obso1337.org

Multi-colored KNotes have made my day today.

seele :: Nov.28.2006 :: Asides, Humor :: Comments Off

As mentioned in a previous posting, I am working with some of the Kubuntu devs on creating a graphical user interface for GRUB (Linux bootloader).

The GRUB configuration in /boot/grub/ allows you to do a lot of things, most of them (that I have come up with) are:

• Modify background color
• Set a password
• Select if the menu should be hidden or on
• Change timeout of when to load default OS
• Reorder the list of OSes
• Change which OS should be default
• Add or remove an OS from the display list
• Change the display name of an OS
• Specify the location of the kernel, RAM disk, and filesystem root
• Specify boot parameters for the kernel
• Select if you want the OS to show a splash screen (if applicable)
• Select quiet or verbos OS messages

Currently, if you want to modify any of these options, you edit /boot/grub/menu.lst and reboot. This is a bit scary for non-experienced users (and inconvenient for experienced users) if a syntax error occurs and the user is left to the GRUB command line and their own devices. Besides the fear of immanent danger, some of the configurable options for both are a bit difficult to understand unless you’ve compiled and installed your own kernel before. Then, there are the kernel parameters, which are a whole lot of options to worry about.

Modifying GRUB isn’t an every day thing, and for most users, it may not even be necessary to modify it after new kernel installations. However it is necessary at some point otherwise there wouldn’t be a need for an interface.

Let’s think about some people who would modify GRUB:

• Users who want to tweak the behavior and look of the GRUB menu
• Users installing a new kernel (manually or via package which does not update GRUB)
• Users who have installed a new operating system
• Users who are tweaking the kernel and want to update boot parameters
• … any others?

Finding out more about who and why a GRUB configuration would be modified is a beginning step to creating a usable user interface.

My questions for the community are:

• If you ever have had to manually modify GRUB, what did you change?
• What kernel options do you have configured for your boot entries?
• Which of those options did you manually change, rather than accept the generated defaults?
• In your opinion, what is the most difficult thing to know or understand about GRUB?

It would also be great if you have experience configuring a GRUB configuration for a non-technical user, what are the things you updated in that situation, and how are they different than your personal GRUB experiences?

seele :: Nov.22.2006 :: General, Open Source :: 33 Comments »

C|Net has posted some kind of list of top 10 geek girls. WTF is Paris Hilton doing on there? Did they really have a hard time finding a cool geek woman that they had to to fill it with Lisa Simpson? Is mentioning geek and chick in the same article really so hot that they just threw something together to generate some hits? Gah.. it’s not even entertaining..

seele :: Nov.22.2006 :: Asides, Geek, Humor :: Comments Off

Are you a design student interested in contributing to an open source project? Here is your chance! OpenUsability is sponsoring their Season of Usability, an opportunity for students to participate in an interesting open source project with the aid of design and technical mentors. OpenUsability is a world-wide non-profit organization based in Germany whose mission is to bring usability and open source together.

These projects are mentored by professionals in the industry who are also very involved in open source. If accepted, these projects are structured enough and provide enough work to fulfill most independent study requirements. Additionally, students receive a $700USD stipend for their time which is a good amount to cover university fees.

~ Release from OpenUsability.org 20 Nov 2006 ~

Season of Usability 2006/2007 is part of a series of sponsored student projects to encourage students of usability, user-interface design, and interaction design to get involved with Freee/Libre/Open-Source Software (FLOSS) projects. FLOSS offers an excellent way to gain experience in the interdisciplinary and collaborative development of user interface solutions in international software projects.

During a three-month cooperation, you will closely work together with experienced professionals and get insights in to their way of work. Depending on your location, you will be invited to a meeting with the development and usability team. Otherwise the collaboration will take place via the established channels of OSS development - email, IRC, VoIP, and etc.

Season of Usability projects are sponsored with $700USD. An involvement of 15 hours per week is expected. The sponsorship will be paid after the successful accomplishment of the project goals.

For more information visit http://www.openusability.org/season/0607/

seele :: Nov.20.2006 :: Academics, Asides, Design, Open Source :: Comments Off

From the do-not-try-this-at-home department:

Some Friday afternoon humor with Will It Blend?

seele :: Nov.17.2006 :: Asides, Humor :: Comments Off