Fedora Weekly Webcomic: Popcorn

My initial plan for this week was to come with a Star Wars themed sequel, but in the end they dropped the part about a princess Leia and without the opportunity to draw some bikini and not get flamed for it, my enthusiasm decreased.

A second option was to talk about one stage of the recent flame war (around the mixer), but that would be an unfunny personal attack, which my easily be seen as personal payback, so scrapped that too.

Then an obvious (and predictable) topic was the recent release of a competing distro and our own preview release. Even if the angle was new, I felt I am somewhat repeating myself and put it on hold trying something else.

I found the fourth subject attractive: a "fedora-flu" pandemic, which is expected to get global in less than one month an geeks wearing breathing masks to keep it under control.

Still unsure I asked for feedback on #fedora-ro and the general opinion was the pandemic premise is good but it lack a good punch so better go back to the third option. I listened, implemented the graphics and here is Popcorn. Don't bother to flame me about how we are all supposed to be friends, hold hands and sing Kum-Ba-Yah.

Fedora, Vader, Stormtroopers, geeks, geekettes

Hurry, so I can take the first post from Tatica... remember my star wars themed comic? It was inspired by actual facts which at the time were supposed to happen. And they happened, thanks to the cool guys and girls from the Fedora Venezuela community.

photo from tatica's flickr account

Eh, isn't this an uber-cool community?

Fedora Weekly Webcomic: Unbreakable Prophecy

While I pompously call this the "Fedora Weekly Wecomic" , my comic is fan-made content, I am in no way a Fedora representative, not even an Ambassador (even if some guys are trying to persuade me into enrolling), so even if sometimes I may appear to pick on some corporations, this is just my personal voice, not a statement from Fedora or any of its sponsors.

Open Source activity in Romania

There is this interesting Open Source Activity Map made collaboratively by Red Hat and Georgia Tech so I had to check the status of my country, which is a very yellowish orange, very close to the bottom yellow:

At the first look I find hard to believe the "community" score is lower than "government", (or for that matter, anything in this country being worse than the government), but looking at the raw data I can understand why, we have things like 0.0000622 Linux users per capita and also can understand why the "e;industry"e; score is so good (things like the cellular network).

We have a lot of things to do, according to the environmental map, we could be closer tot he middle of the pack and the community should be much better (score 33 instead of 55).

However, thins are moving in the community part, so I will use the opportunity to congratulate the guys from the local openSUSE community for getting into legality by getting approval for the trademark usage but also tease them: we (fedora) didn't had to wait for a full month for a similar process, it was solved in a matter of minutes :D (well, it took like 3 days, but that was because we moved slow to print a piece of paper, sign it, scan and send back).

One thing I hate about Firefox 3.1 (3.5)

After I jumped at Rawhide for daily use, I live with the new Firefox (3.1 Beta 3, to be renamed 3.5), which overall is a better browser but I have a huge annoyance: closing the last tab will close the browser entirely (I think I can figure the rationale behind the new behaviour, even if I don't like it).

After a normal working session (with 3-15 tabs), I close them one by one, when I have no need for them any more, until I get to a single one. Then I start something entirely different, by typing a new URL in the address bar or going to a saved bookmark... but not want to send the old URL as referrer for a lot of reasons. In this case I used to close the last tab and start with an empty one and clean history, but it does not work any more.

My current workaround was to set the home page to "about:blank", add the Home icon tot he toolbar and train myself in using that Home icon (don't remember when I have used it the last time). This is some impact on my workflow.

Update: thanks to an anonymous comment, teh solution is to set browser.tabs.closeWindowWithLastTab to false in about:config.

Fedora Weekly Webcomic: Level up!

This week I am playing (an one time try) with a slightly different format (otherwise the story would not fit) and a slightly different character design (chibi). This was also the comic with the most research work behind: several days spent with ZSNES and various ROMs, I needed it tu be accurate :D

PS: the amount of testing was limited only by my own lameness, I was not able to beat and get past of the Evil Wall in FF4 and Hiryuusou in FF5... the work on FF6 is still in early stages.

A messy desktop?

The past day when blogging about the new Leonidas backgrounds, Martin apologised for his messy desktop, which made me think: if that's messy, then how I should call my desktop?

PS: and this is after I did some cleaning the past week, when wiped F10 and installed F11 Beta.

Fedora Weekly Webcomic: Zeus

If you tried the Fedora 11 Beta or played with Rawhide, surely noticed a landscape image with a "Greek" theme: a temple of Zeus, mountains, sky, birds... You may liked or hated it, is already unimportant, the theme will be replaced before the upcoming development freeze (so any time now) with something completely different, about a lion.

The change is happening for a number of reasons developed after the inclusion, among which are NOT the reactions about the use of temples and "worshipping paganism", so I give today a taste of Zeus goodness (fear his thunders if you are unbelievers):

I can has mascot? - take 2

As I said before, I am a n00b at creating lolcats, so frustrating things happens, like you put online your first lolcat ever and a couple of hours later you get a better idea for the caption, as how the text should have been in the first place.

