PC Mech posted a Puppy Linux on USB stick guide

"Puppy Linux is a small (by design) Linux distribution that easily fits on a USB stick. If your computer has the ability to boot from a USB stick (which many do), this can benefit you in a number of ways."

>> Puppy Linux On USB Stick How-To

PC Review have a new article on how to run Linux in Windows, by emulating a Virtual PC

"Many users of Windows XP and Vista will want to try Linux at some point, often just to see what all the fuss is about. There are many different Linux distributions and it isn't convenient for a non-technical user to set up dual booting alongside an existing Windows install. Thankfully, there are tools available which mean you can play with a full Linux install inside the familiar surroundings of Microsoft Windows."

>> Run Linux in Windows

Howtoforge published a guide about setting up Linux Mint 5 Elyssa R1 as a replacement for a Windows desktop

"This tutorial shows how you can set up a Linux Mint 5 Elyssa R1 desktop that is a full-fledged replacement for a Windows desktop, i.e. that has all the software that people need to do the things they do on their Windows desktops. The advantages are clear: you get a secure system without DRM restrictions that works even on old hardware, and the best thing is: all software comes free of charge. Linux Mint 5 is a Linux distribution based on Ubuntu 8.04 that has lots of packages in its repositories (like multimedia codecs, Adobe Flash, Adobe Reader, Skype, Google Earth, etc.) that are relatively hard to install on other distributions; it therefore provides a user-friendly desktop experience even for Linux newbies."

>> The Perfect Desktop - Linux Mint 5 Elyssa R1

Developer Works published an article on Snort, a free and open source Network Intrusion Prevention System and Network Intrusion Detection System tool

"Enter Snort, a free and open source Network Intrusion Prevention System and Network Intrusion Detection System tool for managing and preventing intrusions to your Web sites, applications, and Internet-enabled programs. "

>> Snort your way to more secure websites

Bit-Tech published a guide to using Wireless Networking in Linux titled Working with Wireless in Linux

"However, many people will immediately say that Linux is simply not ready for the masses -- and I agree with them. What bugs me is that when asked why, I'm hearing complaints from ages past treated as present-day problems: "I don't want to have to work in a command line,"/ and /"It's so hard to configure," are just a couple of examples.

It's true that some things still aren't utterly plug-and-pray, but a lot of things really //are nowadays. Unfortunately, one thing has continued to stay on the fringes of penguin compatibility no matter how pervasive it's become in day-to-day life: Wireless networking.

Windows and OSX have such simple ways of dealing with wireless, but for many very good corporate reasons, open-source alternatives have not seen such love. The problem stems from drivers, which (for open source operating systems especially) divulge a //lot of secrets for how the hardware operates. Talk about giving away the golden egg -- how would you like to broadcast every little thing that makes you special to your competitors worldwide?!

Unfortunately, because of the very tight control wars over drivers in general, Linux has lagged in the wireless world. We've largely been forced to go hunt for revision numbers and version SKUs on packaging, scrolling through ten boxes of four brands of card to find which one features a chipset that bothered to develop proper Linux drivers (for the record, that's mostly Ralink and Atheros, which you can find in various card versions of several major brands including Linksys, Netgear and D-Link). Once our prize was found, we'd run home and fire it to gleefully enjoy...

...the same wireless that any Windows user had in about five minutes. Or, worse yet, maybe we got the revision number wrong or it wasn't clearly marked, and the chipset didn't work."

>> Working with Wireless in Linux

Howtoforge posted a tutorial about setting up gOS Rocket G 2.0 (GNOME) desktop as Windows desktop replacement

"This tutorial shows how you can set up a gOS Rocket G 2.0 (GNOME) desktop that is a full-fledged replacement for a Windows desktop, i.e. that has all the software that people need to do the things they do on their Windows desktops. The advantages are clear: you get a secure system without DRM restrictions that works even on old hardware, and the best thing is: all software comes free of charge. gOS is a lightweight Linux distribution, based on Ubuntu 7.10, that comes with Google Apps and some other Web 2.0 applications; gOS Rocket G 2.0 uses the GNOME desktop."

>> The Perfect Desktop - gOS Rocket G 2.0 (GNOME)

PC Stats posted part 2 of their Linux beginners guides.

