Playing With Sid

Installing Sikuli Automation Tool on Ubuntu 11.10

2012-01-20T09:22:00.000+05:30

Sikuli is a cross-platform automation tool. The software uses computer vision technology to automate UI testing.

In this blog post I describe how to install and setup Sikuli on Ubuntu 11.10 OS.

Download the latest version of Sikuli (http://sikuli.org/download.shtml) and uncompress the zip file. You can also install Sikuli using Ubuntu package manager.


$ sudo apt-get install sikuli-ide

You will need OpenCV 2.1 or later to use Sikuli. If you see the following error, the OpenCV libraries are probably missing on your computer.


java.lang.UnsatisfiedLinkError: /tmp/tmplib/libVisionProxy.so: libml.so.2.1: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

Install OpenCV 2.3 on Ubuntu 11.10

Thanks to Gijs Molenaar we now have OpenCV 2.3 packages for Ubuntu. You can find full installation documentation here.

Open terminal and type the following commands to install OpenCV 2.3 packages. Remember to uninstall older OpenCV versions before you do this.


  $ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gijzelaar/cuda
  $ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gijzelaar/opencv2.3
  $ sudo apt-get update
  $ sudo apt-get install libcv-dev

Other Required Tools

The Sikuli documentation fails to mention that you need wmctrl package to launch and control GUI applications on Linux.

 $ sudo apt-get install wmctrl

You are done!

You can now launch Sikuli by typing /usr/bin/sikuli-ide in the terminal program.

SOPA Blackout, Internet Websites Protest (Photoblog)

2012-01-19T07:16:00.000+05:30

On January 18th 2012 popular Internet websites protested the proposed US Stop Online Piracy Act with blackout-ed splash pages .

Erin Jo Richey captured some of the websites on her Flickr photostream.

Updates From Vietnam

2011-12-05T11:17:00.001+05:30

Greetings from Vietnam. Let me give you a quick update from Vietnamese Mozilla Community. Vu Hung shared his Mozcamp experiences and the Mozilla goodies at the informal gathering of Open Source communities in Hanoi, Vietnam.

Few days ago, I met Tuan and Yang to talk about Mozilla community activities in Vietnam. We spent the afternoon discussing ideas for more user engagement, Localization and future events in Vietnam. Mozilla community is well organized in the north Vietnam (Hanoi), however we haven't had much success in Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon).

I'll be traveling to Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City) this weekend to participate in BarCamp Saigon Winter 2011. Planning to meet some of the open source community members at the event and hopefully build an active Mozilla community in Saigon.

Back in Hanoi next week for the FOSS@HUS on December 17, 2011. The annual Open Source fest at Hanoi University of Science (HUS), Hanoi, Vietnam.

Ubuntu in Mandalay, Myanmar

2011-12-05T10:40:00.000+05:30

ThanYalZin Min sends us this picture from Ubuntu day in Mandalay, Myanmar. You can see Min sporting the cool Mozcamp t-shirt in the photograph.

Mozilla Rep Chit Thiri Maung is planning the future Mozilla activities in Yangon and Mandalay. This year we launched the Mozilla L10N team during the BarCamp Yangon 2011.

You can follow Mozilla Myanmar Community here on their twitter page. I hope to see more Mozillians in Myanmar next year.

BarCamp Vientiane 2011

2011-11-28T11:59:00.001+05:30

The beautiful city of Vietiane hosted the second Barcamp Vientiane on Novemeber 19, 2011. Vientiane is capital and the largest city in Laos. Thomas Wanhoff the organizer of the event helped us distrubute Mozilla swag at the event. Unfortunately I couldn't attend Barcamp Vientiane this year but I hope we'll have more mozillians in Vientiane next year.

FOSS Asia 2011

2011-11-27T19:19:00.001+05:30

Vu Hung, Mozilla Vietnamese Localization contributor from Hanoi participated in FOSS Asia 2011 in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. He shares his experiences in this blog post.

Here is a short report for what I (Vu Hung) did present in FOSSASIA.

Arky, who has been helping our open source comminities, especially in building Mozilla community in Vietnam was the best person to give a talk on that, but he was busy with an event in Eupore, so there I go :)

The theme of the event is "mobile".

I had 2 talks and a workshop in this event.

Mozilla:

An introduction to Vietnamese translation for Mozilla products.
Slides: http://www.slideshare.net/vuhung16plus/an-introduction-to-vietnamese-translation

Narro is the tool the translation, and not like for translating .po file Mozilla has a special format for language files so Mozilla team (Arky is one of them) had developed Narror to help translators.

Mozilla mobile technologies
Slides: http://www.slideshare.net/vuhung16plus/mozilla-mobile-technologies

The title of the present was made by Ms. Phuc but the content of the talk focuses on the technologies that Mozilla is using, this will help audiences (mostly students) have a basic knowledge on what is used and cooked in Mozilla.
I also pointed out that Mobile/Smartphone, cloud computing and open web are the trends that Mozilla is working on.

Mozilla mobile technologies

View more presentations from vuhung16plus

LibreOffice

Sides: http://www.slideshare.net/vuhung16plus/mobile-libreoffice
I introduced two projects that LibreOffice is working on at very begining stage:
LibreOffice on smartphone (Android) and LibreOffice on the cloud. Imagine that the share of PCs is decreasing, while the number of (smart)phones and tablets are increasing.

LibreOffice/ODF on Smartphone/Tablet/Cloud

View more presentations from vuhung16plus

Workshop

Slides: http://www.slideshare.net/vuhung16plus/informationmanagementwithredmine-thai-nguyenfossnguyenvuhung2010112101-5877449
My talk is based on the talk I have presented at Thai Nguyen university. The goal of the workshop is to show how to manage IT projects in an agile way.
I have covered a lot of facets in software and non-software project management. 100+ audiences have attended the workshop: Thank you for joining the workshop :)

FOSS Asia 2011 Photos

You can view the FOSS Asia 2011 event photos on Vu Hungs Flickr stream.

Mozcamp Asia 2011

2011-11-25T16:32:00.001+05:30

Mozcamp Asia 2011 was held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia on 18-20 November 2011. The two day event was packed with interactive presentations, discussions on new products, engagement opportunities, and community building.

Mozilla communities from various Asian countries participated in this event. You view more information about various communities and their activities on the Mozilla Asia Community Quilt.

The event theme was "Many Voices, One Mozilla", and had three broad tracks of engineering, training and regionalization, the content for this MozCamp is now available online here

Kick-starting Mozilla Communities with Localization Sprints

2011-11-19T13:17:00.001+05:30

The talk was delivered at Mozcamp Asia. It describes the efforts to start new L10n communities and reviving those that lost core contributors.

Kick-starting Mozilla Communities with Localization Sprints

View more presentations from playingwithsid

2011-11-07T11:09:00.000+05:30

Barcamp Phnom Penh 4 event is mentioned on this weeks Mozilla Contributor Engagement Video. You can find photos and presentation from Barcamp Phnom Penh 4 in this blog post.

You can view this video on Youtube. Don't forget to subscribe to Mozillians Youtube channel.

Hanoi Tweetup Announcement (November 2011)

2011-11-03T14:59:00.000+05:30

Announcing the next Hanoi Tweetup at Hanoi Cooking Centre, Hanoi at 6:30pm on November 11, 2011. Please spread the word about the Hanoi Tweetup widely.
Remember, You don't have to be on Twitter to attend a tweetup :)

What's a tweetup?

A tweetup is an event where people on Twitter (and Facebook and Tumblr and any other social media platform) get together to meet in person. It's a great opportunity to match names with faces, and have a conversation at more than 140 characters at a time.

Event Details

We'll using the hashtag #hanoitweetup for the tweets, blog posts and photos related to this event.
You can also follow us using this twitter search page (#hanoitweetup).

6:30pm November 11, 2011
Hanoi Cooking Centre,
44 Chau Long Str., Ba Dinh Dist., Ha Noi, Viet Nam
+ 84 4 3715 3277 / + 84 4 3715 0088 / + 84 915092248
www.hanoicookingcentre.com

Those of you who are invited to Word Vietnam (@WordVietnam) party can head there at 8 pm after the Hanoi Tweetup.

Bollywood Afternoon In Hanoi

2011-11-01T20:49:00.000+05:30

A lot can happen over a cup of Masala Chai. Sunday afternoon's are usually Indian food at Foodshop 45 in Tay Ho, Hanoi. After a good meal the conversation around the table turned to Bollywood movies. Hey, Next week lets do lunch and watch a Bollywood film. Now that sounds like fun. Lets do it!

Bollywood Afternoon @ PUKU, Hanoi

Do join us for some great Indian food and a Bollywood movie 'Kal Ho Na Ho (Hindi, with English subtitles)' at PUKU, Hanoi. Please don't forget to register for the event.

Time: 06 November · 12:30 - 17:30
Location: PUKU Cafe & Bar 16 Tống Duy Tân, Hanoi, Vietnam
Cost: 250K VND (per person)
Registration: Send email to puku.hanoi(at)gmail.com.
You can also respond using the Bollywood Afternoon event page on Facebook.com.

&lt;p&gt;&amp;lt;a href="http://www.regiohelden.de/google-maps/"&amp;gt;Google Maps Script&amp;lt;/a&amp;gt; von &amp;lt;a href="http://www.regiohelden.de/"&amp;gt;RegioHelden&amp;lt;/a&amp;gt;&lt;/p&gt;

Watch the Trailer of Kal Ho Na Ho (Hindi with English Subtitles 2003)

Life of a very serious girl, Naina, changes on the arrival of her new neighbor, Aman, who teaches her a new way to live. Takes place mostly in NYC - with parts in Mumbai.
Starring: Preity Zinta, Shah Rukh Khan and Saif Ali Khan
IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0347304/

Planning the next Hanoi Tweetup

2011-10-28T16:38:00.000+05:30

It is time for another Hanoi Tweetup. Mien who organised the last Hanoi Tweetup has moved to Ho Chi Minh (HCM) City. So I decided to pitch in and organise the next Hanoi Tweetup.

What is a Tweetup?

A tweetup is an event where people who Twitter come together to meet in person. Normally we connect with our friends online after we have met them. At a tweetup you meet the people you might only otherwise know virtually. Like finally putting a name to a face, a tweetup is a great opportunity to really connect with the people who you follow on twitter.

When is it?

November 11, 2011 was selected as the date for the next Hanoi Tweetup by a public vote (doodle.com/4bn2isdxi5r4rv9z).

Where is it?

We haven't decided the venue for the Hanoi Tweetup. The Word Vietnam is throwing a party on the same evening. Am trying to resolve this conflict and would announce a venue in a few days.

Help Us!

Unfortunately I have to travel to Berlin for Mozilla Camp soon. Anyone interested in helping us coordinate the Hanoi Tweetup activities on November 11 ?. Please leave a comment or tweet me back @playingwithsid.

Learn more

If you have a Twitter account, you can contact us with hashtag #hanoitweetup in your message. You can also follow us using this twitter search page (#hanoitweetup). Don't forget to bookmark this link.

PS: Don't worry if you don't tweet. Come and meet some great people at the next Hanoi Tweetup.

Barcamp Phnom Penh 4

2011-10-28T11:38:00.000+05:30

Travelled to Cambodia to attend Barcamp Phnom Penh 4 this week. It is the second largest Barcamp in Asia, over 1500 people attended the event this year. The barcamp's are user-generated conferences (or unconferences) with open, participatory workshop-events, the content of which is provided by participants. Barcamp Phnom Penh 4 attracted dozens of foreign barcampers from all over the world. The barcamp featured talks related to Blogging, Entrepreneurship, Android Development, Web Technologies, Mobile App development, Security, Mapping Technology and Localization.

The young and enthusiastic team of volunteers led by Be Chantra organized a great event. Quite impressed with the spirit of Cambodian youth and zest for learning. Last month Mozilla helped organize the Open Cambodia event. My trip to Cambodia is to engage the Mozilla contributors and kickstart Mozilla Khmer Localization (L10n) team.

Mozilla Khmer Localization (L10n) Sprint

Open Institute has been developing KhmerOS to provide local language computing environment for Cambodia. However their decision to change the name of Mozilla Firefox and other Open Source software has fractured the contributor community. I hope the Mozilla Khmer Localization(L10n) sprint and my interactions with KhmerOS team would pave way to remedy this situation.

Vannak (@evannak) of KhmerOS project has been spearheading the Mozilla Khmer Localization(L10n) work. The sprint was delivered in English and Khmer by Vannak and me on the first day of the Barcamp Phnom Penh 4. After my presentation, Vannak did a practical demonstration of Khmer localization by translating Firefox strings using Narro web based translation tool. A lively discussion about the linguistic nuances of Khmer language followed.

The response to the sprint was very positive. Many people expressed their interest to join the Mozilla Khmer Localization (L10n) team. We hope to organize more such events to engage the contributors in Cambodia.

Mozilla Khmer L10n presentation, Barcamp Pnnom Penh 4

Mozilla Khmer Localization Sprint

Vennak (Mozilla Khmer L10n Team)

Khmer Localization Using Narro

Barcampers Enjoy Khmer Food

Barcamps are great!

Khmer Translation Talk

Google App Engine talk by
Guy Flysher (Google)

Localization of 'Open Data' Cambodia
by John Weeks

KhmerOS's Norbert Klein makes a point

Khmer Unicode on Android by
Stephen Gibberd (finder.co.kh)

Mobile Learning with iPad by
Adrian Tan (Square Crumbs)

The Search ends, Bastard Original Hacker TV Series

2011-10-20T07:25:00.001+05:30

Few weeks ago I wrote on my blog Do you know this old TV Series about a hacker?. From the other side of the world Niko found the answer. This TV series called "Bastard (1989)" had started my fascination with computers decades ago.

Der Bastard (TV mini-series 1989)

Niko found my blog post using google search engine and wrote this comment.

I remember watching this show as a kid in the 80's in Slovek TV, dubbed in slovak.

I remember a scene, where the main character is trying to hack into a computer with his Commodore 64 ans a vintage modem. As he tries to guess the password, he types in "bastard" and it works.

I think we're talking about the same show - because the dog in the main title is a bastard...

