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    • Wake Forest, NC, — 2025-09-20
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1

Book Update

April 4, 2026
2

Fedora Prix Fixe Menu Gives Flexibility

April 2, 2026March 28, 2026
3

Why Linux Matters More Than Ever in 2026

March 31, 2026March 27, 2026
4

“Using and Administering Linux” Book Progress Update

March 29, 2026March 29, 2026
5

Use FreeDOS to learn about computers

March 26, 2026
6

From ‘Obsolete’ to Opportunity: How Five Old PCs Found New Purpose

March 20, 2026March 19, 2026
7

Fedora 44 Coming Soon

March 18, 2026
8

VirtualBox Problem Solved

March 16, 2026March 17, 2026
9

Is there a better Pi Day than March 14?

March 14, 2026March 14, 2026
  • Home
  • Jim Hall
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jhall

Jim Hall is an open source software developer and advocate. His first contribution to open source was in 1993 with a patch to GNU Emacs, but he is probably best known for his work on FreeDOS, the open source version of the DOS operating system, and for his work on usability in open source software. In addition to writing open source software, Jim also writes about open source software, including Both.org and All Things Open, and about technical writing at Technically We Write.
Curiosity Programming Tips and tricks

3 ways to read files in C

There’s the simple way, and there’s the fast way. Let’s compare.

Jim Hall
May 17, 2024May 15, 2024
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Command Line Fun Linux

Using ‘grep’ to play a word game

You can use regular expressions to match letters and patterns, to help you play a letter game.

Jim Hall
May 13, 2024May 9, 2024
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FreeDOS History Open Source

MS-DOS 4.00 released as open source software

Why it’s important that Microsoft released this old version of MS-DOS.

Jim Hall
May 1, 2024April 26, 2024
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History Programming

Writing your own ‘fmt’ program

Learn a little programming to write tools that do things the way you want to do them.

Jim Hall
April 20, 2024April 14, 2024
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Bash Fun Programming

Learn Bash by writing a number guessing game

Learning a new programming language can be a fun exercise.

Jim Hall
April 14, 2024April 5, 2024
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Code Community Fun

Temporary fixes that become permanent

We asked our community for their stories about a “quick fix” that became a permanent one.

Jim Hall
April 13, 2024April 11, 2024
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Command Line Linux Storage Management System Administration

Tweak your system performance with ‘noatime’

Turn off “access time” to make a slight but noticeable improvement on system performance.

Jim Hall
April 11, 2024April 5, 2024
Read More
Fixing problems Web Server

How to debug a web server error with ‘wget’

The wget command line tool can provide detailed information about what’s happening on a web server.

Jim Hall
April 10, 2024April 5, 2024
Read More
FreeDOS Linux VirtualBox

How I boot FreeDOS using QEMU

QEMU is a fast and flexible virtual machine that you configure using command line options.

Jim Hall
April 8, 2024April 2, 2024
Read More
Linux Open Source Software Programming

Exploring the history of technology

Learn about these important milestones in computing history as you experiment with writing your first program.

Jim Hall
March 22, 2024March 16, 2024
Read More
Bash Command Line Tips and tricks

Using ‘if’ in a Bash script

Writing a short Bash script can save typing lots of instructions at the command line.

Jim Hall
March 15, 2024March 15, 2024
Read More
Community Curiosity

How to write your first article

Open source is for everyone! And at Both.org, we encourage everyone to share their open source journey.

Jim Hall
March 6, 2024March 6, 2024
Read More
Fun Programming

Draw a heart for Valentine’s Day

With a bit of programming, you can draw your own Valentine heart in graphics mode on FreeDOS.

Jim Hall
February 14, 2024February 3, 2024
Read More
Community Open Source

Looking ahead to 30 years of FreeDOS

Learn about the origins of this classic open source operating system.

Jim Hall
February 10, 2024February 10, 2024
Read More
Community Programming

You don’t need a computer science degree to work with open source software

Open source makes software knowledge accessible to anyone, so formal training isn’t the only path to a technology career.

Jim Hall
February 1, 2024January 23, 2024
Read More
Open Source Tools

Teaching technical writing with open source

In addition to my work as a consultant, I also teach a few courses on technical writing. One of these is a course about writing...

Jim Hall
January 8, 2024December 28, 2023
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Posts pagination

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Random Quote

Not until a program has been in production for at least six months will the most harmful error be discovered.

— Troutman’s Programming Postulates

Why I’ve Never Used Windows

On February 12 I gave a presentation at the Triangle Linux Users Group (TriLUG) about why I use Linux and why I’ve never used Windows.

Here’s the link to the video: https://www.youtube.com/live/uCK_haOXPFM 

David Both ATO Interview

Last October at All Things Open (ATO) I was interviewed by Jason Hibbits of We Love Open Source. It’s posted in the article “Why today’s AI isn’t intelligent (yet)“.

“systemd for SysAdmins” Now Available

May 13,2025

My latest book — a #1 New Release on Amazon — “systemd for Linux  SysAdmins” is now available from my publisher, Apress, and on Amazon.

Technically We Write — Our Partner Site

Our partner site, Technically We Write, has published a number of articles from several contributors to Both.org. Check them out.

Technically We Write is a community of technical writers, technical editors, copyeditors, web content writers, and all other roles in technical communication.

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  • Computers 101
    • Hardware 101
    • Operating Systems 101
  • End of 10 Events
    • Wake Forest, NC, — 2025-09-20
  • Linux
    • Why I use Linux
    • The real reason we use Linux
  • My Linux Books
    • systemd for Linux SysAdmins
    • Using and Administering Linux – Zero to SysAdmin: 2nd Edition
    • The Linux Philosophy for SysAdmins
    • Linux for Small Business Owners
    • Errata
      • Errata for The Linux Philosophy for SysAdmins
      • Errata for Using and Administering Linux — 1st Edition
      • Errata for Using and Administering Linux — 2nd Edition
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