Posts on Jackenhack

Getting Asus ROG STRIX B550-F GAMING Motherboard To Boot Headless

Tue, 25 Aug 2026 00:00:00 +0000

I’m running a TrueNAS Server using the Asus ROG STRIX B550-F GAMING motherboard. Because of all the peripherals like a LSI® SAS 9300-8i PCI Express card for my SAS disks, I didn’t have enough PCI lanes to run a “normal” graphics card. So I got an old Nvidia Quadro NVS 290 NVS290 PCIe x1 card that only uses one PCI lane and fits into a X1 PCI slot. But I would rather run the box without a graphics card and boot headless. But all the information on the internet told me that the Asus ROG STRIX B550-F GAMING Motherboard could not run headless. After several tries, nothing worked. But I finally found a solution

pfSense HAProxy HTTPS HTTP Problem Accessing From LAN

Thu, 30 Jun 2022 00:00:00 +0000

After installing my new pfSense firewall, I wanted to expose some of my servers to the internet. First, I had HTTP and HTTPS made available for this blog by using NAT. But that’s not very secure, so I found HAProxy, a module inside pfSense. It’s a reverse proxy, among other things.
I configured it to use ACME, another module inside pfSense, to acquire SSL certificates from Let’s Encrypt, handle all SSL traffic and then send the requests to my internal servers. The internal servers no longer need to handle SSL traffic, so they talk to the HAProxy with unencrypted port 80 traffic. Thus separating the outside WAN from my servers on the inside LAN. I found an excellent guide on how to set this up.

Atom Editor Platformio Hangs at startup endless restart - fixed

Sat, 25 Jul 2020 00:00:00 +0000

When installing the excellent Atom Editor with Platformio-ide, the main window inside the editor would hang on my new Mac. I uninstalled the program and deleted the .atom directory and tried to reinstall, the application would freeze the main window, and I had to force-quit the program. After a lot of experiments, I finally found a way to fix the problem.

(Having a problem with the Atom editor asking to restart over and over? Jump over here)

Hackintosh AMD Shutdown Problem with Fenvi FV-T919

Thu, 28 May 2020 00:00:00 +0000

After finally building my first Hackintosh, I decided that the AMD Ryzen™ 3900X processor would be perfect, although Apple never made a Machintosh machine with an AMD processor. I used the Gigabyte X570 Aorus Elite motherboard because it has everything I need for my build. But I decided to upgrade my working machine with a Bluetooth/Wifi PCI-E card to be able to use the SideCar function in macOS. Being able to connect Bluetooth equipment is also lovely.

After Googling around, I found a card that filled all my needs. It’s the Fenvi FV-T919, a Bluetooth 4.0, and 802.11 a/b/g/n/AC compatible Wifi-card that uses ICs that are supported in macOS directly, so no patching needed.

But after installing the card, there was a problem when trying to shut down the machine from the macOS side; the computer would shut down and immediately start up again. Fortunately, I’ve found a fix for the problem.

Hackintosh Water Cooling Fan Problem

Thu, 13 Feb 2020 00:00:00 +0000

When building my AMD Hackintosh, I decided to prepare for a future upgrade of my CPU. I based my current build on an AMD Ryzen 3900X, but I plan to update it to a Ryzen 3950X. So I decided to install a CPU water cooling system.

MiSTer FPGA Getting Arcade Cores To Use mra Files

Sat, 25 Jan 2020 00:00:00 +0000

This info is out of date! All you need is the script “update_all”

MiSTer FPGA is an amazing open-source platform where they use an FPGA development board from Terasic as the base to be able to do cycle-accurate emulation of computers, arcade games, and gaming consoles. But to get everything set up isn’t very easy. My main interest is the arcade cores for being able to play my favorite old games precisely as it would be, playing on the original hardware. I’ll try to give you a rundown on how to get it to work here.

Quartus Prime FPGA USB-Blaster Problems On Ubuntu 18.04

Sun, 12 Jan 2020 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve decided to learn how to program FPGA:s. So I got myself two Terasic boards, one Terasic DE10-Nano for testing out the excellent MiSTer FPGA hardware arcade/computer/console emulator and a simpler DE0-Nano for beginning to learn Verilog.

But the software used, called Intel Quartus Prime 19.1, is truly horrible. The Windows version doesn’t work with high-resolution screens when using scaling; the text is cut off on the display. So I installed it on my Linux Ubuntu 18.04 machine instead. Now the display works, but there’s a lot of other problems, like getting the dreaded error message: “USB-Blaster unable to scan device chain”. I’ve written them down here for later reference, and maybe you have the same install problems, so this might help.

Blog Is Up and Running Again!

Mon, 25 Nov 2019 00:00:00 +0000

So my blog is finally back in business after being off the grid for many months. Things have happened in my life. A divorce, moving to a new apartment and trying to start rebuilding my life again. But now I’m back!

Shairport Crashing When Using USB DAC with Raspberry Pi

Tue, 26 Mar 2019 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve moved over from Squeezebox server to Roon as my multi-room music playback system. The new system works wonderfully, and I love it. However, there’s one thing that I’ve had a problem with, and that’s getting Apples AirPlay to work reliably with my Roon Raspberry Pi endpoints running Diet-Pi Linux. The Shairport-sync constantly crashed. After searching around the net, I found a solution to my problem.

PayPal Two-Factor Authentication in 1Password

Wed, 13 Feb 2019 00:00:00 +0000

PayPal has now added 2FA, so this info is no longer needed. Kept for posterity.

Two-factor authentication today is a must to keep your online accounts safe. You certainly want to keep your PayPal account safe. Using SMS to add an extra authentication is a hassle and could cost you money as well. PayPal, in their infinite stupidity, has chosen not to use the regular 2FA two-factor authentication used by most of the online sites. Instead, they decided to go with Symantec/VeriSign’s design, where you need a proprietary iOS, Android app, or a dedicated hardware key. This method makes it very hard to get it to work with the worlds best password manager software, 1Password. However, with some elbow grease, there is a way of getting it to work. Here’s how.

Why I Switched To Roon And You Should Too

Mon, 11 Feb 2019 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve been running my music system at home using Squeezebox Server software for many years. It has served me well, but Logitech bought the entire eco-system and then abandoned it. Because it’s Open Source, it’s still updated, but it’s time to do an upgrade to a better system. After testing a lot of different server solutions, I finally choose Roon by Roon Labs as my music server software. Here’s why.

MacBook Netflix Flicker Flashing in Full-screen

Tue, 25 Dec 2018 00:00:00 +0000

I had an annoying problem on my 2015 MacBook Pro Mac OS when watching movies on Netflix using Safari. When in full-screen mode, the display would flash/flicker a couple of times a minute. Well, after digging around, I found a solution for it.

Why Does the screen keep flashing when watching Netflix?

Some MacBook Pro’s have dual graphics cards. Mac OS switches between them depending on what kind of work you are doing, and by switching cards it saves batteries. Unfortunately, the built-in Intel graphics cards are the reason for the flickering and flashing. So we need to turn on the high-performance graphics card when watching Netflix.

PlayStation VR Motion Controller Battery Refuses To Charge

Tue, 11 Sep 2018 00:00:00 +0000

If you leave your PlayStation Motion Controller without charging it for a long time, the battery will not charge. Even after you press the reset button, the controller refuses to recharge. Replacing the battery is an easy fix, but expensive, and there is another way of getting the PlayStation Controller to work again.

Ambien as a Defense For Bad Behavior

Sat, 18 Aug 2018 00:00:00 +0000

There’s been a lot of chatter on the internet of the “Ambien defense”.

It’s quite a good defense for weird behavior. I’m talking as a recovering Ambien abuser for over ten years.

Aneng AN8009 Improve Accuracy, measuring Speed

Tue, 05 Jun 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Just got my new Aneng AN8009 Multimeter in the mail. I’ve made an old post about improving the responsiveness of the Aneng AN8008 in an earlier blog post. I loved that meter, but I gave it to my son who is just beginning on his electronic journey. So naturally, I needed a replacement. After checking eBay, I found that there’s a new model, the Aneng AN8009 so I decided to get that model. It has the same problem that the Aneng AN8008 had; it’s slow to settle on a value when measuring. Fortunately, my old modifications work on the Aneng AN8009 as well.

HifiBerry DAC+ Click When Changing Song

Fri, 06 Apr 2018 00:00:00 +0000

My current music setup is a Raspberry Pi 3 with a HifiBerry DAC+ audio card as my music player. It works perfectly, except for one annoying thing. The new HifiBerry DAC+ makes an audible click or poping sound when changing the sampling rate. I have a lot of recordings in higher resolution than CD-quality of 16-bit 44kHz, so it’s jarring when it happens. I like to play my music loud which exacerbates the problem. But there’s an easy solution, and at the same time, you can get better sound quality overall. Here’s how to fix the problem.

MacOS Remove Purgeable in High Sierra

Tue, 06 Mar 2018 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve written an article on how to remove the purgeable portion on a hard disk on MacOS, but in High Sierra, Apple has changed the file system from HFS+ to APFS. Because of that, my old guide doesn’t work. So here is how to remove the Purgeable part of the disk in MacOS High Sierra.

PA0RDT Mini Whip – Installing In an Apartment building

Fri, 02 Mar 2018 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve recently got interested in RF radio. But I live in an apartment, so I can’t do any installing of large antennas. So after doing the obligatory Google search, I narrowed it down to two antennas. The Wellbrook Loop Antenna and the (much cheaper) PA0RDT Mini-Whip. Being short of cash, I decided to buy a cheap Mini-Whip from eBay.

WiMo Antennen A Horrible Buying Experience

Thu, 01 Mar 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Update: Apparently WeMo took notice of this article and contacted me. They have now sent a replacement unit. I also got an email from the people at Airspy, who mistakenly thought that this blog post was directed at them, which is not the case. The reason for me to choose Airspy is because they make quality products at a really good price, and I plan to do a blog post about using the Airspy Mini as an ADS-B receiver.

Thinking of buying any radios, antennas or other radio amateur equipment from WiMo Antennen und Elektronik GmbHI? Think again!

I wanted to buy an Airspy Mini to use as a makeshift simple spectrum analyzer. Usually, I buy directly from the manufacturer, but I wanted to be sure that if something were wrong with it, then it would be easier to have a seller closer to Sweden, so I decided to buy from WiMo Antennen und Elektronik GmbH in Germany. That turned out to be a mistake.

Cetus 3D Y-Axis Adjustment The Easy Way

Wed, 21 Feb 2018 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve been busy the last couple of weeks, learning all the ins and outs of my new Cetus3D 3D-printer. It’s a cheap printer for around $300, but it has linear rails and can give excellent results. Unfortunately, the calibration quality from the factory was terrible, which is unfortunate on such a superb printer.

My Y-axis was way out. If I zeroed out the nozzle on the left side, the right side was 2.0 lower. There is a calibration feature inside the program, but you need to always print with a raft to get your prints level, with the accompanied wastage of PLA plastic. But I finally found an easy way of fixing the Y-axis adjustment. Here’s how I did it.

Cetus3D MKII Can't Calibrate Nozzle Close to Build Plate

Thu, 01 Feb 2018 00:00:00 +0000

After finally getting my Cetus3D MkII 3D-printer I was eager to start to print. When I started through the steps to calibrate the printer by adjusting the build plate height, but the print head/nozzle refused to get close enough to the build plate to finish the calibration! The cables on the motor came in contact with the chassis of the printer! So the injector was 5mm from the build plate and couldn’t get any closer by increasing the step values. But there is an easy fix for the problem.

433 MHz Support in Node-RED

Fri, 17 Nov 2017 00:00:00 +0000

ITEAD contacted me about testing some new equipment and write an unbiased blog post about it. I usually reject all such offers, but this one worked for me. Why? Well, all the stuff they offered was on my shopping list anyway! And my home is quite literally chock full of Sonoff relays, lamps, etc.

So the first thing I started to play with was the SONOFF RF BRIDGE 433. The bridge makes it possible to control switches, doorbells, curtain openers, etc. that uses 433MHz communication frequency. I’m not interested in using the original firmware because I prefer to do my home automation setup in Node-RED. Here’s how it works.

Retr0bright – Will It Last?

Fri, 03 Nov 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Over the years I’ve been reading about a way of restoring old computers and other equipment where the plastic has turned yellow and how some bright guys developed a method called Retr0bright to reverse the process.

The reason for the yellowing of the plastic is the flame retardant bromide that is infused in the plastic to prevent fires. When exposed to UV-light, the bromide comes to the surface of the ABS plastic, and the yellowing begins.

Unfortunately, even after treating the item with Retr0bright, the yellowing returns after 3-4 years, looking worse than your grandfather’s underwear.

Here’s my attempt at a fix to that problem.

DIY Coaxial Collinear Antenna for ADS-B SDR Receiver – Measuring The Cable

Thu, 26 Oct 2017 00:00:00 +0000

[caption id=“attachment_5818” align=“alignright” width=“300”] My first attempt of a Collinear Antenna. Professional mounting![/caption]

Part 1 – Checking the Velocity Factor of the Coax Cable

I have a homebuilt Collinear Antenna on one of my two ADS-B receivers. It’s an eight element antenna, built without any real effort of making sure that all the elements where the right length. So it’s about time to try to do it properly. The easy way is to get Flightaware’s great ADS-B antenna and filter, but it’s fun to build your own as well.

To build a good antenna, you would preferably use a Vector Network Analyzer so you can do proper measurements of your antenna design. With it you can quickly check stuff like SWR and optimize the impedance of the antenna at the frequency it’s intended to be used. In my case 1090MHz for ADS-B. But if you don’t have the money to spend, you have to improvise. I’m going to build a 12 element Collinear Antenna out of cheap RG-58 coax cable. But to calculate the right length of each element, we need to know the Velocity Factor, or the signal speed through the cable compared to light traveling in a vacuum. So let’s do the measurements.

Aneng AN8008/AN8009 Modify For Better Accuracy Faster Readings

Thu, 12 Oct 2017 00:00:00 +0000

If you are on the lookout for a sub $30 Multimeter (or $15 on eBay) for working with low voltages, the best one right now in my opinion is the cute and tiny Aneng AN8008 TrueRMS Multimeter or the newer model, the Aneng AN8009 with NCV and temperature measurement. They have a lot of functions and can measure µA current, and both are a 9999-count meter. The continuity tester is reasonably fast, but there is one little problem that bothered me. It takes 5 to 10 seconds for it to settle on a correct voltage reading. When it finally ends, it’s spot on, but the waiting is annoying. But fortunately, there is a simple fix for this problem.

Search System Files in Finder Mac OS

Sun, 08 Oct 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Finding System Files in Finder

Don’t you hate it when you need to find a .plist settings file or any other file that is in one of the Mac OS system files folders? I do. So here is a little tip on how to do global system files search directly in the Finder.

Calibrating Brymen BM-Series Multimeters

Wed, 27 Sep 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Easy Way To Calibrate a Bryman BM869s Multimeter

After replacing my lost Fluke 87V multimeter with a new Brymen BM869s (rebranded Greenlee in the US) about a year ago, I’ve been delighted with the multimeter. It has every possible function I could ask for and then some. It’s been my go-to meter when working on electronics projects. I do have a Siglent SDM3055 DMM that is very good, but due to its startup time, I usually reach for my Brymen BM869s when I need to measure something, and it has higher resolution. But after getting a broken HP/Agilent 34401A DMM from eBay, fixing it up and replacing all the capacitors, I now have a better reference. I’ve compared it to my friend’s calibrated 6 ½-digit multimeter, and it’s still within spec, so naturally, I want my Brymen to be as close to my HP 34401A as possible. Turns out that calibrating and adjusting the Brymen is quite easy. Here’s how to do it.

MacOS How To Remove Purgeable on Hard Drive

Thu, 20 Apr 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Can’t Remove Purgeable Disk Space

Note: If you have MacOS High Sierra installed, you need this guide instead.

