openSUSE Leap 42.1

I don't remember when I tested it, but there really wasn't much difference than from the first milestone, and not really too much different from the openSUSE experience (having to add the Pacman repository to get the closed-source multi-media codecs).

Like I said somewhere before, I'm liking Manjaro, and don't plan on looking back to openSUSE, except for the ARM architecture.

Cellular Phone Service Providers

The article I read is: Charge Mobile Data dumps your phone’s voice plan for pure data

While I find provider interesting, to a point, it's sort of a niche market (in my opinion anyway).

I've been with Ting mobile for a year now, and love how they price their plans... if one could call it a plan. Talk, text, and data are charged separately with its own tier structure, but you also pay for the number (a.k.a. "device"). Each device under your account costs 6 USD, and this is charged every month, along with whatever you use. If you don't talk, text, and/or use data for that month, you don't pay for those. For example, I just mainly use data, so I pay 6 USD plus 3 USD for the first data tier (1-100MB), making my bill 9 USD a month (a little over 10 USD after taxes and such).

The two caveats is that (1) calls from your cell phone to your voice mail are not free, and (2) any text messages you receive are also not free. Since I don't use text messages, I disabled that feature (there's better ways of getting a hold of me in a non-vocal way. But the main thing is that if and when I need to make/receive a phone call, I can. That one of my main irks with Charge, is that if someone can't contact you directly via telephone number (without having something set up).

The other problem with Charge is that it only works on Sprint's CDMA network at the moment, whereas Ting works on both CDMA and GSM (the latter being on T-Mobile's network). I'm sure Charge will expand, but it's a limitation that's not in their favour at the moment.

There's also Google's Project Fi, which doesn't seem bad either, but it's also not for me. 20 USD for unlimited talk and text (including international texts), and then 10 USD for every GB of data. Unused data (to the nearest 100MB I'm assuming) is refunded back to you, which is nice, but in my case, I'd be paying 21 USD (before taxes/fees), which is more than what I usually pay with Ting (between 9 and 12 USD before taxes/fees).

I've learned to be more frugal with my data plan with Ting, and so I hardly go over 100MB a month. Because of this, other providers don't really interest me much, because they can't offer what Ting offers me. And like I've said, I'm happy with Ting, so I haven't a need to shop around.

Melty and Triela Upgrades

I apologise that this is not in chronological order, but considering it's just text (and the fact that I haven't properly been updating), I find it easier to start this way.

With Microsoft's free Windows 10 upgrade ending 29 July, I wanted to go ahead and get myself upgraded, so that I wouldn't have to worry last minute. I had remembered (I had forgotten before then) that whenever I have a reason to reinstall Windows on Melty, that I would upgrade the hard drive for the operating system to an SSD before doing so; the price wasn't bad, so I went ahead with it. The only problem with that was that I figured I should also do the same with Triela.

While I prepared the SSD for Melty, I ended up using it for Triela instead, as it was more likely that I'd need her first. I installed Manjaro first, so that Windows didn't try anything funny (though I read that the Windows 10 upgrade process leaves anything non-Windows alone), and because it'd be a bit faster, even if I had problems. I tried net install first, but while trying to download the entire XFCE environment, I was getting download speeds similar to dial-up internet. When I was trying to update packages after using the installer from the live disk, I found the speeds weren't much different, and then remembered about the command for pacman to rank mirrors, which turned out to fix that problem.

I also read to remove the discard option from fstab and use the fstrim service instead, which was one of the first few things I did. Interestingly enough with net install, discard isn't added to fstab at all, while it's the obverse for the installer from the live disk. Booting from GRUB 2 was quite quick, as well as shutting down - while Manjaro was already quite snappy with the stock hard drive, the SSD just blew me away. Needless to say, there wasn't really any major problems, beside a strange theme glitch with Firefox, which was fixed by installing firefox, which removed firefox-gtk2 (why it was installed, I haven't a clue).

Windows was a different story. For whatever weird reason, after installing Service Pack 1, Windows Update became very slow, and I tried all sorts of things here and there to try to fix it, eventually giving up and leaving it. It took a while to get fully updated, but when it was time, I tried to use the "N" upgrade ISO (because I didn't want it installing things I was going to uninstall anyway), which asked me for a key, and so I decided to just use the upgrade program instead. It took a while for the program to do it's thing, including downloading the necessary files, and once it was ready, I let the program upgrade to Windows 10.

For whatever weird reason, while looking at the screen, which was a black screen with a turquoise-coloured Windows logo and the loading dots, I had a very slight anxiety. Eventually that anxiety turned into reality and the upgrade failed. I looked online and found that the simplest method was to try different settings when running the install program (e.g. "Keep my files, but not my settings" instead of "Keep my files and settings"), and when I tried the upgrade program again, it wanted to download everything again. It was irritating, so I decided to download the standard ISO instead of waiting for the program to do it (especially if it decided to fail again). But Microsoft kinda gave me the run around on Triela, so I had to download it with Mei-chan and transfer it via ethernet.

The update succeeded this time (could have also been the ISO, I don't know), and I was met with no internet - no wireless, no ethernet. Device manager had some yellow triangles on both, to which I installed the driver for ethernet first before uninstalling the driver from device manager. After successfully getting internet, I proceeded to do the same for the wireless, but turning wireless off afterwards.

I was quite pleased to find that Windows 10 was able to keep a constant connection to the internet with the ethernet, unlike Windows 7 (might be how my network's set up, I don't know). Other than that, I just reinstalled GRUB 2 with mhwd-chroot and hadn't any major problems with Triela and Windows 10.

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Melty was a different story with Windows 10 (Manjaro wasn't much different than Triela, besides that I didn't feel like spending time manually installing lightdm and XFCE after net install).

I expected the upgrade to fail, but it didn't, which was fine with me until I wanted to reboot to be able to reinstall GRUB 2 - I watched the loading dots spin around for a few minutes before holding the power button down.

I found that it shut down fine, but not reboot, and then while trying to fix it, I ended up fixing the reboot while breaking the shut down. I decided just to keep it that way, as I hardly use Windows and didn't want to continue to try to fix it.

One detail I didn't mention was that I did the upgrade for Melty on 5 March and not the same weekend as Triela. I'm glad I did, because I probably wouldn't have slept any (it was already bad enough I spent 20 hours on Triela broken up by 4 hours of sleep).

Is Windows 10 (6.3 for those actually paying attention to the version numbers) really worth it? Yes and no.

I also forgot that Windows 10 decided to install the drivers for the Radeon HD 7000 series on Triela even though the GPU is the HD 6750M, so there's a bit of screen tearing, but as I've said before, I don't use Windows all that much, so it's something I'll worry about if it becomes a bigger problem.

I've really been considering ReactOS, and have yet to test it, but if it turns out well, I may migrate to it. Overall, the process of upgrading a fresh Windows installation wasn't very positive, but at the least, it won't take Melty as long as it did to boot into Windows.

Blog Updates

Theme was updated so that the background takes up the entirety of the screen instead of leaving grey bars whenever the screen/window is larger than 1600 x 1200. I also darkened the colour behind the blog text, so that it's more readable when it passes over a light portion of the background. I think I might've made that colour too dark, but I'll tinker with that later, as I'm more worried about getting updated.

I've also updated the tags a bit, where "Projects" have been renamed to "General Projects" and the addition of "Electronic Projects". The reason for this separation is because I have been designing circuit boards (a.k.a. PCBs) for various things, and it would eventually clutter the "Project" tag (not to mention harder to sift through).

Anyway, let's continue forth with version 2.1.1!

Updates

I was going to post an entry or two, but remembered I needed to fix the theme (which still needs to be fixed). Hopefully I'll get everything fixed and up to date soon.

Three-month Absensce / Screenshot Program

I've been fairly busy at home with other things and haven't quite had the motivation to update, especially when I've a thing or two pending on several almost-completed projects. In that meantime, I've started some new projects and written a couple stories.

The past month and a half have been really busy for me, since I've been helping move buildings at work, so I've been fairly exhausted. I also spent most of my time after work in December making some gifts for some close friends as well as several postcards to them and others. I'm not entirely operational at work yet, but I'm slowly getting to a mostly-operational state.

I'm hoping to get the blog updated with all the projects within the next month or two (hopefully not longer than that) but please bear with me if I happen to be absent with posts again.

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For a while I've been using Shutter as my screenshot program, but for whatever reason, it can't get the saved settings and resets everything to default, which is annoying. I tried figuring out what was wrong with it yesterday morning, but eventually I figured it'd be better to just find something else.

I tried xfce4-screenshooter, but I didn't like that it brings up a dialogue window after getting the screenshot. I think I figured out how to save it to ~/Pictures but I wanted a simplistic filename, which I didn't feel like figuring out how to do (I'm sure there's a way, but I didn't care to look).

