First, I copied my favicon.ico to my S3 bucket. It’s just a 16×16 png file that I renamed.

In my settings file I made sure the MEDIA_URL was set to my S3 URL.

Then I made sure these things were imported in my urls.py

from django.conf import settings
from django.views.generic.simple import redirect_to

Lastly, I added this rule to my urls.py

(r'^favicon.ico$', redirect_to, {'url':settings.MEDIA_URL+'favicon.ico'}),

That’s it!

Anyway, one of my major disappointments with the iPhone is the lack of podcatching software. If it had a podcatcher, I probably would have bought one right off the bat. Android has presented me with the opportunity to write my own mobile podcatching software. I’ve decided that I’m going to go for it. Being an Ubuntu user, I had to setup the SDK to get working. However, I ran into a few problems along the way. Since I suspect many other Ubuntu users out there also might want to get into the Android developing business, here I will post how I got the development environment setup in Ubuntu.

The first thing you need is a computer with Ubuntu 7.10 Gutsy Gibbon installed. The computer should be connected to the Internet. Ubuntu by default tries to use open source versions of Java, and while these are pretty good, they will not work for android development. The fact that Ubuntu will not default to using Sun Java, even after you install it explicitly, is the primary reason this how to is necessary. Anyway, the first step is to update your packages and install Eclipse and Sun Java.

sudo aptitude update

sudo aptitude install eclipse sun-java6-jdk

If you want to use Sun Java as the default JVM in your web browsers, run this command as well.

sudo aptitude install sun-java6-plugin

Now you need to make Sun Java the default jvm in Ubuntu. You can do that with this command.

sudo update-java-alternatives -s java-6-sun

We also need to edit the file /etc/jvm. Edit that file as root with your favorite text editor.

sudo gedit /etc/jvm

The contents of the file will look something like this.

/usr/lib/jvm/java-gcj
/usr/lib/jvm/ia32-java-1.5.0-sun
/usr/lib/jvm/java-1.5.0-sun
/usr

Change it to look like this, then save and quit your text editor.

/usr/lib/jvm/java-6-sun
/usr/lib/jvm/java-gcj
/usr/lib/jvm/ia32-java-1.5.0-sun
/usr/lib/jvm/java-1.5.0-sun
/usr

When certain programs on your system want to run java, they will look at this file to figure out which JVM to use. They will try every JVM in the list starting with the one on top until one of them works. Eclipse, however, does not use this file. It has its own file that works in the same way. First edit the eclipse java_home file as root.

sudo vim /etc/eclipse/java_home

There should already be a line in that file for Sun Java 6. Move this line to the top of the file. Add it to the top if it isn’t there.

/usr/lib/jvm/java-6-sun

Now your Ubuntu system is ready to run the Android development kit. Go to the Android documentation site and follow the directions there. Have fun making mobile apps in Java!

1. Step 1 – Determine your needs

   What is it exactly that you need? “I need a laptop” is not an answer. Do you need to have a computer that you can carry around? How often and how far are you going to carry it? How long do you expect to use it without charging it? What will you do with the laptop? Will you watch movies, play games, or just do office stuff? You can ask these kinds of questions about any product, technology or otherwise.

   This is often the hardest part for people. They are used to making decisions like “oooh, that looks shiny, I want it!” This is why iPods sell so well while many people would be better served by a Sansa or a Cowon. This is why people buy SUVs rather than sedans. You ask them what they need, and they immediately say SUV. They don’t say that they need a motor vehicle capable of seating 4 people comfortably, driving X miles per year. To make smart purchasing decisions you need to examine your needs on a more fundamental level. You also need to be able to throw away meaningless wants, such as desire for shininess. Heck, you might even discover that you actually don’t need anything at all! This is the best because you just put your money into savings.

2. Step 2 – Research, research, research

   Once you know what your needs are, you can start researching. The bigger the purchase, the more research you need to do. Buying the wrong computer mouse is not a big deal, buying the wrong car will have you upset for a decade or more. You should research every single product that can possibly meet your needs. Don’t think too narrowly either. You might start thinking about sports cars, but then realize that a sport bike meets your needs. You might start thinking about a giant video camera, but realize that a digital point and click meets your needs. Learn everything you possibly can about what you are buying until you are confident that you are almost an authority on it. If you don’t know more about the product you are buying than the salesmen selling that product, you haven’t done enough research. If you are going to own something and use it, you should know everything there is to know about that product. If you aren’t going to bother to learn about the things to buy, you shouldn’t be buying them.

