make Windows 8 CP look native in Virtualbox

Hi all.

I recently encountered another hassle in attempting to perfect my Window 8 machine. setting the virtual machine's screen resolution to fit my laptop screen (16:9) dimensions and resolution (1600X900X32bit) proved to be challenging.

I'm not the guy to run away from such a challenge.

Due to the Beta nature of the OS it was not surprising that Virtualbox's guest addition (Ver. 4.1.8), dose not yet support display dimensions that differ from 4:3

although there is the option of using the "scale mode" <host key+> it doesn't quite cut it.

 Disregarding the annoying host top window bar, the font looks stretched and it's just not it :( no worries, there is a solution:

Shut down all of your Virtual machines and VirtualBox too (not mandatory for linux or Mac hosts).

for windows hosts:
open the command line interface type the following line:

in c:\Program Files\Oracle\virtualBox>

...>VBoxManage.exe setextradata "MachinName" CustomVideoMode1 1600x900x32

for Linux hosts:
open terminal and type

:~$VBoxManage setextradata "MachineName" CustomVideoMode1 1600x900x32

 * replace MachineName with the name of your Virtual machine
Lo and behold ... it works (you can obviously use your favorite screen settings [Hight]x[Width]x[Depth]).

  

so now i can actually use the full extent of my screen.

 ... Oh Joy

G. 

A winning Combination

I have been working with Vim "text editor" for some time now. I found a few helpful entries I'd like to share. These helpful tips and tricks helps me be more efficient, code faster and makes the very powerful Vim even stronger.

First of all - install Vim and learn how to work with it (took me a while, but totally worth it).
 
The first cool add-on: snipMate (super easy to install) check it out

a short feature that show just the tip of the iceberg

Than i found some cool new features that actually transforms Vim editor in to an IDE altogether.

basically you need to run these commands:

$ git clone https://github.com/sontek/dotfiles.git
$ cd dotfiles
$ ./install.sh vim 

unfortunately the both (snipMate and Pathogen) don't work well together, this is just a challenge for me, there is no way I'll give up and just choose one. 
So I looked for a way to combine the two.
The trick was, installing them in the right order, snipMate then Pathogen (although you can mess around with it to find your way).
and then follow this little patch, to fix this small twitch, regarding mapping a different key <Ctrl+j> to activate snippet instead of <tab> to allow the both to co-exist.

Any way, the real cool thing about these features is that you can easily modify and adapt them to your needs. writing new code snippets, changing text highlighting, customizing auto-completions and syntax checking can be super helpful and is super easy to do.
 you can create your very own customized, "free of Charge",flexible and "free spirited" IDE.

For example:
writing a new code snippet for "*.xml" filetype:
simply write a new file named "xml.snippets" and place it in "~/.vim/snippets/"
(or equivalent, e.g. $HOME\vimfiles on Windows), edit the file and add (for the example sake) this code:

snippet version
            <?xml version="${1:*.*}"?>

snippet <>
            <${1:TagName}>
            </${2:TagName}>

this is what it does (I'll let you do the simple revers engineering):
but the guidelines are "${1:text}" - the first variable the marker will enter when snippet key  (in my case <Ctrl+j>) is hit.

* the video is a bit fuzzy but ... you'll get the picture :)
In future entries I'll try summarizing all of my insights in customizing Vim.
let me know what you think ... i feel this work was life changing (seeing that i suck in getting syntax correct the first time).

- Cool fact: "*.snippets" filetype has snippets (recursive ?) -

G.

Are you a team player ?

Do you take care of your own S#!T, or do you expect someone else to do it for you ?
Do you lead ? Do you follow ? Do you feel obliged to do your best for the "greater good" ?
Or do you only take care of no. 1 ?

In order to make it as a team every one needs to pitch in, buck up, give it his best effort and "take one for the team".

Following the rules of the community you live / work in, is the foundation of team work. all you have to do as a team is set the standards and live by them.

Here is an example of a set of rules that puts logic and order into potential chaos.

http://kde.org/code-of-conduct/ 



A global community moving in unison towards a common goal ... on what logically would seem lead to total anarchy ... is driven by the common goal and basic set of rules.

