tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-88928108368216053312024-03-05T10:33:00.615+05:30Lankerisms"Lanky" as I am known in the previous company, I am a Free And Open Source software loving , peace loving guy. My trace of thought has been found to be kinda unique by my collegues and my thoughts and jokes are called "Lankerisms". <br>My blog contains all kinds of posts. So dont turn your back looking at the first few posts.lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.comBlogger79125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-71079706376127890912019-04-09T23:10:00.000+05:302019-04-09T23:10:36.082+05:30Stripping Parsing JSON with nodejs<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
You want to have a json file with comments for your config file. How do you parse it?<br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "courier new" , "courier" , monospace;"><span style="color: #666666;">kamathln@laxX550L:~/exp/nodejs $</span> cat json.json <br />{<br />"really":"simple",<br />/* commanted out code */<br />"test":["hmm", "this", {Just: "worked"}]<br />}</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "courier new" , "courier" , monospace;"><br /><span style="color: #666666;">kamathln@laxX550L:~/exp/nodejs </span>$ node -p "res = $(cat json.json); JSON.stringify(res, null, 4)"<br />{<br /> "really": "simple",<br /> "test": [<br /> "hmm",<br /> "this",<br /> {<br /> "Just": "worked"<br /> }<br /> ]<br />}</span></div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-3494210117413897882017-07-13T20:22:00.005+05:302017-07-13T20:38:59.772+05:30kivy jogwheel<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Miss those nice jog wheels on the side of the old pocket radios that adjusted the volume? Now you can have those on your Kivy+Python app!<br />
<br />
Currently, the APIs might not be stable. But if you are ready for bleeding edge, do feel free to clone, use and improve. <br />
<br />
Change the images.<br />
Add APIs<br />
And don't forget to submit it to the kivy-garden once you get something stable.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://github.com/kamathln/kivy-jogwheel">https://github.com/kamathln/kivy-jogwheel</a></div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-41591097513895251902017-07-07T23:45:00.001+05:302017-07-08T00:22:06.478+05:30Python-For-Android compile-run-install-debug cycle script<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Hi folks! I am releasing into the wild a script I hacked together to help ease my<br />
compile-install-run-debug cycle for python-for-android/kivy apps.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://gist.github.com/kamathln/9e3ea07309e79e90fb6009429510348d/edit">https://gist.github.com/kamathln/9e3ea07309e79e90fb6009429510348d/edit</a> <br />
<br />
This script is shared in the hopes that you will customize it for your environment as some commands and paths may differ. It is also an ugly hackish script I wrote for myself, so anyone craving more quality is most welcome to improve it or re-implement it in python .<br />
<br />
<h3 style="text-align: left;">
Features:</h3>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>Checks for compilation errors of files under src using the compileall module, and stops there if it finds errors. (Compilation by p4a generally ignores and carries on)</li>
<li>Lists the generated apk files with size after compile </li>
<li>Lists the files in private.mp3 with 1 key command</li>
<li>installation to phone using adb(replaces existing app)</li>
<li>runs the app using adb shell am start</li>
</ul>
<h3 style="text-align: left;">
How to use:</h3>
<br />
First customize it for your environment and project by copying the ENVIRONMENT variables below to your "$HOME/.p4a-build.conf" and "$project folder/p4a-build.conf"(note the dots). <b>It is highly recommended that the sources which actually go into the app (like main.py, assets folder, etc.) to be in 'src' folder under your project folder. </b>Make sure your p4a-build.conf , blacklist.txt and requirements.txt are in the project folder. <br />
<br />
<h3 style="text-align: left;">
Typical way to run the script</h3>
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
In terminal 1</h4>
$ cd my_nice_project_folder<br />
$ vim p4a-build.conf <br />
$ p4a-build my_nice_project 3.2 src<br />
c to Compile<br />
l to list private.mp3 contents from unshake2-3.3-debug.apk<br />
i to install unshake2-3.3-debug.apk to phone<br />
r to run installed app<br />
d to run logcat<br />
q to quit<br />
> <br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
In Terminal 2</h4>
$ vim blacklist.txt <br />
$ vim requirements.txt <br />
$ vim src/main.py # Keep editing and saving..<br />
<h4 style="text-align: left;">
In Terminal 1</h4>
> c<br />
.. Lots of compile related messages here. But if any py file in src does not compile, it will fail immediately and give you a big red error.<br />
<br />
After this, you usually end up using the i for install, and r for run and if needed d for debug.. Then the edit-[alt-tab]c->i->r->d cycle repeats.<br />
<br />
<h3 style="text-align: left;">
Improvable areas</h3>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li><div style="text-align: left;">
Single command for compile-install-run (currently they are seperate), with error detection.</div>
</li>
<li><div style="text-align: left;">
Convert to python for better and cleaner code. And cleaner config management : Currently, if any changes in config are required, we need to exit the script, edit the config files and enter the script again. With python, we must be able to cleanly list, edit and save home config and project wise config. Also clean recipes/build/dists/etc easily by hooking directly to p4a modules</div>
</li>
<li><div style="text-align: left;">
Once converted to Python, use advanced Android techniques to push changes quickly to awaiting deamon in the debug version of the app.</div>
</li>
</ul>
</div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-75402156616425426762014-03-08T21:06:00.003+05:302015-05-26T17:06:50.800+05:30Affordable Medicine and diagnosis through radical innovation<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<ol style="text-align: left;">
</ol>
Disclaimer: I am affiliated with none of the following orgnaizations/individuals/innovations/inventions, etc. & I am neither responsible for the contents of the websites herein linked, the results of accessing the same nor the results of following any procedures or usage of the products/services here-mentioned.<br />
<div>
<ol style="text-align: left;">
<li>50 Cents Microscope that folds like origami (Manu Prakash)<br /><a href="https://www.ted.com/talks/manu_prakash_a_50_cent_microscope_that_folds_like_origami">https://www.ted.com/talks/manu_prakash_a_50_cent_microscope_that_folds_like_origami</a><br /><a href="http://microcosmos.foldscope.com/" target="_blank">http://microcosmos.foldscope.com/</a></li>
<li>5 Dollar Punch Card Programmable Microfluidics Chemistry Set (Manu Prakash)<br />
<a href="http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0115993">http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0115993</a></li>
<li>OScan Oral scanner for oral scanner(Manu Prakash) <br /><a href="http://scopeblog.stanford.edu/2012/04/17/stanford-bioengineers-create-an-ultra-low-cost-oral-cancer-screening-tool/">http://scopeblog.stanford.edu/2012/04/17/stanford-bioengineers-create-an-ultra-low-cost-oral-cancer-screening-tool/</a></li>
<li>Lab the size of a postage stamp<a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/george_whitesides_a_lab_the_size_of_a_postage_stamp"><br />http://www.ted.com/talks/george_whitesides_a_lab_the_size_of_a_postage_stamp</a></li>
<li>Better Breast cancer screening using Gamma Rays<br /> <a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/deborah_rhodes">http://www.ted.com/talks/deborah_rhodes</a></li>
<li>BioLab on a MicroChip<a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/frederick_balagadde_bio_lab_on_a_microchip"><br />http://www.ted.com/talks/frederick_balagadde_bio_lab_on_a_microchip</a></li>
<li>A warm embrace that saves lives (Low cost replacement for incubator)<a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/jane_chen_a_warm_embrace_that_saves_lives"><br />http://www.ted.com/talks/jane_chen_a_warm_embrace_that_saves_lives</a> </li>
<li>Vaccine patch - Yay! no painfull needles<a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/mark_kendall_demo_a_needle_free_vaccine_patch_that_s_safer_and_way_cheaper"><span class="pagination__separator"><br />http://www.ted.com/talks/mark_kendall_demo_a_needle_free_vaccine_patch_that_s_safer_and_way_cheaper</span></a></li>
<li>Liquid filled adjustable glasses<a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/josh_silver_demos_adjustable_liquid_filled_eyeglasses" target="_blank"><br />http://www.ted.com/talks/josh_silver_demos_adjustable_liquid_filled_eyeglasses</a></li>
<li>Diagnosing Cervical Cancer with Vinegar and ingenuity <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/27/health/27cancer.html?_r=0">http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/27/health/27cancer.html?_r=0</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.sustainablebrands.com/news_and_views/social_enterprise/gsk-building-better-business-inside-out-bringing-low-cost-diagnosti">http://www.sustainablebrands.com/news_and_views/social_enterprise/gsk-building-better-business-inside-out-bringing-low-cost-diagnost</a> </li>
<li>Plumber fixed the plumbing of his own heart<br /><a href="http://realcleverscience.tumblr.com/post/2945497662/awesome-british-engineer-designs-own-heart-valve">http://realcleverscience.tumblr.com/post/2945497662/awesome-british-engineer-designs-own-heart-valve</a></li>
<li>Many of the lab-on-chip devices are low cost </li>
<ol>
<li><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lab-on-a-chip">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lab-on-a-chip</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.gizmag.com/tag/lab-on-a-chip/">http://www.gizmag.com/tag/lab-on-a-chip/</a></li>
</ol>
</ol>
</div>
</div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-62856568375760950492010-10-05T21:55:00.005+05:302015-05-26T14:41:54.192+05:30Ideas for Face detection application in daily usage.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I had posted <a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/idea/Face_20based_20presence_20sensor_2c_20Auto-brightness_20and_20tilt_20for_20laptop_20screen_20_26_20_20more%21%21#1285927310">this</a> idea on Feb 14 2009 halfbakery.com . After that, It has almost got a life of it's own. I just made a backup/snapshot here for people who go through my blog.<br />
<br />
This post has been edited to remove halfbakery post actions (like edit, add, flag , etc.) . Comments have not been included as the posters might want to edit them on the site.<br />
<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tbody>
<tr><td valign="bottom"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="idea"></a><br />
<h1>
<a href="https://www.blogger.com/null" name="idea">Face based presence sensor, Auto-brightness and tilt for laptop screen & more!!</a></h1>
<span class="fcl" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica;">use that integrated webcam for more than it was designed for.</span></td><td class="controls" valign="bottom"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<div class="copy">
[Update 6: Since I posted this, I have regulary come across stuff that uses head tracking, every time increasing my hopes that all these ideas are coming closer to reality .. See links]<br />
[UPDATE 5: added another idea 8) ]<br />
[UPDATE 4: modified idea 7]<br />
[UPDATE 3: added another idea 7) ]<br />
[UPDATE 2: added one more contributed idea and changed main title and title of 1) of so that Jutta does not get thrown off ;-)]<br />
[UPDATE: added 2 more ideas 4 and 5. also added a contributed idea]<br />
***** ***** Idea begins here ***** *****<br />
Most new laptops,netbooks come with integrated webcams on the top. I can immedietely think of two really usefull ways of using this. <br />
1) Replace input device activity detector with face detector for sensing user presence. <br />
Instead of relying on keyboard and mouse activity, rely on availability of face for activity sensing. No face in front for more than 1 minute? lock screen, show as away on IM. Face came back ? show "unlock" password prompt. This is especially usefull if you are watching a movie or reading a long article using auto-scroll. The screen won't lock/go to screen saver mode in the middle of it.<br />
2) Auto tilt. <br />
I sometimes use my laptop when I sleep on my side to read really long pages. As I use GNU/Linux, I just issue the command xrandr -o 1 or xrandr -o3 depending on which side I am sleeping on. As far as I can remember many recent Windows graphics drivers, even some old ones register Ctrl+Alt+cursorkey to change orientations. <br />
My idea was to use the web cam to detect which angle your face is on.<br />
There are enough face detection softwares out there. Even good open source ones. If someone who can understand all the code can make it extract the angle of the face, then the angle can be fed to another piece of code which uses simple heuristics and time outs to change the orientation of the screen when the user is seeing the screen at 90 degrees. <br />
3) Auto-brightness<br />
At least in linux, its quite easy to change the brightness of the laptop screen, you just write your brightness level to a special file and done. if you can find out the ambient brightness from the camera, then just simply adjust screen backlight brighness appropriately through code. done.<br />
4) Could also be an interesting input for gaming. Though it can be a pain in the neck if the game gets too continuous or fast paced. But the possibilities are interesting.. [a] In a FPS you can use it to control the head of the charector (to look around). [b] In a flight simulator, you could use it to control the pitch, roll, etc<br />
Even better: If you look away from the screen for more than 2 seconds the game can pause itself!<br />
5) [ok.. ideas are getting a bit crazier now]<br />
Hands free! Use it for alternative input for dialogs.. Nod your head around x axis for yes. nod your head around y axis for no. Hands free!<br />
Hands free browsing!. Firefox plugin and extension which can be switched on while having lunch. The plugin that knows where you are looking and automatically scrolls it to centre (very very useful if you have the habit of reading slashdot or other news while having food). A left wink can bookmark the page and position for rereading. A right wink can bookmark the page and position for commenting later on(after lunch). <br />
6) Sleep pause<br />
If you are watching a movie and doze off, the movie should get paused, and the laptop can go to low power mode. ( I am confused whether I should be really adding this idea in the "contributed" section as i got the idea from [bigsleep]'s nick :-)<br />
7) Boss / kids / wife detector. <br />
Saves a lot of embarrassing moments ;-)<br />
8) Guesture based reading of cards (Visiting cards, barcodes(?) semacodes, etc)<br />
If I point at an object (near the camera) edge with an index finger, it should try to find text/barcode/semacode on it. OCR it and present in a dialog. After I confirm or correct and then confirm the input, operations follow suit - URL is bookmarked/launched, visiting card info is stored in my addressbook, etc.<br />
The cam of my EEE Pc is 1.3 megapixel and so I guess all newer notebooks carry good enough cameras.<br />
Contributed ideas:<br />
[2 fries shy of a happy meal]<br />
".. detect how far a persons face is from the screen and change font size accordingly.."<br />
[bigsleep]<br />
".. if one of a number of faces disappears[while watching a movie] it could press pause."<br />
[supershnitzel]<br />
augment speech recognition with face detection. just like hearing-impaired people do.</div>
<div align="right">
<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tbody>
<tr><td valign="top">—</td><td class="fcm"><a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/user/kamathln">kamathln</a>, Feb 14 2009</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</div>
<br />
<span class="fcm" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica; font-size: 85%;"><a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/idea/dual-spectrum_20eye_20recognition">Dual spectrum Eye Recognition</a></span> <span class="fcs" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica;"><nobr>dual-spectrum_20eye_20recognition</nobr><br />got any laptops with IR cams ? [<a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/user/kamathln">kamathln</a>, 25 2009]</span><br />
<span class="fcm" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica; font-size: 85%;"><a href="http://my.opera.com/community/blog/face-the-future">(5) implemented by opera!!!</a></span> <span class="fcs" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica;"><nobr>http://my.opera.com...log/face-the-future</nobr><br />(seems to be april fool though :-( ) [<a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/user/kamathln">kamathln</a>, Apr 01 2009]</span><br />
<span class="fcm" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica; font-size: 85%;"><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0srY37kkMw">CamSpace</a></span> <span class="fcs" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica;"><nobr>http://www.youtube....watch?v=v0srY37kkMw</nobr><br />Comes close to (4) [<a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/user/kamathln">kamathln</a>, May 02 2009]</span><br />
