2009

• Fedora Legal has added the Trusster Open Source License to Fedora approved licenses. This license is used by the Teal/Truss packages.
  [Posted Thursday Dec 31 2009]

• Installed livecd-tools, used livecd-iso-to-disk to write F12 LXDE spin to a USB disk, and used it to boot a Asus EEE PC:

    # yum install livecd-tools
  

  .
  [Posted Tuesday Dec 29 2009]

• I had conducted a one-day Fedora, Free Software workshop at the Bachelor of Computer Applications department, Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda (Vadodara), Gujarat, India on Saturday, December 26, 2009.
  
  Thanks to VGLUG for coordinating with me for the past few months in organizing this event. I would like to thank the Fedora project for sponsoring the travel.
  
  The BCA department lab systems were equipped to run on Fedora 12, and we used it for couple of the hands-on sessions:
  - Use of git: di-git-ally managing love letters.
  - Packaging Fedora RPM.
  
  I had also addressed the following topics:
  - i-want-2-do-project. tell-me-wat-2-do-fedora.
  - Badam Halwa of Embedded Systems.
  
  Participants were from the BCA department, and had also come from Ahmedabad. Vadodara (Baroda) connects to Ahmedabad via 95 km National Expressway 1.
  
  Free/Open Source Software is officially included in the Gujarat state school syllabus for higher secondary (XI and XII). In the coming years it is expected to be even introduced from standard VIII.
  
  The Department coordinator and Professor V A Kalamkar is happy to facilitate work between VGLUG, and the students for Free/Open Source Software projects. We hope to have more interaction with them in the future.
  
  VGLUG members are also keen on participating in the Fedora project at various sub-projects of their interests.
  
  Due to the political crisis in Hyderabad, I was uncertain about reaching the Hyderabad airport, and thus making it to the workshop. The bandh was withdrawn for December 25th, and when I made it the airport on the 25th, the scheduled flight was cancelled. So, I had to re-schedule a different flight, but, the airline officials said they couldn't guarantee if I will make it to my connecting flight in Mumbai. This re-scheduled flight got delayed even further. Luckily, my connecting flight also got delayed, and I finally managed to make it to Vadodara.
  
  As customary, here are some photos taken during the trip.
  [Posted Monday Dec 28 2009]

• Red Hat Legal feels that the TAPR Open Hardware License is non-free because the Section 7.4 clause is too broad.
  [Posted Thursday Dec 24 2009]

• Pushed poky-scripts to Fedora repository. Poky is a platform builder tool written in Python that allows you to build toolchains, kernels, rootfs images for different target hardware. Use:

    # yum install poky-scripts
  

  You can test run pre-built images, for example from Pinky (3.1.x) releases:

    $ poky-qemu zImage-2.6.23-pinky-3.1-qemuarm.bin poky-image-sdk-qemuarm-pinky-3.1.rootfs.ext2
  

  
  If you want to build your complete environment, you need to download the latest Poky stable release 3.2.x 'Purple' (latest) and extract it to ~/devel. Make sure you have a broadband connection and atleast 3G of disk space as the scripts will fetch, build everything from toolchains, kernels, user space applications. Follow the Poky handbook which is very well documented. Supported reference platforms include (to mention a few):
  • Intel Atom devices
  • Compulab cm-x270 and em-x270
  • Freescale MX31
  • ST Nomadik
  • Marvell Zylonite
  • QEMU ARM and x86
  
  [Posted Tuesday Dec 22 2009]

• Downloaded Fedora 12 (i386) mirror using FedX, written by Ratnadeep Debnath and myself. I have updated it to rsync from a mirror to a local copy as well as from an external disk to a local directory.
  
  

    $ git clone git://gitorious.org/fedx/mainline.git
  

  
  
  • Fedora 11 (i386) with rpmfusion repository = 29 GB
  • Fedora 12 (i386) with rpmfusion repository = 23 GB
  
  I assume that this drastic size reduction is due to the switch from gzip compression to XZ (LZMA format). Please refer XZRpmPayloads (when the site is back up and running). This Fedora offline repository is very handy when working offline, or when it is required to install packages when using slow Internet connectivity speeds.
  [Posted Saturday Dec 12 2009]

• Bought the GDL3204 GPS data logger from Sparc Systems Ltd, Mumbai, India for INR 7500 (taxes and shipping charges additional). They use gEDA (GPL Electronic Design Automation) and Printed Circuit Board (PCB) for their work, and I thought I should support them by buying a unit.
  