When trying to install Bootcamp on my MacBook Pro, I had to delete a lot of files to get enough space to be able to accommodate for a Bootcamp partition on the drive. But even after removing around 60 GB of storage, MacOS Sierra could still not make a large enough partition for Windows. When checking with Disk Utility, it showed that indeed I had enough space, but there was a part called Purgeable that was impossible to move. No tools from Apple are available to handle this, but here’s how I fixed it.

(not actually my disk, forgot to take a screenshot)

DietPi Makes Your Raspberry Pi a Lean Mean Linux Machine

Thu, 13 Apr 2017 00:00:00 +0000

My wild guess is that most people get a small Linux computer, like the Raspberry Pi, BeagleBone, Banana Pi or Orange Pi for a specific task. Unfortunately, most distributions are chock-full of software, with everything installed per default. But if you want to set up a lean single board computer for a specific task, you’re out of luck. Thankfully there is a Linux distribution, DietPi, that aims to fix that problem.

NTP Server Extreme accuracy for under $200 Using SI5351C

Wed, 12 Apr 2017 00:00:00 +0000

When you make your own NTP server, you probably spend a lot of time trying to get it as accurate and stable as possible. To get good results, you need to connect your server to a good time reference, like an atomic clock, GPS or a GPSDO to get the PPS (Pulse Per Second) to sync your server with the reference clock.

In both Linux and BSD, there is kernel support to slave the very inaccurate CPU clock crystal to the PPS signal, continually adjusting the frequency, because the crystals of computers continuously drift due to temperature and barometric pressure differences. So most of the work is to get a crappy crystal to behave. What if you just jumped over that step, so the CPU clock gets synchronized with the same lab reference that the PPS signal uses, using a SI5351C Clock Generator?

Read on to see a simple way of doing it and get an extremely accurate NTP server for under $200.

Atten 8502D Pinout Replacement Iron Heating element

Thu, 23 Mar 2017 00:00:00 +0000

So you need to replace the soldering iron on your Atten 8502D Soldering Station. You could just buy the heating element, but you can find a complete soldering iron with cable for less than $12 on eBay. So It’s easier just to replace the whole thing.

It Doesn’t Work!

I have ordered replacement irons before (I’m very rough with my soldering station) just to find out that they don’t work. You get the dreaded S-E or H-E message on display and, obviously, something is wrong. What do you do now? Read on to find out.

Sonoff WiFi Smart Switch With I2C Port

Tue, 21 Mar 2017 00:00:00 +0000

How to add an I2C interface to a Sonoff WiFi Smart Switch.

The Sonoff brand is a whole series os IOT devices that use the esp8266 WiFi processor internally. The devices are easily hacked and are cheap. The Sonoff WiFi Smart Switch is the most straightforward device, which can turn on or off 110/220 Volt 10 Ampere remotely. That means you can have your ceiling fan, lamp or anything else connected t mains power remotely controlled by your phone or computer. But the software that comes with it isn’t very flexible and cannot be integrated into a home control system like NodeRED, OpenHAB or any other home automation system.

Firmware

The Sonoff devices are easy to hack, so you can put a better firmware like ESPEasy on it and integrate the device with any system. ESPEasy has an extensive list of extra modules that you can connect, like temperature, barometric pressure, humidity, light sensors, PIR sensors and a long list of other things.

But most modules connect with I2C, which is a serial interface for interconnecting ICs using a clock and a data line. The Sonoff Switch only have one extra pin available, making it impossible to connect more advanced sensors. But there is a way of fixing that. Here’s how to add that to add an I2C connector to your $5 Sonoff and open up a whole field of stuff you can do.

Cable Impedance How to Measure It

Thu, 16 Mar 2017 00:00:00 +0000

What kind of impedance does this coax cable have?

Sometimes you dig around in your parts bin, desperately searching for a bit of coax cable to make a new connector to your fantastic whizzbang widget. If you find a piece of cable without markings, how do you know if it’s 75Ω, 50Ω or some other impedance? Well, here are two easy ways of finding out.

How To Destroy a Record Mastering

Sat, 24 Dec 2016 00:00:00 +0000

With the resurgence of good Hi-Fi, where more and more people buy good headphones and listen to a lot of music thanks to streaming, it’s sad to see the things the mastering engineers (and in the end the artist) do to music. The recordings are getting worse. Even old records that get the “Remastered” or “Expanded” treatment doesn’t sound as good as the original. Why?

Raspberry Pi 3 Overclocking Heatsink Cheap

Sat, 17 Dec 2016 00:00:00 +0000

I needed a cheap heatsink for my Raspberry Pi 3 that I use as a music player/server. To maximize performance, I wanted to overclock the computer for faster searching and handling of all my music. I’ve managed to overclock my central Stratum-1 NTP server to 1350MHz without any problems, but the dinky little aluminium heatsink was way to anaemic, so I found a very cheap DIY solution to my question. With this heatsink, I can run the Raspberry Pi 3 at 1.5GHz all day at full tilt without any issues!

NAD 3020B Amplifier A Classic Worth Restoring

Wed, 09 Nov 2016 00:00:00 +0000

A friend of mine bought a new amplifier, but he wasn’t pleased with the sound. So he called me and asked if I could recommend a good old amplifier that could drive smaller speakers because he likes the aesthetic of older things. And the venerable NAD 3020B was the first one that came to mind. When I was young, this was the first affordable amplifier that sounded good.

It’s not a powerhouse by any means, putting out (a very conservative estimate) 2 x 20 watts. But the phono stage accepts both MM and MC pickups which is excellent, and the sound quality is exceptional. So he scoured the used market and finally found a NAD 3020B. Unfortunately, when he got it home, there was a loud hum from the output. So I told him to send it to me so I could fix it.

Eagle PCB Crash when Scrolling Mac OS X

Sat, 22 Oct 2016 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve been really annoyed with Eagle PCB because it has a bug on Mac OS X for a long time. When working with a PCB, pressing the middle button on the mouse for scrolling a layout, the program crashes. Thankfully I found a workaround.

Raspberry Pi 3 Overclocking Enclosure

Sun, 31 Jul 2016 00:00:00 +0000

[caption id=“attachment_4974” align=“alignright” width=“400”] Raspberry Pi 3 Overclocking Case Enclosure[/caption]

The results are in: I’ve been very busy with different projects, and one of them requires a custom enclosure. So I thought it would be an excellent excuse to learn Fusion 360. When the Raspberry Pi 3 came out, I did some overclocking experiments. But I settled with just passive cooling with some small aluminum heatsinks. But after seeing some tests done with a more massive copper heatsink combined with a cooling fan, I decided that I wanted to build a case with a silent fan with enough room for a large heatsink. I need it for my NTP server at ntp.jacken.se to get better performance.

High Performance Headphone Amplifier

Sun, 10 Jul 2016 00:00:00 +0000

I haven’t had time to update the blog because I’ve been busy designing a new headphone amplifier. There’s been a lot of development when it comes to operational amplifiers and I was curious about how well I can get an amplifier to measure using the latest technology. The op amp I’m using still hasn’t got a development board, so I make one myself. The op amps are 5x5mm in PVQFN-20, so you need to use an SMD soldering gun or oven to be able to solder them. I simulated the circuit with both LTSpice and TINA90, but left biasing resistors and some other stuff in good old fashion though-hole components for easy testing.

Raspberry Pi Stratum-1 NTP Server Statistics

Tue, 12 Apr 2016 00:00:00 +0000

After becoming a full-fledged time-nut (I’m compiling a new Linux kernel on my second NTP server as we speak), I have started to use the statistics that I usually install on a server just to keep a check on it. Sure, when installing something like MRTG, it’s great to see if something is clogging the system, but mostly, it’s unused. But when working with an NTP server a lot of factors start to make a difference. The temperature of the processor (the whole computer actually, mostly due to crystal drift), the load of the CPU’s, etc.

DIY Reference 10 MHz Distribution Amplifier

Sun, 20 Mar 2016 00:00:00 +0000

I wanted to get a distribution amplifier for my 10 MHz lab reference signal from my GPSDO to feed my equipment, like my timer/frequency counter, signal generator, and other stuff. I also needed a way to distribute a 1 PPS signal from my Trimble GPSDO to my NTP servers and other clocks and monitoring systems. The Trimble only got two 10 MHz outputs and one 1 PPS signal output, so I needed to add more, especially for experimentation.

I saw this video by Gerry Sweeney where he modifies an Extron 300MX video distributions amplifier, adding a rubidium reference standard and was intrigued. But I changed the modifications to fit my needs and here is the result.

Raspberry Pi 3 Overclocking

Wed, 02 Mar 2016 00:00:00 +0000

Warning: as of yet, there is no official support for overclocking the Raspberry Pi 3, so you could damage your small computer. Just a reminder.

Update: I’ve managed to make a DIY heatsink for the Raspberry Pi 3 for $4, and it’s running stable at 1.5GHz. Click here to read.

The new version of Raspberry Pi 3 was released yesterday, so I naturally had to get two. I’m using two as Stratum-1 NTP servers, and with the old Raspberry Pi 2, I had hit the roof when it came down to getting better time resolution. So when I read that a new 50% faster version had been released, I raced to the nearest store and got a couple. I have one experimental NTP server that isn’t handing out time on the internet and another one that is the primary server, connected to the NTP Pool Project.

I installed the experimental Raspberry Pi 3 first, so I could test performance and try to overclock it. And it went very well.

Increase Pulse Width 1 PPS signal from GPSDO

Thu, 28 Jan 2016 00:00:00 +0000

Update: You can download the Eagle PCB files for the PPS Pulse Width Extender here. The PCB is made to fit the Hammond 1455C802BK enclosure.

I have two Stratum-1 NTP servers using Raspberry Pi 2’s as servers. But the two setups are entirely different. My primary NTP Stratum-1 server is available at ntp.jacken.se, but it is also in the .se pool of ntp.org. It’s a Raspberry Pi 2 I use a Raspberry Pi 3 that I have connected a U-Blox Neo-7 GPS receiver. But I’m not using the 1 PPS signal coming out of the U-Blox. I have a Trimble GPSDO that I bought from eBay. The unit has two 10 MHz lab reference outputs and one 1 PPS output. But after measuring the signal coming out from the GPSDO, I realized that the timing speed for the seconds “Tick” was only 10 µsec which is way to fast for the Raspberry Pi to pick up as an interrupt on one of the GPIO pins. So I built a pulse extender, making the pulse around 250 milliseconds instead. And now the Raspberry Pi picks up the pulse without problems. Some GPSDO units can set the pulse width by programming the unit via a serial port, but I can’t find that feature on this unit (which is poorly documented and was OEM made for some other manufacturer), so I had to do it with hardware. So how does it look when crunching the numbers on it?

Python Generators for System Administrators

Tue, 26 Jan 2016 00:00:00 +0000

Generator functions and Python. Doing your administrative stuff faster.

Often when I need to monitor something on one of my linux servers, I always gravitate towards these papers. I always forget how to use them, so putting them here is for me as much as it is for you. Go though the PDF presentation about Python Generators for System Administrators. and fiddle around with the example code. I’m pretty sure you can find stuff you need to to and you will be amazed of the speed of the code. It took a while for me to wrap my thick head around it, but the end result is great!

Raspberry Pi NTP Server LCD Status Display

Tue, 12 Jan 2016 00:00:00 +0000

The last couple of weeks I’ve been busy building a Raspberry Pi 2 Raspberry Pi 3 connected to my Trimble GPSDO using the 1 PPS output. The Trimble unit synchronizes with the atomic clocks onboard the GPS satellites, and the precision is fantastic! I bought the GPSDO to get a 10 MHz lab reference for my measure equipment, but after reading an article about Time-Nuts, people obsessed with measuring time as accurately as possible, and one of my friends showed me pictures of their new Stratum-1 NTP server rack he helped design, I was hooked.

Philips-Fluke PM6665 Frequency Counter with Oven Controlled Crystal Oscillator

Wed, 23 Dec 2015 00:00:00 +0000

Upgrading a Philips-Fluke PM6665 Frequency Counter with an Oven Controlled Crystal Oscillator - Up and Running!

I needed a frequency counter for my little lab at home. Naturally, I wanted an HP Agilent 53132A or similar, but it’s way too expensive for my modest use. So I browsed around eBay and found an old Philips-Fluke PM6665 frequency counter with the optional 1.3GHz add-on board. With a 10 second gate time, I can get down to 0.1 Hz at 10 MHz, so that’s more than I need. It didn’t have the option of a better crystal, unfortunately. When I tested the PM6665 against my Trimble 10 MHz GPSDO reference, the unit was off by 200.1 Hz. Without a calibration sticker on the instrument, I’d say that’s pretty good for a device manufactured in the late 80s. I tried to trim it, but it uses an adjustable capacitor, and you only needed to look at it for it to change settings.

Speeding up your SPI MAX7219 LED displays using a modified Arduino LedControl Library

Fri, 20 Nov 2015 00:00:00 +0000

Speeding up your SPI MAX7219 LED displays when using Arduino and LedControl Library

In preparation for the arrival of my GPSDO[1], I’m doing a quick build of an “Atomic Clock” display to have above my lab equipment. I’m using a cheap, small eight digit red LED SPI-controlled display. It uses the MAX7219 controller that I got from eBay for next to nothing. I plan to parse the RS232 information from the GPSDO unit and display the exact time. I’ll also post error messages if the GPS signal lock gets lost.

I’ve done a quick prototype using an Arduino Uno, but I plan to try to get an Attiny85 to work as the controller when I’ve finished the parser and the rest of the software.

After doing some research, naturally, there was a library available to connect to my LED display called LedControl. It’s part of the standard Arduino libraries (in the download section). But when I checked the code, it uses the Arduino routines to shift out the SPI data to the display. It’s great if you want to be able to use any pins to connect to the screen, but using Arduino’s bit manipulation tools for “bit-banging” the display is slow.

Upgrading a Philips/Fluke PM6665 Frequency Counter with an Oven Controlled Crystal Oscillator OCXO

Thu, 19 Nov 2015 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve finished the OCXO upgrade. Read about it here

While browsing on eBay for my new lab at home (I’m getting into electronics again), I came across a Philips PM6665 Frequency Counter, an old but functional unit so I couldn’t resist, I had to buy it. So I downloaded the Users Manual and Service Manual for the frequency counter and started to check the schematic. As usual the unit, when new, could be bought with several options. One of them was a better crystal oscillator, an MTCXO that can be automatically calibrated using a 10 MHz external reference, giving an accuracy of 3*10-8 but my unit doesn’t have that option, unfortunately. This will be fixed though. But it does have a 70 MHz to 1.3 GHz optional input!

So here’s what I plan to do…

Use LTspice IV Windows Version on Mac OS X

Wed, 21 Oct 2015 00:00:00 +0000

Running LTspice IV on Mac OS X

Before I start testing a new idea for an electronic circuit and building it on a breadboard, I usually want to check it with LTspice. It’s a fantastic piece of software for testing almost any kind of component. Nearly all manufacturers have a spice equivalent for most of their parts. But there’s a snag. The Mac version of LTspice is a piece of crap. Having to run a virtual PC or reboot using BootCamp feels unnecessarily slow and convoluted. But there’s a way of running it as a “normal” Mac application. Here’s how to do it.

Rigol DS1054Z Oscilloscope Hangs-Freeze On Boot

Tue, 15 Sep 2015 00:00:00 +0000

I got myself a four channel 50MHz oscilloscope to be able to do some measurements. The Rigol DS1054Z. It’s expensive in Sweden if you buy it from a local retailer, but I ordered mine from Batronix in Germany and thanks to being part of the EU, there’s no customs and extra taxes added to the price.