<span class="fcm" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica; font-size: 85%;"><a href="http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/pattie_maes_demos_the_sixth_sense.html">Sixth Sense</a></span> <span class="fcs" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica;"><nobr>http://www.ted.com/...he_sixth_sense.html</nobr><br />Comes close to 8 [<a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/user/kamathln">kamathln</a>, May 02 2009]</span><br />
<span class="fcm" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica; font-size: 85%;"><a href="http://smert.net/2009/04/23/opera-face-gestures-beta/#comment-2805">smert.net</a></span> <span class="fcs" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica;"><nobr>http://smert.net/20...-beta/#comment-2805</nobr><br />Implementation by Jason [<a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/user/kamathln">kamathln</a>, 02 2009]</span><br />
<span class="fcm" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica; font-size: 85%;"><a href="http://www.pcworld.com/article/164988-7/10_amazing_gadgets_you_cant_get_here.html">Presence sensor *almost* baked!</a></span> <span class="fcs" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica;"><nobr>http://www.pcworld...._cant_get_here.html</nobr><br />not on sale in the US yet though... [<a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/user/DIYMatt">DIYMatt</a>, May 19 2009, last modified May 20 2009]</span><br />
<span class="fcm" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica; font-size: 85%;"><a href="http://live.gnome.org/MouseTrap">Mousetrap</a></span> <span class="fcs" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica;"><nobr>http://live.gnome.org/MouseTrap</nobr><br />Gaze based cursor control [<a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/user/kamathln">kamathln</a>, Jul 02 2010]</span><br />
<span class="fcm" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica; font-size: 85%;"><a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/john_underkoffler_drive_3d_data_with_a_gesture.html">John Underkoffer's hand gestures demo</a></span> <span class="fcs" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica;"><nobr>http://www.ted.com/...with_a_gesture.html</nobr><br />21 Quest 's suggestion :baked? Just have to adapt it to Laptop :) [<a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/user/kamathln">kamathln</a>, 04 2010, last modified Jul 06 2010]</span><br />
<span class="fcm" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica; font-size: 85%;"><a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/idea/Chat_20Enhancer">same UI</a></span> <span class="fcs" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica;"><nobr>Chat_20Enhancer</nobr><br />for text-based conversation [<a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/user/FlyingToaster">FlyingToaster</a>, Jul 04 2010]</span><br />
<span class="fcm" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica; font-size: 85%;"><a href="http://www.movesinstitute.org/~kolsch/HandVu/HandVu.html">HandVu</a></span> <span class="fcs" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica;"><nobr>http://www.movesins.../HandVu/HandVu.html</nobr><br />Hand Gesture Recognition using OpenCV [<a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/user/kamathln">kamathln</a>, Jul 07 2010]</span><br />
<span class="fcm" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica; font-size: 85%;"><a href="http://www.gizmag.com/sonys-new-bravia-3d-tv-is-watching-you/15330/">Auto-dimming TV</a></span> <span class="fcs" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica;"><nobr>http://www.gizmag.c...watching-you/15330/</nobr><br />[comes close to (1), but on tv and not on a computer. Samsung Bravia TV dims/switches off when you are not looking [<a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/user/kamathln">kamathln</a>, 15 2010]</span><br />
<span class="fcm" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica; font-size: 85%;"><a href="http://design.canonical.com/2010/09/getting-physical/">Ubuntu getting physical</a></span> <span class="fcs" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica;"><nobr>http://design.canon...9/getting-physical/</nobr><br />[<a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/user/kamathln">kamathln</a>, Sep 16 2010]</span><br />
<span class="fcm" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica; font-size: 85%;"><a href="http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=952895">Compiz head tracking</a></span> <span class="fcs" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica;"><nobr>http://ubuntuforums...thread.php?t=952895</nobr><br />[<a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/user/kamathln">kamathln</a>, 16 2010]</span><br />
<span class="fcm" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica; font-size: 85%;"><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHm9teVoNE8">Proxemic media player concept</a></span> <span class="fcs" style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, Arial, Helvetica;"><nobr>http://www.youtube....watch?v=OHm9teVoNE8</nobr><br />Comes close to the string of ideas in comments that came about thanks to idea #6 [<a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/user/kamathln">kamathln</a>, 01 2010] </span></div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-73053581939582058142010-07-13T22:24:00.011+05:302024-02-21T19:44:31.038+05:30Surprising Old Tech<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div>
<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-style: italic;">[The theme of this collection is gadget/tech concepts that we feel "current technology", but has existed for a long time. Of course, this list is definitely not complete. If you know anything that matches the theme but I have missed, please suggest them in the comments. The main reason they are more widespread today is because of falling prices and advancements in processor speed and storage, making it more feasible. But if companies coming up with current products based on these old concepts act as though they inventted the concept, please send them a reminder.]</span></div><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><span style="font-style: italic;"> </span></div><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Driverless bus </b>[1976]</span></span></div><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="https://youtu.be/wOPnSgTtSOQ">https://youtu.be/wOPnSgTtSOQ</a></span></span><br />
</div><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"></div><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"></div><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"></div><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><br style="font-weight: bold;" />
<span style="font-weight: bold;">Apples' first Iphone?</span> [Apple's secret Iphone design, 1983]<br />
<a href="http://mashable.com/2011/12/30/apple-iphone-1983/">http://mashable.com/2011/12/30/apple-iphone-1983/</a><br />
<br />
<b>Seiko UC 2000 Wrist computer </b>[Early smart watch, 1984]<br />
<a href="https://www.inexhibit.com/case-studies/seiko-uc-2000-1984-the-dawn-of-wearable-computers/">https://www.inexhibit.com/case-studies/seiko-uc-2000-1984-the-dawn-of-wearable-computers/</a><br />
<br />
<b>Epson RC 50 </b> [Early Smartwatch with touchscreen, 1984]<br />
<a href="https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4IlGIryo8KU">https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4IlGIryo8KU</a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-weight: bold;">IBM Simon </span>[First Smart Mobile phone. 1993 Also the first smart mobile phone with touchscreen]<br />
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Simon" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_Simon</a><br />
Dont miss the Full view of the UI(big file)<br />
<a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0c/IBM_SImon_in_charging_station.png" target="_blank">http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0c/IBM_SImon_in_charging_station.png</a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-weight: bold;">EO personal communicator/Penpoint OS </span> 1991 (its 50 mins long, but its<br />
just superb considering its from 1991, so please make time to watch.<br />
you can skip first 8.5 mins if you are in a hurry):<br />
<a href="http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=9140399149118885327" target="_blank">http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=9140399149118885327</a><br />
The dev tool demoed in 1994 is not less awesome:<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zh1yCHn8hvE" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zh1yCHn8hvE</a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-weight: bold;">The "Mother of all demos" from 1968 </span>.
