Nowadays, I have to say online privacy is more and more important. That mainly becuse pople and websites on one side, especially social ones, tend to associate virtual accounts with real persons. So if your account is hacked the ”real you” might not get so confortable over, and your friends too.

Now I am gonna show you a list of linux distros aimed to preserve your privacy both online and offline on the computer you are working on. Notable features for these distros are:

• connects to the internet using  Tor and/or I2P networks to prevent traffic analisys or network surveillance;
•  Firefox preconfigured with https anywhere and Torbutton;
• GnuPG for email and data encryption;
• TrueCrypt, disk encryption utility;
• Florence virtual keyboard to prevent keylogging;
• Shamir’s Secret Sharing feature;
• LUKS and Palimpsest for installing and using encrypted storage devices (e.g. usb sticks);
• Non-manipulable operating system as they are capable to run only whithin the RAM memory;

Now let’s see where we can choose from:

Tails it’s a realtively new distro as they have just reached version 0.11 with a major security fix. It’s aimed to be run as a live CD or USB stick. Find more at https://tails.boum.org/ .

Ubuntu Privacy Remix (UPR) it’s a special ubuntu-based distro with an addition of packages for improved privacy. Homepage is https://www.privacy-cd.org/ .

Liberté Linux is a Gentoo-based distro, using a  hardened kernel, with grsecurity/PaX security enhancements making it prevent better software exploits. It will take  only 200 MB of space on you CD/SD/USB media. See more at: http://dee.su/liberte

Linux, has been and it is the most ported operating system (or should I say kernel ?!!!) so far. I’ve seen it on PC’s, mobile phones, routers, servers of course, maiframe computers, tablets and so on. Yes many of you might say  ”Hey there’s Android on my tablet!”, but just let me refer to wikipedia, which says: “Android is a Linux-based operating system for mobile devices …” . Right even Android is Linux-based and yet very succesful.

Isn’t that fact a punch in the face for the pople who might say “open source can’t sell”. It sells and worths every penny because it is developed  by enthusiasts and not some bored-coder-porn-addicted .

Open-Source is often the best choice in many applications – yeah even IT security – since an open-source product has been tested and improved by a lot of people.

Now, as the article title says, I am very curious of the  more crazy/interesting/cool devices on which linux was ported, so far. So let’s see what I came up with:

Linux on iPod

Yeah, that’s really cool and I am sorry for you Apple-fans but the penguin is so hungry it will eat up your iPod too. Well iPod it’s no more a “must have” device but if you had one and forgot it somewere in your basement , playing with linux on it will sure make you love it again. See http://ipodlinux.sourceforge.net/ .

Linux on GameBoy

Who dindn’t had one, or didn’t wanted a GameBoy as a kid? Well I’ll give you a tip: if you want to impress your friend with your “new Tablet” try a linux for it. See http://www.kernelthread.com/publications/gbaunix/ .

Linux on Nintendo DS

That’s really a crazy one. I mean why? “Because it’s possible” – sombody answered. Ahem, so if you don’t like the original games you might wanna try linux. See: http://www.dslinux.org/ .

Linux on i”Shit” (iPad, iPhone etc.) and “xxx”droid devices

Those “linux” guys seems to take care of everything. They just can’t stop porting linux. See: http://www.idroidproject.org/ .

Well, linux seems to run everywhere, but let’s see the most crazyest device running linux:

Linux in your car : yes, as it was ported on Navysurfer I and II. Now you can enjoy linux while driving or having sex in your car . See the product here: http://shop.vic-ltd.com/product_info.php?products_id=12025 .

What’s your favourite device running linux?

As I’ve explained some terminology you have to get used to before using a linux OS, in the first part, it’s time now to get a quick look at the list of commons linux – related tools, utilities and UI features. Even in a real-world situation you might not deal with them, I thought is good to mention them since those tools helped linux become famous.

The X Window System

As it’s name says it’s a window system helping developers to build user interfaces – windows. The main task it does is to provide a set of standards and protocols to interact with the physical devices, leaving the drawing tasks (look-and feel) in the developers hands. The first version of the system was written by MIT, back in 1984. The latest version is X11 and is here since 1987. Some of the most used graphical interfaces for linux, GNOME and KDE are based on X. Find more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X_Window_System .

