Full Circle.

FYI Guys - "Each year, one of the most interesting parts of Microsoft's annual Form 10-K filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission is seeing which rivals and products are listed as competitors for each of the company's divisions. The names won't surprise anyone who follows the industry, but their inclusion in the filing means Microsoft considers them formidable enough to warrant a mention to investors."

So who did Microsoft include in this years filing? Red Hat and Canonical(Ubuntu).

More here: Microsoft's 10-K Filing

Like I said at the beginning of the semester - The Big Boys are taking notice.

Final exam's still up, don't forget the final discussion - Someone mention gaming on Linux? Check out: http://www.cedega.com/

Final Exam

The Final Exam is now posted. There are 18 questions and you have 40 minutes to complete it. Please be aware that Angel isn't tallying points properly - add all your points, divide by 240 (current point total, 345 w/ Final Exam and Final Discussion) to get your current grade. I will be dropping your lowest assignment grade before calculating your final grade.

Good Luck,
Charlie

Grades are posted

I think I got everything set correctly, grades should be viewable. As of now, there are 240pts available, by Saturday, there will be 345.

If you feel a grade is in error, contact me.

Charlie

Final Exam/Final Discussion

Here's what you'll need to know for the Final:

Know your basic vi commands.
Basic Unix/Linux commands(Assignment 3)
Linux directory/file structure
Loading arguments from a command line into a script
basic script routines

Of course, feel free to use any resource at your disposal.

You'll have 30 minutes to complete the Final and it'll be worth 100pts, you'll have one chance to take it, and it must be completed before Saturday, Aug. 8th.

Your final discussion:
You've had a chance this semester to explore the Open Source Community, as well as an opportunity to experience Linux and the idea of "Cloud Computing" first hand. Reading your discussion postings, everyone here has their own opinion of Linux and validity of Open Source - to the point where I'd swear some of you are on Blue Screen of Death's payroll.

Here's your chance to voice your opinion on what you think the future of Linux is, what's missing? What's the key hindrance keeping Linux from breaking into the mainstream?

I've really enjoyed reading your postings this summer, it's given me a better perspective on my admitted biases.

Thanks for a great summer!
Charlie

Final Assignment, Final Discussion, Final Exam

The final assignment has been posted, go to Angel and check it out. Your final discussion topic will be posted tomorrow, and the Final Exam will be available Wednesday - both need to completed by Saturday, 11:59pm. A Final Exam study sheet will also be available tomorrow.

Thanks for your patience this semester, while I dug around trying to figure out Angel. You guys have been great!

Charlie

So - Ubuntu Loaded... Now What?

Well, you have those questions you need to find answers for... Figure out how to open a Console Window -or- a Terminal Window/Session. This will bring you to a screen very similar to the Putty/SSH window we've been using to get to Shaula.

Wubi - Updated Instructions.

For Wubi - go here instead: http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/download The wubi link was taking too long to download everything necessary. Go to the aforementioned link, I chose 'United States OSU Open Source Lab' as my locaton, and downloaded the ISO. It takes ~4hrs to download over DSL. If you have dial-up or a slow connection, (and you live locally) contact me.

Next, go here [http://www.slysoft.com/en/download.html] and download Vitual Clone Drive.and associate .iso type files to it.
Double Click the .iso file you saved, and then click on Wubi.exe to begin your install - I chose 20GB for my install size.

Wubi is here!

What is Wubi - go to angel, check out the new assignment and find out!

Things are beginning to wrap up, so it's time for you guys to have your very own Linux Box, and see it as more than just a console window. Look over the assignment, install Wubi, answer the questions. Do this by Sunday.

Based on Wubi and the joy that comes with it, there will be a new discussion posted this Sunday, and assignment 7.2 - remember that scavenger hunt?

Also, I hope by this weekend, I'll figure out why your grades aren't displaying on Angel.

Next Wednesday, I'll post the final it'll be over Vi, Linux commands, and scripting.

Any questions, feel free to contact me.
Good Luck!

BTW - No discussion this week, concentrate on getting Wubi installed.

Assignment 6 - Deadline extended.

