How To Remove Hidden Partitions From Hard Drives

I hate those hidden, virtural CDs that come on some newer external hard drives. Apparently, this is how to remove them: HP USB Disk Storage Format Tool.

It's a windows app tho. Blech.

Information here.

How To Make Thunderbird Open Links In KDE

Seems like the easiest way to make Thunderbird properly work on PCLOS using KDE is to do this:

1. Go to the config editor (Edit->Preferences==>Advanced->General->Config Editor)
2. Agree to the warning if it pops up
3. Enter this into the filte box at the top: network.protocol-handler.warn-external.http
4. Double-click each entry shown to change it to true.
5. Close the Config Editor.
6. Click a http or https link, and wait for the dialog box to open asking what application to use.
7. Click on Choose and browse to a web browser ("/usr/bin/chromium-browser" for example)
8. Place a check where it says to "Remember my choice" if desired.
9. Profit!

This also works if you click an internal T-bird link, such as "Get Themes" in the Add-ons dialog box. There is a noticable delay before that box pops up tho in that case. Just wait a minute and all will be fine.

More details here at the PCLOS forums.

Random Bowing Thought...

So, Obama can bow down to any foreign leader, but he can't even bend a knee to place a flower at a US soldier's grave, instead just throwing it down.*

* Back during the campaign, when he and McCain laid flowers down at, I think, the Tomb Of The Unknown Soldier on Veteran's Day. Gotta look that up for details.

Rooting the Original Droid

Using an SBF file and RSDlite v4.6. From droid-life.com.

How To Unroot The Droid2

On a related note, here's how to unroot the Droid2, assuming no custom ROMs, and no deleting of stock bloatware apps:

• open your trusty terminal app (that's the terminal emulator you downloaded)
• you should see a $ symbol, now do the following (type each line exactly as writen after the "-" but do not type what is in the parenthesis)
• su (give a minute to ask for Superuser Permission. If it doesn't ask, go into Superuser Permissions and grant access to your Terminal Emulator and go back and retry this step)
• now you should see a # symbol (after each of the following steps is processed, you will see a #)
• mount -o rw,remount -text3 /dev/block/mmcblk1p21 /system
• rm /system/app/Superuser.apk
• rm /system/bin/su
• rm /system/bin/busybox
• mount -o ro,remount -text3 /dev/block/mmcblk1p21 /system
• reboot your phone. Tada, no more root! To prove this, try opening wireless tether or another program needing root access and you will be rejected.

Rooting The Droid2 Without a PC

From droidforums.net:

Download these and copy to root folder of sdcard:

• rageagainstthecage-arm5.bin
• su
• Superuser.apk
• Terminal emulator

Enable USB debugging: Settiings -> applications -> development -> USB debugging

Open terminal emulator and....

• cd /tmp
• cp /sdcard/rage*.bin /tmp/
• chmod 777 rage*.bin
• ./rage*.bin

Wait for about 5 minutes. It may finish and return with a $ prompt.

Hit the Home button, then: Settings -> Applications -> Manage Applications -> Running -> Terminal Emulator. Force close terminal emulator.

Return home, then open terminal emulator. (You should have a # prompt. If not, and/or you phone is lagging reboot your phone and start over at "cd /tmp".)

• mount -o rw,remount -t ext3 /dev/block/mmcblk1p21 /system
• cp /sdcard/Superuser.apk /system/app/Superuser.apk
• cp /sdcard/su /system/bin/su
• cp /sdcard/busybox /system/bin/busybox
• chmod 4755 /system/bin/su
• chmod 4755 /system/bin/busybox
• mount -o ro,remount -t ext3 /dev/block/mmcblk1p21 /system
• exit

Reboot phone.

Check to see if you have the superuser app in your app drawer. Also open terminal emulator and type the following command: "su"

A window should open prompting you to allow it to have superuser permissions.

You now have root.

Also, another droidfurums.net reference here, with what to do after rooting.

I Should Write A Book...

...called "Everything I Learned About Race I Learned From Liberals."

Obama's healing "Republicans can rids in the back of the bus" comment.

Blacks are more "persuadable" than others.

Among many others.

Yet Another Blogilo Test

Using blogilo 1.0.1, in KDE 4.5.2, running on PCLinuxOS.

Only apparent drawback to this program so far is that it doesn't pull in my already defined tags. Hopefully a later version will.

Back to PCLinuxOS

"As you may have heard, the future of the Mandriva Linux distribution is unclear.

Most employees working on the distribution were laid off when Edge-IT was liquidated. We do not trust the plans of Mandriva SA anymore and we don't think the company (or any company) is a safe host for such a project."

Well, all-righty then.

I really don't feel like using a distro that is apparently soon-to-be-dead, so I've jumped the Mandrake/Mandriva ship again. And I'm back to PCLinuxOS. I've always liked the rolling release concept, vs the distinct versions and the obligatory version disaster^H^H^H upgrades. There's no 64-bit, but since you really only need that in order to access 4G of memory or more, it's not that big of a deal right now. Also, PCLOS has kernels that can indeed access much more than 4G of RAM while still being a 32-bit system.

So I'm good for now.

MakeMKV on PCLinuxOS

Well....goodbye Mandriva. Back to good ol' PCLOS. 32-bit, but I only have 3G RAM anyways. So now I need to build MakeMKV again.

Need to install these:

• make
• glibc
• glibc-devel
• libopenssl
• libopenssl-devel
• zlib
• zlib1-devel
• libqt4-devel
• automoc4
• libmesagl1-devel
• gcc-c++
• libexpat1-dev

And....we're back.

Mandriva & MakeMKV

Well, having done a fresh install of Mandriva 2010.1, I needed to install all the development packages so that I can install MakeMKV. Since they only list the required packages if using something like Ubuntu, it takes some searching to figure exactly what is needed on Mandriva. So, here is the list of packages needed to build MakeMKV. This is only the basic list; a number of additional dependent packages will be installed as well:

• lib64qt4
• lib64qt4-devel
• libstdc++-devel
• automoc4
• lib64mesagl1-devel
• gcc-c++
• lib64openssl1.0.0-devel
• make

This is for a 64-bit system obviously.

Found my Droid wallpaper

Turns out 7-Zip can uncompress the android APK files. Who knew?

Published with Blogger-droid

Rooted Droid

Well, I've finally taken the plunge and rooted my Motorola Droid. Started with the SPRecovery and a rooted vanilla Android 2.1. Then really went for it and installed the cyanogenmod. Cyanogen installed easily but seemed to have google voice problems when not connected via Wi-Fi. So I reROMed to bugless beast, and decided to up the ante to the 1.1 GHz kernel.

With bugless my benchmark has me faster than the HTC Incredible. It's blazing fast and has been quite stable, with no Google Voice issues.

Titanium backup has been essential for restoring my apps after flashing new ROMs. It does however not restore desktop widgets correctly. It leaves a placeholder for each widget, but each one must be fully replaced.

Can't wait for a bugless based on Froyo.

Published with Blogger-droid

Testing bloggerdroid

Much better. Title and body section. No tags tho.

Published with Blogger-droid

Testing from android using iamblogger

NBC Admits Man Can Not Cause Global-Warming

I'm still lookig for the video, but NBC Nightly News Anchor Brian Williams admitted during his opening statement the other day that (paraphrasing), no matter how much we thing we run things, along comes mother nature to prove that she's still in charge, referring to the Icelandic volcanic eruption.

I haven't found the video yet, but his blog essentially says the same thing: "Just as we start thinking we're masters of the skies ... something like a volcano comes along."

Upgrading KDE SC 4.4 in Mandriva 2010.0

Not 403

Why I Didn't Vote For Mark Kirk In The Primary

From the Sun Times: Kirk retreats on repeal of health-care bill.

A Giannoulias spokeswoman pretty much sums it up: "It reveals that Congressman Mark Kirk is more interested in political calculations for his own personal gain[.]"

I had come around to giving him a pass on supporting Cap-and-Trade, hoping that he had seen the error of his ways and was now, more or less, going to take more conservative positions.

Much as I don't want Giannoulias in the US Senate, it might be worth it to keep Kirk out.

Earth Day Made A Difference!

OK.

I'm a big man. I can admit when I'm wrong.

I usually deride Earth Day as stupid, meaningless, & hypocritical. An hour when liberals (in theory) turn off the lights and TVs, and stop using their iPhones in order to Save The Planet(tm). And then immediately start doing all those earth-killing things as soon as the hour is up.

Well, this year, it appears that I was wrong about Earth Day.

According to the National Snow And Ice Data Center, arctic ice levels are hitting "normal" levels for the first time since 2001.

