An inexpensive way to prevent unscheduled downtime or data loss due to power problems is with a UPS or Uninterruptible Power Supply. However, a UPS by itself is not enough for proper operation. Hardware, software, and configuration together make up a UPS system that will recover from unexpected power loss or power fluctuations that can damage systems and peripherals.

If you’re serious about music or DVDs, at some point you cross the threshold of having more than you can keep track of easily. The box full of index cards has served its purpose; it’s time to move on to storing information about your CDs and DVDs in a database.

OpenOffice.org is a fantastic office suite, finally undermining Microsoft’s monopoly on Office-like software (word processing, presentations, etc.). Out of all of the OpenOffice.org programs, Writer is by far the most used: writing a document, a letter, or anything else is definitely more common than writing a presentation. This book is all about OpenOffice.org’s Writer.

The 3D world just got a lot brighter with the birth of Compiz Fusion, a powerful compositing window manager for GNU/Linux operating systems. Originally there was one project, Compiz, but the project forked into Compiz, and the unstable and unofficial fork of Compiz known as Beryl. Now, the two projects have been reunited for one amazing compositing window manager. In a nutshell, it adds effects to your desktop like wobbly windows (the windows actually wobble when you move them), a cool virtual desktops manager via a cube, and much more. For proof of how cool it is, just do a Google Video/YouTube search for “compiz fusion”.

Downloading—no matter what operating system you are using—is ubiquitous. If you’ve been on the internet you will have downloaded something at some point: PDFs, pictures, ISOs, movies, music files, streaming videos to name a few. This article will take a detailed look at KGet, a very versatile GUI download manager for the KDE desktop which is easy to use and has plenty of easily configurable options. It isn’t perfect (but the upcoming KDE4 may rectify that) but we’ll go with what we’ve got and put it through it paces.

I recently went looking for a way to rotate JPG images from within Nautilus, and found a nice way to do this and more. It’s not difficult to customize the right-click popup menu in Nautilus to perform custom actions on files. Here are some instructions and scripts to get you started.

If you’re an experienced administrator, you’ve probably used SSH to remotely access a troublesome box or your personal computer. For those who don’t know: SSH it’s a great way to fiddle with a computer from miles away as if you were sitting at its keyboard, but it’s also just about the simplest and most secure way to configure your computer to let you access its files from anywhere. You can use SSH on nearly every operating system to transfer files to and from your computer over the internet or a LAN.

You almost certainly have speed dial set up on your home, office and mobile phone. It saves time, ensures against a failing memory and allows you to work smarter.

Devotees of the command line don’t have to be left out in the cold. One of the crown jewels of GNU/Linux is that every user, be he ne’er so base, has at his or her fingertips the kind of power of which even Caligula could not dream. Alright, I’m exaggerating—a little.

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