Setting Up Remote Gmail Access

To setup access to Gmail from within Kmail, follow these steps:

1. Login to your Gmail account

2. In the top right corner, click the settings gear icon and then click “Mail Settings”.

3. Click “Forwarding and POP/IMAP”.

4. To enable POP, select either “enable POP for all mail” or “enable POP for mail that arrives from now on”.

5. Choose an option for “when messages are accessed with POP”.

6. To enable IMAP, select “Enable IMAP”. Other settings are optional.

Now, you will need to configure your Kmail client:

1. Start Kmail and go to “Settings -> Configure Kmail”

2. Click the “Accounts” button

3. In the Receiving tab, click “Add…”

4. At this point, you will need to decide whether you want to use IMAP or POP (This example will assume you chose POP).

5. In the “General” tab, enter a name you will use to recognize this account.

6. For “Incoming mail server” type: pop.gmail.com (for IMAP, choose imap.gmail.com)

7. For “Username” enter your complete email address: soandso@maketecheasier.com

8. Enter your password.

9. Click the “Advanced” tab and select “Leave fetched messages on the server”.

10. In the “Connection Settings” section, select “SSL/TLS” encryption.

11. Click “OK”

Now click the “Sending” tab and follow these steps:

1. Click “Add…”

2. Select “SMTP” and click “Create and Configure”

3. For “Outgoing mail server” type smtp.gmail.com

4. Check the box next to “Server requires authentication”.

5. For “Login” type your full email address

6. Enter your password

7. If you want, select “store SMTP password” so that you do not have to enter it each time before you send.

Disclaimer: If you use IMAP or have selected to download all of your previous Gmail messages with POP (perhaps as a backup measure), please be advised that it will download everything. That means if you have been in the habit of not deleting any Gmail message, you could spend the next few hours downloading your thousands of emails.

Simplicity and Security

Kmail offers many email features, such as complex templates, that Gmail cannot. Moreover, you can access your messages offline and have full integration with other KDE apps. By keeping your message on your Gmail account as well, you can have the best of both worlds, accessing your Gmail through Kmail on your computer and still using web-based Gmail when you go mobile.

The post How to Check Your Gmail Account with Kmail appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

ZaReason – This company with the strange name has been building Linux computers since 2007 and has an extensive line of laptops, desktops, and servers. It has everything from low-end boxes for as little as $399 to high-end servers priced at $2,499. ZaReason offers a wide range of customization options, low prices, free shipping, and a choice of operating systems, including several versions of Ubuntu, Debian, Fedora, Linux Mint, and the option to get a machine with no OS.

EmperorLinux – The grandfather of them all, EmperorLinux has been selling high-end Linux laptops since 1999. Do not expect to find cheep netbooks on this vendor’s site. You can, however, get the $4,900 rugged Caiman E6400 XFR with your choice of Fedora, Ubuntu, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, CentOS, Debian, SUSE, or Slackware. EmperorLinux has nothing under $1,000, but for the price, the systems come with guaranteed full hardware support using a custom kernel.

ThinkPenguin – If price is a concern of yours, ThinkPenguin may be a good spot to start your search. They offer laptops as low as $499 and desktops as low as $249, before customizations. Without a doubt, you will want to make at least a few tweaks, and this site gives you that flexibility. It also provides a form for you to fill in the distribution you want installed, which presumably means they will install any distro you want. The default option is Trisquel GNU/Linux.

Ohava – Perhaps one of the newest on the block, Ohava offers 3 mini-ITX form factor desktops starting at $299, three notebooks starting at $375.99, and three servers starting at $944.99. The company also offers other services, such as an open cloud solution, web services, and training. Like the others on the list, they offer customization options and the option to install Ubuntu, Fedora, or SUSE.

eRacks – Another vendor that has been around since 1999, eRacks offers quite a few desktop, server, and laptop options with Linux installed. Its website gives you full customization over just about everything from motherboards to extra software. eRacks will install a number of Linux distributions, such as Ubuntu, CentOS, and Gentoo, several BSD variants, and even Windows. It offers laptops starting at $879 and desktops starting at $395.

Freedom and Choice

By purchasing a computer with Linux installed, you can save money, but you can also help support the free and open source software movement. When you buy a computer with Windows, it gets counted as a Windows PC sale, even if you remove Windows and install Linux later. When you buy Linux, you support Linux. Moreover, many of the problems Linux users have stem from incompatibility with hardware that was meant for Windows.

When you buy a computer with Linux installed, your vendor has made every effort to ensure compatibility. You will also have a warranty and support from a company that knows Linux. With affordable prices and freedom, you have nothing to lose.

Image credit: GnuTuxSoftRevolution

The post 2012 Linux Computer Buyer’s Guide appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

At CES, Canonical announced its latest major project that it is calling Ubuntu TV “TV for human beings”. Much of the Ubuntu TV interface will be based on the groundwork that has already been established with the development of Unity, Canonical’s revolutionary, and sometimes polarizing, desktop environment.

In keeping with tradition, Ubuntu TV is free and open source. Therefore, you can install it now, while keeping in mind that it is still under heavy development. If you have the time and wherewithal, you can try installing it from source. If not, there is also a PPA available with binary packages.

PPA Install

Before proceeding, I want to reiterate that this is not a fully-functional version of Ubuntu TV. It is a development build and should be viewed as such. It will, however, give you an idea of how the interface looks and functions on a basic level. This install will essentially take over your Unity 2D install, so if you do not want to risk contamination, you should try using a virtual machine instead.

1. If you have the YouTube video lens for Unity installed, you will need to remove it to avoid conflicts:

sudo apt-get remove lens-video

2 Install Ubuntu TV using the PPA provided by Alin Andrei of WebUpd8:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:nilarimogard/test3
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade
sudo apt-get install unity-lens-video

Make sure you do not skip the “dist-upgrade” step, as it will likely not function properly without it.

3. In this step, you will tell Ubuntu TV to generate thumbnails of your current videos. You can safely assume that this task will be automated in later versions. You will need to copy your videos to /home/username/Videos/unity/local/featured before proceeding.

/usr/lib/unity-lens-video/create_tmb.sh ~/Videos/

Note: I was not able to get video thumbnails to work correctly. Hopefully, you will have better success.

4. If you are not already logged in to your normal desktop (either Unity or Gnome), do so, and run this command from a terminal:

gsettings set com.canonical.Unity2d form-factor tv

5. Kill off your current desktop features.

If you are running Unity 2D:

killall unity-2d-{panel,places,launcher,spread} && killall unity-2d-{panel,places,launcher,spread}

If you are running Unity 3D or Gnome Shell:

metacity --replace &

6. Start Ubuntu TV:

unity-2d-shell -opengl

You will now notice that Ubuntu TV has taken over your entire screen. When you are finished with it, you can end it by Alt-Tabbing back to your terminal and then pressing Ctrl+C. To get your desktop back, type:

unity --replace

or

gnome-shell --replace

Once you are finished getting a taste of Ubuntu TV, run the following commands to get rid of it and get Unity 2D back:

sudo apt-get install ppa-purge
sudo ppa-purge ppa:nilarimogard/test3
sudo apt-get remove unity-lens-video

What Works

From my test of Ubuntu TV, video playback seems to work with multiple codecs (probably any codecs currently installed on my system). It has a very nice pause, skip, and browse feature built into the video player. When you select a video to watch, it will give you the option to view trailer, rent, or buy. Only the “view trailer” button will work for your current videos.

