Now that you’re hooked, I need to tell you that if you don’t use a Linux-based OS, fog off! This ain’t meant for ya! And for those who do, stay on.

I’ll be stepping you through a few steps to turn your finger into a magic-wand. Quite literally. I use Ubuntu 11.10, so these steps apply to it in particular, but it may work on other flavours as well (Comments please!).

Okay, before I start, I want to show you what I’m talking about. Here’s a link to the video (I wasn’t able to embed videos; wordpress requires some payment for that).

How cool is that, eh? Want it? Then read on!

Okay, all that desktop-magic is conjured by an amazing app called ‘Easystroke Gesture Recognition’. It basically recognizes actions you do on your touchpad, with your mouse or, if you’re lucky enough, with your touchscreen monitor! Each gesture is linked to a command, keystroke, or special action; and you could do like a zillion different gestures that do a zillion different things!

Step 1:
Install easystroke. For those ‘terminally-impaired’, open up the Software Center and type ‘easystroke’ in the search box, and the first thing that pops on in the results is the one you want. Follow the link through and click on ‘Install’ to install it.

Alternatively, for those who prefer the terminal way of doing things, all you need is this command:

sudo apt-get install easystroke

Step 2:
Next, you’ll need to configure the gestures that are going to do all those cool things. Press the super key (a.k.a the windows key) and type in ‘easystroke’. Click on it when it appears. You may notice at this point, that nothing’s actually happened. This can be very confusing, so don’t waste time waiting for something to happen – it just won’t.

That’s just about it! Easystroke’s now running. Try moving your mouse whilst holding onto the left-click. You should see a line following the cursor. Now it’s time to bind some actions to the gestures Easystroke is capturing.

Step 3:
Easystroke’s easy-peasy to get to know. Its UI is so intuitive, I hardly think its necessary to explain it all. There are just a few tweaks you need to make (at least, I had to make) to get it running with the least possible hindrance. Without further ado, let’s continue.

Find ‘Easystroke’ once again in the Lens (press the super-key). Click on it, and this time, it should open a configuration window (The first time, it launches a daemon that is responsible to track your mouse’s movements), which should look a little like this (without all those diagrams and stuff):

To add an action, its a simple case of clicking on ‘Add Action’. It will create a new entry (usually ‘Gesture 1′) in the table right above the button (‘Add Action’). Rename this to something meaningful (like ‘Open Firefox’). Next, you need to decide whether that action spawns an application, is an alias for a keystroke, or for text, or simulate a button-press, or scroll-bar action. In this case (‘Open Firefox’), we need to spawn an application, so we choose ‘Command’ as the ‘type’. Under ‘Details’, double click it and type, in lower-case ‘firefox’ and press enter. At this point, you should have something that looks like this: (See the highlighted entry)

Now comes the tricky part – You’ll need to associate a gesture for this action. Before you do this, quickly tab over to the ‘Preferences’ tab. There, you’ll find a button ‘Gesture Button’ (the first one, incidentally). Click on it, and out pops a little dialog box with a large gray rectangle. Simply click inside of it; this is to set the initiation key for the gesture (basically tells easystroke to follow mouse movements, iff the mouse button is down simultaneously). Also make sure that the ‘Timeout’ checkbox is selected!

In the same tab (‘Preferences’), you might also want to tick the check box ‘Autostart easystroke’, so that it starts when you log in.

Getting back to setting up the gesture for the action ‘Open Firefox’, tab back into ‘Actions’ and double click on the ‘Stroke’ column of the table, corresponding to that action entry. It should open a small dialog box, that looks something like:

Now, hold the left mouse key down, and make a gesture – anything you want, really, that you would like to associate with opening firefox. If you’ve done it right, you should end up with something that looks like:

That’s it! Go ahead, give it a go! Close Easystroke’s configuration window, and do that gesture (make sure you’re holding onto the left mouse button while you’re ‘gesturing’). It should open firefox. Magic, isn’t it?

That was just one gesture. You can add as many as you want! Take a look at the screen shots above to get an idea of what you could have as actions. If this tutorial/howto just doesn’t cut it for you, here’s a more technical, better written, I daresay, article on Easystroke.

Any questions? Suggestions? Wanna flame this post? Well, feel free to write a comment.

Cheers!

I’m back!

Well, Its been quite some time since I last penned anything, and there’s no excusing that, but I’ve been busy, what with college and exams and new discoveries in the coding-front.

This post marks the beginning of the next wave of posts, hopefully this time, I can come up with enough material to resurrect this blog. Well, anyways,

Cheers for now
Amrith

There is a mystery
that we rarely see,
one of a forbidden breed,
a silent thing, of forgotten
creed.

Of what, or who, the
puzzle ne’er tells; us
beguiling moths, with
simple thoughts;

T’was one such thing,
it was said, whence in
the past, dwells the
future, in all grandeur,
fickle with feud

A lost bird, in the
majestic sky; a space
of lost words and thoughts:
a many-headed void.

Such was the mystery
thus we spake of; a
journey to the empty
depths, a far out-of-reach
place.

Shall such a thing be
left unsolved?, or left to
be ravished by the curious
lot? That is the mystery
that we speak of;

Alas!, I cry, for the time
has come, for the mystery
to be brought to light!
It is the Earth, my friends,
as old as time itself;

An unsolved mystery, it
is, a beauty beyond compare,
a lost past, shrouded in its
eternal glory; that, I cry,
is the mystery!

- Amrith Nayak

Nigh on one hundred years
since, that fatal doom
had closed; that fair Earth,
and Wicked Winds did cease.

T’was said – “It is the End”,
As before, its close in furore,
Impending disaster was
felt : more out of fear than reality.

In the stupefied stupor,
that they did abstain to,
Did they choke : The Wind
was no more!

And he did decide,
that all was all; in
its own stride, correct,
in all thoughts and trends.

And so the world was
forged anew; the molten
metal cast did break,
Entrails spewing in dismay!

Relief – joyous relief, did
it feel; When that liquid,
cool and unremarkable
was doused; All its heat did
retreat!

In the aeons that followed,
it lightened; Aye the sky
had formed, and it was light,
The bright sun that blotched the sky!

And Life did Flourish!

… borne into the new world!

Amrith Nayak

The war commenced,
Great Bows were tensed,
As once before, Again
will be, the greatest fall!

To the other, of old,
the world was but veiled,
As dark to the eye
as the lamp black night;
That dark ire!

Flames that rose,
Ever higher did it rise,
Across the glen, the
glade did burn!

The ancient trumpets
did sound; its treble
was but an echo; of past,
its future was doom.

A solemn face, both
old and young; fragile,
but tough, though his
words were frail : sweet they were!

A spell of power,
was cast; that quelled
the troubles at hand,
Destroyed naught, it persists;

The sea did roar,
and the sky did thunder;
They bellowed their displeasure,
for the peace that was once
wrought, now rots!

Great powers were challenged,
Like swinging bait to a hungry bear,
they wait; All at once,
they did charge;

And they say,
“Was this doom?”,
to belong was; freedom
awaits, long drawn: its close.

Halt, and the deed was done!

And Doom befell that terrible, cursed land!

Amrith Nayak

The seas cleaved,
The waves frothed in their wrath,
and the fiery tempest
tortured the fair skies

The cold of the abyss
stirred, no thought, only
action survived;
The darkness shattered
and fantastic colours played

Voices rose amid-ships,
torrents far below
had caused a gaping hole,
In the hull, with its barnacles!

Aye, the ship was sunk;
swallowed into the murky depths.
The strongest swimmers
drown’d by monstrous water wraiths!

The tempest grew,
throwing rocks of ice
into the thrashing sea.
The few who survived
were crush’d beneath
its immense weight.

The sky lifted its
veil, and thundered
far above, to the pleas
of the wailing seas.

A calm murmur rose
above the waves, it was heard:
That prequel to the abode,
From the abyss, it came!

The furrows, and brows,
hills and holes, peaks of
foam and froth, dwelt,
like the bearers of a cold war!

At its dawn, the voice
was dull, but now was
growing in tremor and treble,
As much as it enraged those
terrible warriors.

The strange noise fell, to a
sweet whisper, and those
raging, watery beasts failed,
Like ice to the flaming stove.

In all this time, when the
skies were clear, free’d of
the tempest’s wrath,
The world resolved
to peace and light.

Thus was the state he
was borne into,
the fair eye and warm gaze,
graced the wounded sea: It did heal!

Braving the tempest,
Sailing on pure mist,
did he save the raging war;
His allegiance, he cared not!

His words flowed with latent
vigour, unto the deaf ears
of the sky and the sea;
Deft words, upon deaf ears!

Then, as equals, both
great and magnificent,
one as deep as the
other is high, the listen’d!

Ornate words followed,
all slow and royal,
Such as the ancient tongue was,
Sapphire hues spread
through the sea, at the sharp report
of his last word!

And the sky became the sea,
Each a reflection of the other,
With mysteries, both can equal,
Another triumph, amidst the darkness!

Hail! The Close was dealt with!

And the world was borne into new-found peace…

Amrith Nayak

So, I’m assuming that you did head over to the mighty Wikipedia wiki, and found out all about Fractals. I’m also assuming that about half of you didn’t understand most of it  (It took me a long time to figure out, anyway…). But even if you didn’t understand the vast bank of text on the subject on Wikipedia, you might have noticed that a lot of it is, in fact, math. You only need to understand high-school level of math (That is, basic math) to know what’s going on to make a fractal. I know this may discourage some of you, but I’m also assuming that you’re brave souls, and will have the strength to hang in and finish reading the rest of this post.

Anyway, getting back to the topic: Fractals. Okay, so you say, “I’ve read about them, now what?”. If you know your basic math, then there’s a likely chance that you’ve heard of a set of numbers, called complex numbers, and unlike their name, are not very complex to learn about. Again, Wikipedia provides a most excellent, although detailed, summary on the subject. For those of you who find what Wikipedia has to offer, somewhat vague, or are too lazy to read the whole thing, try this site, which gives a most simple introduction on the subject.

By now, you’ve probably acquired a fine knowledge on fractals, and in doing so, brushed up your complex number math. Now, you may ask “So what? Fractals exist.  So what?”.  Fractals are really quite fun. If you’re a programmer, then you can make fun fractal programs, and generate cool pictures from them. I’ve done one recently, and its come out OK, but still needs a bit of work. I’ve coded it in C++, if you’re wondering. Even if you’re not a budding programmer, then you can still have fun with fractals. They make cool class projects (for students!), they inspire ideas on colour combinations (for those architects and designers out there), they make mathematicians go crazy (in a good way), and they leave the rest of us wanting some more of them!

These are the results of my fractal generating program that I made:

Yes, it did produce some interesting results… Try and  see for yourself! If any of you’d like to have the program, just ask for it. If any of you programmers out there would like the source code (its in C++), then ask me for it specifically.

Anyway, Fractals are quite a bit of fun, so happy ‘Fractaling’, and Cheers!

So you’ve already made your website; its up and running, and ready to roll. Then you hit that unforeseen snag. Just where on the internet should you put it? You frantically search the web for website hosting companies, and find millions upon millions of them. And they all look appealing. That is, until you see the price tags on some of them. Then, you stop looking for ‘website hosting’ and type ‘free web hosting’. The search engine comes up with tens upon thousands of results. You start going through them. You then start to realise that they’re not all as good as the paid ones, but you are still reluctant to have to pay for your website hosting. WELL, you can stop looking now. I can recommend to you one site that offers you potentially limitless website hosting opportunities! I’ve used it before, and I’m quite intimate with it, and have utilised and collected its many bounties. It is called x10hosting and offers both free and paid hosting.

I’ll attach links/ads for you, so that you can check them out. x10′s service is amazing, and is very useful if you are just starting a new website. You don’t need to change webhosts even as your website grows, because of x10hosting’s wonderful flexibility, they allow for upgrades and such sort.

They’re really doing a great job! If you are looking for a good, reliable webhosting service, then I’d recommend them to you any day.