Assignment 6 will be due this Friday, 07/31/2009.
Keep in mind:

${/$/$}

*returns* the string with 'pattern' replaced with 'replace_with', it doesn't change the original string. So you have to do something like this:

string2=${string1/$pattern/$replace_with}

that will swap out 'pattern' with 'replace_with' in string1 and assign that new string to string2.

Any problems/issues, feel free to contact me. Reminder, there are online office hours tomorrow evening from 7pm to 8pm on Angel.

Assignment 6 - Issue.

Apparently, Shaula is running an older version of #bash which has issues with variable scope - in our code snippet:

#!/bin/bash
#sample code for reading in a file line by line.
fileIn=$1

cat $fileIn | while read linein
do
echo $linein
done

the piping into the while statement causes the while-loop to run in a subshell, any variables declared above the 'do' will exist in one shell, any variables used between the 'do' and the 'done' will be declared in another. In other words, when the script exits the subshell, variables will be reset to their values prior to entering the while loop. We can fix it by doing this:

while read linein
do
echo $linein
done < $fileIn

This causes the script to execute within one shell, therefore the variable scope is maintained for the whole script.

Good Luck!

New Assignment posted...

Advanced shell scripting this week...

and I'll catch up on grading.

As always, if you have any questions, need any hints, please email me.

Have a good week.

Discussion 6: Open Source for America

Well, we all know the only way to get things done through our government is by lobbyists and coalitions. Looks like the Linux community has caught on, and have created the Open Source for America advocacy group [http://www.opensourceforamerica.org/]

Google around for it, see what you can find out. Which companies are involved in this coalition? What is their goal? Is this going to be beneficial for our economy? or harmful? What are your thoughts?

RE:Discussion 5: Microsoft's Take on Opensource.

Honestly have to say, I did not see this coming:

Microsoft wants interoperability between Hyper-V and Linux, not world domination - But it's definetly a plus for linux users, seems Microsoft is taking the Linux world seriously, I wonder what Bill would have to say.

I'm a little behind in reading your discussion posts - hope to finish up tonight.

Command Line Arguments

Here's a little script that may help you understand how command line arguments are read.

#!/bin/sh
#
# Script that demos, command line args
#
echo "Total number of command line argument are $#"
echo "$0 is script name"
echo "$1 is first argument"
echo "$2 is second argument"
echo "All of them are :- $* or $@"

So if you can set a variable inside of your script like this:
arg1=$1

Assignment 5 - Another Hint

Here's a sample script which changes a directory:


#!/bin/bash
if [ "$#" -eq "0" ]
then
echo "usage: cdTest directory_name"
else
newDir=$1
cd $newDir
fi

Note: Watch the spaces! Unlike other programming langauges, shell programming is a stickler for proper formatting.

Call this script 'cdTest' and run it like:
. cdTest
-or-
source cdTest

and see what it does.

If you guys need extra time, email me, and I'll be willing to extend the deadline. Please note, though, if I extend the deadline, we'll be adding a couple 'extra' features to the assignment.

Assignment 5 - Hint.

Something to keep in mind - when you're running a bash script by typing "bash " you are actually running the script in a *different* shell not your current one with the command prompt. You need to figure out how to run a script in the *current* shell.

The logic behind Assignment 5 is this:

'my_cd ' will do the following:
will 1st print out the current directory then the directory you are
going to change to, and then change directories to it.

useful commands:

'pwd' returns the current working directory
'cd' changes directory

You need to figure out how to read in an argument from the command
line, put that argument value into your script and then change
directories to the that value.

While also remembering to save the
current directory into a variable so you can go back to it using your
custom 'go_back' script. Then:

'go_back' will:

read the value of the global variable you saved the previous 'pwd' to

then change directories to it.

This can all be done stringing together
linux commands we've already come across

Good Luck! Contact me via email if you need some further hints.

New Assignment, New Discussion, plus the VI Quiz

The week's material has been posted - we're beginning shell scripting, this takes some brain power, if you get stuck and need a hint, feel free to contact me. Because of this, this assignment will be due next Tuesday instead of Sunday.

The quiz over VI commands has also been posted, and will be available till this coming Sunday.

