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Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in
shivku's LiveJournal:
| Tuesday, January 2nd, 2007 | | 1:55 am |
Moblogging.. Sure
This is a sample blogpost from my new nokia n 73. Even as i am trying to figure things out.. It is only fitting to say i am having lots of fun.. Oh this phone simply rocks | | Saturday, July 22nd, 2006 | | 11:51 pm |
On Fabric painting
I dont think I told many people about my fabric painting skills. Though it is not of my finest, I achieve a certain goal that is otherwise not possible. I have always wanted to wear some geeky shirts instead of "Beer is better than women" or "Screw me". But I dont get to buy them anywhere , even in Bangalore. So, I decided to put my fabric paints and brush, a bit of my free time and some thinking/browsing to do it myself. Believe me, it is a fine hobby and is not too difficult. Just needs lots of patience and enthusiasm. I plan to share a small bit about fabric painting later in an other dedicated post. Now, I am just going to recall the cloth paintings that I have done so far. These things are not something that you frame and put up in a wall. You put them onto urself and make use of them. So, it is practical and it is cool because you can show off too.
- A spoof of the matrix - I dont seem to get this picture back in search. This was back in the college days, atleast 4 years old.
- An asterix hand kerchief. My chief still carries it in her bag and never uses it to wipe anything (She is trying to preserve it, apparently)
- A Donald duck handkerchief that I gifted to my little brother. Dont think he or anyone else knows where it is now.
- A black shirt with "There is no place like 127.0.0.1" on white. Came out pretty ok.( Pic coming as soon as I come back to India. )
Well, why I am writing about this shit right now is, I got content for my next shirt. I am going to plagiarize from thinkgeek. Sorry guys, I cant afford to buy T-shirts for 20 bucks. I still earn in INR. The content is quite simple.
/* No Comments */
And that is why love it. | | Monday, July 17th, 2006 | | 4:58 pm |
How many matterazzis can you head butt?
This is hilarious. Read it in today's TOI, searched for it and got this. I am also embedding it here just so that you dont have to click click. It is simple, How many Materazzis can you( as zizou) head butt before the umpire notices you and flashes a red card? It is not made well. Any flash gurus out there going to make it better? Please send across a link. Oh, this is simply for sheer fun. No hard feelings. I love Zizou. Invalid video URL. Ensaai. Current Mood:  giggly | | 2:24 pm |
My Teesta connection
The story might be a little weird, but it is true. On my trip to sikkim, if there is one thing that I really got to know well, it is river teesta. It was everywhere and anywhere we went. It was as though it was a part of my trip. Accompanying us without questioning and complaining and infact, enjoying our company. And at the end of the trip, I knew I was going to miss her and was quite sad. That, in short is my love affair with Teesta.  Once you reach zero point ( end of roads, basically) towards north sikkim, All one can see is nature, virgin and full. It is quite unfair that despite knowing I cant possibly describe her beauty, I am venturing into writing about her. Anyways, at this point, Teesta is this small streamlet, slowly learning to crawl along the soft beds of colourful stones laid out neatly. She is quite reluctant to begin and I think she is quite unaware of the distance or the arduous path she is about to take.  As we drove back, she grows up. She learns how difficult things can get and quickly matures by drawing sources from various channels that come along. And by the time I am close to Gangtok, she is blossomed into this forceful river scaring every passer by who I dont think how lovely as a child she was. As the driver chose to take the road to the city, she decides to leave us, for her own good. I felt my kid is on it's own now, capable of taking care of herself. Surely, she will make it to the sea. Bye Teesta, I love you. Current Mood:  calm | | Monday, June 26th, 2006 | | 5:24 pm |
Paris Hilton on NBC saturday night live..
Have you guys seen this video ? Hilarious...
The transcript is here...
Tina Fey: Paris Hilton is a name that's on everyone's lips these days. Here now in an exclusive interview with Jimmy Fallon in Paris Hilton.
Jimmy Fallon: Thanks for coming on.
Paris Hilton: Nice to be here.
JF: So, we agreed, we won't be discussing the scandal that's been in the papers the past couple weeks.
PH: I appreciate that.
JF: We want to find about you, Paris Hilton. Your family...the Hiltons own hotels all around the world.
PH: Yes, in New York, London, Paris.
JF: Wait, there actually is a Paris Hilton?
PH: Yes, there is.
JF: Is it hard to get into the Paris Hilton?
