Strav's blog

Here is a way to select the fastest Debian Mirror:

(subsitute your version for etch in the examples below)

# apt-get install netselect-apt
# netselect-apt etch
# netselect-apt -n etch
# netselect-apt -n -f etch

Link to full article (change the _com to .com) http://linuxhelp.blogspot_com/2007/05/using-netselect-apt-tip-to-select.html

Here is a very small, single executable (no installation required) SFTP server. Very handy for working across firewalls on Windows systems....

Link to blog describing the program (change the _com to .com): jameser.blogspot_com/2006/07/tip-31-simple-portable-sftp-server-for.html

MiniSFTP Server

Here's some information on HDHomeRun, a HDTV tuner which takes 2 HDTV coax inputs and streams them over ethernet. Compatable with MythTV. Interesting, but can only work with unencrypted streams.

mythpvr review
SiliconDust Homepage

I'm going to maintain a list of absolutely necessary Firefox extensions here.

Start with this one to disable the installation delay:

MR Tech Disable XPI Install Delay

NOTE: in firefox 3 this addon does not appear to work. This same result can be achieved by navigating to about:config and setting security.dialog_enable_delay = 0

Then:

Adblock
All-in-One Gestures
Quickdrag
Greasemonkey
Tab Mix Plus
Custom Download Manager
Searchbar Autosizer
Check4Change
FireBug

Also I have a Greasemonkey script and Adblock prefs here: http://www.strav.net/firefox/

FF3 prerelease of Tab Mix plus is here.

Other good extensions:
View Cookies
View Source Chart

FF# prerelease of View Source Chart is here. Note: there is a $10.00 charge for this version.

older extensions:
Tabbrowser Preferences (incompatible with some extension so I no longer use this)
Super DragAndGo (no longer maintained so I'm now using quickdrag)
Download Manager Tweak (no longer maintained so I'm now using Custom Download Manager)

I'm going to post miscellaneous information here regarding the Car-X and CarMedia iBus based media players.

Here is how to convert the video to fit on the 16x9 screen properly:

There is actually a solution to this issue without using a different solution for 16:9 display.

The easiest way to correct the aspect ratio would be to resize the video horisontally by 75%. This can be achieved in the following way:

1. Uninstall all video playback codecs from your CarPC Windows installation
2. Install a recent version of ffdshow from here. WMP and Car-X will now use this for decoding MPEG-4, DIVX and XVID. Make sure you include the AVS rendering option.
3. Install a recent version of AviSynth from http://www.avisynth.org/
4. Now, open ffdshow Video decoder configuration and select AviSynth checkbox. Make sure "Add ffdshow video source" is selected and paste the following code into the textbox:


global x=0
x=Width*75
x=x/100
BiLinearResize(x,Height)


5. This corrects the aspect ration for all content played, and all you have to do now is to choose a suitable zoom level to fill more or less of the screen.