This project would open up to many more people if a more simplistic way of interfacing to the card reader was introduced. How 'bout via the soundcard?
I was poking around the links provided on the site, and found this: The simplest magnetic stripe reader. He wrote software to analyze the audio generated by the card when passed over the read head. This means that any old cassette player has a chance at being used to hack magstripes! Any comments on how accurate this method is, versus the F2F decoder chips?
I bought a copy of VMWare at LinuxWorld NYC ('00? '01?) back when it was 1.0, and got it at a special enthusiast pricing ($80?). While they were good enough to give 1.0 license holders a free upgrade to 2.0, after that, they abandoned this pricing scheme. It's a shame... $80 was fine. $200 isn't. Not for a home user who isn't making a living off of the product.
It's a shame that his computer equipment got trashed, but the FBI (and other law-enforcement agencies) are somewhat prone to do that over the course of an investigation.
What? It's okay to have your property seized and trashed -- OVER A TELEVISION SHOW?! If what you say is true, then sure, he's an idiot. But shouldn't there be a difference in response between being under suspicion of terrorism, kiddie porn, or murder, versus under suspicion of trading low-quality (or even high-quality!) dubs?
If you're not going to donate to this guy's legal fund, you can at least throw a letter the way of MGM's consumer affairs department.
Though the CutCat is handy for simple UPC codes, I'm looking for something that's more flexible, can decode more sophisticated codes, and something which can be mounted so that the user can just wave the bar code by to have it read (think supermarket scanner at the end of the conveyor, but vertical). It's for an embedded device, and the end user shouldn't have to do anything other than make sure the item is in the field of view of the camera. I'm hoping that an inexpensive webcam running at 640x480@10fps would be sufficient.
Printing labels is the easy part. Reading them is another story. In a perfect world, I'd be able to use a run-of-the-mill webcam to read barcodes put in front of it in any direction. While there are a few commercial apps which do this, they're expensive and (after playing with a couple demos) not all that accurate.
If anyone has any leads on a good OSS (or even just cheap -- this is for personal use) solution, please post!
There's some talk about a Fusion driver for the Austrailian DVB-T version of the card (VERY similar to the US ATSC model) over here. I'm not holding my breath though. I've posted to AVSForum, the MythTV list, and the Video4Linux list, looking for anyone who might be interested in building a driver for the card. Since it's cx23881 based, and there's already *some* support (for NTSC capture) for that chipset under linux, I was hoping that someone would be enthusiastic... but so far, no bites on these lists.
Check out the DTB-T list I linked to above. Apparently, those folks have the contacts at Dvico . Good luck!
Most broadcasters are not using the full 19mbps for HD content. They're likely getting a ~45mbps HD MPEG-2 stream from the network and recompressing it down to 12-15mbps, and then adding other content as subchannels. Some put a loop of the local news, others a weather radar image, etc.
Most CATV systems are NOT recompressing the primary HD stream, as provided by the OTA broadcasters. On the other hand, I can tell you that here in NYC, TWC is not providing all of the OTA substreams. In other words, if your local broadcaster is dividing up the bandwidth such that the primary stream is 12mbps, and there are two 3mbps streams along with it, there's a good chance you'll only see the primary stream.
But then again, I think that's because of the cost of the equipment required to do this. It's probably enough of a pain in the neck to remap the ATSC OTA digital channels onto the CATV system, never mind having to do it for multiple "channels" per local broadcaster! Anyway, my point is that CATV systems have plenty of bandwidth to let the full 19mbps flow. In fact, a single analog NTSC channel is able to hold a nice fat 38mbps 256QAM digital stream. 19mbps x 2 = 38mbps. So, for each analog channel your CATV company replaces with a digital channel, they can put TWO full bandwitdh ATSC channels. Then again, it could also hold ~9 SD channels @ 4mbps. I digress...
