tech:yes « Avi Alkalay

Convert DBF to CSV on Linux with Perl and XBase

Published: Fri, 13 Aug 2010 17:39:18 +0000 Updated: Fri, 13 Aug 2010 17:44:53 +0000 |

I spent a few days to figure out how to make a simple conversion of a DBF file into a plain text file as comma separated values (CSV) or tab separated values (TSV) in a batch/command line way. I was almost setting up an OpenOffice.org server because it seamed to be the only packaged solution to [...]

Linux & Open Source ● Web 2.0

Eu, Drupal e a Arrebentação

Published: Fri, 20 Nov 2009 01:14:58 +0000 Updated: Fri, 20 Nov 2009 10:27:07 +0000 |

2 comments

Dediquei-me nos últimos meses a estudar o Drupal. Fiz isso nas horas vagas (tipo da meia noite às 6 da manhã) e foi uma longa curva de aprendizado.

Para quem não sabe, Drupal é um Sistema de Gerenciamento de Conteúdo (CMS) para a Web. Um fazedor de sites, em outras palavras. Quaisquer sites.

Umas semanas atrás ultrapassei [...]

Mobility ● Multimedia

How the iPhone 3GS records videos

Published: Sat, 07 Nov 2009 15:51:27 +0000 Updated: Wed, 25 Nov 2009 10:56:35 +0000 |

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Here are some technical details an analysis about the formats used by the Apple iPhone 3GS to record video.

This is an annotated screenshot of the excellent Mediainfo by Jerome Martinez.

Some notes:

Apple always uses MOV as the extension for standard MP4 files. The recorded video uses an MP4 container so it is capable of holding modern [...]

Linux & Open Source ● Web 2.0

WhiteHouse.Gov migrou para Drupal

Published: Sun, 25 Oct 2009 10:54:39 +0000 Updated: Fri, 20 Nov 2009 01:40:17 +0000 |

1 comment

Drupal é um dos melhores gerenciadores de conteúdo que existem e é Open Source.

Há quem diga que é porque o governo Obama incentiva Open Source blablabla etc. Mas a verdade é que provavelmente a escolha foi pelo melhor: Drupal. No blog do Tim O’reilly, há também mais detalhes sobre a infraestrutura: Red Hat Linux como [...]

Linux & Open Source ● Multimedia

Organize fast and precisely your MP3 files with ID3v2 tags

Published: Sun, 07 Jun 2009 21:32:37 +0000 Updated: Thu, 17 Jun 2010 23:59:58 +0000 |

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This is a set of personal notes and a tutorial for everyone about how to correctly organize and tag MP3 files using the id3 command line tool.

General way to tag MP3 files:

id3 -M -2 [-v] [-t title] [-a artist] [-l album] [-n tracknr] [-y year] [-g genre] [-c comment] file.mp3

Recursively tag with ID3v2 a tree [...]

Mobility ● Multimedia

A Test with High Definition Video Conferencing

Published: Mon, 28 Jul 2008 17:58:58 +0000 Updated: Mon, 28 Jul 2008 18:05:24 +0000 |

4 comments

I just participated in very successful proof of technology with Siemens OpenScape video conferencing products.

We made a point-to-point SIP high definition video conference over a local area network. Another test used H.323 protocol. We also included my SIP-enabled Nokia E61i in the conference over the office WiFi network in a direct multipoint call simply calling [...]

Linux & Open Source ● Mobility

Open Source Software inside the iPhone

Published: Sun, 23 Mar 2008 01:49:42 +0000 Updated: Sun, 23 Mar 2008 01:49:42 +0000 |

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Can Open Source Software be more ubiquitous than this ?

A few days ago I was playing extensively with Apple’s iPhone, investigating each sub-menu and little details. There is a section listing legal stuff and software being used with each license. GPL, LGPL, BSD and other Open Source licensed software rule the iPhone.

Some I have noted:

BSD [...]