The search feature works as expected and was fast on my aging laptop.

The TV function shows a generic UK broadcast schedule that appears to be just for show. As far as I know, there are no specifics on how the TV integration will work.

The YouTube feature did not work at all on my installation, so it is something that will probably come later. Because Ubuntu TV is extensible, the potential for other “apps” to be added is pretty much limitless.

If you want to compile Ubuntu TV from source, you can find instructions on the Ubuntu Wiki. It does not look terribly complicated and should be easy for intermediate users familiar with compiling programs. For more information about Ubuntu TV in general, see the Ubuntu TV website.

The post How to Install a Preview of Ubuntu TV appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

There are a plethora of file storage and file sharing services available on the web. Many of them are free for a limited amount of space (often around 2 to 5 GB). For a lot of people, this type of service is sufficient, but if you want your own file storage system, need a lot more space, do not want to pay a third party service, and already have your own web hosting account for your website, ownCloud is a free and open source option you should definitely consider.

Note: For Windows users, you can install Owncloud in Windows as well.

Installation

ownCloud is a simple PHP web application that will work on most Linux and Unix servers. A typical installation server will have Apache HTTP Server and MySQL or SQLite (if you do not want to use a database server). If you are running your own dedicated server or VPS, your Linux distribution may already have the ownCloud packages in its default repository. For example, to install on an Ubuntu server, simple type:

sudo apt-get install owncloud

It will automatically install dependencies, such as Apache, PHP, and MySQL. Once the installation is complete, you can point your browser to http://yourdomain/owncloud and start the “First Run Wizard”.

To install ownCloud manually, do the following:

1. Go to owncloud.org and download the latest version
2. Extract the contents of the archive to your computer. If you have SSH access to your server, you can upload the archive first and extract with

   tar -xjvf owncloud-2.x.tar.bz2

3. Copy the extracted files to the directory of your choice within the web-accessible documents directory of your server (i.e. public_html, htdocs, etc.)
4. Set the permissions. If you have a shared hosting account, use FTP or SFTP to create a directory called “data” and set the permissions to “750″. Then, set the permissions of the “config” directory to “777″. If you have root access, you can use this command:

   chown -R www-data:www-data owncloud/

   Replace “www-data” with whatever the name of your Apache user is.

5. Point your browser to http://yourdomain/owncloud to complete the installation
6. Enter a username and password for your administrative account
7. If SQLite is detected, ownCloud will use it by default. Alternatively, you can enter your MySQL database information in the “Advanced” section.

Using ownCloud

The software for ownCloud was developed by some of the developers of KDE and is designed to work with free and open source operating systems, unlike some proprietary cloud storage services. You can use your web browser to upload and manage files, but you can also use WebDav to connect to your files directly from your desktop file manager.

In Dolphin, follow these steps:

1. Click the “Network” option in “Places” or go to “remote:/”
2. Click the “Add Network Folder” button
3. Keep the first option, WebFolder (webdav), selected and click Next
4. Give the connection a name and enter your ownCloud username
5. In the “Server” box, type your full domain name
6. In the “Folder” box, type the relative path to your owncloud installation (i.e. /owncloud/webdav/owncloud.php)
7. Check the box next to “Create an icon for this remote folder”
8. Click Save and Connect.

After entering your password, it should connect to your ownCloud folder. You can now drag and drop files just as you would with a folder on your computer. Moreover, KDE apps are all integrated and should be able to use the folder as well.

Cloud Freedom

ownCloud gives you the freedom to use the cloud on your terms however you want. You can access your files from anywhere, just as you would with a proprietary cloud service, but the files and software are yours. You will not have to worry about privacy or the safety of your data. For more information about ownCloud in general, visit the project’s website. For more detailed install instructions, including those for other operating systems and web servers, see this page.

The post How to Install and Configure ownCloud appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

Oxygen-GTK3

The solution to this problem is a package called oxygen-gtk3, which has made its way into some Linux distributions. If it is not in your distribution’s default repository (and it probably is not unless you have the most bleeding edge release), you can likely get the package from a third party.

For Kubuntu and other Ubuntu-based distributions, add the following repository:

ppa:hrvojes/kde-goodies

Then, install the package called gtk3-engines-oxygen:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install gtk3-engines-oxygen

For OpenSUSE, you need to add the swyear repository:

sudo zypper ar Index of /repositories/home:/swyear/openSUSE_12.1

Then, install the oxygen-gtk3 package:

sudo zypper install oxygen-gtk3

Other distribution installation procedures will vary. I did find Fedora packages available from this user, but did not find any distribution-specific installation instructions.

For Archlinux, you need to install oxygen-gtk3-git from AUR.

Completing the Installation

If you have come this far, you might have noticed that your GTK3 applications still look awful, even after you restarted your desktop environment. That is because GTK3 requires its own configuration file called settings.ini, which may remind you of your old Windows days. Fortunately, this settings.ini is not quite so aggravating, and you will only need to add a single configuration line.

If one does not already exist, create a folder at this location “~/.config/gtk-3.0“. In Archlinux, you can apparently just link to the default file:

ln -s /usr/share/themes/oxygen-gtk/gtk-3.0 ~/.config/gtk-3.0

Next, create a file inside the gtk-3.0 folder called settings.ini. Using the text editor of your choice, add this line:

gtk-theme-name = oxygen-gtk

Save and close your text editor, and the settings should take effect immediately. If not, restart your desktop environment. When you open applications like Gufw, you should now see your Oxygen theme rather than the ugly , un-themed GTK3 default that it previously displayed. There have been some reports of certain apps crashing on some distributions. I have not experienced this, but if you do, you should definitely report it to the appropriate developers.

Keeping it Seamless

KDE users tend to like everything to flow nicely together. Oxygen-gtk3 allows you to keep your desktop looking seamless even when you need to use a GTK program. With the next major releases of most Linux distributions, you will probably see this package added by default, requiring no further action on your part. Until then, the above instructions should remain valid and usable.

The post How to Make GTK3 Apps Look Presentable in KDE4 appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

Installation

Icon Tasks is a binary plasmoid, meaning that it must be compiled from source before using it on your Linux or BSD system. The source code is currently available from KDE-Look.org. Alternatively, if you are using Kubuntu 11.10, you can install it from a PPA by doing the following:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gnumdk/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install plasma-widget-icon-tasks

You can also optionally install Firefox UnityFox support with this command:

sudo apt-get install libunity6

And you can install Docky helper support with this:

sudo apt-get install python-dockmanager

To install from source on other distributions, do the following:

1. Make sure you have the necessary Qt and KDE development packages installed. You can build against KDE 4.7. Check your distribution’s documentation if you are unsure about package names.
2. Download the source package and extract the contents

From the terminal:

tar xjvf plasma-icontasks-0.9.2.tar.tar.bz2
cd plasma-icontasks-0.9.2
mkdir build
cd build
cmake .. -DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=`kde4-config --prefix`
make
sudo make install

For full building instructions, see the Readme file included in the source archive.

