Shortcut to switch language keyboard in Ubuntu

Step1. Select Keyboard Layout from applications

Step 2. Click on Options button and select your keys combination from Keys to change layout options

Step 3. Enjoy

Speaking in public

A speech is the act of expressing or describing thoughts, feelings, or perceptions with words in public. There are four different types of speeches that can be given.

* Informative   This is designed to explain, instruct, or clarify
* Persuasive    This influences, motivates to act, or sells.
* Inspirational This inspires or helps the listeners to celebrate or commemorate.
* Improvisational This is given without prior preparation.

Brainstorming and clustering

This is a way to organize your ideas easily, when brainstorming you focus on the topic and write down a list of any words, thoughts, or phrases that come to mind regarding that topic. Not every idea will be used in your speech, but the list will help in develop it.

Another way to gather ideas is by using method called clustering. It is a conceptual map helping to develop a variety of alternatives for the speech. Begin with the main topic in the center. As ideas come, extend a line from the central topic outward to the new ideas. Continue doing so as the ideas come. This process nowadays is also known as mind map.

Parts of speech

Introduction

The role of the introduction is to capture the audience’s attention and introduce the general theme. This can be accomplished by any of the following methods.

* Ask rhetorical questions. This will cause the audience to begin thinking about the topic.
* Surprising statistics.
* Use a quotation. Remember to give credit where credit is due.
* Graphic description. This will draw a picture in the minds of those in the audience.

Body

The body is where your principal and subordinate points will be expressed. It is important that your ideas are expressed as clearly as possible to avoid confusion. Divide the body into from three to five principal points, each one having one or more subordinate points and supporting  material. Supporting material can be testimonials, analogies, statistics and stories. These give the audience reason to believe your principal ideas.

Conclusion

The conclusion should summarize the principal ideas given in the body. It should also reinforce the points you want the listeners remember. Do not spend too much time concluding the speech.

This was based on Quick Learning Personal Development Workshop.

I hope you find this helpful.

Napoleon Dynamite

Recently I saw Napoleon Dynamite an independent film directed by Jared Jess and starred by Jon Heder and Tina Majorino, the movie has a social satire context developed in a high school at Idaho United States. While the story isn't very complicated it still manages to appeal to adults and teens alike.

Stereotypes

Stereotypes about mexican people are expressed in the move using Pedro, such as accent, clothes, style of life, believes. Let’s extend some info about it. Who is the santo niño de atocha which Pedro mentioned in his speech? In the 13th century Madrid was lost to the Muslim invaders, and many Christians there were taken prisoners as spoils of war. The Christians were placed on strict punishments and prohibitions, and the devout prisoners were denied food by their captors. According to legend, only children under the age of 12 were permitted to bring them food.Reports soon began among the people that a child under the age of twelve had begun to bring food to childless prisoners. The child was dressed in pilgrim's clothing yet could not be identified as to the name of the child or its origin. In fact  the santo niño de atocha is a Roman Catholic image of the Child Jesus. In Mexico therefore some people have an image of Santo niño de atocha in their houses as a pray to Jesus to avoid lack of food or basic goods for their families.


The piñata story

Summer and Pedro were competing to the president position at their school. Summer a cheerleader was working in gain votes using flyers and ads to his classmates meanwhile Pedro made a Pinata which in fact was looking like Summer. In the history original piñata was represented by a star shape and seven pikes “The Seven Deadly Sins” and colored with shining colors representing  yearn. Nowadays piñata makers found that they can sell more piñatas if they made them look like cartoon characters, it is not common in Mexico find piñatas looking like real people, only in those cases when piñata makers want to make a mock or offence to someone they do it.

What I loved most was the musical selection like Canned heat by Jamiroquai and The Promise by When In Rome, my favorite part of the movie: when Napoleon danced as skit of Pedro Sanchez, I enjoyed when Napoleon exhales in response about something disgusting and expressions  like “sweet”, “such an idiot!”, “geez!”, “fine!” and “I caught you a delicious bass”.

