Horizontal Applications


You will be able to find a wide variety of UNIX software for most important horizontal applications. For example, many types of office solutions are available on UNIX platforms today, such as spreadsheet packages to perform tracking and results measurements, text processing packages for document preparation, office automation packages to improve information sharing among work groups, and accounting packages for financial management. UNIX programs for viewing and manipulating images and for playing audio files and movies are also easily available. Many games are available as UNIX software for your playing enjoyment. We will provide more details about these and a few other important horizontal application areas, such as mathematics and science/engineering.

Office Automation Packages

Integrated office automation packages combine into a single package several of the most common applications used for carrying out office functions. The components of an integrated office automation package may include a word processor, a spreadsheet, a database manager, a graphics program, and a communications program. Often, integrated packages offer a graphical user interface that permits the use of several applications simultaneously and the use of a mouse to make selections from menus or icons. Office automation packages can also support collaboration so that different people whose computers are linked over a network can work on the same tasks. We will describe a few UNIX office automation packages here.

StarOffice

StarOffice from Sun Microsystems is an office productivity suite that runs on Linux and Solaris platforms, as well as on Macintosh and Windows machines. It includes an integrated set of applications that provide word processing (Writer), spreadsheet (Calc), graphic design (Draw), presentations (Impress), and database access (Base); it also includes an HTML editor, a mail/newsreader, an event planner, and a formula editor. StarOffice features an intuitive user interface, and document filters provide seamless and easy interoperability with Microsoft Office products. StarOffice-currently version 8-can be downloaded from the web and is commercially available for a license fee. It is free to research and educational institutions. For more information about StarOffice, see http://www.sun.com/software/s tar/s taroffice/index.jsp.

OpenOffice

The OpenOffice suite is an open-source version of the StarOffice suite that runs on UNIX, Linux, Solaris, Mac OS, and Windows platforms. OpenOffice.org is the open-source project under which Sun Microsystems has released the technology for its StarOffice Productivity Suite. All of the source code for OpenOffice is available under the GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL). OpenOffice contains the same functionality as StarOffice. As such, it is an extremely useful platform whose functionality equals that of the Microsoft Office suite, with the added benefit of being free.

For a detailed description of the features and modules of OpenOffice, see Chapters 6 and 7. For information about obtaining OpenOffice, see the web page at http://www.openoffice.org/. Figure 26–1 shows an example of the Writer module of OpenOffice.

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Figure 26–1: Example of Writer module under OpenOffice

KOffice

The KDE Project now offers a free desktop suite of applications-similar to OpenOffice-called KOffice. It includes

  • A frame-based, full-featured word processor called KWord

  • A spreadsheet application called KSpread

  • A presentation application called KPresenter

  • A flowchart and diagramming application called Kivio

  • An integrated database application called Kexi

  • A pixel-based image editing and paint application called Krita

  • A vector-drawing application called Karbon14

  • A new project management application called KPlato

In addition to these applications, KOffice includes a report generator called Kugar, a full-featured charting engine called KChart, a mathematical formula handler called KFormula, and a built-in thesaurus called KThesaurus. All of these application modules are available under the KOffice Workspace.

For more information on the KOffice suite, including how to obtain it, you should visit the web site, http://www.koffice.org/. Figure 26–2 shows an example of the KOffice Workspace and its modules.

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Figure 26–2: Example of KOffice Workspace and its application modules

Applixware

Vista Source, Inc. (once part of Applix, Inc.), offers a suite of applications for integrated office functions and environment customization through their Applixware product. Applixware allows information sharing and presentation in a networked environment through its utilities called Words, Graphics, HTML, Spreadsheets, Data, Mail/Open Mail, and Real Time. A scripting language called ELF (Extension Language Facility) is also included. Applixware also provides groupware capabilities via electronic mail. Applixware runs on HP-UX, AIX, IRIX, Digital UNIX, and a variety of other platforms. For more information about Applixware, consult http://www.vistasource.com/.

Uniplex Business Software and the onGO Document Management System

Uniplex Integration Systems offers its Uniplex Business Software and onGO to provide integrated office automation and office collaboration capabilities. Uniplex Business Software is an integrated office automation package for UNIX systems that runs on AIX, HP-UX, Unix-Ware, and other platforms. This includes three separate programs: Uniplex II Plus, Uniplex Advanced Office System, and Uniplex Advanced Graphics System. Uniplex II Plus includes a spreadsheet, a word processor, a database management system, a business graphics system, and file management. These programs are integrated with the Uniplex Advanced Office System. Data files from Lotus 1–2–3 can be imported into the Uniplex II Plus spreadsheet. Uniplex Advanced Office System includes facilities for electronic mail, a report writer, a form builder, and other desktop automation features, including a calendar, a project manager, a calculator, a phone book, and a card index. The Uniplex Advanced Graphics System includes programs for creating presentation graphics and for freehand drawing of graphics. The graphics produced can be embedded in a word processing document.

Uniplex also offers Uniplex Windows, based on the X Window System, as a graphical user interface to Uniplex applications. You can use icons to make your selections. You can use several applications simultaneously and switch between windows, using your mouse.

Uniplex Software’s onGO Office and Document Management System provide web-enabled enterprise-wide facilities to support collaborative work, including directory and resource management, document management, messaging, and scheduling. This software runs on AIX, HP-UX, Linux, Solaris, and other platforms.

For more information about Uniplex, consult http://www.uniplex.com/.

Word Processing and Desktop Publishing Programs

You can obtain word processors for UNIX environments just as you can for Microsoft Windows or Macintosh environments, and you can also obtain desktop publishing systems. Also note that the integrated office automation programs described previously include word processors.

Scribus

Scribus is a cross-platform, open-source page layout program that produces commercial grade desktop publishing output in PDF and PostScript formats. Scribus was originally developed on the Linux, but has been ported to Mac OS X. It is designed to be useful for both novice users and professional publishers, offering a rich set of features. You can find out more about this platform at http://www.scribus.net/. Figure 26–3 shows an example of the Scribus desktop.

