" Setup failed to launch installation engine RPC Server unavailable"

Here is a solution to the BIG bugging error "Setup failed to launch installation engine RPC Server unavailable".

Normally, this is an indication of the Sasser worm or its variants. If you are using Windows XP without SP2 ,immediately install Service Pack 2 for Windows XP or atleast the patch for the Sasser Worm.For more technical info on that problem and how to remove the worm ,it would be helpful if you visit Microsft's Knowledge Base (extensive it is , I might add) here

On the other hand ,if you are using Windows XP with SP2 and still facing this problem, do the following.

1. Verify that the Remote Procedure Call service is running.
   
   For this, goto Start>Run and enter services.msc and in the right pane ,find a service called Remote Procedure Call (RPC). Make sure the 'status' is Started.If this is not the case , just right-click and press Start.
   
   Retry the installation.
   
   Note: Generally, this service cannot even be stopped as it is an 'essential' service.
   
   
2. In case this doesn't work, make sure another service called "DCOM Server Process Launcher" is also started.
   
   Recommended: Goto Services as described earlier and right-click on Properties. Under the General tab ,set the startup type to Automatic.
   

PS: Also recommended that you scan your system with Microsoft Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool(KB890830).

Update to Psi faqs Part1 : From the PsiWiki

In one of my previous posts , i talked of how to solve the SSL/TLS problem with psi for Google Talk .

Here is what the wiki for Psi has to say.

** Linux users must ensure that they have the QCA-TLS package installed first. SSL encryption will not work otherwise and you will not be able to connect to your Google Talk account.

And about the stupid help at Google's website(ya, they do have a section aptly titled "Why are these instructions different from Google's instructions?"

The answer: Google uses psi 0.9.3 for their instructions. The method described here is for psi 0.10.

As of writing the post, psi 0.10 is the latest release and 0.11 is put up for testing.

A must for all psi users: Visit Psi's Website and the psi Wiki

Another problem solved: Force 32-bit programs to run on a 64-bit machine

Phew, it took me 2 hrs of searching and some screwing up my system to get to install Picasa on Ubuntu 7.04

Hint provided by Google.

Q: Will Picasa run on a 64-bit version of Linux?

Yes, but you’ll need to configure the system to provide 32-bit compatibility libraries.

Please refer to your Linux distribution’s help information for more on how to establish those libraries. On Debian, they come in a package called ia32-libs.

Simple now.

Download and install ia32-libs. All that Google means by "establishing those libraries" is to get them installed.

sudo apt-get install ia32-libs

Then download the 32-bit version of Picasa .I was using Ubuntu, so the .deb extension.

By default,it is downloaded to the Desktop directory. Similar instructions otherwise.

cd Desktop
sudo dpkg --force-architecture -i picasa_2.2.2820-5_i386.deb

Changes will be needed to the package name as per the version downloaded.

Messages(*warning*) will be shown that the installation is 'forced'.

Disclaimer:I [NpoWEr], the author of this post do disclaim any responsibility for any harm resulting from your use of the above described method. It has worked for me.

That was just for some fun, cmon guys ,it'll work unless you screwed your system beforehand :D

Psi faqs Part 1: "Cannot enable SSL/TLS. Plugin not found"

All you guys using Linux must have heard of Gaim, Kopete ,etc. One among these and one of my favorites is Psi.

Nicely named ,this is simpler and offers more than what Gaim does.

The purpose of this post ,however ,is just to help out guys out there who are(going to) facing(face) problems setting this kid up.

Firstly, a reading of "How do I configure Psi for Google Talk? " on Google Talk Help would definitely help.

That aside, one problem that users generally face is when you check the "Use SSL encryption(to server)" box, an error message pops up saying "Cannot enable SSL/TLS. Plugin not found" .Now, what do you do?

The answer, which I did a lot of Googling and some hunt in the local repository (I use Ubuntu and IIT Kharagpur does have a 'local mirror' for that) is to install libqca-tls, qca-tls, libqca-ssl or qca-ssl package. One of these would do.

And if you are very new to Linux, here is how you go about installing it from your repository.

apt-get install libqca-tls

If not successful, replace libqca-tls with one of the given packages till you get your lucky one

My New Blog and the purpose

After a long thought process ,I've decided to move to Wordpress .However ,right now ,I don't have enough time on my hands to move *this* blog .I've started a new one and decided that it would be more of non-technical ramblings of a geek@IIT KGP.

The blog is named [NpoWEr]ed .

Comment.

Four Browsers and a comeback

It feels nice to be blogging again... long time no see.

So, starting off with the posts subject : trying out four browsers and make recommendations.

The list : Mozilla Firefox ,Internet Explorer ,Flock and Netscape Navigator.

Mozilla Firefox

The ever stable and my all-time favourite is the one I use for everyday browsing.

Infact ,it is a little interesting how I got to make this post.For a long time, I wanted to check out the home page of the browser (Pardon me guyz, yup, I haven't done it until yesterday). And then there was it, the words that are my mantra for using computers - personalize :)

That somehow led me to a page which was covering Six Flavours of Firefox out of which two were of no interest ,one is more of a media player than a browser( do try it out, I did quite a long time back in its Beta stage and was said to be the next big thing after Firefox itself, it looks cool too) ,one was for the Mac and the other two being covered here ,Flock and Netscape Navigator.

I don't think saying more about Firefox would be of any interest to you guys except if i recommend some good add-ons which I use :
1. del.icio.us Bookmarks
2. Elite proxy switcher (only for people who need to keep shifting between proxies)
3. Foxytunes - this is one amazing hing.
4. Google Toolbar - ah,oh, this must've been numbered 1 ,never mind ;)
5. No Squint.
6. PDF Download
7. StumbleUpon.

And as for themes ,if you like minimalistic themes , go in for iFox or PitchDark. I use a variation of the former , iFox Graphite.

Internet Explorer 7

Microsoft has made a great comeback with this one. I used it for about 6 months after release when I finally realised that Google Toolbar has more customization options in FF than in IE7 ( FF fans thank Google and my personalization here ).

