npDev

Sign all vbox modules

2017-06-01T23:27:00.000-07:00

for item in $(find /lib/modules/$(uname -r) -name '*vbox*' -type f -print | awk -F/ '{print $NF}' | awk -F. '{print $1}'); do echo "Working on $item" && sudo /usr/src/linux-headers-$(uname -r)/scripts/sign-file sha256 ~/vboxdrv.priv ~/vboxdrv.der $(modinfo -n $item); done;

iOS 9 Calendars out of sync - duplicate events - etc

2016-06-23T11:49:00.001-07:00

If you are experiencing exchange calendar even issues, try this "daily iOS calendar hygiene" steps:

This should fix:
- duplicate events
- missing events

done.

OSX Messages Fezz: Couldn't create saved chat path at /Library/Messages/Archive

2016-05-19T12:10:00.000-07:00

I could not see any pictures in my Message App but when browsing around my system logs, also found this:

If you are seeing these messages in your Console (100x of times):

5/19/16 11:58:45.499 AM Messages[3234]: [Warning] Fezz: Couldn't create saved chat sub-path at (null)
5/19/16 11:58:45.499 AM Messages[3234]: [Warning] Fezz: Couldn't create saved chat path at /Users/<username>/Library/Messages/Archive

Problem is apparently with this folder in /Library/Messages/Archive and Library/Messages/Attachments. The need to be deleted and recreated as folders, not files.

To get to Library/Messages on Mac, easiest method I found is: Finder -> Go -> (Press Opt/Alt on keyboard) -> Select "Library", then "Messages".

Enjoy using iMessage, part of benefits of all Apple ecosystem.

iCal remove clear event invites (without responding)

2016-02-22T13:18:00.000-08:00

Go from:

to:

with:

Git & completion in OSX

2015-05-05T11:29:00.000-07:00

Getting '-bash: __git_ps1: command not found' ? Lets get git installed correctly:

Expense reporting help with bash

2015-04-04T13:50:00.005-07:00

Part of the laborious expense reports is being able to sort / classify receipts by day.

Using this bash script can at least help to automate the "buckets" for your receipts:

for day in $(seq 16 27); do echo "Creating 03_"$day"_15" && mkdir "03_"$day"_15" ; done;

A trip from March 16 to 27.

Will post if I find some OCR api improvement. Do you have any recommendations for that part?

OSX IntelliJ or Eclipse says it needs Java 6

2014-06-03T09:07:00.000-07:00

1) Download Java 6 2014 from Apple:
http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1572

2) Install Oracle JDK 7
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/downloads/index.html

Troubleshooting
Missing libserver.dylib?. If you follow the above instructions you should not have this problem.

Other:
Installing Oracle JDK 7 by itself is almost good but not good enough for Apple OSX. Most apps do not complain.

Enjoy:
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/19563766/eclipse-kepler-for-os-x-mavericks-request-java-se-6

Low level shell commands replacement:
cp Info.plist Info.plist.backup
sudo emacs Info.plist

new file:
...
<     <key>JVMCapabilities</key>
<     <array>
<         <string>JNI</string>
<         <string>BundledApp</string>
<         <string>WebStart</string>
<         <string>Applets</string>
<         <string>CommandLine</string>
<     </array>
...

old file:

...
>                 <key>JVMCapabilities</key>
>                 <array>
>                         <string>CommandLine</string>
>                 </array>
...

Emacs insert new line in minimized CSV

2014-03-17T12:26:00.003-07:00

Minimized CSV file content:
"2013-01-12","test", "123","2013-01-12","test", "123","2013-01-12","test", "123"

to convert to CSV (new line at each "yyyy-mm-dd", "test" tuple):
M-x replace-regexp
$"[0-9]+",$
replace with: (new line insert)
\1<C-q C-j>n

Done

Hadoop on OSX

2014-03-17T07:45:00.002-07:00

To get Hadoop 2.+ working on OSX, not using brew, just a pure installation from Hadoop homepage follow this tutorial:

http://www.michael-noll.com/tutorials/running-hadoop-on-ubuntu-linux-single-node-cluster/
Seeing 'Unable to load realm mapping info from SCDynamicStore' use this step - You might have better luck with this setting, however my setup still complains about this.

Thank you for making these articles available for free. Click on some ads while you are there :)

Lenovo K1 How to add Google Apps?

2013-11-11T16:52:00.001-08:00

How to add Google Apps?

Are you looking for a simple answer on how to put Google Apps on your Lenovo K1 tablet? Did you just flash the updated Lenovo K1 stock image and noticed it had no Google Apps?

You should let me know how, a company of worth few billions of dollars manages not to give instruction how to do it easily?

Yes?

