Feedly: Read in style

Posted on February 2, 2012 by Akash

Chances are that you’ve heard of Feedly. If not, you’re welcome (in advance)

“Feedly transforms your favorite websites into a fun magazine-like start page.” is what Feedly’s makers say about it. No doubt they would choose magazine as the key word in that statement, though I would go with transform.

My RSS reader of choice was Google Reader. When I log in, it looks like this:

The same view on Feedly looks like this:

See my point? Like Google Reader, Feedly allows you to use keyboard shortcuts to open up articles inline, or mark them as read etc.

Feedly also has an Explore view – which allows you to discover curated content over a multitude of categories.

If you try and like it, you’ll probably want to check the mobile and tablet versions of Feedly as well. Have a go, read in style.

Make Terminal’s autocompletion case-insensitive in Ubuntu

Posted on January 14, 2012 by Akash

After seeing how to cycle through Terminal’s autocomplete options using the TAB key, here’s how to get rid of another minor annoyance (for some). The autocompletion in Terminal is case-sensitive; if you have a directory called Downloads in your home directory, writing

cd dow

and pressing TAB will not auto-complete to cd Downloads/

To remedy this for the current Terminal session only, run this:

set completion-ignore-case On

More likely though, you’ll want to make this permanent. Run these in Terminal (courtesy of this post):

# If ~./inputrc doesn't exist yet, first include the original /etc/inputrc so we don't override it
if [ ! -a ~/.inputrc ]; then echo "\$include /etc/inputrc" > ~/.inputrc; fi 

# Add option to ~/.inputrc to enable case-insensitive tab completion
echo "set completion-ignore-case On" >> ~/.inputrc

To change this for all users, edit /etc/inputrc and add this line:

set completion-ignore-case On

You might have to restart Terminal, but after that you’re set. Happy tabbing.

Cycle through autocomplete options in Ubuntu’s Terminal with the TAB key

Posted on January 14, 2012 by Akash

The Terminal in Ubuntu, a.k.a. bash shell or console, autocompletes file names when the TAB key is pressed. On multiple hits, however, it lists all the options and waits for more inputs to disambiguate.

For instance, in my home directory I have a directory called Documents and another called Downloads. When I type Do and press TAB, nothing happens. Pressing TAB again shows Downloads and Documents, and now I must either type c or w to choose between them. I personally prefer the Windows Command Line style, where tabbing the first time cycles through Documents and Downloads.

To change to the cyclic completion behaviour, simply edit the .bashrc file in your home directory. To change for all users, edit the /etc/bash.bashrc file. Add the following line:

bind '"\t":menu-complete'

Then restart Terminal and you’re done!

P.S. You might also want to see how to make Terminal’s autocompletion case-insensitive.

Move window buttons to the right in Ubuntu 10.04

Posted on January 10, 2012 by Akash

In Ubuntu 10.04, move the window control buttons (Maximize, Minimize, Close) to the right-hand side by following these simple steps:

Open gconf-editor (you can use Alt+F2 to bring up Run Application to execute this command)
Navigate to apps > metacity > general and set the button_layout property’s value to menu:minimize,maximize,close

TeraCopy – replace your Windows copy handler

Posted on January 6, 2012 by Akash

TeraCopy is one of the first applications I setup on a fresh Windows installation.

TeraCopy replaces your Windows copy handler with one that allows you to pause and resume your copying process. You can even minimise copy windows, and subsequent copy operations will wait for previous ones to finish (though you can override that). Oh and did I mention that it’s much faster than the default Windows copy?

Grab it here.

Keep your private data private with TrueCrypt

Posted on January 6, 2012 by Akash

The most simple, elegant and secure option I’ve used to secure my private data: TrueCrypt. Amongst other things, you can create a container file which will contain all your data, and then mount this file as a new drive. All extremely simple to achieve – let’s get started.

Download TrueCrypt for your operating system and install it.
Open TrueCrypt, and select Volumes > Create New Volume...
We’ll be using the default option of Create an encrypted file container. Click Next
Again, default option of Standard TrueCrypt volume. Click Next
On the next screen, choose Select File... This is actually asking you where to create the file container. Choose a path, give a filename and Save. Go to the Next screen
On the Encryption Options screen, we’ll use the default algorithms. Click Next
Specify a size for your file container. Keep in mind that you can create more containers, but can’t resize existing ones. Click Next
Enter and confirm passwords for the volume. Make this as long as possible and easy to remember. Click Next
Choose a filesystem. If you’re on Windows and unsure what to choose, go for NTFS. Click Format to create your volume. Depending on how big a container you’ve chosen, this part will take some time. At the end of it, you should get a notification that your volume has been created. You can exit the window at this time.
In the main TrueCrypt window, you’ll see a list of unmounted drives in your system. Choose one and click the Select File button. Browse to and select the container file you created in step 5.
Click Mount and enter your password in the dialog box that appears next.
That’s it, you will now have a new drive with the letter you specified in step 10. Just keep your sensitive data in this drive, and when you’re done working with it, select your drive in TrueCrypt and click Dismount. All volumes are also automatically dismounted when you shutdown your system.

If you’re interested in learning more about TrueCrypt and exploiting its advanced features, head over to the documentation.

Moving your Thunderbird profile to a new location

Posted on January 2, 2012 by Akash

By default, Mozilla Thunderbird installs its profile folder in the user’s home directory.

One problem with this is you could lose your profile if you reinstall your OS for some reason. Another is that the profile folder could grow huge, depending on how much mail you’ve configured Thunderbird to download. In any case, it’s a good idea to move the profile folder to another location, preferably on another drive.

Here’s how to do it:

Close Thunderbird
Locate the profile folder. This is best done by looking in the profiles.ini file in the Thunderbird installation folder (Windows: %APPDATA%\Thunderbird Linux: ~/.thunderbird). The profile folder is specified in the Path property.
Move the entire profile folder, usually named something random like vxlwc2al.default, to your new location.
Open the Thunderbird profile manager by running the command thunderbird -profilemanager
Create New Profile > Next > [Give your new profile a name] > Choose Folder
Here choose your profile folder (vxlwc2al.default, in my case) in your new location.
Click Finish/OK, and come back to the Choose User Profile window.
Ensure your new profile is selected, and the Don't ask at startup checkbox is checked. You can also delete your old profile at this point.
Start Thunderbird and start using your profile from the new location.

Have a look at the official documentation for more details.

Changing Mozilla Thunderbird’s default sort order

Posted on December 31, 2011 by Akash

Mozilla Thunderbird is a superb email client, no doubt about that. And although I spend 99.9% of my email time on Gmail’s powerful web interface, whenever I use Thunderbird the one thing that always irks me is Thunderbird’s oldest-first default sort order. Even if one changes it to newest-first, the default is still used on other folders.

To change this once and for all, takes less than a minute:

Open Thunderbird and go to Edit > Preferences > Advanced > Config Editor
Promise to be careful
Set mailnews.default_sort_order to 2

That should do it. If you’re interested in changing other advanced options, have a look at this official entry listing all the config entries.

Not Very Analog At All

Author Archives: Akash