Paul's Digital World

Fixing XFCE sound in Ubuntu Jaunty 9.04

2009-05-03T00:06:00.001-07:00

Not really sure what happened there so I probably need some feedback.
The situation is that I have one of those weird HP laptops with the NVidia video card and realtek sound card. The sound works perfectly with Gnome but when I switched to XFCE, the applet went grey.

The solution is: I followed this guide half way through and I clicked the applet and chose HDA NVidia... PulseAudio mixer. And there is sound!

However, the volume control buttons that worked in Gnome don't work yet.

HP laptop = nightmare?

2009-05-02T13:34:00.000-07:00

Recently, I got hold of a HP laptop and here's the awkward experience.

The laptop is a HP tx1000, or more precisely a downgraded version without the touchscreen and stylus and with the product number, it is identified as tx1215nr.

I got it from a friend because he was absolutely unable to boot it and everything stops with a blank screen before the BIOS logo etc. I usually fixes stuff! I searched on google like crazy and found a post by a Taiwan guy. I followed his instructions by turning the computer on and keep it in the towels for an hour. (That's his standard. Mine didn't get that hot the first time and I had to make it hotter with more blankets and turning it on twice because it turns off automatically when over heated). I can't find the post right now but he explained it helped the mal-soldering of the nvidia video card.

I have only had one boot problem ever since (and I was scared...) but I've noticed a lot of problems with this designs. Two people out of the ones I know have had HP laptops without problems. A few others have had broken hard drives and motherboards. The motherboard or video chip is not HP's fault possibly but I think they do have responsibilities in not thoroughly testing their products out. Of course, the problems usually appear after a year (the same time warranty expires, sad coincidence...). And below I list a few things that I noticed that should be improved (just out of common sense...) (And I believe I'm not the only one having problems with HP designs, Shiny gave very sad reviews on youtube about tx1000 too).

1. I got rid of Vista asap because it is too slow, and the CPU is generating so much heat(cf. 2). There are not alternative drivers to download, so now that I'm dual booting XP and Ubuntu. XP sometimes fails to shutdown and the quick launch buttons become useless.

2. Sort of along the same line as 1, HP gives so little space for configuration and I'm talking about this in comparison to Dell. There's nothing you can do in the HP BIOS whereas in a Dell computer, you can turn off unused devices like a modem and other on-board devices. You can turn off nothing and as mentioned in 1, drivers are not provided. So very little space for configuration and I don't understand the reason. I guess they chose pissing off customer over pissing off business partners.

3. AMD processors give out too much heat. Definitely not suitable for smaller laptops. I don't know if HP got a great contract from AMD or not, I think running Vista on this computer with average work load for a few hours is certainly going to ruin the laptop in about a year. And I don't know why the engineers didn't realize it. The CPU temperature is constantly above 60 or 70, or more. The Dell Inspiron 1300 runs much more smooth and causes much less problems under XP and it has so much less processing power. So with so much more to do so much less, I'd definitely say it's definitely a design flaw.

HP just have so many REDUNDANT things like the touchpad lock. Other computers don't have it but we seldom run into troubles. I'm glad your touchpads are sensitive but we have to fiddle with the button all the time... Just design a soft lock and count characters per 5 seconds typed and if it is above a threshold, then disable the touchpad. I wonder if some other companies already have it.

Well, HP did let us format the hard drive and reinstall other systems easily at least on this laptop (which is even untrue or some others). I don't know what is going on with HP's designs but the HP laptops just seem to have the worst of all others but no highlight of their own.

Note: For those who are using smplayer in Linux or mplayer for windows, if it doesn't show videos, go to preferences->general->video tab and change dx(fast) to gl(fast). Then it'll work.

Winedt shortcuts

2009-04-23T03:43:00.000-07:00

Winedt seems a decent software after I discovered a few great shortcuts. I liked the one where you type alt+g and type Greek letters easily. I was surprised to discover that there isn't a decent list of shortcuts for Winedt after a search on google.

Below, I put mine down and I think there should be more useful ones (Macros?) like a shortcut to type $$ and put the cursor in between and I'll share and post it after I discover how to do that.(Please comment if you know how...). Furthermore, other shortcuts to move the cursor like in Emacs would be useful. I know I'm an Emacs maniac (fan?) but it is just so much easier to move around with your hand focused on the center of the keyboard without having to reach for the up down left right buttons...(Don't know how to set them yet, gotta find the correspondence of keys and the numbers in the settings file...)

WinEdt Shortcut List (Readonly)
===============================

Thursday, April 23, 2009 at 18:31
C:\CTeX\WinEdt\WinEdt.ini
Number of Shortcuts: 197

