Software Woes

Rants, tips and tricks



Saturday, May 06, 2006



Which apps. are you running?



Many times I get into argument why is Slackware distribution on my choice. I like it because it's simple, robust and not bloated. But, I'm quite specific as I don't try every app-of-the-day and only run what I really need. I can install and setup Slackware from scratch in few hours and start using it at full speed. How come? Well, take a look at the apps I'm running and you'll see that I'm not that much of demanding user.



Thursday, May 04, 2006



BSCommander - yet another OFM



You might wonder what is OFM. Well, it's Orthodox File Manager:

http://www.softpanorama.org/OFM/index.shtml
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orthodox_file_manager

Well, I just tested BSCommander 2.20 today. Install was almost too easy, as Slackware package is available from slacky.it. It has many useful options I couldn't find in other similar programs and idea with tabs is excellent and done properly. It uses Qt library and works really fast (which can't be said for Krusader and Konqueror and many others). Keyboard shortcuts are setup very good (although not configurable).

Famous Backspace key works, which is great. The file list flashes a little when navigating directories, but I can live with that. File copying and similar ops work quite good and overall visual look is pleasing. It really has potential to become the best tool in this category, but some stuff needs to be fixed first, and some features need to be added:

One thing I can't find is how to make the opposite panel display the same directory as the current one (can be done with Meta+o in mc). Many times I just need to move/copy some file few directories up or down the hierarchy, so this one is crucial for me.

Another useful option that is lacking is ability to open terminal in current directory (or at least execute command there). Most other programs of this kind have that feature. It would also be useful with FTP to be able to send some command to the server (for example, when I connect to ftp on Windows server, I need to type "cd d:" to access second partition).

One of the things that could be fixed is that it doesn't remember the position (selected directory) during FTP session. It works properly on local disk though.

Also, it is not possible to copy directories via FTP, which doesn't really make FTP support useful.

To conclude, very cute program with lot of potential. However, I'm still looking for decent GUI ftp client for linux...