In Nomine - The Lotus Land http://www.in-nomine.org The focused mind can pierce through stone... Mon, 14 Jul 2008 19:54:28 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=abc en Slow Terminal with xfce, alpha channel issues http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/07/14/slow-terminal-with-xfce-alpha-channel-issues/ http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/07/14/slow-terminal-with-xfce-alpha-channel-issues/#comments Mon, 14 Jul 2008 19:54:28 +0000 asmodai http://www.in-nomine.org/?p=243 I recently switched to using xfce on my FreeBSD desktop. Window Maker is nice but it was starting to feel a bit dated. Thus far I like xfce, but I had one problem with Terminal. Whenever I tried to resize it or switch desktops to one with Terminal open in it I could see it painstakingly render the window. Xterm and aterm didn’t exhibit this behaviour, my 3d was accelerated, and other screen drawing didn’t show problems either (do note I am using NVIDIA’s binary driver for my GeForce 8800, the nv driver from X.org is unusable at this point).

Someone pointed me at the environment variable XLIB_SKIP_ARGB_VISUALS=1. Once added to .zshenv, properly exported on my shell and an X restart later I find Terminal to zoom along as expected. It turns out that the NVIDIA driver doesn’t properly accelerate alpha channels.

]]> http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/07/14/slow-terminal-with-xfce-alpha-channel-issues/feed/ Email threading and breaking it http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/06/01/email-threading-and-breaking-it/ http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/06/01/email-threading-and-breaking-it/#comments Sun, 01 Jun 2008 08:02:21 +0000 asmodai http://www.in-nomine.org/?p=242 One thing that has been annoying me over the past years is that on mailinglists people with Outlook or Outlook Express clients tend to start a new thread by replying to an email in another thread. They remove the body, perhaps some cc: information, change the subject, write their body and send it off. Since Outlook supports completion for to: and cc: fields, it seems a bit of a timewaster to start a new topic like that.

But leaving all that aside, the worst part is that Outlook doesn’t show you all headers, in particular it leaves the References header intact, which means it is now a reply to an earlier post in another thread. And so threading is broken. You might think “why be annoyed over it”, well, the problem is that online mailinglist indexes use this information for proper navigating through a thread. Typically they provide a ‘next by thread’ and ‘previous by thread’ hyperlink to navigate, but the logical flow of the thread is now broken.

So whenever I see someone with Outlook do this, I send them a note about this in private and most often they adjust the way they work, since, like I stated earlier, starting a new message is actually even faster.

]]> http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/06/01/email-threading-and-breaking-it/feed/ src.conf on FreeBSD 7 for the average installation http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/05/22/srcconf-on-freebsd-7-for-the-average-installation/ http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/05/22/srcconf-on-freebsd-7-for-the-average-installation/#comments Thu, 22 May 2008 12:13:26 +0000 asmodai http://www.in-nomine.org/?p=241 If we consider common available technology and the average use of a FreeBSD installation as desktop or server then I think these are sensible defaults for /etc/src.conf under FreeBSD 7.

WITHOUT_ATM=yes

How many of you run ATM to your FreeBSD box?

WITHOUT_BIND_DNSSEC=yes
WITHOUT_BIND_ETC=yes
WITH_BIND_LIBS=yes
WITHOUT_BIND_MTREE=yes
WITHOUT_BIND_NAMED=yes

Do you really need a full installation of BIND on your machine? In most cases you simply need a caching, recursive resolver. For this just install unbound (found in ports/dns/unbound). Do note that I did not specify WITHOUT_BIND_UTILS so tools like dig and nslookup will still be installed. Only if you need an authoratative nameserver might you want BIND. On the other hand, you might prefer to install NSD (ports/dns/nsd).

WITHOUT_BLUETOOTH=yes

Most systems will probably not use Bluetooth at all.

WITHOUT_I4B=yes

Do you even use ISDN?

WITHOUT_IPFILTER=yes

Most people I know use either ipfw or pf, so little need for ipf.

WITHOUT_IPX=yes

You seriously still use IPX? Even NetWare is IP-native nowadays.

WITHOUT_NIS=yes

I would hope most systems are using some sort of LDAP lookup nowadays. NIS seriously doesn’t scale.

WITHOUT_SENDMAIL=yes

Given the ease of configuring Postfix, why would one want to bother with the archaic syntax of Sendmail? It has served faithfully for many, many years, but its design and configuration are archaic.

