Life through the system creators lens

OrgMode - First Impressions

2020-11-11T19:24:00.004-08:00

As many have found before me, orgmode in Emacs is an extremely useful tool.

I've come late to the game but after two weeks of daily use I can comfortably say that I'm quite sorry that I didn't make this a part of my development toolkit a long time ago.

The main value it brings to my daily routine is ease of use. It's a great note taking, time logging, and general organization tool. Publishing solutions for several targets is built in. Specifically the HTML and Open Office targets are extremely solid. Considering the lack of issues I've encountered thus far I hold high hopes for the return on investment of my time once I go deeper into this tool.

Currently experimenting on building a process for publishing a few of my hobby static sites as org mode pages.

Installing Mosh Shell on Suse Linux

2012-07-16T08:30:00.000-07:00

Last time around we installed the mosh shell on LMDE 201204, which I erroneously called Linux Mint 13 ... mea culpa. This time around going for an install on an OpenSuse Linux distribution. It follows my usual route of installing the base packages that are time consuming to install from the distributions repositories, and building from source the utility I'm going to use.

Made this one available as a GitHub gist:

sudo zypper in protobuf-devel ncurses-devel git zlib-devel utempter-devel perl-IO-Tty autoconf automake
git clone https://github.com/keithw/mosh
cd mosh
./autogen.sh
./configure
make
sudo make install

Hope this is useful to others.

The mosh shell and LMDE 13

2012-07-02T05:00:00.000-07:00

Installing mosh on LMDE 13

As an alternative to Ubuntu Precise Pangolin the speedy Linux Mint Debian Edition 13 is a very worthy distribution. A fantastic installation process is supplemented by a clean desktop that screams attention to detail. Even in a VM environment it's so quick to respond that it's become my primary personal development box.

These are some quick notes to help you install the mosh mobile shell. An alternative secure remote shell. It's the perfect companion for those times that you are remotely logged in via an unreliable connection.

sudo apt-get install git libncurses5-dev automake zlib1g-dev protobuf-compiler libprotoc-dev libprotobuf-dev libutempter-dev libio-pty-perl

Then just follow the instructions for "Compiling from Git" at http://mosh.mit.edu/.

$ git clone https://github.com/keithw/mosh
$ cd mosh
$ ./autogen.sh
$ ./configure
$ make
# make install

... and that's all it takes to have a working mosh shell.

Motion Django Meetup ( SlideShare Presentation ).

2010-07-18T10:34:00.001-07:00

If you want to build a large community site but don't want to do everything from scratch. TypePad gives you a leg up, and it's a Django app so implementation is dead easy for the simple case, and adds social sauce to your webapp out of the box.

Motion Django Meetup

View more presentations from Mike Malone.

Google Code - Updates: Google Web Toolkit out of beta as of 1.4 release

2007-09-05T10:25:00.000-07:00

Google Code - GWT 1.4 released to adoring fans!

It looks like Google is moving forward with their revolutionary GWT ( Google Web Toolkit ), and revision 1.4 is an amazing release to what was an already fantastic addition to the open source ecosystem.

Great job Google ... keep up the good work!

Back from vacation

2007-07-18T14:18:00.003-07:00

I didn't want to leave Aruba, but I ran out of money :(

The new Firefox ( version 2.0 ) cometh, and so do the plugins!

2006-10-25T10:14:00.000-07:00

You need to go to the source of all things Mozilla to get the latest version of the current browser tool of choice ( for me )! Version 2.0 is out, and I think I'm going to wait about a month or two to make sure that all of my plugins ( specially the Google plugin ) is available and works.

Continue checking the mozilla plugins site and when all of the important addons are deemed to be ready I will update all of my systems. But I can't live with out my google plugin!

And what do you do when you're unhappy with your Slingbox!?!

2006-10-06T10:43:00.000-07:00

Well the people over at SnappyMultimedia seem to have an answer / alternative with much tighter integration with Windows Media Center PC's, and a little something that Sling doesn't have .... wireless connectivity!

Go on over and give them a gander, and see if it fits your needs.

