I have abandoned the Fedora Core 17 distribution, the me-tv software is not available and I could not get the source code to compile. That program worked perfectly on Linux Mint 12, but when I installed the Linux Mint 13 distribution it would not work properly at all. Presently I have finished installing Ubuntu 11.04 to replace the Fedora Core 17 distribution and the me-tv application worked perfectly. I just need to install the other required software and my desktop will be complete. But why is some software broken in new versions of the Linux distributions? They should not release new versions of packages until they have been properly tested; that is what happened with the KDE 4.0 release, the software was bloated and slow in the 4.0 release and it was not ready for the mainstream, but it was put out in various distributions anyway and that gave a negative impression of the KDE desktop environment, which is actually very good in the KDE 4.8.3 releases. It is not very good if the newest Linux packages are released in a broken state just to have a new version available and showing off cutting edge software. Linux is supposed to be all about stability and reliable software and it is not good if it is actually shipping with a television viewing application that does not work. The new client-server mode that me-tv uses does not work at all. Please fix it.
But the older software in the Ubuntu 11.04 distribution does work quite well and with the Xubuntu-desktop packages, the desktop is very quick and responsive. The newer software is not always the best. Ubuntu 11.04 is supported until October 2012 anyway, so it is still worth using. After you type sudo apt-get install ubuntu-restricted-extras your multimedia playback is taken care of easily. I installed the multimedia codec packages on Fedora 17 and I still could not playback videos using the Indeo video codec, and VLC could not playback restricted formats either. That is no very useful, VLC is supposed to be able to playback any video format and having it crippled is not really useful at all. This reminds me of the Apple corporation that is forcing Google to cripple the Android operating system so that it will not compete with their own iOS operating system they are deploying on their new devices. That is anti-competitive, I prefer Android to the Apple operating system, the Android OS uses the Linux kernel and you can install a wide variety of software to perform any task imaginable. That is the strength of the Linux kernel, it is flexible enough to be part of a new mobile OS and create some very useful devices. The Samsung Galaxy S3 is a miniature computer you can fit in your pocket, that is not a new idea, but the amount of computing power we have now is far above the older pocket computers.
The Casio FX-702P is one of the first pocket computers, it retailed from 1981 to 1984 and used a single line LCD display. The later Sharp PC-E500S was a better model with a multi-line LCD display and 32 kilobytes of RAM which could be upgraded to a total of 96 Kilobytes. This is a pretty impressive device for the time. You could attach a printer and there were serial ports available for expansion. A far cry from the Samsung Galaxy S3 that has a 1.5 Gigahertz dual-core CPU and a maximum of 2 Gigabytes of RAM depending on the model, this is a lot of memory for a mobile phone and there is either 32 or 64 Gigabytes of internal storage with a 64 Gigabyte version to be available on the international market. There is the capability to add a MicroSD card to the device allowing up to 64 Gigabytes of storage to be added. Plus 50 Gigabytes of storage space on Dropbox is available for purchasers of the device. The specifications of the device are impressive and it would be a very powerful digital assistant on the move. There is an interesting article here: http://www.rarst.net/hardware/pocket-computer-fail/ that gives an interesting perspective on the mobile computing revolution. A mobile phone with Opera mobile is a very capable Internet browser and does support a wide range of websites. The default web browser on most mobile phones is not always the best but replacing it with Opera Mobile or Opera Mini is a good choice.