ZenLinux Blog

Now that I’m settling back into some serious Rails development, I’ve been increasingly annoyed by this bug where the Compiz window manager (which provides all the fancy 3D effects on my Ubuntu system) causes dialog boxes in Java applications (e.g, NetBeans) to appear blank on an intermittent basis. Thankfully, it’s been fixed! You simply need to run jre 6u10.

This fixed version of Java is packaged by default in the Ubuntu Intrepid Ibex repositories. For those of us still running Hardy Heron, I can confirm that using the Intrepid packages works without problems. There is also a bug filed in Launchpad lobbying to have 6u10 included in Hardy as an update.

I have the misfortune of living in a town where there are no good coffee houses. In fact, there are no coffee houses at all (although we have four Dunkin Donuts and a couple of drive-through coffee kiosks – bleh). A Starbucks appeared for a year but ended up being the only Starbucks in New Hampshire to be closed down during their recent company reorganization. This didn’t surprise me, because every time I went in there I never saw more than a few customers at a time.

For a while I’ve coped with this situation by enjoying fine teas. The simplicity of preparing tea is wonderful – pretty much all you have to worry about is the temperature of the water and steeping time. Cleanup only takes an extra minute or two.

Lately, though, my interest in tea has waned and my attention has turned back to good coffee. So I pulled out my grinder and french press and have been enjoying coffee. The thing about making a good cup of pressed coffee is that you have to become pretty obsessive about the process. Now I spend nearly as much time cleaning my grinder and press pot as I do enjoying the results.

Is it worth it? Certainly for the time being. And when I head to the Pacific Northwest next month I can compare my results with some of the masters.

With the release of Firefox v3.0.4 the other day, I was hoping to see the inclusion of the mjpeg bug fix. Unfortunately it was not included with this release, but the bug report mentions that it is being planned for inclusion in the next release, v3.0.5. In the meantime I guess we’ll have to do another patch and compile.

My plans are shaping up to visit the incredible city of Portland, OR next month.

Portland Bike Box

My plans currently don’t involve renting a car because the public transportation and bicycling infrastructure is so amazing there. The one downside is I’ll be there during the rainy season (defined as October through May), but I’ve become hardcore enough about bike commuting that I already have some wet weather gear I’ll bring along with me. With plenty of bike shops that rent bikes, I’m really looking forward to exploring the city on a deeper level than my previous visits.