Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-03-07

• @SiStheband do you guys have a place for lyrics? I would really like the lyrics to 'Serve them Well,' I bought the cd & <3 it tons! #
• Stupid Quake live!!! I just lost over an hour worth of notes cause it crashed my browser! #
• Don't build mesa with distcc, it'll break! Unless you patch it:
  http://www.mail-archive.com/dri-devel@lists.sourceforge.net/msg46178.html #
• @matthewforr lucky bastard, I wish I had an arcade cabinet in my trunk! in reply to matthewforr #
• xdg-utils also doesn't play well with distcc ;( #

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-02-28

• yum, I just won a Guruplug last night & am eating it up… #
• Successfully upgraded to DD-WRT v24-sp2 (01/02/10) mini-usb – build 13577M NEWD Eko

  Yay ^_^ #

• IPv6 is kinda working @ home. Need to work out the kinks in my startup script. I'm going to have to put timeouts in cause of dyndns. MEH! #

Floating in numbers [IPv6] | Moved to FreeDNS

I went to SCaLE last weekend, and was very happy to talk to the people at the IPv6 booth. I also jacked one of their “getipv6.info” stickers cause it looked neato & unixy. A day later I stuck it on my laptop (along with some other nice linux/gnu/openvz buddies); and a day after that I started on my journey to IPv6.
I’ve been working through IPv6 Essentials in my free time, and actually implementing it at home! I started out by bricking my router (earlier post), followed by epic failure when trying to configure IPv6 on my router. I was rewarded with a little success before I had to call it quits late at night. I manually assigned my IPv6 address to my mac and everything worked wonderfully (ipv6.google.com for example)

Well I was dis-satisfied, and spent the better part of my day at home (Thursday 25, 2010) getting it to work on my router. Now everything works & I can reboot my router & expect everything to come back when it’s back up. I will post how I got everything working ASAP since the current IPv6 articles are dated & chock full of mis-information.
In the process of moving to IPv6 at home I needed to make my dyndns IPv6 compatible. Well dyndns isn’t IPv6 compatible (for free anyways), so I decided to switch to FreeDNS. It provides AAAA record support (IPv6), and allowed me to pass onto the next level of the HE.net certification:

Yay! I’m an IPv6 Enthusiast…
After reading through IPv6 Essentials I can see the real plusses to IPv6, and can’t wait to take advantage of all it’s neat features.

Unbrick WRT350N

Wow, so last night I tried to flash an unsupported ddwrt image on my WRT350N & I bricked it . I would have been golden, except for some reason boot-wait wasn’t working. I spent about 30 minutes looking what new router I should purchase, when I thought, ah there are no good routers out that will accept DD-WRT; I’ll just unbrick my current router…

Well to start I had to figure out how to open the darn thing. I ended up ripping off the top & bottom plastic where some nice torx security screws greeted me… Well a few came out with some nice twists of my torx driver. Yet a couple actually had the center pin proper height. Easy way to get around this, is to find a small phillips screwdriver. I was able to easily unscrew them with a phillips.

After removing the screws I was now able to access the board; most importantly the serial header:

From Left to Right (Yellow = 3.3V; White = Tx; Red = Rx; Black = GND)

I used my handy dandy CA-42 Serial to USB adapter:

It also has colored wires, and I should have matched them up, but I kinda just plugged some alligator clips in & plugged them into the right wires for the CA-42. The CA-42 layout is like this (Black = GND ; White = Rx ; Green = Tx ; Red = +V)

After connecting everything up, you should be able to see “output” & be able to hit Ctrl-C to be dropped into CFE>

nvram set boot_wait=on

nvram commit

reboot

Now prepare to copy the image over. I had three windows open. A window with the serial output, a window pinging 192.168.1.1, and a window to execute my push command. I would also recommend that you set (IP Address = 192.168.1.10 ; Subnet = 255.255.255.0; Gateway = 192.168.1.1) Once you receive a ping after rebooting run the following command:

echo -e "\nmode binary\nrexmt 1\ntimeout 60\ntrace\nput dd-wrt.v24_mini_generic.bin\n" | tftp 192.168.1.1

where ‘dd-wrt.v24_mini_generic.bin’ is the image you would like to flash (it took me about 6 different images until this one worked [ this is the web flash image on the wrt350n page])
After running the following you should get something that looks like this:

If everything went as planned, then you should end up with a working router Yay!

