New iTunes steals your ability to turn Apple music into iPod-friendly MP3s [via boingboing.net] >O
I'm so not surprised.
Personally, although I own an iPod, I never use it. I know this statement probably makes me sound bad.... ._.
The "biggie" about owning an iPod was managing to hook it up to my linux box. Once I did it (painlessly, if I might add), I lost interest in it.
I even formatted it into a mac-ipod to add a little bit more complication to it, but yeah... once it was done, I wasn't interested in using it anymore. =/
Nowadays all it takes to sync up your iPod to your linux box is plugging it in and opening amaroK.
Friday, June 01, 2007
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
CBS bought last.fm
Music site Last.fm bought by CBS. =O
I'm no sure this is making me sad nor happy. But I guess when earlier this month they said they would provide video streaming, they probably knew this was cooking.
When I read the video-streaming bit, I was a little skeptic as they barely seem to be able to do what they do. However, perhaps now everything falls into place.
Microsoft's surface. I don't know..... I wouldn't want to have to reboot my coffee table because it froze badly... and BSOD doesn't really match my decoration.
I'm no sure this is making me sad nor happy. But I guess when earlier this month they said they would provide video streaming, they probably knew this was cooking.
When I read the video-streaming bit, I was a little skeptic as they barely seem to be able to do what they do. However, perhaps now everything falls into place.
Microsoft's surface. I don't know..... I wouldn't want to have to reboot my coffee table because it froze badly... and BSOD doesn't really match my decoration.
Sunday, May 27, 2007
Recommended software!
Recommended software entry! Wee!
A friend of mine bought himself a new computer. Because he didn't want to spend much money, as his sole intention was to replace his dinosaur-old computer, he went for an averagely cheap over-the-counter computer that came with windows xp pre-installed.
I know. BAAAAD IDEA.
Because this is the third world, and Micro$oft doesn't like people who aren't willing to pay high amounts of money for defective products, my friend got the "Windows XP Starter Edition" pre-installed. I think this version of Windows is one that those of you in prettier areas will never get to see and only consider it to be a matter of crypto-softwarelogy.
Anyway, jokes aside... there are lots of applications my friend does not get and is not allowed to install. One of them is Windows Media Player.
When he told me this, I tried to cheer him up by telling him that this is actually GOOD NEWS! as the less Micro$hit on your comp, the better. But I don't think he thought I was doing a great job at helping.
So, I recommended him VideoLAN/VLC.
VideoLAN, as much as wifey hates it, is a wonderful MultiMedia player that supports many many codecs and video/audio formats. It is available for Windows, MacOS and Linux, and it's free.
It installs fast and nicely, it has a very intuitive interface without much stupid eyecandy, and it doesn't hog your RAM. \^_^/
It can be skinned to look prettier, if that's what rocks your boat; and it can also be used to stream music and videos, but we won't go there yet. Concentrate on the playing your music easily part.
The most important thing about software like VLC is that it's OPEN SOURCE, which means, anyone can see the code that makes the application work and suggest changes, tweaks and improvements to it; as well as security fixes.
If you find that the software you use to play videos, dvd's or even music is too bloated and too fucked-up, give VideoLAN a try. I have a feeling you might like it a lot, and who knows... maybe that old video auntie sent you of her puppy Rigobert that you could never open with WMP or QT can be played now with VLC. =D
A side note about FOSS:
Free Open Source Software (FOSS) reaches you at no cost. However, writing these applications does cost the programmers time, patience, resources, etc.
Usually the people behind these applications -who are regular human beings like you and me- do these projects in their spare time, because they don't get paid for it. As you can imagine, since they don't make a living out of this, they most surely make a living out of something else.
Sometimes users protest about not getting features they want or stuff they want in their FOSS, disregarding the fact that the person who writes this software is putting everything on his or her part on it and getting nothing in return.
So, please, if you find a piece of FOSS to be useful to you, remember to support the writers of this software. They all take donations and it helps them a lot to make ends meet more smoothly and keep writing the software that is so useful and we like so much.
You don't need to donate a lot, and you aren't in obligation of donating money, just please consider it next time you have some spare money. It goes to a good cause. ^_^
A friend of mine bought himself a new computer. Because he didn't want to spend much money, as his sole intention was to replace his dinosaur-old computer, he went for an averagely cheap over-the-counter computer that came with windows xp pre-installed.
I know. BAAAAD IDEA.
Because this is the third world, and Micro$oft doesn't like people who aren't willing to pay high amounts of money for defective products, my friend got the "Windows XP Starter Edition" pre-installed. I think this version of Windows is one that those of you in prettier areas will never get to see and only consider it to be a matter of crypto-softwarelogy.
Anyway, jokes aside... there are lots of applications my friend does not get and is not allowed to install. One of them is Windows Media Player.
When he told me this, I tried to cheer him up by telling him that this is actually GOOD NEWS! as the less Micro$hit on your comp, the better. But I don't think he thought I was doing a great job at helping.
So, I recommended him VideoLAN/VLC.
VideoLAN, as much as wifey hates it, is a wonderful MultiMedia player that supports many many codecs and video/audio formats. It is available for Windows, MacOS and Linux, and it's free.
It installs fast and nicely, it has a very intuitive interface without much stupid eyecandy, and it doesn't hog your RAM. \^_^/
It can be skinned to look prettier, if that's what rocks your boat; and it can also be used to stream music and videos, but we won't go there yet. Concentrate on the playing your music easily part.
The most important thing about software like VLC is that it's OPEN SOURCE, which means, anyone can see the code that makes the application work and suggest changes, tweaks and improvements to it; as well as security fixes.
If you find that the software you use to play videos, dvd's or even music is too bloated and too fucked-up, give VideoLAN a try. I have a feeling you might like it a lot, and who knows... maybe that old video auntie sent you of her puppy Rigobert that you could never open with WMP or QT can be played now with VLC. =D
A side note about FOSS:
Free Open Source Software (FOSS) reaches you at no cost. However, writing these applications does cost the programmers time, patience, resources, etc.
Usually the people behind these applications -who are regular human beings like you and me- do these projects in their spare time, because they don't get paid for it. As you can imagine, since they don't make a living out of this, they most surely make a living out of something else.
