Previously I was using Xfce4. Then, because of the heavy working environment, I tried the lighter desktop environment, LXDE. But still, it has some limitations that made me choose to use Openbox window manager only.

Pros and cons of Xfce4

Xfce4 is lightweight comparing to GNOME or KDE. I like it, because of the conventional design like the task manager. Furthermore another thing I like is the “aerosnap” feature like Windows, which I can view the two windows side by side. However, when running Windows in VirtualBox and other applications, I can feel the obvious slowness in the computer. It is really reducing my working performance. That is why I decided to change to LXDE.

Cloud9 is a web-based IDE good for collaboration and online development. You can store your large project on the remote server, and use any computer including netbook with a web browser to develop your system.

Now, the problem I faced when using C9 on my Chromium. Firstly, the address bar, tabs, and bookmarks occupy some space in the window. This results a non-editor look and feel. This makes me feel lacking of something. Secondly, the worst part is the shortcut key like Ctrl+W. By pressing this shortcut key, it will invoke the web browser closing window instead of the C9 shortcut key. Meaning, the shortcut key of the web browser has higher precedence than C9 itself.

I have an HP 1T external HDD. It is dying. Sh*t!

So, I made my final struggling onto it. Though it is not 100% work as planned, I still have around 320G usable space.

Symptoms

Firstly, I found that some files cannot be deleted, I had no choice but plug out the USB cable manually. Try to chkdsk with Windows since it is NTFS partition, but the chkdsk stopped and no response during the progress. Then I know, these were the bad signs. So, have to avoid using it and get a new HDD, and move whatever files able to be moved.

Since I am working as freelance developer, I spent most of my “otaku” time with Animenfo Radio. Now, when listening with some nice songs you like, and you would like to know what the song is, then you can use Shazam to detect it. But using Shazam requires you to turn on your volume and use your mobile phone to detect it.

What if, you are listening the songs with your ear-phone?

Linux, git, ssh, and Docker.

Linux is the most flexible OS kernel in the world right now. It is used in supercomputer, personal computer, server, embedded system like smart vacuum cleaner, mobile phone, smart TV, etc. Firstly because it is open source, everyone can study it, modify it, and redistribute it. Secondly, thanks to GPL (license). Because of GPL, anyone who use Linux need to open source their code. Those bossy people who knows Windows only and like to earn money without paying any efforts, and never understood programming and programmers, they will never understand the power of Linux and GPL.

Due to the changes of the career, I invested on Dell Vostro 5459, after a long survey. I chose it because it is compatible to Linux. The compatibility to Linux meaning that, all the hardware devices are accessible by Linux. Besides that, it has the NVIDIA graphic card, which allows me to use GPGPU to do my research and study. Moreover, I can play high quality 3D graphics games.

Ubuntu

So, the laptop I bought was pre-installed with Ubuntu. And, I was impressed by the Ubuntu first boot video, which can be found here.

I was using jEdit. And once willing to change to, so called modern text editor, Atom Text Editor. Then I did some comparisons among the text editors. At the end, now my primary text editor for coding is Emacs.

Emacs requires some time to learn and practise. But at the end, I love it too much. It is so powerful, no other text editor to compare with it. But the primary usage is for coding.

My campus lab has the Dell desktops. I am not sure the model, but the network devices are Broadcom BCM43228. As a result, after installation of the Ubuntu (they were not installed by me), Ubuntu cannot get WiFi connection to online.

Since my student mentioned that Windows can use the ethernet cable to share the wireless network, I asked him to help to share the wireless network from Windows on the other Dell desktop, and connect to the target Dell desktop.

Recently I move back to use my (around) 4 years old laptop, HP Pavilion dv3. It has NVIDIA graphic card. But since I (re-)installed Arch Linux 64 bit on it, I failed to run the X11 with the proprietary NVIDIA driver. As a result, I used the Nouveau module instead. Then, I tried several times and finally successfully run the X11 with NVIDIA driver.

To use the Nouveau module, in the mkinitcpio.conf, we have to add in “nouveau” module, then build the initramfs (refer to wiki page). And use the “Xorg -configure” to generate the xorg.conf.

I am not a Facebook fervent user. I use it because of some of my friends are using it.

So, if you want to enable your “available to chat” status to your group of close friends or special group of friends,

1. Go to Friends an create a list that you want to chat with.
2. After creating the list, add your close friends.
3. Now, turn on the Chat.
4. Go to Chat Options > Advanced Settings
5. Choose “Turn off chat for all friends except…”, and add in your target chat.

[caption id=“attachment_1168” align=“aligncenter” width=“300”] Custom chat list in Facebook[/caption]