I’m yearning to see another movie like this, not only because it had not too much money spent in locations, stage, dressing, etc. but also because it is a good story and terrific music. By the way my most viewed video in youtube is “Napoleon Dynamite dance scene”. (636, 522 views and counting).

Enjoy it.

How to backup your favorite movies & TV shows

How do you could get a copy of your favorite video media? If your medias are in a DVD disc then you may ripping first, an easy cheaper option is Clone DVD Mobile and easy DVD. The last one is to access to the protected DVD information, the first one is to ripping properly. I always use the iPod video format since has good quality in audio and video and a reasonable size.

My suggestion: ripping only in English as language and if you want subtitles, you should search them in google such as opensubtitles.org as soon as you get the subtitle you can  add them using VLC. Video > Subtitles Track > Open File. Some times there is a desynchronize rate in subtitles and audio if so, you can synchronize using  Tools > Track Synchronization.

The storage rate is cheaper than other media format, for example you could store The Tudors first season in only two DVD (10 episodes 60 minutes each one as average).

Enjoy it.

I Begin to Wonder

I Begin to Wonder born as a stubborn idea to integrate a Jean Claude Ades song mixed by Jerome Isma-ae, since past year I was trying to added and finally is here, becoming title for this the very first remix of this year. It's genre goes from Deep House, Tech House, Minimal House to Progressive House.

1. Rodrigo Carreira - Communicate (7:35)
2. Anthony Collins - Pop Off (Ludovic Vendi Dub Mix) (9:30)
3. Leron vs. Yves Eaux vs. Luke Star - You Will Be Mine (9:6)
4. EDX - Embrace (Original Club Mix) (7:13)
5. Boom Jinx And Andrew Bayer - Keyboard Cowboys (Original Mix) (7:37)
6. Matt Lange - Other Stories (7:52)
7. Ida Engberg - Owl's Nest (Original Mix) (7:58)
8. Jean Claude Ades - I Begin To Wonder 2008 (Jerome Isma-ae Remix) (9:0)

I hope you like it.

A glance to Ubuntu 12.04 Precise Pangolin

Today I updated my Ubuntu to the new Ubuntu 12.04 LTS "Precise Pangolin", The most immediately noticeable will be the new log in screen and better colors in all UI environment.  Ubuntu 12.04 has cooler tool tips when Rhythmbox change songs or in the launcher bar, also has HUD the new search-based menu and is really cool, since it can interact with all your installed programs such as Firefox (Exploring Bookmark / History), Skype (Filter online, offline contacts) or sending email with Thunderbird just typing email. You save time avoiding access nested menus in huge option programs like Gimp.

See here for more info

Perhaps the most welcome change, though, is the vastly improved performance and power management. Ubuntu, for all of its finer points, has never been particularly battery friendly.

The bad thing I found about it is the launcher side bar, which is quite intrusive in my perspective, I normally use an extended display monitor and now in this Ubuntu version I have to bear this launcher in my extended monitor as well.

After give a glance in the advantages and disadvantages I had no doubt to install it and start to use it, hope this info was useful to you.

Enjoy it.

Tres buenos libros de historia de México

México bárbaro de John Kenneth Turner

Es un ensayo escrito en 1908, dedicado a dar a conocer en los Estados Unidos los acontecimientos que se daban en México en aquella época, describiendo la esclavitud humana que se practicaba durante el gobierno de Porfirio Díaz en lugares como Yucatán y Valle Nacional.

La primera edición de este reportaje a profundidad, vio la luz en forma de libro en los Estados Unidos de Norteamérica en 1911. Se han hecho varias ediciones de la publicación tanto en México como en EE. UU. y se le considera como una importante contribución a la descripción de las condiciones sociales que existían en el México prerrevolucionario del Porfiriato.