----------------------------

Few solutions for Lenovo K1:
Paper weight: use your Lenovo tablet to hold some papers in place. Or continue to sort the web (keep that google index fresh) how "monkey doodles" "ABC magic" and "super duper" trick you into downloading some spyware :D - Welcome to Android!
Hang it on a wall: when kids stop by - you could point to it and say - this is what happens when $ to maintain something like a Lenovo K1 Android port cost > benefit to Lenovo.

----------------------------
Bottom line with non Google products:
Do not buy another tablet unless it is of Google's Nexus brand - everything else is complete WASTE of your money!

I think I was saying the same thing 2 years ago. haha!

Removing VMs from VirtualBox gui

2013-11-06T06:39:00.000-08:00

Deleted files backing the VM? "Remove" option does not work?

edit /Users/<userName>/Library/VirtualBox/VirtualBox.xml and remove entries with the name of your VM. Removing options like LastSomethingSomething was safe to do in my experimentation but the main section is here:

<MachineRegistry>

<MachineEntry uuid="{ee2edf14-bc0f-4436-9cb2-beb983425c8f}" src="/Users/user1/VirtualBox VMs/ui_vm/ui_vm.vbox"/>

<MachineEntry uuid="{911ad5ce-a269-4549-8cdc-b1d8df47df72}" src="/Users/user1/VirtualBox VMs/ui_vm_w_ga/ui_vm_w_ga.vbox"/>

</MachineRegistry>

Disable click anywhere in IntelliJ

2013-07-15T11:48:00.002-07:00

If you are using this awesome IDE - it has an annoying default with virtual space!

Here is how to disable it: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/593214/how-do-i-turn-off-the-unlimited-whitespace-in-intellij-editor

Enjoy!

Enable Hibernate on Ubuntu 12.04

2013-07-12T20:08:00.002-07:00

Best article - stop wasting time and try out this tutorial:
http://www.howtogeek.com/113923/how-to-re-enable-hibernate-in-ubuntu-12.04/

Create custom shortcut for Anki on OSX

2013-06-02T10:13:00.003-07:00

Using this guide you can create an application shortcut and have it "open at login".

The command to run in "Run Shell Script" is:

/Applications/Anki.app/Contents/MacOS/Anki -b ~/Dropbox/Documents/Anki

OSX Open under Linux

2013-05-26T14:59:00.002-07:00

Tested under Ubuntu 12.04LTS

echo "alias open='nautilus $1'" >> ~/.bash_aliases

source ~/.bash_aliases

To make things more permanent, you might want to log out - in so that entire bash environment gets refreshed.

Access EC2 from Terminal on OSX

2013-04-22T10:32:00.001-07:00

Create/Append to ~/.ssh/config:
...
# EC2 Shared keys configuration
Host *.computer.amazonaws.com
User ec2-user
HostName *.computer.amazonaws.com
IdentityFile ~/.ssh/<your_pem_key>.pem
...

then just

ssh <hostNameEndingWithRegexInConfig>

Done.

Didn't work? Tell me about it in the comments.

Emacs favorites so far - (Work in progress)

2013-02-24T12:17:00.003-08:00

Shortcuts:
M-: - block comment
M-/ - auto complete from context
C-M-% - regex-replace
C-q <specialChar> - C-q <TAB>, <SPACE> inserts those special chars

Commands:
M-x whitespace-mode - see all the cursing characters... :-P
M-x man RET cmd - view a man page properly in emacs

Startup file location ~/.emacs Tip: Avoid too many non-standard configurations. Keep your configuration file small and lean. If you evolve and/or heavily modify your environment, it will be increasingly harder to stay productive when you move over machines and won't have access to your superCustomized.el

or

Hypothesis 1: make your file available through some http service. curl it down. run with emacs and watch for errors?
i.e. `emacs some option <yourConfig>.el` if $? == 1 { #don't move HEAD, latest emacs does not work }. You should let me know once you figure this out. :D

Reference links:
http://sachachua.com

Rename bunch of files with Python

2013-02-24T11:38:00.001-08:00

#!/usr/bin/env python

import os, re, commands

fileNameRegEx = '^([0-9])+'
pattern = re.compile( fileNameRegEx )

filesRenamed = 0

for f in os.listdir( '.' ):
match = pattern.search( f )
if match:
newFileName = "{0}.regex".format( match.group(0) )
print "Renaming {0} to {1}".format( f, newFileName )
statusTuple = commands.getstatusoutput( 'mv {0} {1}'.format( f, newFileName ) )
if (statusTuple[0] == 0): filesRenamed += 1

print "Total files renamed {0}".format ( filesRenamed )

Music - Above & Beyond

2013-02-07T07:26:00.000-08:00

A post completely? (almost) unrelated to programming, software engineering. Big fan of above and beyond podcast. (http://www.mixcloud.com/aboveandbeyond). Check it out, if you like electronic, trance music and code away that python <insertYourLangHere> script, class away.

