Joshua Price, Author at Make Tech Easier

Beginner’s Guide to Grep

There is a classic bit of computer wisdom that states “If you’ve got a problem, and decide to solve it with regular expressions, now you’ve got two problems.” This of course stems from the perception that regular expressions are a complicated mix of magic characters and Voodoo. Regular expressions can allow you to achieve elegant […]

Quick Review: What You Should Expect For Ubuntu 10.04

Ubuntu is set to release their next Long Term Support version at the end of April, and we now have a beta version to look at and see what we can expect. There are some pretty big changes coming in Lucid Lynx, many of which are partly or fully implemented in the current beta. There […]

How to Selectively Color Images in 5 Minutes

Using color to highlight a particular portion of your image can have drastic effects on the end result. Using photo editors like Photoshop and Gimp you can emphasize whatever colors you choose in an image. Music videos and films like Sin City used this extensively, and the resulting look can be replicated in Gimp in […]

Google Reader Play – The New Web Discovery Portal

Like many of you, I use Google Reader to keep track of new content from my favorite news sites and blogs. As a feed reader, it does a great job of storing and organizing information from countless sources. My friends can share their favorite Reader items with me, and I can with them. One thing […]

A Brief History of Brown: Ubuntu Feature Timeline

Love it or hate it, Ubuntu has changed the way Linux is perceived by many. What was once a mysterious hacker OS is now on the desktop of many technophobic grandmothers, and part of that success in recent years is due to Ubuntu. Next month, we’ll have the newest long-term release, 10.04 Lucid Lynx. A […]

How to Create Space Scenes Quickly and Easily in Gimp

I’m a sucker for a cool space wallpaper, and judging by the images I find online, so are many of you. Creating a cool space scene can be done in a few minutes once you’ve got the basic method down, and Gimp provides several ways to go about adding random elements to keep things interesting. […]

Smarter P2P with FrostWire

FrostWire is a free, open source multiplatform Gnutella and Bittorrent P2P client. It’s based on LimeWire, and includes many features from LimeWire’s Pro version. It includes such features as live chat, encrypted transfers, iTunes compatibility, and even built-in content through FrostWire’s 100% legal content site – FrostClick.com.

How to Create Your Own Torrent Tracker with RivetTracker

There are some things that are less about usefulness, and more about the cool factor. One such thing is setting up your own torrent tracker. There are plenty of legitimate use cases, but for most people, a personal tracker would be overkill. If, however, you need to distribute large files without wasting bandwidth, or just […]

How to Turn Your Linux Box into a Home Theater with Boxee

Boxee is a home theater PC software program that runs on Linux and has been designed to be used like an interactive TV, somewhat like the Xbox 360 interface. In fact it’s based on another program called XBMC which was originally created to run on the first Xbox consoles. These days, you can use Boxee […]

Is Google Buzz a Facebook Killer?

While the dust is still settling from Chrome OS, Wave, Android, and the Nexus One, Google drops another big announcement with Google Buzz, a new social networking platform. Some of you may be thinking “they’ve already tried that“. That’s true, but there are a few things that make Buzz particularly interesting. Namely, it’s integrated with […]

How to Fix Broken AVI Files with DivFix++

We’ve all had it happen. You download a (perfectly legitimate) AVI file and go to play it, only to find that it’s got a corrupted index, or bad frames, or other such flaws. Ideally, you can find a repair utility that can actually fix the files instead of all the hassle of re-downloading or re-encoding […]

Beginner’s Guide to Fluxbox Configuration

On any list of lightweight Linux window managers, you’ll find Fluxbox. Originally a fork of Blackbox, Flux is well known as a fast, light, highly configurable desktop. Unfortunately, Fluxbox’s emphasis on text files for nearly all configuration often acts as a roadblock for those first trying it out. There is a GUI which provides some […]

Cooking with SliTaz – An Innovative (and TINY!) Linux OS

I just found a new toy. It’s a Linux distro running a complete desktop, Firefox browser, multimedia utilities, FTP/SSH/IM/torrent/email clients, and a custom package manager… in a 30MB ISO. That’s right, it’s even smaller than Damn Small Linux. It can be run from CD or USB, and once booted it runs entirely from RAM, so […]

How to Save and Share Bash Settings Using Pastebin

As someone who earns part of my living by trying out Linux distros, I reinstall a LOT. Even my favorites rarely last longer than a few months before they’re wiped away to make room for something new. Invariably, one of the very first things I do after any installation is to tweak my shell to […]

First Look at the New Google Operating System – Chrome OS

Back in July, Google made BIG waves in the tech industry by announcing the development of a Google operating system based on Linux. For years there’s been speculation about if/when Google would do this, and when the announcement hit, there was no shortage of people throwing in their two cents on how this new contender […]

Google Wave – Round 2

We here at MakeTechEasier got a lot of positive feedback on our coverage of Google Wave, along with quite a few requests for additional information. So here, by reader request, is the second installment of Wave. Today we’ll be covering some of the more advanced and detailed features that didn’t fit into the original post. […]

Google Wave – The Future of Email?

