Sunday 30th November 2003
Song: The Starting Line - Up & Go
Look at this, it made me giggle.
I'm just doing this 'cause I'm bored... waiting for a CD to finish recording.
Last night I kind'a fucked up my computer. Following my last moan at Linux, I've had another problem with the same area... Redhat Package Manager. The bloody RPM files give me more hassle then they're worth. Especially considering I never liked them THAT much anyway. It's recently been brought to my attention that some of the Mandrake one's aren't installed in the default location anyway. Bleh, stupid Mandrake...
For those wondering what I'm on about, each RPM file is (arguably) the linux equivelent of setup.exe. A single file that contains all the files required by the program. They also come with some other info about what the program is and who compiled it etc. But anyway... imagine after you've installed all these RPMs, a large database of your currently installed software is stored (consider I would have had a few hundred of these). This I guess is like Control Panel - Add Remove Programs, except for every single bit of software. Also, since Linux isn't an operating system like Windows, there's a lot more seperate pieces of software required on linux machines to get them in use. So anyway... to get to the point. My computer has absolutely no knowledge of any of this software anymore. It's still all there, installed, alive and well. But the database of what I have installed is no longer with us. This means that I can pretty much not install any other RPM files, because they all have dependancies. Say for example, I try and install a web browser. It'll say it can't be installed, because of failed dependancies, because it'll require certain things that it thinks I don't have installed because the database of my installed software is empty.
This was then made all the worse by the fact that I don't have up to date installation CDs. Imagine needing to re-install Windows XP but only having the CD for Windows 95. So last night after a frantic panic, I decide to start downloading the most recent CDs. It's while considering this option, that I then remember that there is a bandwidth usage limit on NTL's "unlimited" cable service... 1GB per day. Approximate size of the 3 CDs that I need: 2GB. *sigh* It was also past midnight at this point, so I wouldn't be able to use the day changeover to my advantage. I found out that I don't actually NEED the 3rd disk. So I started downloading the first 2, and went to bed. The download was still more than 1GB, though NTL say they're not strictly enforcing and punishing every single person who goes over that limit on one occasion. It's mainly to stop people downloading music, and movies and such daily anwyay... I can't imagine they'd have a huge problem with GNU GPL software being downloaded causing me to go over the limit for just one day.
I'm now waiting for disk 2 to finish recording. I didn't mean to get into that much detail there, but I am bored, since I have a really old, slow CD writer. It's also too early for anyone normal to be up on a Sunday, so IRC, MSN, and Yahoo are all looking a bit boring.
Given recent discussions with a fellow linux user at uni, and my problems with RPMs, I'm tempted to try Debian. I may ask him some more questions next week. I know I have at least one other linux user in my class, other than this Debian user and I (I actually have two debian users, but one's too new to it to have opinions on distro's) so I may ask her what she uses...
I actually prefer the FreeBSD software management, but don't want to leave Linux. I'd considered installing FreeBSD on this server actually... just for the sake of learning to use it. It's not too different to linux, just a few things are in different places and/or have different names. It is also a lot more suited to servers than home PCs, though arguably so is linux.
Ooh... nearly 1000 visitors to this site. How exciting?!
Mmm, still bored. 5 mins left on CD 2.
I keep turning round to look out the window, yet all I see each time is the same tree. Hrm.
Oh, I have a Christina Scabbia poster that I rudely stole off a friend without asking. If anyone wants it, it is available on request. It's only A4, out of last week's Kerrang, though I'm not too sure that (m)any readers of this will actually know who she is. Poster's not too good though, she doesn't look too nice really... on the other side of Brody Dalle from The Distiller's who I've never found overly attractive. On the otherside of the fold, is Amy Lee, who I'd imagine just about anyone living in a MEDC now knows, and Matt Skibba who I'd expect most readers of this site to know. I have a dilema as to whom I want facing outwards from my wall. Amy or Matt... I've carefully thrown it over my other keyboard while not really considering it. It's been there a few days so far, I wonder how long it will be before I get annoyed with it there and just put the poster of Amy Lee up.
