Yep, you're right! The author works for Gitorious too.

Despite the fact that this is a Microsoft blog, the content is about the furthest you can get from MS-centric development. Everything he endorses is open source, from sources other than Microsoft. It's kind of amazing.

Actually it's Linux Mint 10, but same Gnome setup :) (Also, Mint is just a slightly different wrapper on top of Ubuntu).