Dropbox has really done a lot for me in terms of making managing files across multiple machines actually workable. One the greatest things about this cool app is that it makes it fairly simple to sync all your personal information stuff like contacts, calendar info, and notes. Nothing beats having all of your notes instantly available on and offline on all of your machines. It comes pretty close to pure bliss for me, actually.

I’m using Dropbox to sync my Zim Wiki notes, but tech blog Starry Hope gives us the low down on how to best use Dropbox for all you Tomboy users out there. Looks really simple, and I bet you could do something similar with the private-beta Ubuntu One, too.

Full Story: Synchronize Tomboy Notes With Dropbox

Linux Journal has a detailed write up on web browser that was totally new to me called Conkeror. Not to be confused with KDE’s browser/filer combo Konqueror, Conkeror uses Mozilla’s Gecko rendering engine (just like Firefox) to display beautiful webpages.

Unlike Firefox, there are absolutely no buttons or controls (”chrome”) to get in your way; everything is done with Emacs-like keyboard shortcuts. You can have multiple webpages open in one window with “buffers” and many Firefox extensions are compatible with the browser.

If you’re not a fan of Emacs-style keyboard navigation, the shortcuts are totally customizable, so you can get it to behave anyway you like…even like Vi(m).

Conkeror on my Eee PC with the buffer list open. (click for larger image)

I’m aware that there are extensions for Firefox (like Vimperator) that make it more keyboard friendly, but the advantage that Conkeror offers is its super-light resource usage. With two buffers (the equivalent of tabs) open, Conkeror was using about 66 MB of RAM. With the same tabs, Firefox was using well over 100 MB. So Conkeror makes for a great, full featured browser for low-end systems. Without all the chrome, it’s also a great choice for netbooks like the Eee PC series, Acer Aspire One, or HP Mininote.

Full Story: The Conkeror Web Browser Conquers Small Screens

How do you browse from the keyboard?

My wife and I recently decided save some on our monthly budget by cancelling our subscription to DISH network. We’re compensating by upping our Netflix plan to the next level, and reading more :)

I also decided this would be a great time to experiment a bit with an inexpensive, Linux-powered solution for bringing my existing media collection into the living room.

I found a Dell GX60 on Ebay for $99 with free shipping, so I jumped on it. The specs were meager (2.4 GHZ Celeron, 512 RAM, 40 GB HD) but I beefed it up with an additional 512 RAM stick I had lying around, and attached an external 1 Terrabyte drive I already had.

Turns out this humble machine runs XBMC like a champ, and actually plays even high def video pretty well. I eventually plan to step up to a true HTPC like the Neuros Link (looks like a fantastic product) but in the meantime, this little box is working great as a way to play music, dvd backups, etc on my 32” LCD TV.

XBMC playing some Snow Patrol on my super cheap, Linux-powered HTPC

Stuff that doesn’t work too well:

• Sometimes it struggles a bit with certain high definition videos; there’s the occasional tear or visual artifact.
• The onboard Intel graphics card just can’t handle flash video, so YouTube and Hulu are out of the question. I could probably beef up the graphics card a bit, but then I’d need a larger power supply…and that’s just more trouble than it’s worth for me.

Despite these drawbacks, I think the machine was definitely worth the $99 I spent, and I think it will serve us well as we begin our migration to web-only tv and a totally digitized music and video collection.

Do you have a Linux-powered home theatre pc? Share your experiences in the comments!

My graphics card recently exploded. Okay, that’s a slight exaggeration…the capacitors on the card exploded. It could have been electrical/voltage issues, or I was possibly a victim of the dreaded capacitor plague…but no matter what the underlying cause, the bottom line is that I was without a decent graphics card in my primary workstation for well over a week.

Over the course of that week, I learned that a good graphics card is essential to productivity on Linux and computers in general. Not only were YouTube videos unwatchable with onboard graphics (hey, I learn lots of stuff about Linux via YouTube ;), but fonts were blurry, I could use only one of my two monitors, and loading even basic web pages full screen was laborious. And of course, there was no Compiz with all of its many productivity features like the Scale and Desktop Wall plugins.

At least GNOME Do still let me fly through my essential tasks.

All that being said, I found an inexpensive card that works great with Ubuntu at Newegg.com, and now I’m back in business.

What are your experiences with graphics cards and everyday computing?

I love Linux Journal…I should seriously subscribe. This is a great tip for anybody looking to automatically share file systems over a network via Samba & cifs. I’m probably going to use a similar solution to serve video from my main workstation to my yet-to-be-assembled, homebrew XBMC frontend in my living room.