Less than one minute left on the CD now. Gonna stop here as there's always a few typing errors to correct.
Wish me luck!
Tuesday 25th November 2003
Song: The Used - Say Days Ago (live)
The Used are a fucking fantastic band. I put their album back on my portable MP3 player this morning, and was frankly amazed by how fantastic they are. It's been a while since I'd properly listened to them, and I think the break's done me well.
Even if Bert was a bit of a dick to Kelly Osbourne, and I'm not just saying that 'cause I fancy her... I think most people would agree he was a bit of a twat there.
It was weird though... I was thinking about how I was introduced to The Used while walking towards Surbiton station earlier. It brought me back to thinking about something that I've discussed with several people in the past. Action -> reaction. It's a simple concept which fascinates me.
The way I saw it in this example, though it can be traced back further than this, was that if my ex girlfriend was of an entirely straight sexuality. I would have never got into The Used. This is a given fact. However, I then moved on a bit. If I had never got into The Used I would have never met Andrea, Kim, Mary, Sonia etc etc. This probably means that I would have never have seen Brand New the second time round, nor Something Corporate. It also means that I wouldn't be in a position where I can walk into a pub with a friend and have bar staff know what I'll want. Going on from that, it makes me wonder if I'd be half as happy with life in general as I now am.
I mentioned something earlier about how I could trace things with my ex g/f back even further. Me and her got to know one another after our GCSE IT class got moved into alphabetical (by surname) order because we were too noisy. We were next to each other. I have wondered many times, if I'd never sat next to her, how many things in my life since then wouldn't have happened. Which also opens the door for potentially an infinate amount of other things that could have happened. Both good and bad. But anyway, I was thinking if I'd never met her. I would have never got into "emo" music in any shape or form, or even "punk" (nothing past Blink 182 anyway), which in itself may not seem like much of a loss. However... I would have never met Andrea, Mary, Kim, and all mentioned above, as well as Lorna, Kate, Kate's friend who was nice enough to give me a hug, Amour, Ru (spelling never was known), Kim (not same one as above) and most of the people on that wall at college (interesting male:female ratio here (Ru is female)), nor would I have spent an evening with someone from college who I've otherwise spent no time with, and met two of his friends. I would have also have probably never spent much time with Mark or James, people from college who soon became very good friends of mine.
I've completely gone off the point of The Used here. But action - reaction is something that fascinates me. Maybe I do moan from time to time, but maybe I owe my ex girlfriend a lot more than is immediately obvious. Wont digress onto talking about her now though.
Sunday 23rd November 2003
Song: Christina Aguilera - Get Mine, Get Yours
No matter what I say... don't EVER use linux. I recently decided it was time to upgrade a whole bunch of software. It seemed like an easy enough task. The procedure's been made quite simple with the aid of a nice little application. However... it was not at all as easy as it was meant to be. I really don't know why, but something was terribly wrong, and I spent about 3 or 4 hours trying to upgrade one bit of software. One that I needed to get done before I could move on to anything else. I wont go into detail, but it pissed me off a great deal.
I'm also trying to move away from KDE. I've found a replacement e-mail client, file manager, and dictionary program (though it's java, so need to knock up a shell script to run it). Hopefully though, I'll get rid of KDE soon.
I started looking at GTK again today. I felt more up to the challenge now, as it's been a while since I last tried, and I felt I'd got more experience at programming. So I started reading the tutorial. I was met with a 97 line "Hello World" program. For those who don't know, and care, a hello world program is generally the first program any person makes when learning a new language. They usually consist of a few lines of code (3, maybe 5 at most) and it displays "Hello World" on the screen. So needless to say, a 97 line version of it was quite intimidating. Once I'd got through the comments and adjusted it to suit my coding style, It was a lot easier to work with (there's only about 10 lines of relevant code).
A while back, as many of you know, I made a audio CD player. I'd quite like to play around with GTK a bit more so that I can develop a graphical front end for it. I might then consider distributing it, depending on how it comes out (If it comes out...).
I found a very nice truism earlier:
"Coding styles are like assholes. Everyone has one, and no one likes anyone elses"
- Eric Warmenhoven
I liked it so much I decided it warranted a mention here
Uhm, quite a boring/geeky update so far. Sorry...
Oh, so I finally decided to start some uni work today, that should've been completed ages ago. It was meant to be completed a week or two before I joined the course. Thankfully though, it's actually wanted in until Jan, as it's only 1/3 of a thing that's assessed. So, I got lucky there. So anyway, I finally decided to start it. I found myself with two versions. One on paper that they gave to me on my first day, and an electronic version that I'd downloaded. I decided to do the electronic one, and then print it off when complete, because I'm so hopeless at writing. However, it soon came to my attention that question 3 is different on the electronic one, to the paper one. I skipped over it, and looked on. Question 4 thankfully matched. Curiously, I turned the page, I see question 5... So then I moved down a page on my word processor, and... it's blank. I then see that the electronic version has a question 6 that isn't on the paper one. (And no, the questions 5 and 6 weren't the same) So... I'm very confused about that. I think I may have to ask people at uni and see what I should do.
Oooh, no matter who you are, I urge you all to look at this. I'll buy you a drink if you manage to look at the guy without laughing, or snickering. I am aware that he looks nothing like me in any way, shape or form. Unfortunately, AGCC did not come to me asking to choose the guy that's gonna represent me. Oh, I also think he looks like he may be naked. It's just the way that you can see enough of his shoulders to see flesh, but not enough to see any clothes. Hmm.
Oh, my eating has got better lately. Maybe soon I'll qualify as healthy, and wont have to be going to bed in pain some nights. We can but hope...
Oh, Brand New's video for 'Sic Transit Gloria... Glory Fades' is oot and aboot. Quite like it, even though the concept sounded crap when I first read about it. Still unsure of why he's being chased at the start though. If anyone can offer any suggestions, lemme know. Video can be viewed on either ifilm, or launch.
Recently acquired a new respect for the old NWA classic, 'Fuck Tha Police'.
Uhm... written a lot. Gonna go now and moan about being bored to some people who wont care.
Wednesday 19th November 2003
Song: Travis - Baby One More Time
Right... I've totally redesigned the way that the blog part of this site works. I no longer have a huge php file that just gets included into the main page. It's now stored on a SQL database, thus the main blog page is only 24 lines long.
I'm fairly confident that it has been tested well, and so should be ok. But PLEASE let me know if you get any errors or warnings from it.
I basically did it because I wanted to make something decent with SQL, and it seemed like a worthy challenge. It was very stresfull, ended up giving up last night, and have completed it this morning. So leave me plenty of nice messages to read, and lemme know if it breaks please.
Apologies to Mary and Oli for my ramblings about this yesterday and this morning ;)
Friday 21st November 2003
Song: Something Corporate - Globes And Maps
Not really a lot to say... but blog page was looking quite sad with only one entry, so thought I'd add something.
The Drive Thru invasion tour's coming to England in January, and I have no one to go with :( This makes me sad. Homegrown, Allister, The Early November, and Hidden In Plain View... I've asked one person who I know who lives locally and likes the same music as me... still waiting on a response though.
Ooh, just been told about this. I've seen it before, but I think it's bloody funny, so thought I'd share.
Had a nice chat with Mary last night... I recieved a nice warm welcome, and a lovely farewell too, heh.
I noticed a very minor problem with the code for this blog thing, which is too minor to justify the 3 minutes that it'd take to fix. Laziness rocks.
Had a programming test today, was fairly easy. I fear I may get nothing for it though. It was one of those papers read by an OMR machine (like the national lottery forms) and since I had no idea that it was going to be on one of those types of forms, I didn't arrive equipped with the appropriate stationary. It would actually be a big problem if I were to fail it, even though it's not worth much, because I didn't even take the last one, as I wasn't on the course at the time. I'm still awaiting the results from my first programming assignment actually... I'm quite nervous about that :\
Hm, getting called for dinner... farewell
Oh... Interesting how much I can write when I don't have much to say