The oscilloscope is easily hacked to 100MHz and a lot of other functions like serial protocol decoding and also more memory depth. RS232/UART, I2C and SPI decoding, advanced trigger functions like RS232/UART, I2C, SPI, Runt, Windows, Nth edge, Delay and Timeout trigger. Search for “Rigol DS1054Z hack,” and you’re on your way to transform your scope to a much more expensive version. But don’t enable the 500µV option. The oscilloscope doesn’t support it in hardware, so you will run into bugs if enabled.

I’ve been delighted with my purchase, except for the occasional bug. But today it went into a total haywire mode. When trying to start it up, it hangs on boot. Either by just showing the Rigol boot screen, or show the standard display but remain immune to any input from the controls. Panic! But thankfully I found a solution to my problem.

Building A Better Record Player Motor Controller Pro-ject

Wed, 09 Sep 2015 00:00:00 +0000

After fixing my Pro-Ject Speedbox II SE I thought I check how it worked and if I could improve it. I’m in the process of comparing my bench version against the Speedbox, and my model is winning big time! I’ll get back when I have a nice unit up and running…

Apple Music Streaming – It's a No Go For Me

Mon, 10 Aug 2015 00:00:00 +0000

Apple Music

So I gave Apple Music streaming a try. Being able to just search for music and add it to my playlists sounded like a good idea. After a while the recommendations becomes rather good as well, giving me some tips of other bands I might like. But here’s the problem I have with Apple Music. When you sync your music via iCloud, you can no longer sync music via iTunes! And to be able to download music locally from Apple Music to your phone, you must use the “in the iCloud” solution. Catch–22 anyone?

John Carpenter the Genius Film Maker

Mon, 25 May 2015 00:00:00 +0000

Back in the early nineties, I had been out partying all night long. I was way too drunk, but didn’t feel like going to bed just yet. So I poured myself a beer and sat down in the living room. On top of the TV was a VHS cassette I hadn’t seen before. One of our neighbors worked as a film reviewer for a film magazine, so after he had seen the films he usually lent them to our family. So I put it in the VCR and sat down, not knowing what I was about to see. It started right away with a a couple of guys in a helicopter chasing a dog, trying to shoot it. “That’s weird” I thought…

Nagios Directory Index Forbidden by Options Directive

Fri, 27 Mar 2015 00:00:00 +0000

Nagios Directory Index Forbidden by Options Directive

After installing Nagios on a Raspberry Pi 2 Model B by following these installation instructions, I ran into an irritating problem. When trying to connect, I got the authentication dialog, but after that, I got an access error in my browser.

Directory index forbidden by Options directive: /usr/local/nagios/share

I searched around on Google but couldn’t find a solution. But after a lot of fiddling with Apache2, I found a solution. There’s a problem with the standard installation of the file in /etc/apache2/conf.d/nagios.conf created by make install-webconf

Arq Backup for Mac OS X Now Supports Google Cloud Storage Nearline

Thu, 19 Mar 2015 00:00:00 +0000

There’s one thing that I fear when it comes to my storage and that is to lose all the pictures I’ve been taking for all these years. I have seen customers of mine that have lost all their images due to a hard disk crashing and seen the tears. I usually do my regular backup using TimeMachine on my Mac to an Apple Time Capsule. But my photo library in Adobe Lightroom is too big to fit on the SSD drive used in my MacBook Pro, and TimeMachine doesn’t do a backup of external drives. So I use rsync to make a backup to my NAS which uses RAID–1 for extra protection. But I don’t want to rely on a single backup. A fire, burglary or simple hardware failure makes me uneasy. So I also do an off-site backup using the excellent Arq backup program.

MultiMarkdown 4.7 Released

Tue, 17 Mar 2015 00:00:00 +0000

MultiMarkdown has just been updated to version 4.7. MultiMarkdown 4.7 Released. Unfortunately it looks like my biggest gripe with MultiMarkdown still isn’t fixed.

A brand new WYSIWYG editor in WordPress for iOS app

Tue, 24 Feb 2015 00:00:00 +0000

So they added a new WYSIWYG editor in Wordpress own app for iOS. And to my Initial amazement it looks like it handles images the correct way by first uploading them, and then gives you the different automatically created sizes done by the server. Maybe I’m finally able to upload images and have Retina support without having to use my Editorial workflow? But when looking at the generated HTML, the height and width of the images is set to zero. It points the URL to the full resolution image, even if you select a smaller one. Not good. If you save a draft, it forgets your image settings like alignment and title.

Faster WiFi Speed With Your Mac

Sun, 22 Feb 2015 00:00:00 +0000

Getting better speed over WiFi

Most people today have their computers, phones and media players connected via Wi-Fi. But is your wireless network operating at the highest rate? Well, there’s a couple of things you can do to increase both the reach and your connection speed with some simple configuration changes. Let’s see if we can improve your Wi-Fi speed.

Faster Web Browsing By Optimizing DNS

Thu, 19 Feb 2015 00:00:00 +0000

Here is an easy way to increase the speed of loading web pages by optimizing the DNS you are using when surfing the web. Everything you do on the internet will be affected by the speed of the Domain Name System you are using. So let’s try to make it faster.

Mapping WiFi Signals in 3D

Wed, 18 Feb 2015 00:00:00 +0000

“Mapping WiFi Signals in 3 Dimensions”

3D wifi plot image

Adam Fabio, Hackaday:

[Charles] is on a quest to complete ever more jaw-dropping hacks with the popular low-cost ESP8266 WiFi modules. This week’s project is plotting WiFi received signal strength in 3D space. While the ESP8266 is capable of providing a Received Signal Strength Indication (RSSI), [Charles] didn’t directly use it. He wrote a simple C program on his laptop to ping the ESP8266 at around 500Hz. The laptop would then translate the RSSI from the ping replies to a color value, which it would then send to the ESP8266. Since the ESP8266 was running [Charles’] custom firmware (as seen in his WiFi cup project), it could directly display the color on a WS2812 RGB LED.

A great hack. It’s amazing to actually be able to see the reception of the Wi-Fi signal mapped as a 3D object. Shows that just moving a router/receiver a small amount can have an impact on reception.

wpid Added to File Name When Uploading With xmlrpc

Sun, 08 Feb 2015 00:00:00 +0000

I’m working on my script for uploading images directly from the iOS Markdown text editor app Editorial to Wordpress. The current script uses xmlrpc-Wordpress library, but I’m writing my own so the user doesn’t have to install the extra library just to use my script. When uploading files with xmlrpclib, I got this annoying thing happening. Every time I uploaded an image using xmlrpclib and the function wp.uploadFile the uploaded file got wpid- prepended to the filename of all my uploaded files.

GMT Time Showing in iPhone iPad Calendar App

Wed, 04 Feb 2015 00:00:00 +0000

I helped my boss today with a weird problem. In his calendars on his iOS devices, an extra line would show up, displaying the GMT time of the event. The event was placed correctly in the timeline, but it included the GMT time in the text. Naturally I did the obligatory Google search and found a lot of other users with the same problem, but not any solutions on how to fix it.

After checking all the settings on Google Calendar and checked the time and calendar settings, I couldn’t find anything wrong. But after checking out his iPad settings, I realized that the old IT guy had missed a thing.

Editorial App Workflow Upload Image to WordPress Media Library Version 2.2

Sat, 31 Jan 2015 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve tried a lot of blogging apps for the iPad, but none of them handles images the way I want. Images gets the weird name iOS has assigned to them which is not good for SEO. When I upload images to Wordpress, I want them to end up in the Wordpress Media Library and have all the theme defined sizes created automatically. Just like when you upload from the web interface in Wordpress. There’s an added problem when you want your site to support images displayed on a Retina or high DPI device, showing the picture in high resolution using a plugin like WP Retina x2. My favourite text editor on iOS is Editorial app, So I made this Workflow so I can do the naming, resizing and uploading of the images directly inside the app from my iPad or iPhone 6 Plus. You can select which of the theme defined image sizes you want to display and also set the image alignment. This workflow works excellent with the WP Retina x2 plugin, which is the one I use on my site. When everything is done, you have an MultiMarkdown referred image link at the cursor position in the text editor, and the image link and information like width, height and alt-text is added to the end of the document. This makes a very convenient way of blogging on the iPad.

WiFi Map uses community power to share network passwords

Wed, 28 Jan 2015 00:00:00 +0000

“WiFi Map uses community power to share network passwords”

George Tinari, The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW):

WiFi Map is a crowdsourced tool for finding all of the Wi-Fi hotspots in your area as well as the passwords to certain security-protected networks.

This looks like a great utility when trying to find a free WiFi hotspot. I’m going to give it a go on my iPhone next time I’m out and about in the city. I hate the 1Gb cap I have on my phone by network provider Tele2.

YouTube now defaults to HTML5

Wed, 28 Jan 2015 00:00:00 +0000

YouTube now defaults to HTML5

YouTube Engineering and Developers Blog:

Four years ago, we wrote about YouTube’s early support for the HTML5 tag and how it performed compared to Flash. At the time, there were limitations that held it back from becoming our preferred platform for video delivery. Most critically, HTML5 lacked support for Adaptive Bitrate (ABR) that lets us show you more videos with less buffering.

Over the last four years, we’ve worked with browser vendors and the broader community to close those gaps, and now, YouTube uses HTML5 by default in Chrome, IE 11, Safari 8 and in beta versions of Firefox.

Next App for iPhone Expense Tracker

Tue, 20 Jan 2015 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve started to use the excellent iPhone app Next to keep track of my expenses. My bank has a utility that automatically tracks every purchase I make, but for me, being a notorious money spender, it’s kind of a therapeutic thing to be forced every time I buy something to actually acknowledge the expense and not just buying without thinking. It’s also a great way of keeping track of what kind of things I spend my money on.

Clearing the Icon Services cache in Yosemite

Mon, 19 Jan 2015 00:00:00 +0000

“furbo.org · Clearing the Icon Services cache in Yosemite”

After installing or updating a system to Yosemite, I have seen blank (missing) icons on several Macs. I have also seen cases where the desktop doesn’t get updated after a change to the document icons in the application itself (which happens as developers update their apps to use the new icon guidelines.)

Saving this link for later. Looks like a good thing to know.

Editorial App Wordpress Upload images Workflow updated

Tue, 13 Jan 2015 00:00:00 +0000

I have being going through the code for the Editorial App Workflow for uploading images directly to Wordpress Media Library and added some functions. There where several bugs and problems. Should work better now.

— Bug where scaling didn’t work at all (shame!)

— Added full resolution image as alternative

— should work now for blogs that doesn’t automatically make scaled versions of uploaded images, only presented with the option to use full resolution.

Resetting Mac OS X Printing System

Sun, 11 Jan 2015 00:00:00 +0000

How to Reset the Printing System in Mac OS X to Fix Annoying Printer Problems | OSXDaily

How to Reset the Printing System in Mac OS X to Fix Annoying Printer Problems

This little trick was new to me. Good to know.

Apple seeds OS X Yosemite 10.10.2 beta with focus on Wi-Fi, Mail and VoiceOver

Thu, 08 Jan 2015 00:00:00 +0000

“Apple seeds OS X Yosemite 10.10.2 beta with focus on Wi-Fi, Mail and VoiceOver”

AppleInsider:

Apple on Wednesday issued a new beta build of its upcoming OS X 10.10.2 maintenance update, once again asking developers to focus on Wi-Fi, Mail and VoiceOver alongside general system compatibility testing.

I hope Apple manages to fix the Wi-Fi problem that I have with MacBook Airs since upgrading to Yosemite. Constantly dropped connection and the only solution to the problem? Turn off and then on the network again. The machines worked fine before upgrading and It’s very intermittent.

WRC The Game for iOS

Sat, 03 Jan 2015 00:00:00 +0000

I have always loved Rally games. So I was glad to see a new Rally game showing up on iOS AppStore.

Regular readers of this blog knows that I rarely review bad software, trying instead to concentrate on all of the great apps out there. But this review is going to be different.

I’m not a fan of the Freemium way of selling games. I rather buy the game and get all (or almost all) the content and can get on playing without having to constantly pay for obvious things to continue. So I was glad to see that WRC The Game was a paid app. Bad mistake. If it was Freemium, I would have played for five minutes and then happily deleted the game. We are just talking about $1.99, but I’d get pissed if I buy a bad cup of coffee for that price as well.

A Better YouTube App for iOS - ProTube

Thu, 01 Jan 2015 00:00:00 +0000

I love wasting time watching YouTube. There’s always something interesting, funny or informative to find. On my Mac I have extensions to eliminate the annoying ads, And to get the highest quality available, but when watching on my iPhone or iPad I have sit and wait five seconds and then press skip when ads are shown. But not anymore. I found a great YouTube App replacement that plays back videos in the highest possible quality, but also does away with the ads. The app is called Protube. It’s only $2.99 and well worth it. So now I can watch even more crazy videos.

Yosemite Mac OSX wifi problems

Tue, 30 Dec 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Mac OS X Yosemite was released 16th of October. Naturally I installed it on all my machines. My new work computer, a MacBook Air 13" worked perfectly before the upgrade, but after the installation I’ve had constant problem with Wi-Fi. No problems what so ever before upgrading, so obviously something is screwed up with Yosemite. My private machine, a mid-2014 MacBook Pro Retina has no problems at all.

When searching through Apples support forum, there’s a lot of similar stories (and also a lot of noise.) it’s incredible that Apple still haven’t fixed the problem, with the network connection going down every five minutes. The only fix is to turn of wifi and turn it back on again. Incredible…

It's been way to long time

Tue, 23 Dec 2014 00:00:00 +0000

To long between updates

I’ve been too busy with work and other stuff, so this blog has been on the back burner. But my New Years resolution will be to resurrect this blog with a lot of new content.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

How Does Composition Work?

Tue, 04 Nov 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Understanding Composition | Blender Guru

Discover How To:

Why composition is one of the most important things you’ll learn

The most common mistake artists make

Simple rules to create more engaging artwork

Great video on how composition works. Made for to CGI but is equally applicable to photography.

http://youtu.be/O8i7OKbWmRM

As a fun counterpoint, here’s an article about why the golden ratio is bullshit.

Must-Have Mac Utilities

Wed, 29 Oct 2014 00:00:00 +0000

[caption id=“attachment_3666” align=“aligncenter” width=“580”] Josep Ma. Rosell[/caption]

Great Utilities for Mac OS X

Here’s my list of applications I can’t live without on my Mac. It’s the first thing I install when setting up a new machine. Maybe you’ll find one you like?

Great Free iPhone Apps for Film Makers

Mon, 27 Oct 2014 00:00:00 +0000

10 Free Apps for Filmmakers - Premiumbeat.com

Some of these apps are really good. And they’re free!

MarsEdit 3 My New Blog Editor On my Mac

Sun, 26 Oct 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Using Marsedit 3

I’ve been dabbling around with different blog editors for Mac now for a while, trying to find one that suits my needs. I usually try to do most of my blogging on my iPad, but when writing on my Mac I’ve used Byword in combination with Marked2 to do the initial texts written in Markdown.

Airmail updated to version 2.0

Mon, 20 Oct 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Airmail 2.0

A new version of Airmail has been released in conjunction with the new version of Mac OS X called Yosemite. It’s been redesigned to match Apples new look of the operating system and I love it. I’ve written before on my switch from Apples Mail to Airmail and what I like about it, and now there’s more to love. Here’s a list of some of the new features in version 2.0:

Fujifilm X100S My New Walkabout Camera

Mon, 29 Sep 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Fujifilm X100S

My New walkabout camera

I used to try to bring my Canon 5D Mark II with me wherever I went. But with the best walkabout lens, the old 24–70 f2.8L mounted on the camera; it became a pain just to carry the beast around. Only the glass weights 1.1 kilos, and with a battery grip with dual batteries, it’s a complete monster. I still use it because of the great optics and the quality when shooting with it, but I no longer use it for street photography.