[more than just the mouse, it was the data management ideas that I
liked. We could probably call it one of the first crude "mashups"]<br />
<a href="http://sloan.stanford.edu/mousesite/1968Demo.html">http://sloan.stanford.edu/mousesite/1968Demo.html</a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-weight: bold;">First hand writing recognition</span> was partly mechanical , Nov 1914 (yes, 1914)<br />
<a href="http://www.freepatentsonline.com/1117184.pdf" target="_blank">http://www.freepatentsonline.com/1117184.pdf</a></div><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"> </div><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><b>Voder - The First Electronic Voice Synthesizer </b>1939</div><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><a href="https://www.whatisthevoder.com/">https://www.whatisthevoder.com/</a></div><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsdOej_nC1M">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsdOej_nC1M</a> <br /></div><div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on"> <br />
<b>Aspen Movie Map</b> 1978 was street view 30+ years before Google introduced street view<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hf6LkqgXPMU">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hf6LkqgXPMU</a><br />
<br />
<b>Etaks Car Navigation System</b> 1985 was a navigation system that does notuse satellite aid, and instead relies on dead reckoning.<br />
<a href="https://www.fastcompany.com/3047828/who-needs-gps-the-forgotten-story-of-etaks-amazing-1985-car-navigation-system" target="_blank">https://www.fastcompany.com/3047828/who-needs-gps-the-forgotten-story-of-etaks-amazing-1985-car-navigation-system </a><br />
<br />
<b>First Watch calculator </b>1977 (dont miss the advanced features)<br />
<a href="https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/HP-01">https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/HP-01</a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-weight: bold;">First digital camera </span>1975<br />
<a href="http://www.retrothing.com/2008/05/kodaks-first-di.html" target="_blank">http://www.retrothing.com/2008/05/kodaks-first-di.html</a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-weight: bold;">17000 mile journey on a modified cycle with a solar powered laptop back in 1983</span><br />
<a href="http://hackaday.com/2009/09/18/vintage-video-computing-across-america/" target="_blank">http://hackaday.com/2009/09/18/vintage-video-computing-across-america/</a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-weight: bold;">First HDTV (monochrome, 819 lines)</span> came in 1949!<br />
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/819_line">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/819_line</a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-weight: bold;">Patent of iPod like device</span> back in 1979<br />
<a href="http://www.kanekramer.com/html/development.htm" target="_blank">http://www.kanekramer.com/html/development.htm</a><br />
<br />
<b>Multi-touch, Multi-pointer UI, </b>And some concepts like magic lenses which are not yet in today's world! 1982 - 1997 . These need not necessarily be invented by the people who demonstrate them in the video.<br />
<a href="http://www.billbuxton.com/buxtonIRGVideos.html">http://www.billbuxton.com/buxtonIRGVideos.html</a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-weight: bold;">Xerox Alto</span> :[Desktop , 1973]<br />
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xerox_Alto" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xerox_Alto</a><br />
Screenshots:<br />
<a href="http://toastytech.com/guis/alto.html" target="_blank">http://toastytech.com/guis/alto.html</a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-weight: bold;">Xerox Star:</span>[Desktop, 1982, dont miss screenshots .. search on youtube too]<br />
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xerox_Star" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xerox_Star</a><br />
Screenshots:<br />
<a href="http://toastytech.com/guis/star.html" target="_blank">http://toastytech.com/guis/star.html</a><br />
<br />
<b>ATT Viewtron</b> [an older try at Internet/www 1981]<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6DVBPmo4Co">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6DVBPmo4Co</a><br />
<br />
<b>Digital Desk </b>by Pierre Wellner, 1991. Some of the "Envisionment" simulations were also implemented in the EuroParc during this project.<br />
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8lCetZ_57g">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8lCetZ_57g</a><br />
<br />
<b>Touch Screen</b>, [1982]<br />
<a href="https://youtube.com/watch?v=JAcZpQCLb4E" target="_blank">https://youtube.com/watch?v=JAcZpQCLb4E </a><br />
<br />
<br />
And now let us take a detour from the digital world<br />
<br />
<b>P1 electric car</b> by Porsche 1898<br />
<a href="http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1089994_first-ever-porsche-turns-out-to-be-an-electric-car" target="_blank">http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1089994_first-ever-porsche-turns-out-to-be-an-electric-car</a><br />
<a href="http://www.wired.com/autopia/2014/01/porsche-first-car-electric/" target="_blank">http://www.wired.com/autopia/2014/01/porsche-first-car-electric/ </a><br />
<br />
<br />
<div style="font-family: verdana; text-align: justify;">
Disclaimer :
these were a bunch of stuff I came across by searching on the internet. I
have not researched thoroughly about them, nor have I confirmed these.
Though these info have been got from somewhat reliable sources, I do not
give any kind of assurance that the data/information is correct. I only
added items here which I got impressed by the age of the claim and
quality/geekery.</div>
<span style="color: #888888;"><br /></span>
</div>
</div>
</div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-10797642076810049022010-06-04T22:34:00.012+05:302015-05-26T14:54:55.444+05:30JqS5 Slide show and bookmarklet.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I just loved <a href="http://staticfree.info/projects/jqs5/">JQS5 (jQuery Simple Standards based Slide Show System)</a> for the simple beauty that it is. If you just have a bunch of points to put across, and you are fast at html, you can throw together a slideshow in about 2 minutes.<br />
<br />
Start writing a normal html file, put the main title in <h1> tag, your name in <i> follow it by a bunch of lists of points, each headed by an <h2>, load it in the browser and you are ready to hit full screen.<br />
<br />
<span style="font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;">"Oh wait .. dont you have to add the css and js" ? </span><br />
<br />
Oh yeah!, or you could just let these 2 bookmarklets to do that for you .. drag these bookmarklets to your bookmarks toolbar:<br />
<br />
<a href="javascript:hid=document.getElementsByTagName('head')[0];hdp=(function(c){hid.appendChild(c);});dc=(function(e){return%20document.createElement(e);});bas='http://staticfree.info/projects/jqs5';var%20s=(function(sc){var%20ns=dc('script');ns.type='text/javascript';ns.src=sc;hdp(ns);});s(bas+'/jquery-1.3.1.min.js');s(bas+'/jqs5.js');var%20ss=(function(sc){var%20ns=dc('link');ns.rel='stylesheet';ns.href=sc;hdp(ns);});ss(bas+'/jqs5.css');ss(bas+'/theme/staticfree/style.css');">Load JQS5</a><br />
<br />
and<br />
<br />
<a href="javascript:jqs5_init();">show</a><br />
<br />
"Load JQS5" inserts the the js and css .. Dont worry if not much happens, the js is not "activated" - only loaded. Click the "show" button. and let it do the rest for you.<br />
<br />
These bookmarks load the js and css from the JQS5 website itself, which I discourage on 2 counts.<br />
<ol>
<li> We are using JQS5 website's bandwidth</li>
<li>It will be faster to load it from the local machine.</li>
</ol>
</div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-77606535278070377772010-02-08T23:04:00.006+05:302015-05-26T16:00:38.365+05:30Inkjet Printer hacks<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Hacks are fun. Hacks are also usefull. Wierdly, I suddently stumbled upon 3 hacks back to back that use inkjet printers. So I started to list those that I find. If you know more, please leave a comment<br />
