Ubuntu Feisty Fawn is approaching end of life support

Important announcement!

Those who are still using Ubuntu 7.04 (Feisty Fawn) are advised to upgrade their distribution to later releases as it approaches end-of-life support, this October.

What is end-of-life ?
End of life means that the time where a product is no longer supported by its vendor. In case of Ubuntu 7.04 (Feisty Fawn), it will no longer receive security updates and patches. Normally this would not cause problem to desktop computer, but if you are advised to patch your system as regularly as you can if you are connected to the internet to prevent malicious user from accessing your pc.

Curious about how long other Ubuntu releases are being supported? you can refer here : Ubuntu Releases and end of life date

How to convert OpenXML docx files to OpenDocument odf in Windows and vice versa

This guide might be a little different from the others because I write this for the Windows users. Here’s how to convert Microsoft OpenXML docx files to odf OpenDocument files (and vice versa) in Windows using only commandline :

  • First, make sure you downloaded odf-converter tool and copy it to appropriate folder.
  • Convert the files(s) using this command line :
    odfconverter /I filename.pptx
    and the tool will perform the conversion effortlessly.
  • You can use this command to convert multiple files :
    odfconverter /BATCH-DOCX /I c:\newfiles\

    replace /BATCH-DOCX with /BATCH-PPTX, /BATCH-XLSX, /BATCH-ODF, /BATCH-ODP if necessary.

Odfconverter also supports converting Open Document files (ODF, ODP, ODT) to OpenXML files (PPTX,DOCX,XLSX) making it a handy tool to use.

Why odfconverter?
Odfconverter is a (relatively) small and compact standalone tool for converting Office 2007 files to their OpenDocument counterpart. The convenient batch mode conversion makes it attractive tool to use when converting multiple files between the two formats.

The only downside with this converter is that it does not convert mathematical formula pretty well compared to other features.

[Source OOOninja]

How to install *.rpm in Ubuntu / Debian based operating system

There are times when you need to install an application that is only available in *.rpm package in Debian GNU/Linux or Ubuntu operating system. One of the main obstacles is that Debian / Ubuntu are using *.deb based packaging system which is incompatible with RPM.

However you can easily convert RPM package to *.deb and install it afterwards, here’s how to do it :

  • Install alien, its available in Debian, Ubuntu repository
  • Convert rpm package using command “sudo alien -k some-binary-package.rpm”
  • Install it using this command “sudo dpkg -i some-binary-package.deb

That’s all about it! Have fun installing application in your application.

Subscribed to Linux Hater’s Blog : Funny and hillarious blog

After discovering Linux Hater’s blog from Google Reader and Technorati, I decided to subscribe it as it was a funny and hillarious blog. It make fun of people who are using Linux for the wrong reasons (such as trying to act cool) and how some things in Linux are not better than any other operating system.

Linux Tux Logo

Other than that, it contains criticism of the Linux community in general, mainly directed towards fanboys and developers, although one can easily surmise that the author himself is a Linux user who has experience in writing applications, and presumably using a Debian-derived Linux distro.

Well I might be wrong, but Linux Haters Blog is a must read if you are a Linux user yourself because it offer insights of the overall of how GNU/Linux operating system compare to other OS and what would make Linux a better OS

ImageMagick thumbnailer scripts for blog

Hey there, I’d like to share my dirt-easy script for creating thumbnail in blog post. The script will scale any image to the width of 456pixels which I find acceptable by most blog theme (actually the limit is around 460-465 pixel, but better be safe).

Why I wrote yet another script for scaling images? because I find blogger.com and WordPress system of uploading images and photo annoys me, and I rather upload my pictures/photos on my own private server and create thumbnails on my own.

I licensed the download under WTFPL , don’t worry its a free software license.

Download : thumbnailer.sh

Enable Network Printer Sharing with Ubuntu Linux computers

Having a shared printer within a computer network is a nice thing to have. Since all computers within the network can access a remote printer to print documents. Maintenance cost is much more cheaper and easier since you only need to service only a single printer within a network.

Here’s how to enable Printer sharing with Ubuntu (or other Linux based computers) through GNOME :

At the computer with the printer

Administer Printers Ubuntu
  • First at the Desktop, go to System->Administration->Printing. A dialog will appear
  • Go to Server Settings, and check the “Share published printers connected to this system” checkbox

    Administer Printers Ubuntu

  • You may, optionally select “Allow users to cancel any job”
  • Click Apply, and close the dialog

At the client computer(s)

Network Printer Sharing Ubuntu, using Samba

  • From the Desktop, go to System->Administration->Printing. A dialog will appear
  • Check “Show shared printers from other systems” checkbox. Click Apply
  • Repeat the first step, this time click “Refresh Printer Queues” button. You shall see the list of shared printer from the server computer
  • Repeat this on other computers on the network to share the printer

That is all to it! Now you can print documents across your computer network.