BkSp Shortcuts|Backspace
BkSp+Alt Alternatives|Undo
BkSp+Ctrl Shortcuts|Delete Word Left
BkSp+Shift Shortcuts|Backspace + Shift
BkSp+Shift+Alt Alternatives|Redo
BkSp+Shift+Ctrl &Search|&Bookmarks|Move Ring &Backward
Del &Edit|&Delete
Del+Ctrl Shortcuts|Delete Word Right
Del+Shift Alternatives|Cut
Del+Shift+Ctrl &Search|&Bookmarks|Move Ring &Forward
Down Shortcuts|Line Down
Down+Alt &Edit|&Change Case|&Toggle Case
Down+Ctrl Shortcuts|Par Down
Down+Ctrl+Alt &Edit|&Change Case|&Lower Case
Down+Shift Shortcuts|Select Line Down
Down+Shift+Ctrl Shortcuts|Select Par Down
Down+Shift+Ctrl+Alt &Edit|&Change Case|Toggle &Character
End Shortcuts|Go To End Of Line
End+Alt Shortcuts|Screen Refresh
End+Ctrl Shortcuts|Go To End Of File
End+Shift Shortcuts|Select To End Of Line
End+Shift+Alt Shortcuts|Clear Right
End+Shift+Ctrl Shortcuts|Select To End Of File
Enter Shortcuts|Enter
Enter+Alt &Macros|&Activate
Enter+Ctrl &Tools|&Complete Word
Enter+Ctrl+Alt &Tools|&Thesaurus
Enter+Shift &Tools|Check &Word
Enter+Shift+Ctrl Shortcuts|Enter (%%)
Esc Shortcuts|OK
Esc+Shift Shortcuts|Cancel
Home Shortcuts|Go To Beginning Of Line
Home+Alt Shortcuts|Screen Center Line
Home+Ctrl Shortcuts|Go To Beginning Of File
Home+Shift Shortcuts|Select To Beginning Of Line
Home+Shift+Alt Shortcuts|Clear Left
Home+Shift+Ctrl Shortcuts|Select To Beginning Of File
Ins Shortcuts|Insert
Ins+Alt Alternatives|Append
Ins+Ctrl Alternatives|Copy
Ins+Ctrl+Alt &Edit|&Format|Format &Paragraph
Ins+Shift Alternatives|Paste
Ins+Shift+Ctrl &Edit|&Format|&Select Paragraph
Ins+Shift+Ctrl+Alt &Edit|&Format|Format &Document
Left Shortcuts|Char Left
Left+Alt &Edit|&Move / Fill|Move &Left
Left+Ctrl Shortcuts|Word Left
Left+Ctrl+Alt &Edit|&Move / Fill|&Remove String
Left+Shift Shortcuts|Select Char Left
Left+Shift+Alt &Edit|&Format|Flush &Left
Left+Shift+Ctrl Shortcuts|Select Word Left
Left+Shift+Ctrl+Alt &Edit|&Move / Fill|R&emove Comment
PgDn Shortcuts|Page Down
PgDn+Alt Shortcuts|Screen Line To Bottom
PgDn+Ctrl Shortcuts|Go To End Of File
PgDn+Shift Shortcuts|Select Page Down
PgDn+Shift+Ctrl Shortcuts|Select To End Of File
PgUp Shortcuts|Page Up
PgUp+Alt Shortcuts|Screen Line To Top
PgUp+Ctrl Shortcuts|Go To Beginning Of File
PgUp+Shift Shortcuts|Select Page Up
PgUp+Shift+Ctrl Shortcuts|Select To Beginning Of File
Right Shortcuts|Char Right
Right+Alt &Edit|&Move / Fill|&Move Right
Right+Ctrl Shortcuts|Word Right
Right+Ctrl+Alt &Edit|&Move / Fill|&Insert String...
Right+Shift Shortcuts|Select Char Right
Right+Shift+Alt &Edit|&Format|Flush &Right
Right+Shift+Ctrl Shortcuts|Select Word Right
Right+Shift+Ctrl+Alt &Edit|&Move / Fill|Insert &Comment
Space+Ctrl &Tools|&Next Bullet
Space+Ctrl+Alt &Tools|&Insert Bullet
Space+Shift+Ctrl &Tools|&Previous Bullet
Tab Shortcuts|Indent
Tab+Ctrl &Window|Next MDI Window
Tab+Shift Shortcuts|Unindent
Tab+Shift+Ctrl &Window|Previous MDI Window
Up Shortcuts|Line Up
Up+Alt &Edit|&Change Case|&Initial Capitals
Up+Ctrl Shortcuts|Par Up
Up+Ctrl+Alt &Edit|&Change Case|&Upper Case
Up+Shift Shortcuts|Select Line Up
Up+Shift+Alt &Edit|&Format|&Center
Up+Shift+Ctrl Shortcuts|Select Par Up
F1 &Help|&Contents and Index
F1+Alt &Help|&Macro Manual
F1+Ctrl &Help|&Keyword Search
F1+Shift+Ctrl &Help|LaTeX &Doc...
F2 &Window|&Cascade
F2+Alt &Window|Arrange &Icons
F2+Ctrl &Window|Tile &Vertically
F2+Ctrl+Alt &Window|Mi&nimize All
F2+Shift &Window|Tile &Horizontally
F2+Shift+Alt &Window|&Restore All
F2+Shift+Ctrl &Window|Ma&ximize All
F3 &Search|Search &Again
F3+Alt &Search|&Next
F3+Ctrl &Search|Ne&xt Difference
F3+Shift &Search|&Previous
F3+Shift+Ctrl &Search|Pre&vious Difference
F4+Alt &File|E&xit
F4+Ctrl &File|&Close
F5 &Tools|Next &Error
F5+Ctrl &Tools|&Spell Check...
F6 Popup Menu: Circumflex
F9+Ctrl &Macros|Execute Macro Script...
F9+Shift+Ctrl &Macros|E&xecute Current Macro
F10 &Tools|Restore Selection
F10+Ctrl &Tools|Global &Return
F10+Shift &Tools|Mark Selection
F10+Shift+Ctrl &Tools|Global &Mark
F11 &Search|&Bookmarks|&Caret <-> Select
F11+Alt &Search|&Bookmarks|&Mark
F11+Ctrl &Search|&Bookmarks|&Go To Mark
F11+Ctrl+Alt &Search|&Bookmarks|&Reset Selection
F11+Shift+Ctrl &Search|&Bookmarks|Se&lect From Mark
F11+Shift+Ctrl+Alt &Search|&Bookmarks|&Set Selection
F12 &Search|&Delimiters|&Match Delimiter Scope
F12+Alt &Search|&Delimiters|&Auto Check
F12+Ctrl &Search|&Delimiters|&Delimiter Check
F12+Ctrl+Alt &Search|&Delimiters|&Quick Check
F12+Shift &Search|&Delimiters|&Slow Check
F12+Shift+Ctrl &Search|&Delimiters|&Match Delimiter
'+Ctrl Popup Menu: Acute
'+Shift+Ctrl Popup Menu: Umlaut
,+Ctrl &Window|&Next Window
,+Shift+Ctrl &Window|&Previous Window
.+Alt &Macros|Play Macro &Once
.+Ctrl &Macros|Repeat &Last Command
.+Shift+Alt &Macros|Play &Macro
0+Ctrl Bookmarks|GOTO 0
0+Shift+Ctrl Bookmarks|Mark 0
1+Ctrl Bookmarks|GOTO 1
1+Shift+Ctrl Bookmarks|Mark 1
2+Ctrl Bookmarks|GOTO 2
2+Shift+Ctrl Bookmarks|Mark 2
3+Ctrl Bookmarks|GOTO 3
3+Shift+Ctrl Bookmarks|Mark 3
4+Ctrl Bookmarks|GOTO 4
4+Shift+Ctrl Bookmarks|Mark 4
5+Ctrl Bookmarks|GOTO 5
5+Shift+Ctrl Bookmarks|Mark 5
6+Ctrl Bookmarks|GOTO 6
6+Shift+Ctrl Bookmarks|Mark 6
7+Ctrl Bookmarks|GOTO 7
7+Shift+Ctrl Bookmarks|Mark 7
8+Ctrl Bookmarks|GOTO 8
8+Shift+Ctrl Bookmarks|Mark 8
9+Ctrl Bookmarks|GOTO 9
9+Shift+Ctrl Bookmarks|Mark 9
=+Alt Popup Menu: Bookmarks
=+Ctrl Bookmarks|Toggle Line Numbers
=+Shift+Ctrl Bookmarks|&Toggle View
A+Ctrl &Edit|&Select All
A+Shift+Ctrl &Accessories|&AMSTeX
B+Shift+Ctrl &Accessories|&BibTeX
C+Alt &Edit|&Append
C+Ctrl &Edit|Cop&y
C+Shift+Ctrl &Accessories|&Compile Selected
D+Shift+Ctrl &Accessories|&DVIPS
E+Ctrl &Search|&Errors...
E+Shift+Ctrl &Search|&Hide Errors
F+Ctrl &Search|&Find...
F+Shift+Ctrl &Document|&Home Folder
G+Alt Popup Menu: Greek
G+Ctrl &Search|&Go To Line...
G+Shift+Ctrl &Accessories|&GSView
H+Ctrl &Document|&Get Folder...
H+Shift+Ctrl &Document|&Set Folder...
I+Ctrl &Search|&Incremental Search...
I+Shift+Ctrl &Accessories|Make &Index
K+Ctrl Shortcuts|Delete Line
K+Shift+Ctrl Shortcuts|Clear Line
L+Ctrl &Document|&LOG File
L+Shift+Ctrl &Accessories|&LaTeX
N+Ctrl &File|&New
N+Shift+Ctrl &Document|&New Document...
O+Ctrl &File|&Open...
O+Shift+Ctrl &Document|STD &Output File
P+Ctrl &File|&Print...
R+Alt Popup Menu: Edt RCS
R+Ctrl &Search|&Replace...
R+Shift+Ctrl &Accessories|&Run...
S+Ctrl &File|&Save
S+Shift+Ctrl &Accessories|DVI &Search
T+Ctrl Shortcuts|Transpose Chars
T+Shift+Ctrl &Accessories|&TeX
V+Ctrl &Edit|&Paste
V+Shift+Ctrl &Accessories|DVI Pre&view
W+Ctrl Shortcuts|Toggle Wrap/NoWrap
W+Shift+Ctrl Shortcuts|Format Paragraph
X+Ctrl &Edit|Cu&t
X+Shift+Ctrl &Accessories|Te&Xify
Z+Ctrl &Edit|&Undo
Z+Shift+Ctrl &Edit|&Redo
`+Ctrl Popup Menu: Grave
`+Shift+Ctrl Popup Menu: Tilde

