• Tamil99 Keyboard Layout in Ubuntu Linux
    Technology,  தமிழ்

    Get Tamil99 Keyboard in Ubuntu Linux

    தமிழில் தட்டச்சு செய்ய சிறந்தது தமிழ் 99 (Tamil99) தட்டச்சு முறை. இரண்டாண்டுகளுக்கு முன் மைக்ரோசாப்ட் (Microsoft) நிறுவனம், தங்களின் விண்டோஸ் 10இல் (Windows 10) தமிழ்99 தட்டச்சு முறையை கொண்டுவந்தது. இதனால் நீங்கள் விண்டோஸ் 10 பயனாளி என்றால் வேறு எந்த மென்பொருளும் இல்லாமல் விண்டோஸ் 10யில் நேரடியாக தமிழ்99 முறையில் தட்டச்சு செய்யலாம். தமிழ்99 விசைப்பலகை டிவிஸ் (TVS) நிறுவனம் விசைப்பலகை ஒன்றைப் பல வருடங்களாக விற்கிறது. சில நாட்களுக்கு முன் நண்பர் ஒருவர், உபுண்டு லினக்சு (Ubuntu Linux) இயக்குதளத்தில் (Operating System) எப்படி தமிழ்99 தட்டச்சு முறையை நிறுவது என்று கேட்டார். இந்த பதிவில் அதற்கான செயல்முறையை கொடுத்துள்ளேன். Execute the following commands from Terminal – there is a log-out and log-in step in between: $ sudo apt install ibus-m17n Log out and log back in. $ ibus-setup Then follow the on-screen instructions to add “Tamil…

  • Lounge,  Technology

    .EU domains are only for EU residents!

    Just last month I was all praises of the European Union for its pioneering work in framing laws that protect the interest of online users with #GDPR, and, for announcing a bug-bounty to find security holes in the Open Source software it uses including VLC Player, 7-Zip, Filezilla, KeePass, Notepad++ and others. But this week’s guidance from UK government for owners of .EU domains is not encouraging. It appears that .EU domains can only be bought by EU residents and UK residents who already have a .EU domain may be sued or get kicked out post #Brexit. Registrars including GoDaddy are already implementing the rules. In the past I had…

  • With Windows 95 Manual
    Microsoft

    Running Windows 95 on your new PC or Mac

    Windows 95 was one of the most successful operating systems that were ever produced for Desktop computing. I used to love it when it came, it brought so many powerful capabilities to the hitherto humble PC including multimedia, streaming video, video conference (remember NetMeeting), powerful web browsing, mainstream 32-bit computing and so on. This month, a talented software engineer at Slack, Mr Felix Rieseberg has rekindled the love for Windows 95 by releasing a version of the OS that runs as an application. It sounds insane but seeing it in action it was awesome. Released as an Electron app – meaning it doesn’t modify your current OS in any way – it can…

  • Coding,  Microsoft

    Writing .NET Core apps for Windows, Mac OS & Linux

    Having got the newly released “Visual Studio 2017” installed in my PC, I decided to try writing cross-platform .NET Core Apps. I started with the simplest of apps, to write a console app and see how it goes. To follow along you can download Visual Studio Community edition, which is free or the commercial versions. You can refer to this Microsoft doc titled “Building a C# Hello World Application with .NET Core with Visual Studio 2017” for additional information on what I am doing here. The next step is IMPORTANT. You need to access the .csproj file by right-clicking on the project in solution explorer and select “Edit MyConsoleApp.csproj”. CSProj…

  • Events,  Rostrum,  Speeches

    Chatbots and NLP for Tamil

    தமிழ் இணையக் கல்விக்கழகம் அதன் கணித்தமிழ்ப் பேரவை சார்பாக இந்த வாரம் “இயற்கை மொழியாய்வுப் பயிலரங்கம்” ஒன்றை நடத்துகிறார்கள். இது முழுக்க முழுக்க ஆய்வாளர்கள் மற்றும் கல்வியாளர்களுக்கான கோடை முகாம் நிகழ்ச்சி. இதில் எனக்கென்ன வேலை என்கிறீர்களா?. கணினி தொழில்துறையிலிருப்பவர்கள் தமிழ் இயற்கை மொழியாய்வை எப்படிப் பார்க்கிறார்கள், அதன் வருங்காலப் பயன்பாடுகள் அவர்களின் பார்வையில் என்ன, என்ற தலைப்பில் இன்று என்னை பேச அழைத்தார்கள். நானும் எனக்கு தெரிந்ததை ஒரு முப்பது நிமிட அமர்வில் பகிர்ந்துக் கொண்டேன். Tamil Virtual Academy had organized a Natural Language Processing (NLP) workshop this week for academicians and researchers. I gave an invited talk for 30 minutes on why the software industry cares about developments in Tamil NLP and the applications of it. I focussed on recent developments in Chatbots and introduction of Bot Framework from Microsoft,…

  • Coding,  Microsoft

    Visual Studio 2015 installs Google Chrome

    As a Microsoft technology enthusiasts for over two decades, I thought I had seen them all. But with the “new” Microsoft under the stewardship of Satya Nadella, they seem to be defying tradition. From Microsoft’s former CEO Steve Ballmer calling “Linux is a cancer” to today Satya’s Microsoft open sourcing .NET Framework and making it available for Linux, it has been a remarkable ride. Recently when I was installed Visual Studio 2015 CTP 6 from Windows Insider Program, this change hit me in the face, what blew me away was, wait for it, seeing the option in Visual Studio 2015 to install Google Chrome! To be technically correct, Visual Studio…

  • Apps

    Password Manager

    I have written 8 years back on the Password Manager I use was KeePass. I continue to use till day and love it. KeePass is a popular open source password management software, it allows you to securely store your username, password, URL, attachments in one single encrypted database file (KDBX). The database file is protected by one master password, so from remembering hundreds of passwords, you need to remember one password. You can keep that one password long (hence secure). I sync that one database file across my devices using cloud storage apps like Microsoft OneDrive, you can use that or Google Drive or DropBox or other equivalent apps. There are…

  • Apps,  Gadgets

    Virtual Box error

    After getting a new PC, installing all apps I needed, I finally came to installing Oracle’s Virtual Box and restored my backup containing all virtual images (VMDK). When I tried to run a Windows 7 image, I was greeted by an error from VirtualBox saying “81954AF5-4D2F-31EB-A142-B7AF187A1C41”. Also checking the properties for the Guest OS, the processor settings were grayed. After good amount of trials & searching I did the following which fixed the error and I was able to run the images. Enabled virtualization support in BIOS, this was the reason for the processor settings to be not available in Virtual Box, as can be expected Uninstalled the latest version…