Extremely stable and better memory management makes this a very good choice for people who do regular browsing . Infact I see absolutely no reason why a layman(letz use the word junta) who has Vista would leave IE7 . Infact, with its amazing integration into the OS , I recommend you don't.

Well, my current usage of IE7 is restricted to Microsoft's sites which are heavy and I use IE7 exclusively so that it caches these sites as much as possible (you know? I'm smart :-B)

Netscape Navigator 9

Netscape Navigator 9 is based upon FF and takes the crown as far as startup times are concerned.

It has lots of features and claims to be designed with 'socializing' as the area it addresses. Well, it does have great integration of Netscape.com ,a mini-browser , LinkPad akin to live clipboard for FF , news subscription , Sitemail Notifier and Friends' Activity Sidebar and something called Integrated Voting but that is pretty much it. Looks aren't that great and buttons on the installed toolbars don't look good either.

All I could say is Netscape came up with a faster and lighter browser that would make loyalists happy but not something that would capture the market . It sometimes hurts to see one Giant in dire straits. I still remember those old days when IE sucked and Navigator was the way to go.

Flock

Easily the most interesting and 'useful' of the lot but heavy on RAM. That apart I could find only one complaint , the space left after all the 'specials' is a little less than what you generally have in FF.

The interesting stuff - where do i start ? :D
The unique thing of this browser is the Flock Toolbar that can be hid just like a normal toolbar.

And then, the individual descriptions of the buttons, from the left.

1. My World : This takes you to the page you see above.

2. Media Streams : Displays videos or pictures according to the choice of the channel/stream.

3. Show Favorite Sites : This shows you your bookmarks ,both local and online .Supports del.icio.us

4. Display accounts and services : Another very important button. Access all your accounts one-touch.

5. Display Feed Sidebar : self-explanatory

6. Display Web ClipBoard : Drag and drop anything as you see it, pictures or text. Use it later for cut ,copy or paste.

7. Create a blog post :The browser opens up a nice text edit styling and gives us the option as to which blog engine to publish to (I'm publishing this via this feature)

8. Uploader : Again a tool to upload photos to various sites .Flickr and PhotoBucket supported.

Intel's processors and the confusion: 32-bit or 64-bit

Hi.It has been long since a post had been made in this blog. Forgive my negligence, those few loyal readers I have (At least, I have).These days were hectic and I too many jobs on hand to be completed and completed well.

This post, was to just comment on Intel’s, well, negligence (!)?

Hmm, I shall start off then.

As we all know pretty well, AMD had released the first 64-bit processor for desktops and Intel, for a long long time laid its bet on its very-successful 32-bit architecture, well known as IA32. However, Intel, of late (well, at least I have come to know it very late) has realized its fallacy and now all (read ALL) of its processors are 32-bit, including those which were released as 32bit initially which includes Pentium 4,Pentium D, Pentium Extreme Edition, Celeron D ,Xeon and Core Duo line of processors.

AMD has long copied Intel’s designs in that passed 32-bit era of computing (you are allowed to disagree, as usual :D).But, it seems history has its irony and Intel HAD TO adopt AMD’s x86-64 architecture, which was the name AMD gave to its 64-bit processors. Intel renamed this Intel64 and careful note is to be taken to the fact that Intel64 is a completely different architecture from IA-64 and all other implementations of x86-64. IA-64 is the architecture used for the Itanium series of processors from Intel.

Intel has lost the crown of having the fastest processor model since the introduction of AMD Athlon X2 series of processors. However, on July 27, 2006, Intel released its Core 2 Duo series of processors based on the Conroe core(covered on October 27th,click here), and reclaimed its crown and further establishing its lead when it released its Core 2 Quad series(covered on November 2nd,click here).

However, I have stated that I would be talking about Intel’s negligence, although that was a word used rashly above. What I am cribbing about is that Intel, on the Technical Specification sheet does not mention explicitly, the much wanted ’64-bit’ word .All the sheet says is that the Core 2 Duo supports the Intel Extended Memory 64 technology what it calls Intel EM64.

If it takes a person a reading in a online encyclopedia to determine whether a processor is 32-bit or not, and the company’s website says nothing, then should I presume that Intel’s tying to hide something from its customers? Especially that there are not many 64-bit applications around for common use? Any other reasons?

---

And ,as usual ,my fascination with codenames continues.
Here are some for trivia:
Conroe: The core with which the initial Core 2 series of processors came out.

Conroe XE: The core for Core 2 Extreme Edition.

Allendale: The cores which the present Core 2 processors had.

Kentsfield: Codename for Core 2 Quad.

Woodcrest: Codename for the server side version of Core 2, marketed as the well known Xeon.

Merom : The mobile version of Core 2.

Penryn: The successor to Merom (this will have a 45nm core.All others have 65nm cores)

The new quilt and a late post :)

My customization-of-the-template spree continues and a new widget gives its entry - The Quilt.



First,an introduction to the concept of scrobbling, or more precisely as audioscrobbling.Each and every song you listen to is noted down an a database of it is maintained online.This is called 'scrobbling'.And your 'charts' are generated.They might be weekly,monthly or even yearly.This is a way of analyzing your music habits.As time passes, you come to know of your tastes and how they have undergone changes as you discover new artists and songs.Like how Enter Sandman could make Linkin Park go down to Metallica in three days in my case ;) .

And, here is where Last.fm enters the scene.Last.fm© is primarily a Internet radio station and music recommendation system.

Last.fm provides a software that you can install on your computer that would scrobble all the songs that you play on your media player.Ofcourse you also have to install a Audioscrobbler© plugin for that media player.The best part is that it will scrobble even when you are offline.It will write all data to a file and then upload it when you are connected.

Now,the extras:
Last.fm provides nice goodies in the form of code snippets that you can embed on your webpage/blog. This includes live RSS feed of your played songs, and a nice widget called 'quilt' which consists of small thumbnails of all the albums/artists you've hears to.And again ,the choice between albums or artists is yours.

This was just intended to give you a little introduction to the world of audioscrobbling and the world's largest social music platform, Last.fm.

Find out more about Last.fm at Wikipedia and the site itself.

And,in case you join Last.fm ,add me as a friend :).

My profile at Last.fm

Suzanne Shell and the Spiders on the Web

A woman by the name Suzanne Shell has sued Archive.org for the spiders crawling her site. The Colorado woman says she posted a notice on the site saying it she doesn't allow the site to be crawled.She sued for civil theft, breach of contract, and violations of the Racketeering Influence and Corrupt Organizations act(hell, what are they, never heard of them, after all she is an American ...phew).However, this is a late report by me and a court ruling last month dismissed all charges on Archive.com , except for the breach of contract claim. If Shell prevails on that claim, sites like Google will have to get online publishers to 'opt-in' before it can crawl their sites.

It seems it is more of her mistake.As a web-designer or an owner ,she shud've known all the ways to prevent crawling of the site.One of the important thing is to put up a 'robots.txt' file which she didn't. And it is too foolish to argue that the notice shudve served the purpose when it is well known that spiders don't understand the text which they crawl.

The case seems to be completely stupid.If she wanted to protect the page from being crawled , why didn't hse obtain a security certificate for it and why didnt she password protect it giving IDs to people who want to visit the site.Once a page is put up on the Web as a 'public' page ,which a page is by default, there is no use saying it is not intended for public.It is akin to a book once published and sold and then banned.

And what was the Internet for? When she launched the site without password protection, SHE ,infact had ignored the rules of the Net.

If I owned Archive.com , I wud've looked up the rules and sued her instead(ummm,they already know the rules...I'm waiting for the lawsuit to come out. American style :P). And if Miss Shell (or her lawyer,btw) was any more sensible ,they wudve withdrawn the case for the simple reason that there was no robots.txt instead of dropping 'shell's .It is simply the way the system works. Ignorance is no excuse.

I know it too, the hard way though.If she wins the case, it would only result in the emergence of new 'shell's to throw more 'shell's at such companies which crawl the Net.

Product Integration,Version Google :Now its Picasa weds Blogger.

Say hello to the new world of product integration. The concept has been the secret of the rise of mammoths, one whom the new one has taken on. No prizes for guessing who the giants are. Now, into the subject matter.

We’ve seen Microsoft use this strategy for about 15 odd years now and has been very very successful(extra stress on very ) .The integration of Internet Explorer into Windows Explorer ,use of proprietary DLLs into the very famous Visual Studio programming languages and later support to export these into 3rd party compilers was received very well indeed. And, what Microsoft showed was possible in offline products is now being done by its competitor against the creator itself (ala Frankenstein, alas IPRs aren’t to be taken lightly, never mind the bad humor and the point I was trying to make and the fact that this has become an unconventionally long sentence).

The latest in the offering by Google is the export of all the pictures you post in your blog to Picasa .

The offer is that it would provide 1 GB of space that you can use to archive all your pictures by date, tag them and share them too(after all, this has been the mantra of the new web ,the much hyped Web 2.0 –social presence ). And you, in return make them a good competitor to Yahoo Flickr. Of course, they didn’t say that, but what do you think the new features (ala Google style) link in Picasa which refers to the new (aaargh) ‘Search Picasa community photos’ would be for.


And now into the details. Each of your blog has a separate album and the good news (hehe, my hard disk needs some freeing up, note this and you will know my next step).

The little problem for now is that only photos uploaded since December will be archived, for now although, since Google says it is making efforts to get the older ones up as well. Google says the problem is ‘there are a lot of them’ .

The features: You can order prints of them, and mail them. These albums are marked ‘unlisted’ though you can change it later to make them ‘public’. These albums are marked nicely with a ‘B’ (Blogger Logo) and stand out special ;) .


Oh, I forgot to tell you the best part. You can even embed the albums somewhere else in the web. For those who have a real good photo collection, all I would say is “Time to show off, folks”.

More customization to the tag cloud code

Now, we move on to edit the CSS part of the widget. Most of the lines are just to ensure that the cloud doesn't infringe other parts of the page and ruin the nicety of it.

However, there are some elements that are easy and can be modifies to suit your taste.

Consider the first line:

#labelCloud{text-align:center;font-family:arial,sans-serif;}

You could change the font used. You can also change the alignment of the text. I’ve chosen center but other values (given below) can also be used. Try out each and find your choice.

text-align:right;
text-align:left;

The next line is

#labelCloud  .label-cloud li{display:inline;background-image:none !important;padding:0 5px;margin:0;vertical-align:baseline !important;border:0 !important;}

Most of it is not necessary unless you are a serious Web designer. We shall consider only the first entry

display:inline;

This ‘inline’ value makes the tags appear ‘floating’ in the cloud.(In fact, this setting is what causes the ‘cloud’ )

We could’ve changed this to

display:block;

This will make the tags appear in what is called a ‘flat’ listing. Each entry has its own line. And in case you choose this, you might like to sort them by frequency instead of having them listed in alphabetical order. This can be changed by editing the widget in the Page Elements tab in Template section of the blog (as shown below).


And with this, I intend to end this short and informative (hopefully!!!) post. There is much more flexibility in the code but I intended this post for novices creating a tag cloud as a nice little widget to their blog.

PS:Oh,I forgot to add this in the original post.This is a continuation to the tutorial on How to add a tag cloud to your Blogger blogs.

A tag cloud to your blog

All users of Blogger must be knowing what are tags and must’ve tagged their posts.
Now, let us see how to create a tag cloud for your blog.

First, make sure you back up your template. This can be done by navigating to the Edit HTML page in the Template which appears in the Dashboard. Click on the ‘Download Full Template’.

The code consists of three parts: a section for the stylesheet , a configuration section , and the actual widget itself.

---

The Stylesheet Section:

The stylesheet section is marked out in the template between the , tags. The easiest thing to do is to locate the closing tag. In Blogger , the closing line is on a separate line as

]]><b:skin>

Now, place the following code just before this closing tag.