*** Double Shortcuts:
=====================

R+Alt Popup Menu: Edt RCS
A+Alt &Addition
D+Alt &Deletion
E+Alt &Erase Tagged String
M+Alt &Mark
R+Alt &Remark
T+Alt Remove &Tag

F6 Popup Menu: Circumflex
6+Shift &^
A &a
A+Shift &A
E &e
E+Shift &E
I &i
I+Shift &I
O &o
O+Shift &O
U &u
U+Shift &U

'+Shift+Ctrl Popup Menu: Umlaut
'+Shift &"
A &a
A+Shift &A
E &e
E+Shift &E
I &i
I+Shift &I
O &o
O+Shift &O
S &ss
S+Shift &ss
U &u
U+Shift &U
Y &y
Y+Shift &Y

`+Shift+Ctrl Popup Menu: Tilde
/+Shift &?
1+Shift &!
A &a
A+Shift &A
C &c
C+Shift &C
N &n
N+Shift &N
O &o
O+Shift &O
`+Shift &~

`+Ctrl Popup Menu: Grave
0+Shift &}
0+Shift+Ctrl &]
9+Shift &{
9+Shift+Ctrl &[
A &a
A+Shift &A
E &e
E+Shift &E
I &i
I+Shift &I
O &o
O+Shift &O
U &u
U+Shift &U
\+Shift &|
` &`
`+Shift &~

'+Ctrl Popup Menu: Acute
' &'
A &a
A+Shift &A
E &e
E+Shift &E
I &i
I+Shift &I
O &o
O+Shift &O
U &u
U+Shift &U
Y &y
Y+Shift &Y

G+Alt Popup Menu: Greek
A &alpha
B &beta
C varepsilon (&c)
D &delta
D+Shift &Delta
E &epsilon
F phi (&f)
F+Shift Phi (&F)
G &gamma
G+Shift &Gamma
H t&heta
H+Shift T&heta
I &iota
J varsigma (&j)
K &kappa
L &lambda
L+Shift &Lambda
M &mu
N &nu
O &omega
O+Shift &Omega
P &pi
P+Shift &Pi
Q psi (&q)
Q+Shift Psi (&Q)
R &rho
S &sigma
S+Shift &Sigma
T &tau
U &upsilon
U+Shift &Upsilon
V &varphi
V+Shift &vartheta
W chi (&w)
X &xi
X+Shift &Xi
Y eta (&y)
Z &zeta

=+Alt Popup Menu: Bookmarks
-+Alt Goto &Previous Bookmark
0 (Un)Set #0
0+Alt Goto #&0
1 (Un)Set #1
1+Alt Goto #&1
2 (Un)Set #2
2+Alt Goto #&2
3 (Un)Set #3
3+Alt Goto #&3
4 (Un)Set #4
4+Alt Goto #&4
5 (Un)Set #5
5+Alt Goto #&5
6 (Un)Set #6
6+Alt Goto #&6
7 (Un)Set #7
7+Alt Goto #&7
8 (Un)Set #8
8+Alt Goto #&8
9 (Un)Set #9
9+Alt Goto #&9
=+Alt Goto &Next Bookmark
A+Alt Clear &All Bookmarks
C+Alt &Clear This Bookmark
H+Alt &Help
L+Alt &List Bookmarks
S+Alt &Set Next Bookmark

Edit:

As for the emacs specific actions, I found this article:
Emacs key bindings everywhere which enables you to use the emacs movement shortcuts everywhere after you activate(compile it and put a shortcut in the startup folder). Nice!!! Thanks Dave (the script creater)!

How to change firefox to whatever language you like

2009-04-22T01:20:00.000-07:00

Pretty much useless unless you know firefox so well that you know what the menu items are, then you can impress your friends choosing a weird language. I just know more than one languages :D, so I changed the language-pack from time to time.

Go to http://releases.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/releases

Pick the right release

Go to the \xpi folder

pick the language-pack you want and click on the xpi to install.

then type about:config in the addressbar, find general.useragent.locale and edit it to the corresponding language code.

what to do if a folder is named with a colon

2009-03-07T07:16:00.000-08:00

I used partition magic to merge two of my drives. I didn't know I was going to name the folders, so I named one D: , one E:. Then I have problem opening two drives load of stuff. Fortunately, I found a solution in the end. So what do you do if you have a colon for your folder name.

The solution is simply Linux! I tried several Windows tools. The data recovery tools work to "recover" your data but you might not have that much space to copy them and it wastes a lot of time. The commander type softwares don't work either. The reason is in windows, colon is used as an "alternate data stream" symbol. But in Linux it is not.

So just find a Live Linux distribution like Ubuntu and plug it into your cd-rom. Mount the windows drive and change the folder's name because Linux had no problem handling folders with names with colons. If you know some Linux, you know what to do already. If not, leave a question. (It may take me a long time to reply, so the simplest way is probably search for how to mount a windows drive in Linux, there will be tons of answers.)

MPlayer channel redirecting

2008-09-21T05:08:00.000-07:00

Just keeping it for the record if I ever need it again...

-af channels=1:1:1:0
channel from(1) : to (0) : from(1) : to (0)

Linux partition size

2008-07-20T14:58:00.000-07:00

I found an old saved txt on optimal partition sizes of Linux. We now have (relatively) huge hard drives and Linux supports big hard drives and partitions but I was wondering if the old way would give a performance boost. Anyway, just to keep the record.

/boot 20M (a separate partition because of recommendations of various versions too) (Maybe 128M now?Let me see how big grub is next time. And I think I saw somewhere that this should use ext2.)

Swap twice the memory (red hat recommendation)(Or most of the time, with 1G memory, Linux won't normally use swap at all. So if you have a lot of memory, 1G could be enough)

/var (Saves log and email files. not very useful for home users. 1G?)

/home however much you need...

