It’s always painfully annoying when your hard drive dies on you (especially if you haven’t made any backup). This just happened to poor me. :’( Fortunately enough, I have got into the habit of making weekly backups of everything I have. In other words, I didn’t lose any data at all. This should be a lesson to all of you who doesn’t back up your important files!

Anyway, I therefore needed to move my iTunes library to a new drive. It turned out that there is no easy way of doing so, especially if you haven’t selected the option in iTunes to “keep iTunes media folder organized”. I didn’t want to lose all the metadata (ratings, plays etc.), so I tried to find an alternative way. I eventually found a method after digging around in forums (pretty hard to find) which worked out alright in the end, involving modifying all the paths in the iTunes XML database file.

1. First of all, just in case something goes wrong, backup your iTunes library data (make sure iTunes is closed before doing so). These files can be found in <user-folder>\My Music\iTunes+ for Windows, or in /Users/<username>/Music/iTunes for Mac.
2. Move your media library to the new location if you haven’t already done so.
3. Start iTunes and select “File -> Library -> Export Library” in order to export your library XML database file. Save it wherever you want, e.g. on your Desktop. Close iTunes when you’re done.
4. Open Library.xml in a text editor in which you have a “find and replace” function. Notepad in Windows is not good enough for this purpose, I would instead recommend Notepad++. On Mac OS X, TextEdit would work fine for this purpose, but only if it is set to plain text mode (not RTF mode). The point is that you need a plain text editor.
5. If the only thing that changed when you moved your files is the drive name (Mac) or the drive letter (Windows), then do a find and replace and change the old drive name to the new name. For example, “wdDrive” -> “LacieDrive”.
6. This will take a few minutes depending on the size of your media library. Make sure to save when finished.
7. Now, open up iTunes and delete all the files, which you moved to another location, from iTunes. You can do this by selecting them and then right-clicking on them and choosing delete. If prompted, make sure to select the option for keeping them.
8. After deletion, import the previously modified Library.xml by selecting “File -> Library -> Import Playlist”. Depending on the size this can take a long time. In my case it took about 15 min.
9. Done. Check so that everything turned out fine by playing some of the songs.

It seems like Apple should provide an easier way to do such an essential task as updating your file paths after moving your media library. Hard drives die all the time, right!

xev

Remember or write down the key code being showed when pressing the key you want to remap to. In my case I wanted to use the key just next to the space key – keycode 102.
After finding the information with xev, you have to use the command xmodmap.

xmodmap -e 'keycode 102=space'

That’s it! Now you have two space keys; the broken one and the new one.

If you restart at this point the changes you made will be lost. You therefore need to make a shell script and make it run at start-up.

#!/etc/bash

xmodmap -e 'keycode 102=space'

Save this to whatever folder and file name you prefer (for example ~/scripts/remap_space.sh). You thereafter have to make it executable.

chmod u+x remap_space.sh

There’s many places where you can put your start-up scripts, it all depends on your distribution. One place that usually works is /etc/rc.local. Edit the file by using the following command (this depends on your distro and which applications you have installed).

sudo vim /etc/rc.local

or if you prefer the simpler text editor nano

sudo nano /etc/rc.local

Add the following to the end of rc.local.

exec /PATH TO YOUR SCRIPT/script.sh

for example

exec ~/scripts/remap_space.sh

Now you can restart your computer without the remapping disappearing.

Awesome could best be described by one word ‒ Awesome. I was never very fond of this slightly adolescent word used heavily by characters similar to Kelly from The Office. Nevertheless, I have come to change my mind lately, due to my entry into a new and exciting world consisting of tiling window managers. They always seemed a bit too hackerish, strange, and difficult to use for my taste in the past, but having used the tiling window manager named Awesome for just 4 days has made me completely change my mind on this point.

It truly is awesome! Blazingly fast, even compared to my previous choice of a quite ascetic and light weight window manager; Openbox, and way more efficient and fun than anything else I’ve used in the past. There is, however, a steep learning curve and you are required to spend some time learning and studying all the necessary keyboard shortcuts and also how to create a pop-up menu, your own shortcuts, auto-start of programs etc., by using the programming language Lua.

Tiling window managers work in a quite different way from standard floating window managers. It’s purpose is to enable you to work quicker by using the keyboard almost exclusively the keyboard.  In normal tiling mode, you cannot move around your open windows, they are always side by sides (tiling). You can change the size, change the layout and position of them with keyboard commands. In Awesome there’s a mode for making the windows floating for situations when you want to use for example GIMP which needs to have several windows floating around. Since there is no window decorations by default, you need to use a key command in order to initiate movement of the window, but it’s quite easy, just press one keyboard button (Win key) and then the mouse button. The strength of it is that you don’t have to think about where to place your windows, it handles this automatically for you.