<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: 130%;"> Direct to cd printer used for printing cirquits</span><br />
<a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/download/video/8556/talk/760">http://hackaday.com/2009/09/02/direct-to-pcb-inkjet-printing/</a><br />
<br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: 130%;">Inkjet printer used to "print" several different medical tests on paper based, postage stamp sized, "lab" </span>(watch the whole vid, its included somewhere)<br />
<a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/download/video/8556/talk/760">http://www.ted.com/talks/download/video/8556/talk/760</a><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: 130%;">Inkjet printer used to "print" out a set of living heart muscles. </span>(watch the whole vid, its included somewhere)<br />
<a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/anthony_atala_growing_organs_engineering_tissue.html"><span style="text-decoration: underline;">http://www.ted.com/talks/anthony_atala_growing_organs_engineering_tissue.html</span></a><br />
<br />
Inkjet printer used to "print" out other organs like kidney, bladder etc.<br />
<a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/anthony_atala_printing_a_human_kidney.html">http://www.ted.com/talks/anthony_atala_printing_a_human_kidney.html</a></div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-1850786194821509732009-10-15T23:01:00.007+05:302015-05-26T16:01:10.120+05:30GIMP : 2 Layer Dialogs trick<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-weight: bold;">1)</span> Locate the Dialog's special menu<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0PNUlBKvNspyhfSyf2AoQsWr1LRPs4j60mDLKS5J7_vJUo1bdhMiLwgaSbQY0zXeN45jO297lAuZZUWf0vij573o1W_vnnJ4yqYB875SsJe2y5hqXcv8KVDCevG181fxjDYQNmljlFfU/s1600-h/where.png" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392881681211176018" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0PNUlBKvNspyhfSyf2AoQsWr1LRPs4j60mDLKS5J7_vJUo1bdhMiLwgaSbQY0zXeN45jO297lAuZZUWf0vij573o1W_vnnJ4yqYB875SsJe2y5hqXcv8KVDCevG181fxjDYQNmljlFfU/s400/where.png" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 197px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 248px;" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">2)</span> Add a second "layers" menu. (not this is not possible from the Image's "Window>Dockable Dialogs" menu).<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhD56TlJXwxTV0uGBWTzXjP4YToWp3hs6GOztNpMHgsd7GADACqvMT9elSVA9hi_Mg9wMxmPNUd9bdkGYmqJSpF9ZANzkKRyNLcL4Snu9VqWyYM3DG15ZcmeMDwZMNigWm7jPjBV1VC89o/s1600-h/layerDialogOpen.png" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392881681858921314" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhD56TlJXwxTV0uGBWTzXjP4YToWp3hs6GOztNpMHgsd7GADACqvMT9elSVA9hi_Mg9wMxmPNUd9bdkGYmqJSpF9ZANzkKRyNLcL4Snu9VqWyYM3DG15ZcmeMDwZMNigWm7jPjBV1VC89o/s400/layerDialogOpen.png" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 400px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 272px;" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">3)</span> Drag resulting layer dialog tab outside.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpCRa_T_MrTTtau1qulpXxbLdW_YGUyJOjAho5S2wOhwoeqLwR2t1OjtJZcos0_4lEi0Kj4raqlXEoM8MhlvTYfEGnwKB7GrULy13T2OrBwPX22SKg54sQAxEHdf1i3IACnYkvog-hpuY/s1600-h/dragDiaOut.png" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392884441585046866" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpCRa_T_MrTTtau1qulpXxbLdW_YGUyJOjAho5S2wOhwoeqLwR2t1OjtJZcos0_4lEi0Kj4raqlXEoM8MhlvTYfEGnwKB7GrULy13T2OrBwPX22SKg54sQAxEHdf1i3IACnYkvog-hpuY/s400/dragDiaOut.png" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 234px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 400px;" /></a><br />
<span style="font-weight: bold;">4)</span> Disable Auto Image switch for the dock.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg82tsYNOASAA3JS0Ctw0NultLUn6a81Byumf3FFKBVNeTMjKJkFPvYetVj5BFjnPrV4jet8-22lqbHG3ER0f8HKEWw8xj8Of-XWxxQwH8a2gjbS20qMoJdKTvsTR461-xHqBRRvZaqPA4/s1600-h/disableAutoImgSwitch.png" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392885238364539762" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg82tsYNOASAA3JS0Ctw0NultLUn6a81Byumf3FFKBVNeTMjKJkFPvYetVj5BFjnPrV4jet8-22lqbHG3ER0f8HKEWw8xj8Of-XWxxQwH8a2gjbS20qMoJdKTvsTR461-xHqBRRvZaqPA4/s400/disableAutoImgSwitch.png" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 234px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 400px;" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">5)</span> Now use the two dialogs like you would use a split pane window manager.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivF5IhoXUSiMPDx1MdJ-cfWHMr5CGn3aN8s1DVpl0gbKtEtYdjayqbuWCU6jq15xpBvsqvv8e8acF4yR8P-oB4Ka1DNHYag_IT2_qkJmq9ak7OjqfPV10EJusA4sNzpr_WLnhYoUDd5P8/s1600-h/result.png" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5392881686715164498" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEivF5IhoXUSiMPDx1MdJ-cfWHMr5CGn3aN8s1DVpl0gbKtEtYdjayqbuWCU6jq15xpBvsqvv8e8acF4yR8P-oB4Ka1DNHYag_IT2_qkJmq9ak7OjqfPV10EJusA4sNzpr_WLnhYoUDd5P8/s400/result.png" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 234px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 400px;" /></a><br />
<span style="font-weight: bold;">Tip:</span> You can use the scroll wheel to quickly switch images using the image selector at the top of the dock window.</div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-43101915213268013672009-07-13T13:15:00.003+05:302015-05-26T15:25:41.341+05:30Elinks, the best browser for text consoles<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<span style="font-size: 85%; font-style: italic;">[ This was an old email ( though still valid) that I had sent to the internal mailing list at the previous company I worked for. I used elinks in xterm, so you can skip xterm related stuff if you use it on plain text console]</span><br />
<br />
I have started using "elinks" for most tasks.. It is much better than<br />
I thought. Only a few defaults are amiss. I just feel the following<br />
tips will make you like elinks.<br />
<br />
<br />
Tips in using "elinks":<br />
Note, I use it in xterm.<br />
1: First, make yourself familiar with settings up options<br />
manager. To get the Options manager, first press Esc on<br />
the keyboard, or the top row of the terminal using mouse.<br />
In the resulting menu, Go to options manager.<br />
<br />
The points that follow start with the option to<br />
change. When changing the following settings, make sure you<br />
read the accomponying text.<br />
<br />
2: Document->Cache->Ignore cache-control info from server<br />
Set it to: 0<br />
Description: Cache-control header item is usually set by CGIs<br />
to hint that the content must not be cached. When it is<br />
ignored, it ends up as a huge nuisance.<br />
<br />
3: Document->Default color settings->Use document-specified<br />
colors<br />
Set it to: 2<br />
Dont worry, in a short while we will be disabling<br />
transparency. :-)<br />
<br />
4: Document->HTML Rendering->Underline Links<br />
Set it to: 1<br />
Well, Experiement. I liked with Underlines. Though it can get<br />
nasty in webmail.<br />
<br />
5: Document->Browser->Forms-><br />
<div class="ii gt" id=":16r">
<wbr></wbr>External editor<br />
Set it to: your favorite editor.<br />
When focus is in a text area, and it is in edit mode, press<br />
F4 to open the content in text editor.<br />
<br />
6: Under "User interface", play as you like. I liked the<br />
following:<br />
i. Clock<br />
ii. LEDs<br />
<br />
7: Terminals->xterm->colors<br />
Set it to: 2<br />
Actually, the correct way would be to set TERM environment<br />
variable before starting elinks .. But I dont want to bother<br />
myself with that, as I dont think my X is gonna get set to<br />
monochrome all of a sudden.<br />
<br />
If you don't like the document specified color for a<br />
particular website, you can always cycle through color<br />
choosing algorithms using %. It will become second nature<br />
sooner than you imagine.<br />
<br />
8: Terminals->xterm->Transparency<br />
Set it to: 0<br />
<br />
<br />
Other than these tips, remember, the mouse works just like in firefox<br />
for so many things.<br />
1. Left click to open<br />
2. Right click links to get more options<br />
