And yet, another desktop screenshot

Man, I'm getting hooked on this wallpaper stuff... What a hell, it is free after all.

A new desktop

Got it from here

Denial, anger, acceptance

My iBook died the Logic Board Death, on September 30th, 2005. I have tried everything I could to make it breath again (the Reed switch, the "shim" fix, etc) but nothing worked. It is time to move on :)

So, I decided to let it part, disassembly it, and split the pieces for future boxes; the AirPort card went to Thor, my QuickSilver, and the HDD, a 20 GB one, got reassigned to the Compaq Presario. 20 GB is nothing, but the Compaq had a 5 GB one, this one looks amazingly huge.


By following the guide from Ifixit the whole process was easy enough, the only important thing is keeping the order of the removed screws. The toughest screw to remove was one of the two that hold the CD drive in place.
Compared to the iBook, the Compaq Presario took only 5 screws, and less than 20 minutes to disassembly. ITOH, the HDD on the iBook was really, really protected, given the situation; the drive was connected to the iBook but protected with rubber shock absorbers. Not such thing for the Compaq.

The Compaq, once asembled once again, with a whooping 20 GB HDD already up & spinning, and giving it a test drive with Ubuntu (booted from the CD). On the Compaq's screen it is the old iBook partitions, etc.

And the Queen, assembled again as well, as usual, putting it back together again was far more easier than splitting it open. It amazed me how "weak" is, in the end, the whole iBook.

Os X wannabe (on Linux) Pt III

Yet another screenshot of a Linux desktop, modded to look like Os X. The instructions, which you can ind here: Make Your Linux Desktop Look Like A Mac - Mac4Lin Project Documentation.
This time the instructions, which are five pages long, are aimed towards making your faux Os X look like Leopard, and includes steps even on how to add Apple sounds to events, and what today is the coolest Linux Dock available: Avant Window Navgator (Awn).
This howto is more or less specifically for Linux boxes running Beryl or Compiz composite managers.

In praise of the arrow, screw the TIbeam stick!

I like to be able to customize my mouse pointer shape, no matter what operating system I'm using, without any doubt, the one has it the easiest is Windows, at least, until XP that is, I haven't test it on Vista yet.
Even on Linux/ FreeBSD I have been able to customize those.

On os X things are not that straight, there is a program called Mighty Mouse (paid) that allows you to change all your mouse pointer shape, but there are some 'shapes' that seem to be bundled with the the apps, so you are out of luck modifying those.

One of those is the dreaded 'TIbeam', the one used to select and over regular text, I don't know why, but I have always hated it, no matter what operating system I use.
So, if you want to change the shape of mouse cursor on the Terminal, all you have to do is replace the file:


/Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app/Contents/Resources/TIbeam.tiff

for the shape of your liking.. You have to do this, open the Terminal, and type:


cd /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app/Contents/Resources/ ENTER

and then copy your original file onto a backup:


sudo cp /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app/Contents/Resources/TIbeam.tiff /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app/Contents/Resources/TIbeam.tiff.ORIG ENTER

type your administrator password, and then copy the mouse pointer shape of your liking on top top of the old one:


sudo cp /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app/Contents/Resources/yuorNewCursor.tiff /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app/Contents/Resources/TIbeam.tiff ENTER

Quit the Terminal, open it, and you'll have the new pointer shape up &amp running.
Unfortunatelly, this will not work for all of the apps on Os X, many if them have the mouse shape already embedded on the same app binary, see this link: Offscreen Graphics Worlds, Worlds, Pictures, Cursors, and Icons, scroll down to 'Cursors'.

Pictures of Thor

A bunch of really, really crappy pics of Thor, my QuickSilver. These are with the ghetto AOC monitor, I'll get a few pictures with the new Samsung monitor, which rises a notch or two, that is, adds a lot of class to the setup :)





An aerial shot of the setup.

The effing heat is here again

So, once again... I hate the summer, and I really, really hate hot weather... And the summer it not really here, it'll start on December the 21st, but what a effing Hell.
I miss this post like if it was made on another epoch.

Widescreen glory

Today I got a new monitor for my QuickSilver baby, Thor. It is a Samsung, SyncMaster 920nw, 19" widescreen, the thing is simply amazing. Working on my previous monitor was a real PITA, way too small & really, really crappy, besides, the screen was loosing focus on many areas.
In order to be able to use this new widescreen monitor, I had to install a ROM update on the video card of the QuickSilver, which I got here: NVidia FCode flasher 1.1: Information and Download, courtesy of the Apple Docs site.
Without the ROM update, the native resolution (1440x900) of the Samsung simply wasn't available, so everything looked like sh*t.

A picture of my baby's face

A screenshot of my beloved little baby...
Did I mention that I simply love the default looks of Tiger? In my book, there is nothing like the bare naked desktop of a Os X Tiger install.

Get rid of window borders on VLC

I hate windows with borders, ever since I started to use Os x, that's why I post this, in case someone cares to vanish the borders of VLC; don't know when this started, but I hate it.
This is the original window, which looks way to 'Windows like' for my taste.

Open the VLC preferences, and goto 'Interfaces', and then to 'Main Interfaces', select the option 'macosx', and then de-select the option 'Embedded video output', click on Save.
You'll have to close the running VLC too...

Presto, your VLC will have no window border, except for the title bar.

Play count

One of the features I love the most of iTunes is the play count, here is a screenshot of my most played tunes, right now my library has 4817 songs, using 19.19 GB, and spanning for 11.2 days.
I took the time, or the effort, to listen to each and every song, and not until I did the whole list, before starting to listen to them once again.

Partitions, partitions...

This is how I partitioned my new system. "Thor" is my system drive, (and the hostname too) decided to go with 25 GB in case I go waco, and I decide to start installing a bunch of stuff on it.
On the "data1" Volume, I have placed my $HOME, and on the "data2" one, I'm storing my mp3's (with ample room to grow).


WDC WD800BB-40BSA0:
Volumes:
Thor:
Capacity: 24.75 GB
Available: 21.48 GB
Writable: Yes
File System: Case-sensitive Journaled HFS+
BSD Name: disk1s3
Mount Point: /
data1:
Capacity: 49.53 GB
Available: 29.27 GB
Writable: Yes
File System: Case-sensitive Journaled HFS+
BSD Name: disk1s5
Mount Point: /Volumes/data1



Maxtor 6Y080L0:
Volumes:
data2:
Capacity: 76.21 GB
Available: 68.06 GB
Writable: Yes
File System: Case-sensitive Journaled HFS+
BSD Name: disk0s3
Mount Point: /Volumes/data2

I have a new baby!

I got a nice deal for a Powermac G4, dual 800 MHz, with 2 HDD, 60 GB each; the only drawback is the amount of RAM, 512 MB, but I'll get that maxxed ASAP.
To me, it is like getting a Blackbird :D

Installed Tiger on it, updated to the T, and everything it is simply kosher.

Made a few customizations during the install, to get rid of crud I won't use (like all the printer drivers & all those foreign languages), and also, partitioned the HDDs to get my $HOME and my mp3 to a different place.