Decent people would suck it up, learn from the mistake and next time try to do it better. But I am no decent people, I get frustrated, take yesterday's lolcat, recaption it and post again.

Too bad my cat (an all black little guy with an evil look and disturbed personality) is uncooperative, so a weekly lolcat from me is unfortunately out of question.

I can has mascot?

With many thanks to Diego for the source image and to Max and Paul for the story, I present you the first know Fedora lolcat (and is my first lolcat too, made with GIMP and Inkscape):

One step closer to eLiberatica

We are one step closer to Fedora's presence at the eLiberatica conference: thanks to Max I just received a box with Fedora 10 Live CD, so we have the first thing to give to our visitors. We are still planning for more bang, join if you want to help.

Fedora Weekly Webomic: Ctrl + Alt + Backspace

If the other day I ran special edition for the Beta release did someone believe that was all from me for this week? Not so fast! I am here on the schedule with an predictable piece about the huge "Ctrl + Alt + Backspace" dispute:

Fedora Webcomic Special: The Beta Nazi

I guess that a Beta release deserves a special edition don't you think so? Even if it is overloaded with TV references and internet memes... now maybe I can get "hooche mama" out of my head :D (believe or not, it was a tough decision to go with it or "yo yo mama" as the final line)

Daylight Savings Time

As long as I remember, I always hated the Daylight Savings Time in the spring, the move to the Summer Time when suddenly in a week-end you start waking-up one hour earlier in the morning and it takes at least a month for your body to get accustomed with the change.

But this year is different, for the first time I look forward to the change this week-end. Why? In the Summer Time it is till light outside when I leave the office so I can take photos in my way home. Enough with the winter when I could do photography only on Saturdays and Sundays! Now getting good stuff to shoot is a different matter...

Fedora Weekly Webcomic: Versus

This week my comic is somewhat special, its final form was reached with input from Adrian and Mo, a rare thing (usually I talk with Adrian before publishing and I give him previews, but in the end go with my own ideas anyway). So now it was like two against one and I caved-in, maybe my initial idea was not that good, I intended to go with a wussier Vader (a ligher blue) and the final punch was supposed to be about Firefly.

And I may provide a prequel at some point, but this is for the moment out of my hands, it will happen if a certain thing will take place at a conference in the Latin America, if someone will provide a report from the event (with relevant photos) and if I will get the inspiration to link that somehow.

PS: there is a hot debate on the Open Clip Art Library about me potentially breaking the "Intellectual Property" of Lucas Arts by releasing a dark grey version of the "Darth" character under a Free license.

Mission accomplished: OCAL 10K!

The road to 10K images for the Open Clip Art Library ended today and I would say it ended successfully: in due time, March 2009, the 5th anniversary of the project and with a (shameless plug) mighty image. Time to rejoice!

...and keep the contributions flowing, do not rest on our laurels (at this very moment the counter is at 1009).

Fedora and eLiberatica

eLiberatica is probably the largest FLOSS conference held in Romania and this year it is more open, accessible and affordable, it moved from fancy hotels to the Politehnica University of Bucharest so anyone can attend in 22 and 23 of May.

Also this year, thanks to Joerg and Max, Fedora will be present at the conference, including with a booth, where most likely I and a few other members of the local community will act as booth babes (sorry, this is the best we can offer, at least I promise I won't bring my sword).

But there is an ace in our sleeve: we will have a star speaker, Jeroen van Meeuwen in person, so even if you don't like booth babes with beards, come to see him :p ...do not just wait for the ton of photos I am going to publish after the event...

Fedora Weekly Webcomic: Babies and Real Men

Are you counting down the days remaining until the Fedora 11 Beta release? Then you are a crybaby, not a real man! Now go back to counting down 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 ....

Another personal milestone in the OCAL 10K drive

Another personal milestone in the drive to 10K images for the Open Clip Art Library: I almost finished re-uploading my images from the old site to the new one (that was a painful manual effort), setting my contributions at 575 images and the total uploads to 9630 (quite close to the target).

I said almost since I have some more images that were part of the old site, some playing cards (218 images, uploading them will set he goal to almost complete), which I am not sure if and how I should upload (and have not managed to get a straight answer form anybody).

Well, this is almost all my contribution to the 10K drive (started with 420 images, got to 575), until the end of the month I may upload a handful more files (unless the playing cards will kick in), so is the time to pass the torch, who will carry it?

Spring flowers

I join those celebrating the spring on Planet Fedora with some flower [macro] photography made over this week-end:

Saturday I had some things to do out (buy some stuff) and in the way home took a detour trough the park, but it was disappointing, only a few white crocus (brinduse albe) and even those in not such a good shape. Getting home, I took a few more shots in the garden and called it a day, I was not very enthusiastic: rainy and somewhat cold weather.

