Sunday, March 2, 2008

My Favourite Apps on PCLinuxOS Gnome 2008

Sometimes I think what keeps me stick to PCLinuxOS, while there are many popular desktop linux distributions around. Why can't I make Ubuntu, Mandriva or Fedora a mainstay on my notebook even though there are many more desktop applications available for them? Why could not I keep any of them on my notebook for a day or two, even though they have a bigger community behind them?

The reason is - Tex and the Ripper Gang have not only gifted me a great OS, but a good number of applications that just work. The applications compiled by Tex and his Gang alway work. For example, WinFF, I had tried WinFF in Mandriva 2008 and Ubuntu 7.10. And I had a bad impression of the app until I tried it on PCLinuxOS. Oh! My God, it's a great program to meet anytype of video conversion. There are so many other instances where only the applications packaged by Tex and available on PCLinuxOS gives a better experience than any other in the linux world. Perhaps, Tex puts his heart and soul into packaging good applications. Perhaps, they are godly creations!

My PCLinuxOS desktop
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My PCLinuxOS Desktop: No multiple windows, No icon clutter on a pure Linsta look.

xmms my favourite music player on pclinuxos
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The good old music player for Linux and my favourite. I like it for its speed and simplicity.

Wether pclinuxos or windows xp, vlc is my darling video player
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Oh! When I am in a doubt if a video will play on my system I play it on VLC and it goes. VLC liberated freedom to play any video despite the proprietary restrictions.

my next favourite media player on pclinuxos
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Mplayer, my next favourite media player.

aiksaurus is always active on my pclinuxos
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Aiksaurus, the best small thesaurus on PCLinuxOS

wordnet, my oxford dictionary replacement on pclinuxos
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Wordnet in fav word lookup program on pclinuxos

oowriter the iconic word processor on wordnet
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I had in the impression that OOWriter is slow in comparison to MS Word. But after shedding multiple language support, java support, gallery and some rarely used addons I found it very much responsive. I also embedded wordnet with oowriter to make it a writer's possession.

nvu on pclinux is similar to dreamweaver in xp
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Running Nvu in pclinuxos is better than running Dreamweaver in XP

audacity on pclinuxos
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Audacity does those audio correction for me. I don't need a more powerful applications.

blender blends with my requirement on pclinuxos
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Blender is good for creating simple 3d models.

f4l is flash for my pclinuxos
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F4L is not as powerful as Adobe Flash. But how many of us work on Flash and action scripts and develop a complete CD/DVD presentation. If you are not a Graphic Designer and you just want create simple banners and animations, F4L is for you. I am happy with it.

gcalculator on pclinuxos gnome
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I need this app every now and then. Need I say anything about it?

gimp 2.4.4 on pclinuxos
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The best opensource image editor that gets better with each new version.

inkscape on pclinuxos
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Inkscape is the answer to Windows based CorelDraw

isomaster, tiny iso editor on pclinuxos
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When it comes to edit iso files, isomaster is my favourite app.

nautilus cd/dvd burner on pclinuxos gnome
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No more gnomebaker, no brasero, no gcombust. Nautilus cd/dvd burner works the best on my pclinuxos gnome remaster.

pidgin is the best small im on pclinuxos gnome
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Gaim got better with Pidgin and it's on my pclinuxos always.

skype on my pclinuxos
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I love skype for its voice quality and features. It's there always on my PCLinuxOS.

transmission is the best p2p client for pclinuxos gnome remaster
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I have always liked transmission on my PCLinuxOS Gnome Remaster because it's small, simple, fast and flawless.

recordmydesktop, the best screen cast program on pclinuxos gnome
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Recordmydesktop generates optimized ogg video of my screencast on PCLinuxOS. It does better work than most of the non-free screen cast programs.

very good download manager
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I came across wxDownloadfast, don't quite remember where, but it's great download manager. It's fast and light, and runs on pclinuxos quite well.

winff the best video converter on pclinuxos
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WinFF does the best video conversion on top of ffmpeg. Two thumbs up for its power and versatility.

best cli typing tutor on pclinuxos
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My wife's favourite typing tutor on PCLinuxOS gnome.

rxvt, my favourite tex terminal on pclinuxos
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Rxvt, my best text terminal. It is a tiny and fast.
(The screenshot displays my grub menu. My system doesn't stop at boot options. It boot boots just like Windows XP, it's hidden from ther user)

I run bare minimum services on my pclinuxos
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I run bare minimum services on my pclinuxos. The result, my system runs at a blazing speed. If you are a pclinuxos home user you can also reduce your services for faster bootup and better response.

pclinxuos gnome - optimized initiation
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I have optimized my inittab for better bootup. You can do the similar changes to your pclinuxos if you are a home user.

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

i am also using transmission and dxDownload on pclinuxos. but they are not as powerful as utorrent and download accelerator plus on windows xp.

manmath sahu said...

you are right! i have also faced some critical problems with those two application on top of pclinuxos.

1. dxDownload kept crashing while embedded it with fasterfox and firefox download manager.

