People reading Planet SUSE (or indeed my site) over the last few days will have noticed it was responding really slowly. I don't know how long this had been the case with being on retreat but after about 24 hours of debugging and investigation, I've identified and resolved the issue.

I'm going on retreat today ahead of my ordination to the priesthood on Saturday which means I'll be offline until then (and may well have a number of emails to catch-up on when I get back).

I promised screenshots of the install in progress and here they are, fifty of them - some photos and some normal screenshots of the installation on Amanda's Samsung R60plus (64bit).

See the openSUSE 11.0 installation in progress.

When Amanda acquired the laptop, installing 10.3 on it was not without problems but 11.0 installed beautifully. The only two small issues remaining were the continuing issue of the 64-bit Java plugin not working properly in Firefox. The only solution was to switch Firefox and all plugins to the i586 version. I couldn't work out a way to do this in YaST though so I had to do it in smart. The other issue was the rubbishy onboard Atheros wifi adapter and as-yet equally rubbish ath5k module for it. This is solved by popping blacklist ath5k into /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist.

It's free, our new little beastie is out and about - openSUSE 11.0 has been released.

Get yourself some openSUSE 11.0 goodness:

1. Download openSUSE 11.0. I prefer the GNOME install, other people go for KDE. Since they're both live CDs, you can try them each out and see which you prefer if you're new to the Linux world.
2. Once it's installed, get yourself over to openSUSE-Community.org and use the 1-click collection to beef-up your install. Get those multimedia codecs you're going to need to watch DVDs and listen to MP3s, if you have an ATI or NVIDIA graphics card, get the 3D drivers for them.
3. Enjoy.
   Permanent Link

Around five hours to go until the official launch but...

ogley@riggwelter:/home/install/ISO/openSUSE/11.0> wget -c http://download.opensuse.org/distribution/11.0/iso/cd/openSUSE-11.0-GNOME-LiveCD-i386.iso

First up will be weasel my semi-sacrificial/semi-backup desktop machine.

Torrents are also available if you're a torrent kind of person.

This time it's the turn of Dario "Scarf Boy" Minieri to take the gold and the cash. He won the $2,500 No-Limit Hold'em Six-Handed event. The relatively easy final table that beckon Minieri as a huge chip leader didn't fully ensue but he won out in the end thanks to a bit of luck and his trademark aggression.

2008 really is proving to be the year of the pros - keep up with the latest WSOP updates.

It's the final countdown...

We're now under 24 hours until the release of openSUSE 11.0.

Get ready to start your download!

Specifically, get Firefox 3.0 from 18:00 BST today (that's 17:00 GMT).

Pledge your support to Mozilla's aim to set a new download record.

Read about the launch on BBC News.

In light of the imminent release of openSUSE 11.0 (in case you hadn't heard already) and with it, the corresponding Updates repository, I've changed the three main GNOME repositories (STABLE/UNSTABLE/Community) to use the Update repository as their target for each product. Since it's a good idea to keep one's system up to date with official patches and what-not, this makes sense for 99.99% of users.

Only just noticed the news of the latest Meeks to enter the world. Many congratulations to Michael, "J" and the rest of the clan. I pray that God will give you the strength to be a rich blessing to Elizabeth as she grows up.

The online repository for openSUSE 11.0 is now available so there are a few ways you can get hold of the goodness:

• Firstly, if you've been using the betas and then the release candidates, simply change your various repositories to point at the 11.0 final versions. Do the same for any Build Service repositories you have. Then do an online update.
• Secondly, if you've not been using the pre-release versions and are a bit hardcore, you can create a boot CD for an online install. Make sure you use the directory for your architecture and that you read the README.
• Alternatively, you can wait a couple of days for the official release and download the media then.

When the official release happens, I'll be installing from the GNOME CD on my 32bit and Amanda's 64bit laptops and will post details of my "perfect" openSUSE 11.0 install, with shots of the install in progress and details of the additional repositories I use to make my systems really kick ass.

A mere three days after Daniel Negreanu won the $2,000 Limit Hold'em, his fellow Team PokerStars Pro Barry Greenstein has won the $1,500 Razz event. This event was won by another member of Team PokerStars, Katja Thater, last year.

Elsewhere, Daniel Negreanu is the chip-leader in the $5,000 Pot-Limit Omaha with Rebuys event which is down to the final ten players. One more elimination and play will close for the night and the final table will be set. With John Juanda, Johnny Chan, Kiril Gerasimov and short-stack Phil Hellmuth among the others still playing, get ready to chalk another up for the pros, if not for a Team PokerStars member. Looks like Kid Poker is back with a vengeance.