/* Label Cloud Styles
----------------------------------------------- */
#labelCloud {text-align:center;font-family:arial,sans-serif;}
#labelCloud .label-cloud li{display:inline;background-image:none !important;padding:0 5px;margin:0;vertical-align:baseline !important;border:0 !important;}
#labelCloud ul{list-style-type:none;margin:0 auto;padding:0;}
#labelCloud a img{border:0;display:inline;margin:0 0 0 3px;padding:0}
#labelCloud a{text-decoration:none}
#labelCloud a:hover{text-decoration:underline}
#labelCloud li a{}
#labelCloud .label-cloud {}
#labelCloud .label-count {padding-left:0.2em;font-size:9px;color:#000}
#labelCloud .label-cloud li:before{content:"" !important} 

---

The Configuration Section

This code is also in the head of the template but outside the stylesheet part of it So, to make things easy, we place the following code just after the above told tag.

<script type='text/javascript'>
// Label Cloud User Variables
var lcBlogURL = 'http://YOURBLOG.blogspot.com';
var cloudMin = 1;
var maxFontSize = 20;
var maxColor = [0,0,255];
var minFontSize = 10;
var minColor = [0,0,0];
var lcShowCount = false;
</script> 

We shall change some settings later but for now, immediately change the http://YOURBLOG.blogspot.com .It must be replaced by the URL of your blog.And make sure you do not forget the single quotes.

---

The Widget

Now,for the actual widget.

Scroll down your template and find some tags of the form

<b:widget id=”” locked=”” title=”” type=”” />

After all such already existing tags , insert the following code before any other code appears. In fact the line after these tags will be

</b:section>

So insert this code just before the closing tag.

<b:widget id='Label1' locked='false' title='Label Cloud' type='Label'>
<b:includable id='main'>
  <b:if cond='data:title'>
    <h2><data:title/></h2>
  </b:if>

  <div class='widget-content'>
  <div id='labelCloud'/>
<script type='text/javascript'>

// Don't change anything past this point -----------------
// Cloud function s() ripped from del.icio.us
function s(a,b,i,x){
      if(a>b){
          var m=(a-b)/Math.log(x),v=a-Math.floor(Math.log(i)*m)
             }
      else{
          var m=(b-a)/Math.log(x),v=Math.floor(Math.log(i)*m+a)
          }
      return v
   }


var c=[];
var labelCount = new Array();  
var ts = new Object;
<b:loop values='data:labels' var='label'>
var theName = "<data:label.name/>";
ts[theName] = <data:label.count/>;
</b:loop>

for (t in ts){
     if (!labelCount[ts[t]]){
           labelCount[ts[t]] = new Array(ts[t])
           }
        }
var ta=cloudMin-1;
tz = labelCount.length - cloudMin;
lc2 = document.getElementById('labelCloud');
ul = document.createElement('ul');
ul.className = 'label-cloud';
for(var t in ts){
    if(ts[t] < cloudMin){
       continue;
       }
    for (var i=0;3 > i;i++) {
             c[i]=s(minColor[i],maxColor[i],ts[t]-ta,tz)
              }      
         var fs = s(minFontSize,maxFontSize,ts[t]-ta,tz);
         li = document.createElement('li');
         li.style.fontSize = fs+'px';
         li.style.lineHeight = '1';
         a = document.createElement('a');
         a.title = ts[t]+' Posts in '+t;
         a.style.color = 'rgb('+c[0]+','+c[1]+','+c[2]+')';
         a.href = lcBlogURL+'/search/label/'+encodeURIComponent(t);
         if (lcShowCount){
             span = document.createElement('span');
             span.innerHTML = '('+ts[t]+') ';
             span.className = 'label-count';
             a.appendChild(document.createTextNode(t));
             li.appendChild(a);
             li.appendChild(span);
             }
          else {
             a.appendChild(document.createTextNode(t));
             li.appendChild(a);
             }
         ul.appendChild(li);
         abnk = document.createTextNode(' ');
         ul.appendChild(abnk);
    }
  lc2.appendChild(ul);    
</script>

<noscript>
    <ul>
    <b:loop values='data:labels' var='label'>
      <li>
        <b:if cond='data:blog.url == data:label.url'>
          <data:label.name/>
        <b:else/>
          <a expr:href='data:label.url'><data:label.name/></a>
        </b:if>
        (<data:label.count/>)
      </li>
    </b:loop>
    </ul>
</noscript>
    <b:include name='quickedit'/>
  </div>

</b:includable>
</b:widget> 

---

Customizable features:

These changes are to be made in the Configuration Section.

var cloudMin = 1;
This setting you can use to limit the number of labels shown (for example if you have a lot of labels). Leave the setting at 1 to show ALL labels. If you enter in a higher number, then only labels that have at least that number of entries will appear in the cloud.

var maxFontSize = 20;
var maxColor = [0,0,255];
var minFontSize = 10;
var minColor = [0,0,0];
var lcShowCount = false;

The line maxFontSize sets, in pixels, the size of the label with the largest frequency. The maxColor also is related to the label with the max frequency in RGB palette.

Same goes to the lines about minFontSize and minColor.

The cool part of it is that the tags with intermediate frequency are given intermediate size and colors.

The last variable lcShowCount determines whether the frequency is shown beside the label or not. The possible values it can take are True and False (and is False by default).

---

PS: There are two bugs in the code.
1.Make sure that atleast one label is repeated atleast once, i.e. atleast one label has a frequency more than one.

2.Make sure your tags do not have double quotes .Apostrophes and single quotes are ok.

Will be back with some more tweaks to this in the next post.

Tag Clouds :The One-look Summarizers

What are tag clouds?

Well, Wiki says "Tag Clouds occur when a lot of people begin describing a blog, photo, or other online content with the same tags. The tags are a method for summarizing content with weighted words, describing the item's meaning with a few concise words. The tag clouds form after the original post and other users begin describing the content in their own way. A well formed tag cloud implies that many people would summarize or categorize the content with similar descriptive words (tags). "

Now, in this new Web where millions of pages offer similar information to users, it is necessary that users get to the page which offers most of what they need exactly. Tag clouds do exactly that. By displaying words according to their ‘weight’, they offer a means to evaluate the page with just one look.

If you have already visited Technorati, or even Flickr (which is now Yahoo Flickr), the first site to use Tag Clouds, you must’ve seen how much they assist in finding the pics you need (in case of Flickr) , or telling you what is the new hottest talk on the Net ( Technorati )


The above pictures well speak volumes about whats going on in their respective worlds.