"In the first part of PCstats Beginner's Guide to using Linux, we explored the basic features of this open-source operating system by using the Knoppix 'live' CD Linux distribution. For the second installment of this guide, we're looking at something a little more permanent. We're going to take one of the most popular and easy to use free Linux distributions, SUSE Personal 9.1 and explore the process of installing Linux onto your hard drive as a full operating system."

>> Beginners Guides: Linux Part 2: Installing a PC

PC Stats posted part 3 of their Linux beginners guide.

"In the first two parts of our set of Beginner's Guides to the Linux operating system, we familiarized you with the popular KDE desktop environment via a 'live' CD Linux distribution and explored installing Linux permanently onto your system. In this third PCSTATS Beginner's Guide to the Linux operating system, we're going to explore an essential Linux skill; how to track down and add new software packages to your Linux installation."

>> Beginners Guides: Linux Part 3: Installing New Software

TechwareLabs posted a follow-up to their Linux Introduction entitled Linux: The Beginners Guide.

"With so many options for operating systems in the world today, how do you choose? Today, we take a look at Linux and show you step by step how to try it out and see what the hype is about! We take you from selecting the distrobution to installation and configuration all in a step by step process that is easy to follow. if you ever wanted to try out Linux this guide is for you. "

>> Linux: The Beginners Guide

Howtoforge posted a guide about setting up virtual hosting with Virtualmin on CentOS 5.1

"This tutorial shows how to set up a CentOS 5.x server to offer all services needed by virtual web hosters. These include web hosting, smtp server with (SMTP-AUTH and TLS, SPF, DKIM, Domainkeys), DNS, FTP, MySQL, POP3/IMAP, Firewall, Webalizer for stats."

>> Virtual Hosting Howto With Virtualmin On CentOS 5.1

bit-tech published a feature that outlines some ways to get the most out of your Asus Eee PC

"I've been using the device fairly heavily for a few of weeks now and overall I've been really impressed with it. It's light, small and sturdy and has a great feature set for its price. It seems perfect for train journeys, with its quick boot up time and almost precisely the right size for sitting on chair-back tables seen on planes and trains. Not even my old X-series ThinkPad could manage that.

One man's meat is another man's poison, and certainly many people will be put off by the 800 x 480 display resolution and lack of Bluetooth. Word on the street is that the new Eee PC will sport a higher resolution screen, and as much as I'm now used to the smaller screen -- most websites are designed for 1024x768 screens, so this will be a welcome addition. The keyboard is a little tricky to get used to, and even now I constantly find myself pressing "up" instead of "shift", and "2" instead of "1". But for around £220, it still offers amazing value in my eyes.

The operating system is based on Xandros Desktop 4, which is in turn based on Debian Etch. Asus has changed a few things in the install, so it's not 100 percent compatible with Xandros, but it's very close. If you're a bit of a Linux fan, you might feel like just wiping the drive and installing EeeXubuntu, or Eeedora. However, I like to think of the Eee PC as a single function device, rather than a fully-fledged PC. It's got an OS that is designed specifically for that hardware, and it works well. Changing to a different OS is a recipe for lots of fiddling, slower performance and a much greater chance of things going wrong.

As new updates come out, they are rolled out using "Add/Remove Software". As Asus knows the OS is identical on all their machines, it makes rolling out such updates a lot easier -- this has already pushed out an update for Skype 2.0 during my time using the Eee PC.

The OS built into the Eee PC feels a lot like using a Psion device -- simple and speedy. You can get a virtual tour of the OS here. With FireFox, Thunderbird and OpenOffice installed as standard, I feel right at home as this combination of software is what I would be using on any Windows or Linux platform.

The OS isn't perfect though, so in this article I'll be showing you a few of the things I've changed to make the Eee PC feel more like a Me PC."

>> Getting the most out of your Eee PC

Wine Review published a guide about running Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare with Wine 0.9.52 under Linux

"Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare can run on Wine as of the 0.9.52 release with one small patch."

>> Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare on Linux with Wine

MAKE posted an Open Source Hardware Gift Guide

"It's been a year since our last open source gift guide - this year there is so much going on in the world of MAKE, open source, and beyond that we have a series of gift guides for this holiday season. The first one is our open source hardware gift guide - these are physical things you can buy that fit in to the new and exciting category of hardware we call open source hardware. "

>> Open Source Hardware Gift Guide

Wine Review published a guide about installing DirectX 9.0c on Linux with Wine

"Microsoft DirectX is a collection of application programming interfaces for handling tasks related to multimedia, especially game programming and video, on Microsoft platforms. Originally, the names of these APIs all began with Direct, such as Direct3D, DirectDraw, DirectMusic, DirectPlay, DirectSound, and so forth. DirectX, then, was the generic term for all of these Direct-something APIs, and that term became the name of the collection. Over the intervening years, some of these APIs have been deprecated and replaced, so that this naming convention is no longer absolute. In fact, the X has caught on to the point that it has replaced Direct as the common part in the names of new DirectX technologies, including XAct, XInput, and so forth.

