.randyjensenonline.com/blog.

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