i should be working (but i'm fixing my computer).

I've been installing Haiku and Jolicloud to see what's shaking.  Haiku is a new alpha stage operating system and Jolicloud is a cloud-centric version of linux utilizing Ubuntu at its base.

...

One of my computers is running Jolicloud and I recently [started] to install it on my father-in-law's computer.  Between his slow broadband and what appears to be some slowdowns at the Jolicloud server, the process became excrutiatingly slow.  (And now incomplete).  Next visit I hope to complete the task, as I am tired of fixing Windows.  He only uses Firefox and Thunderbird, so the transition should be simple.

The good news (or beta-good-news, as it's not released yet) is that Jolicloud is moving forward from a Ubuntu Gutsy based version to -- well, it's not clear.  The blog equivocates, but in any event, a version of Ubuntu with three-year support life-cycle.  So, that is good news and the release is in "November" so, I'm-a-waiting ...

Haiku is not ready for prime time.  I actually would like to [possibly] do some programming on this OS, since I like the concept philosophically.  And, to the extent my "installs" run, they run pretty well.

Unfortunately, that is a very hampered extent.  I have a VM version -- but as far as I can figure out, there is no way to get data/files in and out of the VM or any way to add storage space.  I'm running it in VirtualBox, and so what you get is precisely the machine that is in the VM snapshot.

It's not "impossible" to get data in and out, of course, you can upload/download via web browser.  However, I haven't been able to solve the other problem, which is to add storage capability outside the VM.  VirtualBox has "extensions" for linux and windows that allow some interchange with the host, but I haven't found any extensions or similar tools for Haiku.

So, I've been trying to install Haiku on an otherwise unused computer -- but, the install crashes and dies trying to install some gcc tools, informing me there is "bad" data.  I have burned two CDs for this purpose, and neither one works, so I am assuming the problem is in the download and not in my CDs.

I can't boot this computer from my USB flash drive, so I can't use that version.  Well -- wait (I'm trying install-effort #992 as I type this) -- the installer does allow selecting which Haiku source to use as the installation media.  So I booted from the CD, mounted the flash drive and used that as the source instead of the CD.

Oops, I was getting too hopeful.  it did not crash where my CD install crashed, it made it all the way to 13247 of 19275 before giving me the bad data error crash.

All out of ideas.

And now for even more fun, the CD drive in the computer is causing thermal shutdown.

Later:  Well, I downloaded and burned the nightly build iso for 11/10/10.  Hey!  I now have (sort of anyway) a Haiku install.

Only thing is, it won't do anything -- the only thing I can think of to do as a threshold task is "browse the internet."  But, the web browser either didn't install correctly or isn't included in the nightly build.  I tried to run it from the alpha2 CD and that didn't work either.  Seems there are some "common libraries" missing.

Wait a minute!  Didn't I read that part of the philosophy of Haiku was that you could put an application in any directory and it would be complete, self-contained and would run with out reference to application libraries?

Hmmm.

Also, I don't think my ethernet card is working correctly, though I'm not entirely certain -- not having an app to test it out with.  The icon shows "broken" wires, so I suppose no link.  I'm picking up the correct gateway and default DNS, but I'm getting a non-network IP as from the DHCP.  So, I tried a static IP that should be actually in my network and that didn't seem to change anything.

I tried the mail program, which (in this nightly build) allows creating an account, but then has no account reading interface, only a "write a new message" interface.

Well, at least with an actual running install, I can begin to investigate.  Or something.

I found that I could put Haiku on the drive along side the existing windows and linux installs because that would have requred an extended rather than multiple primary partitions.  I don't begin to understand this problem, but I therefore wiped out the /home directory from my Linux install and used that partition.  I didn't want to remove my Linux install for the simple reason that (I think) Haiku needed to install its boot options into an existing Grub install.

I don't know this is true.  In any event, my computer is now totally weird for start up options.  First I get choice of Windows or Linux (which may be a Windows boot menu, I can't recall what I did) -- and then I get my OpSu Grub boot window, to which I had added a haiku startup, but it isn't the one that will run Haiku on my computer.   But, when I selected it it crashes to another grub menu, which has two haiku entries, one of which will actually start haiku on this computer.

It's a shame I have no idea what I am doing, but in any event I now have some sort of installed Haiku and settings will "stick", which was a threshold issue for me.

Oh, I can also report that my KVM switch is working AND the external monitor works.  This is a big improvement, since desk space being limited, I have been engaged in gymnastics just to try to run the computer ...

Later, Later:

Well, the command line InstallOptionalProgram installer works fairly intuitively.  So, I was able to install WebPositive (the web browser) and also BezillaBrowser, which is a variant of Firefox 2.0.  Oddly, neither of them would properly log in here to my blog, so I couldn't edit via Haiku, but at least we've got ignition ...

(I think rather than add lots of comments here, I will make further posts about my Haiku efforts in my regular wiki ...)