WebNin9 | Abhishek Biswal

Hotot : One of The Best Desktop Twitter Client Available For Ubuntu Linux

2011-09-28T09:07:00.000-07:00

I often find myself opening new instances of Twitter ( Web ) many times just to check the updates. I tried many Desktop Twitter Clients like TweetDeck, but those clients didn't suit my needs. I wanted a lightweight and fast Desktop Twitter Client which I can use while working on something without opening my browser. And At Last I found It: Hotot is a lightweight Twitter Desktop Client which can be used side by side with a heavy application running. Here is a screenshot of Hotot in action:

The Twitter Timeline

The Best thing I like about Hotot is that it is easy to hide/resume because many Desktop Clients hide ( or minimize ) in the Unity Sidebar, therefore it's tiring to move your mouse to the left everytime you want to use that Client. But if you're using Hotot, it creates an icon in the notification area clicking on which you can easily hide/resume the application.

The other thing I like about Hotot is the Profile View ( see screenshot below ). It also has a tab called 'Stats' which displays the number of tweets by the user and other such statistics.

Profile View

As I have mentioned earlier, you don't have to switch to web version for anything! You can also edit your profile from inside Hotot! You can also post a tweet with a photo or a link like this:

Plain Text Tweet

If you maximize the window, you'll get the same interface as that of TweetDeck ( 2 Views at a time ) which makes it easier for you to read the Tweets. Other than these, there are extensions and themes available for Hotot. You can check the other settings under Preferences. Overall it's a good looking Twitter Desktop App which is light on your system. If you are a Twitter Fan then I recommend you to just give it a try.

To Install It on Ubuntu, type ( or copy-paste ) these lines one by one in the terminal:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:hotot-team
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install hotot

After that you can Search Using The Unity Dash for 'Hotot' and you'll find it there. You can follow me on Twitter : @Abhishek_Biswal

For Other Linux, you can go to http://hotot.org/

Access Dropbox/SugarSync/Box/Google Docs From One Place

2011-09-26T20:10:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I stumbled upon "Otixo", a new web service which allows you to access your Online Accounts from One Place. Currently the supported Web Applications Are: Dropbox, Google Docs, SugarSync, Box.net, Apple Mobile Me, Picasa, Amazon S3. You can also use it to connect to FTP and WebDav.

Why I Liked It

Well, OTIXO is fast, easy to use and most important: It's Feature rich. Otixo lets you add web services ( mentioned above ) to your Dashboard from where you can access them. Here is How you can add Applications To Your DashBoard.

When You First Login into Otixo, You'll be redirected to a page where you can add available web applications. Here is the screenshot:

Adding Applications (Click To Enlarge)

Adding a Web App is Simple: Just Select an application ( service ) from the right sidebar, fill in the required details ( like 'Otixo Display Name', which can be anything ) and you'll be asked to Authorize Otixo in the web app you want to use. For example, If I am adding Dropbox, I will enter a Display Name, say 'MyDropbox', I will then click on 'Authorize Via Dropbox' and I will then be asked to login into DropBox then Authorize the Application be Clicking on 'Allow' button. It's that simple!

You can view your added services and also add more from the left sidebar ( see screenshot ):

Cloud Services

This way, you can add more services and view existing ones. Now, as you're done with adding services, you can view the stored files and folders in the services right from inside OTIXO!

Viewing Files and Folders In Cloud Services

As you can see from the above screenshot, I have added DropBox and Google Docs in my cloud services. Here is how My Dropbox account looks like in OTIXO:

My Dropbox Account inside OTIXO (Click To Enlarge)

You can also perform basic tasks right from inside OTIXO, like: you can can delete, copy/cut, download a file in your Dropbox account from OTIXO. Here's a Screenshot:

Deleting a File in Dropbox (Click To Enlarge)

Other web services can also be added and used similarly.

Conclusion

OTIXO is for those who use multiple storage accounts: Box.Net, DropBox, Picasa ( for images ), Google Docs ( For Documents ), FTP Accounts, Amazon S3, SugarSync , etc. OTIXO makes your tasks easier by letting you access these accounts from one place.

Give OTIXO a try: http://otixo.com/

Google Drive To Launch Soon [The DropBox Killer]

2011-09-25T05:07:00.000-07:00

Do you use Dropbox? Or any other free online backup service like Ubuntu One? Well, then you're soon going to transfer all your files and folder to The Soon To Be Launched 'Google Drive': A Dropbox like service which you can use to store your data on cloud. Well, for now, very less is known about this new service, but TechCrunch has some leaked pictures of Google Drive in action. One of these picture is:

Google Drive In Action [ Source: TechCrunch ]

Some Rumors say that GDrive or Google Drive is being used internally. Back in 2007/2008 it was said to be very buggy, but now Google is ready to release it.

You can read more about 'Google Drive' on TechCrunch.

How To Get The New Facebook Timeline in Just 5 Minutes

2011-09-25T01:45:00.000-07:00

Facebook recently introduced the new Facebook Timeline, for which you can sign up from here: http://www.facebook.com/about/timeline. But, the problem is: You have to wait for some time for it to get activated ( maybe 10-15 days more! ). But if you want to use the Timeline Right Now, then follow these simple steps to get the new Timeline.