Gee I would LOVE to see it again, I just remembered it today and started googling... that's how I stumbled upon your blog.

As kids we knew about Brute-force attack. I used the method to guess our parents long distance Subscriber trunk dialing (STD) unlock code. Niko remembered the key detail of the show and correct password 'bastard' (amazing Niko!). Ten minutes later he found complete information about the TV show including the title track and few scenes from the TV show .

I found the show!!! It was called BASTARD, it was german, shot for the WDR german tv station.

Look at this! http://www.deutsches-filmhaus.de/filme_gesamt/s_gesamt/stark_ulrich.htm

there is an article in Der Spiegel magazine (in german) about the show here: http://www.spiegel.de/spiegel/print/d-13495823.html

and this should be the title song: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtI1Toq-N1A

And this is the imdb page for the series although the picture is not the right one I think... http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0096541.

Bavaria Media Television website provides further information about Bastard (1989) TV series.

Paul David, computer expert and ingenious hacker, is caught in the electronic meshes of a international data network and is confronted with criminals operating behind the scenes of a worldwide organisation, which uses the most modern communication technology for cleverly coordinated, criminal actions. Then Paul is suspected of double murder. When desperately trying to escape the noose he is surrounded by more and more people who obviously have the same aim in common: to catch him in a lethal trap. Only Dettmar Mushaake, expert for computer crime from the regional police department, seems to be on Paul's side - and, of course, Diddle, a mongrel who is anything but a lapdog. He tracks down ambushes, delivers messages and leads Paul's pursuers astray.

You can download full information about the show here.

Perhaps I should write to Bavaria Media Television to let them know that they have a cult classic, They might even consider a DVD release. :)

Setup RubyGems path in ubuntu

2011-10-10T11:14:00.002+05:30

Building Virtual Machines (VM) using Vagrant this week. Unfortunately the Ubuntu Natty does not add Ruby Gems directory to system path variable. Using Ruby Gems on command line is tedious if you have to type the full path prefix everytime. For example I have to type /var/lib/gems/1.8/bin/vagrant .

Instead I used the solution suggested in libgems-ruby bug #145267 .



sudo echo "PATH=/var/lib/gems/1.8/bin:$PATH" > /etc/profile.d/rubygems1.8.sh

Perhaps someone could add this to Vagrant Ubuntu installation documentation.

Gitbox Git GUI tool

2011-10-08T06:35:00.000+05:30

Here is another post in the series of the posts about tools that makes developers life simpler. Git was developed as distributed revision control system with an emphasis on speed. However in real world developers are hampered by lack of good graphical tool to manage their git repositories.

Software developer David Clarke (@onecyrenus) discovered this the hard way. He started using Gitbox application to manage his numerous git repositories and found that it helps speedup his work. I love the simiplicity of Gitbox user interface and it really seems to make 'version control as easy as mail'.

I would love to hear about your experiences with Git. Do tell me about your favorite Git GUI and why.

Do you know this old TV Series about a hacker ?

2011-10-04T14:49:00.001+05:30

Update (20 Oct 2011) : Niko helped us find the answer to this question, read more about the search ends for the TV Show.

What has been your defining moment in life? It is a difficult question. Let me share one defining moment of my childhood. My fascination with computers started with a TV show about computer hackers on India's national television. It was dubbed in English, produced by some foreign (German?) television . I vividly remember the starting scene of the show with a dog running towards the screen, jumping over the opening credits of the TV show.

We'll the credits were actually in some foreign language. The characters looked like German to me, but I might be wrong. The name of show sounded something like 'Computer Spezialist'. The TV show was about a computer hacker who gets mixed up with some criminals who plan to rob a bank. The shows central character is a dog who lost its master in hands of these crooks. Does that ring a bell?

I remember looking up from the TV screen to ask my uncle 'How can this guy get into a bank using a computer?'. My uncle said banks in developed countries were all connected with phones and satellites. It seems so amazing to my young mind. In those days the TV had one channel and getting a telephone would mean 3 years of waiting-list and personal computers would cost an arm and leg.

Do you have any information about this TV series?. I would love to watch it again.

I couldn't find much information about this TV show on Internet except for this blog post. The comments on this blog post might give you more detailed description about the show.

Anonymous said...
It was very nice reading your blog. And you seem the right person to pose this question that i had for a long time -- do you happen to remember a German crime/thriller show that used come on DD1 sometime on Sat or Sun early evening (5 pm 'ish i guess) and involved some computer hacking as well ..and had a very nice soundtrack in its title song ..something involving these words - fighting for his life ..heart of stone. it does not seem Derrick, Der Fahnder, or Der Alte ..but i might be wrong as i really do not remember much ...except that i know the tune of the title song. thanks,

leoNYdassaid...
Yes I do remember that series and the catchy title music. I have vague memories about it since not many episodes were actually aired. It was a series about hacking and I am quite sure it's not German. Well I guess thats as much as I can remember.

asif said...
Dear leoNYdas
i m really thankfull to God ..i came across ur blog
i am desperate to find this tv episode-this wud fall under the categories(drama,thriller and suspense).the name of the series is Computer Specialst(the second word SPECIALIST was spelled differently so i guess this wud be some russian or some other language-european series)...the beginning of the series shows a little dog running towards the screen.the series has beautifull title song..bit metallic or rock ..
"Hearts of Stones".i can faintly remember the lyrics but heres wat i can recall the best
"hearts of stones..ready for hearts of stones ..there is one man....
compromise..."
also the main character i think is a hacker..and he gets in touch with the bad men...of these one the opposite lead character's name is Elizabeth..she is a european police officer..a female spying i guess.also the other names i can recall is Powell..a bald guy i think is the main villian.
the hacker stays with some lady called "teresa" if i m not wrong and is totally involved in computers...
there are few scenes i can recall: the one of bomb explosion ..they kept under the keyboard and the hacker is made to drive a car into some remote place .. a castle ..where the victim who survived the bomb has been under house arrest.
also the female police officer her name elizabeth(she speaks in some other language at times) in the series kills a man in the hotel room with cyanide (she breaks a bit of the cyanide from the pill and mixes it in the drink,she carries the cyanide pill in her finger ring,,,this was shown cleary).elizabeth also has a locket or necklace with the two letters EP...and when the hacker asks her wat does this stand for ..she replies Elizabeth Powell..to which the hacker replies that its European Police.
there is also one scene when a male police officer is hanging from the window from the hackers home and the bad guys are unaware of thi police officer hanging.
in some other episode a man is murdered who comes in to investigate..he orders the hacker to remove his trousers and the man is killed as some one pulls off the carpet beneath his legs and he dies instantly..later his body his dumped in some remote place wrapped in the same carpet he was standing on....and also when the other detectives arrives to investigate the matter ...a person walks in the room and brings in the carpet of same type and he says that he is a carpet cleaner....
plz mail to me as i believe this series was aired in the 1990s ..plzzz somebody help and if u recall these series and let me know-
thanking you

Abhishek said...
Nice Post..
can anyone recollect the name of another detective/thriller..again agerman serial..where the protagonist was a techie guy...it had a very good title track..

Mytop MySQL Monitoring Tool

2011-10-02T09:10:00.000+05:30

If you are a developer or systems administrator who know the MySQL server performance in real time. MyTop tool is just for you. Designed like the traditional 'top' unix program Mytop displays MySQL server information, current mysql processes. It also lets you view complete query information and allows you to kill any MySQL processes. You can get mytop program using systems package installer or download it from mytop project website.

Usage:
You can launch the mytop in the system terminal using the following command line options.
$ mytop -u username -p password -d database

Press f to view full description of selected MySQL query and k to kill the the MySQL process.

You press ? anytime to view more keyboard commands.



 $  mytop -u username -p password -d database

MySQL on localhost (5.1.54-1ubuntu4)                    up 0+06:01:44 [16:26:50]
 Queries: 91.0    qps:    0 Slow:     0.0         Se/In/Up/De(%):    21/00/00/00
              qps now:    0 Slow qps: 0.0  Threads:    4 (   2/   0) 00/00/00/00
 Cache Hits: 17.0  Hits/s:  0.0 Hits now:   0.0  Ratio: 89.5% Ratio now:  0.0%
 Key Efficiency: 100.0%  Bps in/out:   0.2/ 19.0   Now in/out:   8.3/ 2.1k

        Id      User         Host/IP         DB      Time    Cmd Query or State 
        --      ----         -------         --      ----    --- -------------- 
        50      root       localhost      narro         0  Query show full proce
        53     narro       localhost      narro        24  Sleep                
        54     narro       localhost      narro        24  Query SELECT DISTINCT
        45      root       localhost                  543  Sleep

Help Test Narro Online Translation Tool

2011-10-02T08:19:00.000+05:30

Narro is a web application that allows online software translation and coordination. Some of the Mozilla L10n teams use this tool for their localization work. The tool was developed by Mozilla Romanian L10n team member Alexandru Szaz to make localization simple and easy to use.

Please take a moment to test the Narro 2.0 and report any problems and offer feedback to make Narro better.

https://l10n.mozilla.org/narro/projects.php

Please use Narro issue tracker file to your bug reports.

http://code.google.com/p/narro/issues/list

Mozilla Contributor Engagement Video Update

2011-10-01T02:15:00.001+05:30

Featured in Mozilla Contributor Engagement Video update during my visit to Mozilla San Francisco Office.

You can view this video on Youtube. Don't forget to subscribe to Mozillians Youtube channel

Software Freedom Day 2011

2011-09-24T12:24:00.000+05:30

Software Freedom 2011 is a yearly celebration for Software Freedom! Every year there are thousands teams organizing Software Freedom Day in different countries and cities. Let have a look at Software Freedom Day 2011 event in India, Singapore and Vietnam.

Chennai, India

Dwarak published his Software Freedom Day 2011 experiences in this Mozilla India blog post. Mozilla project won the best stall award.

Hanoi, Vietnam

Ha Quang Duong gave a talk about Mozilla L10n activities in Vietnam. Mozilla swag was given away at the event, Thanks Yang for taking care of Mozilla swag distribution.

Photos by Phan Trọng Khanh

Singapore

Preetam Rai represented Mozilla at SFD2011 in Singapore. You can view more picture of the event on Preetam's facebook album.

Wordpress Blind SQL Injection Vulnerability

2011-09-24T11:10:00.000+05:30

My friend a Bay Area entrepreneur had a nasty surprise, his website was defaced. Updating the wordpress content management system to stable version and resetting the default theme from backup fixed the problem.

So don't forget to keep your wordpress CMS updated to latest release and secure your wordpress website to avoid such nasty surprises.

The vulnerability effects WordPress version 3.0.4. Malicious script kiddies exploit the remote blind SQL injection vulnerability in comment_post_ID to deface the wordpress websites. You can learn more about this vulnerability on packetstorm.
packetstormsecurity.org/files/104989/WordPress-3.0.4-Blind-SQL-Injection.html

Malaysian Newspaper Interviews Mozilla Rep Hilary Ho

2011-09-21T01:20:00.000+05:30

Malaysian Mozilla Rep Hilary Ho Jia Hao was interviewed by English-language Malaysian newspaper New Sarawak Tribune . Here is short excerpt of the interview.

Mozilla Firefox recruiting contributors

Mozilla Firefox, a well known and widely used web browser is planning to set foot in the state by recruiting local contributors to make the web browser more user-friendly and community-based.

A representative of Malaysia Mozilla and Mozilla Web Programmer, Hilary Ho Jia Hao, 21, when met by New Sarawak Tribune yesterday said the recruitment is open to everyone who has interest in making the web browser more local based with no limitation on the recruitment as long as they are able to contribute.

A student of Cognitive Science at Univerisiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS), Ho revealed that there are more than 40,000 people in the world who are involved in it.
Read the full interview on New Sarawak Tribune website.

Mozilla Localization Camp, Hanoi

2011-08-22T12:17:00.000+05:30

Last week we organized the Mozilla Localization(L10n) sprint at iWay in Hanoi. The event is first in series of Mozilla Localization (L10n) sprints across Asia. The sprints try to increase contributions to mozilla localization and engage Mozilla Localization (L10n) contributors.

Few active contributors from various localization projects; Tuan(Fedora), Vu Hung(Mozilla), Yang (Ubuntu) and Dung (Sahana) joined the sprint. The small gathering of experienced contributors provided an interactive sessions. We expected more participant however those who confirmed their participation at Mozilla Localization coffee meetup didn't show up. The sprint lasted for more than 3 hours. Later we head to nearby Bia Hoi for round of beers and light lunch.

Narro is web based wiki-like collobrative translation tool. The participants of the sprint were happy with simple interface of Narro. They quickly understand the basics of Narro. I explained how to use commenting, review and voting options to do peer review of the localizations and pointed out feature that would speed up localization. Working with Narro with increasing connection time-outs. During the Narro downtime, Tuan and Vu Hung shared their translation workflow. Tuan found Narro easy to use than Pootle and Yang suggested numerous improvements to the Narro UI and workflow.

Clearly the positive response to the mozilla localization sprint. Tuan expressed interest to talk about Mozilla localiztion at SFD 2011 and having more community driven localization sprints. The goal of such sprints to generate interest and have more community driven localization events.

ICANN 41 Singapore 2011

2011-08-22T12:04:00.000+05:30

The five day Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) 41 meeting was held in Singapore on 19 – 24 June 2011. The ICANN meetings are held three times each year in different regions of the globe. The meeting has pre-meeting workshops, working group sessions and ICANN's annual general meeting. It is a good opportunity for NIXI fellows to have face-to-face discussions with various people dedicated to the guiding of the future of the Internet.

The ICANN 41 meeting is of particular significance to those concerned with the subject of Internet governance. The controversial new generic top-level domain names (gTLDs) was approved by the ICANN board at this meeting. The internet pundits predicted before the event that "Internet is poised for potentially one of its biggest shakeups in years". Being part of this historic moment and to watch the ICANN board vote to expand TLD space was an experience that I will cherish. It really motivated me to play an active role in future ICANN activities.

