2008-07-22
Posted in Web Wandering & Opinion
at 17:37
Introducing the Carnival of Elitist Bastards @ Café Philos
Probably best to read the link above, since I definitely don’t have time to write something anywhere near as good, but in short, it’s an introduction to Dana Hunter’s Carnival of Elitist Bastards which attempts to combat (or at least provide some resistance to) the apparent American tendency towards anti-intellectualism and a tendency to disregard what the experts say if it contradicts what people want to be true.
As I mentioned, the above introduction is much better than this little blurb and I highly recommend that you read it.
Permalink
2008-07-05
Posted in Geek Stuff
at 0:17
Ever wanted to use a VoIP client to answer phone calls over your traditional phone line instead of getting VoIP service? (Surprisingly difficult since everyone seems to want to use their crappy old phones on VoIP instead) Well, here’s the trick: Buy an FXO card like the Voxzone X100P and install the open-source Asterisk PBX software.
Not only do you get to use the VoIP client and high-quality $7 Skype-certified, noise-cancelling microphone of your choice, you can trap telemarketers in a voice-mail maze of your own fiendish design. 
In essence, an FXO card is the “voice” portion of a voice modem isolated and made Linux compatible so Asterisk users will buy them. As such, they’re cheaper than an equivalent voice modem and, since voice is the core function rather than an afterthought, their noise/echo-cancellation is usually better.
Oh, and if you want to plug traditional telephones into VoIP… perhaps to use Asterisk as a full-fledged PBX, you’ll want an FXS card (internal) or an ATA (external, Analog Telephony Adaptor). (FXO cards act as phones, FXS cards act as phone lines)
Update: Given how unpredictable quality can get when you have multi-process C++ compilation running in the background, I decided to use a dedicated box. If you like the idea of open hardware, take a look at the IP04 Open-Source PBX. (I use the one-port version with an FXO module and a bunch of Linksys PAP2T-NA ATAs)
Permalink
2008-07-02
Posted in Geek Stuff
at 0:06
I’ve been busy lately, but I can at least share a few noteworthy things I ran across.
- A faint background image in your terminal reduces eye-strain. (source)
- KDE users can use
kioexec to pass URLs as command-line arguments to non-KDE apps. (source)
set ttymouse=xterm2 will fix mouse support in Vim when you’re running it inside GNU Screen. (source)
Permalink
