Linux

I’m becoming a technology curmudgeon. For as long as I can remember I’ve used a traditional window manager on Linux. Maybe I’m just stuck in my ways but I’m convinced that the combination of Focus Follows Mouse (with a 450ms auto-raise delay), the ThinkPad TrackPoint, and middle-click scrolling is the most efficient way to navigate windows. So Ubuntu’s neglect of that paradigm in favor of something that feels too much like my wife’s Mac has caused me to seek greener pastures.

Right now Adobe AIR is only officially available for 32-bit Linux. But it does work on 64-bit Linux with the 32-bit compatibility libraries. There are several ways to install Adobe AIR on Linux. My preferred way on Ubuntu is to use the .deb package. However the .deb package distributed by Adobe can only be installed on 32-bit systems. Good news is that this can be easily fixed! To install the Adobe AIR .deb package on a 64-bit system just follow these steps:

It’s kinda hard to believe that I’ve been doing Flex development on Linux for over six years now. In that time I’ve tried a few different tools. Vim will always be my favorite but debugging is painful. Flex Builder for Linux worked but lacked major features and commitment from Adobe for continual improvement. Most recently I’ve been using IntelliJ IDEA for Flex development on Linux. It’s been working great! There are a few things I’ve had to get used to but they are doing a great job of providing superb tooling support for Flex. I’ve also been very impressed with the responsiveness from the IntelliJ team in their forums and bug system.

UPDATE: This video was intended to show how to upgrade Flash to a new / experimental version. If you do not have Flash and want to see the video, first switch YouTube to default to HTML5 video and then watch this video on YouTube.

Adobe has just released a preview of a 64-bit Flash Player for Windows, Mac, and Linux! I created a quick video to show Linux users how to install Flash Player on a 64-bit system. Check it out:

*** Update: My boot time is now down to 7 seconds! New video coming soon. ***

I just updated to the latest Ubuntu 10.10 desktop and noticed that boot time is now extremely fast! My Intel Core 2 Duo 2.80GHz laptop with an Intel SSD now boots in 8.6 seconds! That is from boot loader all the way to logged in and ready to use! Nice work Ubuntu! Check out the video if you want to see it in action:

Adobe has posted an update for Flex Builder on Linux which was scheduled to time-out on December 1, 2009. While the Flex SDK has always worked on Linux, development is certainly easier with Eclipse support for coding, compiling, and debugging. This alpha 5 release of Flex Builder for Linux allows us Linux folks to continue building Flex applications in Eclipse for another 401 days. However, Adobe has still not announced any plans to create a full Flex Builder (or Flash Builder) product for Linux. If that is something you want then please go vote for FB-19053. This update still doesn’t support Eclipse 3.5. If you want Eclipse 3.5 support then you will need to apply patches created by Danyul and myself.

Today Ubuntu released Karmic Koala 9.10 Desktop Edition. Like Snow Leopard and Windows 7, I find this release underwhelming. It seems that all three major operating systems are running out of room for innovation and the focus has now shifted to core improvements. But the lack of anything really new and exciting in all three recently released operating systems (Snow Leopard, Windows 7, and Ubuntu 9.10) indicates that the OS space has become a commodity market. All OS innovation seems to have shifted to mobile devices while the only significant remaining differentiator between the operating systems is the applications that run natively on them.

The current alpha version of Flex Builder on Linux doesn’t have feature parity with the Windows and Mac versions of Flex Builder. It is scheduled to timeout on December 1, 2009 and current development seems to be on hold. If you would like to see Adobe create a full version of Flex Builder for Linux then please go vote for feature request #FB-19053! Thanks!

Since the days when I installed Slackware Linux via a stack of 3.5″ floppies, Linux has been a *nearly* suitable desktop for me. With some tinkering and with VMWare to run Windows when I need it I’ve been able to use Linux as my primary desktop OS for around 15 years. As computers and software have evolved Linux has had to keep up. In some areas it’s done exceptionally well and in others it has struggled. But based on the improvements in Ubuntu Jaunty I believe the pace of improvement is accelerating. This means that many of the niche oddities and problems with Linux should soon be ironed out.

Adobe has released Adobe Reader 9.1 for Linux! This is the first 9.x release on Linux and has a number of new features. My personal favorite is the inclusion of Flash Player so that Portable RIAs will work on Linux! Portable RIAs are beginning to catch on more and so it’s great to have true cross-platform support for them.