Another important topic at ICANN 41 was Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs). The ability to have country code top-level domain (ie. www.example.com) displayed in non-latin alphabet would bring the local language computing to full circle. We now have complete operating systems, word processors, web browsers and email clients available in local languages. With implementation of Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs) computer users can surf the web and email in their local language.

The Internationalized Domain Names(IDNs) implementation poses certain complex linguistic and technical problems. At ICANN 41 various IDN Variant TLD case studies were presented. Of particular interest was the Arabic and Devanagari language case studies. The problems faced by various IDN variants are similar however there seems no consensus on how to address them. Presentation and transcripts from these meetings are available here.

Jothan Frakes presentation on Universal Acceptability, The Public suffix & IDN Whitelist was really good. I never realized that Mozilla Firefox supported IDNs. Later I met up with Frakes to understand the internals of Mozilla Firefox IDN support.

Universal acceptability, The Public suffix & IDN Whitelist

James Galvin (Afilias) IDN e-mail solution was perhaps the most practical demonstration of IDN Email support. I hope to test Thunderbird Aurora with IDN email addresses with help of Afilias in the future.

In future, I would be participating in IDN working groups with special emphasis on IDN support for Mozilla Firefox browser and Thunderbird email client. Also work with various Indian language IDN variants groups. Document various technical solutions and provide support using existing workarounds.

Syafiq Mazli's Mozilla Localization Camp (Malaysia) Report

2011-08-15T23:23:00.001+05:30

You can read Syafiq Mazli's report about the Mozilla Localization Camp at the Barcamp KL 2011 here.

Salam,
Good Morning,
Here the report for this event by chronology time.
There has two session, introduction talk session and sprint session
0700 Hours
- Wake up and prepare for out Me,@umarzuki and Arky @playingwithsid. From *Mozilla Base Camp* like Arky said, to MMU Cyberjaya.
0845 Hours
-Arrive at Faculty of Information Technology, MMU Cyberjaya.
0900 Hours
-Bring out bag of Mozilla Swag and straight to counter for registration. Surprisely, there are many crowd arrive before us. Haha. We quite late.

Read More

Mozilla Localization Camp at Barcamp KL, Read the Storify Story

2011-08-15T00:06:00.002+05:30

Traveled to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia this week to organize Mozilla Localization Camp at the Barcamp KL 2011. Instead of doing a blog post I decided to use social media content storytelling tool Storify.

You can view "Mozilla Localization Camp (MozMY L10n Camp)" on Storify

How to Download Your Photos From Facebook

2011-08-02T10:59:00.001+05:30

Do you want to download all your photo's from Facebook?. Now you can using this step by step guide, you to downloading all your Facebook information quickly.

Log on to Facebook.com and go to your Account Settings page. Click on the Download a copy of your Facebook data link at the bottom of the page.

Facebook will now start backing up all your data. It may take some time to finish. You will receive an email with the link to the download file.

When you receive the email from Facebook with the subject 'Your Download is Ready'. Click on the link at the bottom of the email. Facebook should ask you to verify your account information. Please do verify that email indeed came from Facebook.

Click on the download button and the download will start.

You will have to use winzip or similar program to unzip the downloaded file.

PS: Beware, Don't fall prey to Phishing. Please verify that you are on facebook.com before you enter your password.

BarCamp Yangon 2011: Mozilla Localization Community Meetup

2011-06-04T16:25:00.000+05:30

BarCamp Yangon 2011 provided good opportunity to engage localization community in Myanmar. The Make FLOSS Software Speak Your Language talk on the first day of BarCamp was well received. The talk introduced the concept of software localization using wiki-like collaboration tools.

On the second day of the BarCamp the Mozilla Localization Community meetup was held. Some of the mozilla localization contributors participated along few other localization enthusiasts. The goal of this community meetup was to engage the mozilla localization contributors and take concrete steps towards starting new Burmese language localization.

The Burmese multilingual support is hodgepodge of different encoding models and various unicode fonts (Refer Burmese Multilingual support wikipedia page). These problem are both historical and technical, the Myanmar NLP project is spearheading the standardization process. The contributors pointed several technical issues with Firefox Burmese multilingual support. They expressed their willingness to work with the Mozilla developers by reporting bugs and patches.

Ngwe Tun and Steven had already created Burmese/Myanmar (my-MM) Firefox 3.6 Language Pack. These translations should be merged into new locale repository for Burmese locale. The process of starting new Burmese locale can be tracked here (Bugzilla #631921).

Few other ideas that were discussed at the meetup are better co-ordination via a dedicated Burmese L10n mailing-list and getting more people involved in localization using web based translation platform such as Narro and organizing few more community driven workshops at other events in different parts of Myanmar.

Make FLOSS Software Speak Your Language, BarCamp Yangon 2011

2011-02-27T17:46:00.000+05:30

I gave a talk entitled "Make FLOSS Software Speak Your Language" at BarCamp Yangon 2011. The talk covered web-based localization tools Launchpad Translations and Narro that are used to translate Ubuntu Linux and Mozilla applications. The translators can use these tools to contribute translations in a wiki-like collaboration.

This talk was designed as a hands-on session beginning with a short talk that introduced the software localization concepts in a simple non technical language, followed by a practical session where the workshop participants logged on and started translations guided by experienced members of the local translation community.

Make FLOSS Speak Your Language

Ahkeno, a Joomla! localization contributor from Myanmar translated the talk and explained some of the concepts in the Burmese language. She also shared her experience with the Joomla! localization project.

Myanmar based Mozilla Firefox localization community member Steven Zaw Htut talked about the Burmese language package for Firefox 3.6. He explained how to install the package and change the default language of the Firefox Web browser. You can visit the http://www.wordpress-my.tk/ website to download this package.

There was a good turnout for the talk. The audience was mostly young college students who were excited about participating in localization projects. The presence of active contributors from the Myanmar localization community offered them a chance to meet and join these localization efforts. I finished the talk with a few key points about working in teams, asking new contributors not to be afraid of criticism and focusing on quality translations.

Unfortunately we did not have the Burmese (my-MM) locale enabled on Launchpad Translation and Narro. It was therefore not possible to do the practical exercises without the locale and the slow internet connection would have made it difficult for many people to sign up and work on translations. This event nevertheless helped me develop the framework to begin developing material, both printed and online for the future localization workshops. The overall response to the workshop was positive. It showed me that there is definitely a need for these types of exchanges not only in Myanmar but in many different Asian countries.

Stay tuned. More about this event to come!

BarCamp Yangon 2011, Myanmar

2011-02-26T15:42:00.000+05:30

Living in Hanoi, Vietnam, and working with the local Hanoi Linux User Group have been a great experience. They have helped me observe how community driven localization effort works and understand its problems. On January 8, 2011, few Hanoi Linux User Group members organized FLOSS Translation Camp to discuss how to promote localization and to address the problems of Vietnamese FLOSS localization efforts. Following this event and as a result of few off-line discussion with various community members, I decided to design a framework to introduce software localization to new contributors and to create an effective peer review process for improving the quality of the existing software translations. Dietrich who had been following those events closely suggested that I go to BarCamp Yangon 2011. Attending this would be a unique opportunity to know and engage the FLOSS community in Myanmar.

BarCamp Yangon is the biggest bar camp in South East Asia. Last year over 2000 people participated and more people are expected this year. Thanks to the efforts of Mike Amy and the BarCamp Yangon team, I was able to get the paper-work needed for the Myanmar visa. The international participants were received by the BarCamp volunteers upon arrival and everything went as planned if one were not to count the fact that I was stranded at the airport after arriving on a much delayed flight. I planned to stay at the Yangon YMCA but after visiting the latter, I made the wise decision to check into a hotel which offered clean sheets and a hot shower - a much welcomed treat.

BarCamp Yangon 2011 was held at the Myanmar Info-Tech campus on February 19th and 20th. The Myanmar Info-tech campus is situated near the Yangon University on the outskirts of the city. It was already crowded when I reached the venue at 8:30 AM. The registration counter did not have any information about my online registration so I skipped registration and headed to the main auditorium for the opening ceremony. The opening ceremony was very brief. The MC spoke in Burmese and then a dozen or so international barcampers were asked to go on stage to introduce themselves.

There were few machines setup for internet access in the main hall as well as free coffee. The media team was tweeting on the other side. The wireless internet was available, but it was painfully slow considering the number of people who were using it and the waiting one had to endure to get to it.

Unlike other conferences, BarCamps is a different beast. It takes a lot of jousting, pushing and shoving to get your talk posted on the white board that announces the day's sessions. Few of us who had sessions planned the titles of our sessions and handed them to a BarCamp organizer who promptly disappeared leaving us session less and in the dark. Luckily, I managed to swap a session with Luke,an attendee at the Barcamp, who had planned his talk for the next day. The sessions spread across various rooms in different buildings on the campus. Each room had a volunteer with a wireless radio that was helpful in getting across up to the minute messages. Closed circuit cameras were used in some of the rooms for the sole purpose of figuring out which rooms were available.

Please visit the page for more pictures from BarCamp Yangon 2011 https://picasaweb.google.com/barcampyangon/BarcampYangon2011

Intellectual property Lawyer and avid BarCamper John Young's talk on IP and Domain names was really interesting. Perhaps this kind of talks and the later off-line discussions sum up the joy of attending a BarCamp.

After the talk I ducked into a few sessions that were not very interesting. After a quick lunch we headed to my 'Make FLOSS Software Speak Your Language' Free Software localization talk. This talk is covered in the my next post.

While in Myanmar, I also attended The Software & Solutions Exhibition 2011 which was organized by MCF and was held at the Strand Hotel in downtown Yangon. The exhibition had stalls from Software vendors, IT training schools, and surveillance equipment vendors.

John Young blogged about his experience at the exhibition in this blog post “Bridging IT and Business” in Myanmar

Walking back from Strand Hotel onto the busy Sule Pagoda Road, I ducked into a pirate CD shop that offered everything from pirated Windows CD, Mac OSx, Android and Linux distributions. In a country with very little internet bandwidth, I was quite happy to see that it is possible to buy a Linux CD for less than one dollar.

Stay tuned. More about this event to come!

GeoHacking and promoting Open Mapping Technologies

2011-02-23T13:03:00.002+05:30

For two years I helped evangelize OpenStreetMap(OSM) and open mapping technologies with my friends at GeoHackers in India. The group is subject of the article 'Geohackers show the way in open mapping', it feels that all the efforts bears fruit.

When I first met Geohackers, they were bunch of guys who loved to make maps. Very soon I developed a strategy for GeoHackers, combining promotion of grassroots open mapping technology adoption with events and providing consultancy services for companies, governmental and research organizations who want to take advantage open mapping technologies.

Geohackers organized mapping parties at technical events in educational institutions like OpenStreetMap Mapping Party at NIT Calicut and mapping parties that concentrated on heritage sites in Fort Cochin and Trivandrum.

These events helped me create a blueprint that can be used for organizing such mapping parties everywhere in the world. The document How To Organize A Mapping Party was the initial draft of this process. Fine tuning the process and documenting it helped in the capacity building of open mapping enthusiasts in India. More students and young people joined and contributed to OpenStreeMap project during these mapping parties.

With my intense energy I pushed the GeoHackers group to explore new ways of using open mapping technologies. We had a break when Mapping for Social Change invited us to participate and provide help to Information activists use open mapping technologies. Maps play a pivotal role for social activists along with social media.

The Mapping For Social Change workshop gave me an insight into the problems and short coming of Open Mapping technologies. On the two hour flight back from the workshop I designed a project with Sajjad. We spent the next two nights designing and building HeritageWalks.in. We presented the project to show how effectively open mapping technology used at the Maps For Social Change exhibition .

‘Geohackers’ shows the way in open mapping

About two years ago, in an open map party held in Hyderabad, some geeks sowed the idea of forming an open technology mapping consultancy team. Now, the idea has grown into a full-fledged, non-profit, open technology mapping consultancy team called Geohackers.

The team, which consists of seven active members and several contributors, gives consultancy services on open mapping for different organisations and projects, free of cost. The team is also contributing to the Open Street Map, a project to make free and open maps.

“With the belief in the ideology that information has to be free, we undertake consultancy works and training for students on cartography,” said Sajjad Anwar, a coordinator of the open map team and a student of the MES College of Engineering, Kozhikode. The contributors include several technology freelancers and techies, working in different parts of the world, he said.

Explaining that the Geohackers might be the first consultancy service on open mapping in the country, he said, “We thought about starting an open mapping consultancy team to impart the ideology of open mapping to the people, as the need of such a consultancy is high in the country.”

The team is involved in several open mapping projects such as Assistance for Maps for Making a Social Change project and Heritage Walks.in project. “The first project was sponsored by two NGOs- Centre for Internet and Society and Tactical Tech and we have conducted several workshops and training classes for the social workers on how to use open maps. The training and workshops were held in New Delhi and Ahmedabad,” he explained.

“Heritage Walks.in is a unique project to help tourists. People can download maps from the website www.heritagewalks.in for free,” he said.

At present, the mapping of heritage sites in Ahmedabad, Kozhikode, Kochi and Thiruvananthapuram has been completed. “The project is aimed to cover the whole India. More heritage sites will be added to the website shortly,” he said.

For mapping purpose, we use GPS devices and free satellite images. The open mapping foundation has contributed two such devices for the purpose, he said.

You will find various blog posts related to events mentioned in the article.

Accessibility Reaching Everywhere Workshop Nov-Dec 2011 in Brussels

2011-02-23T11:37:00.000+05:30

AEGIS project organizing its final Workshop and 2nd International Conference entitled “Accessibility Reaching Everywhere” on 30 November – 2 December 2011 in Brussels, bringing together both end-users (people with disabilities) as well as platform and application accessibility developers, representative organisations, the Assistive Technology industry, and policy makers. Since 2008, the AEGIS consortium (comprising companies such as Vodafone Foundation, Research in Motion, Oracle, and research groups from Cambridge University and Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, etc.) has been developing an Open Accessibility Framework – comprising open accessibility interfaces, user interface components, developer tools, end-user applications and prototype accessibility solutions for desktops, rich Internet applications and mobile devices.