What do you think ?

G.

Its a small world after all

Recent technological advances allow us to do unthinkable things. if you would have told someone 30 years ago, that he would be talking to his friends halfway accros the world for free, i doubt he would have believed.
this upcoming revolution promisses to leave no one behind. soon, everyone will straighten up and learn how to digitalize there lives.

it raizes sevral major privecy issues.
but it am glad to be a part and try to lead this new, borderlind sci-fi, era.
it is a small world.
and it seems it is just going to get smaller.

leaving a digital footprint...

G.

It's on ...

Can it be ? Is it really happening ?
Can the people who allowed this to happen:

 actually have a standing chance competing head to head with Apple and Google ?

looks like it. it's hard for me to say a good word about Microsoft. But i find my self baffled. Even iPad fanatics will have to admit that that there is a reason to be concerned. I caught a movie published by iPhones.col.il documenting a feature by feature review of windows 8 tablet vs. iPad iOS5 and the end result was more than surprising.

so ... any way ... it seems like the world's biggest PC provider has stepped into the Post PC era.
To that i can only say ...

It's on ...

G.     

Grawcho's BlogPost (ver. 1.0 Beta)

Hi all, instead of saying how exited i am about my first post, I'll get right to business.
Two major companies in the industry launched their OS beta versions yesterday. and as a cutting edge enthusiast “techie” I of course rushed to get both of them.

the first is Microsoft's Windows 8 consumer preview (...or should i say time consumer, and if this is the preview, I wasn't sure I wanted to see the full feature, but my patience level is high).
the process started with the unfortunate fact that it took me half a day to find out how to install this OS version on a virtual or physical machine from scratch (not an upgrade or an 'along side' installation).
at this stage i want to point out ,my hardware and band-width are nothing to be embarrassed about (even the virtual ones).

the download process is enabled only from windows machines (doesn't run on any windows emulator i have) takes about 30 minutes, and right when you think you are done, the wizard starts "checking your files..." for ten more minutes followed by "getting the files ready ...". (what were you doing 'till now, just get on with it ... will ya).
It doesn't end there though, then started the process of calculating "thing you have to do ..." and told me i have low on disk space (only 3GB free left),16GB free space, it needed (my virtual-box windows 7 runs on almost all of a 30GB disk so ... no go there). went on to make more space by unistalling some unimportant stuff (2 more hours) and 5 more minutes to find out how to go back to write the disk image for a fresh Virtual machine.
i didn't give up though (up till now there is about 16 hours of working on this venture).

i finally got around to installing the new VM, and here is my initial take on the bran-new windows 8:
i like the fish image and the background (solid blue) color, the first use setup wizard was a bit unfamiliar and confusing for me, but very looks fitting for tablets the metro style desktop looks excellent for tablets, switching back to regular desktop mode is easy at first, but tend to be tricky and elusive latter.
All in all, it looks like the future... kudos Microsoft.

getting back to my starting point, the second OS beta is Canonical's Ubuntu 12.04 precise pangolin. which in order to get i simply clicked apply changes on the package manager, waited 15 minutes, and started working.
OK ... i admit ... i installed the alpha version on a new machine two days ago (after my wife surprised me with a much anticipated new lap-top), so 15 minutes more. Plus I'll add an hour for hardware patches and another one for correcting syntax errors in those patches (being a code contributor and an alpha tester I'm quite used to it).

finally, by the time i was done, there was little time left for testing or developing anything. so i went to sleep :(
but, tomorrow is a new day and I'll get right to the business of finding more cool stuff.

so, apart from wanting to try a new (and dare i say, very nice) Microsoft product, did i do anything wrong ?
just to clarify: this entry is not meant as a dis but rather as constructive criticism, bottom line is, windows 8 i quite cool.
I'm just saying, the process of getting the Beta version to work could be shorter, i'm sure.
or could it, ...i wonder ...

well, it is, like this blog entry, only a beta version
Any Thoughts (Oh wait .... "hang on while we get a few things ready ...") ?



G.