Author Topic: Fettled any computer stuff today? (Read 216263 times)

Bledlow · « **Reply #600 on:** 26 May, 2016, 10:08:33 pm »

Quote from: Phil W on 25 May, 2016, 07:58:22 pm

I think our dial up when I got my first laptop in 1990 was 19,200 baud. It connected to a Browns Box connected to our mainframe. More than quick enough for text based command line exchanges. The joys of pagers and oncall. Before that in the late 80's I'd have dot matrix print outs of the code of the trial we were doing. Then do support over phone whilst reading through the code. Happy days from more than a quarter of a century ago.

A couple of years after that I was dialling in to support systems for a couple of county councils at 9.6K baud. OK for command line stuff.

pcolbeck · « **Reply #601 on:** 27 May, 2016, 08:53:24 am »

I spend half my life connected to the console ports on routers and switches via a serial cable at 9600 baud.

ian · « **Reply #602 on:** 27 May, 2016, 09:36:55 am »

That's probably the oddest euphemism ever. Unless I'm misunderstanding.

David Martin · « **Reply #603 on:** 27 May, 2016, 11:02:21 pm »

The grand plan to examine the document similarities between all the teaching documents for our curriculum is proving very useful. We give the students on average 2 documents per day. I can see where staff are reusing stuff across modules very easily. Interesting... and has already been helpful in our module review.

David Martin · « **Reply #604 on:** 31 May, 2016, 10:08:51 pm »

Attempting to install ALSA from source on the Pi. Yes they have a package but there is a hardcoded (not even as a header, a literal value buried in the code) that limits the sample rate to 192000 Hz. I need 250000 Hz so am having to rebuild, fix dependencies, rebuild, install yet another tool, recompile, install, cross fingers...

and one small utility depends on TeX so that has to be installed as well. Talk about steamroller to crack a nut.

David Martin · « **Reply #605 on:** 31 May, 2016, 11:53:20 pm »

And then it is failing to find a dependency defined in it's own header file so something is wrong with the includes somewhere. My C compiling fu is of the order of prod with a big stick from a distance and hope. make clean && make && make install for the libraries, and then it might link appropriately. Maybe

Manotea · « **Reply #606 on:** 01 June, 2016, 12:17:50 am »

Quote from: marcusjb on 24 May, 2016, 10:38:13 pm

Hardly a day goes by without me talking to something over a serial cable, or more likely these days still is getting two devices to talk to each other over a serial connection.

Today I made a lighting control system from manufacturer X talk to an interface from manufacturer Y to deal with some curtains. All at 9600 baud (8 1 N for total transparency). I actually had a conversation with one of my business partners about why I ran it so slow (as low as one of the interfaces would go, I think the other could drop even lower) when they could both run at 115200. Because I don't feel the need for speed to exchange a very infrequent amount of 30ish ASCII characters and over the years I have seen plenty of stuff claim it can handle the giddying speeds of 115200, but in fact just curl up into a ball and die when something throws it some stuff to deal with.

9600 forever!

Anyway, in the world of BMS and lighting controls, serial is still dominant because it does just work both in point to point and multi-point flavours.

Back in the days when the world was young and I had nothing better to do then watch bits go up and down a line and try and guess what they meant, my then boss who was a GENIUS fabricated a modem eliminator in his home workshop which had an analogue speed dial, so we could slow the line right down to try and catch the interesting bits (sic) on the protocol analyser, and other times crank it up to 9600. Happy days

.

David Martin · « **Reply #607 on:** 01 June, 2016, 11:21:44 am »

Still can't get it to link - there must be something magic in the order Things Must Be Done. I really don't want to deconstruct the makefiles and autoconf.

David Martin · « **Reply #608 on:** 01 June, 2016, 10:11:01 pm »

Got it to link and compile but it doesn't want to play. Some strange error *** Error in `arecord': double free or corruption (out):

I'll try changing it back and recompiling and see if it is the change or something else.

Edit: It was something else. I was trying to compile from the original dist and now am compiling from the Raspbian source package which should then set the compiler flags correctly for the architecture.

Edit2: Take off, nuke from orbit, start over now I know what I need to do and can do it without screwing everything else up along the way.