The workshop on 30 November will focus on the realisations of the AEGIS (Open Accessibility Everywhere: Groundwork, Infrastructure, Standards) project and provide attendees the opportunity to try out all outcomes of the project. The demonstrated products offer barrier-free access to desktop, mobile and web applications, are open source based and will be freely available.

The conference on 1-2 December will gather a wide array of experts and users in the area of Assistive Technology to discuss scientific and policy developments in accessible technology; showcase relevant projects and initiatives in the area of assistive technology.

Access to both events will be free, but places will be limited.

This event comes ahead of the European Day of People with Disabilities that is marked by the European Commission via a policy conference in the first week of December each year, in close cooperation with the European Disability Forum (EDF).

Invitations for registration, scientific papers and exhibitors will be issued soon.

Both events take place at the Diamant Conference and Business Centre, Boulevard A. Reyerslaan 80, 1030 Brussels. More information is available under www.aegis-project.eu, or contact Ms. Julie Buttier at julie.buttier@epr.eu.

About AEGIS Project

AEGIS is an Integrated Project (IP) within the ICT programme of FP7 and aims, through user research and prototype development with current and next-generation ICT, to develop and validate the necessary infrastructure and accessibility frameworks needed for deeply embedding accessibility into the desktop, smart phones and rich Internet applications; with a focus on the needs of users with mild, severe or complex disabilities served via assistive technologies; and to propose these results to the appropriate standards organisations for adoption, as well as to make them available through open source as much as possible.

You can now view the AEGIS project video online here.

Rare Hoan Kiem Turtle Sighted During Tết 2011

2011-02-04T23:01:00.000+05:30

The Tết (Vietnamese Lunar New Year) began with a beautiful surprise. Today we saw the elusive Hoan Kiem Turtle surface and swim a dozen feet away from the shore. "This is gonna be one lucky year" I said. "Yes, yes it going to be a good year" replied a lady in the crowd "The turtle surfaces on special occasions". It seems that the turtle was last sighted during 1000 years of Hanoi celebrations last year.

The legend of the Hoan Kiem Turtle fascinated me ever since I arrived in Vietnam, I would walk around the Hoan Kiem lake hoping to catch a glimpse of this beautiful creature. And now finally I saw it during the auspicious time of Tết.

Wishing you all happy new year "chuc mong nam moi 2011"

Click picture for full size image

How to install adobe AIR on ubuntu 10.10 "Maverick Meerkat"

2011-02-01T19:01:00.001+05:30

Adobe AIR is actively supported on Linux. Few weeks ago I decided to try to install Mockups software, it is developed with Adobe AIR. I found Adobe AIR installation easy but very inconvenient.

Install Adobe AIR: http://get.adobe.com/ air/
Choose Adobe AIR Installer for Linux and select software to download as .deb
Download and install the .deb package with Ubuntu Software Center or using dpkg -i command
The Adobe AIR is installed to /opt/Adobe AIR/Versions/1.0/ directory. You can install .air Adobe application on command line or select from Applications > Accessories > Adobe AIR Application Installer.
```
cd /opt/Adobe AIR/Versions/1.0/
 sudo ./Adobe\ AIR\ Application\ Installer  
```
You can also associate .air to open by default with Adobe AIR Application Installer. Select .air application and right click to get properies, then change the open with custom command with path '/opt/Adobe AIR/Versions/1.0/Adobe AIR Application Installer'.

How to Install LibreOffice in Ubuntu

2011-01-28T14:29:00.001+05:30

In my last post I talked about LibreOffice. In case you wondering how to install LibreOffice on your ubuntu computer. Here are the instructions. Please note that doing this will replace your OpenOffice.org packages with LibreOffice.
Open a terminal and type the following commands to ad LibreOffice PPA to your software sources list.


sudo apt-add-repository ppa:libreoffice/ppa

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install libreoffice

Please do give your feedback and bug reports to the LibreOffice team.

Catfish and Mandala: A Two-Wheeled Voyage Through the Landscape and Memory of Vietnam

2011-01-27T22:55:00.000+05:30

Its past midnight, I am lying in my bed and reading Andrew X. Pham's Catfish and Mandala . Outside the window, the Hanoi city is still awake preparing for the Tet new year. Few days ago I picked up this book from my friends Tu's bookshelf and fell in love after reading the first few pages. Andrew X. Pham prose is simply beautiful. Rediscovering my love for Vietnam reading through this book.

Yesterday at the Tet lunch at work, I mentioned this book to Marko and he suggested me to read Andrew X. Pham next book The Eaves of Heaven: A Life in Three Wars as well.

About the book

Winner of the Kiriyama Pacific Rim Book Prize
A New York Times Notable Book of the Year
Winner of the Whiting Writers' Award
A Seattle Post-Intelligencer Best Book of the Year

Catfish and Mandala is the story of an American odyssey—a solo bicycle voyage around the Pacific Rim to Vietnam—made by a young Vietnamese-American man in pursuit of both his adopted homeland and his forsaken fatherland.

Andrew X. Pham was born in Vietnam and raised in California. His father had been a POW of the Vietcong; his family came to America as "boat people." Following the suicide of his sister, Pham quit his job, sold all of his possessions, and embarked on a year-long bicycle journey that took him through the Mexican desert, around a thousand-mile loop from Narita to Kyoto in Japan; and, after five months and 2,357 miles, to Saigon, where he finds "nothing familiar in the bombed-out darkness." In Vietnam, he's taken for Japanese or Korean by his countrymen, except, of course, by his relatives, who doubt that as a Vietnamese he has the stamina to complete his journey ("Only Westerners can do it"); and in the United States he's considered anything but American. A vibrant, picaresque memoir written with narrative flair and an eye-opening sense of adventure, Catfish and Mandala is an unforgettable search for cultural identity.

Search Amazon.com for Andrew X. Pham

How do you create an organization chart with OpenOffice.org?

2011-01-27T14:00:00.000+05:30

Few days ago one my colleague asked if I can help to make a organization chart with OpenOffice.org. OpenOffice.org does not come with sample organization chart template. The OpenOffice.org website says it is bundled with Professional Template pack but I didn't find it in there.

There is an organization chart Sample available if you have installed the Professional Template Pack from the OpenOffice Extensions website

Creating organization chart is easy with the OpenOffice shape drawing tools, but it is great to have a sample template. I found an old template here.
http://documentation.openoffice.org/Samples_Templates/User/template/org_chart.stw

PS:Perhaps I'll add a wishlist to the new libreoffice project for this.

HOW TO: Copy a CD-ROM in Ubuntu

2011-01-26T13:55:00.000+05:30

Here is a quick tip on how to make a copy of CD/DVD when the standard CD/DVD burning software is not available. We can use the 'dd' command to copy the CD/DVD as an ISO image file on your harddrive.



 dd if=/dev/cdrom of=/tmp/cdimage.iso

1313832+0 records in
1313832+0 records out
672681984 bytes (673 MB) copied, 127.532 s, 5.3 MB/s

Full-body game control using FAAST and OpenNI

2011-01-22T09:26:00.000+05:30

FAAST is middleware to facilitate integration of full-body control with games and VR applications. The toolkit relies upon software from OpenNI and PrimeSense to track the user’s motion using the PrimeSensor or the Microsoft Kinect sensors. FAAST includes a custom VRPN server to stream the user’s skeleton over a network, allowing VR applications to read the skeletal joints as trackers using any VRPN client. Additionally, the toolkit can also emulate keyboard input triggered by body posture and specific gestures. This allows the user add custom body-based control mechanisms to existing off-the-shelf games that do not provide official support for depth sensors.
http://projects.ict.usc.edu/mxr/faast/

Chinese teacher helps blind find confidence in art

2011-01-21T13:16:00.000+05:30

Inside a brightly-lit room in a lighting store, painting teacher Zeng Bailiang and his group of volunteers are patiently teaching a group of blind students the basics of Chinese painting.

The students in the classes in Nanning, the provincial capital of China's southern Guangxi province, spend hours practising brushstrokes on a special paper, feeling with their fingers the different wet and dry areas to guide them on their painting.

Eventually they get to the point where they can dip a brush, similar to the ones used for Chinese calligraphy, into black ink and draw things such as mountains or bamboo trees with long strokes. Short strokes can create flowers or birds.

Zeng, 55, is a self-taught artist who has been conducting classes for the blind for the past several decades. He says the classes fuel his passion for art with a sense of satisfaction that comes from helping the students - many of whom were orphans who came to him wanting something new and fun to do.
Read More

Snapstick, watch internet content on TV

2011-01-20T16:12:00.000+05:30

Just stumbled across Snapstick on Mozilla-based applications page on Mozilla.org .

Snapstick combines the ease of discovering content on your laptop, tablet, or smartphone with the viewing pleasure of a big screen TV.

Now that sounds really cool. But it still doesn't explain what's the technology behind all this. Digging through the Snapstick.com site, I found the Engadget.com Snapstick review that explained the full details. Perhaps someone at Snapstick is listening, you need to put up relevant content where we geeks can find it easily.
BTW did I mention that this product is powered by Ubuntu. :)

Postfix Log Entry Summarizer

2011-01-19T12:07:00.000+05:30

Everyday I manage a Postfix mail server that handles emails from 20 mailing-lists. On days like this when there lot of email traffic, I keep an eye on the activity using pflogsumm perl script.

pflogsumm -e --problems_first -d today /var/log/maillog | pager

pflogsumm.pl is designed to provide an overview of postfix activity, with just enough detail to give the administrator a "heads up" for potential trouble spots.
http://jimsun.linxnet.com/postfix_contrib.html

CES 2011 Tablet Roundup

2011-01-17T14:19:00.001+05:30

DigitalTrends.com compared 25 tablet computers at International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2011. It sure seems like 2011 is the Year of the Tablet. I feel that the small android devices from Asian manufacturers are going to eat up the market share of the big players if they get their act right.

Motorola Xoom
Blackberry PlayBook
Toshiba Android Tablet
Dell Streak 7 and 10
Dell Inspiron Duo
Samsung 7 Series Sliding Windows PC
Lenovo LePad
Lenovo IdeaPad Slate
Asus Eee Pads and Eee Slate EP121
Acer Iconia Tab A500
Sharp Galapagos Tablet

Small Form Factor Tablets

NEC LT-W Cloud Communicator
Motion CL900 Windows Tablet
iStation Zood 3D tablet
Coby Kyros Internet Tablets
Gadmei Android Tablets
Ace NomadPAD 10 series
Archos 10 Internet Tablet
Rockchip Tablet RK29XX
SBNTech All in One Embedded IP Multimedia Communicator
Jinys Tablets
The Others: the Aluratek Cinepad, AOC Breeze, Gentouch Latte (Latte Grande, Expresso), Notion Ink Adam, Azpen Windows 7/Android tablet, Vizio tablet, and the eFun Nextbook Next 4 and Next 6.

Dan Saffer 'Tap is the New Click'

2011-01-16T19:15:00.000+05:30

Spent the first two weeks of January working on an interactive interface concept design for gesture and multi touch device. Can't ask for a better way to start the new year 2011!.
Don't miss Dan Saffer's 'Tap is the New Click' talk on designing for the new touchscreen and gestural devices for the public.

NYC IxDA - Tap is the New Click - Dan Saffer from Interaction Design Association on Vimeo.

"Tap is the New Click"

Even though the technology has been around for decades, only now are we starting to see mass production and adoption of c. Jeff Han's influential 2006 TED demonstration of his multitouch system, followed by the launches of Nintendo's Wii, Apple's iPhone, and Microsoft Surface, have announced a new era of interaction design, one where gestures in space and touches on a screen will be as prominent as pointing and clicking.

But how do you create products for this new paradigm? While most of us know how to design desktop and web applications, what do you need to know to design for interactive gestures?

This introduction to designing gestural interfaces will cover the basics: usability and ergonomics; a brief history of the technology; some elemental patterns of use; prototyping and documenting; and how to communicate that a gestural interface is present to users.

ABOUT DAN SAFFER
Dan Saffer runs www.kickerstudio.com. He is an international speaker and author, his writing on design has appeared in BusinessWeek and many online publications. His acclaimed book Designing for Interaction: Creating Smart Applications and Clever Devices has been called "a bookshelf must-have for anyone thinking of creating new designs" and has been translated into several languages. His new book on interactive gestures will be published by O'Reilly in October 2008.

Dan is a member of the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA) and the Interaction Design Association (IxDA). He received his Master of Design in Interaction Design from Carnegie Mellon University.

SIM Card Registration Failed Solution

2010-12-31T13:20:00.002+05:30

Few days ago I sent a message on twitter "Anyone know the reason for Nokia's SIM Card Registration Failed problem?". Got quite a few solutions from my friends . It is the most common problem with Nokia mobile phones. Restarting the phone few times or removing SIM and cleaning the contacts also fixes the problem. Try some of the solutions that worked for me.

Solution 1: Blocked SIM or Faulty SIM

In countries like India, you need to register your SIM card. The cell phone company blocks the SIM if they don't receive the application within few weeks of activating the phone. Please check if this is case.

Take out the SIM and test it with a different phone, if the phone fails to read the SIM, get the SIM replaced. Few days ago this worked for a friend with a brand new Nokia handset here in Hanoi, Vietnam.

Solution 2: Clean SIM Contact Pins

Take out the battery and SIM card. Use a clean eraser to wipe the gold contacts of the phone and on back the SIM card. Replace the SIM and make sure its firmly held in place. Few phones tend to start to working when you bang them on your palm a few times due to this reason. Tighten the tiny screws on the back panel of the phone near the SIM card if they are loose.

Solution 3: Phone Software/Hardware Issues

Despite all your efforts, the phone refuses to work then try to the phone repaired or replaced. Some users found that the cellphone firmware upgrade tends to fix this issue. I got a Nokia phone firmware upgraded, it fixed the problem for few months. But the phone started to have the problem again.

Unfortunately there seems to be no sure fix for this problem. Most cell phone service centers including Nokia Authorized shops often fails fix this annoyance. They even charge you service fee just for checking the phone :( .

I would love to hear your experiences, have you had this problem? Did you manage to fix it. Thank you ajuonline, BasilKurian, geohacker for your suggestions.