Sometimes users protest about not getting features they want or stuff they want in their FOSS, disregarding the fact that the person who writes this software is putting everything on his or her part on it and getting nothing in return.
So, please, if you find a piece of FOSS to be useful to you, remember to support the writers of this software. They all take donations and it helps them a lot to make ends meet more smoothly and keep writing the software that is so useful and we like so much.
You don't need to donate a lot, and you aren't in obligation of donating money, just please consider it next time you have some spare money. It goes to a good cause. ^_^
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
Yahoo! Unlimited
Yahoo has just begun implementing the "unlimited" mail storage system. =D The storage-meter on my account is gone (I'd appreciate a counter that tells me how much space I'm using, though) now I can have an unlimited number of old e-mails that will be stored in Yahoo!'s unlimited hard disks. >P
The bad news is that yahoo! photos will be replaced by flickr, which is sad because I used to store lots of interesting photos there that I will now have to backup. =/
I keep wondering about the Y!Disk and whether I'll be able to store large files there, cuz if that is correct, I might have less trouble backing up 120 gig of data in the future.
!
The bad news is that yahoo! photos will be replaced by flickr, which is sad because I used to store lots of interesting photos there that I will now have to backup. =/
I keep wondering about the Y!Disk and whether I'll be able to store large files there, cuz if that is correct, I might have less trouble backing up 120 gig of data in the future.
!
Monday, May 07, 2007
GAIM is now Pidgin
GAIM is now Pidgin.
From what I'm reading there seem to be some notable improvements, and the new Pidgin also has a portable feature that allows you to load it onto a pen-drive and use it without installing it to the computer. =] Think of it as a "light" version of an instant messenging client.
I don't know when Lenny will have it, and I'm not in the mood to compile from source lately 'cos I've a headache and a backache of huge proportions; but those of you running Windowsand Mac may already test it by downloading it and installing it from its official site.
I haven't tried this "on the fly" option (by loading it to a pen drive) yet, but if it works it could prove very useful.
Personally, I like multi-protocol clients because it's incredibly annoying to have 100000000 different clients open to connect to the 100000000 IM networks that people use.
In this way, with just one client (uh... some call those "program") you can use many different networks, like AIM, MSN, Yahoo!, etc. Even LJ's IM or Google Talk; all at the same time. You can also be signed up to two different AIM (or whatever) accounts at the same time, and chat from both. That often saves resources (that your comp can use for something else), RAM, time and you have less chances to crash your system.
Additionally, it provides "tabbed" chat-windows, which helps at keeping things organized, in clear view and handy. It comes with spell-check support and several other options, it allows transfer of files, buddy notifications, custom away messages, custom IM icons and all that jazz.
But the best part of it is that it is FREE AND OPEN SOURCE. =D
From what I'm reading there seem to be some notable improvements, and the new Pidgin also has a portable feature that allows you to load it onto a pen-drive and use it without installing it to the computer. =] Think of it as a "light" version of an instant messenging client.
I don't know when Lenny will have it, and I'm not in the mood to compile from source lately 'cos I've a headache and a backache of huge proportions; but those of you running Windows
I haven't tried this "on the fly" option (by loading it to a pen drive) yet, but if it works it could prove very useful.
Personally, I like multi-protocol clients because it's incredibly annoying to have 100000000 different clients open to connect to the 100000000 IM networks that people use.
In this way, with just one client (uh... some call those "program") you can use many different networks, like AIM, MSN, Yahoo!, etc. Even LJ's IM or Google Talk; all at the same time. You can also be signed up to two different AIM (or whatever) accounts at the same time, and chat from both. That often saves resources (that your comp can use for something else), RAM, time and you have less chances to crash your system.
Additionally, it provides "tabbed" chat-windows, which helps at keeping things organized, in clear view and handy. It comes with spell-check support and several other options, it allows transfer of files, buddy notifications, custom away messages, custom IM icons and all that jazz.
But the best part of it is that it is FREE AND OPEN SOURCE. =D
Tuesday, May 01, 2007
Good news... sort of.
Dell to use Ubuntu on Linux PC's. =D Although I know this is for the most part irrelevant, as most people will hire someone to wipe off the GNU/Linux installed on their new machines and have a pirated copy of MSWindows installed on it, not even taking a minute to check out Ubuntu (which is a great distro, imho) nor to give it a chance. =/..
I know I sound like a pessimist. It is not my intention, by the way.
I know I sound like a pessimist. It is not my intention, by the way.
Monday, April 16, 2007
Michelle's pick of free webhosts
Do you remember the days before geocities was bought by yahoo? Do you remember the days of xoom? How about darkhosts/darkservers? Redribbon? Do those names sound even remotely familiar to you?
It seems nowadays it is very hard to find a webhost that satisfies your needs, if you plan to put up a non-profit, highly informal personal site that looks good and lets you use all those cheesy scripts one sees on paid hosts.
Today, reading my round of daily feeds, I found AwardSpace, and I was awed by their features.
Don't get me wrong... I know many of these hosts die away unexpectedly because they offer too much for too little (or even for nothing) and that quickly puts them out of business.
However, awardspace seems to be fairly reliable (I wouldn't trust it with important data, mind you) for small personal sites, or for those of you wishing to try out your madskillz at webdesign.
For as much as $0.00 you get (and I'll copy and paste from the site):
This sounds quite good to me.
I have just signed up for an account in order to try it. I already have a webhost and I'll be sticking to it for as long as it holds on together. D=
For the basic type of account (that is the free one) you get a file size limit of 500KB (half a megabyte) which prevents you from uploading media. I think this is reasonable considering they are providing a free service. You don't get SMTP either; which means mail-scripts will not be able to send e-mails, but I doubt many people in my flist are benefiting from this option.
You do get traffic statistics, usage reports, ssh (again, I doubt anyone in my flist benefits from this option), mailing lists manager (careful with that!), php, database, email filters, spam protection, cronjobs, and a bunch of other options that are undoubtedly interesting. Especially for a FREE webhost.
