So I'm at Linux Expo Australia, enjoying the conference. You can hit the link below to read assorted random relevant (and irrelevant) notes from the show floor. No, I haven't seen a kangaroo.

lf11 writes, "I have a problem, for which I have been unable to find any applicable documentation. I am trying to bind a combination of keys to produce one character in X-Windows. In this case, I'm trying to bind Alt + Shift + j/k/l/i to function as arrow keys. I don't know if it's an Enlightenment function ("__ACTION __KEY Left" segfaulted) or an X function."

The responses were amazing to last week's LonelyNet Column about a Stanford University report which found that Internet use promotes isolation and loneliness. You speak for yourselves a lot better than anybody speaks for you. "What's going on?" asked many about the study. They also asked that the conversation continue, so it will. Read more:

Well, last Thursday evening we announced the Beanie award winners at the Slashdot/Andover/VA shindig at The China Club. For those of you not able to attend, I've written a synopsis below, otherwise you can watch the whole deal at TheSync. You can grab the awards in both streaming and downloadable format. And, if you'd like to see some pictures from the show, check out Brian Hawkins' online-pix as well as Kurt Gray's pix from the Andover booth.

The first generation Internet promoted certain concepts of freedom that didn't exist elsewhere. This wasn't by accident. Internet protocols were designed to be open and accessible. As the Net enters its second generation, growing numbers worry whether it can stay as free. Net architecture becomes critical. Programmers are no longer technicians working on the margins, but are the principal designers of the world's most ascendant culture, the ones who will determine its future. So here's a series on that topic alternating between columns, your e-mail and your posts on Threads -- as long, short and useful a discussion as you want it to be.

Brian Martin has written a piece on Communal Instinct. It talks a little about the concepts of Open Source, working together, innovation, and communication. There's a lot in there and I think it's worth a read.

Khelder sent us a nifty little bit about the MacOS X Desktop. It talks quite a bit about UI Design (mirror) from a Mac-Centric but also a general perspective. It's quite interesting stuff for anyone into MacOS-X, but also it has lots of practical stuff for anyone who's ever tried to create a usable theme for one of today's modern window managers.

The Internet has provided individuals with more freedom than they have ever had to express themselves. This is great. But not surprisingly, many people are abusing, thus endangering, their new power. The idea of taking responsibility for one's words has not taken hold. (More below.)

The GUI has revolutionized the desktop. It made computers accessible to the masses, and even today it keeps getting cooler. Our nominees areeach carving out new territory in the realm of the graphical user interface. You can Vote for the best interface between The GIMP, Mozilla, XMMS and Enlightenment.

Face it, if our desktops were ugly, our retinas would melt and then what would we have? Buckets and buckets of melted retinas. That would be disgusting. So this award is for the the part of your desktop that just makes it look pretty. vote at will... the nominees are Enlightenment, Propaganda, XScreeSaver, GNOME and KDE.

Who gets to define the future as technology becomes one of the most important social concerns in the world? In Tomorrowland, H.G. Wells, the father of science fiction, squares off against the Imagineers. (more)

Every year I pick a new years resolution and ever year it doesn't come true. This year I've opted to set my sights low so I can greatly increase the chance of suceeding for once. This year my resolution is to continue converting oxygen into carbon dioxide. Read on to learn what resolutions RMS, ESR, Jon Katz, CowboyNeal, Mandrake and others have for the year 2000.

MartyJG asks: "I've been watching my Freshmeat slashbox for a while now, and I've seen many wierd and wonderful project names pop-up on there. There's obviously the cool names like Gimp, Gnome, Enlightenment, CodeWarrior, etc which everyone knows, but recently I've seen names like Orgasm, SleezeBall, Oregano, and SANE. My question is this: Who the hell can take open source software seriously with names like these? Can you imagine a developer saying to his supervisor "I'm not using Microsoft Visual Whatever anymore, I only use Orgasm now"? I can't. There's a flip side: names like Parsecfg, NAMG, Mmucl and Wmmp3 which are probably all great projects, but don't exactly trip off the tongue. Should we care more about what we call our projects? I'm not suggesting making Linux uber-commercial and all suit-like overnight - just give it some respect." Interesting thought, should we take more care in what we name our Open Sourced projects? Or should we stick with picking names that we think represent our projects properly?

Tom Christiansen , perl god, writer, and the guy that once kicked me out of #Perl for asking a question about sockets has written us another excellent feature. This one talks about modern keyboards, and the problem with them. It's an entertaining piece with gratuitous Who references so it's all good by me.

Mandrake writes "Enlightenment 0.16.0 came out this afternoon. Come play with what we've been toiling over for the past few months. Lots of new features from 0.15 - come check it out. Maybe now we can go and get some sleep. If you are at Atlanta Linux Showcase this week, we've even got shirts to hand out."

mikeraz told us about Microsoft's new page on Linux Myths. Designed to convince the seasoned business professional that Linux doesn't measure up to the hype. Some good points. Some not-so-good points. Care to comment? Update: 10/05 06:43 by CT : Mandrake has comments on his page.

teraflop user writes "The Enlightenment window manager now works with KDE, along with a load of other window managers. If you want to run the same window manager under Gnome and KDE, you now have several choices, including E, Blackbox and WindowMaker. "

Monday a whole bunch of people had questions for Mandrake, one of the heavies behind Enlightenment. Slashdot Moderators picked the best ones. We forwarded them, unedited, to Mandrake on Tuesday. His (excellent) answers appear below.

Mandrake, AKA Geoff Harrison, is a heavy contributor to the enlightenment project and has also left his mark on Gnome, XFree86, and a bunch of other excellent free software projects. In real life, he works for VA Research as (surprise!) a software developer. Mandrake is, without question, one of the leading lights of the Linux and free software development communities. Check his Web site, and post any question(s) you have for him below. Answers to most or all of the highest-moderated ones will be posted Friday.

hasse wrote in to tell us that Mandrake, co-developer of Enlightenment is meeting with Amiga. Amiga Central quotes him saying "So sometime next week I'm going to meet with the VP of Engineering at Amiga. That should be interesting. I wonder if I can get them interested enough in enlightenment that they would be willing to donate programmers to the project. "