Keep track of the latest WSOP updates.

[Ref]

Peaceful demonstration against this visit banned. Thankfully my MP, Chris Huhne, has spoken out against the ban in his capacity as the Liberal Democrat shadow home secretary. I'm very glad to read that the march is planned to go ahead anyway, peacefully and in defiance of this deplorable ban and I only wish I could be there myself.

• BBC News coverage
• Mentioned in the Independent
• Top story in the Guardian

Elsewhere, Mugabe threatens to go to war with the MDC. Nothing other than a clear MDC victory in the election run-off will be credible.

Gold is the colour of the day. Things that are gold this morning:

• openSUSE 11.0 is Gold!
  That's right, the culmination of many months work by the various teams, employees and volunteers that comprise the openSUSE project has resulted in the GoldMaster (GM). So, there really are only six days to go.
• Daniel Negreanu's fourth WSOP bracelet.
  Four years after winning his third World Series of Poker bracelet, the man known as "Kid Poker" has won his fourth in the same event as the third - the $2000 Limit Hold'em event. One of my predictions (which sadly, I never got around to blogging) at the start of this year's WSOP was that Daniel would break his recent bracelet drought. It's turning into a year for the pros so far at the Rio, which is good to see. Keep track of the latest chip counts and results here.

[Ref]

Over the last few months, I have been seen limping from time to time and I now have a fairly definitive answer as to why, thanks to a Podiatrist I saw today. I have what is known as a Tailor's bunion and am being referred to the local Bio-Mechanics team to try to figure out how to resolve it.

Question: How dumb do you have to be to mow the lawn when you have a significant pollen allergy and have run out of your tablets for it?

This dumb:

Apologies to Kevin and Jakub for getting their blogs mixed up on Planet SUSE.

Fixed now.

Planet SUSE now has 150 feeds!

At this rate, I may have to increase the number of stories shown...

Recorded yesterday at St Paul's. 22 minutes long. Available as Ogg Vorbis or MP3:

PDF of accompanying presentation.

Ben: Good list of openSUSE 11.0 repos. You major on the KDE ones, which is fair enough. openSUSE is a multi-desktop distribution and it has to be said that the GNOME Team have been rocking hard in the lead-up to 11.0 and we have some pretty nifty repos too.

Firstly, there's GNOME:STABLE which (unsurprisingly) contains the stable GNOME version. Secondly, people will want to check out my own baby, GNOME:Community. There are loads of packages in there, many of which are not part of the core openSUSE distribution. You can read the reasons packages go in GNOME:Community. Thirdly, coming soon, is the 11.0 version of GNOME:GNOME1 which is where outdated and deprecated GNOME 1.x (legacy) applications and libraries live.

• Filed bug #397407 which appears to be connected to GTK+ recent files stuff (according to Rodrigo although I had noticed the obscene number of gettimeofday calls). This involved Magnus introducing me to the wonders of attaching strace to existing processes.
• Brought the gimp package in G:C in line with the Factory packages so that they support branding and so can be used to upgrade the forthcoming 11.0.
• Locked the OpenOffice.org presentation for my sermon on Sunday morning, time to move on to other items on this week's TODO list.

From watching House: Histories...

There are very few funnier words than twerp.

Taking a break from preparing my sermon for Sunday to catch up with the latest news from the primaries. Montana and South Dakota Democrats hold their primaries today and, after the decision regarding the Michigan and Florida elections, it would take a freak result for Sen. Clinton to come out ahead in terms of delegates. She is likely to finish the primaries with a greater share of the popular vote though.

Anyway, all that having been said, it's time for the party to unite behind Sen. Obama (and who knows, maybe it could still be an Obama-Clinton ticket).

None of that is links though, so here they are:

• Justin Webb's blog. Justin is the BBC's North America Editor and he knows his stuff. It's far from dry though, he has a wit about him that political reporting really needs.
• Electoral-Vote.com. I've been using this site for every US election over the last few years. Run by Andrew Tannenbaum (legendary Computer Scientist and creator of MINIX). It tracks polls in the same way that Elmer Fudd wishes he hunted wabbits - successfully. The latest polls crunched here finally show Obama polling ahead of the margin over McCain. Tragically, it also carries the information that 20% of voters in Kentucky said they wouldn't vote for a black person. In 2008!

In the word of Votemaster Tannenbaum, "This is the beginning of the end of the primary season. It's been a wild ride." Next stop, the general election campaign. It's going to be fun...

Conversation this morning after Callum's breakfast:

Amanda: He kissed your photo.
Me:What am I? The Pope?

What a scary thought...