Managing multiple identities with git and ssh

2013-02-06T19:25:00.003-08:00

If you have multiple git repositories, you should create an ~/.ssh/config file to reflect your "identities", here is mine:

# Default GitHub user
Host github.com
HostName github.com
PreferredAuthentications publickey
IdentityFile ~/.ssh/personalPrivateKey

# Work user account
Host supercode.com
HostName supercode.com
PreferredAuthentications publickey
IdentityFile ~/.ssh/my_workplace_companyPrivateKey

Reset MacOSX Lion Password from terminal

2013-01-29T18:06:00.000-08:00

Boot from Install Disc.

Open terminal.

$ resetpassword

Follow the gui and you are done.

This was really quick.

groovy with emacs on ubuntu 12.04 lts

2013-01-20T16:47:00.006-08:00

List of steps to get groovy syntax highlighting working with emacs:

1) Get all *.el for supporting syntax (this step assumes you have a configured github account, if false, you can manually download from github)

git clone git://github.com/russel/Emacs-Groovy-Mode.git

2) Create symbolic links to new .el groovy supporting files: (assuming you performed cmd 1 and in the same folder)

ln -s `pwd`/*.el /home/yourUserName/.emacs.d/

3) Create/append to init.el

(message "Loading emacs init.el")

;;;... <body of init.el> ...

;;; pick up modules into load path

(add-to-list 'load-path "/home/<yourUserName>/.emacs.d/")

;;; use groovy-mode when file ends in .groovy or has #!/bin/groovy at start

(autoload 'groovy-mode "groovy-mode" "Major mode for editing Groovy code." t)

(add-to-list 'auto-mode-alist '("\.groovy$" . groovy-mode))

(add-to-list 'interpreter-mode-alist '("groovy" . groovy-mode))

;;; make Groovy mode electric by default.

(add-hook 'groovy-mode-hook

'(lambda ()

(require 'groovy-electric)

(groovy-electric-mode)))

;;;... <end of body of init.el> ...

(message "Done loading emacs init.el")

(provide 'init)

3) On Ubuntu 12.04 LTS the default .emacs file is present but we need to load our newly modified /etc/<userName>/init .el

so:

rm ~/.emacs

ln -s /home/<yourUserName>/.emacs.d/init.el /home/<yourUserName>/.emacs

Optionally if you do not have your emacs configured, you will see 2 windows coming up. Make sure you enable inhibit start up screen option. That way your editor will always come up with the argument file or folder you passed.

If I missed anything, please let me know in the comments!

Happy Coding!

git-svn adventures

2013-01-16T09:44:00.000-08:00

Checkout:

How to correctly checkout an existing svn repo, following a standard svn layout:

git svn clone http://svnRepoAddress.com/project --stdlayout

verify that you can see branches from svn:

git branch -r

Checkout a branch (notice the appended "Local"):

git checkout -b featureBranchLocal remotes/featureBranch
If you are trying to create a branch, refer to this SO post.

git checkout featureBranchLocal

git svn rebase

How to revert a commit from SVN using git-svn (I recommend doing it in order from HEAD, top-down, haven't tried otherwise but it would seem you would be resolving unnecessary conflicts):

git revert <commitHash>

git revert <commitAnotherHash>

git svn dcommit

SVN should have applications of reverted commits.

Pull down new svn branches: Fetch

git svn fetch

Credit: SO posts: 1, 2, 3.

HTC Sensation 4G - TMobile stuck on ICS

2013-01-13T15:04:00.000-08:00

HTC and T-Mobile pretty much gave the finger to HTC Sensation 4G users. No Jelly Bean update. While it is infuriating to browse the countless Google Search results of garbage results, i.e.: how "monkey-balls" and "super-duper" solve your problems, I really just wanted simple, step by step guide on how to upgrade once and forget it.

Apps like Gmail should be run the way Google intended it to. HTC is better off devoting their resources to making some killer apps and monetizing on those efforts rather than making bunch of f* "glossy widgets".

Best, no-nonsense guide on how to effectively put Jelly Bean 4.2 (ok, OpenSensation is at 4.1.2, still far better than HTC stock image) on your phone:

Basic run down of steps:

Pay attention in guides to your phone's firmware version. The guide and links below mostly mention on how to do this without replacing the existing firmware.
Backup your phone. The adb command offers backup options as cli argument.

If you are reading this and thinking I need to spend $5 on Android backup software, just stop here and have your tech savvy friends take care of this "upgrade").

