23 years…

So here I am, back on blogging after a long silence. But this long break was not because of the fact that I didn’t have anything to write. I think its fair to say that it was because I had so much to say that I couldn’t really figure out how to manage them all in to this little blog of mine. There were so many interesting things happening around me. They’ll always be in my memories. (Naah! I’m pretty sure I won’t forget them. So no! you won’t be reading them here hehe!)

Also its been a crazy semester. Just finished the last paper of the 2nd year final exam yesterady and I think I’m feeling kind of relaxed now. It’s funny, when I looked forward at this moment few weeks ago I never thought I’d be able to happily blog about the end of the exam 🙂 But it went really well and I’m pretty satisfied with all the papers I had to answer. Considering all the crazy things I went through in the past few months I should be glad to be able to blog about it like this…

Anyways! yes! It’s my 23rd birthday today. I’m not quite sure what I’m feeling right now… But when I look back at the last round around the sun, I notice something different than the ones before. I see that I have learned so much about life on this ride. I saw how some things that seem to matter so much in our lives has no real meaning… I saw how easy it is for people to completely ignore the things that really matter in life… I saw how unexpected life can be… I realized that we should not be having too much expectations in life.

And also a really good outcome of all the problems I faced is that I got to make out the people around me. I realized who really cares about me, and who… well, lets say “doesn’t give a sh*t what happens” 😛 Not that I’ll be treating the latter party differently(being angry with people for too long is NOT something I’m very good at) But its good to know that they will not be there for me when I need them. I was glad to see that there were people who believed on me. People who cared about me even when I was not in the usual “guy who saves the day” mode. And I pity the poor souls who tried to enjoy the show when I was down. Hope they’ll be able to stick to the mentality that they did the right thing. 😛

So after all these incidents I’m still doing pretty fine to start the next year of my life. And this time with a little more knowledge about life 🙂 there’s a saying “You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face.” There were many of those moments in the past few months and I really gained strength from them. I will be facing good times and bad times as usual but I’ll know enough not to worry too much about any of them. I was having a great life with pretty much everything I really needed. I stupidly forgot that truth about me sometimes and I’ll try my best not to do that mistake again… because now I know, It’s good to be me! 😀
C.J.

Playing with pligg

So I had this idea for a small (I guess) project that uses a Digg-like voting system. I started with the Pligg CMS and messed around with it for a bit, but after two days, I decided to switch to its well-known Drupal-based rival, Drigg. Don’t get me wrong, Pligg’s a solid CMS, and I’m not saying folks should steer clear of it. But for me, it felt a bit too cluttered. 😐

What bugged me about Pligg? The code’s not super clean, you’ve got to tweak a dozen spots just to do something basic like swap a theme. The development’s not as lively as Drupal’s, which has a huge, active dev community. The karma calculation isn’t very transparent, which could be a real pain later. And the user support? It’s “known” for not really listening to feedback 😛 (though I didn’t run into that myself).
So, I jumped to Drigg, and I’m happy I did 🙂 It’s built on Drupal, and you can feel how tidy the code is. Sure, if you go for a manual install, it takes a bit to set up the modules and get Drigg running. You’ll need some Drupal basics too, but it’s honestly kinda fun to figure out, even if you’re totally new to Drupal, it’s not that tough to pick up.

Right now, I’m tinkering with the site, and I might write a post about setting up Drupal+Drigg if I find the time. Oh, and yeah, I’ll spill the beans on this project I’m working on 😛 If you’re into Free Software, you might actually dig it, heehee. But we’ll see how it goes… 😉

~SeeJay

How to Unlock the Huawei E220 HSDPA modem

The Huawei E220 (or Vodafone E220) is the HSDPA modem you usually get from Dialog Telecom or Mobitel GSM (and maybe Airtel) when you sign up for mobile broadband. Thing is, it’s usually operator-locked, so you’re stuck with one network, even when your ISP starts treating you like dirt. If you caught my last post, you know why I decided to unlock my Huawei E220 from Dialog Telecom. Here, I’ll walk you through how I did it, keeping it as simple as possible. Feel free to hit me up if you need any help.

e220

Disclaimer: I’m not responsible or liable for anything you do with this tutorial. Use it at your own risk.

Alright, with the usual “Disclaimer” out of the way, here’s what you need to do.

First, grab these tools: E220 CardLock Unlocker E220 Updater version 11.117.09.04.00 QC Mobile Analysis Tool And a hex editor, though if you do it right, a basic text editor might work too 😉

Or just download and unzip this file. It’s got everything you need, including a lightweight portable hex editor 🙂

Unlocking the E220 is as easy as running the E220 CardLock Unlock tool, punching in the unlock code, and hitting “OK.” But that’s only if you already *know* the unlock code.

unlock

So how do you figure out the unlock code? That’s where the other tools come in.