Direct3D (the 3D graphics API within DirectX) is widely used in the development of computer games for Microsoft Windows, Microsoft Xbox, and Microsoft Xbox 360. Direct3D is also used by other software applications for visualization and graphics tasks, most notably among the engineering sector for CAD/CAM, because of its ability to quickly render high-quality 3D graphics using DirectX-compatible graphics hardware. As Direct3D is the most widely recognized API in DirectX, it is not uncommon to see the name DirectX used in place of Direct3D"

>> DirectX 9.0c on Linux with Wine

Howtoforge published a guide about setting up Linux Mint 4.0 as desktop

"This tutorial shows how you can set up a Linux Mint 4.0 (Daryna) desktop that is a full-fledged replacement for a Windows desktop, i.e. that has all the software that people need to do the things they do on their Windows desktops. The advantages are clear: you get a secure system without DRM restrictions that works even on old hardware, and the best thing is: all software comes free of charge. Linux Mint 4.0 is a Linux distribution based on Ubuntu 7.10 that has lots of packages in its repositories (like multimedia codecs, Adobe Flash, Adobe Reader, Skype, Google Earth, etc.) that are relatively hard to install on other distributions; it therefore provides a user-friendly desktop experience even for Linux newbies."

>> Installation Guide: Linux Mint 4.0 Daryna (a.k.a. The Perfect Desktop)

Howtoforge posted a guide about setting up gOS as desktop

"This tutorial shows how you can set up a gOS 1.0.1 desktop that is a full-fledged replacement for a Windows desktop, i.e. that has all the software that people need to do the things they do on their Windows desktops. The advantages are clear: you get a secure system without DRM restrictions that works even on old hardware, and the best thing is: all software comes free of charge. gOS is a lightweight Linux distribution, based on Ubuntu 7.10, that comes with Google Apps and some other Web 2.0 applications; it uses the Enlightenment 17 window manager instead of GNOME or KDE."

>> The Perfect Desktop - gOS 1.0.1

Howtoforge posted a guide about making your linux desktop look like a Mac

"Do you want to give your desktop a dash of Mac OS X? The goal of this project is to bring the look and feel of Mac OS X (latest being 10.5, Leopard) to *nix GTK based systems. This document will present the procedure to install Mac4Lin pack & tweak certain things to get that almost perfect Mac OS X like desktop."

>> Make Your Linux Desktop Look Like A Mac - Mac4Lin Project Documentation

Wine-Review has posted an article about running phpDesigner 2007 Professional 5.5.2 on Linux with Wine.

"phpDesigner 2007 Professional 5.5.2 is a popular PHP IDE/editor for PHP development now featuring remote FTP editing and support for PHP frameworks, most everything you need for developing high performance web solutions. Popular award-winning PHP IDE/ PHP editor featuring everything you need for editing, analyzing and publishing applications/websites powered by PHP with full support for PHP 5.2 and PHP 4.4, HTML and CSS."

>> phpDesigner 2007 on Linux with Wine

Howtoforge published a guide about setting up VMware Tools under Linux

"This document explains how to set up the VMware Tools in the following guest operating systems: Ubuntu 7.04, Fedora 7, PCLinuxOS 2007 and Debian Etch. Installing VMware Tools in your guest operating systems will help maximize performance, provide mouse synchronization and copy & paste functionality. This article also shows a way of making VMware Tools start automatically when you start a guest operating system."

>> How To Set Up VMware Tools On Various Linux Distributions

Wine Review published a guide about setting up Windows Media Player 9 & 10 on Linux with Wine

"I'm aware there are many open source multimedia tools that will play most audio and video formats on Linux these days but many people have come to like Windows Media player over the years. And while Xine and Mplayer will play most .WMV .WMA files, both of these players use Windows codecs that are copied into your /usr/lib/win32 directory. So if your currently happy using the closed source Windows Media codecs why not use the player as well."

>> Windows Media Player 9 & 10 on Linux with Wine