Fedora does not contain Chromium, the google based browser. There is a repo available for this, and the author of the repo explains that Chromium does not meet Fedora’s quality requirements. It is hard to work out where the code comes from, but google take and modify (forking) other packages frequently, and barely document what they do.

To be fair, when Google forks an upstream project in chromium, they do write a README.chromium which summarizes the changes that they made. This is technically, better than nothing, but much in the same way that swimming in a pool full of angry, underfed, electric eels is better than nothing when you’re desperate for a quick swim.

If you want a stable version of chromium, I would go here. Be aware that there is not a fedora 21 version available.

And this brings me to the two nightmare vendors. One is adobe: they make two usefully irritating programmes — flash and acrobat. This is one place where it better to avoid the vendors. I would use gnash — which should cover those sites that have not moved their codecs to html5 — and use one of the many open source pdf viewers.

I run Revman for Cochrane work, and this requires Java. You can get Jave 7 up: it does not run with Java 8. This is best done using the proprietary package, and you can have parallel versions of Java (in fact, it is generally a good idea, as some programmes require different versions).

One is now left with working on eye candy, and getting the laptop into running the graphical programmes it will need to use.

Two final notes. I’m fairly worn out, and using glasses: I see better with contacts. But the new fonts on the new, matte screens modern laptops have made reading far easier, and being able to read what you are typing makes a difference.

The second comment is that these machines run cooler, which means that the nocturnal editor is not attacking the keyboard.

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Update

You may not be able to download Chromium as you can on a debian box, but Google has packaged Chrome, and the install is seamless. In addition, you can install dropbox and back everything up from the website, and that works seamlessly.

When you have wifi. Note for Kiwis — use a Spark stick or SIM when travelling, as this will allow you to connect to their wifi system that runs out of every phone booth. Me? I’m working next to the wiseless modem which is connected to the home broadband node.