Just like Jim Rohn said: Miss a meal if you have to, but don’t miss a book, these days I force myself to read more books more often than before. Here is a list of English fictions that I managed to read fortnightly, in the order of my preference, just in case you are looking for good books and want ...

Kein Sieger glaubt an den Zufall. — Friedrich Nietzsche (English translation: No winner believes in coincidence) Photo by this girl.

If you show some friends an ancient trick to multiply two numbers in your head within seconds, typically you would either get a dismissal (“Fast? A calculator or Google is faster!”) or an excitement (“How useful!”). Each response is justified. In our daily activities, we seldom face the situation th...

“You could not live without quaternion, could you?”, so was the impression of my advisor.

I decided to ask her. “Sorry if I’m rude, but isn’t your perfume Escada Moon Sparkle For Men?”

Congratulations to the Qt Creator team for the Beta release! In case you live under the rock, Qt Creator is the new-IDE-on-the-block. It is now open source and it has just reached beta, so just download it (Windows, Mac, Linux) or learn more about it. For the braves, check also its shiny new open re...

(Or see the video on YouTube)

Let us start with a screenshot:

This week in Oslo we have visitors, as evidenced from this picture:

The beauty of taking a trip from/to South East Asia is simply its ridiculous journey. In the last 72 hours, I have been in 6 different airports, gone through 7 hours timeshifting, trapped 3 times in inhuman traffic jams, exposed to 40 Kelvin temperature drop, and of course enjoyed only sporadic in-f...

I heard that seven is a magic number. I am seeing the seventh winter in my life. How magical.

Things are still exciting as ever. In two weeks, I will be in Bali. Yes, I will be there for the Workshop on Open Source and Open Content (WOSOC) that is held in conjuction with IEEE Conference on Signal-Image Technology and Internet-based Systems.

In Oslo? Don’t miss Mithas The Sweethouse (Grønland 2A Oslo)!

As Harry entered the room, he saw Ron hopelessly fighting with his magic tablet. Ron was desperately trying to look for something using the tablet. Harry pulled his wand and then “Flickify!"

Here is a challenge: how to scroll QWebFrame programmatically, if the scroll bars are invisible? At first you might think: Aha, let us just set the value of the scroll bars! The idea looks great, however it does not work that way (since QWebView is not a scroll area). Though you can change the value...

Another example that I showed in Developer Days was an alternative way to tint an image. Suppose you want to have a little feedback to the user when s/he puts the mouse on an icon, what you can do is to colorize the icon while the cursor is still on top of it. Changing the overall tone of the color ...

It does not work on Linux (yet), but this video and voice chat right inside Google Mail will be definitely a killer!

Remember the tradition that I started in Redwood City? Well, the parallax sliding demo was for the graphics talk. For my QtWebKit presentation, the challenge was different. Basically it boils down to a visual version of Google Search. Instead only getting the hits and some text snippet, you should a...

Once a while, somebody asked me about my dissertation. Since I am working in software industry these days, it is a bit awkward to mention my previous physics and electrical-engineering related work. Now the job becomes easier. I can point those curious guys to the following paper:

At Redwood City Qt Developer Days (also where, BTW, a bunch of KDE geeks made a funny group photo), I started a tradition: throw an idea for a demo and I will implement it for the talk. The challenge for my graphics talk was the subtle effect in the Android‘s home screen. We saw T-Mobile G1 the nigh...

Group Photo – AndroidOriginally uploaded by Austin Ziegler Group Photo – Main Staircase Building 43Originally uploaded by Austin Ziegler

KDE and Qt Developers Meet Android Originally uploaded by vanRijn

I wonder if this juice is available somewhere in Oslo, or even Norway, or even Scandinavia, or even mainland Europe…

For details, check out Jason’s post on KDE/Qt California People Sightings.

Credit: picture by this guy.

By popular demand, here is a quick and easy recipe to make a home-made, fresh, delicious lamb pizza. For faithful Planet KDE readers who are sick of my occasional food ramblings, please skip this one (again).

I am back in Oslo for a short rest before flying again to US. Of course, I am still having symptoms of sleep deprivation, in the last 5 days in Munich I managed to accumulate only 19 hours of sleep. Though the schedule was tight, I could squeeze few hours of sight-seeing, among others to visit Castl...

Don’t skip Viktualienmarkt, a 200-years-old food market in a square in Munich downtown (Viktualien apparently means food, or rather Lebensmittel in German). In those hundreds of stalls, you can find a lot of things, from fresh organic vegetables (and pumpkins, see above) to a wide selection of ready...

You think you are good? Why don’t you try to win a Segway or some N810. Head straight to:

“The view from up above is enchanting, especially the view from the Marienbrücke of the castle,…”