Flockzilla

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Installed Flock 0.9.0.2 on my laptop today, quick and easy as root:

Dixie# pkg_add -r linux-flock
Fetching ftp://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/ports/i386/packages-6-stable/Latest/linux-flock.tbz... Done.
Fetching ftp://ftp.freebsd.org/pub/FreeBSD/ports/i386/packages-6-stable/All/linux-hicolor-icon-theme-0.5_1.tbz... Done.

And it is installed as linux-flock in my search path, very useful. I have used Mozilla based browsers for a long time. Years ago I started with Firefox 1.x, it was a great improvement over IE5 and 6, tabbed browsing – I was hooked instantly xD

As I got to spend a lot more time on the computer, I soon came to find Firefox less then perfect. The big bonus to using it had become greater portability between websites and OSes, some thing that is a bit of a must for me. I alos use Konqueror and Opera a lot among other browsers.

I tested Flock 0.7.x on my windows box awhile back and was rather impressed, while not perfect it was still pretty great. With a bit of that ‘surfer’ feel to it 🙂 I did not think though that it would scale to my laptops hardware quite well though. On a Pentium D 930 with 2GB of RAM, to a Sempron 3300+ with 512MB of RAM… But so far it has actually scalled a lot better then Seamonkey or Firefox 3.0 snap shots !

The main reason I discontinued working with Seamonkey and (Netscape) Navigator (9) was because while I liked them quite a lot, Navigator is actually a nice set up IMHO. The lack of responsfulness, particularly while editing text in fields like this and on forums made it less them ideal on my hardware. Even on the faster Desktop I occasionally noticed slow downs during text editing. On my laptop, even Firefox 2.0.0.x and 3.0a builds had the same issue on my laptop.

So far, Flocks Linux version does not, and it is starting faster then Netscape or Seamonkey ever did. And the funky font issues of using Linux Firefox and friends on PC-BSD no longer seem to apply to PC-BSD v1.4.x systems:-)

The thing I enjoy the most about Flock is the web clipboard and services support, especially for ma.gnolia. Being based on Firefox, Flock is still pretty easy to use but I find most of its shortcomings are inherited from Firefox! All of which seem to relate to configuration options…. But it does add enough other capabilities to be a bit of an improvement over Firefox 2 and 3a imho. And like Netscape Navigator 9, should work fine on Google Doc’s and friends hehe.

I think most of the Firefox extensions and add ons should work with Flock, doubt most themes would but Flock has a very nice default theme unlike Firefox. I have never really used much in the way of Firefox Extensions and Add Ons, although I keep several installed in my Desktop; I usually don’t use them ^_^.

Now if only Flock didn’t use the same crappy Spell Checking technology that Firefox does……… *sighs* I really wish Vim or Google would create a portable spell checking library based on their code, because they offer the best spell checking I’ve ever found =/

Night module

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Unfortunitly it is 0430 and I’ve got to get up early for work :'(

Finally had free time to day to shave off that infernal beard.. After so many months it is kind of nice to be reminded I’m more human the Wookie haha.

Spent tonight doing some light but thoughtful work,

Terry@Dixie$ pwd; /bin/ls -1                                               9:26
/home/Terry/code/Python/src/neo/testing/alpha
dialogs.py
main.py
neo.py
options.py
translate.py
Terry@Dixie$                                                               9:29

I have arranged things from the testing directory to it’s own work dir to clean up. Not to mention to continue work in a more module oriented pattern then the monolith and scratch files I have been using to test the first mock up of the programs UI.

  • dialogs -> will hold code common to user interaction through ‘pop up’ windows.
  • main -> the begining of it all, will probably be wrapped in a shell script
  • neo -> the GUI’s mock up code for the main window, need to split stuff off into sub modules when more work is done.
  • options -> the option subsystem, currently part of a config parser; to be expanded greatly
  • translate -> quick references to tools we will need later (subject to changes)

There is also a .neorc INI file for the testing 🙂

My near-future to do list right now is, in no particular order:

experiment with improving the wrapping paper on pkg_info; regex might be an improvement to the current process what ever the possible speed changes are. It might also be beneficial to look into using a pipe in order to ease start up times.

expanding dialogs into some thing more complete, currently it only has a routine for an error message.

