Apr 12 2012
Howto install OpenWRT on an TP-Link MR3020 mini router with external filesystem on a USB stick running a local webserver (lighttpd) to serve up webpages to act as an info point e.g. in a exhibition.
Inspired by the Piratebox Project: http://wiki.daviddarts.com/PirateBox_DIY_OpenWrt
Mar 16 2012
I recently built two Fritzing parts, as i needed them for documentation and since they are Sparkfun breakout boards, i thought they might be useful to others, so i shared them on the Fritzings Google Code page. Today i found this comment and i’m happy that two parts i made will be integrated in one of the next Fritzing versions 
If you can’t wait till the next Fritzing release, here are the parts:
SHT15 humidity sensor breakout board from Sparkfun.com
Humidity Temperature Sensor SHT15.fzpz
ADJD-S311 color sensor breakout board from Sparkfun.com
Oct 20 2011
For years i used Adium, but sometimes i miss the video and audio features iChat provides.
As i updated to Mac OS X 10.7 aka Lion i thought i should give iChat a try. Suprisingly iChat 6 has some features which come close to Adium’s user experience:
Protocols i used in Adium and missing in iChat out of the box:
)right now iChat seems to provide almost all important protocols i used to use on Adium plus the video and audio chatting.
Aug 04 2011
If you own a iPhone 4 and have iOS 4.3 or up installed your lucky because Apple gave you a personal WLAN hotspot for sharing your 3G internet connection to your WLAN enabled devices nearby.
But i still have my old iPhone 3G but wish to share its internet with my brand new iPad 2, so what to do? – it’s easier than i thought:
Jun 19 2011
gEDA is installed using macports, but when installing i found a little problem when xgsch2pcb complained about a missing update-desktop-database
complete install commands:
1 2 3 4 5 | $ sudo port install desktop-file-utils $ sudo port install geda-gaf $ sudo port install pcb $ sudo port install xgsch2pcb $ sudo port install gerbv |
useful addition: Mac OS X launchers for the commandline tools make it easy to start the apps and to double click documents, launches X11 and the responsible program:
http://www.msarnoff.org/geda-mac/
Mar 07 2011
Arduino, a simple RS485 driver, one resistor is all you need to get build your own cheap DMX light controller and get a full featured controlling software for free.
First you have to build your DMX controller, i’ve chosen to build it on a ArduinoProto Shield. It’s based on the design by Tom Kness. Just connect the “input” to D0/RX on your Arduino Board. I used a jumper to switch between D0/RX (for Arduino as a OpenDMX Interface) and D3 which is the default Output for the DMX Simple library
The next thing we need is a free Software to control the lights. I use Q Light Commander which is available for Mac OS X / Linux and Windows.
The most important thing is to unload the FTDI USB drivers (which you probably use for Arduino development because they get preinstalled with the Arduino IDE)!
check if the drivers are loaded:
1 | $ sudo kextstat | grep FTDI |
unload them
1 | $ sudo kextunload /System/Library/Extensions/FTDIUSBSerialDriver.kext |
load them again
1 | $ sudo kextload /System/Library/Extensions/FTDIUSBSerialDriver.kext |
Feb 10 2011
The creation of layered menus in Photoshop is a common task an no big deal but here are some tricks you should know if you need to create 16:9 menus for DVD Studio Pro.
A Trick to achieve the highest possible quality for fonts or if you have to simulate transparency:
maybe that’s overkill, but this way the transparancies of the antialiased fonts are preserved in the DVD, because DVD’s can’t handle transparancy and therefore fonts look ugly.
Feb 10 2011
The problem with the JVC HM100 / HM700 camcorder is that Quicktime movies only work on Apple computers without problems. It’s always a good idea to use the MP4 format for filming in the menu of the camera! But what happens when i have quicktime movies i need to transfer to a PC for editing in Adobe Premiere? There are two solutions: first, buy an expensive XDCAM EX codec for Quicktime on Windows (about 200$) or you’re lucky and you can use an Apple Mac with Final Cut Pro Studio 3 installed:
What you get is a .mp4 file that works native in Adobe Premiere CS4 and up.
