Crimperman.org

I’ve mentioned both my affection for free software and Free Software Magazine before. Well now I can link the two as I have had two articles published in the latest issue (15) of FSM.

The first is a beginners guide to understanding free software which does exactly what it says on the tin (I hope). The second is a review of GRAMPS which is a free software licenced genealogical application.

If you are interested in free software or just want to know what the fuss is about I recommend the first one. The second will be of interest if – like myself and many – you are interested in family trees and the like.

Some time (scarily it was nine years) ago I wrote a piece on here entitled “Touching a heart“. A few years later I followed that up with a piece called “Further lessons from a child“.

Both those pieces centered on lessons I had learned by observing my niece and I often find myself reflecting on the things I have (and haven’t) learned as a result of those experiences. Nowadays I have children of my own and just a few weeks back my son (who at the time was two and a half) taught me something about faith.

We’ve all been there, you wake up in the middle of the night and your throat is a dry as sandpaper. The trouble for my son this time was that we hadn’t left a drink next to his bed for him. So he did what toddlers do in the middle of the night and cried out for one of us to go in. My wife went and discovered the ongoing thirst issue. Actually the words my son used were “How about a nice cool drink mum?”. Mum said she would bring one and left to go downstairs.

So what did my son do during the wait? He sat on his bed quietly waiting for his Mum to return. You see he had no doubt that she would come back or that she would have the water in her hand when she did. He trusted her, implicitly and, to him, the fact that she had said she would do something was enough. No more tears, no going to the top of the stairs, no watching the door, no worrying just patience and – when she returned – thanks. In short my son has faith in his mother – and rightfully so.

So let me ask you the question this triggered me to ask myself. How often do you wait patiently for God? How much do you trust that He will do what He has said? How much faith do you have in Him?

Always handy having kids around when you need a few lessons don’t you think?

It’s been a while since I posted something here – and longer since that was specifically applicable to Christians. Recently I was asked to give a talk (don’t like to think of them as sermons as that always conjurs images of people falling asleep) at my church. Having prayed about it I felt God wanted me to speak on His promises. One of the promises I looked at was the return of Jesus and how it should inspire us to live fuller lives here.

There’s a popular but misguided saying which says that one can be so heavenly minded they are of no earthly good and a lot of people have written a lot of good stuff to refute this. I stand among the group that feels this statement is not only false but dangerous as it prvents us thinking about the one thing that should be giving us hope.

The hope for a better future in the next world is not escapism but realism. If we , as Christians, are unable to focus on the glory that is to come then what hope can we honeslty offer to the world we live in. Without the purpose of heaven in our hearts we just become ineffective as ambassadors of Christ. Indeed I would go so far as to say that the problematic (and sometimes shameful) periods of Church history all contain – at their root – people whose focus was solely on the here and now and not the great hope of tomorrow.

CS Lewis said:

“If you read history, you will find that the Christians who did the most for the present world were just those who thought most of the next.”

And I agree. We must face life – with whatever it throws at us – with both eyes on heaven and bot feet on earth. If we don’t then I fear life will overrun us and eventually we will shrivel up in our own selfishness.

Joni Eareckson Tada wrote an excellent piece, The Earthly Good of Being Heavenly Minded [www.moodymagazine.com], for MoodyMagazine which I found when doing research for my talk. It’s an honest and frank piece and yet it speaks volumes about her approach to life and just how she “copes” with here disability.

I’ve recently found Free Software Magazine, a freely downloadable (or web readable) magazine about – um – Free Software. By which they mean Freedom and not zero cost.

As you know I’m an FOSS afficianado and I have to say this publication is very well produced, the writing is good, the production quality is high and of course, being zero cost, it is great value for money )

If you are interested in Free/Open Source software or in computers in general and want to know about the sorts of things available on Free Software licences then I recommend you subscribe.

Although I’ve been using the Internet (in various forms)ing for a little longer, it has occurred to me that this years marks the tenth anniversary of my web presence in the form of websites.

