You probably think that I'm joking, but I'm not. You can actually build a jabber/xmpp app in less than 10 minutes if you have a good internet connection, and have already set up your system with "clickable". If not, be sure to check out my last post about it …

They say that the first complete chess playing program was written by Alex Bernstein in 1957. There were earlier renditions that could not play a complete game, but could solve tactics puzzles or make move suggestions, however, the Bernstein Chess Program was the first computer program that could actually completely …

Realizing that there are a few apps missing from the Ubuntu Touch OpenStore, and being an Android app developer, I thought I would try to bridge the gap. Rolling up my sleeves proved to be a bit harder than I thought, though. I came to realize that UT doesn't use …

It was interesting to me that white did not always move first in chess. Apparently, in 1857, a master of chess, Mr. Lowenthal made a recommendation to the First American Chess Congress that white should always move first as a rule. However, that rule was not actually enforced until sometime …

Today I had a strange occurrence. I couldn't launch Chromium-browser on my Ubuntu desktop machine. The error I got was this:

ERROR:browser_gpu_channel_host_factory.cc(121)

And something about the profile was already open, so it wouldn't launch again, to avoid corrupting my session or profile. Odd, I thought.

So, I …

As I mentioned earlier. I jumped off the deep end and dove into the world of Ubuntu Touch. One of the principle hangups I found was that there was not a FICS chess app. While this still remains to be solved, there was a great web-app for Chess.com.

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I recently took the plunge, and jumped in on a used Oneplus One phone, converting it to UBPorts community maintained Ubuntu Touch distro. Yes, I now have a true Linux phone. Arguably, Android is Linux, since Linux is really just a kernel, but in most people's minds, when they say …

Back in the middle ages, there were several different renditions of pawn promotion. Originally, the pawn would promote to the queen piece, but back then the queen could only move one space, like the king. Then there was the rule that the pawn could promote only to a captured piece …

Recently, my work "strongly recommended" that I go back and get the CompTIA A+ certification. Interestingly, CompTIA uses a pyramid style of certification, where the higher certifications on the pyramid renew the lower certifications. Oddly, I have two certifications above the A+ lever, Network+ and Linux+, but having a higher …

From the git-go, one of the hardest parts of making this chess engine and the following gui system has always been the pawns and the king. Both of these pieces have unusual maneuvers that you can't easily explain with the traditional shorthand that I was using for the engine. Things …