vimalg2

This is a concrete step in taking the fight to Microsoft's turf - corporate networks.

Now, all they need to do is allow someone to build a sandboxed IE6 instance inside Chrome so those networks still on IE6 for 'enterprise compatibility' can make the switch too. (of course, I'm jokingly referring to those companies that have critical internal sites, that depend on IE6 and custom plugins and other heresy)

This worked for me on GNUlinux/Firefox 3.6

103 contacts imported.

I decided I wanted a backup, just in case <insert_screweduser_scenario_here_>

1) Join a gym. Lift progressively heavier weights. Its fine if you stick to Deadlifts, Squats, and Bench-press (all preferably with free weights) i.e the basic [functional+compound] lifts. Make sure a trainer corrects you on proper Form or you'll injure yourself.

2)Pick a challenging puzzle/problem to solve during the lifting session.

You'll get over your confidence hangups and make bold strides forward in no time.

TVS Electronics India makes a cheap, decent 'Cherry Blue'-based mechanical called the 'TVS Gold' for around $30 (converted from INR).

I have one. I'm thinking of buying one for the day gig as well.

Pics: http://geekhack.org/showwiki.php?title=Island:7268&do=co...

Trivandrum, Kerala, India :

Rent+Utilities for a 750.sq.ft 2BHK (it was a steal): $90

512k unmetered Internet : $24

Occasional eating-out and groceries :$140-$150

and thats for 2 people (I asked my mum to move in with me after dad passed away)

*Cooking your own food for 2, costs the same as when I lived alone and ate out everyday.

Anything else is listed as a a 'luxury' in my Expense tracker. (and i'm the least frugal person in my immediate circle)

If you don't have a RSA key stored in your Ubuntu SSO account, they will provide a temporary password, that you have to change immediately after login.

Fun Things to do when the timer hits the low digits:

Start 'sudo rm -rf' ing twigs, branches, trunks of your filesystem.

I took a chance on /var before losing access to the instance. That was fun.

I was provisioned a Small instance (with the 1.7GB ram). Did everyone else get a Micro?

Unixbench 5.1.2 gave me a score of 133.5 on the one I booted. Anyone know if this is pretty much par for the course on a EC2.small?

BTW, I've gotten excellent unixbench numbers (around the 500 mark) on one of lsc's smaller Xen instances(512M from prgmr.com)

Efficient secure Snapshotted backups. It says so in the 'Design' section. (maybe that ought to be on the front page as well) http://www.tarsnap.com/design.html

We've been using name.com at work and for personal use for over 2 years.

Its clean, no BS, and just works.

Second, it lets my boss deposit cash as name.com prepaid 'credits'; so, I can act on domain purchases/renewals without running to the accounts guy everytime.

I hear namecheap does the 'credits' feature too.

I think thats a really great idea.

I sure would like a 'hard way' courseware for C. (in addition to my trusty copy of K&R C for reference)

I agree with this.

And I ride in Trivandrum, a city in South India with aggressive drivers who get mad when they have to slow down and get caught in the really intense sun, minus air-con. (I've noticed a lot of middle-class folk here save on fuel by skipping air conditioning in city snarls)

Never ride on pavements.

Never ride on the edge/shoulder especially in India where a 'shoulder slip' could easily leave you with a broken neck.

Never ride near the dividing line.

Ride in the 1/3 of the road that lets you spot and recover from surprises served up by pedestrians AND Learn cross-steering if you ride fast on a road bike.

Being visible and noticed early-on is the key to survival.

Being 'in their face' is an effective way to stay alive.

IIRC RHEL still depends on Python 2.4 for a ton of internal administrative scripts. Nobody at Redhat wants to mess with the wiring in a working system.

Interesting... Dropbox apparently does this.

This explains why adding the ubuntu netbook iso image to the Dropbox folder, synced in milliseconds.

My friend was going a little nuts wondering if Dropbox choked.

Sadly, the general population is not familiar with the concept and its inherent sanity.

Imagine the first time you read the phrase, coming from a un-informed background.

Thats pretty much the way, the everyman is going to back the government on this arrest -> for being a traitor to the government.

Honest elections DO require a paper trail, even with EV-machines

I found : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_Verified_Paper_Audit_Trai...

In other words, the system is tailored for good 'students', not great learners.

Autodidacts are viewed as social misfits who do not like working with others. I can attest that this generalization is not true as far as I am concerned.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autodidact

This is what i've come to experience myself. Often a solid grasp of the core fundamentals of your domain is more valuable that having a half-baked knowledge of various in-depth areas.

Like the old man said, (or didn't) , You can always google it from your exobrain.

I even recall Sherlock Holmes' character saying something to that effect; he says something about the human brain having finite usable storage capacity (with a low-enough access-time). I really liked reading that quote (confirmation bias. he he)

This speech shook me rudely awake , reminded me of my post-college long-term life goal(one that makes a contribution to human wealth). My goal is to build a excellent institution of learning, to train the dreamers and doers of tomorrow(not mutually exclusive). This place would rival the IITs in depth of knowledge imparted but would strive to create more well-rounded individuals who would be masters of their own destiny. I feel sad when the cream of India's IITs today prefer to chase that money-minting Investment Banking career or accumulate advanced degrees state-side for a career in academia. I'm not sure if this indicates a problem with their admissions filter. (IIT = http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Institutes_of_Technology)

In India, Education is a capital-intensive , profit-maximizing beast of an industry. The admissions racket is huge. Parents often have to 'donate' (fork out) insane amounts of cash (by Indian income standards) to 'reserve' a seat in an Engineering/medical school. (except the IITs and govt-colleges, BTW)

Breaking into the market requires a large windfall and the ability to invest it wisely in order to build the foundation of such an institution. I'm thinking tech startup route naturally, since that is the only thing that comes to mind w.r.t immediate skill scope.

I suffered no end of anguish when trapped in the rote-learning institutions i'd been shuffled through. At the very least, I dream of hacking it slightly for the better, for my unborn children's generation's sake.

Does anyone in America have the same thought, or are your institutions of higher-learning pretty much satisfactory? This article refers to High-school and onwards, while my focus is slightly narrower : the undergraduate 'professional' education in developing countries; It changes whole families' economic statuses due to the current nature of the global market. We need more startups in India just like the US does.

I live in India and am a proud owner of a TVS Gold.

I got it for the equivalent of around $30 USD.

A mechanical switch keyboard is completely worth it, if you're like me, and want to feel pampered when typing. It also boosted my untrained typist- WPM by 10 instantly. Its that smooth.

I believe it uses 'Cherry Blue' switches, and the key surfaces have an concave curve that invites your fingers to caress them. For hacker folk, stuck using membranes for whatever reason: you don't know what you are missing; Seriously.

Get a good mechanical keyboard today! Don't pinch pennies and stress your bread-and-butter body-parts. Lots of folk smuggle these back to the States. Ask your mates with family in India to help you out.

Some TVS Gold Pr0n: http://geekhack.org/showwiki.php?title=Island:7268&do=co... (warning: around 2MB of image content)

Like somebody wise once said, you should always surround yourself with people smarter than yourself in order to grow.

If you can't do it in the real world because of your geography or the quality of your physical peers, Hacker news is the best place to hang around, particularly if you're a comput(er/ing) enthusiast.

Yes, its a useful trick I often use. However, does anyone know if Chromium or Opera can do the same DNS request tunnelling? (Firefox+Linux is sluggish for me.)

I did the same thing around 6 months ago, except I refined it into 2-phases. I got a Core2Duo E7500 and overclocked it well with a CM Hyper212+ heatsink+fan, for my worskstation.

Spent the money saved on high quality Power supply, case and motherboard.

The next upgrade is a top-of-the-line Core2Quad when local distributors slash prices on those to dump their old stock.

I'm aware there is a trade-off in Electricity consumption Edit: technical typo

I pretty much use Monit for everything. (Though I wasn't aware of supervisord.)

I'm always looking forward to infrastructure/scaling/systems-engineering posts like these.

Trivandrum, India.

I wonder if non-indians can pronounce the official name. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thiruvananthapuram

I think its the mindset that security and IT is just a cost-center, in Big Government Bureaucracies. I'm sure that military personnel at GroundZero everywhere understand operational security, since their lives likely depend on it. Its just that, as usual, people behind desks, don't really appreciate what getting getting sunk by loose lips feels like.

Come to think of it, I read a lot of fiction and sub-consciously engage in filtering out the fictional content from the real-world facts in the text.

I'm inclined to believe, that this has helped me become a better filter for the noise/B.S from the real-world too. :)

Perhaps her real name is kinda hard to use as a handle. Hint: whois query.

All the best, woman.

This is something that Gmail does really well right now, what with the new 'Send via SMTP' feature. When I use a secondary account to send from my 'control center' account, the email appears in the SENT items in both accounts. Double Win for records.

Any improvement over Gmail/Apps search index is worth a look. Thanks.