  
  
  It has a serial interface to connect to a computer, and can store 74000 track points on a 4MB non-volatile memory. It can be used for openstreetmap work. You can use the sparcy (command line tool) with it from Fedora.

   # yum install sparcy
  

  
  [Posted Sunday Dec 6 2009]

• Voted in Fedora Board, Fedora Engineering Steering Committee (FESCo), and Fedora Ambassadors Steering Committee (FAmSCo) November/December 2009 elections.
  
  [Posted Saturday Dec 5 2009]

• Pushed Digital Gate Compiler (dgc) to Fedora repository. I have re-written the build (configure.ac, Makefile.am) so it works with recent autotools, and released new sources for upstream.
  [Posted Saturday Nov 28 2009]

• Upgraded to Fedora 12 (Constantine) using DVD on Dell Vostro 1310 laptop that was running Fedora 11. Documentation and configuration outputs updated.
  [Posted Saturday Nov 21 2009]

• Upgraded to Fedora 12 (Constantine) on a HP 6730s laptop that was running Fedora 11. Used the following:
  

    # yum clean all
    # yum update
    # preupgrade-cli "Fedora 12 (Constantine)"
  

  I had to pass intel_iommu=off to the kernel command line to boot the kernel. Otherwise, everything worked cleanly!
  [Posted Friday Nov 20 2009]

• Nokogiri is a fast Ruby XML parser. You can install it, and its dependencies using:

    # yum install libxml2 libxml2-devel libxslt libxslt-devel
    # gem install nokogiri
  

  You can use XPath query language with it. An XPath tutorial under GNU FDL.
  [Posted Thursday Nov 19 2009]

• I use the following for PS1 for user and root accounts in ~/.bashrc, respectively:
  
    export PS1='\[\e[1;32m\][\u@\h \[\e[0;34m\]\W \$\[\e[0m\] '
  
    export PS1='\[\e[1;31m\][\u@\h \[\e[0;34m\]\W \$\[\e[0m\] '
  [Posted Friday Nov 13 2009]

• A useful document on SQL placeholders for Perl.
  [Posted Saturday Nov 7 2009]

• The Easysoft Perl DBD::ODBC tutorial is well written. You can install DBD::ODBC from CPAN.
  [Posted Friday Nov 6 2009]

• We approach technical advisor X and assistant professor Y for a F/OSS unconference at a premier International Institute, and they never respond for weeks. Apparently, we knew the Head of the Institute, who whole-heartedly agrees, having been a user group member during his college years, and asks X and Y to take things further.
  
  Now, X and Y are upset, because we approached the Head of the Institute, and permission was granted. Then X and Y show off their ego, presence, and reciprocate by not communicating at all our requests. Weeks go by, and we still don't get any prompt response. And we decide to finally call it off with them because it was not helping us progress any further.
  
  End result is that the students/faculty of the Institute are at a big loss for not having the event at their venue for no fault of theirs!
  
  While, I have seen such extreme *ego* cases in India in most of my attempts to organize Free Software unconferences, I have never shared it with others. Maybe I should write a book -- The Adventures of Shakthimaan: The "Lost" Chronicles :)
  
  [Posted Tuesday Nov 3 2009]

• Uploaded documentation HOWTO on setting up Mercurial repository on Fedora with HTTPS + LDAP.
  [Posted Monday Oct 19 2009]

• Registered shakthimaan.in, and it redirects to shakthimaan.com.
  [Posted Thursday Oct 8 2009]

• Beam Telecom (formerly Beam Cable), a popular ISP in Madhapur, Hi-tech area at Hyderabad is using Joomla for their portal. This screenshot was taken before they fixed their database migration :)
  
  
  [Posted Saturday Oct 3 2009]

• I have pushed GPLcver, an interpreted Verilog HDL simulator to Fedora repository.
  [Posted Thursday Oct 1 2009]

• I have now pushed snacc, Sample Neufeld ASN.1 to C compiler package to Fedora repository. Snacc can produce C, C++ routines, or type tables for BER encoding, decoding, printing, and freeing. ASN.1 is a joint ISO/IEC and ITU-T standard with a flexible notation that describes data structures for transmitting, receiving data.
  [Posted Wednesday Sep 30 2009]

• On September 19, 2009, Software Freedom Day at Hyderabad, I visited Devnar Foundation for the Blind, a follow-up to last weekends' installation.
  
