Linux Format Blog

...and, like usual, rather than do Real Work I'm trying to distract myself with BBC News articles. But this time my plan has backfired, as in one of them I just discovered that I'm the same age as Macaulay Culkin, which is, frankly, terrifying.

After posting that I have no intention of making a special magazine on assembly, someone posted a comment containing some assembly source code, followed by the message "You should see Hello world! printed to the screen. Congratulations! You have just written your first assembly program in Linux and irritated the great Hudzilla at the same time!"

Clearly I had vastly under-estimated the interest in such a magazine; Mike seems certain that it'd sell well enough for Future to be interested in doing it. So, I think it's only right of me to gracefully U Turn and give it a try.

Six weeks ago I asked for ideas for things you'd like to see in LXF, and you guys submitted a huge number of suggestions - thanks!

I've spent the last few weeks tracking down writers for all your ideas, and the end result is that around 40 of your suggestions have been matched to writers, given deadlines for future issues of LXF, and are hopefully already under production. At just 116 pages we're far from a big magazine, but I'll try to squeeze in as many of your requests as possible - be patient!

Linux has a reputation as a stable operating system that doesn't often need rebooting. So we were wondering, how often do you boot your systems, and why?

We're mainly interested in figures for server systems, not desktops, and we realise that some intelligent guesswork may be needed to fill in the answers. Just give a reasonable estimate. If we get a decent response we'll publish the results in Linux Format.

As regular readers know, we run 32-bit incarnations of distros on the LXF DVD, including 64-bit versions (where available) as extras in ISO image format. Given that most machines made in the last few years are 64-bit, we're thinking of switching over.

For instance, when Ubuntu 9.10 arrives, we can make the DVD boot into the 64-bit version and have the 32-bit edition as an ISO image. In other words, the reverse of before. What do you think?

I discovered something new last night. Something that sounds like torture. Something so terrible that I'm not even going to look it up on Wikipedia just in case it has pictures. Something that, if you're a husband and as blissfully ignorant as me, you may well find yourself asking your wife about then laughing in disbelief.

And it is this: eyebrow threading. OH MY GOD YOUTUBE HAS VIDEOS AND THEY ARE FULL OF EYEBROWS!

...

I'm never going near a girl again.

Graham and I spent last week attending OSCON in the US, where we had the time to chat to a wide spectrum of geeks from all areas of Free Software. For me, OSCON is a great chance to reconnect my brain to the mains power source of open source - everyone is happy to sit down for a chat about their latest projects, people are discussing weird and wonderful hacks, and, for once, geeks unite under a common banner: it doesn't matter what software you use, as long as it's Free.

I'm sitting on a huge pile of cash, and want to spend it commissioning awesome Linux articles for you awesome people to read and say, "hey, that was awesome." So, tell me: what do you want to read? Seriously - pitch your ideas here and I'll do my best to find someone to write them up.

I don't care whether you read LXF once a year or only ever skim the forums now and then; your opinion is very welcome, so post a comment below listing the things you'd like to read. Be as specific as you like!

Yes, it's here: we've rebuilt and relaunched the Linux Format website to be cleaner, faster and easier to navigate. Along the top you'll find quick access to all the areas of the site - eg the forums, archives, newsletters - while on this front page we'll be posting updates about the magazine and other Linux-related fun. Please let us know what you think!

We try to do our bit for the environment at LXF HQ — we recycle as much as possible, and I program solely in assembly language to save electrons. But we want to do more, so as of Linux Format issue 121 we’re switching to a new type of DVD: EcoDisc. Now, worry not - the disc content is still the same: 4GB packed with distros, software, tutorials, podcasts and more. But physically the disc uses less energy and fewer materials to manufacture, and it’s also lighter and therefore requires less energy to transport. That doesn’t seem like much for a single DVD, but when you consider 30,000 discs moving around the planet, it all adds up!