Nixser.com

Zeitgeist, The Movie.

Yien Bin — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 09:51:47 +0000

I found these two interesting videos. Fact or fiction, make your own judgement.

Part 1

Part 2

Please leave your thought if these videos really make you think.

I am guilty!

Yien Bin — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 09:08:36 +0000

Gosh it is almost a year since the last update in this blog. Apparently I have lost all the passion for blogging, but I am not sorry for that. We human seem to get addicted to many things, at different times. I am guilty though, for leaving this blog deserted and became a hive of spams. For this I must apologize, I hate spams as much as any of you. I will try my best to filter out stupid spams that bypass Akismet, on a weekly basis hopefully.

Okay since I’m already here, allow me to share with you something that you probably already knew.

CodeIgniter. CI, Code Igniter has been my all time favorite for the past year. It is a PHP Framework that does wonders. Any php web programmer should seriously have a look.
Firefox3, this browser is storming the Internet. Regardless of the browser engine itself, the availability of countless Add-ons really makes everyone’s life easier.
Wordpress simply rocks. Endless surprises after I upgraded it to the latest 2.6.2 version. The new plugins management is a godsend, plus many other new features. This is why I am still publishing this blog post actually. I would like to test this version.
GTA4. Grand Theft Auto 4. It is everywhere! I am waiting patiently for its PC version.

That’s all for now, I wish I will be able to write more in the coming days. There are many things I would still like to talk about!

WordPress 2.3 Upgraded, along with some plugins.

Yien Bin — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 07:36:40 +0000

This blog has been upgraded to WordPress 2.3. It is recommended to upgrade because this release addressed a lot of bug. Details can be found here.

New features include:

Tagging - I used to have Ultimate Tag Warrior. Need some time to study on this.
Update Notification - You will be notified whenever a new release of WordPress is available, and new release of plugins.
Improved post and draft management - New “Pending Review” option.

For more details, please check here.

Here’s a list of plugins which I have also upgraded.

Please leave a comment here if you find any problem in this blog. Thank you.

Malaysia: The Internet and The Country.

Yien Bin — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 14:03:14 +0000

I have been terribly frustrated with some of the current issues in Malaysia. First, the Auditor-General’s Report 2006 outlined that ministries have been overspending with public funds. Including:

set of screwdrivers(brand unknown) for RM224, which only worths RM34 per set on the market.
Faber Castell Technical Pens for RM1,147 per set, which only worths RM160 per set on the market.
2 Tonnes Car Jack for RM5,741 per set, which only worths RM50 per set on the market.

These are no lies, though administration tends to label bloggers as liars. These report are from Auditor-General Malaysia(JABATAN AUDIT NEGARA MALAYSIA). I’m not in the mood to tell you more about this, please download and read the reports yourself.(In Bahasa Malaysia). More news on the TheStar Malaysia

Then, this Riot at Pantai Batu Buruk, Terengganu sparked off on a public speech organized by BERSIH(COALITION FOR CLEAN AND FAIR ELECTIONS, a NGO)last Saturday night. Live bullets fired at unarmed civilians by FRU(Federal Reserved Unit). Mainstream media claimed that the officer had to fire at the crowd as he’s been assaulted. Water cannon and tear gas are also used to disperse the crowd. Again, censorship from authority is heavily applied in news reporting of this incident. Now all the opposition parties have something to do with this, according to mainstream media.

Without Internet, some alternative voices cannot be heard, and without Internet, all our sources of Information will have to rely on mainstream media. There is no space for questions, no space for debates, and no space for freedom of speech.

Now, only I’ve realized. Why there is only one broadband ISP in this country, why I have been using a 1MB connection since 2003, and why I have been complaining about it. It is designed to be like this, for the governance need. The countrymen just can’t be allowed to grow too smart.

Malaysia: 50 Years Of Independence.

Yien Bin — Fri, 31 Aug 2007 14:02:15 +0000

Fellow Malaysians, Happy National Day to you all, for today is our country’s 50th year of independence. Are you satisfied with our country’s performance? Are you proud of our country’s achievements so far?

Most of my friends went for vacations, to Thailand, Singapore and some went to Hongkong. I have been staying at home today, had a mahjong session with my parents this afternoon, and rest of the time was spent thinking.

