Talia’s Social Commentary Blog

For ages now I haven’t had the Adobe plug-in for Firefox installed. It’s popped up (as it does) numerous times to ask me if I’d like to install it, but as I go through the process, it doesn’t work.

Since WordPress.com has decided to show it’s blog stats with adobe now, I thought it was time to try it another way. The manual install. I guess this is a ‘how to manually install adobe plug in in firefox’ post. I guess I should have named it that…

I go the package from the adobe site, and downloaded the .tar.gz file.

Once it was downloaded, I opened it in archive manager, and extracted the files. I extracted them into my home folder, as this is the easiest place to access from the terminal.

In the terminal I typed:

:~$ ls
Desktop    firefox                Flock Blog Posts              Pictures
Documents  Firefox_wallpaper.png  gtwitter.exe                  thunderbird
Examples   flock                  install_flash_player_9_linux
:~$ cd install_flash_player_9_linux
:~/install_flash_player_9_linux$ ./flashplayer-installer

Copyright(C) 2002-2006 Adobe Macromedia Software LLC.  All rights reserved.

Adobe Flash Player 9 for Linux

Adobe Flash Player 9 will be installed on this machine.

You are running the Adobe Flash Player installer as a non-root user.
Adobe Flash Player 9 will be installed in your home directory.

Support is available at http://www.adobe.com/support/flashplayer/

To install Adobe Flash Player 9 now, press ENTER.

To cancel the installation at any time, press Control-C.

I pressed enter, and basically just said ‘yes’ or the equivalent, any time it asked me for the remainder of the installation.

DON’T have firefox open while you do this. If you do have it open, then close it when it prompts you later in the installation.

Now it will be installed, and all you have to do is open mozilla and check! I went to this site to check it out.

I’ve just installed Ubuntu again on an old tower Luke and I brought back from Melbourne that his Aunty Carol, and Uncle Greg use to own.

I thought I would document what I’ve had to do to it after installation to get it looking and doing what I want.

1. Changing Firefox’s icons.

I don’t know if it’s just because I installed using an older Ubuntu disc, or if that’s just the way it is, but I like the regular Firefox icons. This forum helped me heaps. I used the information AFTER the red writing.

My terminal looked like this:

talia@Talia:~$ sudo gedit /usr/local/bin/restore_mozilla_icons
Password:
talia@Talia:~$ sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/restore_mozilla_icons
talia@Talia:~$ sudo restore_mozilla_icons
Replace the Mozilla Firefox program icon (y/n)? [y] y
Replace the Mozilla Firefox document icon (y/n)? [y] y

Do you want to divert the original packaged files to alternate locations
(make the changes permanent) (y/n)? [y] y

Downloading and replacing icons. Please wait….. done !

Shall I reload the panel to apply the changes (y/n)? [y] y
talia@Talia:~$

2. Thunderbird.

I also had to install Thunderbird, as it didn’t come with Ubuntu. I just downloaded it off the mozilla website, then opened it with archive manager and extracted the contents into my home folder.Then I clicked on ‘thunderbird’, one of the last things in the folder. I clicked run, and it ran for me. Sweet. I then dragged it into the panel at the top, and wolah, it was there, easy to use!

Unfortunately there aren’t the right icons for it, and I am still figuring that one out…

I’m a little disappointed with how Thunderbird is working for me at the moment, and so I am trying something a bit different. I’m just going to access me gmail (which lets me access all my gmail accounts from the one main one, and all my RSS is google reader. I’ll write another post about that one soon.

3. Shared Folders in Ubuntu.

This is something that I’ve only just discovered this time round with Ubuntu, and just wondered why it didn’t work on my old computer.

System-> Administration -> Shared Folders

A box comes up and I chose to share it with Linux/ Windows systems, because the other computers in the house are windows. It downloads the packages and installs it by itself. :-D

I selected add, and then chose the file that I wanted to share, named it, and wolah, it’s shared. I made a point of adding my desktop as a shared folder as well because often I just quickly put things on there to access easily and imediately.

4. Keyboard Shortcuts.

System -> Preferences -> Keyboard Shortcuts. I changed the shortcut for closing a window to a simple Alt+q. I know that I really should have changed it to Ctrl+q, but on Luke’s apple the apple button is where the alt key is on my keyboard, and it’s easier for me to keep them both the same.

Again, this is something that frustrated me on my old computer, but with a bit of digging around, I’ve managed to change that this time round!

5. One Click Select.

Luke introduced me to the one click select, and I quite like it. Once I tried it it really just made sense to only click once instead of twice. To get this happening I opened a window, just one with some files or whatever in it. Folder -> Edit -> Behaviour -> Single Click to Activate Items.

