Confessions of a Tech Junkie
...Innovation 6!/2!°
...and miles to go before i sleep, and miles to go...*yawn*
Zzzzzzz.....
1. I better start updating my blog again, and writing more frequently, now that I am free again after a horribly hectic period of 1,75,703 minutes, and more importantly, now that i have sooo many things to write about.
2. I'm leaving Delhi in exactly 53 hours and 37 minutes to spend the next five years of my life at National Law University, Lucknow.
3. I'm still a tech junkie, and i'll forever be one.
4. You can survive for (at least) 21 hours and 23 minutes, without sleeping, if you have these few games on your cell, namely NFS Carbon, Freddie Flintoff Cricket, Asphalt2 3D & Nightclub Tycoon.
5. I gotta do my packing tommorow, so i better sleep.
G'nite! Zzzzzzz......
Prelude to Photography with an N72
Safari on my Windows?
Download Safari for Windows Public Beta 3 here.
Personally speaking, I'd say this should be included in the Times Best Events of the Year 2007 or something. Runs beautifully. No slag, no bugs, no bull-sh&t. And lightning fast, too. Got a few decent plugins as well - wmp,quicktime,pdf reader,flash player.realplayer etc etc. Lacks a few necessary features.Doesn't support XML. Had problems viewing CSS enriched content as well. But totally stable, with amazingly low mem usage. Overall, I'd say we'll have to wait till they release the next version, but it certainly seems very promising. Here's a screenshot:
06/07/07: Oops...said it too soon! As soon as I terminate the application, the screen goes blank.
It crashed a few times as well. But, like I said before, its promising nonetheless. I guess we'll just have to wait for the first stable version to come out.
An interesting Ad in the Yellow Pages
Okay, this Ad looks perfectly normal, to the extent you might be wondering what is it doing on this blog.
But wait, just flip the image 180°, cover up the female's face and hand, and see fer yourself:
Ahem, comments please.
The Al Qaeda CD: All hyped up
Personally, I think the CD's not even worth a rat's poop. Its just that here, in India, we are in the habit of hyping up things for no reason. I guess its instinctive.
I mean, consider this for a moment. Would Al Qaeda be so lame as to hand over a CD, and that too, to some remote local news channel, so that its contents can be aired on national TV only to discover that the man, calling himself Abu Abdul Rehman Al Ansari, claiming to be the chief of Al Qaeda india chapter, is some lame-ass guy who's 20 something and is so nervous while he's reading his speech that he's actually shivering and shaking, and stopping to take deep breaths? Moreso, he's masked, and till now no Al Qaeda spokespersons have ever been aired on TV with masks on. Plus the guy is speaking Urdu, whereas all Al Qaeda broadcasts made till date have been in Arabic.
I almost laughed my head off when i saw the flash intro showing the Al Qaeda flag on a clipart kind of a globe. Typically the stuff you expect from an amateuristic flash animator...lousy animations having low-reso pics, text appearing-disappearing...pics alpha-ing in and out...unbelievable it was!
I think its probably the work of some local protest organisation, now that the Kashmir agenda has once again come into the limelight. The man in the vid, assuming he is in al qaeda, has surprisingly criticized Syed Sallahuddin, supreme commander of the Hizbul Mujahideen and chief of the Muzaffarabad-based United Jihad Council (UJC), and Hafiz Muhammad Syed, chief of the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), including them in the list of 'traitors against Islam'. Why would an Al Qaeda man do that? In fact, the Hizbul Mujahideen and Lashkar-e-Taiba have always been known as organisations primarily funded by Al Qaeda itself.
What we must, as a country learn to do, is to not hype up and controvertialise things that might ultimately lead to unnecessary unrest and fear amongst our fellow countrymen. The day we adopt this attitude, the status quo in the country shall in all probability improve.
Commentary, Paki Style
Check out the way he says -"Afridi ne pehle hi ball teh mood set kar dita". Brilliant video! Or funny at least, if not anything else.
The long lost game of 'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'
Then, to satisfy my nostalgic pangs, i decided to go through the game's walkthrough on Infocom's site, hoping to seek some sort of relief/satisfaction from there. Suddenly, i see a link for a direct download of the game. And of all the places, in the AdSense box in the corner. Thinking it'll probably charge me for it, i was hesitant at first, but then taking into consideration my desperation, i clicked on it. And to my utmost surprise, the site was one made by a hitchhiker fan like me, and offered the game downloads for free. And alongwith it, were the very famous (and rare) 50 plus episodes of the original 'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy' BBC radio episodes back from the 70s and the 80s.