Getting Started

After installation, you will need to remove your current task manager and (optionally) any launchers for single applications, since you can add those directly into Icon Tasks. Once you have removed the old task manager, place the new one on the panel wherever you want it to appear.

Any programs you start will appear as icons rather than the traditional taskbar entry (icon with text). Moreover, you can turn any task into a launcher by right clicking and then selecting “Show A Launcher When Not Running”. Alternatively, you can drag launchers from your Kickoff menu directly onto the Icon Tasks bar to instantly create new launchers.

Icon Tasks has full support for standard KDE task manager functions, such as the Highlight Windows desktop effect, task grouping, and window preview popups. To change any features, right click anywhere on the widget, and click “Icon-Only Task Manager Settings”. There, you can enable/disable features such as progress bars over the file manager launcher during copy/move/delete operations, Unity feature support, recent documents, and media player controls in the preview popups of applications like Amarok.

A Game Changer

Icon Tasks is a game changer for KDE that once again demonstrates the flexibility of KDE’s Plasma desktop, which makes it easy for developers to introduce new features. It also increases the number of options KDE users will have, as those who wish to keep the traditional task manager will have that option. This only perpetuates KDE’s reputation for being one of the most flexible and easily customizable desktop environments.

The post How to Get a Dock-Like Taskbar in KDE with Icon Tasks appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

Why KDM?

KDM, the default display manager for KDE, starts when your X server instance begins. This means that the user has still not logged in, and any settings established at this point will apply to all users. Moreover, making these changes in KDM is often safer and easier than modifying your xorg.conf file or coming up with some hack that will only work for a particular user once he or she has logged in.

How to Run Scripts

KDM has its own startup script called Xsetup. When X is started, KDM will execute anything within this script file. To run your own scripts, all you have to do is tell Xsetup to execute them.

For example, you might want to run xrandr when KDM starts. This will automatically configure your monitor or multiple monitors to your preferred settings, and those settings will stick when any user logs into KDE, unless they override them. To accomplish this, follow these steps:

1. Locate the Xsetup file. It may vary depending on your distribution. In Kubuntu, it is located at: /etc/kde4/kdm/Xsetup
2. Edit the file as root.
   example: Press Alt+F2 and type “kdesudo kate /etc/kde4/kdm/Xsetup“
3. Enter the commands you want to execute (note: They will be run as root before the login dialog appears)
   example: xrandr --auto --output VGA1 --mode 1440x900 --right-of LVDS1 --refresh 60.1
4. Click “Save” and close your text editor.

In most cases, it is a good idea to place your command string before this line:

/sbin/initctl -q emit login-session-start DISPLAY_MANAGER=kdm

That will execute your script before KDM starts.

Another example of something you might want to execute before KDM starts is to set Numlock to either “on” or “off”. KDE has a setting for this, but setting it in KDM will essentially enable a global default. To enable or disable numlock, follow these steps:

1. Install numlockx.
   

   sudo apt-get install numlockx

2. In your Xsetup file, add the following line:

   numlockx on

3. Save your Xsetup file.

Just to reiterate an important point, you should always be mindful that anything you put in Xsetup will be executed by root and will affect anyone who logs in with KDM, no matter the user or desktop environment they choose from the KDM menu. This can have far-reaching consequences, particularly if you have a multi-user system.

Safety issues aside, using KDM’s Xsetup script is a great way to get your desktop exactly the way you want it even before you login. Whether you are enabling numlock or even setting up a custom keymap with Xmodmap, you can do it from Xsetup and not have to worry about configuring it after you start your user session.

The post How to Run Startup Scripts in KDM before KDE Starts appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

Those purists still love KDE 3.5, and many of them continue to use the supported version of it called Trinity Desktop Environment. Others, however, mainly just preferred the KDE 3.5 look over the current Plasma Air appearance. If that is the case, Plasma gives you the flexibility to make your KDE 4 desktop look like KDE 3.5.

The Panel

In terms of functionality, much of the KDE panel has not changed. You still have a “K” button, a pager, a task manager, a system tray, and a clock. The default Plasma appearance, however, looks radically different. Furthermore, the Kickoff menu is big and clunky compared to the simple KDE 3.5 menu.

To change the panel’s appearance, do the following:

1. Download the “Vintage” Plasma theme (Unfortunately, there is a problem with the packing of this theme on KDE-Look.org. I repacked it and have made it available here.)
2. Unpack the theme and copy it to your desktop theme folder: /hom/[username]/.kde/share/apps/desktoptheme
3. Open “System Settings”
4. Choose “Workspace Appearance”
5. Click “Desktop Theme”
6. Choose “KVintage”
7. Click “Apply”.

The Desktop

The default KDE 4 desktop uses folderview widgets and icons that are also widgets. If you prefer a desktop that functions like the KDE 3 desktop, KDE 4 can handle that too.

1. Right click on the desktop
2. Click “Desktop Settings”
3. If necessary, click “Unlock Widgets”
4. For “Layout” change it from “Desktop” to “Folder View”
5. Click “OK”

You should now have a more traditional-looking and functioning desktop.

The K Menu

The kickoff menu is very robust with a great deal of functionality, but if you want the simple menu from KDE 3, simply remove the application launcher widget and replace it with the traditional one.

1. Right click on the “K” button on the panel
2. Click “Remove this application launcher”
3. Right click again on the panel and click “Add widgets”
4. Drag the “Application Launcher Menu” widget to the panel

You should now have the traditional application launcher menu from KDE 3.5.

The Icons

The default KDE icon set is called Oxygen, but you can use whatever icons you want, as long as they are properly configured for KDE4’s structure. Fortunately, someone has repackaged the KDE3 CrystalSVG icon theme.

1. Download the icon theme manually
2. Open “System Settings”
3. Click “Application Appearance” and then “Icons”
4. Click “Install Theme File”
5. Locate the icon set you just download and select it
6. Choose the icon theme from the list and click “Apply”

Application and Window Decoration Appearance

Most of the old KDE 3 window decorations and styles are still around in KDE 4. To use them, all you have to do is select them in System Settings. To change the style:

1. Click “Application Appearance”
2. Next to “Widget style” select the theme you want, “Plastique” for example
3. Click “Apply”

To change the window decoration:

1. In System Settings, choose “Workspace Appearance”
2. Choose “Window Decorations”
3. Select the theme you want, such as “Plastik”

The File Manager

One of the most monumental changes from KDE 3 to KDE 4 was the introduction of Dolphin, a new file manager to relieve Konqueror of one its multiple responsibilities. To have a true KDE 3.5 experience, you will need to make Konqueror your default file manager.

1. Open “System Settings” and choose “Default Applications”
2. Select “File Manager” from the left pane
3. Select “Konqueror” and click “Apply”

Once you have all of these changes in place, you may start to see KDE 4 in a different light. Although many features under the hood have changed, it is still possible to get the KDE 3.5 look and feel back on your desktop.