Young generation born around 1980’s in Malaysia, has seemed care less about the country. You can talk with them about latest movies, bistros, gadgets, cars, fashions, celebrities, or anything else, but not current issues in the country. Most of them will not have a clue about what’s really going on, even though they read newspapers, listen or watch news everyday. The traditional medias in this country have lost their credibility, heavily censored by the authority.

I live in Johor Bahru. We can reach Singapore in just around half an hour drive from here. Up to 50% of my friends here have got or pursuing their degrees in Singapore, just because they are unable to be enlisted in the courses they are interested in with local universities. Most of them ended up working in Singapore because they are bound to a three years contract by the Singapore’s government if they want to enjoy a lower tuition fee. Most of the time this is a one way ticket, sooner or later after their graduation, they will be granted a PR(Permanent Resident) status and given an Identity Card.

I have witnessed major development in Johor Bahru these few years. Although the Pandan Flyover Bridge project took 5 years to complete, I’m glad they actually made it before this national day. Danga Bay seems like a successful project too with all people going there during weekends. There is another Iskandar project going on just around my house at Nusajaya, news reported that this project has attracted RM 41Bil of investment from middle east country. There is a Ibu Pejabat Polis Nusajaya just 5 minutes drive away from house, too bad they have this after the serious rob and rape case.

I can go on for days and nights talking about this country but today is just not the day. My resolution for this country’s 50th birthday is: be strong, be open minded, be united, be competitive, and be transparent, dear Malaysia.

I don’t notice much posts in my RSS feed reader from local bloggers. Maybe they just care less nowadays, or disappointed with the current situation. Heck I didn’t even receive any sms to wish me Happy National Day. Anyway, I’ll list down those who actually posted something about national day here, be it good or bad.

Tell me if you have made a post about our National Day too.

Debian: HP Officejet 5610 Network Printing How-To

Yien Bin — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 09:18:22 +0000

Sorry I’ve been busy with a lot of paper works lately. I just bought a HP Officejet 5610 and has been printing quite a lot documents. This is an ALL IN ONE series, has the capability of scan, print and fax, ideal solution for small business environment. My previous HP PSC 1400 is passed to another friend.

I use my debian box to physically connect to the device with usb cable. Setting up the printer should be as easy as my previous HP PSC 1400 how-to. There’s one extra package needs to be installed for this model.

hpijs-ppds

This is a collection of HP printers’ ppd files. 5610 appears to be in it.

Sharing HP Officejet 5610

Following my previous how-to, the device should be running fine on the Linux platform. Now let’s share it on the local network. Here’s my Samba config file for printers.

Codes:


[global]

printing = cups               # tell samba that we’d like CUPS for printing

printcap name = cups
[printers]

comment = All Printers

path = /var/spool/samba

create mask = 0700

printable = Yes

browseable = No
[print$]

comment = Printer Drivers

path = /var/lib/samba/printers

[HP_OfficeJet_5610] printable = Yes printer name = HP_OfficeJet_5610 guest ok = yes use client driver = yes path = /var/spool/samba printing = cups

Note: Add necessary lines instead of copy and paste, do not remove your original config lines.

Restart your samba service after editing the config file.

Codes:

/etc/init.d/samba restart

Installing HP Officejet 5610 as network printer on Windows

On Windows machine, we need to locate the device. Use Windows Explorer and search your network. For fast access I always input following line in the address bar.

Codes:

\\ip_or_hostname\

You should see a printer name “HP_Officejet_5610″(as my samba settings). Double click on the printer will prompt you dialog to install the printer’s driver. Unfortunately, bundled installation cd has no available driver for user to extract. We have to look for alternative here.

Thanks so much to the CUPS team, they have a windows version of CUPS driver available. You can download it here. Download the .tar.gz or .tar.bz2 version on to your windows machine. Extract the file to somewhere on your desktop.

During the selection of driver, click “Have Disk”, and browse to the latest extracted folder, the driver file will be “cups-windows-6.0\i386\cups6.inf“, and there you go, print your test page.

You can repeat this step on any other windows machine you wish to access the printer.

Here’s a test page of Windows XP using CUPS driver.

Please share your experience with me.

References:

http://www.mail-archive.com/hplip-help@lists.sourceforge.net/msg03674.html
http://forums.xandros.com/viewtopic.php?t=19385&start=0

Debian: AmaroK Lyrics How-To, Automatically Load Chinese and English Lyrics.