RPM (Resource Package Manager)

Maybe the best package manager, rpm has been originaly developed for Red Had Linux. It is used to manage (install/uninstall/search/update) software packages on linux distributons. It also provides an API to let software developers to write UI interfaces in various languages and environements.  Find more: official site is http://www.rpm.org/ and the wikipedia  page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RPM_Package_Manager .
A similar software is dpkg developed by the Debian Linux team, and it’s replacement,  apt (Advanced Packaging Tool) .

GNOME

If you ever saw a linux OS, I’m sure you heard it. Gnome is a desktop environement and ui interface for linux. It’s job is to provide an graphical desktop environement  users.  I know those words are hard to remember, but just to show you the differece:

Linux whithout a desktop environement:

 Linux with desktop environement and graphical UI:

Now which one do you think looks more cute?  The one with Gnome on it course. And Gnome itn’t the only one, there’s also KDE, LXDE, XFCE, EDE, or Mezzo.

Window Manager

A window manager is an component or an extension of the desktop environement. It provides the users with the ability to customize the look and feel of the windows. In this list i’ll mention: Compiz, Metacity, Enlightenment, Fluxbox, IceWM,  Blackbox, Xmonad, Window Maker, Sawfish, Pekwm, StumpWM .

Compiz Fusion

As I staded before, Compiz is a window manager. The “Fusion” comes from Beryl, another window manager, now merged with the Compiz project. This is a very popular one, because it enables 3d, wobble, bubbles, fire and a lot of other effects for desktop. Just watch it in action:

GIMP

Gnu Image Manipulation Program is a free, open source image manipulation software, very popular among linux users. It supports layers, effects, alpha channel,  text layers, animations, quick mask, paths, transofmable paths and selections MING support,  and much more using plugins. Find out more on the official page www.gimp.org .  Similar software packages are: Inkscape, Krita, Kolourpaint .

XMMS

It’s name comes from X Multimedia System, and it’s an audio player for linux systems. Nowadays it’s not very popular, beacause there are better alternatives, but it was heavily used before. Find more on the official website www.xmms.org . And the plethora of alternatives are: Audacious,  Amarok, RhythmBox, Exaile, Banshee , Noatun and many more.

MPlayer

One of the oldest and the best video players for linux, MPlayer has been around since 2000. It also has been ported for Windows and Mac OS. It features a good post-processing, and lots of formats supported by default. There are a lot of GUIs for it so, I’m not gonna list them here, only a few alternatives like: VLC, Banshee, Kaffeine, Miro, Xine .

OpenOffice

Not so much linux-related, but still widely used by linux users, OpenOffice is a free office suite, and one of the best competitors for MS Office. Free office suites for linux, are also: KOffice and Scribus .

Some popular games on linux

Course there are some great ones like: Americas Army,  Cube 2 (Sauerbraten), Pingus, Neverball,  Enemy Territory, Nexuiz . And some of these games are also available on Windows or MacOS, so you can start a LAN Party anytime – no matter what OS your foriends choose.

Also “awareded” 

Other noticeable software for linux are: Konqueror – a file manager for KDE, K3B – CD/DVD burning, Cinelerra – non-linear video editing and compositing,  Wine – Windows emulation on Linux, ALSA – sound driver architecture, PulseAudio – sound server, CloneZilla – drive imaging, Audacity – audio editor, Grip – CD ripper, Cenon – vector drawing,  Ktoon – 2D animation, Ark – archiving (zip, rar etc.), Blender – 2D, 3D animation, AvideMUX – video editor, GParted – partition manager and so many more.

So now let’s stop and make a consclusion:

As you probably noticed most Linux operating systems  are just as smart as any other commercial OS. You can do just about anything with it using only free software: watch videos, listen to music, edit documents, play games, draw, reder 3d scenes, make videos etc.

And unlike other commercial operating systems which offer an all-in-one OS with proprietary UI, file manager, web browser etc. from a single vendor; A linux OS offers different copmonents, mostly free, from different vendors. That means that you can make your OS look and feel as you need!