In the end, i guess what saved me was the thing written on the Guide's cover - the simplest piece of advice ever given- 'DON'T PANIC'.
Download the game from here.
till nxt time
aNkIt
Minutes to Midnight: Punk, Classic, Hip-hop or Pure Crap?
Minutes to Midnight is Linkin Park's third studio album, released on May 9, 2007. This is the first Linkin Park album to feature all band members on the album cover, to be co-produced by Mike Shinoda, and to receive a parental advisory sticker (excluding Collision Course, the mash-up album with Jay-Z).
"What I've Done", was digitally released on April 3 in the UK and April 2 in the US. The CD single was released on April 30.
In an interview with Chester Bennington it is explained that the new album is a mix of punk, classic rock, and hip-hop beats.
"Rick has brought more of a stripped down, classic-rock and hip-hop kind of feel."
"This time around, Mike Shinoda is singing a lot more. It may seem like he's not on the record, but he's doing a lot of the harmonies. He also sings a couple of songs alone. We're presenting ourselves in a different way."
This is their first album where Mike Shinoda sings lead vocals for a full length track ("In Between"), rather than rapping. It is also the first to contain guitar solos (particularly on "In Pieces" and "The Little Things Give You Away"). Unlike the two previous studio albums, Minutes to Midnight contains profanity and politically charged lyrics.
The album has polarized critics and fans. In a two out of five stars review, Stephen Thomas Erlewine of All Music Guide described the album's sound as "passé" and summed the band's effort up as "opting to create a muddled, colorless murk." In a harshly critical review by NOW Magazine, Evan Davies panned the album, calling it a "a rehash of the same lame hiphop/metal/electro," and "narcissistic garbage." In the UK, NME magazine's Dan Silver awarded it 2/10, calling it the "sound of a band trying and failing to forge a new identity", and referring to the song 'Hands Held High' as "far and away the funniest thing you'll hear all year".
A CD/DVD Special Edition of Minutes to Midnight is available. It contains a 32-page art book featuring the lyrics and conceptual art by Mike Shinoda and Joe Hahn, along with pictures of the recording process. The bonus DVD contains the following:
- Advanced Resolution PCM Stereo (48kHz/24-bit) versions of all 12 tracks
- The Making of Minutes To Midnight Documentary
- The Making of "What I've Done"
- The "What I've Done" music video
Among the DVD-ROM features are included:
- A PDF booklet with lyrics
- A flash widget and a fansite toolkit.
- Instant Messenger Buddy icons
- Exclusive DVD links to the official Linkin Park website, only accessible through the DVD
- Screensavers
- Wallpapers
Users have experienced problems accessing the DVD-ROM features, as certain computers may not be able to access the enhanced portion of this disc. LP Forum Members are looking into why this is.
Source: WikiPediaiBall Swingcam
Last week my parents went out for a conference for about 10 days, so considering the fact that i'll be missing them a lot, i went out to look for a webcam.
The first thing i saw was a version of the Microsoft LifeCam. A nice, pretty, sleek thing it was. Black in colour with an almond-like shape. The illustrations on the box were sweet too; Live Messenger & Yahoo support logo + 1.0 mp + usb 2.0 + Free Headphones + Free Laptop Clip-on + a nice chick who had an awesome smile - in short, typical of Microsoft. Picked it up - checked the price - found it to be 4530 - kept it back.
Next, my eyes got set on this red box. On coming closer, i discovered it was an iBall SwingCam.
Checked out the config... an amazing 1.3 mp, automatic motion tracking, a huge view angle: 230 degrees, low light vision, video reso: 1280x960 @ 15fps, 640x480 @ 30 fps, automatic white balance, 4x digital zoom.
I hadn't even stopped admiring the thing when i discovered that i was getting a bundleful of software as well - all full versions, no trial : It's Me, Face Filter, Mr. Photo, WebCam Mail & WebCam DVR. And the biggest surprise came when i checked the price-tag - a mere 2495 for a simply incredible deal! I think it doesn't get any better than this.
Plus, one of the software, WebCam DVR, actually lets you monitor your house from anywhere in the world. It captures video and stores it on your HD. You can set an upper limit for the video stored. You can store a night-long vid with a mere 100 mb of space. Plus its got motion detection, so if an intruder tries to break-in, his motion alerts the cam's software and it mails you the pictures/video clip of the intruder.