How about telling your readers what your blog is all about and what you have said so far in the blog.In fact,this would interest them and would invite them to read what you have said about some particular topic or so.

Next post ,we'll see how to create a tag-cloud in a Blogger blog.

Statcounter...One Successful Irish site on the Net

My rendezvous with Statcounter.com started off with a Google(uh!) search for 'website visitors'.Well, this was the first non-Sponsored search result that showed up :).And so it began.A visit to the homepage which looked little different from what it is now.



The description on the first page is no-nonsense and lucid.

What is STATCOUNTER?
A free yet reliable invisible web tracker, highly configurable hit counter and real-time detailed web stats. Insert a simple piece of our code on your web page and you will be able to analyse and monitor all the visitors to your website in real-time!


Free, Fast, Responsive, Quick loading and Reliable Service.

Invisible Tracking - no ads on your website.

Accurate real-time website statistics with detailed visitor tracking and analysis.

The neat interface did appeal to me and I immediately registered.More interesting was that this did not have that too irritating cross-links all over the place.

Registering was all too easy.The free account had only one disadvantage that really matters now.Your visitor detail log is limited to 100 visitors.Once your visitor count crossed 100, the records get pushed out at the bottom of the stack, so to say.

Then came addition of a 'project'.Thats the term used at Statcounter.

A nice page showing up the available options which are quite new!There are two features 'In Development' and the one that is being used by me at present is the 'Standard Statcounter Project'.



Fast Forward some pages and there appears the code as you please.The best part is that you can choose a code which is designed to your constraints.For example, Blogger allows only strict XHTML compliant code to be inserted in the template.

Then the regular Web-master's work:
Copy,paste and save.

Back to Statcounter, and goto My Projects and a page appears displaying the Project Name,icon links to various pages realting to each project,the type of the project,no. of recent visitors,total no. of visitors.

A couple of days and your stats begin building up,assuming ,ofcourse, that your website is doing well.And well ,a beautiful(assuming you love such things) bar-chart appears on the Real-Time stats page.



Now, the extras and the power within...

1.Came From

Shows all the links from which your blog was reached.So thank the links and leave your traces ;)

2.Visitor Paths

This is one amazing page.But too large to put up an image :)

3.Visit Lengths

Are your Visitors really interested in your blog.Are they reading what has been written?Here are your answers.

4.Visitor Geographic Locations

This must be classified under one of the coolest features provided.
Check it out!

5.Recent Pageload Activity

Keep an eye on who is visiting your blog.

6.Recent Visitor Activity

Yo,here is the most checked out page after The Barchart. :)



Wanna have more fun???The detective in you wants more details about that odd guy who visited your page?Just click on the little 'magnifying glass' beside the visitor.Here's a sample.


Apart from this,Statcounter offers features like Keyword Analysis,System Stats,and the browser from which your visitors browse your site,most popular pages in your site,the entry pages,exit pages.No explanations on these, it has been a long post already and I'm not into(as of now) writing pages of reviews about a site.

Well,lemme conclude sayin that this review of Statcounter covers up most of the features provided by the site to Free Account holders and I intend this post dedicated to the people behind it.

I also use Google Analytics ,however that has been a recent thing or habit,so to say,and the simplicity of Statcounter can't be beaten even by The Goliath.

PS:This is a small riddle:Can someone take the trouble and find out what Statcounter records Windows Vista as?The answer is in the post :P

PS2:Did you think this post was too lengthy or did it contain too many pics or even was simply plain boring? Gimme feedback!!!

Back with some weird news :P

Sorry for all the delay in coming up with this humorous(!?) post.Well, I had my exams and then ...laziness ;)

This is nothing original...just a rip-off from Slashdot...well...if u dont find it humorous,I can't help.After all ,it is c/o Slashdot. As far as I am concerned,I jus broke out laughing at the post and the comments that followed it.

Here is the post as it is...

swehack writes
"The guys over at winhistory.de managed to get their Windows XP Professional running on a very minimal box: an Intel Pentium clocked down to 8 MHz with 20 MB of RAM. (The installer won't work with less than 64 MB, but after installing you can remove memory.) The link has plenty of pictures of their progress in achieving this dubious milestone. They deserve a Golden Hourglass award for 'extreme waste of time.' What obscure hardware configurations have you managed to get Windows running on?"

And then, the comments follow...lolz

"....a Beowulf cluster of these!"

"AMD Athlon 3000+ with 1 GB of RAM. A miracle... I know... and STILL I have to reinstall it every couple of months!!"

"So they win an award for biggest waste of time... and somehow I read about it on the front page of Slashdot. Methinks the award was right."

"That's nothing. I got Vista to run on a quad core, state of the art SLI system with only 4GB of ram.

OK, so it only sort of runs, the SLI doesn't actually work and a lot of the positional audio effects on my sound card have disappeared... but I'm hopeful that, with enough time for them to upgrade drivers, I may one day get it fully functional. Until then, Minesweeper is screamingly fast." ....now thats Microsoft.

"
"They deserve a Golden Hourglass award for 'extreme waste of time.'"

Uh... I don't think they'd appreciate that - they probably see plenty of hourglasses already.
"

And the best of it all...

"20 Megs of RAM? I thought 640K was supposed to be enough for anyone!!!"

lolz...now where is Bill!!!They ought to have some changes in the guys who decide the Minimum Requirements...or they have to follow that standard with 'to boot up in 5 minutes...or in that order of time' ;)

Well...the next original post will take time and if you have any nice controversial issues ...gimme...I'm as always outta ideas. Guyz,help!

What says thou...

PS:Hey, my visitor count has crossed 1000 ...yippee ;)

Just some fun

How do you differentiate between programmers and non-programmers?

A non-programmer thinks there are 1000 bytes in a kilobyte.

A programmer is convinced that there are 1024 meters in a kilometer.


********************************************************************
Ramu : I've just become a member of Rotract Club.

Somu : public member or private?


********************************************************************

Ramu : Hey.. My submarine is not sinking into the water!! What could
be wrong?