David Martin · « **Reply #609 on:** 01 June, 2016, 11:56:53 pm »

SUCCESS! Though playing back a quick voice test recorded at 250k at 48k is interesting..

Phil W · « **Reply #610 on:** 02 June, 2016, 10:06:30 am »

Rewrote a distance calculation algorithm to be roughly 500 times faster and pushed it back to the author of the code. This is the beauty of open source, you all get to contribute to improve the software rather than just complain that it runs very slowly when you throw audax type distances and GPX at it

This is part of the open source leaflet mapping project.

Afasoas · « **Reply #611 on:** 04 June, 2016, 09:48:20 am »

My first DuckDuckGo CheatSheet is live.

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=notepad%2B%2B+cheat+sheet&ia=cheatsheet&iax=1

I've got two more in the pipeline...

Mr Larrington · « **Reply #612 on:** 07 June, 2016, 05:20:30 pm »

Any network cable incapable of telling me what Cat it is has been replaced with Cat 6. This has involved hitting things - cable clips, wood chisels, my own knuckles ect ect - with a hammer $:-\$

barakta · « **Reply #613 on:** 07 June, 2016, 10:23:28 pm »

Quote from: Afasoas on 04 June, 2016, 09:48:20 am

My first DuckDuckGo CheatSheet is live.

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=notepad%2B%2B+cheat+sheet&ia=cheatsheet&iax=1

I've got two more in the pipeline...

Nice keyboard navigatables there!

Feanor · « **Reply #614 on:** 08 June, 2016, 05:39:19 pm »

Quote from: Afasoas on 04 June, 2016, 09:48:20 am

My first DuckDuckGo CheatSheet is live.

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=notepad%2B%2B+cheat+sheet&ia=cheatsheet&iax=1

I've got two more in the pipeline...

Is it Vi?

Android won't let me enter Vi in lower case without auto-incorrecting it.

TheLurker · « **Reply #615 on:** 08 June, 2016, 07:16:34 pm »

Finally bitten the bullet and installed Android Studio (two and a half hours!). All I've got to do now is work out why it's wittering about a missing junit dependency in a template project* before I've written a single line of code.

An grumble. Google; why tell me at the beginning of the installation process that my cranky old grid _will_ support hardware device emulation, allow me to enter settings for same and then (at the very last step) tell me actually, no, it can't and I'll have to use the slow old software emulation like I had to in good old Eclipse?

*It might be gradely (actually it's gradle, but gradely makes me grin), but having used naught but Eclipse so far I know sweet FA about gradely.

Afasoas · « **Reply #616 on:** 08 June, 2016, 10:30:36 pm »

Quote from: Feanor on 08 June, 2016, 05:39:19 pm

Quote from: Afasoas on 04 June, 2016, 09:48:20 am
My first DuckDuckGo CheatSheet is live.

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=notepad%2B%2B+cheat+sheet&ia=cheatsheet&iax=1

I've got two more in the pipeline...

Is it Vi?

Android won't let me enter Vi in lower case without auto-incorrecting it.

There's already a fairly comprehensive Vim one: https://duckduckgo.com/?t=lm&q=vim+cheat+sheet&ia=cheatsheet&iax=1

I'm currently working on a cheat sheet or netcat. I've got a lightroom one in the pipe line and, if no one else steps up I'd quite like to improve the Visual Studio cheat sheet too. The cheat sheets themselves are fairly easy to produce, but checking all the shortcuts/commands is quite time consuming.

Afasoas · « **Reply #617 on:** 08 June, 2016, 10:43:58 pm »

I'd rather not tempt fate, but after the second visit from Virgin Media it looks like we finally have at least one stable internet connection.

The SuperHub 3 is best avoided if you plan on using it in modem only mode.
The first SuperHub 2AC that replaced it was faulty. The second SuperHub 2AC that was installed tonight I 't dropped a single packet in over five hours.

All credit to VM for their customer service! I can't believe how quickly they escalated things.

TalkTalk have also issued us a replacement 'hub', a Huawei HG633 which is a steam pile of faecal matter. I've spent the bulk of my evening prodding and poking it. Seems impossible to change the subnet mask (anything other than /24 results in a UI error) and not immediately obvious how to make it behave like bridged modem. The issues with the TalkTalk aDSL have been more transient than with Virgin so it'll take a while to work out whether or not the new 'hub' resolves the issues we've had.