Plug your modem into your computer and run the E220 Updater. Wait for it to detect your modem, then hit the “Cancel” button. Yep, cancel it! This just preps things for the real tool to spot the modem easier.

e220Update Now open the QC BQS Analyzer, click the Hardware Forensics menu, and pick Use Com/USB Port. QCMob-1 Now the “QC Com Diag” window should pop up. Usually, your modem and COM port are auto-selected in the Serial Com Port dropdown. If not, pick it yourself. Then hit the “Send Cmd” button and wait until “Successfully sent command” shows up in the bottom right. QCMob-2 Now select “Read EFS” from the Diag Functions dropdown and click the “Let’s go” button. When prompted, name the file e220.bin and save it. You should see a “Successfully read EFS” message. QCMob-3 Time for some hex digging 🙂 Open the e220.bin file in your hex editor. Search for the ASCII string Sd, (yep, with the comma) or the hex string 53 64 2c. After some random characters, you’ll spot a clean 8-digit code. Trust me, it stands out, and guess what? That’s your unlock code 😀 Hex Once you’ve got the unlock code, just pop it into the CardLock Unlock tool, click “OK,” and boom! your modem’s unlocked!! 😀

Hope this helps! I’d love to hear what you think. Good luck unlocking your modems 🙂 ~SeeJay

Why I unlocked my HSDPA modem (and why you should too)

As usual, it’s old news to my Twitter followers that I’ve unlocked my Huawei E220 HSDPA modem, which I got with my mobile broadband from Dialog Telecom. It was operator-locked, meaning it only worked with Dialog. I’ve got to say, I loved mobile broadband. The idea of having internet wherever I went was awesome. But Dialog’s been doing everything they can to mess that up. When I signed up, they promised 3.6Mbps, but I’ve never seen anything above 1Mbps. And sometimes their DNS servers crap out, making the connection totally useless.

“They’ll get their act together eventually, and we’ll see decent speeds someday,” I told myself. Man, was I wrong.

A few weeks ago, I noticed Dialog quietly “updated” the mobile broadband speed to 1Mbps on their website. Hold up! What about the connection I bought? What happened to the “super-duper fast” (yeah, I know, hilarious, but that’s how they sold it :P) internet that was supposed to hit 3.6Mbps???
My first thought was, “WTF! Who do they think we are? How do they think they’ll get away with this???” The answer’s simple. They knew they couldn’t deliver 3.6Mbps from the start, but they lied. Why? Because they’re the mighty Dialog Telecom, and we’re just helpless customers in their eyes.

“They’ve already paid, so why care? They can’t switch providers since it’s locked,” – that’s probably what Dialog’s big shots are thinking.
Well, Dialog, I’ve got news for you: anything that can be locked can be unlocked! at least with this HSDPA modem you sold us 😛 And that’s exactly what I did. Now I’ve got a fully functional Huawei E220 HSDPA modem 😀

Unlocking it was pretty straightforward, and no, I didn’t shell out cash to some company to do it 😛 I handled it myself after some solid Googling (shoutout to OpenDNS! Web browsing is a nightmare with Dialog’s junk DNS servers. If you’re still using them, switch to http://opendns.com you’ll thank me later :P).

The first question I got on Twitter was, “Are you switching to Airtel now?” My answer? “Nope!”

I’m not ditching Dialog just yet. Why not? Because I signed up for six months, and I’ll stick to that deal. So why unlock it then? Easy! after six months, I’m free to do whatever, but they’re banking on me being stuck with their modem and not switching. They don’t care. Now that I can hop between networks with this same modem, they know I might, and that’s what keeps greedy companies like Dialog from screwing us over. It’s why we should all do it! Teach them to respect their customers.

There are tons of guides out there for unlocking HSDPA modems. My next post, which I’ll write tomorrow morning, will be a step-by-step on unlocking the Huawei E220, the most common HSDPA modem in Sri Lanka. Most of my friends have this one, so chances are you do too. Let me know if you’ve got a different model, I’m always happy to help.

Don’t get it wrong, I’m not some Airtel shill or out to take down Dialog Telecom (LOL!). This isn’t just about Dialog either, it applies to Mobitel, Airtel or whoever there is! My point is, we customers deserve the freedom to pick a network that actually delivers decent service. If they won’t give it to us, we’ve got to push back! I just took the first swing.
~SeeJay

Using Huawei E220 HSDPA modem in GNU/Linux

If you’ve been following me on Twitter, you already know I got a mobile broadband connection. If not, that’s a solid reason to follow me on Twitter. Anyway! The modem I got is a Huawei E220, and I’m stoked to say it works flawlessly on GNU/Linux. I meant to write a blog post about it earlier, but I’ve been tied up with some projects alongside our local KDE dev, Siraj 🙂 (nothing KDE-related, though).

