A Kitten Named "Sueño": Pisi Linux 1.0 Is about to Release its Beta!

I have a strong reason to be excited this week: Pisi Linux will release its first public beta!

This release has been named "Sueño" (the Spanish word for "Dream") as a token of appreciation to the Spanish members of Pisi's team (Way to go, Yoyo and Sapphire!)

This new distro already has a special place in my heart...and in my computers!

Linux Gets Mentioned in "13 Things that Seem Like Scams But Are Actually Really Great"

I was reading Yahoo! Finance and stumbled upon the article "13 Things that Seem Like Scams But Are Actually Really Great".  I got surprised when my eyes saw a big Ubuntu logo among the items listed:

I'd have loved to see a big Tux representing GNU/Linux instead of Ubuntu's logo, but it still feels great to have Linux in this list.

Way to go, Tux! 

Facial Passwords? No, Thanks!

I just finished reading this article here about Google filing a patent for a new facial password technology.  Apparently, Google is considering the idea of including this technology into its Android devices.

What's it about?  Basically, your device will count with some sort of face recognition software that will serve the purpose of unlocking it.  Wait, the new part is that the software will ask you to perform several facial gestures to prove that you are not a photograph.

It may ask you to stick your tongue out, to smile widely, to frown...

Interesting, soon you will see a train full of people who won't show a sign of emotion to each other, but will do it to their phones or tablets!  :P

Now, apart of the silliness involved into making faces to your phone, I still don't see this technology as a security improvement.  Are they 100% sure all this effort means a safer way to unlock a device?  If it is not, I guess at least it is fun!

Let me ask, what's wrong with passwords anyway?  It seems that the trend now is to get away from them.  Is it that people are too lazy to remember them?  Is it that it is too bothersome to type them?

Hey, passwords are good for your brain!

I prefer those good ol' passwords to these emerging technologies.

There's a Cat in My Linux Computer!

Some days ago, Mechatotoro taught me steganography (how to hide compressed files into images.) 

I was impressed to see how easy and fun that was!

Also, I learned that for doing it in Linux, you use the command "cat".

To be honest, I had used the command "cat" before.  However, my use of this command has been mainly to play jokes.  The one of the talking cat is my favorite.  Basically, children (and some adults) get amazed to see this little feline talking from my CLI.

1. You type "cat hello" and you get this:

2. You type "cat identify_yourself" and the cat responds this:

3. You tell something nice to the cat by typing "cat you_are_cute" and the feline answers:

So much for cat humbleness, huh? Cats are like that!

4. Finally, it's time to say good-bye. You type "cat bye" and you get this:

It's quite fun!

What's the trick? For those who haven't figured it out by now, the trick is basically creating four simple text files named "hello", "identify_yourself", "you_are_cute", and "bye", all without specifying any extension for the files.  You draw the ASCII cat in each file and type whatever you want the "cat" to say. Whenever you type "cat" in the terminal, the command displays the content of each file. That's it!

The command "cat" can do very important tasks...but little things like this, besides providing some fun, help people lose their fear of the command line. Who knows? A kid might get interested in programming because of this!

My Third Year Blogging about TUX!

Today I'm celebrating my third year blogging about GNU/Linux!

I have learned a lot (although I still don't know how to compile my kernel), and I've shared with great individuals who have been my inspiration and support.

Also, I've been attacked by others and have been the object of discrimination and misunderstandings just because I dared to use different software.

Still, I must say I am thankful because, after tasting the waters of Free Software, I do not want to go back.

PS.  Thanks to Mechatotoro for the pic!

Linux? What's That?? -- Soon No more

Today, my mother showed me an article she read in a local newspaper.  It was about Linux, free software, and how students from a private university (probably the biggest private university here) were using FLOSS.

The article mentioned the benefits of FLOSS in educational contexts and how those students were using GIMP, LibreOffice, and Linux, of course.

I still recall that, four years ago, if anyone mentioned Linux, all people would ask "What's that?".  To the dismal of some company in Redmond, more and more people are getting to know about Free Software and its advantages.  Why cracking a video player if you have tools like VLC right there to take care of all your video playing needs?

It seems that the strongest weapon of privative software against FLOSS, that is, making it invisible, is working less and less each year.

Soon, most people will know about FLOSS and they will realize they do have choices.

Pynagram: Fun with Words!

Pynagram is a small and simple anagram-typing game that may lack fancy features...but it offers a quick, challenging, and addicting gameplay to make up for that.

It basically presents you seven letters that you may use to type as many words as you can in a 5-minute span. Two-letter words are not allowed.

When you type a new word and it is correct, it appears in the blanks below your available letters:

Any correct words will appear in green when you type them.  Repeated words will be yellow, and inexistent words will be red.  When your five minutes are over, the game will show you all the words.  The ones you got right will be boldfaced:

Even if this game is somewhat modest, its educational value is enormous. It gives you a fun way to test your vocabulary skills --and polish them-- whenever you have five minutes to spare!

Where to get it?  I got it from Debian repos, but you can visit Pynagram in Launchpad for more downloading options: