Archive for November, 2007

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Ubuntu touchpad fix

Sunday, November 18th, 2007

At work, my company issued me a Dell D620L laptop. For whatever reason, the touchpad moves the cursor painfully slow in Ubuntu (but not Windows). As a quick stop-gap measure, I just stick in a USB mice and use that. Today, I forgot my mouse so I decided that I’d look to see how I could fix it.

After some digging online for documentation, this is what worked for me:

  1. Open xorg.conf for edit (I found mine in /etc/X11/)
  2. Look under “synaptics” and add the following options 
       Option	"MinSpeed"	 "1.5"
   Option	"MaxSpeed"	 "1.7"
   Option	"AccelFactor"    "1.8"
  3. Tweak these three numbers as necessary to suit your taste

Here’s a screenshot (click for larger):

ubuntu-touchpad-fix

I hope this helps anyone facing the same annoying problem I did.

On shameless-promo note, check out my cool wallpaper :p The scenery is a picture I took when I was in Grindelwald, Switzerland.

Posted in howto | No Comments »

Quotes: Invention and execution

Sunday, November 18th, 2007

One thing I feel most passionately about: love of invention will never die.”

–Karl Friedrich Benz

Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back– Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth that ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favor all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamed would have come his way. Whatever you can do, or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. Begin it now.

–Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, “Prelude at the Theatre,” 1983

(more…)

Posted in execution, things to remind myself, uncategorized | No Comments »

Wyclef on 1 world, 1 race, and the American Dream

Sunday, November 18th, 2007

Did you know that Wyclef Jean (yes, the rapper) was appointed as a goodwill ambassador to Haiti and was awarded a diplomatic passport?

Famous performing artists wield quite a bit of power, and it’s not surprising that they sometimes help drive political agendas. Look at Arnold Schwarzenegger. Who would have guessed that he would one day become the Governor of the great state of California?

Leaders are great salespeople. They can tell a great story, to move people. Here’s Wyclef’s 7 minute story of 1 world, 1 race, and the American Dream.

This land is the land of opportunity. There’s books, there’s libraries. You get a bus card. You can take the train.

Wyclef, thanks for keeping the dream alive.

Posted in changing the world, did you know, passion | No Comments »

What would you die for?

Friday, November 16th, 2007

And even if he tries to kill you, you’ll develop the inner conviction that there are some things so dear, some things so precious, some things so eternally true, that they are worth dying for. And I submit to you that if a man has not discovered something that he will die for, he isn’t fit to live.
– Martin Luther King, Jr., Speech at the Great March on Detroit

MLK would willingly die with no regrets for a cause worth fighting for. Do you know what cause you are fighting for? What would you die for?

From the Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute at Stanford

Posted in changing the world, fear, passion, quotes, stanford, things to ponder about | No Comments »

Wallstrip

Tuesday, November 13th, 2007

I’ve been kinda busy lately, so this is just a short post. I watched Wallstrip when it first launched .. then sort of lost interest in it and stopped paying attention. Recently as I was cleaning up my RSS feeds (“delisting” the feeds got stale), I checked it again and it sure has been a lot more entertaining. Today’s report on TIF (that’s the ticker symbol for Tiffany & Company) was just flat out entertaining. I think this is as good as it gets for reporting on a company’s stock (of course I hope for better!).

I mean, they have really added value here by taking something as mundane as reporting on a company’s stock to a whole new level. I honestly don’t care about TIF’s stock but if they do another video like this, I would totally want to watch it. For the uninformed single bachelors like myself (hmm .. maybe there’s a reason for this), Tiffany & Company is a jewelry company whose goodies girls go nuts over. And they’re not cheap stuff.

But my readers, let’s not get carried over the shiny rocks. The real star here is Wallstrip :p I know it’s old news that this startup got acquired by CBS, but I’d say happy belated congratulations anyway.

Is the company’s product providing value to end users? Check!

From Kuala Lumpur to Brussels? Now I can TOTALLY relate to that ;)

Posted in uncategorized | No Comments »

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