lunatechian (lunatech-ian)

I have created a emacs major mode, called lunatech-journal, that I use for blogging. It is a derived mode from muse-mode, an excellent mode for writing and publishing.

Currently, it has following functions defined

• lunatech-journal-skeleton - loads a skeleton for blogging
• lunatech-journal-show-hints - shows a buffer with questions to help me blog about my day
• lunatech-journal-make-html - creates a html file from the muse-mode
• lunatech-journal-preview - allows me to preview my journal in the browser

I use a php script to post the blog entry to the website. To use it, I have the following in my .emacs file

(defun journal ()
  (interactive)
  (find-file "~/blog/journal.muse")
  )
(require 'lunatech-journal)
(add-to-list 'auto-mode-alist '("journal\\.muse\\'" . lunatech-journal-mode))

When I feel the need to blog, I do M-x journal, I get dropped into my journal file and I can blog.

Links:

• lunatech-journal.el - the blogging mode
• Playing with your blog's xml-rpc interface shows the php script that I use to post entries to my blog
• MuseMode

The most favorite activity that Bangaloreans indulge in is Trafficking. It is a social activity surpassing the bounds of caste, creed or religion. Every morning and evening all the people in Bangalore come out on to the streets with whatever vehicle(s) they own and create a mass procession. They honk, rev engines, brake hard, bump, double park, shout, jump traffic lights ... its a mass revelry. — Taken from Uncyclopedia

After living here for three and a half years, I think I can say with some authority that commuting in Bangalore is a daily adventure. Every day there is something unpredictable that will happen and will affect the flow of traffic. Either a truck would be parked on the wrong side of the road, or a car would have broken down, or the traffic police would mark one of the roads as one-way.

There is a "magic window" in the Bangalore traffic. This is the time when the traffic flows without the interruptions of the traffic police and the heavy trucks have not yet come out on the roads. If you are able to get to your destination in the magic window, your day will be relatively tension free.

The amount of time wasted on the streets is staggering. If we add the cost we pay in terms of health and peace of mind, the costs would be enormous. To give you an idea, the route to reach my office is around 12 kilometers from my home. However, it takes me around 30 minutes to cover this distance.

In my opinion, a two wheeler is the best way to navigate your way around Bangalore. It is easy to work your way around cars and trucks waiting at the traffic signal. Not to forget, the savings on the petrol bill.

Speaking of cars, I don't understand why people buy luxury cars in Bangalore. I have seen quite a few traffic snarls caused by one luxury car going slow or waiting to take a turn.

Anyhow, enough of my rantings.

testing, testing - 1, 2, 3

I should now be able to set the categories of my post.

This post is brought to you by emacs, php and lots of cups of tea.

Are you planning on storing blobs in Innodb tables? If yes, think again. According to the manual,

InnoDB stores the first 768 bytes of a VARBINARY, VARCHAR, BLOB, or TEXT column in the row, and the rest into separate pages.

This translates into slower retrieval for blobs. However, InnoDB can skip reading blobs if they are not in select column list.

One solution for this is to keep blobs in a separate myisam table and do a join when you need the blob column.

If you are a heavy user of MySQL, I think you will appreciate this list of saved bug searches. For example, check out "p1_bugs_in_5.1" or "ActiveInnoDBBugs" These saved searches are also available as rss feeds.

In the morning I had to visit to the VFS office in Bangalore. The place has very strict security. I was carrying my laptop and the security person at the gate did not allow me to go in . The man at the parking section said he could keep the bag, but he wanted 50 Rupees for that. I really lost my head when he told me the amount. Anyhow, I did not think it would be safe to leave the laptop with him. I will have to visit that office tomorrow again.

Due to time taken to visit the VFS office, I could not do much work at the office.

I had woken up at 6:00 AM today and that had given me enough time in the morning to do some emacs hacking. I really should spend time on learning lisp instead of copying stuff from random places.

Today my trainer at the gym changed my exercise schedule. It became quite grilling. However, I was able to get through the workout. Hopefully in 2-3 days time, I would be able to breeze through the workout.

I spent the first half of my day working on some emacs customiation. I am writing a major mode for blogging and it is a good learning experience.

In the evening I watched 2 episodes of Star Trek, the original series. The plot was thrilling and the pace was good. Captain Kirk did not need to seduce alien women to protect the Enterprise .

As it was a weekend, I did not go to the gym today. I was very happy with my workout on Friday and I hope I would be able to maintain my pace in the gym tomorrow too.

Links:

• Emacs major mode tutorial
• The Squire of Gothos - Star Trek Season 1
• Shore Leave - Star Trek Season 1