Google Desktop for Linux. Finally!

Google has announced the release of Google Desktop for Linux. God! I've been waiting for this.

Here's the link for downloading the .deb/.rpm packages.
For those of you who want to install from a repository, head to this link.
The above link give you detailed instructions on how to get Google Desktop onto your Linux box.
Get going.

Installing a .rpm package: rpm -ivh "file_name_with_extension"
Installing a .deb package: dpkg -i "file_name_with_extension"

Via Google Operating System.

A few Ubuntu & Firefox tips and tricks

Hello! Folks.

Here are some tips for the users of Ubuntu and Firefox.
Gnome 2.x: Supercharge your right-click menu with Nautilus Scripts
Gnome:Add screen actions with Brightside
Gnome/KDE:Dock any application to the system tray with AllTray
Gnome on Linux:Copy and paste without using the clipboard
Gnome:Embed the terminal on the desktop
Linux: Speed up Gnome menu
Ubuntu: How To: Give Ubuntu a speed boost
Ubuntu:Print to PDF in Ubuntu
Ubuntu:Encrypt CDs/DVDs in Ubuntu
Ubuntu:Load programs faster with Preload
How To: Create .iso disk images and generate MD5 checksums

Firefox: Tweak about:config options with Configuration Mania
Firefox on Ubuntu:Beautify Firefox web page forms on Ubuntu

Thanks Lifehacker.
Happy tweaking.

Where's web going? To your Desktop.

You must have heard the buzz that Web 2.0 has been making. Didn't it make you wonder for a fleeting second, if there will be day when you boot into an OS on a remote server using just your browser (YouOS). Thanks to Ajax and the almost transparent asynchronous communication it allows with a server, we have a fleet of Social networking sites(MySpace, Facebook, etc.), Online Office Suites(ThinkFree, Zoho, Google Docs), Mash up Editors(Yahoo! Pipes, Google Mash-up Editor) and myriad other tools that mimic our desktops. Is this going to get any better? Allison Randal, over at O'Reilly Radar gives some insights into the future of Web.

According to the article, the future web will thrive on "ambidextrous" lightweight networked Desktop Applications. That is to say, the future applications run on your desktop and connect to the network giving you the best of both worlds, The speed of the desktop and the ease of use of web applications. The author gives iTunes and Songbird as examples for such apps. Networked Apps make more sense in this ever shrinking world. And they are bound to be more effective, if not efficient, than desktop apps. Imagine, all the processor intensive tasks could be performed locally and data could be fetched from the network.

The author goes on to express interest in ubiquity of Linux. She points to a recent development in the virtualisation space, LINA. LINA is lightweight virtual machine that allows desktop applications to be developed for Linux and run with a native look-and-feel on Windows, Mac OS X, and various flavors of *nix.
More on the technology aspects of LINA:

There are already several ways to run an application written for one platform on a different platform. One is system call mapping: for instance mapping a Linux system call to a Windows system call as CYGWIN does. This allows a Linux application to run in CYGWIN on Windows without the Linux kernel. Unfortunately, syscalls cannot always be mapped exactly, which can prevent the application from compiling or from working as expected. Virtualization takes a different approach, actually implementing an entire operating system on top of another, but applications running in this guest end up being completely unintegrated with the host operating system.

LINA takes a new approach. In LINA, Linux applications run on a cross-platform Linux kernel on a virtual machine. LINA uses resource mapping instead of syscall mapping. So the Windows file system is mapped to a Linux file system, the Windows GUI APIs are mapped to Linux GUI APIs, etc. From the perspective of the LINA Linux application, it is running in a standard Linux operating system. From the perspective of the user, the LINA application is identical to a normal Windows or Mac OS X application.

Doesn't it sound sweet? Probably those of our machines with meager specs will be able to run LINA. Since it is "lightweight". LINA will be licensed under GPLv2. It is built in C and C++. You can write applications for LINA in C and C++. Support for Perl, Python and Ruby will soon be added. LINA can currently run Linux command line utilities and some web applications. Support for development in Qt and GTK+ libraries is planned. See the FAQ section on openlina.com or more info.

Here's the article: Beyond the Browser.

How to build your own Firefox Extension

Have you been planning to whip up your own Firefox extension? Well, here's something for starters. This Lifehacker post can get you started on your very own, pet extension for the browser you love. The post points to plenty of developer resources too. Wachoo waiting for? Go, put on creative thinking cap.

Good Luck.