Using a Wiimote in Mupen64plus

After much head-wall-banging, I got a Wiimote to pair successfully with my computer and work as a controller in Mupen64plus! There was a lot of trial and error, so I've created a guide to getting a working setup so future generations don't have to go through what I did. The details are in this git repo, which includes detailed instructions and config files.

Trying an Android ROM

Against my better judgment, I am going to take another shot at installing a ROM on my phone. The battery life could use some improvement, and people have claimed that some of the 3rd-party ROMs can help with that. I know I have promised myself not to play with ROMs on my phone again, since the result is usually a big waste of time with nothing to show for it, but this time is different.

Brace yourselves for a follow-up in which I immediately regret this decision.

Another Ubuntu update, another b0rked system

*sigh*

I updated to 12.10, and Alt+middle-click to resize windows was broken. After about an hour of circular Googling, I found the correct incantation to sprinkle. For some strange reason, the setting org.gnome.desktop.wm.preferences.resize-with-right-button was set to true. Set it back to false and the system returns to its former functioning state.

Better than "Understanding OOP"

I came across a page talking about the joys of OOP via this blog post. The original page was a thing of horror. I modified the Elisp code from Irreal, adding a few additional features:

Voting third party and government job "creation"

This is copy of an email I sent just now.

My concern about the libertarian candidate, besides the fact that he cannot win,

That's no reason not to vote for him. A well-functioning democracy requires a choice of more than the people who are "obviously" going to win. Otherwise, it isn't democracy so much as a decree by the political parties who will be the next president.

Change GTK keybindings from Emacs back to default

Like any virtuous person, I use Emacs for everything, and so tried out using Emacs key bindings for all GTK applications generally. After a year or so of working like this, I have decided to go back. The main problem is that other applications can't handle the awesome power of Emacs. Firefox, for example, uses C-k to jump to the search box, but if you are in the location bar, C-k will run the equivalent of kill-line which means that in order to get to the search bar, you have to remove focus from the location bar. Not convenient.

Those Dumb Pipes

This is an older idea which had been floating around in my head, half-finished for a few years.

I was inspired by this Ars Technica article to think about the relationship between network operators — both cellular and landline — and consumers. The key quote from the article is by "one mobile operator" and is: