jmv.me » Tips/Tricks

Single-site browser alternatives to Prism and Fluid

Julia Van Cleve — Sun, 20 Jun 2010 22:34:56 +0000

Lifehacker’s post about the Top 10 Mac Applications That Should Be On Windows gave a good overview of the various programs many people wish were in Windows. However, I just wanted to add that although Fluid is a great single-site browser app, there is a Windows alternative that is not Prism. (I tried Prism in Linux and wasn’t impressed.)

Courtesy of makeuseof.com

Bubbles is free single-site browser app for Windows. It’s very simple to use and even has a few added features to further improve the SSB experience.

On a related note, if you use Linux you actually have another option for SSB. Google Chrome’s Application Shortcuts are easy to use and configure (as a matter of fact, there’s almost no configuring needed).

Go to the page you wish to turn into a webapp
Click the Page button (The button that looks like a piece of paper)

Screenshot

Select “Create Application Shortcut”
Choose where you would like the shortcut to be
Click “Create”

And, there you go! You should have a webapp on your desktop or in your Applications menu that you can use. If you decide you don’t want the application anymore, just delete the shortcut.

One thing you’ll probably notice is that the icons Chrome chooses aren’t normally the highest of quality. However, Linux makes it very simple to change the icon image for any shortcut on your computer.

Right click on the icon
Select “Properties”
Click the icon Image
Search and choose your new icon image

Screenshot

Update: Google Chrome in Windows now supports application shortcuts!

Receive Gmail on your phone without a data plan

Julia Van Cleve — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 00:26:46 +0000

I spent the first two weeks in my new apartment without Internet. Thankfully, Gmail has e-mail forwarding which can make your Internet-less days a little less stressful. (Granted, in order to use it you will need to plan ahead and make sure you’re somewhere with Internet for at least five minutes.)

Even if you can’t reply to e-mail messages right away, knowing that someone has replied to your message, that class is canceled, or that something important has happened at work—there are many situations where this can be a useful thing.

Gmail has a feature which allows you to forward incoming e-mails to a given e-mail address. For instance, since I use AT&T, I forward e-mails to <10_digit_phone_number>@txt.att.net. You can find the e-mail address format for your phone by checking the website for your phone’s provider, or checking websites such as makeuseof.com.

Screenshot

However, this feature comes with a disclaimer. If you subscribe to lots of e-mail lists, alerts, etc. you will probably get quite a few oddly formatted, URL-heavy text messages sent to your phone. If you’re like me, and you’re using Gmail’s forwarding feature because you don’t have a data plan, you will need to exercise a bit of caution and make sure not to click the links. Also, if you get a lot of e-mails, you might want to selectively forward the “important” e-mails using Gmail’s built-in filters.

A new webcomic: Compulsive Liars Anonymous

Mini-project: PeeweeGen

Julia Van Cleve — Sun, 23 May 2010 02:41:00 +0000

I just finished writing code for a small password generator terminal application (called Peewee Generator, or PeeweeGen) that uses “/dev/random” to generate three possible password choices based on criteria set by the user. It’s not very fancy or complicated, but I like how it turned out.

Download the .zip and extract it to a directory. Open up a terminal and type:

cd "FILE_DIRECTORY_NAME" && ./peewee

For convenience, you can create a launcher on your desktop the following as the command:

FILE_DIRECTORY_NAME/peewee

Peewee Generator

Note: There is a file embedded within this post, please visit this post to download the file.

Update: Version 0.2 is released on Monday, May 24, 2010. You can download it here.

Distraction: Modular Exponentiation

Julia Van Cleve — Tue, 18 May 2010 05:07:35 +0000

While reviewing modular exponentiation, I got bored and decided to write this program instead. I have not yet finished writing my bigInt calculator I started working on a while back, so, my program only works for numbers smaller than 2^64 bits.

Note: There is a file embedded within this post, please visit this post to download the file.

Distraction: Euclid’s Algorithm

Julia Van Cleve — Fri, 14 May 2010 06:55:11 +0000

While studying for my Introduction to Algorithms final, I decided I wanted to take a break and write a simple program in C++ to calculate the GCD of two numbers using Euclid’s Algorithm.

Note: There is a file embedded within this post, please visit this post to download the file.

A new webcomic: Compulsive Liars Anonymous

Julia Van Cleve — Sat, 01 May 2010 20:42:14 +0000

If you’re into webcomics like xkcd, you may want to start checking out Compulsive Liars Anonymous created by RPI undergraduate Adam Bell ’11, firefighter, fencer and web-designer extraordinaire. The website is relatively new, so there’s only one webcomic posted, but keep checking in as I hear that more are in the process of being added.

If you like the artwork and humor of RPI, you might also be interested in Enjuhneer (created by RPI alum Jenny Blanchard ’09).

Congrats to post 607!

