[Opensource] Giving a flick with my mouse

[Adam Barbary]

Beryl certainly does blitz the opposition in the eye-candy department.
It is interesting to note that Ubuntu Linux (Feisty) has compiz built in
now, and the wobbly windows work fine on a Centrino Laptop 1.3GHz, with
512MB Ram and 32MB(Shared) Intel Graphics. I doubt Vista with Aero would
run at all, let alone match this, but I'm not buying a copy to find out.

On the dual boot note, I have just started playing with Virtual Box
http://www.virtualbox.org/ running under Ubuntu, and have nothing but
praise for this virtualisation tool. The laptop in question has only
512MB of RAM of which half is allocated to the host and the other to the
guest operating system. The system runs incredibly well, and there are
some great features to allow seamless mouse and keyboard capture to a
Windows guest.

Best of all, it is opensource. You can grab precompiled binaries, which
are free for academic use, or compile the system yourself. Definitely
worth a look, especially for those people who have a native Win app
which refuses to work under wine. Virtualisation is much more speedier
option if you have the memory to back it up. Check it out, it is so
simple to set up.

Cheers,

Adam

On Sat, 2007-03-10 at 22:22 +1100, Roland Gesthuizen wrote:
> 
>                Interesting Windows flick with the mouse
> This is screenshot of an Ubuntu Linux desktop that we are running on a
> school computer. We built this on a partition as part of our new dual
> boot setup for deployment on the wider school computers. Seems to be
> working very nicely so far. We included many standard applications
> that are already on the other computer, even managed to add printing
> to a network printer. 
> 
> This desktop is also using Beryl, a cute 3D screen tool with some nice
> eye candy and effects as windows are moved about.  As a test I ran a
> remote console session to access a nearby Windows server. 
> 
> We have tinkered with dual boot desktops before, now that all the
> computers are supported by the one Zenworks image, this is our first
> serious step towards deploying Linux across the entire network. I
> learned heaps playing about with this distribution over the term
> break.
> 
> The odd shape here is from quickly moving the Windows console window
> by moving the menu bar with the mouse and pressing the printscreen
> button. It does make me wonder what other interesting and creative
> shapes I can make by giving the desktop windows a flick with my mouse.
> 
> Windows still runs as normal, the world hasnt ended, the milk in the
> staff room hasn't gone off, there is still oodles of bandwidth and
> server space left, we can still teach basic breathing.
> 
> Full credit for this exciting new project goes to the collective,
> cooperative and open skills provided by Peter and Daniel. We still
> have a few bugglets to iron out. Important thing is that we are
> learning heaps along the way (what schools are about heh?) 
> 
> Why? Because it is fun. :-)
> 
> Regards Roland
> 
> -- 
> Roland Gesthuizen - ICT Coordinator - Westall Secondary College
> http://www.westallsc.vic.edu.au
> 
> "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can
> change the world; indeed it is the only thing that ever has."
> --Margaret Mead _______________________________________________ 
> http://www.edulists.com.au - FAQ, resources, subscribe, unsubscribe 
> Open Source Mailing List kindly supported by 
> http://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au - Victorian Curriculum and Assessment
> Authority and 
> http://www.vitta.org.au - VITTA Victorian Information Technology
> Teachers Association Inc