3. Right click inside document to get yet more options<br />
4. Middle click a link to open in new tab.<br />
5. Middle click a tab to close the tab.<br />
6. Scroll wheel works for vertical scrolling.<br />
7. Scroll on the tabs bar to switch tabs.<br />
<br />
Tips for using forms:<br />
1. Press enter on a form's entry field before typing anything<br />
into it. You can see the the mode in the status bar.<br />
2. Press enter again to submit the form. Again, the status bar.<br />
3. Press dot (.) to enable link numbering .. when this mode is<br />
on, you can type a number to go to that link. Even the form<br />
elements are treated as elinks, so you can jump between form<br />
elements quickly using this.<br />
<br />
Other tips :<br />
1. To follow elinks, press enter or press right arrow key.<br />
2. To go back, press the left arrow.<br />
3. To go "forward" or "unhistory" as elinks calls it, press "u"<br />
downlaod any link target using "d"<br />
4. Press '/' to search stuff on the page<br />
5. Use [ and ] to scroll horizontally. Too much text off the<br />
screen? Use 'W' to switch wrapping.<br />
6. Use '<' and '>' to switch between tabs.<br />
7. Press t to open new tab. c to close, Ctrl-r to refresh.<br />
8. Press g for location dialog.<br />
9. Type a number before a shortcut key to repeat that key so<br />
many times. Usefull for jumping 3 steps back in history.<br />
10. Press "h" for history manager<br />
11. Press '\' to see source<br />
12. Press '=' to see info about the current object loaded .. like<br />
URL,etc.<br />
13. Press '|' to see response header.<br />
14. press D for download manager.<br />
<br />
Squirrelmail and Gmail look good in elinks.<br />
<br />
15. Press q to quit.</div>
</div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-9285837882327775822009-07-06T19:11:00.011+05:302015-05-26T14:43:48.820+05:30Web experience enhancing "semantic web", "standards" and "API"s.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
This is a preliminary list i could think of immedietely.. I am going to add urls to each of them soon. Please comment with any that i missed (make sure that you give a link to the standard's official descriptions page when you do, or failing that, the best page that describes the format)<br />
<br />
It need not be specifically a data format or and API as such. Any specifications that, when adopted by the web developer, enhances the usage of the website can be listed.<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>rss</li>
<li>favicon</li>
<li>opensearch</li>
<li>open-collaboration-services</li>
<li>microformats</li>
<li>sitemap.xml</li>
<li>oembed</li>
<li>bookmarklets</li>
<li>blog pingback</li>
<li>social graph, foaf, XFN</li>
<li>GRDDL</li>
<li>APML</li>
</ul>
</div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-29669019980221990442009-07-01T11:27:00.004+05:302015-05-26T16:06:12.525+05:30CHDK Fun<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I have been recently playing a bit with my camera these days.. And thanks to CHDK, I have been having great fun. Check out my flickr page <a href="http://flickr.com/photos/kamathln">http://flickr.com/photos/kamathln</a> .<strike> And my videos page <a href="http://kamathln.homelinux.net/videos/">http://kamathln.homelinux.net/videos/</a> , available only if my laptop is online.</strike></div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-73976126784801204552009-02-17T13:52:00.008+05:302015-05-26T15:25:41.349+05:30GNOME and Firefox in Kannada<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Just installed kannada and got basic apps in kannada. Note: openoffice is something I use once in a bluemoon so did not bother about it at all.<br />
<br />
I am running Debain lenny recently apt-get updated and installed. I got these quirks sorted out.<br />
<br />
1) got Kannada Unicode to render properly on Firefox, after spoiling it badly.<br />
2) got to type Kannada properly on all places<br />
3) got Firefox translations for kannada<br />
4) set kannada as preferred language in Firefox ( Firefox tells websites about this. The only website that honoured the setting was google, but i was pleased)<br />
5) Get the whole gnome in Kannada<br />
<span style="font-weight: bold;"></span><br />
1) Kannada Unicode rendering on Firefox :<br />
This really should not have been a problem at all. This was my own stupidity. Even before I started out to go to some Kannada website, I airily set a few fonts too Freesans. Then i saw that pages dont render properly, after I tried different stupidities franctically and vainly , I thought I will just reset all the configuration. To do this quick, I just entered about:config and researched for freesans, and "reset"' the values to defaults. This fixed the rendering and I was back in business.<br />
<br />
As Sans-Serif is a magic font, it chooses the right kannada fonts magically.<br />
<br />
And obviously, before starting off with anything ttf-indic-fonts were installed.<br />
<br />
2) Kannada typing in all places.<br />
This was simple. After a bit of googling (I wish I hadn't erased the history of Firefox) I found a page where a Japanese guy had solved the same problem like this :<br />
<br />
GTK_IM_MODULE="scim-bridge"<br />
<br />
in /etc/X11/xinit/xinput.d/scim .<br />
<br />
This worked like magic, I could use SCIM in all places, after I used im-switch to set scim as my default Input module.<br />
<br />
For getting easy Kannada typing, I needed to install scim, scim-m17n and itrans packages and these also pulled some dependencies. After that, itt was smooth sailing with kn-itrans option available under Kannada.<br />
<br />
To get the language list, just click the little keyboard icon in the system tray. ( After first installation, you need to re-login to get it). Note:you need to Left click on the system tray SCIM icon(little keyboard), not right click, which would give you setup options.<br />
<br />
3) Firefox kannada translation<br />
This one was easy<br />
<br />
$ apt-get install iceweasel-l10n-kn<br />
$ LANG=kn_IN iceweasel<br />
<br />
The LANG=kn_IN iceweasel can be kept in a script and the panel launcher's properties could be set to launch the script. Anyways, Item (5) must obsolete it if it succeeds.<br />
<br />
4) Preferred web content set to kannada in Firefox.<br />
<br />
Again, pretty Simple:<br />
<br />
Main Menu->Edit/Tools-> Preferences->Content->Languages<br />
<br />
Or if you already followed item (3):<br />
<br />
ಮುಖ್ಯ ಮೆನು->ಸಂಪಾದನೆ->ಆದ್ಯತೆಗಳು->ಒಳಅಂಶಗಳು->ಭಾಷೆಗಳು<br />
<br />
Once you add Kannada in the list of languages, dont forget to move it to the top(order indicates the priority). Once this is done, you must find that google presents itself in Kannada.<br />
<br />
5) GNOME in Kannada<br />
<br />
I searched for kannada packages for GNOME for a long time. Then an angel from #kannada on irc.freenode.net made me realize that Kannada was installed with GNOME<br />
all along! Stupid me. Just checked /usr/share/locale/kn/LC_MESSAGES/ and they were all there. But LANG=kn_IN gedit, LC_ALL=kn_IN gedit, all failed to present in Kannada.Then the same angel hinted me to run<br />
<br />
dpkg-reconfigure locales<br />
<br />
That reminded me that I was presented with the same UI during installation, and I had neglected it. Damn! Well, it re-generated and configured the languages I chose. after that LANG=kn_IN gedit just worked. So If I am not wrong, a re-login should add Kannada to the list of languages at the GDM login screen, and all the LANG=kn_IN should be unnecessary.<br />
<br />
I will be writing to the GNOME's Debain package manager asking to include dpkg-reconfigure locales as a menu item in system->administration :-P.<br />
<br />
<span style="font-weight: bold;">Update:</span><br />
I have rebooted and here is a screenshot :<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaBgrQiOTOPYQzcQeDmGelj_b_idUxmLcaIYDxgM_FX5pMnATrNujUtrsREp1r1J6ZvSFDsfsNfMh8hCH3tO-Rv9akmPS88HSSj1UFXO5SXwck35dgVpzjXLsVHNx83fZXTwtK-MWWGHI/s1600-h/kannada.jpg" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5303772149823919218" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaBgrQiOTOPYQzcQeDmGelj_b_idUxmLcaIYDxgM_FX5pMnATrNujUtrsREp1r1J6ZvSFDsfsNfMh8hCH3tO-Rv9akmPS88HSSj1UFXO5SXwck35dgVpzjXLsVHNx83fZXTwtK-MWWGHI/s400/kannada.jpg" style="cursor: pointer; display: block; height: 234px; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; width: 400px;" /></a><br />
