Free Culture Forum @ Barcelona 29/10-1/11
YEAH!!! At last an open source event and it’s a big one, the Free Culture Forum . I can’t wait to go! It will concern mainly freedom of knowledge, digital rights etc. I also want to attend the participation of Richard Stallman through videoconference. I missed the Software Freedom Day here in Barcelona, I will not miss this one!
Athens Digital Week 2009
OK. Today’s post will also have some Greek as it concerns a big technology festival in Athens, Athens Digital Week, at which I participated last year with Fedora. Actually I think it was the first time I participated somewhere as a Fedora Ambassador. It also has an open source section thus last year we had Max Spevack’s talk!
Ζηλεύω πάρα πολύ τα παιδιά που θα συμμετάσχουν καθώς είναι μια πολύ ωραία εμπειρία. Δεν μπορώ να ξεχάσω πόσο ωραία ήταν πέρσυ, με την συμμέτοχή του Fedora στο φεστιβάλ. Μιλάγαμε συνεχώς στον κόσμο, πχ η φωνή του Πιέρρου έκλεισε (μάλλον είμαι φτιαγμένος για να μιλάω πολύ) αλλά η κούραση που νιώθαμε στο τέλος ήταν γλυκιά, ήταν από κάτι που θέλαμε να κάνουμε και όσο το κάναμε νιώθαμε την ανταμοιβή.
Πλέον ως πιο εμπειρος Ambassador θα μπορούσα να βοηθήσω ακόμη πιο πολύ αλλα δυστυχώς είναι λίγο δύσκολο από την Barcelona. Ψάχνω απεγνοσμένα για κάποιο event εδώ, ώστε να βοηθήσω. Είναι δύσκολο να οργανώσω κάτι ο ίδιος διότι δεν γνωρίζω Καταλανικά αλλά και τα Ισπανικά μου δεν θα βοηθούσαν σε κάτι που απαιτεί συνεχή ομιλία.
At the previous paragraph I mention that I would be interested to help as much as I can (I have brought some Fedora and Fedora Electronic lab leaflets with me) in organizing an event here in Barcelona. I don’t speak catalan and my castellano are not the best, but I would love to participate (and also speak in English, not all people in Barcelona are locals).
And something out of topic, here are some pictures from the peaceful-interesting-beautiful Valencia :
http://www.flickr.com/photos/constanton/sets/72157622449169847/
Education for everyone!
Have I ever told you that I love the internet? I have already told you about academicearth.org , but I just discovered something that is really worth being on your bookmarks. Youtube EDU : http://www.youtube.com/education?b=1 . I found it from openculture.com (for the latter you should subscribe to RSS).
Youtube is full of channels of universities (200 colleges and universities ->40.000 videos)
Not exactly what I expected to see…(2)
Almost a month here in Barcelona (in 4 days to be precise!)…Anyway, I will be quick. In a previous post there is an picture of a fire extinguisher called “UNIX”. On this post, let me show you my new find!Yes, another fire extinguisher…I think someone is doing this to me on purpose!
Yeah, it says “FIREFOX”…it’s cooler than Unix as it’s open source…but I like them both (?). Anyway. If I find a third one, I’ll let you all know. A friend of mine told me that I should find matchboxes with names like “Apple” or “MS” etc (yes this illustrates an obvious point). I don’t want to find anything of these, they just come to me! Hahaha…
Use your Nokia cellphone for presentations
Today I didn’t have many things to do (“You have to do the laundry” sais the little angel on my right shoulder, “Yeah…Whatever” says the little devil on my left) so I checked out what Google has to offer me (as a Fedora user) now that I am at the mercy of the internet. I checked out Picasa, Google Reader, Google Desktop and amora (not a google app). I am sure you are familiar with the 3 first ones. But the last one may not ring you any bell…If you own a Nokia cellphone actually, you should know it (and yes, I allow you to check the link before you finish reading this post 
). I own a Nokia N82, and amora offers me the means to controll my computer via my mobile’s keyboard (mostly for presentations though).
To install amora I also had to install Python for S60 first (for N82 I found this one and works fine). It’s so cool! I tried it with OOo Impress and works great! I can’t wait to use it!
To install any google application on fedora you have to follow this guide : first configure the rpm key and then configure yum .
By the way I couldn’t launch picasa because I have to intsall the 32-bit openssl package! damn…Not in the mood to fix it 
Google Reader works fine (also Google Reader notifier) . ActualIy, I was using the RSS plugin for Evolution, which is not bad, but now I don’t have to wait for all the feeds to get updated to read my mail properly.
Google Desktop? I don’t think I will ever use it as Firefox is open as long as my notebook is switched on.
edit : amora is simply hosted inside google-code (I didn’t make that clear enough). It was implemented by Adenilson Cavalcanti a developer from “Instituto Nokia de Tecnologia” (Nokia Institute of Technology – Brazil).(thanks to Ademar)
Not exactly what I expected to see…
Not much to say about it…I saw it here at FIB (Facultat de Informatica de Barcelona) at the UPC. OK! It’s a faculty of Informatics…not so unexpected maybe!!! I hope they will upgrade to Linux! hahaha
(Imagine a scene with a trapped person inside the building using the fire extinguisher (yes the UNIX one) to brake a window(s)…quite cool picture eh? hahaha)
My 1st ERASMUS post…about time.
