Top Five Free (as in Freedom) Music Sites

Recently a silly old man from Tamil Nadu was crying foul that he is not getting royalties for his music. Whenever they play his songs on TV or radio or perform it on stage, he expects a share of profit or at least he wants them to seek his permission. While the tyrannical copyright laws facilitate such inhuman extortion, where is the Free Software equivalent of Music? Software industry itself has its origin after the advent of copyright laws. But music is older than Homo sapiens species itself! Greatest works of music known to us were already centuries old when the crude copyrights laws were made. Except few hegemonic and anti-human societies, where advances in science and creativeness in arts were reserved to few group of people (and far worse in cases where it is locked down to people born in to particular family/community), world, at large, always shared knowledge and publicized creativity to the masses. So in this post-human world, are there real humans still left to share their knowledge and creativity to others? May be! They may be very few. But such people are for real. Here are some great sites which allow you access as well as to share music with lesser restrictive licenses.

1. opsound.org

Opsound is a site by Sal Randolph. inspired by free software and applies its philosophy to music. Musicians and sound artists can add their work to the Opsound repository using any of the copyleft licenses developed by Creative Commons. Everyone can download, share, remix, and reimagine music available in their site.

2. freemusicarchive.org

This site hosts lot of MP3 files and they also have apps for iOS and Android devices to access their content. Instead of modeling themselves purely after a later idea like Free Software, they also draw inspiration from Radio! They want to continue what radio did in previous generations, i.e. provide people with free music. Artists can upload their music in whole or part (and hence can attract more customers) and people can enjoy the music without any registration.

3. openmusicarchive.org

Artists Ben White & Eileen Simpson have started this project so that music works whose copyright term has expired and in public domain can be made available to a wider audience through internet. Music with no economic value which are usually forgotten by mainstream record companies are given a second life after their copyright term. Also the site encourages more people to collaborate and make their music publicly accessible.

4. cpdl.org

Is there a Wikipeida of music? Yes, it is cpdl.org. They have a large number of sheet music and music files (MIDI and other formats) in their archive. They host only "free" music without any restrictions even under the funny Mickey Mouse Law of USA. Since its inception in 2005, it has grown to a colossal collection of more than 25,000 scores by more than 2,800 composers.

5. musopen.org

A non-profit organization that aims to provide free sheet music, lessons and books for teaching music. Not only serving as a platform to share music, musopen.org aims to make music education reachable to more people.

What will happen if humans have no civilization or government? Do you think we will be killing each other for food and other needs? Do you think that survival of the fittest means "do whatever to survive"? The answer is "NO!". All communities of humans, be it from so called civilized cities to hunter-gatherers of dense forest, evolved to live a social and community life. Even our non-human ancestors lived in groups and not as "individuals with a will to survive at any cost". Our evolution has shaped us to be co-operative, collaborative and altruistic to some extant. The cut-throat competition and "survival-of-the-fittest" mantra we hear again and again are just modern and unnatural inventions which are making our way of life less and less sustainable. We shared everything before from land to food. Then slowly everything was taken out of the common ownership. The last thing remained in collective ownership was knowledge and creativity as they are inexhaustible resources. But human greed knows no limit and it has even snatched these inexhaustible resources from collective ownership. So to reverse the whole set of damage we have brought on our species and on the planet, we have to start from reversing the latest mistake. By liberating knowledge and setting it free, we can start the process of setting the entire humanity free!

ஃபயர் ஃபாக்ஸ் ஃபோகஸ் - இணையத்தில் உலாவ ஒரு நம்பகமான தோழன்

ஃபயர் ஃபாக்ஸ் ஃபோகஸ் (Fire Fox Focus) ஒரு புதிய ஆண்டிராய்டு / ஐ-ஓ.எஸ் (Android / iOS) செயலி (App) ஆகும். மிகவும் அறியப்பட்ட உலாவிகளில் (Browsers) ஒன்றான ஃபயர் ஃபாக்ஸின் மற்றுமொரு பரிமாணமே இந்தப் புதிய உலாவி செயலி. இந்த உலாவி விளம்பரங்கள் மற்றும் உங்கள் பயன்பாட்டைக் கண்காணிக்கும் டிராக்கர்கள் (Trackers) ஆகியவற்றை தானாகவே தடைசெய்துவிடுகிறது. இந்தப் புதிய செயலியை ஆண்டிராய்டு ப்ளே ஸ்டோரில் இருந்து பதிவிறக்கம் செய்துகொள்ளலாம். இந்தச் செயலி வெறும் 4 எம்.பி அளவு மட்டுமே கொண்டது. எனவே உங்கள் கைப்பேசியின் வேகத்தை இது குறைக்காது.