If you don't have a domain name, you can assign it a free one. If you do have a domain name, you can easily direct it to your account. =]
Most importantly, your website will be hosted on a unix-like server (ie: linux) which makes it more stable and reliable than any windows-based server can ever dream of being. Plus, you don't need to contact your sysadmin eeeeeevery time you need to change file permissions (which is, once again, something I doubt lots of people in my flist do... You all seriously need to be geeked up by me -safe for a couple of exceptions-).
You can try uploading content management software like joomla! or mambo. Or blogging/journalism stuff like wordpress; discussion boards, image galleries (teh-yum!) e-commerce solutions, etc.
If you want to get a free domain name, but you don't know how to do it, head towards http://www.freedomain.co.nr/ to get an http://www.yourname.co.nr domain. =] All they ask is
1) a link back to co.nr (a small button)
2) valid personal information
co.nr has a 2 months inactivity limit, after which they will delete your account without notice.
I've been using godaddy.com for paid domain names. They don't charge much and they are good.
co.nr also offers a cheap domain registration service, for US$5.99 a year per domain name. In this case, since you are paying for it, you don't have a two-months inactivity limit. =]
If you know of other free-domain services, please let me know. ^^
So, I guess everyone can get started learning website-building basics, or advanceds (XDD), or those of you wishing to try out new things but not wanting to risk ruining your paid website, you could use this kind of service to do so (which is what I plan to do, btw). I'll be looking forward to seeing what you guys come up with, if you want to share it. I will share mine as soon as I've put something pretty in it. ^-^ (Mostly pictures of my kitties, hahaha)
Right now, I'm off to dine out with friends. ^_^v
It seems nowadays it is very hard to find a webhost that satisfies your needs, if you plan to put up a non-profit, highly informal personal site that looks good and lets you use all those cheesy scripts one sees on paid hosts.
Today, reading my round of daily feeds, I found AwardSpace, and I was awed by their features.
Don't get me wrong... I know many of these hosts die away unexpectedly because they offer too much for too little (or even for nothing) and that quickly puts them out of business.
However, awardspace seems to be fairly reliable (I wouldn't trust it with important data, mind you) for small personal sites, or for those of you wishing to try out your madskillz at webdesign.
For as much as $0.00 you get (and I'll copy and paste from the site):
200MB Disk Space
5GB Monthly Traffic
2 Domains Hosting
5 Subdomains
Free DNS Server
PHP, Perl/CGI-BIN
1 MySQL Database
FTP/FrontPage Access
5 POP3/IMAP E-mails
Instant Account Setup
Web-based File Manager
Easy-to-use Control Panel
Reliable RAID Backups
GRID Hosting Platform
Super Fast Servers
Reliable Data Center
99.8% Uptime Guarantee
24x7 Network Monitoring
Forum Support
NO BANNER ADS
Fully Upgradeable
This sounds quite good to me.
I have just signed up for an account in order to try it. I already have a webhost and I'll be sticking to it for as long as it holds on together. D=
For the basic type of account (that is the free one) you get a file size limit of 500KB (half a megabyte) which prevents you from uploading media. I think this is reasonable considering they are providing a free service. You don't get SMTP either; which means mail-scripts will not be able to send e-mails, but I doubt many people in my flist are benefiting from this option.
You do get traffic statistics, usage reports, ssh (again, I doubt anyone in my flist benefits from this option), mailing lists manager (careful with that!), php, database, email filters, spam protection, cronjobs, and a bunch of other options that are undoubtedly interesting. Especially for a FREE webhost.
If you don't have a domain name, you can assign it a free one. If you do have a domain name, you can easily direct it to your account. =]
Most importantly, your website will be hosted on a unix-like server (ie: linux) which makes it more stable and reliable than any windows-based server can ever dream of being. Plus, you don't need to contact your sysadmin eeeeeevery time you need to change file permissions (which is, once again, something I doubt lots of people in my flist do... You all seriously need to be geeked up by me -safe for a couple of exceptions-).
You can try uploading content management software like joomla! or mambo. Or blogging/journalism stuff like wordpress; discussion boards, image galleries (teh-yum!) e-commerce solutions, etc.
If you want to get a free domain name, but you don't know how to do it, head towards http://www.freedomain.co.nr/ to get an http://www.yourname.co.nr domain. =] All they ask is
1) a link back to co.nr (a small button)
2) valid personal information
co.nr has a 2 months inactivity limit, after which they will delete your account without notice.
I've been using godaddy.com for paid domain names. They don't charge much and they are good.
co.nr also offers a cheap domain registration service, for US$5.99 a year per domain name. In this case, since you are paying for it, you don't have a two-months inactivity limit. =]
If you know of other free-domain services, please let me know. ^^
So, I guess everyone can get started learning website-building basics, or advanceds (XDD), or those of you wishing to try out new things but not wanting to risk ruining your paid website, you could use this kind of service to do so (which is what I plan to do, btw). I'll be looking forward to seeing what you guys come up with, if you want to share it. I will share mine as soon as I've put something pretty in it. ^-^ (Mostly pictures of my kitties, hahaha)
Right now, I'm off to dine out with friends. ^_^v
Sunday, April 15, 2007
It lives!
System is fully operational. >D!!!
Last night I went to bed feeling incredibly annoyed at the fact that I couldn't boot up after cloning my defunct hard drive. It turns out the bios had switched from booting from hd0 to booting from hd1. I suppose this happened because of all the hard drive mess I made because I couldn't open the carrier, so I had to disconnect the cdrw drive, run knoppix from the dvd-rw drive, use the connectors from the former to make the old hard drive a secondary slave to the dvd thing... oh, well. I will type up all the stuff I did last night in a further entry.
The thing is, after last night I was wisely advised to go to bed, I was feeling very pissed off at the "no-booting" thing, and somewhere in the back of my head I suspected I needed to play with the bios.
Today I did just that and found out the switch in booting devices. I switched back to hd0 and... magic! It booted.
Now I am assessing damage and checking what is working and what is lost. Hopefully not much has been lost... HOPEFULLY.
Well, before I turn off the computer and do some hardware re-arrangement I am going to type this up since it's still fresh in my memory and I know if I wait for a couple of days, I will forget something.
About 20 days ago, I lost one of my hard drives.
Right now, if you ask me , I think there are many reasons why this hard drive could have been damaged.
Off the top of my head, I can think of the unstable electricity line in my previous residence (we like playing with electricity... heh); the sudden failure of my computer's power source about six months ago; the close proximity (almost promiscuity) in which I have placed my hard drives inside the computer case... the many months my computer stays on... the lack of a UPS unit until a couple of months ago... etc.
Whatever the reason, the truth is the hard drive started clicking and reading from it became impossible, to the point it would make the entire system either freeze or crash.
Now, in spite of cryo's hard feelings toward GNU/Linux (hahaha!), we all know Linux is sweet and lovely and it doesn't usually crash nor freeze. That's not Lin. It's its retarded neighbor Windoze.
So, this is a sure sign that the problem is major.
I've tried running knoppix without removing any of the hard drives and accessing data (for recovery) from there. It was pointless, as the bios would recognize there was an IDE drive connected to the motherboard, but could not access it.
Ultimately, I had to remove the hard drive and use knoppix to go online and do my basic pestering of everyone.
You see... the lost drive contained, among other things, the /home partition. An integral part of the GNU/Linux OS as far as regular users are concerned... and we all know you don't just log in as root because it may compromise your system badly. Logging in as superuser is for windoze users. They do it all the time. That's what Micro$oft teaches users of its products: "Be stupid. It makes us profit." Especially considering how people in richer countries would rather buy a new computer than be bothered to clean their system. =/
But let's not get political. Michelle, a third-worlder who is willing to starve herself for antiques and music but not for software, decided to:
a) Rescue her system
b) Rescue her data
c) Pay as little as possible for it.
Since the hard drive was, without a shadow of a doubt, comatose; it was evident a new hard drive was going to be needed. Here Michelle was faced with two options:
a) Steal a hard drive
b) Buy a hard drive.
Option a was tempting but all the planning was annoying and Michelle is lazy, so she decided to shell out the ONLY money she was ready to spend, and she bought a new hard drive.
Now... there are caveats to this.... Because nothing is simple when Michelle is involved.
My old hard drive was 120Gig large. Not too large if you consider the size of HD nowadays. I wanted a 200 or 250Gig one, but the price of them made me run out of the shops calling the National Guard.
I settled for a 160 Gig one. ._. But it's cute, yanno?
Since I was at it, I decided to change the old ide wires (flat gray wires that are used to connect IDE devices, like hard drives, CDRW drives, DVDRW drives, etc) for new, round, blue and pretty IDE wires. Why? Because they take up less room and they allow better circulation of air inside the computer case, that's why.
She also needed some screwless screws which sound like a paradox but they exist, I assure you they do.
(Note: Are screwless screws screws that have never screwed? If so, can we call them virgin screws?)
Now the job to do was, of course, connecting everything and recovering the data. Right? That is the trickiest part of the job.
To begin with, cases nowadays are a bitch and everything fits tightly, so if you need to take one thing out, chances are you are going to have to disconnect other stuff in order to remove it. >[ In addition you might bump into something delicate and fuck it up. >[
What I needed to do was connecting 3 hard drives, a CD drive and a DVD drive. >[ crappy considering I didn't have enough wires to do that. But I somehow managed to do it by disconnecting the CD drive and using those wires to connect the faulty drive, the putting the new drive in the old drive's old place and rebooting from the DVD drive with the KNOPPIX cd on.
IMPORTANT NOTE: EVEN IF YOU DON'T USE LINUX AND HAVE NEVER EVEN BEEN AT A RADIUS OF 10 KM OF A LINUX USER, DO DOWNLOAD KNOPPIX AND HAVE IT AT HAND FOR RESCUE PURPOSES. In case of emergency, it might be the only way to save your data.
And yes, you can use it with a portable computer too.
I booted from knoppix (you need to tell your bios to boot from CD in order to do this. It's probably the easiest bios configuration you can do, and it will spare you of lots of trouble) Prayed that it wouldn't crash upon detecting the faulty hard drive -it didn't- and once kde was loaded, I looked for GPARTED.
GPARTED is a free, open source utility that allows you to partition your hard drives and manage those partitions.
It works pretty much like Partition Magic, only it doesn't cost you a lot of money for something you will rarely use, and it's open source, which means it gives people the chance to learn and the chance to work on the project for improvements.
Making use of it, I partitioned the new hard drive and formatted these partitions in the same manner the partitions in the old hard drive were partitioned.
This took only a couple of minutes, but I had to set up a root password to use the gui. Usually you don't need a root password with knoppix, because you use sudo to gain root access, but in some cases, when using an application thoughtlessly might cause permanent loss of data (note: nothing is ever lost permanently, if you believe in computer forensics) you need to set up a root password to move on.
Generally speaking, knoppix won't ask you for root passwords because it uses sudo, (I will not explain sudo here. Just hold on to the idea that knoppix doesn't require root passwords) I went to the knoppix dialog (a chubby penguin by the KDE logo) and set a root password that was easy to remember: knoppix
XD
It was a break from my usual passwords. I think I haven't used a simple password since... uh... when was that? 1999? 2000? Anyway... once there it was just a matter of dragging and clicking.
After doing that, the next step was cloning the data from the faulty drive to the new one.
In order to do this, I used dd_rescue.
A word of warning about dd_rescue: There is dd_rescue and ddrescue. I got lost trying to understand why Debian (Knoppix is based on Debian) calls ddrescue dd_rescue. Apparently they aren't the same thing, but =/ There is just so much you can ask for me when I'm nervous about losing my JoyDi and Murnau stuff. ;o;
I opened the text console (aptly named "konsole" in KDE) and typed:
sudo dd_rescue -p /dev/hdd1 /dev/hdb1
Let's examine this command chunk by chunk:
sudo: I used it to gain root access.
dd_rescue: the command I'm using to clone the partition in question.
-p: I used the -p flag to keep permissions and ownership intact. Otherwise, I would have had lots of problems when returning to the computer's system.
I advise to use this flag.
