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In the latest Ubuntu newsletter, a new link was posted for the Hardy Heron release countdown script.  The beta version is already available, and we are under a month away from the final release.  Hardy will have the latest Firefox 3 pre-release, as well as major updates to GNOME, the Linux kernel, and much more.  This is another step closer to a general-purpose free operating system that “just works”.  Get excited.

[ Hardy Countdown Timer ]

We’ve released our second iteration of Wosaic just in time for the Engineering Open House at the University of Illinois. At the Engineering Open House, we created over 120 mosaics for people, and won 3rd place for the non-technical theme.

This new release represents a major rewrite in the code for the GUI and general control flow. While this won’t be immediately apparent at first glance, this means major efficiency gains and better stability. You can now create multiple mosaics in the same session, and even cancel processing mid-generation. Also, the resolution parameters don’t take effect until saving, which means you can save a Mosaic at a variety of different resolutions.

For more details, check out the Release Notes, which also contains links to other useful wiki pages. Or, head straight for the download page to grab a copy of the latest version. Keep reading below for a walk-through to create your first mosaic.

Continue reading “Wosaic 1.0 beta– Faster, Cleaner Mosaics From Your Own Photos”

I just upgraded to Ubuntu Hardy Alpha 6 to start testing, and am delighted to try the new Firefox 3 beta.  Amongst other changes, I found this peculiar warning message when trying to view about:config.  In case you’re not aware, about:config allows you to change some backend settings to your Firefox profile, similar to the Windows registry.  When trying to navigate to the page, you get a warning:

This might void your warranty!
Changing the default values of these advanced settings can be harmful to the stability, security, and performance of this application.  You should only continue if you are sure of what you are doing.

It’s a useful message, as you can do a lot of damage with about:config.  But void my warranty?  Since when does Firefox ever come with a warranty?  Check out the screenshot for a closer view.

Screen savers lost their utility as screen-burn preventers years ago, but that doesn’t mean they don’t serve a purpose. The main reasons I still use a screen saver are for privacy, through locking my computer whenever a screen saver comes up, and for aesthetic reasons. The latter is what I will be discussing here, and my favorite screen saver for aesthetic reasons is Electric Sheep.

Electric Sheep is an open source screen saver that is ever changing, and more importantly, ever adapting. It started as just a few video files, but through user ratings, evolution, and individual creations has grown to include a library of thousands of “sheep.” Sheep is the term used for each individual video file, while a flock is a group of video files you can get all at one time.

The best aspect of Electric Sheep is that your sheep evolve over time. Users can rate whether they like or dislike the current sheep that is playing with a simple press of the up or down arrow. This rating is taken into account when the computer, or more specifically everyone’s computers (Electric Sheep takes advantage of your computer’s downtime to run small computations instead of only using in-house servers), to take the higher rated sheep and breed them together. Through the magic of torrents, your computer also uses its downtime to constantly download small bits of the new sheep that are always being produced, thus you are provided with new and beautiful screen savers all the time.

I think I’ve missed the most important aspect of Electric Sheep while explaining all this technical stuff; Electric Sheep is absolutely beautiful. The videos that play are entrancing, dynamic, and vividly colored. I honestly have never seen anything like it before. The picture above is a single frame of a single video. As good as it looks up there, it can’t even compare to how it moves in video form, which I am lucky enough to have playing on my laptop currently.

Electric Sheep is free, open source, and cross platform. One suggestion I have is to download a mega-pack of sheep with your initial download, as the screen saver does not come with any videos at first. If you do not want to download a separate pack, it may take a few hours for sheep to start since they need to download, so let the screen saver run overnight so you will have beautiful sheep to wake up to in the morning.