Figure out how we can create a suitable display area for the output of a shell command (such as ‘make’).

I think I could probably do double the amount of work per day on this, if I didn’t have to do it before bed… Which has the bad limit of only being able to do things until my mind gets to the point that I just have got to sleep or the clock passes a point where I need to hit the hay, in order to get enough sleep for work in the morning.

I am lucky though, I’ve had almost 3 day’s off and only light duties tomorrow.

searchlet test level 7

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Almost finished my work on npm from early this afternoon.

Took care of getting the mock up to actually search the ports tree for a given string, considering incorporating a simplified version of psearch but I can worry about that later.

Did most of the right view of installed software today, it still has a problem but this is good progress:

Click to enlarge

Some of the listings are screwed up and trigger a TypeError, I know I’m doing some thing wrong some where but not sure where yet…. At the moment I am about ready to hit the hay.

Some future tasks include fixing that, adding a toolbar to the mockup, a place holder (or working) msg display area. And moving on to other mock up’s.

So far, it is not pretty but the mock up is doing quite well. Hopefully fiddling with layout management and spacers will not be to much heartache under QT3 without having to use the Designer tool. Hmm, you know it might even be possible to make things a bit more flexibble rather then choosing one of the mock ups as the basise of the final forms overall appearance.

Any way one slices it though, it is time for BED.

An automatic wall paper changer for wmakerAn automatic wall paper changer for wmaker

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I recently switched to using Window Maker on PC-BSD, one of my favorite window managers actually. But it does have a few dis advantages over KDE when it comes to session management…

I went though my large wall papers collection and found several that I would like to use, the WMaker theme I have set is a dark one. 


Terry@Dixie$ ls ~/Pictures/Wall_Papers|wc -l                               6:38
     657
Terry@Dixie$ ls ~/GNUstep/Library/WindowMaker/Backgrounds|wc -l            6:40
      57
Terry@Dixie$                                                               6:40

Many didn’t scale right and I don’t know of any batch image scaler, so I had my shell open each in kolour paint so I could do this. Using a graphical file manager I would have to double click each file at the least level of effort… With the shell, it was simple loop in my backgrounds directory:

for i in `ls`
do
        kolourpaint $i
done

This opened kolourpaint to a file, allowing me to do a quick ctrl+e and set it to smooth scale it to 1280×800 to match my LCD’s native resolution. And then to ctrl+s save it, X out of it and volia, kolourpaint would start again with another file as it continued through the loop.

Having done this, I was thinking how to I get it to change after awhile? I thought about a symlink that would be changed to a different wall paper every now and then, tested it no go. Then I found wmsetbg and the -s (-scale) option, so yeah I wasted my time scaling them all lol.

So I removed them and made symlinks to the original files in my wall papers directory:

for i in `ls`                                                 6:40
do
        ln -hfs /home/Terry/Pictures/Wall_Papers/$i /home/Terry/GNUstep/Library/WindowMaker/Backgrounds/$i
done

Like I am going to stand here and create 50++ shortcuts myself? NO WAY!

After that I set to look into hooking up a shell script that could run in the background and change the wall paper for me. I figured that I would want some thing acline to the sleep() function out of unistd.h but I didn’t really want to use a C program or any other programming language to do it. Because while looping over the directory in C might be faster then /bin/sh by the time the compiler tried to optimize it. Having to invoke a shell for every call to system() (for running wmsetbg) would probably be a bit wasteful. At least in a shell script, there should be no need to create a new /bin/sh process on each pass. Didn’t find a built in shell command for it but /bin/sleep works fine, so I wrote the following script to change my wall paper every 10 minutes:

#!/bin/sh
# A simple automatic wall paper changer for window maker.