/dev/hdd1: The first faulty partition
/dev/hdd2: The first target (new) partition
I will not explain the b and B blocksizes because it's... a long explanation. The default should work on average, but if you find yourself at odds with the process you might want to change these. typing dd_rescue -h offers some nice help about other flags you might make use of. The -r (reverse copying) can be a good option for badly ruined drives.
I did the same for the second partition, etc, until the process was finished.
Then, I did:
sudo fsck hdb1
and
sudo fsck hdb2
fsck is file system check, and it is STRONGLY ENCOURAGED that you run it if using an ext2 partition... which is unlikely cuz you don't use linux. =P
After that, I shut down the comp. Unplugged it. Removed the faulty hard drive, plugged the CD drive back in, and restarted it expecting it to boot from grub. (Grub is a Linux bootloader that can boot Linux as well as other Operating System -for example. windoze-)
... IT DIDN'T!! D=!!!!!
I only got a prompt when past the initial bios screens. D=!!!!
It was late, and morgane_le_fey was bidding me to GO TO BED ALREADY and telling me awful things about Debian. D=!! But in the end, she said maybe I needed to rest my overfried neurones and I would come up with an answer the next day.
So it was.
Appantely, with all the HD switching I did, and rewiring I did, the automatic settings in the BIOS had decided to try to boot from hd1 instead of hd0. >[
I switched it back to the following order, which is the one I think makes the most sense for my system:
Booting order:
1- floppy
2- CD0
3- CD1 (DVD)
4- hd0
5- other devices
Saved options and exited bios setup, and voilá, I saw my pretty grub screen asking me whether I wanted to boot from the latest kernel or an earlier one. *_*
*kisses screen*
Once in my system, I lit a cigarette and watched in pleasure how everything had been cloned correctly.
But alas... my joy was to be short-lived, as I watched how something I had considered but ultimately forgot, came back to bite me hard in the rear.... the size of the partitions is incorrect. ><
This means, I will -during this week- attempt to back-up everything that had not been previously backed-up, and re-write the partition table of hdb (Drive "D" for Windoze users).
Writing to the partition table of a hard drive might entail loss of data. Permanent loss of it.
In the meantime, I'm creating a grub disk, because I can't find my old one. ;o; I think it's probably lost among the many many many boxes of stuff that remain unopened 4 months after having moved.
Things I need to do now to feel at ease with myself and close the computer case:
a) Re-arrange the drives inside the case.
b) Get an additional wire to plug in a hard drive fan. (fan= cooling device. Not a frothing individual with high estrogen blood levels who screams "OMG!!!LULZ!!!" and faps at the images in his/her computer screen.)
c) Finding my grub disk and/or recreating it
d) backing up what wasn't backed-up.
e) Re-write partition table in hdb to make it "see" the real size of the partitions, or, if this is impossible, re-arrange partitions and create a new partition with the free disk space that is viewable and writable from the system.
Oh, btw, since I was at it, I upgraded to the latest testing branch of Debian -Lenny- leaving behind my etch days in the same way I left behind my sarge days when we moved from the latter to the former... and so on. Etch was good, it was really good. May it enjoy praise and love in its newly acquired "stable" form.
Last night I went to bed feeling incredibly annoyed at the fact that I couldn't boot up after cloning my defunct hard drive. It turns out the bios had switched from booting from hd0 to booting from hd1. I suppose this happened because of all the hard drive mess I made because I couldn't open the carrier, so I had to disconnect the cdrw drive, run knoppix from the dvd-rw drive, use the connectors from the former to make the old hard drive a secondary slave to the dvd thing... oh, well. I will type up all the stuff I did last night in a further entry.
The thing is, after last night I was wisely advised to go to bed, I was feeling very pissed off at the "no-booting" thing, and somewhere in the back of my head I suspected I needed to play with the bios.
Today I did just that and found out the switch in booting devices. I switched back to hd0 and... magic! It booted.
Now I am assessing damage and checking what is working and what is lost. Hopefully not much has been lost... HOPEFULLY.
Well, before I turn off the computer and do some hardware re-arrangement I am going to type this up since it's still fresh in my memory and I know if I wait for a couple of days, I will forget something.
About 20 days ago, I lost one of my hard drives.
Right now, if you ask me , I think there are many reasons why this hard drive could have been damaged.
Off the top of my head, I can think of the unstable electricity line in my previous residence (we like playing with electricity... heh); the sudden failure of my computer's power source about six months ago; the close proximity (almost promiscuity) in which I have placed my hard drives inside the computer case... the many months my computer stays on... the lack of a UPS unit until a couple of months ago... etc.
Whatever the reason, the truth is the hard drive started clicking and reading from it became impossible, to the point it would make the entire system either freeze or crash.
Now, in spite of cryo's hard feelings toward GNU/Linux (hahaha!), we all know Linux is sweet and lovely and it doesn't usually crash nor freeze. That's not Lin. It's its retarded neighbor Windoze.
So, this is a sure sign that the problem is major.
I've tried running knoppix without removing any of the hard drives and accessing data (for recovery) from there. It was pointless, as the bios would recognize there was an IDE drive connected to the motherboard, but could not access it.
Ultimately, I had to remove the hard drive and use knoppix to go online and do my basic pestering of everyone.
You see... the lost drive contained, among other things, the /home partition. An integral part of the GNU/Linux OS as far as regular users are concerned... and we all know you don't just log in as root because it may compromise your system badly. Logging in as superuser is for windoze users. They do it all the time. That's what Micro$oft teaches users of its products: "Be stupid. It makes us profit." Especially considering how people in richer countries would rather buy a new computer than be bothered to clean their system. =/
But let's not get political. Michelle, a third-worlder who is willing to starve herself for antiques and music but not for software, decided to:
a) Rescue her system
b) Rescue her data
c) Pay as little as possible for it.
Since the hard drive was, without a shadow of a doubt, comatose; it was evident a new hard drive was going to be needed. Here Michelle was faced with two options:
a) Steal a hard drive
b) Buy a hard drive.
Option a was tempting but all the planning was annoying and Michelle is lazy, so she decided to shell out the ONLY money she was ready to spend, and she bought a new hard drive.
