Digital Nomad

Don't Let the Asphalt Bury the Garden

Wed, 29 Apr 2026 00:00:00 +0930

I’ve spent 30 years watching tech cycles come and go, from the first dial-up modems in rural Austria to the mesh networks I’m currently stringing across the Australian bush. Each time a “next big thing” arrives, we see the same pattern: a frantic rush to centralise, followed by a slow, painful enclosure of what should have been a common resource.

The current noise around AI in open source feels different. It feels heavier. There’s a justified fear that AI-generated code is hollowing out our commons. Maintainers are being buried under a drift of unvetted, mediocre pull requests, while a handful of platform monopolies strip-mine decades of community work to feed their proprietary black boxes.

Opti-Morons and the Death of Critical Thought

Mon, 13 Apr 2026 00:00:00 +0930

I’m tired. Not the kind of tired that a good night’s sleep or a weekend off the grid can fix. It’s a deeper, more pervasive exhaustion—the fatigue of living in a culture of relentless, performative positivity. In the tech world, we’re told to “crush it,” to “move fast,” and to embrace every new “game-changer” with uncritical enthusiasm. If you’re not a believer, you’re a “naysayer” or, worse, a “blocker” of progress.

Wi-Fi HaLow vs. LoRa: A Strategic Guide to Sub-GHz Networking

Mon, 30 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +1030

In the world of Internet of Things (IoT), the sub-GHz spectrum is a frontier of immense promise, offering the holy grail of long-range and low-power communication. Two fundamentally different philosophies are vying to define this frontier. On one side stands Wi-Fi HaLow (IEEE 802.11ah), a direct evolution of the familiar, IP-based Wi-Fi standard, engineered for higher bandwidth and seamless integration. On the other lies the diverse and adaptable LoRa landscape, a collection of distinct networking protocols all built upon the same remarkable long-range radio technology.

LPWAN Meshes: The Verdict - Making the Choice

Sat, 14 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +1030

Over the past few weeks, I’ve pulled apart four different LPWAN mesh technologies. Now it’s time to bring those findings together and look at which tool fits which job on the property or in the community.

There is no “perfect” protocol. What we have is a set of tools with different trade-offs. I’ve evaluated all four across five parameters to help cut through the marketing noise and get to the technical reality.

LPWAN Meshes: ClusterDuck Protocol - Purpose-Built for Emergencies

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 00:00:00 +1030

The ClusterDuck Protocol (CDP) was where my mesh networking journey truly began. The story behind Project OWL (Organisation, Whereabouts, and Logistics)—students building emergency communication networks after Hurricane Maria—resonated deeply, highlighting a technology designed not for hobbyists or industry, but for saving lives when infrastructure fails. While I found its concepts “much better thought through” from the outset, the project’s slow pace and patchy hardware support meant my personal involvement never truly moved beyond some initial tinkering.

Installing Ubuntu on ASUS ExpertBooks - overcoming UEFI issues

Wed, 25 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +1030

ASUS ExpertBooks are popular enterprise laptops with a well-priced combination of hardware and solid build quality. However, installing Ubuntu on these laptops can be challenging due to UEFI issues. In this blog post, I am documenting the challenges and the steps to overcome these issues and successfully install Ubuntu on ASUS ExpertBooks.

Whilst UEFI is arguably useful, the choices made by ASUS in their BIOS settings are problematic. Whilst I have no knowledge of the exact reasons for these choices, they seem to be overly restrictive and limiting for advanced users. Enforcing the device to boot only from the UEFI firmware can be problematic for advanced users who want to dual-boot or install other operating systems.

LPWAN Meshes: Reticulum - Where I Landed

Wed, 25 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +1030

After years of experimenting with various LPWAN mesh networking technologies, I’ve settled on Reticulum as my primary LoRa mesh platform. It emerged as the clear frontrunner not because it’s simpler than the rudimentary Meshtastic (it isn’t), nor because it’s overtly more feature-rich than the structured MeshCore, but because its design philosophy fundamentally aligns with what matters most: privacy, resilience, and true decentralisation. It supports multiple bearer protocols, making it a powerful tool for building a future decentralised network.

LPWAN Meshes: MeshCore - Moving Beyond the Ad-Hoc

Sun, 22 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +1030

While Meshtastic serves as a solid introduction to LPWAN mesh networking, MeshCore represents a move toward more structured networks, particularly when the limits of ad-hoc flooding become a bottleneck. It addresses the “airtime” congestion common in simpler protocols, offering a far more robust path for community-scale infrastructure where a “best effort” approach isn’t enough. MeshCore is built for managed deployments and regional sensor networks where reliability and structured routing are the priority.

LPWAN Meshes: MeshTastic - The Gateway Drug

Mon, 16 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +1030

For many new to LPWAN mesh networking, MeshTastic often appears as a starting point due to its affordability and active community. It can get you from zero to sending a basic mesh message relatively quickly. For some, it may seem like a convenient entry into mesh networking.

In this post, I’ll dive into what makes MeshTastic tick, where it excels, and where it falls short based on my own experience using it across various scenarios.

LPWAN Meshes: Choosing the Right Technology

Wed, 04 Feb 2026 00:00:00 +1030

Long-range Sub-GHz wireless mesh networks have become essential for modern communication, particularly in remote areas where traditional infrastructure is impractical or impossible. By utilising lower frequencies (typically below 1 GHz), Sub-GHz networks can achieve remarkable range, low power consumption, and the ability to penetrate obstacles such as buildings and dense forests.

These characteristics make Sub-GHz mesh networks ideal for applications in IoT, outdoor communication, emergency response, and industrial networks. But with numerous technologies now available, choosing the right one for your needs can be challenging.

From Consumer to Creator: A Practical Guide to Community Telecoms

Thu, 29 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +1030

In the first two parts of this series, we explored why community telecoms matter and how resilient mesh networks can save lives during emergencies. Now comes the question I’m asked most often: “That sounds great, but how do I actually build one?”

This is the knowledge I wish I’d had when I started.

If my journey from those early Austrian tele-working centres to deploying mesh networks across remote Australian properties has taught me anything: the hardest part isn’t the technology—it’s overcoming the psychological barrier between “consumer” and “creator.” We’ve been conditioned to believe telecommunications infrastructure is something large corporations build, not something communities can create themselves.

When the Grid Fails: Building Resilient Comms for a Changing Climate

Mon, 26 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +1030

In an emergency, information is as vital as water. The official advice is clear: “leave early.” But how do you act on that advice when the power is out, the mobile network is congested to the point of failure, and the emergency broadcaster’s tower has been consumed by the very fire you’re trying to flee?

This isn’t a hypothetical. As Fiannuala Morgan chillingly documented in her article, “No power, no phone, no radio: why comms dropped out during the Central Victorian fires{target="_blank”}", this is the reality for communities across Australia. The wholesale replacement of resilient copper landlines with power-dependent NBN connections, coupled with the shutdown of the 3G network, has created a communications infrastructure that is dangerously brittle in the face of climate-fuelled disasters.

Beyond the Big Telcos: Reclaiming Our Digital Lifelines

Sun, 18 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +1030

We live in an era where a reliable connection to the digital world is not a luxury, but a lifeline. It’s how we work, learn, access essential services, and connect with our communities. Yet for many in regional and rural Australia, this lifeline is frayed, unreliable, or simply non-existent. We’ve been told to accept a digital landscape dominated by a handful of corporate giants, a landscape where postcodes dictate the quality of our connection to the modern world. But what if there’s another way?

The Hidden World of Corporate IoT Spying

Tue, 13 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +1030

In the first two posts of this series, we explored the risks of corporate-controlled IoT—from devices being turned into ‘bricks’ to the sustainability challenges facing ‘open-source alternatives’. But what if the bigger danger isn’t just that your smart device will stop working, but that it’s working all too well—just not for you? This post dives into the pervasive, built-in surveillance that has become a standard feature in so-called ‘smart’ devices.

Open Source Is The Hope, But It Needs Our Help

Wed, 07 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +1030

In the last post, I explored the graveyard of ‘bricked’ devices—hardware rendered useless by corporate decisions. It’s a stark reminder that when you don’t control the software, you don’t truly own the hardware. The clear alternative is Open Source, but that path has its own critical vulnerability: sustainability.

the force of collective activism by leogaggl, on Flickr

But this is where the journey gets complicated. We flee to platforms like Home Assistant and embrace open-hardware projects, expecting a haven of stability and privacy. And while we find it, we often forget a crucial truth: “free and open source” does not mean free to create.

Are You Buying a Future Brick?

Sun, 04 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +1030

The promise of the “smart home” was a future of convenience, efficiency, and seamless automation. We bought into the vision of light bulbs that dim with a voice command, thermostats that learn our habits, and security systems we can monitor from halfway across the world. But for a growing number of consumers, that dream is turning into a nightmare of expensive, useless hardware. The culprit? A business model built on centralised control and proprietary systems.

Working Out Loud Again

Wed, 31 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +1030

As a new year begins, it’s a natural time for reflection. Looking back at the history of this blog, it started during my years working in online education. I was fortunate to be surrounded by inspiring colleagues who lived by the principles of “working out loud” and developing ideas “out in the open”. It was a vibrant, collaborative time.

A lot of water has flowed down the rivers Murray and Drau since then, and I’ll be the first to admit that my practice of sharing my work has become sporadic at best. I’m extremely keen to change that.

Where is Our Digital Heartbeat? A Hacker Culture Comparison

Mon, 29 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +1030

I’ve been living and working in Australia for a good while now, having moved from Europe with a healthy dose of open-source enthusiasm. Over the years, however, I can’t help but notice a stark difference between the two continents: the politically engaged, almost rebellious, hacker culture that is so vibrant in Europe seems to be missing its pulse here Down Under.

This has really hit home for me while watching the live streams from the 39th annual Chaos Computer Club Congress (39C3) in Hamburg. It’s one of Europe’s largest gatherings of hackers, activists, and creatives who don’t just write code, but actively question and shape the world it runs on. It’s a cultural phenomenon, not just a tech conference.

Modify Google Earth Viewshed Radius

Wed, 08 Nov 2023 19:40:35 +0930

One of the tasks Google Earth Pro is really useful is getting a quick idea of the viewshed from a specific location. This is particularly useful for planning solar installations or other infrastructure projects such as LoRaWAN gateway deployments.

Whilst the tool is quite powerful, it has a very limited viewshed (roughly 5km) and this is not really useful when looking at gateway deployments that in flat regions of Australia easily can reach 25km+. Also it is not at all obvious how to modify the radius of the viewshed since that has not been a feature in the GUI and it is not documented at all.

Storing Raspberry PI timelapse images using Linode Object Storage

Wed, 08 Nov 2023 19:40:35 +0930

possum cam testing by leogaggl, on Flickr

“possum cam testing” (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0) by leogaggl

One common task for my Raspberry Pi Zero with (infrared) Camera is to do still image capture in regular intervals and upload the images for storage and post-processing. A simple way to achieve this with standard software tools available in the Raspberry Pi OS repositories is to use the S3 CLI tools and a simple bash script run by a scheduled cron job.

Working with Siemens IoT2000 series from Linux

Tue, 18 Jun 2019 19:40:35 +0930

The Siemens IoT2000 series has been a very interesting development from Siemens and it’s really encouraging to see the use of Open Source in the Automation sector definitely on the increase. And that can only be a good thing for developer productivity. Seeing a different IDE for each manufacturer of a PLC invokes some nasty memories of last century web-application development…

Unfortunately, all the documentation for these units still assumes a Windows PC. And since I have not really been using a physical Windows machine for 10+ years now, that is really slowing things down. For the last few I didn’t really have to fall back to a VM, largely due to the fact that in web-development nobody cares about OS any longer. But I have a feeling that shifting my focus to the IIoT space this VM will get a bit more useful as some of these manufacturers don’t even bother with anything but Windows and are challenged enough to keep up with Windows upgrades.

Extracting your Windows Licence Key from Ubuntu

Tue, 18 Jun 2019 09:11:21 +0930

Turns out that working with PLC equipment you are still fully stuck to Windows. Which means I have to bite the bullet and get an up to date version of a Windows VM running on my machine.

Since I have already paid for my Windows license with my laptop (even though I have never used it) this came in really handy.

sudo apt install acpica-tools
sudo acpidump -n MSDM

This command should dump the Windows key in the bottom right of the output.

Goodbye Twitter - you were useful for (quite) a while.

Sun, 19 May 2019 14:25:26 +0930

After getting rid of my Facebook account a long time ago, finally, I have decided to pull the plug on Twitter as well.

I have become increasingly wary of the changes of the platform as it seeks for a way to monetise it’s user-base. The timeline has increasingly become infested with annoying ads and no way of getting rid of them. Since Twitter effectively killed the whole app ecosystem with their changes to API rules and banning anything that became useful to a substantial number of people.

Setting up MultiTech LoRaWAN gateway on Ubuntu

Sun, 15 Apr 2018 15:42:16 +0930

As the convener for the Adelaide community of The Things Network, I am frequently setting up Multitech Conduit Gateways. Depending on your PC or notebook hardware you might have some problems with the Exar USB-UART driver on Linux.

Here are the steps to getting this unit setup from an Ubuntu (should work for any other Linux distro) machine.

lsusb

Should show something like this:

Bus 002 Device 006: ID 04e2:1410 Exar Corp. XR21V1410 USB-UART IC

Moving to KVM virtual machines

Sun, 15 Apr 2018 15:35:30 +0930

Installing VirtualBox is getting increasingly painful on Ubuntu due to the problems with UEFI Secure Boot and the VirtualBox kernel modules. Another reason for an alternative is that running VirtualBox VM’s completely in the background is not as straightforward as it could be.

From the available alternatives I looked into (VMWare, Xen & KVM) it was KVM that fitted my needs (casual VM usage with mostly headless VM’s for testing purposes). Main reasons:

Microchip LoRaWAN Development Utility on Ubuntu

Sun, 15 Apr 2018 15:14:58 +0930

Having just wasted a few hours on getting this Java software running on Linux I am documenting this for future reference and hopefully saving other LoRa / TTN folks some time.

Prerequisites

Install a Java JDK + JavaFX. This should work with the default OpenJDK 8 or 9 which comes as part of the Ubuntu repositories. I ended up installing Oracle JDK 8 as well as I thought the error might be related to OpenJDK.

Display your Flickr Favourites as Screensaver Slideshow

Sun, 04 Feb 2018 12:18:51 +0930

Install XScreenSaver and remove Gnome default

sudo apt remove gnome-screensaver
sudo apt install xscreensaver xscreensaver-gl xscreensaver-gl-extra

Run the Screensaver UI and configure

In the “Advanced” section enter your Flickr RSS URL in “Choose Random Image”

https://api.flickr.com/services/feeds/photos_faves.gne?id=YOURFLICKRUSERID #replace with your Flickr User ID

Create a systemd user service to autostart

mkdir -p ~/.config/systemd/user/
vim ~/.config/systemd/user/xscreensaver.service

[Unit]
Description=XScreenSaver
[Service]
ExecStart=/usr/bin/xscreensaver -nosplash
[Install]
WantedBy=default.target

Start and enable systemd user service

systemctl --user enable xscreensaver
systemctl --user start xscreensaver

To copy the settings (including RSS URL) onto other PC’s or re-install it might be a good idea to backup or copy the contents of ~/.xscreensaver

GrovePi Zero - connecting your IoT sensors

Fri, 29 Dec 2017 12:08:48 +0930

I recently purchased a GrovePi Zero and expected this to be a reasonable straight forward way to connect Grove sensors to your Raspberry Pi, read sensor values via Python and pushing them upstream via MQTT. However the software side of things turns out anything but straight forward. Most of the suggestions on the Dexter Industries forum suggest to download some custom OS image – WTF? Hopefully this will save some people time to chase down the same rabbit holes…..

Set up a Raspberry Pi Zero headless

Sun, 20 Aug 2017 14:51:51 +0930

If you are using the GUI (Raspian full download) and want to connect your RPi Zero to a keyboard and monitor there are probably easier ways to do this. These notes are for people that want to use a headless (no monitor and GUI) setup ready to connect to your RPi after first boot via SSH from another terminal.

Raspberry Pi Zero W by lespounder, on Flickr

“Raspberry Pi Zero W” (CC BY-SA 2.0) by lespounder

Connecting your LoPy to The Things Network in Australia

Mon, 22 May 2017 17:02:05 +0930

EDIT [2018-06-05]: I have updated the code with the Firmware 1.18.+ releases. The code is available at our Growing Data Foundation Github.

These notes are to assist Australian IoT enthusiasts to get started in connecting a LoPy to The Things Network as it is unfortunately (not yet) straight forward to make them work with the current AU-915 TTN Channel plans. As the initiator of the local Adelaide Community of The Things Network I have been experimenting with a number of devices to connect sensors to #TTNADL. One of my personal favourites is the Pycom LoPy as a nice middle-ground between capabilities and technical complexity.

Using DNSMadeEasy as Dynamic DNS provider on Synology Diskstations

Sat, 25 Feb 2017 12:04:26 +0930

Since Synology (despite requests) still has not added DNS Made Easy as a listed provider (despite listing some really obscure services – go figure!) here is the steps to add a custom provider.

DNS Made Easy Setup

Create a new A-Record

Set the name
Set the IP (initial – any valid IP)
Tick the “Dynamic DNS” tickbox
Enter your chosen Dynamic DNS Password
Save the new record

When saving the record you will see a “Dynamic DNS ID” – note down this number. This will become the hostname on the Synology setup.

Getting Fujitsu ScanSnap S1300i to work on Ubuntu 16.04LTS

Sun, 20 Nov 2016 12:38:31 +0930

Upgrade or install SANE backends

Since the version of SANE in the Ubuntu 16.04LTS repos is not working for this scanner you either need to install from sources (see this blog) or from this PPA.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:rolfbensch/sane-git
sudo apt update
sudo apt install sane-backends tesseract-ocr gscan2pdf

Security

Add yourself to the ‘scanner’ group to be able to use the scanner.

sudo usermod -a -G scanner USERNAME

Checking SANE

Check for the libsane version (needs to be at least libsane.so.1.0.26 not libsane.so.1.0.25 which is in the Ubuntu repos)

RaspberryPi Version 3 SOE

Sun, 25 Sep 2016 21:16:05 +0930

Since there is now a supported Raspbian version without GUI and other unneeded add-ons available as Raspbian Lite the need to use other installers (with sometimes some downsides) is now not a necessity anymore. Below is a list of steps I like to perform before using them for any purpose as my Standard Operating Environment.

Download Raspbian Lite

Download link: https://www.raspberrypi.org/downloads/raspbian/

Write to SD Card

dd bs=4M if=2016-05-27-raspbian-jessie-lite.img of=/dev/sdb

Boot RPi

Default login details are
UID: pi
PWD: rasbperry

Giving Opera another spin - ad-blocking as a core feature

Mon, 14 Mar 2016 20:46:44 +0930

I haven’t been using Opera for quite a while as I didn’t really have a need for a third browser lately (Firefox & Chrome being the main ones). However I came across this article today mentioning that Opera has integrated ad-blocking as a core feature rather than a plugin to manage.

If there were no bloated ads, some top websites would load up to 90% faster.

Today, we wanted to share with you a native ad-blocking technology in our Developer channel for Opera for computers. “Native” means unmatched speed vs extensions, since the blocking happens at the web engine level.

Install Hugo on Ubuntu to generate static websites

Sun, 16 Aug 2015 11:15:59 +0930

Whilst there is a .DEB installer to download from the GoHugo sites I get all matter of warnings that the package is of bad quality and I am not comfortable to run these kinds of installers.

I rather install from sources in this case which is very straight forward since the main dependencies (largely GO) are in the Ubuntu main repositories.

Install dependencies

sudo apt-get install golang git mercurial python-pygments

Create environment variables

vim ~/.bashrc
# add the following 3 lines
export GOROOT=/usr/lib/go
export GOPATH=$HOME/go
export PATH=$PATH:$GOROOT/bin:$GOPATH/bin

Update Bash Environment Variables without logging out.

Good bye Android ? Hello Ubuntu ! Not yet unfortunately ...

Thu, 30 Jul 2015 21:48:51 +0930

As a long-term Ubuntu user I am extremely interested in what Canonical and the Ubuntu community are doing on the mobile front. Their convergence strategy (I am testing Snappy Core on IoT devices as well) seems very well thought through and once the the Meizu MX4 phone was released I got myself an invite and ordered a unit. It took a while to ship and then also had to make it’s way down under as Meizu only ship to Europe (and Asia I believe).

ChromeOS - removing SSH known_hosts from Chromebook

Wed, 22 Jul 2015 10:16:41 +0930

One of the things that is not implemented in the Secure Shell Chrome extension is the ability to remove know_host fingerprints which alert you if the fingerprint for a specific IP address has changed.

However there are times when you upgrade a systems and this need to be done.

@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
@ WARNING: REMOTE HOST IDENTIFICATION HAS CHANGED! @
@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
IT IS POSSIBLE THAT SOMEONE IS DOING SOMETHING NASTY!
Someone could be eavesdropping on you right now (man-in-the-middle attack)!
It is also possible that a host key has just been changed.
The fingerprint for the ECDSA key sent by the remote host is
d6:be:12:7e:22:23:c3:e1:56:30:d6:cd:65:b7:ab:42.
Please contact your system administrator.
Add correct host key in /.ssh/known_hosts to get rid of this message.
Offending ECDSA key in /.ssh/known_hosts:7
ECDSA host key for xxxxxxxxxxxxx.yyy.au has changed and you have requested strict checking.
Host key verification failed.
NaCl plugin exited with status code 255.
(R)econnect, (C)hoose another connection, or E(x)it?

OpenVPN - fix issues with DNS server assignment (Synology NAS)

Fri, 19 Jun 2015 16:08:19 +0930

Synology NAS systems are great VPN servers for a home or small office. However if you want to connect to the VPN and route all your traffic through the VPN and be able to browse the internet there are a few things you need to change on the Synology server.

Theoretically you should be able to set these options on the client, but I have not managed to get this to work with Synology and judging by the amount of forum threads a lot of other people had the same problem. If somebody has a better way to fix this I would love to know. I don’t like to manually change these config files as I assume they will be overwritten when making changes to the web-interface.

Finding Notebook Hardware for Ubuntu - 2015 Edition

Sun, 14 Jun 2015 15:43:27 +0930

Unfortunately it is still much harder than necessary to find notebook hardware to use with Ubuntu (or other Linux variants). This blog is full of past experiences (some of them quite time-consuming) on finding notebook hardware that will work without too much fiddling. This short note is to document my recent research on that front to help others who want to do the same (as there doesn’t seem to be a lot of good current info around).

SShuttle - quick and temporary VPN over SSH

Mon, 08 Jun 2015 15:18:14 +0930

Every once in a while you find a gem. One of these for me is SShuttle – until now I have not known about this one.

Threads 140.365 by Stephan Geyer, on Flickr

Creative Commons Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 Generic License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/) by Stephan Geyer

Use-case: I just been trying to get Ubuntu Make to install Eclipse IDE and the local AARNET download mirror is just refusing to cooperate (https://github.com/ubuntu/ubuntu-make/issues/90). A quick forward to a remote VPS fixed the issue without headaches

Installing Ubuntu Phone (Touch) on Nexus 7 LTE

Mon, 11 May 2015 19:06:28 +0930

[](https://www.flickr.com/photos/leogaggl/16898140083 “ubuntu phone by Leo Gaggl, on Flickr”)

Add SDK repository

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntu-sdk-team/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install ubuntu-device-flash

Enable USB Debugging on the device

Make sure you have developer mode enabled (see http://developer.android.com/tools/device.html if you are unsure).
Navigate to Settings > Developer options
Enable USB Debugging. When a device is connected, you will be prompted in Android to authorize it.

Unlock Bootloader

adb reboot bootloader
fastboot oem unlock
fastboot reboot

Check that you have the right device

adb shell grep ro.product.name /system/build.prop > mydevicedata \
&& adb shell grep ro.product.device /system/build.prop >> mydevicedata \
&& adb shell grep build.id /system/build.prop >> mydevicedata

ro.product.name=razorg
ro.product.device=deb
ro.build.id=KTU84P

Paperless Office using the Raspberry Pi

Mon, 23 Mar 2015 17:37:43 +0930

This is a follow-up on an older blog using Ubuntu.

r by rosmary, on Flickr

Creative Commons Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/) by rosmary

Raspberry Pi Prerequisites

Since this will be a purely headless install designed to sit in a corner behind the scanner I am using a Base Raspian (Debian Wheezy) install (I personally like the clean minimal install via https://github.com/debian-pi/raspbian-ua-netinst the best).

Install Ubuntu 14.04 on a Chromebook

Sat, 21 Mar 2015 10:44:00 +0930

There are plenty of sites out there that give advise on this topic, unfortunately most of them are highly ad-infested to the point of being unreadable as well as only containing single bit rather that an overall picture. This is a collection of useful links to source materials as well as steps necessary to install.

Toshiba Chromebook 2 Ports by Joe Wilcox, on Flickr

Creative Commons Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.0 Generic License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/) by Joe Wilcox

CyanogenMod 12 on Sony Xperia Z2

Sat, 21 Feb 2015 21:06:16 +0930

Just a quick update of the previous article on “Sony Xperia Z2 upgrading to CyanogenMod 11“.

One thing is that CM now included the custom recovery and you do not need to download any other custom recoveries !

Download the CM 12 ZIP file for Sony Xperia Z2 (sirius) and extract the ‘boot.img’ file

Download link: https://download.cyanogenmod.org/?device=sirius

Get the device into fastboot (bootloader mode)

Ubuntu 14.04 Webmin Install from PPA

Sun, 26 Oct 2014 15:49:18 +0930

On remote systems sometimes a web-based tool can be very handy. Webmin is such a tool that has been well maintained for decades. To install quickly on a Ubuntu Server without having to manage dependencies and keeping it updated as part of normal OS update operations installing from a PPA Repo is handy.

sudo echo "deb http://download.webmin.com/download/repository sarge contrib" >> /etc/apt/sources.list
wget -q http://www.webmin.com/jcameron-key.asc -O- | sudo apt-key add -
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install webmin

After this you should be able to connect to your webmin instance on port 10000

Barebone Ubuntu 14.04 Cloud Desktop

Mon, 13 Oct 2014 21:42:07 +0930

Since I have found some issues with my previous LXQT setup in real-life work I decided to fall back to standard Lubuntu for my cloud desktop. As part of this I also switched to TightVNC which seems a lot easier to configure.

Add local user account

adduser USERNAME
adduser USERNAME sudo

Install Lubuntu Desktop

sudo apt-get install --no-install-recommends lubuntu-desktop tightvncserver

TightVNC Configuration

sudo vim /etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf

#
# VNC Server configuration
#
# enabled = True if VNC connections should be allowed
# port = TCP/IP port to listen for connections on
#
[VNCServer]
enabled=true
port=5900
width=1366
height=768
depth=24

sudo /etc/init.d/lightdm restart

Connect to the remote system

ssh -L 5900:localhost:5900 -i /path/to/your/aws/keyfile.pem YOUR.EC2.IP.ADDRESS

Accessing your cloud desktop from Chromebook

Sun, 12 Oct 2014 21:19:04 +0930

One of the main reasons for setting up a cloud desktop is that I tend to use a lot of different devices some of which are not very powerful.

One of my favorite devices of late has been a HP 11 Chromebook. I originally bought it for a new employee and wanted to check myself how this thing stacks up to do day-to-day computing tasks more efficiently than a standard laptop without all the headaches of running Windows (viruses, endless driver installs, bloatware, malware, …). We already have several people at work working exclusively from Chromebooks and they absolutely love them. Long story short – I ended up keeping the Chromebook for myself as it’s an absolutely great secondary device for me. I can carry it with me everywhere (doesn’t weigh much more than a tablet, roughly the same size as a tablet & has a keyboard and is so much more useful than a tablet).

Vodafone LTE mobile data on Cyanogen Mod

Sat, 23 Aug 2014 13:14:16 +0930

I have had some issues recently with getting LTE (4G) connectivity on the Vodafone Australia Network using CyanogenMod 11 on multiple devices (http://forum.cyanogenmod.org/topic/92919-no-4g-signal-on-vodafone-au/). Turns out that it was an APN issue after all.

The APN provisioned by default when the Voda SIM card is inserted (vfinternet.au) does not work for the LTE Data Network. It works with GPRS & WCDMA, but fails to connect when the phone is set to prefer LTE (4G) Networks and they are actually available. It means that the handset will loose mobile data connectivity altogether. There are various APN Settings floating around on the interwebs, but any I tried previously did not fix the issue.

Sony Xperia Z2 upgrading to CyanogenMod 11

Sun, 17 Aug 2014 10:17:20 +0930

Contrary to my normal inclinations not to buy anything but Stock Android phones I ended up with a Sony Xperia Z2 in a hurry over the weekend (it’s a long story…). It appears to be quite a decent handset (with a pretty good camera actually) and one of the main reason to choose this over the other options was that is was one of the few high-end devices which already had a CM snapshot rather than just nightly releases. However similar to their colleagues at Samsung the Sony people also opted to stuff all sorts of crap-ware bloat onto the Android base OS. It appears not to be as bad as the Samsung (who are the kings of crap) mods, but for somebody used to the clean Android experience it’s just very annoying. So I opted to flash it straight to CyanogenMod.

Removing 'Video Call' default in Google Calendar

Mon, 04 Aug 2014 21:21:25 +0930

This ‘feature’ has been annoying me for a while and after this has caused some confusion with some of my clients I decided to go and look where to disable this. Why this has been made a system wide default is beyond me.

Rather than in the users Calendar Settings this is actually in the Google Apps Admin Console (https://admin.google.com/)

Console –> Google Apps –> Settings for Calendar –> Sharing Settings

Finding a private location check-in service

Wed, 23 Jul 2014 22:37:51 +0930

Foursquare decided that it was too hard for them to compete with location services like Yelp and split their app into two separate apps. Whilst that might make sense to the 4Square CEO and his VC masters, it makes no sense from a users perspective. Foursquare can be a bit of a battery hog already, and having 2 apps to open and “annoy” you with notifications is not an improvement by any means. And if I wanted Foursquare to be Yelp – I would have used Yelp in the first place. So no – I do not want to install another separate check-in App (called Swarm). One battery hogging location app was enough.

Install Virtualbox Additions on Centos 7 Guest VM

Wed, 09 Jul 2014 11:59:21 +0930

Install dependencies

sudo yum groupinstall "Development Tools"
sudo yum install kernel-devel

Mount the Virtualbox Additions CD ISO

sudo mkdir /media/cdrom/
sudo mount /dev/cdrom /media/cdrom/
sudo ./VBoxLinuxAdditions.run


I will now use `write_file` to overwrite `content/blogs/2014-07-09-install-virtualbox-additions-on-centos-7-guest-vm.md` with this corrected content.

ARD Mediathek offline viewing on Ubuntu

Tue, 01 Jul 2014 15:18:43 +0930

Since I am a bit of a sucker for German “Krimis” as well as some their excellent documentaries I like to watch ARD Mediathek IPTV. However there are several problems with this when you live at the opposite side of the world. ARD has a block for any films that are 15+ years outside of 20.00h-6.00h GMT+1. Which makes it pretty much impossible to watch at a reasonable time in Australia. I also like to watch these things on the plane which requires download of the media files.

Ubuntu 14.04 Amazon EC2 Cloud Desktop using LXQT

Sun, 29 Jun 2014 20:38:36 +0930

Using Amazon EC2’s free usage tier to host your own cloud desktop is a very economical way to to have a desktop at hand anytime you can not be near one. Since I quite often use Chromebooks these days when on the road this is a particular handy way should I need a full desktop for certain tasks.

Since Ubuntu 14.05 is my default desktop on my normal hardware I obviously want to have my cloud desktop running the same underlying OS. However I don’t think running Unity as the desktop interface would be appropriate via a low-bandwidth remote desktop connection. For this reason I chose LXQT. If you need total stability you probably should go for the more mature LXDE instead, but I have already tried LXQT on an old EEE PC and was very impressed by the speed and low resource usage.

Upgrading Nokia X to CyanogenMod 11 (via Ubuntu)

Tue, 17 Jun 2014 20:48:29 +0930

The Nokia X seems to be a nice piece of hardware for just around $125 AUD. Nothing spectacular in terms of computing power, but much better build quality than your average cheap Chinese Android clone. I have always been a fan of Nokia hardware until they decided to commit suicide by firstly adding CEO Stephen Elop and ditching all of their software for Windows Mobile.

The problem with the device out of the box is that is has a horribly butchered version of Android. And by horribly I mean way worse than the usual bloat and crapware that poor Samsung, HTC or Sony users are normally subjected to. Hopefully this is only Nokia’s first step to a more open platform, but I wouldn’t hold my breath on that one.

Upgrade Rikomagic MK902 Android MiniPC from Ubuntu

Sun, 15 Jun 2014 21:05:47 +0930

If there would be an Oscar for the WORST firmware upgrade procedure (and associated drivers, documentation and general quality of software) Rikomagic should win this by a country mile !

Since all the information I found on the interwebs said Linux was not supported I ended up borrowing friends notebooks (as I don’t own any Windows machinery anymore). My main Toshiba Ultrabook seemed to have issues with picking up the USB from a Windows Virtual Machine). After not being able to get the absolute crap USB drivers that come with the firmware download with any of the machines (Vista & Win7_64) I was ready to throw in the towel and put the purchase of this unit (in hindsight I would not do it again anyway) down as a total waste.

Install Google Earth on Ubuntu 14.04

Sun, 25 May 2014 16:11:00 +0930

Trying to install Google Earth on Ubuntu. You could just download the .deb file and run dpkg command, however I prefer to use it via a repo to make sure upgrades are installed as part of the system upgrades.

http://www.google.com/earth/download/ge/

Google Keys

Note: this should not be necessary if you have use the GoogleTalk plugin or similar package from the Google DEB Repo

cd /tmp/
wget https://dl-ssl.google.com/linux/linux_signing_key.pub
sudo apt-key add linux_signing_key.pub
rm linux_signing_key.pub

Add Google Earth Repo

sudo vim /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google.list
#add the following line
deb http://dl.google.com/linux/earth/deb/ stable main

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install google-earth-stable

NOTE: While this should be enough on 32bit versions of Ubuntu 14.04 unfortunately it turns out that there is a dependency problem with the 64bit version

Android SDK issues on Ubuntu 14.04 64bit

Sun, 18 May 2014 12:14:37 +0930

Since the upgrade to Ubuntu 14.04 (Trusty Tahr) I have had issues running the Android SDK Tools. For example this error:

./adb
bash: ./adb: No such file or directory

Check the multi-arch architectures installed on the system.

sudo dpkg --print-architecture

Mine only showed ‘amd64’. Turns out you need to add the i386 architecture and install libc6:i386,libncurses5:i386,libstdc++6:i386 library packages.

sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install libc6:i386 libncurses5:i386 libstdc++6:i386
sudo ./adb

LXQt - extending the life of my trusty old EEE PC (even further)

Sun, 11 May 2014 21:04:06 +0930

My old Asus EEE PC 900 is the oldest piece of hardware I own. With an old Intel Atom processor and 1GB of RAM it’s never was the fastest kid on the block (in fact I never considered the Windows XP version of the same unit usable as it was very sluggish). However after owning it for nearly 7 years I am very surprised I can still use it. Granted I only use it occasionally when I am at home, but thanks to LXDE it was still usable. I recently learned that LXDE is merging with the Razor-Qt project (great idea!) to create the combined LXQT – an ultra-low resource window manager.

Google Android Studio - Ubuntu repository install

Sun, 27 Apr 2014 20:48:31 +0930

Thanks to Paolo Rotolo there is now a Ubuntu Launchpad PPA for Android Studio

sudo apt-add-repository ppa:paolorotolo/android-studio
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install android-studio

Synology OpenVPN connection from Android

Thu, 24 Apr 2014 21:40:13 +0930

Connecting securely to your home network has always been a bit of a challenge since common home ADSL routers not normally contain any VPN Servers (those which do contain such are generally PPTP servers which I would hardly call secure these days). Which is probably a good thing as they would be horribly out of date considering the firmware release policies of retail router manufacturers. You could run/maintain your own dedicated server, but for most home networks that is overkill and out of the technical depth of most hobbyists. However NAS Appliances are becoming more useful in home networks for storage and other common tasks. I have had good experiences with Synology NAS devices over a number of years and the latest iteration also has a very useful VPN Server package available based on OpenVPN (as most Synology Apps are common Open Source components).

Ubuntu 14.04 - post-install enhancements for Trusty Tahr

Mon, 21 Apr 2014 17:43:16 +0930

Excellent coincidence that the release of Ubuntu 14.04 LTS (Trusty Tahr) fell into the Easter holidays. This gives me the time to install earlier than I normally have time for.

This realease being a LTS (long-term support) release means it is a fairly conservative release. There are some nice enhancements and most importantly for me the 3.13 Kernel means finally Wacom Touch devices are supported without kernel mods.

Fixing UEFI Secure Boot problems on Ubuntu 14.04

Sat, 19 Apr 2014 18:49:15 +0930

Unfortunately the mess that is UEFI Secure Boot still causes issues on some hardware. In my case it’s a Toshiba Z930 Ultrabook. I have documented the procedure to get it working here.

However it turns out that there is no ‘Trusty’ release for the boot-repair utility. The fix is relatively easy.

sudo vim /etc/apt/sources.list.d/yannubuntu-boot-repair-trusty.list
#change the following line from 'trusty' to 'saucy'
sudo vim /etc/apt/sources.list.d/yannubuntu-boot-repair-trusty.list

You can then just finish with

Apache Cordova development environment install on Ubuntu

Sun, 06 Apr 2014 16:52:52 +0930

Apache Cordova has very nice documentation, however as so many projects it is focused on the Windows/MacOS duopolies only. Fortunately it’s not too hard to work out the differences.

Installing dependencies

Thanks to: https://github.com/joyent/node/wiki/Installing-Node.js-via-package-manager

sudo apt-get install python-software-properties python g++ make ant openjdk-7-jre openjdk-7-jdk

Installing Android SDK

Please note: one of the problems I found was that I had some Android tools from the Ubuntu repos that were conflicting with the SDK install. It’s probably a good idea to remove them first. That might save you from a lot of headaches down the line (and time to troubleshoot).

RaspberryPi real-world control with REST API

Thu, 03 Apr 2014 18:22:00 +0930

Finally found some time playing with a RaspberryPi and an attached PiFace Interface board to control some garden pumps and potentially an Aquaponics setup in the near future.

Requirements

Raspberry Pi (Model B in my case, but any will do)
PiFace Interface board (http://www.piface.org.uk)

Base Raspian (Debian Wheezy) Install (I prefer the clean minimal install via https://githutb.com/hifi/raspbian-ua-netins).

Configure the base system as per my previous base install.

Getting Foscam IP Cameras to work from Linux (Ubuntu)

Tue, 04 Feb 2014 20:26:07 +0930

As with most hardware manufacturers of hardware Foscam utility software is Windows or Mac only. The actual unit tested with the below is a FI9805E Outdoor POE camera.

Installation

The installation is relatively painless as the unit is set up to get the IP assignment via DHCP (check your routers DHCP assignment list).

https://IP.ADDRESS.OF.CAM

should get you to the web-admin interface. The default user is ‘admin’ with no (empty) password.

Automatically posting GooglePlus articles to Twitter

Sat, 01 Feb 2014 23:51:57 +0930

I have switched most of my Social Media postings to Google+ over the last year. Despite popular opinion being that Google+ is some ‘ghost town’, I find G+ the most useful environment for my particular needs & interests (specially since the introduction of groups). It has in my experience a vastly better signal-to-noise than other social media in particular Facebook.

However I would still like to feed postings through to my Twitter stream. Unfortunately Google has (stupidly / purposely / nastily) not included RSS support to make this possible without much work. There are a few publicly accessibly services out there, but they generally are either not updated or tend to fail very frequently as they hit the API Access limits as soon as they get a few users on their services.

Edit files on remote host via SSH

Tue, 28 Jan 2014 10:12:37 +0930

Whilst most commandline editors have the ability to edit files on a remote host directly this can get messy sometimes when there are multiple files involved. Mounting the remote folder via SSHFS seems to be more reliable in practical use.

Mount

sudo apt-get install sshfs
sudo addgroup USERNAME fuse
sshfs remoteuser@remotehost:/remote/path /local/mountpath

Unmount

fusermount -u /local/mountpath

Ubuntu Touch install on Nexus 4

Sun, 26 Jan 2014 11:31:11 +0930

This is the last of a series of alternative mobile OS installs and the easiest install by a country mile !

Install

Everything is quite well documented here: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Touch/Install.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:phablet-team/tools
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install phablet-tools android-tools-adb android-tools-fastboot
phablet-flash ubuntu-system --channel devel --bootstrap

That is it really ! This is how a OS change on a mobile should work !

Issues

Ubuntu touch can not yet handle the radio firmware past Android 4.3 devices. So if your N4 was upgraded to Android 4.4 (KitKat) you need to flash the radio to the Android 4.3 (up to Version 2.0.1700.84) else WIFI will not work.

Making VIM the default text editor on Ubuntu

Wed, 22 Jan 2014 16:36:13 +0930

In my never ending quest to find the ideal text editor here is another installment. Since I have been using VIM as my default command line editor for years I thought I give it a try for basic GUI editing as well.

Install and set desktop app & icon

sudo apt-get install
vim vim-gnome
sudo wget --output-document=/usr/share/applications/gvim.desktop https://raw.github.com/leogaggl/misc-scripts/master/gvim.desktop
sudo wget --output-document=/usr/share/icons/hicolor/scalable/apps/gvim.svg http://gfxmonk.net/images/vim-logo/vim-logo.svg
sudo update-desktop-database

Set MIME defaults

vim ~/.local/share/applications/mimeapps.list
#add or edit the following mime type and add others as needed
text/plain=gvim.desktop;

Install FirefoxOS on Nexus S (GT-9023)

Tue, 21 Jan 2014 20:52:16 +0930

I just had one of my old hand-me-down phones returned by my offspring in a great condition (junior is very careful with his equipment – well done young man !). This doesn’t happen all too often shows that the Nexus S is a decently built phone. This is also a good example of breaking the built-in obsolescence of modern phones. This particular unit has served me well for nearly 2 years (my average is one year) and served 2 kids after that.

Ubuntu 13.10 based Python/Django/WSGI setup

Sat, 30 Nov 2013 13:06:37 +0930

I am currently looking into the use of Django for one of my extra-curricular projects and needed to set up a development environment on Ubuntu. This is the log for future reference and hopefully useful for anybody needing to do the same.

Dependencies & Django Installation

Core Dependencies & Django

sudo apt-get install apache2 apache2-mpm-itk libapache2-mod-wsgi mysql-server python-django python-mysqldb

Optional add-ons

For my purposes I need a few more additional modules

Ubuntu Apache2 - run VHOST as different user

Fri, 29 Nov 2013 14:59:25 +0930

There are several reasons why you might want to run different Apache Virtual Hosts as separate users from the Apache user account. My most frequent usage is on my development machine to allow running from my home directory.

