Japan - Day 3 and 4

I was too tired to write an entry yesterday, so I’ll just sum things up here. Yesterday we went to Nikko, home of the Rinnoji Temple, the Toshogu Shrine and the Futarasan Shrine. We decided to visit it to see the tomb of Ieyasu Tokugawa. We took the Tobu Railways SPACIA train to Nikko then used a special pass I had bought beforehand online (the World Heritage Pass) to see the places.

August 4, 2008

Japan - Day 2

I’m aching all over but I managed to write this entry. Today I went to the Ueno area first, hoping to go to the National Museum: however I forgot it was closed on Mondays, so I had to go to the National Science Museum instead. It turned out that it wasn’t a bad choice after all, as the museum is rich with exhibits and has a very good presentation. After that we moved to the Toshogu Shrine in Ueno Park, a shrine that was dedicated to the shogun Ieyasu Tokugawa.

August 3, 2008

Japan - day 1

I didn’t get time to write before about it, but I and my brother went to Japan for a 10-day holiday there, starting on yesterday. After a 12 hour trip, we arrived in Narita Airport and I took the chance of getting an IC card (prepaid subway/bus card) plus a shinkansen reservation I could only make in Japan (and that cost me “just” 27,000 yen). Once that was settled, we boarded the Japan Rail (JR) Narita Express and arrived in Tokyo.

July 18, 2008

Digital camera

In preparation for my trip to Japan (I really need to write about it), I have spent a few euro on a digital camera, a Canon Powershot A590. It looks like a decent camera, has a viewfinder (essential for me), some manual customization and of course it works with Linux (using digikam). Here are two examples, depicting no less than my two felines: [![Minou]({{ site.url }}/images/2008/07/img_0004.thumbnail.jpg)]({{ site.url }}/images/2008/07/img_0004.jpg)[![Matisse]({{ site.url }}/images/2008/07/img_0005.thumbnail.jpg)]({{ site.

July 13, 2008

Plasma - resizing and moving panels

Today I’m in a posting spree…This clip shows how to resize and move Plasma panels around. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rmpv-S5JJI4[/youtube]

July 13, 2008

Plasma - creating a sidebar panel

Following up on my previous post, here is another screencast showing off how to create a sidebar panel and add a few plasmoids to it. As usual, the version on Youtube has annotations. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPeFSDdt2PY[/youtube]

July 8, 2008

Plasma ZUI video

I’ve put together a small video that shows what you can do with zooming in and out with Plasma’s Zooming User Interface (ZUI). Enjoy. (note: the version on Youtube has also annotations that explain better what is going on) [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhODrJkoidA[/youtube] If you can, please spread the link to the video. We need more correct information out there.

July 7, 2008

Spread the word!

Those of you that follow my Linux-related posts know that I work (along with others) on a FAQ trying to explain some magic behind KDE 4.x’s Plasma. Now, especially since on the Internet, there is the need to spread correct information (most of the naysayers are not quite informed). So, if you want to help KDE, please spread the word on the Plasma FAQ! If people have questions on Plasma, just direct them to

July 6, 2008

Slayers Revolution - a comeback

[![Slayers Revolution]({{ site.url }}/images/2008/07/slayers3.thumbnail.jpg)]({{ site.url }}/images/2008/07/slayers3.jpg)

It’s been a long time since Slayers had aired on TV, basically since Slayers TRY was released, which means more than 10 years ago. Then, this year news told that two new series were planned, and this post is about the first episode (out of 13, aired on July 2nd; the second series will start sometime around January).

June 29, 2008

Annoying fork talks

Now even the (once respected) Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols is jumping on the bandwagon of Plasma haters. With a rather uninformed and rant-ish entry that just advocates a fork, like some other people said on the kde-devel mailinglist a week or two ago. The entry is rather dismissive of everything in KDE 4 save Plasma (and a mention on Dolphin’s single click icon), and also gets some facts and links wrong (yes, the Plasma web site is outdated, but since the developers are busy coding, someone else should step up and help).