Re: [Hampshire] SMPT Authentification Methods for Hotmail

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Looks like we are heading to a happy ending.

I did spend some time looking at updating the code but it was looking 
very complex especially since I have so little time. However it looked 
like an interesting thing to do but not under pressure.


I managed to find a work around that keeps the invoices flowing albeit 
at the cost of an extra hour per week so the pressure is off.


It looks like Adams suggestion of Mythic beasts is the better solution.

As a bonus, the company had a mish mash of providers, domains and emails 
that had grown uncontrolled over the years and the staff had been crying 
out for consolidation and it looks like this is going to happen.


As for the warm feeling, it is always nice when strangers help out when 
you are not sure what to do. Back in the day this list could have 2 or 3 
queries a day and the amount of time saved must have been significant.


So once again,

Thank you all for your help.

Roger

On 02/10/2024 16:28, Brad Rogers via Hampshire wrote:

On Wed, 2 Oct 2024 16:13:48 +0100
Roger Munford via Hampshire  wrote:

Hello Roger,


Thank you all for your help and advice.

YW, Roger.


After all these years it gives me a warm feeling.

Oh dear.  That bad, eh?   :-)


I will let you know what happens.

I look forward to hearing about it.  I'm not an Oauth user myself, but
you never know;  one day.




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Re: [Hampshire] SMPT Authentification Methods for Hotmail

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Thank you all for your help and advice.

After all these years it gives me a warm feeling.

I will let you know what happens.

Thanks again

Roger

On 01/10/2024 12:49, Brad Rogers via Hampshire wrote:

On Tue, 1 Oct 2024 12:30:30 +0100
Roger Munford via Hampshire  wrote:

Hello Roger,


having hdifficulties finding out what mathod would keep Hotmail happy
and what extra will have to be done to make the whole process work. Up

1.  Hotmail no longer exists, per se - it's Outlook
2.  You're almost certainly going to have to delve into use of the Oauth2
 protocol as username/password is no longer sufficient.

The following will provide some context and may prove useful;
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/modern-authentication-methods-now-needed-to-continue-syncing-outlook-email-in-non-microsoft-email-apps-c5d65390-9676-4763-b41f-d7986499a90d

Apologies for the long link.  But, well, you know;  microsoft.

Finally:  Good luck.




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[Hampshire] SMPT Authentification Methods for Hotmail

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

I have been long retired but an old programme has come back to bite me.

Years ago I wrote a programme in Visual Foxpro using a Chilkat Active X 
mail component so that the user can send invoices etc by email from the 
programme.


However it has stopped working and it appears that the authentification 
method used "LOGIN" is no longer supported.


It is a nice small family company and I would like to help.

I am resigned to having to getting the updated mail component but I am 
having hdifficulties finding out what mathod would keep Hotmail happy 
and what extra will have to be done to make the whole process work. Up 
to now they only needed a password and username.


Thanks

Roger


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[Hampshire] Raspberry Pi Starter Kit

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Is anybody interested in a Raspberry Pi starter kit?
I am posting this on behalf of a friend who would just like a donation 
to the "Motor Neurone Disease Association" .
This kit is available from CPC for £60 and is described more fully here 
https://cpc.farnell.com/ucreate/rpi3-modb-pnpkit1/raspberry-pi-model-3b-plugnplay/dp/SC14936

It has been opened but not used.

Roger Munford


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[Hampshire] Linux Foundation European Open Source Survey

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

I received this on a Southampton Uni information email. The University 
are involved in some way 
https://linuxfoundation.org/featured/linux-foundation-initiates-world-of-open-source-research/


if you just want to take the survey https://www.research.net/r/7XL8MKF

Roger



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[Hampshire] Retrofitting Homes for low carbon

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Some of you will have put together systems for monitoring your homes, 
central heating etc.


Any body around Southampton might be interested in a talk that I am 
organising on Tuesday 24th May at the Highfield Church centre Highfield 
Lane.


An architect with a degree in building physiscs  talking about heat 
pumps, insulation, ventilation and the rest of it. I have heard him 
several times before which is why I invited him


Regards

Roger

"Retrofitting historic properties; Using case studies and reference 
projects to de mystify the challenge"



**

Gary Wilburn MSc BA(Hons) FCSD AECB
Chair of Trustees of the Association for Environment Conscious Building 
/https://aecb.net/


Fellow of the Chartered Society of Designers

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Re: [Hampshire] raspberry pi and educational software

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Thanks for all your interest and suggestions.

I was basically doing a bit of research for the German economist. I had 
always known that the prime aim of the raspberry pi was education and 
part of that was making it affordable so that those interested could get 
their hands on one and feel the magic that we presumably all enjoy. This 
is be very important for developing countries because they need an army 
of technicians to help overcome the challenges that they face. It seems 
to me that the raspberry pi, and associated educational software could 
be enormously useful.