The most commonly recommended option for this purpose is MPM-ITK (a quick hack would be to add yourself to the www-data group using “sudo usermod -a -G www-data USERNAME”)

sudo apt-get install apache2-mpm-itk
sudo a2enmod mpm_itk

Modify the virtual host config file in /etc/apache2/sites-available

Re-index media files on Synology NAS servers

Sun, 27 Oct 2013 11:12:23 +0930

One of the annoying things with Synology NAS servers is the fact that a video file moved to the filesystem does not automatically appear on the DNLA share on client devices. It needs a re-index of the media files.

You can log into the HTML Admin Console and start a re-index, however this will be a full re-index and most likely take ages to complete. A quicker way is to connect to the SSH Console and issue the following command:

Installing libdvdcss on Ubuntu 13.10

Sun, 20 Oct 2013 10:03:47 +0930

With the demise of the Medibuntu repository and libdvdcss not being hosted in the main Ubuntu repos due to licensing issues a new repository is needed from 13.10 upwards. Thanks to the good folks at VideoLAN (makers of the awsome VLC Video Player) there is a ready and updated source available.

wget ftp://ftp.videolan.org/pub/debian/videolan-apt.asc | sudo apt-key add -
echo "deb ftp://ftp.videolan.org/pub/debian/stable ./" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/libdvdcss.list
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install libdvdcss2

Paperless Office on a budget

Mon, 19 Aug 2013 10:00:00 +0930

sudo apt-add-repository ppa:rolfbensch/sane-git
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install sane sane-utils imagemagick tesseract-ocr pdftk libtiff-tools libsane-extras exactimage wput

Install scanbuttond

Download the “Debian Experimental” package from http://pkgs.org/download/scanbuttond

sudo dpkg -i scanbuttond_0.2.3.cvs20090713-14_i386.deb

This step is only for the Fujitsu ScanSnap support. For other scanners you can probably install from the Ubuntu Repository

Scanner config

vim 40-libsane.rules
#add this line
ATTRS{idVendor}=="04c5", ATTRS{idProduct}=="11a2", ENV{libsane_matched}="yes"

Permissions

sudo adduser saned scanner

Useful command lines for troubleshooting

Since I had a few trouble getting this scanner to work properly I found the following commands highly useful in locating the issue.

Quick Adobe Reader install on Ubuntu 13.04

Wed, 07 Aug 2013 12:24:24 +0930

Whilst EVINCE is a very capable PDF Viewer, if you have a need to fill in editable PDF forms it is required to install the Adobe PDF Reader.

sudo add-apt-repository "deb http://archive.canonical.com/ precise partner"
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install acroread

PS: If anybody is aware of an Open Source alternative to the Adobe Reader for editable form please leave a comment !

Installing Custom ROM on Galaxy S4 International from Ubuntu

Mon, 22 Jul 2013 02:49:12 +0930

Or as an alternative title “Liberating your Galaxy S4 Hardware from Samsung Bloatware”.

Unfortunately there is lots of (ad-infested) blogs and forums with dodgy pieces of information on this topic and I found it pretty hard to get descent concise information. So hopefully this might help some poor Linux User liberate their phone. Whilst this has been tested on a Samsung GT-I9505 S4 International LTE device (JFLTEXX series) it should be applicable to other similar Samsung phones that are not fastboot capable (ie. all but the Galaxy Nexus range).

SMS Gateway using Sierra Wireless USB Modem on Debian Wheezy

Sun, 30 Jun 2013 21:06:34 +0930

I have been planning to set up a SMS Gateway for sending and receiving SMS messages via a headless utility unit (Raspberry Pi) for a while. Since I had a leftover Sierra Wireless AirCard 880U from Telstra in Australia I wanted to re-purpose this unit with a spare SIM card. Unfortunately it was very hard to find any good setup manual for this particular combination and took some time to fiddle & debug. This is the working setup for future reference and hopefully it helps somebody.

Twitter RSS Feeds

Wed, 19 Jun 2013 08:42:44 +0930

Now that Twitter has totally killed their V1 API there is no official way to get Twitter feeds via RSS. Which is a real shame as RSS is a well accepted Open Standard for this type of information :-(

RSS icon by Jurgen Appelo, on Flickr

Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/) by Jurgen Appelo

<errors>
<error code="68">
The Twitter REST API v1 is no longer active. Please migrate to API v1.1. https://dev.twitter.com/docs/api/1.1/overview.
</error>
</errors>

SHAME ON YOU TWITTER !

Remove Ubuntu Webapps integration features

Sat, 15 Jun 2013 16:05:39 +0930

One of the most annoying features in Ubuntu from 12.10 onwards are the pesky notifications popping up asking if you want webapps support everytime you visit a supported webpage?

Whilst you can disable this in Firefox’s browser options: Firefox > Preferences > General: Uncheck “Prompt integration options for any website”.

However I prefer to remove the browser extensions entirely.

sudo apt-get remove xul-ext-unity unity-chromium-extension

NOTE: Take care – unfortunatly you can not remove the following as their removal will cause Unity to fail !

Quick ‘manual’ Eclipse install on Ubuntu

Mon, 10 Jun 2013 11:44:39 +0930

Since I always had trouble with the Eclipse version that is avaialable via the Ubuntu repositories I often need to install Elcipse on new machinery. Hence I am documenting the process for myself and hopefully it might help others as well.

If you haven’t got the Java dependencies

Java dependencies install

sudo apt-get install openjdk-7-jre openjdk-7-jdk icedtea-7-plugin

Eclipse download

Note: download link needs to be updated – current as of 2014-01-27

Simple conky system monitor configuration

Sun, 09 Jun 2013 10:26:06 +0930

Just a quick note on install and configuration of Conky.

Installation

sudo apt-get install conky conky-all hddtemp curl lm-sensors
sudo chmod u+s /usr/sbin/hddtemp
sudo sensors-detect

vim ~/.conkyrc

This is the content of my config file.

use_xft yes
xftfont Ubuntu Condensed:size=9
xftalpha 0.8
override_utf8_locale yes
update_interval 5.0
total_run_times 0
own_window yes
own_window_transparent no
own_window_argb_visual yes
own_window_argb_value 155
own_window_colour 081100
own_window_type normal
own_window_class conky-lgaggl
own_window_hints undecorated,below,sticky,skip_taskbar,skip_pager
#background yes
#out_to_console no
double_buffer yes
#max_user_text 32768
minimum_size 300
draw_shades no
draw_outline no
draw_borders no
draw_graph_borders yes
default_shade_color black
default_outline_color white
default_bar_size 150 5
default_gauge_size 20 20
imlib_cache_size 0
draw_shades no
alignment middle_right
gap_x 15
gap_y 15
border_inner_margin 10
no_buffers yes
uppercase no
cpu_avg_samples 2
override_utf8_locale no
default_color ffffff
color1 ffffff
color2 cccccc
color3 000000
color4 FFAA00

TEXT
${font UbuntuBold:bold:size=11}${color4}Info ${color2}${hr 2}${font}
${color1}Date ${alignr}${color2}${time %a,}${color}${time %e %B %G}
${color1}Time ${alignr}${color}${time %T}

${font UbuntuBold:bold:size=11}${color4}System ${color2}${hr 2}${font}
${color1}Hostname ${alignr}${color}${nodename}
${color1}${sysname} ${alignr}${color}${kernel}-${machine}
${color1}CPU ${alignr}${color}${freq_g}GHz
${color1}Loadaverage ${alignr}${color}${loadavg 1} ${loadavg 2} ${loadavg 3}
${color1}Uptime ${alignr}${color}${uptime}
${color1}Cpu Temperature ${alignr}${color}${acpitemp}C

${font UbuntuBold:bold:size=11}${color4}Processors ${color2}${hr 2}${font}
${color1}Core 1 ${alignr}${color}${cpu cpu1}% ${cpubar cpu1}
${color1}Core 2 ${alignr}${color}${cpu cpu2}% ${cpubar cpu2}
${color1}Core 3 ${alignr}${color}${cpu cpu3}% ${cpubar cpu3}
${color1}Core 4 ${alignr}${color}${cpu cpu4}% ${cpubar cpu4}

${font UbuntuBold:bold:size=11}${color4}Memory ${color2}${hr 2}${font} 
${color1}Memory ${color}${alignr}${memeasyfree} / ${memmax} 
${color1}Currently ${color}${alignr}${memperc}% ${membar}

${font UbuntuBold:bold:size=11}${color4}Filesystem ${color2}${hr 2}${font} 
${color1}/ ${color}${alignc}${fs_used /} / ${fs_size /} ${color}${alignr}${fs_free_perc /} % 
${color}${fs_bar 5,300 /}

${font UbuntuBold:bold:size=11}${color4}Networking ${color2}${hr 2}${font} 
${if_existing /proc/net/route wlan0}${color1}Ip ${color}${alignr}${addr wlan0} 
${color1}AP ${color}${alignr}${wireless_essid wlan0} 
${color1}Signal ${color}${alignr}${wireless_link_qual_perc wlan0}${wireless_link_bar 10,100 wlan0} 
${color1}Download ${alignr}${color}${downspeed wlan0}${downspeedgraph wlan0 10,100} 
${color1}Upload ${alignr}${color}${upspeed wlan0}${upspeedgraph wlan0 10,100} 
${color1}Total Down/Up ${alignr}${color}${totaldown wlan0}${color1}/${color}${totalup wlan0} 
${else}${if_existing /proc/net/route eth0}${color1}Ip ${color}${alignr}${addr eth0} 
${color1}Download ${alignr}${color}${downspeed eth0}${downspeedgraph eth0 10,100} 
${color1}Upload ${alignr}${color}${upspeed eth0}${upspeedgraph eth0 10,100} 
${color1}Total Down/Up ${alignr}${color}${totaldown eth0}${color1}/${color}${totalup eth0}${endif}${endif}

${font UbuntuBold:bold:size=11}${color4}Weather ${color2}${hr 2}${font}
${color1}Temperature ${alignr}${color}${weather https://tgftp.nws.noaa.gov/data/observations/metar/stations/ YPAD temperature} C
${color1}Humidity ${alignr}${color}${weather https://tgftp.nws.noaa.gov/data/observations/metar/stations/ YPAD humidity} %
${color1}Weather ${alignr}${color}${weather https://tgftp.nws.noaa.gov/data/observations/metar/stations/ YPAD weather}

${font UbuntuBold:bold:size=11}${color4}Top Processes ${color2}${hr 2}${font}
${color1}${top name 1} 	${alignr}${color}${top cpu 1} ${top mem 1}
${color1}${top name 2} 	${alignr}${color}${top cpu 2} ${top mem 2}
${color1}${top name 3} 	${alignr}${color}${top cpu 3} ${top mem 3}
${color1}${top name 4} 	${alignr}${color}${top cpu 4} ${top mem 4}
${color1}${top name 5} 	${alignr}${color}${top cpu 5} ${top mem 5}

Note: if you want to use this config file you want to at least change the METAR code (YPAD in my case) with one closer to you – see http://www.rap.ucar.edu/weather/surface/stations.txt.

Installing Ubuntu on Toshiba Z930 Ultrabook

Fri, 07 Jun 2013 15:35:01 +0930

Since I have been really happy with the performance and mobility on the Toshiba Ultrabooks (see previous blog entries) I have now chosen to stay with a tried brand and uprgrade to the Z930 i7 model.

Unfortunately this now comes with added hurdles by our good friends at Microsoft in the form of UEFI and the pre-installed disaster that is Windows 8. Instead of totally wiping the system as I did with the Z830 model I decided to install next to Windows 8 as lots of people have reported problems with the UEFI bootloader and the BIOS if you start messing with the pre-installed partitions (specially the EFI partition).

Using TOR and PRIVOXY on Ubuntu

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 13:47:20 +0930

This covers only the basic install and configuration for future reference. More info on Privoxy can be found on their website http://www.privoxy.org/.

Install

apt-get install tor privoxy

vim /etc/privoxy/config

uncomment the following line:

forward-socks5 / 127.0.0.1:9050 .

If you need to browse internal hosts while connected:

forward 10.*.*.*/

Browser Configuration

Firefox: FoxyProxy
Chromium: Proxy Switchy

Documentation: http://www.privoxy.org/faq/misc.html#TOR

FreedomBox + RaspberryPi = FreedomPi

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 13:19:13 +0930

I have been watching progress on FreedomBox ever since watching a video of Eben Moglen a few years ago.

Turns out that that they recently announced the availability of their 0.1 preview release. As part of this there is one component that is extremely useful for RaspberryPi users (funnily the co-founder of RasperryPi is also called Eblen by first name – go figure) out there concerned about increasing snooping of private information by governments and corporations for a variety of reasons.

OpenVPN - forward all client traffic through tunnel using UFW

Sun, 21 Apr 2013 15:19:58 +0930

By default OpenVPN only routes traffic to and from the OpenVPN Server. If you need all traffic from a client through the OpenVPN tunnel there are several options listed in the OpenVPN docs (http://openvpn.net/index.php/open-source/documentation/howto.html#redirect). Since I don’t have any control over the server in some cases I needed a client side solution. As I already have ufw running with Ubuntu I wanted to use the existing software.

Here is how to configure ufw to enable routing all traffic from your client machines through the OpenVPN Server.

Connection Android 4.x MTP mass storage to Ubuntu 12.x

Sat, 23 Mar 2013 09:23:37 +0930

The ability to connect Android 4.+ devices to Ubuntu using the USB Mass Storage interface has always been a pain. With Ubuntu 13.04 a new MTP back-end (gvfs-mtp) is going to be introduced, but I have had some issues with the 13.04 Beta so I found this backport PPA to Ubuntu 12.04 and 12.10

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:langdalepl/gvfs-mtp
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install gvfs
sudo apt-get upgrade

Kudos to Phillip Langdale for the work and maintaining the PPA !

Enabling the watchdog timer on the Raspberry Pi

Tue, 29 Jan 2013 22:51:18 +0930

Turns out that the Broadcom BCM2708 chip on the RPi has a hardware watchdog. This can be very useful if your RPi is located remotely and locks up. However, this would not the preferred method of restarting the unit and in extreme cases this can result in file-system damage that could prevent the RPi from booting. If this occurs regularly you better find the root cause of the problem rather than fight the symptoms.