சில வலைத்தளங்கள் உங்கள் கைப்பேசியில் உள்ள ஜீ.பீ.எஸ். மூலம் உங்கள் இருப்பிடத்தைக் கண்டுபிடித்து, அதற்கேற்றார் போல விளம்பரங்களை காட்டுகின்றன. சில தளங்கள், நீங்கள் படிக்கும் பக்கங்கள், மற்றும் தேடும் சொற்களைக் கொண்டு உங்களை பற்றிய ஒரு ப்ரோபைலை உருவாக்கி வைத்துக்கொண்டு நீங்கள் யார், என்ன செய்கிறீர்கள், எங்கு உள்ளீர்கள், என்ன விருப்பு/வெறுப்பு உள்ளவர் என்று ஒரு அனுமானத்திற்கு வருகின்றன. இதனால் என்ன தப்பு என்கிறீர்களா? அவர்கள் இத்தனை மெனக்கெட்டு இதைச் செய்ய என்ன காரணம்? இந்தத் தகவல்களைக்கொண்டு குறிவைத்து விளம்பரத்தாக்குதல் நடத்தி (Targeted Ad Campaigns), உங்களைப் பொருட்களை வாங்க வைப்பதே நோக்கம்.

ஆன்லைன் வர்த்தகம், நமக்கு வேண்டுமா வேண்டாமா என்ற முன்யோசனையின்றி, நம்மைப் பல பொருள்களை வாங்க வைக்கும் ஒரு சிலந்திவலை. கடன் அட்டைகளும், ஆன்லைன் வர்த்தகமும் நம்மை தேவையற்ற பொருட்களை வாங்கி குவிக்கும் அடிமைகளாக்கியுள்ளன. முதலாளித்துவத்தின் இன்றியமையாத அம்சங்களான அதீத உற்பத்தி (over production), நுகர்வுக்கலாச்சாரம் (consumerism) மற்றும் கடன் மூலம் அடிமைப்படுத்துவது (debt slavery) எல்லாம் உங்கள் கைப்பேசிக்குள்ளும் ஒளிந்திருக்கின்றன. இந்நிலையில், ஃபயர் ஃபாக்ஸ் ஃபோகஸ் உங்களுக்கு ஓரளவேனும் இந்த துல்லியத் தாக்குதல்களில் இருந்து பாதுகாப்பளிக்கிறது.

மேலும் கூடுதல் பயன்களாக, இந்தச் செயலி மூலம் நீங்கள் இணையத்தில் உலாவும்போது, உங்கள் கைபேசியில் உள்ள டேட்டா குறைவாகப் பயன்படுகிறது. இதனால் பக்கங்கள் சீக்கிரத்தில் தெரிகின்றன. மேலும் குறைவான மெமரி, டேட்டா மற்றும் ப்ராசசர் பயன்பாட்டால் உங்கள் மின்கலன்(பேட்டரி) பயன்பாடும் வெகுவாகக் குறைகிறது. கூகிளின் கோரப்பிடியில் சிக்கி இருக்கும் ஆண்டிராய்டு இயங்குதளமும், அதனோடு வரும் உலாவியும் (ஆப்பிள்/ஐ-ஓ.எஸ் குறித்து சொல்லவே வேண்டாம்!) ஏற்படுத்திடும் அச்சுறுத்தல்களில் இருந்து நாம் சற்றேனும் தப்ப இந்த புதிய உலாவி நமக்கு உதவும் என்று நம்புவோமாக!

லினக்ஸுக்கு வயசு 25!