It’s that easy.

If I can suggest a tip for those who are trying this out for the first time, HIGHLIGHTING is the option if you just want to select something, but you don’t want to open it. :-)

6. Changing Open Office.

At the moment I’m trying to print out my assignment, but as you may have figured, I haven’t set up the printer yet. So I’m having to save my documents onto a USB (still got yours Luke!) and take them out to another computer and print there. I did this just now, and none of my files would open- they were all saved as Open Office files!

It’s really easy to change this so that every time you save, it saves as .doc .

Open Open Office -> Tools -> Options -> Load/Save (you will need to press the little + button to open it) -> General

Now go down to ‘default file format’ and where it says, ‘always save as’ select the most recent Microsoft Word option. Done.

To change the file extension of what documents you’ve already worked on, just right click and select rename, then arrow over to the file extension, delete . odt, and replace it with .doc .

I am loving my decision to move to Gmail, particularly now that they’ve got a bunch of new things out. 20MBs of attachment size, and lots of things that were around before, like updating conversations (email histories), and gmail on your mobile.

Two new things that I really like, and that have made my night, is not only the ability to have multiple gmail accounts accessible from the one default log-in, but now also OTHER email addresses! I have added me Uni email, s0079405 (@) student.cqu.edu.au, and also my old hotmail account.

Being able to have multiple accounts was one of the reasons that I used Thunderbird before, only I could never get the hotmail or webmail to work. Now I don’t need to worry because it’s all there on my main email, 87purple.elephants (@) gmail.com.

One of the other things that I like is being able to press ‘forward all’, and forward all the messages in a conversation, not just the first one. Similar to ‘reply all’ which is something else I’ve only just discovered and LOVE.

One of the things that I love about Google is that it all fits together so nicely! From Google Docs, or Picassa, to Blogger, to Gmail, and all the rest in between, it just works.

I have lately become obsessed with Twitter- a site that lets you update what you’re doing so that everyone knows, and also lets you follow around what other people are doing.

I first heard about it on TWIT (this week in tech), a podcast with Leo Leporte, but that was ages ago (when it was the new ‘thing’, and I never did anything about it. I then read about it again on Jim Whimpey’s blog, and decided that I would at least sign up with an account- just to see what it’s like.

Twitter is a fair bit of fun if you have friends who are on it, and it is made even better by the fact that you can set it up to get a text every time one of your friends post, and also send via text message for just the cost of a regular text (that might just be my plan though, so don’t think that’s for everyone).

I was a little disappointed when I realised that there wasn’t a decent  ‘twiteriffic’ type program for linux, but then I found twitbin- a firefox plug in.

Twitbin has been really great for me, I keep it opened most of the time I’m on the internet, and it comes up like a miniature version of the twitter site.

I have had a few problems with Twitbin today, but yesterday was fine. I find that sometimes Twitter has problems actually, and this slows, and sometimes wrecks my twitbin, txt notifications, and even my notifications on twitter.com.

I  think that twitbin is great for me- it isn’t obtrusive, and it makes it a hell of a lot easier to post, just type it in and press enter. Txting is a great option as well- if your phone company allows it.

twitter.com/sunshinetalia 

So I may have lead you astray with my previous post about installing fonts in Ubuntu. I forgot that when I was working on my old computer I had previously installed kfontview to view and install my fonts. You can do it manually, and I will show you how to do that, but this is the easiest way. Thanks goes to Penguin Fonts for the info on how this works.

First you will need to install kfotnview, which is easy to do from a simple comand: apt-get install kcontrol If you’re not logged in as root though, this does present a problem, so I just sudo’d it to get that working. Here’s what my terminal looked like:

talia@Talia:~$ apt-get install kcontrol
E: Could not open lock file /var/lib/dpkg/lock – open (13 Permission denied)
E: Unable to lock the administration directory (/var/lib/dpkg/), are you root?
talia@Talia:~$ sudo apt-get install kcontrol
Password:
Reading package lists… Done
Building dependency tree… Done
The following extra packages will be installed:
kdebase-data kdelibs-bin kdelibs-data kdelibs4c2a kicker libarts1c2a
libartsc0 libavahi-qt3-1 libkonq4 libopenexr2c2a libpcre3 libqt3-mt
libxcomposite1 menu-xdg
Suggested packages:
khelpcenter kicker-applets menu libqt3-mt-psql libqt3-mt-mysql
libqt3-mt-odbc
Recommended packages:
perl-suid akode
The following NEW packages will be installed:
kcontrol kdebase-data kdelibs-bin kdelibs-data kdelibs4c2a kicker
libarts1c2a libartsc0 libavahi-qt3-1 libkonq4 libopenexr2c2a libpcre3
libqt3-mt libxcomposite1 menu-xdg
0 upgraded, 15 newly installed, 0 to remove and 239 not upgraded.
Need to get 36.8MB of archives.
After unpacking 105MB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]? y
(this bit goes on for AGES, so I’ve spared you the details)
talia@Talia:~$

