Renewable energies + energy efficiency, free and open-source software + Linux:
technological alternatives website
technological alternatives website
Recent updates:
- 12/09/2022 : CV de Samuel BENOIT (update)
- 01/10/2020 : Conditions Générales d'Utilisation (update)
- 12/06/2017 : Contact (update)
- 12/06/2017 : Contact (update)
- 19/03/2017 : Accueil principal (update)
- 28/09/2016 : Présentation (update)
- 29/04/2012 : Art numérique (update)
- 06/02/2012 : Autoentrepreneur et Google Adsense (update)
- 27/06/2011 : Les arnaques de l'énergie (update)
- 24/06/2011 : Digital artwork (update)
Welcome ! You've reached my website, which mostly deals with technological alternatives in energy and computing : renewable energies and energy efficiency, free and open-source software. English is not my mothertongue (I'm French) ; editing a website is quite a lot of work so I actually mostly develop the french section of this website. A few international (english) webpages are available, though. They're usually about free software and Linux.
I wish I had time to write about energy and sustainable development as well, but I'm afraid I won'tbe able to do so until I'm retired (which, if ever it occurs one day, will be quite a long time from now...). But be my guest and don't hesitate to contact me if you think I might help in some way or another.
The following is an approximate translation of the original french homepage (sorry for my english…). Therefore it deals with some topics I won't write about in english in the near future, but I think you could be interested in knowing what this website originally talks about, and why.
Two different technical domains, but surely a common purpose
Although energy and software engineering are quite different technical domains, they have one thing in common : in my opinion they could be called "citizen technologies". Somehow they are sustainable technologies, in the "sustainable development" point of view, because they are based on a decentralised and mutualised vision of our society : sharing wealth and knowledge, acting in favor of the common good are what they aim at.
These technologies are opposed to "classical" ones, such as fossils fuels (oil, natural gas, coal, uranium), and proprietary software. These are controlled by a very few corporations, somewhat in a monopoly way, fortunately they are now slowly declining. These "classical" technologies are based on extensive use of finite fossil fuel resources and proprietary software, which are consequences of industrial and market policies : they aim to make the consumer dependent on their products and services, and discrediting all possible alternatives.
Those companies sells services as products, whereas energy and computing should be considered as publical services which Mankind should be able to take advantage of, in a fair and equal way. Yet, most countries, be they industrialised or not, have policies which lead to some kind of public services pillage in favour of huge, private corporations. This causes troubles to the end-user (read: consumer, or citizen), who has virtually no other chice but to pay for something (s)he deserves. Yet, THERE ARE alternatives. One should be aware of those…
Energy: real solutions, wrong solutions
Far from pretending to provide some kind of political critics or analysis, through this website I try to:
- explain what challenges Mankind will have to deal with in the coming centuries, from an energy point of view;
- try to sort out the very many potential solutions, in order to find which ones are the most suitable, with respect to their advantages and drawbacks.
"Are solar energy, wind power, hydropower, nuclear energy, geothermal power, energy from biomass some kind of answers to the 21st century energy and environment crisis?"
Free software and Linux: towards a collaborative society
Free software (free as in free speech, not as in free beer…) or open-source developpers make their code available to the public. Big free software projects (GNU/Linux operating systems, KDE desktop environment, office suite OpenOffice.org, etc.) are developed through collaborative communities. Software developers and very differents contributors (translators, graphists, ergonomists, etc…) are all around the world and they all take part to innovative qulaity software creation, which is (mostly) free of charge.
Despite Microsoft®'s monopolistic strategy, free and open-source software gain more and more computer users : they slowly realise that computing doesn't necessarly means Windows® (or Apple MacIntosh). Some big industrial companies (Intel®, Sun Microsystems®, Dell®) are aware of this, and start to invest in free software projects.
While Microsoft® vainly tries to fight against software piracy by dissuading users from copying its software, free software communities allows software sharing and copying.
I'm no IT engineer, my sole purpose is to share my computing experience as a free software user. Via this website, I'll try to:
- provide a few tips and trick to computer users interested in free software, by explaining advantages and drawbacks of these technologies, and mentioning useful resources;
- mention what challenges are potential threats to free software and computer users, such as software patents, copyrights, and personal data protection.
"What's free software ? What's good in it ? What for ? What do I need to know before I try to get deeper into it?"
About the author…
I am an engineer in energy and thermal processes, specialised in renewable energies. I currently work in Besançon (France) for ENERGICO, an energy engineering firm, specialised in renewables and energy efficiency. Through my job I deal with energy challenges and solutions every day. Developing this website is a hobby. I use KDE desktop environment, provided by Kubuntu GNU/Linux distribution, to create this website. I don't pretend to be an expert in any way. I just like my job and computer. Therefore I tried to combine both. This website may be considered as the result of these two hobbies.
This website is yours as well. I don't pretend to build another community, but your comments, suggestions, questions are welcome.
Please be my guest. Have a nice, wealthy time browsing this website.
Page keywords
computing, energy, energy efficiency, environment, GNU, home, Kubuntu, Linux, renewables, Samuel BENOIT, UbuntuLinks on this page
Internal links |
http://samuel.benoit.online.fr/en/home
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