a good Gnome theme

Today I bumped into a great Gnome theme called "newbuntu" while i was aimlessly searching the web and went into the artwork section of the Linux Mint website. Unlike most dark theme, this one combines perfectly Ubuntu's default Human theme and some dark colours for task bars and menu bars. Menus are black and half transparent, which adds a sense of elegance to the overall feeling. The best thing about this theme is the black & white contrast doesn't hurt eyes at all; they are combined, as I said before, perfectly.

I strongly recommend this theme to those who use Gnome as their desktop environment. It couldn't be better! This theme can be downloaded here:
http://www.linuxmint-art.org/content/show.php/Newbuntu+?content=113221.

For better overall effect, there's the twitter wallpaper I'm using:
http://www.google.com.au/imgres?imgurl=http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/twitter-wallpaper.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.hongkiat.com/blog/nice-twitter-wallpaper/&h=300&w=480&sz=31&tbnid=MifjmIAvCqlaOM:&tbnh=81&tbnw=129&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dtwitter%2Bwallpaper&usg=__-e7hGUmLJj4ThMSyoWAKFPdVCC0=&ei=ck_LSteAJoTasgObu9SOAQ&sa=X&oi=image_result&resnum=5&ct=image

By the way, if you enable some 3D effects from Compiz Fusion, with the theme and wallpaper I provided above, your system will look just... magnificent.

New World

Half the holiday has passed but I still haven't started doing the 3000-word essay and the programming project. I don't know what makes me keep procrastinating, but I just keep doing that. Whatever, I decided to wipe out everything on my hard drive and install only Ubuntu on it. This seems a great fresh academic start. Yeah, it does.

Having gone through the normal installation process, I followed two articles on Ubuntu configuration. They are,

http://ubuntuguide.org/wiki/Ubuntu:Gutsy#How_to_get_Mouse_over
_preview_of_MP3_files_working

and

http://ubuntuguide.org/wiki/Ubuntu:Edgy

The reason why I used the second reference which is an out-dated version of Ubuntu is that it's more detailed than the first one and most of the tricks still work on the lasted distribution. I've been through heaps of configs, but I just want to note some of them which I reckon are worth noting.
I followed a post to get all my hardware up and running last time I installed Ubuntu 7.10. So I scouted it out again at http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=107505. Two tricks in this post helped me a lot. One is how I can get rid of the black screen when I use Alt+Fx to switch to console screen. The way is to change the parameters 'splash quiet' in grub config file into 'verbose'. As you can see, this sacrifices the great boot screen, so i reckon sooner or later I'll solve it in a perfect way. The other thing valuable to me in this post is how to set my Ati x1700 graphic card up. It'll be a piece of cake when you follow the easy steps described in there.

When I was installing mplayer and another user application whatever the name is, I got an error message from apt-get:

The following packages have unmet dependencies:
mplayer: Depends: libpango1.0-0 (>= 1.18.3) but 1.18.2-0ubuntu1 is to be installed
E: Broken packages

What confused me was that i've got a newer version of libpango(which is 1.18.2-0ubuntul here) but but it didn't work and did require the older one. Well, this wasn't just for mplayer. Wtf, what's the point of having a newer version of libpango? I didn't bother downgrading the package because I didn't know how to do it. I googled it and found someone resolved the problem by directly installing the specified version after finding out that he couldn't remove the current package. Okay, why not give it a try? I downloaded 3 deb files and installed them but it was fucked up when I installed the .dev package for libpango. However, the other two files were installed successfully. I tried installing mplayer again, this time I got a massive output which made me feel really shitty. Okay, I aimlessly opened Synaptic Package Manager and it popped up a window saying that there was a broken package on my system(must be libpango). Then I located it and removed it without any difficulty. Excited, I visited apt-get again and this time it didn't complain anything and mplayer install is ongoing while I'm logging this. So in conclusion, don't take everything in other dudes' posts for granted because you have different system setup and things may differ when running on two different operating systems.

And at last, here's the instructions on how to install mplayer and the corresponding codecs:

http://www.ubuntugeek.com/install-mplayer-and-multimedia-codecs
-libdvdcss2w32codecs-in-ubuntu-710-gutsy-gibbon.html

However, this doesn't work with .rmvb files. Last time I installed Ubuntu, I tried all the possible packages to make it working with .rmvb files but I forgot to wirte it down. But right now, I can't be bothered to scout it out, since I don't have any new movies download at the moment. LOL!

This blog post looks a bit of mess. But...well, screw it! This is just for self reference.

60 Earth Hour, take part in it!

On March 31 2007, for one hour, Sydney made a powerful statement about the greatest contributor to global warming – coal-fired electricity – by turning off its lights. Over 2.2 million Sydney residents and over 2,100 businesses switched off, leading to a 10.2% energy reduction across the city. What began as one city taking a stand against global warming caught the attention of the world.

In 2008, 24 global cities will participate in Earth Hour at 8pm on March 29. Earth Hour is the highlight of a major campaign to encourage businesses, communities and individuals to take the simple steps needed to cut their emissions on an ongoing basis. It is about simple changes that will collectively make a difference – from businesses turning off their lights when their offices are empty, to households turning off appliances rather than leaving them on standby.

Stay passionate! Stay awake!

I'm determined to use Java in ACM this year, so it's probably going to be tough for me because i have to learn a brand new programming language as well as doing heaps of bloddy assignments. Well, this could be called an appetizer since i haven't relaly done anything meaningful since i graduated from high school. And i really want this to resurrect myself and start doing what I always dreamed doing. By the way, it's nice to know Laurel, who is most probably going to be my co-worker or partner henceforth.

Stay Passionate! Stay awake! Stay creative! I think the criteron for becoming successful is that one ends up finding himself the kind of person he would like to be.

revelation

Many Chinese people are fucking weird!

about phil essay

Having wasted two weeks' time, now I'm getting to my philosophy essay. After tossing around a bit, I finally decided to focus on philosopher Berkeley's ontology.

But what I'm not sure about is whether Berkeley's idealism is right. His theory is an attack on materialism, and holds that all sensible things exist only in human minds - they are not corporeal substances. For example, heat and cold exist only when we feel them. They don't exist without our minds. Do you guys think it true or not? I agree with him, at least in this heat & cold case, because heat and cold are what we feel. I think there exists kind of relativity. For instance, what you feel cold in summer could make you feel warm or hot in winter. Yes, Berkeley did explain it using the relativity argument.

However, as for light and sound, I prefer the materialism theory as what we have learnt in physics in high school. Light is acutally a massive sequence of particles in the air. This is all that I can remember about light. And sound is the motion of air under some frequency (this is my own reflection, if there's any mistake, please help correct).

So don't know if I could split it up - going for the heat & cold argument and against the sound and light ones. But what would the ultimate opinion on Berkeley's ontology be? I think I should have a main topic, and analyze its fissiparous effects later on.

What do you guys think? Please feel free to put forward your opinions. That'd be more than appreciated!

A letter to The Age by someone

Prime Minister Jobn Howard's commitment to work towards a long-term aspirational goal for climate change continues to frustrate many concerned young people such as myself. We are the generation that will have to deal with the dangers that are to come if we do not act now on climate change. The science is changing every week - not for the better - and is increasingly telling us we need to do more immediately. Most of the science suggests that to fully prevent climate change catastrophe we must aim for zero carbon emissions by 2030 (www.beyondzeroemissions.org/). We cannot afford to the complacent, and long-term goals should start straight away. We want real policy action on climate change, not vague assurances nor contrived rhetoric. Please listen, Mr Howard and APEC political leaders, we are the future generation.

My comment on this:

In your dreams man! This is really stupid because as i said in my prevous log, APEC never makes decisions. What they can do at most is to make some agreements. At the moment, the Kyoto Protocol is one such agreement committing nations to take some 'baby' steps along the road to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. But a post-such-agreement is desperately needed. I think that's what this man wants because it seems impossible to put it on a policy level.

Also I want to add another humble opinion. To solve the global warming problem, we can't rely on promoting a particular technology to tackle the problem. What we need is to reach an international agreement on that instead of solving it by devoting a great deal of effort individually. Someone has proposed a framework called 'contraction and convergence', for crafting a new protocol. We will see.

PS: We are a generation of extravagance, the awareness of water and waste is the prerequisite to solving the problem. This might not be correct, or totally irrevalent. This is just a thought of mine anyway.

APEC in Australia?

The oncoming APEC summit is said to be the most important meeting which will have ever been held in Australia. But I don't think it's true. According to The Age (4th September, 2007), the most important international meetings held in Australia were in 1942, between Geveral Douglas MacArthur, Prime Minister Jobn Curtin and the War Cabinet. They helped to turn the course of World War II, and changed the future of Australia.

This weekend's summit will gather the most important group of people in Australia. But whether it will have an important impact on the world is unclear, because unlike many other important international meetings, APEC never makes decisions. It's just like, a group of leaders sitting together, talking about how they tackle their own countries' problems and disscuss common problems, such as economic issues, security, trade, environmental issues. Anyway, there's not shortage of issues for leaders to talk about. Let's just take China's undervaluation of its curreny, which has had a dominent influence on the world economy. This makes China very attractive to export from, leading to huge rates of investment - nearly 50 per cent of its GDP - blistering growth in employment and output, soaring living standards.

The meetings that matter are those that change the world. But APEC couldn't be in this kind. Do you expect this APEC summit to resolve the global warming issue? Don't do that, because you'd be wasting your expectation. Hope it goes well though.

finantial hit - Melbourne Model

Melbourne Uni warned over new model 'hype'
Farrah Tomazin and Adam Morton
The Age, September 3, 2007


MELBOURNE University has been warned it risks failing to live up to its own hype and, unless it reins in spending, compromising quality as it shifts to a US-style teaching model.

Confidential documents dated March 2007 show that the elite university faced a "serious mismatch" between costs and revenue of up to $25 million, but was well placed to attempt the biggest transformation in its 154-year history.

According to a risk analysis, potential pitfalls associated with the plan included scaring off top undergraduates, compromising quality if costs grow faster than revenue, and failing to match "Melbourne Model hype" due to exaggerated branding.

Internal economic modelling shows the university expects to improve its bottom line in the medium and longer term, but that several faculties, including law and architecture, face a financial hit during the transition period.

Under the new model, the university will from next year gradually replace 96 undergraduate courses with six "new generation" degrees and move professional programs such as law to postgraduate level.

The report by the university's finance committee, obtained by The Age under freedom-of-information laws, says regardless of the teaching model adopted: "The unambiguous conclusion from the cost analysis is that without a concerted focus on the cost side — a focus which needs to occur as soon as possible — the university will be facing a serious mismatch between revenue and costs."

It says the university has strategies to manage the risks — it introduced a $100 million scholarship program to attract top students — and recommends cutting costs by $20 million to $25 million over the next three to five years.

Vice-chancellor Glyn Davis said the reduction was less than 2 per cent of the university's budget, and was being tackled in part by removing administrative duplication.

Professor Davis said the documents showed the Melbourne Model was not financially driven.

The university should be modestly better off compared with the status quo by 2011, he said.

"If you were going to make money this is not how you would do it … you would just go in really hard to the international, fee-paying market," he said.

"The bottom line of this document is that if we don't change we start to run into significant financial problems, which have nothing to do with what we do internally and everything to do with Commonwealth funding rates."

The Age revealed in July that 10 Melbourne University faculties had initially forecast operating deficits this year, prompting management to devote an extra $28 million, on top of an $85 million transition fund, to help bring in the new model.