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Figure 26–3: Example of the Scribus desktop

FrameMaker

FrameMaker is a desktop authoring and publishing system available for Solaris from Adobe. It provides all the features of a standard word processor, a spelling checker, and a punctuation checker. A rich set of page layout capabilities are supported by FrameMaker, which also has graphics capabilities for creating drawings. Graphics filters are included to integrate graphic images generated by CAD programs or Macintosh MacDraw. FrameMaker has a WYSIWYG math processor that is used to enter, format, simplify and solve mathematical equations. FrameMaker provides tools for building large documents such as books. Consult http://www.adobe.com/products/framemaker/ for more information about FrameMaker, including how to purchase it for your Solaris environment. Figure 26–4 shows an example of FrameMaker on a Solaris machine.

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Figure 26–4: Example of FrameMaker on a Solaris machine

Text Editors

A number of free text editors are available for UNIX variants. The oldest-and perhaps best known-is the ed editor. In addition, there is the popular vi editor, and newer editors such as vim and pico, which we discuss in Chapter 5, including where to get them. Finally, there is emacs, also discussed in Chapter 5.

Few, if any text editors are as comprehensive and configurable as GNU Emacs, a text editor used by hundreds of thousands (if not millions!) of people worldwide. You can obtain GNU Emacs for free by going to the GNU web page at http://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/.

GNU Emacs has an X Window System interface with pull-down and pop-up menus, scrollbars, and point-and-click capabilities. GNU Emacs is written around a variant of the LISP programming language and allows you to define entire routines that can be bound to different keystrokes or executed by name.

A spin-off is of this is XEmacs, which provides a more comprehensive X Window System interface with color icons and syntax highlighting of programming language text selectable from a pull-down menu. XEmacs is available for Linux, Solaris, AIX, FreeBSD, NetBSD, and HP/UX. You can obtain it by going to http://www.xemacs.org/.

Text Formatters

Text formatters are programs that allow you to describe, in plain ASCII text, information such as fonts, text alignment, and margins that you would include in a document. Many books have been typeset using text formatters because of the flexibility they allow. Text formatters differ from word processors in that word processors allow you to see what your document will look like as you create your document. With text formatters, you must compile your ASCII text description into a document. The original text formatters for UNIX were nroff (for typewriter-like output devices) and troff (for laser class printers). Older chapter content from this book discussing troff can be found on the Companion Web Site.

A number of newer text formatters are available for UNIX machines; two that are very popular and can be freely obtained are TeX and the groff family of text formatters.

TeX

TeX is an extremely powerful and widely used text formatter-for technical and scientific documents-with a number of powerful add-on packages. TeX (pronounced tech-since the letters stand for the Greek characters Tau, Epsilon, Chi) provides a rich set of fonts that enables you to insert figures in PostScript and a variety of other formats into your documents. TeX generates output in a format called DVI, which is a device-independent representation of your document. DVI files are then converted into a wide variety of formats, including PostScript and PCL. You can view DVI files in the X Window System with xdvi. SliTeX and BiBTeX are two TeX utilities that are available on UNIX. SliTeX produces formatted slides for overhead projectors, and BiBTeX produces a formatted bibliography

For more information about TeX, its evolution, and the many tools available in the TeX environment, consult the TeX Users Group Home Page at http://www.tug.org/. There is also another version of TeX called teTeX, based completely on free software components. You can get it at http://www.tug.org/tetex/. Then there is TeX Live, a comprehensive TeX system for a number of UNIX variants, that includes the TeX programs, macros, fonts, and even foreign language support. You can get TeX Live at http://www.tug/org/texlive/. All of the TeX family of programs are part of the CTAN (Comprehensive TeX Archive Network). You can search the archive for various TeX software pieces at http://www.ctan.org/.

There is another text formatter based on Donald Knuth’s TeX typesetting language called LaTeX. It was developed in 1985 by Leslie Lamport, and it is now supported by the LaTeX3 Project. LaTex was developed as a text formatter for high-quality documents such as technical and scientific documentation, although it can be used for other types of documents as well. For information on how to obtain LaTeX, go the web site http://www.latex-project.org/. Figure 26–5 shows an example output of TeX viewed under the Mozilla browser.

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Figure 26–5: Example output of TeX viewed under the Mozilla browser

groff

The FSF (Free Software Foundation) provides groff, the GNU troff text formatter for Debian Linux platforms for free. groff works just the same as nroff, troff, and ditroff. The groff package includes its own versions of pic, tbl, eqn, and soelim (the nroff/troff picture, table, equation and source file inclusion tools) as gpic, gtbl, geqn, and gsoelim, respectively.

The groff package is available at GNU’s project page for the groff project at http://www.gnu.org/software/groff/.

Spreadsheet Applications

Spreadsheets are applications that allow you to manage data in rows and columns and to analyze and plot the data. While there are spreadsheet programs available as parts of the office suites previously discussed (i.e., StarOffice, OpenOffice and KOffice), stand-alone UNIX spreadsheet products are available commercially as well as free of charge.

Wingz

Wingz is the name of a family of spreadsheet-related products from the Investment Intelligence Systems Group (IISG). This product was once offered by Informix, Inc. One product in this family is Wingz Professional, which comprises graphical development tools with screen and menu painters driven by an English-like programming language, integrated with a powerful, multilayer spreadsheet tool. The Wingz Professional environment supports the development of data-driven solutions that run on heterogeneous hardware and retrieve data from various external sources, such as SQL databases and real-time data feeds. Worksheets act as core building blocks for most programs. The Wingz product is a subset of Wingz Professional that incorporates the spreadsheet component of the product suite.

Wingz is available for a number of UNIX platforms, including AIX, HP-UX, IRIX, and Solaris. Wingz is also available free of charge for Linux users for noncommercial applications.

For information about Wingz, consult http://www.freebsdsoftware.org/math/wingz3.html.

