Some Interesting News

Micro AB receptacles to replace Mini AB receptacles

http://www.usb.org/developers/Deprecation_Announcement_052507.pdf announces this. So, to see a such a connector or cable, a bit of google: From here I got the following info:

Micro-A plug (white)
Micro-AB receptacle (gray)
Micro-B plug
(black)
Micro-B receptacle (black)

hehe that is useful for color blind folks too :)

Standard-A receptacle to Micro-A plug (no other adaptors allowed).
Quote: Micro-USB plug is rated for 10,000 connect-disconnect cycles. It is
about half the height of the mini-USB connector in widespread use today but
features a similar width.

I hear it is stainless steel also :).. Ok, now my Mot A1200 gets plugged in and out of USB cable at my desk around 5 times a day, and once in house on average, that gives me like 4 year or so life time for my cable.. Err.. where are those days where u buy a TV and expect it to last 20 years ;).. just kiding ofcourse.. (my dad has a 15 year old TV and loves it)..

Tons of pages later, I get here..(warn: link might go to archive in the site) and finally get to see a supplier. and another german supplier here(English Translation).

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Palm's FollyOh or JollyYO?

--Palm's Foleo gets mixed reactions--Palm Inc. launched today the Foleo, an
ultra thin, light andinexpensive notebook-like companion for a smartphone, but
the conceptis already being greeted by mixed reviews. More here and here

I mean that thing looks crap - i like UMPC size of a N800 with a full LCD+touchscreen better.. speaking of which.. hmm 500 quid.. errr.. dats same cost as N800 duh?

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Microsoft's ScarFace

If you are a Unspeakable-Named-Company fan.. well this is gonna hurt.. the "NEXT" "IN" "THING" in technology: http://www.microsoft.com/surface/.. BAH!! tslib+tsc2101+kdrive with a sensible configuration... I dont like my computing to be stuck looking down(Ive got enuf neck issues of my own) Though the page shows the forefiger.. I feel like giving it the "you-know-which" finger.. I suppose the servers are overloaded for the videos to pop up, so check out the history sections.. kinda gives u the feel..

3430 in git

Khasim finally started posting OMAP 3430 patches to git.. will take me a while to get to looking at the patches.. but.. it is good to see them come finally!!

interestingly some devices using various OMAPs: http://pdadb.net/index.php?m=pdamaster i suppose lots of similar sites exist..

Yesterday Steve K showed me a cool setup -> he got himself a USB->VGA convertor (some 70 bucks), plugged the 2430 to a USBhub, plugged in a USB keyboard, and vroom.. he is all set.. lovely.. all those stuff.. throw them out.. just provide tons of USB ports ;)

WPA and wireless

Played arnd with my Dell inspiron 9300 laptop.. I had been lazy to update linux to new WPA-PSK key at home.. just finished it..along with a bunch of other stuff.. (I got a debian etch now):
WPA apt-get install wpa_supplicant
then installed
/etc/network/interfaces---->

# The loopback network interface
auto lo
iface lo inet loopback
address 127.0.0.1
netmask 255.0.0.0
# eth0-wired The primary network interface
iface eth0 inet dhcp
#Wireless - eth1
auto eth1
iface eth1 inet dhcp
wpa-driver wext
wpa-roam /etc/wpa_supplicant/wpa_supplicant.conf

<---
Minimal /etc/wpa_supplicant.conf to associate with open

ctrl_interface=/var/run/wpa_supplicant
ctrl_interface_group=0
eapol_version=1
ap_scan=1
fast_reauth=1
### Home network
network={
ssid="MyNetworkSSID"
key_mgmt=WPA-PSK
psk="MyNetworkPASSKEY"
}

Then ofcourse, i tried playing around with this: http://www.beryl-project.org/
installed and got it running.. but for some reasons.. it is too slow to be usable on my Celeron laptop :(... but ended up recompiling and reconfiguring the X once more..Sigh... one cant win all..

