Languages !

Gosh ! why are there so many languages ! Personally I feel the world can do everything with just c. All these new languages are interesting ... but to me as long as there is c++ and java, everything else is just for hobbyists !
Python is getting traction because of google .. otherwise there are so many languages out there ...
I used to work on python in 2001, now ... well should i try it out again ? Maybe !

Netbeans & ubuntu 11.04 with KDE

Well i am always amazed at how great netbeans has got to become ! Its certainly a pleasure , it has been working efficiently for the small things i have been doing , i am officially supposed to use eclipse as we have the .project and .classpath files, though i guess its time .. i try netbeans for official work too ! But ah .. there are so many things. ..

Jdk 7 beta released ! awesome ... well done ...

Well tired of unity - somehow i feel compiz has become a beast ! , i am not finding kwin to be better ! am on KDE at home ... (kubuntu .. thought ubuntu treats everything else other than unity .. badly), but KDE has been working fine ... No hangs etc !

canonical launchpad !

launchpad is an awesome platform .. it enables development , collaboration, bug reporting etc ... its an awesome collaboration platform , however small quirks

If you unsubscribe a bug by mistake, there is no way to resubscribe to the bug, even if you had raised the bug .. solution wait for the LOSA's to reenable it for you !

Firstly if I have raised a bug, there should be no way to unsubscribe from the bug, obvioulsy because i raised it .. i would want to know the status, otherwise why would i raise it in the first place. Even if i have to unsubscribe, most likely in cases where i raised the bug on behalf of someone, it should warn me and force me to give the name of some other person on my behalf who will represent the bug owner !

Strange, small issues ..

xournal pdf editor

awesome pdf editor (though really like an image editor).

on ubuntu/debian systems
sudo apt-get install xournal

open xournal and then open pdf .. then make changes. Not really like adobe writer .. but we can edit pdf ...

gnome-do is great !!!!

I have been using gnome-do and trust me its the best productivity tool i ever had ... always looking for something similar .. got if for the first time.

If you are on ubuntu ...
sudo apt-get install gnome-do


and read the tutorial (online) and see how powerful it is.

ubuntu 11.04 customizations

some customizations ...
1. sudo apt-get install elementary-icon-theme murrine-themes ttf-droid
2. Change the icon theme .. its great.
3. Install (sudo apt-get install gnome-do) its a great application , launched by super+space. It can be used to launch apps, browser url and files.

-- more to come ---

ubuntu 11.04 fresh beta - installing skype 2.2 beta

Well here you go .. after a long time skype has finally released an update of its software for linux !! thanks skype finally ...

To install in general you need to first make sure you have th dependencies .. First download the deb from skype website
1. Try this
$ sudo dpkg -i skype-ubuntu_2.2.0.25-1_i386.deb
I got some error at the end ...

So i did this
$ sudo apt-get install -f
This resolves all the missing packages and installs them for you.

Now repeat
$ sudo dpkg -i skype-ubuntu_2.2.0.25-1_i386.deb

It will be successful !

Gnome3 and Fedora 15 rawhide

Alright , i am on fedora now ! Do i like it .. definitely, i havent seen a crash for the past 2 days i have been using, it is pretty stable. The only issue i have is with gnome 3 usablity. It is pretty stable and looks great, but it has left out a lot of customizations that a user used to have ..

Some of them

1. Cannot change themes (Nothing at all) except background wallpaper.

2. I dont think i like the notifications system, it just pops up and then dies down .. until we go and put our mouse in the bottom right corner .. that is bad design ... as there are times i am not in front of my computer and when i come back , i am not sure if there are notifications, so i have to go and see .. and that is repeated every 2-3 mins .. it is important to leave the decision to end user !

3. Still seeing how to activate screen saver ...

More updates soon, the only thing i really like is the stability ... it is sort of crash free ... touch wood !

ubuntu 11.04 beta

well, come on .. why does compiz crash so often ! But good, that it restarts, there were times in alpha, i was logging into unity with a wallpaper .. nothing else .. that shows up ! :)

ssh and scp slow to prompt for password ubuntu 10.10

I had my ubuntu very slow in giving me password prompt .. i had a tough time to fix it. But here is the solution - my issue checked via ssh -vv was a delay in gss.

$ sudo vi /etc/ssh/ssh_config

Uncomment or add

GSSAPIAuthentication no

GSSAPIDelegateCredentials no

Thats it ... now run your ssh and scp, they should prompt for password immediately (ssh loads the config from ssh_config). Atleast that was my issue .. people did ask to change sshd_config and restart sshd , but that didnt help, i had to do it in ssh_config.

