Lightning McQueen Volvo Rally Art Car

If you were 3 years old, what car do you want your parents to own? It's not an easy question to ask a 3 year old as there answers are limited. However, Lightning McQueen surely has to be one of the top. And, if you need a sporty looking vehicle to base your Lightning McQueen on - what would you choose? A Volvo 740 of course.In this case, three grown adults made the car of their dreams,

Manual installation of Android 2.3.3 Gingerbread on Nexus One and Nexus S

As you might have already known, Google has started rolling out Android 2.3.3 Gingerbread update to Nexus One and Nexus S. But, again, they have mentioned on the tweet that it will take few weeks for the OTA to complete. Some nice guys at XDA Developers have back traced the download link of the updates. In other words, you don’t have to wait for OTA updates and can now download the ROM (they are official Google ROMs) and install it manually on your device. Nexus One Gingerbread update GRI40 from FRG83G. Nexus S Gingerbread GRI40 from GRH78. Read more to know about manual installation.

Steps for manual installation

• First of all download the update from these links - Nexus One Gingerbread update GRI40 from FRG83G. Nexus S Gingerbread GRI40 from GRH78.

• Rename the downloaded file as update.zip and copy it in the root directory of the memory card

• Power down the device.

• Power up the mobile by pressing the power button, volume down key and track ball. This will take you to the boot menu.

• A screen would appear showing your phone’s system searching for various files. Scroll down to “recovery” and press the “Power” button.

• When you see the triangle with an exclamation point symbol, press the “Power” and “Volume Up” buttons at the same time.

• From the menu that appears, select “Apply sdcard:update.zip.”

• This initiates the installation process and the phone gets rebooted automatically once the process got over.

Disclaimer: I am not responsible if you brick your phone in the process of manual installation.

-- Varun

[How to] Setup a Personal Project Repository for free

If you are working on an open source project, there are many places where you can host your project. Some of the popular ones are Google Code, Github, etc. Google Code includes SVN and Mercurical as SCM system. However, if you are working on a personal project and don’t want to open your code yet, there are very limited options left for you. One of the popular free hosts is Beanstalk which offers you 100 MB space, 1 user and 1 repository. Github offers private repository but its little expensive. Here is a tip for you to setup your private repository using free cloud-based file hosting services like Dropbox, SugarSync, etc. Note: I will be using SVN for explanation in this post. You can use any versioning system of your choice.

Setup private repository on the cloud

• Create your SugarSync account. Setup an account with Dropbox or SugarSync (Referral links). Dropbox offers 2 GB free storage where as SugarSync provides 5 GB and you can sync multiple folders with SugarSync. The rest of this post assumes that you have a SugarSync account and have installed SugarSync desktop application. Note: Both Dropbox and SugarSync have their in-built versioning system but you can not enjoy all the features of an SCM like branching, merging, etc.
• Creating the repository. Create a folder named “Repositories/<your_repo_name>” within your synced folder. Then, create a SVN local repository in the same folder. You can use any of the SVN clients to do this. I have used TortoiseSVN to create repository.
• Committing the code. Now that the local repository is ready, you can start committing the code / any file to the repository just like any other repository. The only difference will be accessing the repository via file:// protocol. As you commit the files, the repository will be synced on the cloud. It is important to understand that only the committed files will be synced on the cloud.
• Syncing Work / Home setup. If you are working on multiple computers, you can setup SugarSync / Dropbox sync from all the machines. If you commit on one computer and then commit on another before SugarSync/ Dropbox has synced the files, you may end up with a corrupted repository. To maintain the sanity of the repository, please ensure that the files are synced before committing the files. 
• Team Collaboration.  There are two options for you to collaborate with your team. Frist and the simplest one is to share the repository folder in Windows. Your peers can also access the shared repository via file:// protocol. The second option is to setup a local SVN server using tools like VisualSVN Server. This will help you setup a repository as well as providing HTTP access to your repository. There is also a third option but I don’t recommend using that. You can share the repository as a folder on SugarSync / Dropbox. Your peers will be able to sync the folders locally and commit the changes to their repository and it will be synced on the cloud. Be aware that using this method may corrupt your repository.

-- Varun

Speed doesn't kill people, cars hanging from trees in Australia telling people that "speed kills", kills people

Again with the hanging car, but this time its a warning to other drivers in West Australia that "Speed Kills". But did did it ever occur to the marketing genius that distraction also kills. What is the point of slowing down only to run into another tree while trying to read the sign. Two weeks later your car is up on a tree down the street saying "Billboards Kill". Speed doesn't kill people, cars

Art Cars Hanging Out To Dry in Chile

Art Cars Hanging Out To Dry in Chile - Photo by Eliseo Fernandez / ReutersJust got a tip from Kelly Lyles owner of Excessories Odd-Yssey about some pretty art cars hanging out to dry in Valparaiso, Chile during the National Festival Of Arts. Shown here with Generik Vapeur playing his bagpipe which I guess helps paint dry faster???