But Sunday was beautiful: sunny, warm, beautiful flowers and bees flying, the perfect day to build your enthusiasm for macro photography. Did a lot of shots in the garden and after that some indoors (ideally you do flower macros inside the house, so you won't have problems with the wind).

Fedora Weekly Webcomic: Brainstorm

My all time favorite stupid brainstorm idea is about a distro "hiring" the Art Team of a competing distro to help with their advertising, but for today's issue I stole another one from Rahul, just as hilarious in its cyclicity: brainstorm idea about making developers to give a shit about brainstorm ideas.

However, I can recognize some merit for such a site: is a good PR tool to give people a soapbox to shout, thinking there is someone to listen. Not sure if it is also an effective tool to filter some noise from the real communication channels.

I don't like CC0 and I don't want it used for The Open Clip Art Library

I alluded in the past about my dislike about my dislike for CC0, the new license from Creative Commons, now that the license is foing to be officially announced and the damage control already kicked in, I feel like the best time to reinforce my opinion about it: I don't like CC0 and I don't want it used for The Open Clip Art Library.

I was asked what's my problem with this new license, so probably is fair to expect such an explanation from me: beside the license proliferation and the huge potential for confusion with other CC licenses, I don't see the real need covered by it. According with Creative Commons, the Public Domain dedication, for which CC0 is intended as a replacement, is valid, and can be valid, only under the USA legislation and impossible to follow in other jurisdiction. But for me it feels more like the problem with Public Domain, a name everyone understand, was that it does not contain the words "Creative Commons". I am sure the problem could have been solved without such intrusive branding.

Or how someone much famous than me, Mark Pilgrim, said:

"Seriously, stop making new licenses. I know your needs are extra-special and super-unique and nobody understands you but JUST FUCKING STOP."

What is YOUR Elvish name?

Doing research for Elvish name (thanks everyone who tried to help!) I got this potentially interesting internet meme idea: get people to learn their Elvish names and blog about them. Unfortunately, it is not an easy meme to follow, but it may be fun.

I found a site with a list of Elvish translations, according to with my name (Nicu is the short form of the Romanian Nicolae, equivalent of the English Nicholas and originating from the Greek Νικόλαος) has the meaning "Victorious among the people" and will translate to Elvish as Turwaithion. Cross checking with an Sindarin dictionary where victory is tûr and people is gwaith, it seems plausible.

As documented by a list Quenya names, in this dialect Nicholas is translated as Túrelio (no need to cross check, since the source is "The Elvish Linguistic Fellowship" and the mechanics are the same, "victorious people").

There is also a third source which states my full name as Lenwë Oronar, but I don't trust it: not only it does not document the way names are obtained and the dialect used, but it goes against the Elvish tradition and uses both first names and surnames.

So Turwaithion or Túrelio, Sindarin or Quenya, I am not sure yet. But what is your Elvish name?

And the sword shall be named...

For a long time I was thinking about getting myself a sword but this was mostly like a dream, something that I thought it may be cool to do "sometime". Until recently, when pretending I can use it as prop for some interesting photography, I went forward and bought one.

It is an Agincourt replica sword, but it is real, battle-ready, made from good steel and having sharp edges: when planning and making the photos I want the real feeling, not toying with cheap plastic.

Now to the priorities: the first step (getting the sword) is done, I moved the part about taking the cool photos somewhere in the future (maybe step 3) and introduced a second step, naming the sword - any cool sword has to have a name.

For a long time I thought the name of a cool, magical sword has to include a part about flames, like Burning sword of doom or Flaming sword of retribution but looking at it (I liked it so), silvery, simple and pure, I think something like Vengeful moon ray (long Moon ray of vengeance) would be more appropriate. Ideas? Opinions? I'm open, please help me with your valuable comments.

Ideally the step 2 would be followed by an intermediary 2.1 step, translating the name in Elvish, but I don't think I will have much success with that, a Google search does not reveal good automatic translations from English to Elvish.

PS: the sword is an European medieval model, made by a Taiwanese manufacturer imitating traditional Japanese technology and using Swedish steel, so I pretty much doubt it can release a bankai but I am sure due to my lack of reiatsu will never get a definitive answer about that.

Towards 10K: my 500-th image

On the drive to 10K images for the Open Clip Art Library, with all its nasty bumpings, I reached a personal milestone: my 500-th clipart uploaded.

It is not by any means an artistic achievement, is just a re-upload from the old site and it is an image I made (but never used) for another project and re-purposed it to the library a few years ago. But is a round number and a good opportunity to rejoice.

I have in the queue some more re-uploads, about 75 images, so the increase can be notable in the following days if I will got the time (and also reinforcing my rank), but there is no way in hell I would try do displace John Olsen, with his mighty 2016 uploads, from the top spot.