while (true)
do
    for p in `/bin/ls /home/Terry/GNUstep/Library/WindowMaker/Backgrounds/`
    do
        wmsetbg -u -s $p
        sleep 600
        continue
    done
done

And to run it on window makers start up, I added this line to my ~/GNUstep/Library/WindowMaker/autostart file:

/usr/home/Terry/sh/setbg &

and Hooah ^_^

And here is a python script that displays it in a random order,

#!/usr/local/bin/python

import commands
import os
import random
import time

li = os.listdir('/home/Terry/GNUstep/Library/WindowMaker/Backgrounds/')

while (True):
    x=random.choice(li)
    commands.getoutput('/usr/local/bin/wmsetbg -u -s %s' % (x))
    time.sleep(600)

Hmm, I wonder if I could do this on Windows XP to,under explorer of course hehe.

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Since it’s impossible to work….I hit up newegg.com to experiment with a few ideas.

The PC I wish I could buy:

 1 * Thermaltake Armor Extreme Edition ATX Full Tower case ($180)
  ; drooling over the VA8004BNS !!!
 1 * 600W Thermaltake PSU ($130)
 1 * Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 or E67x0 2.4/2.66Ghz ($190-$240)
 1 * 1024MB DDR2 667Mhz (PC5300) ($22) ; Kingston preferred
 2 * SATA 250GB HDD ($160 total)
 1 * nVidia Geforce GPU (<=$130)
 1 * Turtle Beach RIVIERA Sound Card ($30) ; ALSA support :-)
 1 * 3.5" Floppy ($7 OEM / $20 retail)
 1 * DVD Burner ($45 retail)
 1 * CD || DVD Reader ($20 retail)
 1 * 10/100MB Ethernet NIC ($12 at the local shop ;-))
 1 * 104 Normal Keys KB ($20) ;  Logitech Access would be nice & cheaper
 1 * Wired Laser Mouse ($40)
 1 * 17" LCD Monitor, 4-5ms, No Widescreen! ($180-$200)

 Estimated Total: < $1350 depending on variables and RAM
  + Motherboard ($70-$120), any extra fans/cables

This is a much better PC then the one I am sitting, $1600 worth !!! And I supplied my own Mouse (replacement), Monitor, and had a Keyboard when I bought it. Although I do admit, a PC Desk and sound card was necessary to add to the pre-build… Hehe The system I had originally planned to build was about the same price range as this custom list but with less specs and a complete system minus the monitor and kb… bloody thing even had a UPS in the price factors! In the end, I ended up having my mother raising all freaking heck, to the point that I had to concede to *not* build my own, or she would really drive me crazy until I did F’up. To which I had my brother raising hell at the very idea (the family gamer), to which I ended up shopping for a pre-build to shut them both up (compromise of no DIY but higher specs) and got stiffed on the core factors… Rather then building my ideal ‘personal’ machine, I got stuffed into a Gateway Multi-Media PC that I didn’t want. Over a year later, that PC I bought has been a royal pain in the neck, often needing coercion to get it to do what I want. It has repeatedly failed to work with most tested Linux Distro’s without a lot of kicking, although it does love FreeBSD 6.x as long, the only good thing I can say 🙂 Instead of the GF6600 I had planned for the prebuilt came with a GF6200 (A real POS but still a major upgrade) and a TV Tuner; shitty PSU, funky BTX Mobo, and a signle 500GB drive Vs the good PSU, standard ATX Mobo, and Dual Seagate drives (1 for Windows, 1 for BSD). And a card reader which I can’t use (no media) vs the Floppy drive I wanted so badly. The sound card I had to buy to get the pre-built working properly for my needs was a $80 reck, it is a major POS under Windows… But works great under Linux and FreeBSD, which is why I bought it haha. If I ever could have that level of cash for a PC again, I’d hit Fry’s and build it from parts there….. Rather then letting my family have any say in the matter.. *sighs*, why did I have to be diplomatic instead of exercise my right to freedom?