My almost accidental visit to the secondary school was quite 
inspirational. It was amazing to see them teaching a full curriculum 
under really tough conditions. Imagine doing chemistry or Physics 
without and labwork. I of course was interested to see the ICT center.


I thought that the students would benefit a lot more if they had 5 - 6 
raspberry pis so that each would have more keyboard time. However a 
colleague said that the powers that be might think that the raspberry pi 
is inferior to windows because that's what they use in Europe.


The school had a couple of solar panels ,a charger, a 12V battery and a 
UPS  with a normal PC attached to it. The solar set up was financed by 
Polish Development aid and I think it could be easily extended.


They do get a lot of inappropriate stuff that they can't use because  of 
the environment. They had a load of very slim continental plug sockets 
that would look great in a Swedish house but they are so hard to fit 
that they were just hanging off the walls. What they needed was 
something much more bulky with big screws  and room to bend cables 
around. Something to last.


James, the story about soldering with a heated iron bar sounded really 
interesting. Can you be tempted to flesh it out a bit?


Regards

Roger

On 14/03/2022 09:30, Roger Munford via Hampshire wrote:
I was recently lucky enough to be involved in a development project in 
a remote community in Ethiopia which involved installing solar and 
batteries.


Whilst we were there we visited the local school which had an "ICT" 
centre with a single PC and a further PC used by the staff. It was 
basically a large mud hut with a earth floor. Despite this the school 
had managed to get 25 students into higher education. I thought that 
they could benefit from a few raspberry pis.


On the way back I met a German development economist who was working 
for the EU in Botswana . He said they were interested in a UK product 
"the raspberry pi".


I promised to send him some background info about the raspberry pi and 
how it could be used in education which I know it must but haven't had 
experience myself.


Can anybody suggest resources links that would be useful to pass on? I 
haven't started yet but can imagine somebody out there may have much 
more experience.


Regards

Roger




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[Hampshire] raspberry pi and educational software

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

I was recently lucky enough to be involved in a development project in a 
remote community in Ethiopia which involved installing solar and batteries.


Whilst we were there we visited the local school which had an "ICT" 
centre with a single PC and a further PC used by the staff. It was 
basically a large mud hut with a earth floor. Despite this the school 
had managed to get 25 students into higher education. I thought that 
they could benefit from a few raspberry pis.


On the way back I met a German development economist who was working for 
the EU in Botswana . He said they were interested in a UK product "the 
raspberry pi".


I promised to send him some background info about the raspberry pi and 
how it could be used in education which I know it must but haven't had 
experience myself.


Can anybody suggest resources links that would be useful to pass on? I 
haven't started yet but can imagine somebody out there may have much 
more experience.


Regards

Roger


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Re: [Hampshire] Booster vaccs

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

The vaccination session at Southampton University has started and will 
run until 8 this evening. I saw a short queue there about 16.30.


There will be two further sessions next Monday and Tuesday from 9 to 
17.00 if they are useful to anyone.


Seasons Greetings

Roger

On 20/12/2021 14:36, Roger Munford via Hampshire wrote:


Sorry, Southampton. Started mailing a few local friends but thought 
might do a bit of good just mailing my address book


On 20/12/2021 13:59, Neil Stone via Hampshire wrote:

Thanks for the heads up Roger...

Which University? My fiancee and I are keen to get our boosters, but 
we can't find anywhere available that's accessible, this side of next 
year.


On Mon, 20 Dec 2021 at 13:14, Roger Munford via Hampshire 
mailto:hampshire@mailman.lug.org.uk>> 
wrote:


The university health centre has a walk-in booster session today
building 48 from 4pm to 8pm and are asking people to spread the word.

If this helps any body let them know.

I am going to walk round later this afternoon to check that is
happening
for my niece who will travel from Romsey so if anybody else is
thinking
about it but has to travel a long way, they can check with me first.

Several neighbours had it over the weekend and there was no wait.

Regards

Roger


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Re: [Hampshire] Booster vaccs

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Sorry, Southampton. Started mailing a few local friends but thought 
might do a bit of good just mailing my address book


On 20/12/2021 13:59, Neil Stone via Hampshire wrote:

Thanks for the heads up Roger...

Which University? My fiancee and I are keen to get our boosters, but 
we can't find anywhere available that's accessible, this side of next 
year.


On Mon, 20 Dec 2021 at 13:14, Roger Munford via Hampshire 
mailto:hampshire@mailman.lug.org.uk>> 
wrote:


The university health centre has a walk-in booster session today
building 48 from 4pm to 8pm and are asking people to spread the word.

If this helps any body let them know.

I am going to walk round later this afternoon to check that is
happening
for my niece who will travel from Romsey so if anybody else is
thinking
about it but has to travel a long way, they can check with me first.

Several neighbours had it over the weekend and there was no wait.

Regards

Roger


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[Hampshire] Booster vaccs

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

The university health centre has a walk-in booster session today 
building 48 from 4pm to 8pm and are asking people to spread the word.


