I found this particularly funny. It was passed on from a friend via #tuxhacker on freenode.

Have you ever had an idea for ubuntu?

If the answer is yes then check out Ubuntu Brainstorm.
....If not then go look at the ideas for inspiration and vote up the current ideas that you like.

The last few nights have been spent playing on LaunchPad, mainly translating though also looking over a few 'Answers' and Bugs.

You gotta shake your Windows habits!

Nah but in all seriousness - I hope everybody across England are ok after the earthquake.
From around 1am people experienced a tremor that was a quake which measured 4.7 on the Richter Scale. I can't find much information online bar this Yahoo Answers post. I found out from Freenode and also BBC Radio 5.

I applaud the KDE team.

KDE 4.0

Well I finally done it.
I actually motivated myself and went back to one or my favorite sports. Judo

Tonight I got off my lazy backside and rejoined my local Judo club. I used to be extremely fond of Judo and I had been attending classes from the age of 6 till I got pneumonia then never really returned (around age 14). I had continually said that I would return but I never did, and I really do regret leaving in the first place as I was really quite good.

I came across all my medals and such like just before Christmas and maybe this helped prompt me to re-go.

Oh.. also to help loose the extra xmas pud's that I ate.. :D

I forgot....

.... to turn my phones blue tooth off....

.... how immature people are....

Yes, one hour lecture. Few pr0n pics and movies along with a few .txt files saying 'I'm behind you'.

fun!

...how cold it is today!

 (More)

Are you bi-lingual? Are you multi-lingual? Do you study another language?

If you answer yes to any of them then you can (and should) be helping out with an open source project.

People forget that open source projects consist of a multitude of different people, all performing different tasks. It is not all programmers.

Not only that but you can work on any operating system and help translate applications for any other OS. Here I have created a guide on how to get started on a Windows environment. There is an Ubuntu guide that I wrote too located at the bottom.

So.. Choose a project, contact them and check if there is a current effort in your language. If not.. start one! Request a .po file, these are string catalogue files, and follow this small guide to get started!

First visit the download page and grab the Windows installer (poedit-1.3.7-setup.exe at time of writing).
Save to a location you will remember (i.e. Desktop) and run the installer.

Now open poEdit by going to Start -> Programs (All Programs) -> poEdit -> poEdit.exe

After the install select your native language, and then fill in your details.

Open up your .po file with File -> Open then find the file and hit open.
A list of strings is open at the top window then your translation boxes are located towards the bottom.
You will see the original string in the top box and your new translation in the box underneath.

Once you have translated the string, it is auto saved and you can move onto the next one. A little star appears next to completed strings.
If you are not sure on a string, you can mark it as 'fuzzy' and then other translaters can review it. To do this hit ctrl + u or edit -> Translation is Fuzzy .

Work your way through all (or most) of the strings.
Once you have completed the translation remember to save it.

... have fun!

poEdit on Ubuntu

So today I am university on a larrrrge break, just messing about on the interwebz.

First I found out why my server has been down. Turns out there have been problems with the mobo and it has blown up my account! Ok so not really but hey...I get a month's free credit out of it!
This means my personal sites and TuxHacker will be down for a few days.
It also means I won't be about on IRC as much as I am using my home connection and only on a few of my more favored channels ;)

Ok as said, I was quite bored today and I am currently sitting in a lab at university. I found a new site that I quite like, GnomeFiles, and from there I came across a cool future-gnome project called Banter. I was taking a look on their SVN repo and notice they are low on translations. I helped out by creating a German translation and I am currently working on a Scots translation too. I may even attempt a Gaelic translation.
This project seems to be in quite early stages and seem to have a good structure so if anybody can help out, I think the team would be quite pleased. Even if you can't program grab PoEdit and translate the few strings they have currently, it will only take a few minutes... honest!

So.. Ubuntu 7.10 has been officially released. I sadly have not upgraded to it just yet, though I have just downloaded the final release (both PPC Port and x86 version). I finish university at two and plan to play with them both when I get home an hour later. Lets hope all goes well!

I have noticed a massive increase in questions on #ubuntu on the Freenode network.

Remember:
If you have trouble speaking English you can always head over to your loco team channel, as most users in there are happy to help. Try #ubuntu-CC (where CC is your country code, eg #ubuntu-it, #ubuntu-es for Italian and Spanish respectively)
Also remember you can't private message other users unless you are registered with nickserv (or they have unfiltered set to on).
Take a look at the FAQ to see how to register on Freenode.

My iBook's battery is finally running out of steam; it no longer lasts as long as it used to. This is extremely upsetting as I loved how it would go on and on and on and on.
Think I am going to have to buy a new battery soon. :(
I was hoping to buy some more memory for it (512mb looks cheap and cheerful), alas this cash will have to go towards a battery.

So anybody know of any decent reputable battery sellers online? (UK delivery)

Today I have been playing with Planet.
No not Mars, Jupiter or Venus .....or even Uranus! ;)
But of course the blog aggregator.

I have been meaning to create some sort of planet for TuxHacker for along time and I have started and stopped, never really created much. Most of the time I would get pre-occupied with the site, or another planet that I manage (planet.libervis.net or the likes). So anyway I sat in uni today and made a css it in my break.
I can't upload it just yet as I can't do outbound scp from wireless (stupid rules). Here is a little example screenshot I took;

Ok so my first day was yesterday, I went in and got everything sorted out, then attended my first few classes.

Im not going to bore you with what happened in each class, this isn't "AndrewB's first day at School diary", though I made an interesting observation in the lecture hall.
While sitting in one of the front most rows I thought, "I wonder how large this room is". So looking behind to the back of the theatre, I noticed that most people had their laptops out. Now this obviously is not strange, but what was odd is that they were all Apple laptops [Bar one HP].

I just found this a bit strange as I had not noticed how mac may be making a comeback with their new Intel Based laptops.

This was proven slightly when I spoke to one of the other students later in a tutorial. He switched because he liked Mac OS and now he had the option to boot into Windows, should he so have to.

I just found this funny as I assumed everybody would be using Microsoft Windows and not an alternative OS.

After the conversation he ended with, "So what about you? Are you a Windows or a Mac guy?"

I answered, "Linux..............on a mac!"

Lost for words.

Ok so I haven't been blogging about my life recently. Mainly cause I have not exactly been up to much at all.
I plan to get stuck right back in..

Firstly I have been cooking up a new quizBot for TuxHacker, which resides in one of the child channels. It is not yet complete so I haven't invited anybody really to the channel thus still relatively a secret.
I also have things I still want to do to it, just don't really have the time or the energy to learn more new stuff right now.

I also found a fairly large Ubuntu Wiki that needs a clean up. I have got a copy on my laptop of the page and I plan to work on that this evening. It is massive and it is extremely confusing in it's current state.

I recently donated to Get GNU/Linux. When you make a donation of over 20 euros you can receive a t-shirt to recognize your donation. Please consider donating to their fund raiser, or at least take a look.
I received my t-shirt and was wearing it with pride to the cinema on Sunday night.
Extra geeky!

Tomorrow is my first day at University. (Glasgow Caledonian Uni)

Wish me luck!