<span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"></span></span></span></div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-90659166709682081892009-02-15T17:19:00.005+05:302015-05-26T14:49:04.954+05:30Telescopic display support for laptop<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgczYYenGrureJhh-eLeZHjIBBGZU9_lFiVIzlW3eXuVKn4OuaT68k_1lXxXZJcLxvl9N5PvsXvMc59HQPL2MyX39W3t9vLaSaWMRm4TkYQcyj15LYXiHqp2pG_Y2QW3Vhux_3zSG9xO9E/s1600-h/laptop2.gif" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5302996729471400418" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgczYYenGrureJhh-eLeZHjIBBGZU9_lFiVIzlW3eXuVKn4OuaT68k_1lXxXZJcLxvl9N5PvsXvMc59HQPL2MyX39W3t9vLaSaWMRm4TkYQcyj15LYXiHqp2pG_Y2QW3Vhux_3zSG9xO9E/s320/laptop2.gif" style="cursor: pointer; float: left; height: 320px; margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; width: 256px;" /></a><br />
This is an illustration for an idea i submitted to halfbakery. You can view the idea <a href="http://www.halfbakery.com/idea/Telescopic_20display_20for_20laptop">here</a>.<br />
<br />
I am not a good artist or a technical drawing guy, so please only appreciate the main idea, and don't analyze it under a microscope :-) .<br />
<br />
The base extension is actually thinner and can be fit into a groove on the sides so that even when it is extended, the laptop will maintain a flat level.</div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-21358450245631337542009-01-07T00:11:00.004+05:302015-05-26T15:33:43.568+05:30Tagz.in same or grown ?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
For the uninitiated, <a href="http://tagz.in/">tagz.in</a> is a social bookmarking site by my friend Jeethu Rao. And If you already know about tagz, and visit tagz again you may find a little change visually. But don't be fooled. The engine under the hood has grown up and is a lot more mature.<br />
<br />
For instance he just added recommendations, now that is something that I have been always wanting - it now recommends bookmarks from other people by learning your tastes once you have voted on at least 50 items. Of course .. it takes into account the tags you have saved under your bookmarks too, so dont forget to save your bookmarks.<br />
<br />
And there are loads of tiny improvements here and there. A lot of caching etc..<br />
<br />
Dont forget to keep a watch on the "<a href="http://tagz.in/whatsnew">whats new</a>" entry. And yeah.. don't forget to register and check out the recommendation engine. It rocks!</div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-18469468510092981562008-12-18T17:33:00.004+05:302015-05-26T14:50:13.007+05:30My name is Laxminarayan Kamath<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
[Someone had asked me about the meaning of my name. I had this in my draft from more than 3 years. The "To:" field was blank. So I have completely forgotten whom it was for. So I thought it is better I leave it here, instead of being stagnant information in some corner of gmail's servers]<br />
<br />
My first name is Laxminarayan. And last name is Kamath. Laxminarayan is actually a combination of the name Laxmi and the word Narayan. Where Laxmi is the Hindu Goddess of wealth and Narayan means owner or Lord. So as the Hindu perception of husband as the owner, Laxminarayan means, the husband of Goddess of wealth. According to the Hindu Religious beliefs, Laxminarayan is also a God. Laxminarayan is an all loving, all powerful God. He is considered the maintainer of the universe.<br />
<br />
Kamath is my last name. Kamath is actually in a language called Konkani. Konkani is one of several languages of India, and is the primary language of the Goa state and also several people of the west coast of India. The word Kamath actually expands to Kama and Mathi. The word Kama in the language Konkani stands for material pleasure or material duty (as opposed to spiritual pleasure or spiritual duty). The word Mathi in the language Konkani, stands for soil. So in total, the word Kamath means occupied with the duty of soil.<br />
<br />
Last names in recent years are only legendary, and inherited from the ancestors. There are few people who actually have the same occupation as their last name indicates.</div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-69867752735343376682008-09-27T23:52:00.005+05:302015-05-26T15:27:18.413+05:30Tagz.in - Yet another (?) social bookmarking site?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
We got a huge number of social bookmarking sites. Is there a need for antoher one?<br />
Well, this one is, by far one with a very clean, no-nonsense UI. It means business. Being developed by my friend Jeethu, <a href="http://tagz.in/about/">it</a> is mainly an experiment to see what happens when you mix social bookmarking like del.icio.us with social sites like reddit. Though it began with that in mind, Jeethu has not stopped adding usefull features <a href="http://tagz.in/help/">http://tagz.in/help/</a> <a href="http://tagz.in/tagz/whatsnew/">http://tagz.in/tagz/whatsnew/</a> . And knowing a bit of his plans, I can assure that several are on their way.<br />
Oh! before I forget.. he also has a <a href="http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/6z68i/ask_proggit_commentscritique_on_my/">reddit page</a> , <a href="http://tagz.uservoice.com/">uservoice page</a>, and obviously a <a href="http://jeethurao.com/">blog</a> of his own. He likes coding in python, and as on the <a href="http://tagz.in/about/">about</a> page, uses django and other python stuff.<br />
It is clearly evident from my monopolization of the website and the uservoice pages that I am really liking it. :-)</div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-9494618005172096172008-08-30T09:02:00.003+05:302015-05-26T14:51:02.958+05:30E17 wishlist<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<ol>
<li>Saving customizations of a theme. In "advanced" part of the theme manager, after a lot of customizations - setting different borders, fonts, etc., if you want to try out a complete new theme, you have to lose all previous customizations. This is a pain.. Allowing a simple "saving" of custom sets will help avoid a lot of frustration.</li>
<li>Automatic GTK/QT Color settings according to current e17 theme.<br />- Just like KDE does to GTK.</li>
<li>Restart theme setttings app along with e17 when you press "apply" in the theme manager.</li>
<li>Some old effects from dr16 (especially transparent move and resize ).</li>
</ol>
</div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-49915726444399359042008-08-14T22:13:00.006+05:302009-04-30T10:50:46.705+05:30Corruption analysis<span style="font-size:85%;">(This is a reply given by me to the suggestion on a forum that it is now important to remove the two Indian political parties BJP and Congress.<br />I feel there is enough juice in it to share it on my blog too.<br />Text in squared brackets[like this] are grammatical correction or filled ommission.<br />The original thread is available here<br />http://groups.yahoo.com/group/India-Force/messages/14035?threaded=1&m=e&var=1&tidx=1</span>)<br /><br />I am no expert in these subjects .. So don't call on details if you<br />want to explain me something .. My question is whether removing<br />Congress and BJP will really remove the roots of the problems ?<br /><br />Currently corruption follows power. And a large part also follows<br />"power potential". If power shifts from BJP to Congress or from<br />Congress to BJP or any other party/ organization/ whatever, corruption<br />follows suite. Some corruption stays back if there is "power<br />potential" still remaining in the party. If there is another<br />party/organization which a part of corruption sees that it has "power<br />potential", it will move to that if circumstances affecting the<br />corruption's victim compulse it.<br /><br />Where does this corruption come from? Citizens. Can you remove<br />corruption from citizens without corruption drive[ing] it's forces against<br />your plans? The corruption in Government( with a few lakh employees?)