/usr give it a lot of spaces, 8G, softwares are saved here (or just put it all together with /)

How to get rid of the startup screen in portableapps softwares

2008-07-20T13:06:00.000-07:00

How to get rid of the startup screen in portableapps softwares

Suppose you're getting rid of the splash screen of software X from portable apps:

in the folder, find other then source folder, then there's Xportable.ini
copy it into the top level folder (same as Xportable.exe)
then open it with notepad, change the value of disablesplashscreen to true

Mouse Scrolling in VMware

2008-05-29T21:55:00.000-07:00

Just for the record:

edit: /etc/X11/xorg.conf

Scroll down (it’s not far, perhaps 20 - 30 lines) till you see a block that looks like this:

Section "InputDevice" Identifier "Configured Mouse" Driver "vmmouse" [.. blah blah blah ..] EndSection

Replace that whole section with this:

Section "InputDevice" Identifier "Configured Mouse" Driver "vmmouse" Option "CorePointer" Option "Device" "/dev/input/mice" Option "Protocol" "ImPS/2" Option "Buttons" "5" Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5" EndSection

from http://peterc.org/2008/64-how-to-enable-vertical-mouse-wheel-scrolling-in-ubuntu-hardy-on-vmware-fusion.html

Can we put the emacs team to develop an office software?

2008-03-22T09:34:00.000-07:00

I'm frustrated with Microsoft Office.

I'm been writing an article and editing it on word. But the efficiency is so low. I miss the emacs days when you get through everything with a few shortcuts. Even something close to vi would work...

I even tried Office 2007. Quite some improvements with the menu layouts etc. But still...I want emacs style editors. The problem is the slow users don't really care about the shortcuts anyway, they just click through the menus but those who want it, I don't think the current design is sufficient.

And even with OpenOffice, which is supposed to be for Linux geeks, they're still as childish as MS office...

Miranda IM, simply the prettiest

2008-02-25T18:10:00.000-08:00

Miranda IM is a msn messenger replacement.
I've been using it for a while, it supports MSN, AIM, Gtalk, etc. I've mentioned its functionalities in my favorite softwares post, but behold how pretty it can be! I'll never use Windows Live messenger again.

There has to be one that you love!

source:
All pictures taken from http://www.deviantart.com/.

An inventory of great portable PCs

2008-02-14T08:42:00.000-08:00

With the advent of Macbook Air, portability as a consideration, is brought to a new level. Portable or "ultra-portable" notebooks apparently go way back they have different names like portable, or ultra-portable or sub-notebook etc and they vary in sizes from pocket size to smaller-than-most-but-still-within-proportion kind of sizes.

I just wanted to see who they are and let other people know who they are. So let's take an inventory! ( My little comments are mainly just first impressions. I cannot help it but you can ignore them :).)

Pocket size:

Nokia 770 internet Tablet

Nokia has released a series of tablet PCs small enough to fit into your pockets. The latest I am aware of is N810:

It features a Linux operating system but of course, it is nowhere near being powerful. But you can at least access the internet with Opera or Firefox, check emails, use skype on it. It is at least a good alternative to iPhone except it looks serious.

In the same category, are some other "pocket PCs", or PDAs, or "smartphones". But not all smartphones are that smart. I do think however, the good smartphones have most of the functionality a PDA will have, so if you are going to buy a pocket PC, why not have a smartphone? Some other major types of smartphones that I liked are : HTC TyTN II (great specs), Sony Xperia X1 (hot in the news). They are all quite affordable even as phones around $500.

Ultraportable:

These are small too and some will also fit into your pocket. However, they have relatively strong hardwares too. And of course, power costs you money.

OQO:

Here you go, price tag included :).

Sony's VAIO UX Premium Micro PC

This makes me think: if only I could have one...Very elegant and versatile:

Subnotebooks:

They are bigger but being big makes operating on it easier. I definitely think notebooks will go in the direction of subnoetbooks instead of laptops. So you take a subnotebook (or smaller device) with you and you have a desktop at home.

Asus EeePC

No offense to Apple but this is probably the best way to show what the 7 inch size means:

Cloudbook: From Everex based on gOS. As small as EeePC, Everex is really good at keeping the cost low. What can you get for $399? If you don't need serious computing, you can at least get this one (though I don't feel that confident about gOS. But it's been on the market for multiple PCs and I've never tried one so maybe it has got enough functionality/compatibility or you can always install stuff on your own I guess).

Tablet PCs:

Tablet PCs are nice. You can fold it so it becomes simply half as big (or at least this is how my logic goes)l. But they are generally as big as other notebooks.

If you can fit a touch screen where you can put a normal screen, why not go touch? It is useful and you can just write on your PC etc.

All the major manufacturers offer tablet PCs I think. Dell, Sony, Compaq, Lenovo, Toshiba, HP.

Also worth mentioning is tabletkiosk with its Sahara appearing on CSI NY constantly. They also have ultra-portable PCs too.

The following are from HP, Lenovo, Toshiba

Apple Macbook Air and its non-Apple counterparts:

What can I say? There is already so much fuss about this.

Macbook Air maybe a great laptop otherwise but I just don't think being super thin makes that much of a difference. Or maybe it does for other people...

There are tons of articles on Macbook Air alternatives, here, I just want so show one:

Lenovo X300. Hope Lenovo make it in time and catch the 2008 Olympics. It'll make a hit at least among the engineers.

Cairo - A new shell

2008-02-12T07:24:00.000-08:00

BBlean is sort of ancient. Then what is the hottest shell for Windows? Of course it's not Microsoft's Windows shell.

It's Cairo:
"Cairo is a revolutionary desktop environment for Windows. Our goal is to develop a desktop experience that increases productivity and advances current technology standards. With a focus on stability, performance, and productivity, Cairo is sure to turn a few heads."

It's still under development and just reached milestone one. They are calling for testers. Being a tester or not, I would keep an eye on the project.

The amazing bblean

2008-02-08T05:36:00.000-08:00

Desktop shell replacement which replaces the Windows shell. Why? I don't know. How about just for fun?

I groundlessly think that it improves efficiency. (Well, not totally groundless. You can put whatever you use most frequently at wherever you want. That should improve efficiency.)

I wish I could offer more "culture" but wikipedia only have a few lines of it.

Features:

It is said to save resources but it really isn't a big concern nowadays.

transparency

full customization. Seriously, I mean FULL. You can edit everything with your notepad. It's like programming your desktop with c. But that also means a lot of work too. You can build a lot of sub-structures etc. to make your desktop perform whatever way you want, sick simple or sick

There's this amazing little button on the upper left corner that hides your active window but leaves the banner. I think it's really useful.

Fully customizable hotkeys. FULLY. Use notepad to program it. (Win + End executes the above feature for a starter.)

Here are a few screenshots I stole from what seems to be the major forum for bblean. Just find a pack and play with it. You won't probably like it the first day but after a while, you'll see how great it is. (I figured out a trick to make effectively drop-down menus on the desktop and is quite excited about that. I'll post a little howto shortly. The little trick will do make you think though: what if the things we click and appear are already there? It's just "invisible" to us. I think maybe Windows shell works the exact same way.)

