Installing drush on CentOS (as root):

Do I need jailkit?
Here’s how to install jailkit:

The jailkit configuration files are in /etc/jailkit/

Jailing drush is in fact about jailing php-cli (or just php depending on your distro).

Turns out no scripts are needed (other than jailkit). I added the following to /etc/jailkit/jk_init.ini

And ran:

Now to setup the drush alias:

with the following contents:

Next, set up a passwordless login to the remote server using:

And you should be able to run drush commands from the local machine using:
drush @remote1 status

Going to test this shortly…

But then it hit me: We’re going up to Bekaa to visit Pia’s aunt. Plenty of food today! Here’s a sample (low quality pics from my phone!):

Tabbouleh:

An assortment of sauteed wild greens and fresh “Aisha Khanum” beans the traditional vegetarian way:

Wild thym:

Wild dandelion with caramelized onions on top:

The beans again:

Pickled green olives:

Pumpkin Kibbeh with Spinach, Chickpeas and Walnuts:

I really did not eat that much, but I knew that the diet was over. The next day we were invited to a friend’s house (a sushi chef) and he made the most beautiful sushi/maki plates. His wife and other friends made Pancit, roasted chicken legs with rosemary, organic green salad, and about 10 other things. And then a couple of days later we were invited for a barbecue dinner at my in-laws. And more invites are lined up for the coming days and weeks. So I’m giving up…

Or maybe I’ll restart again in a couple of days. Meanwhile, I finished baking a wonderful whole-wheat sandwich loaf with honey and olive oil. The smell is great and I’m pretty sure it tastes great as well.

Coffee brewing now. Good day.

On with lunch:
Pia made me a beautiful salad (same as yesterday), with a large portion of moudardara. Feeling full and satisfied!

I wrapped 3 thin slices of salami and lots of rockets in a medium size Lebanese pita bread for an afternoon snack.

And then for dinner (after having a beer with friends) Pia suggested baked potatoes. I just added a sprinkle of light tuna, some baba ghanouj and a few mint leaves. Great stuff, and I still feel light (did 2 quick sets of 35 pushups afterwards).

Breakfast: 3 slices of mortadella with olives, wrapped in medium size Lebanese bread
Lunch: bulgur bedfeen light (~2 cups)
Dinner: egg drop noodle (70gr dry noodles, 1 egg, 2 table spoons coconut milk, spices)
Snacks: 1 apple, 1 handful of peanuts, 1 grapefruit with a teaspoon of honey.

Weighted in at 83kg

Let’s see how this goes.
Pia tells me the lot makes up for 1739 cal.

I wish this worked with people too!

and here’s the gist of it

#!/bin/sh
URL="http://apache.mirrors.hoobly.com/maven/maven-3/3.0.5/binaries/apache-maven-3.0.5-bin.tar.gz"
INSTALLATION_DIR=/usr/local/maven
if [ -d $INSTALLATION_DIR ]; then
    mv $INSTALLATION_DIR $INSTALLATION_DIR.$(date +"%Y%m%d")
fi
mkdir $INSTALLATION_DIR
wget -O- $URL | tar zx --strip-components=1 -C $INSTALLATION_DIR
cat << _EOF_ > /etc/profile.d/maven.sh
#!/bin/bash
export MAVEN_HOME=$INSTALLATION_DIR
_EOF_
cat << 'EOF' >> /etc/profile.d/maven.sh
export PATH=$INSTALLATION_DIR/bin:$PATH
EOF
echo maven installed to $INSTALLATION_DIR
$INSTALLATION_DIR/bin/mvn --version

Bread making

We had been thinking about this Moulinex bread machine for a rather long time. Pia did the research and it seemed like the best one we could find in the Lebanese market. We didn’t shell out an extra 60$ for the “Baguette” version as it seemed very silly to pay that much for a simple insert!
Since then, we have been making our own bread. Played around with the recipes and indulged in some “pain au lait” and brioche the first week or so. Then we moved back to our regular whole wheat bread. That smells and tastes just great.
I am still looking for Rye flour, and not finding any. Maybe I’m just looking in the wrong places.
pics coming soon

Small hacks

Desk lamp

For some reason, I am not able to find anything these days. Or things are simply too expensive to be reasonable. We need a couple of desk lamps, but I couldn’t find anything below 100$. Now tell me this is not crazy! I found clip-on lamps at the Chinese store in Manara for 4000LBP(~3$). But their necks were too low. So I bought a microphone stand for 15$ and fixed the neck of the clip-on lamp on that. Pia was positively impressed and I felt pretty proud of myself. Compare this to prices on Amazon! *sigh*
pics coming soon

Internet TV

I did not hook the TV to the cable/antenna/sat receiver yet. For different reasons (mainly being lazy). I will probably do that soon, but meanwhile I am enjoying getting all the latest TV series and my favourite movies thru a combination of flexget, deluge and xbmc. Oh, and here’s a good howto to get you started.
I also use the official XBMC remote for android and Transdroid (not from market) from my phone to control those. It’s a good combination, pretty easy and I don’t have to think about it. The only problem I have is that the old Dell i6400 I’ve been using as HTPC is slowly dying of old age and I have yet to find a suitable replacement!

Cloud9 IDE

Almost all of the PCs/Laptops we have are in sync. Still using the IDE and re-syncing the files on the laptop after working all day on the desktop (even with the ease of git) is a bit annoying for the lazy programmer in me. And I have been looking for an IDE to use on the road even when I’m out of the house. Enter Cloud9 IDE. Sure it’s nice to work in the cloud, but it turns out they have a standalone version that doesn’t have all the bells and whistles (no problem here). You will need nodejs setup along with a few dependencies and modules. But it’s really worth it. I’ve been playing with a new personal app for the android (and perhaps iOS) to be released soon and doing all of the work (so far) inside c9.

Gadgets wishlist

Here’s my list for the coming months:

• MYO: Unleash your inner Jedi. preordered
• Sphero: I’m wondering if I should get a dog with that, or just let the cats play with it
• Laptop/Tablet: still not sure what to get

Yesterday I was playing For Elena, and I ended up with Tony Hanna‘s “La thalifini bil shanab“. Don’t ask why, the mind works in strange ways. And after I finished going through it the first time (slowly) I started thinking of the cultural implications of this song. Let me try to translate the first part in English and see if it makes sense:

Don’t make me swear on my moustache
Don’t try to shame me with reproaches
From the bottom of my heart I swear to you
That I will always be faithful to your love
But keep the moustache out of it

The moustache has a very important part of the male look for centuries. In Arabic many idioms, sayings and even curses are related to the facial hair on the upper lip. At one time, the only guarantee needed from a man in Lebanon was him touching his moustache. That was the same as saying “you have my word” or “I swear on the Bible/Coran”. Tony Hanna was in fact saying, you can have anything you want and I’ll offer all the guarantees you need, but don’t even think of mentioning the moustache in a derogatory way.
But in this day and age where men are clean-shaven and won’t live up to their end of any bargain even if it’s written, sealed and notarized, does Tony Hanna’s Shanab/Moustache mean anything?

Here’s one saying I heard from my dad a lot during my early teens (when I had a moustache), translated: if the moustache makes a man, a [scaredy] cat would be the most manly man. [that really needs a better translation!]

Sorry Tony Hanna, this is really not about you. It’s about the image of virility and manly honour you represented in that song.