1991-ஆம் ஆண்டு லினஸ் பெனடிக்ட் டோர்வால்ட் (Linus Benedict Torvalds) என்னும் ஃபின்லாந்து நாட்டுக் கணினியியல் மாணவரால் ஒரு பொழுதுபோக்காக ஆரம்பிக்கப் பட்டதே இந்த லினக்ஸ். லினக்ஸ் என்பது முழுமையான இயங்குதளம் (OS) இல்லை. அது இயங்குதளத்தின் கெர்னல் (Kernel) எனப்படும் உட்கருவாகும். லினக்ஸ் கெர்னல் கிணு-வுடன் (GNU) சேர்ந்து கிணு/லினக்ஸ் (GNU/Linux) இயங்குதளத்தை சாத்தியப்படுத்தியது. இருபத்தைந்து ஆண்டுகளுக்கு முன் லினக்ஸின் ஆரம்ப நாட்கள் குறித்து லினஸ் டோர்வால்ட் கூறுகையில், "அது முழுவதும் ஒரு தனிநபர் செயல்பாடாகவே இருந்தது" என்கிறார். மேலும் 1991-ஆம் ஆண்டு அவர் லினக்ஸ் குறித்து எழுதிய முதல் பதிவில், "இது கிணு போன்று திட்டவட்டமானதாக இல்லாமல் ஒரு பொழுதுபோக்குக்கான ஒன்று" என்று குறிப்பிட்டிருந்தார்.

கிணு இயங்குதளத்திற்கான வேலைகள்  அமெரிக்கரான ரிச்சர்டு ஸ்டால்மன் (Richard Stallman) தலைமையில் வழிநடத்தப்பட்டு வந்த நேரம் அது. ஏறத்தாழ முழு இயங்குதளமும் முடியும் தருவாயில் இருந்த நிலையில் அதற்குத்தேவையான ஹர்ட் (Hurd) உட்கரு (கெர்னல்) மட்டும் தேக்கநிலையில் இருந்தது (இன்றும் அப்படியே உள்ளது!). மினிக்ஸ் (Minix) என்னும் மாற்று இருந்த போதிலும் அது கட்டற மென்பொருளாக (Free Software) அப்போது இல்லை.  அந்த நேரத்தில் யாரும் எதிர்பாராத வண்ணம் ஃபின்லாந்திலிருந்து உதவி வந்தது.

ஃபின்லாந்து நாட்டின் ஹெல்ஸின்கி பல்கலையில் கணினியியல் துறையில் பயின்று வந்த லினஸ் இணையத்தின் மூலம் தன்னுடைய கெர்னலை வெளியிட்டார். மேலும் அதை கிணு பொது உரிமத்தின் (GPL - GNU General Public License) கீழ் வெளியிட்டார். அப்போது மினிக்ஸ் கெர்னலை எழுதிக்கொண்டு இருந்த ஆண்ட்ரு டனேன்பௌம் (Andrew Tanenbaum) லினக்ஸின் கட்டமைப்பு மோசமானது என்றும் தன்னுடைய மைக்ரோ-கெர்னல் கட்டமைப்பே சீரியதென்றும் விவாதித்தார். அதற்க்கு லினஸ் தன்னுடைய கெர்னல் ஒரு சிறிய அளவிலான ஆதாயமற்ற மென்பொருள். மேலும் அது இன்டெல் 80386 சிப்பிற்கு மட்டுமே எழுதப்படுவது என்று கூறினார்.

ஆனால் இன்றோ இந்த லினக்ஸ் கெர்னல் நீக்கமற எங்கும் நிறைந்துள்ளது. உங்கள் கைப்பேசியில் உள்ள ஆண்ட்ராய்டு இயங்குதளம் முதல் பங்குச்சந்தைகள், நீர்மூழ்கிக்கப்பல்கள், குளிர்சாதனப்பெட்டிகள், தொலைக்காட்சிகள், விண்வெளியில் சுற்றும் செயற்கைக்கோள்கள் வரை பல இடங்களில் லினக்ஸ் ஊடுருவியுள்ளது. உலகில் உள்ள மிக வேகமான 500 சூப்பர் கம்ப்யூட்டர்களில் ஒருசிலவற்றைத் தவிர அனைத்தும் லினக்ஸ் கெர்னல் மூலமே இயங்குகின்றன.

கைப்பேசிச் சந்தையில் ஆண்ட்ரைடுக்குப் போட்டியாக இருக்கும் ஒரே இயங்குதளம் ஆப்பிள் நிறுவனத்தின் ஐ-ஓ.எஸ். ஆனால் ஆப்பிள் நிறுவனத்தால் கணினிகளில் (மேசைமேல் மற்றும் மடிமேல்) ஒன்றும் சாதிக்க முடியவில்லை. மேலும் ஃபயர் ஃபாக்ஸ், டைசன் இயங்குதளங்களும் லினக்ஸ் உட்கருவையே பயன்படுத்துகின்றன. இதற்க்கு நேர்மாறாக கணினிகளில் மேலாதிக்கம் செலுத்தும் மைக்ரோசாஃப்ட் விண்டோஸ் இயங்குதளம் கைப்பேசிகளில் சொற்ப அளவிலேயே பயன்படுகிறது. ஆனால் கைபேசி மற்றும் கணினிகள் என்று மொத்தமாகப் பார்த்தல் லினக்ஸ் உட்காருவே அதிகமாக பயன்பாட்டில் இருக்கிறது. இணையத்தை இயக்கும் சர்வர்கள் (server) பெரும்பாலும் கிணு/லினக்ஸிலே இயங்குகின்றன. இந்த அடிப்படையில் இன்று உலகிலேயே அதிகமாகப் பயன்பாட்டில் உள்ள இயங்குதள உட்கரு லினக்ஸே!

இதன் வெற்றிக்கு முழுக்காரணமும் யாருக்கும் சேராது. இது ஒரு கூட்டு முயற்சியே! இன்றைய நிலையில் லினக்ஸ் நிரலில் வெறும் 0.2% பங்களிப்பே லினஸ் டோர்வால்டிடம் இருந்து வருகிறது. இணையமும் தொழில்நுட்ப முன்னேற்றமும் பல புதிய வழிகளைத் திறந்துள்ளன. 25 ஆண்டுகளுக்கு முன் இருந்த இணையமும் கணினியும் சாதிக்க முடிந்த ஒன்றை இன்றைய நிலையில் 4ஜி-யும் ஸ்மார்ட்போனும் கொண்டு நாம் செய்ய முடியாதா? கூட்டு முயற்சியும், ஒத்துழைப்பும், ஆர்வமும், தேடலும் இருந்தால் லினக்ஸ் போன்ற எண்ணற்ற புதிய படைப்புகள் தோன்றும். அது கணினித்துறையில் மட்டுமே இருக்கவேண்டும் என்று அவசியம் இல்லை. மருத்துவம், வேளாண்மை, வாணியல் என்று எந்தத் துறையிலும் இருக்கலாம்! வாருங்கள் அறிவைப் பகிர்ந்து ஆற்றலைப் பெருக்குவோம்!

கட்டற்ற மென்பொருள் என்றால் என்ன?

கட்டற்ற மென்பொருள் (சுதந்திர மென்பொருள், Free Software) பயனர்களுக்குப் பின்வரும் உரிமைகளை அளிக்கிறது: பயன்படுத்துதல், நகல் எடுத்தல், பகிர்தல், ஆராய்தல், மாற்றம் செய்தல் மற்றும் மேம்படுத்துதல்.

கட்டற்ற மென்பொருள் என்பது அதன் கட்டற்ற தன்மை மற்றும் பயனரின் உரிமைகள் குறித்தது. இது மென்பொருளின் விலையைக் குறித்தது அல்ல. குறிப்பாக இலவசம் என்று இதனைப் பொருள்கொள்ளக் கூடாது!
 

கூண்டு இலவசம் என்பதால் அது சுதந்திரம் ஆகாது!

மேலும் தெளிவாகச் சொல்லவேண்டும் என்றால், கட்டற்ற மென்பொருள் 4 அடிப்படை உரிமைகளைப் பயனர்களுக்கு வழங்குவதாகும். அவை:

• பயனர் விரும்பும்படி, எந்த பயன்பாட்டிற்கும் மென்பொருளை இயக்கலாம். (உரிமை 0)
• மென்பொருளை ஆராயவும், தேவைக்கேற்ப மாற்றம் செய்யவும் உள்ள உரிமை. (உரிமை 1)  இதற்க்கு மூல நிரல் (source  code) வெளிப்படையாக இருப்பது அவசியம்.
• உங்களிடம் உள்ள மென்பொருளின் பிரதி/நகல்களை அயலாருக்கு விநியோகிக்கும் உரிமை. (உரிமை 2)
• மென்பொருளை மேம்படுத்துவதற்கான உரிமை மற்றும் பிறருக்கும் பயன்படும் வகையில் அதை வெளியிடும் உரிமை. (உரிமை 3) இதற்க்கும் மூல நிரல் வெளிப்படையாக இருப்பது அவசியம்.