Google Nexus S

2010-12-28T04:08:00.002+05:30

You heard about Google Nexus S and all the buzz right. Well, I asked a friend what he thought about his shinny new Nexus S. He said the he found the 4" Contour phone display screen little odd and the phone does seems to get hot.

What are your thoughts about Nexus S?

Create Android apps with a web browser

2010-12-28T04:03:00.000+05:30

Googlelabs Inventor for Android lets you create Android applications with a web browser. No programming experience needed!

Creating an App Inventor app begins in your browser, where you design how the app will look. Then, like fitting together puzzle pieces, you set your app's behavior. All the while, through a live connection between your computer and your phone, your app appears on your phone. Read more...

MeeGo Road Show in Hanoi

2010-12-27T09:56:00.000+05:30

Vietsoftware and Intel co-hosting a MeeGo roadshow in Hanoi on December 28, 2010 in Hanoi.

MeeGo Roadshow Event Details

9:30 to 10:00 Registration and Welcome guest
10:00 to 10:15 Welcome speech
10:15 to 10:30 Introduction MeeGo Core
10:30 - 10:45 Introduction Asianux distribution on the MeeGo Lite 2.2
10:45 to 11:00 Demo Lite Asianux 2.2
11:00 to 11:30 Introduction Intel AppUp and development programs.
11:30 to 11:50 Gifts!
12:00 to 13:30 Lunch

Location: Saigon Hotel - 80 Ly Thuong Kiet, Hanoi

Get in touch with Trang or Hoa for registration
Ms. Trang: trang.nguyen @ metanvietnam.com
Ms. Hoa: hoaptt@asianux.org.vn

Google Mobile Maps 5.0 for Android

2010-12-26T17:37:00.000+05:30

If you are excited by the Google Maps UI features demo by Google's Andy Rubin @ Dive Into Mobile. You can try them out on your android phone with the new release of Google Maps 5.0 for Android

With Google Maps for mobile 5.0 you can explore maps in 3D—tilt, rotate and try “compass mode” to see new perspectives that can help you navigate around. Maps are now more reliable when you’re offline, and we’ve added offline rerouting in Google Maps Navigation (beta). To get the latest version, search for “Google Maps” in Android Market and update. Note that not all new features will be available for all phones. Read our blog post for more information.
http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2010/12/next-generation-of-mobile-maps.html

Firefox 4 Daily builds on Ubuntu 10.10

2010-12-21T14:51:00.001+05:30

Last evening I met Firefox Hacker Dietrich Ayala in Hanoi. He was surprised that I don't use firefox 4 yet. So here what I did to get the daily builds of firefox 4 onto my Ubuntu 10.10 machine.


# Add the mozilla daily builds PPA 
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntu-mozilla-daily/ppa

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install firefox-4.0

# Make Firefox 4 as default browser
sudo update-alternatives --config x-www-browser
There are 3 choices for the alternative x-www-browser (providing /usr/bin/x-www-browser).

  Selection    Path                       Priority   Status
------------------------------------------------------------
* 0            /usr/bin/chromium-browser   40        auto mode
  1            /usr/bin/chromium-browser   40        manual mode
  2            /usr/bin/firefox            40        manual mode
  3            /usr/bin/firefox-4.0        40        manual mode

Press enter to keep the current choice[*], or type selection number: 3
update-alternatives: using /usr/bin/firefox-4.0 to provide /usr/bin/x-www-browser (x-www-browser) in manual mode.

Testing Firefox Babies

Firefox is my most commonly used application, coming next only to terminal and Emacs text editor. Perhaps I would able to isolate and report more problem in the coming months. Accessibility and UI issue are at the top my list right now.

Have a look at the presentation of how you can help to make firefox better.

Testing Baby Foxes

How to install Sun JDK on Ubuntu 10.10 “Maverick meerkat”?

2010-12-19T13:07:00.001+05:30

Surprised to find that Sun Java packages were missing in Ubuntu Maverick (10.10). The new Ubuntu release uses OpenJDK by default. I needed sun-java6-jdk package to use a eclipse IDE development Android ADT plugin.

Found the solution in this StackOverFlow thread How to install Sun JDK on Ubuntu 10.10 “Maverick meerkat”?


# Add this line to your /etc/apt/sources.list file
deb http://archive.canonical.com/ubuntu maverick partner

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install sun-java6-jdk 

# Get rid of OpenJDK 
sudo apt-get remove openjdk-6-jdk openjdk-6-jre openjdk-6-jre-headless openjdk-6-jre-lib

Managing Creative ZEN Mozaic with mtp-tools

2010-12-17T09:19:00.001+05:30

Using the Creative Zen Mozaic in Ubuntu 10.10 is a nuisance. The ubuntu standard Rhythmbox Music Player has problems with this MTP portable player. In previous version of Ubuntu Gnomad2 was used to manage these devices, but it is no longer available in latest verion.

My solution is to use the mtp-tools on command line. You can install the package by typing the following line on the terminal or use Ubuntu software center program.
sudo apt-get install mtp-tools

Next get rid of the Gnome Gphoto2 VFS program that will try to automount the device as a camera.
killall gvfs-gphoto2-volume-monitor

Now you are all set. Connect the device and lets see if we can detect the player with mpt-detect command.



$ mtp-detect
libmtp version: 1.0.3

Listing raw device(s)
Device 0 (VID=041e and PID=4161) is a Creative ZEN Mozaic.
   Found 1 device(s):
   Creative: ZEN Mozaic (041e:4161) @ bus 1, dev 6
Attempting to connect device(s)
USB low-level info:
   Using kernel interface "usbfs"
   bcdUSB: 512
   bDeviceClass: 255
   bDeviceSubClass: 0
   bDeviceProtocol: 0
   idVendor: 041e
   idProduct: 4161
   IN endpoint maxpacket: 512 bytes
   OUT endpoint maxpacket: 512 bytes
   Raw device info:
      Bus location: 1
      Device number: 6
      Device entry info:
         Vendor: Creative
         Vendor id: 0x041e
         Product: ZEN Mozaic
         Vendor id: 0x4161
         Device flags: 0x00000001

Now to get the list of folders on the device, use mtp-folders command.

To deleting a folder, type mtp-delfile -n <id> .

Lets create a new folder and copy all the mp3 files from the current folder to the device.
mtp-newfolder Classic_Hits Music 0
find -name *mp3 -exec mtp-sendfile {} <folderid> \; If you have a similar MTP portable player, hope this short tutorial will get you started.

Change Samba Password Expiry Setting with pdbedit

2010-12-16T08:43:00.001+05:30

We have a Zentyal (Formerly EBox) Linux Small Business Server running as our office file/print server. Its runs smoothly hardly needs any maintenance. Except for this one issue, every few weeks I hear complains from staff that they can't logon to file server.

Quick peek at the Samba server logs reveals that 'password expired'. So there is password aging setting in force here.

 
[2010/12/05 17:33:45, 1] auth/auth_sam.c:sam_account_ok(179) sam_account_ok: Account for user 'tom' password expired!.
[2010/12/05 17:33:45, 1] auth/auth_sam.c:sam_account_ok(180) sam_account_ok: Password expired at 'Sat, 04 Dec 2010 15:20:57 SST' (1291515657) unix time.

Lets remedy that using Samba pdbedit tool. We are gonna reset the 'Password must change' policy to all the users on the server.

Zentyal uses LDAP to manage the passwords, so we use '-b' option to point to the LDAP backend. And we change the default policy to passwords never expire.



pdbedit -b ldapsam:ldapi://var/run/slapd/ldapi  -P 'maximum password age' -C -1

account policy "maximum password age" description: Maximum password age, in seconds (default: -1 => never expire passwords)
account policy "maximum password age" value was: 0
account policy "maximum password age" value is now: 4294967295

# Defaults Before reset 
Unix username:        tom
NT username:          tom
Account Flags:        [U          ]
User SID:             S-1-5-21-3818554400-921237426-3143208535-5056
Primary Group SID:    S-1-5-21-3818554400-921237426-3143208535-513
Full Name:            Tom Thumb
Home Directory:       \\filesrvr\homes\tom
HomeDir Drive:        H:
Logon Script:         logon.bat
Profile Path:         
Domain:               SRV
Account desc:         Thumb Sucker
Workstations:         
Munged dial:          
Logon time:           0
Logoff time:          never
Kickoff time:         never
Password last set:    Sun, 05 Dec 2010 17:46:51 SST
Password can change:  Sun, 05 Dec 2010 17:46:51 SST
Password must change: Sat, 05 Mar 2011 17:46:51 SST
Last bad password   : 0
Bad password count  : 0
Logon hours         : FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF
init_sam_from_ldap: Failed to get password history for user director

# After reset

Unix username:        tom
NT username:          tom
Account Flags:        [U          ]
User SID:             S-1-5-21-3818554400-921237426-3143208535-5056
Primary Group SID:    S-1-5-21-3818554400-921237426-3143208535-513
Full Name:            Tom Thumb
Home Directory:       \\filesrvr\homes\tom
HomeDir Drive:        H:
Logon Script:         logon.bat
Profile Path:         
Domain:               SRV
Account desc:         Thumb Sucker
Workstations:         
Munged dial:          
Logon time:           0
Logoff time:          never
Kickoff time:         never
Password last set:    Sun, 05 Dec 2010 17:46:51 SST
Password can change:  Sun, 05 Dec 2010 17:46:51 SST
Password must change: never
Last bad password   : 0
Bad password count  : 0
Logon hours         : FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF

How to switch to OpenDNS in Ubuntu

2010-12-15T02:11:00.010+05:30

I prefer using OpenDNS instead of local ISP DNS servers. OpenDNS is faster, better and totally free. Read the How to switch to OpenDNS in Ubuntu for faster browsing post on OMG Ubuntu to learn more.

What OpenDNS can do

OpenDNS is available to use for free and comes with plenty of features that make it a more desirable option over that of your ISP – not least of which is speeding up your browsing!

OpenDNS works anywhere in the world via a global network of servers that ensure all of your DNS requests automatically go to the OpenDNS server that’s physically closest to you.

“The result is an immediately-noticeable faster, more reliable Internet for everyone in your household.”

The service is so good it’s even used by many well-know brands all over the world, with customers ranging from Nvidia & BP to Lush! cosmetics and DC shoes.

How to Convert .BIN/.CUE Files to .ISO in Ubuntu

2010-12-14T05:23:00.001+05:30

Here is another way to convert BIN/CUE’s files to ISO CD format in Linux. Before you start install the ccd2iso package using your system package manager.



 ccd2iso <.img filename> <.iso filename>
 ccd2iso cdimage.bin newcdimage.iso

Another solution would be to use the bchunk program explained in this post



bchunk filename.bin filename.cue filename.iso

KeePassX Cross Platform Password Manager

2010-12-13T08:27:00.001+05:30

Ask me my phone number, I have to look it up. But I do have uncanny memory for passwords. May be I type them so often that they are etched in my brain.

If you have manage a large set of usernames and password KeePassX is a good choice. It is good way to manage all your access information for the a SME organization. You can organize the data into different categories (Local Networking information, Mail Server, Webserver, Emails account information etc)

Automated password generation is another feature that I use often. You can choose the length of the password and the combination of numeric, special characters. Its cross platform available for multiple operating systems so if your boss uses Windows, it will still work.

KeePassX Features

Extensive management- title for each entry for its better identification
- possibility to determine different expiration dates
- insertion of attachments
- user-defined symbols for groups and entries
- fast entry dublication
- sorting entries in groups
Search function
- search either in specific groups or in complete database
Autofill (experimental)
Database security
- access to the KeePassX database is granted either with a password, a key-file (e.g. a CD or a memory-stick) or even both.
Automatic generation of secure passwords
- extremly customizable password generator for fast and easy creation of secure passwords
Precaution features- quality indicator for chosen passwords- hiding all passwords behind asterisks
Encryption- either the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) or the Twofish algorithm are used
- encryption of the database in 256 bit sized increments
Import and export of entries
- import from PwManager (*.pwm) and KWallet (*.xml) files- export as textfile (*.txt)
Operating system independent
- KeePassX is cross platform, so are the databases, as well
Free software
KeePassX is free software, published under the terms of the General Public License, so you are not only free to use it free of charge, but also to redistribute it, to examine and/or modify it’s source code and to publish your modifications as long as you provide the same freedoms for your modified version.

BlindLead.org HTML5 accessible wordpress website

2010-12-12T11:54:00.000+05:30

Few weeks ago I received a email from Ted Moallem, we collaborated on Blind Lead project in August this year. The BlindLead.org project website seems to be inaccessible to screen readers users. Ted used the latest version Wordpress 3.0 content management system (CMS), but Black Letterhead wordpress theme and the page structure were creating some problems.

Decided to attempt redesign the website using HTML5. HTML5 offers many accessibility improvements with new elements, ARIA landmark roles etc. Initially I thought of building with Starkers HTML5 theme. However Wordpress ships with a HTML5 complaint theme Twenty Ten so I decided to stick with it. Added some rounded corners, little bit of typographical changes, disabled the sidebar widgets for now. And the site looks better already.

Next I set about cleaning up the inline styles in the page content. Some of the styles were introduced by the wordpress editor and other external editors.The pages structure needed some re-organizing as well. Added headers instead of just bold text. The Web Developer Document Outline feature comes in handy here. You can access it from Web Developer > Information > View Document Outline menu item.

Right now we have only few pages, blog posts, photo gallery and accessible widgets would be added to the site soon. This is my first HTML5 website, there is lots of things to be fixed. So give me your feedback and share your experiences working with HTML5 accessibility.

Nina Universal Braille Teacher

2010-12-10T06:16:00.001+05:30

Here is yet another innovation from N.Krishnaswamy the creator of Universal Braille Kit (UBK)

Nina Universal Braille Teacher is battery operated handheld device which aids teaching and learning of braille alphabets. This model is designed for the English language, but other languages are also supported. The Nina Universal Braille Teacher is available two models, a teacher model built with LEDs to provide visual indicators for sighted teachers and the student model with audio messages only.

The device is manufactured at Workshop For Rehabilitation and Training of the Handicapped (Worth Trust) in India.