3. Step 3 – Consider turning back

   It is only at this point in time that you should think about money. Thanks to your extensive research, you should now have a good idea of which products most closely meet your needs. I run into many situations where there simply does not exist a product that meets my needs. Other times I find that every product that meets my needs is out of my price range. In situations like this you must make a decision. Are your needs urgent? Must they be fulfilled right now? Perhaps you are willing to sacrifice some of your needs in order to save money and avoid waiting. If you haven’t yet found a product that is affordable and meets all your needs, return to Step 1 and change your needs.

4. Step 4 – Shop Around

   Once you have determined a product, or set of products, that meet your needs, it is time to shop around. Since you did research, you should know about all the different makes and models of whatever product you are considering. You should also know about what price is fair for these products. Go to every store you can until you find the lowest price you can possibly find. Do everything you can, within reason, to find the best price you can find. If you earn $50 an hour on your job, and you spend an hour of your time finding a deal that is $25 cheaper, you just lost $25. Meanwhile, if you spent an hour looking, and you found a deal saving you $100, you just made money. With the Internet, it shouldn’t take very long to realize what kind of deal you are going to be able to find.

5. Step 5 – Buy

   You’ve got the product you want, you found a place to buy it at an agreeable price. Just buy it already! Too many people wait around too long to buy something. Unless you research shows that there will be big changes coming soon, just buy the product. Don’t give me that iPhone BS. Buying such a product at launch for that ludicrous price was a dumb idea whether they had the price drop or not. Barring these extreme cases, waiting to buy a product usually just means your needs will go unfulfilled for just one more day. You’ll be paying the same price for the same product, but you’ll be getting one less day’s worth of use out of it. If that one day of use will make a difference, buy it. If you are still not confident in your decision, you might have done a poor job of research or poorly evaluated your needs. When you buy, you buy knowing you made the right decision before you take out your wallet.

6. Step 6 – Enjoy

   You bought it, now get your use out of it. Nothing is worse than when you buy something big, and then it sits on the shelf unused. If you do buy something and it remains largely unused, go back and figure out where you went wrong. Most likely you bought something you didn’t actually need. It’s also possible you may have purchased a product that doesn’t fulfill your needs. Think back to why you bought the product in the first place, and do a better job the next time. If you can, return the product and start the process again.

Yes, I know this article is incredibly generic, and full of common sense. It’s so generic that I feel it is almost pointless to write it down. I might as well write an article all about the sky being blue. If you are thinking this is all just common sense, then you do not need to read this. Move on. This is here for all the people who spend too much money on things they don’t need. This is for the people who buy things and then get upset only after making the purchase. This is for people without common sense. Learn to make a decision!

First off, if it isn’t broken, don’t fix it. One guy was having a problem because he was following some guide about how to setup the perfect Ubuntu install. He didn’t have a specific problem he was trying to fix or anything. He was just following some guide that claimed to provide directions to a perfect install. Luckily I was able to convince him that there was nothing wrong with his Ubuntu as it was, and none of that stuff was necessary.

Rule number two, don’t tweak things for the sake of tweaking things. Some people enjoy uselessly twiddling widgets on their computer for no reason. They like to do things they think increase performance just for fun. Not only do some of those tweaks not actually increase performance, but these people only use their computers as boxes of tweaking. If any performance is ever gained it is never used outside of a benchmark. Trying to uselessly tweak bits in your software without a reason is going to get you into trouble. Don’t be that guy. If you want to be that guy, get an old PC and install Gentoo on it.

Perhaps the most important rule is that you shouldn’t do anything unless you understand what it is you are doing. Far too many people find a howto guide and simply type all the commands in order. They don’t understand what any of the commands do. They don’t read the output from those commands. And even if they did read the output, they wouldn’t understand what it means. I put part of the blame on howto writers for not explaining what commands do, but simply giving direct instructions. However, users are not without blame. They blindly follow the instructions on random websites without even trying to understand what they are doing.