The post How to Make KDE 4 Look Like KDE 3 appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

Fortunately, some KDE users have taken the initiative to create monochrome icons for those programs that did not already have them and even some alternative tray icon sets for users who want a different look from the standard Air desktop theme set. This brief tutorial will show you how to quickly and easily install tray icons for your KDE Plasma desktop theme.

Icon Choices

Some Plasma themes come with their own tray icon sets. For others or for your own custom theme, you will need to install one. There are a few system tray icon sets available on KDE-Look.org, including the following:

• Krayscale – Gray scale icons with some color effects
• Monochrome Tray Icons – These fit KDE’s default desktop theme, adding icons for extra apps
• Oxygen Plasma System Tray Icons – For those who dislike the monochrome look, this returns color to your system tray

Installing System Tray Icons

Normal KDE user-installed icons are stored in /home/[username]/.kde/share/icons, but system tray icons are part of the desktop theme and are stored in the theme’s folder. These icons are SVG and are designed to scale nicely with your panel size.

Tray icons are kept in the following folder structure:

/home/[username]/.kde/share/apps/desktoptheme/[theme-name]/icons

For global themes that will be accessed by all users, use the following directory (dependent on your operating system or distribution):

/usr/share/kde4/apps/desktoptheme/[theme-name]/icons

To install, simply extract and copy the icons to the theme folder. If you are using the default KDE theme, you would copy them to:

/home/[username]/.kde/share/apps/desktoptheme/default/icons

Using the Icons

A restart of KDE should make your icons appear, but if it does not, you may need to clear your icon cache or plasma cache. To do so, go to the following folder:

/home/[username]/.kde/cache-[ComputerName]

Then, remove the file “icon-cache.kcache” and possibly also “plasma_theme_[theme-name].kcache”. This should reset the theme and show your new icons.

Earlier versions of KDE-PIM applications did not support the SVG tray icons. Therefore, most of the monochrome icon sets do not include kmail, akregator, and others. With KDE-PIM 4.6 and up, these icons will now work. The Krayscale icon theme includes them, but the icons will not show message counts for Kmail or Akregator, which may be enough incentive for some to stick with the default color icons.

If you decide to make your own icons or simply change the color of an existing one, you can use Inkscape to edit the SVG images and then copy your creations to the desktop theme folder. If you do decide to create your own, make sure you share them on KDE-Look.org so that everyone can enjoy your artwork.

The post How to Use Custom Tray Icons in KDE appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

I have spoken to many people who dislike KDE solely based on its default appearance, the Air/Oyxgen set of styles and themes. Some have even argued that it looks too much like Windows (although evidence strongly suggests that Windows 7 mimicked KDE, rather than the other way around). What those people may not realize is that you can make KDE look as much like Gnome or any other desktop environment as you want.

The customizations in this guide are just examples. They will not give an exact Unity or Gnome appearance, as most people change those defaults anyway. Instead, this example will use some of the common customizations that Ubuntu and Gnome users often apply.

The Desktop Theme

KDE-Look has a plethora of desktop themes you can use. To change your theme, do the following:

1. Open “System Settings” from the kickoff menu (or press Alt+F2 and type it)
2. Click “Workspace Appearance”
3. Click “Desktop Theme” on the left-hand pane
4. Click “Get New Themes” at the bottom
5. Choose whatever theme you want and click “Install”. For this example, I have chosen the “Ambiance” theme.
6. Click “Apply”

The Window Decoration

Since you are already in Workspace settings, now is a good time to change the window decoration.

1. Click “Window Decorations” from the left-hand pane.
2. Click “Get New Decorations”
3. Following the same example, search for Ambiance Aurorae and click “Install”
4. Choose the decoration theme and click “Apply”.

If you want to really be like Ubuntu/Mac OS X, you can move the window buttons to the left side:

1. Click “Configure Buttons”
2. Check the box labeled “Use custom title bar button positions”
3. Simply drag each button type to the left in the order that you want them.

Application Appearance

Getting the application appearance you want is a little more tricky. That is because KDE does not currently offer users the ability to install new styles from within System Settings. Therefore, before you choose a style, you will need to make sure the one you want is installed. You have two options: 1. You can install the actual GTK style that you want and use it, or 2. Find an actual KDE or Qtcurve style that matches the one you want.

If you decide to go with the Qtcurve option, you can download something like Ambiance-like. Download it and extract it to the folder of your choice. To install it, do the following:

1. Open “System Settings”
2. Click “Application Appearance”
3. Choose Qtcurve and click “Configure” (If you do not have Qtcurve installed, it is probably in your distribution’s software repository)
4. In the “Presets” section, choose “Import”
5. Find the Ambiance-like theme (Ambiance-like.qtcurve) and then click “OK”
6. Click “Apply”
7. Click the “Colors” button in the left-hand panel
8. Choose “Import Scheme”
9. Locate the Ambiance colors (Ambiance-like.colors) and click “OK”
10. Click “Apply”

Alternatively, you can use the Ambiance color scheme from KDE-Look.

Panel and Launcher

In most distributions, the KDE panel is at the bottom and is rather large. To move it to the top:

1. Right click on the panel and click “Unlock widgets”
2. Click the cashew button on the far right
3. Click and hold the “Screen Edge” button and drag the panel to the top.
4. Click and hold the “Height” button to make it the size you want

KDE can use a global menu that works for KDE, Qt, and GTK apps. To use it:

1. Click the cashew again and click “Add widgets”
2. Choose “Window Menubar” and drag it to the panel

You have a couple of options for launchers. You can either use a KDE-native launcher like Daisy or Fancy Tasks, or you can use a separate launcher program like Docky (mono-based but very reliable), Plank (fast, light-weight next-gen Docky), AWN (robust and powerful), or Cairo Dock (all about options).

Icons

KDE uses a slightly different icon theme system from Gnome and Ubuntu. Therefore, it may not be the best idea to use those themes directly, but they will still work. The alternative is that you can find one specifically modified for KDE. Faenza-Cupertino is a very popular iconset for Ubuntu users, and KFaenza is an excellent KDE version.

To install it:

1. Open “System Settings”
2. Click “Application Appearance”
3. Choose “Icons” from the left-hand pane
4. Click “Get New Themes”
5. Search for “KFaenza”
6. Click “Install”
7. Select the icon theme and click “Apply”

Mixing and Matching

You are certainly not limited to the examples I have shown. You can mix and match whatever you like to get your KDE desktop looking exactly the way you want.

The post How to Give Any KDE Desktop An Ubuntu Makeover appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

KVM (kernel-based virtual machine) is a Linux virtualization tool that makes use of hardware-assisted virtualization (also called native virtualization) using processor technology such as Intel VT-x and AMD-V. Red Hat’s Virtual Machine Manager now has support for KVM, making it easy to setup a virtual machine with a free graphical interface. It is also available for Fedora, Gentoo, FreeBSD, Ubuntu, and many other operating systems.

Installation

Installation will vary according to the operating system, but we will look at the Ubuntu installation to get an idea of what it entails. Since KVM requires hardware virtualization capabilities, you need to make sure your computer’s processor supports it.