If this helps any body let them know.

I am going to walk round later this afternoon to check that is happening 
for my niece who will travel from Romsey so if anybody else is thinking 
about it but has to travel a long way, they can check with me first.


Several neighbours had it over the weekend and there was no wait.

Regards

Roger


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Re: [Hampshire] Laptop

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

It may sound a bit old fashioned but you could try John Lewis. At least 
in the recent past they did train their sales staff.


They may not thank me for suggesting this but we have had excellent 
service from Rocket Repairs in Southampton. I would recommend them 
highly for their repair service but they might be happy to advise based 
on their experience.


Regards

Roger



On 26/01/2021 14:53, Owain via Hampshire wrote:

Afternoon.

I wonder if anyone could give me some advice?  My son is in the last 
leg of his chemistry degree and finding that his laptop is not up to 
the statistically heavy Matlab calculations he has to do, so he wants 
a higher spec laptop.  In the past I have used PC World and the like 
with both of my sons and been amazed with the disappointing performance.


So where is a good place to go to have knowledgeable but 
non-patronising service?  He wants a Windows machine, but I am hoping 
to inherit the old one myself, and install a grown-up operating system 
on it.


Thanks for any tips

Owain

https://tantmusic.com




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[Hampshire] General advice sought

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

It is customary at this time to wish everybody a happy new year. However 
it is probably more appropriate to wish you all good luck in the future.


I haven't had a question [n years and now two have popped up at the same 
time.


The first is advice on programming. I have programmed everything in C 
but would be interested to know if there are any advantages in adopting 
another language.


I have a couple of projects to do with household monitoring running on 
raspberry pis and I have done enough to get them working but I would now 
like to make them more robust.


The first is a central heating monitor. I have a vaillant boiler and 
some years ago bought a windows programme plus a hardware dongle which 
monitors the communication between boiler and controller (ebus). By 
experimentation and research I found the necessary commands so that I 
can get information such as room temperature and programmer times and 
can change the heating programme details remotely. This wasn't as useful 
as I thought because I discovered that I was working from home and 
everyday was pretty well the same as any other day.


My system consisted of two parts which communicated by using shared 
memory. The first part consisted of the bus monitor which synchronised 
with the bus and read every packet. Some data came randomly such as 
current room temperature and when that was received the shared memory 
was updated. Other data such as programme times were only sent after a 
request so the monitor would have to send those as well. Temperature 
data was stored on Mariadb. I had hoped at one stage to make it 
inteklligent so the boiler was only activated when necessay, not just 
follow the timer.


The second part is a webserver and I used PHP to create a web page with 
the controls on and communicate with shared memory. When a control is 
changed, a flag is set and the monitor sends the commands to the boiler 
controller to get the required data.
It all works but is there a better way of organising it.? It runs on 
plain Raspbian but is there a better OS more suited to these sort of 
apps. should I be looking at Ubuntu core for safety and upgradeabilty?


I have some other monitoring projects which are gathering data. I 
monitor my electricity consumption, solar generation and car charging 
(modbus) and plan to monitor individual room temperatures (one wire) and 
water consumption and rain water harvesting usage pulse (counting).  I 
am interested in doing more home automation. Would it be worth getting a 
home automation package and could they be configured to work with these 
disparate functions?


The second major query has arisen because my local community formed a a 
whatsapp group during the covid crisis which was very successful. Two 
groups are emerging. Those that want to support the natural environment 
and those that want to tackle social problems in our area. I know first 
hand some people involved in long established groups in both of these 
areas but their activities are not well known and I think that we need a 
couple of websites that people could refer to. Could anybody recommend a 
solution which would involve cheap hosting, ability to register details 
and easy administration. It might even be a sort of dating app. Those 
offering help and those organisations who may need it.


Thanks for your time, I would be grateful for any comments.

Good luck in the New year.

Regards

Roger


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Re: [Hampshire] Linksys NSLU2 Network Storage looking for a home

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Sorry Andy, it went to the first reply.

Am pleased that I had a chance to pass it on.

Regards

Roger

On 16/07/2020 11:28, Andrew Rogers via Hampshire wrote:

Hi Rob,

If this is still available I would like it please, I had one years ago 
but it sadly died.


Kind regards

Andy  Rogers

On Thu, 16 Jul 2020, 10:18 rmluglist2--- via Hampshire, 
mailto:hampshire@mailman.lug.org.uk>> 
wrote:


Hi Roger

I had one which broke and I have a particular use for it.   If
it's free to good home - I'll happily take it - but I'm probably
too late.

Cheers
Rob

-Original Message-
From: Hampshire mailto:hampshire-boun...@mailman.lug.org.uk>> On Behalf Of Roger
Munford via Hampshire
Sent: 16 July 2020 09:59
To: Hampshire@mailman.lug.org.uk <mailto:Hampshire@mailman.lug.org.uk>
Cc: Roger Munford mailto:rogermunf...@parussoftware.co.uk>>
Subject: [Hampshire] Linksys NSLU2 Network Storage looking for a home

Many years ago this was popular because the underlying linux was
accessible so it was a low cost low power platform.