If you are planning on using Linux as your desktop operating system, and you care to actually get real use out of it, then follow my instructions. Do not fix what is not broken. Do not tweak or change anything unecessarily. Do not do something unless you completely understand what it is you are doing. If you follow these three rules, you will have a much better experience.

Anyway, this was the mid 90′s and it was around that time that windows 95 came out, duh. Eventually reluctantly I switched to windows 95 because every new program back then started to require it. Mechwarrior 2 was lost to me. I had beaten it, but it was still my favorite game of the time. Not of all time, just at that time in my life. Imagine being really into a game and still getting tons of enjoyment from it and then all of a sudden you can’t play it at all. Yes, I know what I could have done, but I didn’t have the computery knowledge I have now back then. I mean, I knew more than most, but not nearly as much as I know now.

In the later 90′s I got my first computer that was my own, it was Pentium 3 450mhz. It is serving this web page to you right now. The BX chipset, more specifically the Abit BX6r2.0 motherboard, is the most stable durable motherboard/chipset ever. If I had to pick one computer to use forever I would pick that because it would never fail me in a million years. Anyway, I ran 98SE and Red Hat on it. No room for Mech2.

When I got to college I replace Red Hat with Mandrake four years ago and replaced 98SE with win2k three years ago. 1 year ago, in fact last September, I switched the mandrake with gentoo. At this point I was doing linux and windows 50/50. I also got my new desktop last August, nforce2, Athlon XP 2500+, FX5900. It’s what I’m using right now. I plan to use it for 4 more years. Still no Mechwarrior 2. At this point it has been almost 10 years since I’ve played this game. All my NES games had come back to me through emulation, game boy or other means. The only games from my childhood I could not revive were old DOS games, especially mech2.

Earlier this year, early February, I was fooling around with dosbox in windows xp. I got mechwarrio2 to load and go through the menus, but it always crashed when it was time for the game to actually start. I was so close I could taste it, yet it would not go. I got other games to work, like Quest for Glory, my roommates favorite. But mech2 still eluded me. I know there was a windows version I could have gotten that probably would have worked but I wasn’t going to do that. I had the original DOS CD-ROM and it was going to run goddamnit.

Just this past week I got a new hard drive, 160 gigs for $120. I will never want for space again, until I start ripping DVDs. I took this opportunity to switch to being 50% linux to 100% linux. I do have a 10 gig windows partition, but I only need it to run Steam. If I get winex I wont need it at all. I have managed to use only linux for over 7 days, and I’m going to keep it that way. This decision to be linux only has benefited me in many ways, but my timing could not have been more impeccable. It is as if the stars aligned to return my mechwarrior to me…

I’m sure you are aware of the release of new versions of Firefox and Thunderbird. Well, after I emerge -upped firefox I cleaned out my bookmarks. I found a bookmark to the vogon’s forum where I posted when I was trying to get mechwarrior 2 to work in windows with dosbox. I searched for mechwarrior and there was a thread… Mechwarrior 2 works with dosbox. Holy shit! I click on it, and don’t you know, the instructions were for windows. Was I cursed? No, I was not. I quickly did esearch -c dosbox. Yes! dosbox was available for gentoo. I emerged it in a rush. After taking about 10 minutes to make it go and create a dos folder in /home/apreche/dos I was ready to go. By modifying the instructions in the forum and combining them with my cd-rom and what I learned the last time I tried to do this a miracle came to be. Right now, as I type this, on my other monitor is an X window. It is managed quite nicely by my XFCE4 window manager. And in this X window is mechwarrior 2. It is running absolutely flawlessly. The frame rate is full. The graphics are perfect. The controls are pristine. The resolution is 640×480. I could not ask for more. Apparently the people running it under windows are still having sound problems. HAHAHAHA!!! I am the win!

It would take a whole lot to make me more happy right now. Its as if a long lost friend has returned out of the blue. And he returns to be a better friend than he was when he left. Back in the day I couldn’t run gaim and xmms while I played, guess what I can do now? With no loss in framrate no less. Mechwarrior 2 is one of the best games ever, and the old school dos version runs perfect under linux. This weekend I think I will try to get the ghost bear legacy expansion to run…

W00000000000000000000000000000000000T!!!!!!!!1111111111!!!One