BOSS GT-100: Plug the guitar directly in return

 After a lot of experiments my favorite is very simple: bypass the preamp totally. The signal chain is:

1. Guitar
2. Boss GT-100 (whatever settings you like there)
3. Return (in my case an Orange 35-RT)

Be somewhat cautious - it will be loud.

[SOLUTION] YouTube: Cannot save channel info edits

Problem: When I try to change the graphic, description or add links the save button is greyed out.

Solution: Open the channel in a private window in Chrome. Restart Firefox. Now you can save the stuff again.

- This error is most annoying, and a great problem for the millions of YouTubers trying to edit their channels. Probably it is a internal storage error of some kind. @YouTube: please fix this

Libre Office Impress on the Path to Suck

Normally I'd prefer Impress over anything from Microsoft, but here and now the program just sucks:

• The slide pane is buggy. Sometimes it works, somtimes not - that's annoying.
• You cannot insert a YouTube or online video, c'mon please!

My user experience is a constant struggle with panes, hidden menus and what not. 

Dia - how to delete something on MacOS

 Press FN + Delete (backspace)

For some reason you can't just press delete. But on a Mac it's more intuitive and artistic. Hence you have to guess this combination of keys. (Sarcasm warning)

Dia and the Flowchart

 The symbols we need are found in the UML symbol collection.

[SOLVED] Dia Diagram Editon Cannot Launch in MacOS

Run Dia from the terminal
Run it via this command in the terminal:

# DISPLAY=:0 /Applications/Dia.app/Contents/Resources/bin/dia

Launch via alias

Since it is often used, try to create an alias for the terminal:

# alias dia='DISPLAY=:0 /Applications/Dia.app/Contents/Resources/bin/dia'

In order to run dia, simply write this in the terminal

# dia

Unfortunately you'll have to run Dia from the terminal every time. Methinks this is a serious bug - since most users want something that will run out of the box. 

Make the alias permanent

In the termina edit the file .zshrc (og alternatively .bash-profile):

# nano .zshrc

Finally add these lines somewhere convenient in the file:

# Dia launch from the terminal

alias dia='DISPLAY=:0 /Applications/Dia.app/Contents/Resources/bin/dia'

MacOs: internal links in PDF documents cannot open in a browser

For some reason I often have problems when trying to open urls from a PDF on MacOS. If you know the cure here, please let me know in the comments below. 

Don't know why, but so far I've tried to:

• Use Acrobat Reader
• Use Safari 
• Use Chrome
• Change security settings
• Open the links from a browser
• Download the PDF, and open from a PDF-reader (sometimes that's the cure, but alas only sometimes)

In some documents the links work. In other documents they don't. Somehow I suspect that the problem may be PDF's created on a Windows system. My most esteemed collegues have Windows computers, where the links seem to work fine.

About my MacOs:

neofetch

                    'c.          perthykjaerjensen@Pers-MBP.nalnet.cable

                 ,xNMM.          ---------------------------------------

               .OMMMMo           OS: macOS 12.0.1 21A559 x86_64

               OMMM0,            Host: MacBookPro16,2

     .;loddo:' loolloddol;.      Kernel: 21.1.0

   cKMMMMMMMMMMNWMMMMMMMMMM0:    Uptime: 12 days, 17 hours, 38 mins

 .KMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMWd.    Packages: 87 (brew)

 XMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMX.      Shell: zsh 5.8

;MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM:       Resolution: 1440x900@2x

:MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM:       DE: Aqua

.MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMX.      WM: Quartz Compositor

 kMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMWd.    WM Theme: Orange (Light)

 .XMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMk   Terminal: iTerm2

  .XMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMK.   Terminal Font: PTMono-Regular 15

    kMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMd     CPU: Intel i5-1038NG7 (8) @ 2.00GHz

     ;KMMMMMMMWXXWMMMMMMMk.      GPU: Intel Iris Plus Graphics

       .cooc,.    .,coo:.        Memory: 10719MiB / 16384MiB

Fighting Notifications and Mailing Lists

 So far I've tried to unsubscribe from any unwanted update (in practise most of them are unwanted). After three months I only have to unsubscribe once or twice a week. Probably I'm having a windmill fight like Don Q.

Game: Age of Conquest IV - buggy

 Tried for three hours to attack with troops. No success. Conclusion: the game is a buggy waste of time.

MacOS: no USB connection to Rioch Theta 360-degree photos

 The Rioch Theta works with a Ext file system. You can mount it on Windows, but for some reason you're not allowed to do so on my MacOs.

• OS: macOS 12.0.1 21A559 x86_64
• Host: MacBookPro16,2
• Kernel: 21.1.0

I asume that you have to add the ability to mount Ext drives on the MacOS somehow. Then it should be possible to use the device. If this is not an option add a virtual Linux to the Mac - and share the drives. In theory that is possible. 

(To be done ... wait and see ...)  

Probably the cure is here.

Concerning Linux

USB connection is OK on Ubuntu 21.10 x86_64

Concerning the Wifi Connection

• Remove the USB Cable
• The Wifi icon will appear as soon as you push the Bluetooth button
• Now you can use the Theta app downloaded via Google Play

Since we can use the app the problem is sort of solved. At least if you posess a Linuxu system.