Dropping the wires on the Raspberry PI

Tue, 29 Jan 2013 21:23:34 +0930

Testing the RPi for some remote sensing application I needed to use a wireless connection as it would have been a pain to reach with an Ethernet cable.

Parts

Raspberry Pi Series B 512MB
Raspbian 3.6.11+ Kernel
Comfast 802.11n – Realtek RTL8188CUS WLAN Adapter

Install WPA Supplicant

sudo apt-get install wpasupplicant

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wpa_supplicant

Check for the USB adapter

sudo lsusb

This should show output similar to this (depending on your USB adapter)

Webserver and database combination on Raspberry Pi

Mon, 28 Jan 2013 20:13:01 +0930

My normal combination on the big-server side would be Apache + MySQL (or PostgreSQL), but on the RPi this seems to be absolute overkill. For data-logging operations I would not use the local system anyway (looking at MQTT as well as Remote MongoDB datastore via REST Webservices).

After some poking around and reading up on the options I decided to go for the following combo: LightHTTPD + SQLite. Both are lightweight replacement of their fully-featured big-server counterparts (Apache HTTP & MySQL) and have very familiar configurations. There would be other options that have even less resource usage, but I really don’t have the time to start from scratch somewhere.

Chromebook tips to get started

Mon, 28 Jan 2013 03:38:58 +0930

Just got myself (actually it’s for our Office Manager back in OZ) one of these Chromebooks while in Europe (since Google Australia with their absolutely hopeless hardware strategy do not seem to be able to ship any devices – Nexus 4 anyone ?) .

Since the first days turned out to be a bit of a frustrating experience, I thought I share some of the findings as I had a hard time finding much useful info on troubleshooting ChromeOS.

Raspberry Pi - Raspbian post install tasks

Sun, 27 Jan 2013 00:31:35 +0930

The Raspbian Install process is fairly well documented using the Raspbian Installer. This is just to document common tasks after the stock install.

Install base utils

apt-get install sudo vim ntpdate git-core binutils make gcc ca-certificates rpi-update

Allow non-root user account access to ‘sudo’

adduser USERNAME sudo

For those Ubuntu users there is no ‘admin’ group in Raspbian (Debian Wheezy).

NTP time update

sudo rm /etc/localtime
sudo ln -s /usr/share/zoneinfo/Australia/Adelaide /etc/localtime
sudo ntpdate -u au.pool.ntp.org

Probably best to choose an NTP Server closest to your location or provided by your ISP

Mongodb / Python development install on Ubuntu

Sun, 27 Jan 2013 00:29:25 +0930

Add apt repository key

sudo apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv 7F0CEB10

Add apt repository

sudo vim /etc/apt/sources.list.d/10gen.list
#add the following line:
deb http://downloads-distro.mongodb.org/repo/ubuntu-upstart dist 10gen

Install mongodb & python utils

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install mongodb-10gen python-pip python-dev build-essential
pip install pymongo

Accessing 1-wire devices on Raspberry Pi using OWFS

Tue, 08 Jan 2013 22:53:43 +0930

To connect 1-wire serial devices to the RPi I am using a DS9490R USB 1-wire adapter (rather than wiring I2C 1-Wire master components to GPIO I2C – which I might look at sometime down the track)

Install packages

sudo apt-get install owfs ow-shell

Edit config file

vim /etc/owfs.conf

! server: server = localhost:4304
# USB device: DS9490
server: usb = all
######################### OWFS ##########################
mountpoint = /mnt/1wire
allow_other
####################### OWHTTPD #########################
http: port = 2121
####################### OWFTPD ##########################
ftp: port = 2120
####################### OWSERVER ########################
server: port = localhost:4304

Create Startup Script

I created a startup script for owfs modelled on the owserver script (not sure why this one is actually missing)

Installing OMXPlayer on Raspberry Pi

Mon, 07 Jan 2013 21:31:18 +0930

Since I didn’t have any luck playing videos on the RPi using mplayer I found omxplayer after some search. It has the ability to use the RPi’s GPU thus taking some load of the CPU.

UPDATE 2013-04-01: omxplayer is now included in the Raspbian (Debian Wheezy) repositories and can be simply installed by one line.

sudo apt-get install omxplayer

Check another article on how to install Raspbian.

Raspberry Pi - Text to Speech

Mon, 07 Jan 2013 12:15:58 +0930

Just a quick note on Speech Synthesis a Raspberry Pi project. I had to research some of the options on the Raspberry Pi while looking into a project where I need some audio announcements.

Configuring Sound

echo 'snd-bcm2835' >> /etc/modules
sudo modprobe snd-bcm2835

sudo apt-get install mplayer alsa-base alsa-utils pulseaudio mpg123
# make mplayer use mpg123 codec instead of default ffmp3float
echo "afm=mp3lib" >> ~/.mplayer/config

Since I am using Raspbian which is a Debian based (Wheezy) Distribution I used some Ubuntu documentation (https://help.ubuntu.com/community/TextToSpeech) as the starting point.

Creating Twitter Archives

Mon, 10 Dec 2012 10:23:16 +0930

One of the more common uses of Twitter for me is to monitor “back-channels” at events (often events I can attend, but more often these days events I am unable to attend).

Unfortunately Twitter’s search capabilities cease to be useful after a little while and so it is very handy to be able to create an archive for the events ‘hashtag’. There used to be a number of tools in the early days, but mainly because of Twitter’s changes to policies and very unfortunate morphing into a closed ‘media-publishing’ platform, the developers of such tools were forced to discontinue their services.

Enable GeoIP lookups on CentOS

Tue, 02 Oct 2012 12:05:00 +0930

GeoIP enables you to identify the location, organization, connection speed, and user type of your website visitors.

yum install GeoIP mod_geoip
cd /usr/share/GeoIP/
wget http://geolite.maxmind.com/download/geoip/database/GeoLiteCountry/GeoIP.dat.gz
wget http://geolite.maxmind.com/download/geoip/database/GeoLiteCity.dat.gz
gunzip GeoIP.dat.gz
gunzip GeoLiteCity.dat.gz
rm -f *.gz

Edit the VirtualHost settings in httpd.conf

<ifmodule mod_geoip.c>
GeoIPEnable On
GeoIPDBFile /usr/share/GeoIP/GeoIP.dat Standard
GeoIPDBFile /usr/share/GeoLiteCity.dat Standard
</ifmodule>

Restart Apache

/etc/init.d/httpd restart

Accessing Amazon RDS from Desktop

Sun, 09 Sep 2012 22:18:42 +0930

Every once in a while it is handy to be able to access an Amazon RDS Database Instance remotely from a desktop.

ssh -i <strong>YOUR-AMAZON-PRIVATE-KEY</strong>.pem -l <strong>YOUR-AMAZON-RDS-USERNAME</strong> -L 33060:<strong>YOUR-AMAZON-RDS-PRIVATE-IPADDRESS</strong>:3306 -N ec2-usr@<strong>YOUR-AMAZON-EC2-INSTANCE-PUBLIC-ADDRESS</strong>

Note: YOURAMAZONRDSPRIVATEIPADDRESS needs to be the AWS internal RDS IP Address – not the external hostname

You can then connect to RDS using mysql commands or any GUI tool such as MySQL Workbench via localhost:33060

Thanks to: Dirk Taggesell via AWS Forums

Wireshark install on Ubuntu 12.04

Mon, 03 Sep 2012 17:25:36 +0930

Just a short note on Wireshark install (needed to beat an Asterisk SIP install into submission)

sudo apt-get install wireshark
sudo useradd -U -M -s /bin/false wireshark
sudo chgrp wireshark /usr/bin/dumpcap
sudo chmod 754 /usr/bin/dumpcap
sudo setcap 'CAP_NET_RAW+eip CAP_NET_ADMIN+eip' /usr/bin/dumpcap
sudo gpasswd -a YOURUSERNAME wireshark

Source: http://wiki.wireshark.org/CaptureSetup/CapturePrivileges

Organisational micro-blogging for all

Tue, 24 Jul 2012 12:19:26 +0930

Having seen more and more articles on the use of micro-blogging tools in educational and corporates settings, I am constantly surprised that one of the most useful options from my point-of-view seems to be constantly overlooked. Micro-blogging is like Twitter, but private to your organisation. It is a great way to capture those more informal internal discussions. It can help distribute useful information (such as links) throughout your organisation or help kick-start conversations.

Offline RSS Reading on Ubuntu

Sun, 15 Jul 2012 10:19:34 +0930

I sometimes have time to read RSS feeds when I have no Internet connection. Granted this is happening less often these days with wireless connectivity pretty much ubiquitous, but I frequently have that need. Most often it’s in an air-plane when you want to catch up on non-essential news and don’t have any connectivity.

This is where Lightread comes in handy. It synchronizes your Google Reader Account with excellent integration into the Ubuntu UI (desktop notification of new items …).

CoffeeScript on Ubuntu 12.04

Sat, 07 Jul 2012 10:53:59 +0930

Installing CoffeeScript on Ubuntu 12.04 is a complete no-brainer by the looks of it (since both node.js Core as well as Node Package Manager are in the Ubuntu repos).

sudo apt-get install nodejs npm
sudo npm install -g coffee-script

To check the installation

coffee -v

Just as a reminder for myself & in case it helps somebody …

Saving Video Streams in Ubuntu

Sun, 24 Jun 2012 23:18:18 +0930

Flash Media

rtmpdump

apt-get install rtmpdump
rtmpdump -r "rtmp://domain.tld/video_name.flv" -o video_name.flv

Docs: http://rtmpdump.mplayerhq.hu/rtmpdump.1.html

Windows Media

mimms

apt-get install mimms
mimms mms://domain.tld/video_name.wmv

Docs: http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/precise/man1/mimms.1.html

mplayer

mplayer -dumpstream -dumpfile video_name.wmv mms://domain.tld/video_name.wmv

OpenVPN Install on CentOS 6 Server

Sun, 24 Jun 2012 22:43:59 +0930

I recently had a need to install a VPN service in a OpenVZ container. Since I normally only use Hardware emulating VM’s I ran into quite a few issues in terms of low-level networking support on this Container Virtualisation System. Turns out that you are stuck with a TUN/TAP solution as most services won’t enable PPP services on their infrastructure. Also Ethernet bridging is not available (at least on the service I used) so you’re stuck with NAT IP masquerading. Considering the options I thought best served with using OpenVPN server.

Installing Poptop (pptpd) VPN Server on CentOS 6

Thu, 14 Jun 2012 19:15:12 +0930

For roaming mobile clients PPTP (Point-to-Point Tunneling Protocol) is still the quickest way to get VPN connections to tunnel traffic over a secure link.

Installation

I always prefer installation via a yum repository as this will ensure patches are applied during regular system updates

sudo rpm --import http://poptop.sourceforge.net/yum/RPM-GPG-KEY-PPTP
sudo rpm -Uvh http://poptop.sourceforge.net/yum/stable/rhel6/pptp-release-current.noarch.rpm
sudo yum install ppp pptpd -y

Configuration

Note: replace $USERNAME and $PASSWORD with actual values

IP configuration

Disable services on boot - Ubuntu 12.04

Mon, 11 Jun 2012 18:52:07 +0930

To keep my desktop (notebook) machine light and responsive I don’t want unnecessary services starting on boot-time. Turns out Ubuntu is surprisingly cumbersome to configure in this area (compared to RedHat / Fedora).

Two services I need on my notebook, but don’t want them to start unless I require them running are MySQL and Apache. But it looks like some services are started using upstart init daemon and it appears there is no management tool for this. Services can pe prevented from auto-starting either by renaming the config file or commenting out the start line in the config file

Galaxy Nexus Firmware Upgrade on Ubuntu (manual)

Mon, 28 May 2012 02:07:51 +0930

As a Galaxy Nexus Owner I have been waiting for months for an OTA (over the air) upgrade to the factory installed Firmware (4.0.2). I am finally sick of waiting and complaining to Google (an absolute lost cause).

After some research it turns out that (contrary to popular opinion) not every unlocked Google Nexus actually has the ‘official’ Google Firmware. Some of them have a Samsung variant (WTF !?) of the firmware. Now I really don’t want to get off the technical topic, but I personally think that this means Google is misleading their most loyal customer base. The reason I chose a Nexus device over the (from a hardware perspective) superior HTC One X was the fact that they were supposed to have the official Google Firmware and I did not have to wait forever for bugfixes from the manufacturers.

Open Source creative tools

Sun, 20 May 2012 12:03:47 +0930

Since I am tired to constantly recite this list whenever one of these designer-type people tells me that they need Adobe’s Whatever Suite to do some basic task here is a summary that I can point them to.

Installing Oracle Java7 JDK on Ubuntu 12.04

Tue, 15 May 2012 17:00:01 +0930

If you really need Oracle Java (some applications seem to insist on it) on Ubuntu here is the procedure using a PPA.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:webupd8team/java
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install oracle-java7-installer

HT to WebUpd8 http://ppa.webupd8.org/

Running Android 4.0 (ICS) on Virtualbox

Mon, 14 May 2012 11:47:17 +0930

Debugging things on the Android Emulator (incluced in the SDK) can be a very slow and cumbersome process. Thanks to the Android-x86 Project it’s quite easy to run Android in VirtualBox. This is highly useful when you need to test mobile apps and websites from the Android Browser (as well as Chrome Mobile).

Download an Ethernet enabled ISO from Tablets x86

wget http://dl.dropbox.com/u/75945873/android-x86-4.0-eth0-generic_x86-20120426.iso.torrent
transmission android-x86-4.0-eth0-generic_x86-20120426.iso.torrent

Create new ViratualBox VM

Important Settings (see screenshots)
- OS: Linux, Version: Linux 2.6
- Enable VTx/AMD-V
- Use Bridged Network Adapter (if you want to allow direct Internet Access)
Mount the ISO file downloaded previosly and start the VM
Create the Root Filesystem (ext3) on the VBox .vdi created with the new VM, mark as bootable
Write the Filesystem changes to disk (VDI) and format the disk
Install GRUB Boatloader
Copy files from ISO to VDI
Unmount the ISO image and reboot Note: You need to disable the mouse pointer integration (if you have installed VirtualBox Client Add-ons) in the menu of Virtualbox (‘Machine’ –> ‘Disable Mouse Integration’) when you start the VM (see screenshot). I have not found a way to disable this by default on Virtualbox on Ubuntu (If anybody has managed this I would love to know how !)

Install GIMP 2.8 on Ubuntu 12.04

Sun, 13 May 2012 17:35:44 +0930

Since the latest version of GIMP has not been included in the main 12.04 repositories because it was not ready at release time you have to use a PPA at current.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:otto-kesselgulasch/gimp
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install gimp

TIP: Go to the “Windows” menu and select ‘Single-Window Mode’ to use Gimp in one window (see screenshot).