Neat, innit?
Now for the ratings: I'll give it a 8.5/10 for value for money...i think its worth every penny you spend on it; a 9/10 for the features; a 7.5/10 for user-friendliness (did i mention that my pc crashed once or twice initially due to a faulty driver installation?); and a 7/10 for the looks.
Isko laga dala toh life jingalala!
I guess u might have heard a lot bout Tata Sky lately, even i had...so guess what......i decided to buy it (duh,what else). I purchased it from a dealer, so my set-top box got delivered a few days earlier than the whole thing was setup.It didn't take me much time to discover that the 'Sky' in Tata Sky actually referred to the collaboration of British Sky Broadcasting with Tata. The Tata guys came a few days later. The installation went fine. The guy who came did not find much trouble in getting it up and running in a few hours. One thing that kinda disappointed me was that the Tata people only had one customer care no, and that too which could only be dialled through an MTNL/BSNL no, and me havng an airtel no, could not get through to them. Calling them is necessary as once you receive your box, you have to schedule ur installation. So, as a result, i ended up calling an ambala no (std charges!! @#%*) and scheduled my installation.
The Tata Sky box offeres me more than a 100 channels (maybe even more, didnt bother to count). The best features, as i found out, were the ACTVE (active) Sports and News. In the ACTVE Sports thing, you can actually choose your own commentator (as in eng/hindi/stadium sounds), see the highlights whenever you want. You can even see the match analysis in a virtual stadium, ball-by-ball. In ACTVE News, you can watch the headlines and the top stories whenever you want in the day, without having to watch the commercials in between. The games (though lousy they were) can be fun when you're bored. Another thing that impressed me the most was that (to my utmost relief) you could choose the language of the channel you were watching. So that means no more dubbed s**t (beg ur pardon fer d *s...guess d mod wont let me practise my vocab here) on discovery, cartoon network & disney channel(yipee!) . Other neat features include the channel guide, the kiddy lock, the programme reminder etc etc.
I'll give Tata Sky an 8.5/10 for its features, a 7/10 for its services and an 8.5/10 for its value for money (as it costed me only 4000 alongwith 6 months of rent free). An overall of 8/10. I'd say a great buy esp if you olready haven't paid ur cable guy for that lousy CAS thing (cuz it sucks! nd so does DishTV!)
till next time
aNkIt
Using The GIMP to make a signature
1. Open up a new file with a white background and a size to suit ur sign.
2. Use the 'Amethyst' pattern.
3. Go to Tools>Color Tools>Colourize. Play around till you get what you need.
4. Next, go to Filters>Distorts>Polar Coords
5. Make 'Circle depth in percent = 0' & 'Offset angle= 40.75'
6. Uncheck 'Map Backwards', 'Map from Top'.
7. Check 'To Polar'
8. The image should now look something like this :
9. Get a render from planetrenders.net
10. Get a good font. I got mine from nofonts.com
11. Here's the final image:
Get The GIMP & the GTK+ runtime environment required to run it from http://gimp-win.sourceforge.net.
till next time
aNkIt
The iPod Funda
If you've ever noticed, whenever you connect your iPod to your system, it always comes up as a 'removable storage media'.
If you're curious enough to explore your iPod (in my case, an iPod mini), you'll find a bunch of directories in it, namely 'Contacts', 'Calender', 'Notes'... etc
What we need is the 'iPod_Control' directory which is hidden by default. On opening up this directory, we get to see yet another bunch of hidden sub-directories.
Open up the directory labeled 'Music', and you'll find folders named as 'F01', 'F02'... and so on. Now, when you open up any one of these folders, you'll find your songs and podcasts, all having their original extensions and file sizes. The only thing different would be their naming (whose funda, till now, i haven't been able to figure out)
Anyway, what u need 2 do is to rename the file u want 2 replace with the name of an existing file.
On checking up your iPod, you'll find the new file playing under the artist name and title of the file dt you've replaced.
It'll even have d same time as d original track.
Dis way, u can trade ur songs nd podcasts wid ur friends widout gettng ur iPod formatted everytime. :-D
Till Next Time
aNkIt
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...and miles to go before i sleep, and miles to go...*yawn*Zzzzzzz.....
Prelude to Photography with an N72
Safari on my Windows?
An interesting Ad in the Yellow Pages
Meanwhile, try some Sudoku