Green Tech Girl

I’ve actually been using a Hipster PDA (or hPDA) for my organizing needs for some time now. As much as I love computers, I have never been able to deal with electronic to-do lists. My Hipster PDA fits into my purse and I use it to write random notes, to-dos, and ideas for my business. It also has a calendar, which I make manually by printing out a template onto cards that I cut to index size. (I still don’t know why some smart person hasn’t started selling pre-printed Hipster PDA index cards…on recycled paper, of course!)

I’ve thus avoided the smartphone mania for some time. I did used to have a Palm device - actually, a Handspring Visor - and actually, I still own it. I can’t sync it anymore (serial connection) but I do have a backup module in case it needs a reset. Since it takes batteries I sometimes like to play solitaire on it, or the extremely addictive Dope Wars.

But alas, I needed a way to get email instantly and have a more robust calendar for the yoga classes I am teaching. I got a BlackBerry Curve for Christmas, and it’s fabulous. It has:

A 2.0 megapixel camera with flash
A video camera
An MP3 player (with an iPod-like interface)
Push email
Calendar/contacts
GPS system with voice navigation
Full keyboard
Games (I even found a free version of Dope Wars for BlackBerry!)

The default browser isn’t so hot, but if you download Opera Mini, you will get a fantastic mobile browsing experience, complete with easy zoom functionality.

Screw the iPhone - I love having a real, full keyboard. Touchscreen does not do it for me, never mind that it’s probably easier to break. (By the way, what was wrong with the Palm stylus system anyway? I actually got good at Graffiti and miss using it!)

The downside to the BlackBerry is that if you don’t have Microsoft Outlook, your option for syncing your calendar and contacts is Google. Google is starting to scare me - are they going to turn out to be the younger, trendier version of Microsoft? I hate having to put all my info online like that but I’m not buying Outlook. (And it does work pretty well.)

Problem is - there is no way to sync your to-do lists in Google. Once again, I am back to my Hipster PDA as the best, most convenient solution for my to-do lists and brainstorming sessions.

Is it environmentally bad to be using up paper like that? Should I just be typing it all in? If someone would come up with PDA that used a stylus with handwriting recognition, maybe I would. Well, I guess I could get a tablet PC one of these days…though buying a very resource-intensive computer just to save a few trees does not seem to be a good trade, environmentally speaking.

I guess I’ll be sporting both the Curve and the hPDA…at least we women get to carry purses around so it’s no big deal at any rate.

Maybe this seems like a silly thing to get excited about, but I was really jazzed to find out my Wells Fargo ATM can now accept cash and checks without envelopes. I had already tried the cash to great success (it gets posted immediately to your account!) and today I deposited a check.

The ATM not only accepted the check but read the dollar amount off the check (in scrawly handwriting) and then popped out a receipt with a miniature copy of the check printed on it. Wow!

I suppose it would be even “greener” to not get a receipt, but I always like a paper copy. I do recycle them, however.

As I’ll probably say here 100 times, it is much better to rescue an old computer and make it useful than to simply toss it out into the garbage. Linux makes this easy - er, well, kind of easy, depending on the distribution and your tolerance for troubleshooting. While more and more Linux versions are requiring more and more computing power, thankfully, not all of them suffer from the never ending quest for software progress.

Puppy Linux is one of the lean, mean Linux distributions specifically designed to work well on older as well as newer hardware. There’s an extremely small version without a lot of added software, and a more “bloated” version that includes Seamonkey browser and email suite.

I was looking for a new Linux distribution to try on my old Pentium III laptop. I had PCLinuxOS 2007 on it and it ran pretty well, but became concerned over the future usefulness of this distribution on my old hardware, due to KDE 4 looming as a potential future for PCLinuxOS. (Though, PCLinuxOS is actually sticking with KDE 3.5 I believe for the forseeable future.) I tried Linux Mint on my PIII, and it worked pretty well until it stopped recognizing my monitor resolution for some bizarre reason. Then it started to hang. Who knows why.

So I thought I’d give Puppy a try. Sure, there is “Damn Small Linux” but the Puppy logo is a lot cuter. OK, that wasn’t really the reason - I had just heard Puppy had a lot of fans and felt it was worth a shot. Read the rest of this entry »

I read with some amusement the CherryPal review over at TG Daily - the author’s biggest gripe was that she felt the CherryPal was really ugly because the ports faced in front. (Turns out, the direction of the cherry logo confused her, which is funny to me because I never even noticed the logo’s direction. I just set up the box with the ports facing back. Big deal!) There was also a complaint about the box seeming “flimsy,” which is not my experience whatsoever. And, oh, horror, there’s no CD/DVD drive!