Little Snitch 3 Privacy Monitor and Controller

Sun, 21 Sep 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Little Snitch 3 your network connection monitor

I have a couple of applications that I always install on a new Mac. Little Snitch 3 is one of them. They are the essential software I need to have installed to be productive and secure. Little Snitch by Objective Development is one of them. I’ve been using it for more than ten years now, and I wouldn’t dream of running a Mac without it installed. What Little Snitch 3 essentially does is monitor all outgoing traffic from your open applications and processes and gives you the ability to allow or deny that traffic. It is an excellent way of seeing what kind of information is sent from applications without your knowledge or consent. And it’s a great way of stopping traffic that “Phones home” without your explicit permission. When an application tries to send out something over the network, it gets intercepted by Little Snitch, and you can then allow or deny the connection, either temporary or permanently via the dialog box that appears. So Little Snitch is always there, protecting your privacy.

A Quick Test of the Blogo 2 Blogging Application

Mon, 15 Sep 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Blogo 2

Update: After using Blogo 2 for a while I decided to use Marsedit 3 instead. It’s a much more mature product right now.

I decided I wanted to try a new blogging application and stumbled onto Blogo 2. After installing it I had problems at first because I could only see the first 16 pages of content on my blog. But after contacting their support, they found out the problem (a weird character in one of my posts) and even logged in and fixed it. So my initial impression of the support for the application is very good. I just wished that the application supported Markdown and have a way of synchronising to Dropbox so I can switch between my computer and my iPad. But for quick posts like this (and if everything works because I haven’t pressed the Publish button yet) this could be a useful application. And there is sync with Evernote so that might work in a pinch.

JPEGMini an easy way to reduce size of large photos

Wed, 10 Sep 2014 00:00:00 +0000

JPEGMini

What if you could reduce the size of all the jpeg pictures on your hard disk? Do you have problems sending full resolution jpeg images via email because of size restraints? Is your iPhoto library too large? Let’s face it; pictures is one of the things that sucks up space on your drives. It’s even more annoying if you are using a newer Mac with an SSD disk where cost is premium. Upload speed when sending emails or uploading images to the web can be slow and annoying. An application called JPEGMini claims to help you with reducing your pictures with up to five times while retaining all the quality. I got a bit curious if the team at JPEGMini and their patented image compressor really could reduce large JPEG photos without losing quality. I’ve tried the application before when I wrote my article about comparing the best jpeg compressor applications for web use. But even though JPEGMini is geared more towards large megapixel pictures, not small images usually used on web pages, my test shows that it stacks up well against the competition even on more modest photographs. Many web pages now use pictures optimized for high-resolution images like for Retina display and high-resolution mobile devices, so the use of an image compressor is getting even more useful for web use.

But how well does JPEGMini retain quality on megapixel images in JPEG format? How much do you lose in quality by using compressing?

SpyderGallery color calibration for iPad

Wed, 03 Sep 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Trying to display color corrected images on an iPad

A couple of weeks ago i bought the Spyder4Elite so I could color calibrate my Retina MacBook Pro 15“ and my Asus PA246 24” monitor. And the calibration works really well.

There is no way of color calibrate your iPad, because Apple has not given developers the ability to create or change the calibration of the screen. But Datacolor, the makers of the Spyder4 line of calibrators has solved the problem by making an app that connects to your Mac via your network and use the calibrator to calibrate their app called SpyderGallery. This enables you to see calibrated versions of your pictures inside the viewer. But the calibrated data only works in the SpyderGallery app.

Backblaze Off-Site Backup

Tue, 02 Sep 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Non-local backup

I’ve been going back and forth trying to find a good off-site backup for a long time. I do have an Apple TimeCapsule where I do backup locally, but it doesn’t backup my external drives where I have all my pictures that goes back many years and that would be a nightmare to lose. I use Arq and Amazon Glacier to backup my pictures off-site and I also use rsync to a local NAS for a local backup. But I want a way of doing backup of all my stuff, so I’ve tried both CrashPlan and Backblaze but always found them to slow for my liking. Another reason for giving up on CrashPlan was the client software that uses to much processing power and I think the client is written in Java which would explain why it’s a resource hog. Not so with Backblaze that uses only about 3% of CPU even when the settings for upload speed is set to full upload speed and it doesn’t use much memory.

Image Compression JPEG Tools for Web

Mon, 01 Sep 2014 00:00:00 +0000

There are several JPEG image compression tools available that takes a jpeg file and reduces the size of the photo without altering the quality. But which one works best for posting images on a website? I was curious, so I took the tools I usually use and put them through the compress photo function. All applications tested claims not to lower the quality of the image. I’m concentrating on testing jpeg files here, and do a followup article later with results for optimizing PNG files.

Corsair K70 Clicky PC Gaming Keyboard on a Mac

Thu, 21 Aug 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Using a Clicky PC Keyboard from Corsair on a Mac

If you have followed this blog, you probably know that I love clicky keyboards. But getting a Buckling Spring or even a Cherry MX Blue keyboard specifically made for Macintosh isn’t easy, at least not here in Sweden. So the way to go for me was to get a PC gaming keyboard.

Squeezelite problem starting in SqueezePlug on Raspberry Pi

Tue, 19 Aug 2014 00:00:00 +0000

SqueezePlug problem where Squeezelite refuse to start

I installed a Raspberry Pi in my livingroom as a Squeezebox music Server/Player, using a SqueezePlug [1] image. But when I tried to install the Squeezelite player, it refused to start. I tried to uninstall and reinstall, selecting another USB Audio Interface, but the problem persisted. After checking around and doing a some experimenting, I found that I could start Squeezelite manually from the terminal prompt, but if I tried to start it with the init.d or service script, it refused to start. So I started to dig around and experimented with changing the settings for Squeezelite and I found the problem…

Airmail for Mac a Great Replacement for Apple Mail

Thu, 14 Aug 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Update to the update 2018

Still my favorite email client, and I’m now also blessed with a version for iPad and my iPhone. It’s up to version 3. It never crashes, and the search is fast and excellent. Best email client ever!

Update 2016-02-16

I’m still using Airmail now, two years after I wrote this post. It has never failed me in any way. It’s now up to version 2. I guess Apple has probably fixed a lot of the problems they had back then when connecting to Gmail. And let’s face it, Google changed a lot from the original IMAP standard, so everyone had to keep up. But I’m sticking with Airmail 2. Now there’s even an excellent version for Airmail for iOS. And you’ll feel right at home. It also syncs your settings from your Mac OS X application, so now I have an HTML signature on my iPhone. Yay! The only complaint is that they did the app for iPhone only and not an iPad version. In a perfect world, it should have been a universal app. But hopefully, they’ll fix that in the coming months.

Airmail, my new favorite mail client

After Mac OS X 10.8, Apple Mail has been going downhill by every update. It’s weird because the iOS Mail app is rock solid. I have my email domain on Google Apps, and I know that Gmail doesn’t follow the IMAP standard, instead choosing to do it their way. So they use tags instead of folders, etc. The blame has to be put on Google for not following standards but is a significant player; you can pretty much set your own rules. Anyway, Apple Mail has become a slow, unreliable application although they have fixed some of the more severe problems in the latest release. For the first time in many years, I was on the lookout for a new email client software.

Time to find a new Mail Client

I wanted to be able to have both of my private and work email accounts in the same program but have them separate to make life easier, and after searching the net, I found an application called Airmail. The feature list is comprehensive to the point of me not wanting to list all the features here, but follow the link to get a lowdown on all the things the application can do. I’ll go through the things that persuaded me to switch.

New MacBook Pro 15" Retina Color accuracy

Wed, 13 Aug 2014 00:00:00 +0000

MacBook Pro 15" Retina Mid2014 Calibrated compared to sRGB and Adobe RGB 1998

A couple of days ago I got my new Spyder4 Elite Color Calibrator for color calibrating monitors. After doing a calibration on both on the latest MacBook Pro 15" retina and my factory calibrated Asus PA246, I saved the comparison charts for the two displays to see how they stack up.

Overcast iPhone Podcast App

Thu, 31 Jul 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Overcast makes it fun to listen to Podcasts again

After reading a lot about a new podcast app called Overcast created by Marco Arment, famous for creating Instapaper I downloaded the app just to check it out. I love Instapaper, an app that really has made me appreciate long form journalism, so I thought I’ll try to see if Overcast could make me interested in listening to podcasts again, something I haven’t done in a while.

Apple AirPort Utility Hidden Feature

Tue, 08 Jul 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Apple Airport Utility how to display more information

While doing a Wi-Fi scan at work to get better reception and optimize the location and channel selection using NetSpot Wi-Fi Reporter, I had a problem. Our wireless network is set up with roaming, so when NetSpot Manager displays the scanned Wi-Fi device, it only shows the MAC address. So identifying an AirPort Extreme wireless router can be difficult, especially since Apple has simplified the user interface of AirPort Utility and removed a lot of information. One of them being what MAC address the AirPort unit has. So I needed a solution.

Mac OS X Finder Missing Sidebar Shared Computer Icons

Mon, 07 Jul 2014 00:00:00 +0000

I started to have a problem with Mac OS X Finder where the Shared computers in the Finder window sidebar didn’t show up. I couldn’t even change the Sidebar settings in Finder Preferences. So I did some digging around and found out how I could fix it, but also how stupid I am.

MultiMarkdown on iPad iPhone Revisited

Sun, 06 Jul 2014 00:00:00 +0000

MultiMarkdown on iPad - an update

I have updated my list over how well iPad Markdown writing apps handle the more advanced MultiMarkdown rendering. I also added some new apps to the list of the features I tested. Since I wrote the article, a new favourite writing app of mine, Editorial has been added to the list, and also IA Writer which now has MultiMarkdown support.

Almost all of the apps on the list supports Dropbox syncing, so writing in one application and rendering it in another that supports the features you need isn’t to hard. And with the enormous potential for scripting provided by Editorial, using x-callback-url schemes to send the text to another app for final rendering is pretty easy.

Raspberry Pi Car Audio System

Mon, 23 Jun 2014 00:00:00 +0000

My Raspberry Pi Car Audio Player

A lot of people are using the excellent Linux microcomputer Raspberry Pi and install it in their cars. Usually, they use a color screen that is touch sensitive, being able to play back video and music. But I’m only interested in high-quality audio playback, being able to have all my CDs in lossless FLAC format for optimal sound quality. So a 16x2 LCD with some buttons is plenty. I now have a working system (but not yet installed in my car.) here’s a description of how I’ve built it. Most of the installations I’ve seen the use of the audio out from the Raspberry Pi, but it’s only 11-bit and sounds like crap. I want to use an external DAC, and you can get that to work in XBMC, but only menu and music output, not films. There are some HDMI to audio converters, but I’ll instead use a quality USB DAC.

http://youtu.be/wzmFZlpbBCQ

Dumping Disqus from my blog

Sat, 21 Jun 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Inserting Score Card Research javascript

After doing some research using Google Webmaster Tools to get my images indexed, I discovered that a JavaScript called b.scorecardresearch.com/beacon.js was loading without me installing it. I found out that the Disqus comment system adds it without my knowledge. That’s not ok, so I have decided to remove Disqus from my blog. It’s unfortunate, because it is a pretty good system. I like the ease of making comments, and also that you can follow comments you made on different sites with ease. But if they try to do sneaky stuff like that, they’ll end up in /dev/null (in the trashcan for non geeks). After searching with Google I found that this isn’t something new. It’s been going on for quite some time. Thankfully I have all my comments stored, so I’ll just have to use the build-in comment system in Wordpress.

Loosing Google PageRank Because of hAtom errors

Tue, 10 Jun 2014 00:00:00 +0000

hAtom errors and Google PageRank

When I checked my blog in Google Webmaster I noticed a lot of errors in the Structured Data section. After fixing the errors in Wordpress by adding structured data, my traffic increased without any changes. That includes posts. So obviously Google uses hAtom when setting PageRank.

Flac, the best choice

Sat, 19 Apr 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Audio Engineering Pioneer John Meyer: Stop Chasing The Next Big Thing, And Go With Flac Instead — Tech News And Analysis:

John Meyer may be making really expensive loudspeakers, but when it comes to high-end audio, the audio engineering pioneer prefers free. FLAC, the open source audio format developed by Grateful Dead fans to trade bootleg recordings, is “the perfect format” for music aficionados looking for higher-resolution audio, Meyer told me during a recent interview. And to him, any company pushing trying to make a buck with selling upsampled music is just out to sell snake oil. “It’s tricking people who don’t know enough about technology,” he said.

Editorial iOS Upload Images to WordPress Workflow

Thu, 17 Apr 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Update: A newer, better version has been created. You can download it here.

I use the excellent iPad app Editorial as my preferred text editor. I want to be able to upload images directly from Editorial to WordPress, using xmlrpc, so the images ends up in the media gallery, the files in the correct folders, thumbnails made and a Markdown link with the correct URL is created. So I’ve written a workflow you can download that gives you the ability to select some text (that will be the alt text for the image), and either upload the image in the original size, or resize the width to the dimension you specify. After the image is uploaded, the Markdown image code is inserted. Another good thing is that you have the ability to name the image file, which I haven’t seen in other solutions, like in Poster App, where you get the cryptical iOS internal name of the image. Not so SEO friendly. The easiest solution was to use the wordpress_xmlrpc module, so that needs to be installed before you can use the workflow! but I’ve written a guide about how to install the module/library here. If you forget to install it beforehand, you will get this dialog box with instructions on how to install it if you start the workflow.

How To import modules with Pipista into Editorial iOS app

Sun, 06 Apr 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Importing pipista modules in Editorial

Lets face it, the Editorial App is a fantastic text/Markdown editor. It’s incredibly powerful with scripting abilities. But one of the most amazing tool for a power user is the ability to write Python scripts that can do almost anything. There are a lot of modules included with Editorial, but how do you add a library if it’s not included? There is a script for Editorials sister application Pythonista, that makes it easy to add modules, and you can use that for importing libraries to Editorial as well. The script is called Pipista.

SwiftKey for iOS

Mon, 03 Mar 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Update: this problem is solved with iOS 8. Apple has opened up the operating system, so you can install alternative keyboards on your iPhone or iPad. SwiftKey is working on an iOS version.

I’m just trying out the app SwiftKey on both my iPad and iPhone and it works very well. I can’t understand why they haven’t implemented an URL scheme though. That way you could use apps like Drafts or Editorial together with SwiftKey, and then send text to and from your favorite editor when your done. Hopefully they will implement it soon.

Major step in iOS gaming

Sat, 11 Jan 2014 00:00:00 +0000

Major step in iOS gaming

This is something I would really buy for my new iPad Air. Be able to play first person shooters on the go! Love the size of the controller!

Editorial iPad App Writing

Sat, 14 Sep 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Editorial iOS Markdown Text Editor

So I found a new favorite iPad text editor called Editorial. After reading Federico Viticci’s great review of Editorial on macstories.net I bought the app, because the creator Ole Zorn wrote one of my other favorite apps Pythonista. And Editorial is amazing!

Nix Color Sensor by Matthew Sheridan — Kickstarter

Wed, 11 Sep 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Nix Color Sensor by Matthew Sheridan — Kickstarter:

Nix is a patent pending device that allows anyone to become a color expert. Just grab Nix from your pocket, purse, or bag, touch it to an object and magically watch the exact color appear on your iPhone, Android, PC, or Mac. Once scanned, you can keep palettes of your favorite colors, match the color to real life pigments, and even receive directions to the nearest store where you can purchase the color.

Adafruit TRINKET – Mini Microcontroller

Tue, 03 Sep 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Adafruit TRINKET – Mini Microcontroller – 3.3V and 5.5V versions:

It’s a tiny microcontroller board, built around the Atmel ATtiny85, a little chip with a lot of power.

A cool cheap little Arduino compatible board for smaller projects. The 3.3V version runs at 8MHz and the 5V version can run at 8 or 16MHz. It has five I/O pins available and comes with 8kb of memory. It can be programmed with AVRDude or the Arduino IDE after some small modifications. Looks great!