PH: Actually, it's a very exclusive hotel, no matter what you've heard. JF: I hear the Paris Hilton is very beautiful.
PH: I'm glad that you've heard that.
JF: Is there double occupancy at the Paris Hilton?
PH: No.
JF: Is the Paris Hilton very roomy?
PH: It might be for you. But most people find it very comfortable.
JF: I'm a VIP, I might need to go through the back entrance.
PH: Doesn't matter who are you – it's not going to happen.
JF: Fair enough, okay. I throw a lot of events. Do they have ballrooms there?
PH: We do.
JF: Great, I'd love to have my balls held by the Paris Hilton. Sounds awesome. I'd like to check into the Paris Hilton.
PH: I don't think you can.
JF: Really? I'd only be able to stay there a minute and a half...two minutes, tops.
PH: Good luck.
JF: Paris Hilton! | | Thursday, June 15th, 2006 | | 4:53 am |
Write in LJ and read in Blogspot
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=92.1) Do you like both Blogspot and LJ? Do you have your readers split between these two lovely blog provider sites ? Well, I do. I was telling sunson the other day that I want to blog in LJ and then syndicate it into blogspot. Apparently, you can do this by paying LJ for a premium account. I dont know what else a premium account provides, but I really dont want to pay for something like this. Why would you do that when you have Greasemonkey and PHP? So, A bit of a night out and some ciggys amalgamated into the "LJ Blogspot integrator". What is good ? Well, this entire thing, isint ? What is bad ? - You need to install this greasemonkey script. That means, you are stuck to firefox and you have to install it on all the firefox browsers you blog from.
- The backend is PHP. So you need a server to run it. Maybe, at a later point, I will write the entire thing in javascript.
- You have to switch to the "plain text mode" before you click "update". This is because I dont know how to capture the text written inside the rich text editor. You can help me to fix this.
- LJ user links have a broken image. Will fix this later.
- Your update entries will not take effect in blogspot. Not sure if I want to fix this.
Go find the greasemonkey script from here. I am hoping you already have greasemonkey and know what I am talking about. Find the backend PHP code here. Read up the code to see what all you have to change. And then you are all set to go! Ensaai! PS: If you find this blog on my blogspot, it got there because of what I just told you! Current Mood: accomplished | | Monday, June 12th, 2006 | | 12:14 pm |
| | Friday, June 2nd, 2006 | | 12:21 am |
| | Thursday, June 1st, 2006 | | 11:16 pm |
Wow! Picasa
Only recently was I my manager asking me if I was using Picasa. I told him I dont put on my windows anymore. I dont, partly because my installation is screwed and I dont know better than to re-install the entire god damn thing, and partly because I really wanted to evaluate linux as a home desktop OS. Where I am on the the evaluation? well, I am fairly convinced I can do all my day to day activities without much pain. A situation happens once in a while when I hate myself for being on linux, but that happens when I am on windows too. So, that evens it out I guess. Ok, getting past the crap, these situations I was talking about has been narrowed down a bit by Google's amazing gesture to us, poor souls by releasing Picasa for Linux. Wow! I mean, seriously.. I love picasa because it has the simplicity and usability that photoshop does not have. Now, it is on linux. Baby! I cant ask for more, and I wont go back to Gimp unless I am shooting Aishwarya Rai.Thanks Google! I love you. PS: Video Search on the new video.yahoo.com for Aishwarya rai sucks. Current Mood: excited | | 6:10 pm |
What does little johnny think of himself ?