Dec 17 2010
based on L. Preston Sego III’s work, check it out here.
first we need to install some tools:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 | $ mkdir ConverterTemp $ cd ConverterTem $ curl -O http://www.cmake.org/files/v2.8/cmake-2.8.3.tar.gz $ tar xvfz cmake-2.8.3.tar.gz $ cd cmake-2.8.3 $ ./bootstrap $ make $ sudo make install |
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 | $ svn co http://aften.svn.sourceforge.net/svnroot/aften Aften $ cd Aften $ mkdir default $ cd default $ cmake /../../Aften/ $ make $ sudo make install |
1 2 3 4 5 6 | $ svn co svn://svn.videolan.org/libdca/trunk libdca $ cd libdca $ ./bootstrap $ ./configure $ make $ sudo make install |
download MKVtoolNIX from http://jonthn.free.fr/MKVtoolnix/
1 | $ sudo ln -s /Applications/Mkvtoolnix.app/Contents/MacOS/mkv* /usr/local/bin/ |
install mkvdts2ac3:
1 2 3 | $ curl -O https://github.com/JakeWharton/mkvdts2ac3/raw/master/mkvdts2ac3.sh $ chmod 755 mkvdts2ac3.sh $ sudo cp mkvdts2ac3.sh /usr/local/bin/mkvdts2ac3 |
Usage:
1 | $ mkvdts3ac3 --new -n -f -wd /Volumes/myDisk/Rips mymovie.mkv |
Dec 15 2010
install nagios3 packages:
1 2 3 | $ sudo apt-get update $ sudo apt-get upgrade $ sudo apt-get install nagios3 nagios3-doc |
config files are located in /etc/nagios3 and /etc/nagios3/conf.d configure your contacts and hosts accordingly.
what got me crazy was enabling external commands (needed to perform actions in the webinterface like sending alerts or enabling/disabling things).
edit /etc/nagios3/nagios.cfg:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 | # EXTERNAL COMMAND OPTION # Values: 0 = disable commands, 1 = enable commands check_external_commands=1 # EXTERNAL COMMAND CHECK INTERVAL # NOTE: Setting this value to -1 causes Nagios to check the external # command file as often as possible. command_check_interval=15s #command_check_interval=-1 |
to get rid of Error: Could not stat() command file ‘/var/lib/nagios3/rw/nagios.cmd’, i had to do this:
1 2 3 4 | $ sudo /etc/init.d/nagios3 stop $ sudo dpkg-statoverride --update --add nagios www-data 2710 /var/lib/nagios3/rw $ sudo dpkg-statoverride --update --add nagios nagios 751 /var/lib/nagios3 $ sudo /etc/init.d/nagios3 start |
to send notification mails using the corporate smtp host i had to do this:
1 | $ sudo apt-get install sendemail |
Edit /etc/nagios3/resource.cfg:
1 2 3 | $USER5$=your_isp_email_username $USER6$=your_isp_email_password $USER7$=your_isp_outgoing_mail_server |
Edit /etc/nagios3/commands.cfg
Change command_line for command_name notify-host-by-email:
1 | command_line /usr/bin/sendemail -o tls=yes -s $USER7$ -xu $USER5$ -xp $USER6$ -t $CONTACTEMAIL$ -f $CONTACTEMAIL$ -l /var/log/sendEmail -u "** $NOTIFICATIONTYPE$ Host Alert: $HOSTNAME$ is $HOSTSTATE$ **" -m "***** Nagios *****\n\nNotification Type: $NOTIFICATIONTYPE$\nHost: $HOSTNAME$\nState: $HOSTSTATE$\nAddress: $HOSTADDRESS$\nInfo: $HOSTOUTPUT$\n\nDate/Time: $LONGDATETIME$\n" |
and the notify-service-by-email command line to
1 | command_line /usr/bin/sendemail -o tls=yes -s $USER7$ -xu $USER5$ -xp $USER6$ -t $CONTACTEMAIL$ -f $CONTACTEMAIL$ -l /var/log/sendEmail -u "** $NOTIFICATIONTYPE$ Service Alert: $HOSTALIAS$/$SERVICEDESC$ is $SERVICESTATE$ **" -m "***** Nagios *****\n\nNotification Type: $NOTIFICATIONTYPE$\n\nService: $SERVICEDESC$\nHost: $HOSTALIAS$\nAddress: $HOSTADDRESS$\nState: $SERVICESTATE$\n\nDate/Time: $LONGDATETIME$\n\nAdditional Info:\n\n$SERVICEOUTPUT$" |
1 2 3 | $ sudo touch /var/log/sendEmail $ sudo chown nagios:nagios /var/log/sendEmail $ sudo /etc/init.d/nagios3 restart |