Newly available confidential documents from June analysing how faculties would cope with the new model found:

■The law faculty faced a "significant funding gap" during the transition years.

■Architecture, building and planning faced "real financial risks" from potential loss of fee revenue, forecasting deficits for the next three years.

■Arts — which recently announced a 12 per cent staff budget cut, expected to cost dozens of jobs, to rein in a projected $12 million deficit — has been hit by a drop in the number of international students.

■Making the education faculty postgraduate would make it difficult to recruit Australian fee-paying students. Its success would depend in part on gaining State Government and school sector support for a more intensive teacher-training program.

■The university would continue to rely on the economics and commerce faculty for more than 25 per cent of fee income.

According to the documents, the university does not have a good record in making structural reforms to contain costs, but its costs were not at the upper end compared with other institutions.

french fries

Things r fucked up.

Have been thru sum shitty days.

Wil get over it, I'd hope.

haven't updated it for ages

Well, hadn't had internet at home for almost one month before i reactiveated it today. I'm feeling like being home after several years' out. ;)

There happend plenty of things during this time period. An exciting and dangerous snow trip (out of this period but hadn't got a chance to log it before internet went down), hanging out with tiger, chief in Crossway, going to Planet Shakers with Miriam and experienced the post-modern church style(It was AWESOME!), and going to South Yarra with Sera and a bunch of guys to attend DNA(a church study group). Well, the prime should be the tour to Crossway, and I will always remember that Sunday night. It was my 21st birthday. I went to Glen Waverley with Rachel, and we leaped into tiger's super ride after arriving there. Then we spent some time at Alicia's house-house:-P She played her piano after i finished a cup of capccino. She was awesome! Then she tried teaching us her great finger-twitching skill, but my fingers were too stupid to learn:(. After mucking around for an hour or so, we headed off Crossway. We yelled continually in the car, and I sang 'The old man, he plays...' with leish, it was so much fun!

(gotta do micro assignment, that's due 2moro. will continue sometime this week)

she's getting darker

yo yo yo! I'm callin you!

Leave your footprints here, mates! Don't be mean.

unawareness

The University of South Australia has carried out a nationwide survey, which was the largest Australian study into community's attitudes towards abuse in relationships.

This survey shows firstly that approximately a quarter to almost half of the respondents don't recognize it's the sign of abuse to try to control what their parners wear, to scroll through their text messages and to spend days giving them silent treatment. Secondly, the survey reveals that for people under the age of 18, males are three times more likely than females to think that pressuring for sex is not abusive. Over one-third of young people think that men and women are equally the perpetrators of abuse. However, the survey thirdly shows that women are victims in 85 - 95 per cent of abuse cases and men in 5 - 15 per cent of cases.

All points are from Herald Sun, Monday, July 23rd, 2007.

new pics

got nothing to say

You are far inferior, man!

scratching ur achy ass?

We meant to meet at 11am at McDonals near Flinders street, but Ken and Chen had got something to do in school, so Wing and I waited 45 minutes for them in McDonalds, also finished two big mac meals. That was easy.:p By the way, Wing looked pretty tired and it seemed he had hit the sack very later last night. But the fact is, he was no later than me last night. I dun know the reason. lol!

Then we took some time to go the MSAC(Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Centre). Unfortunately, basketball courts there were not available from 9am to 3pm because of some ****in' program. The time we got there was half past one or something. So we headed back to city and picked up Chen's high school classmates and we went to the uni together. It was really a bad day today. I hurt my left hand on the court and the other off. Afterwards, we made our way to Melbourne Central to watch movies and had some food beforehand. Thanks to Ken's coupons, I bought two meals at the price of $10 in Hungry Jacks! It was hard to decide what to see, Ken wanted to watch Transformers, and Wing, Blades of glory. Well, had we chosen to watch either, we would have to wait for two or three hours, which would have been too stupid. So we chose Shrek 3rd at last. Still got an hour to go, so we wandered within Melbourne Central after buying the tickets - CountryRoad, Foot Locker...

