Merging AVI together

I sometimes find in my video collection of multiple AVI files, in windows I had to use complex software to try and get the videos into a single file. However, in linux there's a terminal friendly method.

1. Download and install transcode package using sudo apt-get install transcode
2. The transcode package contains a utility called avimerge, use this to merge the two files together: avimerge -o outputfilename.avi -i firstFile.avi secondFile.avi thirdFile.avi 

Make sure you check the output file to make sure that it has joined everything properly, one way to do this is to check the ends of the files to see the transition - this should be seamless if the two files are meant to flow from one to the other. 

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Reset MySQL root password Ubuntu/Debian / Linux mint

I wanted to get my portfolio up and running and saw this great plugin for Wordpress which I thought was kook to showcase tool. The only problem was that it needed Wordpress to operate, and I thought sure not a problem and used apt-get install to download install it on my Mint.

After installing the wrong version I struggled installing Wordpress, only to realize that I had to pull down the tar.gz and upgrade Wordpress manually. Well here is where all the trouble started, for some reason I had forgotten my MySQL root password and I had forgotten the the only user that I had created to create users and create databases.

I went online and tried different methods without much success, and finally found one that worked with my Mint 14 setup:

1.  sudo dpkg-reconfigure mysql-server-5.5

2. Enter the password for root as part of the sudo command

3. Enter the new password for root for MySQL

And that's it, the password has been updated. Now to get into MySQL punch this in mysql -u root -p

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Samsung Galaxy SIV (S4)

It's not too long now before the Samsung Galaxy S4 is announced with all the new features and bells and whistles. I unfortunately didn't take up the opportunity of getting the S3, why? because was I was tossing and turning over whether to switch over the Windows Phone and to give that a go. Plus, I wasn't a fan of the Touchwiz interface from Samsung, I felt it was abit bloated and the stock android was pretty snappy and looked great. So to kill the time I had purchased the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, loaded with Android 4 - this has to be one of the best phones that I have had in a long time even to the point where I had forgotten about all the other phones.

With the LG Nexus, I decided to stay away - purely because I didn't like LG phones. period.

So with the new Galaxy SIV, the specs that I have been reading about look absolutely amazing :

• 2 x 4 cores (1 for heavy tasks and 1 low level tasks) - 8 cores!!! My latest upgraded computer has only 4!
• A massive 4.99inch display with full 1080p
• 2GB of graphics RAM
• 13 Megapixel at the back and 2.1 at the front

In other news that I had read today, there is potentially new mechanism for scrolling with your eyes. That is where the phone recognises where your eyes are and then scrolls the page based on where your eyes are looking. You may have seen a similar feature with the S3 where they touted that it knows when you have fallen a sleep, and also knows when you are looking at the screen to maintain the brightness (I think they called it smart stay). I think this might be a gimmick, or people may not have realised that smart stay was actually working - since I have never heard any one rave on about this feature. Regardless it is still a cool feature to have. 

What I would like to see from Samsung as part of the S4 are:

• Better battery life
• Usage of curved OLED, i hope this phone has this feature
• Key Lime PIE!!!!
• Faster turn around of Android updates, I know that the carriers play a part in it but really they blame samsung for not providing x, y, and z. Getting very tiresome. 
• Wireless Charging - Nokia has it, Samsung should do too

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XBMC: Remove Music from Library

I was playing around with my XBMC home theatre setup and decided to add in some music and pictures to the library. The wanted to first do a trial with a small amount and then see how it works before trying to load the full library.

The CD that I loaded failed miserably, when I had ripped the CD I forgot to include the ID3 tag information using the CD database. That was a huge fail, and I don't know to what extent this has affected my mp3s.

So after the first attempt, I tried to look for an option to remove the files from the library. My first thought was to remove the source and then update the library - my thinking here was that once the source is removed I assumed that XBMC would recognise that it is no longer available and remove the records from the library. I thought wrong.

I searched high and low, I even tried to use the clean library function. After reading some forum posts, I realised that this was not going to be as easy with a number of people facing similar challenges. Some suggestions stated to move the files to another location and then to use clean library - since the issue was that the files physically existed on the location.

After some digging I found a method that worked for me, without having to move the files etc... I did the following:

• launched nautilus
• went to ~/.xbmc/userdata/Databases
• deleted the file MyMusic32.db
• Exit XBMC
• Launch XBMC

MyMusic32.db is the database holding the contents of the library for your music. Once you delete this you essentially delete the library, you then need to exit XBMC and then re-launch it. Once you re-launch it XBMC will generate a new database without any content. 

Whilst this solved my issue, this may not solve your issue especially if you have individual music that you want to remove from the library - and I don't have a very good solution to share in this scenario. This is feature, I feel, that has been overlooked by the development team (even as great as they are). To the development team, thank you for all your hardwork on producing something as good as XBMC, I would like to see in future versions some of these functionality to manage the library a whole lot better. 

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Antiguan Government to offer Warez to the World

In a world of ridikulouse announcements, I came across the following article at a tech site. Essentially it states that due to failing Gambling economy in Antigua caused by the United States of America, the Antiguan government is looking to be reimbursed by offering copyright materials online - I'm assuming that this is similar to how warez sites operate.

This has all started when the multi-billion gambling industry was stopped by the United States of America, even after the WTO (World Trade Organisation) stated that the actions by the United States of America violated the free trade agreements.

This would mean that everyone that visits a warez site no longer need to look shady, after all it is being sponsored by a sovereign government. However, this may not be seen as piracy since WTO allowed Antigua to re-coupe $21Mil annually by suspending United State's copyright.


For more information on this, check out this link.

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Unlocked Phones with a Plan - A transparent business model

As you may already be aware, the 26th of January 2012 is the day that ends the "free carrier unlocks" in the USA. So from here on, you could serve time if you attempt to unlock your phone yourself. This marks the end of the 90 day period provided by the Library of Congress, who oversees matters related Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

Personally, whenever I purchase a phone I ensure that the phone is unlocked from the carrier, and if it is locked to a carrier I request that for the phone to be unlocked. In my case, I generally purchase the phone and the plan separately.

Firstly, one of the main reasons for this is to ensure that I have the freedom of choosing my carrier when I want and not be tied down by contract. Its all too often you hear about the carriers being slow to re-act in some shape or form, or you find a carrier offering cheaper prices than your plan.

Secondly, having the ability to choose the carrier allows your phone to be used in other countries, without having to use roaming features. Everyone knows that the charges for roaming, calls and data, is daylight robbery. Every time I land in another country, where I plan to spend close to a week, the first thing I do is to get a local sim and notify a bunch of people of new number. When you get a local sim, the operator generally asks you if your phone is unlocked - if it is then you're out of luck and you will need to live with the roaming charges, buy a new phone, or stay off the grid for a while. Most people, first time tourists, do not know the difference between a locked phone and an unlocked phone they normally don't have a need to switch carriers and these are the same people who are disappointed once the realise the limitation in another country.

I personally don't get the point of a carrier locks, essentially it allows a carrier to restrict you to their network only while you are still under contract from them. Some carriers actually unlock your phone if you are on a certain plan (i.e they are able to profit off you), however, the plans which will prevent you from getting an authorised unlock are the ones where you are under the impression that you have a great deal however, there is a risk factor that the carriers are betting on - cheaper outlay price with the thought that you will spend it big with them. This essentially would mean that if they offer an unlock and you start to use another carrier (even if you are under contract) they end up of loosing due to the cheaper outlay price.

