Micro$oft Outlook Replaces Thunderbird

December 29, 2009 I posted on my Facebook wall:

This web page is what I need to finally get rid of Mozilla Thunderbird for a personal email client and go to Micro$oft Outlook. Not what I wanted to do, but the latest Thunderbird continues the trend of decreased stability and lack of any decent Calendar. Actually, the Calendar, which I have begged Mozilla to update is my primary reason for dumping Thunderbird. Stubbornness was the only reason I kept using TB. I am not a big fan of M$, which goes all the way back to 1976 and Bill Gates "Open Letter to Hobbyists", however M$ Outlook is a mature product which has a very good Calendar. Since I have had Outlook on my computer for years to support work why not use it as my personal client too, if I can separate work and personal email using multiple profiles.
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Outlook e-mail profiles explained - Outlook - Microsoft Office Online office.microsoft.com
> Products > Outlook > Outlook 2003 Help and How-to > E-mail > Configuring E-mail Accounts > Profiles
December 29, 2009 at 5:39am

Well yesterday I finally got around to changing from Mozilla Thunderbird to Micro$oft Outlook. As a final attempt to live within the environment provided by Mozilla's Thunderbird, I tried using Kalendra. Kalendra seemed like a really good calendar-centered application, but that's not what I wanted. I wanted an integrated email and calendar application.

The initial transition of setting up Outlook with a new profile and my two personal email accounts went smooth. Haven't tried to move either my old mail or address book from Thunderbird to Outlook, so I haven't faced those problems yet.

This morning I noticed an email from slashdot.org containing the stories was not complete, but I've seen that before. Since I'm already dealing with another issue with slashdot.org emails not being delivered I guess I'll just ignore this problem.

So for now at least, I'm willing to live with the situation.

Linux Pulls It Out!

Don't ask me how Linux decides what it's going to do next. Yesterday, after being turned off for two weeks the two Linux boxes booted up just fine. My main rationale for booting them was I received an annual email from Linux Counter to check my listing (user 164701). Noticed I only listed the old machine so I added the IBM to the list. I installed the auto update script and it shows in the cron log that it ran on both machines, but still doesn't show up on Linux Counter as auto updated.

As soon as the old box booted I noticed that somehow without input from anyone but the Linux Gods it was back to the 1280x1024 screen resolution. I updated both boxes which requested a reboot when it completed and they both came back up without problems.

Just wanted to post this to be fair to Linux and all the work people do in developing it. I could of just posted it as a comment to my May 31, 2009 post, but that's like a newspaper accusing someone on page one for the headlines and posting the retraction on page six. That's not right for newspapers, TV networks, or my posts.

Linux Still Sucks

Back on April 4th and 8th, I commented to my own post "Linux (Fedora 10) Sucks!" that I had ordered and installed CentOS 5.2 on two computers. All went well once I added memory to the old IBM E series 580. Both the Micron and IBM installed CentOS quickly and they both run fine. Last weekend, over the long Memorial Day weekend, I thought I would run Package Updater. The updater appeared to run just fine on the IBM, but the Micron came up an error while resolving dependencies. The error message reads, "Unable to resolve dependencies for some packages selected for installation." Under details it says, "Missing Dependency: /usr/share/magic.mime is needed by package httpd-2.2.3-22.el5.centos.i386 (updates)". Of course when I go to the /usr/share directory, there sits the magic.mime file. Today I Google the "Missing Dependency..." and sure enough a guru has trouble shot the problem and found all you have to do is clean out the Yum database with the command "yum clean all". This seems to have fixed the problem this weekend, but why did the problem exist in the first place?

After I ran the Linux software updater, the Micron wanted to reboot and I told it to go ahead. It came up in a screen resolution of 800x600. You would think no problem, I'll just set the resolution back to 1280x1024 that I had been using before and take advantage of my 19 inch monitor. As I should have expected when I tried resetting the screen resolution, my choices are now 800x600 and 640x480. Now what's up with that? I give up, Linux is never going to mature and will always be nothing more than a playground for the people who want to play there.