Gnumeric

GNOME has an open-source spreadsheet application available for its desktop called Gnumeric. Gnumeric provides not only all of the worksheet functions of Microsoft’s Excel, but the newest release has significantly more functionality Gnumeric has the ability to import and export data in several spreadsheet formats, including Excel, Applix, PlanPerfect, StarOffice, Quattro Pro, and Lotus 1–2–3, as well as XML and HTML. You can obtain Gnumeric by going to the web page at http://www.gnome.org/projects/gnumeric/.

Oleo

The oleo program from the Free Software Foundation is an open-source spreadsheet. The oleo program has X Window System support and uses key bindings that are similar to GNU Emacs. To find out about oleo and to download it, consult http://www.gnu.org/software/oleo/oleo.html. Figure 26–6 shows an example of an Oleo spreadsheet and its graphical representation.

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Figure 26–6: Example of an Oleo spreadsheet and its graphical representation

Database Management Software

Almost everyone who uses a computer must organize data and search through this data to locate information. Most people, for instance, keep a list of phone numbers to search through when they need to call someone. Libraries maintain records that borrowers search through to find material of interest. Businesses keep information on their customers that they search through to find customers with overdue bills, customers in a particular area for advertising mailings, and so on.

A DBMS (database management system) provides a computerized record-keeping system that meets these needs. Database management software is among the most commonly used software for the personal computer. Business applications built on database management systems are used extensively on minicomputers and mainframes. Database management systems provide a query language used to retrieve, modify delete, and add data. (Many database products support the query language SQL [Structured Query Language], which is an ANSI standard.) Most modern database management systems use a relational model, which stores records in the form of tables and supports operations that join databases, select fields from databases, and form projections by using specified fields from the records in the database.

Database management systems also provide facilities for generating customized reports of various kinds. They also often provide tools that can be used to develop customized applications, including fourth-genemtion languages (4GLs). Application developers can use 4GLs to quickly develop database applications, because statements in 4GLs correspond to common functions carried out on databases. Each statement in a fourth-generation language corresponds to multiple statements in a third-generation language, such as C, or older, widely used languages such as COBOL or Fortran.

The trend toward distributed computing is reflected in database management systems. Distributed database systems present a single view of a database to users, even though data is located on different machines. Here are some representative database management software packages, including both commercial DBMS packages and those that can be used free of charge, that provide some of the useful features just mentioned.

Empress

Empress Software provides database products that run on Intel, SPARC, and IBM and MIPS RISC processors, and that support Linux, AIX, HP-UX, and Solaris. Empress RDBMS is a POSIX-compliant relational database that provides a 4GL application generator and a C-callable kernel, producing applications that can be run over distributed processing environments. Empress Database Server is an Ethernet-LAN-accessible IP-based environment for running Empress RDBMS over the client/server network. More information about Empress can be found at http://www.empress.com. You can even obtain a free trial version of the software at this site.

Informix

Informix provides a range of database management products that run on Intel, SPARC, HP, and IBM processors, and that support HP-UX, Solaris, AIX, and Linux. Formerly a series of products from a company with the same name, Informix is now owned and marketed by IBM. IBM Informix software lets you build and manage applications of any size, with enterprise-class availability and reliability Informix is optimized for web-based applications and handles multimedia as well as conventional data. More information about Informix, including how to obtain it, can be found at http://www-306.ibm.com/software/data/informix/.

Ingres

The Ingres Corporation, a company of CA, Inc. (formerly Computer Associates International), offers a range of open-source database management products that run on operating systems that include Linux, HP-UX, AIX, and Solaris, under the GNU General Public License. The newest release of Ingres, called Ingres 2006, allows integration of multiple sources of data from different platforms into a single application. Supported database platforms include Sybase, Oracle, and Informix. The Ingres 2006 platform includes end-user applications as well as tools for applications developers and systems and database administrators. In addition to the open-source version, Ingres also may be licensed as a commercial product. More information about Ingres can be found at http://www.ingres.com/.

Oracle

Oracle is a relational database management platform offered by Oracle, Inc. Oracle was the first company to commercialize relational database technology, and it is the recognized leader in the industry in data warehousing. Oracle Database 10g, the most current release of the database product, supports a concept called grid computing. Grid computing is an IT architecture that allows resource pooling of a network of computers to allow you to access and store your database content without having to worry about where the data physically resides. Oracle provides support for all computing aspects on Linux-applications, middleware, database, and the operating system. In fact, Oracle is the market leader on Linux databases, with over 80 percent market share. More information about the commercial version of Oracle can be found at http://www.oracle.com. A free version of Oracle, called Oracle 10g Express Edition, is available at http://www.oracle.com/technology/products/database/xe/.

Sybase

Sybase is a relational database management platform offered by Sybase, Inc. Sybase provides a set of product families consisting of database servers; synchronization, movement, and access tools; a modeling tool; information delivery services, and middleware integration tools. The database engine is called Sybase IQ. It runs on the AIX, Linux, Solaris, and HP-UX platforms. More information about Sybase can be found at http://www.sybase.com/.

Unify

Unify is a suite of integrated application solutions from Unify, Inc. Unify NXJ is a business process management platform that integrates data warehousing functions with middleware to provide web-based portal services (web applications) to end users. Unify DataServer is an application that provides a relational database with built-in SQL features. More information about Unify can be found at http://www.unify.com/.

MySQL

MySQL, developed by T.c.X. DataKonsultAB (now MySQL AB), is arguably the most popular multiuser, multithreaded SQL database server available for use free of charge, running on over 20 UNIX platforms, including Solaris, Linux. HP-UX, and Mac OS X. MySQL is a client/ server implementation consisting of a server daemon mysqld and many client programs and libraries. MySQL has been designed for speed, robustness, and ease of use. MySQL is the database of choice for applications built on the open-source LAMP stack (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP / Perl / Python). Chapters 16 and 27 discuss the LAMP philosophy in more detail. For more on MySQL and to download software, consult http://www.mysql.com/. Figure 26–7 shows an example of the MySQL Query Browser.

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Figure 26–7: Example of the MySQL Query Browser

PostgreSQL

PostgreSQL is a popular database management system based on the POSTGRES database management system developed at the University of California, Berkeley (the same people that developed INGRES). The query language supported by PostgreSQL is an extended subset of SQL. PostgreSQL is free, and the complete source is available. The latest version is currently 8.1.4. PostgreSQL runs on a wide range of UNIX versions, including Solaris, HP-UX, AIX, and Linux. For more information on PostgreSQL, and to download software, go to http://www.postgresql.org/.

Drawing Applications

Drawing applications fall into two categories: object-based drawing programs and painting programs. Object-based drawing applications allow users to create objects of various types such as lines, rectangles, circles, text boxes, and curves. These objects can be selected, moved around, and grouped to form more detailed drawings. Painting applications differ in that you draw, with computer-supplied “pencils” and “paintbrushes,” on a canvas. The result is a bitmap rather than a collection of distinct objects.

Two object-based drawing programs are idraw and xfig. idraw can be tricky to build on a system, since it requires the building of the InterViews package, a collection of C++ libraries for X Window System programming. A nice feature about idraw is that the output is PostScript, which allows you to print to your printer or include a figure in a TeX document using the psfig package. For more information about idraw, see http://www.ivtools.org/ivtools/idraw.html. Figure 26–8 shows an example idraw screen.

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Figure 26–8: Example idraw screen

xfig output can be saved in a number of formats, including some formats that can be inserted directly into a TeX document. Both allow you to import images for inclusion in your document. For more information, see the web page at http://www.xfig.org/.

Two painting applications are Xpaint and tgif. Xpaint is a color image-editing tool that features most standard paint program options. tgif is an Xlib-based interactive 2-D drawing tool under X11 on Linux and most UNIX platforms. Each allows the image to be saved into formats that Netpbm (a graphics manipulator) and xv (an interactive image manipulation program for the X Window System) can work with, and that can be imported into an idraw or xfig document for further editing. For information on Xpaint, see https://sourceforge.net/projects/sf-xpaint/. For information on tgif, see the web page at http://bourbon.usc.edu/tgif/. For information about Netpbm, see the page at http://sourceforge.net/projects/netpbm/. For information on xv, see the web page at http://www.trilon.com/xv/.

For more complicated painting applications under Linux, you may wish to use the GIMP application. GIMP is discussed in detail in Chapter 6.

Graphing Applications

The xgraph program is a simple-to-use x-y plotting program that supports multiple data sets, various fonts, and the capability to set your titles and name your data sets. Data is input as a sequence of ordered pairs to be plotted. The xgraph program uses the X Window System to display its graphs, and output can be either printed or saved in idraw format (idraw is described in the preceding section). For more information, see the web page at http://www. xgraph.org/.

GNUplot is a command-driven function plotting program with a variety of output formats, including the capability to display graphs via the X Window System. It can draw using lines, points, boxes, contours, vector fields, surfaces, and associated text. It also supports specialized plot types. For more information, see the web page at http://www.gnuplot.info/.

Gri is a command-driven scientific plotting program that can generate x-y, contour, and image graphs using a TeX-like scripting syntax and simple commands (e.g., open, read, draw). For more information on Gri, see the web page at http://gri.sourceforge.net/index.php.

Image Manipulation and Viewing

Image scanners can use used to digitize pictures for viewing and manipulation by computers. UNIX provides an excellent platform for viewing and manipulating images in many different formats, as well as for performing various operations on images such as sharpening contrast, scaling, cutting and pasting, grayscaling, and color map editing. We will describe a few of the many packages available under UNIX.

The xv Interactive Image Display Program

The xv program (see “Drawing Applications” earlier in this chapter) allows a user to view and manipulate images in a wide range of formats, including gif, jpeg, tiff, ppm, X11 bitmap, X Pixmap, BMP, Sun rasterfile, IRIS RGB, 24-bit Targa, FITS, and PM formats. Using xv, you can also output PostScript files for printing to a printer. The xv program provides routines for grayscaling and 24-bit to 8-bit color conversion. Various other xv operations include sharpening, blurring, colormap editing, RGB intensity tuning, cropping, rotation, scaling, and edge detection. You can also create visual effects to make your image look like an oil painting or an embossed image. All of these operations are possible from xv’s intuitive and easy-to-use GUI front end. For more information about xv and to download it, go to the official xv home page, http://www.trilon.com/xv/. Figure 26–9 shows an example xv screen.

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Figure 26–9: An example xv screen

Netpbm

Another widely used set of tools is Netpbm, an unofficial release of pbmplus, a set of UNIX command-line filters for converting and operating on images. By using the tools in Netpbm, you can create a wide range of visual effects and operations by pipelining multiple commands or placing commands in shell scripts. Netpbm runs under many versions of UNIX. Among the many formats the package understands are portable pixmaps and bitmaps, Andrew Toolkit raster, Xerox doodle brushes, CMU window manager format, group 3 fax, Sun icon format, GEM .img format, MacPaint, Macintosh PICT format, MGR format, Atari Degas .pi3, X bitmaps, Epson and HP LaserJet printer graphics, BBN BitGraph graphics, FITS format, Usenix FaceSaver, HIPS format, PostScript image data, gif, IFF ILBM, PC Paintbrush, TrueVision Targa files, XPM format, DEC sixel format, Sun Raster, tiff, and X Window System dump. Operations on images include Bentleyize (smearing), cratered terrain, edge-detection, edge-enhance, normalize contrast, cut and paste, dithering, convolution, rotation, and scaling. To learn more about Netpbm, go to the web site http://sourceforge.net/projects/netpbm/.