This almost feels as though it is shady business, and it may be depending on how you look at it. Although the carriers are not being upfront it really is the responsibility of the consumer to be aware of a deal too good to be true. Next time that you are purchasing a phone on via a plan, ask the sales person if after commencing the plan whether they will unlock the phone for free ? If they agree, you know that they have forecasted the amount of the plan are profiting purely on the monthly charges. If they dis-agree then they are most likely betting that you will consume a lot, and hence will profit from your consumption. You can work this to your advantage if you plan on consuming little, and stick to it.

Hope this helps.

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Keen to build my new computer

Now that I have my monitors sorted out, I'm really keen to get my new computer built. The last time I had upgraded my computer was in 2006, and I've pretty much used the same specs (apart from adding 16 gigs of additional ram and the usual harddrive upgrade), and the PSU upgrade.

However, it just shows that unless there's a dying need to a dual core CPU with adequate amount of ram can still hold it's own after 6 years. In the early 2000, computers were slow a day after you bought the latest one. There was fierce competition between AMD and Intel and in each release they would edge a little ahead from one another.

I think the specs that I have can still carry me through for a another couple of years. I haven't felt that the system is running slow - I even run Virtual Machines with Photoshop etc... and I still feel that this configuration can hold its own. But my dillema, like my previous posts is that I'm upgrading due to the need to build a HTPC.

I can quite easily build a HTPC by itself, but essentially my current computers specs would be quite nice for a HTPC. So, instead of purchasing similar components I thought why not upgrade my current computer and move the current components to the HTPC.

So, as I said above now that the monitors have been purchased I can start acquiring the parts for the computer.

Case
I'm thinking of keeping my current case, which is a thermaltake for the time being. Although it is a thermaltake case, it is one of the heaviest and the most annoying cases. The first annoying thing about the case is that it has a door to access the power button, optical drives etc... often when I need to either start the computer, reset the computer, to turn off the computer, or just to access the optical drives I need to first check if there is anything in front of the door and if there is I need to move it - I often have to move things out of the way.

The second thing that is very annoying with the case is that outside or front usb ports are on top of the case, smack bang in the middle. This essentially renders the case being used as a shelf.

The third annoying thing about the case is that where the front usb is, i.e at the top, also has a case. It was quite flimsy and had broken off the hinge within the first year. Essentially all the inputs pointing up have been slowly collecting dust.

But the case is large, it can accomodate any or most beastly motherboard component configuration. So for this reason, and because I don't really want to chuck out this case on the street reason I'm going to hold on to this case... for the time being.

Motherboard
I've searched long and hard for motherboards between AsRock, Asus, Gigabyte, MSI they all seem to be carrying similar specs to each other. Sometimes each one will bring out some proprietry software to control xyz component on their board - but I run linux and their bundled software is windows only.

So right now, with the thought that this computer is going to essentially carry me through for at least 6 years (considering the last one carried me for 6 years), I need to make sure that whatever motherboard that I choose contains the latest specs of everything - for example USB 3 is now out and over time USB 2 will become a legacy protocol. So over the next 6 years or so, it would be beneficial for me to have as many USB 3 ports as possible.

In the end, I chose the AsRock's Z77 - Extreme 9 for the Intel Chipset. The motherboard looks impressive with:

• 12 USB 3.0 ports (4 at the front, and 8 at the back)
• 6 SATA 3 ports
• Onboard WIFI 802.11 a/b/g/n 
• Onboard Blutooth v4.0
• WI-SB Box (it's essentially two usb front ports and a rack for the SSD, I've also heard that this is where the WIFI/blutooth antenna's are located)

CPU

I was looking to get something that might be a monster of a CPU like a 6 core or an 8 core CPU, but the problem that I ran into was that Intel had only 6 cores and it was trumping AMD with their 8 Cores. 

Regardless, the six core CPU from intel was quite pricey but the overall issue was that the number of motherboards that supported the CPU was very limited in their specs. So I thought I'd stick with an Intel i7 3770 3.4GHz. 

This is a real step up from my dual core, however, I don't think the additional cores will really give me that much advantage since my dual core still feels quite snappy. 

More to Come...

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