October 2011 - luv-talk

phones
by Russell Coker 29 Oct '11

29 Oct '11

Virgin has the Galaxy 2, the Xperia X10, and the Xperia Arc (which is like the X10 but with more RAM and newer Android) for free on the $29 per month plan, they also have the first 3 months free which means you pay $25.38 per month on average over the 2 year contract. The $29 plan includes $450 of phone credit which at $1 per minute and $0.40 flag-fall means something like 360 minutes of calls per month - more than enough for most people. It also includes 250MB of data which is adequate for non-technical people and barely adequate for people like us if Wifi is used for Android market. This seems to be the best deal available now if you need to buy an Android phone. If you already own a phone then TPG and Amaysim are two of the better options. If anyone knows of a better deal then please let me know. A couple of my relatives will get Galaxy 2's on the Virgin $29 plan very soon if I can't find a better offer. -- My Main Blog http://etbe.coker.com.au/ My Documents Blog http://doc.coker.com.au/

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Re: [luv-talk] [luv-main] Some decent speakers for PC's
by Craig Sanders 25 Oct '11

25 Oct '11

i'm cc-ing this back to luv-talk (mostly because i hope someone knows of a decent - i.e. low tosser ratio - audio web site / forum). hopefully anyone replying will remember to cc their response to you. On Tue, Oct 25, 2011 at 11:04:43AM +1000, Lindsay Sprinter wrote: > The BX5a's are deffiniely better than the AV30's although they (the > AV30's) are no slouch (Note 1) MAudio also have a CX something. I > have not done a direct comparison with the Magnaplanars, this would > unlikely be a profitable exersize as experience has showed the they > will show up anything. I can't really justify spending over $400 on speakers. $150 is OK. maybe even $229 for the AV-40 if they were significantly better. but i doubt if i'd even notice or care about the difference betweeb $150 speakers and $400 speakers. given the bass requirements below, though, i'd even consider paying more for a separate subwoofer to place on the floor, especially if it was something i could add later if needed - but i haven't seen any for less than about $400. and if i bought one of those, how do i find out what's involved in setting it up - do i need some sort of splitter/filter to route the low freqs to the subwoofer and everything else to the monitors? am i better off with a separate amp and unpowered speakers? what i'd like to find is a web site for practical audio information without raving reviews by wanky audiophiles of $1000 gold-plated cable and similar ignorant-of-physics nonsense. > Note 1: Listening to music is one of the most subjective things on > this planet. The only real way is to listen to something to see if > some audio item suits you and what you listen to. yep, i know. i've got two main uses for speakers - listening to music, and playing games. for playing games, good bass is important for the explosions. for music, i've got eclectic but very selective tastes. Sturgeon's Law applies to music too. i mostly like ambient, trance, chill, various other forms of doof (so, again, bass is good), some classical and earlier music (have developed a liking for some medieval music and baroque guitar), some "world" music, also Dead Can Dance / Lisa Gerrard, and other stuff that provides complex entertainment/work for my brain's audio pattern recognition hardware. i like some rock and pop type music but despise most of it (even the best of it tends to be boringly simplistic), and i like individual pieces in all sorts of musical genres....pretty much anything except for C&W and the various metal sub-genres. i prefer instrumental music or music with lyrics in languages i don't understand so i don't have to know how banal the words are and can hear the voice as just another instrument. > If you search for subjective reports on the MAudio's you will find > plenty of support for how good they are. StoreDJ also had a large > stack of them in the shop both times I was there (around 1.25 metre > cube) so one would assume I am not the only one that thinks them OK. BTW, i noticed that storedj also has a BEHRINGER MS40 with optical spdif input for $209 - any idea if they're any good? https://www.storedj.com.au/products/BEH-MS40 craig -- craig sanders <cas(a)taz.net.au> BOFH excuse #205: Quantum dynamics are affecting the transistors

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who's up for a demonstration?
by Russell Coker 24 Oct '11

24 Oct '11

http://etbe.coker.com.au/2011/10/24/stop-hrl/ I attended the Stop HRL demonstration this afternoon. On Sunday the 13th of November there is a demonstration against the Baillieu government. Are any other LUV members planning to attend? We could form a "penguins against global warming" contingent. ;) -- My Main Blog http://etbe.coker.com.au/ My Documents Blog http://doc.coker.com.au/