ZAGG invisibleSHIELD is a scam

Something worth just 1-2 dollars they sell for 25$. It is bad , i ordered two iPhone 4 skins it took 10 days to come to my place . cost me about 52$ and what do i get ? Two motorola droid full body skins ! So i called them .. wait time 40 mins .. yes i was on call for 40 mins . finally i was given an RMA and told to return , but with a tracking method , and well you guessed it right, they said i have to pay for the return shipping .. well crazy , i think it was their fault they should return me the money for shipping too .. I realized they are there to make huge profits thats right .. they are cheats .. AVOID them at all costs. I have ordered from best skins ever which is 7.99$ a piece, lets see how that order goes through.

ubuntu 10.04 good .. but sad due to kernel issues

My dell studio 1555 always has some issue or the other with kernel. 2.6.31 which came with ubuntu 9.10 did not allow me to change brightness .. ACPI bug. Now that it was fixed in 2.6.32 i was happy with lucid alpha's , but later i came to know that when i was resuming my computer from sleep, it was having ACPI thermal was having an issue, so it shows 0 temperatures, hence fan doesnt start, so the computer runs very hot for some time and then dies. Very very bad. Now yes the fix is in 2.6.33 , but hey ubuntu sticks to 2.6.32 and i dont think there is a plan to backport .. well this is the problem with open source development, it is good, but it leads to lot of bugs and noone responsble for anything. ACPI bugs are not acceptable with laptops in play. So the solution !!! Back to windows !!! yay
Or rather i will try the daily kernels and upgrade my kernel.

No backup in Vim

Ever wondered why these files with *.*~ get generated and if there was a way to avoid that ?

1. Open vim
2. Esc : e $MYVIMRC
3. add the following lines after the "source " commands.
set nobackup
set nowritebackup
4. esc : wq

Thats it .. now your vim should stop writing backup files.

bluetooth in ubuntu started working !!!!

I am surprised at the accidental solution.

I run ubuntu and i was never able to get the bluetooth working. I went into windows (since i have a dual boot), and i saw that i didnt install the drivers, so i installed the drivers there and then i rebooted into ubuntu and viola , bluetooth works :) looks like the card got enabled when i installed the drivers on windows ! I am sure its not a firmware kind of thing that went into the drivers .. but who knows, this could be the only documented case where windows driver in windows installation, causes a device to working in ubuntu linux !!! Convergence isnt it.

[solved] USB powered on during suspend/sleep

I had a problem with my laptop where my USB powered laptop cooler was on even when the laptop was on sleep.

To solve this its pretty simple... on dell studio 1555

In bios, there is USB, and disable the option that says "Wakeup on suspend" . Thats it .. on suspend, next time USB will also sleep.

Goldman Craps no Sachs and other such companies ???

I dont understand the rationale behind such huge bonuses. They are stealing money - sort of. I would say when they consider bonus as a way of retention, then i think the problem can be solved easily if govt restricts the maximum bonus to realistic values. So if someone gets 300K bonus in GS, that person cannot go to any other place for want of better bonus as there is a limit. So now people will value the company for what it is and they will be loyal to it. For now its loyalty to money and thats what they see, after doing an MBA , is that what they are taught ? What sort of ethics are they working on ?

Why Google OS ? Why not Ubuntu

I think i am in love with Ubuntu, having used it for a long time, coming back to using it with 9.10 i have really liked it more and more ... I think we dont need a new OS, we need someone to build a standard OS like ubuntu. Google OS is only for netbooks and its not for PCs and if people think its the future .. yes we already have the future, we have linux distributions. All we have to do is start using it, then automatically you will find hardware manufactures building drivers for it.

I am using Dell studio 1555 and ubuntu 9.10
- I have a lexmark X2600 all in one printer and i got the driver from lexmark website and it works great, just took seconds to install, it was much faster than standard windows install.
- My SD card was recognized and i was able to read it, out of box.
- Everything works, except bluetooth, which i will check.
- Brightness control issue has been rectified with new kernel which is in RC stage.
- I have been using it for the past 5 days didnt have to restart even once. Windows 7 had to be restarted more than once a day, thanks to issues with flash player and skype not working.

Google Wave - Crap ?

Here are the different emotional stages i went through

Stage 1 - Begging for invites.
Stage 2 - Now i have an account, what do i do, i need more friends to join.
Stage 3 - Wait for others to join.
Stage 4 - Start waves to discuss on what to do with waves.
Stage 5 - Boring ....
Stage 6 - Forgot i have a Google wave account ...

This is too much. I hate being kept in suspense only to see i cannot do anything with it.. Looks like lot of people in world like wasting time.

Lost Trust ? Indians huh .... AMWAY SCAM ...

I am tired of the pestering indian desi's who are scouting for "AMWAY" "QUIXTAR" talents !!! I have lost trust now, any indian approaching me in a store , it feels as though everyone is running behind with a business and want to recruit you ... so simply whether its your business or anyone elses business , whether you are amway or any other company thats hiding behind it or looking like it .. Some do it alone, some involve their wives into it ... please please STOP THIS , dont let people lose trust on each other .. i am sure now i will be very critical and aggresive if someone tries to befriend me for a business idea ... stop the scam.

ubuntu 9.10 the best ever

I am impressed by ubuntu 9.10 to be true, it just worked out of the box, everything works .. my machine is dell 1555 studio and yes everything works ... (except i have to activate bluetooth) . Since i have ATI graphics i might have to hunt for ATI linux drivers. Otherwise this is probably the only linux version (even from ubuntu) that works out of the box (sound, brightness, suspend etc). ...