Testing in Safari on Linux

Had the need to test Apple's Safari browser on a website or three. Issue: I'm a Linux (Ubuntu) user. Of course Linux is awesome and super good, but the big Apple doesn't make a version of Safari for Linux.

Solution: PlayOnLinux

Looks like it is popular for gaming, but it also has more practical use, it sets up and configures to let me run Safari through Wine. BTW, it also supports Google Chrome (yeah!).

Download it for your distro here.
  http://www.playonlinux.com/en/download.html

Many to choose from with instructions or simply use the available .deb file. Install and launch PlayOnLinux (it appeared in my Games menu).  Click the Install option, select Internet, choose Safari, click Apply, then walk through the screens and your all set. Once installed it will show up in your wine menu and desktop if you chose the desktop option (i had to manually make the desktop launcher executable).

Note while installing Safari: When asked about "Install Bonjour for Windows" and "Apple updates" uncheck both of these, you do not want them as they will cause problems.

Model Railroad

Beginnings of a model railroad in the basement. Additional videos over the next week, catch them on YouTube.

Screenshot? Shutter at the Thought

Formerly known as GScrot, Shutter is a fantastic screenshot tool for Linux.
In their own words,

Shutter is a feature-rich screenshot program. You can take a screenshot of a specific area, window, your whole screen, or even of a website - apply different effects to it, draw on it to highlight points, and then upload to an image hosting site, all within one window. Shutter is free, open-source, and licensed under GPL v3.

For what it's worth, Shutter comes highly recommended by me. I am currently using it for all my screen capture needs.

Downloads are available for multiple distributions, of course, including Ubuntu. A quick deb install and your all set.

Reorganizing & Merging PDF Files

Needed to merge and then reorder the pages several pdf files today. I don't have and prefer not to use Adobe tools when I can avoid them. A quick google turned up a couple of options.

1. Ghostscript from the command line to merge them
   (would have needed the pages in order first)
2. PDF-Shuffler GUI

A quick overview on Ghostscript can be found on linux.com.

Since my pages were not necessarily in order, I decided to give PDF-Shuffler a whirl. To give fair credit, I learded of PDF-Shuffler from bigbrovar.

PDF-Shuffler is a small python app packaged in a .deb file for the Debian flavors of Linux, including Ubuntu. Download, install deb, launch app from office menu, drag pdf onto application window. Once the pdf loads you can drag and drop pages to move them around, delete and rotate pages, or drag to add another pdf. When finished export the new pdf.

It's quick, easy, and worked without the slightest problem on my 12-15 files and merged them all into one 10 meg pdf.

California Coaster Train

Saw the Coaster in SanDiego; fantastic in real life, great on video, and cool surfliner in small scale. Check it.

Linux - Immutable Files

Here is a cool tip on how you can make files on your system immutable. By immutable, I mean even root can't delete the files if he choose to.