It has been 13 days I am here in Barcelona and I have already attended the sessions of the orientation week at the UPC. Well, Barcelona…It ’s really an amazing city. I can’t wait to meet and get to know better with even more people at the university (or even not only there) .The weather the first 9 days has been more than great. Now, autumn tries to make us notice its presence with some rain every now and then.
I have met lots of people from Italy, people from France, even greek and cypriot students…great guys all of them. I believe I will also make more contact with locals soon. I try to improve my castellano, but now I also see the need to learn català ( I will take courses actually)! I believe it will be most confusing, but I am sure that castellano will be sufficient enough for the school. I will also apply for classes of català at the university. I have 3 courses in english and 2 in català. I have attended one lesson for each course, I must admit that when the professor is talking in català I understand very few words, so I have to pay attention to the blackboard and the slides.
The quality and quantity of the infrastructure here at the UPC is more than I could imagine. It’s a paradise.
And now…for something that I am really happy about. I am officially a member of FC Barcelona and I have acquired 3 tickets for matches with Atletico Madrid, Mallorca and Villareal !!!
Anyway my photoset is here (it will be updated from time to time) :
http://www.flickr.com/photos/constanton/sets/72157622385493308/
I’m flying with Firefox
Well, first of all, my find-something-bad-to-make-you-downgrade period for Fedora 11 is over and the results are as expected…using my computer on daily bases is a procedure that leveled up. But the beauty of it is that you know you are using free software. Software that is shared to you and belongs to you thanks to other people that believe in freedom. And then you say “hey! maybe I should contribute” because that’s your way to say thank you and learn stuff. That’s how I feel to be honest. So, just because I use Firefox every day for many hours, I decided to say thanks this time by contributing as a Test Pilot . OK, I admit that I am also curious to see how this whole thing is going to work. I also can’t hide that I want to be a package maintainer for Fedora, but I have lots in my mind right now.
Furthermore, the last 3 days I try to focus on wireless sensor networks which of course means my familiarization with TinyOS and other technologies which are extremely cool. There is the need of great effort from my part though. Anyway, networks ,electronics and applications that can be used for HCI …no need to ask for more
I almost forgot CHECK THIS OUT: academicearth.org when I first saw it I tried not to behave like the men at the recent Heineken commercial (cheering like crazy). Thanks Christos!
Χωρίς λογική και ανθρωπιά ο νόμος είναι δώρο…άδωρον
Ναι το post αυτό αφορά το κάπνισμα και την απαγόρευσή του σε δημόσιους και ιδιωτικούς κλειστούς χώρους κτλ.
Δεν είμαι καπνιστής και δεν γνωρίζω την στέρηση του τσιγάρου. Δεν έχω μπει καν στον κόπο να δοκιμάσω. Δεν με ενδιαφέρει κι όλας αν κάποιος έχει αυτή τη στέρηση. Με ενδιαφέρει η υγεία μου και η υγεία των οικείων και άλλων προσώπων που συμπάσχουν μαζί μου.
Το πρόβλημα είναι απλό. Ένα άτομο έστω, ανάβει ένα τσιγάρο σε έναν κλειστό χώρο και αρχίζει και καπνίζει. Τριγύρω του για κάποιο χρονικό διάστημα έστω ότι υπάρχει ένας μη καπνιστής. Το αποτέλεσμα είναι ο μη καπνιστής να εισπνεύσει τον καπνό του καπνιστή. Ο καπνός αυτός μπορεί να ενοχλεί ή και να μην ενοχλεί. Σίγουρα βλάπτει την υγεία και την θέτει και σε κίνδυνο σε κάποιες περιπτώσεις μακρόχρονης έκθεσης στον καπνό.
Σε αυτό το σημείο να φέρω ένα άλλο παράδειγμα κάπως αντίστοιχο της περίπτωσης που ενοχλεί. Δύο φίλοι συζητάνε σε ένα τραπέζι και ένας άγνωστος ή γνωστός πάει με ένα τεράστιο στερεοφωνικό, βάζει την πιο αντιπαθητική μουσική με την ένταση τέρμα και αφήνει το στερεοφωνικό μπροστά στα μούτρα των 2 φίλων.
Για μένα η μόνη διαφορά με την περίπτωση του τσιγάρου είναι ότι το τσιγάρο μπορεί να βλάψει ανεπανόρθωτα την υγεία του μη καπνιστή (δηλαδή του παθητικού καπνιστή). Αν θες να πεθάνεις κύριε…πέθανε μόνος σου, εμένα δεν με ενδιαφέρει. Δεν σε ξέρω δεν με ξέρεις υποφέρω και υποφέρεις. Αν σε ξέρω δείχνει έλλειψη σεβασμού και μηδενική ντροπή. Μου προσθέτεις (έστω και ασυναίσθητα) ένα επιπλέον πρόβλημα στην ζωή μου. Το ότι το έχεις και εσύ και άλλα τόσα εκατομμύρια δεν αποδικνύει τίποτα.
Έχω βαρεθεί να βλέπω 14χρονα να καπνίζουν φανερά πλέον στους δρόμους. Καλύτερα στα φανερά, αλλά δίχνει πόσο δεν σέβονται την υγεία τους. Ζήστε πιο υγιεινά γιατί χανόμαστε! (και όχι χανόσαστε).
Shock ‘n’ Roll with Firefox 3.5! Go get it…
I’m only 10 minutes late! And here is the post for the Shiretoko Super Shock!
Get some freedom and spread it!
