zero0w

Just want to report that Mplayer 0.9 RC4 + mplayer mozilla plugin 0.40 truly rocks :D . I can enjoy the Quick Time Movie like I did on Windows (including streaming QuickTime!). Can't wait for Mplayer 0.9 final. :)

A new version of Blender, an open source 3D model & animation toolkit, has been released! Blender 2.26 http://www.blender.org/ http://www.blender3d.org/ For the feature update and bug fixes please see the release notes.

Thanks for the suggestion Lin! As feedback to your suggestion, I think some of them are answered in the Linux On Desktop article - better than I can :P . Also I didn't cover those stuff that are already installed with Mandrake by default (such as KDevelop, XChat, gFTP, etc....). So yes, most Linux users and newcomers will still have a lot of room to experiment and play with besides those toolkit/software mentioned here in the article. I just covered those which are not installed/coming with Mandrake 9 CD as I knew of in an integrated piece altogether. As you might notice, I did not talk about any server side stuff, as I think there are better articles out there and also my interest for now is mostly on the Linux desktop. Interesting Linux development is coming in 2003, and that will be the focus of the second part of the article (still coming :D ...), plus the Linux resource guide on the internet.

LinuxWorld has a new article on how to make MySQL work with Open Office: Trail of tears: MySQL, ODBC & OpenOffice 1.0 http://www.linuxworld.com/2003/0207.barr.html EDIT: I seem to run into dependency conflict with MySQL-share-*.*.rpm.... It seems Mandrake does not have such package in their cooker/contribs repository, could someone voice the need for such package in the Mandrake Club or Cooker mailing list?

Just as a reminder, there's also a full install Win32 version released, for your friends who are still using Windows to try out. I think it's time to introduce open source to more people as well as artists :) .

sodipodi 0.30 is released, this time the release is mostly for bug-fixing.

The book "Linux in the Workplace" will be released under GNU FDL license and freely available online after Feb 15, 2003. For more detail you can check out the news at Desktoplinux.com: http://www.desktoplinux.com/news/NS1998414155.html Time to have Linux desktop at your workplace :D . Also there are many desktop improvements made or coming on Linux. I will describe more in the follow-up of the article in the sticky thread. * Go back writing article * :o

Just try the Demo, very nice. I can beat Level 24 but still stuck with Level 12 :P . Interesting game :) . The Cell shading technique is well used.

9.1 will have a PPC version, as I remembered.

sodipodi 0.29 is released! This and future versions will be based on GTK-2.0+ instead of GTK-1.2+. Also MDK rpm is available, you can check out the sourceforge site. Enjoy!

Again, can't blow the surprise, check out the link: > here <. :D

China is very strong and determined to get a national distro; curiously I think Taiwan will stick with MDK (RedHat apparently removed the Taiwan national flag and upset a lot of Taiwanese...) and other established one. Maybe Taiwan will decide to create a local distro, eventually. In Hong Kong, there're distro such as Thiz Linux and Chinese 2000, but for now I will stick with MDK until I learn more about Linux :o .

You can download the demo here: http://www.3dgamers.com/games/returnwolfenstein/

I got them last night, runs fine, now i just have to figure out the weird interface :) Good luck with that. :D Try Wings3D as well, you can look for more info at the Sticky thread I posted at 'Everything Linux' forum.

China is moving in, but here at Hong Kong the media and general public are still slow to react (thanks partially, to the cost(less) of bootlegged Windoze & widespread of warez....). Of course, me and my sister have moved to all Linux - with those resources I posted in the sticky post. At another day I convinced my sister to compose MIDI using Rosegarden-4 and to her surprise, it really worked right after installation. Of course there are some bugs around here and there but I am sure the developers will solve them out sooner or later :D . Originally, I was hoping Linux/BSD/open source will provide more choices for every one of us. But it seems that the media/MPAA/RIAA and MS are joining forces on regulating users on how to use their computers. I am afraid other than technical, open source will be moving into the political realm - an unfortunate happening, but still we have to face it. Anyway, I really hope it will take root in South Africa and other parts of the world. It's really interesting to see if US will be slower than the rest of the world in this new tide of technological (as well as social) innovation of software movement. If history is any guide, breaking monopoly and restoring competition will help to create better products, services and knowledge for the society - many of us should benefit from it.

I just download the Linux binaries from www.blender.org and run them anywhere I like.

Thank you thac for making those rpms available :) . To the Rosegarden developers: (http://www.all-day-breakfast.com/rosegarden/) Today I convinced my sister to try Rosegarden-4 on Mandrake Linux. To her surprise, everything worked right after installation. She connected the MIDI keyboard to the SB Audigy soundcard. After loading soundfont with sfxload, she played a VGM (FF X) score with the MIDI keyboard, and Rosegarden recorded perfectly what she just played! Now she can work on composing her songs without booting back into Windows. Here, I just want to say: You guys rock! My deep gratitude and thank you to you all. It is fine work such as yours that makes open source and Linux meaningful. -zero0w

Thanks ump & ramfree17 :D . I have updated the article using the feedback I've received so far. Thanks everyone. I hope more articles like this one will show that Linux On the Desktop is ready in 2003 for daily use. Also Mandrake has really made it easy for us by providing many ready-to-install rpms: which are created by the staff from the company, the Club members, and other volunteers. I hope Mandrake will make it thru her financial trouble and live on so we can continue to enjoy using one of the best distributions out there. :o

Thanks for the link to the WINE daily rpm build. :)

Thanks, Falcdragon & breser. I will add them to the article later, plus some other changes.

It is, isn't it? LOL

blackstripe, you finally arrived :) . Welcome to MandrakeUsers Board.

Someone ports it to Linux please :D Here's the link to the news: http://www.osnews.com/comment.php?news_id=2555 Also, > WaterRace Screenshot > WaterRace Mac OS 8/9 Source Code The game looks really nice.

Illegal operations..... wait I thought it should be segfault on Linux :P .

Flash 6 for Linux plugin is available here: http://macromedia.mplug.org/