GIMP

The Free Software Foundation provides the GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP). GIMP is written and developed under X11 on UNIX platforms. It is a freely distributed package that can be used for photo retouching, image composition, and image authoring. It can be used as a simple paint program, an expert-quality photo retouching program, an online batch processing system, a mass production image renderer, a image format converter, and so on. GIMP is designed to be augmented with plug-ins and extensions for just about any task. It supports an advanced scripting interface that enables everything from the simplest task to the most complex image manipulation procedures to be easily scripted. GIMP is the standard desktop image manipulation program for the GNOME and KDE desktop environments (see Chapters 6 and 7). For more information about GIMP and to download it, go to http://www.gimp.org/. For an example screenshot, see Chapter 6, under “The GIMP.”

ImageMagick

ImageMagick is a package for display and interactive manipulation of images for the X Window System available for all major versions of UNIX, including Linux, which can be used for free. The ImageMagick image display program is able to display images on a workstation screen running an X server. The program can read and write image files in many formats, including jpeg, tiff, pnm, gif, and Photo CD. Using this program, you can resize, rotate, sharpen, color reduce, or add special effects to an image. For more information about ImageMagick and to download software, go to http://www.imagemagick.org/. Figure 26–10 shows an example ImageMagick screen.

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Figure 26–10: An example ImageMagick screen

gPhoto2 (GNU Photo)

The gPhoto2 program is a free digital camera utility that is a project of the gPhoto team under GNU. It is replacement of the gPhoto utility With gPhoto2, you can take a photo with any digital camera, load it onto your computer, print it, e-mail it, put it on a web site, save it on your storage media in popular graphics formats, or view it on your monitor. gPhoto2 is a free graphical application for retrieving, organizing, and publishing images from a range of supported digital cameras or existing images on your hard disk. gPhoto2 supports an HTML engine that allows the creation of gallery themes that can be used to publish images to the web. A directory browse mode is implemented that makes it easy to create an HTML gallery from images already on your computer. gPhoto2 also features a command-line interface, useful for setting up web cams, time lapse movies, and other applications from within scripted languages such as Perl. Consult http://www.gphoto.org/ for more information about gPhoto2 and to download software.

Audio Applications

You can obtain many different types of UNIX freeware and shareware audio applications. For example, you can obtain compact disc players, wave file players, MIDI players, audio mixers, music composition programs, text-to-speech programs, speech recognition programs, and so on, for a number of UNIX variants. A few audio applications are described here. You can find many more by using the above terms in a web search by your favorite search engine (e.g., Google).

XMMS

XMMS is a multimedia player for UNIX systems. XMMS stands for X Multi-Media System. It can play media files such as MP3, MODs, WAV and others by using plug-ins. XMMS was modeled after Microsoft’s winamp player. While XMMS is primarily used for audio playback, efforts by some developers have given it some primitive video playback features. For more information about XMMS, see the web site http://www.xmms.org/. Figure 26–11 shows an example XMMS display.

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Figure 26–11: An example XMMS display

GRIP

GRIP (the GNOME CD Ripper) is a CD player and CD ripper for the Gnome desktop. It has the CD ripping capabilities of cdparanoia (http://www.xiph.org/paranoia/) built in but can also use external rippers, such as cdda2wav (see http://www.cdda2wav.de/). It also provides an automated front end for MP3 (and other audio format) encoders, by letting you transform CD content easily straight into MP3s. Grip works with DigitalDJ (an SQL-based MP3-player front end) to provide a computerized version of your music collection. For more information, see the web page at http://nostatic.org/grip/.

Xmcd

The Xmcd package is a free, open-source software package, written by Ti Kan, that enables a computer to use its CD drive to play compact discs. Xmcd includes xmcd, a CD player for the X Window System that uses the Motif GUI interface, and cda, a text-mode CD player with a command-line interface. The cda program also has a curses-based, screen-oriented mode. Both xmcd and cda transform a CD drive into a stereo CD player, and both programs have a rich feature set and are intuitive to use. They take advantage of many CD-ROM drive capabilities not accessible via other players and support a CD database feature that maintains the disc artist/title, track titles, and associated text, such as band information and lyrics. Moreover, xmcd supports CD recognition via the Compact Disc Database (CDDB), an information service for compact discs on the web, so it can connect to CD database servers on the Internet to get the information when a CD is loaded. Also, xmcd is compatible with many firewall proxy configurations for CD database server access. For more information about Xmcd and to download it and xmcd, go to its web site http://directory.fsf.org/xmcd.html. Figure 26–12 shows an example xmcd screen.

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Figure 26–12: An example xmcd screen

Zinf

The Zinf audio player is a simple but powerful audio player for Linux (binary), Solaris, and BSD (source only) platforms. It supports MP3, Ogg/Vorbis, WAV, and Audio CD format playback. Zinf has a powerful music browser, theme support, and a download manager. It is based on the FreeAmp audio player, which was developed by eMusic.com, Inc. For information, including how to obtain it, go to the web site http://www.zinf.org/.

Movie Players

Movie players are applications that display real-time or near-real-time movies and animations. Some movie players are software-only products. Note that without special hardware, movie players are typically restricted to displaying in smaller frame sizes (e.g., 300 pixels by 300 pixels). Movie players are designed to play animations and/or movies in a variety of different formats.

MPlayer

MPlayer is a movie and animation player that supports a variety of codecs and file formats. Among them are MPEG1, MPEG2, and MPEG4; DivX digital media formats; RealAudio/Video; Quick Time 5 and 6; and Vivo 1 and 2. It has many optimized native audio and video codecs, but it allows using XAnim’s and RealPlayer’s binary codec plug-ins. It has basic VCD/DVD playback functionality including DVD subtitles, but supports many text-based subtitle formats too. For video output, almost every existing interface is supported. It can also convert any supported files to raw/divx/mpeg4 AVI (pcm/mp3 audio). MPlayer runs on a number of UNIX variants, including Solaris, HP-UX, AIX, and Linux. For more information, including how to download, go to http://www.mplayerhq.hu/. Figure 26–13 shows an example MPlayer movie running on a Solaris screen.

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Figure 26–13: An example MPlayer movie running on a Solaris screen

Xine

xine is an open-source, free multimedia player engine, available under the GNU General Public License. xine consists of a library of tools (called xine-lib) and an API that plays CDs, DVDs, and even VCDs. It decodes multimedia files such as AVI, MOV, WMV, and MP3 from local disk drives, and plays multimedia streamed over the Internet. It interprets many of the most common multimedia formats available (as well as some uncommon formats). It is available on a number of UNIX variants, including Linux, Mac OS X, and Solaris. For more information, including how to download it, go to http://xinehq.de/. Figure 26–14 shows an example xine video output with controls.

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Figure 26–14: An example xine video output with controls

Totem

Totem is the official movie player of the GNOME desktop environment (see Chapter 6). As such, it is usually installed along with the GNOME desktop onto your Linux environment.

You can load Totem onto other Linux distributions, however. It is based on xine-lib (see xine, previously) or Gstreamer (a C language development tool for multimedia players). It supports a playlist, a full-screen mode, seek and volume controls, and keyboard navigation. For more information about Totem, including how to download it, see the web page at http://gnome.org/projects/totem/.

The MpegTV Player (mtv)

The MpegTV Player (mtv) is a real-time software MPEG video player with audio synchronization that runs on UNIX/Linux platforms. The Linux and Solaris SPARC versions can also play VCDs (Video CDs). The control panel of the player has VCR-like controls. mtv is available in both free and shareware versions. To find out more information and to find download sites, consult http://www.mpegtv.com/.

The XAnim Program

The XAnim program allows you to view a wide variety of animation and video formats, including Type-1 MPEG, FLI, FLC, IFF, DL, Amiga MovieSetter, AVI, and QuickTime animations. You can also play and hear audio using XAnim. Given a set of gif files, XAnim will display them one at a time in sequence. Visit the page at http://xanim.polter.net/ to learn more about XAnim and to download the software.

Other Multimedia Tools

In addition to audio and video playing software, there are a number of tools for creating (burning) CDs and DVDs so that they can be played on UNIX systems. While the basic features are the same, some advanced features differ from vendor to vendor. Along with mainstream commercial products like Nero, CD Creator, and Gear Pro, there are other open-source versions that run on a range of UNIX platforms. Here are a couple of them.

xcdroast

X-CD-Roast is a flexible CD-burning tool that runs on a variety of UNIX variants such as Linux, Mac OS X, Solaris, HPUX, and AIX. It is a GUI (graphical user interface) that was built on a set of tools called cdrtools. For more information on X-CD-Roast, including how to download it, go to http://www.xcdroast.org/. Figure 26–15 shows an example X-CD-Roast CD creation screen.

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Figure 26–15: An example X-CD-Roast CD creation screen

K3b

K3b is a Linux CD/DVD burning tool that has been optimized for the KDE desktop. You can create data, audio, and video CDs, copy CDs, burn DVDs, rip CDs and DVDs, and reformat CD-RW CDs. It is freely available for a number of Linux distributions, in both source and binary formats. For more information, including how to download K3b, go to the web site at http://www.k3b.org/. Figure 26–16 shows an example of K3b running on a KDE desktop.

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Figure 26–16: An example of K3b running on a KDE desktop

Games

From Tetris to chess to configurable multiplayer gaming systems, you’ll find a tremendous variety of UNIX game software to amuse you. For example, the FSF (makers of GNU software) provides a chess program built on an X Window System interface. Shareware versions of the popular Doom virtual reality game are available for Solaris, and Linux. To obtain the source software, go to http://www.doomworld.com/classicdoom/ports/.

There is also a networked game called Nettrek, which allows you to fly a Klingon Battlecruiser, Federation Starship, or Romulan Warship into battle against other players. For more information, see the web page at http://www.netrek.org/. The popular game Quake is available for Linux and Solaris. For more information, including how to download, go to the web page at http://www.quakeworld.net/.

Xpilot is a popular networked multiplayer 2-D space game that was initially developed at the University of Tromsø in Norway In Xpilot you pilot your own spacecraft in a two-dimensional space. You can play against many other people either on your own or as a team. The game incorporates mines, lasers, multiple shots, and cloaking devices. To play Xpilot without problems requires a fast Internet connection and an accelerated video card. You can find out more about Xpilot and download it at http://www.xpilot.org/.

Another popular game you may want to run on your computer is XBlast. XBlast is a multiplayer arcade game for the X Window System and has been tested on most major UNIX platforms, including Linux, Solaris, and HP-UX. It was inspired by the video game Bomberman. You can find more information about it at the web page at http://xblast.sourceforge.net/.

One of the more comprehensive strategy gaming applications is Xconq, which allows you to create your own game pieces and define their behavior by writing scripts in a custom language. With Xconq, you can recreate World War II or other world battles, blast aliens out of the sky, build a modern economy, or play chess, all by loading different scripts. Xconq is multiplayer, and it can be played alone against the computer. You can find it at http://sourceware.org/xconq/.

ToME (for Tales of the Middle Earth) is a tile-based dungeon crawler similar to Nethack, Rogue, and Angband that runs on the Linux platform. For information on how to download Tome, go to the web page at http://www.happypenguin.org/list?search=Tome. Figure 26–17 shows an example of a ToME screen.

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Figure 26–17: An example of a ToME screen

Games for the GNOME and KDE Linux Desktops

In addition to the general games available across the UNIX variants, a number of games have been developed specifically for the GNOME and KDE desktops. These games are a combination of adaptations of existing games available in formats from Windows to Gameboys, and new games developed specifically for the Linux platforms. Some of these are discussed in Chapters 6 and 7. To see the variety of games that are available for download, go to the web pages at http://www.gnome.org/projects/gnome-games/ and http://games.kde.org/.

Internet Applications

There are a number of applications that are available for use on the Internet. These include web browsers, web servers, e-mail applications, IM (Instant Messaging), browser add-ons, multimedia players and viewers, and Internet telephony applications-such as VoIP (Voice over IP).

