Mounting iso files

Unlike Windows where we need to install third-party apps, GNU/Linux or other Unix-type OSes have a built-in way to access disk image files as block devices as "Loop Devices." This can be done using the mount command as:

mount -o loop example.iso /media/disk

Concatenating videos with MEncoder

Some video formats like mpg allow files to be merged directly by concatenation. You can combine other complicated formats like avi, flv with MEncoder which is a free video encoding/decoding utility and a close sibling of MPlayer. The way to do this is:

mencoder -of lavf -oac copy -ovc copy -o output.flv input1.flv input2.flv

Boost your volume on toshiba laptops running ubuntu

If you have a Toshiba Satellite laptop and run ubuntu, then you probably hate the fact that you cannot hear the sound as loud as you would want it to be. Doing a
sudo apt-get install gnome-alsamixergui
will not help too much as well, since it will still show only Master and Capture in the alsamixergui under Applications -> Sound and Video -> Alsa Mixer

So here is what you need to do: you need to install alsa from source. First, download the latest ones from here: http://www.alsa-project.org/main/index.php/Download. The volume control is under Utilities, but you will also need the Library to install that stuff.

So first, install the library:

tar -xvjf alsa-lib-1.0.20.tar.bz2

cd alsa-lib-1.0.20

./configure

make

sudo make install

Then install the utilities:

tar -xvjf alsa-utils-1.0.20.tar.bz2

cd alsa-utils-1.0.20

./configure

sudo make install

NOTE - there is no make step here - direct make install!

If you get an error that says "`t-ja.gmo': No such file or directory" then you need to install gettext.

sudo apt-get install gettext

After that, once your utils are fully installed, go ahead and see the alsa in full glory: open Applications -> Sound and Video -> Alsa Mixer Gui and increase the Master, Head and Front volumes to full! Yennjoy!