தொழில்நுட்பம் மற்றும் இணையம் அதீத வளர்ச்சிபெற்றுள்ள இந்திய சூழலில், கட்டற்ற மென்பொருள் இயக்கம் அது ஆரம்பிக்கப்பட்ட 1983-ஆம் ஆண்டைவிட இன்று பெருமுக்கியத்துவம் பெறுகிறது!

மேலும் விவரங்களுக்கு கட்டற்ற மென்பொருள் அறக்கட்டளை தளத்தைப் பார்க்கவும்.

நன்றி: http://www.gnu.org/

Way to Go Wayland!

With the newer version of Gnome 3.x shells, you get an option to try Wayland sessions. You have to choose it in the login screen. I have never seen Gnome running so smoothly in X previously. Wayland is very smooth and very fast. But Wayland is still a work in progress and it may first arrive only for Gnome. While I tried, my videos files didn't play in SMPlayer and I had encountered very few gaps. (These are not bugs or glitches. These are areas where Wayland team is closing up. So it is wrong to call them bugs or issues).

Manjaro with GNOME 3.20 using Wayland

Wayland is designed from the scratch at the same time, keeping all the shortcomings of X display server in mind. X is like dinosaur and had its own time during reptilian era of GNU/Linux. In no way X is inferior to any other thing. But X's days are over. It is time to make way for a more secure, less buggy and architecturally clean Wayland.

Here is a short video of Wayland in action:

Fedora tried to make Wayland by default for 24 release (which will arrive by June 2016). But due to some gaps and effort needed for packaging and testing everything, that has been postponed to some later release. KDE project is also working with Wayland support and planning to make it default display server in near future. Bleeding edge distros like Arch and Fedora may get Wayland within next 12-18 months (May-Nov 20017?).

Ubuntu on the other hand is working on Mir (another display server). It was supposed to be arriving with 16.04 LTS release but it missed. Still 16.10 may not get Mir. Unity 8 and Mir are the two crucial updates which Ubuntu users are waiting for a long time. Like Internet Explorer had its own "standards", Mir is Canonical's way of doing Wayland. But Canonical has a valid reason (at least according to them) that they are working on convergence (same OS, UI, UX across all devices) and Mir is what they need. May be!

All I can see about Wayland is exclusively positive. I am confident that with Wayland, the UI will be buttery smooth, with less bugs and more security. Also I think nobody will troll Wayland like they do Systemd. Some or other day Systemd will also become the default display server. Oh my! I myself can't help trolling Systemd ;-)

Book Review: Net Force - CyberNation

Written by Tom Clancy around 2001, the book is set in early 2010s. The book is not worth a review per se, but I am writing this because it confuses free as in freedom with free as in free lunch. Even 10 years after the dissolution of USSR, the author was still afraid of Communism and Socialism. This book is nothing but a knee-jerk reaction towards the presumed threat of deprived "intellectual property rights" or "intellectual communism"!

Long, Boring Story Short: 

CyberNation is a group or a corporate, you can say, consisting of management, hackers, PROs, lobbyists, lawyers etc. Their aim is to replace all the ISPs and fill their space with their own version of Internet, where there is no "Intellectual Property" i.e. people only need to subscribe to the CyberNation to get all their music, movies, books, porn, scientific journals and whatever else that can be downloaded. CyberNation will make money by advertising. So to press the people to make the switch from their regular ISPs to CyberNation, they do all the dirty tricks from DDoS attacks to blowing up hardware using bombs! A special task force called Net Force, tries to identify and stop CyberNation. There are lots of useless diversions like too much of description about martial arts training on both sides (but no martial art fight in the climax!), virtual reality, bashing Russians and commies, New Age bullshit and incorrect futuristic predictions. At last, the "good" guys win.

A Look into CyberNation:

Have you heard about Free Basics by Facebook? CyberNation sounds more like this. It runs ads and campaigns to entice people to support them, just like what Facebook did with Internet.org/Free Basics. It has lobbyists placed in many countries to convince politicians and authorities to make changes in laws exactly like what Facebook did by asking us to send support letters to TRAI. CyberNation has all the money and means to do it exactly like Facebook. Their aim is to loop in more people so that they can earn more by advertising to their user base, again exactly like Facebook. I can feel the ennui here. But I couldn't help.