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Alex's OpenShot keyboard shortcut enhancement & Applied Code reading
by Rodney Brown 23 Oct '11

23 Oct '11

Alex's lightning talk on reading the python code of OpenShot to add a keyboard short cut reminded me of some of Diomidis Spinellis's blog posts - his IEEE Software "Tools of the Trade" columns, the latest of which are now available as podcasts http://www.computer.org/portal/web/computingnow/tools-of-the-trade Applied Code Reading: GNU Plotutils http://www.spinellis.gr/blog/20090811/index.html Applied Code Reading: Debugging FreeBSD Regex http://www.spinellis.gr/blog/20090916/ I think they may be from his book "Code reading: the open source perspective" http://books.google.com/books?id=8lYbNfsAVT4C&hl=en I should have read one post more closely "Process Substitution" was something I didn't know, advanced plumbing ... http://www.linuxtopia.org/online_books/advanced_bash_scripting_guide/proces… Chapter 22. Process Substitution Process substitution is the counterpart to command substitution. Command substitution sets a variable to the result of a command, as in dir_contents=`ls -al` or xref=$( grep word datafile). Process substitution feeds the output of a process to another process (in other words, it sends the results of a command to another command). Command substitution template command within parentheses >(command) <(command) His example follows.. To locate classes that call the method userGet, but don't call the method userRegister we process their source code with the following bash script. comm -23 \ <(find . -name \*.java -print0 | xargs -0 grep -l userGet | sort) \ <(find . -name \*.java -print0 | xargs -0 grep -l userRegister | sort) The script depends on a wonderful feature of the bash shell: the ability to make the output of a command appear as a file.

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"Conference" microphone
by Peter Ross 18 Oct '11

18 Oct '11

Hi all, I am looking for a (most likely USB attached) microphone that I can place in the middle of a table during a conference call. It should be able to capture everone's voice while she or he is up to 2 metres away. The problem is to have it here before Thursday. That rules out buying online, I think. I haven't been successful finding a shop here in Melbourne selling such item. Maybe one of you know a place? Thanks for help Peter

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Re: [luv-talk] [luv-main] help urgently needed tomorrow when I buy new hardware
by Tim Connors 18 Oct '11

18 Oct '11

On Mon, 17 Oct 2011, Russell Coker wrote: > On Mon, 17 Oct 2011, Chris Samuel <chris(a)csamuel.org> wrote: > > As for RAM - well Java is not known for its light memory limits, > > there's one Java code that's run at VLSCI that can fail if it > > gets less than 30GB or 60GB of RAM, but we believe that's because > > it's doing stupid things with its file IO. :-( > > There are also Java implementations on smart cards with RAM measured in > kilobytes. > > The RAM use is determined by what the application does and also by the garbage > collection system. Often people tune their JVM to not do GC very often to > save CPU time at the cost of using more RAM. > > One thing that's worth noting is that in many environments Java code is > written by people who don't know much about how computers work at a low level > (they are the people who can't write a C program that doesn't SEGV regularly), > so they tend not to be efficient with memory use. I think that Java gets a > bad reputation because of this. Is it possible to write a java gui that feels snappy? I've never seen one, but it could be due to the widget set being extremely high on overhead, or it could be due to people trying to do too much work in a single threaded application without yielding to the GUI often enough. Any examples of java software that doesn't suck? -- Tim Connors

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Java in a browser and memory defaults
by Peter Ross 13 Oct '11

13 Oct '11

Hi all, recently I had some trouble with a login page of a commercial website that is providing a Java applet. Sometimes the login was successful, sometimes not. As the main user has a Windows XP desktop, I concentrated on the particular machine in question but I saw the same on my Ubuntu desktop too. Anyway, it seems to be resolved by putting more memory in the machine in question. Do you know how Java applets behave regarding memory? Do they question the host system at startup and adjust the memory settings? I know about the Java Control Panel and the applet settings - but I did not change them. Still: the increased system memory seems to have solved the problem. On a side I love an app that answers with "Login failed, wrong user or password" when it is an Out Of Memory. I requested password resets three times.. Regards Peter

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[Fwd: [free-software-melb] Rare opportunity on software patents]
by lev＠levlafayette.com 13 Oct '11