The First Step is: Login to Your Facebook Account and then Go to http://developers.facebook.com/apps and click on the Allow Button. You have now Granted Permission to Facebook Developer to access your account. After Clicking on the Allow button, you'll be redirected to a page like this:

Facebook Developers App Page ( Click To Enlarge )

Now, On The Top Right corner of the page, click on 'Create New App' and Popup will appear ( see screenshot):

You can Type in anything in the name. if the namespace is not available ( if it says failed ), then try another name.

After Clicking on continue button, you'll be asked to type in the Captcha. On the final page, there will be a Left Sidebar. On that Left Sidebar, click on 'Open Graph':

Click On Open Graph

Now, on the resulting page ( see screenshot below ), type in anything you want in the two input fields. In this screenshot, I have Typed in 'plan' and 'trip':

The Last Step

Now, click on 'Get Started' button. Here you might get an error message: all you have to do is ignore it and then skip to the Facebook Homepage ( http://facebook.com/ ) . There you'll get a invitation: just click on the button and skip to your Profile Page, and your New Timeline will be there! The Downside of it is: For now, only those who are Developers ( I mean those who have gone through the same process ) can see your Timeline.

Like Us On Facebook To Get More Updates On Facebook.

How To Install XAMPP on Ubuntu

2011-09-11T21:46:00.000-07:00

XAMPP, short for Cross Platform Apache MySQL PHP Perl is one of the widely used program by Web Developers to test their Product locally. Last Week, I shifted to Ubuntu from Windows, and the first thing I installed was XAMPP ( Yeah, you guessed it right, I am a Web Developer ). Here is a Tutorial which will show you how to install XAMPP on Ubuntu using Terminal ( It's Easy! ):

Open Terminal ( From Applications > Accessories > Terminal ). Here you have to type the following commands ( you can paste them too ). First You have to switch to Desktop. To do so, enter this command:

cd ~/Desktop

This will switch the current location to Desktop. I have switched to the Desktop because we need to download the XAMPP Archive on the desktop. Now you need to download the Archive ( about 70MB) > enter the following code in the terminal:

wget http://www.apachefriends.org/download.php?xampp-linux-1.7.1.tar.gz

Now the download will start. As soon as the download ends ( you'll again see a blinking cursor in the Terminal ), enter this command in the Terminal:

sudo tar xvfz xampp-linux*.tar.gz -C /opt

This Command will extract the Archive in the /opt folder. Before executing it, note that there's an asterisk there in the command. The Downloaded File's name varies. So, therefore enter the file name downloaded on the desktop. For example, My Download's File name was: 'download.php?xampp-linux-1.7.1.tar.gz', therefore I entered this command in the command line:

sudo tar xvfz download.php?xampp-linux-1.7.1.tar.gz -C /opt

This Command will extract the Archive in the /opt/lampp/lampp directory. But How to run XAMPP? Here's How:

Creating a XAMPP Launcher in the Start Menu
First, to make things easier, we'll add XAMPP to the start menu (under Applications), to do so, enter these commands in the Terminal:

cd ~/.local/share/applications
gedit xampp-control-panel.desktop

Now you'll see , gedit, the default Text Editor in Ubuntu, where you have to enter the follwing lines ( in the text editor, not in the terminal):

[Desktop Entry]Comment=Start/Stop XAMPP
Name=XAMPP Control Panel
Exec=gksudo /opt/lampp/share/xampp-control-panel/xampp-control-panel
Icon[en_CA]=/opt/lampp/htdocs/xampp/img/logo-small.gif
Encoding=UTF-8
Terminal=false
Name[en_CA]=XAMPP Control Panel
Comment[en_CA]=Start/Stop XAMPP
Type=Application
Icon=/opt/lampp/htdocs/xampp/img/logo-small.gif

Now, you can find the XAMPP launcher, under Applications > Others > XAMPP.

Publishing:
The Default location for publishing your web apps is /opt/lampp/lampp/htdocs. Many of the newbies complain that they are not able to copy or edit files in htdocs. This is because only admins or root users can edit the things in htdocs folder. The solution to this problem:

Open Terminal Once again and enter this command:

cd ~
mkdir public_html
sudo ln -s ~/public_html /opt/lampp/htdocs/$USER

This will create a folder named public_html placed in the 'Home Folder'. You can place files or folder here and then test them. For example, I am creating a PHP file:

<?php echo "How are you?" ?>

Paste the above line in Text Editor and save it as index.php inside 'public_html'. Now Start XAMPP using the Launcher in the Start Menu and then in your browser address bar type in: localhost/username/index.php to open the file. Here you'll see a blank document on which only 'How are you?' is written and nothing else. Don't forget to replace the username with your real username. For example my computer's username is 'abhishekbiswal', therefore I access the file using 'localhost/abhishekbiswal/'
If it works then fine, if it doesn't then check if XAMPP is working or not by pointing your browser to 'localhost/'. You should see the XAMPP Logo there. Facing Problem? Comment using the Comment Form given below.