Muaad Elsharif's Blog

WhatsApp is a popular texting message, and Telegram is an alternative of WhatsApp that has gained mainstream interest after the acquisition of WhatsApp by Facebook. While being really similar in features, I'll be comparing them head to head so readers can have a decision!



At the core, both applications are similar, they both serve the same purpose, chat apps!
There are some differences, let's take a look at them!
I made a table of comparison based on information availableat the moment.



Key points
While being very similar, whatsapp's killer edge is having voice calls, the option that Telegram doesn't have and doesn't plan on adding them to it's feature set.
WhatsApp is many times more popular than Telegram, so it has a wider user base, and the devices supported by WhatsApp are much more than Telegram! (supports older model Nokia Asha and Symbian but only until the end of 2016!).
It requires updating very often and it's hard to manage on a limited internet connectio…

BlueGriffon is back to a steady path of development after being marked inactive by Alternativeto.net this time version 2.0 is in the works and recently a first preview version was posted on-line.
It released 1.8 in October and now 2.0 is under development!


I've downloaded the version and tested it on Ubuntu, what I noticed immediately is hat the color scheme is different, and that the toolbar that has been carried along since the days of nVU (one of the earliest open source web author systems).




It enhanced the way that panes are displayed, instead of being awkward pop-up windows now it implements tabs which make better use of the screen.

This version isn't fully functional and far from complete, but I had to break in the good news!
What I really hope for (and I suggested this to the developers already) that a PPA would be used (personal package archive) that way BlueGriffon will be isntalled easily and updated with the system automatically, and catograized peroperly within the …

Over the course of the last weeks I've been making change happen by playing around with interfaces, now I'm left with the buggy Cinammon interface and the two login screens bug.


I began downloading Gnome 3.12, it took a while using these commands:
$ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gnome3-team/gnome3 $ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gnome3-team/gnome3-staging $ sudo apt-get update $ sudo apt-get dist-upgrade $ sudo apt-get update
To add some extras:
sudo apt-get install bijiben polari gnome-clocks gnome-weather gnome-maps gnome-music gnome-photos gnome-documents gnome-contacts epiphany-browser gnome-sushi gnome-boxes gnome-shell-extensions
That didn't work. Then I realized I need to download Gnome full from Ubuntu software center That I did, a total of 436 MB





The lock screen thing wasn't resolved, one page suggested a full uninstall of lightfm-gtk-greeter
I did that, and it won't log in any more!!
I had to open the system live mode and it didn't fix it, even by download…

WhatsApp is changing it's payment policy to become totally free, before the first year was free and you had to pay 0.99 cents each year, but that is long history now!





In a recent blog post, the company addressed the current payment plan, they admitted the plan wasn't going well, as many users didn't have credit cards or debut cards (I for one don't have one of those), and those people were wondering if they were going to lose service after the first year. This lead to the change we all witnessed, WhatsApp is free now!

You might be wondering, and it's a very legitimate question, how is WhatsApp going to pay for it's services?

It's not going to be paid by ads, it's paid by "testing tools" for communicating with organizations and companies, so in another way WhatsApp now is a beta and you are the tester!

It's not bad, my concern is the privacy policy as it's owned by Facebook, if you want a truly secure messenger, there is Telegram.

I think a …

Last week I posted about wanting some change by changing the interface, and took a look at several interfaces, this post is the second part, where I actually chose an interface and got down to business.

I decided to go with Cinnamon, it's visually appealing and the download size is relatively small (51.4 MB). My only concern was reading online that it's buggy and has many problems. But I was willing to take a chance!
At first I installed Cinnamon using these commands
This command is to add the repository to my system.
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:lestcape/cinnamon
This command is to update and install.
sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install cinnamon.

After the first reboot I had Cinnamon as an option on the login screen, which still looked like it was in XFCE and I had to enter my password twice! (it's a common bug actually!)



I figured that deleting Xubuntu will fix my problem, so I began deleting Xubuntu, once and for all!
I used several commands to make sure th…

I've blogged about FDM in this blog before, being the best free download manager, and the alternative for IDM, and that it could replace uTorrent on your computer (and if you are using uTorrent, please remove it, it's malicious!)< and the continue broken downloads using mirrors even if the server doesn't support it!

I have a need for change lately, I have been shaking things up and reordering things here and there . I believe its healthy. Amongst the changes decided to do some remodeling on my computer.


As you may know I use Xubuntu Linux and Windows 8.1 side by side as a dual boot. And since I just reverted back to Windows 8.1 (coming back from Windows 10) there is no need to mess around that. So it was time to take a look at my Linux distribution.

I have been using the same interface for quite some time now (since April 2014 to be specific) and that seems like a very long time to spend around one interface.
XFCE works well and I configured it to work like I want. Using Docky and Kupfer to do my daily tasks. And it works too well I'm afraid!
XFCE is a minimalistic interface who focus on performance rather than visual appeal, that's a polite way of saying it looks awful but works well.
The blue scheme is depressing! I felt a sudden urge to change the scenery ( not just editing the them…

السلام عليكم كنت قد نوهت في تدوينة سابقة أنني سأقوم بترجمة برنامج CodeLobster إلى اللغة العربية لفائدة الشركة، ويسرني أن أعلن أنني قد أتممت ترجمة النسخة والحمد لله، وأتمنى عليكم تجربتها وإطلاعي بأية أخطاء إن وجدت وإرشادي لمواطن النقص فيها.

There has been a lot of news this week, too small for a separate post each, but together you can have a collection of news!

Ubuntu 16.04, code named "XenialXerus" -A fancy word for hospitable squirrel - is just around the corner, and a torrent of cool news and amazing vibe is in the air! Here I have some news about the newest edition to the Ubuntu family:


The software center won't be included in Ubuntu 16.04, instead it features "Gnome Software".Empathy and Brasero are also retired and won't be shipped along 16.04.It is announced that Ubuntu 16.04 will have Kernel 4.4 the latest stable kernel published yet!Alpha version of the new 16.04 is available for download, please not that this version is for test purpose only, and not for daily use on your machine!Ubuntu 15.04 support ended already, if you are using it please upgrade to Wily Werewolf 15.10 to continue getting updates and security patches. And, a single piece of Windows news ..
Windows 8 support ended o…

Yes, I've made it! 
I didn't plan this far ahead, I didn't even prepare a speech! *Whips out a speech!!

It's been a terrific journey, reaching to this point was a dream when I started blogging 4 years ago, now that I'm here. I'm thinking of the next summit to climb.




You will notice a new "minimalistic" theme, how do you like it?


Thanks for being a regular reader and supporter, and I will see you in a new milestone soon enough!

Random question, has anyone missed the Game of the week column? 

Update: I'm putting podcasts on hold for now, too much effort with zero reward!

السلام عليكم في ظل تغطيتي الخاصة لعملية إصدار الجوازات الليبية الجديدة (الإلكترونية) لفت انتباهي خبر جديد!
لمتابعة كل المقالات السابقة حول إصدار الجوازات الرجاء الدخول على هذا الرابط للجزء الأول، الجزء الثاني، الجزء الثالث.