I still have to solve some issues, like not having plug ins in SeaMonkey but in Mozilla Firefox. The Canon printer now also works on Bryan's new computer, but still not on my 64 bit system. I also compiled drivers for Bryan's on board network adapter (Atheros). The driver wasn't written for Debian/Ubuntu, not even for my kernel (2.6.24-19-generic) and Google was unable to cough up something that worked so I had to fix the errors myself. Far from easy I tell you. A bit too time consuming also, but I am glad that it works for him now that we have Internet again.

Woops. Oh, there is a new version of Komodo IDE (v4.4). Let me download and install it right away. Ha, that was easy. Done. Even adding an application launcher is easy.

I do however keep stepping back in time. I mean I am forced to use the console for just about anything. Microsoft Windows is easier to handle and way more user friendly. Sure, you geeks state that I have to get used to it, but isn't that the other way round? Surely the wrong way, at least in my view. Hey, I do love Ubuntu but it just needs a lot more love.

This morning I received an e-mail to activate my personal(?) account (with the wrong name) so I refused to comply and replied by saying that things aren't exactly going as they are supposed to go. Let's start with the name shall we? Listen, my last name is van Rantwijk. I simply refuse to use van Rantwyk or anything else, simply because THAT IS NOT ME. In fact I doubt my contract would be valid, legally speaking that is.

KPN told us that the move should take 10 business (as in two weeks) however we are still waiting. And keep waiting ever since April 16th. Ok, we received a letter saying that the work is planned for June 26th so we should have a working connection this Friday. But one can never be too sure. I am sick to death of this whole issue so I keep my fingers crossed. Ha, my reply just went up in smoke (e-mail address no longer in use). Totally expected.

Back in the old days one could e-mail and phone in for free, but these days are over. Basically (arrogantly) saying: "Take it or leave it". So they make errors, and we have to pay for it? Since when does it work like this? What about service? KPN shareholder should wake up, because this isn't the way to make money. No, this is aggravating the hell out of your potential new customers.

They have send me an e-mail stating that the supplied information wasn't right. What? We called them and it turned out that the ADSL line was still there. So what? Just fix it, and please this time without sending smoke signals. I mean, my info turned out to be all okay after all. The old line was still up, blocking my new connection (even for the same person on the same address). KPN can't just change data in their database, or wait they can. At least that's what yet another person told me on the phone. Let's sum up: 100 Euro mobile minutes vaporized, many misleading e-mails received, and yet still no Internet! God, you have got to love KPN.

The double name problem is still there, yes. Not to mention the Rantwyk v.s. Rantwijk problem. What should I do now? I just want my Internet connection up and running and use the right name. I don't want to wait any longer. I want to work on my projects again, and a.s.a.p. please as I have done everything right so get your act together will you!

The good news is that one day my generation takes control in KPN, people who know how important Internet is for us. As in this (very) simple chain: food - computer - Internet access - clothing.

Getting it to compile was the first hurdle, and it was a big one I tell you. I'm glad that I know how things work now, more or less. There was a lot that I had to learn, like lsusb which shows the connected USB hardware and corresponding settings. Listing and killing cron processes was also important (the driver went nuts the first time) so I had to use things like ps, kill, killall and what not. Entering http://localhost:631/ made me realize that I had seen this before. Probably from back in the days that I installed RedHat.

I opened the Symantic Package Manager on my notebook and copied the list with installed files from the property window. I use this in a home brew script (a makefile) which checks for missing files and wrong permissions. It found a few, which I fixed and reboot. No juice. I have CUPS v1.3.7 installed and already switched on debug for the log files, but there ain't any errors showing up in /var/log/cups/error_log. As if everything is going well. I guess that a re-installation of CUPS wouldn't help, but should'n hurt either. Let's see if that helps. Still no juice.

/etc/init.d/cupsd seems to be the root problem. Why? Because it doesn't spawn the lp cron jobs I expect to see with ps-ef. I also tried /troubleshoot.py (a python script) but that didn't help. Oh well. I guess that I have to keep on digging a little longer and let you know when I have solved this problem so later ;)

Oh great (but not really) the links in the weblog are not working. That is weird; the PHP code inserts two different timestamps (formats). I guess another thing that I should fix, but it isn't a show stopper right now because I am already swamped. Wait! Didn't we have a webmaster? Raj my friend can you please fix this for me? Thanks.

Though I switched from Windows to Ubuntu, I still have quite a bit to learn and get used to, but MultiZilla sucks on Linux. Seriously. Some issues are cosmetic only, but others are more seriously. The latter should be fixed first, of course, but I will make a list with all issues that I like to take care of (simply because there are just way too many right now) and work my way through the pile of sh*t from there.

I just copied my SeaMonkey profile from Windows to Ubuntu (system overkill) and had to set group and owner properties from the command line. I either did something wrong, completely, or I need a script for this next time (excessive file rights are a no go for me). At least I have my bookmarks, certificates and password at hand on Ubuntu. Great.