I can't imagine that either broadcasters, content owners (tv studios), or the MPAA would allow something like CableCard to be implemented without the ability to prevent exactly what you're talking about. I'm all for recording a direct digital cable stream (that's why I'm recording the unencrypted QAM signal - see www.dvico.com), but it's just not likely that we'll have the option in a few years. Face it - once analog broadcasting goes away, so does our ability to record.
The number of non-windows-based devices Sony has out on the market running different OSes is quite big, especially considering the user base. Ignoring the number of PS2's, look at Sony/Ericsson branded mobile phones. Now, add the upcoming PSP. There's no reason to own a "PDA" when either of these devices will be able to run circles around PalmOS devices.
Well, if you strung up some copper wires between you and your wife, that wouldn't be a "phone" service. And if you added a friend or two, that wouldn't be considered a phone service either. But what if you ran copper to 300 of your neighbors, and started charging them a montly fee for service? THAT might be a different story. And what if you then hooked them into the PSTN?
My question is: how can they regulate VOIP when they're not regulating the cable modem service I use to get VOIP delivered to me?
Okay -- they're signed. But HOW does one go about checking the signature? If there's not a point-and-click tool to do this, or at least instructions on how to do it, you can go on about crypto-whatever until you're blue... but the average downloader isn't going to have any desire to bother checking. What's the saying...? Something like 'with a choice between convenience and security, convenience wins every time'.
What (specific) steps do we need to do to verify that the image is authentic? Instructions for both *nix and windows would be welcomed.
Because it'd be near impossible to meter, it's unreasonable to expect VOIP-to-VOIP traffic to be regulated and taxed. However, VOIP which peers with the PSTN (i.e. the phone company) is a much easier target. But aren't taxes already being collected here? For each phone number assigned to a VOIP device, the party providing you with service (i.e. voice ISP, such as Vonage) needs to get a PRI or similar hookup to the phone system. Doesn't that get taxed? And what about sales tax? An argument could be made that wherever the VOIP provider has POPs, they could charge sales tax. And don't I already pay taxes to my ISP for my internet connection?
I'm not against taxes - I'm against excessive, stupid taxes. Like paying an E911 tax, only to find out that the money collected is going towards office supplies, dry cleaning, cars, etc. Or paying over 20% tax on my cell phone service.
Wow -- insults on IRC couldn't be more accurate. Couple weeks ago, I went onto #fedora (?) to get some help installing FC2T2 onto my laptop. With a USB CD-ROM drive, no FDD, and not enough time to download the full ISOs, I needed help. In a nutshell, I wanted to boot off USB CD-ROM, then install via FTP. This is harder than it sounds - something about the kernel of the minimal boot cd not having USB drivers, or similar. Instead of getting helpful advice, the only one answering anyone, some l33t d00d spouting off insults, would only say 'can't be done!', 'why won't you f#@*%() listen to me - it can't be done!', and the classic 'you shouldn't be looking at linux if you already have questions like this!', etc. Of the two other people hanging around looking for help, one went as far as to say 'if this is what linux community support is all about, screw this!' In the end, I found my own solultion, with ZERO help from this joker.
So, what's the solution? The only thing I can think of right now is to create a semi-official IRC channel/forum, where volunteers are peer-reviewed and ranked.
(BTW - If anyone cares, the install went like this: Created a boot CD with DOS USB CD-ROM drivers to boot Partition Magic 8, to resize my Win2k partition and create ext2 and swap partitions. Back in Windows, I installed VMWare (free trial) and gave it direct access to the partitions I created for linux. Downloaded the minimal ISO (few MB) and "booted" from it, emulated in VMWare. Did a minimal install. Did the trick to let you use the NT bootloader to dual-boot. Rebooted into linux, installed the extra packages I needed.)
I'm a big fan of Home Power magazine. They focus more on solar solutions, but you'll catch an occasional article on hydro. Best part is you can download the current issue for free (after registration).
Sprint Spectrum, based in the DC/MD/VA area, was the first PCS license in the country, operating GSM1900 around 1995-2000. This was not, initially, the same company which is now Sprint PCS. As they were later deploying the new Sprint PCS network, using CDMA, Sprint Spectum continued to promise multi-city access, without roaming, on the Sprint network; since they were using two completely different systems, it was a very empty promise.