If you are interested to procure the device, please do get in touch with Worth Trust.

Worth Trust 48, New Tiruvalam Road
Katpadi, Tamil Nadu (India)
Phone: 0416-2242739 0416-2243464
Email: worth@md3.vsnl.net.in
Website: http://www.worthtrust.org.in

AEGIS project video

2010-12-08T05:19:00.001+05:30

AEGIS is an EC-funded FP7 project that seeks to determine whether 3rd generation access techniques will provide a more accessible, more exploitable and deeply embeddable approach in mainstream ICT (desktop, rich Internet and mobile applications).

You can now view the AEGIS project video online here.

Drupal Installation Profiles, Distributions and Features

2010-12-07T09:54:00.001+05:30

When you think you learnt all about Drupal CMS. You stumble across across few new features that boggle your mind. Have you stumbled across Drupal Installation Profiles, Drupal Distributions and Drupal Features yet?

If you haven't heard about these, don't worry. Read Isaac Sukin wonderful article Simplifying Use-Specific Drupal Sites: Installation Profiles vs. Distributions vs. Features

Japan-Vietnam Workshop on Software Engineering 2010 (JVSE 2010)

2010-12-06T12:08:00.000+05:30

JVSE 2010 is the third joint workshop on software engineering aiming to further strengthen the progressive R&D collaboration between Japan and Vietnam. This workshop intends to exchange on-going research topics in software engineering and related fields as well as to find possible research collaboration of all participants. In particular, theoretical researchers are encouraged to present the research results that would be implemented as tools. Graduate students and young researchers are encouraged to present their on-going research and initial results, and to participate to obtain new ideas and overview of current trends. JVSE 2010 is a special event to celebrate the 15th Anniversary of the Establishment of Faculty of Information Technology, University of Engineering and Technology, VNU Hanoi.

The workshop is about all aspects related to software engineering. The topics include but are not limited to the following categories:

Software specification and verification
Software testing
Formal methods and industrial case studies
Component-based development
Software evolution
Software metrics and measurement
Software process improvement
Real-time and fault-tolerant software
Modern software architectures
Multi-agent systems
Software services and cloud computing

INVITED SPEAKERS

Keijiro Araki, Kyushu U., Japan
Zhenjiang Hu, NII, Japan
Hiroyuki Iida, JAIST, Japan
Atsushi Ohori, Tohoku U., Japan
Kazuhiro Ogata, JAIST, Japan
Mizuhito Ogawa, JAIST, Japan
Koichiro Ochimizu, JAIST, Japan
Masahiko Sakai , Nagoya U., Japan
Hiroyuki Seki, NAIST, Japan
Akihiko Takano, NII, Japan
Shoji Yuen, Nagoya U. , Japan

Event Details

Event Name: Japan-Vietnam Workshop on Software Engineering 2010 (JVSE 2010)
Date: Thursday, December 9, 2010
11:00p - Friday, December 10, 2010 12:00am
Location: Room 212, E3 building, 144 Xuan Thuy rd., Cau Giay dist., Hanoi, Vietnam
Website: http://www.coltech.vnu.edu.vn/~hoangta/jvse2010/

Jackie Sawiris: He Must Be a Friend

2010-11-29T06:55:00.000+05:30

My friend Jackie was assaulted in Amman. She has been fighting harassment through the objecDEFY harassment project.

objecDEFY Harassment is a women-powered, Arab world-based, self-perpetuating system that empowers women to combat harassment.

Please help break the silence and spread the word. Jackie speaks about her ordeal here.

"He Must be a Friend" (www.7iber.com)
"Must be a Friend" (www.sawtalniswa.com)

Visit the www.objecDEFY.com website and join the efforts to fight back.

Go Rock Portable Speakers

2010-11-29T06:35:00.000+05:30

Love listening to music while hacking on my computer. The go-rock portable speakers are my prized possessions. I use the go-rock single portable speaker to listen music on mp3 audio player. The battery lasts for few days, always carry this speaker when traveling or spending time outdoors.

Got a second go-rock portable stereo speakers for mostly watching DVDs on my laptop. This speakers are designed in shape of an over sized pill, they break up to form two left and right speakers. The USB and Line-in cables can be retractable easily, just pull the cable and spring action will retract the cable smoothly.

The audio quality of go-rock portable speakers is good. You can unscrew the top for BASS mode. They are small enough to fit into my laptop bag and can be recharged with USB. Never had any problems with these speakers, except once I broke the locking notch by applying to much pressure. If you are looking for great portable speakers, go for go-rock.

George the robot makes a come back at 60

2010-11-24T09:59:00.001+05:30

Robots, the stuff of my childhood dreams. Tony Sale revives the much loved robot George, the 6 foot robot made from scrap metal. It is remotely controlled can walk, move the arms and turn his head. The robot inspired the whole generation and found its way into popular fiction.

Newsreel From 1950

Your browser does not support iframes.

Getting Started With Sahana-Eden

2010-11-11T09:28:00.003+05:30

I was introduced to Sahana Open Source Disaster Management Platform few years ago at FOSS.in 2008. But never contributed any code to this project until the SahanaCamp 1.2 in Hanoi last week.

Sahana-Eden is based on web2py python web development framework. Coding with Model-View-Control(MVC) framework is breath of fresh air and I dived headlong into the code on day one of the event. Thanks to Fran Boon, for helping creating this quick tutorial for Sahana-eden developer setup.


# Get all dependent packages for sahana-eden 
sudo apt-get install python-lxml python-reportlab python-xlwt python-shapely libgeos-3.2.0

# Create a directory to store web2py and sahana-eden source files
mkdir ~/Sahana

cd Sahana

# Checkout web2py source code
bzr branch lp:~mdipierro/web2py/devel web2py

# web2py applications are stored in directory
cd web2py/applications

# Checkout sahana-eden source
# Note web2py doesn't like - in directory names (Thanks fran!)
bzr branch lp:sahana-eden eden

# Change to base directory
cd ~/Sahana

# Launch rocket web server with password 'eden' 
python web2py/web2py.py -a eden 
web2py Enterprise Web Framework
Created by Massimo Di Pierro, Copyright 2007-2010
Version 1.85.3 (2010-09-18 07:07:46)
Database drivers available: pysqlite2
Starting hardcron...
please visit:
       http://127.0.0.1:8000
starting browser...in 5 seconds

# Open the webpage and login with password 'eden'
firefox http://127.0.0.1:8000/eden

# On first run, sahana-eden creates 000_config.py and cron/ files
# Change FINISHED_EDITING_CONFIG_FILE = True in 000_config.py file
nano web2py/applications/eden/models/000_config.py

# You are done! Start hacking and send it your patches!

Installing mod_pagespeed

2010-11-10T20:29:00.002+05:30

You must have heard Google released mod_pagespeed module for the Apache web server. The mod_pagespeed module improves web page speeds by delivering optimized formats of CSS, Javascript and images on the fly and turning on HTTP caching options. If you are interested read the in-depth technical details on mod_pagespeed filters page.

So you want to get started with mod_pagespeed?. Site Point has published a good guide to Apache mod_pagespeed installation Optimization Made Easy with mod_pagespeed .

Dreamhost users can take advantage of this module right away, it takes less than a minute enable mod_pagespeed using Dreamhost Panel.

Convert MagicISO UIF to ISO

2010-11-01T05:39:00.000+05:30

This morning I have the unfortune task of converting MagicISO (Universal Image Format, used by MagicISO) to standard CD image. Thankfully Ubuntu linux has 'uif2iso' program for this purpose. First install the package and then run the follow command to convert the .uif file.


sudo apt-get install uif2iso   
 
uif2iso image.uif image.iso

UIF2ISO 0.1.7
by Luigi Auriemma
e-mail: aluigi@autistici.org
web:    aluigi.org

- open image.uif

  file size    000000003118ba6d
  version      4
  image type   8
  padding      0
  sectors      494134
  sectors size 2048
  blhr offset  0000000031184e6c
  blhr size    27649
  hash         8f60ec4f532c6729852bab2b1f082890
  others       00000040 00000000 01 02 01 00 00000000

- enable magiciso_is_shit encryption
- ISO output image format
- create image.iso
- start unpacking:
  100%
- 0x000000003c51b000 bytes written
- finished

Apps for Development Competition

2010-10-30T17:05:00.000+05:30

The Apps for Development Competition aims to bring together software developers and development practitioners to use World Bank data in the creation of innovative software applications.

The Competition challenges participants to develop software apps related to one or more of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The apps could serve to raise awareness, measure progress, or help achieve the MDGs. The app should also use one or more datasets from the World Bank Data Catalog, found at http://data.worldbank.org.

For example, a technology student or an employee in a computer company can create a program that predicts the concentration of internet use in various parts of the world 5 or 10 years from now.

Or, a government office can get data from Doing Business and create an application that would locate the country that is most conducive for the country's investment based on trading across borders and taxes.

The following link has a video with many other ideas that came out of a meeting between software developers and development specialists in the warm-up to the competition launch: http://appsfordevelopment.challengepost.com/resources#ideas

Who can enter? Entries may be made by any individuals or teams, including researchers, academics, policy makers, non-profit or civil society organizations, private sector companies, statisticians, software developers, social entrepreneurs, etc.

What kind of “apps” or applications are eligible, and how will they be assessed? Any software application—whether web-based, mobile, SMS, smart phone, desktop, or tablet—that includes World Bank data will be qualified, as long as it meets the eligibility requirements set forth on the official Competition website.

Prizes

First Prize $15,000 USD
Second Prize $10,000 USD
Third Prize $5,000 USD
Honorable Mentions (5) $2,000 USD Each
Popular Choice Award $5,000 USD
Large Organization Recognition Award: The Large Organization Award winner will receive public acknowledgement, but no cash prize.

Deadline for submissions is January 10, 2011.

For more information, rules, and submission guidelines, go to www.worldbank.org/appsfordevelopment

Apps for Development Competition Video Conference - Hanoi

This video conference session is organized to brief you about the competition in details. The video conference will be held on Tuesday, November 02, 2010, from 6pm to 9pm.

Venue: Vietnam Development Information Center, 2nd floor, 63 Ly Thai To, Hanoi.

For registration, please contact Ms Vu Thi Nha, office phone: 04-3934 6845, email: nvu2@worldbank.org.

Sahana Camp in Hanoi Vietnam

2010-10-26T09:27:00.001+05:30

SahanaCamp 1.2 will be held from November 2-5, 2010 in Hanoi, Vietnam, sponsored by IBM Vietnam

SahanaCamp 1.2 is a 4 day event to show participants how information technology can help with Disaster Management through the Sahana Eden Open Source Disaster Management Platform. Sahana Eden has been deployed in numerous disasters including the 2010 Haiti Earthquake and Pakistan Floods. SahanaCamp will be an intensive, interactive and participatory event, where participants will get hands on experience using the Sahana Eden Platform. The event will be facilitated by Fran Boon and Michael Howden from the Sahana Software Foundation, who have extensive experience in using technology for Disaster Management and have run similar SahanaCamps in India and Taiwan. SahanaCamp will contain general sessions for people interested in using Sahana Eden for disaster management and technical sessions for people who are interested in supporting the use of Sahana Eden in Vietnam and contributing to the Sahana Eden project.

Spaces are limited. Applications close Thursday, 14 October. Register for SahanaCamp 1.2

For more information, please contact Michael Howden or visit SahanaCamp 2.1 home page.

Web Accessibility Initiative in India: Technology, Standards and Implementation workshop

2010-10-25T16:19:00.000+05:30

W3C India office and Yahoo! India Research & Development is organizing a Workshop on Web Accessibility Initiative in India: Technology, Standards and Implementation on 11 December 2010, Bangalore. Workshop would provide the technology developers, web service and solution providers, Policy makers, NGOs and users a unique platform for understanding the common needs and implementation issues.

The special focus of workshop will be on multilingual requirements in web accessibility area and capturing the requirements for Indian languages as per W3C WCAG 2.0 Standards.

The details of the workshop may be referred at: http://www.w3cindia.in/wai_conf/waiweb.html .

The workshop is free of Cost and the last date for registration is 25th November 2010.

Topics to be Covered in Workshop

W3C and Web Accessibility Initiative

Overview of Web accessibilty and role of W3C Standards
WCAG 2.0
WAI-Accessible Rich Internet Applications (WAI-ARIA) 1.0

Web Accessibility Status in India

Challenges Multilingual web Access
Adoption of W3C WCAG 2.0
Guidelines for Indian Government websites-Roadmap from Web Accessibility respective and Accessibility of PDF and OFFICE documents
Certification,Compliance and Evaluation tools
Casestudy : Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment

Emerging Technology and Web Accessibility Implications

HTML 5.0 and Accessibility
Mobile Web and Accessibility
Accessibility Issues for Next Generation Devices

Technology Development for Multilingual Accessibility in India

TTS In Indian Languages
Braille Interface in Indian Language

Business and Strategic Perspective of Web Accessibility

Industry Session

Summary and Recommendations

Reset Philips GoGear MP3 player

2010-10-24T18:49:00.000+05:30

Had a real bad panic attack today while charging my Philips GoGear Mp3 Player. The player freezed on 'Do not disconnect' screen. :)

After a quick google search I found that we do a soft reset by pressing the power button and volume up (+) button together. It didn't work. So I decided to do a hard reset by pressing the reset button (its a small hole next to usb connection socket) with a safety pin. It worked. Thankfully it didn't delete any of the content on the device either :)

Handbrake : Video Encoder For Everyone

2010-10-21T10:38:00.000+05:30

Just discovered HandBrake video encoder. It is free software encoder that allows you to convert your videos into various video formats. Whether you are sharing videos on Youtube, Vimeo or transferring them to portable devices like iPod, iPhone and Android based devices. HandBrake is the tool for you and its cross platform video encoder that also available on Windows and Mac.

Why use HandBrake, when you got powerful video encoders like mencoder, ffmpeg. Well, I find HandBrake interface far more intuitive, it does not expect the user to know a lot of video encoding or use arcane command line options.

How to install HandBrake on Ubuntu

You can get the HandBrake packages from John Stebbins HandBrake PPA.


# Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid 
 sudo apt-add-repository ppa:stebbins/handbrake-snapshots  
 sudo apt-get update
 sudo apt-get install handbrake-gtk

# Ubuntu 10.10 Maverick 
# Add a deb line to your /etc/apt/sources.list & Get the publickey 
deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/handbrake-snapshots/ppa/ubuntu jaunty main
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install handbrake-gtk

Sumatra A PDF reader for Windows

2010-10-20T10:30:00.000+05:30

If you are looking for a FLOSS alternative to Adobe PDF reader on Windows OS. Check out Sumatra PDF . It is a free software release under GPLv3 licence.

Ubuntu On ARM : Changing Game Plan

2010-10-19T09:44:00.001+05:30

My friend Tim Denny believes that ARM powered devices will drive the future of netbook and tablet computer technology. I agree with him, ARM delivers great performance and its low power usage makes it ideal. Perhaps the lightweight Ubuntu Netbook desktop would be a choice distribution for ARM powered devices.

The new release of Ubuntu 10.10 has all the right ingredients. There is better support for ARM, the Ubuntu netbook desktop is lightweight and Unity bring fresh design thinking for small screens. And now there is multi touch support as well. Here are some of the stories that that deal with this trend.

Ubuntu Gives Maverick a shot in the ARM

Excuse the dodgy pun but Ubuntu 10.10 is going to be a fantastic release for many reasons, not least of which is improved ARM architecture support.

Toshiba AC100 hacked to run Ubuntu 10.10 RC

The Toshiba AC100 is one of the first netbook-style devices to ship with Google Android installed. The operating system is typically installed on smartphones or tablets with touchscreen devices — not computers with keyboards and touchpads. The Toshiba AC100, on the other hand, looks like a netbook, with a 10 inch. 1024 x 600 pixel display, a keyboard and touchpad, and no touchscreen.

Marvell Armada 510 running Ubuntu 10.04

Is not it amazing when you see these power-sipping ARM processors running a powerful operating system so smooth? Here is an ARM processor, the Marvell Armada 510 running Ubuntu 10.04 Netbook Edition.

Unity and uTouch

One of the most exciting things about the Ubuntu 10.10 release has been the delivery of the Unity ‘shell’ in Ubuntu Netbook Edition. For the uninitiated, this delivers a very different user experience to that in the main desktop edition.

Ubuntu 10.10 Multi-touch

As many are aware, we released our maverick Maverick a few days ago. Part of what comes with Ubuntu 10.10 is the new uTouch stack.

Multitouch And Qt

Until recently, there has been no Multitouch stack for Linux. The great news is that the folks at Qt are very interested in getting Qt to work with uTouch.

Installing Python on Android

2010-10-06T09:08:00.001+05:30

Had left the Openmoko Linux phone and aging Nokia N70 back in India. Now I travel with a basic model phone, do miss hacking phone.

This morning I decided to change all that. Checking out Python Scripting Layer For Android using the Android SDK. My Nokia also ran Python S60 until the project lost wind. Getting the android environment on Ubuntu was easy thanks to Eric's tutorial

Broadcom BCM4311 Wifi driver for windows

2010-10-04T17:22:00.000+05:30

Finally found the MS Windows driver for the Broadcom BCM4311 802.11b/g WLAN . It was really difficult to find this wifi driver that worked on Lenovo R3000 laptop computer.

It is not the first time I had to search for this driver. Perhaps its a good idea to blog it. :(

http://drivers.softpedia.com/progDownload/BROADCOM-Wireless-802-11b-and-802-11g-Download-14408.html

Drush command line shell and scripting interface for Drupal

2010-09-22T10:21:00.002+05:30

I haven't heard about Drush command line tool until recently. Books about Drupal do not talk about this nifty tool, not even the advanced ones. Drush takes the power of command line, it can be savior for lazy hacker like me. The only prerequisite for using drush is secure shell access to execute commands on your web server server.

First thing I learnt to do with drush is download, upgrade and enable modules. It a quick and efficient way of upgrade modules.

# /usr/share/drush/drush disable link The following modules will be disabled: link Do you really want to continue? (y/n): y Link was disabled successfully. [ok] # /usr/share/drush/drush uninstall link The following modules will be uninstalled: link Do you really want to continue? (y/n): y link was successfully uninstalled. [ok] # /usr/share/drush/drush dl link Project link (6.x-2.9) downloaded to /var/www/drupal/sites/all/modules/. [success] # /usr/share/drush/drush enable link The following modules will be enabled: link Do you really want to continue? (y/n): y Link was enabled successfully.

Another favorite feature of drush is ability to execute sql commands to debug problems. /usr/share/drush/drush sql cli

Learn more about the various options and rediscover of the joy of Drupal.

Software Freedom Day 2010 Hanoi Linux User Group Vietnam

2010-09-21T20:57:00.001+05:30

Photo blog of Hanoi Linux User Groups Software Freedom Day 2010 event.

Software Freedom Day 2010 , Hanoi, Vietnam

The Day Begins ....

Keynote Talk

The Audience

OLPC Vietnam Sugar On Stick Talk

Talks video streamed live across Vietnam

Hanoi LUG members having a good time

Linux Gaming.. Tux Racers

Linux Gaming, I love my score :)

Linux RPG Gaming

Linux First Person Shooter Game

Linux Multi Player Gaming

Linux CD/DVD burning, Game Contest running in background

Video Conference between Hanoi and Saigon LUGs

Kudos to Hanoi LUG Team

Ubuntu Accessibility Talk at Hanoi SFD, 2010

2010-09-20T11:16:00.001+05:30

This weekend I gave a short talk highlighting Ubuntu Accessibility at Hanoi Linux User Groups Software Freedom Day 2010 event. Giving this talk was quite a challenge, I had to remember to stop every few sentences for Yang to do the Vietnamese translation. (Thanks for a splendid job Yang!)

You can download the slides online from the Ubuntu Accessibility Scribd page.

Origamic pop-up greeting cards

2010-08-22T11:07:00.000+05:30

Spent the Sunday evening walking through the night market in Hoan Kiem, Hanoi. Among the mire of people, stalls, street vendors I saw something truly extra ordinary. The origami pop-up greeting cards made by Anh's and her family. The craftsmanship and detail of these cards are amazing. It is not very easy to find this stall at the night market, you can visit the ORIGAMIC shop at 85 Hang Gai Str, Hoan Kiem Dist. Hanoi( vn.origamicATyahoo.com.vn #084-4-39386787).

Made with Slideshow Embed Tool

Ralink Wireless support in Puppy Linux

2010-08-20T16:44:00.000+05:30

My Gecko Edubook has a Ralink wireless USB adapter. Later models of this ultra-cheap netbook shipped with more ubiquitous wireless cards from Realtech. You have to get the download the firmware and blacklist few modules to be able to use Ralinux wifi wireless card in puppy linux 5.1.

Download the firmware for RT28XX/RT30XX USB series (RT2870/RT2770/RT3572/RT3070) zip file and extract the rt2870.bin file to /lib/firmware.

Next use the BootManager configure bootup program to blacklist rt2800usb kernel module and enable rt2800sta module instead. These steps should enable Ralink usb wireless card support in puppylinux.

Ubuntu Netbook Remix (UNR) UI on Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid LTS

2010-08-18T11:34:00.000+05:30

Transformed my standard Ubuntu Lucid Desktop into Ubuntu Netbook Remix (UNR) this morning. This interface allows netbook users to make better use of screen space and few great interface enhancements.

The Ubuntu UNR wiki page gives all the information about the packages and the required steps to convert your standard ubuntu desktop to UNR interface. Don't forget to report bugs to Canonical Desktop Experience Team.

Universal Braille Kit (UBK)

2010-08-10T05:18:00.001+05:30

The Universal Braille kit (UBK) is brainchild of octogenarian N.Krishnaswamy. It is designed to teach braille to blind children at home in developing countries with no access to special education. The Universal Braille Kit has a braille cube, an alphabet plate, a braille slate and stylus, a standard abacus and instruction manuals. This kit is produced by Workshop For Rehabilitation and Training of the Handicapped (Worth Trust) in India.

Last year I traveled to Chennai to meet N.Krishnaswamy (NK) at Vidya Vrikshah. We remained in close contact sharing ideas on various braille projects. Last week few accessibility designers met at Worth Trust factory in Katpadi, Tamil Nadu. NK was there, full of energy and ideas. NK never fails to surprise me. " Arky, At my age I am in a terrible hurry" he says with a chuckle. Just as he was leaving I managed to corner him and shot this video.

In this video N.Krishnaswamy explains the story behind the design of the Universal Braille Kit (UBK) and explains the concepts by demonstrating various devices of the kit.

The Universal Braille kit (UBK) from arky on Vimeo.

If you are interested to procure the Universal Braille Kit, please do get in touch with Worth Trust.

Worth Trust
48, New Tiruvalam Road
Katpadi, Tamil Nadu (India)
Phone: 0416-2242739 0416-2243464
Email: worth@md3.vsnl.net.in
Website: http://www.worthtrust.org.in

Nortec SurfBoard Running Ubuntu 10.04

2010-08-07T18:40:00.000+05:30

Just heard that Lekan got the SurfBoard running ubuntu 10.4. The video shows Google Chrome running Youtube videos. The video perform flawlessly in fullscreen mode.

The SurfBoard is an ultra low-cost, energy efficient computer keyboard selling for only $119.95. Ideal for classrooms, thin clients, hotels, banks and anywhere else where an energy efficient, silent, low cost computer can be used.

How to resize photos with Bash shell script

2010-08-05T18:23:00.001+05:30

Ivo Kaspar wrote this guide to resize multiple images using simple Bash shell script. It uses the convert program from ImageMagick, the swiss-army knife of command line image processing software. The original guide is edited and rewritten in some places.

You'll find this guide interesting if you want to resize a lot of pictures to upload to your website or email them. First you need to install the 'imagemagick' package if it is not installed on your computer. To install imagemagick, copy this line into your terminal application and confirm with your password. Close the terminal after it finished the installation. sudo apt-get install imagemagick

Open the text editor and paste these lines into it:


#!/bin/bash
for i in *.JPG; do convert $i -resize 10% $(basename $i .JPG).jpg; done

Save the document and give it a sensible name to recognize it later on.

Note that this script will work only with files that has uppercase '.JPG' extension and renames them to lower case '.jpg'. Some digital cameras follow this kind of file naming schema. You may like to change this to suit your needs.According to its manual page ImageMagick can read, convert and write images in a variety of formats (about 100) including GIF, JPEG, JPEG-2000, PNG, PDF, PhotoCD, TIFF and DPX.

If you want to define the size of the picture replace the "10%" with the amount of pixels you want it to have, 400x600 is a usable resolution. Of course it is also possible to keep the relative scale with any value instead of the “10” followed by "%" postfix. To change the file format to something other than “.JPG” you have to change the last “.JPG” into the format of your choice.

If you want to rename the pictures, you have to add something behind the "(basename $i .JPG)" and the ".JPG". I usually add an "-s" (for small) to indicate the reduced size of the pictures.

When you run the script it will proceed to resize all the pictures in the current folder, but not in any sub folders. Keep in mind that:

Small pictures are small forever, you can't revert them.
The filenames must not contain any space
The filename must match to the first two “.JPG” or “.jpg”

Examples Scripts:


# capital .JPG files, 10% size, no rename, it will overwrite the old
pictures
#!/bin/bash
for i in *.JPG; do convert $i -resize 10% $(basename $i .JPG).JPG; done
---
# lower case .jpg files, 10% size, renamed to capital .JPG (with ubuntu it's
a different file, not with windows!)
#!/bin/bash
for i in *.jpg; do convert $i -resize 10% $(basename $i .jpg ).JPG; done
---
# capital .JPG files, 10% size, adds an -s in the name of the new ones,
keeps the old ones
#!/bin/bash
for i in *.JPG; do convert $i -resize 10% $(basename $i .JPG)-s.JPG; done
---
# capital .JPG files, 600x400 size, no rename, it will overwrite the old
pictures
#!/bin/bash
for i in *.JPG; do convert $i -resize 600x400 $(basename $i .JPG).JPG; done

THE THIRD WAVE A Volunteer Story

2010-08-03T17:02:00.002+05:30

Returned to my hotel room exhausted. The noise and heat in the braille labeler workshop drains me at the end of the day. Its my second week in Vellore (Tamil Nadu), I'm here to help Ted Moallem build braille labelers with a team of blind workers. There isn't much to do in this town, expect watch television until I can't keep my eyes open. While channel surfing I found The Third Wave playing on Sony Pix. Its a movie you shouldn't miss, it will move you to tears.

The documentary tells the story after the 2004 tsunami in Sri Lanka. A group of four volunteers come together to rebuild the village of Peraliya. They are not part of any non-profit organization, they are people who just want to help and meet each other by chance. Some had sort help of friends to buy tickets to Sri Lanka. They arrive with few hundred dollars in their pockets. The story follows Alison, Oscar, Bruce, Donny and countless volunteers who fight against odds to bring medical care, relief and supplies. They start a medical aid station in the village school and take care of a relief camp.

Children are the most affected by the Tsunami, many lost their family right before eyes. The volunteers work with children and take them to beach. The children are nervous, its their first time in the sea after the 40 foot wave wiped out their village. Soon the children overcome their fears and have a gala time until they stumble upon a dead body half buried in sand. The reality of life aftermath the tsunami is capture vivid in this movie. The volunteers fight exhaustion, frustration to regain the piece of paradise lost.

Bait Seaside Restaurant, Kovalam beach

2010-08-01T16:39:00.017+05:30

Taj Green Cove in Kovalam, Trivandrum opened a new seaside restaurant Bait. If you are craving for a good thin crust pizza then you should try Bait's wood chip oven baked pizza the best in town.

The restaurant is designed by local architect Vinod Mathew, he showed me around this amazing place. The restaurant is constructed on raised platform of solid timber away from reach of high tide. It has some of best view of the beach, the lake on the other side and Taj Bali village style cottages further inland.