Crimperman’s Christian Freebies started life in 1996 as a way to distribute my Christian desktop themes, other sites were added and around 5 years ago I merged them all into the site you see before you (obviously I’ve updated the content since then!).

Of course a lot has changed since then, in terms of the World wide web and me but some things remain the same. I’m still having the make sure my web pages can load on on dial-up connections for a start. It’s not that I expect everyone to pay for broadband if they don’t need it but I have to say that ten years ago I expected the basic connection speed would be a lot faster than 56k!

As you may have guessed I use both GNU/Linux (Debian) and Firefox at work and home. Within Debian I use the KDE desktop and for some time it has bugged me no end that firefox (and Thunderbird for that matter) use the GTK dialogs (as used in GNOME. Now there’s nothing wrong with these per-se but what bugs me is that I choose to use KDE and therefore pretty much all my desktop applications use the typical KDE open, save and print dialog boxes – except Firefox and thunderbird and try as I might I couldn’t find a way to switch them over….

Until now…

Kde – How To: integrate Firefox with KDE – Ubuntu Forums

Above is a link to a Ubuntu forum (Ubuntu is another GNU/Linux distribution based on Debian) which explains how to get firefox to use the KDE dialogs. It works a treat and can be transposed to Thunderbird as well. For those who don’t want to hop over there – or in case the post isappears in the future, here’s the relevant details…

1. Find the system-wide firefox components directory. For Debian it is /usr/lib/firefox/components.
2. Edit the file called nsFilePicker.js in that directory (you may need to be root)

3. Find the following piece of code compMgr.registerFactoryLocation(FILEPICKER_CID, “FilePicker JS Component”, // really long comment here “”, // really long comment here fileSpec, location, type);

4. Edit it to look like this

   compMgr.registerFactoryLocation(FILEPICKER_CID, “FilePicker JS Component”, // really long comment here FILEPICKER_CONTRACTID, // really long comment here fileSpec, location, type);

   1. Save the file

   2. You’ll now need to refresh the firefox chrome registry which is easiest done by installing or removing an Extension (Look under the tools menu) and restarting firefox.

That’s it. If you want to make similar changes to Thunderbird edit the nsFilePicker.js file in the thunderbird components directory (in Debian this is /usr/lib/thunderbird/components/”).

On restarting firefox the standard GTK open, save and print dialogs are all replaced by the typical KDE ones for your system. Incidentally this also resolves a problem with firefox defaulting to letter size paper for printing (not good if you’re not in the USA).

I have long been a fan of the open source philosophy along with others like Creative Commons. I like the way they allow you to distribute things in a fair manner whilst still protecting the author or the work to the extent they prefer. Much better than the restrictive and prohibitive copyright licences used so often today. This blog is distributed under a Creative commons licence. Basically you can distribute it without penalty or charge as long as you give others the same rights.

Recently it struck me how much the Christian viewpoint is left unhindered by such licences and how much it is hindered and impinged by copyright and publishing law.

Take for example a worship or praise song. In days of old, hymns were written by men and women for the use of all, without penalty, and the for the glory of God. They may have been published or distributed by word of mouth but rarely was there a restriction on their use. In short the aim of the author was to glorify God and they saw no reduction of this aim by allowing as many people as possible to freely and fairly use their works to this end.

These days? Somebody writes a song, releases it on a CD and then releases the sheet music under a copyright licence. Suddenly churches using these songs – to glorify God – are left with a minefield of legalese to overcome so that they are not “robbing” the author of their livlihood. Payments to copyright agencies (aren’t these just protection rackets?) abound on the off chance that you may use a song that was (shock) written to be used in that way.

In short, in 1850 somebody could write a hymn and churches could use it. Somebody hearing it in one church could introduce it to another without breaking the law. These days, you hear a song in one church, ask the musician for a copy of the sheet music and, if it is handed over, both of you are breaking the law. Result? songs that are written to worship God are not allowed to do so because it would impinge on the “rights” of the author. The same author who wrote the song to worship God! What is really meant by “rights” is “income”. If no copyright is placed on the music, or so the philosiphy goes, then you and I could distribute and sell said music and rob the author of their livlihood from selling the stuff they’ve written.

Imagine if people like Hillsongs, Survivor and Kingsway published their sheet music under a Creative Commons licence? You would be freely allowed to copy and distribute the sheet music but not sell it. So the song is used for it’s intended purpose (worshipping God) by many more churches, none of whom are breaking the law by doing so, none of whom are paying a licence fee just because they used a song in it’s indended purpose. But only the original composer/publisher may sell the song. This means a CD with it on continues to earn the composer a royalty.

Transpose this to Bibles. There are some great modern translation of the Bible. Some of you may not like them, everyone has their favourites. There are also some great computer programs to help us read and study the bible. But unless someone pays a licence then this software often only includes public domain translations like the KJV. “But if you want to use it you should pay for it” you say. fair enough but let’s take the New Century Version for example (the same applies to other versions).

I own two paper copies of the NCV in differing sizes and with differing extra bits. I also own a Palm Pilot PDA with some bible software on it. In order for me to read the NCV on my Palm Pilot I must buy another version of it. Okay so far I’m with this, seems fair. But I also own desktop bible software which doesn’t come with the NCV. I think it’s fair usage for me to want to use the same elcetronic version in two programs but only one at a time. I’ve bought the Bible (a few times now) – the translators, publishers et al have been rewarded for their work – I just want to use it on two programs. To me, this is like reading it in two different chairs. But no I would have to either wait for the software company to bring out an NCV module and then buy that one or use differing translations in differing places.

Again, suppose I have an electronic copy of a bible. I come across a friend who cannot afford one but would like one. Or I come across a friend who – not being a Christian – would like to look into the Bible on a try before you buy-in basis. I could tell both these people to go buy a modern version but doesn’t it come across as more gracious for me to give them a copy? Wouldn’t it more in the spirit of Christ for me to not expect them to pay? “So give them yours” you say – can’t it’s licenced to me and not transferrable. “Buy them one” you say – can’t because it’s no longer available for their operating system. “Copy yours – the publisher won’t mind” – no they may not mind (mostly because they wouldn’t know) but it is still illegal to do this – what does that tell my friends?

If digital versions of Bibles used Creative Commons licences then I could freely use it on any software I liked and pass it to friends for their use. At the same time I would not be allowed to sell it – only if the publisher authorises it.

“So” you’re thinking, “if the publishers use Creative Commons licences and allow you to give their stuff away – why would anyone buy them? They still lose money.”

Well, no they don’t the paper versions are still under copyright law. The recorded version of songs are also still under copyright and publishing law. And in fact if someone is given an electronic copy of a particular translation and uses it regularly, it would make sense to assume that when it comes to buying their own paper version they would plumb for the same translation.

Some authors have found that when they published their books under a Creative commons licence electronically, sales of the paper version have not dropped but been enhanced by the free distribution of the electronic one.

The point

Okay so here’s the point of this post…

It strikes me that a major aim of Christians is to become more Christ like. This would be the Christ who said “Freely you have received, freely give” then and who turned the tables on the temple sellers for making unfair profits from those who simply wanted to follow God’s way?

Where would Christianity be today if the gospel and epistle writers had prohibited copying and distribution of their writings without royalty payments? Where would we be today had people like John Wycliffe and William Tyndale had slapped copyright all over their translation or if Charles Wesley or John Newton had done the same with their hymns?

What would have happened? Christianity would have died along with the hope of humankind that it brings.

Perhaps you’re thinking that those people weren’t in this age, they didn’t need to be have been concerned about the “wrong” sorts of people corrupting their work from it’s purpose. Perhaps it’s true that they didn’t have to earn a living from their works. Perhaps these are true but most of them worked in conditions far less privielged than we do today. Most of them could have been killed if the “wrong” people got their hands on their work. Yet they did that work and they did for the higher purpose we all serve – the Kingdom of heaven.

So here’s a wake up call to the Christian publishers, Bible houses, Song composers and authors of today:

Think about why you do that work? If it’s for God’s glory and the furtherance of the God’s kingdom then are you not restricting the very purpose of that work by restricting the fair usage of it by others?

