This should significantly increase our capture and processing speed. First, install libcv1 in ubuntu, I like to get the documentation and python bindings as well, and these will install libcv1 anyway. ` sudo aptitdue install python-cv opencv-doc ` Now we’ll start writing some C code. As I have the benefit of writing this article after the code, I know that one can render/display 30fps without processing, and can render/display without lag with processing as well (thank you compiled code!). You can compile opencv code in linux using the following command:
Ok, now that we have a working home automation server setup (see article 1), let’s plug in a lamp module and have it flash when our gmail arrives. First up, plug in the light module, select your house code (‘heyu info’ will tell you your house code) and an unused x10 number on the dial.
Find a lamp you’d like to have flash (or turn on, or dim etc etc) and plug it into any other outlet. Turn on the lamp, you want to be sure the light is actually on before you start cursing at your x10 module. Now plug the ‘on’ light into the x10 module. Let’s try turning on the module with a heyu on A3 Where A is your house code and 3 is your module number. Voila, you should have light. a quick heyu off A3 will get us back to the off state. There are many heyu options (dimming !) to try out, but they all work in this manner. Now, let’s install gmail-notify with a sudo aptitude install gmail-notify Gmail notify is a great python script to notify you when you have gmail. We will insert an execute command into the python code (very simple) so when gmail-notify runs and we have an unread email, flash the light (or dim the light, or turn on your lava lamp, etc.)
A little tic/toc ery has shown that without an image draw scilab can process 3 fps. So here’s a loop unrolled version that delays image rendering till 3 dots have been drawn.
//”paint” a scene with a laser pointer in realtime
//speed of update depends on speed of camera + processor
For some time now I’ve been into computer vision. However, much of computer vision is done on matlab, a 1000$ piece of software that doesn’t jive with my open source philosophy. Luckily, there are a number of open source alternatives. I prefer scilab, though octave is a good alternative. However, scilab has the advantage of an open source video toolbox. In this first article, I’ll show you how to setup scilab, opencv (the intel open computer vision library), and the sivp toolbox. Then we’ll verify its working by processing video from an avi file or in this case, a live webcam stream.
Ok, so i’ve got this old clamshell ibook. The main weakness of these models was the screen, a paltry 800×600 resolution. The main sweetness of the project:
Sometimes I feel like all the world’s problems can be solved with shell scripts. Here’s one that’s short and sweet. You give it a PID, interval, and outfile, and it keeps track of the PID given till the PID dies (or you kill the script). These values are plotted against time with gnuplot. I wrote it while keeping an eye on ‘top’ on a server. Snag it here
Ping Rebooter is a simple but useful application, basically it pings a website at some time interval if the website does not return, it uses wget to execute your cable/dsl modem’s reset string. The default reset string is: http://192.168.100.1/gscan.cgi?freq=331000000 This works for my linksys cable modem and has been tested on a few others. I find this useful
One of the more popular programs I released around 3 years ago, this one made it to the big-time. Magazines, download sites, and advertising revenue! SSRSS allows you to easily create and edit rss files.
Here is a program I wrote freshman year of college (1999). A text-based roleplaying game based on people I had met in the cs department. Fun, dated, text-based.
This is a program I wrote about 4-5 years ago which received some popularity on various international websites and magazines. While not as popular as ssrss, it still made lockergnome and shell city if I remember correctly. You use it to scroll or appear lines of text from a book or text file (or alarm text items you set up, features!) on the current window titlebar of whatever application you are using at the time. Source code available gplv3.