Somu : may be u have used float instead of double in the software.


********************************************************************


THIS ONE IS TOO GOOD!!!

PS : Hey Bull, Can you do me a favor? Can you pass on these 500 rupees
to Suthi..?

Bull : Sure.. Why not? But tell me one thing. Tell me whether its pass
by value or pass by reference.


********************************************************************


Ramu : I am very very sure that the guy who just talked to me is a
Software engineer...

Somu : how do you say that?

Ramu : he asked my physical address instead of my home address!


********************************************************************


Ramu : why people are beating that SW engineer black and blue?

Somu : it seems, he asked one of them that whether "vande mataram"
is new kind of RAM in the market!


********************************************************************


Ramu : Hey.. I think that SW engineer is very very naive..

Somu : How do you say that?

Ramu : He believes that there is an Arabian Sea++ next to Arabin Sea.


********************************************************************


Ramu : Hey.... whats time now?

Somu : System time or local time.

********************************************************************
And some signatures:

"Some people say that I must be a horrible person, but that's not true. I have the heart of a young boy - in a jar on my desk.
We are each our own devil, and we make this world our hell "

"The primary aim for developing AI is to make computers realise how frustrating it is to program them"

"If you always do, what you've always done,
You'll always get what you've always got. "

"Reality bites like a mad Dog,
and bitten Person acts like a mad Dog"






Taken from the local IIT Kharagpur forum (lovingly called Mutter Index)

PS: As of now,blog visitor counter hit 100 for the month. It is 2:40 AM,February 7,2007 IST.Preety good going I guess.

Forget Vista...Say hello to the next Windows.

Yeah guyz...u read it right.The next version of Windows is already been worked upon.

Well,to remember the events a few years back, this next version of Windows was announced in February 2000 to be the next in line after Windows XP (codenamed 'Whistler').The new OS was codenamed 'Blackcomb'.However the bar was set too high and Microsoft knew too well that it would be long before the concepts that formed the backbone of Blackcomb would be realised.

Soon, Blackcomb was pushed back and Vista(codenamed 'Longhorn') was announced as the release that would follow Windows XP.

Internal sources from Microsoft say Blackcomb as being not just a major revision of Windows, but a complete departure from the way users today typically think about interacting with a computer.While Windows Vista is intended to be an evolutionary release, Vienna is targeted directly at revolutionizing the way users of the product interact with their PCs.The Explorer shell will completely be replaced by new concepts based on the previous 10 years of research at Microsoft's VIBE.Projects such as GroupBar and LayoutBar will make their way in which would allow users to handle tasks,documents and windows much more easily.

Blackcomb was renamed 'Vienna' in January 2006 and in February 2007 again as 'Windows 7', as official sources say.This accompanied the naming of the successor of Office 2007 as Office 14

Vienna will feature the Sandbox feature partially implemented in Vista as with the Internet Explorer 7 which increases the security of the computer by running in a restricted environment.Also present in Vista,the 'complete as you type' search (ala Google Predict) will be present in Vienna,or now,Windows 7.

Vienna will, supposedly be able to handle tasks as complex as receiving speech commands from the user.

According to Microsoft, Vienna will be available in both 32-bit and 64-bit Client editions but Vienna Server will be available only as a 64-bit version.However,32-bit compatibility will be retained and 16-bit Windows and MS-DOS applications will not be supported any longer.

The Server and the Client versions have a current release estimate of 2009 to 2012 although Microsoft has said nothing about it.

---

The Fun behind Codenames

Here is some trivia that would make things interesting.

Both Windows XP and Vienna are codenamed Whistler and Blackcomb respectively after the Whistler-Blackcomb ski resort located in Whistler, British Columbia, Canada.

And the codename for the intermediate release ,Vista, was taken from a bar in the resort ,Longhorn.

External Links

A July 2006 update on Windows Vienna by Gerard Boyers on VistaSector.
Mr. Bill Gates speaks about Blackcomb...archive July 12,2006

Piracy Built the Romanian IT Industry...any different here?

Here is a post inspired by an article on Slashdot commenting on a report in Washington Post about a weird incident.



Romanian President Traian Basescu in front of a important audience and more importantly sharing the stage with Bill Gates himself, admitted that piracy of Microsoft products helped Romania come this far in the IT industry.The event was the opening of a technical centre in Bucharest.Bill Gates,however ,refused to comment on the President's words.The President said that piracy helped the younger generation discover computers.

It is well known that Romania is a IT powerhouse in Europe. And it made me wonder if India was any different.Romania ,though having enforced its anti-piracy laws 10 years ago,still loses 70% of its revenue from software sales due to piracy. Same case here...

Probably this is a what-point-did-you-make post but I just wanted everyone to reassess the situation in India. Do we really need to have pirated software. As a entrepreneur rightly said, a country with so many programmers and genii doesn't have an ingenious OS from the bigwigs Infosys and Wipro ,to name some of them. It is a shame that we proudly say that we 'serve' by providing customized solutions to some customer i some country. And feel more great by having more customers from various countries, apparently concentrated in US and North Europe. I dont expect the companies not to do this but what have the heavy weights done for the software industry in terms of finished products. Do you use one software that says ©Infosys ?
When there are small groups of individuals(it is what I mean "groups of individuals"), trying hard to compile code through the nite with limited resources, why the hell do these companies come forward to support them. The government has made its effort in the form of establishing C-DAC but that is barely enough to pull out a large country like India.

A better effort from the biggies should help...check out all the projects on Slashdot,Sourceforge and freshmeat ,they tell a lot about the determination that programmers show in burning their midnite oil.

This post,dedicated to all Indians who put in great effort in making computers more accessible to the masses of India.

[NpoWEr] signing off...

Customize Windows XP - Security

First some apologies...those 'advanced' security features I promised will not be covered in this post.They were just too many!!!And gettin the best is too much trouble for a lazy guy like me :D

Windows Installer

This can be found under Local Computer Policy>Computer Configuration>Administrative Templates>Windows Components

Now lets discuss each of the settings.

1.If you do not want new applications to be installed on your computer,then change the value of "Disable Windows Installer" to Enabled.