Intel Ultrabook tweaks on Ubuntu 12.04

Tue, 08 May 2012 10:56:16 +0930

After upgrading my Toshiba Z830 Ultrabook to 12.04 (Precise Pangolin) I noticed that the ability to control the screen back-light was not working using the Toshiba Fn F6/F7 keys.

Thanks to http://www.linlap.com/wiki/acer+aspire+s3 the solution was found quite quickly.

sudo vim /etc/default/grub

This will open the grub configuration file. (Grub is the initial boot selection software)
To be able to dim the screen brightness, You’ve got to modify the line:

Accessing Samsung Galaxy Nexus as USB Media Device Ubuntu 12.04

Mon, 07 May 2012 11:21:45 +0930

To use a Samsung Galaxy Nexus as a media device (MTP) there is a utility called gMTP.

sudo apt-get install gmtp mtpfs mtp-tools

NOTE: Unfortunately there is a bug in the 64-bit version at the moment (https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/mtpfs/+bug/936165) – which means it’s not all that useful to me at the moment.

Disable the Guest account from Ubuntu Login Screen

Sun, 06 May 2012 11:27:23 +0930

Having a guest account might be useful on a home computer, but it’s generally not what I want enabled on a notebook.

To disable the default Guest account you need to edit lightdm.conf and add a line (allow-guest=false).

sudo vim /etc/lightdm/lightdm.conf

[SeatDefaults]
greeter-session=unity-greeter
user-session=ubuntu
allow-guest=false

Tested in Ubuntu 12.04 LTS Precise Pangolin & Ubuntu 11.10 Oneiric Ocelot

Ideal OS for EEE PC - REVISITED

Fri, 04 May 2012 10:09:27 +0930

As a follow-up on a very old post I thought it’s worth providing an update. Despite it’s age (& only costing $350 at the time) my little Asus EEE PC 900 it is still a useful device. It has turned out as one of the better IT investments in my lifetime. However it’s not (and was never) the fastest kid on the block and recent OS upgrades have become increasingly resource hungry.

Installing Java6 JDK on Ubuntu 12.04

Mon, 30 Apr 2012 07:26:59 +0930

UPDATE: [01-May-2012] It appears that this PPA repo is currently broken (does not allow to get GPG key and has unmet dependencies on x84_64). It appears that the install on i386 systems does work anyway if you ignore the GPG key error, but I wouldn’t install in that case as PPA installs are security risk enough without GPG errors.

UPDATE: [11-May-2012] The reason the PPA does not work is that it has been disabled by Ubuntu due to a licensing issue with (not hard to guess) Oracle. Flexion.org have however created a script (hosted on Github) to allow the automated update of Java 6 for those who still require it as a dependency.

Installing the latest stable version of LibreCAD on Ubuntu

Wed, 25 Apr 2012 22:14:11 +0930

I have recently been looking at different CAD options on Ubuntu and LibreCAD (http://librecad.org/) is looking like the best option for my needs at current (apart from the wish there would be some DWG support).

Since the main Ubuntu repositories are usually a fair bit behind the lastest stable realeases of LibreCAD you need to add the LibreCAD Dev PPA Repository

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:librecad-dev/librecad-stable
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install librecad

Darktable - Photo Management under Ubuntu

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 11:08:02 +0930

Whilst I am by no means a photographer I do end up taking quite a few photos (these days pretty much exclusively on my phone) and the management of these photos can be a pain. So far I have never found an program worth the pain over plain old file management.

But having stumbled across Darktable (http://darktable.org/) I think I might have found a worthwile package.

Bulk converting Office documents to PDF

Mon, 09 Apr 2012 19:16:14 +0930

When you need to convert multiple documents to PDF for distribution (or from one Office format to another) there are a few utilities around. The most workable I found is the UNOCONV utility which is build on top of LibreOffice / OpenOffice. This uses the OpenOffice conversion facilities rather than a simple PDF print driver.

On Ubuntu it can be installed via Software Center or via apt-get from the core repositories.

Jitsi Ubuntu VoIP SIP Client

Fri, 06 Apr 2012 04:15:28 +0930

The latest instalment in my never-ending quest to find a decent SIP client (see Ubuntu SIP I & Ubuntu SIP II) I came across JITSI (http://jitsi.org/). Since the website looked very interesting and the project seems very well maintained (http://jitsi.org/index.php/Main/Screenshots) I decided to give it a go.

The installation is a breeze with a Ubuntu/Debian package available and the installation also adds the repository to keep the package up to date.

Installing Samsung Multifunction Printer - Ubuntu 11.10

Tue, 03 Apr 2012 04:50:02 +0930

Getting Multifunction Printers to scan under Linux can be a bit of a pain. The Samsung SCX-3400 I had to install recently was no exception.

Here are the necessary steps I had to perform:

Ignore all Samsung Provided CD’s and downloads. They do not work under Oneiric Ocelot (11.10)
Add Samsung Unified Driver repository http://www.bchemnet.com/suldr/smfpv3.html
Install Samsung drivers and libsane-extras
Edit sane configuration files

vim /etc/apt/sources.list
#add the Samsung Unified Driver Repo
deb http://www.bchemnet.com/suldr/ debian extra

wget http://www.bchemnet.com/suldr/suldr.gpg
apt-key add suldr.gpg
apt-get update
apt-get install samsungmfp-data samsungmfp-driver samsungmfp-network samsungmfp-scanner samsungmfp-configurator-data samsungmfp-configurator-qt4 libsane-extras

The following sane config files need to be modified (add lines)

Connecting to Cisco Small Business VPN from Ubuntu

Sun, 04 Mar 2012 12:32:49 +0930

Connecting to IPSec VPN gateways has always been one of the more painful things to do. Unfortunately Cisco is not helping by being extremely sluggish on making their utilities available on most recent OS revisions (you can’t even get their QuickVPN client to work properly on 64bit Win7 yet). Operating System support outside of Windows seems to be pretty much non-existent (see https://supportforums.cisco.com/thread/2040595).

Shame on you Cisco !

Option 1 – running QuickVPN under using wine

Download the QuickVPN client

Android 4.0 screenshot functionality on Galaxy Nexus

Wed, 29 Feb 2012 18:08:38 +0930

One of the features I missed since the good old Android 1.5 days was the ability to take screen-shots on the device. Prior to Android 4 (ICS) the only workable way to create screen-shots was to connect via USB cable and use the Android SDK to make remote screen-shots.

On Android 4.0 all you have to do is press Volume Down Key + Power Key down at the same time and hold. You should hear the camera click (if audio is on) and Android will show a notification that the screenshot was saved on your device and you can now upload or transfer to your favourite service.

Installing VideoLAN VLC 2.0 on Ubuntu 11.10

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 06:02:15 +0930

With the release of the final VLC 2.0 player you need to add a back-port (the next version 12.04 will have it included in the main repositories) PPA to Oneiric Ocelot (11.10)

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:n-muench/vlc
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install vlc

Thanks to Nate Muench for providing this !

Finding a Notepad++ alternative / replacement on Ubuntu

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 19:45:43 +0930

One of the most important utilities on any computer is a decent text editing tool. Since there are as literally hundreds of text-editors out there you would think it is an easy task to find a similar one for each platform.

On the Road Manuscript, #1 by Thomas Hawk, on Flickr

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0 Generic License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/) by Thomas HawkAfter years of trialing on various Windows platforms I have found [Notepad++](http://notepad-plus-plus.org/ “Notepad++”) to be the most useful of them all (closely followed by EMEditor which I used for years before Notepad++). Since I have now switched to Ubuntu completely it was necessary to find a permanent alternative on that platform since Notepad++ is only available on Windows.

Ten iOS apps I can not do without ...

Sat, 11 Feb 2012 09:03:56 +0930

Since it seems everybody has to do one of these “10 <insert marginally useful term> I can not live without” articles here is my take.

The 10 Apple iOS Apps I can not live without

Enjoy ! I hope you find them as useful as I do. :)

Mobile sensors and the “Internet of Things” in learning

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 11:00:10 +0930

With the Internet of Things slowly becoming mainstream the potential uses of this technology can also be seen in the Education sector. This blogpost is the first installment of a series of posts that highlights practical examples that can be used in teaching and training.

Part 1 – Environmental Noise Monitoring

WideNoise by leeander, on Flickr

Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 Generic License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/) by leeanderNoise pollution has been a serious problem in many large cities all over the world and with the help of common mobile devices (smartphones) this can be easily measured, monitored and compared with a large quantity of samples from other cities/regions.

Education and the Internet of Things

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 18:14:06 +0930

Here are the slides from a presentation for the South Australian Department of Education & Childrens’ Development – Luchtime Bytes Series.

**[Education and the Internet of Things](http://www.slideshare.net/leogaggl/education-and-the-internet-of-things-10332928 "Education and the Internet of Things")**

View more [presentations](http://www.slideshare.net/) from [Leo Gaggl](http://www.slideshare.net/leogaggl)

For those who just want a link [click here](https://docs.google.com/present/view?id=dc854ttt_17jpq3shhf "Education and the Internet of Things"). Printable [PDF here](http://www.brightcookie.com/images/blog/IoT_in_Education-3.pdf "Internet of Things in Education").

The original copy of this blogpost was posted on http://www.brightcookie.com/2011/11/education-and-the-internet-of-things/

Getting a handle on Ubuntu mobile power management

Mon, 06 Feb 2012 17:27:25 +0930

To get an idea on the current power usage and some suggestions on how to improve power-management ‘powertop‘ is a must-have.

sudo apt-get install powertop

Powertop Screenshot

For some more detailed suggestions this is a good start:

Turning the Toshiba Z830 into a Ubuntu Ultrabook

Sun, 05 Feb 2012 12:33:07 +0930

[](http://www.flickr.com/photos/leogaggl/6821823795/ “ultrabook by leogaggl, on Flickr”)

EDIT: Here are some tweaks if you install 12.04 (Precise Pangolin).

Since I will have to do a fair amount of traveling in the next year I was in need of upgrading my trusted workhorse of Toshiba Qosmio F60 to a more portable option that will be easier on the shoulders during long travels. After doing some research into which of the major manufacturers offer the best support for a Linux based Operating System it came down to a final two: the Intel i7 variants of Samsung Series 9 and the Toshiba Z830.

Mobile Browser Testing on the Desktop

Sat, 28 Jan 2012 14:59:53 +0930

If you need to check websites for mobile compliance on a regular basis you know that having a device to constantly check is painful and slows down your work during debugging and phases of constant change.

Surrounding myself with screens by adactio, on Flickr

Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/) by adactio

There are a few tools that will make this work a lot easier:

Using Google Goggles in mobile learning projects

Fri, 23 Dec 2011 14:56:48 +0930

One of the lesser known free Google services in our experience is Google Goggles. Specially in it’s lastest release (Version 1.7) it has received a few enhancements that make it very useful for some mobile learning applications

Scanning of barcodes

Google Googles will scan most standard barcodes and provide information on the product scanned.

![](http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zVz-njJCNvE/Tt-0411eONI/AAAAAAAAAKg/4fSsNl6qpN4/s320/1.7%2Bblog%2Bimage%2Bleader.png “Google Goggles Screenshot”)

Here is an example from the Google Mobile Blog:

Open Governance Index – measuring openness

Wed, 14 Dec 2011 08:17:50 +0930

This is an interesting report and info-graphic by the folks at VisionMobile on a new way of measuring the openness of some mobile open source projects.

The Open Governance Index measures the true openness of eight open source projects – Android, Qt, Symbian, MeeGo, Mozilla, WebKit, Linux and Eclipse – and analyses how governance, and not licenses, tell the full story of a project’s openness, across transparency, influence and control.

Installing MySQL Workbench on Ubuntu 11.10

Sun, 04 Dec 2011 13:15:54 +0930

Thanks to Olivier Berten for providing this package via his PPA Repo !

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:olivier-berten/misc
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install mysql-workbench-gpl

EDIT: this has been confirmed to work on Ubuntu 12.04 (Precise Pangolin) as well).

Facebook - good riddance !

Wed, 30 Nov 2011 08:21:11 +0930

Finally I made the effort to completely get rid of my Facebook Account. After initially getting a Facebook Account in the very early days (as an ‘occupational hazard’ to investigate the potential of Facebook Applications) I have always been suspicious of the companies motives and decided not to use such a closed system as a base for application development.

Recent developments have only confirmed this suspision:

Instead I will concentrate all of my content inside this blog (including as a backup for other social services I create). I believe the control over my own content is important enough for me to warrant the extra effort.

Google Docs - custom styles

Wed, 26 Oct 2011 09:48:35 +0930

One of the most annoying things in the recent ‘upgrade‘ of the Google Docs editor was the removal of the ‘Edit CSS’ and ‘Edit HTML’ functionality without any replacement (such as a Custom Styles Editor).

Thanks to a discussion on the Google Help forum (where 100’s of people wonder how this could have been called ‘upgrade’) I discovered this hack.

Create an empty document in LibreOffice or OpenOffice (MS Office is also reported to work)
Change the default styles (using Format –> Styles and Formatting (F11))
Upload the resulting document to Google Apps (Note: you will need to convert to GoogleDocs) and use as a template

To get the ARIAL font on Ubuntu I also had to do install the MS Fonts package

Install Microsoft Fonts on Ubuntu

Wed, 26 Oct 2011 09:37:45 +0930

If you have kids going to school you will know these questions:

Why can’t you have Microsoft Office ?
I can not find ‘xyz’ font on this …. – why ?

I have managed (after some time) to convince my kids that there is no need for having a particular Word Processing Software and they are much better off knowing the concepts of text processing rather than some particular office package. Unfortunately I have had no look convincing many teachers that they should follow a similar principle ….

Virtualbox 4 install on Ubuntu

Wed, 26 Oct 2011 09:20:16 +0930

Since the default Ubuntu repository does not have the current version of VirtualBox (currently 4.1.x) here is the installation procedure via apt-get

echo "deb http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/debian $(lsb_release -sc) contrib" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/virtualbox.list
wget -q http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/debian/oracle_vbox.asc -O- | sudo apt-key add -
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install virtualbox-4.1

To use USB devices on the clients you need to install the Extension Pack from the Oracle Site and install via the File –> Preferences.

Google Adsense - or when is big TOO big ?