There are plenty of resources on the internets. I found this wonderful link: http://dg.cascade.dyndns.org/wrt350n.html which perfectly outlines EVERYTHING I needed to do. It was very helpful in this process.

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-02-21

• recompiling glibc for the 20'th time (trying to optimize the crap out of this till I'm happy with it) #
• ==> Finished making: gcc 4.4.3-1 arm5 (Wed Feb 17 12:36:03 PST 2010)

  real 751m57.248s
  user 654m52.570s
  sys 25m11.030s #

• [fsk141@uFsk-H gcc]$ time makepkg -Ac (using distcc on 3 plugs)

  This is AMAZING!!! [100% cpu usage on all three ;P] #

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-02-14

• compiling glibc on arm is a pain in the butt! #
• meh, making linux from scratch is a lot of work on 1.2Ghz, I need more power.
  …gnueabi is awesome… #
• sudo ./miniarch i686

  I love scripts awesome people make for easy chrootin:
  http://blog.mudy.info/2009/03/deploy-archlinux-chroot-onto-vps/ #

• http://twitpic.com/12748d – compiling gcc-ada on arm, lets see what happens? I told myself I was going to sleep 2 hours ago #

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-02-07

• Pogoplug overall throughput is a little disappointing #
• Just got a bunch of monies back from the government (I <3 Turbotax) #
• I love that I can access my home router from the internet. Otherwise I couldn't finish this pogoplug review… #
• New kernel done:
  [jgerold@smsiovz1 ~]$ uname -r
  2.6.27.42-OVZ27-chistyakov.1 #
• #plugapps sucked me in, and I can't stop helping… #
• So much compiling & editing to do…
  Apache is on my hit list atm, then icu >> all to build php #
• papps_installer (for plugapps) is almost done. Then I need to work on SOOOOOOOOOO many other bugs/hacks… #
• http://www.archplug.org # preparing to start my own distro for arm! #

[Review] Pogoplug v2 (Pinkie)



Summary:

Bunch of information, and hay look, an iPhone! Too bad I only have a Motorola Droid Oh wait, there’s an app for *that* too.

Ohh, ahhh! It’s nice how they framed up the pogoplug against the black backdrop. What sucks is that the material the black stuff is comprised of is felty & sheds all over the device. After I pulled the device out of the box I had to thoroughly clean all the blackness off of the plug. It might not bother some people, but I believe that when you take a device out of the box it should be in its cleanest/mintist condition it will ever be in

Aside from this minor trifle I was impressed with the look/construction of the device. It looks pretty, and keeps the pink theme, and has a nice white/glossy finish.

The Front of the device is stunning. It includes the pogoplug logo lit up with green (not pictured). Then the pink accent sweeps to the rear of the device. It doesn’t stop there, the designers added some more plastic, and added a cable loop. When you’re selling a device that is supposed to have a bunch of usb devices plugged into it; it’s nice to have some kind of cable organization built in. The back of the device is very simple. 3 usb, ethernet, and a wallwart plug. What’s spectacular is that the PSU is builtin to the device. Meaning there is no un-stylish boxy wallwart. It’s just a plain white cable that plugs into the back of the device.