Something that my friend Sairam sent over to me. Parental Advisory required.... little johnny went to the pope's house for dinner with his parents ! in order to give respect to the pope his mom and dad speak to him with great respect ! mom says "pope the great , pass me the plate" ! then his dad says "pope the divine , pass me the wine" !! so little johnny thinks that he also has to speak the same way ! he wanted some dessert to be passed , so he says "pope the bastard , pass me the custard" !!! little johnny is very foul mouthed , keeps using bad words in class ! the girls in his class hate him for that ! so one day all girls in his class decide to leave the class and go out if he utters something unacceptable again ! one fine day , the teacher asks all students to go back home , and on the way if they find something new , they will have to speak abt it the next day ! so the next day comes , and the teacher asks one by one to come up on stage and speak abt what they found ! first a girl comes up and speaks abt this new company being constructed near her house , and how her dad happens to be the ceo ! next a guy comes up and speaks abt this new restaurant coming up near his house , and that it serves italian food , which happens to be his favourite ! then little johnny comes up on stage and says " there is a new brothal coming up near my house" , immediatly all the girls in the class get up and leave - to this little johnny says "oh little whores , wait , its not started recruiting as yet" Little Johnny was heard by his mother reciting his homework: "Two plus two, the son of a bitch is four; four plus four, the son of a bitch is eight; eight plus eight, the son of a bitch...'" "Johnny !" shouted his mother. "Watch your language! You're not allowed to use the swearwords." "But, Mom," replied the boy, "that's what the teacher taught us, and she said to recite it out loud till we learned it." Next day Johnny's mother went right into the classroom to complain. "Oh, heavens !" said the teacher. "That's not what I taught them. They're supposed to say, 'Two plus two, the sum of which is four.' " Current Mood: mischievous | | Thursday, May 25th, 2006 | | 12:24 pm |
What am I ?
Blue Pyramid thinks I am "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn". I dont even think I have read this book. Time to do it now, though.
You're Adventures of Huckleberry Finn!
by Mark Twain
With an affinity for floating down the river, you see things in black
and white. The world is strange and new to you and the more you learn about it, the less
it makes sense. You probably speak with an accent and others have a hard time
understanding you and an even harder time taking you seriously. Nevertheless, your
adventurous spirit is admirable. You really like straw hats.
Take the Book Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.
Current Mood:  cold | | Thursday, May 11th, 2006 | | 8:29 pm |
Ironic indeed
I was just listening to Jagged Little Pill Acoustic version of Alanis Morisette...And she goes "It's like meeting the man of my dreams And then meeting his beautiful husband" Instead of... "It's like meeting the man of my dreams And then meeting his beautiful wife " Guess it does happen when you keep doing the same thing over and over again. It was a really bad rendition of a very good song as well... Ironic indeed... | | Wednesday, May 10th, 2006 | | 6:41 pm |
The magic of x2x and x2vnc
I have solved this problem about 7 times now. And everytime I reboot the machine, all the xhost and nolisten tcp stuff that I did to my X server will vanish. And, considering the amount of RAM I have in my head, I will start from scratch once again, wondering how to go about doing it. So, this time I decided to write it up, atleast for my convienience. So, Without any further crap...Let us assume you have two machines ( hosts) at your workplace/home..They have two displays ( monitors) and you dont have ( or want to have) a KVM switch. Two displays at the same time is good, but two keyboards and two mouses is a really irritating thing. I end up typing my password using the wrong keyboard all the time. Or hang on to the wrong mouse and wonder what the hell is wrong with it. I also used to wonder if there is a way to pass a piece of text ( from the clipboard) , say a URI from the browser of host A to the browser on host B. Unintelligently, I used to run a messenger client on both the hosts, and send the blob over IM back and forth.
Connecting two X servers:Ok, Now that we are convinced we need something better here, let me introduce x2x. It is a magical pixel grab software that works really well on two different OSs. ( I connect a linux host to a FreeBSD host). Thanks to the concept of X server. You could get the sources from here or check out your ports distro for packages. Install x2x on one of the two hosts (that has the better mouse and keyboard) and then issue a command like this: x2x -west -resurface -to tohostname:displayportDissection:-west: This means that the host you are connecting to ( Or the host you wish to use without it's mouse/keyboard) is to the west of the host you are connecting from. If you are poor in directions ( and I always say a lot of women are), think of the number "4".. Draw the number "4" with the horizontal line first starting from the right. This is your east..and then go "east , west, north and south" as you write "4". -resurface: Not so important..Check up x2x -h or the man page for more info. -to: This signifies that the following string is the host you want to connect to ( Or pixel grab from).
tohostname:displayport: This the hostname and the display port. For ex, my.host.name:0.0 How do you figure out what the display port is? go to the host you are connecting to and then type echo $DISPLAY That will tell you what display port you must connect to. Now that we are at it, the default X port is 6000 which is signified by 0.0 . U can also run multiple X servers on the same host listening at different ports. In that case, your display port must go 0.1 , 0.2 etc , which actually translates to port 6001. 6002 etc... Thatz it. Put this as a rc command so that it gets fired everytime your host reboots, and that you can always use the same mouse/keyboard without having to run x2x everytime. Important notes:
- All X servers, by default run with the option "-nolisten tcp". What this means is, the X server is listening on a unix domain socket and that it wont listen to TCP connect requests from the network.