Sat, 22 Oct 2011 09:17:00 +0930

I am not generally one for writing blog entries about customer support failures. Thanks to my technical work I have had my fair share of dealing with call queues and help-desk systems over the last 20 years. But compared with my experience with Google AdSense over the last weeks all of these just pale into funny memories. I have never experienced the outright refusal to acknowledge an issue and blanket denial of communications.

Alternatives to Google Adsense

Sat, 22 Oct 2011 09:11:15 +0930

Due to a recent absolute Customer Service failure with Google Adsense I have done some research on the alternative to Google Adsense as a content-sensitive mobile and web advertisements.

We are currently reviewing the following services:

Once we have some results I will update this post. Please add your comments should you have any (good or bad) experiences with similar services.

Using Blackboard Collaborate (Elluminate) on Ubuntu

Thu, 20 Oct 2011 11:49:10 +0930

Like it or not (personally I am in the second category) Blackboard Collaborate or Elluminate (as it is still more commonly referred to) is something you have a hard time avoiding if you work in online education.

I discovered that I have audio issues on some Ubuntu Linux machines and found the following to fix the issues.

1) Install alsa-aoss

apt-get install alsa-oss

2) Save the Elluminate Java Webstard (.JNLP) file to a local folder – DO NOT OPEN IN BROWSER
3) Launch Elluminate using this command (in the folder you saved the JNLP)

Setting up TV channels for DVB tuner cards in Ubuntu

Wed, 19 Oct 2011 10:05:15 +0930

Just some memory aid to help remember how to set up DVB cards in Ubuntu:

apt-get install dvb-apps dvbstream w-scan
w_scan -c AU -X > channels.conf

You can use this channels.conf with a number of TV players (MeTV, MythTV,…) however I prefer the no-nonsense interface of VLC

vlc channels.conf

Here is the example output (for those in Adelaide, South Australia you can just save this into channels.conf):

Ubuntu - create manual application launcher (Unity)

Tue, 18 Oct 2011 17:42:02 +0930

With every new release of Ubuntu I am becoming more resigned to the fact that the effort to revert back to the Ubuntu Classic (Gnome 2) interface is getting harder and sooner or later I will have to bite the bullet and learn to live with the ugly and more cumbersome Unity interface (specially since Gnome 3 seems to be even worse). One of the first issues I found is that there seems to be no easy way to manually add programs to the “Launcher” (as well as to the applications list).

Installing Java6 JDK on Ubuntu 11.10

Tue, 18 Oct 2011 12:30:09 +0930

UPDATE: To install on 12.04 (Precise Pangolin) you need a different PPA.

Since sun-java6-jdk has been removed from the default Ubuntu 11.10 (Oneiric Ocelot) repositories you need to add a PPA repository (unless you want to install by hand)

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ferramroberto/java
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install sun-java6-jdk sun-java6-plugin

Export Delicious Bookmarks in XML

Thu, 13 Oct 2011 15:58:43 +0930

After the recent takeover of Delicious from Yahoo Inc by Avos and the subsequent total screw-up of what was a workable system I have been struggling to export bookmarks from Delicious in XML format (since the API is badly broken). The API export of all bookmarks limits the export to 1000 bookmark entries. Which is fine if you have less than 1000 bookmarks stored. But it makes it impossible (since there is no paging functionality exposed by the API) to export the rest should you have more (and many people would have much more than that).

Back up Google Apps Mail using getmail4 + IMAP

Mon, 10 Oct 2011 11:27:28 +0930

Just a quick note on how to configure backups of Google Apps email to a local machine.

Install getmail

apt-get install getmail4

create config directory

Create a subdirectory in users home folder (and change permissions)

mkdir .getmail
touch .getmail

create config file

Create a file such as .getmail/username.gmail

[retriever]
type = SimpleIMAPSSLRetriever
server = imap.gmail.com
username = username@domain.tld
password = password
mailboxes = ("[Gmail]/All Mail",)

[destination]
type = Maildir
path = /path/to/storage/directory/

[options]
# print messages about each action (verbose = 2)
# Other options:
# 0 prints only warnings and errors
# 1 prints messages about retrieving and deleting messages only
verbose = 1
message_log = ~/.getmail/gmail.log

create data directories for storage

Create 3 sub-directories in your designated data directory

OpenSource e-book creation

Fri, 23 Sep 2011 10:14:31 +0930

After recently researching the available software for e-book creation for some of our clients (in the education sector) I came across quite a number of options. However after some further look into the option and trying some I was able narrowed the field down to 2 options that seem to be reasonably user-friendly and matured. The two are using a very different approach and will suit different types of users. One is a native e-book writer which will give better low-level control for the more technical types. The other is a plugin to the popular OpenOffice (or LibreOffice) Office Suites.

Running your business (mostly) on Open Source Software

Mon, 12 Sep 2011 16:04:31 +0930

The release of the latest Ubuntu Version has been seen by a number of commentators as the most end-user friendly yet and signals another milestone in the readiness of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) for more widespread (and business) use.

As a long-term user of a number of different Operating Systems and as SME Owner for the last 15 years I have overseen the gradual replacement of a number of proprietary software solutions with FOSS Alternatives. With the beginning of the new financial year however, we are planning to go another step further and are starting to change our default Operating System to Ubuntu (from MS Windows).

Nokia Bluetooth Keyboard on Android

Tue, 06 Sep 2011 18:27:24 +0930

One of my oldest pieces of hardware is a trusty Nokia SU-8W Bluetooth Keyboard. I have tried to revive it on an Android 1.6 & 2.0 device with not much luck. However I got it working successfully on a Gingerbread (2.3.4) Google Nexus S.

Pre-requisites

SU-8W Manual (http://nds1.nokia.com/phones/files/guides/Nokia_SU-8W_Wireless_Keyboard_UG_en.pdf)
BlueKeyboard JP (https://market.android.com/details?id=elbrain.bluekeyboard.ime)

Steps

Install the BlueKeyboard JP from the Android Market
Go to Settings > Wireless & Networks > Bluetooth Settings
Scan for devices and click to pair the Nokia SU-8W
Enter a passcode (I used the highly inventive 0000 combinaton) on the phone and click ‘OK’
Enter the same on the SU-8W (need to use green ‘fn’ keys for numbers) and hit enter
The phone should show the Nokia SU-8W as paired but not connected
Go to Settings > Language & keyboard > BlueKeyboard JP Settings
Select the Nokia SU-8W as the keyboard and make any other changes you might need
Click the ‘Back’ symbol and tick the option box to enable the ‘BlueKeyboard JP’ keyboard
In any data entry field (i.e. GMail) hold the finger on the input box and click ‘Input method’ and select BlueKeyboard JP
Wait for the keyboard to connect.

Enjoy !

Installing Ubuntu: Extending the HP Touchpad

Sat, 27 Aug 2011 17:59:37 +0930

As one of those who grabbed a HP Touchpad at the recent firesale (after announcing the killing of the product line) I did it as in full knowledge that this device in it’s current form is of limited use and (highly) unlikely to have lots of additional applications created for it.

After casually using it for a few nights of use I am personally not surprised that HP decided to ditch this product. Compared to the current Tablet leaders the Touchpad is miles behind both Android and iOS and HP would have had to spend serious money to even get close to the current functionality of the competition. And you can take a bet that both of these will not remain static. I was actually hoping that WebOS can be a serious competitor to the current duopoly, but after using this thing I have to say that it is not even close.

Open Source Content Management Comparison

Mon, 01 Aug 2011 08:29:43 +0930

This is an interesting info-graphic comparing the 3 most popular OpenSource Content Management Systems.

While I don’t really agree with some of the metrics (such as the web-service stats) it is never the less a very good visual overview. As a long-term user of WordPress and Drupal there are some good points to give a quick overview.

[![CMS Comparison](/images/blog/devious_cms-68x300.png "CMS Comparison")](/images/blog/devious_cms.png)

Original: http://deviousmedia.com/infographics/devious\_cms.png

Upgrade to Firefox 4 on Ubuntu 10.04

Mon, 25 Jul 2011 15:03:24 +0930

Since some older hardware (Toshiba Satellite A300 for example) has issues with the current version of Grub as well as the newer Kernel I still need to run 10.04 on some machines.

However since the 10.04 Repository still uses Firefox 3.6 you need to add a PPA repo to upgrade to Firefox 4.

Either go to Ubuntu Software Center > Software Sources and click the ‘Other Software’ tab. Press ‘Add’ and enter ppa:mozillateam/firefox-stable

Install Handbrake on Ubuntu

Sun, 29 May 2011 04:51:09 +0930

Note: this has been verified to work on 11.04 (Natty), 11.10 (Oneiric) & 12.04 (Precise)

To convert a DVD and make it viewable on your mobile device Handbrake seems to be the most useful tool I have discovered so far. Since it is not part of the default Ubuntu Repositories here is the installation process. The first step is to insure libdvdcss2 is installed

sudo apt-get install libdvdcss2
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:stebbins/handbrake-releases
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install handbrake-gtk

VoIP client for Ubuntu II

Wed, 27 Apr 2011 17:26:34 +0930

After upgrading to Ubuntu 11 (Natty) I did some further research on VoIP clients (SIP) for Ubuntu Linux as XLite seems horribly out of date now.

I came across QuteCom (formerly WengoPhone) and from first testing it seems to work quite well. The install is easy as it’s part of the Ubuntu Community Software (Universe) and that means it can be installed via apt-get, Software Center or Synaptic.

GoogleApps (Gmail) as default Ubuntu mail client

Sun, 24 Apr 2011 12:41:24 +0930

Keeping mail on a local machine does not make sense when working across a large number of different (vitual) devices. As a GoogleApps user I have long preferred browser based mail client as my default.

Unfortunately this is not yet a very straight process on most Operating Systems and Ubuntu is no difference.

Edit: all the commands need to be run with root privileges. so either run “sudo su” or prefix all with “sudo ” (thanks to Paul for the comment below)

KeePass Version 2 on Ubuntu

Fri, 22 Apr 2011 15:26:03 +0930

EDIT: As of Ubuntu 11.10 (Oneiric Ocelot) this is now much easier as KeePass 2 has finally made it into the repositories

apt-get install keepass2

————————————————————————————————————-

If you need to read KeepPass 2 data files (.kdbx) on Ubuntu (as well as from other platforms such as Windows or Android) you need to run the Portable Version under Mono (.NET Runtime). Make sure you download the Portable Version 2.x from http://keepass.info/download.html

Find the direct link to a Twitter status update

Tue, 05 Apr 2011 13:43:01 +0930

I sometimes need to link to a specific Twitter status update and since the recent upgrade (or as I personally see it downgrade) of the Twitter UI it is quite annoying to find the Status ID, as it can not be copied from the interface (without some Javascript debugging tools at least).

http://api.twitter.com/1/statuses/user_timeline.xml?screen_name=[screen_name]

This will show the users timeline in XML format revealing the Status ID in the XML result. The following URL can be used to then construct the permalink to the specific status update:

My mobile personal learning environment

Mon, 04 Apr 2011 07:56:27 +0930

Taking part in MobiMOOC has given me the opportunity to take stock of my own MobilePLE – the top 5 tools I find most useful as part of my ongoing learning.

Catch Notes (previously 3Bananas) – mobile note taking the most critical component. Whenever I get a new device – this is what has to be installed as one of the first actions. For those not familiar with this software – it’s like Evernote without the bloat.
TwiDroyd – mobile Twitter / Status.Net client. This could be replaced by similar Twitter clients
GoogleReader – RSS reader client
Flickr – image upload and sharing
FourSquare – location based sharing

These are the main applications I use pretty much constantly, however here are some other useful services I use regularily:

Using Yahoo Pipes to aggregate learning resources

Mon, 04 Apr 2011 05:03:36 +0930

I am using the opportunity of me taking part in a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) on mobile learning as an excuse to add some more content to this neglected blog.

On of the issues I am facing with my participation in the MOOC is the massive amount of e-mails generated and my already overflowing inbox would not cope (let alone me managing it). That is not taking into account other sources such as Twitter & Flickr

Revert Ubuntu Netbook UI

Sat, 04 Dec 2010 16:13:16 +0930

If you upgrade you Ubuntu Netbook release to 10.10 (Maverick Meerkat) you will notice a change to the new ¨Unity¨ user interface.

Personally I think the new interface is absolutely horrible (from a usability perspective) and I wanted to revert to the previous Netbook-Launcher.

HOWTO

Install the required components via terminal:

sudo apt-get install netbook-launcher-efl

After install just change the “Login Settings”

VoIP client for Ubuntu

Sat, 26 Jun 2010 15:00:19 +0930

Having used IP Telephony for a number of years I need a workable SIP client for all of the devices I use. I have found a very capable client for my Android phones (SipDroid) and on Windows/MacOSX I generally use X-Lite (as well as it’s paid version EyePhone) from Counterpath.

Having tried several different Linux SIP clients (Ekiga, Twinkle, …) but all discarded them because of weird UI’s and/or problems with stability I noticed that there is a Linux version of XLite available. Unfortunately on current versions of Ubuntu (10.04) it needs a deprecated version of a library.

Huawei K3765 on Ubuntu 10.04 (Lucid)

Sat, 22 May 2010 14:27:51 +0930

Since I have switched my 3G data network from Hutchinson Three to Vodafone AU recently I also upgraded the USB modem from a Huwaei E220 (which used to work fine on recent Ubuntu NBR releases on my trusty old ASUS EEE 900)

Unfortunately the new Huawei K3765 would not be recognised as a valid modem by the network manager. After a fair bit of searching it turns out that you only need to install one additional package (usb-modeswitch) to make this modem work (be recognised) on the current stable 10.04 release:

iPad Alternatives

Wed, 14 Apr 2010 10:10:09 +0930

Due to the hype generated by the recent launch and my reservations on using the Apple Inc. iTunes I was doing some research into alternatives to the proprietary and completely locked iPad device (and the associated lock-down to Apple’s iTunes Store). Hopefully this list can be of use for other people as well.

I can see the form factor and the tablet style with a cut down (mainly web-browser based) Operating System as useful in a number of settings not least in educational institutions and libraries.

iPad - Trojan Horse ?

