Day: November 8, 2004

Linux presses Windows more and more. Now the ascendant tactical scheme for Linux is a release of desktop which can be right for unsophisticated users (I mean, no familiar with system administration). MEPIS is one of fair treat desktops based on Debian (Debian is a free Linux distribution that focuses more on stability than being “state-of-the-art”).
MIPOS has following advantages:

• it is distributed as a single live CD;
• it allows to play MP3, mpeg, DVD etc (you need to install only few packages);
• it comes with several Voice Over IP programms: Skype, Free World Dialup, GnomeMeeting;
• it includes office tools: OpenOffice, AbiWord, Gnumeric, FreeMind, Scribus;
• it comes with several tools to work with graphics i. e. transfer and capture files from just about any camera;

More details about installation and customization of MEPIS you can find in the Michael C. Barnes’s article “The Best Free Desktop Linux . . . and how to make it better”.

I’ve found quite interesting article on ONLamp.com – Simplify Business Logic with PHP DataObjects.

"You can implement data access layers in more than one way, but here, we’re interested in DataObjects.

The concept of DataObjects comes from some very well-documented design patterns, namely the Data Access Object and Transfer Object patterns. These patterns can be quite complex, but with a little imagination, we can use their fundamental ideas and purpose to make our own data layer in PHP 5 much easier to work with."

It’s a good news that PHP sticks to the philosophy of patterns which can make life of developers easier.