linuxNUS is an organisation to promote the use of Free and Open Source Software in NUS and Singapore. We have been organising Hackfests which promote working in teams with an intense focus on the execution of an idea. These Hackfests are aimed at encouraging the JFDI – Just F**kin’ Do It attitude, while collaborating with the community.

So now, we’ve come up with the idea of a Hack Workshop series for NUS students. These workshops will be aimed at promoting “learning how to learn”. They will talk about hacking as an important part of entrepreneurship and boundless creative exploration. As we say, a great idea is nothing without excellent execution, so we’d really like help make excellent execution a reality.

Essentially the workshops will feature the following concepts -

• simplicity in design
• team synergy
• scalable models / adaptability to change
• power of opensource
• collaboration
• proper developmental practices
• the importance of self-learning

The workshops are for those interested in learning to how develop a project while working in teams. We will be collaborating with local open source developer groups, entrepreneurs and startups for the workshops.

The workshops will come in two flavours, technical and non-technical -

The technical workshops will primarily cover topics such as web development and software development best practices, while the non-technical topics will cover the business viability aspects, presentation skills and will include talks by successful start-ups.

The workshops will be held either on a Saturday or Sunday morning – 10am till 1pm. All the workshops will be followed by a Hackfest (yeah the same old one where you can sit around, talk to people and develop anything!).

To ensure quality of the workshops (and to cover the cost for course material) the workshops will be priced at $5 each. Students can pre-register for the whole workshop series comprising of 7-8 workshops at $30.

Here is a list of Workshop topics (stay tuned for updates on the Workshop schedule!) -

• Linux/Unix basics,

• NUS Linux setup – configuring printers, network.
• Basic system administration – package management, etc.

• Revision control – GIT/SVN
• Beginning Web development – HTML/CSS/Javascript.
• PHP/MySQL – Making a simple Blog CMS (with CodeIgniter).
• Software development best practices – Agile Development, TDD, Pair Programming
• Presentation Skills
• Start-up talks
• Designing with GIMP/Photoshop

You can preregister with us for the workshops here and more news - http://bit.ly/baD3dP

If you think you can contribute to the initiative you can contact us at coreteam(at)linuxNUS(dot)org with suggestions for topics or speakers.

Developing a portable application has never been an easy task, be it a browser-based service or a fanciful desktop application. With emergence of many frameworks for developing cross-platform applications, choosing the right one has become a challenge. One can name a bunch of frameworks for desktop development, such as GTK+, Gtkmm, FLTK, VCF C++, etc. Adobe fans would pronounce Adobe Air as the best choice. Well, so what do I have in my hat? Voilà! I’d like to present Nokia Qt C++ framework – one of the leading frameworks for desktop & mobile development.

GUI in a while

There are many reasons why I love Qt Designer and would like to share some with you:

• If you love Delphi & M$.NET GUI designers, you will find a new romance with Qt Designer.
• Dozens of widgets are available to serve you and what you need to do is just to drag & drop.
• Adding menu, submenus, toolboxes & docked widgets can be done with a few clicks.
• Qt Designer loves diversity and accepts your custom widgets.
• Feel free to load and change GUI dynamically with UiLoader.

You may want read more on Qt Designer.

Write once & run everywhere

You can target different architectures such as x86, x86-64, ARM, … and run on Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, S60, Maemo, etc with no or little modification to your code. The broader audience you reach, the more popularity you gain.

Network boldly

Qt has a wealth of network libraries. The clients to the standard services such as HTTP(S) & FTP are already there for you. XML parsing, XQuery & XPath libraries will enable you to interface with web services. Writing own TCP/UDP-based protocols with Qt is easy. Feel free to read more on Qt Network.

Browser & scripting integration

Along with high quality modules for GUI, networking and XML, Nokia Qt C++ framework has other 2 killer modules: QtWebkit & QtScript. QtWebkit provides browser integration based on the Webkit engine used by Apple Safari & Google Chrome. Adding a browser to your application to render web pages or custom help/manual files in HTML has never been easier. QtScript exposes Qt objects to scripting with JS-like language. With QtScript you are empowered to do cross-platform scripting on your applications to increase productivity and encourage users to write their own extensions. Please refer to the official Qt Script and Qt Webkit documents and examples to explore more.

