Screenshots. Where would the internet be without them? They are ubiquitous and when you are researching that latest piece of cool software or the latest ISO of your favourite GNU/Linux distro they are an opportunity to preview the eye candy. There are many ways to make those screenshots and most KDE and Gnome users will be familiar with the GUI tools bundled with them: Ksnapshot for KDE and Take Screenshot for Gnome. They are good at what they do. However, sometimes you just need to take screenshots quick and dirty without the overheads (especially if you are using a lightweight windows manager on a relatively low-spec machine). If that’s your case, you can use “Scrot”.

I love the command line. If the command line were a dog, it would be a hard-headed labrador: big and somewhat intimidating, but really kind of even-tempered and friendly once she gets to know you.

I just compared the command line to my dog Roscoe. I love them both, and they both frustrate me.

I can’t do much with Roscoe, but I can help out a bit with the command line. And so allow me to introduce four of my favorite utilities: df, du, file, and find.

This last week I’ve been trying my hand at a bit of DVD authoring and I thought I’d pass on everything that I’ve found out! A couple of the most useful tools are command line based, hence the title, but I’m also going to talk about a fantastic GUI that brings these bits and pieces together. To my horror, just as I sat down to write this I discovered Mitch Meyran had just posted a very similar blog entry! This post, however, is a bit more command line based and HOWTO-like in structure.

As you might have guessed this is going to be a brazen and shameless plug for the command line. I write it to throw in my tuppence-worth after my own Linux experiences. I am also concerned about a new generation of users coming to GNU/Linux without a proper understanding of the underlying reasons for its superiority over Windows but this not a blow by blow comparison.