Well, I suppose I’ve had a (not quite so) brief hiatus from blogging, and it’s time to come back into the fold.

I’ve been looking for a good GNU/Linux thin-client for my employer, a school district in the US. We have scores of aging desktops (primarily Intel PII 350 MHz and PIII 800 MHz systems) and looking more into the mobile arena for most computing needs. We currently utilize Citrix’s MetaFrame Presentation Server for most client applications, so we could substitute the current Windows XP OS for GNU/Linux.

In my last blog post, I started writing about OpenWRT, a free software firmware replacement for many off-the-shelf home broadband routers. I received an email last week from a reader who had some of the very same questions I had about the whole process of installing a new firmware. I’ll address some of his points here.

I returned from a wonderful vacation in Florida to discover that my broadband cable service was no longer working. After some troubleshooting, replacing some coax lines and connectors, I ended up having to replace my Linksys cable modem/router combo unit.

Here in the US, yesterday (Feb 2) was Groundhog Day. From what I understand, this comes from an old German Pennsylvania ritual of getting up early on a Winter day and observing an animal coming out of hibernation to see if he (or she, or it) can see his shadow. If so (as Phil did yesterday), tradition holds that there will be 6 more weeks of Winter. If not (which is a lot rarer), there will be an early Spring.

As a member of two a cappella vocal ensembles, I have been searching for several free software projects to fit some of my musical needs.

The first need is a way to print out scores of vocal music. My director often re-arranges pieces, especially old hymns, and trying to read the hand-written manuscript and sight-read is very difficult. Additionally, after copies are made into copies of copies, the quality of the page decreases dramatically. I would like a soft-copy of the vocal music for reprinting at any time, and for long-term storage.

I have to admit that I am a sucker for nice screen shots, desktop wallpaper, etc. I also subscribe to OSDir.com’s RSS feeds, and every week (or sooner) they post screen shots from yet another Linux distro that I’ve never heard of.

This week, however, they posted a link to a page of thumbnailss of all different types of distros!