Kdenlive review

Date: 2010.11.06 | Responses: 0

As some of you know, Kdenlive is a free and open source video editor. As of lately, I have really enjoyed working with it and am impressed at its feature set. The best part of it is that time line view is quite intuitive. Furthermore, you can do your basic text clips and mask different clips together in interesting ways. One unique thing I found out recently is the ability to create your own masks so for example, you could have a background video of say of some fire and then create a smiley face mask on another video so that the video on top has this fire-filled smiley face (see how to) . Also, there is many audio and video effects you can apply to your clips.

Granted it’s not perfect and you may encounter a bug or two, but for your basic editing and some cool effects/transitions, it’s awesome. I am in the process of exploring it more, but as of now, you can check out some videos I made using kdenlive.

Lame Apache error

Date: 2010.09.20 | Responses: 0

I was getting this error when starting my apache server

Apache error: pcfg_openfile: unable to check htaccess file, ensure it is readable

This is due to permissions, seems all you have to do is add the execute bit to owner.

chmod 755 foldername

source: http://www.liamdelahunty.com/tips/apache_pcfg_openfile_unable_to_check_htaccess.php

Skype on Debian AMD64 and pulse audio

Date: 2010.08.27 | Responses: 0

Everytime I install skype, it crashes right after the login screen. This is because by default it tries to use Pulse Audio, which I don’t use but I do have the pulse libraries available because many programs depend on it. Thus, if you don’t use pulseaudio, you can just make the pulse audio libraries unreadable, like so:

 chmod a-r /usr/lib32/libpulse*

Kisagotami, the Mother With the Dead Child

Date: 2010.08.17 | Responses: 0

This is an excerpt of the story of a woman whose child died and then came in contact with Dhamma in the time of Buddha (2,500 years ago). It’s inspiring that 2,500 years ago there was already progressive thinking in women’s outlook toward personal liberty.

When Mara (temptation), as he had done so often before with other nuns, came to tempt her, to distract her from meditation and asked her whether she was lusting for man now that her child was dead, she immediately replied, discerning the ruse:

“Passed is the time of my child’s death
and I have fully done with men;
I do not grieve, nor do I weep,
and I’m not afraid of you, friend.
Sensual delight in every way is dead,
for the mass of darkness is destroyed.
Defeating the soldiery of death,
I live free from every taint.
— S 5,3

Source

HDMI setup using ~/.asoundrc

Date: 2010.08.10 | Responses: 0

This .asoundrc file sets the hdmi digital audio output as the default sound output device. The sweet thing about this setup is that it uses the dmix plugin, allowing you to have multiple applications use the device at once instead of just one hogging it. Also, this will add a volume slider to your mixer (hdmi_vol). Thanks to  the original person who wrote the config, Dewey Oxberger (aka Jon B), and  frigginacky at ubuntu forums (see post).
Note: To find the device card & number, you can run

aplay -l

~/.asoundrc file:

pcm.hdmi_formatted {
 
  type plug
 
  slave.pcm "dmix:1,3" #card 1, device 3 (may be different for you)
 
}
 
pcm.hdmi_complete { # add a volume slider in mixer
 
  type softvol
 
  slave.pcm hdmi_formatted
 
  control.name hdmi_volume
 
  control.card 0
 
}
 
pcm.!default hdmi_complete