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Showing posts from June, 2013

Fedora 18 Compile Moxa Beta Device Driver

Down below is a guide for Ubuntu Linux.  Here is the same thing for Fedora Linux. The serial interface device drivers on the Moxa web site may not work with the latest Linux kernels. Send an email message to " support at moxa dot com " and ask for a Beta device driver for Linux for your Moxa device model number.  You should get an answer within a few hours. First update the system # yum update or use yum extender GUI. The above will typically install about 50 to 100 Megabytes of updates and will take a while. Install the software development tools # yum install kernel-headers # yum groupinstall "Development Tools" "Development Libraries" Make a directory to work in $ cd $ mkdir Moxa-Beta $ cd Moxa-Beta Save the tar ball there and untar it: $ tar -zxvf driv_linux_uport_v1.2.5_build_13040314.tgz $ cd mxuport Make the driver $ make driver_make ...and you should see this scary m

Security Paranoia

The hullabaloo around the world-wide, blanket NSA phone, chat and email logging of the last few weeks has been a boon for computer security, since it made everyone think about it.  OK, not quite everyone, but hopefully every computer geek thought at least a little bit about security! http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/the-nsa-files The whole sorry mess is turning into a modern day enactment of Franz Kafka's Der Prozess (The Trial), where a man is tried by a secret court with a secret charge and eventually executed, without him or anybody else being any the wiser about what it was that he supposedly did wrong. Of course, all serious computer security professionals knew about all the spy-vs-spy stuff all along, but convincing Joe Public, or just a normal middle manager, that you are not a crazy paranoid deluded fool, is very difficult.  The current spate of news articles and government fancy footwork, denials, retractions and debate, now makes it a lot easier to talk about compute

4WD Rover

Flying a model plane in the desert is difficult.  There is sand laden wind during the day, so one can only fly at night and then one cannot see the plane properly.  So I decided to make a little runabout. A runabout robot uses much the same parts as a plane.  An aircraft RC system is used for backup and test and the autopilot is the same, just with a different ArduRover software load. Details here  http://rover.ardupilot.com/ Where to get the parts Pololu.com sells a range of motor speed controllers with various control inputs.  The Easy series has linear, digital and RC control inputs.  It can also blend two RC channels for differential control.  This way, one can make a 4WD robot chassis, using the Throttle channel for speed control and the Rudder channel for direction.  The blending will add or subtract the two channels such that the left/right will speed up or slow down the one side slightly, to make the model turn. I picked the 18V 15A speed controller  http://www.pololu.c