MySQL GUI Tools (Query Browser, Administrator) for Fedora 13

In Fedora Linux, the mysql-gui-tools package provides the graphical (or GUI) clients to query and administer a MySQL database – useful alternatives to the command line client.

While I’m very comfortable with the mysql command line client, I do switch to the GUI query browser to add/edit stored procedures/functions.

“yum install mysql-gui-tools” was the simplest command to install the GUI tools for MySQL in Fedora Linux. But in Fedora 13, this results in “No package mysql-gui-tools available”.

So what happened here?

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Drupal Views: Hide or display alternate text for 0 (zero) comments

I have been playing with Drupal Views extensively for the last three months for a Website project. Whenever I overcome a hurdle with Views, I end up realizing how powerful and flexible is the Views module. It is just me who doesn’t know all the syntax to tap it’s power. Here is one such example. With about four lines of code, I was able to get rid of an annoyance in an otherwise neat-looking View.

For the Website project, I built a View to show the recent blog posts along with their title, author, post date and the number of comments. All looked fine expect the comments. It pinched me to see “0 comments”, in the View, against the posts, which did not have a comment. Read the rest of this entry »

Firefox 3.5 (Final) on Fedora 11

Firefox 3.5, the final release, has made its debut and is ready for download from here. Typically (and unfortunately) it may take about a day or two for Firefox 3.5 final to appear in the Fedora 11 repositories and across all the mirrors. When it appears, upgrading from the current version (Beta 4) of FireFox to the final release would be a matter of issuing ‘yum install firefox’. But we may not have to wait! Read the rest of this entry »

Fedora X

How things change while on the move! I had been hitting the Fedora site constantly for the Fedora 10 download – last at around 20:30 hrs IST from a client’s office. While driving back, about 30 mins away from home, I checked the site on my Windows Mobile (ironic?) and I spotted “Fedora 10″ written all over the site. Rushed home at double speed.

Fired the torrent as well as direct download. The latter because, saw only one peer @ 98.7% download. Let’s see who, direct or the torrent download, wins the race on my 2 Mbps connection at home. The torrent download is not giving me more than 3KBps whereas the direct download is dicey and swinging – at times from about 260 KBps to 40 KBps

Once downloaded I have to start thinking about backing up my laptop running Fedora 9 and installing the 10. This may happen tonight, if sleep does not take over the X.

Will update this post as I sail to X from IX.

And now (Nov 27, 2008 @ 16:30 IST), my laptop runs Fedora 10 Continuing to write from Fedora 10, about it. Following is the first glimpse, with the noteworthy new wallpaper,  of Fedora 10’s desktop, after the installation:

Fedora 10 Desktop

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Chromified Firefox

In a half an hour attempt to make Firefox look like Google Chrome with some similar functionality, I achieved the following:

Online storage for Linux

I was looking for an online storage:

• Which can work on Linux (on my Fedora 9 laptop)
• Using which backing up files is quick – as easy as drag-n-drop or copy-n-paste (else I will be lazy to back up)
• Free
• Atleast a GB of space (if not more)

Optionally:

• To be able to access the files from anywhere
• To be able access the files using my laptop, home desktop and office desktop running Windows/Linux
• Offline access to files (for those rare occasions when I’m not connected to the Internet)

I checked out Xdrive, Adrive, Gmail Drive and Live Mesh but none of these fit my mandatory requirements. Xdrive and Live Mesh are Windows only. Adrive’s WebDav access is paid. Gmail Drive (tried using fuse-gmailfs on Fedora) was erratic.

The solution that worked for me was Dropbox – 2 GB free space, works on Linux and drag-n-drop online storage. Dropbox is also available for Windows and Mac OS, besides Linux Read the rest of this entry »

Fennec – Firefox for mobiles

We love Firefox on our desktops and now there is Firefox for our mobiles – called Fennec. Fennec is a web browser for mobiles (phones, PDAs and small screen tablets) released by Mozilla. As of this writing, it is in Alpha 1.

Fennec Alpha 1 is available only for Nokia N810 tablets running Maemo. But I own a Windows Mobile. Fortunately, Fennec is downloadable for Windows, Linux and Mac desktops – for users (like me) to see its glimpse, test it and give feedback.

I downloaded the Linux version from here. Extracted the archive (tar -jxvf fennec-1.0a1.en-US.linux-i686.tar.bz2). This produced a directory named fennec.  Changed to this directory and launched Fennec by issuing ./fennec.

Fennec - The first launch

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Open Office 2007 files in Linux

Occasionally (or often), when one sends you Office 2007 files (docx, xlsx, pptx) and you are using OpenOffice, you wonder how to open it?  I can suggest, my tried and tested solution on OpenOffice, on Linux.

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Clipart for OpenOffice Draw

The closest  to Visio in Linux is OpenOffice Draw. This is, going by the convention that a diagram tool is an integral part of an office or productivity suite.

I have myself done two comprehensive SRS (System Requirement Specification) documents – about 50 pages in length and full of UI diagrams – using OpenOffice Draw. The connectors, the basic shapes and  numerous the export options (or file formats) are all indispensable. But what was missing was a clipart of common shapes and elements.

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Open source alternatives to Microsoft Products

Here is a list – based on my own compilation and personal xp (experience). Does not mean a feature comparison, which is better which is not and definitely not, Open Source vs Microsoft. Just a list, a mere informative list, to start looking:

• Microsoft Biztalk: Jitterbit
• Microsoft Commerce Server: osCommerce
• Microsoft Dynamics CRM: SugarCRM
• Microsoft Exchange Server: Zimbra
• Microsoft Office SharePoint Server: Alfresco