More in the Nature gallery

2009-08-09 22:13 by Nailbar
Took a few pictures of random nature realated stuff. Ta-daa!

Visit the Gallery of Nature for more of this.

Swapping

2009-08-07 10:01 by Nailbar
Mark this day. It's the first time I need to use the swap partition on my work computer. Reason? Three virtual OS'es running while I'm working on other stuff; Debian 5.0 as server, Windows XP as source for agony, and openSUSE being installed as I write this. And of course the host system Linux MINT 7.

Things are starting to feel a bit sluggish as openSUSE is draining processor time.

Humans versus Bots

2009-08-06 21:51 by Nailbar
I checked my visits counter today and figured the following:

The bots are clear winners with 12220 visits since I don't know when, against 1922 human visitors of which most of them are probably me.

Should this make me sad?

In other news, I just released a new version of my [Nailblog-2]. It's still in beta but I have a good feeling about it. Much to do, still, though.

Update: here's the current, live, visit counter: 145137 peeps so far.

Space ship

2009-08-06 00:55 by Nailbar
Like dragons, I'm also boyishly into space ships, though my own drawing skills are far from what I'd wish them to be. Here's another go at this. After all, they say practice makes perfect.

Kinda cartoonish, don't you think? The nose annoys me, but the engines are cool.

Linux Installation

2009-08-05 18:26 by Nailbar
This post is partly for me, so I will remember 'til next time, and partly for all them peeps who wonder how I in particular goes by when I install a new Linux distro. I am loaded up with the latest Linux MINT 7 KDE edition DVD, using MINT 7 with gnome at the moment of writing, and some watermelon to keep me hydrated.

I'll keep it short so if you're unsure of something, just ask.

Partitioning

Linux MINT 7 is installed on sda8, Linux MINT 6 is installed on... I just ran out of watermelon... sda6. I will install MINT 7 KDE ed. on sda6 then.

Boot loader

I'll install the current boot loader to sda8 (hd0,7 in grub) so I can chain load it from whatever the new installation will give me.

$ sudo grub
grub> root (hd0,7)
grub> setup (hd0,7)
grub> quit

Installation

Booted into the Live CD and launched Install from the desktop folder... English, Helsinki, Finland, Manual partitioning...

This is where I select /dev/sda6, Edit partition... Use as Ext3, Format, Mount point="/". I'll add /dev/sda7, which is my data partition, to /media/data while I'm at it. No formatting on that one.

Then I type in my name, login name, password, computer name... And then it's install time. This is where I go and play some Wii. Brb.

Post install

So now I've installed and rebooted and logged in and made sure the welcome screen won't bother me again. Next I'll update all that needs to be updated and install the restricted drivers for the graphics card.

Ahem. mintUpdate locked up on this one quoting "Checking for updates". Let's do this from Synaptic. Mark all upgrades will give me a newer linux kernel so I'll be rebooting after this. While downloading updates I'll set up my home folder... Nice feature on KDE4 that one, by the way.

• Step 1: Delete all default folders.
• Step 2: Add symbolic links to stuff in /media/data like:
  • public_html
  • stuff
  • work
  • photos
  • sound
• Step 3: Copy some config files from my old home folder:
  • .xscreensaver
  • .wine
  • .VirtualBox
  • .Skype
  • .purple
  • .local/share/applications
  • .gimp-2.6
  • .mozilla

Alright! Before I reboot I'll just install the restricted drivers.

Uuh. Fatal error? Okay. Maybe I'll just reboot now.

That's better. Restricted drivers installed. Complaining about reboot. I won't do that now. I'll just restart the X server with Ctrl+Alt+Backspace. Ta-daa!

My programs

Next it's time to install what programs I use. I'll try using mintInstall this time.

• Pidgin
• Skype
• VirtualBox
• Wine - strangely, this was not in mintInstall

Let's see if the sound works. This is usually a braking point in my experience. Printer used to be, but that's changed.

No sound from headset, but big speakers are speaking. Mixer controls? Fiddle fiddle fiddle... Nothing. Sad. Alsamixer? Fiddle fiddle WIN! Wooo! Mic working? Yes. But way too silent. Gets garbled if I turn it up too much too. And Skype is way too silent in it self. I can hardly hear the test call message. I'll fix this later.

Video is working.

Amarok playlist a little confusic but I think I got the hang of it.

The VirtualBox version I installed through mintInstall didn't support the settings file. Odd. I'll have to reconfigure it all now:

1. New machine
2. Name="Server1"
3. Memory="1024"
4. Hard disk="stuff/os/virtualbox/webserver.vdi" - Error. Wtf! Anyhow...
5. Seems to be working none the less
6. Configure port forwarding...
   $ VBoxManage setextradata "Server1" "VBoxInternal/Devices/pcnet/0/LUN#0/Config/http/Protocol" TCP
$ VBoxManage setextradata "Server1" "VBoxInternal/Devices/pcnet/0/LUN#0/Config/http/GuestPort" 80
$ VBoxManage setextradata "Server1" "VBoxInternal/Devices/pcnet/0/LUN#0/Config/http/HostPort" 8080
$ VBoxManage setextradata "Server1" "VBoxInternal/Devices/pcnet/0/LUN#0/Config/ssh/Protocol" TCP
$ VBoxManage setextradata "Server1" "VBoxInternal/Devices/pcnet/0/LUN#0/Config/ssh/GuestPort" 22
$ VBoxManage setextradata "Server1" "VBoxInternal/Devices/pcnet/0/LUN#0/Config/ssh/HostPort" 2222

Can't get networking working on the virtual machine. Annoying.

Summary

Well... Two hours later I can say that the installation and most of the configuration was swift and easy. I got two error messages, but nothing fatal. The KDE4 desktop seems really nice so I figured I'd stay with this one for a while. Hopefully I'll find solutions to the microphone and VirtualBox problems so I won't have to go back to GNOME for that matter.

I'll add more if there is any more. Thanks for reading.

More

Making xscreensaver automatically start on login:

1. Disable the KDE screensaver
2. Create script .kde/Autostart/xscreensaver.sh
   #!/bin/bash
xscreensaver -no-splash &
3. Make it executable

Sound in Firefox. There was none. As I was trying to watch a YouTube clip I eventually decided to go back to the GNOME version. Maybe I'll still find some time to fiddle with this one, but I doubt it. I'll just wait for a newer release instead. Too bad, really, 'cause I enjoyed the rest of the desktop experience with KDE4.

So I installed the MINT KDE grub to sda6 for eventual chain loading, and the MINT GNOME grub back to MBR.

$ grub
grub> root (hd0,5)
grub> setup (hd0,5)
grub> root (hd0,7)
grub> setup (hd0)

Oh, cool. A dragon!

2009-08-03 22:33 by Nailbar
I've always been into dragons. Yeah. I'm one of those. Love to draw dragons. Love everything about them.

You know I've been playing around with my still new media tablet.

You do the math.

Se also:

And so on and so forth. Maybe I'll start scanning some from my sketch book and school notes from way back.

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