How to identify directories and executables in Linux

We can use the below command:

ls –Fx

The option “F” is used for segregating executables and directories and x is for multicolumn output.

 

Here / refers to directories and *refers to executables.

Connected movie: Better than the original

Whenever a movie is remade, viewers always compare it with the original and mostly understate it.This infact is true to some extent as well. I remember the remake of The Omen, how inferior it was compared to the original, though there had been such technical advancement in movies.
But here is a nice treat from the makers of the runaway hit of the 2004 movie “Cellular” starring Kim Basinger , Chris Evans and Jason Statham, a remake of the movie in cantonese aptly titled “Connected”. The movie was released in 2008. (I watched only sometime back).I expected it wouldn’t match up to the original, but surprisingly it was much better with some spectacular action scenes and some very good acting by the lead characters.
The story is mostly the same as that of the original, a woman kidnapped by gangsters and how she contacts a stranger with a broken phone that she assembles.Here the character of the stranger is replaced by a father (who is a debt collector),showing maturity in the role. Bob also has a strained family relationship which he is struggling hard to build. The rest of the story revolves around how Bob helps the woman out from the crisis also with the involvement of low ranking police officer.
Though the story line is similar, what I liked most was the presentation. The characters had more depth, and more emotions than that of the original. The antagonist also played the part very well.Overall I would rate it 3.5/5.

World Hold on

A cute song on a kid’s vision to save the world.

 

The Maltese Falcon

Started reading the book “The Maltese Falcon” by Dashiell Hammett. I will post the review soon!

My Favorite Eminem Song

The Magnificent Seven: A classic must watch movie

  

A village where people toil their sweat in the fields to get one meal a day to feed their beloved ones.

And the village being raided by bandits periodically, looting their hard earned food.

And one fine day, realization dawns them to fight the evil.

This is the backdrop of the classic movie “The magnificent Seven”. Inspired by a Japanese movie called The Seven Samurai, the movie makes us feel why we donot have such movies any more. A simple innocent story interwoven with an ensemble cast, yet proves to be one of the best action movies of the olden times. The movie was one of the starting phases of the “Sphagetti western genre” movies. We can find lot of cow boys, gun slings, good vs evil battles and so on.

As I mentioned the story is quite simple. A mexican village is constantly being troubled by a a group of bandits. They raid, loot grains and kill people who come their way. The rural police are of very less help. When the situation becomes unbearable, group of villagers decide to fight back. They approach an elderly man of the village, who advises them to go to the “border” and get weapons to fight the baddies back.

Once at the border, they happen to find a young man from the city called Chris, who happen to be a gunslinger. Observing his skills, they approach him for help. Though he denies initially, he decides to help the poor villagers. He begins a quest of finding six best men and forms a group : The magnificent seven. The rest of the movie is how the magnificent seven defend the village, finally defeating the bandits.

Finally the movie meets the moral : Unity is strength.

The music score of the movie is one of the best I ever heard and breaths life to the story.

 

Main cast

Yul Brynner as  Chris Adams

Eli Wallach as  Calvera

Steve McQueen as  Vin Tanner

Charles Bronson as  Bernardo O'Reilly

Two Best compilers for C

Borland C compiler

Despite advances in IDEs and Intelligent compilers for programming languages, the Borland C has still stood its test of time. Its simple to use but is inherently powerful. We require a DOS emulator for running it currently due to processor speed constraints.

 

For running the code, press F9. The code will get compiled, linked with the standard library and will create “.exe” file and execute, all in one go.

This is extremely useful for writing and executing code faster.

 

Bloodshed Dev C++

Dev C++ is a free IDE developed by Bloodshed Software. It has several integrated features such as code completion, syntax highlighting, tool manager, Find and replace utilities etc. It can be downloaded from the link:

http://www.bloodshed.net/dev/devcpp.html

Once the source is written, it should be saved as a C source file. We can compile the file by pressing Control F9 and run using Control F10. or else we can compile and run together by just pressing F9.

