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Hello! This will be a little (but epic!) foray into the hardware realm here at Ainer.org. If it is well received I may update this on a semi-regularly basis in the future (yearly, half-yearly, quarterly). For now, this post will provide some suggestions on what hardware components, what peripherals, what display and audio components, what supplementary networking gear, and even what cables I currently suggest for a single system that can provide solid Home Theater Personal Computer (HTPC) functionality, excellent 1080p resolution gaming (Gaming PC), adequate room and connections for several storage drives (Home Server), as well as general purpose personal computer (PC) usage (Web browsing, document editing, et cetera).

A month or so back I went on one of my little quests to find a piece of software that I don't currently have buttoned down. This time around I was not looking for another handy-dandy media related application nor another operating system. Instead, I was looking for a tool I use daily to find other tools, a Web search engine. I have, in the past, looked for "Google alternatives" but have always found myself back with the nearly unavoidable digital giant. This seemingly inevitable return was, at least partially, due to old habits, market penetration (it's the default just about everywhere!), and also simply because the suite of tools the Google behemoth provides work well, integrate well, and help me to be more productive and have functionality that, in many cases, I can't find anywhere else (Gmail, Google Docs, Google Voice, Google Chat).

A little over a year ago I fired up the then latest version of Fedora (13) and found much that I liked. Ultimately though, it just wasn't the right tool for the job and I ended up going back to Ubuntu and Linux Mint. Fast forward another year, a few more releases have come out from Fedora, and Canonical has been making some choices that, while likely great long-term for Ubuntu, are a bit awkward currently for some of its user base.

Ubuntu’s next release, the Oneiric Ocelot (11.10), will soon be upon us and the first beta for this release is now out! At this point, Oneiric has already gone through three alpha releases and the features and the interface should be, essentially, set in stone (both the feature and the user interface freezes have past). Following the beta release today the focus should shift from the user interface (UI) to polishing up the release, squashing bugs, and improving over all quality (see the overall workitems here!).

Kiwix is a neat little program that allows users to read content from Wikipedia offline. Using ZIM files, Kiwix displays articles exactly as they would appear on Wikipedia (pictures and all!), and also provides some functions that are used in web browsers (such as the ability to use tabs and bookmarks). Combine this with links to other articles, options, like selecting a random article to view, and it’s easy to forget that this is only an offline version of Wikipedia!

VyprVPN provides a similar service between your Ubuntu or Linux Mint personal computer, Android mobile device, or TomatoUSB (RAF) router, and any one of their VyprVPN servers located around the world (Los Angeles, Washington, DC, London, Amsterdam, and Hong Kong). After the connection between your device or network and the VyprVPN server is established, your traffic is first routed through the VPN and then over the World Wide Web (as it normally would were it connected without VyprVPN).

Whew! Alright, lots of Mozilla Firefox goodness to write about here, so let's get to it! First off, in case you haven't yet heard, Firefox 6 should soon be officially announced (August Sixteenth) and should also be available to Ubuntu 11.04 (Natty Narwhal) and Linux Mint 11 (Katya) users with nothing further needed than a standard update once it is added to the official repositories! Firefox 6 will also be the initial version available in the upcoming Ubuntu 11.10 (Oneiric Ocelot) release!

After a (fairly) successful event last year, the Open Science Summit will again happen this year, taking place in Mountain View, CA on October 22-23. Featuring multiple speakers from many different disciplines, the Open Science Summit focuses on how to adapt current scientific practices to ever changing technology, as well as how to open source scientific work and research.

This guide will be based around the latest versions of Ubuntu and Couch Potato with all updates installed. If you're using Linux Mint, or an alternative desktop environment (Xfce, Gnome, LXDE, KDE, etc), there will be a bit of adaptation that will be needed. However, both Linux Mint's mintMenu and Ubuntu's Home button have search functions that make navigation much the same so it should be easy to use this for either. If you get stuck feel free to ask me a question below in the comments or to shoot me an email as I'd be happy to help get you unstuck if at all possible.

The Humble Indie Bundle features a collection of games that are DRM free and run natively on GNU/Linux systems. If bought separately, they could cost you around $50. However, the Humble Bundle allows you to determine what you want to pay for the collection.

SABnzbd+ is, simply put, a Usenet client. It allows access to Usenet in the same way as a Web Browser allows access to the World Wide Web, or as an Email client (be it Web based, or installed directly onto your computer) allows access to your Email servers.

Well, it has been a (relatively) long wait, but it looks like it's finally here, an application like Couch Potato and Sick Beard, but for music! Headphones is a very young project (first commit was posted on May 20, 2011), but is already showing significant promise!

This transition back to Ubuntu is mainly in response to some positive changes in ease-of-use that the Ubuntu 11.04 (Natty Narwhal) release has brought with it. One of these changes is the ability to allow the automatic installation of Flash, closed-source drivers, and support for MP3 and other non-free media while installing Ubuntu.

Recently, I discovered CoLab. Founded by Casey Stark, a Ph.D. student in astrophysics, and DJ Strouse, a senior working towards a degree in physics and mathematics, this online science collaboration tool hopes to innovate the way scientists do their research work. The site aims to open-source science by having researchers post and update their work as they are working on it, rather than hiding their work until a journal picks up the polished manuscript.

SABnzbd+ 0.6.0 was released a couple of days ago and is already available via JCFP's SABnzbd+ private package archive (PPA). Considering the maturity of the project, SABnzbd+ 0.6.0 brings with it an impressive array of changes and updates. The most noticeable one (visually), is undoubtedly the change from using the Smpl skin as the default to using the updated and expanded Plush. With this change, the SABnzbd+ developers have decided to focus solely on Plush and may even possibly phase out the other skins entirely.

Well, it's just about that time again, Ubuntu 11.04 (Natty Narwhal) was just released and the developers over at Linux Mint are readying for the subsequent release of their flagship Main Edition, Linux Mint 11 (Katya). To kick things off, Clem, the founder and lead developer of Linux Mint, released a preview this morning over at their blog. Since then, a private 32-bit testing release has dropped in for the tester's group over at the community site. For those wanting to keep tabs on the progress of the Linux Mint 11 development process and status this will be an ideal place to do so.

For those that are not familiar, this is the third such bundle since last year. It features independent games that are GNU/Linux compatible and DRM free. The Humble Bundle also provides the chance to donate to the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) as well as Penny Arcade's Child's Play charity. Both of these charities are ones I'm interested in continuing to support in the future and the EFF does amazing work with limited resources. Be sure to follow their Deeplinks blog to see their on-going progress.

Just an update, Linux Fest Northwest is this weekend! If you're free and in the area be sure to come by for at least one (or part of one) of the days! For more information, see the quote below from my previous post!

The recent popularity and growth of Linux Mint Debian Edition as well as the migration and planned migration of some of the alternate desktop environment based editions (Fluxbox and XFCE so far) has strummed up questions about the future of the main Linux Mint edition which is based on Ubuntu and Gnome. To help answer these growing questions, Linux Mint's founder and project lead, Clement Lefebvre has created an easy to miss F.A.Q. nestled at the end of the Linux Mint XFCE announcement.

While this may not be quite as neat or exciting as last month's release of the Ubuntu & Linux Mint compatible Amazon Prime Unlimited Instant Video Streaming service, it does bare mentioning as it provides a similar Ubuntu & Linux Mint compatible service for music (all from the same website) and provides significant benefits over similar offerings such as the iTunes Store!