Citroën Bluetooth Connection Unstable

 My Android Phone has problems with the Bluetooth connection. Also with Citroën. I found out that the cure sometimes is this:

• Turn on Bluetooth on the phone
• If you don't see the Citroën connection restart the phone.
• Pair the devices.
• Then click on the Citroën Conneciton in the Phone's Bluetooth

I get a "syncronization error" every time. Then suddenly the connection to the phone is established. 

There must be some kind of dark shadowy magic afoot here. I strongly suspect that the Moon must be in a favorable aspect with Mercury when you try to use this connection ... but wait till black cats and witches pass the street. If you thought that Bluetooth was based on science, think again ;-)

Cure

Often af reboot of the phone before you put in the carkey will do the trick. This is only a partial success. Sometimes the reboot works. Somtimes not. 

[SOLVED] Zoom cannot share screen on Ubuntu

 The problem is still the Wayland driver. After an update Ubuntu could'nt share screens any more. As before the solution is: don't use Wayland at log in level.

[Problem] Adobe Animate - animations in the internal movies not working when exported to animated gif

 In Adobe Animate the animations in internal movies are not animated after export to animated gif.

Citroën: Bluetooth and Android Auto

Bluetooth

 For some reason the car had problems with the BT connection. I put the phone in pairing mode. But the car would not. I never found the menu entrance, but suddenly the car asked for the pairing code. Then I guess the BT connection worked. At least it did a moment ago.

Android Auto

I had to tweak the settings, and added the "OK Google" option. Worked like a charm. However there were many weird connection issues related to the BT connections, that failed. One workaround was to share the wifi via USB. That really did the trick. Android Auto seemed to work, while there was no BT connection. Apparantly that's a solution when the BT fails.

I really like Android Auto. It's a cool app, and since I never use iPhones the addition of Android devices is highly appreciated. Better late than sorry.

Driving Experience

By now were at around 200 km or so. The car is easy to use. Starting the cruise control was not easy to find. I guess it was a lucky punch when I hit the start button. On the speed limit there is a fine and easy to understand icon.

This morning my car wanted to communicate in French ... I don't know why. I had to change the language settings. 

Libre Office Annoying Autocorrect

 Every #€%&&%&!! time I use Libre Office I have to prevent i from becoming I. And capital letters after abbreviations is a pain in the butt. Here are the setting I have to correct after each update. Since this is not common knowledge I have to do this fight 20 minutes or more depending on my luck in the search engines.

Here is the solution:

The blank fieds are the ones I removed. Then work was possible again.

Figma - extremely slow on Ubuntu / Chrome

 In this case the solution is simple: use a Mac og Windows based PC. From a Linux user perspective Figma is useless - however nice on other OSs.

MacOs Cannot install drivers for tone studio

The installation guides are gibberish. While installing the driver, I'm asked to remove the driver ... and go to security and give permission [to WHAT, and WHERE]. Hopeless instructions here. Dropped the program after 10 - 15 attempts. That's enough. 

Linux / Unix: rsync vs. dd

• dd will create one file image
• rsync will copy file  for file
• dd is faster
• rsync will give you easy access to the files in the backup

Here is a nice dd cheat sheet.

Here is a nice rsync cheat sheet.

Ubuntu 21.04 Brightness GUI

Ubuntu 21.04 has no GUI for the screen brightness. Add  this repo:

# sudo add-apt-repository ppa:apandada1/brightness-controller
# sudo apt install brightness-controller

Now you can run the program, or add it to favorites.

Ubuntu 21.04 set brightness

There is no brightness button in Ubuntu 20.04. Why? But you can set the brightness via terminal commands.

Step one: find the name of your monitor.

In my case:

# xrandr | grep " connected" | cut -f1 -d " "
# HDMI-2

Then set the brightness in the terminal:

# xrandr --output HDMI-2 --brightness 1

Night settings could be a brightness of e.g. .75

No GUI for the screen settings, such as color and brightness etc. is yet another serious UX-flaw in the problematic Ubuntu 20.04. This update is not the best we saw from Ubuntu. We need UX'ers in Ubuntu.

[SOLVED] Ubuntu 21.04: if Share Screen in Zoom does not work

1.  Log out of the session.
2. On the log on screen click the gear at the bottom.
3. No you can choose between the new Wayland and another option.
4. Don't chose Wayland. Choose the old version.

It seems that Wayland is not ready for Zoom yet. I hope that you see this before trying to share Zoom screeens in Ubuntu 20.04 ;-)

Ubuntu: Connecting Gnome Files to MacOS via SFTP

 

So the connection via SSH from Ubuntu to MacOS was possible. Why not establish a GUI-connection via Files. You can add other network shares at the + at the bottom of the shortcut list.

In the form add the address of the remote computer and use a sftp connection:

sftp://192.168.xxx.xxx (use the actual ip-adress where you see the xxx)

Click ok.

And that's all it takes.

Now you can work with the files on your Mac from Ubuntu.

Nice!

Update Ubuntu to the latest version

 

Here is a crash version:

# sudo apt update
# sudo apt upgrade
# sudo apt dist-upgrade
# sudo apt autoremove

Edit this file: /etc/update-manager/release-upgrades

Make sure, that the Prompt is set to normal.

# sudo do-release-upgrade

or if you dare and want the upgrade before the actual release:

# sudo do-release-upgrade -d

Mainly based on this blog post.