Thank you Earth Day.

An Open Letter To Russell King and Other Liberals

Dear Mr. Russell,

You recently wrote an open letter to conservatives, bemoaning all the supposed hate coming from them, and basically asking why we can't be more tolerant like you and your ilk on the Left.

After reading your shallow, hypocritical, ignorant letter, I feel that I have to respond. Responding to each and every point will take up way too much space, so I'll focus on your basic misconceptions. Rather than focus on the hate coming from the left, I prefer to attempt to open your mind. To show you where you are wrong. To challenge some of your misconceptions about conservatives. (Tho I do reserve the right to, at a later date, highlight all the hate that comes from the mainstream Left, as well as to point out your hyprocrasy and blatant errors.)

To begin, you need to stop echoing Democrat talking points and learn to think for yourself. I would suggest turning off MSNBC and CNN as a start. I would suggest that you start watching Fox News (which even Hillary Clinton thanked for its fair and balanced coverage during the Democrat primaries), but that may be too much of a shock to your system.

You begin by smearing all conservatives as closed-minded. We're all afraid of change, afraid and hateful of anyone not like us. I'm not sure what you really mean by those statements. What is "not like us" exactly? What does a conservative look like? I can only assume you think all conservatives are straight, white Christian males who own a gun. We probably all have blond hair and blue eyes as well. So, who's guilty of stereotyping, Russell? Your bigotry is revealing.

Rather than criticizing what you think is a conservative, perhaps you would be better off shedding your prejudices and researching what conservativism actually stands for. You have a tiny, myopic view of the world, and you would do us all a great service if you could try to understand why we actually oppose government intrusion into our lives instead of the blanket statement that we're all racists and haters.

To expand your narrow view of the world, perhaps you could start by visiting sites like GayPatriot, and GOProud. Yes Russell, gay conservatives. Hard to believe, eh? GayPatriot is even an official CPAC blogger. I would suggest that you start by reading up at those two sites. You would certainly be surprised to learn that an anti-gay speaker was booed from the stage at CPAC.

Yes, we have our nutcases, Russell (the anti-gay speaker just in case you haven't figured it out yet). But we shoo them away. We don't embrace them and ignore their hate because it's politically convenient.

I'll understand if you're feeling a little confused at this point. I mean, conservatives welcoming gays into their midst? What is the world coming to?

Have you heard of Kenneth Gladney? No? I'm not surprised. He is a black man who was selling "Don't Tread on Me" flags and buttons at a town hall meeting hosted by Rep. Russ Carnahan (D-MO). He was called a "nigger" and assualted by members of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). This happened after the President urged his supporters to attend these meetings and the Tea Party protests, and to "punch back twice as hard." It appears that someone was listening.

See also Star Parker, a former welare queen opposed to Obamacare and government programs that portray themselves as helping the poor. She also writes a column at Townhall.

What about Joseph Cao, the first American of Vietnamese decent to serve in the US Congress? A Republican.

Bobby Jindal. Michele Bachmann.

What about Michael Williams, running for US Senate from Texas? Is he a hater too? What colors is he afraid of, Russell? Seriously. I want to know.

And how about the man you love to hate....Dick Cheney? You know, that hateful man, the one John Edwards and John Kerry felt completly comfortable telling us all that his daughter is a lesbian, as if that somehow matters to conservatives. The same Dick Cheney who opposed the Federal Marriage Amendment. The same one who supports repeal of Don't Ask/Don't Tell.

Both he and his daughter have been welcomed with open arms at conservative events.

Weird, huh?

Then there's Katrina Pierson, who spoke at the Dallas Tea Party last year. Someone who Janeane Garofalo for some reason labeled a racist. Katrina even politely invited Janeane to attend the Dallas Tea Party last Independence Day. For some reason Janeane didn't show up.

Finally, I would suggest that you actually attend a local Tea Party. Rather than sitting there in your living room listening to Keith Olberman tell you how evil and racist all "those people" are, show up and see for yourself what's going on. See who is attending.

You are the coward. Rather than debating conservatives and our ideas, you label us racists, thereby eliminating any need to actually debate. After all, we're all just a bunch of sheet-wearing, ignorant, bigots. Why should you waste your time talking to people like that.

So come on Russell. Put aside your bigotry and prejudices and open your mind.

We'll all be better off if you do.