Reinventing iOS Automation: Editorial Review

Sun, 25 Aug 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Reinventing iOS Automation: Editorial Review:

Editorial for iPad, redefines the market of text editors for iOS, and, in many ways, sets a new standard for iOS automation and desktop-class apps. Editorial makes me want to work from my iPad.

Editorial is my new favorite Markdown editor with amazing workflow scripting abilities and a complete Python interpreter from the programmer that made Pythonista. Link to an extensive review of the app and its capabilities.

RSS Reader

Fri, 28 Jun 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Now that Google is pulling the plug on Google Reader, I’ve been researching an alternative. I bought Fever, a self hosting solution. My favorite RSS app for ipad is Mr. Reader has just been updated with support for Fever, but it’s slow. So I’m giving up on Fever as my syncing for RSS and going to use Feedly instead, now that they have an API. Feedly has a very nice app on iOS but Mr. reader now also supports Feedly, so I’m going to use it instead. On my Mac I’ll just use Feedly’s web interface which is quite nice. Good to be able to find interesting articles to read again.

Problem syncing Google Apps Exchange on new iPhone

Tue, 25 Jun 2013 00:00:00 +0000

When trying to sync a new iPhone to my Google Apps account it seems that it’s no longer possible to use Exchange push mail, address book and calendar syncing. By signing up for their service for free I paid by letting Google rummage through my mail for later use in targeted advertising. But now they killed yet another service that I come to depend on. My trust in Google is totally gone. Now I have to spend hours setting up a mail server, getting passwords from my users and sync all accounts using IMAP. Then I have to help everyone to set up iCloud sync for the address book and calendars instead. Because Google can’t be trusted. All these problems can easily fixed buy paying Google, but why pay twice? Money AND my private life? WTF?

Raspberry Pi Samba Showing Wrong Size Mounted USB Disk

Thu, 30 May 2013 00:00:00 +0000

After setting up a SMB Samba share on my Raspberry Pi in Squeezeplug, the size of the mounted volume showed the size of the SD-card instead of the USB hard disk. To fix it, I had to change the setup for Samba. Here’s what I did to fix it.

Run Away Brainz: Audio: Crystal cMoy Freeform Headphone Amp

Wed, 29 May 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Crystal cMoy Freeform Headphone Amp:

Very cool transparent cMoy headphone amplifier, made using clear casting resin. This is something I have to try.

Via 0pachira

Raspberry Pi Car Computer

Fri, 17 May 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Update: You can find my latest update on the progress of my Raspberry Pi Car Audio System here.

I’m working on a Raspberry Pi as a music player in my car. I’m putting all my music on a SSD disk in lossless FLAC. I’ve already got hold of a 2x16 character LCD with six button from Adafruit that only uses two pins for communication with I2C. It’s easy to program and it has four different background colors.

Raspberry Pi avahi-daemon disabled because there is a unicast .local domain - solved

Sat, 06 Apr 2013 00:00:00 +0000

When setting up a Raspberry Pi with SqueezePlug, my favorite distribution for setting up a music server I always get the error message “avahi-daemon disabled because there is a unicast .local domain” because I have a lot of Apple equipment configured with Bonjour. To fix it, all you need to do is to edit /etc/default/avahi-daemon and change the line:

AVAHI_DAEMON_DETECT_LOCAL=1

AVAHI_DAEMON_DETECT_LOCAL=0

then restart the Avahi-daemon with

sudo service avahi-daemon restart

Problem solved.

How To Use Day One App

Sat, 30 Mar 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Uses | Day One:

This is an ongoing archive of the many use cases we’ve found for ourselves and that have been reported by our users. We hope this will inspire you to think of new ways you can incorporate Day One into your workflow and daily routine.

Great page of collected uses for the marvelous app Day One. I found some good ideas for writing earlier stuff than the diary I’ve kept for two and a half years. It wouldn’t exist a diary if it wasn’t for Day One. And the great thing is that it’s available on iOS and Mac with syncing through iCloud or Dropbox.

Getting rid of Open With duplicates - All this

Sun, 24 Mar 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Getting rid of Open With duplicates - All this:

You right-click its icon in the Finder, choose Open With, and a submenu pops up with an absurd number of duplicate entries.

When you first noticed the duplicates, it was just one or two and you didn’t want to take the time to find out how to fix it, but now you’re kind of pissed at your Mac for being so stupid.

Google Reader joins graveyard of dead Google products - Slate Magazine

Sat, 23 Mar 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Google Reader joins graveyard of dead Google products - Slate Magazine:

It’s hard to lose a loved one, especially if that loved one is a Google service. That’s why we’re opening the gates of the Google Graveyard, a virtual space for grieving. Buried in these hallowed grounds are some of Google’s ill-fated services. Some, like Google Reader, lived long, prosperous lives, full of admiration and glory. Most, like Google Wave and Google Buzz, struggled to carve out a place in this harsh, unforgiving world where technologies continuously clash and innovation reigns king. But whether these services transformed our productivity or only polluted our inboxes, they all touched our world in some way.

Going Paperless With Evernote and Any Scanner On Your Mac

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 00:00:00 +0000

[caption id=“attachment_2704” align=“alignleft” width=“272”] Photo by phrawr[/caption]

Going paperless

Tired of drowning in stacks of papers? Want to go paperless? Here’s how I moved all my documents to the cloud and cleared up a lot of the clutter at home. I used my old trusty photo scanner, because when all the old papers are scanned and achieved, I only have to scan the new inflowing papers, not the insane stacks of paper I had previously.

Scanning Workflow

The easiest route is to buy an advanced duplexed document scanner like the highly regarded and award winning Fujitsu ScanSnap iX500 duplex document scanner. It comes with all the software you need and you just put in a stack of papers, receipts or business cards and away it goes.

There’s also a small portable scanner called Doxie Go that looks interesting, with rechargeable batteries and a SD card slot.

But I don’t have the money to buy one now so my old flatbed scanner, the Canon CanoScan 8800f, now discontinued and replaced with the better Canon CanoScan 9000F have to do at least for now. It’s not really made for scanning large amount of papers, but it does the job. I’ve made what I think is a pretty good workflow so I’ll try to describe it. Maybe you can find some nuggets here.

How to use interrupts with Python on the Raspberry Pi and RPi.GPIO » RasPi.TV

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 00:00:00 +0000

How to use interrupts with Python on the Raspberry Pi and RPi.GPIO » RasPi.TV:

We’ve finally got interrupt capability on the Raspberry Pi for GPIO programming in Python using RPi.GPIO.

Interesting! Saving this link for later experimenting. Need buttons for my Carputer Raspberry Pi.

Via Scoop.it!

Battery Draining Applications on Macbook Pro

Sun, 17 Mar 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Better battery life Macbook Pro with gfxCardStatus

Update: Just installed Mac OS X 10.8.4 and now it works much better. Fantastical, Growler, Hardware Grower, Scrivener and Tweetbot now works without switching cards.
Later models of Macbook Pro computers comes with dual graphics card. This makes it possible to use a low performance card when not using graphics intense applications, and automatically switch to the faster, but less energy efficient card if needed. But how do you know which card is currently active? There is a great application available called gfxCardStatus that shows you when the computer switches, and even uses notifications.

If your on the move and on battery power, you can force the computer to use the Integrated less power draining graphics card. If you need full speed, just select the Discrete card. The third alternative is to have it in the normal Dynamic Switching Mode. But there’s a snag when using Switching Mode. A lot of applications forces the Macbook Pro into using the Descrete high performance battery draining card, for no apparent good reason. Let’s examine that.

inessential.com: Why I love RSS and You Do Too

Sat, 16 Mar 2013 00:00:00 +0000

inessential.com: Why I love RSS and You Do Too:

Why I love RSS and You Do Too
Even if you don’t use an RSS reader, you still use RSS.

If you subscribe to any podcasts, you use RSS. Flipboard and Twitter are RSS readers, even if it’s not obvious and they do other things besides.

Insightful article about RSS from the venerable developer of NetNewsWire. RSS is everywhere. He’s right about the future of RSS. Google killing Google Reader will end up better for everyone.

Secure browsing on iOS (iPhone/iPad) using OpenVPN and the Raspberry Pi

Thu, 14 Mar 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Secure browsing on iOS (iPhone/iPad) using OpenVPN and the Raspberry Pi « Remi Bergsma’s blog:

When I’m not at home I use my iPhone or iPad and connect to the internet using either 3G or public wifi. I want to configure my mobile device to setup an encrypted VPN tunnel and route all traffic through it, so I have a safe browsing experience. Fortunately, there now is an OpenVPN app available on iOS that allows you to do that! Please install this app using the App Store, and continue reading to set it all up.

Why should I trust Google Services?

Thu, 14 Mar 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Official Blog: A second spring of cleaning:

We launched Google Reader in 2005 in an effort to make it easy for people to discover and keep tabs on their favorite websites. While the product has a loyal following, over the years usage has declined. So, on July 1, 2013, we will retire Google Reader. Users and developers interested in RSS alternatives can export their data, including their subscriptions, with Google Takeout over the course of the next four months.

I don’t get it. So they count heads, and see that not as many people use Google Reader as they’d like. But the only people I know that use RSS on a daily basis are the one that counts. Bloggers, journalists and tech leaders. You know, the people that write and influence the rest of the heard. How can you not make money on the data Google gets by their reading habits? You want me to have to spend all day reading assorted ramblings on Google+ or Twitter to find some nuggets? I don’t have the time for that.

Blog Post Directly from iOS Safari to Poster App Using Pythonista Script

Wed, 13 Mar 2013 00:00:00 +0000

I want to be able to share interesting web pages on my Wordpress blog using iOS directly from Safari using a bookmark and a Pythonista Python script. The script takes the URL of the page, any text you copied and the page title, formats it in Markdown and creates a new post in Poster App automatically.

Comparing iPad Calendars

Mon, 11 Mar 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Comparing iPad calendar apps at a glance | iMore.com:

Most are pretty good. One looks like no designer really cared to do much design. As with the iPhone versions, that might be because there’s a split between apps designed for iOS users, and for users who prefer functionality over form in the best old Windows Mobile sense of the word…

I’ve been trying to find a good Calendar replacement. Finally there is an Mac, iPad and iPhone version of Fantastical App.

Wordpress MarsEdit Problem Doesn't Show Categories Varnish xmlrpc.php

Mon, 04 Mar 2013 00:00:00 +0000

External Wordpress editors like MarsEdit doesn’t show categories or tags

I just installed Varnish Cache on my website to speed up load time with great success. But after loading my favorite Mac blog editor MarsEdit, when doing a refresh, all the categories and tags disappeared! I realized that it must have something to do with Varnish blocking the requests between the external blog editor and Wordpress, but I haven’t had time to really learn all the intricacies of vcl. As usual Google came to the rescue, and I found [this post in Swedish that solved the problem]). I’d thought I might regurgitate the solution here in English for other with the same problem.

Pythonista Review - Programming iOS with Python for iPad iPhone

Wed, 06 Feb 2013 00:00:00 +0000

Pythonista, finally programming workflow automation for iOS?

I’m doing most of my writing on my iPad or occasionally on my iPhone, and I write everything in Markdown. There are some great scripts in my current favorite language Python out there for doing Markdown conversions, image manipulations, etc., but unfortunately, Apple rules regarding programming apps on iOS devices are pretty stringent. But an app for programming Python on iOS called Pythonista have some smart ways of getting around some of Apple’s restrictions. And one of the wonderful things you can do is home screen shortcuts, making your scripts available directly from the home screen of your iOS device. All you have to do to create a Pythonista home screen shortcut is to go to a web page and enter the script name and optional arguments. After that, add the page home-screen with Safari’s bookmarks button. Another way of starting your scripts is directly as bookmarks in Safari or another web browser. I found the app from this article about making life easier by scripting with Pythonista, a great read of all the functions available in the app.

Because they added a Python library for managing the clipboard, you can copy pictures or text to it, then start your script that reads from the clipboard and then put the new modified text/picture back to the clipboard, ready for pasting into any app. Very handy!

Raspberry Pi as a Squeezebox Logitech Server

Sat, 22 Dec 2012 00:00:00 +0000

I love my music playback setup that consists of a couple of Squeezebox V3 players in different rooms so I can listen to music in lossless format wherever I am in the apartment. With the iPeng HD app on my iPad, I have a nice interface for controlling the players with album art and other nice features. But the best part is that I can playback high resolution audio directly on my iPad using the Camera Kit USB adapter and an HRT HeadStreamer DAC portable USB headphone amplifier. But I wanted a small, cheap and eco-friendly server for hosting my music files and wondered if I could use the Raspberry Pi. And here’s my findings.

Amazon Glacier Cloud Backup with Macintosh Using Arq 3 Backup Application

Mon, 10 Dec 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Check out my article on using Qrq with a Google Cloud Storage Nearline. It’s cheaper than Amazon Glacier.

Being a photographer, I have a lot of pictures on my hard disks. Using a Canon 5D Mark II with it’s 23 megapixel sensor shooting in RAW doesn’t help. My main backup is two different NAS servers doing alternating TimeMachine backups every other hour, a feature added in Mountain Lion. This is great, because if one backup unit breaks down or gets stolen, I still have another copy on the other NAS. But what if both got stolen? Imagine the horror? So I’ve been searching for an offsite backup solution that’s cheap and just works. And now I think I found it.

MultiMarkdown - iPad Supported Apps

Mon, 03 Dec 2012 00:00:00 +0000

iPad and MultiMarkdown Supported Apps

Updated 2014–07–06

Since I originally wrote this article, much has happened. The Elements app looks like it’s been discontinued because I couldn’t find it in the AppStore, so I have removed it from the comparison table. I’ve added my new favourite iOS text editor, Editorial which is an amazing app for configure your text workflow just the way you like it. IA Writer has added support for MultiMarkdown so I added it to the list as well.

SD-Card is read-only in Mac Macbook Pro card reader - solved

Fri, 02 Nov 2012 00:00:00 +0000

After getting my Raspberry Pi I used the one built-in on my MacBook Pro, but the SanDisk SDHC-card showed up as read-only in finder on my mac, and Disk Utility refused to format it. The write protection switch on the card was correctly set, so that made me a bit baffled. But it seems that the internal card reader on the MacBook Pro is a bit finicky.

[

GeoTagr - my iPhone-iPad GPS DSLR Geotagger of choice

Sat, 11 Aug 2012 00:00:00 +0000

GeoTagr

To be able to tag your DSLR pictures with GPS information is both fun and practical. But to date, most DSLR cameras don’t have GPS built-in or is an expensive hardware add-on option. That includes the Wi-Fi iPad you might own. The last couple of years I’ve used a lot of different solutions to track GPS data while I’m out taking photographs. My first way was to use a Garmin GPS unit and then transfer the information to my Mac, but now, with mobile phones like iPhone and Android, there’s no reason to tug along yet another device.

My weapon of choice now is an app for iPhone and iPad called GeoTagr, a universal app for logging GPS tracks while you photograph, and then tag images with location data. For me, the pictures I want to tag are the RAW images that I import into Adobe Lightroom 4. And with this app, it’s straightforward to accomplish.

1Password Secures computer passwords on the web

Sat, 28 Jul 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Instead of having one favorite password that you use on every account you create on the web,making it very easy for someone that gets ahold of it to wreak havoc of you life. Wouldn’t it be great if you had different, impossible to guess passwords on each site? But you only had on password to remember? Well, 1Password can help you both generate random passwords and to help you log in automatically to those sites using just one master password.

Ubuntu Server WordPress with W3 Total Cache install

Mon, 04 Jun 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Initial installation Ubuntu Server

Last time I configured my web server with Ubuntu Server, I had problems finding all the instructions on what and how to install everything needed to get a WordPress blog with W3 Total Cache, CDN, Apache2 MPM Worker and fcgi working. So this is my attempt to write down the steps needed to get the server going. You might find it of interest if your needs are similar to mine. Here’s the requirements for my WordPress blog.