Open a terminal and type this command:

egrep -c '(vmx|svm)' /proc/cpuinfo

The output will either be a “0″ or a “1″. A “0″ unfortunately means that you do not have hardware virtualization. If you get a “1″ and have virtualization enabled in your BIOS, you are good to go. Without hardware virtualization, you cannot use KVM extensions. You can still run virtual machines, but they will be painfully slow, as I discovered on my laptop with an old Intel T4200 processor.

If you want to double check the results, you can also run this command:

kvm-ok

If all goes well, it will return:

INFO: Your CPU supports KVM extensions
INFO: /dev/kvm exists
KVM acceleration can be used

Ubuntu has some meta-packages you can install to get the virtualization tools you need. With one command, you can install most of them:

sudo apt-get install ubuntu-virt

If you want to install each package manually, see the Ubuntu documentation. After the installation, you should have qemu-kvm and virt-manager (the graphical frontend) installed.

Post-Installation

After installation, you need to make sure KVM is configured and given the necessary permissions. Type this command:

groups

Among your user groups, you should see “kvm” and “libvirtd”. If either or both are missing, you can run these commands to add your local user to the groups:

sudo adduser `id -un` kvm

sudo adduser `id -un` libvirtd

The last post-installation step you need to take is to logout and log back in. If you do not, you will get a qemu error like this: “libvir: Remote error : Permission denied”

Create a Virtual Machine

Once you are logged back in, you can start Virtual Machine Manager. It should be in your applications menu. Alternatively, press Alt+F2 and type virt-manager.

On the first run, there will only be one available button to click labeled “Create a new virtual machine”. Click it and go through the creation process.

1. Name the virtual machine. It can be pretty much anything. It is only an identifier for you to remember what it is.
2. Choose the installation method. In this example, I am going to use a CentOS 6 LiveCD ISO. That requires the first option “Local install media”. After choosing, click “Forward”.



3. Select the OS type and version. In my example, I chose “Linux” and “Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6″.
4. Select the amount of RAM you want to allocate and the number of CPUs to use.
5. Set your virtual disk size. This largely depends on the OS you are using and the amount of space you think you will need.



6. Set your network options. In most cases, the right option is already selected.
7. Click Finish

Virtual Machine Manager should immediately start booting your virtual machine. If you booted from an ISO, you can then install the OS as you normally would or even run it from the LiveCD. If you want to see real-time information about your virtual hardware, click the “show hardware virtualization details” button. You do not have to keep the virtualization window open to keep running your virtual machine. This is useful if you only intend to connect to it remotely and use it as a server.

For more information about Virtual Machine Manager, visit the online wiki. For more information about KVM, see the online documentation.

The post How to Use KVM with Virtual Machine Manager appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

Standard Notifications

By default KDE’s notifications pop up from the “Notifications” widget, which is found in the panel next to the system tray. Whenever a system or application event occurs, the notification will briefly appear in a Plasma popup over this area. Once the popup disappears, you can click the icon at any time to see past notifications.

Notification Widget Settings

The notification widget has a few settings that can change the way it displays notifications for you. To reach the settings, right click on the widget icon and click “Notification Settings”. The first section labeled “Pop Up Notices” allows you to select some basic notification categories: “Application notifications” and “File transfers and other jobs”. The last setting labeled “Automatically hide” determines if notifications disappear after a short time.

Notification Configuration

More extensive KDE notifications are available in System Settings in the “Application and System Notifications” section. The first pane called “Manage Notifications” allows you to configure system and application notifications.

“Event source” refers to the system or application that will send the notification. The “State” column tells you which types of notifications are enabled for a particular event. KDE gives you five options for this:

1. Play a sound – Choose any supported audio file you want.
2. Show a message in a popup – the standard method
3. Log to a file – useful if you want to keep track of how often an event occurs
4. Mark taskbar entry – The taskbar will change colors to alert you of the event
5. Run command – With this you can enable more advanced responses to notifications. When a certain event finishes, it can spawn a program that starts another.

As an example, suppose you want to change the way KTorrent notifies you when a torrent has finished downloading to automatically start your video player. By default, it will only show a popup and possibly play a sound if the KDE sound system is enabled. To change this, do the following:

1. Click the dropdown menu next to “event source” and choose KTorrent
2. Choose the last event in the list “Torrent has finished downloading”
3. Check the “Run command” box
4. Type in the command /usr/bin/dragon (or whichever video player you use).

To change the way KDE plays system sounds, click the next tab labeled “Player Settings”. This allows you to adjust the volume, use an external player (such as “play” or “mplayer”), or disable audio output completely.

Other Notifications

One of the more annoying features that I have always disabled in KDE is the bouncing “busy cursor”. If you share my disdain for it, you can disable it by clicking the “Launch Feedback” button and choosing “No Busy Cursor” from the dropdown menu. In order to still get some type of notification when a program is launched or demands attention, leave “enable taskbar notification” enabled. The “startup indication timeout” option determines how long the notification stays in the taskbar even after a program fails to start.

KDE’s notification system can make use of the accessibility system bell to provide better notification for people who are not easily alerted by the standard notifications. Click the “System Bell” button and check “use system bell instead of system notification” to enable this feature.

Ultimate Flexibility

KDE now has the ability to interpret GTK notifications, resulting in better integration of KDE and non-KDE apps. The KDE nofitication system can be as active or as passive as you want. You can even detach a notification popup and move it to a different location. It provides the ultimate flexibility for all types of users.

The post A Guide to the KDE Notification System appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

Because of this reality, it is important for torrent file sharers to find ways to protect themselves from litigation, prosecution, bandwidth shaping, and malware. The following tips should help you make your torrent experience safer, private, and more secure.

Disclaimer: Downloading copyrighted media without the owner’s permission is illegal is some countries. Under no circumstances is this article intended to encourage illegal activity, and there are no guarantees that this information will protect you from any legal action.

1. Port Forwarding

Every modern router has some form of port forwarding that you can use for your bittorrent client. With it, you can circumvent ISPs that may block common torrent ports or limit their bandwidth usage. Using port forwarding, you could, for example, forward your BitTorrent traffic through the standard web port (80). Some torrent clients also support randomizing of ports so that they will use a different one every time you start them.

2. Limit Downloads and Uploads

Since many ISPs now limit the amount of bandwidth you can consume within a month (or even at certain times of the day), it is important to not let your torrent downloading and uploading go unchecked. Torrent clients like qBittorrent have features that allow you to limit the number, speed, and even time of day that downloads are allowed.

3. Encryption

Encryption is all about privacy. There is no reason for anyone, even your ISP to know exactly what sites you are visiting or what files you are downloading. Most torrent clients support some type of encryption for the data and/or header information. It is important to note that encryption will not mask your IP address, so anyone spying on the torrent (i.e. actively connected to the tracker) will still know you are downloading it, but anyone trying to spy on your Internet traffic in general will not be able to see what you are doing.

4. Filter Lists

There are plenty of organizations that are known for their snooping or malicious intent. With an IP filter list, you can completely block them from connecting to you as peers, thereby eliminating any chance of them monitoring you and catching you in the act of downloading something. This may also help reduce the chance that you will connect to a peer that sends out harmful data or malware.

5. Proxy or VPN

Of all of the security measures on the list, this is by far the most effective. By routing your torrent traffic through a proxy or VPN, you can completely hide yourself from the outside world. Used in combination with the other tools on this list, your torrent downloading will be virtually covert. Proxy providers usually charge a subscription fee, and they will require you to either download a specially configured bittorrent client or reconfigure yours to use their proxy (often utilizing a SOCKS5 protocol).

Your privacy, however, is only as secure as the company offering the service. If they are under investigation or are willing to sell your information, using their services may not help you at all. Therefore, it is a good idea to ask around and do your research before using a proxy or VPN service.

Privacy and Security

The media often associates BitTorrent with illegal file sharing, but there are numerous legitimate organizations, from Linux distribution developers to content delivery networks (CDN), that make use of bittorrent technology. Furthermore, many free media distributors who use open licenses, such as Creative Commons, use bittorrent to help reduce their bandwidth costs.

With a little effort, you can use the above-mentioned tools to help you take back your right to download and share legitimate content and software, while also maintaining your privacy and security.

The post How to Secure Your Torrent Downloads appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

In reality, a font can make or break a desktop’s appearance and accessibility. KDE makes it incredibly easy to install and configure fonts, but since I could not find any one document that lists all of the features and functionality, MakeTakeEasier comes to the rescue again.

Choosing Fonts

KDE does not have a default font set. That completely depends on the Unix or Linux distribution you happen to be using. The font you choose should be both aesthetically pleasing and also easy to read. Whether you realize it or not, you do a lot of reading on your computer, from menus to emails, making font appearance a critical feature.

To change KDE fonts, do the following:

1. Open System Settings by clicking the “K” menu and then going to “Applications -> Settings -> System Settings”. If it is in a different place, you can type it in the search box to get to it.
2. Under the category “Common Appearance and Behavior”, click “Application Appearance”.
3. Choose the fourth sidebar item from the top labeled “Fonts”
4. Click the “Choose” button to the right of the font type you want to change or click “Adjust All Fonts” to change them all at once.

In addition to selecting the font you want, you can also set some font rendering settings. Anti-aliasing will give the fonts a smoother look, removing jagged edges, but it can also make them slightly blurry. Some users must have this setting on while others cannot stand it.

If you click “Configure” next to that option, you will see some options for “subpixel rendering“, which may vary depending on your monitor and graphics driver. “Hinting” may make your words clearer, but you should experiment with it to get the best results possible.

Installing Fonts

You can install fonts from within system settings, but this is not the only way to do it. You can also install them directly from Dolphin, KDE’s file manager. First, to install using System Settings:

1. Start System Settings
2. Under “System Administration” click “Font installer”
3. Click “Add”at the bottom to install a new font.
4. It will then ask you if you want to install it for “Personal” or “System”. “Personal” refers to local fonts for only your current user, while “System” refers to fonts usable by all users. If you choose “System”, it will prompt you for your administrative or root password.

Installing From Dolphin

When you download a font from the web or want to install one from a removable device, you do not have to go into the font installer. You can install fonts from anywhere using Dolphin. To do so:

1. Open Dolphin and navigate to the folder where you have saved the fonts
2. Click the font to open it, and it should bring up KDE’s font viewer, which will provide a preview.
3. Click “Install”.

Alternatively, if you do not need a preview, you can skip the font viewer and simply right click on the font, go to “Actions” in the menu, and then click “Install”. In either case, it will prompt you to choose between Personal and System.

Other Apps

KDE applications will almost always use the global fonts you specify. In some cases, however, you can use custom fonts for individual applications like KMail. Furthermore, you may need to configure fonts manually for Qt-only apps and GTK apps, although this may happen automatically. For Qt, you can use qtconfig and qtconfig-qt4. For GTK, you can use gtk-chtheme. Once you are finished, you will have a beautiful KDE desktop with your fonts exactly the way you want them.

The post How to Get Great Looking Fonts in KDE appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

Not all graphics cards are equal, but one would expect them to perform the same or close to the same on one operating system as they do on another. Unfortunately, the lack of cooperation from some graphics chip manufacturers and the slow development of some open source drivers have created an environment where every user’s experience may be different.

KDE has several settings that you can tweak to get better performance with desktop effects. Unfortunately, there is no solution that fixes all issues, and even two users with the same graphics chip manufacturer but different models may have dramatically different results. The intent of this guide is to help you understand the different settings and what they can do to help improve performance.

Enable Desktop Effects

Many current Linux distributions will enable desktop effects by default. If your distribution does but you still cannot get desktop effects working, you should first check the settings.

1. Open “System Settings” from the K-menu or press Alt+F2 and type “System Settings”.
2. Under Workspace Appearance and Behavior, click “Desktop Effects”.
3. Check the “Enable desktop effects” box.

If you cannot check the box and it tells you that it could not be enabled, KDE may have your graphics card on its black list. To get around this problem, you will need to manually edit ~/.kde/share/config/kwinrc. You can use the following commands from a terminal:

kwriteconfig -file kwinrc -group Compositing -key Enabled true
kwriteconfig -file kwinrc -group Compositing -key OpenGLIsUnsafe false
kwriteconfig -file kwinrc -group Compositing -key CheckIsSafe true

Advanced Configuration

The “Advanced” tab in the “Desktop Effects” configuration allows you to tweak your effect system to work better with your graphics card. As a warning, you should know that some settings may cause your screen to become unreadable or cause desktop effects to stop working. Fortunately, any changes you make will revert back to their previous settings if you are unable to confirm them.

Compositing type

There are two choices here: OpenGL (3D) and XRender (2D). From my experience, graphics cards with good 3D hardware and drivers should always use OpenGL. Nvidia and AMD cards usually fall into this category, although the AMD/ATI drivers may vary in performance depending on the age of your card. Recent Intel graphics drivers have been horrendous, and your 3D performance will probably be significantly lower than it would in Windows. Because of this, I recommend using XRender with Intel graphics chips until the drivers are improved. The down side of XRender is that it will disable some effects, such as Desktop Cube and Cover Switch. Most, however, such as Transparency, Shadows, and Desktop Grid, will continue to function.

If you want to make sure desktop effects stay enabled no matter what, check the “Disable functionality checks” box. This may help if some effects work with your card but are not supported.

Keep window thumbnails

In most situations, you can leave the setting “Only for Shown Windows”. If you experience any problems, you can always disable it.

Scale method

This is all about speed vs. quality, and only the discerning eye will know the difference. “Crisp” is faster and more rigid, while “Smooth” is slower and more polished.

If you think suspending desktop effects will improve performance, you can check “Suspend desktop effects for fullscreen windows”. This may help some games and videos.

OpenGL mode

There are three settings for OpenGL mode:

• Texture from Pixmap – In this setting, textures are stored directly in the graphics card’s memory, which is usually faster than storing them in the system memory
• Shared memory – This stores the textures in your X server’s shared memory, which is a section of your system memory. Use this only if pixmaps do not work, as it is usually slower.
• Fallback – This setting simply tries Texture from Pixmap and then switches to Shared memory if the former does not work.

Direct rendering

This is one setting that will vary greatly from one graphics card / driver combination to another. Generally, direct rendering should be faster as it bypasses X and sends instructions directly to the graphics card, but some cards have stability issues or incompatibility with this option.