This new episode reminds me of the "good old days" back in 1997-98 while running Redhat 5.0 and needing to setup my video card. I had time back then, wanted a Unix box at home and wanted to learn this new thing called Linux. Back in those days if your video card didn't come supported out of the box, you did some rather bizarre calculations and then put the results in one of the configuration files in a very specific order. Then came the Xconfigurator or some such. Been there, done that, grew tired of that. Finally, when the computer I was running Linux on back in 2002 or 2003 burned out the IDE controller trying to load Redhat 9, I decided the heck with it and didn't run Linux until I ran across Fedora Core 6 in a magazine in late 2006. That's when I bought the Micron at a garage sale. This is how I got back in the Linux playground. I was hoping that Linux had matured and all the esoteric mechanization to do the simplest tasks was gone and Linux was maturing. Obviously, it was not to be true.

Looks like the next time Linux costs me money, in either software or hardware, I'll just let it die. Until then these two machines will limp along updating when they can and falling behind when they can't. When they die for whatever reason they will end up in a re-cycling center somewhere.

Just to make it perfectly clear, I am no fan of Microsoft Windows either. Microsoft's careless disregard for how much the hardware you must buy to support their software and not to mention the ridiculous software prices drives me nuts. I've got this XP Pro machine that has managed to corrupt it's NTFS file system. Not sure if this problem is Windows or the Symantec/Norton System Works and their virus called GoBack. Oh well, that's a story for another post.

Then there's this Gateway, Vista 64-bit stuff.

Sounds to me like I am just getting older and less tolerant of the things that don't work like they should, or maybe I am expecting too much. I don't want to keep complaining about Linux, I just want it to work without jumping through hoops and clicking my heels together the right number of times.

Linux (Fedora 10) Sucks!

<--- GEEK ALERT--->

I have been using various forms of Red Hat Linux since 1998. I was primarily using Linux for web development, and did some amazing things with it. In the past I have let it run for more than three months, and only shut it down when I noticed I hadn't used it for weeks. Another time to support development on my computer and hosting on a distant system, I disconnected it from the network (10base2 and dial-up back then) and set up the DNS server to return itself as the response to any request for an address. Worked like a champ.

Over the years I have had trouble keeping up to date with the current version. Back in 2002 or 2003, I burned out the IDE controller trying to install Red Hat 9. Went without Linux for a couple years. My latest system running Linux, an old Micron with a 9GB SCSI drive and 384MB of memory and a CD drive, started at Fedora Core 6 using CDs. I had managed to use the Internet to nurse it through updates to Fedora 7, 8, and 9. Each one presented challenges, but was surmountable. Then came Fedora 10.

Back on January 2, 2009, I decided it was time to update to Fedora 10. I started the process just like the previous updates. I happened to notice that Fedora 10 was not available on CD, but only DVD [sic - see comment 1 below]. As was true with the previous updates (notice I don't call them upgrades) it took many hours. After it tried to reboot, it came up eventually during the boot with the meaningless gibberish message:

Reading all physical volumes. This may take a while ...
Volume group "VolGroup00" not found
Unable to access resume devie (/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol01)
mount: error mounting /dev/root on /sysroot as ext3: No such file or directory
scsi target2:0:0: FAST-20 WIDE SCSI 40.0 MB/s ST (50 ns, offset 8)
sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] 17783204 512-byte hardware sectors (9105 MB)
sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Write cashe: enabled, read cache: enabled, supports DPO and FUA
sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] 17783204 512-byte hardware sectors (9105 MB)
sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Write cashe: enabled, read cache: enabled, supports DPO and FUA
sdb: sdb1 sdb2
sd 2:0:0:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI disk
sd 2:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg2 type 0

Since the computer only had a CD and Fedora 10 was only available on DVD, I quickly tired of this update game and shut it down intending to throw the computer away.

Finally, last weekend on Saturday, 3/22/2009, I decided to checkout CheapBytes.com where I have bought Linux media for a long time. I was surprised to find they now had Fedora 10 on CD as well as DVD. I ordered both versions and they arrived yesterday. I decided I would take a old IBM E series 580, with a DVD reader and CD burner, but only a 9GB hard drive. I had a couple 40GBs laying around and put one of them in the IBM. I started the install process on the Micron using the install CDs and on the IBM using the DVD. On both, I must admit that the media from CheapBytes.com worked great and was faultless.

