| 05:58 | jnettlet | topi`, they should be here today :) Just got an SMS from customs |
| 10:06 | topi` | jnettlet: we have a wooden house so one thing I would be interested in, would be to measure long-term changes in temperature/humidity (dew point) in the inner constructions of the house |
| 10:06 | topi` | just drill a hole, and drop the sensor in ;) |
| 10:06 | topi` | if a battery can work for a few years, even better |
| 10:35 | jnettlet | topi`, there is connector for a larger battery. I will take measurements on battery life. This does have a nice loop on the case so you could attach a string and fish it out every so often if needed. |
| 10:36 | jnettlet | if you collect the accelerometer data as well you can try to detect earthquakes also. |
| 11:37 | topi` | our earthquakes are nothing to boast about :) |
| 11:38 | topi` | should move perhaps to New Zealand to detect those |
| 11:38 | jnettlet | you never no. earthquakes have been popping up in odd locations. |
| 11:38 | jnettlet | Italy, New Zealand. |
| 11:40 | bencoh | italy isn't really an "odd location" for earthquakes |
| 11:40 | jnettlet | no? I hadn't heard of any since recently. |
| 11:40 | jnettlet | at least not since I moved to denmark. |
| 11:41 | bencoh | I'm not saying that happens a lot, but they're actually at the right place for it to happen |
| 11:42 | suihkulokki | both Italy and nz are on tectonic plate boundaries, so earthquakes are very expected |
| 11:42 | bencoh | exactly :) |
| 11:46 | jnettlet | well on another topic. I just switched to a vertical mouse and I would highly recommend it. So much better ergonomics than a normal mouse, or trackpad |
| 11:47 | topi` | I hope my 8040 board won't be delayed because of tectonics |
| 11:47 | topi` | what is a vertical mouse? a mouse hanging on a flexible string? |
| 11:48 | jnettlet | it is a mouse that twists the way you hold it. |
| 11:48 | topi` | oh, google images shows it |
| 11:48 | jnettlet | https://www.anker.com/products/98ANWVM-UBA |
| 11:52 | jnettlet | and relatively cheap. I was getting weird shoulder pains recently so revamped my office to be more ergonomic. Saw these and decided to try one out. It made the biggest difference. |
| 11:53 | topi` | I had an episode of shoulder pain while working at Nokia, wrangling the Meego kernel |
| 11:53 | topi` | got 10 times physiotherapy, which took the pain away |
| 11:53 | bencoh | so that's why it was eventually terminated! |
| 11:53 | topi` | but, after that, I never used the mouse again. |
| 11:53 | topi` | bencoh: that's something we may thank Elop |
| 11:53 | bencoh | topi`: yeah I know, j/k :) |
| 11:56 | topi` | jnettlet: how's the kernel going with Marvell's patches? do you actively work on the 8040? |
| 11:56 | jnettlet | topi`, rabeeh is working on the 8040 right now. Still some hardware debugging |
| 11:56 | topi` | right |
| 11:57 | topi` | that's always the painful period of any hardware project :) |
| 11:57 | topi` | sometimes it took 4 iterations on the prefab line for new Nokia linux products |
| 11:57 | topi` | and we didn't have to fly all the way to Korea! :) |
| 11:58 | jnettlet | all our fab work is done in Israel |
| 11:58 | jnettlet | one of the benefits |
| 11:58 | jnettlet | okay the TI sensors just arrived |
| 12:06 | jnettlet | everything works from the Android App. Now to connect to this from a HB |
| 12:10 | topi` | some quick HOWTO would be nice :) I haven't done anything with Bluetooth ... |
| 12:12 | jnettlet | okay btle can make it out of the freezer. But not quite into the house from the shed where the freezer is. |
| 12:12 | jnettlet | but that is fine since I am going to put a HB as a camera out there anyways and then use that as my IoT relay |
| 12:12 | topi` | maybe there's only a tiny slot where the signal can escape? the doors are metal |
| 12:13 | topi` | yeah, a relay is the best solution |
| 12:13 | jnettlet | yeah, the seals are the only hope |
| 12:13 | jnettlet | but that is enough. |
| 12:13 | jnettlet | They also make a cool oled or epaper display that I didn't buy yet. that may be next. |