A few days ago, I came across a blog where the owner wrote about switching to GNU/Linux. One of his worries was getting his Huawei E220 to work on Linux. Sure, it’s a breeze, but I’d hate for a new Linux user to ditch it over a little hiccup with their 3G modem 😛 I left a comment on his blog, and by the time I was done, I’d basically written a full post on how to set it up. So, I figured I’d polish it up and share it here to help anyone else struggling with 3G on Linux. Here’s my mini tutorial – tweaked a bit to fit nicely.

*******************************

The E220 works perfectly with wvdial on Ubuntu Hardy Heron.
Here’s how to do it…
(1) Plug in the modem and run
sudo wvdialconf
(2) Then edit the wvdial.conf file…
sudo vim /etc/wvdial.conf Uncomment the Username and Password lines in wvdial.conf and add this to the end: “stupid mode = yes”
(3) Save the wvdial.conf file
(4) Run wvdial to connect 🙂

If you’re on Ubuntu 8.10, the Graphical Network Manager picks up the modem and hooks you up in seconds.

I usually use kppp on my Slackware setup, and it works great too. I like kppp better than wvdial since it even tracks the modem’s data usage.

*******************************

That’s it, folks! If you need help, I’m just a blog comment away!.. or hit me up with an @message on Twitter. Yep, I’m the seejay over there.

~SeeJay

Vote for Digg!

Hey guys, it’s time to vote for Digg in the Open Web Awards and flex the muscle of the Digg Nation!!!

Wanna learn GIMP??? (!!!)

Me too!!! 😀 We’ve got to build this website for our Internet Techs & Apps module this semester, and I’m supposed to design a slick header and logo for it. Well, the whole site, really. I’ll be handling all the coding, but my group mates are killing it with gathering the data, sketching layouts, and all that jazz. That stuff’s the hardest for me, so I’m super, SUPER grateful they’re not making me deal with it.

But here’s the kicker, I’m terrible at graphic design! 😛 Well, not totally. It’s just that I haven’t had time (ugh, not that excuse again!) to mess around with it. Graphic design’s never really been my thing. I barely touched Photoshop back in my Windo$ days either… But now that I’ve got to step up for this project, I figured it’s a good chance to try out GIMP. Hoping it’s easy to pick up since I’m not hooked on those evil proprietary tools like… you know… Photoshop (yep, I said it! :D).

So, I’m scouring the web for GIMP tutorials and stumbled across some cool sites so far. I’ll stash them in my scrapbook for whenever I need them (err… scrapbook??? That’s a story for another post, hee hee…).

gimp-tutorials.net

gimp.org tutorials

YouTube GIMP tutorials

gimpguru.org

gimp-tutorials.com

OK, that’s it for now, folks! Hit me up if you know any awesome GIMP tutorial sites. I’ll keep the Links section updated as I dig up more goodies.

~SeeJay

Will this help???

OK! I’m not a blogger! SeeJay isn’t a blogger… not anymore!!! :-S I can’t believe I haven’t blogged in so long. And I can’t come up with any excuses besides pure laziness. It’s not wrong to say my higher education’s keeping me kinda busy, but I’ve got to admit I could’ve carved out “some” time for blogging. Yet, somehow, I haven’t spent a single minute on it 😛 Is it because blogging doesn’t feel as exciting as it did back in the day, thanks to all these microblogging platforms like Twitter? Or maybe because I don’t find Blogger’s UI as cool or fun as the WordPress interface I’ve been using lately??? I don’t know. But if it’s the latter, this might just fix it…
Some of you might remember the “Performancing” extension for Firefox, right? For anyone wondering what the heck I’m talking about, it “was” this awesome Firefox add-on that let you post to your blog. Once installed, it gave you a slick text editor right inside the Firefox window, and you could publish a post with just one click. It seriously boosted how often I blogged by cutting out the hassle of logging into the site every time.
But Performancing is gone now. They’ve renamed it (and spruced up the features, of course) to “ScribeFire.” Honestly, this is old news… It’s been months, if not ages, since they made the switch. I’ve had ScribeFire installed this whole time and used it for jotting down notes and stuff. Then, a few minutes ago, it hit me: why not set up ScribeFire to post to seejay.net? So, that’s exactly what I did. Here’s hoping it reignites that old blogging spark… This is my first post using ScribeFire, and I’ve got my fingers crossed that this “not-so-new” method will get me back into the groove and make me a real blogger again…
~SeeJay

Get Atheros 5007eg working under GNU/Linux

The Wi-Fi card in my new ASUS laptop is an Atheros 5007EG, and unlike Intel’s Wi-Fi cards, it doesn’t seem to work “out of the box” with any Linux distros 😦 You’d think MadWifi tools would fix it, right? That’s what I assumed too, until I tried it. I found tons of success stories online about MadWifi working with Atheros 5006 cards, but the 5007EG is pretty new and doesn’t seem to play nice with MadWifi yet.
After typing sudo iwconfig in the Terminal, here’s what I got…

lo no wireless extensions.

eth0 no wireless extensions.