Bisigi Project designs quality Ubuntu themes

Julia Van Cleve — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 07:24:58 +0000

What the Bisigi Project lacks in quantity it makes up for in quality. After coming across a theme of theirs in Gnome-look I was went to their website, and was hooked. As of now, I have tried:

Exotic
Wild-shine
Tropical
Aquadreams
Bamboo Zen
Step Into Freedom
Ubuntu Sunrise
balanzan (formerly known as Ubuntu-fr)
Infinity (I used the old version)

I loved them all, though my favorite by far was Bamboo Zen, which works really well with the Google Chrome theme Zen Spring. A screenshot of my desktop is below:

Screenshot

Here are some themes that I haven’t tried yet:

As of today, there are 13 themes on their website. Back when I first found them (not exactly sure when) they only had nine. So, they don’t crank out themes every day, but they do keep their current themes up-to-date and when a new theme does come out, you can be sure that it was very well thought out.

Badschemer offers easy theme-design for gEdit

Julia Van Cleve — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 04:34:19 +0000

Badschemer is an opensource program designed by David Brown which offers an intuitive gui for creating and editing of gEdit style schemes.

Instructions on downloading this application can be viewed here.

Screenshot

I have submitted three patches to Badschemer that can be downloaded below. The first patch is necessary for those using Badschemer 1.0.1 on Karmic Koala, but it has already been included in the November release of Badschemer 1.0.2. The second patch adds the “right-margin” coloring description to the application and the third removes a warning. Make sure to add the “right-margin” patch before adding the warning patch.

A screenshot of gEdit demonstrating the right-margin patch is below.

Screenshot

Note: There is a file embedded within this post, please visit this post to download the file.

Docky goes solo, doesn’t disappoint

Julia Van Cleve — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 05:03:34 +0000

A while back, I was considering losing the Docky interface of Gnome Do, going back to AWN, and just using Gnome Do for its Quicksilver functionalities. However, I decided that I really wasn’t ready to sacrifice the speed and reliability of Gnome Do for the unpredictable AWN.

That was when I came across a post in Lifehacker which talked about Docky and Gnome Do going separate ways. Now, this doesn’t mean that the Docky interface is completely gone from Gnome Do, it just means that it’s getting less attention in Gnome Do than it is in Docky. I was ecstatic to hear that this split had happened. It was exactly what I had been hoping for. No AWN for me!

Docky is pretty early on in its development, however, it was already apparent that there were many improvements. This means a lot, since I hadn’t felt that there was much to fix in the first place, till I saw how smoothly Docky performed in comparison to Ghome Do’s Docky interface.

There are many more customizations that can be applied to the dock. There aren’t a lot, but more than Gnome Do. You can change the dock background, the dock placement (a definite plus), and even the number of docks. Granted, it takes a bit of poking and prodding to figure out how to change things, but they do work.

Screenshot

Remember that the whole reason why I looked into getting a standalone dock was so I could use the dock solely for window management, and then Gnome Do as my Quicksilver for Linux. Well, I accomplished that, since Gnome Do and Docky work perfectly well together, no interferences.

So, you don’t need to get rid of Gnome Do if you’re content with the limited options of your dock. It’s a wonderful app and will serve you well. However, if you’re picky like me, then try Docky. Be patient and you wont be disappointed.

You can download Docky by adding ppa to your software repositories, then searching for docky in Synaptic Package Manager.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars

Bring useful functionalities of Mac OS X to Linux with “Gnome Do”

Julia Van Cleve — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 00:15:49 +0000

I tend to be very particular about how my computer works, and if it doesn’t do what I say, when I say it, I get angry. A couple of things that I’ve always admired about Mac OS X is the Dock, and Quicksilver. I tried Avant Window Navigator a while back, but sadly, the number of bugs and glitches eventually forced me to revert back to the traditional Ubuntu panels.

Not too long ago, while searching for a “Quicksilver-for-linux”, I can across Gnome Do which integrates the Quicksilver functionality with an optional Dock interface.

Screenshot

How does it work? Install it, click “Windows button” + Space Bar and a search window will appear. Type in an application (ex. Thunderbird) and when it shows up, click enter. Suddenly the application is open! If you’re familiar with how Quicksilver works, this isn’t surprising. But, that didn’t stop me from admiring a few key functionalities of Gnome Do.

Clean interface
Optional “Mac-like” Dock
Recently searched applications remain in Dock after being selected
Auto-hide feature (and an “intellihide” feature, which I don’t quite understand.)
Optional Plugin to enable searching for folder names
A neat weather widget
A non-buggy Dock-able Trash-bin (This was one of the issues I had with AWN)
If it doesn’t find an Application or Folder, it will assume you want a definition. Which is sort of nifty and convenient.

Gnome Do can be found in the Synaptic Package Manager, or at this link: Download

Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars