Okay, you’re black. Maybe it’s time you get over it.

GEEK CONTENT WARNING

On december 26, I got one of the last parts needed to build the computer I’m dreaming of since I moved.

I already have my fast, dual-booting laptop, so why fork out money on a 552mhz desktop? Well I wanted to take the Sci-Fi turn and have an always-on linux desktop with weather, email and Wikipedia ready at all times. Also, the machine had Windows XP and is relatively quiet.

Here’s how I plan to do it:

Step 1: Install Ubuntu

While Windows XP is a good system, it’s just as noisy as other Windows systems. Since this computer will always stay on, I don’t want a noisy spinning hard drive to keep me awake all night long. Linux distributions are also much more customizable than Windows and mostly immune to viruses. The only thing left to do would be to pick the distro I want. Ubuntu? Kubuntu? Xubuntu? Fluxbuntu? U-Lite? If it wasn’t for the internet bill, I’d try ‘em all.

Step 2: Make it faster

On a 300mhz, 256mb RAM machine, Ubuntu ran surprisingly fast but nothing near what I wanted. I expect it to be significantly faster on this machine (with 768mb RAM), but nowhere near what I got used to on my dual-core laptop. There are many guides out there to tweak your system to boot and run faster. It’s also important to tweak Firefox too, as it’s one of the main applications you are going to use.

Step 3: Tweak it

The difference between my laptop and an always on PC is the speed at which I can get information. I want to be able to know the weather, see my Google Reader feeds and see my emails without even touching the mouse or keyboard. To do so, I will install desktop widgets. In Ubuntu, they come in many flavors. I found the best application to display them to be Screenlets but gDesklets also has a lot of available aplets. Most of them can be found at gnome-look.org.

Then, keep the desktop clean in order to make it look like an internet appliance. This means I must hide the removable drive icons on the desktop. This is easily fixed by following a nice tutorial by HowToGeek. Once this is done, I can place icons to important applications (Firefox, Rythmbox, Images…) on my desktop by dragging them from the Applications menu. They can then be resized by right-clicking them and selecting  “Resize”. There you go! A nice, useful desktop “Home” screen with all the information needed available at a glance. I really recommend adding shortcuts to your Photos, Videos and Music folders. You can right-click them, select “Properties” and add emblems to them so they look like more than boring folders. Don’t forget to edit the applications menu to hide unused applications (heck you might even uninstall them!) and keep only the necessary ones (multimedia, internet, IM and dictionary).

Since the device will always stay on, it is good practice to prevent the computer from going to sleep by simply asking it to dim the backlight after a few minutes. To do so, go in Setting>System>Power management.

It’s also important to have a good-looking theme to suit your awesome new information central. I’d avoid picking a dark theme and background as colors put a nice touch of happiness in the room. You can also change your login screens and various icons with the files available at gnome-look.org.

Can you find a synonym to “synonym”?

What could have taken all those night from me while generating a passionate interest from me? Gecko, my latest programming project.

As promised, a beta release will be out for Christmas (that’s in, like, five days) for you to try. Unlike Core 3, Core 3.1 will finally introduce a stable application, new features and universal device support (finally!). The UI is still as ugly, as I keep this for the end.

Thanks to all the generous donators and helpers who made this possible. It’s just the beginning!

Go to GetGecko.org for the beta!

The secret...

...is all in the shin

Cookies?

30 hours of Photoshop to make you think he's hanging from the ceiling

Yeah, he always has that creepy face when I pull out my camera

The only picture we managed to snap of her not hiding (and we tried hard!)

Hugo, two beers later

I had mine too

Lolcat-ready

Winter

Hopefully to be covered in snowmobile trails

Ice

Here, you have pictures. Sorry for the delay, I was too buzy lazy to upload them.

With more time on my hands to play with my brand new Diamond, I finally fell in love with it. More on this whenever I’m not too lazy to type.

Okay okay okay. Forget what was here. I’m in love. It’s not as slow as I said (without WkTask it’s easy to forget 10 apps are running at once). I’m satisfied and can’t wait to try out the GPS.

The only sad thing is the lack of a memory card slot. As a developer I swap cards a lot (especially since transfer speeds are faster with a card reader) and carrying a keychain card reader is much easier.

I just sent back my HTC Touch to the eBay seller and I’m expecting a refund soon.

Now I have 400$ to buy another phone and I might just be tempted to try out a BlackBerry phone and buy a TyTN or another cheap Windows Mobile phone for development.

I’m not really tired of Windows Mobile, but if I buy another Touch it will be my 5th phone in a bit over a year. These things bug and break rather fast so I’m tempted to try anything that offers hacking possibilities and has Wi-Fi.

…and that doesn’t come bundled with kajillion-dollar plans. Looking at you, Rogers.

UPDATE: Just kidding, I’m getting a Touch Diamond