Eventually, other GSM providers popped up across the country, including Omnipoint (later Voicestream, now T-Mobile), PacBell (in some markets), and a few others. But Sprint Spectrum, later bought out or merged (?) with Sprint PCS, started to let their GSM network stagnate, focusing on building the CDMA network instead.
A class-action suit was brought against Sprint, charging that they promised their customers inter-city usage on the nationwide Sprint network, but never delivered. The result of the lawsuit was that Sprint was to provide their GSM customers with a PCS (CDMA) phone and a small rebate towards PCS service.
Well, it couldn't have played out better for Sprint -- they were able to move their customers to CDMA, had a legitimate reason to shut down the GSM network, and here's the best part: they provided old model, REFURBISHED phones to the customers who were being moved from GSM to CDMA. Conveniently, the slightly nicer models of the replacement phones were frequently out of stock, and if you wanted to get a brand-new model, you would be forced to sign up as a new customer.
Years later, I tried to get an old GSM phone from the Sprint Spectrum network SIM-unlocked. Trying to convince the Sprint PCS people that I had a Sprint-branded GSM phone was like trying to tell them the ocean was purple.
(Amongst) The problem(s) with linux GUIs is that they require the user to need a in-depth knowledge of how the system works. Hasn't this always been the case? So while the answer to a windows programmer looking to switch might be "learn how to script", this is simply not an option for the vast majority of computer users who were attracted to the "plug and play" mantra. And maybe that's why OS X (*shudder*) is quite dangerous to the linux community. It's a good thing Steve Jobs and Co. are arrogant asses, otherwise OS X86 would wreak havoc on linux... power of unix under a *user-friendly* GUI, sitting on cheap hardware. And I'd guess there are macro recorders for OS X, right?
Do I have an answer? Sorry, no. I'm a big fan of scripting, but it's totally impractical when I think of how fast it is to record and replay macros.
If you're considering buying an i730 (Nextel) because of it's GPS features, think twice. Unfortunately, it's nearly impossible to use the i730 like you would a normal GPS receiver. The phone needs to have a VERY, VERY good view of the sky. I suppose if you're on a boat or in a large field, you might be okay. But using it in a car, even when sitting on the dash, looking out the window, it's VERY slow to get a lock, and when it does, it's not with many sats (which means accuracy is degraded). Also, you WILL lose your position if you pick up your phone to talk.
I ended up buying a Delorme Earthmate USB device. For under $100, it does the job very nicely (though I'm not very impressed with their mapping software -- you can, however, use the GPS with any NMEA-compliant software).
I have to second (third? fourth?) this -- Clear-Com units are THE way to go. There's a reson the pro's use these units. On the other hand, they're WAY expensive for such (relatively) simple devices.
If your school can't afford to buy a bunch, you should consider renting them, or perhaps trying to convince a local theatre group to let you borrow theirs. If you have a professionally installed PA system, the folks who supplied you with that can usually supply the belt-packs as well. Note that most of your positions can be wired, and with only a few wireless, that'll save $$$.
The GPS portion of the phone blows. I've set it on top of the dash of a car with a real nice swath of sky in front of it, and it would time out before aquiring enough satellites to get a fix. OTOH, one day I took it out to play with the GPS, and it seems that it had magically found some birds a few hours previous, while it was sitting on my desk, not far from a window.
Compare this with a "real" GPS receiver, of which modern ones can acquire a fix within a minute or less.
The IBM M keyboards *can* be completely silent. Just remove the springs. I kid you not -- remove the key caps, pull out the springs, and put the key caps back on. Though the keys don't spring back anymore, the keyboard is still functional -- just the tiniest bit of pressure on a key will cause it to register... silently!
