October 15, 2006
Ubi.ach 2.0
Email reader - Ubi.ach
IM reactor/reader - Ubi.chat
WirelessSpeaker - Ubi.play
Posted by min at 10:18 PM
September 09, 2006
Ubicomp '06
Our Ubiach got into the 8th annual Ubicomp conference This year, they are holding it in Irvine, CA.
More to come... Busy preparing...
Posted by min at 11:59 PM
June 17, 2006
Ubiach Demo
Posted by min at 03:34 PM | Comments (0)
Techs of the Ubi.ach
RF by Sparkfun and our prototype board.
Posted by min at 03:06 PM | Comments (0)
June 01, 2006
UB.iach For the SpringShow 2006
Posted by min at 05:28 PM | Comments (0)
March 26, 2006
UBi.ach MidTerm 03.23.06
We faced a few problems with the switches. Because the walkie talkie works off holding onto the side button when transmitting, the signal kept on turning off as soon as we made a connection Also. because we had stuffed the walkietalkie into the chicken doll inside with all the motors and wires, the antenna did pick up a lot of static. The TTS software was a little too machanic also.
The transmitter peeps
The wires ended up falling off the last minute before our presentation, but we pulled through. The class sent emails out to ubiach@gmail.com and the chicken did its thing by running around and saying the subject through the walkietalkie. Everyone was amused. We have decided to take it further into our final project for this class. More ideas to come, but we plan onto create a community of these ubi.aches with their very own characteristics and functions.
Other projects
Christian and Rob's 3d Cube Controller and game
Tristan, Zach and Ben's bluetooth, EEG controlled muscles project
Posted by min at 03:30 PM | Comments (0)
March 22, 2006
UBi.ach 03.20.06
Our UBi.ach Receiver in action
Posted by min at 03:44 PM | Comments (0)
March 20, 2006
UBi.ach Update
G finally returned from Texas and we met up on Sunday 03.19.06.
From G's blog.
The php file will:
a. parse the new email messages and place them in a database (SQL).
b. place the subject of the message on the clipboard
can use the - GtkEditable::copy_clipboard command:
void copy_clipboard(void);
copy_clipboard() copies the current selection to the clipboard.
It also causes the "copy-clipboard" signal to be emitted.
c. The TTS application will run automatically (from the startup), and take as argument anything that's on the clipboard. Then needs to erase the clipboard.
For the midterm, we will have a stuffed toy with a walkie talkie inside and the sound out will come from the ubiach@gmail.com account through the TTS. More to come.
Posted by min at 10:58 AM | Comments (0)
March 11, 2006
UBi.ach Hardware
The plan over break
Details of easy walkie talkies
Gilad: ubiach@gmail.com perl script into clipboard
To check every minute
Tracy and Min: Hacking into walkie talkies
Hack input and output
Output of the computer into the walkie talkie
Output into out speaker
Today, Tracy and I met up at ITP at noon to start our walkietalkie hacking.
Instead of using a MINI ITX, the EasyRadio, we figured out from Todd H that all we'd need was a walkietalkie. This part would be the part that would be needed for the doll to become wireless from the computer.
Went over to the big bad Kmart at Astor Place to find these cheap $20 WalkieTalkies, Model FV200 made by Motorola.
As soon as we opened up the walkietalkies, the first thing T says, "I HATE these switches!"
What we've been able to accomplish today
- hacked the power button on the walkie, 2 pins act as switches
- the audio input from the mic in the walkie #1 gets hooked up into audio in on the laptop, listens to the TTS software and transfers the sound into walkie #2
Diagram
During the SpringBreak week, Tracy and I will be working on the rest of the buttons on the walkie and try to fit in into a stuffed toy just to test it out.
Posted by min at 05:13 PM | Comments (0)
Location and Identification 03.09.06
RFID tag from Texas Instruments
The reader costs about $70.
- pets in NYC are to have these embedded in between their shoulders by law. Recently have become a law
- there are readers that only read certain tags
- can do w. multiple readers to sync with each other. the RFID reader also has a serial connection to receive data
- set to different frequencies so not to let interferrance with other readers (keep them paired up)
- powered RFIDs can travel much further
- passive tags gets a burst of energy when reader comes by it (32bits on the tag)
- semi passive
- active passive : its own power source, more data, reads further
- invasive technology
- look into Sklar, Dorkbot
Mini ITX
GPS
- need a point of reference
- satallite reference. government has control over them
- question in accuracy, not too sure of the location
Biometric
- knowing exactly who a person is (finger prints etc)
Posted by min at 10:04 AM | Comments (0)
March 09, 2006
UBi.ach Revised FlowChart
Automated gmail check to php checks then brings into the clipboard, into Text to Speech. Sound out.
The Ace High, Text to Speech App reads out whatever is on the clipboard of the computer.
Posted by min at 10:59 AM | Comments (0)
March 08, 2006
WiPort 03.04.06
Need to use serial for first WIPORT configuration
Inverting serial, instead of talking to the PIC, talking to the WiPort
Through zterm, hit 0 to connect
Hold down to X key
Gateway IP address : 192.168.1.1
8 bits of the host port netmask
WLAN :
N
Find network name (netobj)? Y
Enable Ad Hoc network ( letting other things to connect as an access point) N
Data rate : set to 6
Power management : radial battery cycle N
Save prefs
Fix the antenna to a certain point that needs to be pointed towards a direction
Try and reload web based interface
192.168.1.102
If one is trying to connect to the wiport, it can only handle one at a time.
Once set up, pic can talk to the WIport using hex invertor
Wiport over Bluetooth. Wiport is easier than Bluetooth. Wiport covers a much larger area. Bluetooth is for personal space areas of about 2ms or so. Less battery power also. Wiport has 300 ft range. Robust connection and range of signal.
MINI ITX boards:
Full blown 17x17 motherboard like the computer. Much more powerful than a PIC. DO need the power to do multimedia.
Mac minis are mini ITXes (nano ITX) can run Pentium, windows
Wireless servers : ITP sandbox
To get access to sandbox, email tom about accessing sandbox.
Then set it up to make it talk to the outside world
With the mini itx, we don’t need one.
MINI ITX
IDE 2.5” 1.8 harddrive, or compact flash (difference like video ipod n nano) power is the issue here- battery usage 1gig CF= 60 bucs
Depends o nthe OS that is used,. Windows xp more than linux.
Have to test it out to see power usage
Mini ITX sites : email and ask Patrick before ordering them
Computer GATE computergate.com
Mini ITX link
800 mhz processor MINI ITX board $100 : EPIA -800
128-258 RAM $20
HD :CF or mini hard drive $20-200 , connector for the Compact Flash
Mini hard drive – adaptor = $10
Power $30 ATX connection power
ATX : Big computer desktop boards
ITX : mini motherboards
Mini ITX: working with the computer, scripting languages are allt here, C C++ java, can run servers on it also, graphical environments as well.
To connect to motors, etc, use serial, usb or connect to an XPORT to talk to eachother. Sensors hooked up into the Xport to talk to the computer to get data in.
Knobs etc. on the XPort
XPort with serial / Ethernet into the mini itx
We have to build our MINI ITXes
For the wiport, need a good fanning/ cooling system- heat sync etc
WIport and Serial RF:
Same range,
Wiport has everything bundled together. No protocol needed, has web access.
RF: buy a transceiver, receiver 2 serial connections going on. Have to do our own protocol.
Posted by min at 09:09 PM | Comments (0)
Space Annotation & Smart Home, Midterm Project 03.02.06
Tristan's friend from Columbia U came to demo a neural controlling interface. Simply freaky. As one would control the buttons on a mac, his arms would twitch without his control. Only about 0.025mAs going through these electrodes, but the layer of the skin with H20 abundant tissue cells allow for the current to move through rapidly, affecting the muscle movements.
Midterm
- concept, theory, execution (actual physcial thing)
- presentation of
Ideas
- Single board computer
- SD chip has 60 sec chips SMD
- TMS :cuts out certain parts of the brain functions to knock out parts of speech, visual field, etc
Spatial Annotation
- wifi systems, gps
- we don't really need to have the tech to get this idea of spatial annotation, ex. street signs, tagged environments around us
- who, what, how is it used?
- creating tags onto spaces (open node), chalked tags on streets (temporal quality)
- visual, audio tags
- podcase : museum audio guidance
- storage= flat
- memory = texture to it
- the idea of "tagging" has changed
- tagging is storage not memory (experience)
- needs the experience and memory
- retrieving into not creating exprience or mem
- bodies moving things that are tagged, not necessarily static tagging
- changing community with a wifi boombox
Domestic Annotations
- smart homes: predicts, manages life at homes, controlled environments
- controlling environments outside of the home and managing appliances
- knowing personal prefs for me
- predicts, plans, manages
- programming randomness within the controlled system
- automated systems: can become absolutes
Posted by min at 01:59 AM | Comments (0)
March 07, 2006
Networking at ITP, Nancy L Workshop 03.03.06
PC: putty as secure shell
the new server is now in place. Some general information on it:
• RedHat Enterprise Edition Application Server 4 (RHEL 4)
• SELinux for more info see this and that
• Apache 2
• PHP 4.3.9 (running in Safe Mode)
• Perl 5.8.5 (runs only in cgi-bin)
• MySQL 4.1.10 : REDHAT 4 allows this
ITP server is hosted by ITS- RED Hat Packages with the versions according.
Php runs as “user apache” – web server user and not user id make the file writeable
In putty, control u deletes the line in the prompt
[gml229@itp blog]$ quota
Disk quotas for user gml229 (uid 793994):
Filesystem blocks quota limit grace files quota limit grace
/dev/mapper/asvg-home
113276 125000 127000 2445 125000 127000
ls –l
control c : cancel out
top – shows what programs are being used right now
[gml229@itp ~]$ ps -U gml229
PID TTY TIME CMD
15243 ? 00:00:00 sshd
15245 pts/10 00:00:00 bash
17408 pts/10 00:00:00 ps
Man : manual
Q : to leave
D : down
Binary works best most of the times
Shows all hits on the site
tail -10/var/log/httpd/ access_log | grep
usage : 200 is successful load and read,
300 or 400(wrong password) is wrong access
Grep ’72.30.133.19’ /var/log/httpd/access_log
Posted by min at 07:42 AM | Comments (0)
March 04, 2006
UBi.ach Gmail Reader
Gilad, Tracy and I have begun to talk about our midterm for our NetworkedObjects class.
Lots have been talked about. We've already had three meetings, simply discussing about our concepts, the technicality that would be involved and the final object that we envision in the end. I have to admit, so far, the group dynamic has been really good. I've always wanted to work with both Tracy and Gilad and this is the most ideal setting. I'm really quite excited.
After much talk about applying RFIDs into a language translator on the floor at ITP, haptic objects that would give biofeedback etc, we've decided to create a "Gmail Reading Doll"
I think we've decided to explore in the lines of "Calm Technology" with emails in our daily lives.
Yes, it is true that this idea has been done before, on a parrot, but we would like to give this "doll" some preferences that would suit the user and give it a lot more character than the parrot.
We had originally thought of this idea of a ubiquitous doll that would read out emails, smses and the things to do in that day, but I think it would be of an enough challenge for us to get one part going. For the miterm, we plan on prototyping a very simple idea, demo and then hopefully carry on into the finals to realize our original concept.
Essentially, these are the underlying ideas behind our UBi.ach.
- whenever an email is sent out to ubiach@gmail.com, the perl script, cron tab will refresh and update the info that has been received. This then gets taken into PHP and the data will be separated and parsed into subject, sender, body etc of the email.
- this all then gets sent into our ITP SQL server and gets stored in a database. there is a system within that separates the important emails from the less important ones and will create a list of important contacts (eg. if my mums were to send me 10 emails per day to remind me to call, the UBi.ach will give me a constant reminder of the message)
- in the hardware side, the PIC, XPORT will communicate with the PHP script and the SQL server to check up for constant incoming email messages, events and reminders etc.
- the data will then be sent to a Text to Speech application and stored as a .wav or .mp3 file on the ITP server
- the sound files come into a flash card inside the doll
- PIC will read and play the sound files
Our first FlowChart for our project.
We had our next meeting again on Mar 3rd. After hearing some options from Patrick D, we have decided to go ahead with a single board computer that he recommended to Gilad.
Posted by min at 08:18 AM | Comments (0)
February 23, 2006
Networked Game First Assignment
From Gilad's Blog
CatchMeNetworkedGame
We created a 2-player game that is controlled with 4 potentiometers (2 for each player), each controller uses an Xport (with the following code
) to connect to a python script
on the itp server (in the cgi-bin). This script parses the message from the PIC (the two readings from the pots), and writes them to a .txt file (important not to put the .txt file in the cgi-bin folder-> otherwise processing can't open it!). We run a processing app which reads both data files and uses the information from the potentiometers in order to place the two players at the appropriate spot on the screen.
There have been problems with the itp server/timing. Best would be to have our own little server (next time!), but also every time the we send information to the server, to cut off the connection (sending the ascii character '4' - "serout[4]") and then time is not wasted on the server talking back to the PIC chip. It is also extremely wasteful to have the .txt files in between the communication.
Brainstorming
SystemDiagram
Controllers for two players
Posted by min at 02:17 AM | Comments (0)
February 09, 2006
Soldering Party 02.09.06
We all soldered our Xport boards today. Nothing much but just that it was quite time consuming.
Music in the bg, the birthday boy brought us all goodie bags... Thanks Rob for everything!
And my very own xport board!
Posted by min at 06:24 PM | Comments (0)
February 08, 2006
Context Awareness Readings
The BBCi Showcase, interactive display seems quite successful. First the user's interface is easy to follow and it seems that the screen on the window definately would attract those people that are passing. It seems that it is the latest trend with broadcast stations to add more interactivity. Whether it be online or offline, like this project by IDEO. In Korea, the latest trend are the DMBs that have recently come out. Digital Multimedia Broadcasting. People would be able to link their cells or portables to the TV stations and watch the programs in real time. This would not limit the user to his environment and location to get constant entertainment, information and news updates.
The Blinkenlights project in Berlin however seems to lack much content and interactivity. Why would one play "pong" on a building. How is the result so rewarding? The random patterns and images that people were able to create seems more appealing. Also, from this project, it seems that the "love message" were the most popular. Then, why would one use a lower res pixelated windows on a building to send a message out to your loved one instead of on a huge billboard screen? If the outputs are just random, how is that different to having windows of the building separately light up?
The Vectorial Elevation project was my favorite out of these three. Lights in the sky at night is almost magical and has the potential to engage everyone out on the streets. I remember when the 911 memorial lights were lit up at the beginning of this year. Even from NYU, the lights could be seen and it made me think back to the time when I was here during the event. It's quite surprising that over a period of 2 weeks. only 522,442 people had visited and interacted with the website to try and change the night skys in Dublin. Perhaps the public wasn't quite ready for such networked, interactive artwork. This definately showcased the coming-together of the virtual and the real-world. Visually and conceptually, I think it was a great networked piece.
Posted by min at 11:23 PM | Comments (0)
February 02, 2006
Context Awareness 02.02.06
Discussions on the reading assignment
Project Planning
Code flowchart - quasi code to make it clear in the head, diagrams etc
Posted by min at 10:02 PM | Comments (0)
January 30, 2006
The Coming Age of Calm Technology
I enjoyed reading this article by Mark Weiser and John Seely Brown.
I was quite surprised by the fact that people had such ideas in 1996, when personal computers and networks weren't as available to individuals.
The first sentence of the articles is powerful, "What matters is not technology, but its relationship to us." Technology is only a tool that people use to facilitate their lives. It can not be the core factor in life, nor can it be disruptive to us. So the relationship is something that I've always asked myself about. There are so many peripherals today that we all own. However, I sometimes get all wound up in the whole idea of the cool gadgets and techs and I find myself feeling overburdened by these new technology.
It is important that as artists, engineers and inventors at ITP, we try to embed this idea of "calm technology" into our projects.
I was recently in Korea over the break and learned quite a lot about the new ubiquitous city, in development, the Song Do City, Incheon. It's a city where the whole community will be networked, creating smart homes, appartments and environments that is aware of the human activity. Even today, in Seoul, there are new apparments in the city where the appliances and the utilities within a home is networked. One could use their cell phones to connect into their appartments to check in on the heating, gas leaks and possible burglaries. One could even monitor the humidity and oxygen levels.
"Ubiquitous computing is fundamentally characterized by the connection of things in the world with computation." When this is true, it is essential that the user should have the choice to stay out of all this networking. The user should NOT be overburdened and he should be able to have complete control.
Personally, I find that my cell phone for instance is a form of calm technology. I may choose to leave it on vibrate mode, ignore it and get back to it when I can. However, the email application is not "calm" to me what so ever. Constantly notifying me of the emails that I get that require my attention. I can choose to ignore it, just like I would with my cell phone, but currently being a student, it's my habit that I choose to put emails at a higher priority.
Interesting recent read, Real-time design in the "world as spread-sheet"
Posted by min at 02:09 PM | Comments (0)
Calm Technology, Xport 01.26.06
Discussion
Calm tech, with the abundance of info, computers, gadgets and peripherals that are widely available today, it has to be a form of passive technology.
OSI [Open Systems Interconnections Model]
More info in this link.
7 layers
Any of these layers can be removed and won't affect the other layers below it.
Control Issues in Networks
Xport, the communication
Posted by min at 01:17 PM | Comments (0)
January 29, 2006
Class one 01.19.06
Class structure
Class link
Three hardware projects
Reponses on readings on blogs
Discussions on networks today
Posted by min at 02:11 PM | Comments (0)