Gtalk Voice Chat in Linux: No more a dream

There were some things that I always missed in linux. One of them was Voice chat through gtalk. I had always dreamt of the day when I would be able to do that. That dream has come true now through empathy.

Empathy is a Instant Messenger client. It uses Telepathy and Nokia’s Mission Control, and reuses Gossip’s UI. The main goal is to permit desktop integration by providing libempathy and libempathy-gtk libraries. libempathy-gtk is a set of powerful widgets that can be embeded into any GNOME application.

Its pretty easy to install and even easier to make it work. In skype, I had spent some hours to make my voice chat working but empathy has made everything so simple that start from installation to get it work, it took me not more than 5 mins. (Your net speed does matter though :P). Enough beating around the bush...... Here are the instructions to set it up on your machine...

Fedora:
su -
yum install empathy

Ubuntu:
sudo apt-get empathy

This will complete the installation.

There are some dependencies like:
1. telepathy-gabble
2. telepathy-mission-control
3. telepathy-stream-engine
4. telepathy-butterfly python-msn

Make sure these are installed as well.

Using Empathy

You can start Empathy from Applications –> Internet –> Empathy Instant Messenger

Configure your gmail account with the following settings

1. In Empathy, Edit –> Accounts gtalk0 is checked

2. For Gtalk account you have to give Login ID user-name@gmail.com

3. Server is: talk.google.com

4. Port is 5223, and

5. Use old ssl is checked

That's all. Now go waste as much of your internet bandwidth as possible. ;)

P.S.: There is no support for proxy right now in empathy. So, users behind proxy have to wait for some more time or have to use their brain(I hope you got it what I mean).

Feel free to post your problems over here.

Mac Vs Linux

Until this post I use to feel whatever Macintosh does is a benchmark for all GUI lovers. But then I came across this website comparing Mac with Linux, and revealing things that Linux does better than Mac. I personally haven't used Mac much and I am pure linux freak, but still had a tremendous respect for Macintosh even I don't appreciate there policy of closed source. Because what they claim(UI), they do it best. Well, this GOD like respect came down a bit after reading this which every linux freak should read. It acted as an eye opener to me. Probabaly will do the same for many of you too.

http://www.internetling.com/2008/08/12/5-things-linux-does-better-than-mac-os-x/

Many more posts to come in near future on linux. So linux freaks keep checking....

Copyleft

P.S. : Those who don't know Copyleft, must know and google it around to find it out. Don't expect me to spoon feed you. :P

What is more fascinating??

Breaking codes, analyzing protocols...... feels like soon you gonna become one of those code breaking geeks. Li Gong, Ricardo Corin et al inspires you to work in this area of Alice and Bob. Applying newly learned algorithm on the never understood(atleast I hardly understood the biological complexities) biological problems, and getting amazed by helping biologists with your simple applications on their problems. These was the phase when I was cofused which field is more interesting to work on. One field where, now even Shamir would have found it difficult to make a giant leap. And the other where biologists are astonished by the progress made by a newbie. One where you can visualize the things working and other where you find it difficult the terms to sink in. Both were dragging me into there own pool of research and then came the third area that drove me crazzzzzzzzzzy. It was modern graphics architecture.

Now I feel how do one decide, which area to work on when you have so many options and so many interests to work on? When do one say Gosh!!! This is the field I had always wanted to work on. I still can't say which is more fascinating out of all 3 - graphic architecture, cryptography or bioinformatics. Only one thing I know for sure that for the rest 1.5 years I am gonna work on modern graphics architecture and I know I am gonna fall in love with it. And I wish there would be a day when I will say .... Yes! this was the field I always wanted to work on.

Life....

Life is not easy, it's tough................. is it? Or it's just the way you take your life? I don't know, i really don't know. Have heard from many that life is tough and i have felt the same many a times too. At the same time have heard many people that it's easy it just depends how you take your life. Hmm... i agree with that sometimes. So, now you see I don't know how to take it. Sometimes its tough and sometimes its easy.

But, if you will actually realize life is not easy. It's just a rat race. Everyone in this world is running after something or other. We all are running in a race. Some are running for money, some for success, some for love, some for fame and what not. These days i am running for the success in my education life and having a successful life and may be then may be i will run for the job, money, family and all. Is it not same for all? Are we all not running a rat race? Are we all not striving for success, fame, love, family, happiness? You accept it or not, we are.

Where are we heading to? What we finally want to achieve? wooooooo..... I am getting too philosophical now. Sorry can't help it. I am bit philosophical. Bear with me. Well i have thought on these questions many a times but then after couple of long hours of mind boggling thinking I quit. Actually i don't quit but do decide many thing to do. But then when i come out of my thinking into this bloody bad world and get back into my routine work. I don't get to do the things i have decided to do. Haven't you all not felt the same way? I am sure, you all must have. Even though we think over these questions but once we get back to our routine work everything is back to square one in couple of days. Same old story, same old race. We all start running again. It is something like you are a driver of a Formul1 car with and endless Race Track. And during this race you get into pit for sometime and then back to the track. Well, don't know whether i will win or not in this race but i will keep on running. At present running in the track of GRE. And i am sure there is another track to race on after that. And we all have one all time. So why are you wasting your time reading this crap :P speed up else you will loose. All The Best.....

Go Cabby ....... Win the Race..... ;)

PHI... A ratio found everywhere

PHI Φ, the Golden Ratio (or Golden Number), a ratio that could be found everywhere. This is also known as Divine Proportion. I didn't know this until i read the book The Da Vinci Code. I got mesmerized when i was reading about it. Got to know many interesting stuff.

Well, the value of PHI, Φ is : 1·61803 39887 49894 84820 45868 34365 63811 77203 09179 80576 or (√5 + 1)/2, which a rational number and the value of this has been calculated till 20000 places but in general its value is taken as 1.618.

Easiest number to get the square.

Square of phi is just adding 1 to it. Φ² = Φ + 1. Isn't it easy? and Isn't it amazing?

Fibonacci Series and Golden Ratio

There is a very interesting relation between PHI and Fibonacci Series. i.e. The ratio of successive fibonacci numbers get closer and closer to the number Φ. Or you can say the ratio of successive fibonacci number oscillate around the number 1.618.... or Φ.

1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21

1/1 = 1 < Φ 2/1 = 2 > Φ
3/2 = 1.5 < Φ 5/3 = 1.666666666666666666667 > Φ
8/5 = 1.6 < Φ 13/8 = 1.625 > Φ
21/13 = 1.615 and so on < Φ Isn't it amazing?? Wow!!! i felt it quite surprising. Golden Section:

The Golden Section is also known as the Golden Mean, Golden Ratio and Divine Proportion. It is a ratio or proportion defined by the number Phi ( = 1.618033988749895... )

It can be derived with a number of geometric constructions, each of which divides a line segment at the unique point where:

the ratio of the whole line (A) to the large segment (B)

is the same as

the ratio of the large segment (B) to the small segment (C).

In other words, A is to B as B is to C.

This occurs only where A is 1.618 ... times B and B is 1.618 ... times C.

Divide the line again and again in the same way:

This is known as "Golden Ruler"

This appears in the proportions of many life forms.

This ratio has been used by mankind for centuries

It was used in the design of Notre Dame in Paris and continues today in many examples of art, architecture and design.

The Renaissance artists knew it as the Divine Proportion and used it for beauty and balance in the design of art

It also appears in the physical proportions of the human body, movements in the stock market and many other aspects of life and the universe.

The Divine Proportion in the Body

The white line is the body's height.

The blue line, a golden section of the white line, defines the distance from the head to the finger tips

The yellow line, a golden section of the blue line, defines the distance from the head to the navel and the elbows.

The green line, a golden section of the yellow line, defines the distance from the head to the pectorals and inside top of the arms, the width of the shoulders, the length of the forearm and the shin bone.

The magenta line, a golden section of the green line, defines the distance from the head to the base of the skull and the width of the abdomen. The sectioned portions of the magenta line determine the position of the nose and the hairline.

Although not shown, the golden section of the magenta line (also the short section of the green line) defines the width of the head and half the width of the chest and the hips.

There are many interesting relation between PHI and our nature. An endless number of relations. For greater details check out: http://goldennumber.net/