How cool is this: I just bought a new webcam, from the second-hand shop near my home, on the way home from work. Brought it home, plugged it into this computer and it worked immediately: no need to install drivers or configure anything, just started the software and there I was smiling back at me from the screen. And this is on Linux!
It’s Ubuntu 7.04 to be precise. The Linux version of Skype doesn’t do video so Nic and I used Yahoo Instant Messenger (at her end) and Kopete (at mine) to connect with video while Skype provided the soundtrack and everything worked seamlessly straight out of the box.
I’m celebrating the wonderful world of open source software development. Thankyou everyone who has worked hard to make this stuff just work.