$1395?! Why not just buy a laptop? Or two? It would be (much!) faster, similarly power efficient with an external power supply, could likely boot from CF, could act as an AP, would even have an integrated diplay for debugging... and MUCH more. C'mon folks -- I was hoping something like this would go for $400, not $1400!
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This project would open up to many more people if a more simplistic way of interfacing to the card reader was introduced. How 'bout via the soundcard?
I was poking around the links provided on the site, and found this: The simplest magnetic stripe reader. He wrote software to analyze the audio generated by the card when passed over the read head. This means that any old cassette player has a chance at being used to hack magstripes! Any comments on how accurate this method is, versus the F2F decoder chips?
I bought a copy of VMWare at LinuxWorld NYC ('00? '01?) back when it was 1.0, and got it at a special enthusiast pricing ($80?). While they were good enough to give 1.0 license holders a free upgrade to 2.0, after that, they abandoned this pricing scheme. It's a shame... $80 was fine. $200 isn't. Not for a home user who isn't making a living off of the product.
VMWare, bring back enthusiast pricing!
What? It's okay to have your property seized and trashed -- OVER A TELEVISION SHOW?! If what you say is true, then sure, he's an idiot. But shouldn't there be a difference in response between being under suspicion of terrorism, kiddie porn, or murder, versus under suspicion of trading low-quality (or even high-quality!) dubs?
If you're not going to donate to this guy's legal fund, you can at least throw a letter the way of MGM's consumer affairs department.
Though the CutCat is handy for simple UPC codes,
I'm looking for something that's more flexible, can decode more sophisticated codes, and something which can be mounted so that the user can just wave the bar code by to have it read (think supermarket scanner at the end of the conveyor, but vertical). It's for an embedded device, and the end user shouldn't have to do anything other than make sure the item is in the field of view of the camera. I'm hoping that an inexpensive webcam running at 640x480@10fps would be sufficient.
Printing labels is the easy part. Reading them is another story. In a perfect world, I'd be able to use a run-of-the-mill webcam to read barcodes put in front of it in any direction. While there are a few commercial apps which do this, they're expensive and (after playing with a couple demos) not all that accurate.
If anyone has any leads on a good OSS (or even just cheap -- this is for personal use) solution, please post!
Oops... check out this link too: MythTV Users List discussion on HDTV support
There's some talk about a Fusion driver for the Austrailian DVB-T version of the card (VERY similar to the US ATSC model) over here. I'm not holding my breath though. I've posted to AVSForum, the MythTV list, and the Video4Linux list, looking for anyone who might be interested in building a driver for the card. Since it's cx23881 based, and there's already *some* support (for NTSC capture) for that chipset under linux, I was hoping that someone would be enthusiastic... but so far, no bites on these lists.
Check out the DTB-T list I linked to above. Apparently, those folks have the contacts at Dvico . Good luck!
Most broadcasters are not using the full 19mbps for HD content. They're likely getting a ~45mbps HD MPEG-2 stream from the network and recompressing it down to 12-15mbps, and then adding other content as subchannels. Some put a loop of the local news, others a weather radar image, etc.
Most CATV systems are NOT recompressing the primary HD stream, as provided by the OTA broadcasters. On the other hand, I can tell you that here in NYC, TWC is not providing all of the OTA substreams. In other words, if your local broadcaster is dividing up the bandwidth such that the primary stream is 12mbps, and there are two 3mbps streams along with it, there's a good chance you'll only see the primary stream.
But then again, I think that's because of the cost of the equipment required to do this. It's probably enough of a pain in the neck to remap the ATSC OTA digital channels onto the CATV system, never mind having to do it for multiple "channels" per local broadcaster! Anyway, my point is that CATV systems have plenty of bandwidth to let the full 19mbps flow. In fact, a single analog NTSC channel is able to hold a nice fat 38mbps 256QAM digital stream. 19mbps x 2 = 38mbps. So, for each analog channel your CATV company replaces with a digital channel, they can put TWO full bandwitdh ATSC channels. Then again, it could also hold ~9 SD channels @ 4mbps. I digress...