However never got round to opening the box.

If anybody fancies it, I would be pleased to pass it on. I would
even pay the postage.

Best Regards

Roger



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Re: [Hampshire] Linksys NSLU2 Network Storage looking for a home

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Rob,

its yours.

I live in Highfield, Southampton if it is possible to pick it up, 
otherwise I will send it too you.


I am happy that it is getting used. I almost put it into the wee bin.

Regards

Roger

On 16/07/2020 10:18, rmluglist2--- via Hampshire wrote:

Hi Roger

I had one which broke and I have a particular use for it.   If it's free to 
good home - I'll happily take it - but I'm probably too late.

Cheers
Rob

-Original Message-
From: Hampshire  On Behalf Of Roger 
Munford via Hampshire
Sent: 16 July 2020 09:59
To: Hampshire@mailman.lug.org.uk
Cc: Roger Munford 
Subject: [Hampshire] Linksys NSLU2 Network Storage looking for a home

Many years ago this was popular because the underlying linux was accessible so 
it was a low cost low power platform.

However never got round to opening the box.

If anybody fancies it, I would be pleased to pass it on. I would even pay the 
postage.

Best Regards

Roger



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[Hampshire] Linksys NSLU2 Network Storage looking for a home

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Many years ago this was popular because the underlying linux was 
accessible so it was a low cost low power platform.


However never got round to opening the box.

If anybody fancies it, I would be pleased to pass it on. I would even 
pay the postage.


Best Regards

Roger



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[Hampshire] Old fart needs digital makeover urgent

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

My son is back for Christmas and is disgusted that his parents are 
shuffling around listening to occasional you tube videos on You tube.


I had actually been planning to attend to this at some stage with a 
project based around the raspberry pi, small amps and a tuner. However 
it has been pointed out that it could be years before that gets done so 
I am seeking advice on what is available for a quick fix.


What I have in mind is ceiling mounted speakers in the lounge a kitchen 
and possible bathroom. Oldies have limited frequency response so quality 
is probably not a priority.


At the moment I switch on the 40 year old radio by punching the on off 
switch and get instant reaction. I would like to duplicate that.


I would also like to be able to access the BBC iplayer, you tube and 
other internet services. There is also a pile of CDs that would have to 
be somehow available for occasional use.


Any suggestions from "persevere with the raspberry pi it is really not 
that difficult" to the hardware involved in a DIY  or a commercial 
solution and where to get it would be very helpful.


I am sorry that I have not even started my own research but this has 
sort of come up unexpectedly.


Seasons Greetings

Roger Munford


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Re: [Hampshire] Raspberry PI

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Adam,

I have a friend who has an impressively automated house and you might 
want to aim at something a bit more sophisticated.


First of all the user interface. He has an old smartphone with a 3d 
printed holder which makes a smart control mounted on the wall. He has a 
nice user interface which his wife his pleased with. He also stores his 
data so he can see how the system is performing.


You might want to control each individual radiator and zone the house 
with an individual temperature sensor and power relay. The bathroom 
would be the obvious room to zone.


I also had this fantasy a few years ago and with the help of a lot of 
research manged to hack a windows programme that could monitor and 
control my Vailliant boiler and wrote a programme for the Raspberry PI.


The idea was to make it smart so that I would record inside and outside 
temperatures and over a period of time learn about the heating 
charactersitics so I could set the time when I wanted the temperature 
and not just switch on the system according to the time. So it would 
calculate the time required based on outside temperatures and switch on 
accordingly. Also if the sun was up and temperature was rising rapidly 
it would switch off prematurely.


Ultimately it would be combined with weather data for maximum efficiency.

The project stalled when I discovered that I and my wife worked at home 
and we have the heating on all the time. Am hoping to get back to 
finishing it soon before climate change renders the project useless.


Overt the years I have installed cat 5 cabling in the house with a view 
to monitoring each room. I have also been collecting the white plastic 
containers that dental floss come in to house the temp sensors for 
several years.


I hope that the move to France is successful and your heating 
requirements are probably reduced.


Best Regards

Roger




On 18/02/2019 10:37, Adam John Trickett via Hampshire wrote:

Bonjour !

I have finally found a use for a Raspberry Pi...! Since moving to France we
have ended up with a house with stupid electrically heated oil filled
radiators. They are not properly controlled and quite inefficient, at best you
can control them on a thermostat but there is no clock...

It seems obvious that all I need is a thermometer, a mains relay a Raspberry
Pi and some some software to create a time controlled thermostat that I can SSH
into...!

So I think I need
a box
a AC/DC transformer for the Pi
a mains relay
a digital thermometer
an override switch
something to mount the relay and transformer on
WiFi Pi or WiFi module for Pi depending on model

I think this is technically easy to do, but the biggest constraint seems to be
that the overall box needs to be small and "wife friendly"...