So, I decided to try another route; using the Windows driver with “ndiswrapper.” After a few hours of tinkering ;), I got the Wi-Fi up and running 😀 The first thing that hit me was, “I’ve got to blog this so no one else wastes time figuring out how to get Atheros 5007 working on Linux!” 🙂

Here’s how I got the Atheros 5007EG working on Ubuntu. I’m also planning to write up a post for Slackware once I get some free time to test it out 😀 Alright, here’s what I did.

First, go to System >> Administration >> Restricted Drivers Manager, disable HAL, and then reboot.

Next, install ndiswrapper from Synaptic. You’ll need these three packages:
ndisgtk
ndiswrapper-common
ndiswrapper-utils-1.9

Once ndiswrapper is installed, you’ll need the Windows driver for your Wi-Fi card. I had the Atheros 5007EG driver on a DVD that came with my laptop, but if you don’t have it, you can grab the right one from the Atheros website at http://www.atheros.cz/.

Open the Terminal, navigate to the folder with your Windows driver (the .inf file) for your Atheros card, and type:
ndiswrapper -i xxx.inf (replace “xxx” with the name of your .inf file).

Now, blacklist ath_pci. Type gksu gedit /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist in the Terminal.

Add this line to the end of the file:

blacklist ath_pci

Then type ndiswrapper -l to list the installed drivers. If it’s working, you should see something like this:

net5211 : driver installed
device (168C:001C) present (alternate driver: ath_pci)

Run these commands in the Terminal, one after the other:

sudo depmod -a

sudo modprobe ndiswrapper

sudo ndiswrapper -m

Then type gksudo gedit /etc/modules, add ndiswrapper to the end of the file, and save it.

That’s it, folks! 😀 Reboot your machine, and you can check if the Wi-Fi’s working (spoiler: it is!) by typing sudo iwconfig in the Terminal. Here’s what I got after the process:

lo no wireless extensions.

eth0 no wireless extensions.

ath0 IEEE 802.11g ESSID:off/any
Mode:Managed Frequency:2.412 GHz Access Point: Not-Associated
Bit Rate:54 Mb/s
Encryption key:off
Power Management:off
Link Quality:0 Signal level:0 Noise level:0
Rx invalid nwid:0 Rx invalid crypt:0 Rx invalid frag:0
Tx excessive retries:0 Invalid misc:0 Missed beacon:0

Alright, have fun! Feel free to let me know if you run into any issues or if anything in this post isn’t clear.
~SeeJay

Yippee! Got myself a new Lappy!

Since I’m studying for the BSc Honors in IT at SLIIT, I had no choice but to move to a boarding place near the campus. After moving, all I had was my good ol’ ThinkPad laptop, which wasn’t exactly cutting-edge anymore 😛 I had my desktop PC at home, but moving that beast to the new place was too much hassle. So, I had to stick with my IBM ThinkPad for a few weeks until I could get a new laptop. I checked local dealers for a few models and quickly realized I’m too broke to buy an IBM ThinkPad, which, in my opinion, are overpriced in Sri Lanka. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t think those Lenovo ThinkPads have the same durability as the old IBM ones. Any Lenovo users out there???

So, I decided to go with another brand “well-known for durability”, ASUS! Yep, luckily they had a new series of notebooks priced reasonably, considering the quality of ASUS products. There were cheaper HP and Acer laptops too, but I didn’t want anything other than ASUS since I’m such an ASUS fanboy 😀
I ended up buying the ASUS X51R series laptop with a Core Duo 2.0GHz processor. I even got a 7.5k discount from the Epsi guys (our local ASUS dealers) thanks to my BFAM Suchetha! 🙂

The first thing I did after getting back from Epsi was repartition the 120GB HDD, wiping out the evil proprietary OS from my precious laptop. While partitioning, I created one big (90GB) partition for /home and 1GB for swap. The rest was split into three more partitions: one for my primary distro and the other two for testing versions and betas.
So now I’m back on track, and my only problem is the lack of time. Not because SLIIT stuff is keeping me busy (actually, there’s not much to do these days, maybe because it’s the first semester), but because I have a ton of other things to tackle. As most of you have noticed, my blogs have been neglected over the past few months. I’d love to return to my old schedule of posting 10+ articles a week, but I don’t think I’ll have that much free time in the coming years 😦 So, I’ll aim to post at least once a week. It’s better than nothing, right??? 😀
~SeeJay