The movie turned out to be good, hilarious. Ken said it was better than two, but I couldn't recall any detail of two. So I was just a good listener:). Hey what are we gonna do? They wanted to watch games at crown but I don't have an age-proof stuff(haven't applied for my L yet). Hence, we made our way to my house, then got two decks of cards and started playing. To tell the truth, I rarely played cards. So they taught me different kinds of Poker, which was prevalent in casinos as well as a Hong Kong card game. Although it was my first time to have played these games, it turned out that I earned the most chips. And both Ken and Wing had loans from me, lol!

Yo yo! I'm a folder, not a scruncher! I don't know what you are, but yeah, I'm what I'm saying.(Don't take it seriously man, you know what I'm saying if you are smart enough)

indulgence

What have I been up to these days? I'm not even clear enough. It seems that I've been in a dream, getting around Shaitan, Icicle and Argent, having encountered cactus, melon, camel, lizard, shrub, clam, crab, drinking contaminated water, eating sea snail meat, resting in havens and outposts distributed around the world, been devoting myself to a lot of quests aiming at becoming a crusader, in the meantime, setting off to the sea for challenges without knowing i needed to refuel and needed more powerful cannons (although I dun have a pistol, I've got a bigger boy, kuhanust!). The people I visit most frequently are teleporters. I still remember clearly levelling with Toinks outside the Icicle city after getting stuck on the beach near the Abandon Mine Haven. I still remember I didn't distribute my points carefully and didn't have an idea how to have an illusion slash despite the fact that I had been meaning to be a crusader and the life of melee was tough.

That's really no good. That's addiction; that's indulgence, that's suicide. I need a resurrection. From where to where? Death to life? Dunno, I wish I had been a herbalist.

"Ah huh! New gear looks cool! But that ain't enough"

"Yo, we need to form a party of five"

Things I have to post here

This is what I've been thinking about Chinese government. I did something about computer science when I was in high school and encountered a great deal of trouble accessing some overseas academic websites. GOD-DAMNED xxx! My being posting this isn't because I'm in Australia and I'm looking down on something in China, I've been having this sort of feeling for several years when I was interested in computer science but suffered from the very strictly control of media in China. No one would like hat except the government! They control what people should know and what they can know, which is to blame despite the fact that I'm Chinese as well.


'Citizen journalism' battles the Chinese censors FROM http://www.abc.net.au/

Reporters Without Borders says the Chinese Government finds ways of blocking or censoring content - including the website of the press freedom group itself (File photo). (AFP: Frederic J Brown)

In the strictly controlled media world of China, "citizen journalism" is beating a way through censorship, breaking taboos and offering a pressure valve for social tensions.

In one striking example this month, the Internet was largely responsible for breaking open a slave scandal in two Chinese provinces that some local authorities had been complicit in.

A letter posted on the Internet by 400 parents of children working as slaves in brickyards was the trigger for the national press to finally report on the scandal, which some rights groups say had been going on for years.

The parents' Internet posting was part of a growing phenomenon for marginalised people in China who can not otherwise have their complaints addressed by the traditional, government-controlled press.

Beijing-based dissident Liu Xiaobo was one of the student leaders of the 1989 Tiananmen Square democracy protests.

"The phenomenon of 'citizen journalism' suddenly arrived several years ago," he said.

"Since the appearance of blogs in particular, every blog is a new platform for the spread of information."

He cited the example of a couple in the south-western city of Chongqing who became known as the "Stubborn Nails" in April because they refused to leave their home until they received adequate compensation from the property developer who wanted them out.

They quickly became household names in China - and symbols of resistance against greedy land developers and corrupt local authorities - mainly thanks to Internet postings.

"That case was first revealed through blogs," Mr Liu said.

Also in Chongqing, parts of the city were this month set on fire following the beating of flower sellers by the "chengguan", city police charged with "cleaning up" the city's roads.

