Many people do not realise that their computers can spend most of their time doing nothing. They are just waiting for you to press a key or something. It's only when running games or other intensive tasks that the processor is really pushed.

Various people have had the bright idea to use this spare capacity to solve difficult problems. One of the best known projects is SETI@home that analyses radio signals for signs of alien intelligence. I ran that briefly, but have dedicated much more time to distibuted.net (mathematical proofs and code-breaking challenges) and grid.org (medical research). I've clocked up several years of processing for each of them.

I don't get paid for this or anything, but I like the feeling that I am contributing to possibly worthwhile causes. I've recruited others to the cause and am always trying to bring in more people. For grid.org I started a team called Whizz for atomms (a Gerald Searle reference). Feel free to join us.

I know some people will worry that these programs could pose a security risk, but I'm very wary myself. I check various forums for any potential issues before installing anything. I've not heard of issues with either of these. Some people have found that they can affect their PC performance, but I've not noticed this. Mail me if you have questions.

Bob has been thinking about trying some form of VOIP (internet telephony) to save on his phone bills. I had heard good things about Skype so he installed that. They offer fairly reasonable rates to most countries and free calls to other PC users. I installed it on my Linux box too. That worked, but needed some help from the forums to get the sound working. We tried some PC->PC calls, but it kept having problems with delays that gradually got worse. The sound quality was good though.

Simon pointed me at 18866 who offer 1p UK calls and similar internation rates on a normal telephone. That may be worth a play to cut our bill, but it's never that massive anyway.

Bruce Schneier is one of the world's top computer security experts and a man who talks a lot of sense. He has just published his updated list of ways to keep you computer and data safe here.

I go along with most of that, but I'm not quite as paranoid as him. Maybe I've been lucky or I could have been hacked without knowing about it. My move to Linux should help matters a little, but I still need to be careful.

Generally the internet is fairly safe if you stick to sites you know with good reputations. Have a read of his hints and you should be okay.

Let's be careful out there.

I've been working almost entirely with Linux as a main OS for a couple of weeks now. It's stable and does what I need. It's a learning experience. I have to work out how to install things, i.e. packages, compiling from source etc. I'm even getting my various peripherals working.

Mozilla provide Firefox (web) and Thunderbird (email) as I was using on Windows. Both have reached version 1.0 now and work well.

OpenOffice continues to satisfy my word processing and spreadsheet needs.

GnuCash replaces Quicken to the limited extent I use it.

gPhoto talks to my Kodak digital camera. I'm still sorting out a tool to organise the resulting pictures. My Sipix webcam does not seem to be very well supported on Linux.

Psi works in the same way as on Windows for Jabber, MSN and other chat networks. As with my email I can use GPG to keep my communications private, as long as the person at the other end uses it too.

My Canon i455 printer is partly working using a driver for a different printer, but it comes out a bit faint. There is no specific driver for mine apart from the commercial Turboprint. I used that on the Amiga many moons ago. I may consider it if there is no alternative. I need to get the scanner working, but I believe my Epson is supported.

I've been trying some simple programming using Python. It's a neat little language that I want to learn. So far I've just done a bit of encryption, but one day I may write proper applications with GUI etc, just for fun.

So generally it's going well. The rest of the family can use it without having to know it's not Windows. The kids still have a Windows 98 PC for games and web. The other PC is still awaiting fixing, but can be persuaded to boot when needed. I have lots of data on there that will not fit on the others. I need to invest in bigger disks, but that's for after Xmas.