Google’s not afraid to reinvent the wheel, as long as they think they can make a better wheel. So far, in my opinion at least, they’re usually successful. That being said, when I first heard about Google Wave, the new browser based communications system, I was skeptical. I like my emails, IMs, message boards and […]

How to Install and Use Ubuntu Netbook Remix

As time goes on, netbooks are getting more and more popular. These small, cheap, portable computers are gaining popularity in situations where you want the flexibility of a laptop, but don’t need the raw power or price tag of a high-end machine. Some come with Windows, some come with Linux. Unfortunately, the pre-installed Linux on […]

How to Find Free Linux Ebooks and Courseware

Like it or not, with Linux comes advocacy. There are a lot of people out there who like to spread the love in whatever ways they can. One nice side effect of this is the abundance of free Linux related information available to anyone. That’s good for us, as we’ll be covering just how to […]

How to Enhance Your Browser with Greasemonkey

How would you like to be able to customize the layout of the Google homepage? How about add better video controls and a download button to YouTube? Or set a profanity filter that works across all websites? Maybe remove all the “What type of leafy vegetable are you?” quizzes from Facebook? These are very few […]

How to Run Multiple Linux Distros Without Virtualization

A few weeks ago, I wrote an article on How To Run Multiple X Sessions Without Virtualization, which demonstrated how you can run multiple desktop environments at the same time on the same computer, and switch between them at the push of a button. I admit, this was somewhat of a warmup for the real […]

Getting Started with Pardus Linux

Pardus is a Linux distribution created and maintained by Scientific & Technological Research Council of Turkey. There’s certainly no shortage of customized and special-purpose Linux distributions available, but Pardus is unique in several ways. Today, instead of covering the usual aspects of an operating system like installation and included software, I’m going to cover the […]

How To Run Multiple X Sessions Without Virtualization

One of the best things about a Linux system is its flexibility. Even though I’ve been a heavy Linux user for years, I still come across features in the OS a related applications that surprise me. A while back I learned to run multiple desktop environments at the same time, using nothing but the features […]

How to Install Software from a Tarball in Linux

Most of the time, installing software in Linux is a breeze. Package management utilities like Apt, Portage, and Yum have made software installation in Linux even easier than it is in Windows (in my opinion at least). If you know what you want, you simply tell your package manager that you want it, and it’ll […]

How To Use Wolfram|Alpha Search and Firefox Extension

If you keep up on tech news, you’ve doubtlessly seen all the hype surrounding Wolfram|Alpha, the new not-exactly-search-engine that’s making big waves in the web search industry. Your traditional search engines like Google, Yahoo, MSN etc all work on the same basic principle: finding web pages based on keywords. Wolfram|Alpha isn’t about bringing web pages […]

How To Be More Efficient With Firefox Keywords

A feature of Firefox that often gets overlooked is the keyword system. Firefox can be set up to accept keywords to do things like open a favorite page or search a particular website. Today we’ll try out some of the things you can do with keywords. Bookmark Access Often, it’s faster to send your computer […]

How to Microblog From Your Gmail/Jabber

XMPP (Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol) is a IM system used by all kinds of chat clients, most notably Jabber and GMail. It’s open standard, allowing anyone to create a XMPP compatible chat programs. This gives it a flexibility not found in other chat systems like AIM and MSN Messenger. People have come up with […]

Making Full Use of the Super (Windows) Key in Gnome

I use a lot of different computers. Many of those computers are on different operating systems, or desktop environments. Just when I find myself growing accustomed to a particular way of doing things, I find myself on a different system with a different way of doing things. Key combinations are some of the most common […]

Making The Linux Command Line A Little Friendlier

One thing that gets debated over and over in Linux is the need for the command line. Many say that you should never need to access a command prompt to get things done, others are of the opinion that the power of the Linux shell is one of the things that makes Linux so great. […]

How To Be Part Of A Supercomputer With BOINC

Companies like Google are well known for their approach to computing power: using lots of little computers to do the job of a supercomputer. It’s cheap, fault-tolerant, and if done right, almost infinitely expandable. Well if that works with computers networked directly to each other, why not over the Internet? BOINC (or the Berkeley Open […]