Christianity is about risks – take one with the work you do for him and see if God likes it.

You may have gathered from other posts that I am a Londoner. You will probably also be aware of the bombings in London on 7 July 2005. Although, fortunately, not in any of the trains or the bus that exploded I was affected and this is my account – for what it is worth.

On that day, I was travelling to work on the Central Line, scheduled to arrive at my destination Liverpool Street Station around 9:00 am (running a little late). At 8:50(ish) my tube driver anounced that Liverpool Street was closed because of a “security alert” and Bank was closed due to a “localised power failure”. Nobody panicked on my carriage, instead there was a general raising of the eyebrows and shaking of the head at yet another delay to our journey. For over thirty years Tube users have become accostmed to stations closing because of security alerts, only to then re-open thirty minutes later when the security alert was discovered to be a touristwho had left their suitcase unattended. Like many others, when I heard this anouncement I simply did a mental calculation of my revised journey into work. Get off at Stratford anf catch a Mainline train into Liverpool Street. We arrived at Stratford with no further information – the driver made the same announcements at each intermediate stop. There was some stopping in the tunnel which which is normal for security alerts. I got off just as a mainline (ONE) train pulled into the adjoining platform. I got on that and the train pulled off. Ten minutes later we pulled into Liverpool Street Station. It was now around 9:20am – half an hour after the Liverpool Street Bomb, after both the other Tube bombs but before the bus. At the same time several other trains pulled in. Thousands of passengers were greeted by a small but calm group of British transport Police officers who waved us toward the exits with the words “Could you please exit the station this way – thank you”. The underground was closed (confirming what my Tube driver had said) so I left the station along my usual route and walked to work. The only people I saw in any kind of quandry were three people who had just got off the Stansted Express – direct from Stansted Airport – and who were unsure where the bus terminus was. Everybody else seemed calm – if not a little peeved at the delay. I arrived at work around 9:40 – there were crowds on the street but again this is normal if a tube station or two in closed. Passing through Old Street Subway (in which is housed the Tube station) I saw the Northern line was closed because of “power failures”. Again my driver was confirmed. Upon arriving at work I got my first real inkling of what had happened. A small band of my colleagues stood in reception and said things like “Thank God” and “Did you see anything?” Things had been so calmy and matter of factly dealt with on my journey that at first I refuted claims of bombs as being media hysterics. Surely I would have heard something of it during my journey? But no I hadn’t and for that reason I was able to keep calm on my journey. Liverpool Street is a large area. The bomb exploded in a tunnel halfway to the next station. There was consequently no indication of the atrocity that had happened was given.

In the aftermath and flurry of news reports the London travelling public were praised for the calm way they had handled the situation. I would cetainly say that evryone I saw as calm. Personally I think this is down to two things. 1. We have dealt with so many security alerts and station closures that finding alternative routes to work becomes almost second nature. 2. The calmness of Tube and Rail staff and of the Police gave none of us any reason to think it was anything else. I’ve seen a lot of praise for them for their bravery and hard work. I would like to add to that a commendation for the calm they brought to the situation. Both those on the ground and those in command of the services managed themselves in a way which did more than anything else to bring a sense of calm to what could have been a much bigger tragedy.

I decide to sit it out at work rather than try to get home immediately. I was offered a sofa for the night if required by a colleague who lives near work. I rang my wife and my parents to reassure them and sat it out. Eventually I heard that Liverpool Street mainline trains were running again and got home around 5:30pm. Actually my journey home was quicker and easier than my usual one – mostly because I got to the station just as the first trains were running and hardly anyone had heard about it.

So to be honest I had a fairly uneventful day but it is still one I wil never forget. As an example, I have been on leave until today and travelling in this morning my tube driver announced – at the same spot as last time – that Bank station was closed due to a security alert. This time I shuddered momentarily – concerned that more people would lose their lives. I glanced around and saw a similar concerned look on other faces. The bombs affected everyone who travels on the Tube. In reality only a small percentage were directly affected by the attacks but their effect is clear on all of us now.