Performance/Interface:

Lets start with a few transfers (Network Throughput):

fsk141@FailNAS:/ambry/Media/Photos$ time scp -r 2005-Car-My_Room root@10.0.0.106:/tmp && time scp -r 2005-Car-My_Room 10.0.0.100:/tmp

# Pogoplug

020.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   974 KB    00:00
012.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   929 KB    00:00
015.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1005 KB    00:00
004.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   941 KB    00:00
003.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   902 KB    00:00
014.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   514 KB    00:00
013.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************| 56584       00:00
021.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1245 KB    00:00
002.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1212 KB    00:00
005.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   833 KB    00:00
006.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   859 KB    00:00
001.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1181 KB    00:00
008.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1106 KB    00:00
019.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   975 KB    00:00
010.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   832 KB    00:00
017.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1211 KB    00:00
022.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1429 KB    00:00
025.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1424 KB    00:00
009.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************| 32202       00:00
007.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   876 KB    00:00
024.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1020 KB    00:00
023.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1048 KB    00:00
016.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   983 KB    00:00
011.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   888 KB    00:00
018.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1149 KB    00:00

real    0m5.975s
user    0m0.527s
sys     0m0.121s

# Storage server
020.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   974 KB    00:00
012.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   929 KB    00:00
015.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1005 KB    00:00
004.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   941 KB    00:00
003.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   902 KB    00:00
014.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   514 KB    00:00
013.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************| 56584       00:00
021.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1245 KB    00:00
002.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1212 KB    00:00
005.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   833 KB    00:00
006.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   859 KB    00:00
001.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1181 KB    00:00
008.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1106 KB    00:00
019.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   975 KB    00:00
010.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   832 KB    00:00
017.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1211 KB    00:00
022.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1429 KB    00:00
025.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1424 KB    00:00
009.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************| 32202       00:00
007.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   876 KB    00:00
024.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1020 KB    00:00
023.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1048 KB    00:00
016.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   983 KB    00:00
011.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|   888 KB    00:00
018.jpg              100% |*************************************************************************************|  1149 KB    00:00

real    0m0.730s
user    0m0.403s
sys     0m0.053s

The speeds are 8.18 times faster to my storage server that the pogoplug. BTW the reason I’m using /tmp and not a connected device is so that I can get the most clean results. It’s nand flash, and should be the fastest. Plus there is no abstraction layers that would complicate the transfer process…

fsk141@FailNAS:/ambry/Media/Photos$ time scp 2005-Car-My_Room.tar.gz root@10.0.0.106:/tmp && scp 2005-Car-My_Room.tar.gz 10.0.0.100:/tmp

#Pogoplug
2005-Car-My_Room.tar 100% |*************************************************************************************| 23544 KB    00:05

real    0m5.742s
user    0m0.474s
sys     0m0.108s

#Storage Server
2005-Car-My_Room.tar 100% |*************************************************************************************| 23544 KB    00:00

Single file transfer speeds are eggzactly the same, with a little better performance due to a fraction of a second speedup on multi-file transfer.

This is a big disappointment Although most users don’t care if it takes a while to transfer a file, I do. My time is precious, and I don’t want to have to wait for extended periods of time for my files to transfer over to *any* device.

——

Onto the CPU:

The ARM9 cpu is great, but it seems like pogoplug is pushing the capabilities a little far. For example, by default the pogoplug will auto encode your video/music files for streaming. This is great, since a lot of my files are in *great* quality & need to be compressed to allow smooth streaming. The only problem is that it takes upward of 2 hours to encode a 30 minute (160MB) .avi file. I guess it’s nice that it *does* encode video, but that it takes that long is kinda a bummer. It would be kewl if you could have a few pogoplugs that would work together & process your stuff (shared resources). [On a side note I'm working on a hack to allow this, but it's not supported out of the box]

Onto the web interface:

The Pogoplug (web interface) is simple to setup (6 step process). Basically all you need to do is plug in your device to your network, plug in some storage, and head over to http://my.pogoplug.com to start the registration process. Once finished you are greeted by the following:

A nice little greeting of what’s to come…

After you’ve plugged in your storage device(s) you have access to them in almost any way imaginable. It’s just a matter of installing Pogodrive on your computer, which will give you access to your drives on your pogoplug:

The drive acts as if it was plugged in locally (minus the slower transfer times). I didn’t take the time to delve into the program too deeply to see if it deciphered between you being in a local/outside network to determine what path would be fastest to transfer files. I suppose it’s a hybrid process that will use the fastest route.

