racoma.com.phJ. Angelo Racoma on technology, economics, writing, problogging, and getting things done

Last week I ditched Beryl in favor of Compiz Fusion. While Beryl effects are really slick, what I’m really after is the productivity boost I get with being able to manage windows and workflows more efficiently. For instance, I like how I can group windows, and how I can use different faces of the desktop cube for different window/task groups. And I particularly like the OSX Expose-like “Scale” functionality. The zoom functionality is also useful when making presentations.

However, I found Beryl to be quite unstable at times. It’s great that Compiz and the Beryl (a fork project of Compiz) had merged into Compiz Fusion. I would expect better stability and new functionalities and that’s just what I got. And they’re actually still in beta. I hear they will release a stable edition later this year.

Some screencaps. Oh, pardon the OSX-like theme. I was trying out some eye candy, and since I’m used to my Mac’s look, I guess it helps to have a more or less uniform look.

The desktop cube in action

The Expose-like Scale feature

Expo is much like the Desktop Wall feature. One thing I don’t like with Desktop Wall is that it conflicts with Desktop Cube. So it’s great to have Expo along with Desktop Cube (you can move windows across the different faces easily just by dragging).

Compiz Fusion’s settings manager has less customization abilities than Beryl, though, but I guess that’s a good tradeoff if you’re after stability. And it’s still not a final/finished product (active development is ongoing). So you can still expect more. Check out a guide for installing Compiz Fusion on Ubuntu Feisty here. I hear Compiz Fusion is included by default in the next release of Ubuntu (Gutsy Gibbon).

Working on two laptops simultaneously with one having an extended display (guess which one)!

One for writing email and articles, one for blog feeds and IM chat windows, one for reference. Sweet!

Hey, I have designer friends with display set-ups that are even more kick-ass!

Now why do I need both Windows and Mac? That’s an interesting question.

I’ve been offline since the morning of Thursday, September 28th, 2006 due to the typhoon Milenyo. Our power was cut off 7:00 a.m. and the phone line came down a few hours after that. I just heard this evening that the power and DSL connection are already up, so I can hopefully be able to get online later this evening. I’m just checking up my email inbox to see if I missed anything important.

Isulong SEOPH

I’m at Ortigas, by the way, having some coffee and dessert in the aftermath of the Isulong SEOPH contest awarding. Our entry placed fifth!

Too bad we didn’t get to win the iPod Nano raffled off, though.

The crowd at the awarding wasn’t the usual blog meetup crowd. Well, okay, it was about 50% of the bloggers’ crowd, and the other half comprised the SEO people who were (likely) not really into blogging.

I’ll write about this later on, with some pics to boot. Right now, I’ll be enjoying a cup of coffee and some cake with my lovely wife.

(Just had to get online after three days’ being off the grid.)

Update: No power again!

Looks like I spoke (or wrote) too soon. Only a few hours after power was restored, it’s down again in our area. Must be some transformer that overloaded. Am now on battery connecting via dialup (trying to get in touch with Meralco via their website, but to no avail!). Sigh.

My articles and blog posts here and on the other blogs I manage/contribute to have been DUGG several times now, and I’ve posted some of my observations on ForeverGeek:

I’ve a handful of articles and blog posts that have been DUGG to frontpage, and I can say that I’ve had different experiences from each of them. But the few times my stuff had been voted up to front page, one can draw conclusions about the way the DIGG crowd thinks.

Here’s a brief rundown of my DUGG postings:

• On ForeverGeek, my beginner’s guide to podcasting (DIGG link here).
• On the J Spot, my guide to getting free US and UK incoming telephone numbers from anywhere in the world (DIGG link here)—reached frontpage, but was buried and marked “inaccurate” because the server hiccupped due to the sheer rise in traffic during the time at front page.
• My article on VPNs at bLaptops—nearly frontpaged (DIGG link here), but again it was buried and marked “inaccurate” because a glitch in the blog’s layout caused the content to be hidden in IE (stupid IE).
• On ForeverGeek, my post about the Windows vs Mac OS X issue being about the “maximize” button (DIGG link here).
• Several other places, I’d rather not disclose.

And what have I learned from this? Well, to get DUGG, you have to know what interests the DIGG crowd. Notable among these are:

• People love to argue – e.g., Windows vs. OS X.
• People love free stuff – e.g., free calls, free software, etc.
• People love new stuff – e.g., new gadgets, new ways to do things.
• People love how-to’s – e.g., hacks, tutorials.
• It pays to have a lot of friends. Even better, it pays to have influential friends – Bring on the DIGG army!

Check it out at ForeverGeek. Please feel free to comment either here or there.

As I write this, there’s only a week and a few hours left to go for the Isulong SEOPH contest. This is basically your usual search engine ranking contest, where the ones at the top of Google search by the end of the duration for a certain keyword would be awarded the prizes.