I share my scanner on the network using sane but after reloading my server I found it was not being seen from the network even though it appeared to be working locally.

I saw this kind of stuff in the logs:

Dec 19 15:56:19 localhost saned[32422]: saned (AF-indep+IPv6) from sane-backends 1.0.19 starting up
Dec 19 15:56:17 localhost saned[32422]: check_host: access by remote host: 10.0.0.55
Dec 19 15:56:17 localhost saned[32422]: init: access granted to saned-user@10.0.0.55
Dec 19 15:56:19 localhost saned[32422]: saned exiting

I increased the verbosity but it wasn't any more helpful:

[saned] check_host: access granted from IP address 10.0.0.55 (in subnet 10.0.0.0/24)
[saned] init: access granted
[saned] init: access granted to saned-user@::ffff:10.0.0.55
[saned] process_request: waiting for request
[saned] process_request: got request 1
[saned] process_request: waiting for request
[saned] process_request: got request 10
[saned] bailing out, waiting for children...
[saned] bail_out: all children exited

After much troubleshooting I realized that while local access worked file, saned was not working when running as user saned, but worked fine if run as root.

Obviously this looked like a permission problem, and it was. I checked the perms on the scanner device, /dev/sg2 and confirmed that saned had no access. But why? I checked the udev rules and found a rule that would give permissions to the scanner group, of which saned is a member. But this rule had set the permissions.

Then I realized that since I booted up with the scanner attached, and then installed sane, the new udev rule would not have had any effect until the device was replugged or the system was rebooted. I restarted udev and un/re-plugged the scanner and then saned worked fine again!

Posted by ra at 20:28 | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)

I've been experimenting with more and more IP cameras.

Some quick notes on image/video/audio URL's for the cameras I currently have:

ABS 311M
mjpeg:
http://camera_address/mjpg/video.mjpg?resolution=vga

Trendnet 312W
jpeg:
http://username:password@camera_address/cgi/jpg/image.cgi

mjpeg:
http://username:password@camera_address/cgi/mjpg/mjpg.cgi

pcm (amr?) audio:
http://username:password@camera_address/cgi/audio/audio.cgi

Posted by ra at 01:28 | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)

Yes, Virginia; I DID finally get a MOTOCLIQ!

And yes, I love it! I will have to withhold further comment until later because right now I'm too busy playing with my phone!

Posted by ra at 17:21 | Comments (0) | Trackback (1)

I still have yet to own a smartphone. I carry a phone and a separate PDA, although the latter is kept in my wallet-case so I'm not really burdened by carrying an "extra" device or anything. But it does feel like a bit like I'm living in the past. When I pull out my PDA it seems like people are thinking "wow... that's quaint".

It wasn't until my first exposure to Android that I actually had any desire for a smartphone. I had finally found something that could truly replace both my phone and my Palm TX and give me more functionality rather than amounting to a frustrating compromise. It certainly doesn't hurt that's it's Android based and largely open-sourced either. So I am definitely decided on the Android platform, there's just one problem. I need to find some sexy Android powered hardware. And that's the problem.

Until now, that is. I will have to wait to see and touch it in person of course but I think the Motorola CLIQ could be my first smartphone. It runs Android, I love the look of it, I love the physical keyboard and I've had a lot of Motorola phones over the years and for the most part have been very pleased with them. The G1 was just too clunky looking for me, and the HTC Magic lacked the physical keyboard and I just didn't care for how it felt in my hand. But the Cliq... appears to be something entirely different. I can't wait!

Posted by ra at 12:30 | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)

If you're lucky enough to be able to call two different Asterisk servers from one phone, a really fun thing to do is to call the echo test on one Asterisk server, then conference in a new call to the echo test on a different Asterisk server, creating an echo loop.

The IP phone on my desk is connected to two Asterisk servers and it made my day when I realized I could do this.

Posted by ra at 13:45 | Comments (0) | Trackbacks (0)

I've been shopping for a new laptop and it's becoming a thoroughly frustrating experience.

I know what I want... but NO one makes it. I'm considering either purchasing a 15" laptop that would be my primary workstation at home and away, or buying a 13" small, convenient, portable machine that I would use mostly on the go. I would even go for a 14" if I could only find one with the right features, even though it's not what I really want.

This is my requirements list for each size laptop:

15" LED backlit WUXGA (1920x1200) screen
Intel Core 2 Duo 2.4+Ghz
DDR3 ram

14" LED backlit WSXGA+ (1680x1050) screen
Intel Core 2 Duo 2.2+Ghz
DDR3 ram

13" LED backlit WXGA+ (1440x900) screen
Intel Core 2 Duo 2.0+Ghz
DDR3 ram


I don't think I'm really being that picky. My budget is at most about $2500 for my new laptop, so I am willing to pay for something that meets my criteria. Plus there are all kinds of other components not listed on which I'm willing to be flexible. Alas every notebook on the market falls short. I don't know what to do, so for now I'm just waiting for a new product to come along and impress me.

Posted by ra at 21:18 | Comments (0) | Trackback (1)

...the radio star. Yeah. Anyway, I have a linksys WVC54GCA Network/IP camera that I've been playing around with. This camera is convenient because it's wireless so I can put it almost anywhere I want... or I could if the fucking piece of shit didn't lose it's wireless connection every ~24 hours and require a reset to get back online. So I have to run cat5 to the fucker instead. And it doesn't support PoE. Annoying, but it seems to work OK with power and UTP stuck up it's ass. Whatever. Remind me not to buy linksys again.

I've also been playing around with ZoneMinder and trying to get it grabbing video from the camera. That worked fine at 320x240 (jpeg) but not at 640x480 (jpeg or mjpeg). I finally figured out that it was a memory allocation problem. Even though I had followed a tip I found somewhere on upping the limit to 134217728, apparently that wasn't enough to grab high res from the camera. Finally I found this tip and I raised the limit to 268424446. Now it works fine at 640x480.

The most difficult part of the process was finding the URL's for grabbing video/stills directly. Through googling and experimentation this is what I came up with:

Linksys WVC54GCA - firmware 1.00r24

320x240 jpeg:
http://camera_ip_address/img/snapshot.cgi

640x480 jpeg:
http://camera_ip_address/img/snapshot.cgi?a
(I first tried ?res=640x480, which worked, but then I discovered that passing any argument at all gives you the larger jpeg)

640x480 mjpeg:
http://camera_ip_address/img/mjpeg.jpg
http://camera_ip_address/img/mjpeg.cgi
http://camera_ip_address/img/video.mjpeg
(I don't know whether there is any difference between these. I didn't notice any.)

640x480 mpeg:
http://camera_ip_address/img/video.asf
(VLC 0.9.4 plays this perfectly, including audio)

Posted by ra at 00:38 | Comments (5) | Trackbacks (0)