I can't imagine that either broadcasters, content owners (tv studios), or the MPAA would allow something like CableCard to be implemented without the ability to prevent exactly what you're talking about. I'm all for recording a direct digital cable stream (that's why I'm recording the unencrypted QAM signal - see www.dvico.com), but it's just not likely that we'll have the option in a few years. Face it - once analog broadcasting goes away, so does our ability to record.
Patience.
The number of non-windows-based devices Sony has out on the market running different OSes is quite big, especially considering the user base. Ignoring the number of PS2's, look at Sony/Ericsson branded mobile phones. Now, add the upcoming PSP. There's no reason to own a "PDA" when either of these devices will be able to run circles around PalmOS devices.
Well, if you strung up some copper wires between you and your wife, that wouldn't be a "phone" service. And if you added a friend or two, that wouldn't be considered a phone service either. But what if you ran copper to 300 of your neighbors, and started charging them a montly fee for service? THAT might be a different story. And what if you then hooked them into the PSTN?
My question is: how can they regulate VOIP when they're not regulating the cable modem service I use to get VOIP delivered to me?
Okay -- they're signed. But HOW does one go about checking the signature? If there's not a point-and-click tool to do this, or at least instructions on how to do it, you can go on about crypto-whatever until you're blue... but the average downloader isn't going to have any desire to bother checking. What's the saying...? Something like 'with a choice between convenience and security, convenience wins every time'.
What (specific) steps do we need to do to verify that the image is authentic? Instructions for both *nix and windows would be welcomed.
Because it'd be near impossible to meter, it's unreasonable to expect VOIP-to-VOIP traffic to be regulated and taxed. However, VOIP which peers with the PSTN (i.e. the phone company) is a much easier target. But aren't taxes already being collected here? For each phone number assigned to a VOIP device, the party providing you with service (i.e. voice ISP, such as Vonage) needs to get a PRI or similar hookup to the phone system. Doesn't that get taxed? And what about sales tax? An argument could be made that wherever the VOIP provider has POPs, they could charge sales tax. And don't I already pay taxes to my ISP for my internet connection?
I'm not against taxes - I'm against excessive, stupid taxes. Like paying an E911 tax, only to find out that the money collected is going towards office supplies, dry cleaning, cars, etc. Or paying over 20% tax on my cell phone service.
Wow -- insults on IRC couldn't be more accurate. Couple weeks ago, I went onto #fedora (?) to get some help installing FC2T2 onto my laptop. With a USB CD-ROM drive, no FDD, and not enough time to download the full ISOs, I needed help. In a nutshell, I wanted to boot off USB CD-ROM, then install via FTP. This is harder than it sounds - something about the kernel of the minimal boot cd not having USB drivers, or similar. Instead of getting helpful advice, the only one answering anyone, some l33t d00d spouting off insults, would only say 'can't be done!', 'why won't you f#@*%() listen to me - it can't be done!', and the classic 'you shouldn't be looking at linux if you already have questions like this!', etc. Of the two other people hanging around looking for help, one went as far as to say 'if this is what linux community support is all about, screw this!' In the end, I found my own solultion, with ZERO help from this joker.
So, what's the solution? The only thing I can think of right now is to create a semi-official IRC channel/forum, where volunteers are peer-reviewed and ranked.
(BTW - If anyone cares, the install went like this: Created a boot CD with DOS USB CD-ROM drivers to boot Partition Magic 8, to resize my Win2k partition and create ext2 and swap partitions. Back in Windows, I installed VMWare (free trial) and gave it direct access to the partitions I created for linux. Downloaded the minimal ISO (few MB) and "booted" from it, emulated in VMWare. Did a minimal install. Did the trick to let you use the NT bootloader to dual-boot. Rebooted into linux, installed the extra packages I needed.)
I'm a big fan of Home Power magazine. They focus more on solar solutions, but you'll catch an occasional article on hydro. Best part is you can download the current issue for free (after registration).
