Well; I Googl’d it and found this wiki. I thought I’d attempt to give it some traction since others must have the same question.

http://code.google.com/p/chromium/wiki/ChromiumBrowserVsGoogleChrome

How to Enable Flash Support

Once I got Google Chrome installed, of course, the Flash plugin wasn’t associated with the web browser. So; here’s a quick tutorial. First off, the Chrome install is now in the “/opt” directory.  If it’s not there create a “plugins” directory:

$ sudo mkdir /opt/google/chrome/plugins

Now you’ll need to make a symbolic link to the “libflashplayer.so” file. This can be accomplished with the following command.

$ cd /opt/google/chrome/plugins
$ sudo ln -s /usr/lib/flash-plugin/libflashplayer.so

The system will create an alias file named “libflashplayer.so” within that plugins directory. If you’re running an x86_64 system then you’ll need to make a symbolic link to the “nswrapper” file instead of the direct “libflashplayer.so” file. Do a search and find the location that fits your system.

$ locate libflashplayer

Here’s a link to an Ubuntu-related post on Flash support for Google Chrome. http://maketecheasier.com/enable-flash-support-in-google-chrome-in-ubuntu/2009/08/19

Even if Chromium is a total bust, or doesn’t “revolutionize” your computer as they are claiming… this will certainly be a giant spotlight on FOSS. Hasn’t that been our goal from the very beginning. Share the wealth of Free and Open Source Software!? Vive logiciel libre et opensource!

For those that may have remembered my prior post, “New Linux Threads!“, we finally launched the web site September 17th and  renamed the product line to “FOSS Threads.”  It’s been quite a ride to get the site going and quite the adventure getting the t-shirt designs from concept to production.  Again; I can’t thank Kay Ferguson Apparel enough for all the hard work.  I’m pretty proud of the startup designs we’ve put together, but I’d give up my first born really like to know what you all think of them.

Launch Weekend

We wanted to make sure the site was launched before the Atlanta Linux Fest, September 19th.  We made the deadline and now we trying to figure out a marketing strategy to help get the word out.  “We did build it, but how do we get them to come!?” We’ve got a couple ideas, but if there’s a marketing specialist that wants in on this, let us know and we’ll talk (@FergatROn [twitter] [identica], mferguson at digitalalias dot net).

The thing I love most about this site is it’s ability to function on any mobile device. I didn’t use any JavaScript or fancy-dancy DHTML tricks. Well maybe one trick, but it was done using JQuery. With it being XHTML strict and applying the proper CSS it’s working like a dream. The tough part was getting the right CSS combination in order to make it function on multiple platforms.

Developing the Site

Besides the fact that we’ve created a solution to my initial need of having a designer FOSS shirt. I was able to finally create a web site from the ground up using FOSS. How incredible is that!? I’ve been a Dreamweaver/Photoshop developer for many years even when I started using Fedora (distro of champions!) I originally tried to get those programs working through Wine. I didn’t have much fun with them so I decided that I should use native programs.

What I’ve come up with through my research is Bluefish for coding, Gimp for graphics work and Inkscape for vectors (I haven’t worked with vectors though). Interesting enough, I heard of a plug-in for Gimp to make the interface look like Photoshop, and at first I wasn’t for it.  After using it for this project I’m almost considering it. I’m a keyboard shortcut kind-of-guy (watch out gals) and the shortcuts in Gimp make absolutely NO sense to me.  How am I to remember that the erase tool is SHIFT+E instead of a simple “E” key!? At least that one has an “E”. There are other tools that don’t match their name. Very confusing.

The Aftermath

Before completing this project I was a big-time “I’ll code it in gedit if I have to”. Now that I’ve used Bluefish (a full-text editor) for this project I am really considering a WYSIWYG editor. It’s very time consuming doing the code by hand.  Especially when coding  XHTML Strict! I need shortcuts.  I miss Dreamweaver.

Now our main focus is to start marketing this web site and eventually move it into a Magento environment.  I hope you all enjoy the shirts as I have. We’re looking for some serious feedback.  Good and bad, we need it all.  I want to stress the community aspect to this project. True, I made these shirts out of my own need, but I know there are more folks out there that had the same problem. Now that I’ve created a platform, I want us all to benefit from it. Give us your feedback and design ideas (no images, just ideas) and we’ll start making more Free and Open Source Software apparel.

I wonder if the cut n’ dry world of Microsoft or the stylish enthusiasts of MacWorld could make me feel the way I feel right now. I’m having such a great time with Linux, learning all kinds of new commands and functions, etc.  True; it has its limitations, but the advancements that we have has been produced by majority of volunteers who have a love for open source.  I joined the ranks of the Fedora project and I’m slowly getting more acclimated to working with a community… I’m so used to doing things by myself and this group has allowed me to be apart of something greater.

Yes, one can say that religion or a local charity or organization can help me feel a sense of higher purpose – but those “avenues” don’t really appeal to my core.  Technology is a driving force for me and anything that involves a computer will grab my attention and stir up my passion.  When I first learned DOS, Windows 3.1 up to Windows 98, there were tons of things to learn and I learned them quite well.  After that I just became more proficient at them.  I’ve been running Linux as my main machine for over 9 months now.  I’m back in that “learning” mode, but there is no horizon line for the end of knowledge – open source is so broad, so vast, so liquid that I may never learn everything about FOSS (free and open source software).  That’s something to reach for.

Within the past day (really, several hours) I’ve learned about PGP/GPG encryption, SSH and command-line document editing using vi, and syndication. I’m a firm believer of supply and demand.  With Linux, and my distro of choice being Fedora there will always be a demand to perform some sort of function and FOSS will provide me the means of supplying it.  Yah, this post wasn’t very technical, but it’s a result of technology.  If you haven’t already joined, come and join us here at the Fedora Project.  I encourage to be part of your distro or any open source project.