So how do you make money from your Blog?

2006-10-06T10:41:00.000-07:00

Here's a fairly simple way to attempt to monetize your Blog.

There's also Google Adsense, and Amazon aStores, just in case you didn't know about #1, and #2 :-)

So you wanna record HDTV?!?

2006-10-05T15:31:00.000-07:00

There's probably no easier way to do this than to buy some pre-built machine, but for those curious about a little checklist put together back in 2005 by the EFF here's a little light reading.

As I find more links with better details I'll add them to this blog.

John Hunt saved my bacon!!!

2006-10-03T09:41:00.000-07:00

On May 12th, 2006 John Hunt from www.john-hunt.com wrote a short pithy blog article regarding recovering from an unanticipated error encountered while upgrading MySQL.

Here is the link to the MySQLUpgradeBreakingThings article, and all I can say is THANK YOU John!!!

So decided to put this up here so future generations of witless children such as myself aren't unduly discomfited when they run into this little issue.

The web office 2.0, how to use the web as your office!

2006-08-05T10:51:00.000-07:00

Here's something that most of us geeks have though of trying to do, but have never had the time. A very nice ( dare I say, comprehensive? ) list of tools to allow you to leverage the web for the best software available. Well someone finally decided to bite the bullet and get it going here, and it serves as a fantastic example of a very simple mash-up created via the DabbleDB API.

So go there right now ... NOW I say!

First time home buyers READ THIS! Great list of pitfalls, and advantages to home buying, for people on the fence.

2006-08-04T17:37:00.000-07:00

Buying a first home can be a complicated decision with many emotions thrown into the mix. Sometimes it is a good thing to step back, and really look at the pros / cons of a situation. Thi article gives some ( by no means all ) of the items that should be thought of when one is looking into buying their first home.

It's a good article. Very well written, and clear on a topic that is easily one of the most confusing and stress filled decisions in a persons life.

Go take a gander here. (http://biz.yahoo.com/special/firsthome06_article2.html)

From Digg: Programming is Hard: Let's work to make it a little easier

2006-08-03T19:38:00.000-07:00

From Digg: http://digg.com

read more | digg story

From Digg: Learn How to Develop Firefox Extensions!! - A step-by-step Tutorial

2006-08-03T19:35:00.000-07:00

From Digg: http://digg.com

read more | digg story

Is there such a thing as too much graphics power!?!

2006-08-03T12:59:00.000-07:00

Soon to be released from NVIDIA. Is the Quadro Plex VCS.

Now it does have a MFR of $17,500.00 ( US ), so I'm not seeing this coming to the local CompUSA / Circuit City / Best Buy / < put your favorite merchant here! > store. It does raise some pretty interesting considerations about external video possibilities for the future. This would be great for those of us who have multiple machines, but don't want to spend $700.00 per machine to update them to the latest & greatest video cards. That way we can play the great games we own on any machine we happen to have lying around. It goes without saying that there are a few technical hurdles to overcome, such as the throughput issue ... I don't think there's anything out there yet that can handle the massive amount of continuous data throughput required for such video applications, as of now ( 08/03/2006 ), can change any day now!

Using the Performancing plugin!

2006-07-28T13:11:00.000-07:00

Just a different way of blogging.

The Performancing plugin allows you to easily create Blog entries from within the Firefox browser. Instead of having to leave whatever idea inducing site you are currently perusing, now you can quickly, and fairly easily leave your thoughts on your currently favorite blog location.

I truly hope they add support for Yahoo360 really soon! As much as I love Blogger I like having the option of using Yahoo360 as an alternative posting site.

Well signing off now for now.

2006-06-16T09:49:00.000-07:00

To blogger, or to 360 ... hmmm.

So I finally got around to trying out the interface for Yahoo360. This began as a trip to the Apple website looking at the prices for the MacBook ... then migrated to MacBook Pro 17" ( wow ) ... then looked at the iMac 20" edition.

