Ecolitan - Linux, Chess and Politics

Vodafone Mobile Connect

2009-08-28T19:58:00.002+02:00

Not long ago we got a new Vodafone Wireless stick and I didn't think it would be difficult to get it working under Ubuntu. Firstly I got the Vodafone Mobile Connect software which was kindly provided by Betavine, and installed it and got everything working fine on my laptop, the real problem would come with trying to get the software running on my wifes laptop.

I found the X86 version of the software, installed it and it worked, but when I later went to run an update I found out the VMC application had a missing dependancy and that apt wouldn't upgrade because it considered VMC to be a broken application which needed to be removed, I tried to get apt to ignore the missing dependancy but it wasn't too happy about that, the only solution apt would accept was to install the missing dependancy or remove VMC. The dependancy was ozerocdoff, which I couldn't find on the Betavine site for X86.

Eventually I decided to edit the VMC deb and remove the line from its control file that lists ozerocdoff as a dependancy (which it obviously isn't since the application runs quite happily without it being installed), then rebuild the deb and reinstall from the new deb file. Once I learned how to do that, everthing went back to normal and is working fine now. It only took a day of my time to get it all going.

Languages

2009-08-08T19:23:00.005+02:00

I started learning C last week, after having put off learning any serious programming languages for my whole life. I've also just finished two months of intensive German courses, and am finding that the syntax of C is remarkably simpler than German, which makes me wonder why I put off learning it for so long. I guess it's just a matter of motivation, living here in Germany I need to learn the language to survive and thrive, with programming I was always able to just administer the applications other people had written.

Now I'd like to take my programming a bit deeper than just shell scripts and learn to solve bigger problems, I'm also finding that learning how the code works also helps with administration tasks too.

Saalfeld Rapid Chess Tournament

2009-05-11T12:08:00.000+02:00

Last Saturday I participated in the local Saalfeld annual rapid chess tournament, held in the Hotel Tanne here in Saalfeld. I hadn't planned on participating in this tournament in advance but because it was just down the road I decided to take a look before round one at how many people were there, and decided to register.

The format was a 7 round swiss, G20+0 with everyone playing together in one grade. This was a bit funny because there was a GM an IM and an FM participating and the nearest players to them were around 2000 stregnth.

Round 1:
I paired with the FM Sobolevsky,Leonid (2300) as black and tried out my Alekhines defence for the first time over the board. From my side of the board it seemed like he had a crushing attack and would checkmate me, but he allowed the exchange of queens and was let off the hook. The price for escaping checkmate was an inferior pawn structure and he outplayed me in the endgame.

Round 2:
I took white against a kid about 11, Kania,Markus (1178) and tricked him from a Ruy Lopez into an losing variation of the Two Knights. He resigned after 13 moves.

Round 3:
Black against Seidel,Thomas (2031) I tried out my Gruenfeld Defence over the board for the first time. I obtained a superior position but couldn't find a way to covert it into anything usefull within the time avaliable. Eventually the clock got the better of me and I blundered away some pawns before losing on time.

Round 4:
With white against Krämer,Alexander (1533) we had an even game up until the rook and pawn endgame where I made some innacuracies and eventually lost.

Round 5:
Taking the black pieces against Schneiderheinze,R (1637) I tried out my Gruenfeld once again, this time with more success I obtained a good position out of the opening and went on to exploit it throughout the game.

Round 6:
White against Jahn,Christoph (1307) in a Sicillian Taimanov my opponent dropped a whole piece in the most blatant fashion, by moving it undefended onto an attacked square. He swore and played on, but paid the price of the mistake quite quickly.

Round 7:
With the white once again, this time against Jahn,Christoph (1729) I faced the counter-center. I didn't have a very promising position out of the opening and felt that if I didn't do something drasitic I would get ground out. The position was complicated and my opponent was moving slower than me, so I launched a somewhat dubious/unsound attack on the kingside against his king. Even though objectivly his position was much better, he spent longer and longer thinking over each move, and I deliberatly made the position as complicated as possible. He got into a real time scrabble and blunbered away two pawns going into the endgame, before losing on time. He was really pissed and told me quite loudly about how unfair it was and how he should have won, while the other games nearby were still playing. I kept the smile off my face until he'd left.

Final results of the tournament were that the GM won as expected with 6.5/7, I scored 4/7 with a performance of 1731 which was not too bad for me.

Tournament Results

Test

2009-05-08T11:29:00.000+02:00

The test post.