But CyberNation is against "Intellectual property", the meaningless umbrella term that clubs together various different and uncorrelated concepts like copyright, trademark, patents etc. Instead of me struggling with my half-baked knowledge to explain it, you can hear from Dr. Stallman himself (http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/not-ipr.en.html). People who really care for freedom of knowledge and information won't accept invasion of privacy and anything that disturbs net-neutrality. That is why FSF and other like-minded people are vehemently against Facebook's Free Basics and other such schemes that can disturb the net-neutrality. But CyberNation is pro-freedom and anti-freedom at the same time. Like a typical Right-wing person who fights against abortion in public life and forces his daughter to undergo one on her teenage pregnancy to save the "family honor", Tom Clancy can envision such organization without a problem!

CyberNation is much like Mark Zuckerberg running the Pirate Bay. One thing the book got correct is the character of Jasmine Chance. What a person will become when educated in management and shaped by the corporates, a ruthless, self-worshiping person who cares the least about others in achieving their selfish goals. She is much like the so called role models of this generation namely Steve Jobs, Larry Ellison, Bill Gates, Ambanis, Tatas etc. Bribing, killing, cheating all are fine provided you get what you want. This is what today's "business" has boiled down to. Everyone else is labelled as losers or considered running charities.

The book says that the "Intellectual Property Rights" is very important for innovation and without the motivation of monetary benefits it is impossible for new inventions and researches happening. Yeah! We have seen that in the case of Daraprim! Who invented that drug? But the novel idea of "Intellectual Property Rights" allowed a retard like Martin Shkreli to exploit people using a drug that was invented decades before he was born! Similarly the book confuses resale of used book and making unauthorized copies of a book and selling it in market. Coming back to the drugs, what type of drug will get more funds today? Is it the one that will prevent millions of deaths or the one that can amass trillions of Dollars? We all know the answer.

 The greedy, cut-throat completion of the laissez faire economy won't address the "needs" of the people more than the "wants" of the rich any day! For Tom Clancy, putting needs of the general public before wants of the rich is communism. He can call it whatever he wants, but for me this is the very definition of human nature. A monkey never feels guilty for snatching a banana from another monkey. And a group of monkey watching this won't condemn it. But we humans do. If we sit back and allow corporates to exploit labor and resources of the poor for the luxury of the rich, we will be no better than monkeys!

Conclusion:

So sad that Tom Clancy is no more. I am pretty much sure that he will use the exact same arguments like "private property", "individual freedom and rights", "free market" etc. to support whatever Facebook is doing. He will be with the people who are arguing for paid fast-lanes in Internet. All that mattered to him is the rich to win over the poor. He wants the strong to trample the weak with the help of governments holding the poor down with their laws and regulations. That is what democracy is in Clancy's view. But surely a true CyberNation will rise. It will be rule of people. It will fight for freedom of and freedom for ideas, arts, science and knowledge. It will fight for the people's privacy, freedoms and rights. It will shatter the evil monopolies built with the backing of inhuman laws. On that day, NSA or Clancy's Net Force will be silent spectators who will watch the giant force of people marching towards true equality!

Media Players for GNU/Linux

People often think that GNU/Linux lack support for video/audio playback. With Distros like Linux Mint having out of the box support for most video/audio formats and almost all Android phones work seamlessly with almost all media types, it is still a common myth that GNU/Linux won't play MP3 or MP4. So I am just listing few media players that can do the job for you.

VLC

Surprisingly many people running Microsoft Windows use VLC doesn't know that it is part of Free Software. But VLC (Video LAN Client) is the most widely used media player among Windows users. It plays everything from FLV to FLAC told one of my friend who runs Windows and a Microsoft fanboy. He challenged me to show an equivalent or alternate for VLC in GNU/Linux. When he visited my house next time, I showed him my PC having the same VLC (latest version). So VLC is one of the most commonly used media player that GNU/Linux users can make use of.

Link: https://www.videolan.org/vlc/

Kaffeine

Kaffeine is a very good media player that has a whole set of features to give you a full fledged media center experience. It is a KDE based player (you can still run it in other DEs.) It has support for scrambled and copy protected DVDs (you may need libdvdcss) and it is easy to use too. It is the default player for most of my DVD viewings.