  Most of their systems have been donated. So, there are different motherboards, and brands. Apparently, the local AMC support guy who had come today didn't have drivers for different proprietary OSes, and for different motherboards. I then migrated their office computers to Fedora 11 :)
  
  Now, they have HCL, Wipro computers running Fedora. I have disabled many start-up services, to boot the systems faster. I also adjusted Orca pitch, rate settings for clarity. It should take them some time to get accustomed to the American accent.
  
  Thanks to Prof. Haasan, Department of Astronomy, Osmania University, I have deployed Fedora 11 repository (29 GB) at one of their department systems.
  
  They are interested in creating a Fedora Spin for Astronomy, and release it, as this is the International Year of Astronomy [1]. I have provided Rahul Sundarams' e-mail contact to them.
  
  [1] http://www.astronomy2009.org
  [Posted Sunday Sep 20 2009]

• Uploaded Alpine e-mail client configuration and setup documentation.
  [Posted Tuesday Sep 15 2009]

• I have pushed vrq, a verilog tool parser software to Fedora repository.
  [Posted Monday Sep 14 2009]

• Today, Sunday, September 13, 2009, I deployed Fedora 11, and Fedora 11 offline repository at Devnar Foundation for the Blind, Mayurmarg, Begumpet, Hyderabad, India.
  
  They have been using a proprietary software on a proprietary system, and wanted to explore better alternatives in this regard.
  
  I was given a 256 MB RAM system, with 40 GB hard-disk. This system did not have Internet connectivity. The offline repository really helped. Most of the systems are donated by companies for the school to use. The school follows the Andhra Pradesh State syllabus, and this year they have introduced Intermediate (after Board X). They write their exams on slate or on Braille paper (which I believe, is very expensive). Some students stay in the school hostel, while others' are day scholars.
  
  They do have one MountBatten Brailler [1] (costing around 1,00,000 INR) which can produce output to a computer or a printer. It also spells out the input. I didn't have time to test it with Fedora (serial, parallel ports).
  
  A junior teacher, Miss. Shashi, did try out Orca [2] with the Gnome shortcut keys, listening to Orcas' audio output. She was able to navigate through the Gnome menus, and use Openoffice.org Writer. They did want spoken American English, which is default in Gnome. It will be good to have those Orca audio recorded in Telugu or other regional languages in India.
  
  There were some very interesting questions like:
  
  * Orca loads only after logging in -- which spells out menus, the frame window that is selected, keys pressed etc. So, grub which loads prior to all these doesn't announce the choice of kernel. So, how does one choose the right kernel?
  
  * A sound can be played after gdm loads? Otherwise, they wouldn't knowif the system booted to gdm or not. If there are multiple user accounts, some application need to spell-out the login names?
  
  * By default there is no shutdown sound in Fedora 11? How to set one?
  
  * Some applications pop-up menus didn't support tab feature, so one had to remember to use shortcuts like Alt+S to Save, or Alt+C to Cancel.
  
  I shall check these requests with the Orca project team, and any other queries that they might have as follow-ups.
  
  I would like to thank Padma Shri Dr. A. Saibaba Goud for giving me an opportunity to deploy the solution at their school. Thanks to Rakesh ("arky") Ambati for introducing me to them, who also works for 'Braille Without Borders' [3]. Eric Ofori from South Africa will be following it up with support for the school staff (about 40 in number). If anyone who is coming to Hyderabad and who would like to help them, please do contact me offline.
  
  With all due respect to the physically challenged, I did not take any photos.
  
