欧州自転車レース追っかけ日記

Swiss Toll road pass (vignette) and its e-Version
In many European countries, motorways are not toll-free or simply toll roads.

In Germany motorways, Autobahns, are free.

In France, you have to pay for them as you go. In other words, most of the time the further you go, the more you pay.

In Switzerland, there is only one way to pay for them, a yearly pass, or a vignette. I think the first time I paid for it must be around 2005 or 2006. Since then the basic system has not been changed. You have to purchase the sticker that would go on the inner side of the windshield. It is valid for one year or more precisely within a year plus one month on both ends. In other words, you can buy it in December and it will expire in the second January. For example if you buy it in December 2024 and it will expire at the end of January 2025 (by then you are supposed to get the new vignette).

In Austria as far as I know there were a couple of ways to pay for them (motroways). There were, ten years ago or so, short-term vignettes and long-term vignette.

I am thinking of a short car trip to Zurich (Zoo-rick in English and Choo-ri-he in German), Switzerland toward the end of September. That is when and where the World Championship of road race is held.

I would buy it (vignette) at the border crossing points from the people who were there (border police officers?) on arriving at the border. This time I want to change the way I buy it.

I knew that I could buy it (the vignette sticker) in Luxembourg at the office of ACL (perhaps Auto Club Luxembourg, a variant of AAA in the U.S.). This time I checked its web page and then I learned that I could buy as a non-member I have to pay extra 2.5 euros in addition to the 44 euros (equivalent of 40 Swiss Francs). Adding the required time and fuel, I would end up paying more, I thought.

I checked out the website and learned that there was a brand-new way to purchase it. It is called e-vignette. Unlike its sibling, normal old-school sticker vignette, it does not have a physical presence. It exists in the database kept by the issuing body, a branch of Swiss government, I guess. I have to register my license plate information.

I think all those cameras installed on the Swiss highways pick up the license plates and check if the vehicle have valid vignette if the camera can not make out the physical sticker vignette on the windshield before sending the citation for traffic violation tickets.

If my plans for a small trip (taking some days off) is granted (from my workplace), I would purchase the e-vignette and see what happens at the border crossing point.

antiX (version 23 and updated to the latest) on Mac Pro Late2013 experiencing a problem
I installed antiX on my Mac Pro Late2013 and I was enjoying it. Well I was but now I ran into a problem.

antiX works well generally on my Mac Pro Late2013. I tested the USB memory stick Live environment for several times before deciding to install on a USB connected SSD (formerly used in my MacBook Pro 13-inch Late2010).

I had already tested this Linux distribution on Compaq Presario CQ56 for a while tyring to install Japanese Input System before abandoning it. I knew that I was so close to completing the setup but I had to abandon it. I wanted a revenge. I needed it.

I wanted to install antiX on my Mac Pro for several reasons.

First I wanted to see if antiX was a better choice than Kali Linux or Lubuntu as a daily drive.

Seconly, I wanted to complete the installation of Japanese Input System on antiX. This details will follow in the following paragraphs below.

Thirdly, I think Linux is is very cool. I want to be associated with this coolness.

Some reviews praise the outlook or the appearance of particular distributions. "... looks stunning" or "... beautiful" but every time I see one of those I think to myself that looks are deceiving or the look has nothing to do with what lies inside.

Why do they (those review articles) focus on the appearances? Maybe because they (review writers) spend so much time just enough to touch the surface (appearance) but not enough to see what really lies underneath. Or the review writers do know that the readers can not understand the subtle differences among those Linux distributions but that the readers can only recognize them by their looks. I strongly believe the latter is the case here.

How did it go?

antiX on Mac Pro Late2013
antiX 23 works very well on it. The installation image (Full/64 bit/runit) on the USB memory stick worked fine and still works fine.

I installed it on an SSD connected to one of its USB ports. It worked fine at first but upon updating "Pulse Audio Volume Control" ceased to work.

Since it (Pulse Audio Volume Control) is responsible for selecting the audio stream channels (Mac Pro's inner speakers or monitor's speakers through HDMI cable), now the audio comes out of the inner speaker (or speakers?). I wish future updates solve this problem soon.

Japanese Input Method fcitx5 and mozc combination
For some unknown reasons, antiX has Japanese Input Method as a package (bundled software pieces) ready to be installed. The problem that I found, however, was that it features "anthy" not "mozc". mozc is what I want.

I once installed this "package" on one of the Compaq Presario CQ56 machines and did not like it.

Now I chose "fcitx5" and "mozc" as separate pieces of software and let the installer install "recommended (by those two above" pieces of software.

After the installation, I could now write in Japanese. I was happy. Only a minor piece of annoyance remained then.

fcitx5 does not automatically start. I have to invoke "fcitx5 Configuration" first. This configuration software notices that what it is going to configure (namely the fcitx5) has not been running and then kindly tells me if I want it to run. When I click the button, fcitx5 runs.

How should I make it run automatically? I figured that
Menu -->
Control Center -->
Session -->
startup

I know I am supposed to write something to run fcitx5.

After searching for some information on the Internet and reading something on the Ubuntu forum, I decided to put "fcitx5 -d" and it seemed it worked.

Now I have to find out why so far Geany (or LibreOffice) only can handle Japanse Input but not Leafpad or Featherpad. I can read Japanese in any of these editors but can not write in Japanese in Leafpad or Featherpad.

In Japanese:続きをどうぞ [fcitx5 and mozc and other things]の続きを読む

テーマ:Linux - ジャンル:コンピュータ

1. 2024/08/27(火) 18:42:12|
2. Linux
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Testing antiX on my Mac Pro Late2013
I have run antiX live USB environment a couple of times on it and I liked it. I noticed something peculiar to this (or maybe other similar Macs) machine.

When the machine is booting, the booting process (I don't know but from one of the "runit" processes) puts out a message on the screen for me to choose the option. It prompts me to choose which graphic chip I want to use. The choice is either 1) or 2). It shows the identical chip name and etc.

They (2 lines) correspond to the two graphics cards (Apple's names are Slot-1 and Slot-2). The correct response to this question is "2" but not "1".

What would happen when you made the wrong choice, namely "1"?

The screen goes black while the system is running as the Slot-1 card is not connected to the monitor output in any ways.

I just made the wrong move and chose "1".


Installing antiX on Mac Pro Late2013
I had a couple of old (and smallish) SATA SSDs around. I havd also an external USB SATA case. So I decided to install on one of them (SSDs) antiX using Mac Pro Late2013.

It was easy if you knew what to do. This SSD had been inside the MacBook Pro 13-inch Mid2010 for many year before the MacBook Pro's primary SATA went awry. It took me some tweaking as I neglected this SSD for a while before I could initialize it and format it.

Anyway, my Mac Pro Late 2013 does not accept additional HDD or SDD or for that matter it does not accept (almost) anything inside at all. I know that there's a board that snugs into its Apple's own special SSD socket and accept two or more SSDs. What is it called?

A quick search found the "AngelShark Carrier Board". There could be other ones similar to this product.

So I installed antiX on this SSD from the boot image burnt on a USB memory stick.

Now I can run antiX on this Mac Pro Late213. I have installed 64 GB of RAM in it but the antiX takes only a modest bite out of it. 300 MB or so after the boot and less than 500 while using some programs.

In Japanese: 続きをどうぞ [antiX on Mac Pro Late2013]の続きを読む

テーマ:Mac - ジャンル:コンピュータ

1. 2024/08/22(木) 18:49:46|
2. MacBooks and Macs
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Movie Review: Argylle 2024
Bryce Dallas Howard and Sam Rockwell play the main charactors (but none of them play the so-called "title" role. Henry Cavill tacitly plays the "title role" in a way. I thought he was placed at the front line of the next 007 James Bond race. At the time of this writing, he seemed to be not likely the next James Bond.