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[Hampshire] Document Management Systems

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Dear All,

I am on the local residents association committee which generates a 
quite a bit of documentation through its various activities and there is 
a paper archive stretching back to the 30's.


It has been suggested that we should digitise it. At the same time most 
of the current documentation is held as emails and attachments so I 
thought it would make sense to see if there was a document management 
system which would suit our needs or standards to follow.


I was wondering if anybody had similar experience and had any advice to 
offer.


Regards

Roger Munford


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Re: [Hampshire] Au revoir mes amis

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Adam,

My wife is German and we have exactly the same heartbreak on a daily 
basis and the stay go question just wears you down. The children took 
German nationality two years ago and are building their lives in Germany 
and Italy.


It is extremely sad that people are forced to make big decisions like this.

If you come across Lord Lawson in the post office, give him my regards.

Regards

Roger


On 03/10/18 03:58, A. J. Trickett via Hampshire wrote:

Dear LUG,

It is with a heavy heart that at the end of September we sold our
house and left not only Hampshire but England for France. As some
of you may have known my wife is French and the recent political
changed have made things awkward, so elected to move and for the
past few days we have been unpacking boxes in our new house just
across the channel in Brittany.

I'll remain on the list probably to the end of the year, but then
fall off.

Bonne chance !




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Re: [Hampshire] what to do with a dead imac

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

That was my original fantasy but I thought that the video connection 
would be daunting.


However this a very feeble and I feel bad that I posted before a bit of 
research. I think I was hoping for a "put it on ebay" reply but it is 
definitely now on the project list and wont be leaving the house.


Thanks

Roger

On 17/09/18 13:54, Peter B. via Hampshire wrote:

yeah. Rip out the old mobo. switch a roo.
If you can get something nice and tidy fitting no reason y u can't 
reuse the case, screen etc


On Mon, 17 Sep 2018 13:10 David Anderson via Hampshire, 
mailto:hampshire@mailman.lug.org.uk>> 
wrote:


    On 17/09/18 11:06, Roger Munford via Hampshire wrote:
> We have a old 21" imac which has died due to a a failed video
card and
> a repair would not have been cost effective.
>
> It is however still a very elegant computer and I was wondering if
> there was any creative suggestions for re use.
>
> Thanks
>
> Roger
>
Put a Raspberry Pi into it ;)

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[Hampshire] what to do with a dead imac

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

We have a old 21" imac which has died due to a a failed video card and a 
repair would not have been cost effective.


It is however still a very elegant computer and I was wondering if there 
was any creative suggestions for re use.


Thanks

Roger



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[Hampshire] A Festival of 3D Engineering Excellence

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

This looks interesting




23 June 0900 to 1700 free entry

at the Solent Sky Museum, you can enjoy a day of 3D engineering 
excellence delivered by some of the industry’s biggest hitters, 
including isodo3d, HP, FARO, Solid Solutions, Graitec, Frazer Nash and 
3T RPD. Plus plenty more activities throughout the event offering 
inspiration and insight into some of the most exciting 3D engineering 
and manufacturing stories to date.


This festival is split over two days, Friday 22nd June being for 400 
invited guests and dignitaries in the engineering and manufacturing 
sectors. The second day, Saturday 23rd June will be open to the public 
with live seminars to educate and enthuse.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77KZproTE18

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[Hampshire] Wireless access points

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

I have constructed a link across some fields to a small remote church in 
order to connect their solar array for real time monitoring.


The link starts at a private house which has wi fi router. The owner is 
happy to share his wi fi because he is away most of the time but does 
not want any cabling at all in his house. The network login details are 
entered here.


I have a TP Link TL-WA86ORE wi fi extender which has a single Ethernet 
port which allows a connection to the wifi network. This is situated on 
the corner of a barn about 20 meters from the house.


I then have an ethernet cable which leads to a TP LINK CPE 510 on the 
other side of the building which forms a bridge to the another CPE 510 
on the church across the fields. An ethernet cable connects to the solar 
inverter and it all seems to work nicely.


However I have been asked if I could include a wireless access point in 
the church using this link. In fairness to the generous donor who is 
happy for it to go ahead, I want to ensure that everybody is not logging 
on directly to his network. Would it be possible to to provide an access 
point with its own SSID?. If so what hardware should I be looking for?


Thanks,

Roger



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[Hampshire] Invitation to visit National Grid Control at Wokingham near Reading

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

I am organising a visit on Wednesday 21st of February. Hopefully it is 
not running Windows XP.



*Draft Agenda*

10:30 Arrive at St Catherine’s Lodge, Bear Wood Road, Sindlesham

10:45-12:00 Presentation on the role of the Electricity National Control 
Centre


12:00-12:30 Lunch and informal discussion

12:30- 13:00 Visit Viewing Gallery on to Control Room

13:00-13:30 Open Q&A

13:30 -Depart

Please let me know if you would like to come.

