Suramya's Blog : Welcome to my crazy life…

January 28, 2012

Proof that you can find anything on the net if you look long enough

Filed under: Books Related / Reviews,My Life — Suramya @ 8:57 PM

After looking for this book since 1994 which was when I first read it I finally managed to get my hands on ‘Earth Invaded’ by Nathan Elliott in the Amazon used book section. The book was in pretty good condition and got here quite fast considering it was shipped from the UK using normal post (I as eager to read the book but not eager enough to pay for express international shipping)

Took me about 45 mins to read the first book (its a trilogy and is only 160 pages) but it sure brought back a lot of memories.  The book is the story of how a group of soldiers fight against alien invaders when none of their energy weapons work against them. The plot was simple, and the story straight forward. I guess that the book was written for a much younger audience but was still a good read even at my age.

I have the third book in the series but am still waiting for the second book to be delivered (Got that one from another used store on Amazon) so can’t read the next one till that arrives. 🙁

Currently waiting for my system to finish deleting files fromm the Trash folder so am typing this on the tablet using the new keyboard. 🙂 For some reason when I recovered data from one of my crashed disks and copied it to the new one it got into some sort of loop where the same directories were replicated under a folder over and over again i.e. I have a folder called .wine/dosdevices/z:/dev/fd/3 under which is another wine folder with the same layout and so on… So a 120GB folder was copied over as over 400GB and its taking forever to delete the files. Actually correction, I was able to delete them from the system but emptying the trash is taking time.

Well this is all for now. Will write more later once my system is back up (Booted into single user more to speed things up).

– Suramya

Rooting the Samsung Galaxy Nexus

Filed under: Knowledgebase,Linux/Unix Related,Tech Related — Suramya @ 1:45 AM

A rooted android device gives you a lot of flexibility so one of the first things I did after I got back home was to root it using the following instructions (modified from Android Forums: [HOW TO] Root the GSM/HSPA+ Samsung Galaxy Nexus):

Note: I am assuming you are using Linux in the instructions below. If not then visit the link above for steps in Windows.

  • Download the Android SDK from here to a folder on your PC.
  • Power down your device
  • Connect the USB cable between the phone and your PC
  • Open a shell session
  • Switch to the directory where you downloaded the SDK (In my case it was Media/Downloads)
    • cd Media/Downloads
  • Extract the SDK Zip and switch to the new directory
    • unzip sdk-tools.zip
cd sdk-tools
  • Make the applications executable
    • chmod a+x fastboot-linux adb-linux
  • Now, Boot your phone into fastboot mode by pressing and holding the volume-up AND volume-down AND the power buttons UNTIL you see the little green Android laying on his back with door on his chest open
  • Verify that fastboot can “see” your device
    • ./fastboot-linux devices

    You should see something similar to this:

    0146B5030B02100E        fastboot

    If you don’t see anything, try running the command as root.

  • Next we start the unlock process for the bootloader by issuing the following command. Keep in mind that this will completely wipe out all data from the phone so make sure you backup before running the command.
    • ./fastboot-linux oem unlock

    Confirm that you want the bootloader to be unlocked by acknowledging the warning message on the phone. (Please note that this will void your warranty). Use your volume rocker/keys to select the confirmation and press the power button to actually confirm.

At this point you have an unlocked bootloader and now we will start the rooting process.

  • Download the su.zip flashable root package

    • I had to manually copy the su.zip to the Phone because for some reason I kept getting an ‘error: insufficient permissions for device’ when I tried copying the file using adb. I used FTP (as I have SwiFTP on the phone, but you can use any method that you are comfortable with)

  • Download the Clockwork Recovery for Galaxy Nexus (GSM) to the same folder as fastboot and adb
  • Soft boot the ClockworkMod custom recovery by issuing the following command. This method will not replace the currently installed recovery partition on your phone, so you can still receive updates from Google.
    • ./fastboot-linux boot recovery-clockwork-5.5.0.2-maguro.img

    Your phone should now boot into ClockworkMod custom recovery. The next few steps are done on the phone. You shold use the volume key / rocker to navigate and the power button to select an entry.

  • From the main ClockworkMod Recovery screen / menu, select ‘install zip from sdcard‘
  • Select ‘choose zip from sdcard‘
  • Select ‘su.zip’
  • Confirm that you want do this.
  • Select ‘*****Go Back*****”
  • Select the ‘reboot system now‘

That’s it. 🙂 Once your phone finishes rebooting, you should now have root. If you hit issues, try reaching out to the folks in the Android Forums for help.

Hope this helps.

Update (14th Feb 2012): As you all know links/stuff tends to disappear over time on the internet so I have updated the post with links to my mirror of the software required to root the Nexus. Original links are still listed below.

Original Download links:

– Suramya

January 27, 2012

My new Phone: Samsung Galaxy Nexus

Filed under: My Life — Suramya @ 11:42 PM

After drooling about it for almost 3 months I finally have my new phone: Samsung Galaxy Nexus. Special thanks to Ronak and Jheelna for getting it to me from the US. 🙂 I got the phone on the 18th and have used it for about 10 days without any net connectivity for the most part and I can honestly say that I really like it so far.

First impressions/experiences so far:

  • The settings page is a bit sparse and seems to be a bit dumbed down. I see a lot more options on my Galaxy Tablet that is running Android 2.3
  • The default set of applications that come with the phone should be expanded, I really missed having a memo pad app
  • My screen now has a small scratch on it because I dumped my hotel key in the same pocket as the phone. Although to be fair, the key was pretty big and heavy.
  • The system is very fast and responsive. A genuine pleasure to use
  • Some of the settings/options should give you feedback when used, e.g. when asked to check for system updates, some sort of indication would be good. Right now I don’t know if it is stuck or just waiting for a reply from the server.
  • USB Host access is not supported, so I can’t mount the phone as a USB drive on my computer. 🙁 This really sucks but as a workaround I have installed SwiFTP on the phone which is a FTP server.

Will document more of my findings as I use the phone more and more. But as a starter, now that I am back home with a good internet connection I rooted the phone to give me more options and will be installing a whole lot of apps and experimenting.

Well, this is all for now. Will post more later.

– Suramya

January 26, 2012

Vacation… Where am I on the graph?

Filed under: Humor,My Life — Suramya @ 9:44 PM

The following graph is quite true when you think about vacations. I have been out of office for a bit more than a week now and I am just at the end of my trip (typing this at the Bombay airport) so starting monday I will have to deal with all the emails that have accumlated the past week.. Unfortunately most of them won’t be spam, and this is just after I managed to clean up my inbox before I left. 🙁

image

The trip was a lot of fun, will describe it in a separate post as I want to include some of the photos as well in the post.

Well this is all for now. Will post more later.

– Suramya

January 18, 2012

‘Vimana’ a good SciFi read

Filed under: Books Related / Reviews — Suramya @ 3:46 PM

Its been a while since I last reviewed a book, guess I have just been busy. However I just finished reading Vimana by Mainak Dhar and really liked it. As some of you know, I don’t usually like reading books by most of the famous indian Authors. Before you get upset, its not because I think that Indian authors are bad, just that the topics most of them write about are of absolutely no interest to me. There are some notable exceptions to this like Ashok Banker (author of the Ramayan series), Amish Tripathi (wrote the Shiva trilogy). Now I have another author to add to the list of authors I like: Mainak Dhar.

The premise behind the book is quite simple, the myths we have about Gods fighting in their flying Vimans are true and based on aliens with advanced technology fighting on earth and one boy gets dragged into the fight because he literally stumbled into it.

The story is quite fast paced and is very light reading, there are not too many plot themes to keep track of, but that just makes the book fun to read. Since there are not too many plotlines at times the story gets a bit predictible but the fast pace keeps it from getting boring.

The love interest of the main character could have been left out but it didn’t get too bad.

In all I would recommend the book to others, Actually this would also be a good book for kids as well. Though for that I am basing the criteria on my reading habits which was considered quite advanced and not normal 🙂 (I was reading Michael Crichton, L Ron Hubbard etc in 7th & 8th class. )

As an side note, This entry was typed in flight on the way to Mumbai using my new keyboard for the Galaxy Tablet. Now that I have this keyboard, I really don’t need a laptop as I can do everything on the tablet. Except maybe code but that isn’t that big an issue as so far I haven’t needed to code on a flight. Plus its a lot more compact than a laptop. 🙂

Well this is all for now. Will post more later. 

– Suramya

January 13, 2012

Official style guide for Android developers launched

Filed under: Computer Software,Interesting Sites,Tech Related — Suramya @ 3:01 PM

Google has just launched Android Design, a website created to help aid developers in the creation of applications for ICS. This makes it easier for developers to code visually consistent applications, so if you are interested in Android development check it out. I took a look and it has some good tips/suggestions on design etc.

