rpl & regexxer: search, replace strings

Developers need to search and replace strings in multiple files frequently. While there are several combinations of commands, sed, awk etc. to do that, the default Ubuntu repos come with 2 relatively unknown specialized gems to search and replace text in several files at a time. Let’s check them out!

xara: Debian package manager

Most Ubuntu users prefer Software Center or synaptic for package management. Those who love the command-line definitely use apt all the time. In this article we will explore another package manager available in the default repos – xara. xara is written in GTK+ and has powerful capabilities.

25 years of Linux: some timeless videos

You might have already read that Linux is turning 25 this 25th August. Linux Torvalds announced his hobby OS on Aug 25, 1991. Here’s a collection of a few informative speeches and documentaries on Linux and open source to enjoy the rest of the week.

Hacking noice: fast cmdline file browser

noice is a minimal file browser for those who don’t like to type cd ... to reach a file, then open it; or one who doesn’t like to open a file browser and keep clicking to find and open a file. noice reduces the effort to pressing the arrow keys. Originally noice is written as a utility having minimal interactions with X. For example, image files are opened with feh. Considering most people use X and love to use to GUI apps when it makes sense, I have forked a branch with some changes of my own.

sbm: monitor network traffic

$ sbm -i wlp2s0 -c 10
wlp2s0:   0.00  bps Rx   0.00  bps Tx     0 pps Rx     0 pps Tx
wlp2s0:   5.54 kbps Rx  18.94 kbps Tx     6 pps Rx     8 pps Tx
wlp2s0:   2.78 Mbps Rx 122.69 kbps Tx   256 pps Rx   141 pps Tx
wlp2s0: 433.54 kbps Rx  45.22 kbps Tx    55 pps Rx    35 pps Tx
wlp2s0: 528.00  bps Rx 752.00  bps Tx     1 pps Rx     1 pps Tx
wlp2s0:  10.94 kbps Rx   5.50 kbps Tx     6 pps Rx     4 pps Tx
wlp2s0:   0.00  bps Rx   0.00  bps Tx     0 pps Rx     0 pps Tx
wlp2s0:  13.34 kbps Rx  26.10 kbps Tx    11 pps Rx    13 pps Tx
wlp2s0: 384.64 kbps Rx  57.70 kbps Tx    57 pps Rx    49 pps Tx
wlp2s0: 553.67 kbps Rx  51.35 kbps Tx    69 pps Rx    56 pps Tx

sbm (Simple Bandwidth Monitor) is a tiny utility to track your network traffic. It’s similar to slurm in functionality but shows a continuous log of transfer rates (upstream and downstream). The best use-case is the situation in which you want to figure out how much data an application transmits in isolation. With constant monitoring, you can also figure out easily if any application is sending information home.