  [1] http://mountbattenbrailler.com/
  [2] http://live.gnome.org/Orca
  [3] http://www.braillewithoutborders.org/ENGLISH/index.html
  [Posted Sunday Sep 13 2009]

• If you need to convert a Git repository to a Mercurial repository, you can use Convert extension.
  [Posted Friday Sep 11 2009]

• I ran multiple "while true; do dmesg > /dev/null; done" scripts to heat the processor to drive away the ants that entered my laptop. It worked! I will need to physically secure the laptop if left running overnight.
  [Posted Wednesday Sep 09 2009]

• I have pushed eqntott, that generates truth tables from Boolean equations to Fedora repository.
  [Posted Wednesday Sep 02 2009]

• I have restored the soft copy of திருக்குறள் (Thirukkural), on my website thanks to web.archive.org. I have received permission from the publishers, to use it for any non-commercial use.
  [Posted Saturday Aug 29 2009]

• Today, Saturday, August 22, 2009, I conducted a Fedora workshop at ACE College of Engineering, Ankushapur, Ghatkesar Mandal, Ranga Reddy District, Andhra Pradesh, India.
  
  I have addressed "i-want-2-do-project. tell-me-wat-2-do-fedora", "Packaging RPM", "Badam Halwa of Embedded Systems" presentations. The attendees were Computer Science and Information Technology Department students, and faculty. I would like to thank Mrs. K. Jaya Bharathi, Head of the Computer Science Department, for coordinating with me for the past one month in organizing this workshop.
  
  They don't yet have a Fedora Lab. I have provided them with Fedora 10, 11 repositories for their offline use (53 GB). I have also given them Fedora 10, 11 DVDs.
  
  Ghatkesar is 25 km from Hyderabad, and one hour drive from Hyderabad through NH-7.
  
  As customary, here are some pictures taken during the visit: http://www.shakthimaan.com/Mambo/gallery/album58.
  [Posted Saturday Aug 22 2009]

• I have pushed espresso-ab, a logic minimizer software to Fedora repository.
  [Posted Monday Aug 17 2009]

• I have provided 50 GB of Fedora Core 10, 11 software repository to IIIT, Hyderabad.
  [Posted Saturday Aug 15 2009]

• I now have complete x86 Fedora 11 repository (fedora, updates), in addition to x86 Fedora 10 repository (fedora, updates). Each is about 25 GB. If anyone needs it, please contact me by e-mail.
  [Posted Wednesday Aug 12 2009]

• Installed Fedora Core 11 on my Dell Vostro 1310 and uploaded configuration files, logs, outputs.
  [Posted Friday Jul 31 2009]

• I am dedicating the study-abroad page in loving memory of my Aunt, Dr. Mrs. S. S. Kodimani (1945-2009).
  [Posted Wednesday Jul 29 2009]

• You can now follow me on http://twitter.com/shakthimaan and http://identi.ca/shakthimaan.
  [Posted Wednesday Jul 22 2009]

• Photos taken at GNUtsav, July 18-19, 2009 at National Institute of Technology, Agartala, Tripura, India.
  [Posted Monday Jul 20 2009]

• A simple packaging RPM workflow documentation.
  [Posted Thursday Jul 09 2009]

• My IRC chat logs from I Know What You Are Going To Do This Summer 2009 for i-want-2-do-project. tell-me-wat-2-do, di-git-ally managing love letters, and Packaging RPM are now available under Verbatim Copying and Distribution License.
  [Posted Saturday Jul 04 2009]

• Wireshark has Diameter support and the Opendiameter HOWTO has been updated to 1.2, with test procedures for testing client/server libdiameter examples.
  [Posted Thursday Jun 25 2009]

• Opendiameter-1.0.7-i builds and runs fine now with ACE-5.6.9.tar.bz2 with the latest gcc-c++-4.3.2 on Fedora 10. Opendiameter HOWTO has been updated to 1.1.
  [Posted Wednesday Jun 24 2009]

• Opendiameter and ADAPTIVE Communication Environment (ACE) build/setup HOWTO on Fedora 10.
  [Posted Thursday Jun 18 2009]

• My Git presentation called di-git-ally managing love letters. It can be run as a tutorial. The LaTeX Beamer sources are available, or you can clone it from http://gitorious.org/di-git-ally-managing-love-letters.
  [Posted Saturday Jun 6 2009]

• A short, simple HOWTO on setting, testing and using gitosis on Fedora.
  [Posted Tuesday Jun 2 2009]