I have a new keyboard and mouse, so I have to get used to them again (I just opened a Python shell). Another thing is that Komodo's spellchecker (available from version 4.2 and up) isn't working for me. I mean there's no keyboard shortcut (I must be blind again) and check as you type is either non functional or not, yet, implemented.

I installed CVS yesterday and started my impatient checkout. Here's the catch; I did it as guest thus 244 files on my HD now carry the login guest in it, this instead of my own name. For crying out loud; what was I thinking? I always logged in as HJ simply because I was too lazy to change all of these files, but now it the time to fix this. to come up with some sort of script or I'll be beeped.

A 550 Watt Corsair power supply is doing its job, but I tried to configure two 7200 RPM Maxtor's for RAID1 and that didn't work. This should not be a problem, really, but I couldn't wait any longer (to see my new Intel Core 2 Quad processor in action) so I installed Ubuntu (64bit) and VirtualBox first and will deal with that RAID issue later this week. Windows XP/SP3 runs smoothly in VirtualBox so this beast is really fun to work with.

So, most software has been installed now, but the Canon CAPT driver is for 32 bit systems only thus I will have to compile the source myself. The fun part is that I haven't done this specific task before (not for this driver) so I might need a little time to get it going.

Hmm, I just spotted another, but minor problem (I forgot to add a symbolic link for the SeaMonkey plugins). What is next you ask? I have no idea, yet, but I am getting ready to start working on the projects again. That is; I am pulling the source and www bits from mozdev.org right now. Done. Let's add two Komodo projects; multizilla-src.kpf and multizilla-www.kpf Also done. Now I need a good replacement for Wiz (a Windows only tool). Building JAR and XPI files with Ant works, of course, but it isn't a silver bullet. I would love to get my hands on something with a GUI. That is so much easier and thus more fun to use. Suggestions welcome of course.

Update: I had to buy a new Intel Core 2 Duo (2.4GHz) today, just to get my motherboard going; because the suckers who sold it (Norrod in Zwolle/I was in Zwolle for the Firefox download day) didn't update the BIOS for the CPU I bought for it (in the freaking same store!) so I was stuck with a completely dead system. And that wasn't the end of it, no, because this Frank guy choose to talk for 30 freaking minutes (telling us that he didn't had time to check the motherboard) and when he finally did... he either checked it with other RAM modules, or he just damaged one (because one of them was dead when I came home with it) and he certainly didn't use my Intel Core 2 QUAD processor, simply because the BIOS did still not support it (I have done what he should have done and that is to upgrade the BIOS to the latest revision). Great to have a local shop who replaced the RAM for free... without even asking anything. That's what I call service!

The Intel High Definition on my ASUS P5L Pro motherboard is great. Much better than on Toshiba notebooks (but don't ask me why) or is my new Sennheiser (nothing fancy, just a HD202) so much better? Can't be, because it is the same model, but I will check this later today.

Ubuntu 8.04 comes with a pre-installed copy of Mozilla Firefox (which kept crashing time after time) but I want to use SeaMonkey instead, so I installed it (don't remove Firefox!). The good thing is that there is Ubuntuzilla these days so you don't have to go through all sort of hoops and loops to get SeaMonkey running. Note that MultiZilla will have it's own installation script in a near future update!

The next thing I did was to install VirtualBox (currently at version 1.6.2) to see how that worked. And I tell you this works very well for me. VirtualBox is Open Source (for personal use and evaluation purposes) and that was the main reason for me to choose VistualBox instead of VMWare. I now have all my Windows programs running in it, and without any trouble so far. Ok, I had to change the image size yet again, but LVPM was my friend. All I had to do was to rename c:/ubuntu/new.disk to c:/ubuntu/root.disk and reboot into Ubuntu.

Am I happy with Ubuntu? Yes and no. It works for me, but OSX 10.5.2 is much more appealing. I even tried to install it as a new virtual machine, but that didn't work. I guess I will have to add one more partition. Ubuntu needs more love if it is to become the next mainstream OS for me. Some parts of Microsoft Windows are also much more user friendly, and no this isn't because I got a job offer from Microsoft Edge in Ireland to come work for them, but this is just a simple fact. Let's face it; when did Microsoft ask you to build (make/compile) a program or utility? I know, this is just how Linux works, because of all hardware it runs on, but still this might be a big hurdle for new Ubuntu users.

I have also been busy with some new things; like getting a better grip on Ubuntu GNU/Linux and getting a new and much faster HP computer, one with two 22 inch LCD monitors, which should arrive sometime next week. I'm also going for a new HP notebook with a 17 inch widescreen (to help me produce more code in less time). No more Toshiba for me. The reason for this is that my Toshiba fails to produce bass tones, and it is literally falling apart after being used for a little over one year (the headphone jack and volume on the front of the notebook are both broken).