This movie aims slightly at 007-like action movie but it aims more at just general public entertainment.

There are several scenes (situations) where the villain (or "good" guys) have the chance to eliminate the opponents with just a squeeze of the f**king trigger but they just don't do it. I like them, those scenes.

I think (and I am by now very sure) that they (movie makers) intendedly leave those scenes in order to leave those who are NOT in the know frustrated and let those who are in the know appeased.

"Those who are in the know"? Those scenes are the homage to the earlier thriller, suspense or spy movie makers. They should be there to let the audience know that the script writers or directors are paying the due homage. I used to hate them (those scenes) but now I appreciate and love them because I am now in the know.

I have to love this movie (Argylle) as they include them.

Mac Pro Late2013 graphic chip problem
It first happened about a week ago. I got this Mac Pro Late2013 as a used computer from the United States of America (Texas, yay baby!).

When I got this machine (actually before I got this machine), I researched on the Internet if this machine was worth paying around $300 (US dollars) or more in 2024. I soon learned about the faulty graphic chips and then naturally first looked for Mac Pro Late2013 with the D300 chips. I knew D300 chips had no problems but other chips (D500/D700) did.

The reason I got this particular machine was its production year (April, 2018). I learned how to figure out the production year from the serial number. Machines with D300 ceased to be produced around 2015 or something.

A YouTuber (Hutrkay Mods) also recommended machines with D300 chips as D500/D700 chips just get hotter with no performance benefit (almost no software programs ever utilize their potential anyway). Apple wanted to other software developers to get along but none actually did.

Now I regret not having taken his precious advice more seriously. How wise he is! I guess that I just have to bite the bullets and keep dealing with this annoyance.

What happened? The image on the screen suddenly got disturbed (flickering, fading out and so on). I then looked for more information and I eventually (or almost instantly) found myself reading the report on the MacRumors user forum. My seemingly a chip from "the trouble-free production period" D500 just turned out to be a faulty chip after all.

This disturbance happens not all the time. It occurs from time to time. When it happens, I have to turn the machine off and reboot. Usually after the reboot, the problem goes away.

How long can I use this machine? How often will I be bothered by this problem?

In Japanese: 続きをどうぞ [Some thoughts]の続きを読む

テーマ:Mac - ジャンル:コンピュータ

1. 2024/08/18(日) 21:52:17|
2. MacBooks and Macs
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Oh My God. The cursed FirePro D500.
My Mac Pro Late2013 has been showing some noises (flickers and others, in other words, visual disturbances). I searched on the Net and arrived at the MacRumors' Forum and found out that my predicament was just what was described in the Forum.

In Japanese: 続きをどうぞ [My Mac Pro Late2013 has been inflicted with "that" Graphic chip problem]の続きを読む

1. 2024/08/12(月) 20:04:58|
2. MacBooks and Macs
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Kali Linux
I am using Kali Linux on one of my Compaq Presario CQ56 machines.

I have to update the system by issuing these commands periodically.
kali@kali:~$ sudo apt update

kali@kali:~$ sudo apt full-upgrade -y

There is no such applications that would do the process by a few clicks of mouse buttons.

32GB vs 64GB Geekbench6 scores on Mac Pro Late2013
I upgraded the memory on my Mac Pro Late2013 from 32 GB to 64GB just recently. I wanted to know how much impact this upgrade would have so I ran the benchmark application.

I knew it would not not improve since (I assumed that) Geekbench6 seemed that it did not use all of 32 GB of memory. If it does, the benchmark score will be greatly affected by swap (using the disk space when the memory is deleted) performance.

I guessed increasing the memory would not affect at all or the overall performance might get worse because of the unnecessary memory.

It did. I mean the CPU single-core and multi-core scores fell. Here' are the scores. The first three scores are from the era when the machine had 32 GB and the last two scores are current ones.



In Japanese: 続きをどうぞ [64GB of memory on Mac Pro Late2013]の続きを読む

1. 2024/08/07(水) 10:26:31|
2. Bike Races
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