Installation

1. Please find suitable installation package for your OS & architecture from http://qt.nokia.com/downloads/. Please pay close attention to whether your OS is 32-bit or 64-bit and make sure you download the version of Qt SDK that suits your OS.

2. Proceed to the installation with the default settings. It is recommended that you stick with the default installation settings. There are very few things to tweak.

3. Set up paths and links for the Qt library. If you are using Mac, you may skip this step. This step is only advisable for Windows and Linux developers.

   • Windows: You need to add paths to the Qt bin & MinGW bin folders. If you installed Qt 4.6.3 then the path of Qt is C:\Qt\2010.3. You need to add the following paths: C:\Qt\2010.3\qt\bin and C:\Qt\2010.3\mingw\bin.

   • Linux/Unix: You have 2 options: Either to create soft links or add to the environment variables PATH & LD_LIBRARY_PATH. To add soft links, you need to run the following commands:

     sudo ln -s /opt/qtsdk-2010.3/qt/bin/* /usr/bin/

     sudo ln -s /opt/qtsdk-2010.3/qt/lib/lib* /usr/lib/

     To manipulate environment variables, edit the file ~/.bash_profile and add these 2 lines:

     export PATH=$PATH:/opt/qtsdk-2010.3/qt/bin

     export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$LD_LIBRARY_PATH:/opt/qtsdk-2010.3/qt/lib

   For the changes to the environment variables to take effect, you need to log out and log in again. Soft links don’t need that extra step.

Now you are ready to run Qt demos & examples. Enjoy!

Conclusion

Nokia might not suit all your needs but it’s one of the best options to keep an eye on. Among large users of Nokia Qt C++ framework, there are companies such as Google, Adobe and Skype. Qt has found its application in a breadth of industries. Your next killer application may be written in Nokia C++ too! Stay tuned with our series of Qt tutorials!

* The screenshots are provided at the official Nokia Qt C++ documentation website.

Pictures!!

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

It was anticipated that 12hrs is not enough time to develop anything from scratch to end. But yeah, it was enough time to thrash down the ideas, think over it fully and come up with a basic structure. It was also enough time to meet the people around. That was the main beauty of the event. I was teamed up with 2 other NUS students and it was great to see some bonding and idea development. We are surely following up on the stuff that we developed in those 12 hrs.

The people who attended the event -

Ruiwen and Luther – HackerSpace Membership management system in Django.

Angad, Bryan and Shanmugam – A picture with a descriptive related story CMS. [PHP and AJAX]

We also came up with another idea – A Past year papers questions/answers database for Primary, A Levels and University students. We will surely follow up on this one and if anybody is interested in helping out, please contact at coreteam[at]linuxnus[dot]org.

Shanmugam was highly interested in Rooting his HTC Magic and upgrading to 2.1. He received great guidance from the android geeks at the place and we wish him luck with his ventures with Android. He is also a newly recruited member of linuxNUS.

Martin – OpenMoko Bootloader. He was totally immersed into his two Green geeky OLPC XOs and was developing a bootloader on the Open Hardware phone - OpenMoko.

We had a guest who dropped in around 3pm – Nelson,  from Dominican Republic. He is a passionate Ruby Developer and did a great show of some cool stuff such as http://www.hashapass.com/ and some Ruby process on his Mac. His blog can be found here – CopyPastel

Tomithy – a peer from the module CS3216 also dropped by and took part in the discussions around. He is a Social Entrepreneur, embarking on NOC next semester to UPenn. Good Luck to him!

The event was ended by a show and tell from everybody present and an enlightening discussion about typed and un-typed languages.

And finally it was great to eat the specially cooked food – low temperature and longer time cooking (sous vide) from Meng Weng. The eggs were really nice with pepper. Moreover, the location of HackerSpaceSG is a great one for good food outside.

Looking forward to organising more such events. We really needs such places and such groups to come up with loads of ideas and execute them with a high spirit. This would surely induce better understanding of – how an idea can be converted effectively to a final product, team work spirit and the start-up environment. Its ultimately all about hard-work and working smart

This time great ideas come together at a single place. You have 12hrs to develop anything, either with a team or individually. Share your ideas with others, form great teams and meet different people. You are free to develop anything, any idea that you have in mind – Android, iPhone, Web2.0, linux etc.

Have a blast with coding, designing and developing a business idea, straight from idea >> execution. Start your idea with awesome people around and <geek> out.

The last 2 hrs will be devoted to a short discussion of ideas that everybody is working on.

So Come over, grab a corner and JFDI!

The event starts at 9am and ends at 9pm.

9am – 11am Form team, discuss idea.

11am – 8pm – JFDI!

8pm – 9pm – Show-and-Tell & Makan

Please register here. Please note that places are limited for the first 30 registrants. You will be informed by email

http://bit.ly/9FNeyq

Please feel free to drop by the IRC Channel or email us at contact@linuxnus.org

My favorite sections in the NUS Central Library is the TK5I05.885 and QA76.76 – all catering to the latest and old books on various Computer technologies. Last semester, I had to write an essay for the USP application on a topic that talks about my interest. And guess what, I wrote about  Open Source. I had to keep it non-technical as mainly Arts Professors would evaluate that. (Disclaimer : I did not get through USP ).

So I looked up some books regarding the topics, and for that I had to look up in the above shelves of QA76.76. And there, sitting on the old shelves were the immense bundles of knowledge talking about the various aspects of Free and Open Source Software. I will be providing a list of books and locations at the end of this post so that any geek, passing the library can have a look at the areas.

Though, almost all these books are available freely over the Internet under the GNU license, getting some to read in the comfort of your bed is a boon in itself. And why not use the vast library that is full of smelly books, untouched for years, waiting for geeks?

I try to make it up to a habit that I have always craved for and sometimes achieved – “a book a week”. But a busy semester and less sleeping time pulls the habit down.

The most important aspect of FOSS that has inspired me is the point that reeks out from all the books that talk about history of Open Source – The way the eminent personalities coded day and night with huge motivations. I mainly refer to the “Rebel Code” by Glyn Moody. He gives a comprehensive insight into how the Hacker movement transformed into a highly organised rebellion – giving birth to GNU and Linux, as we know them today.

I think its better to read the books altogether, rather me giving brief reviews about each (I am still reading some of them, if you cant find them on the Book shelves, ping me, I will return those books back to the library).

You can get a simple list of all the books with the Keyword – “Open Source” at LincNUS -

http://linc.nus.edu.sg/search/Y?SEARCH=open+source&searchscope=16&SORT=D&submit=Submit

Other Books, pertaining to FOSS, I will list :  There are even more in the above link, and more that I am looking out for. Will update the list soon.

P.S. There are perhaps thousands of books that cater to the technical aspect of Open Source technologies such as PHP, Apache, Ruby etc. I talk only about the non-technical ones here.

We are 1 month old, and we’re celebrating it by throwing ourselves a Christmas Party! This event is similar to our open house party! We’ll be catering some halal food from around the area. If you can bring more food, that will be great! Just make sure it is halal, or if not, indicate it isn’t. Drinks will be available, including Wine, and some alcohol. As usual, contributions to our pot of donations will be appreciated. We’re also going to have a gift exchange in the form of a game. So bring some physical gift which cost no more than $15, wrap it up, hide it, and come up with clues! The smaller the gift, the easier to hide. *evil laughter* Oh and you don’t have to bring a gift to attend the party, but you won’t be able to play the game (I think??). Join us for our party now!!!

