Thursday, 25 September 2008
Fun times
Instead I have a windows xp box running wamp on it. It currently runs Wordpress, and Gallery2. So why not install it on that machine. i know it has a limited hard drive, but this is a proof of concept. Hahaha, these normally turn into full running machines which never get turned off and end up with the system fan or cpu fan not working. More about these later.
better get back to getting silverstripe running.
now that I have it running it is getting to grips with what it can do. I am going to have to think, nooooo, getting used to templates and subdomains, right, need to start with the tutorials. It took me 12 minutes and a google search on how to change the title and subtitle.
You may now laugh at me...
Wednesday, 24 September 2008
developments
Tuesday, 16 September 2008
Playing around
But that is not what this post is about. It is about what i am doing in class. We are getting our newly purchased second hand dell machines up and going, one of them we are playing around with as a wireless hotspot and the other getting LTSP running which is a Linux Terminal Server Project. I am just in the process of getting it downloaded, again from the site to try and install it again, never lend the development CD out to students. I am using the new browser called chrome to do this, something new and for the proxy logs to take in account :)
I have managed to download and install the alternate version of 8.04 and it is currently installing on the machine now, though I do think I may need to add some more RAM to it. Also looking at getting an alternative to mstc. As I think this is locked down in the RMSmartTools environment, so have download and run RealVNC to see what that will act like.
Just going through now and installing 118 updates to the system, and will then try and connect to it. Though I need to find a manual on how I update the local virtual image.
My big fear is that it will run its own DHCP server that will take over the schools already working DHCP server?
Also what port do I access the machine on?
*Note: This is rather an issue now, you cannot access this via rdc, it is a PXE boot only, words that cannot be mentioned here are echoing around the room I am in at the moment. I have spent all this time trying to do something that cannot be done, maybe some more searching and reading needs to be done. Well it is 7:40pm and I am still here, maybe I should go home and sleep on it.
I am also playing around with mobile technology to see what I can do with it, and what it has to offer, I can't wait for a presentation at the ulearn conference on how the teacher in Auckland is handling mobile technology in his classroom and field trips.
Now I have to get the Office 2007 installation CD and put it on my laptop, it just feels wrong to do this, but oh well.
Monday, 15 September 2008
Robots
Sunday, 14 September 2008
Issues with mail
Friday, 12 September 2008
Thinking about XNA development Next Year
Thursday, 11 September 2008
First Exam
Wednesday, 10 September 2008
Terminal Services
Ubuntu offers you an easy way to turn a desktop installation into a terminal server for your office or school to serve multiple diskless clients.
The LTSP-5 Terminal Server implementation that was developed in Ubuntu together with ltsp.org and debian, is now being adopted into most other distributions (Fedora, Gentoo, OpenSuSE). With Ubuntu Terminal Services you get the most recent and reliable Terminal Server implementation currently available on the linux market.
Recent studies have shown that using diskless Thin Clients in office environments saves on average around 50% of your power costs. Maintenance, user and software management of a Terminal Server is centralised on the server instead of maintaining individual work places. All data is stored on the server, so if client hardware breaks you won't lose data. Hardware replacement is as easy as changing a lightbulb, allowing users to carry on with their work in minutes.
To use Ubuntu Terminal Services during Ubuntu install use the Ubuntu Alternate CD for installation, hit F4 at the bootscreen and select "Install a LTSP server" from the pop up "Modes" menu. If you use a machine with two network cards, your server will work directly out of the box (in the case where you have only one network card it will tell you what to do).
Visual Diaries
But looking through it i came across a page which caught my eye. I am unsure of the date but it is around teh time I created a piece of work called soccertape, which is on page 58 of a book I have calledx ICONS Web Design: Studios Ed Julies Wiedemann, which has a website for www.evergrowing.net
Now this was an idea for a end of year assessment for this to be developed by the students and I even took images of grass that they could use as a background for lawn moving to get flowers to grow out of, I don't know why. But at least I can see when I imported the image onto my computer, this was around the 4/12/2006.
Now I see a Senior Curriculum Guide for 2008 listed on the next page and following that a description for Year 9 Technology ICT that lists that we have it fo 10 weeks and three periods a week. So I am trying to think when I wrote the Senior Curriculum Guide Information, it must have been 2007.
We need an online subject choice and information of subjects for the following year.
Needs to be simple to use.
Maybe print off final selections in a pdf document to be taken around to HoD to sign.
Selection by Year
By Subject/Group
Use 2007 data to trial this, what format could it be in.
I think this is just a preview of what we were looking at, it could be just the curriculum guide in a different electronic format, much less that what it is now. This was to just display the curriculum guide not make option selections. I planned this two years ago, as it lists the curriculum guide for 2008, we have now done it for 2009, which is for next year.
But I am amazed at what I wrote down and what it has become.
Tuesday, 9 September 2008
programming for the mac
Xcode is Apple's tool suite and integrated development environment (IDE) for creating Mac OS X software. The IDE provides a powerful user interface to many industry-standard and open-source tools, including GCC, javac, jikes, and GDB. Xcode is designed to fully support the Carbon and Cocoa frameworks and Java. It contains templates for creating applications, frameworks, libraries, plug-ins, Java applications and applets, and command-line tools. Developers can use Xcode to edit and manage source code, test code performance, and perform many other common development tasks.
a look at 2009
I am thinking about creating a survey to ask these students hwa they thought about this year and what they want to do next year. With NCEA you can do just about anything, with some limitaitions, we cannot create a killing machine, but we can create a lego robot with attachments that can kill other robots. But what do they want to do and what do I have to learn to help with that. Of course I still have to cover some computer science curriculum, but do we have one at the moment to cover, no. We are still waiting for the digital Technologies Guidelines, and other various groups to get together and hash something out for Computer science.
Some of the things this year we have had to put extra permissions on the machines to get XNA to run. This would probably need to go over two classes next year. I would like to have RM Smart tools removed and a back to basic winXP operating system, or dare I say Vista installed on the machines. On its own subnet so the security issues and control still remain with us. This would allow us to do Hacker High School and do some more techniques than this year. Also the hassle of getting virtual machines and software installed on the RMSmartTools network has caused headaches and work arounds. Maybe the students could access a terminal server is they needed to do their work.
One of the projects that I would like to do is listed here, http://techreport.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=31609
It is to develop and underwater ROV.
More to come
the second dell machine
The power light is flashing amber
Which means...
If the power light is blinking amber —
The computer is receiving electrical power, but an internal power problem might exist.
Ensure that the voltage selection switch is set to match the AC power at your location (if applicable).
Ensure that the processor power cable is securely connected to the system board.
I can find no fault of anything that could explain this.
Update
Power supply is dead, we unplugged the power supply and hooked up the other one from the other dell machine that was brought at the same time. It brought the system to life. So I am now on the lookout for another power supply, must be 24 pin + 4 pin, and have SATA connections on it.
Update 2
We may have managed to find a supply for this machine, both through the technician at work and the other through a reader of the blog. Will update when we get these and connect them up.
Meanwhile the first dell machine is going hard at it, although we found another issue when reinstalling ubuntu 7.10. It would stop at 80% install. Thanks to one of the students looking up the Internet it was a simple fix, unplug the Ethernet cable and away it went. The first install we did we didn't have the network cable attached, I wonder why?
Update 3
yay, we managed to get a power supply that fits into the machine and connected. we now have ubuntu 7.10 installed and running on it. Now I need to get more network cables connected and work out how we can get a couple more wireless access points. I think I might need to raid the old ones from maths department
Monday, 8 September 2008
Motel wireless setup
We have managed to get some dell machines from an online auction house. These machines are Dell Opitplex Gx280.
We have some ubuntu 7.10 CDROM available to us which will allow us to get linux up and running on them. Who needs Windows.
Some of the software we are looking at installing and testing out is hotcakes.sourceforge.net.
Alternative link to the sourceforge project site is here. http://sourceforge.net/projects/hotcakes/
We have done an initial install and tried to follow the manual on how to install it with some success. The only hitch we have have hit is getting CakePHP to run. This has involved some tinkering and some sudo commands to get access. However, most of the documnetation we read on how to fix this problem is for windows environments running WAMP, which hasn't been much help.
The cake Manual is available from here, it will take some understanding to be able to install it and some help from other websites as I am still having trouble trying to get the links to the mysql database working.
Part of the reason why I am looking at hotcakes is the features, it is customiable, wherei can put the logo of the motel in and personalise it just for them, its free. Which is always a good thing and it gets students involved in developing their own skills.
There are other alternatives out there, one of these is chillispot running on DD-WRT. Now this requires that you have a Linksys WRT54G Wireless Access Router and requires you to flash the device, however when you read the file you will see what challenges lay ahead. See the link to view more details
Note:
I do wish we had more time to get down and dirty with this, one hour periods are fine for juniors, but for senior students working on some serious projects, one hour is not enough each day. You only really catch up what you did the previous day and maybe work through one or two steps before the time is up.
Notes that I wrote up while in class working on this solution:
The seninario is:
To create a wireless hotspot for a motel owner to use with his current system.
The current system he currently uses is ZoneCD which runs on a LiveCD (http://www.publicip.net/ ia the development site, the commericial site is available at http://publicip.com/). He uses a usb storage device attached to grab the configuration data. The only problem with this has been a lack of secure socket layer encryption. In plain laguage, it keeps cutting out.
This could have been due to his internet connection problems but has since change internet providers and routers which the same problem.
the logs state.
ermail log attached.MySQL Error: ()
~ 09/06/08 LogsMessage-ID: <20080906235831.GA3621@zone.publicip.net>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Disposition: inlineUser-Agent: Mutt/1.3.28i
Your Daily Logs are attached for Database error: connect(localhost,free_web,PASSWORD) failed.
MySQL Error: ()
09/06/08...
No other other log information is received through the email settings.
He would like a new system that is a little more stable.
The machine he curently has is an old pentium computer that has been running for two years without being turned off and is now making strange noises, This could be due to the fan on the processor or the power supply fan.
He has two network cards in the machine to allow for the filtering of traffic, so people cannot download torrents or thrash his network in any way.
There is no keyboard, mouse or screen attached to the computer so it cannot be interferred with by any staff member or minders. You can access the computer by ssh or remote desktop.
It is also stored in a storage area of the motel that has limited space.
Wireless access points, these are configured with static IP address and are open, the zoneCD is used as a firewall to stop outside people using this connection.
The other issue is that he is right beside a secondary school that has their own wireless access network. So channel and SSID settings need to be set up right.
He has a Linksys Wireless access point WRT54G and a Belkin Wireless access router that is being used to service the 14 units and the motel reception.
The system needs to be simple enough for him to create a user account and password, and allow them access for a certain amount of time.
Other issues with his current system have been the session popup box not connecting back to the server to give proper time, or having to relogin ever 5 minutes. There has been no support for the ZoneCD since Version 1.2-3 (Released 8 ·24·2005)
Future setups could be for our own secondary school to provide wireless acces to our students. So any development needs to be documnetated and amended as necessary.
Current Configuration Settings are available at http://publicip.net/devl/boot.php
Wednesday, 27 August 2008
subject choice
Add junior functionality, have added a table called subject_jnr
need to add junior export of data as well as change the export scripts not to export junior data just yet.
some extra functionality of exports is required
Tuesday, 26 August 2008
Wii Interactive Whiteboard
Connecting the wii remote to the bluetooth is a case of pressing the 1 and 2 button on the remote at the same time to put the remote into discovery mode.
Needed to install .net framework 3.5 to get the wiiwhiteboard software working,
Students have been having fun with it, thoufh we found the whiteboard that we have it too reflective for it to be used like a normal pen, instead we turned the marker around have been using in reverse with great response.
Other issues have been the wii turning itself off after 10 minutes of inactivity.
This requires you to re sync up the bluetooth and restart the wii whiteboard software after it has crashed out.
Also where the wii is placed, at the moment it is on top of the datashow, which is in a difficult place to get.
Maybe using velcro we could make something up that connects to the light fitting that is near the board to be able to hooked it up.
Students have been getting up and using it as I have had google earth running to show them what they can do, they then ask how is this working, the cannot see the other two interactive whiteboards within the school. I say I am using a wii remote they don't believe me, as they cannot see the wii. Thats one of the things I like about this, it makes them think about what they can do with accessories at home, why are they just used with one device, why not many devices.
Will look at creating another pen that we can use in reverse.
Friday, 22 August 2008
3d visual tour
Microsoft just released some cool software to mesh photos together. After taking several photos, the array of photos stitched together to recreate the scene.
in three dimensions. It's one of those deals where you have to see it to believe it. The product is called photosynth and you really need to think out of the box and be created to mesh your pictures together. The site has existing projects to view along with a blog.
This information is from the site:
You can share or relive a vacation destination or explore a distant museum or landmark. With a nothing more than digital camera and some inspiration, you can use Photosynth to transform regular digital photos into a three-dimensional, 360-degree experience. Anybody who sees your synth is put right in your shoes, sharing in your experience, with detail, clarity and scope impossible to achieve in conventional photos or videos.
Synths constitute an entirely new visual medium. Photosynth analyzes each photo for similarities to the others, and uses that data to build a model of where the photos were taken. It then re-creates the environment and uses that as a canvas on which to display the photos.
Subject Choice .4a
Thursday, 21 August 2008
subject choice .3d
Also looking at being to integrate year 9 into the system, working out how I could work through the 19 subjects some of these students have into the 8 subjects that is currently in the students imported database.
technology integration into the museum
Friday, 15 August 2008
Wii Interactive Whiteboard
the guy has developed a wii interactive whitevoard. I had seen something through the internet earlier in the year about this, however I thought, no way, whatever.
Today, i have been down and brought a couple of wii controllers to play with and get going.
You dont need a complete wii, just the controller, yay
The talk that has inspired me is located at http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/johnny_lee_demos_wii_remote_hacks.html
Johnny's website is located here, this is where you can access information about his wii hacks and what his next developments are.
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~johnny/projects/
for the specific wii information that I require is available here.
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~johnny/projects/wii/
i have to wai for my electronic supplier to get me in some iR LEDs
Also, there is a forum on tki on teh development of this
http://www.tki.org.nz/r/discuss/showthread.php?t=45&page=2&pp=10
Thursday, 14 August 2008
subject choice
fixing up spelling errors,
entering in last peices of text to help students, though i do need to modify one more part, they don't have to choose in options lines, there are no option lines.
Fix up list of subjects displayed for this year, subject 1 was shown twice, instead of subject 2.
and graphics as well as css updates.