Sat, 10 Apr 2010 07:34:49 +0930

Trojan Horse

Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/) by Unknown

The media hype generated by the launch of the Apple Inc. iPad has been seriously irritating me over the last weeks. Apart from the fact that I can not see anything revolutionary about either the hardware nor the software, I can see a number of highly problematic developments with the way Apple is trying to create a total vendor lock-in. ### The evil is in the Store

orange

Sun, 31 Jan 2010 15:26:29 +0930

![](http://static.pixelpipe.com/d760ee51-a5ba-463c-b5f3-4adc529a7275_b.jpg )

horseshoe bay

Sun, 24 Jan 2010 19:24:28 +0930

![](http://static.pixelpipe.com/7ee84525-64ab-4b78-8818-3e893430548d_b.jpg )

Ubuntu - Google Mail (GoogleApps) as default mail client

Tue, 15 Dec 2009 18:34:22 +0930

Since Ubuntu 9.10 NetbookRemix has been released I am again finding myself using my trusty old ASUS EEE when on the road. And finally it seems I have found a vanilla Linux distribution that is reasonably responsive and works ‘out of the box’.

One thing I don’t need on the road (as a matter of fact on none of my equipment) is having to install & maintain some client/server mail client. Here is a workable solution to have your browser default ‘mailto:’ links to Google Apps.

Useful software for practical mobile learning

Sun, 26 Apr 2009 23:42:36 +0930

Since a fair bit of my time is spent working and researching in the field of Mobile Learning and there is not a lot of recent listings of Software useful in practical m-Learning implementations I have compiled the following list from my bookmarks and Software I commonly use for these purposes. This list tries to represent currently usable applications not applications in the development stage.

Rather than writing this in the form of a blog entry I decided to keep this as a live document within Google Apps that people can contribute to.

Need for digital (media) literacy

Sat, 14 Mar 2009 18:32:05 +0930

I just recently stumbled across this link to the ‘Heartland Institute‘ via a reference in an American Newspaper site citing their sources for an article about the US Economic Stimulus package. I initially was hoping this might be a satiric site such as CNNN, but after taking a closer look and checking out some references it appears these people are actually serious (and worse still seem to have a lot of funds at their disposal to spread their dubious view). Reading this rubbish got me thinking about how many kids would actually think this could be an authoritative source for information.

Ubuntu - the ‘old man’ experiment

Wed, 11 Mar 2009 12:39:35 +0930

Recently my father, who has so far not wanted to have anything to do with computers, decided to change all of this with age 67. While initially surprised (and remembering the comments I got when sitting in front of computers as a teenager instead of working on the family farm), I quite liked the idea. It’s a great to see him still wanting to explore and learn new things.

Unfortunately since there is approximately 17.000km between us, there was a limited amount I could do to help him get set up. So my eldest sister (as she always has to do) ended up having to help out instead. Finding hardware was the easy part and very cheap these days (and since it was bought online I could help with the technical aspects). However the machines in that particular shop came as white-boxes without an Operating System (which is a good thing in my book).

m-learn: Mobile evidence gathering using GoogleDocs

Wed, 18 Feb 2009 09:52:46 +0930

This one nearly escaped my attention yesterday. Google has just announced the ability to edit Google Docs on your mobile device via their Google Mobile Blog.

Just point your mobile browser to m.google.com/docs and start editing.

Along with the use of 2D barcodes this will open a few interesting m-learning possiblities for educators that would previously have required custom coding to achieve. I can see this being very useful in situations where you have students being in the field and allowing them to enter data gathered using a standard mobile phone. The barcodes could point students to the location of the spreadsheet (avoiding the need to type the information)

Finding the ideal OS for (my) EEE PC

Sun, 15 Feb 2009 14:31:50 +0930

I have been a user of an EEE PC 900 for over 10 months now and in general very happy with the form-factor and it’s portability. I has been very useful in public transport, waiting rooms, coffee shops,…

However – in terms of Operating Systems I am now on my 3rd OS (despite initially telling myself that I will stick with the default and avoid tinkering) and it looks like I still have not found what I am looking for.

Testing mobile Twitter clients

Sat, 14 Feb 2009 19:51:40 +0930

Being out and about a lot, I am a fairly heavy user of my mobile internet plan (currently with Hutchinson 3). One of the more common tasks when there is some down-time while in transit or waiting for coffee is checking out what’s happening in the twittershere.

Personally (being a web-app developer for years) I generally prefer browser-based apps over ‘native apps’. Dont even get me started about J2ME apps. One of the main reasons for this preference is that I tend to switch handsets fairly frequently. This makes installing software on phones a large waste of time. Just copying your bookmarks (in my case I have made up my own custom start page on the device) saves a lot of time.

BESPIN - another nice one from Mozilla.org

Sat, 14 Feb 2009 16:28:20 +0930

Getting excited about a new text editor of all things is not something I like to admit to easily, but in my line of work (although less and less is actually doing hands on coding) text editing is an important part.

That’s why I checked out the BESPIN project as soon as I heard of it. The prospect of being able to edit your files from anywhere is very appealing to me since I spend a lot of time away from the desk and on devices that not always have good text editor (let alone all the files necessary). The thought of being able to edit files from a netbook while on the run is coming to mind straight away.

Using Nokia Share Online to upload directly to Flickr

Sun, 01 Feb 2009 11:42:41 +0930

One of the nicest ways to get photos straight from your mobile to Flickr (without having to use e-mails) on Nokia devices is the Flickr Plugin for the Nokia Share Online application. Since a lot of my clients in the educational sector are starting to use Flickr as part of their online teaching I decided to create a short HOWTO.

The application itself comes with the phone on most recent Nokia S60 devices (with recent Firmware – check Nokia Software Updater for new firmware). To check if your particular phone is capable you can check the Nokia Share Online Support site.

About

Sat, 10 Jan 2009 17:54:07 +0930

Sustaining the Commons: The Sovereignty Ledger

This site and the research it documents operate outside the reach of corporate advertising and algorithmic tracking. It is a digital commons, sustained by people who believe that knowledge—whether it’s about mesh networking or soil health—should be free to use and independent of corporate influence.

The Sovereignty Ledger is a living record of the projects currently supported by the community. Your contributions directly fund the time, hardware, and field testing required to build these systems. No corporate gatekeeping, no marketing hype—just fuel for the craft.

QR code usage in Japan

Fri, 02 Jan 2009 09:19:48 +0930

Just came across this post about barcode tombstones in Japan. Shows very clearly how much public acceptance the 2D barcode technology has got in Japan.

It allows visitors to the grave to access to the biography and photos of the deceased person and leave a personal message.

This concept probably takes some time to get used to, but you can see that it could clearly add some value for people visiting cemeteries. There is not much info you can fit on tombstone. A good example of providing ‘further information’ for people that are interested.

An accounting software that works like we do ...

Thu, 07 Aug 2008 14:55:00 +0930

In running my businesses over the years I have been an unhappy user of MYOB for years. But due to time constraints I have always put off a change in accounting software as it is very disruptive and the alternatives were not too convincing (better the devil you know …). However due to the fact that our business is growing and we were at the end of a financial year the pain of using MYOB became greater than the pain of switching.

Working with Second Life in an educational sense

Thu, 20 Mar 2008 09:03:23 +0930

With the help of SL resident Moggs Oceanlane I was able to get our first Sloodle implementation off the ground. Being a bit new on the SL concepts (Moodle as such is my daily life) I found the technical process quite easy, but was struggling with SL terminology a little.

![Sloodle Screenshot](/images/blog/sl_screenshot.png "Sloodle Screenshot")

Looking forward to getting some hands-on experience of the use of SL in an educational setting. I can see the practical applications – looking for some pilot projects to put them into ‘reality’ once we have got all the technical side tested thoroughly.

Open Source web conferencing tool

Sat, 08 Mar 2008 16:05:30 +0930

Came accross this project recently. Seems like an excellent tool for web meetings. Certainly something that we will give some more attention to as it seems to have some good integration with various products we are using such as Moodle and SugarCRM.

![DimDim Logo](/images/blog/dimdim_logo.png "DimDim Logo")

iPhone User Survey

Sat, 08 Mar 2008 13:17:00 +0930

As people that know me are aware I am not the biggest fan of the iPhone (3G – hello ???), but obviously from a professional perspective it is another phone that is with us and gaining market share (although not much happening in OZ yet). And to be fair it is breaking some technical ground as well (just not in the areas I most need). From my own anecdotal evidence I was expecting a high percentage of users to choose the iPhone because it ‘looks cool’ or is a ‘chick magnet’ – but I can not back this up by an empirical research (yet) ;-).

Unmetered mobile access to university websites

Mon, 03 Mar 2008 11:33:00 +0930

I came accross this article last week which I found quite interesting in terms of it’s impact on m-Learning.

University inks unmetered Web access deal with Bigpond

The unfortunate thing is that this is only limited to one particular
university and one provider only. It would be interesting to see if
there are any other institutions that are going down that track. How
about a general unmetering for the ‘edu.au’ TLD ?

[2D Barcodes] Global standard approval for mobile airline check-ins

Sat, 27 Oct 2007 16:47:00 +0930

Another good sign that 2D tagging is here to stay and there is some (long overdue) standardisation on the way.

Original Article – Herald Tribune

Co-working in Australia

Mon, 15 Oct 2007 15:22:00 +0930

After reading an excellent article by Brad Reed on Network World (this seems to be the online version: Co-working: the ultimate in teleworking flexibility),ï¿½I finally got motivated enough to do some more research about thisï¿½phenomenum in the two places of interest to me (Austria and Australia)ï¿½as well as write a quick entry about this.

The whole co-working concept has been interesting me ever since it started, but the organisational issues associated with starting such aï¿½venture (and as with everything else – a lack of time) have alwaysï¿½prevented any serious attempt to actually move in this direction. Butï¿½after reading some of the examples in the above mentioned article andï¿½doing some further research I am starting to warm to the idea again.

Mobile 2D codes gathering pace (outside of Asia)

Sun, 14 Oct 2007 10:06:00 +0930

FINALLY !!! As somebody that has been experimenting with this technology for over 2 years now I am quite exited to see that the adoption of this technology is gathering some steem. While it has bee widely adopted in Asia for some years now, it has taken some time to get a foothold in the rest of the world this seems to be changing now. At least in Europe as I can see for myself at the moment. In my opinion with Nokia finally getting serious and throwing its (considerable) weight behind this technology (http://mobilecodes.nokia.com/) and some other industry heavyweights joining forces in the Mobile Codes Consortium.ï¿½ This will hopefully produce one key outcome, the stadardisation of the label technology, which up to now has been one of the stumbling blocks that has kept people such as myself from adopting these codes in real-world projects. Along with the adoption by some major companies in their advertising this should produce the momentum that was needed to push mobile 2D codes into some broad adoption.

Open Educational Resources (OER)

Fri, 28 Sep 2007 16:09:46 +0930

One of the few new (for myself in my working life at least) bits of information I have picked up on here at ICL is Open Educational Resources (OER). That’s probably because it is outside of my usual area of expertise (which is more the technical implementation of e-Learning), but I found the concept never the less interesting and very similar to the Open Source Software concept which I have been working with for quite a while.

Seeing a students life from the other side again ....

Thu, 27 Sep 2007 17:58:13 +0930

Since my working world is centered a little more on educational topics at the moment (while attending ICL) I came across this Youtube Video which I think is a very good visual example of what’s commonly referred to as Education 2.0.

Personally I hope that I actually comprehend this and a good part of my working life is spend improving this situation. The fact that I am sitting in a ‘lecture’ myself and watching a Youtube video should hopefully illustrate that I am can (despite my actual age) understand the students perspective quite well. ;-

Using Nokia Mobile Webserver in an educational environment.

Wed, 26 Sep 2007 20:56:00 +0930

The ability to host your own content from your mobile phone opens some interesting possibilities to engage students and will allow the integration of user generated content in the education process. David Johnson from the University of Reading is working on serving portfolio data from your mobile.

Some of the current limitation of this approach:

-cost of the bandwidth
-speed

The ability to proxy the users content on the Mobile Web server Gateway as well as the ability to integrate content outside of the mobile phone seem to be the main points that will have to be improved for this to become a more mainstream technology. Another area of concern (or another potential use of this technology – depending on your viewpoint) is the backup of data from the mobile phone. The ability to proxy the content on the Gateway could also be used as a backup of the content that is hosted within the MWS on the mobile phone.

Configuring the Nokia E-Series SIP for Nodephone (Internode)

Sat, 01 Sep 2007 19:05:00 +0930

This is Part 3 of the Nokia SIP settings. This time for NodePhone (Internode – Australia). It has been hard to find this information (particularily the Registrar Server settings). NOTE: The Realm setting in the Registrar Server are CASE-SENSITIVE. For some screenshots check the ENGIN Australia setup entry.

General

Profile name: nodephone

Service profile: IETF

Default access point: {Your WLAN Access Point}

Public user name: sip:{NodePhone Phone No}@sip.internode.on.net

User compression: No

Configuring the Nokia E-Series SIP for sipgate.at

Sat, 01 Sep 2007 18:49:00 +0930

This is Part 2 of the Nokia SIP settings. This time for sipgate.at
(Austria), but it should also work for other SIPGate domains. It has
been hard to get this information from the providers themselves. For
some screenshots check the ENGIN Australia setup entry.

General

Profile name: sipgate
Service profile: IETF
Default access point: {Your WLAN Access Point}
Public user name: sip:{SIPGate UserID}@sipgate.at
User compression: No
Registration: When needed
Use security: No

Configuring the Nokia E-Series VoIP client for Engin Australia

Fri, 24 Aug 2007 15:44:00 +0930

Since I had to look all overï¿½for the correct settings and there was a
lot of trial and error involved (specially for the Realm). Thanks to Engin Support that finally provided this info after logging a support request.

The screenshots are from a Nokia E65, but should be applicable for similar Nokia phones.

General

Profile name: engin
Service profile: IETF
Default access point: {Your WLAN Access Point}
Public user name: sip:{phone number}@voice.mibroadband.com.au
User compression: No
Registration: When needed
Use security: No

Zero dollar minimum spend post-paid phone plans in Australia

Fri, 24 Aug 2007 11:57:00 +0930

Since I had to do some research on this topic recently, here are the results that I have found. These plans are interesting for people that do not call out a lot, but rather use the phone to be accessible.

GoMobile – Pay as you go plans

Southern Cross Telecom – Pay as you go plans

AAPT – GO15 plan (**needs to be bundled with Landline phone)

** – some conditions apply to qualify for $0 minimum spend)

Contact

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

Contact forms on the internet have been problematic for some years now. Running websites since the late 90’s I have given up on forms that submit per e-mail as 99.9% of it ends up being SPAM and making people jump through CAPTCHA hoops deters people.

To contact me should not be too hard. Search engines are your friend. My LinkedIN and other social links are in the header and footer of this site and all will enable you to contact me.

Search

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000