VSync

With vertical synchronization, all screen drawing is synced with the monitor’s vertical display updates. It is designed to make the screen easier on the eyes and prevent tearing. For some, however, it can slow down performance.

The Right Combination

It is impossible to know what the perfect combination of settings will be without trying them on your own graphics card. Until the Linux graphic driver situation improves,  KDE users will have to do some tweaking to get optimal performance.

The post How to Optimize KDE Desktop Effects appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

One media streaming dilemma that still faces some Xbox 360 and PS3 users is the ability to stream content from another device, such as a desktop or laptop computer. If you have home movies, pictures or photos, a collection of MP3s, or other content that you have downloaded to your computer, it is a pain to have to copy that content to your game console. For Windows users, they can connect their Xbox 360 to their Windows computers without much difficulty. For the rest of us, there are third-party tools. One in particular that I have been using lately is PS3 Media Server.

PS3 Media Server

Despite the name, PS3 Media Server can actually stream to a number of UPnP-capable devices, including the Xbox 360, Android phones and tablets, XBMC, iPad, and Sony Bravia Internet TVs. It is also cross-platform and free and open source, with builds available for Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows. It is written in Java and can stream supported content formats directly or even transcode incompatible content before streaming.

Installation and Setup

The Windows and Mac versions comes with .exe and .dmg files respectively. The installation process should be familiar to you. For Linux, there are no distribution-specific packages, so you will need to download the .tgz file and extract the contents. You can copy the extracted files wherever you want and then just execute the PMS.sh file. As it is platform-independent, you might be able to get it to work with other Unix-like OSes, such as FreeBSD, as long as Java is installed and working.

After startup, the first screen will show you a detection process where PMS will look for a PlayStation 3 on your network. If it finds one, it will show a picture of one at the top and immediately make itself available to it. Regardless, it will continue searching for additional devices. If it finds an Xbox 360, it will display a picture of one on the bottom half of the window.

Your content will now be ready to stream, but you still need to tell PMS where the content is. To do this, click the “Navigation/Share Settings” tab. At the bottom is a section called “Shared folders”. Click the folder icon with the big plus emblem and select the folders you want to add to your streaming library. Once you have selected the folders you want, you will notice that the top middle button labeled “Restart HTTP Server” has become available. Click it to refresh your new shares.

There are many other features you can configure, such as image thumbnails, network features, and transcoding settings. To support transcoding, you will need to make sure you have Mplayer/MEncoder and/or FFMPEG installed. If you intend to stream HD movies while transcoding them, you will need a powerful computer. My laptop was unable to do it without stuttering through it. Without transcoding, everything streams fine.

At your game console, you should go through the normal process of attaching media streamers and playing content. On the Xbox 360 for example, it will detect your PS3 Media Server and play content from it as if it were a Windows machine. If you have trouble connecting, always go back and check the “Status” tab on PMS, and if necessary, restart it. You should now be able to enjoy your computer’s content from your living room anytime you want it.

PS3 Media Server

The post How to Stream Media to Your Xbox 360 or PS3 appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

The developers of Steel Storm, Kot-in-Action Creative Artel are back again with the next installment, Steel Storm: Burning Retribution. The formula is still the same, an action-packed top-down shooter with strategy elements woven throughout. This time around, there are new weapons, more maps, new enemies, new missions, bonus campaigns, and new multiplayer features.  Steel Storm: Burning Retribution also includes Episode I, so you can play it again or, if you are new to the game, for the first time.

About the Game

In Steel Storm: Burning Retribution, you take on the role of a ship pilot. Rather than going into space, the ship hovers low to the ground, making its way through canyons and man-made structures. The ship is equipped with standard cannons, but you can pick up a variety of weapons along the way, including missiles that are quite destructive.

Although it is a top-down shooter, it is rendered in a 3D environment, so you can adjust the camera angle to suit your taste. You also have full control over graphics features so that you can adjust settings to run on your computer. It is suited to run well on both fast and slightly older machines.

Enemy ships can appear on the spot and may fire at you from several different angles at once. You will need some coordination to dodge them and fire at the same time. To help you with this, Steel Storm offers a few control options, including mouse+keyboard, gamepad, and Xbox 360 controller support.

Gameplay

This game is not your typical arcade shooter. Do not expect to meet wave after wave of enemies on a linear map. Instead, you must complete mission objectives, which sometimes involve exploration, back-tracking, and finding the right tools to get the job done. Some of those tools include keys, force-field generators, and teleporters. You will still have to fight wave after wave of enemies, all while trying to complete those strategic objectives.

For the most part, you can just keep your finger on the trigger whenever enemies are around, but you will need to use your environment to effectively dodge attacks and stay alive. Once all of your ships have been destroyed, it will send you back to the beginning of the mission. Therefore, you cannot survive without some tactical maneuvering.

Campaigns are only part of the fun with Steel Storm. It also has complete multiplayer functionality with deathmatch, co-op campaigns, and capture the flag matches. There are usually several servers online to choose from, as well as a Steam multiplayer community. Moreover, it is quite easy to setup your own server and go into a private match with your friends. Multiplayer is a great way to get a taste for all the weapons, shields, and other goodies Steel Storm has to offer, and testing them out on your gaming friends is quite fun.

Lastly, Steel Storm includes an editor, allowing players to create their own campaigns, death matches, and capture the flag matches. The developers have even posted a video tutorial to help you get started making your own missions.

Availability

One of the great things about many indie games is that the developers care about reaching as wide an audience as possible. Steel Storm: Burning Retribution is no exception and is available for Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux.

You can try Episode I for free, which is more than a short demo. It is a stand-alone game in itself. Steam users can get the Windows and Mac version through the normal process for $9.99.  Ubuntu users can purchase through the Ubuntu Software Center for the discounted price of $8.99.

Final Verdict

Steel Storm: Episode I was already a fantastic game all by itself, and many would probably have been willing to pay just for that game. With Burning Retribution, you get Episode I and the new game, all for under $10. It is hard to find fault in that, and I could not find any other faults with this game. If you are a fan of shooters and like to get a lot for your money, this game is worth it.

The post Steel Storm: Burning Retribution Review appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

Converseen is easy to install and use and will have you on your way to converting and/or resizing your small or large collection of images in just a few simple steps.

Installation

The Converseen website has binaries for the program available for Ubuntu, Fedora, and OpenSUSE, complete with installation instructions for each.

To install in Ubuntu, type the following in a terminal:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:faster3ck/converseen
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install converseen

If you need to install it from source, follow these directions:

tar -xvf converseen_0.x_src-tar.bz2
cd converseen_0.x
qmake && make
su
make install

Setup and Conversion

Converseen’s global settings only have two options, one for language and the other for giving you the option to either automatically overwrite images with the same names or “ask first”.

The first thing you should do to begin converting is to select the images you want to manipulate. Click “Open Images”. In the file browser you can select more than one image in a directory by holding Ctrl and clicking each one, or select them all with Ctrl+A.  Click “Open” to add them. If you later need to add more, click the “Add Images” button instead.