Zapata de Pedro Ángel Palou García

Palou detalla: “Zapata luchó y tomó ciudades, llegó a la ciudad de México y estuvo a punto de tomar el poder, pero fue congruente con su convicción de que la política no es para los hombres del campo. Él le rehuyó al poder, nunca se sentó en la silla presidencial, de ahí que sólo buscaba acabar con las injusticias y hacer que se cumpliera la ley.

“Zapata nunca asumió un sólo puesto en la Convención de Aguascalientes, ni le aceptó ninguno a Francisco I. Madero. Fue un hombre de gran coherencia”.

Zapata tuvo que enfrentar muchos openentes en su lucha por defender sus ideales, entre ellos Porfirio Díaz, Francisco I. Madero, Alvaro Obregón y Venustiano Carranza, finalmente fue asesinado en la Hacienda de Chinameca en una trampa ejecutada por Jesús Guajardo.

Azteca de Gary Jennings

Hacia 1530, el emperador Carlos pide al obispo de México que le proporcione información sobre la vida y costumbres de los indios americanos; el obispo, fray Juan de Zumárraga, envía al monarca un relato autobiográfico hecho por un indio de unos sesenta años, Nube Oscura o Mixtli, en el que narra su niñez, la mentalidad y costumbres de su pueblo, su formación y sus amores, siempre tormentosos y trágicos. Por fin, el emisario de Moctezuma entra en contacto con los españoles de Hernán Cortés, es bautizado y recibe el nombre de Juan Damasceno, aunque sigue fiel a los usos de los aztecas. Ésta en su trepediante y desgarrada historia, que simboliza el choque de dos civilizaciones, de dos maneras irreconciliables de entender el mundo.

Older people are happier

Feelings like stress, worry, anger decrease with age. In the paradox of ageing is mention that when we recognize we won't live forever change our perspective on life in positive ways, we recognize we don't own all the time in the world and we see our priorities most clearly, we take less notice of trivial matters we save or life, we are more appreciative, more open to reconciliation, we invest in more important things, and life gets better.

Laura Carstensen

An efficient way to backup your information

Unison allows you to synchronize a directory with an external drive or a remote host, it is like mirroring your directory.

I would like to explain only external device option.

First connect your external device

Then run Unison and create a new profile where simply specify the paths to the directories you want to keep in sync.

The synchronization is pretty straightforward, in Unison screen you will see changes are ready to apply, finally select Go from the menu.

In my case, I'm always listening new music from several genres, and when some new track please me, I copied to /media/Shared/Music directory in a corespondent directory-genre name. Since I have a bunch of new tracks in different directories. Unison helps me to copy to my backup only new tracks, in a kind of incremental backup.

Enjoy.

How to convert flac to mp3 usgin ffmpeg in ubuntu

In order to convert flac to mp3 you need to install ffmpeg in your computer.

As a root:
1. apt-get install ffmpeg
2. apt-get install lame
3. apt-get install libavcodec-extra-53

Then run command as follow:

ffmpeg -i audio_souce.flac -ab 256k audio_output.mp3

Where ab is bitrate in kb/s

Enjoy

How to Create a Wallpaper Slideshow in Ubuntu 11.10

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:crebs/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install crebs

Select your photos and name your slideshow.

After creating it. Crebs store it as xml file in $HOME/.crebs

Then rename & replace crebs xml file to background-1.xml in the path /usr/share/backgrounds/contest
Right mouse click on Desktop and select: Change Desktop background
Select your slideshow in the appearance window.

If for some reason the crebs repo doesn't work, you can always edit your /usr/share/backgrounds/contest/background-1.xml and change the images path for those which you want to use.

Don't forget to assign proper rights to the xml file. I use to set 666 with chmod command. (chmod 666 background-1.xml)

Enjoy it

FFmpeg

Have you ever needed to increment audio volume level from any of your videos? ok, it is not too common but anyway, there is a powerful tool to help us whit that task. FFmpeg, so I'm going to set the steps here.

1. Remove sound from a video file.

 ffmpeg -i source_video.ogv -an -vcodec mpeg4 -b 1200k just_video.mp4

2. Extract audio from video.

ffmpeg -i source_video.ogv -ab 128k just_audio.mp3

3. Increment volume from an mp3 audio

ffmpeg -i just_audio.mp3 -vol 2000 -ab 128k overninethousand_audio.mp3

4. Encode to the final video.

ffmpeg -i overninethousand_audio.mp3 -i just_video.mp4 -vcodec mpeg4 -b 1200k final_video.mp4

That's it, you have a new video with over nine thousand level.

FFmpeg site

Mixes 2011

Thank you whoever listened and downloaded my mixes this year !

http://www.mix.dj/josdem 

Compound Prepositions

A preposition relates the noun or pronoun following it to another word in the sentence. Compound prepositions are also known as complex prepositions and are, as the name implies, made up of more than one word. Some of the more common compound prepositions are used frequently in the English Language and they will always (or, most probably) be found together. In this post I wrote a helper list for understanding compound prepositions meaning as follow:

Compound preposition
following by description: and an example.

According to
In a manner, correspond to, in proportion: This list is sort according to the Alphabet.

Along with
In addition to someone or something; together with someone or something
Jane went to the mall along with David. I ate some chocolates along with some fruit.

Apart from
With the exception of: Apart from a few scratches, the car was undamaged.

As for
Considering or speaking about: I am still working, and as for my health, it is very good.

As of
On: The project was terminated as of January 1.

Aside from
Excluding; except for: Aside from a mild fever, the patient feels fine.

Because of
By reason of: I didn't go out because of the rain.

By means of.
Owing to: He'll succeed by means of sheer persistence.

By way of
Passing through something (as a place); via something: He came home by way of Toledo.

Except for
Apart from; with the exception of: Except for this mistake, you did very well

In addition to
As well as; besides: In addition to directing the play, she designed most of the scenery.

In back of
Means behind: The trash is kept in back of the store.

In case of
If there should happen to be: A number to call in case of emergency.

In front of
At or near the front part of (something): Not in front of the children!

In place of
Instead of someone or something; as a substitute for someone or something:
I changed my mind. I want a red one in place of the blue one.

In spite of
In opposition to all efforts of: He still loves her in spite of everything.

Instead of
Rather than: He walked to school instead of taking the car.

Next to
Beside; alongside: A adventure playground is located next to the main building.

On account of
Due to and owing to: He was kept in after school on account of his bad behaviour.

On behalf of
Speaking or acting for: On behalf of all those present, may I thank you for a well executed presentation.

On top of
Fully informed about: A senator who is always on top of the issues.

Out for
Definition: To be + out for Searching:  I'm looking out for some new door handles.

Owing to
Because of; on account of: I couldn't attend, owing to illness.

Prior to
Preceding; before: Prior to the changes of ownership and editorship

Regardless of
In spite of: We will persevere regardless of past failures.

With regard to
Concerning; about: I spoke to him with regard to his future

Las Valkirias

Una vez leí en un libro de Paulo Coelho “Todo lo que ocurre una vez, puede no ocurrir jamás. Pero todo lo que ocurre dos veces, terminará sucediendo una tercera”, desde entonces esa idea ha formado parte de mi vida, y es una grata sorpresa volverlo a encontrar en las Valkirias.

No soy muy afecto a la poesía, pero que tal ésta de Oscar Wilde.

Destruimos siempre aquello que más amamos

en el campo abierto, o en una emboscada;

algunos con la ligereza del cariño

otros con la dureza de la palabra;

los cobardes destruyen con un beso,

los valientes destruyen con la espada.

 De la poesía a los ángeles. ¿Existirán?. No me lo creo mucho, pero sería hermoso que si.

¿Has tenido la sensación de que, en determinados momentos en tu vida, alguien te observa? -- preguntó Paulo.

-- ¿Cómo los sabes?