They are expecting about 20 but I think it may be possible to have more.

I will be inviting several groups and I am hoping to minimise the number 
of car journeys. If anybody with spare seats would like some company or 
would be happy to go as a passenger, please let me know.


There are no charging points at the centre at the moment!

Best Wishes

Roger Munford

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Re: [Hampshire] Windows problem

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Thanks for suggestions which confirms what I found online.

It would have been interesting to find out what suddenly changed to 
cause this problem but at the end of the day it is not a problem with my 
software and it is probably better for those with responsibility for the 
network to fix it.


However thank you very much for coming to my aid.

Thanks again,

Roger



On 13/01/18 17:09, Roger Munford via Hampshire wrote:
Sorry to sully the content of the list with a windows problem but 
somebody could be well versed in this sort of thing and it may be a 
trivial solution.


I will also try and make it up next week with an interesting 
invitation to the list.


Years ago I wrote an Epos programme which runs on the pos version of 
Windows XP and has worked for years until last week.


I think that the permissions have been changed. I traced the fault 
back to Windows being unable to create a temporary file.


When I try to copy a file with windows explorer I get  "This security 
ID may not be assigned as the owner of this object".


The PC is part of a windows domain and l think the user logs in as 
administrator.


Login is OK and the programme runs so it opens ,reads and writes files 
but looks like cannot create.


Any simple advice before we have to call in the expensive Windows man.

Thanks,

Roger






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[Hampshire] Windows problem

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Sorry to sully the content of the list with a windows problem but 
somebody could be well versed in this sort of thing and it may be a 
trivial solution.


I will also try and make it up next week with an interesting invitation 
to the list.


Years ago I wrote an Epos programme which runs on the pos version of 
Windows XP and has worked for years until last week.


I think that the permissions have been changed. I traced the fault back 
to Windows being unable to create a temporary file.


When I try to copy a file with windows explorer I get  "This security ID 
may not be assigned as the owner of this object".


The PC is part of a windows domain and l think the user logs in as 
administrator.


Login is OK and the programme runs so it opens ,reads and writes files 
but looks like cannot create.


Any simple advice before we have to call in the expensive Windows man.

Thanks,

Roger



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[Hampshire] Christmas Cheer

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

I found myself in Lymington the other evening with a couple of hours to 
pass whilst waiting for my wife.


As luck would have it, they were switching on the Christmas lights that 
day so I thought I would go and enjoy the carols at the church.


As even more luck would have it, the MC was Peter Soulsby whose name 
would be very familiar with older members of the LUG. Peter also 
baptised both my children before moving to Lymington.


I had a few words with Peter afterwards and was pleased to find out that 
he had built an app so that anybody could choose the pattern of 
Christmas lights on the church. Open Source of course.


You can also do it from the website http://www.lymingtonchurch.org.uk/

You cant keep  a good lugger down.

Seasons Greetings

Roger


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[Hampshire] Raspberry Pi, RS485 and libmodbus

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

I am trying to connect an energy monitor to a raspberry pi equipped with 
a small RS485 card from AB electronics. Effectively the card is just an 
interface chip between the pi's GPIO pins and the RS485 bus which is 
just 3 wires.


I have installed libmodbus and followed the instructions to disable the 
serial port login.


Originally I was working with the Bluetooth equipped RP3 but reverted to 
RP2 running wheezy because bluetooth complicates things and I thought I 
would avoid it.


If anybody is familiar with this sort of setup and may have possibly 
come up against the following problem I would be grateful.


I have done the "make check" which tests the libmodbus installation. I 
have modified the  "test" programme for my environment and the 
initialisation and connection are OK but when I try to read the 
registers, I get a timeout. The fault could be anywhere.


Thanks,

Roger



nd connect correc

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Re: [Hampshire] Home user Linux Support opportunities in Southampton/Eastleigh area?

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Imran, Thomas,

I was very pleased to read this because I know the repair cafe people 
well and I will try and pop along in October to see what can be done.


It would be nice to see you again after some years.

Roger


On 14/09/17 20:48, Thomas Kluyver via Hampshire wrote:

On Thu, Sep 14, 2017, at 08:44 PM, Imran Chaudhry wrote:
Thanks for that Thomas, this is the first I've heard about the Repair 
Cafe concept but I fully support the idea.


I will try to pop along to the next one in October.


Cool! Shall I put you in touch with the organiser?

In the meantime I've decided to try and run a local "setup your own 
Linux laptop"  course to generate my own clientele. I'll report back 
here on how it goes.


I look forward to hearing how it goes. How are you making people aware 
of it?


Thomas




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Re: [Hampshire] Colour Printer Replacement

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Aaron,

Thanks for your reply. I am looking at some text printed in landscape. 
in black and white the centre third of the page is uneven and smeared. 
In colour mode the whole page is covered with coloured smears as if it 
was printing a woven textile but not so regular. Black solids print 
nicely but coloured solids are scratchy.