Cheers,

LINKS:

Text Link:     Free Web Hosting at x10Hosting

PS: I really hope you find x10 as useful as I have…

First things first:

What exactly is CSS? Many would say that it is a programming language. It actually isn’t. That’s the whole point. However hard one may try to convince one self that it is a programming language, it just isn’t. It doesn’t bear those trademarks of those good ol’ rugged programming languages, like C++, or even JavaScript. Many out there, (I know you’re out there!) have something of a mind-block for anything to do with programming. I hope to erase that block (or at least some of it, as some walls are really built strong) in this article. So, I’ll bet you’re asking – “Okay, so then, what is CSS?”. Its not scary. According to Google definitions, it is: “Cascading Style Sheets (CSS): A stylesheet language used to describe the presentation of a document written in a markup language.” And according to the rest of us, it’s just a way, a method to make your website (or application!) nicer. Basically, it defines elements in a (X)HTML document in the average webpage. Okay, so now we’ve got that clear, let’s move onto how to write a CSS document.

What do I need?

You maybe asking yourself this question. CSS does not need expensive or large IDE‘s to write it. It’s just like (X)HTML. Notepad would do the job just fine. You may also want to have a browser handy, to see the fruits of your toil, although, if you are reading this, you have already taken care of it. That’s all you will need to start writing CSS!

What Next?

Okay, I’m going to rely heavily on the fact that you already know (X)HTML. If you don’t, stop now, and read this. Now that you’re up to brush with you’re HTML, create a webpage, and save it some directory. A sample (X)HTML page would look like this:
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en">
<head>
<title>My Test Page</title>
</head>
<body>
<p>Some text here</p>
</body>
</html>

Open Notepad, or whichever text editor you are using, and create a new file. Save it in the same directory as the (X)HTML file, as ‘style.css’. Let’s write some CSS in it. I’ll take you through only the most basic CSS in this tutorial, but I will write some more later on. In the file, type (or copy and paste), the following:
* {
border: none;
margin: none;
}
This is the most basic CSS you’ll probably ever see in your life. It tells the browser that all elements on your webpage has no border, and no displacement from the edges of the browser’s viewing area. This doesn’t really do much. If you link this CSS document to your (X)HTML document by attaching the code shown below to the <head> of your document, you will not see any change!

<link rel="stylesheet" href="style.css" type="text/css" media="screen" />

I’ll expand the CSS now.
body {
background-color: #C0C0C0;
font-family: Georgia, Verdana, sans-serif;
font-size: 14px;
color: rgb(0, 0, 0);
}
In technical terms, the code in between the braces are called selector attributes or properties, and the thing you’ve typed before the opening brace is known as a selector. You may notice that every attribute is terminated by a semicolon. This is important. Onto the explanation of the code above:

• body - It is the selector, which means whatever comes here is the entity (or element) you are defining in your (X)HTML document.
• background-color: #C0C0C0; - This will display a silver colour as the background of your webpage. It essentially does the same as the bgcolor="#COCOCO" in (X)HTML.
• font-family: Georgia, Verdana, sans-serif; - This attribute will set the font style for your webpage. If the computer can’t find the fonts Georgia and Verdana, it will fall back on any sans-serif font.
• font-size: 14px; - This will set the size of the text on your webpage. Note that the size is written in pixels (px). Incidentally, all numerical values used in CSS are either in px or em form.
• color: rgb(0, 0, 0); - This attribute sets the colour of the text on your webpage. I have used rgb(x,y,z) values to set it, although you can use the ‘normal’ method, and set it in hexadecimal form.

That’s basically it. You can extend this a lot, but I won’t be the one to teach you that, for the time being at least, but do have a look at this amazing tutorial.  I will be adding to this short, basic tutorial later on. Anyway, experiment as much as you can with CSS (that’s how you get good).For now, its adieu.

Cheers

If you have the curiosity to view the source, then be warned of some horrendous scripting (I haven’t tidied some parts yet), but on the whole it looks OK.

EDIT: (Have Fixed the Code!)

Any comments/suggestions relating to the website/sIFR are welcome. You are even open to criticize the website thoroughly.

Enjoy!