Varun's Blog

From 30,000 feet above

varun — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 07:35:57 +0000

Technology has definitely come a long way. I’m writing this post on board Delta flight DL-2106 from San Jose to Atlanta using an in-flight wifi service called gogowifi. Getting a fairly decent speed as well. It’s a red eye, so I’m going to try and tune out so I can be functinal in the morning.

After a hard day’s work (long walk)

varun — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 22:42:16 +0000

Vasona Park, Los Gatos

varun — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 00:45:35 +0000

Ubuntu upgrades

varun — Mon, 27 Jul 2009 09:28:17 +0000

Spent some time upgrading my linux machines today. The Ubuntu network upgrade from 8.04 to 9.04 went smooth on one of the machines. I had to do the intermediate 8.10 first though. On the other machine (Armada M700), it ran into a kernel bug (specific to 9.04) that caused the machine to hang during startup, so I kept it at xubuntu (XFCE desktop) 8.10. Here’s the bug reference:

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux/+bug/393262

Also, in order to get the nomachines nx client to work here are the settings:

Select Desktop = Unix/Custom, and then
under Settings, “Run the following command” = /usr/bin/startxfce4
and also Options = New Virtual Desktop.

Hawaii pictures

varun — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 03:05:06 +0000

Just updated the photo gallery with the Hawaii pictures. Shot them with the new Canon EF-S 18-200mm lens. I would say an overall decent travel lens with a good zoom range. The image stabilizer works pretty well too as I was able to capture Bare Naked Ladies in action.

Waikiki Beach

varun — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 13:13:55 +0000

Hanauma Bay Hawaii

varun — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 01:27:55 +0000

Aloha

varun — Sun, 05 Jul 2009 23:38:04 +0000

BMW Voice Command

varun — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 01:35:25 +0000

Sample video taken with the iPhone 3GS demonstrating BMW voice command integration with my iPhone. I’m amazed at the accuracy of recognition without having to teach it anything.

Here’s my wish list:

1. Stream music from my iPhone to BMW’s sound system – currently not possible since BMW bluethooth doesn’t support A2DP (Advanced Audio Distribution Profile) even thought iPhone 3.0 firmware now has support for it.

2. Network access in iDrive by tethering it to the phone. This would open up possibilities to stream Pandora, look up weather, send an address to the car’s navigation system etc.

iPhone 3GS shot

varun — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 21:20:41 +0000