| 12:14 | jnettlet | plan to document this. I bought these great outdoor cases that were made for the original RPi. company went out of business so I grabbed 4 during their liquidation sale. |
| 12:15 | jnettlet | https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1821240043/pice-the-ultimate-case-for-your-raspberry-pi-and-c |
| 12:19 | topi` | looks fun. Does it fit the original HB inside? |
| 12:19 | topi` | some things, especially the mSATA connector in the bottom, can pose a challenge |
| 12:26 | jnettlet | I had to remove the inner heatsinks that were designed for the Pi. other than that everything fits fine. Nothing 20 minutes with a dremel cut off wheel can't take care of. |
| 12:26 | jnettlet | then I just use Sugru to close up the holes and re-weatherproof it |
| 12:26 | jnettlet | I will document it. |
| 12:32 | jnettlet | wow. Cypress just bought Broadcom's wifi segment and released all their datasheets. http://www.cypress.com/search/all?f[0]=meta_type%3Atechnical_documents&f[1]=resource_meta_type%3A575&f[2]=field_related_products%3A110101 |
| 12:35 | topi` | what?? |
| 12:35 | topi` | maybe a new brcmfmac driver is in order ;) |
| 12:36 | topi` | Cypress is a very old company, I remember we had some Sparcstations at the uni which had Cypress SPARC clone processors |
| 12:37 | topi` | those processors lacked hardware multiplier, and one had to use a stepping instruction instead... |
| 12:37 | topi` | not that anyone cared to program in assembler anymore... |
| 12:38 | jnettlet | yep, I remember those clones |
| 12:39 | jnettlet | well I am more interested in what they are doing for firmware |
| 12:39 | jnettlet | we are switching to TI chips in the new SOMs |
| 12:39 | topi` | I guess the TI chips have good sw and firmware support? |
| 12:39 | jnettlet | better |
| 12:40 | topi` | I had some odd behavior with the brcmfmac driver and hostapd |
| 12:40 | topi` | sometimes my android tablet just couldn't connect, or it would connect and immediately disconnect |
| 12:41 | topi` | dunno if it was a problem in hostapd, or in the 3.14 kernel or brcmfmac, or the HB hardware itself |
| 12:41 | jnettlet | the driver needs a revamp, but the upstream support is quite good, and performance is decent. right around 50Mbps for the single antenna. Up to 92Mbps for the 2x2 connected at 5Ghz |
| 12:41 | jnettlet | topi`, most likely the hostapd. I do tethering via connman which uses wpasupplicant in host mode and never had any issues. |
| 12:42 | topi` | can wpasupplicant create an access point? |
| 12:42 | jnettlet | I just read that another project has started to replace wpasupplicant with a complete rewrite. |
| 12:42 | jnettlet | yeah |
| 12:42 | topi` | but hostapd is from the same author, isn't that kind of pointless? |
| 12:43 | bencoh | 12:58 < jnettlet> all our fab work is done in Israel |
| 12:43 | jnettlet | I think it was specifically for tethering, so another daemon wasn't required |
| 12:43 | bencoh | really? |
| 12:43 | bencoh | including boards? |
| 12:43 | jnettlet | bencoh, well not the SOCs, but the boards yes |
| 12:43 | jnettlet | all local |
| 12:43 | bencoh | nice |
| 12:43 | topi` | impressive |
| 12:44 | topi` | almost everyone else is in china |
| 12:44 | jnettlet | yep. |
| 12:45 | jnettlet | http://www.nistec.com/ |
| 12:45 | bencoh | I wonder if the hw guys here know about the fab you work with (we're located in jer) |
| 12:45 | bencoh | ah nistec. yeah we know them :) |
| 12:45 | jnettlet | they just built a brand new facility up near the SolidRun office |
| 12:45 | bencoh | neat |
| 12:46 | bencoh | so you really don't have to wait :) |
| 12:46 | jnettlet | nope, just a short drive for the guys in the office |
| 12:47 | jnettlet | it is great just in case issues with production arise. |
| 12:47 | bencoh | indeed .... |
| 12:50 | topi` | we had to fly to the other side of Finland :) it is a long country |
| 12:50 | topi` | so there was always some planning involved when going to preproduction |
| 13:22 | jnettlet | the talk about the new wireless daemon. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3uYkW1K0wxo |