Now... there are caveats to this.... Because nothing is simple when Michelle is involved.
My old hard drive was 120Gig large. Not too large if you consider the size of HD nowadays. I wanted a 200 or 250Gig one, but the price of them made me run out of the shops calling the National Guard.
I settled for a 160 Gig one. ._. But it's cute, yanno?
Since I was at it, I decided to change the old ide wires (flat gray wires that are used to connect IDE devices, like hard drives, CDRW drives, DVDRW drives, etc) for new, round, blue and pretty IDE wires. Why? Because they take up less room and they allow better circulation of air inside the computer case, that's why.
She also needed some screwless screws which sound like a paradox but they exist, I assure you they do.
(Note: Are screwless screws screws that have never screwed? If so, can we call them virgin screws?)
Now the job to do was, of course, connecting everything and recovering the data. Right? That is the trickiest part of the job.
To begin with, cases nowadays are a bitch and everything fits tightly, so if you need to take one thing out, chances are you are going to have to disconnect other stuff in order to remove it. >[ In addition you might bump into something delicate and fuck it up. >[
What I needed to do was connecting 3 hard drives, a CD drive and a DVD drive. >[ crappy considering I didn't have enough wires to do that. But I somehow managed to do it by disconnecting the CD drive and using those wires to connect the faulty drive, the putting the new drive in the old drive's old place and rebooting from the DVD drive with the KNOPPIX cd on.
IMPORTANT NOTE: EVEN IF YOU DON'T USE LINUX AND HAVE NEVER EVEN BEEN AT A RADIUS OF 10 KM OF A LINUX USER, DO DOWNLOAD KNOPPIX AND HAVE IT AT HAND FOR RESCUE PURPOSES. In case of emergency, it might be the only way to save your data.
And yes, you can use it with a portable computer too.
I booted from knoppix (you need to tell your bios to boot from CD in order to do this. It's probably the easiest bios configuration you can do, and it will spare you of lots of trouble) Prayed that it wouldn't crash upon detecting the faulty hard drive -it didn't- and once kde was loaded, I looked for GPARTED.
GPARTED is a free, open source utility that allows you to partition your hard drives and manage those partitions.
It works pretty much like Partition Magic, only it doesn't cost you a lot of money for something you will rarely use, and it's open source, which means it gives people the chance to learn and the chance to work on the project for improvements.
Making use of it, I partitioned the new hard drive and formatted these partitions in the same manner the partitions in the old hard drive were partitioned.
This took only a couple of minutes, but I had to set up a root password to use the gui. Usually you don't need a root password with knoppix, because you use sudo to gain root access, but in some cases, when using an application thoughtlessly might cause permanent loss of data (note: nothing is ever lost permanently, if you believe in computer forensics) you need to set up a root password to move on.
Generally speaking, knoppix won't ask you for root passwords because it uses sudo, (I will not explain sudo here. Just hold on to the idea that knoppix doesn't require root passwords) I went to the knoppix dialog (a chubby penguin by the KDE logo) and set a root password that was easy to remember: knoppix
XD
It was a break from my usual passwords. I think I haven't used a simple password since... uh... when was that? 1999? 2000? Anyway... once there it was just a matter of dragging and clicking.
After doing that, the next step was cloning the data from the faulty drive to the new one.
In order to do this, I used dd_rescue.
A word of warning about dd_rescue: There is dd_rescue and ddrescue. I got lost trying to understand why Debian (Knoppix is based on Debian) calls ddrescue dd_rescue. Apparently they aren't the same thing, but =/ There is just so much you can ask for me when I'm nervous about losing my JoyDi and Murnau stuff. ;o;
I opened the text console (aptly named "konsole" in KDE) and typed:
sudo dd_rescue -p /dev/hdd1 /dev/hdb1
Let's examine this command chunk by chunk:
sudo: I used it to gain root access.
dd_rescue: the command I'm using to clone the partition in question.
-p: I used the -p flag to keep permissions and ownership intact. Otherwise, I would have had lots of problems when returning to the computer's system.
I advise to use this flag.
/dev/hdd1: The first faulty partition
/dev/hdd2: The first target (new) partition
I will not explain the b and B blocksizes because it's... a long explanation. The default should work on average, but if you find yourself at odds with the process you might want to change these. typing dd_rescue -h offers some nice help about other flags you might make use of. The -r (reverse copying) can be a good option for badly ruined drives.
I did the same for the second partition, etc, until the process was finished.
Then, I did:
sudo fsck hdb1
and
sudo fsck hdb2
fsck is file system check, and it is STRONGLY ENCOURAGED that you run it if using an ext2 partition... which is unlikely cuz you don't use linux. =P
After that, I shut down the comp. Unplugged it. Removed the faulty hard drive, plugged the CD drive back in, and restarted it expecting it to boot from grub. (Grub is a Linux bootloader that can boot Linux as well as other Operating System -for example. windoze-)
... IT DIDN'T!! D=!!!!!
I only got a prompt when past the initial bios screens. D=!!!!
It was late, and morgane_le_fey was bidding me to GO TO BED ALREADY and telling me awful things about Debian. D=!! But in the end, she said maybe I needed to rest my overfried neurones and I would come up with an answer the next day.
So it was.
Appantely, with all the HD switching I did, and rewiring I did, the automatic settings in the BIOS had decided to try to boot from hd1 instead of hd0. >[
I switched it back to the following order, which is the one I think makes the most sense for my system:
Booting order:
1- floppy
2- CD0
3- CD1 (DVD)
4- hd0
5- other devices
Saved options and exited bios setup, and voilá, I saw my pretty grub screen asking me whether I wanted to boot from the latest kernel or an earlier one. *_*
*kisses screen*
Once in my system, I lit a cigarette and watched in pleasure how everything had been cloned correctly.
But alas... my joy was to be short-lived, as I watched how something I had considered but ultimately forgot, came back to bite me hard in the rear.... the size of the partitions is incorrect. ><
This means, I will -during this week- attempt to back-up everything that had not been previously backed-up, and re-write the partition table of hdb (Drive "D" for Windoze users).
Writing to the partition table of a hard drive might entail loss of data. Permanent loss of it.
