OpenBSD on The Thinkpad T60 (2)

A little follow up.
The WiFi seems more robust, at least compared to how OpenBSD performed with the WiFi card of the T60p.
Played a bit with the Window Managers that come pre-installed 9or part of the base system), TWM, CWM & FVWM, but in the end installed XFCE.
The problems I had before, apps crashing are still here, even tho I've raised the limits on the "/etc/login/conf" file.
Also, and this might be small potatoes for some folks, but it is really annoying how the mouse cursor icons changes all the time while running XFCE on OpenBSD... It simply refuses to honor the way I've configured those, they keep changing to the .
A total and royal PITA.

Customizing My Google Cursor

Yes, another one of those posts on how to get rid of the damn I-beam cursor...
I have a thing for cursors, specifically, for cursors that do my bidding.
Right now I'm using a very nice cursor them called Google Cursor, that, yes, tries to replicate the look and feel of the Chrome OS cursors, but, this being Linux, I certainly can customize my cursor icons the way I see like them...
Which is something that Chrome OS don't let you do... At all..

These are the changes I made to the Google Cursor theme to suit my needs, after installing it on ~/.icons/

cd ~/.icons/Google_Cursor/cursors/

cp xterm xterm.ORIG
cp ibeam ibeam.ORIG
cp text text.ORIG

cp left_ptr xterm
cp left_ptr ibeam
cp left_ptr text

So... Cinnamon...

Yeap... Some tests were performed... Need to replace the OS on a couple of lappies around here sooner than later, so, testing time!
Following a a very brief and very disastrous stint with Sid, gave a shot at Cinnamon, first on Debian Stretch and then on Linux Mint 18, mostly because that is the last Cinnamon version that I like, it is stupid, but that version is the last one AFAIK that still has the pointy menu.
Yeah, I know, it is stupid, but what a hell, the Computer is Personal since 1981 or so, right?
Kinda like my ongoing obsession with mouse cursor icon customization.
Cinnamon looks great (specially on the high resolution screen of the T60p) but compared to XFCE, the lack of options it is big, big no-no.

Back Into The Reservation

Nope, definitively, I don't have to take the my Chromebooks onto Developer Mode...
After a short test with Crouton, I got the little Chromebook Pro back onto the full Google domains.

Yeap, I have done it in order to try to customize the damn mouse cursor shape, basically, to get rid, or rather, to change the dreadful I-Beam onto the lovely Arrow, but, again, I wasn't able to do, and this time it was even harder, Chrome OS no longer has any resemblance of a Linux file system hierarchy, at least, not in the traditional way... That is, there is no longer a /usr/share/cursors/xorg-x11/default/ directory... Not that being there helped at all in the past...
Anyways, back onto plain vanilla Chrome OS, I hate the mess that running Developer Mode does, and I think it doesn't makes or gives any advantage, since I can't do what I want with the OS.
I know it is stupid, but I do want to have the mouse cursors the way I want them.

Cascading with Style on Chrome

As a futile attempt to customize the cursor shape on Chrome OS I'm using a Chrome extension called Custom Stylesheet & Script, using this CSS snip:

body {

  cursor: default !important;

}

input {

  cursor: default !important;

}

But the thing works so so... And of course, it only works inside of Chrome.

The Current Chrome OS Desktop

Wow, the folks at Google did a major change with their Dock.
Pretty, pretty good.
I just hope Chrome OS would allow you to configure mouse cursor icons...
Anyway, I can dream all that I want.

To Dev & Write And Back Again

Well... The little Flip is back on the reservation.
That is, got it back under (full) control, even turned back from the Developer Mode.
The experiment I did to customize the cursor icons on Chrome OS went nowhere at all.
I'm pleasantly surprised as how easy got to be to get out and back onto the Google/ Chrome OS reservation.

Small potatoes? Big cursors! (II)

Ok, this is no news, I'm a schmuck, I know that already, but nevertheless, I can't believe I'm not able to customize my mouse cursors icon on Chrome OS.
I know, I know, it is not a big deal, etc. etc. etc But, what a hell, I want to be able to do such a stupid thing w/o having to do all sort of stupid crap on my box.

I went the same route, the same pain and trial and error passage, when I was using Os X circa Snow Leopard, (damn, man! That was nearly 8 years ago...)
Anyway, it even seems like it is harder to accomplish something like that on Chrome OS.
A real shame, since I find the hardware amazingly sexy and cool, specially the Asus Chromebook C302, not to mention the PixelBook.

Mouse Cursor Icons on the Chromebook

Yesterday moved my Asus Flip to the Developer Mode.
The idea is to customize the damn mouse cursor... So far it was useless, I failed miserably on the endeavor.