Once all this is done you can get out of the terminal, and just download the font. If you’re like me, then this is all because of the Beginners Alphabet font. I have already emailed the font, and the spotted/ lined version to someone who asked me for it, and if you were after it as well, then give me a holler.

So, where was I? I download the font, and it should ask to open it in kfontview (don’t save it, just open it- though it doesn’t really matter if you save it…). You will most likely need to re-size the window in order to see the ‘install’ button in the bottom right hand corner. Choose system or personal (I like to do system, in case one day I have multiple users, but if there’s only you, then there’s not that much point… unless you’re logged in as root one time). You will need to use the root password to activate this most likely. Once you’ve done that though it is installed and ready to use!

Happy font using!

I’ve done a little cutting and pasting, and this is what PenguinFonts says about installing fonts in different ways:

By hand
If ~/.fonts does not exist, create it:
$ mkdir ~/.fonts
Copy the font, from the command line, run the following:
$ cp [fontfile] ~/.fonts
From the command line, run the following:
$ fc-cache -f -v ~/.fonts
or alternatively, log out, and log back in.

Installing for system wide use
Make the following directory as root:
# mkdir /usr/share/fonts/truetype/myfonts
Copy the font(s) into the newly created directory:
# cp [fonts] /usr/share/fonts/truetype/myfonts
Run the following:
# fc-cache -f -v

Installing Windows Fonts (eg. Times New Roman)
Make sure you have the “universe” repository added. If not, as root, modify your /etc/apt/sources.list and uncomment the deb line which will look something like this:
# deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu dapper universe
Then update apt-get:
# apt-get update
Run the following as root:
# apt-get install msttcorefonts 

Did you know that you can comment photos in WordPress blogs? Assuming they’re uploaded correctly that is.

Luke, my handsome fiance wrote this post about how to set it up so people can comment, and also how you can comment!

Happy Reading!

So when I finally post my new ‘installing ubuntu’ blog, you will know that I am unhappy with how Thunderbird is behaving. This is unfortunate timing for Thunderbird, because lately I have been looking through all the ‘new’ google apps.

I’ve always like Gmail, and to be honest, was a little sad when I switched to TB, because it meant I wasn’t using gmail on the web anymore. Google Reader is the RSS feature of google, and what with all my switching computers and rebooting etc. I thought that it made sense to start using that. It’s all online, and easy to access, which for me is a big plus.

Reader is VERY easy to use, and I like that I can put feeds into folders. For example, I have Luke’s blog feed, and his del.icio.us feed in one folder entitled ‘Luke’. When I view that folder it doesn’t discriminate  between any of the feeds, just shows me what the latest published thing was.

I like that everything is online, easy to use, and fits together. I’ll continue to use Google online for my emails and RSS, until I get sick or it, or want a challenge and try to fix whatever the problem is with Thunderbird.

Until then, feel free to ’stalk’ me on twitter: www.twitter.com/Sunshinetalia

My fiance sent me a message today that said I was ‘1337′. I inquired as to what that meant, but he wouldn’t tell me. Upon googling to tonight I discovered what Wikipedia says about ‘1337′, or ‘leet’.

Leet or Leetspeak (1337 or 13375p34k) is written form of slang used primarily on the Internet, but nowadays also in many online video games,^[1] which uses various combinations of alphanumerics to replace proper letters. The term itself is a degenerative form of the word “elite“, and the language it describes resembles a highly specialized form of electronic shorthand. At first the word leet was used as an adjective, to primarily describe the behavior or accomplishments of others in the community. In that usage, Leet generally carries the same meaning when referring to either the game prowess or, in original usage, hacking expertise of another person. From adjective form its use then expanded to include use as an expletive in reaction to a demonstration of the former qualities. With the mass proliferation of Internet use in the 1990s into the 21st century, Leet has since become a part of Internet culture and slang.

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

Urban Dictionary.com was able to give me a translation of the entire alphabet in this hacker language.

