64bit Amazon Mp3 Downloader Alternative
Despite my great appreciation for Jamendo, there is still bit of music I like that you can not get under a Creative Commons license. Usually when looking for this music, I turn to the Amazon mp3 store, which uses a proprietary downloader whenever you buy a whole album. Fortunately this downloader has supported Linux for some time now, and I was fine using it on my 32 bit desktop. But, having finally gotten around to switching my desktop to 64 bit, I discovered that the downloader no longer worked, and would require me to install all the required 32 bit...
So far in Gentoo - Part 2
Today marks my second day of setup on my new Gentoo desktop. Before any one begins to laugh at the time it has taken so far - I’ve only been spending free time on it, and during much of that I’ve been working on it through an ssh connection while watching TV. Today marked my successful setup of the Xorg server, including the configuration of my graphics card to work with it. Nor did I forget the other half of my promise before writing again, as I am currently listening to the album sundance kids through the speakers connected to...
So far in Gentoo - Part 1
With my old Ubuntu installation on my desktop beginning to show signs of implosion (probably a result of the server software that had been installed and then removed once i setup my real server) I felt like trying something new. I’ve managed to come to grips with Ubuntu over the past few years, but I feel somewhat constrained in my explorations in Linux by the ease of use within Ubuntu. So, rather than reinstalling or fixing Ubuntu again, I decided it was time to try a new distribution, one which requires more setup than Ubuntu or even Fedora (which I...
Cryptonomicon
Many people have written reviews on Neal Stephenson’s Cryptonomicon before, but many tend to be overwhelmingly positive, even to an extent that they claim that the book can change your life. Perhaps I’ve read a broader variety of books, and that has lead me to be a bit more judgmental about the books I read, but I hardly found it to be life changing. The plot is made up of three or four different story lines, jumping around throughout time and space. One of the main plots revolves around Lawrence Waterhouse, a mathematician who works for the military breaking codes,...
EEE PC Fn Lock Tip
Use the key combination Fn and F11 to toggle the Fn lock on and off. I only brought this up because every once in a while, my netbook gets some of its keys locked in to the secondary set of keys, which are the ones printed in blue. This results in my netbook being rendered near useless until I switch it off - unfortunately it took me some time to figure this trick, resulting in a couple of hours attempting to fix my keyboard troubles.