With 3D desktop being in the trend, I still think there's much one can do with planar design. Besides, I think with a mouse which is 2-D control, 2D desktop is the most intuitive and efficient.

Technorati : bblean
Del.icio.us : bblean

on Meizu (famous for its iPhone clone)

2008-01-19T07:52:00.000-08:00

I recently read about a Chinese manufactured cell phone called minione or M8. It bears close resemblance to iPhone as the picture shows:

And that resemblance brought some heated discussion.

A little bit of disclaimer. A person can never seperate himself from his cultural roots and the social influence and sooner or later, I'll be attacked for my Chinese point of view so I say at the beginning that I am Chinese; I grew up in Beijing. I'm getting my college education in the US right now.

The company's CEO, however, looks to me not mainland Chinese. The company Meizu is based in Zhu Hai, a southmost booming Chinese technology city. But judging from the company's CEO's name Jack Wong, he either isn't really largely influenced by mainland China education or is from Hong Kong because official Chinese pinyin would translate his name into Jack Wang. (Wong is the Cantonese counterpart of Wang in Mandarin.) So no matter what his stand point is, mine is independent even from cultural background point of view.

First of all, regarding the GUI similarities, it all depends on how Apple's design is patented. If by law, it's illegal, then it is wrong and Jack Wong has made a really wrong choice. Popularity of iPhone asserts the design's appeal but it's unlikely perfect. Proper changes would not only lawly differ the GUI but also make the phone more attractive. Of course, that's all just words because the effect of any of the changes, the fine line between being a smart upgrade and a non-genuine, stupid copy is really hard to judge. These are crucial for him to decide and also his supporters.

I do support his idea and here I explain why.

Personally, I see fundamental differences between the devices. M8 uses Windows CE and iPhone uses OS X. You can make KDE look like Windows GUI or vice versa. But that only means the GUIs are versatile and they can be made the same or look similar. So Windows CE has the potential to like OS X and he only used it. (Whether legally or not, again, even law is subjective in a way, I don't want to go any deeper into that.)

However, I think his idea of second-generation development style is very suitable for new born IT companies in developing countries like Meizu. These companies apparently do not have the capital to pull off a R&D cycle on its own so it has to use its own advantages. What are its advantages? Flexibility and cheap labor.

Marginal benefit diminishes. So to some extent, it'll cost big companies too much to test every possibility and make everything perfect. It's like hiring people to pick up trash on the street. If your engineers (trash pickers) are all paid high, you better only hire them enough long to pick up enough trash so that the street is not blocked. If you hire college students, you can hire them longer to pick up more so the streets are kind of clean. And if you hire boys running on the street, you can hire them really long to get the streets really clean.

The analogy is meant to show that up to a certain point, developing cost including human cost and time cost can be really high for large companies so they stop at a certain point on the way to "perfection" and little companies can pick it up there because they can still make a few "relatively crucial" detail changes and by proper imitation (within lawful territory) make a new product. Both parties won't lose because there's really no promise how well the little companies will do when they change the designs. They may affect stability or they may simply screw up in any of the one million possible ways. So the targeted higher end market is still the big company's and the small company get a share of the low-end market. Besides, if the small company can make as good a product with legal imitations at a much cheaper price, then the big company simply loses at cost management. There are probably more advantages for small companies but I guess they teach these in MBA courses and I don't have permission to talk about that.

Furthermore, I think J. Wong's business idea is quite smart at that at a reasonable risk, he is already getting more attention, creating a larger consumer base by this act. The device could turn out very different from iPhone in various ways, but the slight hint of resemblance could really help.

To make the idea work out even better, I here offer my advice for him:

Improvement is crucial. If it's only as good as iPhone or not even as good (on average), he should only expect criticism. The device will sell but it's definitely bad for the company's future. Even if he doesn't get into any law trouble, the company will be seen as a stupid copying factory. Larger companies do imitate in certain ways like Moto and Nokia both have "Blackberry Clones" but it is their own inventions that make them the way they are. If we start a company immitating all Apple's products, call it ELPPA, the company will probably only grow 1/1000 size of Apple not to mention that there are a lot of products that you can't just immitate. So resemblance being the eye-catcher, improvement is the soul of the product (Improvements sounds like the phone somehow is based on iPhone. The phone of course doesn't necessarily base on iPhone but it should certainly learn from user feedbacks of iPhone.) .

At the end of the day, if you make a better phone, it will sell, in China, in the US, in Europe and people will love it because people simply want a good cell phone and that's what it is. Which company invented car? Mercedes I think. But people buy Toyota, BMW, GM, Ford, because their cars are just simply good. And success of M8 may push Apple to issue an iPhone II because otherwise no one buys an iPhone. (Or less probably, they might issue one anyway.) And that'll put Meizu in competition with Apple which is great for Meizu, the consumer (now, Apple is almost running a monopoly in touch screen smart phones).

From the consumer point of view, M8 could be better because it's much less expensive. It has good quality. I actually look forward to a more lasting battery than iPhone's. In China, we've got those Chinese made cell phone batteries for big brands like Samsung or Nokia that sell at 30% the price of brand battery yet last longer. My father has had Fei Mao Tui batteries for his Samsung cell phones and he says the Chinese batteries actually last much longer. So I hope M8 take advantage of that. (How is that possible? Again, probably lower cost. How low can cost go down to?) Flexible to be used with any carrier and you can just stick a local SIM card from anywhere you go and use it which saves you a lot of phone bills because you won't be roaming. (My professor received a $1800 bill after he attended a meeting in Israel.) And you know what, according to the specs, you have two SIM slots, the way Chinese like it. A lot of Chinese people like dual SIM slots because then they can have a phone number just for business or work and another one for family and friends. It won't be bounded with iTunes and will probably offer good sync support to any Windows based computer (Windows for sure and Mac and Linux probably?) I won't get too deep into its features, we'll just have to wait and see some reviews after it comes out.

I meant to offer more precise suggestions but unfortunately I don't own an iPhone so I don't know the detailed cons of iPhone and of course I don't think M8 is around for me to make suggestions either.

What I do know is however, some people complain about the keyboards and I've written something on keyboard suggestions for Blackberry 9000 (rumored touch screen) to beat iPhone but those are kind of long shots.

In the end, I hope the company can grow healthily and maybe utilize the free Android platform in the future and develop a phone with good hardware configuration as this one and still at a low price utilizing its own advantages I've mentioned above.

Update:
Here's the most comprehensive and detailed information about M8 (Mini one) I've found.

Technorati : M8, Meizu, iPhone, minione
Del.icio.us : M8, Meizu, iPhone, minione

CentOS: fixing the most annyoing problems

2008-01-18T11:06:00.000-08:00

I switched back to CentOS from Fedora 8 because F8 was kind of too heavy for my Dell laptop. After A few hours work, I am finally able to fix the most annoying problems I've had with CentOS, nm-applet asking to unlock keyring and screen failing to light up again after closing the lid. The methods should work as well for earlier versions of Fedora like Fedora 6. For convenience, I also put solutions to some other problems in the end.

Annoyance 1: nm-applet asking to unlock keyring

(If you haven't got your wireless to work, for Intel 2200BG or Intel 2100BG series wireless cards scroll down.)

