I had some problems some days ago setting up 2 monitors to work in Ubuntu. One of my colleagues pointed out that he was using a Nvidia card and it worked out of the box in his machine. So, I took his advice and replaced the ATI hardware here with a Nvidia card. We took the Nvidia from a Windows user and left my old ATI there. Let's face it. Microsoft scored. Both cards worked by just inserting the hardware and clicking the buttons "Yes" or "Next".

Now my machine is running with 2 monitors on Ubuntu and with all fancy but cool effects from Compiz. We use 19" monitors here. Hardware in Brazil is so damn expensive. Let's say thanks to the government for all taxes and making the acquisition of TOOLS we NEED to WORK this HARD.

Anyway, I was curious on how people work with 2 monitors here. Right now, the best approach for me is to have Emacs on the left. On the right monitor I have the browser and the terminal. I leave the terminal maximized since it has transparency and it's a such nice feature. I can type my bash stuff and still read what's on the browser. Wohooo!! There's just one feature missing in GNOME. I can't set a different wallpaper for each screen. KDE has this option though.

Whenever I need to use another program or do some unusual task I go to a different Desktop. Two Desktops are enough for me. I can only do an unusual task at a time. I guess Rands is right when he says I Don't Multitask

After some time working this way I'm changing my mind about two monitors. I'm now willing to work with only one monitor. But it must be HUGE!!

Back from Germany! Had 15 days to rest. Lovely company, places to visit, great food and beer. Oh beer!! Das Bier und das Wasser. Neutral liquids. I wish if I will ever find a bottle of Erdinger here for only 85 cents.

Well, I must admit that it was not 100% fun. First my flight was canceled and I had to make a connection in France. Then they lost my luggage. Due to almost 8 hours delay I missed the chance to visit Switzerland. Aff. At least I had a book with me. For good or bad I improved my skills on security. PHP Pro Security is good reading by the way. Since I mentioned a book I can also recommend Beginning Linux programming although I'm still reading it.

Now! I didn't know how tired I was until now. I'm feeling that batteries are recharged and don't need to sleep for a long period. And that's great

'CAUSE I'll will put on hold the AR development.

BUT I have a new side project with a great webdesigner.

Details about Vaporware some other day.

The main reason I'll put on hold the AR project is time. I just don't have enough free time for it now. Other than that it's PHP code. Don't get me wrong. It's not a PHP issue. The problem is that my "official" job demands most of my day into PHP. You know, nothing like a different project/language to keep you fresh and learn new stuff. Since the AR is not an online project no one will be hurt if I bury it into fridge for some time. Gesundheit.

After 5 versions of the free version of the autoresponder I finally decided to stop working on it. The main problem is that I don't have time to develop 2 versions of the script. It's also hard to know that there's something that I could really improve but I never have time to do so. It's better for me to focus only on the professional version. I'll keep the download link for a while.

The post today is to announce "vaporgrade". I've been working on version 1.4 of the Professional version of the AR. Right now, I have 50% done from my Todo list. The plan is to fix some small bugs (don't know if people would ever notice them) and add just a small number of new features without any bugs (soooo naive). Humble goals since I only have night time to code on it. Pragmatic as hell.

This tough schedule brings to my mind that we are always striving to be more productive. Well, at least people who do programming are obsessed about it. That said let me shout: Emacs rulez!!

I mentioned in a previous blog that I was already making use of Emacs. The great thing about it is that you can learn a new keystroke or shortcut or even some elisp code everyday. Small doses for me.

Before starting real code in the morning I always try to eat a sandwich and learn something new. Emacs (and elisp) is on my top list. You learn a new function and you wonder: Ow God, how miserable my life was before!

I'm in love with Emacs. Can't go back to products like Eclipse or Komodo anymore. Right now my problem with Emacs resides in the spaces and tabs territory. It would be a piece of cake to solve it if it was not for my completely ignorance (yet!) with Emacs Lisp. All I have is a disaster that brings me shame everytime I see my .emacs file. PHP and Python modes among copy and paste code from the internet. Newbie!! Now I have to learn elisp.

Emacs? Lisp? Ain't the title about Ubuntu??

Yes it is!

Well, I'm a huge fan of Ubuntu. Can't go back to Windows anymore.

There's only one thing that pisses me off. Wireless is a nightmare. Here's the saga. Installed Ubuntu 7.04. No wireless. After reading some tutorials and hundreds of posts it finally worked! Worth mentioning that Ubuntu Forums is an awesome place. Update to Ubuntu 7.10. Wireless broken. Here I go again... forums, blogs... wireless back. Ubuntu 8.04? Guess?? Wireless broken again. Hell. Ok, this time just one blog for the rescue. Everything back to normal, then... update in the kernel plus a few more fixes and not for the first time something happened. Guess?? Again?? Wireless.

I hate to copy and paste solutions from forums. I need to understand why things are the way they are. That's why everytime the Internet on Ubuntu stops I need to re-read tips and recipes and be remembered that I'm no wireless network whiz.

I'm not lazy. I can tell you that. The problem is on my focus. I don't wanna loose my current focus and order some books about wireless on Amazon so I can have internet, so I can study elisp (and power of spaces and tabs whenever I want), so I can go back to PHP and Python.

I can only hope that Intrepid Ibex finally have wireless network working out of the box.

Too much whining today. Guess I'm pissed about my passport and PF here in Brazil. As an angel said to me about PF: "there's no sense of customer service".