-- Porque lo sé. Son momentos en los que, sin tener conciencia, notamos la presencia de los ángeles.

Los ángeles son mensajeros de Dios. Ellos nos dicen empieza a moverte, y yo empezaré a cuidar de tu camino.

La segunda mente. -- Ésa es la segunda mente  -- dijo --. La que está cantando esa canción. Podría ser una preocupación cualquiera. O si estuvieses enamorado, podrías tener ahí dentro a la persona con la que te gustaría estar, o lo que desearías olvidar. Pero la segunda mente no es fácil: trabaja independientemente de tu voluntad.

¿Tú nunca tuviste amores aprisionados?
-- ¡Son los peores amores, amores terribles! -- Continuó Took, sin poder contener la risa --- Viajas, intentas olvidar, pero la segunda menta te está diciendo todo el tiempo: "¡Ella adoraría esto!", "¡Caray, qué bueno sería si ella estuviera aquí".

El espacio mágico. Todos los hombres y animales, creamos una especie de ‘espacio mágico’ a nuestro alrededor. Generalmente es un círculo de cinco metros de radio, y prestamos atención a todo lo que entra en él. No importa si son personas, mesas, teléfonos o vitrinas: intentamos mantener el control de este pequeño mundo que nosotros mismos hemos creado.

”Los magos, sin embargo,  miran siempre a lo lejos. Ellos amplían este ‘espacio mágico’ y tratan de controlar muchas cosas más, a eso le llaman mirar al horizonte”.

¿Qué son las Valquirias?. Ninfas del palacio de votan. La palabra valquiria proviene del nórdico antiguo valkyrja y significa la que elige a los caídos en batalla. Mensajeras de los dioses, conducían a los heroes a la muerte y después al paraíso. Simbolizan al mismo tiempo la embriaguez del coraje y el reposo del guerrero, la aventura del amor en la lucha, el encuentro y la pérdida.

¿Qué es la rutina? Es un ritual cuidadosamente elaborado, que el ser humano procura ejecutar con precisión porque tiene miedo de que todo se venga abajo si no cumple con cualquiera de sus partes.

Como cualquier libro de Coelho no podía faltar la mención del sentimiento más hermoso del mundo. El amor. “La pasión es algo bueno, divertido, y que podía enriquecer mucho la vida. Pero era distinta del amor. Y el amor vale cualquier precio, no merecía ser cambiado por nada”.

Frases de Valkirias:

* El mundo está en las manos de quienes tuvieran el coraje de soñar y de vivir de sus sueños.

* Mantén nuestra mano firme y haz que no desistamos de luchar, aun sintiendo que somos indignos de la batalla.

* Quien es feliz sólo puede mirar el mundo con amor, esa fuerza que  regenera todo lo que existe en el universo.


Paulo Coelho - Las Valkirias (Amazon)

Steve Jobs

Ayer feliz porque estaba estrenando mi MacBook Pro, hoy me entero que Steve Jobs se ha adelantado. Un visionario, un hombre que trascendió por el impacto en la vida de muchas personas. El mundo no hubiera sido el mismo sin él.

Aleph

1.  Las Oraciones
¿Pero las oraciones no nos acercan a Dios?

-- Voy a responder con otra pregunta. ¿Todas esas oraciones que rezas harán que el sol salga mañana? Claro que no: el sol nace porque obedece a una ley universal. Dios está cerca de nosotros, independientemente de las plegarias que hacemos.

-- ¿Estás diciendo que nuestras oraciones son inútiles? -- insiste Tatiana.

-- De ninguna manera. Si no te despiertas temprano, nunca conseguirás ver al sol naciendo. Si no rezas aun cuando Dios simpre esté cerca, nunca consiguirás notar Su presencia.

 2. El perdón
Seré naturalmente capaz de amar por encima de todo desamor.
De dar aun habiendo sido desposeido de todo.
De trabajar alegremente incluso en medio de todos los obstáculos.
De extender la mano aun cuando esté en la más completa soledad y abandono.
De secar las lágrimas aun en medio del llanto.
De creer aun sin ser creyente.