Witnesses to the beatings had appealed to local television journalists, but nothing was broadcast.

The incident only became known outside the city thanks to photos and stories published on the Internet, sparking anger among China's netizens.

"It's fascism," said one, while another mocked: "The inhabitants of Chongqing are truly naive, the Chinese media is all controlled by the Communist Party, they decide what people know."

Several days later, another blunder by the "chengguan" - this time in Zhengzhou in central Henan province, again targeted at a street seller - provoked further riots.

The image of protesters surrounding a police car, captured by a mobile phone, made its way round the world, after being posted on Chinese movie sharing site Tudou, then reposted on YouTube.

Elsewhere across China, protesters often seek to post on the Internet photos or videos of unrest to counter the versions from the state-run press and local authorities, who usually downplay or deny the events.

Recognising the threat of China's growing online community, Chinese President Hu Jintao called in January for the Internet to be "purified", and the Government has since launched a number of online crackdowns.

"The department of propaganda has sent out regulations to try and control the opinions being spread on the Internet, but every citizen has the right to criticise or to take part in public affairs on the Internet," said Zhu Dake, a professor at Shanghai Tongji University.

"The government has to accept the criticisms of the people, it can no longer react crudely like in the past."

Julien Pain, who monitors Internet freedom issues for Reporters Without Borders, is less optimistic.

"One cannot truly say that the Internet in China is becoming more and more free, because at the same time as the development of citizen journalists, the government finds ways of blocking or censoring content," Pain said.

Reporters Without Borders, which labels the Chinese Government an "enemy of the Internet", says about 50 cyber dissidents are currently behind bars in China.

Life will be harsh

I had been thinking about whether Maths B was suitable for me as a computer science student and I hadn't had one elective subject chosen. So I made an appointment with Louise Walker, who's my course adviser today at 11.

I hadn't know she worked all day even on holiday before she told me so. Well, the reason I was here today was that I had been told by my maths tutor that there were few people choosing Maths B each year. So I was wondering if this subject was good enough. However, Louise told me Maths B was definitely the best maths subject for computer science students. Hence I wouldn't have any doubts after the authority's announcement. For the unchosen subject, Louise asked me a question, which was really hard for me, "Do you wanna learn or wanna get a good mark?" I wanted to get good marks cos I wanted to take the honours study. Having said that, I wanted to learn something cos I thought uni was the only good opportunity that I could learn without worrying about anything else too much. So I told her I wanted to learn after 20 seconds' thinking. Then she recommended me philosophy, history and xxx (I forgot what it was at the moment). After tossing around a bit, I finally replaced Managing People and Organization which I had chosen before semester 1 by a philosophy subject - Great Ideas in Philosophy, and added another ESL subject - Academic English 1.

That means I will be struggling a great deal next semester cos the assessment of both subjects involves a lot of essay writing. For Academic English 2, there will be a 700 word assignment 20% (due mid semester), a 1500 word assignment 35% (due at the end of the semester) and an oral presentation of 800 words 25% (due at the end of the semester). For the philosophy subject, there will be a written assignment of 500 words 10% (due early in the semester), a written assignment of 1500 words 40% (due mid semester), a 2-hour written examination (not open-book) 47% (due at the end of semester) and tutorial participation 3%. These are just half of my work during semester, I will also be doing advanced maths and algorithmic problem solving, which will also take a lot of time. I will be having a harsh life in the second half of the year definitely. Essay writing is scary, because it took me sooooo long to get my essay for Academic English 1 done satisfactorily last semester. I worked on the draft for weeks, but needed to start it over again after the first evaluation, which took me another week to rearrange it and added something new to it. That's was really a nightmare and don wanna see it again. Hope everything goes well.

So I'm going to take maths and algorithms a bit seriously on winter holiday, wishing I would be struggling less with it when I'm overwhelmed with piles of assignments and homework. I've been relaxing for almost two weeks, which is quite enough I reckon cos I feel really bored. Let's get to work!