Download and install extension packs to provide:
I want to use my new USB drive exclusively with Linux, so I decided to wipe the factory default partitions and create a new ext4 filesystem on the drive. The drive uses 4096 byte physical sectors and we have to make sure that the new partition is correctly aligned. For some background information on partition alignment, see this link.
Check that we are wiping the correct drive
sudo parted /dev/sdb unit s print free
Note the details in case you want to restore the original partitioning scheme. Information on the factory default can also be found here.
Continue reading Repartition a new USB driveWhen scanning an A5 booklet as individual A4 pages, but would still like to have them combined into an A5 PDF, the individual pages all end up in the ‘wrong’ place.
Continue reading Convert two scanned A4 PDF files of an A5 booklet into a single PDFFor the XFCE desktop environment Atril is the default PDF viewer and I also use it to open any PDF files from Firefox. It is a great lightweight document viewer which does what I need most of the time. One exception is when after opening a PDF file from Firefox I decide to keep the file and select File Save As. Atril insists on saving the file in $HOME/Documents, which is practically never the directory I want to use…
Continue reading Atril (evince, document viewer) default directory for Save AsCreate a new folder on the Desktop with name
GodMode.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}
Download latest IDE tarball from the Arduino store, unpack the tar file and install bin symlink, desktop files and add menu entries.
Continue reading Arduino IDE Linux installationIn xfce when you move a window around and it gets close to the top edge of the screen it suddenly jumps to maximised size – this is never what I want and so I find this feature really annoying.
The setting where this feature can be turned off is hidden in a somewhat counter intuitive location:
Yes, the setting is called ‘Accessibility – Automatically tile …’!
About ten days ago my network connection with Virgin Media started to play up. I was experiencing significant packet loss, at times in excess of 50%, and increased latency times with peaks at more than 100ms.
Continue reading Fix for packet loss and latency problems with Virgin Media cable connectionsOccasionally when my scanner is emailing me a PDF it gets corrupted along the way. Most of the time the individual scanned images in the PDF are either perfectly valid or at least can viewed, even though the PDF viewer refuses to open the corrupt PDF file.
The bash script below will extract the images and then combine them again into a valid new PDF file.
Continue reading Recovery of scanned PDF corrupted by email transferIf you have just received an e-mail similar to the one below, read on.
The SyntaxHighlighter WordPress plug-in is used to display code ‘as is’; unfortunately WordPress again is too clever for its own good and mangles special characters like & and ” even before the text gets to the SyntaxHighlighter blocks in the Block Editor.
The solution is to add a filter function in your custom functions.php file:
Continue reading Special character mangling in WordPress and SyntaxHighlighterIt may be necessary to restart an appliance, for example a WiFi access point, at a regular time each day. The easiest way to do this is by using a cron job.
Continue reading Restart appliance using cronFortunately it is straightforward to create a new OpenWrt firmware image – just follow the steps below.
Continue reading Create custom OpenWrt image for TP-Link TL-WA901NDv2Fortunately it is straightforward to create a new OpenWrt firmware image – just follow the steps below.
Continue reading Create custom OpenWrt image for Thomson Technicolor TG582nI found that I use my laptop’s touch screen more frequently – it is particularly useful for image editing. However, when I work in my (home) office I also use a multi-screen set-up with three monitors. The problem is that the touch region of the laptop screen automatically gets scaled to the overall size of my screen, which spans multiple monitors.
Continue reading Touchscreen calibrationInstall the Google Chrome Remote Desktop app on your client phone or tablet (see app on Google Play app store). Once installed, start the app.
Download and install the Google Chrome Remote Desktop server on your host computer.
Continue reading Install Google Chrome Remote DesktopThe Linux diff program can be used to record differences between two directories, making it easy to update the old directory later with any of the changes created in the new version of the directory.
Continue reading Linux diff and patchFull colour emoji fonts are now available for Linux. To install:
Continue reading Full colour emoji fonts for LinuxMy HP ProLiant MicroServer Gen8 G1610T VirtualBox host has been experiencing random restarts.
Continue reading HP ProLiant MicroServer Gen8 G1610T VirtualBox host random restartI wanted to hide an element on a static page I recently created for my WordPress site. The easiest way to do this is to create a custom CSS entry for the particular element, the title in my case.
Continue reading Hide an element on a WordPress page