On the Micron using the CDs, again after hours installing the system rebooted and guess what. The reboot resulted in the same error message above. Darn all that time and electricity wasted on this attempt to update!

On the IBM using the DVD the system booted to the DVD and started the install by asking the standard questions. Eventually it came up to configuring the hard drive. Each time, and there were many attemps even with a different drive, the install would fail on the IBM with the meaningless gibberish message:

anaconda 11.4.1.62 exception report
Traceback (most recent call first):
File "/usr/lib/anaconda/lvm.py", line 248, in vgcreate
raise VGCreateError(vgname, PESize, nodes)
File "/usr/lib/anaconda/fsset.py", line 2506, in setupDevice
entry.device.setupDevice(chroot)
File "/usr/lib/anaconda/packages.py", line 169, in turnOnFilesystems

anaconda.id.fsset.createLogicaVolumes(anaconda.rootPath
File "/usr/lib/anaconda/dispatch.py", line 204, moveStep
rc = stepFunc(self.anaconda)
File "/usr/lib/anaconda/dispatch.py", line 127, in gotoNext
self.moveStep()
File "/usr/lib/anaconda/text.py", line 741, in run
anaconda.dispatch.gotoNext()
File "/usr/lib/anaconda", line955, in
anaconda.intf.run(anaconda)
VGCreateError: vgcreate failed creating vg "VolGroup00" (PESize=32768kB) on
PVs: /dev/sda3
Log:
Running... ['lvm', 'vgcreate', '-v', '-An', '-s', '32768k', 'VolGroup00', '/dev/sda3']

I even put the disk in a external enclosure and deleted the partitions on the drive which I believe came out of a Dell Desktop. All to no avail.

Finally, on a whim I thought I would stick an old Windows 98 install disk in and see if it would install. Sure enough, after answering more questions than a typical 3-year old has, it formatted the hard drive and installed. Since I blew past the driver searches by telling it to skip each file it was looking for, it's not really functional, but it didn't seem to have any problems with the hard drive like Fedora 10 did. It should be embarrassing to the Linux community, and Red Hat in particular that a ten (10) year old OS is robust enough to deal with installing on this hardware.

This experience along with the history of Linux might explain the Slashdot story back on March 25, 2009 entitled "Red Hat CEO Questions Relevance of Desktop Linux". The slashdot story was:

"Red Hat CEO Jim Whitehurst questioned the relevance of Linux on the desktop, citing several financial and interoperability hurdles to business adoption at a panel on end-users and Linux last night at the OSBC. 'First of all, I don't know how to make money on it,'Whitehurst said, adding that he was uncertain how relevant the desktop itself will be in five years given advances in cloud-based and smartphone computing, as well as VDI. 'The concept of a desktop is kind of ridiculous in this day and age. I'd rather think about skating to where the puck is going to be than where it is now.' Despite increasing awareness that desktop Linux is ready for widespread mainstream adoption, fellow panelists questioned the practicality of switching to Linux, noting that even some Linux developers prefer Macs to Linux. 'There's a desire [to use desktop Linux],' one panelist said, 'but practicality sets in. There are significant barriers to switching.'"

Discuss this story.
Anyone have any comments, other than Windows 98 is from the same era as the hardware and thus should support it.  I might go back to CheapBytes.com and get the CD version of Fedora 9 and try to install it on both systems.

I've not been a big fan of Microsoft over the years, primarily for their attitude that they know what you want more than you do and force things on you. However, I now find myself with:

* Gateway desktop w/ Vista with 8GB of memory 750 GB hard drive
* Homebuilt desktop w/ XP Pro 2 GB of memory 320 GB hard drive (see Seagate Story below)
* HP desktop w/ XP Home 1 GB of memory 80 GB hard drive
* Dell Dimension desktop w/ XP Home 1 GB of memory 250 GB hard drive
* Dell Inspiron laptop w/ XP Home 1.256 GB of memory 160 GB hard drive
* Compaq laptop w/ Win 98SE
* Homebuilt desktop w/ Win 98 64 MB of memory 6 GB hard drive