Desktop Environments

I'm trying the Gnome 3 desktop environment for Debian 8 and it really isn't that bad, reminds me of Windows 8/8.1. I'm using MATE in FreeBSD which is a for of Gnome 2. And starting with Vista Windows uses DWM I think or that might be like Xorg. They use Aero. Windows also uses the Windows bootloader and Linux GRUB. I really would like to be able to install the Windows desktop environment just like another environment like KDE or Gnome. I've forked the Budgie Desktop environment and made my own called Blueberry for Linux and Gnome Shell. I've also forked the Lumina desktop for BSD which is a low level C++ desktop environment. Fairly new.

Upgrade for Wheezy to Jessie

Yesterday I upgraded to Debian 8 "Jessie" which is now on the stable branch from "Wheezy" and my base image was "Squeeze". I also began reading about the systemd process and how it replaced "init". Also here is a source list generator from Switzerland.

Microsoft Design Principles and Scenarios Star 2011

In 2011 I completed a course and in Microsoft's eyes became a design principles and scenarios star. More on this as I remember it, it was the design toolbox and I still have all of the files. And here was my avatar.

Building Singularity

In 02010 I downloaded and read about a Microsoft research OS called Singularity. Now I'm going to tell you how to build it. First you can download it from Codeplex here. Next unzip the RDK and right click on the "configure.cmd" and run as administrator, accept the defaults and press enter. This should place a Singularity shortcut on your desktop. Next open the the shortcut placed on your desktop and type "msb Distro\World.proj" allow about 25-30 min depending on your machine to build. After it is built you should be able to run it in a VM. I might go into more detail later. If you really want to have fun read up on MSBuild and and how to add you own CLI projects to the Applications folder. The Singularity build requires .NET 3.5.You also might need to add "C:\Windows System32;" to your PATH environment variables. You also can find many of the build tools like boogie and the CLR Profiler on Codeplex. You might want to sandbox your modifications so if Microsoft releases another Singularity variant in the future it will be compatible. Again read up on MSBuild. You can turn on your virus protection after the build. Because many viruses are written in assembly.

 

Future of Concurrency and Parallelism

Here is a Joe Duffy interview. I first read Concurrent Programming on Windows in 2013. Here are the CHESS Tools There is also Midori which I haven't heard that much about lately but there is a C# OS called Cosmos and MOSA. I really haven't had much time to work with CHESS. Other than to write my own MSBuild wrapper.

COM

I first learned about Microsoft's Component Object Model in 1999. I read and learned the model through MSDN libraries and magazines. I think my first was a MSJ. I have all of my DVD archives. About three or four years ago I bought Don Box's "Essential COM".I partly read this book in an old MSDN library. And used Microsoft's M Language.

How to luanch the old style Control Panel in Windows 10.

To launch the old style Control Panel in Windows 10. You could go into the system files and find "control.exe" and pin it to the start menu. One good improvement in Windows 10 was the improvement to the environment variable settings. You can also launch the old -sytle control panel following this article.

MATE desktop environment and Slim

To install the MATE desktop environment and Slim so you can design your own Slim themes. Please no baby picture themes please. First "pkg delete" all of your old desktop environment packages and settings and then remove and unwanted dependencies with "pkg autoremove". The installation of a new desktop envirnoment is usually done after a clean install of FreeBSD. If some of the packages names change over time be sure to look them up on the freshports website.


Step 1:

 #pkg install xf86-video-fbdev mate-desktop mate xorg  

Step 2:

Add the following lines to /etc/rc.conf

 moused_enable="YES"  
 dbus_enable="YES"  
 hald_enable="YES"  

Step 3:

 #pkg install slim  

Step 4:

Add the following line to /etc/rc.conf

 slim_enable="YES"  

Step 5:

Create the following .xinitrc file in the user’s home directory and add the following line.

 exec mate-session  

Step 6:

You might have to configure slim by enabling the following line in your slim.conf file. Or if you are using bash enable it for bash.

 login_cmd   exec /bin/sh - ~/.xinitrc %session  

Reboot

Building Sandcastle Documentation in Visual Studio

Here is a nice article on building MSDN style documentation with sandcastle from The Microsoft Gulf Technical Community.

Why FreeBSD?

Here is an IBM article on why I kept choosing FreeBSD. There are differences in the kernel. And there isn't as much support like Linux as there should be.

Building the Windows Research Kernel.

To build the Windows research kernel after to obtain it legally from your academic institution like I did. You may need to download some Visual C/C++ runtime libraries but after that the kernel should kinda be sandboxed and build on Windows XP or later. I'm building it on Windows 8.1. We will be building WRKv1.2.

So open a command prompt and enter:

 set wrk= "path to WRK1.2"  
 set arch=x86 [or amd64]  
 path %wrk%\tools\%arch%;%path%  
 cd %wrk%\base\ntos  
 nmake -nologo %arch%=  

This will produce kernel files in BASE\NTOS\BUILD\EXE\%arch%

I really don't recommend booting the kernel on anything other than XP, but you can try and there should be instructions that came with the WRK 1.2 on how to do that. Pius you can read David Cutler's original design notes. Also you might get like I did a project called "Project OZ" which you can use the kernel with.

Cairo Dock and Plugins

The Cairo Dock and it's plugins need to be compiled from source. They are available in the ports at:

 /usr/ports/deskutils/cairo-dock  

and

 /usr/ports/deskutils/cairo-dock-plugins  

a simple "make install clean" for both will work. It may take about 30 mins or so depending on your machine. For the 3d effect select the 3d plane in the docks configuration settings. To tweak and remove the bottom toolbar use the "dconf editor". Finally add add the dock to your startup programs.

My very first FreeBSD Toolkit (no not from ebay)

Latest FreeBSD update

I noticed on the FreeBSD list someone asked about the latest security update for 10.3 RELEASE.
I've been a volunteer for FreeBSD for about 15 years now. And speaking from experience if the:

#freebsd-update fetch install 

doesn't work like it should. You might have to do a source update ans described in the latest security advisories here.You also might want to have these updates in a cron job  This is also in the handbook.