Duarte wants to remedy this. On Thursday, Google launched Android Design, a web site created specifically to help aid developers in the creation of applications for ICS. The site offers a comprehensive visual to third-party application developers, giving suggestions on everything from how to implement different visual elements to overall back-end patterns for the OS itself.

In theory, it will help developers better understand just how the Android team thinks about layout and implementation, while simultaneously giving suggestions to interaction designers on how to maintain visual integrity. Basically, it will help both first-time developers and Android veterans make apps look less crappy.

Since have been thinking of diving back into mobile development for the past few days, this site will be very useful and has been launched at just the right time. Considering the previous experience I have with mobile development was on Symbian using Python, I can use all the design help I can get.

– Suramya

January 12, 2012

Still waiting to use this in real life.

Filed under: Humor,My Thoughts — Suramya @ 11:26 PM

Actually now that I think of it, I haven’t used any of the stuff from Physics, Chemistry or Bio that we learned at school in real life either. Gah, the no of hours of my life that have been wasted…

– Suramya

January 11, 2012

Enter a 1 TB Pen Drive

Filed under: Computer Hardware,Tech Related — Suramya @ 1:43 PM

Have you ever despaired of not having enough storage space when on the move? Are the 16GB pen drive no longer enough for you? In that case this announcement from ‘Victorinox’ is just for you: their new SSD Flash drive will be available in capacities up to 1 TB (1024 GB) while still retaining the same size format as the regular pen drives.

Designed for the person who’s never deleted a single file and maxes out their monthly bandwidth limits on torrents, Victorinox dropped a bomb on CES with their new SSD flash drive which will actually be available in capacities up to one terabyte. That’s a thousand gigabytes people

It’s actually the largest flash drive Victorinox has created in terms of its physical size too, but it’s still very easy to slip in a pocket or tether to a keychain. It’s not like they just slapped their shield logo on an external hard drive and attached a pop-out blade. Read and write speeds are promised at 220MB/s and 150MB/s respectively, and from my personal experience Victorinox’s drives have been some of the fastest I’ve ever used.

I have a 8GB pen drive which is currently missing in action. But unfortunately this device is not available yet for retail and there is no information of the pricing yet, however I am sure it will have a hefty price. Still: me want!

Thanks to Gizmodo for the story.

– Suramya

January 9, 2012

Finally watched the new Sherlock movie

Filed under: My Life — Suramya @ 11:59 PM

Finally watched the new Sherlock movie today. One word review: bleah… Didn’t like the movie at all. They made it into an action movie but bare minimum of Sherlock touches so that they could claim that it was based on the books. Frankly, if you like the books then you should watch the BBC series ‘Sherlock‘ instead. They have done a way better job of portraying Sherlock than the movie even thought the series in based in 21st century London.

Considering a lot of people who were raving about this movie are the same ones who are raving about Mission Impossible 4, I am wondering if I should make the effort to go watch MI4.

I am going to go watch the latest episode of the second season of Sherlock Holmes now to purge my brain of this horrible movie.

– Suramya

January 5, 2012

A new file-sharing religion Kopimism is recognized

Filed under: Humor,Interesting Sites,News/Articles — Suramya @ 9:53 PM

When I first saw this I thought it was a joke and that maybe I have had too many cold meds in too short a time period. However it looks like the newly founded religion ‘Kopimism’ is real and its central tenet; the right to file-share has been formally recognised by the Swedish government. The Church of Kopimism claims that “kopyacting” – sharing information through copying – is akin to a religious service.

This is quite interesting and funny at the same time. Most governments in the world allow religious freedom so if that same right is given to Kopimism, then the war on piracy would grind to an abrupt halt because continuing would open a large can of worms.

The Swedish government agency Kammarkollegiet finally registered the Church of Kopimism as a religious organisation shortly before Christmas, the group said.

“We had to apply three times,” said Gustav Nipe, chairman of the organisation.

The church, which holds CTRL+C and CTRL+V (shortcuts for copy and paste) as sacred symbols, does not directly promote illegal file sharing, focusing instead on the open distribution of knowledge to all.

It was founded by 19-year-old philosophy student and leader Isak Gerson. He hopes that file-sharing will now be given religious protection.

“For the Church of Kopimism, information is holy and copying is a sacrament. Information holds a value, in itself and in what it contains and the value multiplies through copying. Therefore copying is central for the organisation and its members,” he said in a statement.

Before you get all offended and upset, remember we already have a church of the flying spaghetti monster.

Thanks to BBC News for the initial news. If you want to learn more visit Kopimism’s Official website.

– Suramya

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