Web Browsers

A web browser is an application that allows you to connect to the Internet and view web content. This content can include text, images, and multimedia audio or video. There are a few good browsers that are available for the UNIX environment.

Firefox   Firefox is a free, customizable (and award-winning) web browser that was developed by Mozilla Corporation (the developers of the Mozilla browser). It features an integrated search capability, as well as built-in pop-up blocking, enhanced security, and automatic update capability You will find background information about Firefox at http://www.mozilla.org/, and more detailed information and download information at http://www.mozilla.com/. Figure 26–18 shows an example of the Firefox web browser.

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Figure 26–18: An example of the Firefox web browser

Konqueror   Konqueror is the web browser for the KDE desktop environment (as well as the file manager). Chapter 7 discusses the Konqueror browser. It is included with the KDE desktop for many Linux distributions, but it can be loaded onto other Linux distributions. For more information, including how to download it to your distribution, see the web site http://www.konqueror.org/.

Mozilla   Mozilla is an open-source web browser that was developed by the Mozilla Corporation to serve as a browser engine for the Netscape browser. Mozilla was adapted from the Mosaic browser that ran under the Windows environment. It was given new, more powerful functionality and became known as the “Godzilla version of Mosaic,” hence Mozilla.

You can get the latest version of Mozilla for Linux, Solaris, and Mac OS by going to the web site http://www.mozilla.org/products/mozilla1.x/.

Web Servers

A web server is an application (sometimes also thought of as the actual computer) that acts as an interface between your web browser and the Internet. At the basic level, it translates requests from your browser (usually in the form of an HTTP request or a form request), directs the request to the appropriate server machine containing the content you are trying to access, and delivers it back to your web browser so that you can display it in your browser. You can find both open-source and license fee-based web servers in the UNIX marketplace.

Apache Web Server   The Apache web (HTTP) server is a very popular, freely available, web server used to provide HTTP services for web browsers. Chapter 16 discusses the Apache web server in great detail. For more information, including how to obtain the source for the server, see the Apache Project web page at http://www.apache.org/.

LiteSpeed Web Server   LiteSpeed Technologies offers two versions of its web server. The first is the Standard Edition, which you can obtain for free. The second is the Enterprise Edition, which is available for a license fee. Both are fast secure servers (using HTTP/1.1) that offer Dynamic Language Support, IPV6 support, virtual hosting, and API connectivity For more information, see the web page at http://www.litespeedtech.com/products/home/.

Zeus Web Server   Zeus Technology offers a commercial product called ZWS (Zeus Web Server). ZWS is a high-performance, scalable web server that can be used for web hosting, ISP service providing, portal ware, and transaction-oriented businesses that require a secure environment while performing a large number of transactions. You can find out more about ZWS, including how to purchase it, at http://www.zeus.com/products/zws/.

Internet E-Mail Applications

A number of UNIX e-mail applications are accessible from within a web browser. Chapters 6 and 7 discuss some of the built-in e-mail capabilities of the GNOME and KDE desktops. In addition, Chapter 8 also discusses some of these applications. Here are a few more to be considered.

Thunderbird   The Mozilla web browser has a built-in e-mail client called Thunderbird. It is a simple-to-use, full-featured e-mail application that you can customize. Thunderbird supports IMAP and POP mail protocols, as well as HTML mail. It has enhanced security, including junk e-mail and “phishing” (scamming) protection. You can get Thunderbird at http://www.mozilla.com/thunderbird/. Figure 26–19 shows an example of the Thunderbird e-mail client in a multiwindow environment.

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Figure 26–19: Example of the Thunderbird e-mail client in a multiwindow environment

Netscape Mail   The Netscape browser (currently version 8.1) has its own internal e-mail client as well. If your e-mail address ends in netscape.com, you probably already know about this feature. If you want to find out more about it, go to http://www.netscape.com/.

WING   WING (the Web IMAP/NNTP Gateway) is an Apache/mod_perl-based system that allows users to access e-mail held on an IMAP server using any web browser. You can get it by going to the SourceForge web page at http://sourceforge.net/projects/web-imap/.

Nwebmail   Nwebmail is a webmail client written in ANSI C. It allows users to check and send e-mail from any web-browser. Nwebmail accesses the mail spools directly for fast and efficient mail processing. It also supports MIME attachments and can import and export address books from other mail clients. To obtain Nwebmail, go to http://sourceforge.net/projects/nwebmail/.

Instant Messaging

The Internet is the home for many IM (instant messaging) applications. In order to provide an instant messaging environment, there must be a server to manage the movement of the messages as well as a client to send and receive the messages. Here are some examples of both.

DBabble   DBabble is a chat, discussion, and instant messaging server (and client) that allows users to send encrypted instant messages, have private conversations, and create and participate in private or public chat rooms and discussions. Users can talk to the chat server using a web browser (or a Windows IM client). Users can communicate with ICQ, MSN, Yahoo, and AIM (AOL) users, send instant messages to groups of users, receive e-mail copies of their instant messages or new discussion group articles, and they can send and receive instant messaging from e-mail addresses and mobile phones. The DBabble IM server is available for Solaris, Linux, Mac OS X, Free BSD, and AIX, and it can be ported to other UNIX variants by special request. For more information, see the web page at http://www.netwinsite.com/dbabble/. Figure 26–20 shows an example of a DBabble session.

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Figure 26–20: An example of a DBabble session

GAIM   gaim is a multiprotocol IM (instant messaging) client for Linux, BSD, and Mac OS X. It is built into many versions of the GNOME desktop as the basic IM application (see Chapter 6). A multiprotocol IM client can talk to multiple IM services simultaneously For example, gaim allows to sit in on an IRC (Internet Relay Chat) session while you are instant messaging with other users on services like Yahoo and AOL. You can find more about gaim, including how to obtain it, at the web page at http://gaim.sourceforge.net/. Figure 26–21 is an example of gaim in a multiwindow environment.