I then browsed through a list on Arch's wiki, and went with scrot next, which did what I wanted it to do, and eventually after a bit of tinkering, it became the perfect replacement.

Now when I hit Print Screen, it saves it as "YYYY-MM-DD_HH:MM:SS.png" and puts it in ~/Pictures like I want. Shutter is nice, but sometimes simplicity is the best solution.

Smartphones

As I stated in my previous post, I would be talking about the Nexus 5x.

This isn't going to be so much about the phone itself, but more about the crappy experience I've gone through these past few months that lead me to buying three phones within 6 months.

Since I bought my Galaxy Nexus a few months before the Nexus 4 was released, I had hung onto it for quite a number of years (especially when I was unemployed for almost two years). When I got my job earlier this year, I knew I was going to need some sort of upgrade, since the Galaxy Nexus was being really sluggish.

Since the Nexus One, I stuck with keeping it stock and unrooted until I got a newer phone. My friend/co-worker said that he read about a cache filling up that causes smartphones to be sluggish and it can only be cleared if the phone's rooted (factory data reset would also work). I didn't want to tinker with my phone any, so I just dealt with it while looking at some new phones. I also wanted to upgrade because the Galaxy Nexus was "3.5G" and not true 4G.

The first phone I found was Alcatel's Idol 3 (or whatever it is, I'm too lazy to look up the correct name right now), which I thought was a very nice phone for the price (though reviews said that the interface was a bit iffy).

I stuck with the phone as the "phone-to-get" until I saw news of ASUS's ZenFone 2 - the top model being $50 USD more than the Idol 3 and having better specs. I was quite ecstatic, but the large screen was the main drawback for me.

I kept up with upcoming phones until the ZenFone 2 was released, and I bought my first one. I liked it quite a bit (save for the large screen, but at least ASUS has a "One Hand" feature that remedies that, though slightly awkward to use sometimes) and I used it no differently than my Galaxy Nexus.

That was the problem.

When I was putting my phone back into my bag, I kinda spun it in my hand to re-orient it to slide it into the bag in the correct orientation (I like keeping my things oriented in certain ways for efficiency), but this time, out of the numerous times I've done it, the phone slides out of my hand and falls onto a large, sealed, lead-based battery. I'm talking about ones that are about the size that would go into the average sedan.

It fell (long) edge-first onto the terminal of the battery, bounced, hit the wall, and into a metal box. I'm not sure if there was a grimace on my face, but I was definitely cringing - the first non-Otterbox case I use and I drop it onto a battery. I didn't even see that it hit the terminal, but when I pulled the phone out of the metal box, and saw the shatter pattern, I immediately was upset the half-second between that and turning the screen on to see about 1/6 of the screen not working.

It was still useable, but I put it into a thick, plastic bag to keep the glass shards from going everywhere, and at some point I took the case off while keeping it in the bag (which became a bad idea because it scratched the glass of the camera glass).

How did I know it landed on the battery terminal? There was a dent in the plastic bezel, even though the case was some sort of plastic rubber stuff (I wish I could describe it better). At the least, the case prevented a much worse damage, but still didn't protect my phone like I wanted.

I panicked, and bought a new ZenFone 2, but since Amazon didn't recognise my sign in, they disabled my account. I had to make a new password and re-enter my  credit card info before I was able to redo the order.

At some point afterwards, I was talking with my friend/co-worker about it and he was suggesting I see if I could get the screen repaired. At this point, I hadn't calmed down yet, so I ignored his suggestion then.

When I got home, I then looked at replacement screens, which was $30-50 USD, and I first went with the cheaper option after cancelling the order for the new ZenFone 2. When the screen was out for delivery, I decided to go ahead and disassemble my phone, so that it'd be ready.

It didn't even cross my mind to backup my data at all.

I reached the point of no return when I removed the screen and digitizer assembly from the plastic, as I had to pretty much break the screen even more to get it out.

Bad became worse when I got the replacement screen, as it was for the model before my phone (ZE550ML... or was it CL?) and (probably) wasn't compatible with my phone (the backlight came on, but no image). I returned it and went with the slightly more expensive option, but had to wait at most a month for it be delivered from Hong Kong.

I had no choice but to go back to the Galaxy Nexus.

(Also, I'll mention now I had problems booting correctly, but I was unaware at that time.)

After waiting about two or three weeks, I try again, but I had the same problem, where the backlight would turn on, but not give me an image at all. (Also, the phone itself was turning on just fine, but again, I was unaware.) I stuffed the parts into anti-static bags (the replacement screen going back into the packaging it came in) and just set it to the side.