Good Luck!

BTW - continuing last week's discussion, you may want to check this out: http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2009/07/google-vs-microsoft-what-you-need-to-know/

Discussion 5: Microsoft's Take on Opensource.

Alright - so you guys are probably sick of discussing the opensource community. But the main attraction to Linux, is the opensource nature of it. As I have stated before, the opensource community is Gene Roddenberry's Utopia. We are developers working towards a better platform. We want to take someone elses idea and improve it; we want to see our ideas improved upon. We're not in it for the money, we're in it to have our ego's stroked, we're in it for the glory.

Microsoft has a different take, which I have no problem with, they are, afterall, a profitable corporation with global dependency. Bill Gates is a genious, and when he talks, people listen.

Here's an article covering Bill Gate's lecture at the Institute of Systems Biology where he touched upon the effectiveness of the opensource community in improving software, and not surprisingly, here's his opinion on opensource software from 1976.

But, they are trying to figure what this entire opensource-thing is about, they've introduced Codeplex (the faq:http://codeplex.codeplex.com) - but it's on their terms, see:http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-10058421-16.html

So, I'd like to know your thoughts on a couple things.

A) Do you think software can be improved through opensource? Or are nominal developers just trying to get their egos stroked - I mean, if they were *real* developers, why are they dealing in opensource?

B) We know Microsoft wants to make money, they are a company, is there a way to make opensource software profitable?

BTW - if anyone's interested, heres a link to a video Bill Gates discussing Microsoft and the Opensource Community @ UC Berkeley.

Quiz - Technical issues.

The quiz over vi commands apparently didn't show itself, I found the issue. It'll be released this evening along side Assignment and Discussion 5. It'll be available till this coming Sunday, 11:59pm

Assignment 4 and Grading update.

Hey Guys!
Assignment 4's been published, this week's the Vi Editor. I'm in the middle of getting caught up on grading.

Another great read on your discussion posts! Good Job! Many of you pointed out that you can buy "unlocked" PSPs or iPhones - but keep in mind, these are hacked (proper term is "cracked") devices. The main idea behind an opensource hardware device is it would be open from the manufacturer, and users would be *encouraged* to develop apps for/customize them.

Coming soon is Wubi! You may want to do a little behind the scenes research on it.

Contact me w/ any questions,
Charlie

Discussion 4 - Chrome OS.

Is Linux ready for the big time with Chrome OS?

Google announced their Chrome OS today. Google has become a mainstay in the Internet business, succeeding where others have failed (webcrawler, altavista, jeeves, live search) opening up an industry where even Microsoft is trying to carve out a niche (bing). Google is now going into the OS business, ready to take on the big guns - Microsoft and Apple.

There a lot or articles out about Chrome OS, do an internet search and sum up the features, and give me your thoughts on how/if Google can succeed in this arena - Chrome OS has the potential to revolutionize the PC - similar to what Microsoft did with DOS and Windows.

Please have your thoughts posted to the discussion board by 11:59pm next Tuesday, July 15th

Assignment 3 - Clarification.

In assignment 3 - you'll find a list of tasks I want you to find out about our linux server. Show me the results of the task as well as the command (or commands) used to get that result.

If you have any questions, feel free to email me or post a comment here.
Charlie

Updates! - Assignment 3, New Discussion, and Your Accounts

Assignment 3 has been posted, also your account id's are now available. Refer to the Assignment 3 instructions for your account information and login directions.

This week's discussion is following up on last weeks, except think about hardware. Here's an op-ed piece from Wired which illustrates the thought.

If hardware were equiped with an opensource OS - developers would be able write any app for any device and market it themselves - what would be the repercussions? What would be the benefits? With the impact opensource software is having on Microsoft, do you think Apple would see a similar impact with their iPhone?

Please post your discussion posting to Angel by next Tuesday, 07/07/2009 11:59PM.

BTW - your discussion posts from last week were great - Good job guys!

Discussion 2.

