Much of the talk leading up to the 2004 Presidential Election centered around how the internet was being used by then hopeful Howard Dean in raising money.  Ironically, it was a video clip and a sound bite file being shared that brought his campaign back down to Earth.  The nation also witnessed a major bi-product of McCain-Feingold Act.  The 527 groups funded by George Soros literally paid people to spread their displeasure with the Commander-in-Chief across the web throughout the campaign.  As was shown with the exit polling of 2004, however, data and truth do not always go hand in hand.

At this point, I would ask all of the Diebold conspiracy propagators to hold their tongues.  Election officials of the past have cheated by stuffing ballot boxes in Chicago or tossing them out in the Bay, but it's quite another thing to commit widespread election fraud and then cover it up.  Now what is happening in this year's primary elections is taking place quite out in the open and it is not fraud.  In what Rush Limbaugh has dubbed as "Operation Chaos" republicans are voting for Senator Hillary Clinton who trails Senator Barack Obama in the bid for Democrat Party nomination for President.

Why does America's #1 rated radio talk show host want fellow conservatives to vote for a Democrat?  It's quite simple— revenge.  He believes that democrats crossed over to vote for Senator John McCain to give him a victory in New Hampshire and edge out former Governor Mitt Romney.  That gave McCain the initial momentum to secure the Republican Party nomination, so effectively democrats influenced the election.

It is debatable whether Operation Chaos has made a difference in the Democratic Party outcome thus far.  Polling records indicate that Senator Obama received more votes from republicans in Texas.  Still with Senator Clinton winning both Texas and Ohio the race is far from over.  And that is exactly what Rush had in mind.  Some of the adverse effects on the democratic nomination process include increased media scrutiny of both candidates.  For Senator Obama this has meant having to explain his political ties to indicted individuals and more recently his personal beliefs in contrast with what was preached from the pulpit of his church.  Senator Clinton has faced the pressure of having to admit that she lied about being in the line of fire on the trip to Bosnia.  She has also suggested that delegates pledged to Senator Obama could vote for her instead. And this is the party that frequently decries voter disenfranchisement?

Perhaps the least covered aspect of the democratic nomination process is that party has been unable to use the media coverage to their advantage against the future Republican Party nominee.  Both the Democratic Party candidates and their supporters are facing criticism on all sides and it has nothing to do with the issues.  Senator McCain, on the other hand, can point to their lack of experience and integrity.  He can say that Democratic Party candidates do not understand the reality of the threats facing America.

Now in addition to voting for an opposing party candidate, fine upstanding conservatives are answering the call to become state delegates for the Democratic Party.  Rush Limbaugh says that he has his staff working on an encrypted form of communication that can be transmitted via cell phone.  By stringing out the election, there is a small chance that a text message to undercover delegates could promote further confusion.  Wouldn't it be interesting if the Democrats in Congress reauthorized the provisions of the Patriot Act just so the government could monitor activity surrounding the Democratic Party Convention?  To counter traffic analysis, Rush stated plaintext messages with potentially self-incriminating information could be sent to the cell phones of unsuspecting delegates.

With most of the media moguls on their side, it is unlikely that democrat leaders would allow such a scenario.  Recently one of them put forth the idea of having former Vice President Al Gore step in.  I'll repeat the question.  Is this the party that frequently decries voter disenfranchisement? Operation Chaos is in full swing.

People have heard of Linux, but most don't know much about it.  Even if you are a die-hard fan of other computer operating systems such as Apple's Mac or Microsoft's Windows you should know two things about Linux.  One it is the operating system now used widely across the internet to bring you all kinds of information.  Two it is the operating system embedded into many of the latest personal electronic devices.

If you work with computers on a daily basis and didn't know about Linux, don't feel bad.  Up until now if you were to browse the shelves of almost any store in the U.S. it is unlikely that you would come across it.  You see Linux is not the product of one company.  It is the work of thousands and thousands of computer programmers all over the world.  Some are paid by their employers while others volunteer their time with the hope that their combined efforts will provide a better computer platform for everyone.  If that sounds idealistic, you are right, it is.  And guess what...  You can download and run Linux for free.  Like Mozilla's Firefox web browser, Linux is open source software.

At this point, I am not going to argue the technical merits of Linux.  Companies are adopting Linux in droves because it is both free and easily customized to meet their computer needs.  As a curious person you might want to get a copy and install it on a computer you own for similar reasons.  Think of all the money spent in the purchase of  a new computer.  Sure you bring it home and then you have to go out and buy more software just to get it to work for you.  Today you can go down to Wal-Mart and buy a computer with Linux and many compatible software applications pre-installed for approximately $200.  Yes, I'd venture to guess that this is roughly 10% - 20% of what you would spend to get a desktop computer from an Apple Store or pre-loaded with Windows Vista.