• I have now included mailing list guidelines and Free Software communication guidelines directly into i-want-2-do-project. tell-me-wat-2-do. The separate edition for i-want-2-do-project. tell-me-wat-2-do-Fedora has also been updated. mailing-list-guidelines has also been updated.
  [Posted Saturday May 23 2009]

• Photos taken at http://fosjam.in, May 16-17, 2009 at Jaipur Engineering College and Research Center, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India.
  [Posted Monday May 18 2009]

• A simple RPM presentation called Packaging Red hot, Paneer (butter) Masala (RPM).
  [Posted Monday May 11 2009]

• Photos taken at an introductory Free Software workshop at NBKR Institute of Science and Technology, Vidyanagar, Nellore district, Andhra Pradesh, India on Saturday, May 2, 2009.
  [Posted Sunday May 3 2009]

• orgcard.txt reference cheat sheet for Emacs org-mode.
  [Posted Friday April 17 2009]

• I bought a new, customized Dell Vostro 1310 and installed Fedora on it. Everything worked out of the box.
  [Posted Sunday April 12 2009]

• A good pointer on declaring, assigning, and using function pointers.
  [Posted Tuesday April 7 2009]

• A useful introductory book on Autotools: a practitioner's guide to Autoconf, Automake and Libtool.
  [Posted Sunday April 5 2009]

• Updated Emacs-a-day-keeps-the-vi-zing-away with formatting and link to /downloads page.
  [Posted Friday April 3 2009]

• ASIC design made easy and cheap by Peter Kaiser.
  [Posted Thursday April 2 2009]

• Getting Started with PCB by DJ Delorie.
  [Posted Wednesdsay April 1 2009]

• Happy Birthday shakthimaan.com! We have now completed four years. Thanks to all shakthimaan.com readers.
  [Posted Thursday March 26 2009]

• Gerber RS-274X format.
  [Posted Tuesday March 24 2009]

• Uploaded photos taken from the National Seminar on Embedded Design with GNU/Linux held at Government Engineering College, Barton Hill, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala.
  [Posted Monday March 23 2009]

• CodeChef.com.
  [Posted Thursday March 19 2009]

• Compiled the i-want-2-do-project. tell-me-wat-2-do-fedora presentation.
  [Posted Sunday March 15 2009]

• Notes on the m4 macro language.
  [Posted Tuesday March 10 2009]

• Jollen's consulting for embedded GNU/Linux in Taiwan.
  [Posted Sunday March 8 2009]

• I am now a Fedora Ambassador. I am primarily interested in Fedora Electronic Lab.
  [Posted Friday March 6 2009]

• Uploaded few photos taken during fossconf.in 2009.
  [Posted Monday March 2 2009]

• commandlinefu.com :).
  [Posted Thursday February 26 2009]

• unetbootin.
  [Posted Tuesday February 24 2009]

• ROBIN - Wireless mesh networking.
  [Posted Monday February 23 2009]

• Badam Halwa of Embedded Systems presentation under GNU Free Documentation License.
  [Posted Saturday February 21 2009]

• Unsubscription tip!
  [Posted Friday February 20 2009]

• magit with emacs.
  [Posted Thursday February 19 2009]

• Introduction to nose unit testing framework.
  [Posted Wednesday February 18 2009]

• GCC architecture documents by Abhijat Vichare.
  [Posted Tuesday February 17 2009]

• GNU/LinuxFest Northwest 2009.
  [Posted Monday February 16 2009]

• MeshLab for processing and editing of unstructured 3D triangular meshes.
  [Posted Wednesday February 11 2009]

• Updated ddd + gdb + openocd + debug board + FreeRunner setup HOWTO.
  [Posted Sunday February 1 2009]

• Creating high-resolution screencasts with vnc2swf.
  [Posted Friday January 30 2009]

• Slideshow Creator.
  [Posted Thursday January 22 2009]

• David O'Tooles' org tutorial.
  [Posted Wednesday January 21 2009]

• CHDK wiki site.
  [Posted Tuesday January 20 2009]

• I now have a Facebook profile.
  [Posted Wednesday January 14 2009]

• Uploaded ORe Build and Test HOWTO documentation.
  [Posted Monday January 12 2009]