Unlock your HTC Bootloader from HTC Dev
Install 4EXT Recovery Image (see the 1st link, its basically a "high level, boot loader/rescue CD" for your desktop computer)
Download the custom image you want (link 1 from supporting links) and place it as zip on your sdcard.
Reboot into recovery (see guide 1st link) and navigate within the 4EXT to install from zip. (Make sure here you wipe any "cached" settings and format the system partitions. Getting this right means the difference between a stable phone and bunch of random resets and lockups.
Get the gapps (3rd supporting link) for your image/version.

Optional next steps:

Fed up with T-Mobile horrible service (your service is probably OK if you live in a dense, urban area)? Changing providers?

Get your phone IMEI # (behind battery)
Call them up while you have service, request your phone be unlocked. Classic excuse would be "traveling internationally".
Cancel service when you are ready. Verify that new sim works with your existing phone.

My cancelation fee per line is in ~$100-$150 (~half-off), so in most cases the earlier you cancel and start with some conservative plan, you will save money. ( $monthBill * 24 months > paying $100 a year of services like H20, Virgin Mobile or even (yes!) TMobile prepaid).

Update: Feb 27 2013

Jumping off carriers did not work for me as planned. The TMobile and HTC partnership goes through great lengths to lock you down to a network. Firmware on the phone is designed with that partnership in mind. It does some work to ensure that business is as usual. Best choices, I think, at this point are to get the $30 - unlimited data/text, 100 mins from TMobile. Its "month-to-month" still far better than my current bill of $130. Other "virtual operators" leasing TMobile service are probably good choices too.

Update: March 27 2013
Only issues so far is location. There were instances where enabling location without a phone reboot "dead locked" to the phone. Instant hangups and long pauses. The only "workaround" for this was to enable location and reboot the phone right away. Otherwise, there have been occasional lock ups but nothing major. Phone has been operating well for weeks.

Update: Jul 15 2013
Cancelled T-Mobile - after prepaid having essentially no "internet" data available this plan was ridiculous - for a smartphone. But TMobile knows this very well, that's why these plans are designed this way.
What am I using now? (with a new affordable phone from Ting.com)
Ting.com. ~$25/month - pay for what you use at very reasonable rates. 12 * $25 = $300 < 12 * $120 = $1440.

Update: Nov 6 2013
Looks like LycaMobile might get your GSM phone down to $16-20 monthly cost range. $8 for the sim/shipping. Know only 1 person that uses this, not sure what the service quality is.

Read carefully:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1631861

Supporting links:
http://tips4droid.com/top-5-custom-rom-for-t-mobile-htc-sensation-4g/
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1494373
http://goo.im/gapps
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1494373
http://files.tamcore.eu/android/?dir=pyramid

Good luck,

Choppy audio in Ubuntu 12.04

2012-10-13T20:53:00.000-07:00

This problem seems to affect ALC XXXX chips, it has to do with some wrong settings for pulse-audio. Try this to move forward:

Edit /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf:
And append this:
options snd-hda-intel model=generic

or try this one-liner:
echo "options snd-hda-intel model=generic" >> /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf

How do you know if you have this card?

bgs@dev1:~/Desktop$ dmesg | grep intel
[ 1.103778] intel_idle: MWAIT substates: 0x1120
[ 1.103793] intel_idle: v0.4 model 0x1E
[ 1.103794] intel_idle: lapic_timer_reliable_states 0x2
[ 20.411326] snd_hda_intel 0000:00:1b.0: PCI INT A -> GSI 22 (level, low) -> IRQ 22
[ 20.411378] snd_hda_intel 0000:00:1b.0: irq 50 for MSI/MSI-X
[ 20.411403] snd_hda_intel 0000:00:1b.0: setting latency timer to 64
[ 20.465477] snd_hda_intel 0000:01:00.1: PCI INT B -> GSI 17 (level, low) -> IRQ 17
[ 20.465480] hda_intel: Disabling MSI
[ 20.465508] snd_hda_intel 0000:01:00.1: setting latency timer to 64
bgs@dev1:~/Desktop$ lsmod | grep intel
snd_hda_intel 32765 6
snd_hda_codec 109562 2 snd_hda_codec_hdmi,snd_hda_intel
snd_pcm 80845 5 snd_usb_audio,snd_hda_codec_hdmi,snd_hda_intel,snd_hda_codec
snd 62064 24 snd_usb_audio,snd_usbmidi_lib,snd_hda_codec_hdmi,snd_rawmidi,snd_seq,snd_hda_intel,snd_hda_codec,snd_hwdep,snd_pcm,snd_timer,snd_seq_device
snd_page_alloc 14108 2 snd_hda_intel,snd_pcm
bgs@dev1:~/Desktop$