My small contribution to the day was a lunchtime presentation on using Linux for back office stuff like web servers, mail servers, networking, etc. It’s a very general overview of the popular projects and tools out there for Linux. It’s mainly intended as a starting place for people looking to install a new service on a Linux platform. The slides from my talk are below.

The post is based on Aaron Swartz’s rant against OCLC and WorldCat.  It is, however, a valid rant.  Libraries have tolerated OCLC’s “less than open” practices because there wasn’t much alternative.  Now that open alternatives such as Open Library and ‡biblios.net are growing, it will be interesting to see what happens.  With the growing popularity of open source in libraries, having open records and open cataloging will be very important.

Linux penguins are suspected of sabotaging the vessel.

As busy as I am, I’ve still found time to play around with Mozilla’s Prism browser. I really shouldn’t call it a browser since it’s not intended for browsing the Web. The Mozilla site describes it best: “Prism is an application that lets users split web applications out of their browser and run them directly on their desktop.” The idea is that as more applications move to the web, people will want a way to use those apps outside of their web browser. Prism is essentially a bare-bones browser intended to view a single website (web app). There are practically no bells or whistles like tabs, bookmarks, or customizations. Users create shortcuts on their computer that allow them to launch a web application just like any other application on their computer.

I was drawn to Prism by my own extensive use of web apps. When I launch Firefox, I have tabs automatically open for sites like Remember the Milk, Gmail, Google Reader, and Google Calendar. Should I have to keep those tabs open in Firefox all day and keep track of them among the other sites I visit? Would it be better to launch a web app from the desktop or from Firefox’s bookmarks? Intrigued by the idea of moving those apps to their own windows, I started using Prism for many of my applications.

While the concept of Prism is promising, it was a much different experience in practice. I found myself longing for many features that I had become accustomed to in Firefox. There is no find as you type in Prism. I never realized how much I use that feature. Many web apps offer their own integrated search, but it’s just so easy to hit the ‘/’ key and start typing search terms. I also miss the ability to easily adjust font sizes. Pressing Ctrl++ has no effect in Prism. Apparently Prism does have some support for extensions, but these must be loaded for each web app individually. Some extensions like Google Gears are not supported at all right now. I don’t use Gears much, but I like having it available for Remember the Milk and Google Reader if I want to use them off line.

Again, I think that Prism has a lot of promise. It has a lower memory footprint than Firefox and it’s nice to see the different applications showing up on my task bar instead of my browser tabs. Libraries may eventually find a use for Prism as a nice kiosk browser. It’s really easy to lock it down since it doesn’t have many features or menus. My problem is that I’m just too used to living in my web browser. Firefox is the only application that I always have open. Granted, if I used Prism I probably wouldn’t need Firefox open all the time. I guess old habits are hard to break.

I’ve also been playing around with Amazon’s Simple Storage Service (S3). For about a year now, Amazon has been offering a remote storage service with unlimited capacity. The storage and data transfer costs are cheap enough that S3 can serve as a nice off-site backup option. The catch is that the storage is made available only as a web service. If you want to store or retrieve data, you must write your own interface or use a third-party tool. Some of the tools are free while others are commercial. Jeremy Zawodny has a nice list of tools available for S3.

I started playing around with some of the tools to see which might work well for backing up our files at home. I started with Jungledisk since it is one of the more popular offerings and it’s cross-platform. With Jungledisk, I can mount a “bucket” on S3 just as if it were a drive on my computer. Unfortunately, Jungledisk kept failing on me for larger files. I don’t know if it’s a problem with just the Linux clients or what, but it just wasn’t reliable enough for me as a backup solution. I eventually tried S3sync and that seems to be working out well. It acts like the *nix utility ‘rsync’ and only transfers new and updated files to S3. That saves on transfer costs and time. Using a tutorial I found on automating backups with S3sync, I was able to set up automatic backups for our home server. I’m still getting some odd errors at time and apparently there are some bugs with the S3 service itself, but overall it’s a promising solution for disaster-proofing your data.

So the point is that even though I’m buried in projects at work, I’m still trying to find time to play with newer technologies. Playing with cutting-edge stuff doesn’t always pan out, but every now and then you find a gem.

ColorZilla

This extension puts a little eye dropper tool in the lower-left corner of the browser. Clicking on the dropper and then on the web page gives you the RGB or Hex code of the color at that spot. You can also copy the code to the clipboard to be pasted into a style sheet, etc. I use this one a lot. It’s simple, but very useful.

Dummy Lipsom

I don’t use this as much as I should, but that’s because I often forget about it. It allows you to quickly fill in form fields with dummy Lorem Ipsum text. That way, you can quickly test a form without having to fill it out by hand. If you use a CMS, you can also use this to quickly create body text for a page.

