Why I quit using Kubuntu and where I found my refuge

I has recently spoken of my experiences with kubuntu 9.04

Today I removed it from my system, due to several reasons, most on the functionality side.

1. KDE4 would not remember the settings. My desktop widgets would get reset on every boot. (this alone is a deal breaker)
2. Sound wouldn’t work fine. multiple sources of sound/flash problem (I needed it! youtube and media player)
3. Microphone wouldn’t work out-of-the-box (need Skype)
   
4. Hard disk drives would not auto mount. had to be mounted by typing the password each time.
5. The themes weren’t really appealing. The plasma desktop, however was.
6. General appeal. To quote Srik, “I always have this weird feeling that everything in Ubuntu is oversized.” I share the feeling.

Anyway, I truly couldn’t make myself try anything that did not have wubi to set it up. (separate partitions just aren’t necessary) Ubuntu, Kubuntu – tried both this month. The next release is in August, I think.
So here was my saviour… (drumroll…) LinuxMint

1. Cool looks (yeah, its important to me)
2. Things work out of the box (yea, Sabayon style on debian platform )
3. They have a good story behind it. I liked the story (the {clem} paragraph in the About page)
4. Everything I expect to work works (yea- graphics, flash, wireless, apt-get, drivers, codecs – you name it!)
5. Zero post-install customization necessary (installing apps, drivers, fixing things.. )

I have further more respect for Ubuntu now, seeing that things like Linux Mint can be built on it.
Linux Mint 7 will surely stand high in the rankings of my experiences with linux distributions, and will be my current recommended distro for new users.

Emergency contact numbers of family members

Here, I am talking NOT about 112/108/911 kind-of emergency, but instead about the first point of personal contact like family or friends.

Is there a standard protocol to save emergency contact numbers in mobile phones?

How about SpeedDial 2 being used for the emergency number? (Like SpeedDial 1 is reserved for voicemail. )

Enforcing end users to set it manually, is of-course not a good solution, and would only work with people who are aware and enthusiastic. 

However, there is scope for this to be done in the network end, if the required no is taken during subscriber registration.

The user, signing up for the connection, provides the next-to-kin/family/friend emergency contact number and that is stored in the network —> using SpeedDial 2 (press and hold button 2) —> phone sends request to the network to connect to the emergency family member number provided by the subscriber —> and the call is thus routed beyond.

There is also scope for mulitple numbers to be defined and fallback in case of non-availability of the primary emergency phone no, right?

What do u think? (there’s always the comments section for feedback

PS: another use-case : If u find someone’s lost phone, what number in there do u try to contact? the first number in the phonebook? how relevant would that be to the situation? you’ll look for “Home” ? (that’s smart, isn’t it ) isn’t there a need to find his/her “primary” alternate contact number..

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Picasa3 from Google

Turns out Picasa3 from Google is pretty damn good.

organizes your photos well.

export to html and other few other neat features built-in

creates world-class photo collages – the feature I liked most

one software that meets my usability and quality expectations

download from http://picasa.google.com/ if you don’t already have it, and try out

random pictures collage 1

random pictures collage 2