]]> http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/05/22/srcconf-on-freebsd-7-for-the-average-installation/feed/ 25-year old readdir() bug fixed http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/05/09/25-year-old-readdir-bug-fixed/ http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/05/09/25-year-old-readdir-bug-fixed/#comments Fri, 09 May 2008 10:30:59 +0000 asmodai http://www.in-nomine.org/?p=240 Marc Balmer (of the OpenBSD Project) investigated reports of weird filesystem behaviour and found a 25-year old bug in the BSD libc implementation of readdir().

The fix should be in the trunk of all BSDs now and scheduled for merges or backports soon (e.g. see http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/cvsweb.cgi/src/lib/libc/gen/readdir.c revision 1.15’s diff).

]]> http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/05/09/25-year-old-readdir-bug-fixed/feed/ Better layout http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/05/07/better-layout/ http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/05/07/better-layout/#comments Wed, 07 May 2008 20:18:11 +0000 asmodai http://www.in-nomine.org/?p=239 The website should now look a bit better again, especially on the reading side.

]]> http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/05/07/better-layout/feed/ The stars in your eyes http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/04/27/the-stars-in-your-eyes/ http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/04/27/the-stars-in-your-eyes/#comments Sun, 27 Apr 2008 11:25:14 +0000 asmodai http://www.in-nomine.org/?p=238 Your smile goes so deep,
it makes me happy and I wonder
if I can ever find a star
that matches the brightness of your eyes.
The curve of your lips hides nothing,
everything is there in plain sight.
It is all so simple, yet a beauty beyond compare.
How can I protect that smile of yours?
When I lay the moon and stars at your feet,
will you keep smiling for me?
Or is it better to leave them in the sky above,
so I can catch their reflection in your eyes
as you move ever closer and closer and closer…

]]> http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/04/27/the-stars-in-your-eyes/feed/ Being an author http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/04/27/being-an-author/ http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/04/27/being-an-author/#comments Sun, 27 Apr 2008 11:18:48 +0000 asmodai http://www.in-nomine.org/?p=237 There are no clouds of boredom in my living sky,
no lack of purpose as time passes by.
I grasp the moment with all my soul,
firm, yet gentle, of my own destiny I take control.
Shaping, like a potter, form from naught,
organically grown, the shape at end matters not
for it is the experience itself, the path I took
that writes the chapters of life in my book.

]]> http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/04/27/being-an-author/feed/ Help flu research in BE, IT, NL, and PT http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/04/23/help-flu-research-in-be-it-nl-and-pt/ http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/04/23/help-flu-research-in-be-it-nl-and-pt/#comments Wed, 23 Apr 2008 08:14:21 +0000 asmodai http://www.in-nomine.org/?p=236 For a few years now there’s been a website in the Netherlands and Belgium that asks participants to fill out their details on a weekly basis with regard to cold and influenza symptoms.

After that there was a Portuguese site doing the same thing.

And now there is an Italian site as well.

There is still not much known about migratory patterns and occurences of the flu within the world, these websites will help create more understanding, so please help them out. It will take a maximum of 5 minutes per week, but the information is very useful for scientists (virologists).

]]> http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/04/23/help-flu-research-in-be-it-nl-and-pt/feed/ Haka ka mate and Sipi tau http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/04/20/haka-ka-mate-and-sipi-tau/ http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/04/20/haka-ka-mate-and-sipi-tau/#comments Sun, 20 Apr 2008 12:28:17 +0000 asmodai http://www.in-nomine.org/?p=235 New Zealand starts its Haka ka mate but then get interrupted by Tonga with their Sipi tau. Every time I watch this my skin gets goosebumps. Quite powerful when you see them perform against each other like this.

See this post about the text of the Haka ka mate and this for the Sipi tau.

]]> http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/04/20/haka-ka-mate-and-sipi-tau/feed/ Microsoft IME 2007 on Windows x64 http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/04/20/microsoft-ime-2007-on-windows-x64/ http://www.in-nomine.org/2008/04/20/microsoft-ime-2007-on-windows-x64/#comments Sun, 20 Apr 2008 11:25:04 +0000 asmodai http://www.in-nomine.org/?p=232 So I was updating my input method editors (IME) from the default in Windows x64 (IME 2002) to the ones provided by Office 2007’s language packs. As explained in a previous post of mine you can install the proofing tools and input by passing LAUNCHEDBYSETUPEXE=1 to the execution of the MSI. Now, on my Windows x64 I installed the IME by installing the IME64.MSI with this added variable. The weird thing was that some applications worked flawlessly and yet others showed me the wrong number of icons or no icons at all! It turns out that these applications are 32-bits applications and need to have the 32-bits IME installed as well. So next to installing IME64.MSI of the language you want to install, you will also have to install IME32.MSI. Only after doing this will you notice the applications working as you want them.

Thinking back on it, it makes perfect sense, but while you are in the middle of working with it you keep wondering: “why?”

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