| 13:23 | topi` | I hope they won't use C++ for new projects, it's soon 2020 for christ's sake :) |
| 13:25 | jnettlet | https://git.kernel.org/cgit/network/wireless/iwd.git/ |
| 13:25 | jnettlet | it is all C |
| 13:26 | topi` | even worse :D |
| 13:26 | topi` | it's quite unfortunate that all these wireless protocols have gotten so complex |
| 13:27 | jnettlet | progress :) |
| 13:27 | topi` | I've had the unfortunate impulse of looking at hostapd's source code, and oh yes, there's a zillion things happening in just "one simple accesspoint" |
| 13:28 | jnettlet | absolutely |
| 13:28 | topi` | well, progress requires us to start using more advanced tools |
| 13:28 | topi` | C is literally the stone axe of computing |
| 13:28 | topi` | OK, if assembly is the stone axe, then C is the bronze axe :) |
| 13:29 | topi` | nowadays we have nice and, oh well, still work-in-progress systems languages like Rust |
| 13:29 | topi` | I want to like Rust, but so far the learning curve has not been nice to me |
| 13:31 | jnettlet | it seems golang is gaining more traction |
| 13:37 | topi` | hope it is even slightly easier to learn than Rust :) |
| 13:38 | topi` | honestly, I'm drawn to Rust because it provides same kind of data abstractions and functional stuff like languages like Haskell |
| 13:38 | jnettlet | it is like a mashup of Java and C# |
| 13:38 | topi` | urgh |
| 13:38 | topi` | C# is passable, but I'm not a fan of Java |
| 13:39 | topi` | but even in cases like a hostapd-like daemon, concurrent or async programming is a must. So the languages we use must provide good facilities for tacking it |
| 13:39 | jnettlet | I think Go is closer to C# |
| 13:40 | topi` | you can do callbacks in C, even, but it isn't very friendly |
| 13:40 | topi` | coroutine-based programming and async/await are very, very nice at least in Python |
| 13:40 | topi` | luckily I'm not writing any ieee802.11 userspace stuff :) |
| 13:40 | bencoh | how are callbacks in C not "very friendly"?! |
| 13:41 | topi` | callbacks *in general* are not very human friendly |
| 13:41 | topi` | that's why it's called "spaghetti" :) |
| 13:41 | bencoh | :) |
| 13:41 | bencoh | but that has nothing to do with C or non-C |
| 13:41 | topi` | I just created a daemon that watches a handful of IP addresses for ssh accessibility and send emails to a list of recipients when systems come back online |
| 13:41 | topi` | that was a bunch of callbacks |
| 13:42 | bencoh | (and to be honest I usually enjoy writing C code) |
| 13:42 | topi` | I used to enjoy writing C code - not anymore |
| 13:42 | topi` | I think I've been programming Python way too long at professional level |
| 13:42 | bencoh | been doing that for quite sometime, both userspace and kernel |
| 13:42 | bencoh | still enjoy it : |
| 13:42 | bencoh | :0 |
| 13:42 | topi` | OTOH python is very simple and nice in comparison w/ e.g. Java |
| 13:43 | topi` | I had to do some stuff in Java in my previous job, and it sucked big time |
| 13:43 | topi` | things get complex very quickly and it just feels like I'm driving a big tank |
| 13:43 | topi` | so, yes, in that context, programming in C can be just plain fun :) |
| 13:48 | suihkulokki | the learning curve with go is quite nice |
| 13:50 | suihkulokki | it's very homogenic, so jumpiing into any random go codebase is easy |
| 13:51 | suihkulokki | the less-cool part (from small-computer pov) is go builds huge static binaries |
| 13:52 | topi` | I saw a nice project where a guy compiled a standalone Rust program straight into bare metal and flashed that onto a Raspberry pi |
| 14:52 | jnettlet | vpeter, so Kodi is dumping all non-upstream decoding interfaces it seems. |
| 15:31 | vpeter | where you see this? |
| 15:32 | jnettlet | chewitt pinged me on slack |
| 15:34 | vpeter | I'm not aware of this. But don't really follow what is going on. Just update things on each new le update. |
| 15:37 | jnettlet | I am just trying to get caught back up. |
| 15:39 | vpeter | When you know more let me know. |
| 15:43 | jnettlet | yep will do. |