Such reviews are truly missing the point of the CherryPal, which was conceived to be a low-power green computer that did not require moving parts or fans. Let’s just try to envision the world in maybe as little as five years, where DVDs are becoming obsolete with the increased use of digital downloads and flash drives. Let’s look ahead to a time where electricity costs are increasing due to increased power consumption and lowered reserves of natural gas. Perhaps at that time, a small desktop computer that consumes only 2 watts and doesn’t need a DVD drive would be ideal? Perhaps. Read the rest of this entry »

“Net neutrality” is the idea that the Internet remains free and open and will not discriminate on access based on dollar signs. In simplistic terms, this means that you can access my Green Tech Girl website just as easily as you can Microsoft’s. With the advent of video on demand, many companies are looking for ways to deal with increased bandwith consumption, and some of these plans seem to be crossing the line into a bifurcated Internet.

Google has recently come under fire for a plan perceived to threaten net neutrality, though they claim there is confusion over the matter. (Is caching content the same as limiting bandwidth?) While Obama has been quoted as saying he supports net neutrality, considering his major flip-flip on FISA in favor of the telecom companies, we cannot rely on his administration to protect the people’s interests against the telecoms.

Ultimately, a free and open Internet will always be at risk as long as big corporations own the pipes. I remember reading a long time ago an idea that individual users could create their own worldwide “Internet” via peer-to-peer wifi, thus bypassing the big corporations altogether. Will this ever come to pass? Perhaps. Meanwhile, we still need to remain vigilant on the issue of net neutrality. It will be up to the genius of individual developers to come up with a viable Internet that does not require corporate backing or control.

The trendy Mercedes-Benz of the future may well end up being electric. Daimler has begun work on developing advanced batteries to fuel electric cars in partnership with Evonik. This is only a first step, however. Once stronger batteries are developed, what will power them? Will the trophy wives of Beverly Hills and their having-a-mid-life-crises husbands want solar panels replacing their sun roofs? Perhaps, if the current eco-trendiness continues, such green luxury cars will be seen as the status symbols of the future.

It’s kind of funny to me that there are actually computer conspiracy theorists out there who think the CherryPal really doesn’t exist and those of us reviewing it are making it all up because we don’t have actual video of the computer in action. Well, pardon me, but I don’t have a video camera - I’m a writer, not a cinematographer! (I’m a doctor, not a mechanic, Jim!)

The CherryPal is slowing getting shipped out to those “on the list” - whether Brand Angels or those ordering the machine. There have been some other reports of glitches - people not being able to login or other bugs. Most people who get one seem to have no problem with it out of the box, fortunately, but this is definitely a machine that has some kinks to be worked out.

My thoughts on the CherryPal upon further use:

Pros: I love how absolutely quiet the machine is. I love the small footprint and the “green” aspect of saving on electricity. I love having a no-nonsense Linux box without hassling with Windows or a lot of bloatware. So on the whole, I’m really hoping that we see more machines like this in the future.

Cons: The CPU is woefully underpowered for the software. Upon testing, I discovered that the CPU often runs at about 100% just to load a large web page. Really complicated web pages can freeze the machine, even when using a leaner browse such as Epiphany. I have yet to test video on the box, but I’m not hopeful what with the current performance. I’m wondering why they went with Xubuntu as the OS instead of a more optimized Linux distro such as Puppy Linux.

Given the limitations of the CPU, I would not be able to replace my regular computers with the CherryPal at this time. I do plan on using the CherryPal, however, for writing and checking online email. I often leave my computer on all day as I like to go back and forth from the computer, and I’d much rather leave on the low-powered CherryPal than my laptop, so I don’t burn out the laptop earlier than I need to.

As for a cheap computer, though, it might be better to get an old computer and put Linux on it. I have a Pentium III I run Linux on. I just put Puppy on it and it is 10x faster than my CherryPal.

So if you want a second machine to save power with, the CherryPal might be a good option. It is not a replacement for a full-powered desktop just yet.