Apache MPM Worker threaded version
APC PHP Opcode optimizer
All the required modules for W3 Total Cache
Graphics libraries for Mint statistics

vsftpd on Ubuntu server 530 login incorrect error - fixed

Tue, 22 May 2012 00:00:00 +0000

When setting up my new web server I had a problem when installing vsftpd on Ubuntu Server 12.04 LTS. After doing the sudo apt-get install vsftpd and enabling login for local users, I got a “Server 530 login incorrect error” when trying to connect with a local user. The settings for disabling anonymous login and allowing local users where set in /etc/vsftpd.conf. [cc lang=“bash”]anonymous_enable=NO local_enable=YES write_enable=YES[/cc] But the ftp server still refused to let me login with any of the users on the system. I tried remove and reinstall, but the problem persisted. Finally I found a thread where others had the same problem. And here’s how to fix the problem. [cc lang=“bash”] sudo apt-get remove vsftpd sudo rm /etc/pam.d/vsftpd sudo apt-get install vsftpd [/cc]

Web server with SSD disk

Mon, 21 May 2012 00:00:00 +0000

SSD

My old web server built on old spare parts had a hard disk crash a month ago. So I had to put it up on my BlueHost account while waiting to get hold of a new disk. I decided to try out a SSD disk, so I got hold of a 60gb IBM SSD disk. Without any optimizations, it can now handle double the traffic! I’ll continue to optimize tomorrow to get the most out of it. I’m doing an article on how to set up a LAMP server on Ubuntu Linux for WordPress with all the stuff needed to get W3 Total Cache, APC and other stuff working, because I can’t find a good article that describes everything. I will start writing on it tomorrow.

Make Safari browser Faster, More Secure and Crash proof

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Safari Browser

Safari, the standard web browser that’s included with Mac OS X is fast, stable and has some great features. But there are some ways of improving it to make you’re browsing experience even faster, more secure and pleasurable. Here’s a walkthrough of my favorite extensions for Safari.

Tactile Mac Clicky Keyboards for Typists

Mon, 27 Feb 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Choosing an excellent keyboard for your Mac

Let’s face it, Apple produces some great products, but there are two things the past years that they aren’t that good at. They can’t make usable mouses, and the keyboard is less than stellar. The laptop keyboards are ok as far as laptop keyboards go, but after you’ve tried a “REAL” keyboard, you will become a keyboard snob. Thankfully Apple stopped using proprietary connectors many years back, so you can buy any mouse for PC and use that instead. Even USB keyboards made for PC works after changing a setting, by switching the alt-command keys. But you won’t get all the unique keys for controlling iTunes, volume and other settings. The funny thing is, that if you want to find a good keyboard, you see the most extensive selection of keyboards with good, tactile and clicky response among all the PC gamer keyboards. Most of them look horrible though.

I’ve been working with computers since 1979 and here’s my list of the best keyboards ever produced. And I’ll try to give some tips on getting your hands on a tremendous clicky keyboard.

Speed up MacBook Pro by installing a SSD disk

Sat, 25 Feb 2012 00:00:00 +0000

SSD drive and extra disk for more speed, instead of DVD drive in MacBook Pro

Changing out your hard disk in your MacBook Pro to an SSD disk is a great way of increase the speed of your machine. And I’m not talking about a little faster, where talking about the feeling of getting a new machine. But a SSD is still expensive and are limited when it comes to storage size. So it’s not going to be able to replace your big standard disk. The solution is simple. Replace your internal disk with a SSD disk, then remove your DVD drive and install a large 2.5" disk for your bigger files. Replace your DVD? Yes, do you use it anymore? I’m not. You need a special bracket to be able to install the extra disk, so you have to buy it. But many installation kits for replacing the DVD player also includes an external USB case to install the DVD into, so you still have access to one if you need. I bought my installation kit from Ebay for next to nothing, but didn’t include the case. As I said, I’m a modern Mac user and don’t use DVD. Hint, hint.

permalinks in Wordpress - changing without losing Google rank

Sat, 11 Feb 2012 00:00:00 +0000

When changing permalinks in Wordpress from an old format to a new, you risk losing Google page rank.

On my blog, I’ve had my permalink set to /archives/year/month/day/name-of-article. Looking at my web server log, very few used the archives sidebar, so I removed it. To make the link shorter I needed to remove everything except the article name. But when changing the permalink, all the incoming links will get a 404 error from all old connections, and the search result from Google, lowering your Google ranking. Not good.

Disk never sleeps in Mac OS X - how to fix it - updated

Mon, 06 Feb 2012 00:00:00 +0000

[caption id="" align=“alignright” width=“448”] Image by DigaoSPBR[/caption]

My internal hard disk would continuously spin on my MacBook Pro and never goes to sleep. I replaced my internal drive on my MacBook Pro with an SSD disk, which made a massive difference in speed. At the same time, I removed the DVD unit and installed a new 500gb drive instead. The extra disk went to sleep when not in use, but then started within a couple of minutes or less. Here’s what I did to fix that problem.

Geotag your DSLR images using your iPhone GPS and a Mac

Tue, 24 Jan 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Geotag DSLR images using an iPhone and a Mac

One of the nice things about modern camera phones and even some regular cameras uses GPS to tag photos and embed the coordinates in the pictures EXIF data. But wouldn’t it be great if you could do that with your fancy DSLR camera photos as well? Programs like iPhoto, Aperture and Adobe Lightroom 4 can show you your pictures on a map. Many online photo sites like Flickr also uses the GPS data in the pictures to display them on a map.

Asus PA246Q ProArt Professional monitor review

Thu, 19 Jan 2012 00:00:00 +0000

Asus PA246Q ProArt Professional monitor – Made for photographers

As a photographer you need to be able to really get the most out of your images, you need a color accurate monitor. You usually have to pay a lot of money to get a good monitor that’s factory calibrated and uses a IPS panel, a panel type that is better at showing correct colors than the more common (and cheaper) TN panels. But there are some reasonably priced monitors. One of them is the Asus PA246Q ProArt monitor. It’s factory calibrated and even ships with a printout of the calibration result from the factory. You can set the monitor to sRGB or Adobe RGB 1998 color space directly on the front controls of the monitor. It’s also has fairly high resolution with 24" size 1920x1200 pixels.

My favorite commands in .bash_profile on Mac OS X

Wed, 24 Nov 2010 00:00:00 +0000

Here are some additions to my .bash_profile for making life easier. I especially like that completion now ignores case. Makes navigating the file system so much faster. Give them a spin. [cc lang=“bash”]export HISTCONTROL=erasedups export HISTSIZE=10000 shopt -s histappend set completion-ignore-case on [/cc]

Problem with flickering screen on iPad fixed in iOS 4.2 beta 2

Sun, 03 Oct 2010 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve had problems with my new iPad, where the screen would flicker when the brightness was set to a low setting. Very irritating. My first fear was hardware problems but after upgrading to the latest beta version of iOS, 4.2 beta 2 the problem is fixed! Yay! No need to replace my beloved iPad.

**Update** A bit too fast, the problem remains.

Trying out an iPad and liking it

Thu, 19 Aug 2010 00:00:00 +0000

My first try to write on an iPad and I’m smitten. Hopefully I’ll get one next week.

Arduino, a good way for kids to learn how to program

Mon, 09 Aug 2010 00:00:00 +0000

My twelve year old son want’s to learn how to program. My first idea was to teach him Ruby or Python, but I decided to go with Arduino. It’s C-based so that’s a good start I think. Were currently planning a couple of projects but so far he’s managed to get some LED’s blinking. A good start.

Adding a Kingwa clock to a Pioneer PD S-505

Sat, 19 Dec 2009 00:00:00 +0000

Here is the second part of how to improve the quality of an old CD player, the Pioneer PD S-505. You can find the first part here. In this section, I’m going to show you how to install a better, more stable clock circuit into your 505 to lower the jitter. This particular clock comes from Kingwa, that has a series of crystal oscillators for improving DVD players, CD players, and DACs. The price is reasonable. I’ve installed them in three different units and had zero problems, so the quality seems reasonable.

Ok, so why install a new clock? Isn’t there one in there already? Yes, your right. But by using better parts like crystals with lower ppm and also design a very clean power supply to feed the clock, you can make your CD-player sound much better. And the reason is lower jitter.

But what is jitter? There is plenty of excellent places to go read up on it. Here’s some.

Optimize MySQL performance for speed and memory use

Sun, 11 Oct 2009 00:00:00 +0000

[caption id=“attachment_978” align=“alignnone” width=“300”] Jamison Judd[/caption]

I found this great shell script to test your MySQL server. You need to have your MySQL server up and running a while before running the test to get valid data. With all the possible setting variations this is can be a handy tool.

Get MySQL Performance tuner here.

Lenn-Art Tang Band W8-740C subwoofers

Wed, 16 Sep 2009 00:00:00 +0000

[caption id=“attachment_969” align=“alignnone” width=“292” caption=“Lenn-Art Subwoofer”][/caption]

Last time I ordered some speaker elements from Germany I ordered some extra Tang Band W8-740C subwoofer elements for a later build. I’ve been oogling this design to go with my home-built?ProAc 2.5 clones. Micke, a friend will make the boxes for me, provided I sent him the drawings. What an exellent excuse to try to learn Solidworks. Amazing program. I have designed my own version of the venerable GainClone amplifier with a beefed up power supply and will use two subwoofers in stereo. Nice to not have to build the boxes. Last time when I built the clones the apartment was filled with MDF dust for months.

Upgrading to Nginx and getting WordPress to work

Wed, 24 Jun 2009 00:00:00 +0000

So, after doing an upgrade of my Apache installation all my web content stopped working. It continued to give 403 errors. After spending hours changing permissions and checking every little detail I gave up. So I installed Nginx instead. It’s a bit scary to start using a totally new web server software, but why not live dangerously? Anyway, it’s fast! Really fast. The only problem I had was to get all the redirects to work. And I also removed my gallery2 installation and moved the blog to /

GPS tagging on the cheap

Sat, 09 May 2009 00:00:00 +0000

Read a newer article on how to do this using an iPhone instead.

I just love gadgets. That’s why it’s nice to find that I bought a Garmin eTrex a long time ago. Haven’t used it in years, but then when Apple released the latest version of iLife 09 with the map function in iPhoto I realized that it is very cool to have all the images geo tagged. So I found a program called GPSPhotoLinker, a program that downloads GPS data and pictures and by the date/time on the pictures manages to add longitude and latitude information in the picture info. When you import pictures with this information iPhoto can use that to show it on maps and make it searchable. And when you upload pictures to Flickr, it also uses the location information place your picture on a map. Very cool.

Mods and upgrades on a Pioneer PD S-505 for better audio quality part 1

Sat, 28 Mar 2009 00:00:00 +0000

Part two of this series is now up. Read on how to install a better clock in your Pioneer PD S-505 CD player.

Mods your Pioneer PD S-505 CD Player for better sound quality

So I bought this Pioneer PD S-505 for $40 to test how good audio quality I’m able to squeeze out by modifying it. But It will not be just the standard subjective judgment of improvement but also measurements. Back in 2000, you had to pay about $400 for it. It uses the stable platter which means you have to put the CD in upside down. So let’s get going.

MAMP WordPress Error establishing a database connection

Fri, 20 Mar 2009 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve installed MAMP on my Mac to do some changes to my blog. I tried to set the WordPress wp-config.php file to connect to localhost:8889, but got an error that It could not connect to the database. After replacing localhost:8889 to 127.0.0.1:8889 it works. My quick guess is that permissions for the root user is set to allow connections 127.0.0.1, but not localhost. Anyway, it works now.

My wp-config.php file looks like this:

Spotify is going to kick some ass

Thu, 08 Jan 2009 00:00:00 +0000

After using Spotify for a couple of days, I must say that they almost nailed it. And I have never seen as much entusiasm about a new service among people of so different age groups. The Mac client is really nice (and fast!) This is something the music business should have come up with a long time ago. I think I bought about five songs on iTunes total. I like the idea of “owning” my music, or at least own the piece of plastic it comes on. But the chear joy of being able to just search and ad a shitload of music and start listening is exhilarating. But I have a couple of gripes…

AVR based analog CPU meter

Tue, 18 Nov 2008 00:00:00 +0000

Got my cpu vu-meter working.

Yes, please apple, kill AppleScript

Tue, 03 Jun 2008 00:00:00 +0000

Everytime (well, last night actually) when I need to do something with Applescript I shudder with horror. The syntax is actually something you forget all the time. There must be better alternatives for Apple to use as a scripting language. I agree with this article, but Python or Ruby would be a better alternative I think.

Mac OS X 10.5.2 hangs on wake from sleep

Wed, 21 May 2008 00:00:00 +0000

I have had this annoying problem with my Macbook Pro. Sometimes when waking the machine from sleep, the machine can not connect to the selected Airport network and then hangs with spinning pizza of death.

Apples next update to 10.5.3 looks like it will fix it. Hopfully Apple will release it soon…

From Fixed list of Mac OS X update 10.5.3 - Joining AirPort network after wake issue resolved

Our new family member!

Sun, 09 Sep 2007 00:00:00 +0000

ProAc Response 2.5 clones plays real music

Tue, 29 May 2007 00:00:00 +0000

So finally my new ProAc Response 2.5 clone playing music. And how they play! I got myself a new Class-A amplifier to have something nice to drive them with. At first they sounded a bit short on the bass side, but now after about 20 hours of listening, the bass starts to improve. I’ve never believed in the “burn-in” of speakers, but I have to say I’ve been mistaken.

Proac clones finished! Almost...

Mon, 14 May 2007 00:00:00 +0000

So I finished putting my new diy speakers together. I still need to put veneer on them (probably going to use cherry) But they sound great! Yes, really great. I’m going to add the notch filter, just to try it out.

Proac Response 2.5 clones

Mon, 23 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000

So I finally decided to go with the Proac Response 2.5 clone speakers. The original speaker costs $4400, but a very good copy or the original is possible to build for around $1000. It uses high quality Scan Speak speaker elements, and I bought them today. My friend Micke is also building a pair at the same time. So now I have four speakers standing in my livingroom. Everything is covered in MDF dust. Thankfully I have a very understanding wife.

Cyburg Needles Speakers

Fri, 13 Apr 2007 00:00:00 +0000

Here’s a quick picture of my finished Cyburg Needles speakers. First time I ever done any wood crafting, and they sound great! They are really easy to build. You can find the plans for them here (PDF warning).. Next up, a pair of Jordan Transmission Line speakers.

Update: I built a couple of ProAc Response 2.5 clones instead. They are incredible and sounds absolutely amazing!

New version of JackenIAX

Wed, 28 Mar 2007 00:00:00 +0000

I have made some small upgrades to JackenIAX. The main thing is that now you can set the number of digits used for local extensions, so that you don’t get a prefix number added before dialing.

There is other stuff coming shortly…

Go and download the latest JackenIAX

DIY speakers

Sat, 17 Feb 2007 00:00:00 +0000

I want to have a couple of speakers in the beadroom, so I started to search the net. I found a very intresting DYI speaker project here (Swedish). So I ordered the speakers and can’t wait to get them. My skills in working with wood is very limited, but I may get some help from one of my friends, who is an expert wood carpenter.

JackenIAX with multiple lines support

Tue, 06 Jun 2006 00:00:00 +0000

I finally completed a new version of JackenIAX. It now has up to four lines support. I also added a searchable call log. Lot’s of other small improvements as well.

Great source for CSS ideas

Wed, 10 May 2006 00:00:00 +0000

I found the site CSS Library, a great source for CSS code snippets and ideas. Fits me perfectly because I’m working on a Drupal site for work, and this comes in handy.

Updated blog

Tue, 09 May 2006 00:00:00 +0000

I just uploaded an updated version of my site. There’s a lot of stuff still to fix, like old pictures in the wrong sizes etc. The same goes for the movie pages. But at least I finally installed WordPress 2.02.