The compilation progress will be displayed in a window

 

In case of any syntactic or semantic errors, they would be displayed under the complier tab. In this case we can notice that the function “print” is not defined, hence it results in an error.

RC Helicopter

I bought RC helicopter sometime back. It’s fun to play with whenever you are bored. I will try to post a video of it in action some time later.

It’s remote control requires four pencil batteries. But the cells get discharged very fast, within 15 minutes of flight on full throttle. Hence we should go rechargeable cells. The build quality of Modelart helicopter is good, the rotors are flexible and there is no very scope of the device getting damaged even if we descend it fast. But this model is strictly for indoor. The device cant stand even a mild gust of wind.

 

Train Diaries: photos



Tracks



I always enjoy the changing scenary from the train like everyone else, standing near the doorway! Took some photos on the way to Bangalore.

How to find out shell packages in Ubuntu Linux

A simple command:

apt-cache search shell would output the list of all the packages in Ubuntu. A sample output is below

Remembering Yashica

I was shuffling though some stuff in the almirah at home when i suddenly tumbled across our old Yashica camera of the analog era. It is motor wind, i.e. the reel used to advance automatically once photo was taken.

How to list out different shells in your Linux system

A simple command to list out all the shells in Linux would be

cat /etc/shells

Note that you need to type "shells" and not "shell".

The output would be similar to below:

A lost paradise

Melkota is a temple town situated around 130 kms south of Bangalore. Its a historic town with temples, lakes and citadels. I will post some of the photos I took in the next few posts. The place proves that Paradises are not high above in heavens but right on our planet.

Time

This is an old little post of my previous blog, Felt like reproducing it here


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"Time and tide wait for none" This is the age old saying that makes one to be always conscious of this thing called time. What is time all about? Is it just a medium to make events run? Or is it a creation of man only for some reference? No one knows for sure. And this has been a baffling topic for scientists and phiosophers and will continue to be. Because time is something boundless which is not just limited to clocks and watches. It is an enitity which itself comprises of entirety.

But time is unidirectional. It is like a one way traffic that moves in a single direction and makes all of us move in THAT direction whether we desire or not. Hence the concept of time management arises. Time management is not about managing time.. But in fact managing ourselves according to time.

Train Diaries:The Strict TTE(2)

Beside me sat a family, husband-wife with their little kid who was around 4 months old. The kid started crying after a while, and the wife started singing some lullaby to put the baby to sleep. I was amused.
Soon chai walls, hawkers and 'masala moori' wallas filled the coach, screaming at the top of their voices.
Admist the chaos, I still was enjoying the journey glancing at the chaning scennary outside the window.

"I am a Railway Employee" said the man sitting on the opposite berth. His wife was sitting beside him near the window. "I have been working with the Indian Railways for almost 5 years. I know quite many people there".

"Ok, That sounds good" I  said disinterested in his speech, and turned towards the window.

He tapped me, "What about you?"

I told him, I was working in IT and travelling home for vacation.

He remained silent for a while and started his speech again.

"You know" He began, "I don't require any id proof like you people to travel" He fished out his Railway Id card, "This alone is sufficient"

"But I heard Railway employees have pass to travel" I said.

"Yeas, its true. But I just wanted to see how a sleeper coach looks like. I always travel in AC2 or 3 tier you know" he bragged ,"I didnt bring pass delibrately and bought tickets."

"Please stop it" muttered his wife.

"You be quite" He shouted at her.

She looked out of the window.

He resumed "You know, whenever we travel to a new place, we are given Railway Guest house and you know the rent? It's just 10 Rupees!"

"OK" I said without the need of any surprise, which presumably he required at this moment.

"It's only 10 rupees!" He said atleast three times, to see for any expression of surprise on my face.

But I gave him a cold look.

"Tickets please"

The TTE arrived at the scene.

"Tickets please. Also show your id proofs". Soon the passengers showed their tickets with id proofs. I showed mine as well, I had brought my passport.

"Fine" he said putting a tick mark on his sheet.

"What about you, gentleman?" He said, looking at the "Railway Employee" infront of me.