A language in which numbers and symbols are put together to look like letters. Some people create their own 1337 letters and it makes them look more 1337 by fellow 1337-speakers. Here is an alphabet of 1337 letters I know and have created:

A: 4 or l\ or ^ or @ or /\ or /-\
B. l3 or 8 or ß or ]3 or l:
C: ( or < or © or ¢
D: l) or l> or ])
E:3 or £
F: l= or # or ƒ
G:6 or 9
H: # or l-l or (-) or !-! or }-{ or }{ or l+l or )+( or !+! or }+{
L: 1 or ! or ][
J: _l or _/
K: l< or l( or l{ or l<=
L: l_ or ! or 1
M: l\/l or /\/\ or l\l\ or ^^
N: l/l or /\/
O: 0 or () or <> or * or ø or Ó or °
P: l* or l> or |D or l^ or l+
Q:& or (\) or ¶
R: l2 or ®
S: 5 or $ or §
T:+ or 7
U: l_l or /_/
V: \/
W:|/\| or \/\/ or |/\/ or \/\|
X: >< or }{ or :-:
Y: ¥
Z: 2

()/\/\9 7^l+l+ 15 73)-( 1337 #l\:-:<>l2 1 +()l_l> _/<>* ^l3°l_l+ /\/\3}-{ #1213l/ll>!!!1!!11!1!! )+(3 |D\l\/l/l2.

translation:Oh my god that is the leet hacker I told you about my friend! He owns.

So now you know a little bit of info when someone says that you’re ‘1337′. And you also know how you can write to other people as well! If I were you, and I wasn’t a hacker, I probably wouldn’t go trying it though. Some people might get a little testy about stealing their language?

I just went and installed Zotero, a firefox extension perfect for assignments and things like that. I love it when I stumble upon things that are useful like that!

One of the great things I love about firefox, there again. It goes so nicely down the bottom of my screen- unobtrusively sitting there until I need it! Similar to Google Notebook, which I also just got.

So the way it works is it recognises if you’re on a page that you would reference and a little icon appears in the URL. You can click it and it will add it to your library. Then at a later date, when you’re online or offline (who the hell is ever offline?) you can organise it into categories. You can add tags, notes, links, say what it’s similar too. It’s really handy.

If it doesn’t recognise that you might want to reference something then you can always add it in manually.

So I thought that this was a great tool for doing assignments, and I think I would use it even for blogging- a great way to reference things properly. Should bloggers take this into consideration more?

I just read an article online, from the Australian, it was about how Powderfinger (my favourite band) may be facing a ban on some lyrics on their forthcoming album, Dream Days At The Hotel Existence.

The song Black Tears is about Aboriginal deaths in custody. The second verse describes a scene similar to one version of events surrounding the 2004 death of Aboriginal man Mulrunji in the Palm Island watch house (off far north Queensland).

‘‘An island watchhouse bed, a black man’s lying dead,” a line from the song, is said to refer to this death. The reason for wanting to censor the lyrics, and as far as I can see, is how closely it relates to this particular case, and the fact that the release date for the album is so close to the trial of Sen-Sgt Chris Hurley who is facing assault and manslaughter charges is the Townsville Supreme Court. His trial is on the 12th of June, just 10 days after the expected release of Powderfinger’s album.

The album’s release might have to be postponed is Queensland, and online, which would suck, not just because that’s where I live, but because Powderfinger are Queensland boys themselves- Brisbane, Sunshine and Gold Coasts.

I thought it was interesting when Luke sent me this link because I had just been listening to an interview on Triple J with Rob Hirst, previously of Midnight Oil. Rob had mentioned when inducted into the Aria Hall of Fame last year that the Australian music industry isn’t producing songs with political grunt (or something to that effect).

Below is an extract of his acceptance speech at the Aria Hall Of Fame night:

“Last week GW Bush finally admitted that Iraq may prove to be his Vietnam, but Vietnam inspired some of the greatest protest songs ever written. Not so now, surprisingly, even when hundreds of thousands of Australians crowded our streets to demonstrate their opposition to another senseless war. Maybe complaint rock is still being written, but is ignored by an industry hypnotised by get-famous-fast TV shows. Bless you, John Butler, but you shouldn’t have to do it all by yourself.”

Anyway, back on subject, one shouldn’t expect Powderfinger to release an album that doesn’t have at least one politically minded song. On Double Allergic it was JC, on Internationalist it was Belter, on Odyssey Number Five it was Like A Dog, and on Vulture Street it was How Far Have We Really Come?.

Of course there are many more songs on each album (I’m not counting Parables For Wooden Ears, I don’t know it well enough) that are politically minded, and so there should be, but these are just one from each album that I picked out.