<br />does not have a chance against clean citizens (100 crore!!!). Can you<br />turn this growing population "problem" into a strength against<br />corruption (not just in the Government), thus being it's own<br />solution?.<br /><br />The world is shrinking by the minute in terms of communication and<br />technology. So corruption can make it's way through those channels.<br />Can you make people immune to such channels of corruption? Can you<br />come up with an elaborate plan to block only corruption from various<br />channels of information exchange and then implement flawlessly all the<br />plans in one go? If you have a[ny] delay between to parts of plans,<br />corruption can slip through.<br /><br />I am really sorry that I am not good at expressing everything I feel,<br />especially thoughts sift too quickly through my mind for me to<br />construct examples required to convey my ideas. May be that is where<br />my corruption point lies.<br /><br />Can you do all the above in one go ? Then we may have a chance against<br />corruption.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">(To this, Someone replied :)</span><br />yes sure to some extent. This is not a permanent solution but would work<br />miracles and help root out the problem once and for all time in near future.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;">(And my reply was:)</span><br /><br />Yes. You are quite right. But unless you have the complete solution to<br />the problem of corruption, we must not attempt this. I will explain.<br /><br />The circle of corruption is a vicious one. The Government is corrupted<br />because the citizens are corrupted. And the citizens are corrupted<br />because the government is corrupted. The citizens are supported by our<br />Government. So if we remove BJP and Congress, we should have something<br />in it's place that can fit and support us otherwise, as a society, we<br />will collapse. And of course, it goes without saying that it should be<br />able to withstand the corruption from the citizens and should be free<br />from corruption itself. Unfortunately, for most citizens it has become<br />a matter of pride to be corrupted. Any point of time where we need to<br />be corrupted should be a matter of sadness to us and we should not<br />stop at fixing our individual problems which forced us to be<br />corrupted. If a father died because of cigarette smoking, the son<br />should not continue smoking saying "My dad used to love smoking.. I am<br />smoking for him.". Instead he should fight against the people who<br />corrupt their body with unnecessary chemicals.<br /><br />I completely understand that sometimes corruption becomes necessary to<br />avoid any glitches in the design of the Government. But instead of<br />being temporary, it becomes a permanent thing. Like an Asthma patient<br />getting addicted to the steroids. That is what we should be always<br />aware about and avoid.<br /><br />BJP and Congress, are the fruits of such a society and thus the<br />corruption is concentrated there. Nothing wrong in it. They are our<br />own fruits. In the plan to remove it, we citizens should also include<br />ways of cleaning ourselves and in the mean time prepare a replacement<br />Government which is clean, strong and has a high resistance to<br />corruption as well.lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-33774804449530509142008-07-21T15:31:00.003+05:302015-05-26T14:51:32.005+05:30Very small audio streamer ( serves only one client at a time)<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Serves whatever is coming from your recording source<br />
<br />
Ingredients:<br />
<ul><br />
<li>tcpserver</li>
<br />
<li>arecord</li>
<br />
<li>speexenc</li>
</ul>
<br />
<br />
Method:<br />
<code><br />#!/bin/bash<br />cat <<EOH<br />HTTP/1.1 200 OK<br />Content-Type: application/ogg<br /><br />EOH<br />beep -f 3200<br />arecord -r 8000 -t raw |speexenc --8bit - -</code></div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-33396532608300820972008-07-07T11:42:00.005+05:302008-07-07T12:27:58.258+05:30"Taking granted" is a convinience.We should realize that the concept of "taking granted" serves only as a convinience. While you may label me as the "Master of the Obvious" for saying that, most people dont realize that it means, on a larger scale of time, we should always be aware that there might be other possibilities. We need to preiodically research and revise of what we have taken for granted. This is way easier said than done. It is important to be critically minded to be able to search for, go after, and dig out to view things taken for granted.<br /><br />BTW, This happens to be a way of "Be prepared" strategy.lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-79851233033317141112008-07-05T17:22:00.002+05:302015-05-26T14:52:51.736+05:30Me back, Telecommuting, Website up<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Its been a while.. I am back in Mangalore.. Got a job in the previous company I worked. My Laptop, and hence website is back up.</div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-31133631060709588852008-07-05T17:11:00.002+05:302015-05-26T14:52:34.218+05:30Human behavioural statistics.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
Human behavioural statistics stays true till the moment it published.</div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-86095720705604756932008-06-16T21:23:00.000+05:302015-05-26T14:53:05.689+05:30Me at Mumbai,website down<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
I am currently in Mumbai, will be off to Bangalore in a few days and then to Mangalore. Till then, kamathln.homelinux.net will be down. Be sure to check back on 30th June.</div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8892810836821605331.post-6212121207286887742008-06-03T10:10:00.006+05:302015-05-26T16:07:32.301+05:30Power saving on GNU/Linux laptops<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<ol>
<li>Forget all snazzy desktop stuff. Especially those that update the screen unnecessarily.</li>
<li>Try this: <a href="http://lesswatts.org/">http://lesswatts.org</a> .</li>
<li>If you have a IBM THinkpad check out this one too: <a href="http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/How_to_reduce_power_consumption">http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/How_to_reduce_power_consumption </a></li>
</ol>
<br />
<br />
Then also try these tips :<br />
<ol><br />
<li>In Firefox: disable prefetch. For that :<br /> <ul>
<li>In urlbar type about:config</li>
<li> In the resulting table.. type "prefetch" in the search box to filter out those keys that have "prefetch" in them.</li>
<li>In the result, set "network.prefetch-next" to "false".<br /> <ul>
<li>If you have Stumbleupon installed, disable it's prefetch too. stumbleupon.somenumber.prefetch</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>Unless you are a heavy user of gmail, use the simple html mode.</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>Use text based browsers unless the page demands a GUI browser. Elinks is an excellent choice.</li>
<li>Disable anything that blinks/ updates the screen. This makes X wake up the CPU on every update.<br /> <ul>
<li>Disable blinking cursors. Many terminals allow a way to disable the blinking of the cursor.</li>
<li>Disable the "seconds" indicator on the clock. Really, are you on a race track ?</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>Disable "system monitor" "battery monitor" and such other applets. Configure key shortcuts that run a command like "uptime" "date" "acpi" or somthing like that and pipe it to xmessage or something like that. Also havea script that .. every 30 seconds call these commands and checks for dangerous values. If any, popout a xmessage.</li>
<li>Have a decent amount of RAM. This reduces the kernel having to wake the hard disk often to play with the swap.</li>
<li>Remove anything unnecessary. Unnecessary daemons, Unnecessary devices, Unnecessay drivers, etc..</li>
<li>I dont know if this works: Try using small flash based drives to store frequently used small documents, music, etc. This brings disk usage to a minimum.<br /> </li>
</ol>
</div>
lankythoughtshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16278204218436078989noreply@blogger.com0