Xiaogang Wang's blog

ipod touch(IPT) and MobileCast

xgwang — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 16:48:30 +0000

I bought an ipod touch recently. I used to listen to a podcast with a laptop through wifi in bed before I sleep. Now I can do this with IPT!
Even better, I found MobileCast. I can download a podcast through a wifi at work and listen to it on my way home.

Since I get busy, I have no time to download the podcast on a pc and then to plug the ipod to it to transfer the mp3 files to the ipod. This is especially annoying for a news program.

The next thing is to import a podcast list. Typing the feed address in IPT is not fun. I find a good way.

Edit a simple “opml” file with a list of my favorite podcast and save it to a web server. MobileCast can import it. Here is the opml file.

07-Mar-2008

“Close the lid” = “Suspend to memory” on thinkpad x40 and Ubuntu Gutsy

xgwang — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 05:03:54 +0000

Having used debian Sarge, Etch, Lenny for three years on my thinkpad x40 laptop, I have recently switched to Ubuntu Gutsy because things (acpi and gui fails for users other than root due to permission issues on /dev/null etc) were broken when I upgrade from Etch to Lenny. This turns out to be a good move. More things worked out of the box. E.g. no need to recompile madwifi for the atheros WiFi chip.

The suspend-to-memory(F4) and suspend-to-disk(F12) also worked well. However, when I close the lid, it does not do suspend-to-memory. It does /etc/acpi/lid.sh which still consumes a lot of energy. This default behaviour drives me nuts. Now there is a simple solution:

cat /etc/acpi/events/lidbtn

I get

# /etc/acpi/events/lidbtn
# Called when the user closes or opens the lid

event=button[ /]lid
action=/etc/acpi/lid.sh

Simply replace the last line with

action=/etc/acpi/sleepbtn.sh

Done!

I would also hope to skip the password check after resuming since this protection does not make sense for a personal laptop. It was suggested to uncomment

LOCK_SCREEN=true

in /etc/default/acpi-support. But it does not work on x40. I will keep looking.

Set up chinese fonts using Microsoft’s simsun.ttf in Ubuntu 7.1 (Gutsy)

xgwang — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 21:35:18 +0000

Mostly, I follow http://www.fwolf.com/blog/post/170, but that is old (for Ubuntu dapper). They suggested modifying /etc/fonts/fonts.conf which is bad in case of upgrading since fonts.conf will be overwritten. A better way is to add /etc/fonst/local.conf

1) My laptop has XP/Ubuntu Gutsy dual boot. The XP partition is mounted on /c.

mkdir /home/xgwang/win-fonts cd /home/xgwang/win-fonts cp /c/WINDOWS/Fonts/simsun.ttc simsun.ttf cp /c/WINDOWS/Fonts/simhei.ttf . cp /c/WINDOWS/Fonts/tahoma.ttf . cp /c/WINDOWS/Fonts/tahomabd.ttf . cp /c/WINDOWS/Fonts/verdana.ttf . cp /c/WINDOWS/Fonts/verdanab.ttf . cp /c/WINDOWS/Fonts/verdanai.ttf . cp /c/WINDOWS/Fonts/verdanaz.ttf . chmod 644 *

2)
cd /usr/share/fonts/truetype ln -s /home/xgwang/win-fonts/ win-fonts cd win-fonts mkfontscale mkfontdir

3)
fc-cache

4)Edit two files (due to Feisty and Gutsy’s new way of mananaging /etc/fonts/)
/etc/fonts/conf.avail/40-generic.conf
/etc/fonts/conf.avail/60-latin.conf
append
Simsun
after
Bitstream Vera Serif
in fields of ‘serif’, ‘sans-serif’, ‘monospace’

5)do the same in a new file, /etc/fonts/local.conf
(For a starting local.conf, copy http://www.gnome.org/fonts/local.conf)
append
Simsun
after
Bitstream Vera Serif
in ‘serif’, ‘sans-serif’, ‘monospace’

4) and 5) may not be needed both. Any one to confirm ?

Missing “Show Desktop” quick launch icon in XP

xgwang — Mon, 21 May 2007 18:26:09 +0000

To recreate it :

Click Start->Run
In the “open” box, type “notepad” (without the quotes)
Click ok
Copy the following lines in your new notepad window :

[Shell]
Command=2
IconFile=explorer.exe,3
[Taskbar]
Command=ToggleDesktop

Click “File” in the notepad menu and select “Save As”
Save the file to your desktop as “Show Desktop.scf”
Drag the new icon from your desktop to your Quick Launch toobar and select “Move here”

XGW’s note: this tip is copied from http://www.windows-help-central.com/show-desktop-icon-in-xp-missing.html

Today I configured pine to read and send gmail. Cool.

xgwang — Tue, 16 Jan 2007 21:05:37 +0000

create a file .pinerc.gmail with the following contents

smtp-server=smtp.gmail.com/user=USERID@gmail.com/ssl

inbox-path={pop.gmail.com/pop3/ssl/user=USERID@gmail.com}inbox

Then,

pine -p .pinerc.gmail

The first time you run it, pine will insert other configuration stuff into .pinerc.gmail. This is fine. This is the simplest way.