For instance, if you are running gdm, then a ps ax | grep gdm will show the arguments passed to gdm and one of them will be "-nolisten tcp" . You have to open up your gdm.conf (in my case, it is at /etc/X11/gdm/gdm.conf ) and then explicitly set DisallowTCP as false. Restart the X server and you will be fine.
- You might also have to do a "xhost +from.host.name" so that the X server running in to.host.name allows the from.host.name to connect to it.
Connecting to a windows host from a host that runs X:
I also sometimes boot up windows. That shouldnt deter us from doing magic, should it? Ok, install a VNC server on your windows host. RealVNC is a really good, free to use VNC server for windows. Start up the VNC server and then make sure you allow clients to connect ( with or without authentication) , and other stuff that it has. Download x2vnc sources from here or check your distro for packages. your x2vnc command will be very similar to the x2x. As I am losing patience, please check "x2vnc -h" or the man page for more details. Hope that helps someone.. | | Sunday, May 7th, 2006 | | 11:12 pm |
wma to mp3
That is simple..This is how I do it: mplayer -vo null -vc dummy -af volume=2:sc,resample=44100 -ao pcm:waveheader /home/shivku/hdrive/Music/Green\ Day/When\ I\ come\ around.wma && lame -m s audiodump.wav -o /home/shivku/hdrive/Music/Green\ Day/When\ I\ come\ around.mp3 You should, ofcourse write a script to go pick up all wmas and convert them to mp3s. If you are using MPlayer-1.0pre7try2 like me, make sure you get that -af part right... af volume=2:sc,resample=44100
without the volume part there, mplayer seems to crash. It is apparently a bug. Also, -waveheader is deprecated..It is gotta be, -ao pcm:waveheader Ensai! | | Monday, March 13th, 2006 | | 10:48 am |
Barcamp @ Chennai
Well, Going to chennai to meet mom and dad or for a carnatic concert...Everybody does that. But, never in my willdest dreams did I think I will get to chennai to attend a conference on web 2 dot oh and open source. It is heartening, really. You get to go to your home town and also get to listen and share things about stuff that you are doing or always wanted to do. I was desparate, to the verge of being restless, about attending something in San francisco, where things like this always happen. Just like how no concert ever happens ONLY when I go there, conferences didnt happen either. And I come back, everybody blogs how they are going to meet a group of VCs who is roaming around 101 waiting to give them money. Here it is, Go check it out. I am beginning to see what I can do about as well. If you are planning to go, let me know. We will meet up there for sure. | | Friday, March 3rd, 2006 | | 12:30 am |
Save the endangered species called paisa
Recently, I offered to give chechi[1] 50 paisas as two 25 paisas. She threw her hand up in the air refused to take it from me.
"Nobody takes 25 paisas anymore".
I thought it was a one of case, or maybe she has gone mad. Little did I realise that many more ciggy shop owners ( peddlers) are going to tell me the same thing. Then it struck me.
"Paisa is going to get extinct"
There is just one more coin-gene pool left. The 50 paisa coin. Considering how quick the 25 has followed the 10 to the graveyard ( It is well inside my living memory and my living memory is not that long), I started getting jitters. Is paisa going to die altogether in another 10 years ? Also, Ours is possibly the only nation where paisas still have some value. Considering the value of a money in other "Rupee countries" such as pakistan, sri lanka or Nepal, I think there is a better chance of the paisa surviving in India. Is it not our bountiful duty to preserve it ? What can we possibly do? As techies, work endlessly so that we export quality software, create more demand, start more startups, increase FDI, increase forex and GDP, make the US pay for everything in rupees and somehow hope that the value of money goes up phenomenally. Or, just start donating paisa coins to the museum nearby and vow to take our kids to show them the wonderful world of paisas. Just my two, I mean 50 paisas.
[1] Mallu for sister. She runs a shop(kadai) and sells important goods. I spend more time at the chechi kadai than at home trying to do nasty things to my lungs. Current Mood:  annoyed | | Saturday, February 4th, 2006 | | 1:54 am |
LiveJournal Vs Blogspot! and a bit more
Google is probably going to tell you a much better answer about that.