Firebug

If I had to pick only two extensions, Firebug would be one of them. It sits as an icon on the bottom status bar until needed. It’s great for debugging JavaScript code, but I don’t do a whole lot of that. For me, the best feature is being able to click anywhere on the web page and seeing in real time what HTML and CSS is code is involved in that spot. Firebug also allows you to edit code and see the effects in real time.

HTML Validator

This extension is simple, but valuable. It validates web pages in the background and displays a check mark in the status bar. When viewing HTML source, it highlights the lines that are causing validation errors. It’s great for ongoing monitoring of a web site.

IE View Lite

Another simple extension. Load a page in Firefox, right-click on the page, click on “View this page in IE.” It will launch Internet Explore and load the same page you were viewing in Firefox. It’s nice for checking how pages look in IE and for pages that don’t look or work properly in Firefox.

Web Developer

If I had to choose just one extension, this would be it . It’s not quite as powerful as Firebug, but it’s very easy to use. It gives you a toolbar across the top of the browser that has the tools clearly organized and displayed. I like that I don’t have to think about how to use tool. It’s just second nature. Nifty features include a ruler, a page magnifier, a window resizer, and many more.

X-Ray

X-Ray puts an item on your right-click menu that acts as a toggle. When turned on, it surrounds a page’s content with the underlying elements and classes. So instead of a word showing up as word. It is displayed as <p><em>word</em></p>.

YSlow

This one is an extension of an extension. It works with Firebug to identify “problems” that may slow down the loading of a web page. The extension is Yahoo’s response to its Thirteen Simple Rules for Speeding Up Your Web Site. When run, it gives you a letter grade on all thirteen aspects of your page. Pay attention to the rules and what they mean. Some of the suggestions it makes can actually slow down your page depending how your site and server are set up.

I should note that all of the above extensions work in Firefox running on both Linux and Windows. I haven’t tried them on a Mac, but I bet many of them will work.

Of course, I’m not developing all of the time. Sometimes I just want to use Firefox as a browser. Having all of the above extensions loaded into Firefox can use up RAM and slow things down. So I created a separate profile in Firefox where I installed all of the developer extentions. So when I start the browser, I can choose to load my day-to-day profile with minimal extentions or the developer one.

If you develop web sites and don’t use Firefox, you should. If, however, you are stuck with IE, there is an Internet Explorer Developer Toolbar available. I haven’t used it, but I hear that it’s decent.

My main computer is a Thinkpad T43 notebook. It runs Kubuntu Fiesty Fawn (Kubuntu is a version of Ubuntu that uses the KDE environment instead of Gnome). I can run XP inside of VMware Player or boot into Vista on a separate partition. The Thinkpad T series is great for running Linux. Everything just works.

When I’m at the office, my laptop is docked to the screen in the upper-right of the photo. I have Kubuntu configured to stretch my desktop across the laptop’s screen and the external one. I usually run my web browser (Firefox) on the external screen and put all other windows on the laptop’s screen. Windows can be dragged across both screens as needed.

The screen on the upper-left is attached to an older laptop running XP. I use this system mainly for email (Thunderbird). I can also quickly run other applications that require Windows. I don’t use the XP system’s built-in keyboard or mouse. Instead, I use an open source utility called Synergy to connect the XP laptop to my Kubuntu laptop over the network. Synergy acts like a software-based keyboard/mouse switch. It allows me to use one keyboard and mouse to control both computers. When my mouse hits the left edge of the main laptop’s screen, Synergy automatically switches input to the XP laptop. It’s all seamless and works flawlessly. It feels like I’m using just one computer with three screens. Synergy even allows me to cut and paste text across the two systems. Matt Cutts has a good post on his site on how to set up Synergy.

Having three screens really helps me get things done. On a typical day, I keep email up on one screen, web pages up on another, and then anything else I need to run on the third screen. I can see all applications without having to alt-tab or use the task bar. When I’m building web pages or applications, I put my code and mark-up on one screen, the output of web pages on another, and display error logs on the third. Having three screens for web development is wonderful. Highly recommended.

Outside of Firefox and Thunderbird, the applications I tend to run most often are Pidgin/Skype (instant messaging), Amarok (music), VLC (video), OpenOffice.org, and Quanta Plus (web development). All of those except for Amarok and Quanta can run under Linux or Windows. I also alway have Superkaramba running widgets on my desktop for things like weather, time, CPU/RAM usage, etc. I do a lot on the command line and have found that Yakuake is the best console application. With a single keystroke I can unroll a console window over my desktop and then roll it back up to get it out of the way. When I need to print, I use the Bright Q driver for Linux that lets me access all of the functions on our Canon copier.

So this setup lets me use an environment that’s best for me, while staying connected to the resources and data that other people in the office are using.

Libraries have a lot in common with the open source movement. Both believe that access to information should be made freely available. Many libraries are moving to open source for everything from web browsers to ILS’s to WiFi gateways.