A few of us will gather there for the party. If you want to join us, detail of the time and venue is as follow:

Date: Friday, 18 Decemer 2009

Time: 19:00 – 23:55

Location: HackerspaceSG , 70A Bussorah Street, Singapore

And please remember to RSVP on Facebook

See you there

But it seems that a new warfront is being fought in the sphere of soft drinks with Bing Soda, Microsoft Soda and Ubuntu Cola

We’ve come a long way since then, of course. From a single humble mailing list, we then set up our main site, linuxNUS.org, our wiki – Opensource@NUS, forums and our IRC channel, #linuxnus on irc.freenode,net (which you can join by clicking “Chat” at the top of this page).  We’ve ridden the recent social wave as well, turning up on sites such as Facebook and Twitter!

In this time, we’ve never stopped trying to promote, advocate and educate people about the use of open source software, organising activities that hopefully brought value to all involved. We organised Installfests, workshops and Hackfests, and even brought in external speakers to share their pet projects with us,  such as Mario Behling on LXDE, Ole Tange on OpenMoko, and Harish Mallipeddi on developing Facebook applications with Django. linuxNUS also produces a podcast, where we talk about stuff related to open source in Singapore. The linuxNUS Podcast has covered groups and events like the Free and Open Source Alliance of Singapore (FOSA), Software Freedom Day 09, and we even managed to squeeze in an interview with Jim Whitehurst, CEO of Red Hat, when he was in Singapore.

It’s been a blast for us so far, and for those of you reading who have been part of activities, we really hope that you enjoyed the experience, and more importantly, gained something from it.

With that, we leave you know with a little something to mark our journey through the years

There. I’ve said it. Now I await the pitchforks.

Before you toss me into the vat of boiling oil for heresy, however, hear me out. We’ve all been in this fix before. We really, really, want to use only open source software, but there are just so many things that stand in our way.  That YouTube video your friends are laughing over? That’s proprietary Flash all right. That cool new game everyone’s been playing? Chances are (but not quite),  that it runs only on Windows.

Things get worse when you’re put into situations that are completely out of your control. In NUS, we most often run into such situations in the courses that we take. Perhaps the lecturer wants the class to use some software that only available on a closed platform. Or he wants you to develop code in a proprietary language. Or perhaps he just insists on sending out .pptx files. Every. Single. Time.

What’s an open source geek to do? Good question, we’re stumped too!

So here’s the deal, if you’d ever faced a dilemma like that in NUS, we want to know! What situation were you put in, by whom, and how (if at all) you managed to get around that. Drop us a note in the comments, and we’ll collate the results for a nice fancy table in a follow-up.

Oh, and general comments welcome too, of course.

The Free and Open Source Alliance (FOSA.sg) would like to invite you  to take part in Software Freedom Day Singapore 2009. We have a number of events lined up for you next month on September 18 and 19 at the Singapore Management University, Bras Basah and the National Library Building, Bugis, and we hope you’ll be able to join in. We’ll have events all day on both days. On Friday (September 18),  we’ll be organizing a series of talks at the NLB, providing an overview of setting up and using free and open source software in  business, government and education, aimed primarily at a non-technical audience. Saturday (September 19) will see two simultaneous events: at SMU, we’ll have tutorial sessions on the use of open source tools and techniques, aimed specifically at a technical audience. At the same time, we’ll have booths set up at the National Library Building’s plaza to introduce members of the public to the benefits of open source, the wide range of powerful, reliable tools available for free, and to the participants, both companies and groups, involved in the open source community in Singapore. Event overviews are available at http://softwarefreedomday.sg/ ; detailed schedules will online as soon as they’re ready.

So this year it is going to be more grand than the previous year because it is going to be held at NLB

linuxNUS definitely wants to be part of the action for SFD 2009. So a few of us did a quick brainstorm in IRC, and we came out with the following ideas:

• Showcase Compiz-Fusion
• Play our podcasts
• Setup some multiplayer FOSS games: Note need lots of manpower and resource… to be done only if there is sufficient manpower.
• Check with ComCen and Mozilla@NUS team on their involvement with Open Source
• Showcase what linuxNUS has been doing over the past few years to promote the cause in NUS

Currently, we already have a small ad-hoc team to get things moving. But more heads are definitely better than the few we have. So if you have any ideas, or would like to contribute to the linuxNUS’ SFD booth in terms of resources or manpower, please post in the comments