prash_n_rao's blog

Anne in New York: Please comment

2011-05-30T15:46:00.000+05:30

Anne in New York: Please comment: "If you read this, please leave a comment. Just curious about who is actually reading my blog, if it's worth writing everything in English an..."

I read everything, but would still like to listen to your stories when you get here :-)

Tips to improve attention

2010-01-31T00:39:00.000+05:30

I am trying to study these days. Most of my reading material is on my laptop. I keep losing focus. I wonder if I have ADHD or something. Sometimes, I have a tendency to waste time on irrelevant activities. At other times, I day-dream endlessly about completely unimportant things. I intend to document here the things that I have tried, in learning to handle it.
1. Sticky post-it like software on my desktop. (Saw someone recommend this, online. Works sometimes.)
2. Use a clock that chimes every half an hour or so. Before I start a wasteful activity, remind myself that I will stop at the self-stipulated time. (Tip from a psychologist. Works very well against external distractions.)
3. Use text to speech software to read out large documents, and at a fast enough pace so that it forces me to retain focus. (Tip from a friend. Not tried yet because it is not suitable for the nature of documents I'm trying to read these days.)
4. Set a screensaver to go off after just one minute of inactivity. (I take credit for this one. This sudden change in front of my eyes works very well when I'm staring at the monitor and I'm off, day-dreaming.)

Bitten by Dell

2009-07-26T12:31:00.004+05:30

I realzied that even a more or less generic PC maker like Dell bites. I have been trying to install the latest ATI Catalyst drivers in Vista for the last few months, with no success. After some searching today, I discovered that OEMs do not allow component manufacturers to supply the latest drivers to end-users directly.

Fortunately, I came across software at http://www.driverheaven.net/modtool.php to bypass draconian limits set by Dell.

2009-07-25T15:44:00.010+05:30

I keep finding things to crib about in both distros of Linux, and whichever I run, I feel that the other one is better. I do not have the space to install both on my system, nor do I have time to keep reinstalling to switch from one to the other.
More than anything else, this is a reminder for myself, to prevent me from manically reinstalling whichever I don't have.

Ubuntu 9.04	Fedora 11
Synaptic works very well. + each package shows a list of optional and mandatory packages it depends on. This is useful to keep the download size small, and the system lean. + accessibility software are easier to find.	- Yumex works much better than the default Fedora software, but is not as powerful as Synaptic.
- Suspend and resume do not work on my laptop (Dell Studio 17). It suspends, but on resuming, the screen remains blank. The only way I have discovered to come out of this frozen state is a hard reboot.	+ Suspend and resume work well.
- Feels relatively slow (because of kernel 2.6.28 ?)	- Feels relatively fast (because of kernel 2.6.29 ?)
+ All the latest ATI graphics drivers worked for me.	- Even the 9.7 ATI graphics driver did not work for me.
- Real-time kernel did not work (probably with the ATI graphics drivers).	Yet to test

I learnt that...

2007-11-17T18:00:00.000+05:30

You really are desperate to know, aren't you?
My, my!

Politically,

2006-04-09T23:43:00.000+05:30

You are a
Social Liberal
(73% permissive)

and an...
Economic Conservative
(80% permissive)

You are best described as a:

Libertarian

Link: The Politics Test on Ok Cupid
Also: The OkCupid Dating Persona Test

Vashi Coast at Low Tide, 2005 Nov 17, 17:52-17:55

2005-11-26T03:03:00.000+05:30

Vashi Coast at Low Tide, 2005 Nov 17, 17:52-17:55

prash_n_rao's blog

2005-04-03T15:10:00.000+05:30

prash_n_rao's blog

My shell prompts in Bash/Zsh

2004-12-29T19:36:00.000+05:30

When using Bash/Zsh I like the shell prompt to look somewhat like this:

[0 Prash ~]
%

except that the background is black and the forground text is white.
The first field displayed, in green, is the exit status of the previous command. The second field, in blue, is the login id. The third field, in red, is the current working directory.

This is how I do it:
For zsh, I have
prompt=$'\[%{\e[1;32m%}%? %{\e[1;34m%}%n %{\e[1;31m%}%~%{\e[0m%}\]
%# '
in the file /etc/zshrc

And for bash, I have
export PS1="\[\033[1;37m\][\[\033[1;32m\]\$? \[\033[1;34m\]\u\[\033[1;31m\] \w\[\033[1;37m\]]
\\$\[\033[0;37m\] "
in the file /etc/profile

New ISP

2004-12-29T19:34:00.000+05:30

I recently got an always-on connection. Maybe I can really maintain a blog now. Let's see..

Created blog

2004-06-26T14:17:00.000+05:30

I created this today!!