What you do with your computer is your own business.  A lot of people these days are just sending email and using a web browser to manage their finances and read the news.  To you, I say, why not use Linux?  Many of the sites that bring you the news are running Linux too.  Google, for example, uses Linux to crawl the web and provides you with results from their search engine.  I can't remember the last time when there was news of Linux being susceptible to computer virus.  The more I think about it the more I realize why Linux is right choice for me.

Desktop environments such as KDE and GNOME make things easier for computer users, but as desktop environments become more and more integrated, some users may feel stuck with a graphical interface that was designed for someone else. Having to use the mouse over and over for the same thing can get old real fast. Keyboard shortcuts help to pick up the pace in some applications, but neither KDE nor GNOME really lends itself to keyboard navigation. Luckily, for those who want to combine the efficiency of the command line with all the resolution of the X Window System, there's a window manager called ratpoison.

The ratpoison window manager has a keyboard-driven interface similar to GNU
Screen. It's policy is to show the window, the whole window, and nothing but the window. There are no borders or title bars, as windows are sized to fit the display.
Getting it installed

Since ratpoison does not have any large library dependencies, it should be fairly straightforward to install. Download and extract the compressed archive. Installation is the standard configure, make, and su to make install. If the make command can't find readline header files on your system, use the disable-history option that's documented in the configure help.

After installation, you can type which ratpoison at the command prompt to find the path to the application. From a virtual terminal, type startx followed by the full path to ratpoison to see it in action. For systems that have a graphical login, the default display may be active, so you may have to type something like startx /path/to/ratpoison -- :1 to get going.

Those more familiar with point and click can take comfort in the startup message ratpoison displays in the upper right corner: "Welcome to ratpoison! Hit `C-t ?' for help." Holding the control button down while pressing t is the ratpoison Command key. (After you press it the pointer turns into a square.) This keystroke precedes ratpoison commands, thereby insulating them from keystrokes handled by applications. Now type ? to get help.

The help screen lists all of the ratpoison key bindings. Each key binding is followed by the full command name. The command can be entered at the colon prompt. For example, pressing C-t : and typing help root also shows help. Toward the bottom of the list are some duplicate commands; for instance, to display the version of ratpoison, C-t v will work just like a C-t C-v combination. These extra bindings prevent error messages from becoming a nuisance when you're typing in a hurry.
Window and frame management

It can take some time to become accustomed to ratpoison's interface. You can view how ratpoison is managing windows by pressing C-t w. The Program Bar at the top of the screen shows a number to the left of each window's title. You can enter that number after typing C-t to bring up the associated window. Although you could hit C-t 0, C-t 1, C-t 2, and so on to cycle through the windows sequentially, there are other options. To see the next window, you can choose between C-t n, C-t Enter, and C-t < space >. Return to the previous window by pressing C-t p. You can delete the current window by typing C-t k or hide the windows by typing C-t -. When an application is running in more than one window things can get confusing. Enter C-t i to show information for a single window.

What about viewing more than one window at a time? Well, windows can be divided up among frames. Press C-t s to split the display into two frames, one above the other. When there are more windows than frames, some of them will be hidden. You can still use C-t Enter to cycle between windows and press C-t Tab to switch the focus of the current frame. Typing C-t S splits a frame into two frames, placed side by side. Of course, the more frames there are, the more windows you can see at the same time. Press C-t f to see the number of each frame. Immediately typing the associated number switches the current frame accordingly. Simply typing C-t F shows the current frame. A C-t R combo will remove a frame, while C-t Q removes all but the current frame.
Less is more

Shawn Betts, ratpoison's primary developer, and his colleagues did not design ratpoison to be compliant with any desktop framework. Nevertheless, most applications work fine under ratpoison whether they require the mouse or not, but for additional flexibility, ratpoison offers a tmpwm command to open another window manager. It's particularly useful when it comes to handling multi-window applications such as the GIMP.

For more information, browse through the project's excellent documentation. To make ratpoison your default window manager, put exec ratpoison on the last line of your .xinitrc file for a while and find out how it works.

It's nice to discover another way to deal with windows. For X users who lean toward the keyboard, ratpoison provides a useful command-line interface.

Note:  Article was originally published at Linux.com on September 07, 2004.