Hey reader of my blog…

I know i have been getting quite a bit of traffic; though not phenomenal as gmail or orkut or something.

I however would like all to do something; more than just read my blog; tell me who you are.

Surely the people who i know and who read this blog is just a small percentage of the whole traffic. So if you dont mind, do introduce yourselves to me. Send a comment or something: i can always delete your comment if you have privacy issues (yeah right; who’s gonna spam ya? Me? I dont even know how email’s work; how can i spam ya huh?).

So what do you say reader? Will you introduce yourselves to me? Or no? You be the judge.

The all new “Karmic” experience: it’s just a result of “Karma”.

Well, the new version of Ubuntu, christenend “Karmic Koala” was released on Oct 29. I’d been eagerly waiting for this version since I was pretty disappointed with the earlier version 9.04 codenamed “Jaunty Jackalope”.

Of course, the end semester exams are approaching and so I decided to focus on them in order to boost my GPA and hence my chances in getting a good college for higher education (if it’s possible; maybe later it’s another long story). And so I decided to study throughout the weekend and stay away from the laptop except in the night for some counterstrike gaming. But fate had something else in store that would put me focussed only on installing Karmic throughout the weekend.

Customising your ubuntu screensaver

Sure Ubuntu and other FOSS softwares do talk about contributing to open source. But how many of us can actually do something with the box in front of us?

Many at my college actually are too lazy to customize the looks, add applications or themes or looks to their ubuntu. So they just install a customized version of ubuntu and there we go they have got everything they need. I don’t do that: i get a basic install and install everything as and when necessary. That’s why I don’t have a fancy laptop with super slick and super cool looks thanks to my virtue of laziness and the philosophy of trying to do things myself.

So, I was searching for Ubuntu screensavers and didn’t manage to find any(one site gave me windows screensavers saying they were for ubuntu; Ha! I’m not that dumb). So i find this interesting site that tells me how to customize my screensaver and I say why not give this a shot and I do so. Few moments later, I’m sitting in front of a screen with my picture floating around the screen.

Here’s what to do.

STEP 1:

Open a command line terminal(yes no other GUI altrenative; you need to use the CLI)

STEP 2:

Type in the command “cd /usr/share/applications/screensavers” without the quotes.

STEP 3:

Copy the ubuntu_theme.desktop to any file of desired name say me.desktop.

cp ubuntu_theme.desktop me.desktop

STEP 4:

Open the file me.desktop using your favourite text editor as root user.

I used gedit to edit the file.

gksudo gedit me.desktop

STEP 5:

Change the name(i used the name “me”), comment as required and change the line

Exec=floaters /usr/share/pixmaps/ubuntu-screensaver.svg

to Exec=floaters <path>

where <path> is the path of the file you want to display.

STEP 6:

Go to System -> Preferences -> Screensavers and in the list search for entry in the list with name “me”. Once you select it, you’ll see your screensaver just like what the floating ubuntu was except the picture that’s floating is what you specified and not ubuntu logo!!! There you go; you’ve created your own screensaver for ubuntu!! And to share this, just give everyone the .desktop file and the photo to the correct path.(Maybe you could create an archive with the image, the .desktop file and script to copy the image and .desktop file to the correct location adn there’s you go, you’ve even automated it!! The possibilities are endless!!!)

Have fun creating your own screensaver for ubuntu!!!

A two weeks at home that went by like a Shinkansen

Shinkansen(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shinkansen) is the train that holds the world speed record of 581kph. Literally, that’s how fast the past two weeks have sped by.

I reached home quite by surprise actually: no one expected the college to close this all of a sudden a week early. And then came the rumours of swine flu, H1N1. And, after that, as usual, people started wondering if college is really opening on 7th or not(quite a lot of people asked me about this; sorry to burst you bubble ).

A rocking two weeks that saw a flurry of activity online for me(I was so long in front of the computer and rarely did anything else that mom started saying “You go back to college this instant. Then at least you’ll talk somewhat to me ), including the ubuntu developer week(I scarcely understood what they were talking about; where they talking english I wondered throughout ; but made some sense thanks to my common sense I’d say), GCJ, those chat room jaunts(that often results in me IMing a bot ) and mainly the tweeting (man it is so addictive! Initially, I used to tweet like IM but now I IM like tweet!).

But, now all that has come to an end and I must pursue with new hope(seems CS engineers have best chances of getting a job post-recession: http://www.infoworld.com/d/networking/career-advice-high-tech-healthcare-best-choices-college-students-013) and i must head back to college and listen to the interesting stuff made to sound like useless drivel.

I’m really going to miss home. Perhaps it’s due to my complacency I don’t know: I don’t like change I guess. But that has to change(kind of ironic don’t you think? But well it is the right thing: I have to change:) ).

This two weeks has been the best time of my life so far I’d say. Learning PHP was so much fun, I’d like to get back to it soon. But, Varrun and Zubin are correct: I need grade points and I need to improve on algorithm too. Will now try to focus on these.