I really really don't recommend TalkTalk. I was again seriously looking at AAISP in the midst of all this, but 100GB usage cap and the fact you have to pay phone line rental on top deters me. I can't justify £60 pcm for the vDSL/1TB option... well, at least not yet.

Phil W · « **Reply #618 on:** 09 June, 2016, 05:24:40 pm »

Created new site for simplifying GPX tracks to reduce size and bloat.

https://simple-gpx.herokuapp.com

Afasoas · « **Reply #619 on:** 11 June, 2016, 12:06:15 am »

Raised a pull request for second new duckduckgo cheat sheet and started the third one.

Thinking about creating an instant answer to help with Havard Referencing... if I can at least find the relevant APIs that is.

T42 · « **Reply #620 on:** 11 June, 2016, 10:17:45 am »

Yesterday, ye gods...

Inlaw Paw's bedroom TV has HDMI sockets but refuses to accept input from perfectly fine DVD player & HDMI cable. After wasting a hour trying out Stuff:

1. set up old laptop with Ubuntu, shoved a DVD in. It opens, great! Shows the files but won't play them: "Format error". But DVD is fine.

2. set up 2nd old XP laptop - had to restore system to get it to boot in less than 20 minutes. Shoved in DVD: it plays!!!! But audio is kaput.

3. set up missus's old Mac. Surprise, surprise, when she moved back to a PC n years ago she didn't take the batteries out of the KB or mouse. Mouse OK, batteries in KB needed Delicate Persuasion^® so now even with brave new ones it's kaput. So I sacrificed the USB KB from my Pi

and went through the recognition rigmarole.

And it works. The IP is content.

I want a new keyboard.

Phil W · « **Reply #621 on:** 11 June, 2016, 04:20:05 pm »

Quote from: T42 on 11 June, 2016, 10:17:45 am

Yesterday, ye gods...

Inlaw Paw's bedroom TV has HDMI sockets but refuses to accept input from perfectly fine DVD player & HDMI cable. After wasting a hour trying out Stuff:

1. set up old laptop with Ubuntu, shoved a DVD in. It opens, great! Shows the files but won't play them: "Format error". But DVD is fine.

2. set up 2nd old XP laptop - had to restore system to get it to boot in less than 20 minutes. Shoved in DVD: it plays!!!! But audio is kaput.

3. set up missus's old Mac. Surprise, surprise, when she moved back to a PC n years ago she didn't take the batteries out of the KB or mouse. Mouse OK, batteries in KB needed Delicate Persuasion^® so now even with brave new ones it's kaput. So I sacrificed the USB KB from my Pi and went through the recognition rigmarole.

And it works. The IP is content.

I want a new keyboard.

So was it the DVD player with the issue or the DVD? Sounds like the latter to me. You did test with a working DVD (that works on a different TV)?

T42 · « **Reply #622 on:** 11 June, 2016, 06:01:10 pm »

The DVD player and the cable work with a different TV. The DVD had already been played umpteen times and was fine. The IP's TV wouldn't even show the player's built-in menu. The TV's own menu included a selector for HDMI input that had no effect. Conclusion: TV's defective.

David Martin · « **Reply #623 on:** 11 June, 2016, 10:29:27 pm »

Quote from: T42 on 11 June, 2016, 06:01:10 pm

The DVD player and the cable work with a different TV. The DVD had already been played umpteen times and was fine. The IP's TV wouldn't even show the player's built-in menu. The TV's own menu included a selector for HDMI input that had no effect. Conclusion: TV's defective.

How old is the TV/DVD and does the DVD have copy protection in hardware that the TV does not support?

TimO · « **Reply #624 on:** 16 June, 2016, 11:30:04 am »

For the second time in a few months, and after mostly an eighteen month hiatus, dug out the PC104 stack with quad SpaceWire interface and anisotropic magnetoresistive sensor board, aka the I-PDHS MAGIC hardware, got it working and took it to Airbus to plug into their system.

Luckily it all worked, so I didn't have to delve deep into whatever code I wrote and integrated into the Linux install, two to three years ago !

Right, so now that project is done and dusted, what can I do with the hardware?