Multimedia

How to Make High Quality DVD Rips

Published: Sun, 02 Mar 2008 09:36:50 +0000 Updated: Wed, 11 Mar 2009 09:48:50 +0000 |

47 comments

After a long study of months I found this method to be the best way to rip/encode or backup my DVDs. The resulting digital file uses the best standards and technologies (as H.264, MP4, Matroska, AC3 etc), looks practically lossless to human eyes and has reasonable good file size (about 1 to 1.4GB per [...]

Info & Biz Technology

Zeroconf your Network

Published: Mon, 03 Dec 2007 15:16:03 +0000 Updated: Tue, 15 Apr 2008 07:35:39 +0000 |

3 comments

I remember the days when I was configuring DNS and DHCP for a small home network with only 2 or 3 computers.

This is not needed anymore since the invention of Zeroconf. As Wikipedia says, “is a set of techniques that automatically create a usable IP network without configuration or special servers. This allows inexpert users [...]

Info & Biz Technology

New Laptop

Published: Thu, 29 Nov 2007 13:07:30 +0000 Updated: Thu, 29 Nov 2007 18:10:05 +0000 |

12 comments

I am sort of away this days because I got a new laptop. Check it out.

My previous laptop was a IBM Thinkpad T40, Pentium M, 512MB RAM, 1024×768 screen size, CD-RW, Cisco WiFi/b, no bluetooth. Served me well for 4 years.

The new one is a Lenovo Thinkpad T61, Intel Centrino Pro (dual [...]

Info & Biz Technology

Renumbering Categories in WordPress Blogs

Published: Sat, 13 Oct 2007 06:56:01 +0000 Updated: Sat, 13 Oct 2007 06:59:06 +0000 |

12 comments

There are some situations you may want to manually change (or hack) the category numbers of your WordPress.org blog. Here is how.

Supose you have posts category named “Wine” with ID 15 and you want it to become 1015. You probably already have some posts categorized as “Wine” too and you want to make the number [...]

Linux & Open Source

Basic Subversion Repository Management

Published: Fri, 31 Aug 2007 06:22:51 +0000 Updated: Thu, 31 Jan 2008 19:47:42 +0000 |

3 comments

(This is a shared personal note, suggestions are welcome.)

Create a Subversion repository for a project, say The SVG Blog Icons:

Create the repository on the hosting panel with a project name (e.g. Blog Icons) and project ID (e.g. blogicons).
Import the files:
bash$ cd src/
bash$ ls
blogicons
bash$ export EDITOR=vi
bash$ svn -m “First import” import blogicons http://svn.alkalay.net/blogicons/trunk

Start over with a [...]

Mobility

Nokia E Series with Wireless LEAP Authentication

Published: Wed, 29 Aug 2007 17:21:52 +0000 Updated: Thu, 19 Mar 2009 10:46:59 +0000 |

12 comments

So looks like some people are having problems to configure LEAP in their Nokia E-series phones as E61i or others. This is a guide:

Go to Settings->Connection->Access Points
Create a new access point with any name you want
Use the following configuration:

Data bearer: Wireless LAN
WLAN network name: the SSID of your WLAN which is found by a WLAN [...]

Linux & Open Source

How to Get Attacked

Published: Tue, 07 Aug 2007 11:38:47 +0000 Updated: Sat, 25 Oct 2008 07:36:49 +0000 |

3 comments

I noticed Oded’s blog was attacked which makes me remember some things:

I was once invited to analyze a Linux machine that was invaded. I ended up writing an article about it to the brazilian Linux Magazine.

The problem with the machine was a VERY weak root passw0rd. We could also find the tools they used to [...]

Linux & Open Source

Install Java on Fedora, Red Hat, SUSE with RPM

Published: Mon, 11 Jun 2007 13:07:18 +0000 Updated: Thu, 31 Jan 2008 20:05:19 +0000 |

4 comments

A concise guide on how to correctly install Java in RPM-based systems with the JPackage standard. Get Java correctly integrated into Fedora, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, SUSE and [...]

Linux & Open Source ● Multimedia

Fedora Post-installation Configurations

Published: Sun, 10 Jun 2007 17:31:03 +0000 Updated: Mon, 12 Jul 2010 18:29:52 +0000 |

27 comments

A short and practical guide on how to install proprietary technologies on Fedora Linux. Get MP3, DivX/Xvid, MP4, AVI, Flash, and fonts installed easily on Fedora [...]

Linux & Open Source

O Meme dos Comandos Mais Usados

Published: Mon, 28 May 2007 17:43:44 +0000 Updated: Wed, 05 Sep 2007 15:23:55 +0000 |

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Resolvi aderir ao meme (alguém sabe onde começou?).

floripa:~$ history|awk ‘{print $2}’|awk ‘BEGIN {FS=”|”} {print $1}’|sort|uniq -c|sort -rn|head -20
222 ls
140 cd
136 ls
52 rsync
43 dmesg
35 mv
[...]

Essays ● Web 2.0

SOA, Web Services, Virtualização, Grid, Web 2.0: Mashup gigante

Published: Sat, 19 May 2007 13:06:04 +0000 Updated: Thu, 31 Jan 2008 20:07:51 +0000 |

3 comments

Entenda a relação entre SOA, Web Services, virtualização, Grid, Web 2.0 e [...]

Multimedia

Supra-sumo em Compressão de Video

Published: Wed, 09 May 2007 10:23:48 +0000 Updated: Sun, 02 Mar 2008 09:59:23 +0000 |

10 comments

Andei estudando tecnologias de compressão de vídeo e é um mundo fascinante. Tudo sobre Linux.

DivX e Xvid são compressores ainda bons mas de gerações anteriores. O mais moderno e avançado é o H.264 também conhecido por MPEG-4 AVC, padrão ISO. Uma das melhores implementações desse compressor é livre: o projeto x264.

E sobre containers, um dos [...]

Essays ● Linux & Open Source

Na Trilha do Invasor

Published: Mon, 12 Feb 2007 18:33:11 +0000 Updated: Thu, 31 Jan 2008 20:21:50 +0000 |

15 comments

Este artigo relata como um Linux invadido por um cracker foi analisado, buscando evidências da presença do cracker, ferramentas que ele usou, por que ele atacou, e também como ele conseguiu invadir a [...]

Web 2.0

Google Maps Plugin for WordPress

Published: Sun, 12 Nov 2006 00:27:53 +0000 Updated: Mon, 05 Jan 2009 16:56:58 +0000 |

652 comments

This software will let you easily render Google Maps anywhere on your blog as a web service. It also includes code for easy integration with WordPress blogs, but what the code does best can actually be used with any other blog system or plain web [...]

Essays ● Linux & Open Source

Instalando Java e Eclipse em Linux

Published: Thu, 09 Nov 2006 18:25:27 +0000 Updated: Thu, 31 Jan 2008 20:30:48 +0000 |

10 comments

Um breve posicionamento de Java como padrão aberto, e entre outras tecnologias de desenvolvimento/linguagens, seguido por um guia prático para instalar Java em Linux usando o padrão [...]

Web 2.0

Soleil Theme for WordPress

Published: Mon, 06 Nov 2006 00:10:15 +0000 Updated: Mon, 17 Dec 2007 11:50:43 +0000 |

101 comments

Advanced and beautiful Soleil theme for WordPress which includes widgets-ready sidebar, on-demand localization and feed readers [...]

Linux & Open Source ● Multimedia ● Web 2.0

Converting YouTube to MPEG or iPod

Published: Fri, 29 Sep 2006 12:09:00 +0000 Updated: Thu, 24 Apr 2008 07:55:04 +0000 |

9 comments

A concise guide on how to convert YouTube videos to MPEG files on your [...]

Linux & Open Source

System Rescue Without a Password

Published: Wed, 23 Aug 2006 10:44:00 +0000 Updated: Sun, 28 Dec 2008 11:31:49 +0000 |

2 comments

So you lost your Linux root password.

No panic. There is a way to reset it:

Turn the computer on and pay attention.
When the bootloader (GRUB or LiLo) screen appears, select the partition you want to fix the password.
Do not boot it yet. Go into edit mode for this partition.
In the end of the kernel boot parameters [...]