In the meantime, I'm creating a grub disk, because I can't find my old one. ;o; I think it's probably lost among the many many many boxes of stuff that remain unopened 4 months after having moved.
Things I need to do now to feel at ease with myself and close the computer case:
a) Re-arrange the drives inside the case.
b) Get an additional wire to plug in a hard drive fan. (fan= cooling device. Not a frothing individual with high estrogen blood levels who screams "OMG!!!LULZ!!!" and faps at the images in his/her computer screen.)
c) Finding my grub disk and/or recreating it
d) backing up what wasn't backed-up.
e) Re-write partition table in hdb to make it "see" the real size of the partitions, or, if this is impossible, re-arrange partitions and create a new partition with the free disk space that is viewable and writable from the system.
Oh, btw, since I was at it, I upgraded to the latest testing branch of Debian -Lenny- leaving behind my etch days in the same way I left behind my sarge days when we moved from the latter to the former... and so on. Etch was good, it was really good. May it enjoy praise and love in its newly acquired "stable" form.
Saturday, April 14, 2007
Computer fixing progress
Well, I have just replaced the flat ide wires for the round ones. They are blue because it matches the leds in my case's rear fan.
It seeeeeems I didn't mess it when connecting the wires, I put the 1st pin where it had to go, and the rest of the pins seem to have followed nicely. =D
This is uncomplicated when one is putting the comp together because everything is loose. It is complicated now because everything is fastened and I am TOO LAZY to unfasten it. =/ So, I couldn't see much.
What I have seen, though, is the amount of kitty hair inside the comp. o_o
I've taken the opportunity to clean the comp's intestines again.
I also bought these thumb-screws or screwless-screws (which sounds like a paradox) I bought 8 but the guy said he didn't feel like opening the bag and gave me a full bag of them. o_o But I only paid for 8. Well... I guess now I'm giving away thumb-screws to people, but it seems nobody appreciates my presents. ;_;
YOU'LL SEE WHAT PAIN IT IS WHEN NO PHILLIPS SCREWDRIVER SPINS YOUR SCREWS!!! (That sounds funny...)
Well, now my problem is... I don't have any more ide connectors. Hahahaha... *headesk* >< So I'll see if I can use a usb carry case to clone the dead HD. ~_~
Another option would be to temporarily remove the CD-RW drive (slave), since I can still run knoppix from the DVDR one (master). ~_~ I wonder if that will work? I think it should work.
I have a spare IDE connector for the wire that goes from the MoBo to the 3 1/2 disk drive (a dinosaur, I know, but remember I love antiques. =P) But I don't think I can connect an IDE HD to that connector? Or can I (and it will work)?
Hmm... if anyone has any hints, they will be much appreciated. ^_^♥
It seeeeeems I didn't mess it when connecting the wires, I put the 1st pin where it had to go, and the rest of the pins seem to have followed nicely. =D
This is uncomplicated when one is putting the comp together because everything is loose. It is complicated now because everything is fastened and I am TOO LAZY to unfasten it. =/ So, I couldn't see much.
What I have seen, though, is the amount of kitty hair inside the comp. o_o
I've taken the opportunity to clean the comp's intestines again.
I also bought these thumb-screws or screwless-screws (which sounds like a paradox) I bought 8 but the guy said he didn't feel like opening the bag and gave me a full bag of them. o_o But I only paid for 8. Well... I guess now I'm giving away thumb-screws to people, but it seems nobody appreciates my presents. ;_;
YOU'LL SEE WHAT PAIN IT IS WHEN NO PHILLIPS SCREWDRIVER SPINS YOUR SCREWS!!! (That sounds funny...)
Well, now my problem is... I don't have any more ide connectors. Hahahaha... *headesk* >< So I'll see if I can use a usb carry case to clone the dead HD. ~_~
Another option would be to temporarily remove the CD-RW drive (slave), since I can still run knoppix from the DVDR one (master). ~_~ I wonder if that will work? I think it should work.
I have a spare IDE connector for the wire that goes from the MoBo to the 3 1/2 disk drive (a dinosaur, I know, but remember I love antiques. =P) But I don't think I can connect an IDE HD to that connector? Or can I (and it will work)?
Hmm... if anyone has any hints, they will be much appreciated. ^_^♥
Saturday, March 31, 2007
Hardware failure happens
My hard drive died last night.
If I was supposed to do something for you (I remember a translation I promised and an upload I promised to two different people), please bear with me for a couple of days until I manage to sort things out.
Sorry.
Have fun in the meantime.
Edit: BTW, this is not an April's fools joke. It's real. I know the timing is awful.
If I was supposed to do something for you (I remember a translation I promised and an upload I promised to two different people), please bear with me for a couple of days until I manage to sort things out.
Sorry.
Have fun in the meantime.
Edit: BTW, this is not an April's fools joke. It's real. I know the timing is awful.
Thursday, March 29, 2007
No love for hotmail
From Boing-boing:
Link.
I just simply hate hotmail, so I guess this is amusing for me.
Hotmail users deemed too dumb for employment at firm
Pete says:
A guy, who works in the department of a Human Resources consultancy company, says they made a selection process in which, among other things, they asked for a person with ample experience in using the internet (navigation, searches, formats...).
They received 50 candidacies, from which 30 came from Hotmail-directions, all of them erased as they entered.
The reason: You can't pretend being an internet expert and use a Hotmail account at the same time.
Link.
I just simply hate hotmail, so I guess this is amusing for me.
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Virtual Stickies!
Lately I'm all about productivity.
I know it won't last, though, because I'm lazy at heart.
But for now, I want to fancy myself a very productive person that GTD (gets things done). Ph33r me.
And in my quest to GTD while struggling through very busy times at work, I found a very interesting website that might very well help one boost one's productivity (or at least combat early signs of Alzheimer's O_O ).
Stikkit.
This is, basically, virtual stick-it notes. Ones that talk to your PDA, your cellphone or your e-mail. =D
You need to create an account (it's free), and then you can start typing "stick-it" notes. You don't need to download anything at all. This works like... hmm... getting an e-mail account at yahoo or gmail. The service is web2 powered, and it seems to work quite well, from what I've been seeing.