As always, all of this is with the sole purpose of getting rid of the dam I-Beam cursor, guess you could say that I'm on a crusade, since I've been doing this on every single OS I get my hands on.
On the chromebook, the cursor icons are stored on the directory:

/usr/share/cursors/xorg-x11/chromeos/cursors/

And the index.theme for the icon set is located on the directory:

/usr/share/cursors/xorg-x11/default/index.theme

With the contents:

Inherits=chromeos

What I've tried to use my custom cursors, so far was to create a directory on the $HOME for the user chronos, and place the cursor files there; tried using the directories ~/.icons/ and ~/.cursors/.
So far, the damn thing simply refuses to work, that is, it keeps using ChromeOS default mouse cursor icons.

Chrome OS: Configure Mouse Pointer

It turns out you can't.
You're stuck with the default ones,
So this means that once again, I'm stuck with the fucking dreaded I-Beam... It drives me the fuck nuts, besides, now I'm older and that damn cursor is harder to see.

Net Install Jessie on Thinkpad T60p

Started: 14:49 hrs.
Selected Install (doh!)
Partition HDD: 14:54 hrs.
Setup an encrypted LVM
Select DE: 15:10 hrs.
Selected: XFCE, SSH Server & Standard system utilities (of course)
That had to download 1098 files
Finished installing files: 15:48 hrs.
Finished installation: 15:50 hrs.

Login onto XFCE and selected on the "Welcome to the first start of the panel" to "Use default config".
First thing installed after the initial install. switch to a Virtual Terminal, login as root and:

apt-get install sudo

To modify the cursor the way I like it:

cd /usr/share/icons/Adwaita/cursors/
sudo cp xterm xterm.ORIG
sudo cp arrow xterm

The default XFCE theme looks rather ugly to me...

The Unity Desktop

Installed the Ambiance Touch for Willy theme on my Thinkpad W530.
 I like it, it is flat, the decorations and the windows are tiny, and it looks rather nice, spiffy and modern.

One thing tho, by default, the theme is called "Ambiance", and since I don't like to install themes under "~/.themes", I have renamed it as "Ambiance-Touch" and installed it on the global/ for all users location, on "/usr/share/themes/".
I d'loaded and extracted the tgz file on "~/Downloads", renamed the original directory "Ambiance" to "Ambiance-Touch" and then cd onto it, and edited the files:

• Ambiance-Touch/index.theme
• Ambiance-Touch/metacity-1/metacity-theme-1.xml

The index.theme file looks like this: (using my custom cursor!)

[Desktop Entry]
Type=X-GNOME-Metatheme
Name=Ambiance-Touch
Comment=Ubuntu Ambiance Touch theme
Encoding=UTF-8

[X-GNOME-Metatheme]
GtkTheme=Ambiance-Touch
MetacityTheme=Ambiance-Touch
IconTheme=ubuntu-mono-dark
CursorTheme=basic-goofy-black+
ButtonLayout=close,minimize,maximize:
X-Ubuntu-UseOverlayScrollbars=true

INTOH, on the metacity-theme-1.xml file, all I did was simply changing the name on the name tag, line 5.

Skype + Cinnamon: Mouse Cursor Shape Shenanigans

Cinnamon's own mouse pointer theme, accessed thru System Settings > Themes > Other settings > Mouse Pointer, it is the de facto way of setting those the way that you want it.
No matter if you edit the file:

/usr/share/icons/default/index.theme

If you fail to set the mouse pointer theme thru the Settings GUI, you are screwed.

That is why, after setting up the mouse pointer theme I like (basic-goofy-black+, of course!), I've noticed that, even tho the mouse shape was the correct ones all over the place, Skype simply didn't honoured the mouse pointer theme.
It changed it to something else, not the default, the white one, but a black version...
So, to correct that, and the theme all across the board, the way it should be, I had to edit the index.theme file mentioned above, and then logout and back in, and presto, problem solved.

A Subtle Mouse Theme

I love this mouse theme called Basic. There is certainly nothing basic nor goofy about it...
I specially love the set called "basic-goofy-black+" that has the inverted arrows, pointing toward the right.
The whole theme seems nice, and the icons are slightly smaller than the regular one, the one called DMZ-White or Black, which makes it look more elegant to me.

The Left Party Mouse

Moved the cursors from my Ubuntu box to the left.

Even tho I'm not left handed I've always loved left pointing mouse cursor icons, guess it comes from the old Netscape, which had left pointing cursor for the menu option selection.
Besides, I have a mouse cursor shape fetish going on for years...

