PC Speaker

If you are getting mad by the sound of the PC Speaker while you are working in the console mode, kill it before it drives you mad.

sudo rmmod pcspkr

Update: It is better to do,

sudo modprobe -r pcspkr

Latex tip - how to include graphics

Tools

First convert your PNG file to EPS format. For that the png2eps can be used. To make png2eps work you would need to install the following:

1. pngcheck (part of netpbm)
2. pngtopnm (part of netpbm)
3. pnmtotiff (part of netpbm)
4. tiff2ps (part of libtiff-tools)
5. sed basename bc (should come default with your distro)

$ sudo aptitude install pngcheck libtiff4 libtiff-tools netpbm
$ wget http://www.henlich.de/media/png2eps/png2eps
$ chmod a+x png2eps
$ ./png2eps myimage.png > myimage.eps

Using graphics

\documentclass[a4paper,10pt]{article}
\usepackage{graphics}
\usepackage{graphicx}

\begin{figure}
\caption{some figure}
\begin{center}
\includegraphics[bb=0 0 438 476]{myimage.eps}
\end{center}
\end{figure}

NOTE: Although I prefer PNG, if you have a jpj file, the jpg2eps tool can be used.

[Source: A PNG to EPS convertor, Images in LaTeX]

Update:
I have found it much easier to create illustrations in Dia and export them directly in the eps format. Dia is available for Windows, Mac and Linux.

Empathy has a long way to go!

The new IM client on 9.10, Empathy, is not at all impressive or may I say that I am so used to Pidgin that I had to switch back.

What is bad?

1. Notification mechanism - when someone pings you, the new chat window does not show up but is hidden in the notification area, which is really weird
2. Does not give too many options under preferences
3. You can't search for contacts while they are offline (which is required because most of the people are invisible these days)
4. You can't add a buddy pounce
5. Empathy would always remember your password. If you tell it not to, it won't log you in and once you give your password, it stays there. (this is really weird)
6. You can't close a conversation with the ESC key

The GREAT news is that Pidgin now supports voice and video, so can someone please tell me why they hell did Gnome decide to dump Pidgin for Empathy :-o

How to install Pidgin?

sudo aptitude install pidgin pidgin-themes pidgin-facebookchat pidgin-musictracker