JackenIAX and multiple lines

Sun, 19 Mar 2006 00:00:00 +0000

I finally have a version of JackenIAX that supports multiple lines. I have added so you can choose to output background music for the calls on hold. There’s a lot of testing, and I also have to rethink the user interface to be able to handle multiple calls. But i think it’s going to be cool.

Grisen skriker

Fri, 17 Mar 2006 00:00:00 +0000

You got to love the net. What ever you search for, you’ll find it. One of the best concert I even attended was the last concert with a Swedish punk band called Grisen Skriker (the pigs are screaming) back in 1979. And guess what, someone took pictures of the event. Naturally I did a vanity search of the pictures, but couldn’t find myself in the pictures. But I did find the lead singer of the band Ebba Grön, one of the ultimate Swedish punk bands. He probably learned a thing or two that night. It took me one hour just to make it from the door into the hall where they where playing. The band eventually took their clothes of, because the air conditioning broke down.

Adding new features

Wed, 08 Mar 2006 00:00:00 +0000

Every time I answer the phone (yes, I’m using JackenIAX), I have to pause iTunes before answering. So today I added an option so when you answer or dial, iTunes pauses automatically. It will be in the next release (within a couple of days) I had to rewrite a large section of code for some other features that I have planned. I’m getting a bit more comfortable with Cocoa programming, and discovers old code full of brain farts. And the code is getting smaller with more features. A step in the right direction…

New version of JackenIAX

Mon, 06 Mar 2006 00:00:00 +0000

I just put up a new version of JackenIAX. Added Applescript support, URL dialing (currently only via Applescript), DTMF tones when dialing etc.

Apple hates games

Tue, 28 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000

So Apple released a new Intel Mac Mini today. And they use Intels GMA950 for graphics. How stupid is this? So this machine is a no-go for me. I’m so disappointed.

Looks like it works on Intel Mac

Sun, 26 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000

I just received a mail from a user of JackenIAX. He’s running a patched version of Mac OS X on a generic PC, and now the program works on his machine. Cool! So now I guess JackenIAX is working on Intel Macs as well. Debugging via proxy (I don’t have an Intel Mac) is not the way to go. You could press the Donate button on this page, and I promise to buy a Intel Mac for debugging. Nudge Nudge…

New features in JackenIAX

Thu, 23 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve added a couple of new features in JackenIAX.

Added a symbol to indicate when you got new voice messages in your Asterisk server. Rewrote all of the code for the indicator symbols. Nothing you will notice, but I feel good about it. Now the codec selection actually work. Input validation of all preferences.

Problems on the other end

Mon, 20 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000

As you may know I recently released my new program for VoIP for the mac. I have written instructions on the home-page how to get a free account at FWD Free World Dialup to test. It seems they have a lot of downtime, so I get a lot of bug reports. I really need another free IAX provider to recommend. Anyone knows about one?

First beta of JackenIAX released

Sat, 18 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000

So it’s finally time to release my IAX softphone for Macintosh. It’s still very much in beta, but I need feedback on how everything works. There’s a lot of stuff that I’m adding that didn’t make it into this release. Have a look here.

The release of the first beta of JackenIAX SoftPhone for Mac OS 10.4 is imminent

Fri, 17 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000

I just need to write rudimentary install instructions, finish the simple homepage for downloading and I’m in business. So any day now…

If you are in a hurry, mail me at info@jackenhack.com and ask if you can join the beta team.

Interfaces

Wed, 08 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000

I used to be fascinated by the idea of a voice interface to the computer. That was until I actually used one. It feels awkward and it’s slow. Yeah it has some use in specific applications, but for general use, I think it will never be. Back in 1983 Hewlett Packard released a computer called HP 150 that used touch-screens. My boss thought that I needed to go though their authorization courses to learn about this new revolutionary computer they where going to sell. So I was excited (this was before the mac). It was kind of fun to see that the attendees was fascinated and used the touch-sceen for the first fifteen minutes, but it was just to slow and uncomfortable to use, so everyone, including the teacher, started to use the keyboard. So I just wrote that computer off. And I’ve been skeptical about touch-screen input ever since. Until I saw this and was blown away! If a tablet computer had something like this I’d sell my body to science to get one. And science would probably reject the body and demand a refund. But then it’s to late, I’m dead and I have a tablet computer! Muhahahaa!

CMoy DIY Headphone Amplifier

Sun, 05 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000

Building the venerable CMoy DIY Headphone Amplifier

The last couple of weeks I’ve been thinking of building a small headphone amplifier. I want to tap into the line-out of my iPod to get better sound. I also have a problem with my headphone jack on my pod. After fighting with my friend Hermans dog, he managed to get his paw entangled in my headphone cables and destroyed the cable jack. So I have searched the net to try to find a good amplifier to build (I don’t have the money to buy one right now), and I found the Cmoy headphone amplifier. But I used another build page that has some upgrades to it. Unfortunately I could not find the bread board they used, so I had to make my own design. So after a couple of hours of soldering and using a drill it was time to try it out. And it worked! No debugging or anything. This must be a first.

Firewall

Wed, 01 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000

So I finally got my 100 mbit internet connection. Yay! But after testing the speed through my WRT54G router/firewall, I could not get higher speeds than around 20 mbit/sec. After assembling an old 300 mhz pc with three Ethernet cards and the SmoothWall linux firewall I get around 70 mbits/sec. I will probably try to overclock the poor old pc to 400 mhz tomorrow. To try everything out, I downloaded the XCode 2.2.1 development image from Apple. It’s around 800 mb and it took just a couple of minutes. I could get used to this.

Apples silence and my Powerbooks echo

Thu, 26 Jan 2006 00:00:00 +0000

Still having problems with looping echo on my Powerbook G4 15" There’s a new website about the problem, so go there and sign up if you experience this problem.

It’s incredible that Apple has chosen to keep this problem quiet. Instead of admitting that they have a problem with the latest 15 and 17" Powerbooks. Instead they give lame excuses and tells the customer that they can only run one audio program at a time. But even that doesn’t work. Give it enough time, and this could become a PR nightmare for them. If they just admitted that they have a problem and that a fix is on the way, but right now no one even knows if they are going to fix this.

Waiting time

Thu, 19 Jan 2006 00:00:00 +0000

I haven’t had time to update my blog for a while. The last couple of days has been spent trying to hunt down an annoying bug in my IAX client I’m writing. Sometimes when dialing in, my program would not get a notification from the Asterisk server that a call was in progress. So I have tested all sorts of things to try to find the bug. So today I finally used tcpdump to see exactly what kind of packets I got from the server. And the problem was that I connected from the inside of my firewall, out trough and back again! So it was just an miss-configuration, the program has been working all along. Isn’t the Darwin award coming up soon?

VU Meter

Mon, 02 Jan 2006 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve been hard at work on my IAX client software the last couple of days. I also have re-written a lot of the code. I decided early on that I wanted to have classical VU-meters to display the in and output volume. But I don’t want them to take to much CPU time. So I made a lot of optimizations on that code. So after the rewrite I managed to lower the CPU utilisation by half. And it’s fun to do programming in Cocoa, but the framework is hard to learn by the volume of it. But slowly I’m getting more comfortable.

Logos, Intel and Apple Computer

Fri, 30 Dec 2005 00:00:00 +0000

After reading stuff like this and this, I wonder Is it only me who sees the connection? There’s been a lot of discussions on the net about Apple getting a bit of the Intel “Intel Inside” payoff and if they consider putting the logo on the new macs? My uneducated guess is that Mr Jobs actually made Intel change their logo to something worthy putting on a Mac. Just my guess. But I’m known to be insane…

TextMate

Thu, 15 Dec 2005 00:00:00 +0000

I have had a bit of a snag in my program Im writing, so to do something else for a while. So I tried to install Ruby On Rails, a much talked about web developer framework. And after reading all the hype, I just had to see what it was like. So off to Ruby By Rails homepage to read up on it. They have a presentation area that has a couple of Quicktime films demonstrating Rails programming. And rails looks good! But another thing caught my eye, the guy managed to write code fast and easily it seemed. And the guy doing the demonstration was doing it on a Mac OS X machine. The speed and the way of working with text really blew me away. But nowhere could I find the name of the text editor. So I had some googling to do. And I found it. It’s called TextMate. So I wanted to buy it so I could use it to program my new VoIP software client. But I don’t have much money to spend on software right now, being totally broke, but after seeing the price €39 I bought it immediately, you can’t complain at that price. The integration with XCode looks good. I haven’t had any problems so far. It’s nice to see that you can find great software from small firms and download and buy them directly.

Compiling

Wed, 23 Nov 2005 00:00:00 +0000

The IAX client I’m writing is coming along nicely. It’s now in a state that makes the program usable. And today I made changes so I could compile a universal binary. And the program works on my PPC mac, but I use some libraries I needed to change the makefiles for, so I don’t know if they work on a Intel Mac. It would be cool if I could get the first release to support universal binaries, so hopefully I can find someone who has a developer machine, or a pc with a hacked Mac OS X for Intel on it.

Setting up SUBSCRIBE/NOTIFY BLF in Asterisk@Home for Grandstream GXP-2000 phones

Tue, 22 Nov 2005 00:00:00 +0000

With the latest beta firmware in the Grandstream GXP-2000 VoIP phone, the have added support for BLF. This means that you can use the quick dial LEDs for status of extensions. You can monitor all extensions on your phone. If a extension is busy, the led for that extension is lit. You can also dial directly to the extension by pressing the dial button. Very handy.

New Powerbook

Sun, 20 Nov 2005 00:00:00 +0000

So my wonderful wife gave me a new Powerbook G4 15". And it’s a a nice machine. A lot of people will probably laugh at me when the new Intel Powerbooks will be available in early 2006, but she could only get hold of one now. And I’m not complaining. I’m currently so poor that dogs compulsory take a piss on my leg.

The screen has the same resolution as the last 17" screen. So now I have to change the font size in Xcode and NetNewsWire to be able to read. And I keep finding new specs on the machine. I had to go into the audio settings and found that the machine now supports 24-bit 96khz audio. There’s also digital I/O.

Google Analytics

Wed, 16 Nov 2005 00:00:00 +0000

Googles new free service both delight and scare the shit out of me. They have managed to get people to sign up their mail at GMail, letting Google index all their emails. And now with Google Analytics we are going to give them every detail on how we surf? So George Orwell was wrong, you don’t need an totalitarian society to have full control of peoples life’s. We are in-fact giving them that for free. We write our thoughts and events, and then hands the information over to a company for them to go trough and index and generate patterns. And as long as the company is “not evil” it’s apparently ok. Makes me feel a bit uncomfortable.

Hibernate on your older Powerbook or iBook

Tue, 15 Nov 2005 00:00:00 +0000

On the latest versions of Apples Powerbook, there is a function called hibernate. Normally when you close the lid on your Powerbook to let it go to sleep, forgetting to plug it in to a charger, all your unsaved data will be lost. With hibernation activated, you just plug in your Powerbook with the depleted battery and press start. Now the desktop comes up, just the way it was when you put your machine to sleep. But this only works on the new machines? Well, some people beg to differ. Go read it and see if you can hack your machine to get it to work. I did it on my Powerbook G4 867ghz and have had no trouble so far.

Application name

Thu, 10 Nov 2005 00:00:00 +0000

I now have a working IAX soft phone up and running. Answering and dialing works. The sound quality is good. And the amount of cpu usage is around three percent. But as soon as I add all the animating graphics, like sound input/output meters and stuff, that figure will go up substantially. But one of the goals is to try to avoid letting the program becoming a resource hog.

I decided to really try to stay focused on the basic stuff to really iron out the bugs/memory leaks before continuing to the fun stuff like user interface. But thanks to Project Builder, it’s easy to make a usable interface immediately.

IAX Soft Phones for Mac OS X

Tue, 08 Nov 2005 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve been looking for a softphone for Macintosh that uses IAX, but I haven’t been able to find a good one. The EyeBeam and X-lite uses sip and has stability problems so they are not an option either. So I started to write my own softphone. It’s nice to be programming in Cocoa again. But I’m becoming old, so I have to read up on programming in Cocoa again. I have a working softphone up and running already. Well, sort of. It receives calls and you can answer and talk. But I’ve only been writing on it for two days, and most of the time has been spent on installing a Subversion system on my server. As soon as I get a polished version, I’ll put up a beta program. I’m thinking of calling the program “Breaker-Breaker!” in the old CB-radio spirit. And yes, it will have the old style analog VU indicators for bandwidth and voice volume.

Apple Pages

Sun, 06 Nov 2005 00:00:00 +0000

I’m currently looking for a new job, so I needed to write a CV and some other stuff. So I thought that this would be an excellent opportunity to try out Apple Pages. Sure, it’s a bit buggy and slow in some instances, but over all it’s actually a pretty decent program. It won’t replace Microsoft Word for power users, but for people like me, who need to write simple documents, it’s perfect. My guess is that Apple have not done to well selling this program. And if they go the normal route, they’ll just stop updating it and let it die. This is a lesson that Apple really need to learn from Microsoft. They have to stick to it, improving the program, and the buyers will come.

Gizmo Project

Sun, 23 Oct 2005 00:00:00 +0000

As soon as you mention the word VoIP, everyone responds with “Skype?” This immediately gets me into an discussion why people should not use Skype. The fact that your computer is used as a link to route traffic, much like BitTorrent. That it is based on a proprietary protocol, only known by Skype, so no other manufacturers can make compatible equipment without permisson (and probably a big fat wad of cash) to Skype Corporation. All this means that there’s no connection between Skype and regular SIP phones that is emerging as the standard for VoIP calls. But all hope is not lost.

Problem dialing in to Asterisk@Home from FWD

Sun, 16 Oct 2005 00:00:00 +0000

I helped my friend Micke to set up an Asterisk@Home PBX server today. But when setting up Free World Dialup FWD, we had some problems. First I forgot to enable IAX in the account setup. After that, dialing out worked, but we could not dial in to his FWD number. To connect we use an IAX trunk. We searched for an hour trying to find the problem, and after searching Google we finally found the answer. In the trunk settings for FWD, the incoming user context has to be named iaxfwd. Irritating to say the least. After changing the name everything worked fine.

Free book about Asterisk

Sat, 15 Oct 2005 00:00:00 +0000

Asterisk: The Future of Telephony online from O’Reilly Media. They have released it under the Creative Commons license. This means that you can download the book here for free. But it also means that you should buy the book here. Now you have the downloaded pdf version for quick searching, and the nice feel of a paper copy for browsing.

A professional sounding Digital Receptionist in Asterisk

Fri, 14 Oct 2005 00:00:00 +0000

After setting up my Asterisk@Home server and do all the configuring to get all lines and extensions up and running, it was time for recording the Digital Receptionist messages. My first stab at it wasn’t that great, let’s face it, I’m no voice-over announcer. I wanted a little more professionally sounding recording. So I started to search the net for a way to do it, and I think I found a pretty good solution.

SIP Voip Phone Grandstream GXP-2000 Review

Sat, 08 Oct 2005 00:00:00 +0000

I got my first real Voip phone, the Grandstream GXP-2000 a week ago.

I have two ATA boxes to connect my old wireless phones, but I wanted to try out a real IP-phone. It’s a nice enough phone, feels a bit cheap (which it is), but I guess you can’t get everything for $100. Connecting it to my Asterisk server was a no-brainer. It has a web interface for setup, but you can do basic setup like ip-numbers from the phonepad. It’s great to have an message-waiting led on the phone. Then you just press the MSG button to listen to your voice-box messages. To enable this function, just put *97 in the field “Voice Mail UserID” in the Account page of the web setup. There’s support for up to 11 line indicators (with an additional key-module) but I think I’ll do fine with four. The only thing I haven’t got working is the Conference button, but it’s easy to just transfer the calls to a conference number. You also have 7 quick dial buttons. To configure them, just go to the web setup for the phone and enter the name and number. The sound quality is excellent. Much better than both the Linksys PAP2 and the i3 micro Vood VRG-121 box I have for my old analog phones. The speaker phone works, but isn’t fantastic. I normally just use the speaker phone while waiting for the call to go through, so for me that’s not a problem. There’s a new firmware I’ve just installed that’s supposed to make the speaker phone part work better, but I haven’t had time to test it fully. So would I recommend this phone? Yes, if you need a cheap voip phone that uses SIP I can really recommend this one.

