Today, Microsoft released a new, free (free as in Free Beer) antivirus program called Microsoft Security Essentials. This new program is available for Windows XP 32-bit, Windows Vista and Windows 7 32-bit, and Windows Vista and Windows 7 64-bit operating systems. Continue reading
Monthly Archives: September 2009
Three More Reasons Not To Use Linux
Last week I read a half-witted blog post citing “3 Reasons why we shouldn’t use Linux”. I’ve got one tip for TechBirdy, the blog author.
TechBirdy’s reasons are either borne out of complete ignorance, or from a desire to spread pure FUD. Continue reading
Bash to Basics: The While Do Loop
The While Do Loop
One of the most common structures in programming is the Do Loop. The version that I’m going to show today is the While Do Loop. The basic structure of the While Do Loop is: while condition A exists, execute the loop. Here’s an example program that counts to ten and then exits. Continue reading
Create a Bootable FreeDOS USB Drive on Windows
Why a Bootable USB Drive?
Most computers sold these days don’t have a 3.5″ floppy drive, yet many computer manufacturers still only provide BIOS flash utilities that require booting to a DOS environment. Luckily there is a free version of DOS called FreeDOS and a utility called UNetbootin to the rescue. Using these two free programs you can create a bootable USB drive that will enable you to flash your BIOS. Continue reading
Command Line Basics: Pipelining Output
One of the most powerful features of the Linux command line interface, (and other shells that conform to the POSIX standard) is the ability to pipeline output from one command as the input to another. This is done using the vertical bar or pipe character [ | ]. Continue reading