During that time I couldn't fail but notice the .Mac adds subtle and not so subtle placed everywhere I went. So I took a look at that, and well it does provide a very integrated experience that one could easily jump into, and not spend much time trying to get used to things. Mostly because it is extremely well tied together for Mac owners, ergo the brand .Mac!

As I perused the site I considered the costs involved, and the fact that no one I knew would be willing to pay $100 U.S. ( or more ) per year for this service. I began to think of what alternatives are available.

So here I am utilizing the very mature, and rock solid Blogger. I will (B)log my progress here, and maybe in a year or two as I keep updating this I'll be able to look back on this as a nice little historical tool for how the internet became a truly pervasive experience for communities ( network of friends ) at large.

Things I'll start with ( will add things in the future ):

Photo sharing: Seems to be the number one topic for everybody to start with.
(B)logging: How easy is it to start / maintain / change / move over etc.
PodCasting: Sometimes text is just not enough, and audio is easy to listen to while you work on something else. At least I tend to!
vPodCasting: Ok, for those times when you really want to share that incredible idea you had for a TV show, but no TV Network in it's right mind will produce, and distribute it for you.
Basics: eMail / Personal Site ( different from a Blog site, for now ) / Calendaring / ToDo Lists / Contact Management / File Storage.
OS Support: What it just runs on Windows ... hmmm ... guess I won't be using that! With a few caveats to be explained at a later date.
Really 6a ( Platform Support ): Mobile platform support.
API: How many services do they expose? What languages do they support? Are there any onerous usage restrictions? Can you mash them up? Create alternate monetized services that use the API's? At what cost? Submit any questions for item 8 that interest you, and I'll pop them on my checklist.

Well that's gist of my current goals for this hobby of mine.

Thanks for taking the time to read all that, and if your interested check back every 2 or 3 days, I'm going to be making a concerted effort to have updates from all the big boys once every few days.

It will be interesting to see how many of them leave up my links to the other blogs that I will be starting as part of this experiment. That will be a test of exactly how much trust we can put in these huge online behemoths that are currently battling it out for the all important mind share.

It has just occurred to me that I will likely have to take a trip to the massively hyped myspace.com, to make a proper analysis of the current social fad that has made myspace so apparently popular.

NOTE: THIS POST IS VERY NEARLY THE SAME AS THAT ON MY 360 PAGE, THERE WILL BE DIFFERENT POSTS ON EACH SITE AS THIS TEST PROGRESSES.

2006-05-01T11:48:00.000-07:00

Yes still working on Twisted apps, just doing a little of Pylons ( http://www.pylonshq.com ) work right now. Just much much faster to get up and running with it.

2006-05-01T11:47:00.000-07:00

Just a quick update for anyone who reads this.

2005-08-19T17:20:00.000-07:00

Blogger: Strolling through memory lane. :: Manage Posts

Yep, my automagic blogging tool works even from Linux / Firefox! ;-)

2005-03-08T11:04:00.000-08:00

Microsoft Windows Update

Just writing an update about a windows update ... consider this just a test of the Google bar blogging util.

2005-02-07T16:33:00.000-08:00

Amazon.com: Welcome

Just a test of the Google toolbar on IE6+, automatic Blogging of websites you visit.

2004-05-26T22:15:00.000-07:00

So in the continuing saga for twisted, python, imap mastery. Here's the line to get the current version of Twisted off of the subversion repository.

svn co svn://svn.twistedmatrix.com/svn/Twisted/trunk Twisted

In other news. The imap4client.py requires a * to be placed inside the double-quotes that are the second parameters for the proto.list.

That way a list of current mailboxes will be shown instead of a bogus empty list.

Back for more tips later.

2004-05-26T01:13:00.000-07:00

Another quick note to self.

How to get the latest and greatest Quotient, fresh off of the SVN tree.

svn co svn://divmod.org/svn/Quotient/trunk Quotient

Don't forget to add the privateKeyFile, and certificateFile variables to the deploy(), or else you get all kinds of nastyness about no SSL site available.

<grin>

Going to be working on the IMAP4Grabber stuff to see if there's a way I can kludge folder support into it. Hopefully it won't be so ugly that the divmod guys will reject out of hand.