These two weeks has impacted me well and changed me a lot I believe. For the better or worse, I’m yet to see.

Ciao. Catch ya sometime I come to blog. Else, follow me on twitter; but no updates will occur when I’m at college . Take care and have fun.

Finally a non-CS from my year checks out ubuntu

Today, I saw that one of my friends, Vineeth Mohan(http://bujrox.wordpress.com), of Electronics And Communication Engineering, in my year, went ahead and did something: checking out Ubuntu(http://bujirox.wordpress.com/2009/09/01/ubuntulinuxvlc/).

This is an encouraging thing I must say. Most people are of the opinion that Ubuntu (or Linux in general) is meant only for computer science and information technology students. Hello?! If that’s so, I say stop using computers at home, stay away from the labs, the cafe in the campus and from any place that has anything even remotely connected to computer(that of course includes mobiles with internet in them since internet was originally available on computers)

I’m happy(no exalted) that he did so. He even went straight to the command line and started installing applications(hell even I don’t do that; that’s way cool Vineeth). People have no problem using Windows at home. But, when asked about it, they say, “Oh! It’s just to play games, surf the net, chat etc”. Hello?! You can surf the net in ubuntu too?! Plus it’s more secure(compared to Windows; thank to unix’s superuser concept). And chatting, well what’s pidgin for then hmm?? It even let’s you IM multiple friends (Yahoo, GTalk, MSN and 15 other protocols) all from within the same window. Plus you can have multiple accounts at the same time like 2 Gtalk or 3 Yahoo! accounts at the same time.

Oh don’t get me started on games. There are 17 games installed by default in Ubuntu(all with a superb AI I must say; not like windows where the computer lets you win sometimes. Try playing GNU chess: not your average chess app. I lose sorely in this. I’m not a good player I agree. Still, I don’t lose this bad! If that’s not enough, there are Linux versions of Windows I believe. Also, any game on Windows can be played on Ubuntu thanks to Play On Linux I believe. Have not tried out: don’t have any high end games to test it out with.

So, with so much in, and that too for free, wont you feel ashamed when asked “Have you tried Ubuntu?” and you say know? I agree you cant try Mac: you have to be filthy rich for that. Windows every Tom, Dick and Harry would’ve tried out and know. You don’t have to pay for Ubuntu. How come you haven’t even tried it out huh? But, hey it’s never too late.

Ranjit Laxman’s Photography

My mom introduced me to his photograpy: he is the husband of my mom’s colleague at school. The main thing I found attractive about his photography is that the photos don’t talk about various superb awesome things that are worth prizes and stuff; it’s just about what he sees daily that many people tend to miss out very badly. I wish you’d just go and take a peek at his photos. Just check out his photos.

http://www.ranjitlaxman.com/

Aaah finally some rain

From 19th to 21st, I was away at Ernakulam, when it apparantly rained so heavily that they cancelled futsal tournament. I personally verified this when I saw the status of the futsal ground: it was so much filled with mud that it was immediately clear why it was cancelled. But instead of being furious at the rain, I found myself seething at the fact that I missed the rain.

Sad news, sadder memories

Just now mom told me about the differently abled boy who used to be in my old school Bhavans Calicut. Mind numbing news that evoked even saddder memories.

Harikrishnan was my junior at Bhavans Calicut by two years. He had muscular problems in his and was always confined to the wheelchair. I’ve often seen him come to class escorted by his driver, who used to help him throughout the day to have lunch, navigate around the campus etc. The boy was a very smart boy and performed very well in class as far i knew and had a very good name with teachers too.

Love Aaj Kal: Ek Aaj kal ki kahani jo “mango” kahani nahi hai :)

Today after coming back from HAR CTF (boy it was a really long one), I had a bath and decided to catch on some sleep. So, I slept at 12 and woke up at 1:40: an hour later than I was supposed to actually. This made me nearly miss lunch; if I had not raced at top speed to the mess, I’d have definitely missed it. After that, I walk around buying some biscuits for the evening since I was sure I’d sleep and not go for tea.

HAR CTF 2009

Well HAR CTF 09, the latest capture the flag contest that the college team participated, got over on saturday.
After that, I have stayed away from internet for an unusually long period of 48 hours(I prefer 48 hours over 2 days because it conveys the size of the period better). And now, am back in front of it.

So this is the our team logo. I like it: it even has a cool name: BIOS. It actually has another expansion, other than the usual BIOS; but the seniors haven’t told me the expansion they came up with.

HAR CTF Over; was damn fun

So finally the HAR CTF is over (I thought it’ll never get over:) ).

It was damn cool: i had fun in here@ARL: reached here at midnight and been here ever since. Had a 10 minute sleep in the middle perhaps but otherwise no rest at all and i still do not feel any tiredness. However, it’ll be soon apparent once i reach hostel. Nothing much about the contest: we were busy patching up basic stuff in it that’s all. But man we did much better than last time(Cipher CTF).

Now sleep time and the whole gang’s leaving. Bye.