The black toner is almost full but the coloureds are almost empty.

We are thinking that this printer has had its time and the economics of 
replacement are weird. The toner is so expensive in comparison to the 
actual printer. Is this just a marketing ploy or is toner expensive to 
manufacture.


Regards

Roger


On 21/07/17 12:17, Aaron West wrote:
Can I ask what the problem is? Last time I checked people still did 
repair proper laser printers, 6 years ago I was doing it working out 
of a Romsey based company.


Usually you can buy service kits which contain new rollers, pickups 
and other stuff. You can also buy new drums and transfer belts and 
even replace key components that can fail like the power boards.


The funniest repair we ever did was a little nylon ring that became 
warped(egg shaped) and we managed to source one of those and replace 
and fix.


On Fri, Jul 21, 2017 at 10:03 AM, Roger Munford via Hampshire 
mailto:hampshire@mailman.lug.org.uk>> 
wrote:


Our HP colour laser printer which is quite old now must be
replaced. A repair seems out of the question I assume because
nobody seems to repair these days. It is a pity because we have
quite a bit of toner left.

Does anybody have any recommendations or warnings of a
replacement. It is the normal home office sort of usage probably
quite low.

I am not particularly wedded to any technology, just reliability.

Regards

Roger


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[Hampshire] Colour Printer Replacement

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Our HP colour laser printer which is quite old now must be replaced. A 
repair seems out of the question I assume because nobody seems to repair 
these days. It is a pity because we have quite a bit of toner left.


Does anybody have any recommendations or warnings of a replacement. It 
is the normal home office sort of usage probably quite low.


I am not particularly wedded to any technology, just reliability.

Regards

Roger


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Re: [Hampshire] Raspberry Pi based Air quality monitoring project

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Jay,

this would be well worth looking at. I can foresee that when the data 
starts flowing which is a priority at the moment, some serious 
consideration must be given to the analysis of that data. I know from my 
own experience that the sensor characteristics and siting are very 
important. They have probably given that some thought.


Regards

Roger



On 09/05/17 18:33, Joseph Bennie via Hampshire wrote:

This may be of your interest. about 20 years ago i worked with 2 bp execs that 
founded a project to monitor air quality in brazil. It was their way of giving 
back in retirment.

I have a few archive disks containing spreadsheet models and math which my be 
useful to the project. As both execs have passed away now. it would be nice if 
their work lived on and did some good.

feel free to contact me directly.
Jay

Sent from my iPhone


On 9 May 2017, at 18:09, Tim via Hampshire  wrote:


On 09/05/17 13:32, Thomas Kluyver via Hampshire wrote:

On Tue, May 9, 2017, at 10:19 AM, Roger Munford via Hampshire wrote:
They have raced ahead developing the monitor but have now reached the
point of early deployment and have come against an unexpected problem.
How to organise themselves. They are about to receive some grant funding
but need some sort of organisation to account for cash flow, insurance
and some expenses so far small but becoming significant. They want to be
non profit making and totally open source as you would expect butt hey
need advice on a structure. Any suggestions?

It might be sufficient to organise as a university society - it's not
unusual for student societies to handle some money. The sailing robot
project I presented a couple of months ago is organised as the 'Maritime
Robotics Student Society', and we were able to accept some money from
the university and manage it through the university finance system.

I don't know much about the organisational side of our project, but I
could put them in touch with the people who do if they want to know more
about what we did.

Thomas


Does the Project have a web page?


Tim


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Re: [Hampshire] Raspberry Pi based Air quality monitoring project

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Tim,

There is a website but as they say it is still under construction and 
will probably be hosted on its own site when the data starts flowing 
https://solentairwatch.wixsite.com/airwatch.


Regards Roger



On 09/05/17 18:08, Tim via Hampshire wrote:

On 09/05/17 13:32, Thomas Kluyver via Hampshire wrote:

On Tue, May 9, 2017, at 10:19 AM, Roger Munford via Hampshire wrote:

They have raced ahead developing the monitor but have now reached the
point of early deployment and have come against an unexpected problem.
How to organise themselves. They are about to receive some grant 
funding

but need some sort of organisation to account for cash flow, insurance
and some expenses so far small but becoming significant. They want 
to be

non profit making and totally open source as you would expect butt hey
need advice on a structure. Any suggestions?

It might be sufficient to organise as a university society - it's not
unusual for student societies to handle some money. The sailing robot
project I presented a couple of months ago is organised as the 'Maritime
Robotics Student Society', and we were able to accept some money from
the university and manage it through the university finance system.

I don't know much about the organisational side of our project, but I
could put them in touch with the people who do if they want to know more
about what we did.

Thomas


Does the Project have a web page?