Yien Bin — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 10:17:05 +0000

My second AmaroK entry, you can look at the first entry here. Auto loading lyrics has been an useful feature in AmaroK, it really saves a lot of time for me.

AmaroK with lyrics auto-loaded.

Locale Settings

First, you have to make sure that your locale environment is setup properly. In my environment, I’m able to input chinese(big5 or GB) and English, switching with hotkey CTRL-SPACE. Files can be saved in chinese file names(big5 or GB). It is useful if you can save your chinese music files in chinese file names, I will tell you why later.

Download This Script, Lyrics CN

This script is created by sanfanling. He’s uploaded the script to kde-apps.org. Many thanks to him.

However, the original version did not work properly for me. I had to tweak a small portion of the codes to make it work in my environment. Download my tweaked version here.(Please change the file name to ‘Lyrics_CN.amarokscript.tar.gz‘ after download, strange WordPress behaviour). It is a python script, you will need to have python installed on your system.

Install Lyrics CN

After you have the Lyrics_CN.amarokscript.tar.gz in place, open your AmaroK -> Tools -> Script Manager
. Click on ‘Install Script’ button to browse the location of the .tar.gz file and open it. Highlight the “Lyrics_CN” entry in the script list and click on “Run”.

How does it work

This script will make use of your media’s title, artist, and album tag information, send a query to various lyrics databases, including mp3.baidu.com, sohu.com, yahoo.com.cn, lyrc.com.ar and hk.music.yahoo.com. It is crucial that you have your media’s tags organized, so there is sufficient information for the query. Successfully loaded lyrics will be displayed in Context Browser -> Lyrics tab. The script will send query to baidu.com as default, if the lyric is not found, you will have options to search from sohu.com or yahoo.com.

Tips for Chinese Media Files

Always store your media files in chinese file names. For example, I always save music albums this way “Artist - Album/trackNo.title.mp3″, then make use of the “Guess Tags from filename” button in Track Information. In this way I don’t have to input the tags manually. Filename scheme for above file saving technique will be “%artist - %album/%track.%title“, make use of this feature will save you a lot of time.

As For Windows

Sorry, AmaroK is not for Windows. If you can read mandarin, and don’t mind using a full mandarin program, please try ttplayer. It has a very cool line by line lyric display feature.

Share your experience with me please.

WWW: BAYIMG.com, your new choice for photo sharing.

Yien Bin — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 15:28:19 +0000

bayimg.com

The pirates at piratebay.org, has rolled out another service for the community. BAYIMG.com is a brand new image hosting service which claims that this service is totally uncensored, which means they don’t really care what do you upload to the site, and most probably they won’t respond to any legal notice.

Don’t choose side now, whether you are a freedom fighter or MPAA/RIAA fanboy. What I want to emphasize here is the features of this new service.

There’s no registration needed. You can straight upload your image files on the main page. You keep track of your uploads yourself.
Tag Clouds. You are able to tag your files, and search for other images according to tags.
Removal Code. With each upload, you can specify a removal code along with the file. You can then remove the file anytime you want with the code.
Archive Uploading. You are able to upload ZIP or RAR files, each archive file will then be treated as an album. How cool is this?

This service is really simple and idiot proof. The site ranks 6528 at Alexa, just barely more than one month since they launched it on end of June 2007. These pirates have not only server administration skill, but also a very very deep pocket.

371 Games for Linux, Getting Rid Of the Linux Blind Spot.

Yien Bin — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 14:56:19 +0000

Most Linux users will have the impression that gaming on Linux will more or less involve Wine, to run Windows native games on Linux. Some hardcore Linux gamers prefer Cedega, a paid service offered by Transgaming Technology, developed based on Wine.

Most users are not aware that, there are also Linux native games available on the market. For example, Quake, Unreal Tournament 2004, and my favorite Neverwinter Nights. All these have Linux native versions available.

This is a list consists of 371 Linux native games, free or commercial, compiled by Zakk from icculus.org. Please spend your time go through it and see if you can find any of your taste. The list here.

WWW: Microsoft Censors Instant Messenging Conversations.

Yien Bin — Tue, 07 Aug 2007 14:17:43 +0000

This happens at server-side, regardless of which IM client you are using. Joost de Valk has discovered that MSN server is censoring messages that contain “.info” domain name in the line.

I’ve tested with pidgin, the server is indeed rejecting conversations with such input. Here’s a screenshot.

Well done Microsoft. What’s next?

Origianal Story.