In the quest to implement tiling in KWin, I've decided to use binary trees as an internal representation. This morning, I hacked on it to produce a decent prototype, just to check if the idea would work well enough, without introducing too much complexity in the code. At the moment, it does tend to crash or have repaint issues once in a while. But it works, and it does what tiling is supposed to do.…

Well, my holiday has been cut short... I'm leaving next Saturday to spend the last month and a half of my vacations in college. I've received an internship opportunity to work as a Playtester and Beta-tester MILLEE. I really enjoyed the short vacation though, I learnt to drive, did a lot of swimming, and hacked some decent code. The last year (academic) has been really really unique, perhaps the most satisfying and enjoyable one.…

Yesterday I committed code which adds a semblance of tiling to kwin. Every time you launch a window, it will be maximized vertically, but each window shares the width of the screen equally. You can check out code from KDE svn. The location is /home/kde/branches/work/kwin-tiling/ You'll need to edit $KDEDIR/share/config/kwinrc and set Placement=Tiling. Then you are ready to go. Right now there are no configuration options, no key bindings, nothing!…

I'm home! Till almost the end of July I'll be @ home. Which means a better internet connection at the very least :p So I've been swimming and learning to drive! Driving is fun, I've finished five days out of the 22 and I've managed not to hit anyone or anything. In programming, I'm working on a game using Canvas for the CodeChef game contest. You can track its progress on github.…

Well, none of my two proposals got selected for Summer of Code 09. Of course I will be applying to Summer of KDE soon, and getting a lot of experience over the next year, so that I have higher chances next time. Which reminds me, I am on the way to getting a KDE svn account, and I already have 5 patches into KGet. :) My code will be in 4.…

* This is another GSoC related post, normal users please ignore it. Abstract ======== KGet is a versatile and user-friendly download manager for KDE. This project will add various features to KGet to improve its functionality and usability. These include semantic information via Nepomuk, support for digital signatures, better Metalink integration and good Plasma support. Personal details ================ Name: Nikhil Marathe Email Address: nsm.nikhil@gmail.com Freenode IRC Nick: nsm Location (City, Country and/or Time Zone): Mumbai, India ( GMT + 5:30 )…

*Note to my normal blog readers, this post may not be of interest to you Abstract: This project will add a tiling layout mode to KWin. Tiling window managers displays all windows on the desktop at once, side by side. This allows easy navigation and allows tasks shared across applications to be carried out effortlessly. Unfortunately it is usually presented as a power user option. This will be an attempt to make it more accessible to new users.…

The exams are over and I've been hacking a bit on the Arduino today. So I came up with a simple hack which blinks an LED on the Arduino if you've got unread mails in your Gmail inbox. I assume that you're familiar with the basics of Arduino. Equipment A computer with an internet connection Python pySerial Arduino ( I'm using Duemilanove ) Red LED Pushbutton (optional) Wires On the computer…

I was in mumbai over the weekend, attending Techfest 2009 at IIT Bombay. Techfest has been a large and great event for many years now, bringing cutting edge technology to students and holding great lectures by iconic people in technology. Me and three of my friends went specifically to attend the Physical Computing workshop by Keyur Sorathia, an interaction designer. This was my first foray into hardware hacking, mainly because hardware components are not so accessible in India.…

I went paragliding again last week, to finish my Elementary Pilot course. I had my first solo flight from a height of 45m on 24th Dec 2008. It was an exhilarating feeling, although short. After 3 days of solo top to bottoms, I now have 15 min of total air time. I'll put up the pictures soon. The sight is Shinde Wadi, around 125km from Mumbai.…