We all have an idea of what kind of impact the open-source community is having on the world. I'd like you guys to read this article: Linux World - Free Software will kill Redmond

Think about how the open source community and the Internet is changing our software applications paradigm, how do you think this will affect companies like Microsoft or Oracle? How do you think these companies will respond to on-line application suites? Do you use any on-line suites?

Sorry for the late discussion topic, for this reason you will have till next Tuesday (07/01/2009), 11:59pm.

User accounts will be ready next week.
Thanks guys.
Charlie

Assignment 2 is posted!

Check Angel for instructions.

Accounts coming soon!

I have procured us some Linux accounts on the Parkland Linux server - details coming soon. We'll be playing w/ the command line for the next couple weeks to get ourselves accustomed to the the command syntax. We'll then go on to installing Wubi on our personal machines, and dive further into the Linux world.

For the time being, please flip through Chapter 1 of your book, familiarize yourselves with the following concepts:
1. The History of Linux - plenty of resources online, as well.
2. Overview of Linux - try to understand Figure 1-1 on page 9. This is a great diagram of how Linux (and other OS's) integrate with Software and Hardware.
3. How Linux handles multi-user/multi-tasks
4. The Filesystem, and how the root directories are organized - Figure 1-2, page 10.
5. What a shell?
6. What is X windows?
7. What is the Graphic User Interface?

It might be useful to not only review the Chapter, but also look for on-line resources to give you more insight. You'll be amazed at the Linux Community.

Stay tuned - More to come.
Charlie

Joys of Linux - Assignment 1

In modern times, an Operating System (OS) is only as good as the applications it supports. Look at the major OS's, they've all been able to thrive because of the applications developers have been able to build - the Microsoft Office Suite being a major player - in fact, industry experts have pinpointed Microsoft Office as a major contributor to the success of Apple's Mac OS (we don't hear that on Apple's Mac vs. PC commercials).Unix isn't the main reason behind the grass roots success of Linux, sure it is a driving force - CS majors who had gotten used to Unix in their computer labs now have the power of a Unix workstation on their desktop - but the average end user could really care less. The open source community behind Linux is the main reason. For those of you unfamiliar, the Open Source community develops and distributes applications with their source code. If they choose, the end user has the ability to view/modify/redistribute any application licensed as Open Source. This license is the main driving force behind Linux. People can view the source code for any paticular component of Linux - want to write a 3D game engine? Review the code for the device drivers that control the video card. Want to write a sound mixing station? View the mp3 player code and the sound card device drivers and write your own.Most users, though, prefer to just go out buy the necessary software they wish to use instead of writing their own. With Linux and the Open Source community, there's no need to *buy* - you scour the net, find what you need, and download it. No worries about spyware or viruses - why? Because, you have the source code, you can review it to be sure there is no malicious intent.So for our first assignment, we're going to have a scavenger hunt on the Internet.

On Angel, under Content (Angel->Content->Assignments->Assignment 1:Scavenger Hunt, there is a list of software applications I have installed on my Windows box, see if you can find Open Source equivilants for Linux.

Discussion One's been posted.

One of the driving points of Linux is the sense of community among it's users and developers. Take a moment and introduce yourself to us - likes, dislikes, whatever you feel like sharing, also answer these questions:

Why Linux?
What drew you to this course?
What are your expecting to get from this course this summer?

Also, please leave a comment on someone else's post.
This is your first discussion post, as stated in the syllabus, this is worth 5 points.

Head over to Angel->Discussions, look for the discussion forum, and make your post. Please contact me if you're unable to hit the discussion forum. You my also be able to hit by Angel->Content->Discussion Forum.
Thanks guys...
Charlie

Welcome

Hey Guys - Sorry for the confusion. Decided to make this our temporary home for the summer. Most everything will be posted off of the blog site. We'll use angel to hold our discussions, and for you to drop off assignments and take quizzes/tests and such. I'll post the discussion topics and assignment info here, though - as well as post news stories/blog articles about anything cool going on in the linux related world. If there's anything you wish to add, feel free to leave comments here.

If you haven't done so yet - drop me an email to my gmail account above, put CSC128-940 in the subject line so I can tag you properly.

Stay tuned - Discussion 1 and Assignment 1 are coming soon...

Here's to a good summer...
Charlie