GET ME THE **** OUT OF HERE !

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I’m sitting here across the building…

Trying to build a working mockup of my main widget that’ll handle searching ports for the entered string through the GUI and volia !

Family is driving me out of my fsck’ing mind.

Just for once in my life, I would love it if I didn’t have to stay up to after 4 in the damn morning just to get stuff done because I can’t be left alone during the afternoon !!!!!

Every one else asleep == I can get stuff done

Any one else awake == 75% less chance of being able to hear my brains internal dialogue, let along get work done (much lower chances).

What Do You Have To Say? – Ah, Youth

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Describe one moment from your youth that is impenetrably seared into your memory.
Brought to you by HP

Live Journal: Writer’s Block

Most of them are, good or bad, fun or horrible a like… My memory is just like that =/

A choice of one, would only be which one my brain recalls first.

Of dreams and actions

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My dreams seem to have been plagued by the same things that often assail my mind….

Past today’s have been a lot of work for me and I’m actualy very lucky to have today off work I spent a little time working with Pre Processor like program but didn’t have time to get any thing done.

Today, I want to get back to work on NPM, I’m off (hopefully) till Tuesday so with luck I can get some work done!

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Some where between merryment and torment, there lays the occasion =/

I’m definitally not looking forward to the holidays… but time stops for no man.

Not really in the mood for coding tonight, I’m tired.. Started work at like 0130 last night, finished and started reading about QT, then logged off for bed ’round 0400… And fell asleep after 0600 !!!

Looking over some of the first things I ever wrote programming wise. The creation dates are mostly november 2005 although the binary of dev-cpp is marked as feburary 2005 on my moms PC. To be honest, I have no real idea why I started learning programing =/ And it’s been at least 2 years since day one with C++.

I probably decided, I’d been around PC’s long enough and wanted to try taking it to the next level, maybe that is why… I don’t really know but I am glad I did. I know what pushed me into the level of computer studies I have, was a little trip through the WWW in that direction and the fish, ehh spider was hooked. I think it was The Unix and Internet Fundamentals HOWTO that hooked me, I wanted to learn more.

It’s December 2007 and I’ve come a long way. From a Windows XP user with no love of DOS. To practically living in a shell and thriving on *BSD systems. C++ I have not used in a long time, snored through Perl… nice tool but not my style. Java, from a book but never cared much for writing in it. C, because I wanted to see the differences between C++ and C, and what I found was a language I liked 10,000 * more lol. Always hated shell script… but came to value it as a great tool once I got used to it. Python and I didn’t hit it off and Ruby I had scoffed at early on before I decided on C++ as my first language.

One day, out of boredom I sat down and said, “Ok I’m learning Ruby” and a love affair was bourne. For my current task, I’ve been cramming the Python and QT like a mad hatter!

HTML, I also muddled with fromtime to time but rarely used. Eventually, writing in XHTML kind of replaced my need for a word processor haha! I’ve also had a longing to learn Ada but have never had the time :@, Scheme syntactically I find a bit strange but I guess I’m not used to lisp like languages.

I wonder, where the next couple of years will lead me, GOD only knows.

Thinking…

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A few concept drawings of what I have in mind

Style #1: simple interface (emphasis on searching and ease of performing common actions)

Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us

Style #2: orthodox interface (commander like with toolbar, I like this one xD)
Free Image Hosting at www.ImageShack.us

Style #3: balanced interface (I think it would be better with the left being a |installed software | build messages | tab-thingy).

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Personally I think the first style is easier to use if your not familiar with what your doing, can you get more simple then ‘search, click, click’ with a big set of buttons?

The second I really like because I think it makes best use of space and presents the most important information quickly.

The third, I think is probably a better choice since it combines #1 and #2’s ways of doing things into a fairly simple yet compact amount of space.

To be honest, I would kind of love docking / undocking elements and a very ‘cool’ look, like XFire or XMMS L&F with a Gimp or Designer style of operation but I think that would probably be a lot of work and a bit confusing to new people =/