It should be said that it is a requirement to be quite familiar, and even to have a preference of using the command line, so if you have only touched the desktop part of Ubuntu or coming directly from OS X or Windows, I would advice not to dive into this environment head first. That experience could turn out to be damaging for your view of Linux in general. If you on the other hand is a person with experience in the usage of Linux and even the command line from now and then, I can highly recommend to give it a try. It’s not for everyone, but if it fits your needs it can be a very interesting, inspirational and changing experience.

http://awesome.naquadah.org
http://openbox.org

My thoughts were that the decision to merge the Mac with iOS may make it even more restrictive than previously. At the same time, the introduction of the Mac Store will probably make the software development take off rather quickly making it more lucrative being a mac developer and put it into a similar kind of gold rush as the iOS platform is in at the moment. Nevertheless, my hopes lean towards that the Mac Store will coexist peacefully alongside the more traditional open and non-censored model of software development and sales.

However, if it turns the Mac into a hugely restrictive and controlled platform in the same fashion as iPhone I will consider leaving completely for Linux. I will definitely follow this development very closely and I’m really looking forward to seeing the outcome of this.

http://www.apple.com/macosx/lion/

This is exactly what happened about two weeks ago. A clever programmer named Eric Butler has written and released a Firefox extension named Firesheep on Github, making it freightenly easy for anyone without even the slightest knowledge in the field of hacking to hack and aquire access to anyone’s Facebook, Amazon, Twitter, etc. account in a matter of seconds just by double-clicking the victim’s displayed profile picture in the Firefox sidebar. The victim needs to be located within the same local area network at for example an obvious place such as a cafe or any other kind of open public wifi spot. The extension then collects information about the surrounding computers or smartphones, automatically downloads their profile picture from their at the moment used social network services and displays them in an easy and browsable way. If the attacker then wants to gain access to their accounts they just double-click the victim’s aquired profile picture.

This sounds like terrible news, but in reality I believe this to be great news. Finally companies will become aware of the security problems which have been there all along. It has been possible to make these types of attacks in a not to difficult manner through software such as Wireshark. It required way more knowledge before but anyone determined to carry it out could do so without to much trouble. Hopefully from now on this issue will recieve the attention it so badly deserves.

The good thing is that this problem can be corrected in a very easy fashion right now. Just turn on WPA encryption! That’s it! By doing this all packets transfered within the LAN will be encrypted and this technique will get completely thrown off. Cafe owners should turn WPA on and put up a notice with the password for anyone to see, or even put the password in the ESSID of the router. I also hope this will lead to the general public becoming more aware of the dangers concerning connecting to public WIFI spots from this point onward. People should always need to keep in mind that connecting to a public network means that there’s always apossiblity for someone to access your private and sensitive information if they so choose to.

Codebutler – http://codebutler.com/firesheep

I immediately installed Windows 7 and Ubuntu 10.04 on it and have been enjoying my new system ever since. I feel especially excited to finally be back on Linux again. Five years ago I used to use Debian as my primary system, so in some ways I feel like I’m finally back home again.

The new version of Ubuntu is a joy to use and is very much suited for first time users and is in my opinion easier to use than Windows 7; updates and installation of new software cannot be more simple, it beats Windows and OS X hands down on this point.
Nevertheless, I am now looking for a Linux system I can have more control over and I have recently been playing around with Arch Linux in a VM for this purpose. I think I will replace Ubuntu with this very soon. Arch Linux provides you with a very basic installation without a GUI, so it is up to the user to build it up and put it together to their own likings. I always want to learn more about how the OS works and I think Arch Linux can be very helpful for me on this point.

I am also very happy to now have a netbook due to its portability. I no longer hesitate to bring it wherever I go and it’s very nice to sometimes work and study from a cafe instead of from the too familiar and uninspiring place called home. I was previously thinking about getting an iPad, but have now, due to my newly acquired netbook, given up any thoughts about it. When it comes to doing real work and freedom of usage, iPad can unfortunately not compete with a PC.

ASUS Eee PC 1000HA
Arch Linux
Ubuntu

In parallel I use Windows at school and also for work and I don’t have anything against using it. On the contrast, I really like using the new Windows 7, which I find very slick and polished compared to previous versions. I also try to keep myself updated on the Linux side, which I used to use as my sole system for many years, so I hope and aim to stay objective during the never-ending OS war.
I found out after testing many other systems that OS X fits me personally very well, but at the same time I believe all systems are quite capable depending on which purpose you are using them for. I guess I just want to say, don’t be **** a fanboy!

Regardless of whether the issue is about OSes or VI vs Emacs, MS Office vs OpenOffice, PSP vs NDS, it all depends on what we want to do, we should choose the tool which we feel comfortable using, simply speaking, whatever gets the work done. Computers were made for helping us work, and when we work, we should use whatever tool can help us do that. Computers can certainly be a hobby too and from that point of view it’s nothing wrong to play around with other systems. I just want to say, don’t be a bonehead and a fanboy when it comes to work, use whatever is best for the task! It really annoys me sometimes when I read about people that stand by their favorite system no matter what the facts are. There’s way too much of that out there!

