spoonfork

i haven't posted anything opensource related for a while, so here goes:

• Gnome 2.14 is out! i have been using the overlay from gentopia and the noticeable differences are the start-up speed, and performance improvements in both gnome-terminal and nautilus. other than that, everything else seems to work fine, except that that i can't change themes because whenever i do that, the themes window goes blank.


• over at gentoo there's an article about running both PHP4 and PHP5 concurrently. i decided to take an easier approach: run both php4 and php5 on separate apache instances.


• linuxlah's cara tersohor untuk install gentoo 2006.0. beyonce knowles and halle berry are hawt, but tyra banks???


• hooked on emerge and want to install web application by emerge? here's a collection of ebuild for web applications that are not in the official gentoo portage. managing overlays is quite tedious for me, so for web applications, i just install them the manual way.

question: i want to the menus (sort of like fluxbox or xfce) to appear when i right-click on the desktop in gnome. any ideas on how to do this?

other stuff: the week has been pretty tiring. james lavelle is playing a gig in KL tonight, fsck it, i'm not going. oh wait i have a better idea - mayb i should go to one of them crowded megamalls and shoot rubber pellets at random people.

listening to: jurassic five - swing set

[ i don't know what to blog, actually ]

TLC - Creep. I always like this anthem of infedility by TLC. They dropped this jam back in ninetyfo and till now it's still one of my favorites. Timeless, I would say. T-Boz sings with a sexy voice: 'I love my man with all honesty, but I know he's cheating on me', over Slick Rick's sample of "Hey Young World". The opening horns are simple, easy, slick, but distinguish. This is a superb track, skillfully mixed and excellently performed. (note there's a 3-second beginning of another track at the end - ignore it).

DJ Z-Trip & DJ P (Track 13). The tracks in uneasy listening aren't titled - this one's actually a great mash-up of the Star Wars theme. If you listen carefully, the horn sections are remixes from other songs as well. And then there's the kick-ass 10-second drum breaks (timpani i think), and the snare drums throughout the track adds some old skool kicks. Of course master yoda opens the track up, and sound clips of chewbacca and the rest of the characters thrown in for good measure. [ an interview with DJ Z-Trip at downhillbattle ].

p/s: if anyone have more information regarding the drum breaks please let me know.

listening to: blackalicious - swan lake

OOIOO - Grow Sound Tree. grow sound tree is the kind of mesmerizing track that starts unremarkably, but becomes coherent in the most remarkable of ways. remarkable in the sense that despite the different tunes, rythmms, musical instruments, and the spattering of vocals used, the arrangement and the layering are just, spot on. this is what set japanese musicians apart from their western counterparts: they're are not afraid to experiment.

Nouvelle Vague - Just Can't Get Enough. I'm sure many of you have listened to just can't get enough in various remixes and covers. nouvelle vague, are a french musical collective put together by marc collins and olivier libaux. their aim: recycling 80s music - bossa nova style. the result? saucy! what i like best is the alluring chanteuse and the happy-go-lucky choo-choos. make you wanna hit the dance floor and swing, eh?

listening to: ooioo - right hand

current indulgences:

• hooverphonic - the new stereophonic sound spetacular


• the mars volta - frances the mute. (i know, but i just have to listen to them every now and then)


• mudhoney - under a billion suns.


• the who - who's next


• the little willies - the little willies. it's (gasp!) country (gasp!) intermingled with some ass-kickin' jazz. so it's not entirely country mmmkay?


• boom boom satellites - full of elevating pleasures, out loud


• three 6 mafia - most known unknown hits.

sorry, no review. writing reviews are damn hard if one's a music snob, and one's tastes varies from gangsta rap to acid jazz to trip hop to hip hop to ambient to whateverfuschgenreyamamacallit. lately though, i found myself more drawn to jazz - not jazz as in coltraine or the t-monks or billie holliday or louis armstrong (i've have had enough doses of these), but more of a blunted, mad, acidic and experimental kinda jazz. for example, jazz fused with rock n roll and electronica or jazz fused with hip hop and turntablism. a bit hard on the ear, but rocking!

listening to: the mars volta - l'via l'viaquez

Bellua Cyber Security Asia 2006 will be held from 30th - 31st August 2006 at the Jakarta Convention Center. This is one of the largest computer security information gathering in Asia (second to HITBSecConf), and one of the most rocking. I've there before, and if you haven't, mark your calendar!

Syscan 06 (Symposium on Security for Asia Network) will be held from 20th - 21st July 2006 at Swissotel Merchant Court Hotel, Singapore. This is a smaller conference compared to Bellua Cyber Security Asia and HITBSecConf. I haven't been to any of Syscan events before. I probably attend this one.

HITBSecConf2006 Kuala Lumpur. This is THE computer security event in Asian region. The largest, the maddest and the most rocking! This year's event will be held from 18th - 21st September 2006 at the Westin Hotel, Kuala Lumpur. Haven't been to the con? Just check out the pictures.

Just a note: I'm no longer involved in organizing the Capture the Flag game for HITBSecConf2006. So, please stop asking me questions about CtF My involvement is limited to selecting papers for the conference.

p/s: I entertain question from people who are interested in organizing CtF, either for their own event or just to learn.