——
As far as the web interface goes…

It needs polishing. Oh I forgot to mention that the uploader uses flash. Not javascript/ajax/hybrid. It uses FLASH! This really eeeks me. I know that web uploads are last resort, but I really wish it wasn’t flash . Anyway there is a lot that I wish was in the web interface, and wish there were a lot more things to configure. Supposedly there will be an update in March that will address my hopes and dreams (until then I wait & hack away with plugapps)
Epic disappointment:

There is no local access to the device at the moment. You have to be connected to the internet for your device to work & authenticate with the Pogoplug servers. So if your internet access goes down, well your screwed. You can always go and detach your devices and plug them into your machine; but who wants to do that? I would really like to see an update that allows for failover in the case of loss of internet connection. (To access the device via ip address)

Conclusion:

Meh… The Pogoplug has wonderful potential, but it seems like the software is lacking where the hardware has the capability to shine. Then again the device will still be held back by the network bus. I wanted the review to be as stock as possible so I didn’t hack the device to add on testing programs (that would be cheating). In the future I will test to see if the device even has a wide enough network bus to allow for true Gigabit speeds. It seems like it *won’t*, but maybe with some optimization I can get it to perform? Overall the Plug is a decent consumer device, but I would hold off on recommending it to anyone until an update address’ some issues (configurability via web config, local access, network bus throughput optimizations, [easy] extensibility, remove flash uploader) What it boils down to is the device has a great setup, and is tailored for dummies. But when an advanced user goes to use the device they are left in the dark…

Pros:

• Super easy setup
• Web interface
• 4 usb ports (way better that other plug devices that require you to have a usb hub
• Win/Linux/Mac/Android/iPhone Support

Cons:

• Slow (encoding, network throughput [ ])
• Limited configurability
• No local access (via internal IP address)
• Flash file uploader in web interface
• Packaging leaves black stuff all over the device

Convert .bin/.cue to .iso [Mac/Linux]

I dislike .bin/.cue combinations for a few reasons. But the biggest is that Mac doesn’t natively support mounting them. Good thing I have macports to install linux programs.

Firstly lets install bchunk (use your favorite package manager, or macports on the mac)

# Mac Installation
sudo port install bchunk

Then locate your .bin/.cue combinations and CONVERT!

jg_mbp:CBT NUGGETS CISCO CCNA CCENT EXAM-PACK 640-822 ICND1 jgerold$ bchunk agcnccci.{bin,cue} CCENT
binchunker for Unix, version 1.2.0 by Heikki Hannikainen <hessu@hes.iki.fi>
 Created with the kind help of Bob Marietta <marietrg@SLU.EDU>,
 partly based on his Pascal (Delphi) implementation.
 Support for MODE2/2352 ISO tracks thanks to input from
 Godmar Back <gback@cs.utah.edu>, Colas Nahaboo <Colas@Nahaboo.com>
 and Matthew Green <mrg@eterna.com.au>.
 Released under the GNU GPL, version 2 or later (at your option).

Reading the CUE file:

Track  1: MODE1/2352    01 00:00:00

Writing tracks:

 1: CCENT01.iso  338/338  MB  [********************] 100 %
jg_mbp:CBT NUGGETS CISCO CCNA CCENT EXAM-PACK 640-822 ICND1 jgerold$ ls
CCENT01.iso     agcnccci.bin    agcnccci.cue
# ^Yay a new .iso

bchunk makes .bin/.cue > .iso conversion EASY!

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-01-31

• OMG, just got http://www.pogoplug.com and I love it. It is one of the most amazing NAS devices I've ever setup (and setup took about 1 min) #
• jg-mbp:~ jgerold$ ssh root@10.0.0.106
  root@10.0.0.106's password:
  -bash-3.2#
  ^ Just rooted my Pogoplug #