I can definitely understand if people have a very strong ideological view, for instance regarding open source, and choose their software according to that, but if you do that don’t say that what you are using is the best, in cases where it clearly is not. Just because you prefer using it doesn’t mean that it’s the best, try to get some perspective on things and look at the situation from a different angle.

I usually don’t rant about things, but I have seen a lot of useless, and rubbish comments in the last couple of days about the iPad, which made me frustrated to say the least. I get the comments about iPad being a completely closed computer, and I agree to a certain extent and find that aspect of it frustrating, but it seems like people are only looking at the bad side of it and completely shuts out everything else, unable to see the true potential of this device.

Open your eyes, and you will soon see.

Writing can be surprisingly difficult if you are not in the right mood for it. What can I do in order to make it easier to write? I realized that I probably have to do it on schedule, to force myself to write. Learning and honing my writing skills was the reason why I started blogging in the first place.

I believe it can be a very useful and handy skill to possess. In business it is of course immensely useful due to various obvious reasons, such as handling clients, promote yourself et cetera. However, it may certainly also come in handy in your personal life. Keeping in contact with old friends, requires discipline in writing, it is however at such times not necessary to write like a master, but it is important to be able to pull yourself up from the laziness and just do it. I am a master at failing in this area. If any of my old friends are reading this, I am truly sorry for my stupidity and I apologize for it.

From here on I will initiate a schedule based form of blogging, at first I will set the bar at once a week, and when I get comfortable with such, I will consider to increase it. So here it is, my resolution for 2010, to pull myself together and write more.
This doesn’t only apply to my writing. My ability to get things done, regarding personal projects, is unfortunately not very high. In the job area it is however not very difficult to get things done. If I am working at a project for a client I have to do it, that’s it, and I cannot fail my client I tell myself, but in my mind it is not so bad to fail myself.

This thinking can turn out to be quite problematic. There are so many things I would like to learn and do, but my self-discipline is sadly not enough to get on with it. I’m in the middle of studying web design, and it is fine as long as I just read and study it, but when it comes to starting and practicing on personal projects my self-discipline drags me down. I need to practice the things I want to learn, not only shallowly touch the surface of everything I study.

You can never get really good at something, until you practice, practice, and finally practice it a lot more. According to Malcolm Gladwell’s best seller Outliers, nobody can become a master at what he do until he practices it for at least 10,000 hours. That means 3 hours every day for 10 years! I have long way to go in many areas!

It is time to get real, time to dig down and get dirty. This is my resolution and promise to myself.

Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell

Just to mention a few of the tools I recently stumbled upon, I’ll start with Pixlr, a free to use application which mimics Photoshop and its functions. Sure, it’s very basic compared to Photoshop, but it seems to have all of the most common and useful functions which are needed for basic photo editing. It’s quite amazing that you can have access to a desent photo editing tool wherever you have access to Internet, for free and you don’t even need to create an account in order to use it.

Pixlr uses the Freemium model, articulated by venture capitalist Fred Wilson and later more deeply explored by Chris Andresson in his book Free: The Future of a Radical Price from 2009, which is essentially a free version and a paid premium version.
This leads me to another product which uses the same model; Evernote, the product which I’m using right now on my iPod Touch to write this post in. Evernote is a note taking tool to store and gather anything you need to remember. Thing that makes it stand out ftom the crowd is that you can access it basically anywhere. There’s a Mac OS X, Windows, iPhone OS, Android, Blackberry OS and Windows Mobile and WebOS client and if you can’t use one of those you can always access all your data from a web browser. The perfect memo pad if you ask me.

According to the founders of Evernote’s own podcast, their business model is to gain as many users as possible through the free version. If they can get only around 1 percent of those users to sign up for the premium version that’s enough. Did they succeed? They most certainly did. They created an amazing product with now more than 2 million users, and 1.5%(31 000) of those are using the premium version.

Another very useful tool I recently found is Etherpad. A document collaboration tool which lets anyone, whithout an account, create a document and after that anyone who is in possesion of the newly created URL to the document can join and start editing the document at the same time as the creator in real-time. Well, this is similar technology as Google Wave is using, but this one only focuses on the document editing and it does it, in my opinion, way better.

Some other useful web tools are, Kuler – a quite advanced color picker from adobe, 280 Slides – an alternative to PowerPoint and Keynote, Bespin – a editor for software code from Mozilla. Last but not the least all of the Google apps(Gmail, Docs, Reader, Calendar etc.), which of course is immensely useful and absolutely free (except the ads).