What can it do for me? Well, for example, for lists of to-do things, you can ask it to remind you of whatever it is you have to do by e-mailing you when the task is due.
You can also keep a portable list of contacts, be reminded of due bills, birthdays, anniversaries, keep bookmarks, or just jot down notes.
It can be synced to your calendar software -if you use one- or contacts software -if you use one-.
Be reminded of TV shows, release dates, events, meetings, etc. It's like a life cron job. =P (yes, that was nerdy)
I think for now I'm gonna be using it to be reminded of birthdays. =D So, I'm gonna be harrassing your userinfo pages for this purpose. Hehehe. ^_^
I need to set this to work with my cellphone.
The site is very intuitive and very very very easy to use. It will take you only a few minutes to start building your own stickits. However, if anyone thinks a tutorial might be needed, they have very helpful forums with tons of them.
I know it won't last, though, because I'm lazy at heart.
But for now, I want to fancy myself a very productive person that GTD (gets things done). Ph33r me.
And in my quest to GTD while struggling through very busy times at work, I found a very interesting website that might very well help one boost one's productivity (or at least combat early signs of Alzheimer's O_O ).
Stikkit.
This is, basically, virtual stick-it notes. Ones that talk to your PDA, your cellphone or your e-mail. =D
You need to create an account (it's free), and then you can start typing "stick-it" notes. You don't need to download anything at all. This works like... hmm... getting an e-mail account at yahoo or gmail. The service is web2 powered, and it seems to work quite well, from what I've been seeing.
What can it do for me? Well, for example, for lists of to-do things, you can ask it to remind you of whatever it is you have to do by e-mailing you when the task is due.
You can also keep a portable list of contacts, be reminded of due bills, birthdays, anniversaries, keep bookmarks, or just jot down notes.
It can be synced to your calendar software -if you use one- or contacts software -if you use one-.
Be reminded of TV shows, release dates, events, meetings, etc. It's like a life cron job. =P (yes, that was nerdy)
I think for now I'm gonna be using it to be reminded of birthdays. =D So, I'm gonna be harrassing your userinfo pages for this purpose. Hehehe. ^_^
I need to set this to work with my cellphone.
The site is very intuitive and very very very easy to use. It will take you only a few minutes to start building your own stickits. However, if anyone thinks a tutorial might be needed, they have very helpful forums with tons of them.
Thursday, February 01, 2007
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
iTunes alternatives
Friday, January 12, 2007
CD Swapping!
I don't know about you, guys, for me music files are fine but nothing replaces the actual media. Be it a CD or its analog parents (LP's for example); I really love those and cherish them greatly.
I am not going to even start touching the somewhat itchy topic of "I don't have money to buy CDs! OMG! I have bought a new cellphone/color contacts/etc!" here because that always makes my eye twitch.
I'm simply going to talk to those of you who appreciate CD's (LP's, cassettes, etc.) more than mere streams of intangible bytes.
I think the growing trend in this aspect last year have been sites that facilitate CD-swapping. Real CD's, not copies.
Among those, perhaps lala.com has taken most of the credit. I think I blogged about it about six months ago, when it was still in "beta" and you could only join by getting an invitation code.
Right now, the invitation system has been dropped and everyone can join.
Basically, the site works as middle-man, getting people in touch so that they can exchange CD's that they no longer want for CD's they do want.
Lala.com is only available to users in the US ( =/) and it charges you 1.75 per swap, but facilitates the envelopes to send the CD's.
You can go to the site, or you can read a very nice and extensive review here.
Another good option might be SwapaCD, which -again- is only available to users in the US (so, half my flist has stopped reading by now. ._.) I think this is because of the different laws ruling in every country, and the owners of these sites not wanting to risk being issued a cease & desist order or facing a lawsuit.
You earn SwapaCD credits by sending out CDs, and receive CDs by spending earned credits.
On the other hand you have chancexchange, which allows users from every country to swap CD's. Where's the catch? You wonder. Well, you can only exchange CD's with people in your same country.
I am only listing the sites that do not seem to require paying a fee to join, and basically work as a peer-to-peer network where you don't have to "buy" a CD, but rather you simply exchange them for another CD.
There are numerous vendors that "buy" your old CD's and re-sell them; or even allow users to sell their stuff through their interface for a small (or not) fee. Amazon comes to mind.
=]
Well, I hope this is useful for someone.
I am not going to even start touching the somewhat itchy topic of "I don't have money to buy CDs! OMG! I have bought a new cellphone/color contacts/etc!" here because that always makes my eye twitch.
I'm simply going to talk to those of you who appreciate CD's (LP's, cassettes, etc.) more than mere streams of intangible bytes.
I think the growing trend in this aspect last year have been sites that facilitate CD-swapping. Real CD's, not copies.
Among those, perhaps lala.com has taken most of the credit. I think I blogged about it about six months ago, when it was still in "beta" and you could only join by getting an invitation code.
Right now, the invitation system has been dropped and everyone can join.
Basically, the site works as middle-man, getting people in touch so that they can exchange CD's that they no longer want for CD's they do want.
Lala.com is only available to users in the US ( =/) and it charges you 1.75 per swap, but facilitates the envelopes to send the CD's.
You can go to the site, or you can read a very nice and extensive review here.
Another good option might be SwapaCD, which -again- is only available to users in the US (so, half my flist has stopped reading by now. ._.) I think this is because of the different laws ruling in every country, and the owners of these sites not wanting to risk being issued a cease & desist order or facing a lawsuit.
You earn SwapaCD credits by sending out CDs, and receive CDs by spending earned credits.
On the other hand you have chancexchange, which allows users from every country to swap CD's. Where's the catch? You wonder. Well, you can only exchange CD's with people in your same country.
I am only listing the sites that do not seem to require paying a fee to join, and basically work as a peer-to-peer network where you don't have to "buy" a CD, but rather you simply exchange them for another CD.
There are numerous vendors that "buy" your old CD's and re-sell them; or even allow users to sell their stuff through their interface for a small (or not) fee. Amazon comes to mind.
=]
Well, I hope this is useful for someone.
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