Arrow Key In Vi Showing A B C D

[Update: After some discussion with my friends.  The following only true for Ubuntu Desktop version.  By default, Ubuntu Server version installs full version of "vi". 2010.09.16 1538]

If you are using Vi text editor in Ubuntu and found that entering arrow key (up, down, left and right) resulting the letter A, B, C and D.   That's because by default, Ubuntu install "vim.tiny" instead of the full version "vim".

To solve it, it's easy, just install the full version "vim"

sudo apt-get install vim

[via: http://ubuntuforums.org/archive/index.php/t-291853.html]

Picasa New Feature - Face Movies

Google Picasa releases a new version - 3.8 yesterday.  New features include:

1. Picnik integration
2. Batch upload from Picasa to Picasa Web Albums
3. Metadata updates
4. Face Movie

The most interesting feature is "Face Movie."  Quote from their blog.

Face movies create a movie based around one person both figuratively and literally. Instead of the usual transition from one photo to the next, the images align themselves to the face in the photo. This creates an extremely smooth viewing experience which allows the person in the photos to remain the focus rather than the transition effects themselves. 

Here is a video I made up in 5 min. (http://youtu.be/UxW6MaXoBfk)

This feature will be good for telling someone's life for a baby or in a wedding.

Here is the video created by Google to introduce this feature.  (http://youtu.be/fLQtssJDMMc)

Turn On Home Ubuntu Computer When You are Not Home On Demand

You can turn on any computer remotely using Wake-on-LAN (or WOL). It's really handy if you need to grab a file from your home computer but you don't want to turn on that computer 24/7 just for one file.

Requirement:

1. You need to know something about computer/Bios/LAN/Router as I can't explain everything here.
2. You need to somehow able to be in your home LAN.  Possible methods:
1. You can VPN back to your home network.
2. You can ssh back to your home server (This is what I do)
3. You forward port 0,7 or 9 on your home router to your computer. (highly NOT recommended since everyone will be possible to turn on your computer)

Steps:
Let's call your home computer "Computer A" and your other computer "Computer B"

In "Computer A"

1. Go to your BIOS, and turn on WakeOnLAN. I might be called something else. Look for something like "Wake On Lan," "Remote Wake Up" or etc.
2. Turn on WOL
1. Find out your network interface name by "ifconfig". Normally it's similar to "eth0."
2. Turn on WOL
   
   

   ethtool -s eth0 wol g

   Since the effect of this command only last till next restart, you will need to set up a script to turn it on every time you start your "Computer A" - See Reference 1 - http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=234588 for detail
3. Find out your network interface's MAC address
   
   

   ifconfig | grep HW | cut -d' ' -f11-

   it's something like "12:34:56:78:9a:bc". Copy it down and turn off your computer.
4. (Optional) If your "Computer B" is a Windows machine, you will also need to find out Computer A's ip address.
   
   

   ifconfig | grep "inet addr" | cut -d' ' -f12-12| tr -d 'adr:'

   It will look like '192.168.1.127'

In "Computer B"

1. If it is a Ubuntu or any other Linux distro.
   
   

   wakeonlan 12:34:56:78:9a:bc

   the above command should be sufficient.  If it doesn't work, try the command again with port 7.
   
   

   wakeonlan -p 7 12:34:56:78:9a:bc

2. If it is a Windows machine, try the following.
   
   

   wolcmd 123456789abc 192.168.1.127 255.255.255.255 7

Hope it helps someone.

Reference:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=234588
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wake-on-LAN
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wake-on-LAN#Sending_the_magic_packet

Cache Ubuntu Update to Speed Up Update and Save Bandwidth

If you have several Ubuntu machines at home, every time there is a new package, you will need to download the same package several times.
Just found out a package called squid-deb-proxy.  You will need to have a server and install

sudo apt-get install squid-deb-proxy avahi-utils

and in other machines install:

sudo apt-get install squid-deb-proxy-client

From now on, "avahi" on the server will advertise the proxy server in your network.
And when you download any package from any of your local machines, it will see the proxy server and download the package through the server.

[via: http://castrojo.wordpress.com/2010/02/28/zeroconfing-squid-deb-proxy/]

Google Street View Arrived @ Hong Kong and Macau

[Update: Google blogs about Street View in Hong Kong]
[Via blogoscoped.com and gspy.blogspot.com]

Finally, Google Street View arrived at Hong Kong and Macau (only the southern half).   It will be very handy next time I go to Hong Kong and Macau.
Here are some places I visited last time I went back to Hong Kong and Macau.
If you can't see the embedded Google Map below, click here.
如果你無法看到下面嵌入的谷歌地圖，請點擊這裡.

Stanley, Hong Kong | 香港, 赤柱

View Larger Map

Hong Kong International Airport | 香港國際機場

View Larger Map

Hong Kong Coliseum | 香港體育館

View Larger Map

The Ruins of St. Paul's, Macau | Ruinas de Sao Paulo, Macau | 澳門, 大三巴牌坊
Note: They don't have it yet. (Will add the Street View if Google updates it)
Update: 10/11/2012 - Google Street View updated

View Larger Map


Restaurante Tenis Civil (Leon), Macau | 澳門, 利安餐廳

View Larger Map

Central, Hong Kong | 香港, 中環

New Toy - Nexus One

I got a new toy - Nexus One.  (Any good app I should try?)

 

After undated the Firmware to Android 2.1-update1, I got Pinch-to-zoom, Google Goggles and a updated Google Maps.  Some cool videos about Nexus One below.

Google Goggles - Search With Pictures Instead Of Text

Google Goggles is an application for Android phone that search the web with picture instead of using text.  Below are some examples from their site:

Search Landmark - Golden Gate Gridge

Enter Contact 

Search for Places - "The Diner", "Scarpetta" and "Comix Comedy Club"

They just added a new feature: Translate text in picture.  It's currently in beta testing for German-to-English translations only.  Check out the video in the blog: Integrating translation into Google Goggles.

1. Take a picture of the German menu

2. Menu Translated

Google GDrive Is Coming (Sort of)

(Update 1/12 9:38am - Added Google official announcement blog post from Google Blog, Google Docs Blog and Google Enterprise Blog.  One more detail: The 1 GB storage limit only count those files that can't be convert to Google Docs formats.  That means you can upload as many word documents, spreadsheets and presentations as you want as before.)

According to Michael Arrington from TechCrunch, Google will release GDrive (Google Drive) in the coming weeks.  However, it will not be called GDrive or Google Drive, instead, it will be integrated in Google Docs.

Quotes from the blog post from TechCrunch:

... you can soon upload any file type at all to Google Docs, not just the dozen or so Office formats that the service allowed as of yesterday. Video files. Images. Audio Files. Even Zip files. As long as those files are 250 MB or smaller, you’re good.

Regular users have 1 GB of free storage and can purchase more for $0.25/GB. Enterprise customer pay higher prices, starting at $17/year for 5 GB. There are no bandwidth charges.

Three partners have been working with Google to build value add features on top of the new product. The most interesting, Memeo Connect (from Memeo), lets users sync files between the desktop and Google Docs.