Five Watt Web Server

Calxeda has 5 watt web server based on the EnergyCore ECX-1000 1.1GHz processor. Compared to Intel’s 3.3GHz Xeon E3-1240, the results were surprising according to ZDNet.

This makes the Calxeda SOC (Server on a chip) ARM hardware 15 times more power-efficient that Intel’s hardware. According to Calxeda, this translates into a 77 percent reduction of overall total cost of ownership over three years.

And CPU performance is quite acceptable.

While the EnergyCore ECX-1000 is not as powerful as the Xeon E3-1240 — with it only able to handle 5,500 requests per second compared to 6,950 for the Intel hardware — it manages this performance while consuming a little over 5 watts, compared to over 100 watts for the Intel processor.

Multiply a thousand times, you see the potential savings.

Twitter’s New Bird Logo

Twitter recently released a new bird logo. What do you think? From the Twitter blog, “starting today you’ll begin to notice a simplified Twitter bird. From now on, this bird will be the universally recognizable symbol of Twitter. (Twitter is the bird, the bird is Twitter.) There’s no longer a need for text, bubbled typefaces, or a lowercase “t” to represent Twitter.”

Linux Helicopter Drones

The US Navy just signed a $34 million dollar contract with Raytheon, to convert and install, up to 168 (VTOLs) vertical take-off and landing drones, from Windows-based to Linux-based drones.

The VTOL drone model is called MQ-8B, which are already used in Africa, Libya and Afghanistan. The Navy did not elaborate the reasons for the switch. Let me take a wild guess. It’s probably about security and stability.

This is a great win for Linux.

Mac OS Mountain Lion

Apple announced today, the Mac OS X Mountain Lion is due to ship in July for just $19.99. That’s about the same as 5 Starbucks lattes. The new OS will bring in a slew of applications and features available on the iPad and iPhone to the Mac.

Some of the new features will include “dictation, a Power Nap feature which updates your streams while the Mac sleeps and a tabview feature associated with the Safari browser, which allows you to zoom in and out. It will also get deeper integration with iCloud” according to Mashable.

Finally, here’s a video of the new features of the Mac OS Mountain Lion.

ProFTP Mod Vroot

I recently upgraded my personal server at home to Ubuntu 12.04 LTS. A day later, I realized the ProFTP server is no longer working. I’m not able to login at all. So, I restarted the ProFTP daemon and I was getting an error that says:

Fatal: LoadModule: error loading module ‘mod_vroot.c’: Operation not permitted on line 74 of ‘/etc/proftpd/modules.conf’

The ProFTP mod_vroot module was not required in previous Ubuntu versions. When I upgraded to Ubuntu Server 12.04 LTS, it was displaying an error because the mod_vroot was not installed. To fix the problem, I just needed to open the Terminal and install the ProFTP mod_vroot module.

$ sudo apt-get install proftp-mod-vroot

In case you are wondering, the mod_vroot module implements a virtual chroot capability that does not require root privileges. The mod_vroot module provides this capability by using ProFTPD’s FS API. It also allows one to map a directory out of the user chroot as an alias in the chroot for sharing common directories.

In case, you have the same issue, this is an easy fix.

Fedora 17 Now Available

Fedora 17 also known as “Beefy Miracle” is a collection of software and an operating system based on the Linux kernel. Some of the highlights of Fedora 17 are: GNOME 3.4 and KDE 4.8, OpenStack, Eucalyptus and Open Nebula, ICC profiles for color printing and an improved gimp, and virtualization improvements.

64 bit is now the default when downloading Fedora 17. If you want to download the 32 bit version, you can still do so by clicking the “more download options.” The minimum RAM requirement to run Fedora is 768MB in text mode, and 1GB RAM with a graphical environment. In addition, you will also need at least 9GB of disk space.

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The Perfect Desktop Linux Mint 13 Maya

If you’re looking for a perfect desktop installation based on Linux Mint 13 “Maya”, check out the installation instructions at How To Forge “Linux Tutorials.” You’ll find detailed instructions how to install Linux Mint 13 along with screenshots. The list of applications is comprehensive. Give it a try.

Linux Mint 13 Maya

Linux Mint 13 “Maya” is now available. It comes in two desktop editions. You can choose either Mate 1.2 or Cinnamon 1.4 desktop. Linux Mint 13 is based on Ubuntu 12.04 LTS meaning it’s also LTS. It will be supported for 5 years until April 2017. In addition to the desktop environments, Linux Mint 13 is also available on 32-bit and 64-bit processors. Get Linux Mint 13 today.

Ubuntu One On KDE

Ubuntu One is now on KDE. Ubuntu One is Ubuntu’s Linux cloud storage. Ubuntu One has been around for a couple of years, but it runs mostly on Gnome, the default desktop environment for Ubuntu. KDE on the other hand, used on Kubuntu, didn’t support Ubuntu One. Until now.

Kindle Cloud Reader on Ubuntu

Amazon has Kindle eBooks for both Windows and the Mac OS. With Kindle eBooks, users are able to access purchased books for the Kindle to be read from a Windows or Mac OS computer without a need for a Kindle device.

What about Linux users? Don’t fret. Although there is no Kindle eBooks application for Linux, users can still go directly to the Kindle Cloud Reader to access their books. Just hop to https://read.amazon.com, and login with your Amazon Kindle credentials.

You can now access and read your books directly from any of the popular browsers. It’s that simple. Kindle Cloud Reader even gives you the option to download the file to your computer for offline reading.

Kindle Cloud Reader works in any platform, not just Linux. It works in Windows, Mac and just about any flavor of Linux. Kindle Cloud Reader really is an incredible tool because you have access to your Kindle books anywhere.

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