Link: http://sourceforge.net/projects/kaffeine/

SMPlayer

This humble yet powerful player is not known outside the GNU/Linux world much. But if someone tries SMPlayer, they will make it as their default player for sure. It has very nice sound output and it has lot of settings that will allow you to tweak every aspect of your audio/video. The excellent keyboard shortcuts will come handy while watching videos. I am so addicted to the shortcut configurations of this player as I wonder how other players got them so wrong.

Link: http://smplayer.sourceforge.net/

So, if you are running GNU/Linux, just search for these packages in your software repositories. Sometimes you may need to add some other sources or to build from source (that is not the case usually as all major distributions have these media players in their repositories). Please share about your favorite media players in GNU/Linux systems in the comment section.

Note: Personally I strongly suggest you to stay away from non-free media formats. For list of clean and free media formats check the below link.

Link: https://www.defectivebydesign.org/so_youve_got_some_questions_do_you#formats

3D (Anaglyph) Image With GIMP

What You Need:

1. A mobile/digital camera
2. A PC with GIMP (preferably running GNU/Linux)
3. Glass papers (red, blue and green colors)
4. Carton box (like the one comes with corn flakes, health drinks etc)
5. A pair of scissors
6. Glue

3D - An Introduction:

What ever we see with TWO eyes is 3D. Yes. It needs two eyes to resolve 3 dimensional visual. The same is true for hearing. How this happens? We have two eyes. But they are placed slightly apart on our face. This small distance between the eyes does the trick. Both our eyes send a two dimensional visual to our brain. and our brain merges them to resolve 3 dimensional vision. Closer the object, higher the difference between the images and farther the image lesser the difference between images created by right and left eyes. Using this, our brain creates a 3 dimensional vision.

Clicking The Photo(s!):

As we have seen in the introduction, we need two slightly different images of same object to create a 3D anaglyph. So take a photo with your digital/mobile camera and slightly move the camera few centimetres to left/right and click another image. Extreme care must be taken to avoid change in lighting, shakes and zoom levels. Try your best to keep the change in horizontal plane as much as possible (like our eyes which are horizontally separated). I have clicked first photo of this tiger doll and slightly moved the camera horizontally to left and clicked the second photo.

Right eye view

Left eye view

GIMP Work:

1. First open your right eye view image with GIMP

2. Go to Colors -> Desaturate and choose whatever shade of grey base you like. I have chosen Luminosity.

3. In color picker dialog choose red as foreground color. Make sure the values in Blue and Green fields are 0 and Red field is 255

4. Now go to Layers -> New Layer and choose foreground color. A red layer will be placed on your image! Don't panic!

5. Go to File -> Open as Layer and choose the left eye view image

6. Go to Colors -> Desaturate and choose exactly same shade of grey base as you chose in right eye view image.

7. A quick look in to your layer dialog will be like this!

8. In color picker dialog choose cyan as foreground color. Make sure the values in Blue and Green fields are 255 and Red field is 0

9. Now go to Layers -> New Layer and choose foreground color. A cyan layer will be placed on your image! Again, don't panic!

10. A quick look in to your layer dialog will be like this!

11. Select Cyan layer and choose the mode to "Screen"

12. Click on the eye icon in the layers to toggle visibility. If the eye icon is displayed, the layer is visible. Now make cyan layer and left eye image layer alone visible

13. Now your image will be like this. Go to Image -> Merge Visible Layers...

14. A quick look in to your layer dialog will be like this!

15. Select Red layer and choose the mode to "Screen"

16. Make red layer and right eye image layer alone visible


17. Now your image will be like this. Go to Image -> Merge Visible Layers...

18. A quick look in to your layer dialog will be like this!

19. Make both layers visible and select the cyan layer. Select mode as "Multiply"

20. If done correctly, your image will be like this. Export it as JPEG or PNG as you wish.

21. Fine tune your anaglyph by adjusting the layers while wearing the 3D red-cyan glasses (see below to know how to make it!)

Here is the anaglyph I have made!

