SAP GUI for Linux Users

If you're working with SAP ERP, it is very likely that you use a computer with the Microsoft Windows operating system. SAP GUI for Windows is the most common way to log into the SAP ERP backend system.

But what if Linux is your preferred operating system?  Do you have any option to use SAP GUI?

Yes, there is a way: SAP GUI for Java. It runs on any machine with Java enabled, even though the list of officially supported operating systems is not that long.

Desktop Environment Contest from Linux notes from DarkDuck

There were quite a few contests on this blog already.

• Some of them were dedicated to some specific products, like Linux Mint or Zorin OS.
• Some of them were more generic, like Zinio-sponsored contest about Linux in general, Subscribers' contest or Social Contest.
• And some of them were not actually contests at all, like Screenshot Beauty Contest in 3 parts.

I bet you liked all of them. Do you want another contest? I have one for you!

This time round, you will need to use your writing skills again. But this contest will not be driven by a specific product. Neither will it be about Linux in general. It will be something in the middle.

The main reason I love Linux: it works. Plain and simple.

I got introduced to Linux in 2006. My first distributions were Kubuntu, then PC Linux OS. Until eventually I arrived to Mint Daryna.

By the middle of 2007-09 I was hooked on Mint 9 Isadora. Recently I have installed Mint 13 Maya on my wife's tower, and I am presently tearing my hair out, using a tower with WinXP.

I find that Mint is so much easier to use then any other Distro. Everything works out of the Box. Very little has to be tweak or altered.

The boot up time, and the shut down time has not altered. The Win XP is slowing down.

The main reason I love Linux: it works. Plain and simple. It means more productivity to me.

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This is a guest post by Joseph Barr, which took part in the Linux Mint contest where the main prize was the book Linux Mint System Administrator’s Beginner’s Guide and the second prize was the Linux disk from Buy Linux CDs.

I've been interviewed!

The readers of this blog know that I perform interviews from time to time. People like Carla Shroeder, Katherine Noyes, Artyom Zorin and  Eugeni Dodonov  visited my virtual interview room.

It's now my turn to become a "victim". Steven Ovadia asked me about My Linux Setup. Please welcome to read!

How To Video Record Your Desktop

Screencasting software has sprung up all over the place in recent years, and there are a number of good reasons why you might want to use it to record your desktop.

Firstly, it’s a great way to create software tutorials that you can share with others. There are thousands of them on Youtube to date already, and companies use them to display clear instructions for their own products, as well as putting them to use for marketing purposes.

Screencasting is also useful if you’re having PC issues and need tech support – by recording your screen as you step through a problem, you can show the techie exactly what goes wrong where, and you’ll give them the best chance of helping you resolve the issue.

Here are some of the best tools currently available for recording your desktop. Some of them are OpenSource.

Experiences of a software consultant with various Linux distributions

I like reading comments under the posts of my Linux blog.

Some of these comments are short. Some of them are extended to several paragraphs. And some of them deserve a separate post. That's why I decided to re-publish a comment by Balaji Neelakantan to the post "What would be my own ideal Linux distribution?" as a separate story. 

I hope you will enjoy. Fasten your seatbelts! Let's go!

Another level taken: 700 subscribers

I am not sure whether I should be proud, or I should be embarrassed.

The number of subscribers to this blog continues to grow rapidly after I stopped writing much of the content for it. As I've written just 2.5 months ago, most of the content of this blog is currently written by yourselves, my dear readers. I mean guest posts, of course.

Just 2.5 months ago I announced that the number of subscribers reached 600. And today.. It's over 700!

I should admit that 700 limit was not reached today for the first time. It was above 700 level as well on the 26th of June - exactly 2 months after the previous announcement. Unfortunately, I could not fix that achievement that time, and I had to wait for another 2 weeks. Not a big deal.

Anyway, thank you to all the subscribers who follow Linux notes from DarkDuck! I appreciate your support and your interest! I'll keep this blog alive!

And, if you are interested, please feel free to contact me with ideas of your own guest articles, or maybe ideas for my own Linux- and FOSS-related posts.

Linux is here to stay

Christopher Cox

For me Linux has become more than just a kernel.  Though a kernel it most certainly is. Linux has now become synonymous with a platform. But even better it has become transparent solution provider. A part of daily life.

For me my adventure into Linux started with wanting Unix at home. As a Unix programmer and administrator, I was very comfortable with the power and (dare I even say this) ease of which solutions could be developed in Unix. One day another systems administrator had me log into his machine at his house (via modem back in those days). What I saw was something that was somewhat System V like (unlike all of the BSD variants of the day, which still contained proprietary AT&T System V code and so were somewhat "untouchable").

You see Unix was very expensive. The machinery was expensive and if you tried to put it on a PC, commercial Unix was too far out of reach for most pocketbooks.

Linux provided not just a cheap POSIX Unix clone, but a whole new platform... the opportunity to take the ideas of Unix and take it beyond the limitations of both System V and BSD. Linux gave a kernel to the GNU tools, which really helped launch the success of Linux and made the whole idea of Linux distributions easily achievable.

As a student of microprocessor architectures, I had a natural disdain for Intel 386 architectures especially as implemented by IBM in what we now call the PC. So, making the choice to get a 386 architecture machine was difficult for me, but because of the potential of Linux, I took the plunge. My first PC dual booted Windows 3.1 and Yggdrasil Plug & Play Linux. I had a 14" 1024x768 8bit display (which was pretty high end in those days). The host machine had a huge 8M of main memory (thank you Microsoft Windows 95 for making that affordable!) and ran an early (buggy) Intel Pentium processor.

Thus my first real Internet connected home host was Linux based. I have been a fulltime Linux desktop user ever since.

But look at today... now my switches run Linux, my storage subsystems run on Linux, my phone runs on Linux. Yes, it's not just about a kernel anymore, it's a platform... no... it's a solution provider!  Because of Linux, we have solutions. And not just solutions, but lasting solutions because you see, Linux is also about freedom and primarily about the GNU Public License which protects intellectual property and preserves it indefinitely. This is something that proprietary licensed software does not have today. In other words, not only is Linux at the heart of all solutions today, it's also not going to fade away due to corporate impropriety, mistakes or acquisition.

Linux is here. It's here to stay. And it just keeps getting better and better everyday. I am proud to be a contributor of software and solutions built on top of Linux.

And the story goes on and on... (must be because of Linux uptime)...

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This is a guest post by Christopher Cox, which won a prize in the joint contest of Linux notes from DarkDuck and Zinio.