office space closed

RIp.

Iam closing this blog, so that I can concentrate on my other one. Also, as you seen, I haven't really even posted since september. I will continue to write about using Linux in my home office on my other blog.

My New Office Setup

Now that my internet connection is running again, I can do more than check news and email. its a delight to have some media again. So, enough just loafing around, its time to get to business. Since I am planning on using Linux to run business needs, there still some playing around to do.
First off, after installing Ubuntu, I went to the add programs in the application menu and begun my search. I selected the option to show all open source programs, to see the entire listing that in the repositories I have set currently.
For me personally, I'm going to stick to mostly Gnome applications, but don't let me stop you if use wish to use KDE and Gnome applications co-existing or using KDE via Kubuntu exclusively.
Here are some the applications I would need for just right now, I will update if their any changes.
Open Office is already installed, ready to go, so that covers document creation.
Timekeeper- Gnome Time Tracker, also known as gnotime. This program will let me track how long I'm working on what. This is good to know early on to see if overdoing it in the worthless tasks category.
Address book- I had some issues finding one oddly enough that I liked. Rubia Address book will fill the need for now. I don't know if I have a use for this, but keeping info on contacts does make some..sense.
Open Office Alternatives- AbiWord, Gnumeric. This just in case I get sick of open office.
stock chart program- QTStalker. Seems “business-like” to have in my arsenal. Its a program like Metastock, charting program. I may not have really any use for this until later. Windows is king it seems like for any stock related programs, such as trading platforms, charting, and so on.
Mind Mapping- Labyrinth mind mapping. I doubt I will have much use for mind mapping, but none less, its free so why not?
I selected a few financial tracking programs and I'm going to do an article comparing them later on. I have to start playing with them to see which one I end up using. Eqonimise, Grisbi, GnuCash, and Homebank will be the ones I'm going to work with. I know GnuCash is the oldest and most used one out of the group, so I will start with that.


One application that might worth be throwing into the bunch is a screen capture program to see if your staying on track. You could play the video to see if your really working or just staring at a screen. I decided Gnotime is good enough. Now, that my shop is setup, one thing I need to do is create an environment I can work in, so changing themes, from places like art.gnome.org or gnome-look.org is a great place to look at. This application menu might need some suggestions, so please leave some in the comment section.

Linux for fun

While I'm mostly using Linux on our computer for business reasons, I haven't been using it much. Mostly, its been for fun. fiddling mostly with the mythtv project. Tomorrow, I am going to do some stuff with gnucash and see if I can make some statements. Fun..no. Budgets stink. But, I need to learn now, so that I can setup and deal with the system.

Now, We are running..

Over the weekend I found a 60 gig drive deep in the back of my closet. Naturally, I have it now installed in the office computer. Now, no more running virtual machines. Having this fast of a duel core processor, isn't quite something Im use to in Linux, so Im enjoying it immensely. Later down the line Im going to replace the motherboard, since this one is driving me nuts. Im thinking about replacing it with another cheap board, a Asrock p965

Up and Sortof Running

Taking another stab at this Linux only office, for now I have Linux running in a virtual machine via the program VirtalBox. While its just as easy to repartion and in install for me, I wanted to run some tests first. So far I have fedora 6 running, but it just finished installing. Haven't done..much else. Over the week I bought A new computer(Fry's Electronics had a sale) here some working specs

Intel 915 processor(duel core, not the core duo, 4300 might of been a better buy, but you cant go wrong only spending 78 dollars on a processor and motherboard combo, unless you have vendettas against ECS motherboards[sometimes..I do] or you can spend 50 more on the core duo 4300 with the same board)
PT890T-a While this board horrible, It can be changed later whenever..I get around to that.
1 gig of ram I had to purchase DDR2 for the motherboard, its Kingston if you wanted to know the brand, for this board. I still carry a whole lot of just DDR memory since my main(gaming) system is a AMD Athlon 3500.
Host OS is Windows XP Pro.
Oh yea, 20 gigs is dedicated to fedora virtually.

This is also an upgrade from an Intel 631 system of the nearly same specs. Minus DDR2.

The original plan of using an older athlon 2400, is obviously out of the question due to space reasons( I live in a 540 sq ft apartment, and my wife says I am only allowed 3 computers running, at least she said in humor, but I'm trying to keep that wish)
and lack of a case currently, since its been really humid and I haven't finish the paint job. The older Intel 631, will be used probably for the Linux office at this point in time.

death of a computer

Woops, due to some playing around on the computer, I ended up with a non-booting system. Spending 3 days on it was a killer getting things back in order. I will do some posting here in a day or two once Im up to date on everything. Till then...

a real...hello

Well, I finally got around to it and decided to post something here. So here we go...

First off, this blog will make much more sense by checking out here first. Mostly here going to be my personal rantings and office setup- which is going to be different than most. I'm going try to stay in Linux as much as possible to handle all my home office needs(blogging, bookkeeping, light web surfing, and some photo editing in gimp). I have found it to be mature enough to work as a desktop OS, contrary to what most journalists, individuals, and system administrators say. Even more so, our office computer is quite old by a few years. So, if that doesn't add fuel to the fire, who knows what will.

Right now, the computer case is being spray painted purple(wife choice), once that modding is done, the system should be put into good use. While that taking awhile due to the recent rain storms, I went ahead and installed Ubuntu onto a old hard drive. The drive will then be used in a newer system for now. Once I get everything installed, I will cover the choices that I made.
Some system specs:

Amd Athlon XP 2400
1024 gigs of ram
30 gigabyte hard drive

Granted, that does not sound like a horrible system, however its on the old side. More to report very soon.