lm sensor compilation..sdp2430

If you already know how to build a filesystem, good else for OMAP2430, here it is: http://www.geocities.com/crecmca98/Linux/omap2430_From_almost_scratch.pdf

lmsensor for OMAP has been a slight pain so far..
lmsensor needs sysfsutils to build properly..
pick them up here: http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=44427
./configure --target=arm-linux --build=i386-pc-linux-gnu --prefix=/home/fs/nmenon/arm/ --host=arm-linux CC=arm-none-linux-gnueabi-gcc
mymake install

lmsensor: Download it from here: http://www.lm-sensors.org/wiki/Download
compiling this is a pain:
first I modified Makefile, changed
I2C_HEADERS := $(LINUX_HEADERS)
WARN := 1
DEBUG := 1
CC := $(CROSS_COMPILE)gcc
the last one was not sensible... but personally, I hate seeing CC=gcc in Makefiles...
might have been good to have ETCDIR := $(PREFIX)/etc

Next compilation started
mymake LINUX=/home/nmenon/opensource/copy/linux-omap.git/ MACHINE=ARM CFLAGS="-I/home/fs/nmenon/arm/include/" V=1 PREFIX=/home/fs/nmenon/arm/ LIBDIR=/home/fs/nmenon/arm/lib INCLUDEDIR=/home/fs/nmenon/arm/include ETCDIR=/home/fs/nmenon/arm/etc user_install

For some stupid reason, it'd not compile lib/libsensors.so.3.1.3
quick step: arm-none-linux-gnueabi-gcc -shared -Wl,-soname,libsensors.so.3 -o lib/libsensors.so.3.1.3 lib/data.lo lib/general.lo lib/error.lo lib/chips.lo lib/proc.lo lib/access.lo lib/init.lo lib/sysfs.lo lib/conf-parse.lo lib/conf-lex.lo -lc -lm -L/home/fs/nmenon/arm/lib -lsysfs
later it compiles and proceeds to install... :)

I had posted a FIFO enable patch to the omap list here: http://linux.omap.com/pipermail/linux-omap-open-source/2007-May/009842.html. This seem to remarkably stabilize i2c operations for 2430 HS/FS ops(it has i2c-dev enabled).. but I am still not happy.. look at the following:
~ $ i2cdetect -y -a 1

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 a b c d e f

00: 00 01 02 03 04 -- 06 -- 08 -- -- -- -- -- -- 0f

10: 10 11 12 13 -- 15 -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

20: -- -- -- -- -- -- -- 27 -- -- -- -- -- 2d -- --

30: 30 31 32 33 34 35 -- 37 38 -- -- -- -- 3d -- --

40: 40 41 -- -- 44 45 46 47 48 -- -- -- -- 4d 4e --

50: 50 51 -- 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 5a 5b 5c 5d -- 5f

60: -- 61 -- -- -- -- 66 67 68 69 6a -- -- -- -- --

70: 70 -- -- 73 74 75 -- 77 78 79 -- -- -- 7d -- --

~ $ i2cdetect -y -a 2

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 a b c d e f

00: 00 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 0a 0b 0c 0d 0e 0f

10: 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 1a 1b 1c 1d 1e 1f

20: 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 2a 2b 2c 2d 2e 2f

30: 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 3a 3b 3c 3d 3e 3f

40: 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 UU UU UU UU 4c 4d 4e 4f

50: 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 5a 5b 5c 5d 5e 5f

60: 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 6a 6b 6c 6d 6e 6f

70: 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 7a 7b 7c 7d 7e 7f

I know that there are no devices all those locations... but why does it display it?? need to dig into this in the middle of mundane tasks such as grocery shopping, movie and library visits... Shrug.. Also need to probe with a scope the i2c scl and sda lines to see if multistart causes goof up in hsi2c protocol.. aaah.. bugs bugs to fix.. not ever enough time to do... I still need to be reading for my new work.... err.. somethings are addictive :(