3. Yo te amo
Yo te amo como un río, que crea las condiciones para que la vegetación y las flores crezcan por donde pasa. Te amo como un río que da de beber a las personas que tienen sed y transporta a las personas donde quieren llegar. Yo te amo como un río, que entiende que necesita correr diferente en una cascada y aprender a reposar en una depresión terreno.

4. Experimentar, aprendizaje.
¿Es posible desviarse del camino trazado por Dios? Sí, pero siempre es un error. ¿Es posible evitar el dolor? Sí, pero entonces no aprenderás nada. ¿Es posible conocer las cosas sin experimentarlas verdaderamente? Sí, pero ellas nunca formarán realmente parte de ti.

Paulo Coelho - Aleph (Amazon)

Compassion

Love & Compassion are necessities, they are not luxuries without them humanity can not survive. ~ Dalai Lama

Compassion is comprised from that capacity to see clearly in to the nature of suffering, is the ability to really stand strong and to recognize also that I'm not separate from this suffering.

Compassion has enemies and those enemies are things like pity, moral outrage & fear.

“When your fear touches someone’s pain, it becomes pity, when your love touches someone’s pain, it become compassion.” ~ Stephen Levine

You Lost Me

I am done, smoking gun
We've lost it all, the love is gone
She has won, now it's no fun
We've lost it all, the love is gone

And we had magic
And this is tragic
You couldn't keep your hands to yourself

I feel like our world's been infected
And somehow you left me neglected
We've found our lives been changed
Babe, you lost me

And we tried, oh how we cried
We lost ourselves, the love has died
And though we tried you can't deny
We're left as shells, we lost the fight

And we had magic
And this is tragic
You couldn't keep your hands to yourself

I feel like our world's been infected
And somehow you left me neglected
We've found our lives been changed
Babe, you lost me

Now I know you're sorry and we were sweet
But you chose lust when you deceived me
And you'll regret it, but it's too late
How can I ever trust you again?

I feel like our world's been infected
And somehow you left me neglected
We've found our lives been changed
Babe, you lost me

Matando nuestros sueños

El primer síntoma de el proceso de matar nuestros sueños es la falta de tiempo. La gente más ocupada piensa yo tengo que saber que en mi vida siempre hay tiempo suficiente para hacer todo. Aquellos que hacen nada estan siempre cansados y no ponen atención al pequeño esfuerzo que se requiere hacer. La queja constante que el día es muy corto. La verdad es, ellos estan temerosos de pelear una buena pelea.

El segundo síntoma de la muerte de nuestros sueños se encuentra en nuestras certezas. Porque nosotros no queremos ver la vida como una gran aventura, empezamos a pensar en nosotros mismo como sabios, justos y correctos y procurando preguntar tan poco de la vida. Miramos más allá de las paredes del día a día de nuestra existencia, y oimos el sonido de las lanzas rompiendose, olemos el polvo y el sudor, y creemos que ni la victoria o derrota son importantes; pero lo que es importante es solo que ellos están si están peleando una buena pelea.

Y finalmente, el tercer síntoma el dejar pasar nuestros sueños en paz. La vida se vuelve un Domingo en la tarde; y pedimos nada importante, y desistimos de pedir nada mas de lo que nosotros podemos dar. En ese estado, nosotros pensamos en nosotros como maduros; ponemos de lado las fantasías de nuestra juventud, y buscamos logros personales y profesionales. Nosotros estamos sorprendidos cuando la gente de nuestra edad dice que ellos aún quieren hacer esto o aquellos en la vida. Pero realmente, en el fondo de nuestro corazón, nosotros sabemoos que lo que está pasando es que hemos renunciado a la batalla de nuestros sueños. Nosotros hemos decidido no pelear una buena pelea.


Traducción de blog de Paulo Coelho.