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31Jul/080

First things to install on a clean Mac OS X

So I decided to do a clean install of Mac OS X Leopard after experimenting with Yellow Dog Linux on my Apple PowerBook G4. Since OSX is not new to me, I already had in mind what 3rd party software to install immediately after the OS was up.

  • Firefox 3. I do like the Safari browser that comes with Mac OS X, but I need a browser that can handle my Delicious bookmarks in an easy way. with the del.icio.us Bookmarks Extension rocks my world! ;)
  • iTerm. A full featured terminal emulation program written for OS X using Cocoa. The default Terminal.app is not bad at all, but iTerm just has that extra touch. Most important feature to me: selecting means copy. :)
  • Adium. This really is the very best IM (instant messaging) application for your Mac! Adium handles AIM, MSN, Jabber, Yahoo, and more.
  • Growl. A notification system for Mac OS X: it allows applications that support Growl to send you notifications. HardwareGrowler is one of my favorite helper programs.

These are the applications that will definately be installed on my PowerBook after a fresh install of Mac OS X. Of course more will follow, but these ones are pretty vital to me. What are the OSX apps or tools that you cannot live without?

31Jul/081

Yellow Dog Linux on a PowerBook G4 for a day

I have been running Mac OS X on my Apple PowerBook G4 since I bought it. However, after upgrading from Tiger (10.4) to Leopard (10.5) I was slightly disappointed at the performance. So, time for trying something else...

I remembered a distribution that can run on PowerPC hardware and already exists for several years: Yellow Dog Linux (YDL) by Terra Soft. The most recent version is 6.0 which came out in the first quarter of this year. Downloading and burning the install image to DVD is as simple as always. Just be sure to download it from a local mirror. In The Netherlands, ftp.nluug.nl is very fast.

I decided to NOT install it dual boot with Mac OSX, since I wanted to reinstall a clean system anyway if I would not like YDL. Installing is a pretty simple task, especially if you have installed some distro before. Put the DVD in the PowerBook and reboot it while holding the C key, so it will boot from DVD