icorey news feed

Paludis

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 11:28:47 EDT

Last night I installed Paludis (read: I was really bored). I'm proud to say that I'm ready to do my first update using Paludis.

Installing it is a breeze...just use Portage. I enabled the inquisitio USE flag. Then, if you check out the Getting Started page on Paludis' website, you'll find info on automatically configuring Paludis. The script they give you works very well.

When first running Paludis, I got an error about missing the file repo_name in /usr/portage/local/profiles. I solved that by sticking the name I chose for my local/custom ebuilds in said repo_name file.

When I tried to pretend to do an update, I got more errors, mostly about unavailable versions or blocks. For instance, if mod_perl requires dev-perl/Compress-Zlib (which isn't available) or evince is blocking dev-libs/poppler, re-install mod_perl and evince using Portage (the problem here is that ebuilds have been changed since these programs were last installed).

The final error was about /usr/portage/distfiles belonging to the wrong user. This is fixed by running chown -R paludisbuild:paludisbuild /usr/portage/distfiles.

Other users might run into other errors, but those are the only ones I've encountered so far. Since I haven't actually installed anything using Paludis, I don't have much to say about it. However, I must say inquisitio is very slow, even with a names cache.

Projects

Thu, 18 Jun 2009 23:49:47 EDT

I'm working on a few projects.

First, there's the Evince nsplugin (for browsers like Firefox). I've noticed some inadequacies in mozplugger and there is at least one way I thought of to improve Evince when used in a browser. I started working on this and, honestly, I don't see this project getting much further. I have no experience with nsplugins, which has become a major stumbling block.

Twimblr is the second project. More info is at icorey.com/twimblr. I would really like to turn this into something very robust and I can definitely do that with enough time. However, it's solely a web tool and that makes it a little less interesting to me.

Finally, I thought of something that I can't believe no one has implemented: an internet-humor e-mail filter. It would be sort of like a spam filter. This project seems like it would be very feasible for me. The only problem is that I use Gmail primarily and I don't know how I'd be able to integrate something like this with Gmail.

Individually Wrapped

Mon, 15 Jun 2009 13:12:49 EDT

Brilliant idea: Pre-folded Toilet Paper singles

tumblr.

Sun, 07 Jun 2009 03:31:19 EDT

Just the other day I decided that tumblr is awesome. Check out my tumblelog and see for yourself. It's pretty empty now, but that won't be the case for long.

Embarrassing

Sun, 31 May 2009 22:49:38 EDT

My roller hockey game today in the Saturday morning adult rec league was embarrassing. These games don't matter at all. We're not pros. We're not going to be pros. Whether we win or lose doesn't affect our daily lives.

These games are so unimportant that, obviously, we must act like a bunch of angry four-year-olds whenever penalties are called on our teams. We need to whine and swear and throw things because ... well, I'm not sure why we do this, but I can only imagine what we must look like.

We won today somehow, but when everything was said and done and we finished the game with three players left, I was embarrassed to have taken part in the whole affair. I know we're all immature little kids, but do we need to make that so obvious?

Summer Goal

Fri, 29 May 2009 01:16:34 EDT

I've figured out my goal for the summer: develop an Evince PDF Netscape plug-in so I can read PDFs within Firefox using Evince (particularly on amd64 Linux).

I have yet to find out if this is at all feasible. I am thinking it is very feasible for a more experienced Linux programmer, but I'm assuming it will be a huge challenge for me. But, I've already found the Netscape plug-in API and some other documentation. Bonus points to anyone who can tell me why the API is only available via archive.

Part of me thinks this should be very simple, but another part of me is pretty sure this will take me years.

EDIT: Screw it, I just installed mozplugger and, despite what I read about it, it works great. I guess I need a new summer goal now.

Cycling

Sun, 17 May 2009 22:39:00 EDT

I like riding my bike and I like my phone. Luckily, the two work great together. Here are some adventures I had over the weekend.

Lake Erie/Niagara River/Scajaquada River

Riding along the lake and these rivers is pretty cool. I rode along Ohio Street out to Lake Erie, and from there I got on the Riverwalk. There might be a way to avoid Ohio Street altogether, but I’m not sure. From the Riverwalk, I went on the Scajaquada-Delaware Path, which was very nice—it follows the river and ends at the history museum. Most of the these trails are good for roller blading, too.

Map: Google Maps

Knox Farm State Park

Knox Farm is pretty lame if you’re on a bike. The map below shows every path you’re allowed to use with a bike. That said, if you’re hiking (or riding a horse), the place might not be that bad.

Map: Google Maps

Eighteen Mile Park

After the failed trip to Knox Farm, I went to the Eighteen Mile Creek. This place is pretty awesome. The creek is pretty and the trails are okay (for mountain biking). Most of the trails were dry (except for a few muddy patches). However, someone took their horse along the trails recently, so some parts were pretty hacked up and there was lots of poop.

Maps: part 1 (Google Maps) and part 2 (Google Maps)

Photos: Picasa

Things I want to do this weekend

Fri, 01 May 2009 16:20:17 EDT

Quick list of the things I want to do this weekend:

Well, gotta hurry up and get started!

Twitter

Sat, 11 Apr 2009 23:32:47 EDT

I set up a Twitter account back in October, but I started updating it regularly only recently. Be sure to check it out and follow all of my crazy twitterific adventures!

Malware

Sat, 21 Feb 2009 00:54:40 EST

It seems weird that personal computers and widely−available internet access have existed for so long and yet there are still TV commercials for malware like FinallyFast.com. Before this, I remember commercials for Stop Sign. I’m sure that both suck profoundly.

I like to compare things I don’t understand to…other things I don’t understand. Ads for malware must be similar to get-rich-quick scams. You download FinallyFast.com’s software and your computer goes slower, just like how (I imagine) you invest in Quixtar and you find you’re making less than minimum wage (or no wage).

What I would like to see is a commercial for biological malware—something like a sponge that gives you the flu.