Donald Trump, a cheap bastard?

Tue, 27 Sep 2005 00:00:00 +0000

While watching some old stuff I recorded on my Dreambox, I found an old episode of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno; the guest was Donald Trump. Leno is auctioning out a motorcycle for charity. A guest (a blond bimbo who’s name eludes me) sold a kiss to the audience for $500 for charity, which Jay Leno quickly doubled. During which one of wealthiest persons in the US sat silent, doing nothing. His publicist must have torn his hair out. You can’t make yourself look cheaper than that. Being a sleazy bastard is probably one of the many things you need to get that rich, but I rather stay poor than let me become anything like that man.

Adding blacklist to an Asterisk PBX Server

Mon, 26 Sep 2005 00:00:00 +0000

Update: The code below does not work in Asterisk 2.0b4 or newer. I will update with instructions on how to get it to work in those versions. Thanks to Dan for pointing this out.

Update: I have changed the code to the removed part. It now requires a key press to accept the number to delete.

I have added a blacklist function to my Asterisk@Home server and thought that I’d share it here if someone is interested. There are two ways to add a number to the blacklist. The easiest is to dial *32. Then you get a voice telling you the number of the last incoming call. To add it to the blacklist, press 1. Great use against pesky telemarketers and If you want to add it manually, press *30. Then you can enter the phone number directly on your telephone. To remove an entry from the blacklist, press *31 and enter the phone number. If you don’t like the codes I use, change them.

Adding ENUM support in Asterisk@Home

Tue, 13 Sep 2005 00:00:00 +0000

There’s a system called ENUM that enables VoIP servers like Asterisk to check the number your dialing to see if there is a possibility to connect directly to your server instead of going over PSTN land lines. So I registered at E164.org and added my phone number. I tried to figure out how to add this functionality to Asterisk@Home, but couldn’t find anything on how to do it. But I finally managed to get it to work, and it’s really simple. Here’s how I did it.

Screaming monkeys

Tue, 13 Sep 2005 00:00:00 +0000

Today I finally got to see a tele-marketer getting caught in my Asterisk server. I’ve made a blacklist system, so I can blacklist callers. As soon as they call, they get transfered to a voice saying “There is no one to take your call, they’ve all been carried away by monkeys” and then a lot of monkeys screaming. And the dumb fuck called back three times before giving up. One down, three million to go…

More Asterisk AGI

Fri, 09 Sep 2005 00:00:00 +0000

I have finally finished my first AGI program for my Asterisk server. So time for my next program. I have installed Nagios network monitoring program on one of my machines. I want Nagios to call my mobile phone when one of my servers go down and using Festival, giving me a voice message of what server and the type of problem.

Change SIP in iChat AV

Wed, 07 Sep 2005 00:00:00 +0000

In apples voice/video chat program, it appears that it uses some kind of SIP protocol to communicate. But Apple, why not implement SIP phone ability into iChat AV? Being able to make voice phone calls to other SIP phone systems would be really cool.

Linux is taking over my home!

Sun, 04 Sep 2005 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve had performance problems with my firewall so I thought it was time to upgrade to a better firewall. After looking around I found a lot of articles about the Linksys WRT54G, a wireless router that’s easily patched with new firmware. Because it uses the linux operating system, Linksys have to publish source code under the GPL license. This makes it easy for others to improve and implement new features. So I got an image from Sveasoft called Talisman and installed it. And it works great! I can now have QoS so my VoIP telephone stuff always gets priority.

Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger memory problems

Sun, 04 Sep 2005 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve been generally happy with tiger on my powerbook. The Spotlight search really has helped me finding my stuff. But I’ve had problems with slowdowns after working with my computer for a couple of days. I never turn of my computer, just putting it to sleep when I’m done working, and after a couple of days the machine would get slower and slower. I finally gave up and started to search for the problem. Turned out that Dashboard (when loaded) ate memory like a hog! My guess is that their is a memory leak when using some of the widgets. But for me, Dashboard is to slow to be of practical use for me, so I opted to disable it. And now the machine works great again.

Continued adventures with Asterisk

Sat, 20 Aug 2005 00:00:00 +0000

As usual when I find something new, it goes a bit overboard. I always wanted to delve into learning the Perl programming language. So I took this opportunity to use it to write a small plug-in for my Asterisk server. As soon as somebody calls, my script goes to a Swedish directory service and looks up the name. It then puts it in the callerID information so the name shows up on my phones. It also connects to my satellite receiver and displays a message on my tv so I know who is calling. Pretty nifty. Naturally I found that someone already written this in php, and that they’ve used the wap version of the lookup page to find the name. That preserves a lot of bandwidth so I’ll probably rewrite my program to use that instead. Anyway, Perl is an amazing language.

Asterisk PBX

Sun, 14 Aug 2005 00:00:00 +0000

So I’ve been busy for the last five days setting up my Asterisk PBX. I’ve connected two different VoIP lines to it. I have the X-Lite VoIP softphones installed on all the computers and an FSX device so I can use my regular wireless phone. And it’s enjoyable learning something new. First, my wife thought that I was crazy, “Who needs a telephone switchboard at home!?” But I think she’s coming around. Now she can sit at her computer using a headset and talk to her friends without holding the line. And it’s easy to transfer calls between all the phones in the apartment. It’s also nice to have a digital answering machine and get the messages mailed to you. The added benefit of multiple lines on the same phone number and that it doesn’t cost anything to dial a phone in Sweden is a bonus.

New domain www.jackenhack.com

Thu, 17 Feb 2005 00:00:00 +0000

Today I got a new domain, www.jackenhack.com (jacken.com is taken unfortunately)

Have been struggling with mod_rewrite so redirect works with a 301 code. Hopefully I’ll still keep my ranking at google this way without loosing it all.

so if you link to my blog, please update them as soon as possible. Don’t forget to update my RSS links if you use them. Thanks!

Fix for constantly running fan after 10.3.8 update

Fri, 11 Feb 2005 00:00:00 +0000

[caption id=“attachment_2955” align=“alignleft” width=“400”]©John Lillis[/caption] I got fed up with the fan that’s running constantly on my Powerbook 12" rev b 867mhz after installing the 10.3.8 Update. So here’s how you do it:

Download Update 10.2.8 and use Pacifist to extract /System/Library/ExtensionsAppleADM103x.kext from MacOSXUpdate10.2.8.pkg to the desktop.
Do a backup of AppleADM103x.kext from your startup disk at /System/Library/Extensions to your home folder.
Copy AppleADM103x.kext from your Desktop (the one you extracted from 10.2.8) to /System/Library/Extensions, you’ll need to enter the admin password to do that. Start Disk Utility and do a repair permissions on your start volume. Problem solved. Just for good measure, reset the parameter-RAM by holding down Command-Alt-P-R at startup. My machine now turns on the fans at 148 Fahrenheit instead of 125 Fahrenheit.

For some reason Apple choose to change the temperature when the fan starts on Rev.A Powerbook 12" after Mac OS X 10.2.8 from 148 Fahrenheit to 125 Fahrenheit. This gives the result that the fan runs almost constantly due to the fact that the powerbook operates normally at 125 Fahrenheit. I did this hack back when Apple changed stuff in the 10.3.2 update, and they haven’t updated AppleADM103x.kext until 10.3.8.

Annoying fan

Thu, 10 Feb 2005 00:00:00 +0000

After updating to 10.3.8 Apple managed to lower the temperature that the fans turn on and off. So now when doing medium light work the fan goes on. And it drives me crazy. My guess is that they only changed the values one or two Fahrenheit, but it’s just at the point where my normal work load is. I tried the old trick to replace the kext for the fan control, but to no avail.

Running powerbook fan with Update 10.3.8

Wed, 09 Feb 2005 00:00:00 +0000

I just upgraded to 10.3.8 and Apple has managed to fuck up it up for the second time. On my Powerbook G4 867 12" the fan now runs constantly. This is the second time a software update has done this. But this time it’s worse, now it’s on constantly, not just when the computer is a little hot. This is going to drive me nuts, so I’ll probably try to replace the kext driver for the fans later on. That was the way to do it the last time. So if your running a Powerbook G4 12" (first model) wait a bit if you don’t want to listen to a constant breeze…

IBM

Thu, 13 Jan 2005 00:00:00 +0000

IBM is getting to be an even cooler company. By embracing Open Source IBM changed my view of the company, and now they have given free access to 500 patents. Rock on! This is a statement from one of the biggest patent holders in the world. Software patents is bad for you.

It's a real secret

Mon, 10 Jan 2005 00:00:00 +0000

Back in 1982 I used to work for Apple answering Apple II support questions by phone. A couple of times people would call and ask questions about the Macintosh. This was two years before it was released! I guess Apples confidentiality is a lot better today.

First Mac rumor on the internet.

RsyncX

Wed, 24 Nov 2004 00:00:00 +0000

I’ve been trying out the program RSyncX for doing backup of mail and web documents from one of my servers. The program can copy between folders on the same machine, or to or from any machine on the net. But I had some problems getting it to work. When using Quck RsyncX Script Generator I got an error, “rsyncx –showtogo unknown option” So I had to to add --rsync-path=/usr/local/bin/rsync to the generated command line to get it to work. I’ll continue trying it out tomorrow, looks like a powerful tool.

Electric Cars

Fri, 19 Nov 2004 00:00:00 +0000

One thing that mystifies me is the way car companies implement electric cars. So here you have a car that has a limited range. So when the batteries are depleted, you’re supposed to stop for several hours and recharge them? Why? There is already an infrastructure (gas stations) that would be able to handle the recharging. When your battery is about to go empty, you stop at a recharging station (gas station) and exchange to a freshly recharged battery. Make the cells in a box that’s exchangeable. What you pay for is the recharging of batteries, and you pay a little extra for using the battery. This covers the cost of replacing used up batteries for the charging station. Of course, they all have to agree to use the same size for the batteries and to make a way of getting the battery changing done automatically. But if you can put a man on the moon, surely you could make this work? Maybe I’m missing something. And another way of making electric cars popular? Try performance. It’s effortless to make electric vehicles accelerate like hell. Make a cheap, nice looking and fast accelerating electric vehicle tailored for young people. Like the Ford Mustang used to do. If your ass is kicked at the stoplight by an electric car, you may consider one the next time you buy a car. Especially if you don’t have to stop and wait for recharging.

Photoshop, color correction, calibration and management

Wed, 10 Nov 2004 00:00:00 +0000

If your interested in learning how to color correct images in Photoshop and learn how color management works, this is the book. Photoshop Color Correction by Michael Kieran is an excellent book about all these subjects. It includes an example cd, and he goes through several examples on how to create exceptional looking images without color casts and other problems. He also shows how to set the black and white points of an image, how to make all adjustments using curves and a lot of tricks on how to fix a seemingly impossible image with modified profiles.

Fool me twice, shame on me...

Wed, 03 Nov 2004 00:00:00 +0000

So they decided to vote in the nitwit again. There’s a famous picture by Diane Arbus of a young man taken in 1967 with “Bomb Hanoi” buttons proudly on his chest. It was the first thing that popped in to my head when I saw that Bush probably will win.

100mbit/sec

Sun, 04 Jul 2004 00:00:00 +0000

So I upgraded my internet connection to 100mbit/sec. This is something that I would have thought that I would do in three to four years, but it’s a reality now. All I had to do was to enable it on my admin page at my ISP (and also get a bigger bill next month!) and ten minutes later after a reboot of my firewall, I was up and running. This is the way to do it! And this on a sunday! Lovely.

My old Newton

Fri, 30 Apr 2004 00:00:00 +0000

My friend Martin once gave me a special edition of Apples Newton. It was transparent so you could see all the internal stuff. Very cool. I managed to drop it, unfortunately, so I got to see all the internals first hand :( Wish I still had it. To this day I have still not seen any PDA with the same features that the Newton had. For one thing, how come they still don’t have an auto correct feature in the drawing programs? If you drew a circle on the Newton, it automatically corrected it to make it into a real circle. No bitmapped image but vectorized. Perfect for people like me who couldn’t draw a straight line at gunpoint.

This is how it looks

Tue, 20 Apr 2004 00:00:00 +0000

I saw a bump in CPU usage on my server and had to check it out (yes, I have no life) And this is how it looks when you get posted on MacSurfer

Usenet - The forgotten network

Tue, 30 Mar 2004 00:00:00 +0000

[caption id=“attachment_2418” align=“alignleft” width=“300”] Photo by Paul Hammond[/caption]

It’s been awhile since I last logged on to Usenet to read some groups and to download stuff. I found this great application called Unison from a company called Panic. And it’s great. I even signed up for a Usenet account from them when buying the software. I now have a 10mbit line at home, and no Usenet provider has been able to provide a fast enough service to me, until now. Impressive stuff. The only downside with the account is that you only get 10gig of download. Now, that may sound like a lot, but I get through that fast.

Little Snitch makes sure Mac applications doesn't call home

Mon, 13 Oct 2003 00:00:00 +0000

Little Snitch keeps you covered

Use Little Snitch to monitor what developers of programs sends home. Then you can stop that specific traffic. More and more programs phone home with information to the software company. Sometimes it’s harmless, like checking if a newer version is available, but sometimes they also send data like serial numbers and your registration information. So is there a way for you to control what programs can do? Yes, there is! There’s an excellent program called Little Snitch that monitors all communication from applications on your Mac OS X machine and asks you if the information is allowed to be sent over the internet.

EU the European Union and the technical stupidity

Wed, 08 Oct 2003 00:00:00 +0000

When Sweden joined the European Union a couple of years ago, all the politicians promised that everything would be better. The food would get cheaper and a lot of other stuff.

Well, the food is more expensive than ever. Other than that the only thing I noticed is some stupid things that changed. Let me give you a couple of silly examples. Here are some rulings coming out of Brussels.

Me, myself, I and my car

Sat, 27 Sep 2003 00:00:00 +0000

So after reading all the crap, I write here, you probably wondering who this guy is? No? You insensitive clod! Well, here I go anyway. I’m a 38-year-old computer consultant who loves technology. So you Luddites, read something else. My main passion is computers, but I have occasional attacks of other interests as well. One thing that always interested me is cars. 12 years ago I decided to build a car. I bought an old beat up Chevy Nova 75. It’s the kind of car you always see on race day. Usually, the one at the receiving end of death-defying jumps with junk cars. Anyway, a sleeper car can never lose. I disassembled the car entirely with the help of my friend “Raggar”-Johan and rebuilt everything. Here is a picture of the car.

My first blog.

Fri, 26 Sep 2003 00:00:00 +0000

So this is my first try at weblogging. I’m probably going to get bored after about three days, but I will give it a try. This must be the ultimate in narcissistic acts one can do. That’s why I think this will fit me like a glove.

Finally made some changes to my homepage for my company. Last time I did any significant changes was about three years ago.

My next project will be to build a new WiFi access point with a board from Soekris. I’ll try to create my antenna from an aluminum can. I’m thinking of using a small Linux distribution called Pebble. It will fit on a 128mb CF card. All this for making a free access point. It will use throttling to limit bandwidth for non paying people. I think this is the way of the future. In Stockholm, there is a lot of access hot spots, but it´s usually because people haven’t configured their Wifi gear correctly;-) There are some commercial hotspots, but paying without first being able to try it out is the wrong way of doing it.

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This info is out of date! All you need is the script “update_all”

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Use LTspice IV Windows Version on Mac OS X

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