Fixing the problem for Fedora 8 is somehow more automatic. But here's what you do with CentOS 5.

Download pam_keyring from here. Fc5 rpm worked fine for me.

then as super user (su enter)

gedit /etc/pam.d/gdm

Add the following lines to suitable places.

auth optional pam_keyring.so try_first_pass
session optional pam_keyring.so

The order is crucial for it to work. Here's a copy of my gdm file:

#%PAM-1.0
auth required pam_env.so
auth optional pam_keyring.so try_first_pass
auth include system-auth
account required pam_nologin.so
account include system-auth
password include system-auth
session optional pam_keyinit.so force revoke
session include system-auth
session required pam_loginuid.so
session optional pam_console.so
session optional pam_keyring.so

You're done if your login password is the same as your keyring password.
If not, do "yum -y install gnome-keyring-manager gnome-keyring pam_keyring" log out and run "/usr/libexec/pam-keyring-tool -c" to chance it.

2. When you close the lid and re-open it (on a laptop), the screen doesn't turn back on

su enter

gedit /etc/acpi/events/video.conf

uncomment the last two lines making it look like this:

# Configuration to turn on DPMS again on video activity, needed for some
# laptops. Disabled by default, uncomment if your laptop display stays blank
# after you close and open the lid.

event=video.*
action=/usr/sbin/vbetool dpms on

3. Other problems that should be easy to solve:

3.1 Wireless for Intel 2200BG, 2100BG or 3945BG

Go to http://ipw2200.sourceforge.net/index.phpto download your wireless card's firmware. Extract it and copy it to /lib/firmware

Enable networkmanager from system->administration->services and reboot.

Then your wireless network should be ready. Also, because network-manager activates your wireless card automatically for you, I usually choose not to activate them in system->administration->network because it takes extra time.

3.2 Screen resolution for Intel 915GM.

System->administration->display. Choose the intel vendor driver.

3.3 NTFS.
Go to CentOS wiki page on NTFS.

And if you want to tune your CentOS to perform faster, the Fedora tweaks here should all work (and of course some of the services are different, just ignore the ones CentOS doesn't have.).

MacBook Air, what I think

2008-01-16T15:54:00.001-08:00

After the iPhone success, Apple is releasing its Macbook. iPhone received some criticism on its keyboard but still gained popularity. MacBook however, is much more fiercely attacked on its pricing. And the worse part is that $399 is a lot different from $1,800+ and the customers may just not be motivated enough to try it out.

It feels as good as all the other Apple products. The screen looks bright and clear. Webcam and other little designs are good.Equipped with Intel processor. (So we can have fun installing Linux, Windows right?)

I think we won't really mind the absence of an optical drive. We could utilize an external hard drive, or a USB cd-rom (or a combo of the two) and Apple has never been bad at offering accessories.

I know real customers probably don't shop this way but on the whole, they still have some sort of mechanism. So let's play with this list Is MacBook Air Worth the Money? Five Slim Laptops Face Off.

If we assume they care about weight, battery life, processor speed and eliminate the worst one in the five, then its competition is from Toshiba Portege R500. And Apple MacBook Air is actually the cheaper one with a bigger screen and more RAM even though it's heavier and has a smaller hard drive.

If only people will fall for thinness, MacBook Air's future is not that bad competing with only Toshiba Portege R500 winning 50% of these people. However, I think it would be a much idea to have it thin and you can fold it in half or something. I mean ultimately, no matter how thin it is, it still occupies that much area (which isn't very small). I think we really somehow want the total volume to be small. So I hope Apple next time present us with a foldable MacBook.

Changing the MBR to Windows or Linux boot with a Linux rescue or live CD

2008-01-16T10:43:00.001-08:00

Now a lot of people use Linux and Windows and dual boot them (like me), sometimes after we install one system, we want another's boot back etc. Here are a few different situations and how you change the MBR.

* You installed Windows which ruined dual boot with Linux and you want the dual boot back.

o With some Linux CDs (I've used Fedora rescue CD and Ubuntu live CDs to do this and it should work with a

lot of other Linux live / rescue CDs)

Go to Linux rescue mode (usually by pressig F5)

Then after a while you get to a system prompt: sh#

grub then enter

root (hdX,Y) then enter

(hdX,Y) is the (Y-1)th partition on your (X-1)th hard drive. If you have done a dual-boot install, you should

usually know. If your /boot is on /dev/sda7 and you only have one hard disk, it translates to hd0,6. (If you don't

know the disk/partition, the method below would be nice because you can search for it.)

setup (hd0)

quit

and reboot

* With a Ubuntu Live CD (or some other sort of Live CD)

Boot from a Ubuntu live CD (or some other Linux live CD)

Open a terminal, run the following as a superuser (or you can do sudo grub in Ubuntu).

grub

(find /boot/grub/stage1 when you don't know where your boot files are. (Or sudo fdisk -l also gives you some

information, your Linux partition is most likely the one with Ext3))

root (hdX,Y) (Again, (hdX,Y) is the (Y-1)th partition on your (X-1)th hard drive. If you have done a dual-boot

install, you should usually know. If your /boot is on /dev/sda7 and you only have one hard disk, it translates to

hd0,6)

setup (hd0) (to write to MBR. If you want to write the boot information to your Linux partition, then setup (hdX,Y))

quit

and reboot.

* You want your Windows MBR back with Ubuntu Live CD (I guess some other distributions have ms-sys functionality

too. I think I've heard of Knoppix being able to fix Windows MBR. If you know, please comment.)

Boot into your Ubuntu LiveCD

Go to System -> Administration -> Software Sources and enable (by checking it off) the Universal repository.

Open a terminal session (Applications -> Accessories -> Terminal) and type the following:

sudo apt-get install ms-sys

Use

sudo fdisk -l

to figure out which partition your Windows is on. (Most likely the ones with NTFS or FAT32)

We want to fix the MBR, on /dev/sda1. To do so, type:

sudo ms-sys -mbr /dev/sda1

(if your Windows is not on /dev/sda1, change that part.)

reboot.

Sources:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=117829&postcount=2
http://ubuntuforums.org/showpost.php?p=121355&postcount=5
http://www.arsgeek.com.nyud.net:8080/?p=3340

CSI NY Gadget S04EP12

2008-01-10T16:07:00.000-08:00

This isn't a very gadget episode and I didn't see anything outstanding. No drama like the previous one and no cool gadgets like some of the previous ones. We've identified the camera in my last post.

But there is still an old friend, the tablet PC they use.

Table Kiosk Sahara Slate PC

More of this tablet from Episode 14.

And according to this site, it is supposed to hand back and forth, again and again in the season. No wonder we see it all the time :).

A picture from the original site:

Windows Explorer in Opensuse Installer

2008-01-03T15:37:00.000-08:00

Seems Novell and Microsoft are working VERY closely together.
Look at the explorer window in Opensuse' installation. Doesn't it look familiar?

Open file from Windows 95

Update:

So a lot of people suggested it is the dialog from Qt, not specific to OpenSuse. False charge at Novell. But even for Qt designers, can't they think of something new? I mean does an open dialog have to look at that?