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Figure 26–21: An example of gaim in a multiwindow environment

Yahoo Messenger for UNIX   Yahoo Messenger for UNIX is the UNIX client version of Yahoo Messenger for Windows. It is available under the GNU General Public License. You can obtain it by going to the web page at http://linux.softpedia.com/get/Communications/Chat/Yahoo-Messenger-002.shtml.

   Kopete Kopete is a flexible and extendable multiple protocol instant messaging system designed as a plug-in-based system. It is the KDE desktop built-in instant messaging service (see Chapter 7). It supports a number of IM services, including AIM, ICQ, MSN, Yahoo, Jabber, and IRC. For more information, including how to obtain it, go the KDE web page for Kopete at http://kopete.kde.org/.

Internet Multimedia Players and Viewers

A number of multimedia players and viewers are available on the UNIX platform that are intended to be used in the Internet environment. Some of them have been listed previously in this chapter in the sections “Audio Applications” “Movie Players,” and “Other Multimedia Tools.” Some of these applications and tools are built into the various UNIX web browsers. You can access others by using what is called a plug-in. A plug-in is a piece of software that enables the browser to recognize and play back the media type that you are accessing or downloading (see Chapter 10). Here are a couple more.

Amarok   Amarok is an extremely powerful audio application for the KDE Linux environment (it may even replace Noatun in future KDE releases). It has an easy-to-use wizard for configuration, a playlist browser to manage playlists, a collection filter to produce statistics (most often played, newest, etc.), a music rating and scoring system, and a list of audio support features too long to list here. For more information, including how to download it, go to the KDE web page at http://amarok.kde.org/. Figure 26–22 shows an example of the Amarok player.

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Figure 26–22: An example of the Amarok player

VLC Media Player   VLC (formerly VideoLAN Client) is an extremely portable multimedia player for a number of audio and video formats (such as MPEG1, 2, and 4; DivX; MP3; and Ogg Vorbis,), as well as DVD and VCD. It also supports some streaming protocols. It can be used as a server to stream in unicast (point to point) or multicast (many receivers) in IPv4 or IPv6 on a high-bandwidth network. VLC provides a Mozilla/Firefox plug-in that lets you view QuickTime and Windows Media files from web sites without using Apple or Microsoft products.

VLC is available for Linux, Solaris, Mac OS X, and a number of other UNIX variants. For more information, see the web page at http://www.videolan.org/vlc/. Figure 26–23 shows an example of the VLC player and controller.

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Figure 26–23: An example of the VLC player and controller

Internet Telephony Applications

Internet telephony (or Voice over IP) has reached maturity. A number of Internet and voice service vendors have developed commercial platforms that allow home computer users to use special equipment attached to their computer to originate and receive telephone calls using the Internet, rather than the traditional voice network, as the method of transmission. This paradigm shift has lead many of the traditional voice service vendors to place more emphasis on developing high-quality, reliable Internet voice services. One such example is replacing traditional voice-based call centers (e.g., help desks, customer service desks) with ones using Voice over IP solutions. Here are a few commercial and open-source software platforms for Internet telephony.

Cisco Voice over IP   Cisco Systems, Inc., has developed an end-to-end platform of Internet telephony services. There is even a user’s group of IP telephony users at http://www.ciptug.org/. To find out more about Cisco’s platform, go to the web page at http://www.cisco.eom/en/US/netsol/ns340/ns394:/ns165/ns268/networking_soluation_package.html.

VOCAL   The VOCAL (Vovida Open Communications Applications Library) project is an open-source project whose mission is to facilitate the adoption of Voice over IP in the marketplace. The software suite includes a SIP (Session Initiation Protocol)-based Redirect Server, Feature Server, Provisioning Server, Policy Server, and Marshal Proxy, along with protocol translators from SIP to H.323 and SIP to MGCP. For more information, see the project web page at http://www.vovida.org/.

   Avaya Internet Telephony Avaya offers a wide range of commercial SIP-based Voice over IP solutions for business customers. Through platforms such as MultiVantage Express for mid-sized business customers, Avaya provides enhanced VoIP services that can increase a company’s ability to reach its customers while reducing costs. For more information, see the web page at http://www.avaya.com/gcm/master-usa/en-us/pillars/iptelephony/index.htm.

Software for Mathematical Computations

UNIX workstations have long been employed for complicated mathematical computations in the mathematical, biological, physical, and social sciences. Programs have been developed to carry out all common, and not-so-common, mathematical computations. Recently, these programs have evolved to provide support for specific types of computations, such as those required for digital signal processing, and they have incorporated a variety of tools for analyzing and visualizing the results of computation. Among the commercial application programs that support mathematical computations are

  • Maple (http://www.maplesoft.com)

  • Maxima (http://maxima.sourceforge.net/), an update of the legendary Macsyma program

  • Mathematica (http://www.wotfram.com/)

  • MATLAB (http://www.mathworks.com)

Each of these programs runs on the AIX, Linux, Mac OS, and Solaris platforms.

UNIX Scientific and Engineering Applications

A wide variety of UNIX application programs, both commercial programs and open source, are available for scientific and engineering computations. This is not surprising, since UNIX has long played an important role in these areas.

A web page at http://ceu.fi.udc.es/SAL/index.shtml has catalogued almost 3,000 applications for Linux and other platforms that-although most are designed for the scientific and engineering community-include alternative software packages for most of the categories discussed in this chapter. SAL (Scientific Applications for Linux) contains a wealth of links to sources for office, database, and graphics tools, as well as mathematical, programming, visualization, and other technical software.

Software for Running Windows Applications on UNIX Machines

The immense market for business and consumer applications that have been developed for PCs has meant that many desktop software programs were initially available for Windows-based PCs. Fortunately, due to the efforts of the developers in the Linux/UNIX community-with cooperation from various Open Source groups-this software can be run on UNIX systems using various Windows emulators. See Chapter 18 for details about these programs.




UNIX. The Complete Reference
UNIX: The Complete Reference, Second Edition (Complete Reference Series)
ISBN: 0072263369
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2006
Pages: 316

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