Old wooden railway sleepers are layed all around the building adding texture with their weathered look, they are used because of their amazing resistant to sea water. The restaurant flooring is created with concrete mixed with gel and coloring agents, the bathrooms are great example of how you can use concrete to create great surfaces. The bar stools are created from single block of wood, the chairs are custom designed with bamboo string backs. The deck chairs are custom designed and built in Vinod's workshop. I won't blame you if you doze right away in these comfortable chairs. The ceiling is covered with elephant grass and grass hand woven mats covering inner roof.

Wooden Railway Sleepers

Custom Designed Furniture

Watch the fisherman bring in the catch

Meera enjoying in the children play area


Bean bags for adding comfort

Bar with wooden block chairs

Healthy Fruit Juices In Trivandrum

2010-07-31T16:39:00.001+05:30

For most visitors to Kerala the tender coconut juice seems to be standard choice. If you are feeling adventurous visit Chitra Juice Palace near the Law College in central Trivandrum. This juice shop offers an uncanny assortment of fresh fruit juices at affordable prices. Watching the owner of the shop Suresh man the seven juice blenders at the same time like a samurai is a special treat.

Suresh returned from the middle east few years ago to open this juice shop. He soon started to experiment adding south Indian species to his lime juices. He created various combinations of fruits juices based on his clients taste, he is innovator with knack for creating new juices that appeal and sometimes shock your palate. Even the doctors of the city visit the shop to taste his special recipes that seems to cure bad common cold or relive the headache from the heat.

Free Software Accessibility, Call to Arms

2010-07-22T01:23:00.000+05:30

Chris Hofstader Director of Access Technology for Project GNU writes his thoughts on the future of Free Software Accessibility.

Call to Arms

In the time since I joined FSF/GNU as Director of Access Technology, I have focussed largely on policy, fundraising and coordination with other groups. Meanwhile, I've whined a lot about the state of the software which must be our highest priority.

We have three areas where we need to focus our hacking efforts: OS level things like dbus (I don't understand this part of a GNU/Linux system too well but Bill, Joanie and Janina seem to have good ideas for these areas), orca and other AT "middleware" that needs to communicate both with the OS and applications and, very importantly, support for the applications and how they communicate with the AT.

We thought of setting priorities but this would, at the start at least, just be a list of lists of lists and would probably, like so many lists before it, die on the vine.

So, instead of finding tasks and then volunteers to work on them, we are switching gears again and trying to first find volunteers and asking them what they want to work on. We may try to suggest specific high priorities for volunteers but, as they aren't being paid, letting them find their way to the projects they find interesting will likely be the best route to productivity.

We also need volunteers to step up and take the lead role on projects and project components. Don has taken charge of OCR and we've seen great progress there, Joanie owns orca and needs lots of help, Bill and Tony (of course) run the vinux shop, Sina is leading the Java Access stuff but, while we've talked about it a lot, we've no leader for speech recognition/dictation, no one on magnification, learning disabilities and other projects suited for people with non-vision disabilities. On braille, of course, we have John J. Boyer whose project has led the pack for a number of years. We are on our way to a FLOSS AT future but we've lots of work from now until then.

At yesterday's Open a11y (www.a11y.org) call, we discussed priorities and a list of mostly vision related items topped the list. This group needs help with regression testing for orca (this can be done by pretty junior people and those interested should contact Joanie but keep in touch with us so we can know what is going on around this small community) and the second item was poor performance of orca which needs people with C programming skills, an understanding of how GNU/Linux works under the hood and a talent for finding bottlenecks (Python will also be helpful) and this group should probably contact either Joanie or Bill but, as above, stay in touch with us.

A lot of us, including me, complain about performance and functionality in various applications when running orca. We've got to stop whining and get hacking. It would be good to have people take the lead on Firefox, OpenOffice and other "high value" programs. It would also be useful for people to take charge of entirely new AT (like speech recognition) projects to help us move forward in areas that are not already covered.

We need resources to be used judiciously but we also want our hackers to have fun working on projects they will find most rewarding. We need hackers, testers, documenters and probably a bunch of other skills that I cannot think of at this moment.

Please forward this message to as many lists you can find that may have interested parties on them. Also, if anyone on this distribution has skills in languages other than English, please try to send along translations calling for volunteers who may not speak English.

HK GO+ Portable iPod Sound Dock

2010-07-19T04:19:00.002+05:30

Got a chance to use the Harman Kardon Go + Play Portable Speakers System with Dock for iPod this evening weekend party at a friends place. Its a great buy if you are looking for an inexpensive portable speakers with some great sound. The build is solid and sturdy, even on uneven, smooth surfaces like car roof for a outdoor party or a rock ledge, your ipod is in safe hands. The design is very minimal, there are only three buttons for power and volume control.

There are couple of downsides, I noticed bass sound was not great. Also you can't see the ipod screen when its docked. The large metal handle bar blocks the view and angle of the ipod faces upside. Its a major design flaw. Overall this is a great affordable ipod sound dock system. A Good buy!

Acer Aspire One BIOS Reflashing

2010-07-10T16:39:00.000+05:30

Few hours before flying out of Nepal the Acer Aspire One netbook died. The BIOS got screwed, netbook won't even complete Power On Self Test(POST). Competent computer hardware technicians I hear are as rare as the famed Himalayan Yeti. Wiping my tears and picking up the thousand pieces of shared ego from the floor, I set about reflashing the BIOS. Thankfully, the relief was quick.

How to reflash a Acer Aspire One BIOS

Please be careful, you might end up bricking your netbook. :)

Download the latest BIOS and extract the v.3114.zipcontent to USB pendrive
Rename the ZG5_3114.fd to 'ZG5IA32.FD'.
Power on the netbook the with pendrive connected while holding down Fn + Esc keys. Make sure the power cable is attached.
After a few seconds the power light blinks, press power button once and wait till the netbook reboots.

It took few minutes for new BIOS to be flashed and the computer automatically rebooted.

Acer Aspire One Battery Charging Problem

2010-07-09T12:27:00.000+05:30

If you believe amnesia is a malady that effects humans, think again. Recently a Acer Aspire One netbook landed on my table with a similar problem. It refused to charge the battery, perhaps it always thinks the its battery already full. The only way you can use this machine was by connecting it the power outlet.

A quick search on the Internet will turn up a lot of Acer Aspire One (AOA) owners reporting similar problems. Quite often people update the Bios to fix this problem. However there is similar solution.

The Problem

The Amber (Orange) battery light blinks constantly and netbook works only on AC power.

The Solution

Follow the steps given below. (Please be careful when handling computer electrical components like batteries and AC Adapters)

Remove the battery and hold down the power button for few seconds (to drain all remaining power)
Power up the computer without the battery with the A/C adapter plugged in.
Wait for few seconds and plug the battery back in

After a few tries the computer should start charging normally. The amber battery stops blinking and turn green when fully charged.

OLPC Solar Charger

2010-07-08T13:59:00.001+05:30

The OLPC Solar charger started working this morning, the 8W solar panel started charging the OLPC without an issue. The power controller which regulates the power input to the OLPC is simple enough to be assembled with locally available electronics.

The OLPC solar charger is developed at BWB Center of Social Innovation. Keep watching this space for more updates on this project.

Nepal National Audio Library For Blind

2010-07-07T15:02:00.001+05:30

Spent a month in the beautiful city of Pokhara in Nepal. Here on invitation from Inclusion Empowerment Center (IEC) Nepal, a organisation run by my friend Khom Raj Sharma. He was instrumental in creating the first audio library for blind in Nepal few years ago. Prithivi Narayan campus is a short ride from Lakeside Pokhara, sitting high above the white waters of the Seti river. It is walking distance from Seti River Gorge, a popular tourist destination.

I met up with Khom, Tek Thapa, Birajman Kumal, Laxman Subedi and Kumar Pun at the campus. Most of them are the former students and now work with various non-profit organisations, they are my tour guides for this morning. Walking around the campus, I learnt about the problems they faced as blind students, the lack of accessible teaching material was a biggest issue and the National Audio for Blind (NALB) was born. We interacted with some the blind students of the university on the way to the library.

We then entered the Regional library building and walked past the wooden librarians desk and beyond the rows of tables to the far right corner of the library. The audio library is housed inside a sound proof room with large glass windows looking out into the main library. The space is divided into a large main hall and three small rooms. On one side along the glass paneled wall is large table with work spaces for a dozen people. Instead of workstations, we have DAISY players with headphones and few tape and CD players. Around the room there are large cabinets with neatly stacked disks of reading material. There is a recording room with workstation running DAISY recording software suite, a editing room with CD-ROM, tape replication/copier machines and office space for administrative purposes. It is neat and orderly. Unlike other projects in developing countries this library is clearly well cared for and buzzing with activity.

The project was setup by Kaski Association of the Blind(KAB) with the aid of Force Foundation of Netherlands. The Tribhuvan University contributes money for running of library and students get access to library for a nominal annual fee. It is very heartening to see this initiative born out the need of print disabled. Perhaps other developing countries can learn from this project and build audio libraries of their own.

Orca Caps Lock Issue

2010-07-07T14:52:00.001+05:30

Caps Lock key doesn't work is the most common complaint from Orca screen readers users. On Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx I found that Caps Lock is reset mysteriously. Here is workaround you can use until we find the culprit responsible for this.

Debugging with xmodmap

You find the present keymaps setting with xmodmap command. You can see that the line starting 'lock' is empty. We can set it properly with xmodmap -e "add Lock = Caps_Lock".


$ xmodmap 
xmodmap:  up to 4 keys per modifier, (keycodes in parentheses):

shift       Shift_L (0x32),  Shift_R (0x3e)
lock      
control     Control_L (0x25),  Control_R (0x69)
mod1        Alt_L (0x40),  Alt_R (0x6c),  Meta_L (0xcd)
mod2        Num_Lock (0x4d)
mod3      
mod4        Super_L (0x85),  Super_R (0x86),  Super_L (0xce),  Hyper_L (0xcf)
mod5        ISO_Level3_Shift (0x5c),  Mode_switch (0xcb)

# Set the Caps_Lock with xmodmap 
$ xmodmap -e "add Lock = Caps_Lock"

# Now caps lock works properly
$ xmodmap 
xmodmap:  up to 4 keys per modifier, (keycodes in parentheses):

shift       Shift_L (0x32),  Shift_R (0x3e)
lock        Caps_Lock (0x42)
control     Control_L (0x25),  Control_R (0x69)
mod1        Alt_L (0x40),  Alt_R (0x6c),  Meta_L (0xcd)
mod2        Num_Lock (0x4d)
mod3      
mod4        Super_L (0x85),  Super_R (0x86),  Super_L (0xce),  Hyper_L (0xcf)
mod5        ISO_Level3_Shift (0x5c),  Mode_switch (0xcb)



 Bash Autostart script for setting Caps lock

 Now we know that this can be fixed so I used a bash script to call the modmap script everytime we boot. Somehow '.Xmodmap' settings are not getting loaded so I am using an alternative script '.xmodmaprc' and call it from .bashrc file manually.  

# .xmodmaprc
xmodmap -e "add Lock = Caps_Lock"

# .bashrc
if [ -f ~/.xmodmaprc ]; then
    . ~/.xmodmaprc
fi

Reboot the computer and enable the modmap file to be loaded at boot time. PS: Kudos to dotslashblog for the xmodmaprc solution

Change Makers :: My Booklist

2010-07-07T14:24:00.003+05:30

Few people venture out into the unknown fueled by idealism and by sheer power of their will transform the lives of many.

Over the last few weeks I started collecting the list of books by such change makers. Its amazing how many people contributed to this list. My backpacking buddy introduced me to 'Two Cups of Tea' in Thailand, I visited Cabbages & Condoms restaurant in Bangkok. The hotel owner in Nepal suggested the 'Room to read' project. Guisamel, a fellow passenger on flight over Himalayas suggested 'Schools in the clouds'. Some of the books I already read and others still on my reading list.

Using Launchpad and Bazaar

2010-06-27T15:35:00.003+05:30

Created this handy tutorial to get you started using Bazaar Version Control System with Launchpad.
I needed a quick how to use Bazaar and launchpad tutorial to get my interns started with fixing Ubuntu bugs and put together this tutorial based on examples from Jay Pipes presentation A Contributor's Guide to Launchpad and Bazaar.
A Contributor's Guide to Launchpad and Bazaar

For the impatient, you can get started typing the commands. There is much more indepth information about Bazaar in the presentation and Bazaar documentation as well.


# Make a source repos for all projects
mkdir ~/repos   

# Create new repos for software-center project 

cd repos; bzr init-repo software-center 

cd software-center/

# Get the truck of software-center 
bzr branch lp:ubuntu/software-center trunk 

# Pull in new revisions of truck
cd ~/repos/software-center/trunk/ 
bzr rebase

# Branch to work on new bug 
bzr branch trunk bug538384-inaccessible-button 
cd bug538384-inaccessible-button

# Hack away, review your diff and commit
bzr diff 
bzr commit --fixes=lp:538384 -m 'Adds accessible name to features links button' 

# Push to launchpad 
bzr push lp:~arky/ubuntu/maverick/software-center/fixes-538384

Headphone jack sense problem in Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx

2010-06-26T13:36:00.004+05:30

After upgrading Dell Vostro 1014 laptop to Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx I found the old problem of headphones failing to mute the internal laptop speakers when plugged remains in the new release as well.

Three months ago I posted a workaround for Ubuntu Jaunty users in this post ALSA Jack Sense problem in Jaunty. However this solution doesn't work in Ubuntu Lucid.

To solve this issue you need to install linux-backports-modules-alsa-lucid-generic package and reboot your computer.


sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install linux-backports-modules-alsa-lucid-generic

Now speakers should mute as soon you plug in your headphones. If that doesn't work try to pass the correct model name by adding the line to /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf file. options snd-hda-intel model=dell-vostro enable=1 index=0

ACAP Solar Cooker and Circulatory Hot Water system

2010-06-20T13:30:00.007+05:30

While traveling I always keep an eye out for innovative home brew green solutions. In Pokhara Nepal the Annapurna Conservation Project (ACAP) is promoting cost effective circular water heating system and solar cookers made out of Nepali Doko baskets wrapped with aluminum foil.