Technorati : Linux, Opensuse
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Linux vs Windows: operating system security

2008-01-02T17:17:00.000-08:00

The problem of security should be considered at two levels, user level and system level. An operating system can be at most as secure as its user. An uninformed user has every possibility to put an operating system under risk. Internal system vulnerability, on the other hand, cannot be prevented (without considerable effort, equivalent to patching the system oneself) by the user.

Therefore, the whole idea of improving security should be realized by means of warning the user of possible risky operations and strengthening the operating system itself which are equally important.

Security threats come in three kinds, (or in fact, I put them into three categories) aggressive attack, seductive attack, fundamental attack. How someone can harm your computer or data in general? They can find some system vulnerabilities on their own and do whatever they want without your help. They can entice you to run some harmful things or disguise their virus or bundle harmful things with useful things. Or, they can (I doubt if they really can, but let's still keep the possibility) put something in the Windows or Linux update / installation files (but people have found things in Windows fonts where the author left his name if you expand it large enough). So these three corresponds to my "aggressive", "seductive", "fundamental" attacks. (I'm not really good with names, so more suitable names are welcomed)

Under aggressive attack (by which I mean direct attack through system vulnerability) Windows is more secure:

Linux is open source so, theoretically, anyone can go out and find security holes in it. But the process is not so direct with Windows, which makes Windows more secure. Furthermore, Microsoft has a central bug tracking system and all information goes to Microsoft for their system vulnerability. And the company's profit force them to better fix the problem as soon as possible.

(On the long run, Windows has program management tool so it is shouldn't be so hard for Microsoft to enable third-party updating. As Linux is going more commercial, security problems maintenance mechanism will establish too.)

Seductive attack (attack utilizing user unawareness) concerns general user more I think and I've had tons of malwares that opens certain webpages, adds certain buttons to your Windows start menu, shuts down your computer,(and these are the mild ones), etc, etc. They can take your internet banking information, personal contact information and so on.

Linux wins under this because the ruling factor is security through obscurity. It may not necessarily be so as Linux is gaining popularity but I think you have much less problem of this sort using Linux than Windows right now.

But let's go deeper and see further.

First of all, Linux is diversified and only going to be more so. The bottom line is, if I'm using gnome, you're using KDE, he's using Fluxbox, there are certain things that isn't really easy to do. (Or at least requires far more effort and creativity to do than in Windows.) So diversity really helps.

Limiting user privileges is of course important. Linux is doing good by asking for root password but too much authentication reduces usability and is not good. There's at least a balance to find and there may be smarter ways to do this too.

In the future, however, I see Windows' approach more promising. Ideally, the more complicated (in a good sense, so maybe I should say mature or robust) our "trust rule" is, the less information virus makers will have to mechanically bypass the protection. Just like how internet security is now. If a virus wants to gain administrator privilege to install something, if the system always ask for a fixed password, then the virus can find it by recording keyboard moves, pretend to be an update and ask for your administrator password etc. But if you have a bubble asking the system administrator to answer a question, the virus has to go to a whole different level, to bypass that. (It may not need a human to run by stealing the password from keyboard movements but it definitely needs to bypass the user in the latter case. I think security here, is more of an identification process, how the user knows the thing running is of authentic origin, how the system knows the thing running is of authentic origin. So a little bit of encryption trick would work. Have you guys used Bank of America's internet banking? The encryption with a picture and a user defined name is pretty interesting.) Then it is the system's responsibility to warn the user what are dangerous or highly dangerous operations to make. The process is more of an interactive one. (It is still true that the system can be at most as secure as its user, but ideally, the user is warned at different levels and should be more cautious than the plain asking the password for every system change method.)

What I want to add a little bit is that above all, realistically, the virus developers are always more informed than the average user. So there's a large possibility that they can fool some of the OS users. Building a fool-proof security system is very hard.

A central filtering system sounds like a good idea but I read somewhere that it takes 6 days to build a malicious software but much longer for Microsoft to respond to it. So maybe future security systems should start by asking "Do you know what ... is?". If not, the security system immediately shuts it down. I mean you can always start it again or restart the installation after gaining some more information but the damage is a one time thing.

Fundamental attack (by which I mean security threats resulting from tampered provider-side files) sounds ridiculous but it may happen and be very tragic.Linux wins because diversity predominates. If all people are downloading from different sources, using different distributions etc, then it takes much more work to harm them all. And we can always fully trust open source because there may always be people examining the source. So Linux is much more secure in this way. (It's not about Microsoft. They wouldn't intentionally add some bad things to their operating systems but some competent ones might and you won't know.)

I am a Fedora user (as you can see most of my valuable posts are about Fedora). Every time I install a software, I get a message if I want to import some "key". I didn't dig into this issue but if it is what I imagine it to be, then Linux put Windows to rout under fundamental attacks even more. If the source files are somehow encrypted with keys that the receiving operating system can validate with, then tampering with installation, updating files will be harder because the key has to be valid. I think this offers very good protection. Windows doesn't have to do this the same way because they can just validate their files with some internal mechanism before they make the discs. The encryption process could be useful for later updates or at least, Microsoft should validate its updates once in a while (and Linux repositories should do that too).

Conclusion:
I am aiming at a discussion rather than a conclusion. There are system internal structures that could make a difference but I don't know that much about them so I did not attempt to discuss them. Instead, I am trying to theorize a framework that security features can be evaluated, ie, whether it improves user level security, or reduces system vulnerability, in what ways and whether it works against aggressive, seductive or fundamental attack and how.

I am inspired by this discussion where people just go every direction and argue from different angles. I think it will be much more clear if we consider security problems from the categorization I suggested.

Technorati : Linux, Operating System, Security, Windows
Del.icio.us : Linux, Operating System, Security, Windows

a complete guide to tweak, speed up Ubuntu

2008-01-02T11:07:00.000-08:00

1. Update

Just after installation, do an update. Fixing problems increases your system speed.

2. Services

Install the tool:


sudo apt-get install sysv-rc-conf

Start configuring services


sudo sysv-rc-conf

You can turn off the following services. (Depending on your machine, you may not have some of them. And pay attention to reminders in the parenthesis.)

alsa (if you don't use alsa sound subsystem)
anacron
apmd
atd
bluez-utiles (if you don't have bluetooth devices)
cupsys (if you don't use printing)
dns-clean (if you don't use dial-up)
evms
fetchmail
gdomap
hplip (if you don't use HP printing and imaging systems)
mdamd (if you don't use raid)
mdamd-raid (if you don't use raid)
portmap (if your computer is a pure client)
usplash (if you don't want to see the splash booting screen. Also, delete the word splash. sudo gedit /boot/grub/menu.lst)

3. reduce swapiness

sudo gedit /etc/sysctl.conf
add:
vm.swappiness=0
and save.