2. transmission is a small and fast bit torrent client. it works fine if you download at a stretch. if you stop it followed by a restart of your system, very often it starts downloading afresh, previously downloaded chunks are gone.

these issues are already logged as bugs. hope the next releases won't have such problems.

by the way, the latest pclinuxos full release is around the corner. prepare for a new experience.

Anonymous said...

mandriva 2008.1 is set to release on next month, still there is not certainty about PCLinuxOS 2008 Full Release. It's a pity!

manmath sahu said...

As the pclinuxos developers say, it will ready when it is ready. You should better visit their forum and post your question there.

Anonymous said...

hi manmath sahu ,any chance of getting a remaster from urself, the one that u use--maybe, via torrent, it would be really gr8, Its really an uphill struggle to download stuff from the net , if u havent guesssed already i,m from a 3rd world country , pakistan to be specific and downloading is an issue .although i can get remastered xp or vista from local market but funny enough no remastered linux

manmath sahu said...

well, i've one remastered copy of pclinuxos but i had made some extreme tweaking so as to fly on my system. even i have made some kernel tweaking that i have not mentioned in the mail.

please send me the hardware specs of your desktop/notebook on which you are going to install pclinuxos. also mention your postal address. i will build a remastered pclinuxos and send you soon.

also, remember pclinuxos full release is squeezed enough to fit into a cd, while remastering (adding a lot of goodies) it generally exceeds in size, so i will make a dvd of it. make sure you have a dvd drive, else borrow a dvd drive for installation.

keep posting comments on my blog.
regards.

Anonymous said...

hi manmath sahu ,thanks for the quick reply and your offer of help,greatly appreciate it,
i got
p4 3.2ghz socket 775 cpu 541
intel 915gav mboard
1gb ram kingston
160gb sata
dvd rw20x samsung sh-s202j

THE OTHER RIG I GOT
P4 3.06 GHZ SOCKET 478
I850E CHIPSET MOTHERBOARD
512 RDRAM FSB533 @1066

I AM NOT GOOD WITH WORDS AND A FELLOW BLOGGER DOES A GOOD JOB OF SAYING WHAT I,D LIKE TO SAY HIS THREAD
http://www.johnlpreston.co.uk/why-more-people-dont-use-linux-and-why-i-moved-from-ubuntu-to-mepis

SO I COPIED AND PASTE
Hi
I think its a good idea to do remasters , as i was out on the look out for a distro that JUST WORKS, I havent got the bandwidth , net connection and all to download all the rpms etc I was trying to show off Kubuntu to some friends last Tuesday, and because Kubuntu doesn’t contain any proprietary software, I couldn’t play MP3s or video. Needless to say, they instantly thought it was rubbish, because they, along with 99% of the population of Earth, didn’t understand the whole concept of “built with free, open-source software”.This is why more people don’t use Linux, it’s a pain to get set up correctly. The thing that really annoys me is vendor lock-in, which is one reason why many Linux distributions use only free, open software. But it’s gone so far, that now Linux is on the brink of exerting vendor lock-out. It’s this kind of behaviour from many distributions that is causing the slow down, and in some cases reversal, of Linux; people want to be able to do everything they can on Windows on Linux, with minimal fuss. It’s exactly this reason why I switched to ultimate1.7 and pclinuxos2008 he.

According to the poster of pclinuxos2008 he
Quote:
As i've mentioned, this is a distro i've made specifically for an Israeli/Hebrew user. Which is why everything is pre-included in the system, in the US it may be illegal but not in Israel. Even all our DVD Players here are region-free.

Also i'd like to note, that this has nothing to do with official PCLinuxOS, this is a PRIVATE remaster done from it, and it is not endorsed by PCLinuxOS community.

You could basically d/l PCLinuxOS 2007 and do a full update and then add the MP3/DVD and what would be the difference ?


I definately would urge newbies like myself to give it a spin also do try out ultimate 1.7 that also rocks .Most of my friends use xp black edition ie the remastered xp with all the software preinstalled , funny thing is i can get a copy of that in the local market and linux -- no , i dont think so!!

I USUALLY GIVE A COPY OF LINUX DISTRO TO LOCAL SOFTWARE MARKET ,SO AS TO PROMOTE LINUX

manmath sahu said...

Thanks for your comments. Also I liked the url you mentioned about pclinuxos remasters mirroring black xp. You will be happy to know that some people are working a lot towards it. Granular Linux is one such remaster of PCLinuxOS that has truckload of productive software that every pc user needs.

Anonymous said...

Nice write up, I too was intrigued by BlackXP.
You may want to take a look at Ultimate Edition 1.7, comes in a few flavors. A gnome version, a gnome/KDE version, a KDE4 version and the latest is an x64 version.
Has many of the apps you mentioned and then some.
See the forums here: Ultimate Edition

jfg69

manmath sahu said...

ultimate edition is seems very promising, i am going to try it anytime soon. but now i am using testing the latest pclinuxos gnome remaster.

How about this