I tried to continue using the Galaxy Nexus, but eventually I broke again, as Google Play Newsstand crashed without warning (I had the problem before getting the ZenFone 2), and ordered another ZenFone 2.

While getting apps installed to the new ZenFone 2 (via Google Play Store web-version), I noticed that there were two ZenFone 2 entries, and it didn't take me too long to figure out that one of them was the screen-less ZenFone2 (which made it much easier to make a near facsimile of it).

When I took a closer look somewhere with the device info, it said that it was last used 14 or 16 July, which is when I last tried to get the screen to work. I was happy that the motherboard was fine, but still upset that I can't get into it to get my stuff off of it.

Since my new ZenFone 2, I've been a lot more careful about handling it, along with trying out a couple other cases that I think (or thought) would offer better protection. I now keep some sort of positive contact (be it the fairly grippy sides or the screen and the case backing) when I remove/insert it from/into my bag.

My friend/co-worker told me that he had to root his ZenFone 2 to be able to write to the SD card, and that was one of the things I did when I got my new ZenFone 2. (I apologise for the lack of chronology.) I uninstalled all the bloatware and went to do the system update (after installing all the apps I had). Bad idea.

The ZenFone 2 took too long to get past the loading screen, so I turned it off, but when I tried to turn it back on again, the screen didn't come on at all. That is when I found that I did what I wasn't supposed to do. Eventually I found some restore images, including one for the latest update. Once I got the ZenFone 2 to turn on properly (two vibrates and not one, and without having anything plugged into the micro USB port... I think?), I was able to apply the image and proceed to set up my phone and reinstall my apps again.

The problem I've been having now is that I get an error every time I try to apply an OTA update... (Well, the first one actually worked, but nothing after that.) While I should've updated manually, I haven't had the patience to do it, especially considering the experience I've been having when straying from the Nexus line of phones.

One of the updates to ASUS's power saver app somehow changed my battery mode setting from "balanced" to "smart saving" without my knowledge or consent, which screwed up how my timer app worked - I use a timer app to know when to take lunch and when to clock out of work, otherwise I'd lose track of time and who knows how over I'd be.

It took a while to figure out that it was that along with the power saver app that really fucked things up. I even tried switching timer apps because I thought the app wasn't working.

I think it was a couple Fridays ago when my alarm didn't go off and I was woken my my dad about 10 minutes before I was supposed to leave the house. When I returned home, I found that something got screwed up and the alarm didn't fire off. Eventually I fixed it (not sure how), but I started becoming really aggravated with the ZenFone 2.

It was earlier this week when I had another OTA update (which failed, needless  to say), and I don't remember what else set me off, but I snapped this past Thursday night and pre-ordered the Nexus 5x.

While the ZenFone 2 is the best specifications for the price, and I do like the ASUS launcher a bit more than the stock (being able to hide bloatware or folder apps to get to apps not on the home screen(s) quicker), but the reliability is poor... Yes my base system's not up-to-date, but it should still be just as reliable.

Honestly, with how much money I've spent this year on phones, I should've just bought a Nexus 6 and dealt with its large size.

I was considering the Nexus 6p, and while I would like to go back to an AMOLED screen, I don't really need the specs and I don't want a "phablet" (I've already learned this too well with the ZenFone 2).

I wanted a somewhat high-spec phone originally because of the app-crashing issues that I had with the Galaxy Nexus, but considering I'm using Ting as my cellular provider (pay-per-use), I've learned to use my phone less and less. The only thing I'd need performance for is to be able to play some graphics-heavy games - that is, when I actually do play them.

When I get my Nexus 5x, I'll be backing up my ZenFone 2 on Melty before doing anything else. I'll also swap the motherboard from the screen-less ZenFone 2 to the newer one and praying I can get what I need off of it.


Before the two ZenFone 2 phones (I'm really getting sick of typing "ZenFone 2"), I only had the Nexus One and Galaxy Nexus, so I've always had the base-line Android experience. To a point it feels a bit foolish of me to stray from it, while chasing something I didn't need at all. (At this point I also remember that I wanted something that was x64 compatible for some slight future-proofing, though it was mainly ARM64 that I was looking for.) I think I've learned my lesson after spending how much I've spent across three smartphones (two and a half?).

Things I've learned:

• Don't get blind-sided by price-performance ratio
• It's better to stick with what works sometimes, as pricey as it may be
• Handle large phones cautiously