13 Oct '11

---------------------------- Original Message ---------------------------- Subject: [free-software-melb] Rare opportunity on software patents From: "Ben Sturmfels" <ben(a)stumbles.id.au> Date: Tue, October 11, 2011 3:23 pm To: australia-public-discuss(a)endsoftwarepatents.org linux-aus(a)lists.linux.org.au free-software-melb(a)lists.softwarefreedom.com.au -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hi Folks, The Australian government is requesting comments in a review of "innovation patents". Submissions close *this Friday* 14 October. This is a rare opportunity to be heard. Please write to <mail.acip(a)ipaustralia.gov.au>, explaining the problems of software patents and pointing out that "innovation patents" are the same, but worse. (I've added some notes below to help get you started.) Important: 1. Please focus on software patents only, not patents in general. 2. Please BCC to <swpat(a)sturm.com.au>. 3. Try get your colleagues and organisation to co-sign. For more on the campaign, please visit: http://endsoftpatents.org/australia. The ACIP review: http://www.acip.gov.au/reviews.html#patsys Thanks for your help. Regards, Ben Sturmfels Ideas for your email ==================== Please feel free use your own words and ideas too. FYI: "Innovation patents" came about in 2000 as a replacement for "petty patents". They have a term of 8 years (std. patents 20 years), minimal examination and much lower barrier of "inventiveness" - easy to get, just as hard to defeat. Intro ideas: software patents in general ---------------------------------------- - you're in the software industry - patents on computation and information processing do the opposite of promoting innovation - harmful to both software industry and society - as such should be abolished - you're one of the thousands who signed the paper petition to the House of Representatives calling for this Body ideas: "innovation patents" are the same but worse ------------------------------------------------------- - pose all the same risks as standard patents - are worse because they have lower requirements for examination and inventiveness - should also be abolished Closing ideas: -------------- - you wish you'd been aware of the 2009 Review of Patentable Subject Matter so you could have commented on that too _______________________________________________ Free-software-melb mailing list Free-software-melb(a)lists.softwarefreedom.com.au http://lists.softwarefreedom.com.au/mailman/listinfo/free-software-melb

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Interesting Bush Telegraph interview 'The Serval Project'
by Rohan McLeod 13 Oct '11

13 Oct '11

There was an interesting interview with Dr Paul Gardner-Stephen from 'The Serval Project'; on Radio National 621's Bush Telegraph this morning (Wed12/10/11). Nice ad for FOSS, with an application to run on Android and Nokia phones; that seems to set up a self-organising wireless LAN for emergencies when the cell network falls over. Would be interesting to know whether the software could be ported to GSM and NextG phones Seems to be a site here: http://www.servalproject.org/ regards Rohan McLeod

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Naive IP network questions
by Rohan McLeod 12 Oct '11

12 Oct '11

Assembled Illuminati; some very naive IP network questions;understanding seems to come very slowly to me; but I am very 'nosy'.! Background: I have an iPrimus ADSL 2Plus account providing an internet connection via a DSL-502T router , accessible via ether USB or Ethernet cable; which is still functioning ! I had an iPrimus 'NBN Co First Release Trial' account providing an internet connection via a Linksys 2000; accessible via Ethernet or wireless; internet access is currently blocked, pending the replacement of the ADSL account with a NBN-Fibre account. Details of the latter: $66/month bundled internet and phone, VOIP local,STD included; mobile at $0.30/ min no flagfall; 15GB/ month cap , 25 Mb/s down 10 Mb/s up; Realistically I'm expecting about 1.25MB/s down ! which is still an improvement on my ADSL; which is only 0.150 MB/s on a good day. . Questions : 1/ The DSL-502T has a web interface at 10.1.1.1 and a 'system' interface at 10.1.1.1 using Putty; the Linksys 2000 has a web interface at 192.168.1.1 but no system interface at 192.168.1.1; why is that ? 2/ I take it that 10.1.1.1 and 192.168.1.1 are the local IP addresses ; other wise I would be accessing everyone else's routers ?...the mist clears very slowly ! 3/ Would the NBN Network Terminating Device which appears to be a fibre-optic router m/n 1-240G-R ;which has an Ethernet connection to the Linksys 2000 have a local IP address ?; talking to the cable tech's who installed the NTD it would seem to have an external IP address; any way to determine this ? Please feel free to correct me if the questions are 'wrong'; regards Rohan McLeod

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