But I could not resist putting thoughts about this on paper(blog, in
this case). Blogspot is full of illusion. It is like a "maya". At the look of it,
it is fanciful and does all that you want it to do. But, you gotta get
out of it. It is not the real world. As sunson once mentioned, "nothing ever happens" TM . Sure, you can do a lot of things, but what happened to basics ? Blogging is the lifeline of web 2.0. And you dont have a notion of communities,
You can't tag etc. But, my biggest problem with blogspot is the way
they have written their "Comments" module. It has to be better than
that.
Like</span> sunson has already pointed out, we are talking about blog and not a website. Nobody really visits a blog ever. Just as how
"Adsense" does not make sense, all those "Lotsa" things does not make sense either.
Just to say something original, I was talking to a first yearite in IIM
Bangalore about Business, startups ( I am damn interested in all of
these
things) and everything(Seems like my favorite hobby these days is to catch hold of an IIM MBA and talk to him about startups ).
He questioned Google's ( How comical will it be to give an outgoing
link to "google" ? Will that increase my Page rank ? :) )
business model.
Though not sure about the exact numbers, having close to 100% of revenues from Advertisement is not such a wise thing. Y! had a
similar stature six years ago and we all know what happened.
I told him "If newspaper(s) industry can survive close to 150 years
just on advertisement, I am sure Internet ( and hence G & Y ) can
too."
Someone once told me, an issue of the "The Hindu" would cost Rs. 125 , but for the advts it carries.
Do you disagree ? Leave a comment. I have a big theory behind this one and is probably material enough for another entry.
</span> Current Mood:  contemplative | | 12:20 am |
Jethro Tull - almost live in Bangalore
It was a different experience for me. Never have I been to a concert where I felt so ignorant and bored. Two things here: Ignorant. I knew a few songs of Jethro Tull and I went to see them primarily to start listening to them. And I dont think they have done that to me. Also, logically, these four or five are probably their most famous of songs. And they(which is mostly Ian Anderson) played about three from them. He didn't play my favourite song Acres Wild either which was quite a disappointment. So, during most part of the show, I was trying to see if the base pattern was a complex off beat or if the beats dont round of at multiples of 2. I don't think any such thing happened. I mean, I don't think they play complex music, or their music is so complex that I don't understand. Bored. The entire concert seemed like one big song. Beyond a point, I was actually Yawning and talking to a colleague of mine about how he intends to do "Automatic data QA". Guess that says it all. Some interesting stuff did happen. "Locomotive breath" , "Aqualung" for two. Ian's stage caricatures was another. Also, Ian wanted to celebrate Mozart's 250th year along with us. He played a medley starting with some kinda symphony, the scale of which I could not make out. He went on to play ( the all famous) 9th symphony with his own stuff. He also played a Bach and somebody else of whom I didn't know. Now this is stuff that people wont normally do. His accent was quite heavy and I loved it. He got most of us laughing. I remember this one clearly though it does not sound that hilarious: "When people ask me what they should do when they hit a lyrical block, I ask them to go to a 12 year old boy to write lyrics for them. Most of the time, he writes better and you dont have to pay the little bastard a penny". He apparently also hates Rock n Roll. Oh, something I am forgetting to mention is the Hindusthani Slide Guitarist who joined Thermal and a Quarter, who opened the show ( obviously). He was out of place and so was his music. I believe that each genre has it's own mood or character and any fusion attempt predominantly ends up spoiling both the genres. I am not talking about Pop or Rock, which is a very broad and loose classification. Hindusthani in a rock song before jethro Tull. C'mon guys, I am sure you can innovate better. Anyways, despite the hype my friend gave bout TAAQ, they were not too impressive. I did come back with an "Aqualung Live" by Tull and "Plan B" by TAAQ complementary CDs for sparing the time and spending 600 bucks with IIM Bangalore. Current Mood: calm | | Wednesday, February 1st, 2006 | | 8:27 pm |
I am here!
To hell with blogspot and all it's CSS and templates and other fancies. I want to reply when a soul comments and I want them all to be on my blog. I gave a bit of a try to somehow combine the goodness of both blogspot and LJ ( and I probably will). But, I dont have either the enthuse or the time to do worthless hacks now. Anyways, LJ, Please welcome me. Current Mood:  bouncy | | Wednesday, October 19th, 2005 | | 8:51 pm |
I use blogspot mostly. But at a later point, I mite be tempted to use LJ. I believe they have one of the best written "comments" module with them. But blogspot lets you do stuff with code. Now thatz what you want. Visit http://shivku.blogspot.com to read through my ramblings. |
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