I needed to deposit cash at a Wells Fargo ATM recently. I am always a bit paranoid about depositing cash at an ATM, so much so that I wanted to stick the cash in a plain envelope, with a deposit slip, into the Wells Fargo envelope. But when I got to the ATM machine, no Wells Fargo envelopes were to be found. I searched the area, high and low - no deposit envelopes.

I keep a few Wells Fargo deposit envelopes in my car just in case, so I went back to the car and stuffed the cash I had into a spare Wells Fargo envelope. But when I get to the actual part where I’m supposed to deposit my money, the ATM machine tells me to deposit my cash - wtihout the envelope!

It’s a new technology they’ve created. You can deposit up to 50 bills in a stack, directly into the ATM, and the machine will count them and post the cash to your account instantly.

Still a bit dubious, I put my smallest bill - a $10 note - into the feeder. There was a little whirring sound and the ATM informed me I had just deposited $10 - would I like to deposit any more cash? I put in a few $20s in a hurried handful. They were not in any particular order and not even stacked neatly. The machine whirred again and voila! It had counted and confirmed each bill I put into the machine.

The amazing thing about this new technology is that it will apparently also read your checks. I am not sure if it actually reads the amount right off the check, because I have yet to put a check in and test it. With the checks, you have to line up your account number in a certain way, so it’s a bit more rigid than the cash deposit. But what an amazing technology this is! Imagine, the paper that will be saved once all ATMs use envelope-less deposits.

Of course, we’d save even more trees without cash and checks, but I’m not willing to forgo the immediacy and anonymity of cash, no matter how environmental it may be.

I’ve managed to “unbrick” my CherryPal - hurrah! - but it’s still not out of the woods yet. As I mentioned in my last post, I had tried the reset hole on the bottom of the machine, but it did not seem to do anything. Then Max Seybold told me to try the reset hole on the CherryPal boards, not knowing I’d already tried it. So I decided to try it again. Ah! There is a trick to it. I have discovered the secret of the CherryPal reset hole. Here it is:

Using a paperclip, push down in the hole right when you turn the machine on. Hold it there until you start seeing a bunch of boot-up information appear on the screen. This installs the Linux recovery firmware in the box.

For some reason, my machine hangs when “inetd” is being started, but if you press CTRL-C you will get to a prompt. This is not your actual CherryPal filesystem. It is a virtual filesystem and any changes you make to it will disappear when you reboot. There is a huge lost+found folder in there that obviously has the CherryPal data on it, but it’s inaccessible.

In order to rescue your CherryPal, you must mount the flash drive onto your virtual filesytem. Follow these commands:

mkdir /mnt/hda1
mount -t ext3 /dev/hda1 /mnt/hda1

Then you can go into the /mnt/hda1 directory and make any changes as necessary. PLEASE BE CAREFUL, because deleting anything important here will ruin your operating system!

(Note: When finished with your edits, you might want to unmount your drive manually to be on the safe side, so before rebooting, type in: umount /dev/hda1)

I discovered that in trying to add a new CherryPal user with the graphical interface, somehow my entire passwd file got hosed. The gdm user had been deleted, which is why I could not login. I manually entered in a gdm user (copying what was in my passwd, shadow, and group files from a Mint installation on my laptop). I rebooted and voila! I was able to login and see my CherryPal desktop again.

Unfortunately, I still have some clean-up to do. I only added the gdm user during my rescue and apparently all the users were hosed, including those automatic users that run important things like networking. Additionally, my default limeos user now no longer has sudo priveleges so I can’t make any changes to anything. I am going to go back into the failsafe Linux (using the reset hole) to manually reconstruct my passwd, shadow, and group files following what’s in my laptop Linux files. This may be painstaking but it should fix things. I’ll post an update when I have it all working again.

Moral of the story: Do not add users to CherryPal using the graphical interface!

UPDATE: I asked for copies of the default passwd, group, and shadow files on the CherryPal Ning boards. A kindly Brand Angel posted them and I used them to reconstruct my default files. Everything is working again. Phew! I am actually typing this update from my CherryPal.

Well, not one day into it and I managed to brick my CherryPal. (For those of you who aren’t in the know on the slang, that means, I’ve broken the machine and turned it into a “brick.”) I am pretty good at exposing any vulnerabilities in a Linux distro in my first day or two of use - without meaning to. It’s a special talent I have. This is potentially a major bug, and CherryPal users should be warned about it, until they have a solution for it. Read the rest of this entry »