4. faster broadband

sudo gedit /etc/sysctl.conf
add:


net.core.rmem_default = 524288
net.core.rmem_max = 524288
net.core.wmem_default = 524288
net.core.wmem_max = 524288
net.ipv4.tcp_wmem = 4096 87380 524288
net.ipv4.tcp_rmem = 4096 87380 524288
net.ipv4.tcp_mem = 524288 524288 524288
net.ipv4.tcp_rfc1337 = 1
net.ipv4.ip_no_pmtu_disc = 0
net.ipv4.tcp_sack = 1
net.ipv4.tcp_fack = 1
net.ipv4.tcp_window_scaling = 1
net.ipv4.tcp_timestamps = 1
net.ipv4.tcp_ecn = 0
net.ipv4.route.flush = 1

sudo sysctl -p

5. Sessions

Go to system->preferences-> Sessions.
Delete the ones you don't need, such as bluetooth if you don't have bluetooth devices, printing, if you don't use a printer.
You only need restricted driver manager once. Once the drivers are installed, you don't need it any more.
I don't use Evolution so I don't need Evolution Alarm Notifier.
Delete update notifier because constant updating really doesn't make your system healthier (Not to mention the consumption of resources). Just update after installation and manually update afterwards.

6. Remove extra virtual terminals
cd /etc/event.d
sudo mv tty3 tty3.bak
sudo mv tty4 tty4.bak

do it up to tty6

7. Gnome
sudo gedit ~/.gtkrc-2.0
Add this:


gtk-menu-popup-delay = 0

Save and exit.

I personally think icons use a lot of resources in the menus and I read the words instead of the icons anyway. So I turn it off.

System->preferences->appearance->interface
uncheck show icons.
You can choose none in visual effects tab and that helps performance much too.

9. Profile startup
After all these tweaks, restart your system.
When it enters the grub booting screen, press Esc to stop it. Press e on the default Ubuntu option to edit it and e again at the kernel line. Add the word profile in the end, press enter and press b. The first time it'll start slower but it'll start faster for all the following startups.
(It reorganizes the startup files which kind of works like defragmenting in Windows. )

10. Ubuntu tweak
There are many more options you can change with Ubuntu tweak.
The tool is straightforward to use so no further explanations here.

11. Enable concurrent booting.
Concurrent booting takes advantage of dual-core processors and CPUs that feature hyperthreading. To set this up, edit the "rc" file in the /etc/init.d directory:

sudo gedit /etc/init.d/rc

Find the line that says CONCURRENCY=none and change it to:

CONCURRENCY=shell

12. Disable IPv6 (poor IPv6. People disable it to speed up Linux; people disable it to speed up Firefox...)
Edit /etc/modprobe.d/aliases and change the line:

alias net-pf-10 ipv6

alias net-pf-10 off #ipv6

13. Aliasing hostname to localhost
Modify /etc/hosts's first two line as follows:

127.0.0.1 localhost yourhost
127.0.1.1 yourhost

where yourhost, is your chosen hostname. This will fasten up applications load.

14.Preload
Preload your frequently used applications.

sudo apt-get install preload

15.Speed up your HDD
Install hdparm with

sudo apt-get install hdparm

and enable 32 bit IO and UDMA if it wasn't before with:

hdparm -c3 -d1 /dev/yourdevice

where /dev/yourdevice is your HDD.
And to make it persistent you also need to edit /etc/hdparm.conf, and make it run at every startup, so you have to enable the "Hard disk tuning (hdparm)" service with System->Administration->Services.

Sources:
(Where the services tweak came from. Also, if you over-tuned and have problems with services, this post recorded the defaults)
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=89491
(Broadband and concurrency tweak, but it's not available any more)
http://tvease.net/wiki/index.php?title=Tweak_ubuntu_for_speed
(Menu delay tweak.)
http://lifehacker.com/software/linux-tip/speed-up-gnome-menu-269934.php
(Tweak 12, 13, 14,15)
http://yoten.blogspot.com/2007/04/speed-up-ubuntu.html

Technorati : Linux, Ubuntu
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Linux of Beauty: Opensuse impression

2007-12-31T16:57:00.000-08:00

Who said we have to work with ugly Linux distros?

I was bored on new year's day so I decided to try some new distros. Then opensuse stroke me with its beauty and attention to details.

1. Pictures speak louder than words.

I am personally not a big fan of 3D desktop or wabbling of windows but I did fall in love with the idea of making Linux a little prettier. I may be getting old but I just think basic graphical designs such as shapes and choice of colors have a lot of potential. I mean people love paintings and (generally) never want to replace it with some 3D stuff. (But the technology to enable the 3Ds and wabblings are definitely encouraged because even though I don't like it for daily use, there may be times that those could be nice.)

2. Go commercial.

If the 2007 booming of Linux and the emergence of the Linux machines taught us one thing, then we definitely know Linux is not going to just sit in the basement in some geek's machine. Instead, Linux has a huge market potential. But what makes Linux sales-ready? A friend told me, to him, Linux is all command line. I don't think commandline based systems are ready to sell (universally). Instead, a delicate GUI and working out of box are the keys. Ubuntu is quite close to that but Canonical promised it'll be free.

Besides working out of the box nicely, opensuse has even a restoration tool. (It is a little slow compared to some other distros but that also characterises commercial operating systems :P ) So people at Novell probably only need some marketing. Sign a contract with Dell or something !

Trivia:
I did met some problems.
1. It doesn't auto-mount your Windows partitions as nicely as Ubuntu. You'll have to change fstab yourself and make a symbolic link on the desktop.
2. nm-applet keeps asking for keyring password all the time. I haven't found any solutions and the warning is, don't try to use pam files from other systems. I tried to use Fedora/Ubuntu fixes, then I can't login anymore.

Technorati : linux, opensuse
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A llittle Linux distro geneology

2007-12-22T13:22:00.000-08:00

There are tons of Linux distributions out there now. I just wanted to find out which is based on which and others can see it in a visible way. Some of the relations are not strictly A begets B, but you get the idea.

PS. Sorry to the early readers. The page was incorrectly formatted. I wanted to later add links to each distribution and maybe add some little comments. But in different browsers, the formatting show up drastically different, so I had to make it a bmp.

So these are most of the top 30 distros on distro watch (I didn't put most of the language-specific versions on here like "a Brazillian Version of ..."). My impression is most of the "descendents" try to make their "parents" more user-friendly except some specific distros with specific usages. So I suppose daily users and beginners should be looking at the more derived ones.

Technorati : Linux, Linux distro geneology
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What can Dell's pre-installed Linux bring us?

2007-12-18T22:16:00.001-08:00

Dell announces Ubuntu 7.10 PCs. What can be the consequences?

Cheaper computers? I don't know how much OEM versions of Windows can go down to but Linux is free. So that will cut the cost. But should Microsoft raise the price of single Windows systems to force consumer's who want Windows to have Windows pre-installed or lower the price to compete. Well, higher price, lower sales, it'll at least take Microsoft a while to figure out the new equilibrium.

Better compatibility for Linux? Linux can be sold and can be made money of. So, there's more incentive for people to work harder to develop Linux drivers and hardware vendors to support Linux to sell to Linux market?

Do you prefer a laptop with Linux pre-installed or Windows pre-installed? I would choose Linux probably. That'll save you all the trouble to fix things and Windows supports everything anyway.