2.This is a important setting in case you are the admin for a network.This setting "Always install with elevated privileges" must be disabled to make sure that users with limited permissions are not given access to directories/settings in some very important computer.

Note:This setting is available in both "Computer Configuration" and "User Configuration". For the changes to be effective, this setting must be disabled under both.

3.The next setting discussed is the "Enable user control over installs". In most cases when a limited user tries to install software and tries to change the installation path,the installation would halt due to a security violation.However, the installation program must be running under a 'privileged security context' which would grant it permission to directories which the user himself does not have.
It must be set to "Enabled".

4.Enable "Allow Admin to install from Terminal Services Session" to give the admin the rights to install program through the Terminal Services.

5.Enable 'Logging' to specify the types of events you want the Installer to log into the file "msi.log" .This provides you with some very important info about the installation including the arguments given during the execution of the installation.

6.Do enable the "Prohibit the removal of Updates" to maintain a good control over program updates. If you enable this, neither an admin nor a user would be able to remove updates individually. If you disable this, the user can remove updates only if he has the rights.

---

I should make a safe bet that most of you have already moved on to Mozilla Firefox but in case you are using Internet Explorer, you can stop others cribbing about it lacking security. Just check out the settings available in Local Computer Policy> User Configuration>Administrative Templates>Windows Components>Internet Explorer.
Whoa! Check out the features.An exhaustive coverage is almost impossible but taking a day off improving your browser is sort of cool!

Thats it for now...Its [NpoWEr] signing off.

Customize Windows XP

Note 0:Read the whole post completely before attempting these!!!And read Note 1(at the end of this post)

There have been comments on the previous post saying I've been too lazy not updating this blog even after a week!!! So here are some things I was experimenting with all these days...and this is original work.

Ala ©Naveen Kumar M.

I begin by telling you that you are doing this at your own risk and do create a restore point before you do this...I had some problem remembering all the changes I did in this program called "gpedit.msc" .

Check out the screenshots

This is a better approach than using msconfig.exe because the changes in msconfig can too easily changed accidentally.

Without further ado let us start off.

1.Click on Start button and select "Run"(or alternatively Windows Key + 'R').
2.Enter gpedit.msc and press Enter.
3.You will see a window with the title "Group Policy"

Now under "Local Computer Policy", choose Computer Configuration>Administrative Templates>Windows Components

Windows Messenger

Most of us do not use Windows Messenger ,so we can actually disable it.
Choose Windows Messenger and on the right-pane you will see two items.Double click on them and choose Enable.

Digital Rights Management

Again, how many of us do actually purchase music...and that too on the net.Disable Windows Digital Rights Management by choosing the same in the left pane and modifying the value of the item on the right to "Enabled".

Windows Update

Assuming that all of you use pirated versions of Windows(or even otherwise), you would not want your computer to work slower just because Windows is contacting some microsoft.com

Select Windows Update in the left pane and then you will see a list of items in the right pane,11 in all.Arrange them in alphabetical order by clicking on "Setting".Now I will list out the values of these in that order.
First four :"Disabled"
Next two :"Enabled"
Then "Disabled",again "Enabled" and then all the other three "Disabled".

Recycle Bin

This probably is the most important feature you will be using :-)
If you are a person who consistently uses "Shift+Delete" instead of "Delete", then you must be a person absolutely confident of what you want on your computer and what you don't.How about making "delete" work the same as "Shift+Delete".

Under "Local Computer Policy>User Configuration>Administrative Templates>Windows Components>Windows Explorer" .

In the right pane, you have the option "Do not move deleted files to the Recycle Bin" option(Here is the screenshot).Just "Enable" it.

And if you are absolutely sure of what you are deleting, then the next option "Display Confirmation dialog while deleting files" can be set to "Disabled". This is highly not recommended, though.

---

Thats it for now,we'll discuss more advanced security features(most of them won't be important to you but in case somebody is very much interested in using these Power Features ...then have fun!)in the next post.

Note 1: Please use the picture links provided for reference in case you have a doubt.Actually I wanted to include them in the post itself but have some problem aligning them in proper positions.

Of Messengers and Yahoo

Frust....that is all messengers have left me with ,the last two weeks. Explanations later on but the statement at present is that Yahoo's help sucks.

And that Windows XP can be fallen in love with (more of that in next post maybe or even later).

Well,back to the topic of 'messengers'.

To connect through Yahoo messenger has been an awful experience,thanks to Sign In problems and IIT's mahaan proxies set to block chats. The problem began someday when I signed into my mobile and Yahoo messenger refused to sign back in from my comp giving some crappy error that my account has been signed in through another device. Then why the heck am I able to sign in through meebo and now Gaim ,my default messenger for all other accounts other than Google's.

Another hell of a trouble has been Windows Live Messenger.Beautiful as it looks ,it hides such a poor troubleshooting wizard that the end result can be guessed even by a layman.Guess what it points out!!!It tells you that your Internet connection is alright but the connection to Live Messenger cannot be made. Oh Thank you!I never knew that!???

Mention must also be made of the stupidity in cookie handling by Firefox.And thanks to Google's intelligence(hello...I'm kiddin), I cannot open my Gmail and Orkut accounts simultaneously since they are not the same 'Google Account'. I never asked it to verify that,did I ,or did you?

Courtesy Pranesh, I came to know of a website http://www.firefoxmyths.com . Please note that it will redirect to http://mywebpages.comcast.net/SupportCD/FirefoxMyths.html(just in case the former link does not work).

And yes, I almost forgot,to speak of Yahoo's great customer care.It sucks and the worst part is that only the Indian portal(http://in.yahoo.com) has this big problem.The international(more correctly ,the US portal page) is much better and in fact very good.The Indian portal does not have a single mention of where to mail your queries to. Right now I just have the address to contact in case you have a problem with your messenger, and here it is(the Indian version) : in-messenger@cc.yahoo-inc.com

And a scan of the main page of the portal gives you two pages of link errors(those elements on the page which have been hyperlinked to an unavailable address) excluding those with Error 403 : Forbidden.