The Glasses:

To make the glasses, you need red, blue and green glass papers. Cut two rectangles of red glass paper and one rectangle each of blue and green papers. Cut the frame of the glass from the carton box. Glue the red paper on one eye and blue and green on the other (to create cyan). I have made one within 15 minutes. The glass papers (large sheet) cost Rs. 5 each. You can make at least 10 glasses with a single purchase of glass papers.

Viewing:

Place the cyan side on your right eye and red side on your left eye. If you see ghost image, then move farther from screen or just zoom out the image. Outdoor images with farther backgrounds work better with this trick.

Conclusion:

So we have seen how to create an anaglyph with easy steps using GIMP. Also we have seen how to create 3D glasses at home cheap and easy! So enjoy your weekend with kids. If possible, kindly share your anaglyphs here!

Ubuntu 14.10 - Utopic Unicorn Review

If you have 14.04 LTS installed and upgrading to 14.10, there is not much to notice except the performance and power management improvements which are under the hood. Ubuntu 14.10's blueprint has only 35 items while 14.04's blueprint had 117 items. It seems Ubuntu didn't want to leave a bad taste in the minds of users on its 10th birthday. It has become a new norm in GNU/Linux community to militantly oppose any major change.

Things that are new include, improved support for hardware, power management, SSD optimization using TRIM, better Btrfs support, all of which are due to the Linux kernel update to version 3.16. 

Now let us see what Ubuntu 14.10 - Utopic Unicorn can deliver to end users against other OSes.

Ubuntu is a trusted name among GNU/Linux users. It is well known for its ease of use, good support and stability. Also even after 10 years, the release cycles of Ubuntu went like clock works and the users are provided with latest and greatest software!

Compared with proprietary operating systems, Ubuntu stands top in addressing security issues. It supports most of the latest hardware components like sound card, USB devices, laptop hot keys etc. Most of the proprietary OSes require you to install drives separately.

The centralized software management (which is common to all GNU/Linux platforms) is also a key in maintaining the system. Everything from your core operating system to browser will be updated in one shot!

So this is not a compelling update for 14.10 LTS users. But if you think there can be any thing new in 15.04 or 15.10 or even 16.04, you need to upgrade to 14.10 now. Else you have to wait till 16.10 to get any thing new that may come in between like GNOME 3.14 or Unity 8 or Mir.

But for users of other proprietary OSes, this is a compelling release. People are waiting for a newer version of windows just for a start menu button lately! But with Ubuntu you have various choices of desktop environments which can meet our taste. Also you don't have any attached guilt of pirating the OS or wasting your money on a disk of 0s and 1s :)

Ubuntu 14.10 – Steps to Upgrade

As discussed earlier in a previous blog post, Ubuntu 14.10 is out! Finally the wait is over. Before you are going to upgrade your OS, keep in mind that 14.10 is a regular release and 14.04 is a Long Term Support release (meaning you will get security/critical updates for 5 years). So if you want the LTS to stay, don't bother updating your PC/laptop until 16.04, the next LTS version, which will be release around April, 2016. With that said, for those who always want the stability of Debian with cutting edge packages, can proceed with upgrading their OS.

Steps to Upgrade:

First update your machine. Open terminal, type the following command

sudo apt-get update

This laptop was bit outdated!

Type in the password. After completion, run

sudo apt-get upgrade

Depending upon the number of packages you have and the interval of update it can take few minutes to update your OS to latest available packages.

After this, go to “Software & Updates” click on the “Updates” tab and check the “Notify me of a new Ubuntu version:” option at the bottom. It should be set to “For any new version”.

Search for "update"

Check the last option in the "update" tab

Now go to “Software Updater” and it will notify you that a newer version of Ubuntu is available.

Search for "updater"

Wow! The wait is over!

 Click “Upgrade” and you will be presented with the release notes. Click “Upgrade” here too!

It will download the “release upgrade tool” which will take care of the remaining upgrade process.

The upgrade tool will do preliminary preparations for the upgrade and calculates the packages to update as well as size of download and approximate time to download. Ensure that you have enough time and stable Internet connection. If yours is a laptop, then don't forget to connect the charger! (But sadly, there was a power cut during my upgrade process and my modem went off. But thankfully the download started from where it was left in between!)

Click “Start Upgrade” and the packages will be downloaded. After that the required packages will be installed/upgraded and obsolete packages will be removed.

After everything is over, the upgrade tool will prompt you to restart your machine.

And after that!!!

The wallpaper looks awesome!