London is and will continue to survive this attack. The actions of the Police and transport staff will continue to bring calm to travellers in moments like these and London commuters will continue to raise their eyebrows at security alerts and find alternative routes. We’re not especially brave (except those who were directly involved and now still have to get back on tubes and buses), it’s not a conscious “blitz spirit” that keeps us going, it’s just that’s what we’re good at – we keep going. In the absence of definite information the Spirit of London is to just get on with what we were doing anyway. We’ll complain to high heaven about rip-off prices and the poor services and yet still use them. We’ll moan about the grime but still drop litter. We’ll watch out for suspect parcels or people but need to be really sure before we pull an emergency cord. If London needs a motto – I suggest “Getting on with it”.

I am immensley proud to be a Londoner – more so after the bombings. My heart and prayers go out to those who lost loved ones or who were injured. My thoughts are with the security services as they go through the terribly difficult task of sifting through the evidence at the scenes and as they try to track down those responsible. But my heart is with London. I know of no other place that would have dealt with this in this way, not with public outrage or grief – not our style, but with quiet dignity and reverence to those gone.

London – Getting on with it.

There’s been an interesting post on Slashdot (a regular visit for me) recently regarding the use of Blogs as spam.

When somebody commented that they like to see a Google feature that filters out blogs a discussion ensued which included some comments about how asking people not to blog was against human rights (free speech) and also the First Amendment of the US Bill of Rights.

The US Bill of Rights aside (like much of the web I am not American and have never read it so I can’t really comment) as a human and a (very occasional) blogger I thought I’d comment on the idea that blogging is a human right (that of free speech).

Much seems to be made and held of certain (to use the US term) “inalienable” human rights we apprently have. These I am lead to believe include things like the right to life, freedom from tyrrany, freedom of speech, freedom of expression and freedom of religion (or not accordingly).

The problem I see with this idea of human rights is that the idea is worthless on it’s own. I can bang on to my heart’s content about my freedom to life but if someone runs me over my “right” is worthless. Okay so governments can protect against such a thing but only in theory. They could enconse in law the right to life and punish my killer but that would not actually ensure I get my right to life.

Now if we talk about Human Responsibility in place of human rights then it starts to make more sense.

• Instead of a right to life we have the responsibility to protect and care for it.
• Instead of a right to freedom we have the reponsibility to allow it.
• Instead of a right to freedom of speech we have the responsibility to listen and engage in dialogue.
• Instead of a right to freedom of religion we have the responsibility to respect other’s faith (or deliberate absence thereof) but live out our own.
• Instead of a right to blog we have a responsibility to blog respectfully.
• Instead of a right to have blgos exlcuded from our searches, we have a responsibility to exclude them (thus implying the search engines have a responsibility to give us this functionality, much as Google does with it’s safe-searching facility now).

And human responsibility can be legislated for just as much (if not better than) human rights. Murder is the deliberate choice to avoid the responsibility to protect and care for life.

I am a Christian and throughout my life I have heard that the Bible promotes human rights. This is generally because of passages that speak of social care for the ostracised. But by my reading those passages refer to a responsibility on the part of those that have to aid those that have not. There is no mention of a widow or orhpan’s “right” to be looked after. There is mention of the responsibility of the rest of us to do so. There is no mention of a mugged man’s “right” to a Samritan’s aid, there is mention of the responsibility of us all to help those in need.

One final big difference between human rights and human responsibility. It is possible to infringe on other people’s human rights without realising or meaning it. It is almost impossible to ignore your human responsibility by accident – you have to mean to do so.

Following my first time parents post in November, I am pleased to announce that we are now second time parents. My daughter was born in May and is very healthy and beautiful.

When I posted the original stuff about how first time parents can be overwhelming for those around them, I figured that second time parents were less so. Now we have our little girl I am afraid this is wrong. I have a feeling that all those emotions that go with having a child – the inability to keep your mouth shut, the grins and the regular updating your colleagues of every new “advancement” the little one makes – are just as valid for a second child. In fact it’s worse because now I find myself comparing “how he was at that age”!!

I imagine I must be very boring – if so why are you still here??