In the left column, you will see a preview of the selected image followed by settings to change resolution, dimensions, output directory, and batch name assignment for the new files. You can change dimensions using percentages or pixels. The “maintain aspect ratio” option allows you to set either a uniform height or width, while keeping the right aspect ratios for all images. If the output directory is the same as the current one, you will need to decide whether you want Converseen to overwrite the current files or create new ones. You can do this in the “Output Options” section.

If you want to rename your files, check the “Rename” option and then enter the new naming scheme you want to use. By default it is “#_copy”. That means, if the original is named Beach.jpg, the converted file will be named Beach_copy.jpg.

To convert the images you have added, check the files you want in the batch or click “Check All”. Then, select the image format you want from the dropdown menu. Be sure to click “Image settings” to configure any available features for that format.  JPEG and PNG formats will have “compression level” settings that will affect image quality and size.

When you are satisfied with all of the settings and selected images, click “Convert”. A dialog box will appear showing you how many files have been converted and if there were any errors. When it finishes, click “Close”.

Image Bliss

Converting a large number of images can become time consuming. With Converseen you can let it do the work while you do something else. It also cuts down the number of steps since you can convert and resize images all in one swing. With such an easy tool, you will be in image bliss.

The post How to Batch Convert and Resize Images with Converseen appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

About the Game

Like many of the free FPS games, Red Eclipse is primarily geared toward multi-player matches, and although it includes some single-player functionality, it refers to it as “practice” and does not offer any storyline or cut scenes like you would expect from a commercial singe-player game.

In terms of multi-player variations, it has all the match types you would expect plus a few extra. Matches include: Campaign, Deathmatch, Capture the Flag, Defend the Flag, and Time Trial. Another match type, Bomber Ball, is a variation of Capture the Flag that requires you to deliver a bomb to the enemy base before it explodes in your hands. Red Eclipse also includes numerous “mutators” that modify the gameplay in a variety of ways when applied. Some of them are:

• Vampire – hurting others helps restore your health
• Expert – only headshots kill you and enemies
• Jetpack – holding jump makes you fly around
• Instagib – one shot kills

Weapons include: Fist, Pistol, Sword, Shotgun, SMG, Flamer, Plasma, Rifle, Grenade, Rocket, and Melee.

Graphics and Visuals

Based on the Cube Engine 2, Red Eclipse offers a pretty decent graphical experience. It will not blow you away, but it can impress at times with its dynamic lighting, shadows, explosive effects, and general bloody carnage. Motion blurring and reflections further help immerse you in the gameplay.

Character models for the players are somewhat generic in their almost Halo-looking spacesuits, but they serve their purpose sufficiently.

The weapons look impressive, particularly the sword (although I had little success actually cutting someone without getting shot).

Gameplay

One benefit of using the Cube Engine 2 is that Red Eclipse is fast – extremely fast.  Even on a low-end notebook, I was able to get full effects and super-fast gameplay.  The speed is particularly useful when taking advantage of features like the ability to momentarily walk up a wall or leap from an impossibly high ledge, features the game makers refer to as “Agile Gameplay”.

The game modes are thoughtful, and one can expect that more modes and mutators will be added as the game matures.  Many of the multi-player servers may be empty when you look for online matches, as would be expected with such a new game, but there is usually at least one server with active participants.

Some things with Red Eclipse take time to get used to, such as needing to press a key to pick up a weapon. Although that is probably more realistic than the snatch-and-shoot style of other multiplayer FPS games, it tends to slow down an otherwise fast-paced game. It also makes it unlikely you will be able to hit enemies with a barrage of different weapons in one attack.

The controls are pretty straightforward and fully customizable. Those who are used to the mouse+keyboard assault combination will feel right at home.

One of the most unique and promising features of Red Eclipse is the Editor. It already features a good number of maps, and users can create their own with an in-game editor. This means that you can literally walk around in your world as you create it. This is a feature of the Cube Engine 2, which makes switching back and forth between editing and testing a matter of keystrokes.

Overall Impressions

Red Eclipse is not a game changer in terms of the FPS genre, but it will definitely attract those who are familiar with its multi-player predecessors. Furthermore, features like the mutators and editor place it a little higher than some of the other free and open source FPS games.

While the graphics will not blow you away, the gameplay is fast and fluid, allowing for intense battles and a lot of the agile gameplay the developers promised to deliver. Red Eclipse passes the ultimate test of being fun without complications. For that, it gets a four out of five. Oh, one more thing. When you play the campaign, be prepared to shoot zombies.

The post A Review of Red Eclipse, Free and Open Source FPS appeared first on Make Tech Easier.

Once setup, users can connect to the Sparkleshare server and edit/add/create files that are shared with collaborators, who can then do the same. Sparkleshare also has the potential of being used for simple cloud file storage like Dropbox or SpiderOak. The major difference is that Sparkleshare is free and open source, and you can install it on your own server.

Sparkleshare makes use of Git, a free and open source versioning control system. If you have git installed on your server, you can effortlessly keep your files in sync. If you do not have your own server or VPS, you can use Github or Gitorious to at least test the early version of Sparkleshare that is currently available.

Installation

To install Sparkleshare and get started, just follow these steps:

On Ubuntu 10.10 and derivative OSes, add the necessary repository and install.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:nuovodna/nuovodna-stuff
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install sparkleshare

If you prefer not to add a third-party repository, you can also download the deb file directly in 32-bit or 64-bit.

To install from source on another distribution or OS, see the Sparkleshare README.

Configuration

If you are going to use Sparkleshare on your own server, you should follow the instructions on this tutorial. To try out Sparkleshare using GitHub, do the following:

1. Get a free GitHub account
2. Click “Dashboard” – “New Repository”
3. Give your project a name and (optional) description and click “Create Repository”
4. Start Sparkleshare on your computer
5. Enter your Name and email address and click “Next”

6. Open a file manager and go to ~/.config/sparkleshare
7. Edit a file called sparkleshare.username.key.pub  (username should be replaced with your username)
8. Copy the entire contents of this file.
9. Back on the GitHub account, go to “Account Settings -> SSH Public Keys -> Add another public key”
10. Give the key a title and paste the contents from your .pub file and click “Add key”
11. Go back to Sparkleshare, select GitHub as your remote folder, and for Folder Name, enter your GitHub username and repository folder name: “username/repository-name”

12. Click “Sync”, and it should sync successfully.

Note: If it says “something went wrong”, check your ssh key again. If you are sure you pasted it correctly, you may need to manually accept the connection. Open a terminal and type:

ssh github.com

It will ask, “Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)?”

Type yes and press Enter. When you go back to Sparkleshare, it should now work.

The Sparkleshare folder icon should stay in your system tray when it is running. Clicking on it will show your available repositories. Anything you edit or save in that folder will be edited and saved on the server, and those changes will be visible for any collaborators.

Currently, there is no actual cloud service (paid or free) for Sparkleshare, and unless you want to pay for a GitHub account, your projects will be publicly visible. If, however, you use your own server, you can setup a private repository and enjoy secure, free, open source file syncing and collaboration.

The post Open Source File Syncing And Collaboration With Sparkleshare appeared first on Make Tech Easier.