There's a limit to what you would want image stabilization to correct. If it's too strong, deliberate motions are filtered out.
Anyway, what I'm really looking forward to is the $18.50 jib.
Sprint Spectrum, based in the DC/MD/VA area, was the first PCS license in the country, operating GSM1900 around 1995-2000. This was not, initially, the same company which is now Sprint PCS. As they were later deploying the new Sprint PCS network, using CDMA, Sprint Spectum continued to promise multi-city access, without roaming, on the Sprint network; since they were using two completely different systems, it was a very empty promise.
Eventually, other GSM providers popped up across the country, including Omnipoint (later Voicestream, now T-Mobile), PacBell (in some markets), and a few others. But Sprint Spectrum, later bought out or merged (?) with Sprint PCS, started to let their GSM network stagnate, focusing on building the CDMA network instead.
A class-action suit was brought against Sprint, charging that they promised their customers inter-city usage on the nationwide Sprint network, but never delivered. The result of the lawsuit was that Sprint was to provide their GSM customers with a PCS (CDMA) phone and a small rebate towards PCS service.
Well, it couldn't have played out better for Sprint -- they were able to move their customers to CDMA, had a legitimate reason to shut down the GSM network, and here's the best part: they provided old model, REFURBISHED phones to the customers who were being moved from GSM to CDMA. Conveniently, the slightly nicer models of the replacement phones were frequently out of stock, and if you wanted to get a brand-new model, you would be forced to sign up as a new customer.
Years later, I tried to get an old GSM phone from the Sprint Spectrum network SIM-unlocked. Trying to convince the Sprint PCS people that I had a Sprint-branded GSM phone was like trying to tell them the ocean was purple.
Do I have an answer? Sorry, no. I'm a big fan of scripting, but it's totally impractical when I think of how fast it is to record and replay macros.
If you're considering buying an i730 (Nextel) because of it's GPS features, think twice. Unfortunately, it's nearly impossible to use the i730 like you would a normal GPS receiver. The phone needs to have a VERY, VERY good view of the sky. I suppose if you're on a boat or in a large field, you might be okay. But using it in a car, even when sitting on the dash, looking out the window, it's VERY slow to get a lock, and when it does, it's not with many sats (which means accuracy is degraded). Also, you WILL lose your position if you pick up your phone to talk.
I ended up buying a Delorme Earthmate USB device. For under $100, it does the job very nicely (though I'm not very impressed with their mapping software -- you can, however, use the GPS with any NMEA-compliant software).
This is great, but how can I put my linux box in firewire target mode?
No, really... how? This would be a *huge* benefit to us!
I have to second (third? fourth?) this -- Clear-Com units are THE way to go. There's a reson the pro's use these units. On the other hand, they're WAY expensive for such (relatively) simple devices.
If your school can't afford to buy a bunch, you should consider renting them, or perhaps trying to convince a local theatre group to let you borrow theirs. If you have a professionally installed PA system, the folks who supplied you with that can usually supply the belt-packs as well. Note that most of your positions can be wired, and with only a few wireless, that'll save $$$.
The GPS portion of the phone blows. I've set it on top of the dash of a car with a real nice swath of sky in front of it, and it would time out before aquiring enough satellites to get a fix. OTOH, one day I took it out to play with the GPS, and it seems that it had magically found some birds a few hours previous, while it was sitting on my desk, not far from a window.
Compare this with a "real" GPS receiver, of which modern ones can acquire a fix within a minute or less.
The IBM M keyboards *can* be completely silent. Just remove the springs. I kid you not -- remove the key caps, pull out the springs, and put the key caps back on. Though the keys don't spring back anymore, the keyboard is still functional -- just the tiniest bit of pressure on a key will cause it to register... silently!
$1395?! Why not just buy a laptop? Or two? It would be (much!) faster, similarly power efficient with an external power supply, could likely boot from CF, could act as an AP, would even have an integrated diplay for debugging... and MUCH more. C'mon folks -- I was hoping something like this would go for $400, not $1400!