Easy ISO recording under Windows

If you want to convert a CD/DVD to ISO image, one of the easiest solution is ISO Recorder. After installing a new menuitem will appear when you right-click on a CD/DVD in MyComputer to make ISO image.

Bricked than unbricked...

I have a USR5461 router in my workplace (ok it's not my but I am the system administrator:)).

I tried to get the dd-wrt firmware on it. The flashing worked perfectly, I got to the webinterfacein a few minutes. I started to configure it and something went bad...

After a restart I wasn't able to access it. It worked like switch but it isn't replied to my pings and I wasn't able to reach the web interface. The only thing I was able to is upload new firmware with tftp. I tried resetting the nvram but it isn't worked. I was scared to bricking it and I imagined to by a new one from my own money.

But after a few hours trying I decided to give the original firmware a try, and it WORKED! I got the original settings back so I was able to access and use it.:) It was an exciting morning.

I have found this forum thread after a bit goggling, so maybe I'll try tomorrow again.

New calendar menuitem grayed out in Lightning under Ubuntu

The solution for this is to install libstdc++5 and then reinstall lightning.

Sending notifications from commandline

Just install libnotify-bin and then call the notify-send command for example like

notify-send Stone.log 'Wisit my blog at http://yoten.blogspot.com'

to get the following notification.

Internet bandwidth counter script

I have a wireless broadband modem for my laptop. I have 1G bandwidth for 30 days. It isn't much but ideal for reading emails and browsing. I wrote a small script to monitor the used bandwidth.

It isn't a big deal, and maybe isn't the best solution but worth checking out.

To use, put the script somewhere and put a 1 minute execution period of it to cron. For example:

* * * * * root /usr/local/bin/netCounter.pl count

(The execution period can be huger but, the more small the more precise the counting is.)

To reset the counter jut run the program with the reset argument, and to get the consumed bandwidth just run the program witout any arguments.

Note: root right isn't required to run the program.

#!/usr/bin/perl -w

$interface = 'ppp0';
$statFile = '/var/log/netCounter.log';

if (@ARGV && $ARGV[0] eq 'reset') {
  open(FILE, ">$statFile");
  print FILE `echo -n \`date\`` . ";0;0";
  close(FILE);
} elsif (@ARGV && $ARGV[0] eq 'count') {
  $ret = `ifconfig $interface 2>&1| grep 'RX by'`;
  $ret =~ /RX bytes:([0-9]+) \([0-9]+\.[0-9]+ [A-Z]*\)  TX bytes:([0-9]+) \([0-9]+\.[0-9]+ [A-Z]*\)/;
  if ($1 && $2) { 
    open(FILE, $statFile);
    ($date,$sum,$oldBytes) = split(/;/,);
    close(FILE);
    $bytes = $1 + $2;
    if ($oldBytes > $bytes) { $sum += $oldBytes; }
    open(FILE, ">$statFile");
    print FILE $date . ";" . $sum . ";" . $bytes;
    close(FILE);
  }
} else {
  open(FILE, $statFile);
  ($date,$sum,$oldBytes) = split(/;/,);
  close(FILE);
  $sum += $oldBytes;
  $sum /= (1024*1024);
  printf("%2.2f MB since %s\n",$sum,$date);
}

Happy using if you want!:)

Ubuntu alsa sound after hibernation

There are some sound cards who don't works after hibernation only if you remove the modules and reinsert them. The old but now deprecated way was to add alsa to the /etc/default/acpi-support file's STOP-SERVICES variable. Since it is deprecated you should not do this. But you can set force_unload_modules_before_suspend to "all" in /etc/default/alsa file. And it works again.

Ubuntu EeePc 1000H low maximum volume

To get reasonable normal maximum volume level take a look at the following thread, and after installing new ALSA with the script mentioned there, add the following line to your /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base file:

options snd-hda-intel index=0 model=basic

Roadwarrior

I've got a 3G broadband modem and a Vodafone service with it. I plugged it in my Eee Pc of course running Ubuntu Linux, and it worked out of box. So I am ultra mobile now.:)