I haven’t put up a post in awhile so here’s what’s new:
I still am using my old Gateway machine with Crunchbang, although since Waldorf is the current stable version of Crunchbang, I’m using mostly Debian Testing (Jessie), which is eventually going to become the new Crunchbang 12 codenamed Janice.
Crunchbang uses Muppet names for their releases based on the first letter of the equivalent Debian release codename. Thus Debian Squeeze was Statler, Wheezy is Waldorf, and Jessie will become Janice (the lead guitarist of the Muppet band “Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem”.)
This practice of using codenames is widespread in Linux – Linux Mint’s upcoming 15th release is named Olivia, Ubuntu Linux has Quantal Quetzal, and Fedora’s most recent was named Spherical Cow – just to name a few.
I have been taking a 9 week course on Interactive Python via the Coursera online teaching site. The course is one from Rice University and the professors are really good. It is pretty compressed, though and there are days when I wish the projects had a few more days before the deadline hits. But it’s a lot of fun, and challenging.
I’ll probably end up installing Pygame and a few other related files onto this laptop so I can continue my Python learning and practice after ths course ends.
For games, I have set up Angband, Brogue, DoomRL, Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup (with tiles), Freeciv, Freecol, Frogatto (which you can buy on the iPhone and I recommend!), Solitaire, Mahjongg Solitaire, Nethack, and Pingus (a Lemmings clone using penguins). I also have emulators for Sega Genesis, NES, SNES, and the Gameboy Advance, with several games for each. I haven’t gotten around to installing a Nintendo 64 emulator just yet.
I also use DOSBox to play a few games from the 90s – currently I have installed Darklands, Master of Magic, Master of Orion, Might and Magic 1, Sword of Aragon, and Sword of the Samurai.
I’m not really sure just how soon I will be able to get a new laptop, but at least I’m not missing out on anything – I have the LibreOffice suite to write with, all those games, and many other applications for programming and graphics. All my video and music streaming has been no problem. I gotta say, this Gateway machine has lasted far longer than I ever expected it to when I originally stopped using it in 2009!
Duskfire's Blog 
Great post and glad you’re using CrunchBang.
The origin and use of code names for releases is a pretty interesting endeavor. As you mention above, CrunchBang’s release names coincide with the Debian release name, where CrunchBang uses a “Muppet Show” character with the same first letter of the Debian release, which is based on “Toy Story” characters. Probably the most interesting part of this is that Debian testing is called “Sid,” which in “Toy Story” is the kid next door who “experiments” with toys.
Linux Mint’s naming convention is simple: In alphabetical order, a woman’s name ending in “a”. I asked Clem Lefevbre once what he was going to do when he reached “Zelda” or whatever the Z name would be, and his answer was simple: He’ll start with women’s names starting with A and have the last letter be E.
Ubuntu is easy: An adjective describing an animal with the same letter, decided upon by — and only by — Mark Shuttleworth.
Fedora is a little more complex: They have a formula where $CURRENT_NAME is a (whatever it is), and so is $NEXT_NAME. It’s voted on by the Fedora community and it sometimes produces some pretty interesting results (Beefy Miracle, Spherical Cow, Schrodinger’s Cat).
By: Larry Cafiero on May 28, 2013
at 10:01 AM
I’ve been running #! on one of my old computers and I’ve gotta say it’s becoming my favourite. Next time I buy a new laptop, it’s probably going to become my main distro. Plus the forums are pretty good fun, although I’m just an occasional lurker.
Anyway, keep up the Python courses. It’s a really tasteful. and a convenient language to know. My step-sister recently asked me to teach her programming and she’s having a much nicer time and learning faster than I did with C++ as my first language back in the 90s.
By: Caio McCaioson Ibn Caio on May 29, 2013
at 11:41 AM
HI, my name is Bert, I’m from Italy… So, I ask you to forgive me for my poor English! 😉
On my opinion #! is the best distro ever! No comparison with New Ubuntu releases… It’s Deboan better than Debian itself (you don’t need 2 o 3 DVD to get new packages: you download almost everything from Synaptic except for Skype and few others softwares).
Well I’m running #! on my 1st PC and on my old eeepc too (1Gb RAM)… Also eeepc becomes fast and light with #! I installed it on other eeepc and notebooks and I never had a single problem…
I write this post to give newby users some advice and info to get the best from this fabolous distro.
I recently found a universal way to install NVIDIA drivers on 11. Statler had a nice script, but on Waldorf you need a different kind of installation. There are many ways but this is the only one that worked fine:
1) sudo apt-get install nvidia-kernel-dkms nvidia-glx nvidia-xconfig nvidia-settings
2) sudo apt-get install nvidia-vdpau-driver vdpau-va-driver
3) (IGNORE ERROR MESSAGE IF DISPLAYED):
if [ -f /etc/X11/xorg.conf ];then sudo mv /etc/X11/xorg.conf /etc/X11/xorg.conf.backup;fi && sudo nvidia-xconfig
4) ADD TO xorg.conf:
# Disables Nvidia logo
Option ” NoLogo” “true”
# Fix Large fonts
Option “DPI” “96 x 96”
# Power saving setting for Nvidia drivers
Option “OnDemandVBlankInterrupts” “1”
# Enables overclocking gui
Option “Coolbits” “1”
5) RESTART
What I love of #! Is the dropdown menu that I edited with everything I need, including link to facebook, gmail and so on… I edited shortcut keys too and now i can be satisfied!
On Waldorf you can easily install Libreoffice 4 adding a repo if you want:
First:
sudo nano /etc/apt/sources.list
Add:
## Backports
deb http://ftp.debian.org/debian/ wheezy-backports main
Then:
sudo apt-get update
Finally:
sudo apt-get -t wheezy-backports install libreoffice
To get skype working you need to install the following dependences:
sudo dpkg –add-architecture i386
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install ia32-libs
There are many more details you can change and/or add to build YOUR OWN OS…
Kind regards,
Bert
By: Bertrando Goio on August 22, 2013
at 8:11 AM