Basic

I'm using specifically the one called "basic-goofy-black+".
Of course since I hate the text selection cursor, called "xterm" in Gnome, had to do this:

sudo cp xterm xterm.ORIG

sudo cp left_ptr xterm

Other related posts:

• Fade to black


• Adventures in Ubuntu Land: Mouse cursors

Fade to black

Today switched the mouse cursor from the stock Ubuntu white to black.
That isn't news at all -well, for it is...- except for the fact that there is a bug that doesn't allow you to change it (if you're running Compiz).

You don't only need to edit the file:

/usr/share/icons/default/index.theme

With the name of the cursor shape you want to use, but also be sure that the same name is reflected on the "index.theme" file of the actual theme you are running.

Customize mouse cursor icons on Snow Leopard

Or fuck off and die a slow death, I-Beam!

Well, took me a while, but I finally got rid (mostly) of the awful I-Beam cursor icon.
The idea of editing the CoreGraphics file went nowhere... So I installed Unsanity's Mighty Mouse.
Right now Mighty Mouse does not have an official Snow Leopard release, so it is necessary to use the one for Leopard.
There are some instructions floating around on the internet how to do so, like this one Changing your mouse cursor (OSX 10.6), but I found them to miss a part or not easy to follow; so here is my setup step by step.

Install APE, and then reboot.
Download Mighty Mouse, tested with "mightymouse-20b1.dmg", mount the dmg file, and then:

cp -R "/Volumes/Mighty Mouse/Mighty Mouse Installer.app/Contents/Resources/ui/Mighty Mouse.ape" \
~/Desktop/
cp -R "/Volumes/Mighty Mouse/Mighty Mouse Installer.app/Contents/Resources/ui/Mighty Mouse.prefPane" \
~/Desktop/
cd ~/Desktop/
cd "Mighty Mouse.ape/Contents"
cp Info.plist Info.plist.ORIG

Edit the Info.plist file with your favorite editor, it has to end like this:

        <key>APELeopardCertified</key>
        <true/>
        <key>APESnowLeopardCertified</key>
        <true/>

Then:

cp -R "Mighty Mouse.prefPane" ~/Library/PreferencePanes/
cp -R "Mighty Mouse.ape" ~/Library/Application Enhancers/

I had to create the directory

~/Library/Application Enhancers/

.

Logout and then log back in, and start using it.
Been using it for the last couple of weeks without any issues on 10.6.5, even tho I have a valid license from when I was using Mighty Mouse -the PPC version- on Tiger it seems like Unsanity has changed its registration process, so it doesn't work; nad incidentally, everything seems to point that Unsanity is out of business so I guess I'l have to keep using this unregistered version, which has nagging window now and then.

Related posts:

Small potatoes? Big cursors!
The fight against IBeam goes on
The fight against IBeam goes on (and on...)
The fight continues...

The fight continues...

Yeap, I still have this damn thing going around my head, I can't get it out of it... I simply hate the I-Beam cursor, there is no other way around that...
A couple of more links I've stumble upon the matter

Changing your mouse cursor (OSX 10.6)
OS X Mouse Pointers as a Metaphor

The fight against IBeam goes on (and on...)

Couple of (more) link regarding the dreaded iBeam replacement:

Cursor Theme，鼠标指针的主题
Cursor Theme，鼠标指针的主题(2)
Theming,theming,theming!!!

Those are, obviously, in Chinese :D
It looks like cobranail has gone far onto the subject, but on Tiger...

Why, why Apple??? Why on Earth you make this hard to simply customize an already existing cursor icon? I don't want to add new ones, nor animate them, nor make them things that you wouldn't aprobe... I just want to replace the fucking IBeam with the plain vanilla arrow!

The fight against IBeam goes on

Last night hit Google hard searching for a solution to this, I simply fucking hate the IBeam piece of crap icon!
The cursor icon set is hard coded, there is no way around that, or so it seems; the trick with Terminal's own IBeam is just a tease, to to the same globally, there is no other option than to (HEX) edit the CoreGraphics file... Boy, that looks like a lot fun... Fuck me.
These links are old, solutions that once worked... Well, it looks like it is going to be a funny next couple of days...

Cursor in CoreGraphics in 10.4
Cursor para zurdos
Help me find default cursor
NOOB trying to change Cursor: Mac os x 10.5.6
OSX Cursors location found
Editor Hexadecimal para Mac: Solucionado

Also, there is this safety net, which is exactly the opposite than the above... Or is it? Installing a haxie, for a different OS version, doing nasty symlink stuff, and all of that to use a product from a company (Unsanity) that seems to be closed...

Unsanity's Mighty Mouse DOES work on leopard !, Easy Hack
Leopard and non native crypto libraries

Why the hell does Apple make this hard to do such a trivial thing?