Click here for screen shots

And to end this story of the portal that has made it real big, I must confess that my problem hasn't yet been solved, thanks to a reply from customer care very politely saying

"
Hello Naveen,

Thank you for writing to Yahoo! India Customer Care.

We're sorry to hear that you're currently experiencing difficulties when
attempting a connection to our servers.

Please be sure that you have established your Internet connection before
attempting to sign in/connect with Messenger. Launching Messenger will
no longer initiate a connection to the Internet.

<......All that was already tried out....>

Further, we recommend that you upgrade to the current version of
Microsoft Internet Explorer. If you use Netscape or Mozilla Firefox as
your browser, you don't have to switch to Internet Explorer, or even run
Internet Explorer. However by upgrading to the current version of
Internet Explorer it will offer you increased functionality and
stability with the latest version of Messenger.

"
That was it and then another mail from Yahoo! Customer Care with the subject line "Yahoo! would like to get your feedback for Support Case".

Sorry, I did not oblige.Just too pissed off that day.

The only point I wanted to make was that I was really shocked not to find a single helpline on the Indian portal.If Yahoo was always like this it might not have shocked me like this.But the US version also has a Premium phoneline service!!!Why don't we have it?Why don't we pull up our socks.Why does a portal that looks so glitzy on its homepage have such an unattractive help page(yes ,yes there exists one). And why does it not care to update it when it does to its services pages.Would another hundred hours of work on the Help page really matter or is it that voices like mine will never be heard for they form a minority in India( we do have a large population, don't we? :D).

The last post....before the split

The time had come...to make the decision...err...to put the decision into action.The decision:split the blog.Excuse me for that would not have made much sense but there is always the chance to explain.

Here we go.

It has been long since I've been planning to make this blog an exclusive 'technical posts only' blog and separate my personal life ...I mean ...non technical posts.The aim of this blog is now to practice well my technical writing and start off a career of sorts.The Step was taken and it has to be continued with all enthusiasm and interest, both of which I still retain fortunately.

I've been having some ideas lately but been lazy,I must confess , to enact them and as a result, no posts on the blog. This also had its own advantages.The ideas have been thought over that they've been assimilated, understood(ya...by me) and matured (err, these words do not go together,I know) that it is now 'about' the right time(Heisenberg....precision..bah).

Make hay when the sun shines,
They said then,
Write blogs when you have time,
Says Naveen now :-D

So!The time cometh to make the Announcement de finalé (same prob...my invention...probably ruining French but don't care)

Starting today the 8th of Jan,2007 ,
This blog, addressed in the web, as http://naveendageek.blogspot.com
With the alternate address http://snipurl.com/wif0 ,
Shall be a technical blog only
And its author hath set upon
Separating his non-technical writing from this blog.
With some mercy , however,
He shall be allowed to
Link up the new blog in the sidebar,
In due time.

Phew!!!Over with the catholic style baptism(!).

Now a prayer (a request to pardon me if there are any errors in this, recovered from memory)

Our program who art in memory,
Hello be thy name,
Thy operating system come,
Thy command be done ,
At the printer as they are
On the screen.
Give us this day our daily data,
And forgive us our I/O errors,
As we forgive those whose logic circuits are faulty.
Lead us not in frustration,
And deliver from power surges.
For thine is the Algorithm,
The Application,
And the Solution.
Looping forever and ever.
-Return.

And to finish off,the wise saying "The geek shall inherit".

PS:Hey Pranesh,A lil too many of poems in the post?

The day that was....fulfilling

Yep.At last a fulfilling day after coming back to KGP.

Yesterday I got my computer up and running(it has to be put that way,because of the unorthodox way that my comp came into existence!!!).Only the monitor had to be connected and there it was.Up and ready...all the 8GB required for putting it on sharing...And as a new comp would,this did have its effect on me...requiring me to sleep at 4:30am today morning.

Well,all this intro to enter 'The Day', the 4th of January,2007.So,it began. And as the new Spring semester time table would have it, our class starts at 7:30 am. It required some efforts from friends to wake me up.A mere 2 hr sleep is extremely insufficient on a winter day.

Well it was PDS(Programming and Data structures) class and I didn't want to miss the class.So up and quickly to the class 'we' went.And the class was far below expectations and the day seemed far from what the post-head says.The class was followed by Mechanics,another subject that I hated through my class 11 and 12.It only made things worser.But only until the next prof came.What was expected to be a boring lecture on SHM turned out to be very interesting more due to the way it was being treated...'damped oscillations really give beautiful graphs' was what I was thinking midway.A one hour break was given with perfect timing and it was a relaxing period topped with an interaction with a senior. Now a class in the new GSSST building.Mathematics!!! What would be on offer this semester! It was to be matrices...no simple things these.As words like 'three diagonal matrix' and other words(I don't even remember them now :-/) flew out of the profs mouth it was our turn to stare back at him in excitement(and for some,disgust...lol...god save those who hate math and took up engineering).Phew!One hour passed by and we were back to our hall for lunch.

No afternoon classes only meant I would not give up the seat in front of the comp and so it was to be.

Back in KGP with a comp is proving to be a real good thing.With an obvious distraction being the network gaming scene here it is to be seen if I give into the temptation.

This semester has unwoven itself beautifully and it is to be seen what it has to give me (and what I have to give up...fun!?).With Kshitij and Spring Fest lined up back to back in Feb., surely this is a semester to watch out for!

And to end this post in my style(hope to develop one with this blog and post),I must tell you some geek humor...
The famous Murphy's Laws of Computing

1. When computing, whatever happens, behave as though you meant it to happen.

2. When you get to the point where you really understand your computer, it's probably obsolete.

3. The first place to look for information is in the section of the manual where you least expect to find it.

4. When the going gets tough, upgrade.

5. For every action, there is an equal and opposite malfunction.

6. To err is human . . . to blame your computer for your mistakes is even more human, it is downright natural.

7. He who laughs last probably made a back-up.

8. If at first you do not succeed, blame your computer.

9. A complex system that does not work is invariably found to have evolved from a simpler system that worked just fine.

10. The number one cause of computer problems is computer solutions.

11. A computer program will always do what you tell it to do, but rarely what you want to do.