Tim





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[Hampshire] Raspberry Pi based Air quality monitoring project

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

I have recently come across a group of postgraduate students at 
Southampton University who are developing cheap RP based air quality 
monitors with the intention of creating a "citizen science" network 
which would provide real time AQ information alongside the very few, 
very accurate and very expensive fixed monitors provided by the local 
authorities. This sort of thing is going on in other cities round the 
world. I got interested because I was involved in a project about 25 
years ago to do the same thing but even then cheap was several thousands 
of pounds.


They are hoping to encourage people to buy kits and depending on their 
level of competence, put it together and start contributing to the 
network which will also be showing shipping and traffic movements. 
Anybody who can contribute software or hardware electrical and 
mechanical expertise is more than welcome. The initial device is 
basically a RP with a very low cost particulate monitor but there are 
other gas monitors which will be include in the future. If anybody is 
interested please let me know.


They have raced ahead developing the monitor but have now reached the 
point of early deployment and have come against an unexpected problem. 
How to organise themselves. They are about to receive some grant funding
but need some sort of organisation to account for cash flow, insurance 
and some expenses so far small but becoming significant. They want to be 
non profit making and totally open source as you would expect butt hey 
need advice on a structure. Any suggestions?


Yes Lisi I will get them to the Portsmouth Lug for a presentation as 
soon as possible .


Thanks

Roger







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Re: [Hampshire] Best place to buy a Raspberry Pi?

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

I bought my pi(s) at the Pi Hut https://thepihut.com/. I think they 
started from scratch, have a range of extras and offer some support. 
Nothing has gone wrong with the purchasing (5 times) so I think they are 
well organised and probably pay UK tax and prices look OK. They do kits 
which make it worthwhile if you need all the components which you dont.


While I am writing has anybody used a twin socket with built in USB 
charger to run a Pi continuously. A few years ago when they first came 
out I asked MK and they said it wasn't designed for continuous use but I 
had the impression that they were just saying that to cover themselves. 
It would make sense to use one unless of course it was not 100% safe.


Roger



On 09/01/17 18:27, Andy Random via Hampshire wrote:


Hi,

So I've resisted buying a Pi until now because I have way too much 
junk in the house I bought and never really used and given the way the 
Pi has changed since it was first launched that was probably a good plan.


However now I have something I want a low power always on wifi enabled 
device for and I'm think a Raspberry Pi fits the bill.


So where is the best place to buy one?

I'm happy to buy one from a real shop if there is one I can visit 
easily and won't make me pay significantly over the odds (hello 
Maplin) or order online. I'm an Amazon Prime member so ordering from 
Amazon is easy and delivery is free, but honestly I try not to buy 
everything from Amazon just on principal.


I'm looking for a Pi with wifi (Pi 3 model B?) an SD card for it and a 
power supply, I don't need a case but if the cheapest/easiest way to 
get what I want is some kind of starter kit that includes a case 
that's fine.


I really don't want an HDMI cable (I have too many already) or a 
Keyboard or mouse as once setup the Pi will run headless and be 
administered via SSH.


So recommendation please?

  Andy




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[Hampshire] Lifts to Portsmouth meeting on Saturday

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

At last sandwiches. I am planning to go and can offer some places in the 
car from Southampton.


Regards

Roger

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[Hampshire] At wit's end with windows sharing

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Sorry to pollute the list with a request for windows help but it is a 
bit exceptional and somebody may have the experience to nail it.


I wrote a programme years ago which is still being used and has survived 
upgrades from win2k upwards to win7. The programme uses a mapped network 
drive to share files.
However since the user was bullied into upgrading to win10  on the PC 
with the files the drive mapping has stopped working and it demands a login.


Normally I can sit down and google a solution but after a couple of 
hours have not got anywhere and I have to go to Germany on Wednesday for 
two weeks to move my son and his belongings.


If this problem rings a bell and there is a solution that would be 
great. If anybody thinks they can help (for payment) the business is a 
small dairy between Salisbury and Romsey and team viewer is on both 
computers.


I apologise if this is a bit intrusive but I hope you will understand 
the situation.


Regards

Roger

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Re: [Hampshire] Annual General Meeting - Future of the LUG

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

First David Bowie and Alan Rickman, the referendum and now this . 
Looking forward to the end of this wretched year.


Roger


On 10/08/2016 22:59, Tim Brocklehurst via Hampshire wrote:

Hello everybody,

Sparked by the imminent renewal of the HantsLUG domain name, the committee
has recently been discussing the future of the group. If there was
significant mailing list traffic we would just renew it without concern,
however, as there has been very little traffic, the question of whether
the LUG should continue has been raised. We are therefore calling a
meeting to determine the future of the LUG. A copy of the constitution is
available on the website, should you wish to view it.

In order to register to vote at the meeting, please e-mail
webmas...@hantslug.org.uk with subject "votereg" please include your name
in the e-mail.

Details of the date and location will follow in a second e-mail. I would
urge everyone to attend if at all possible. Ultimately, it's your LUG and
up to you to decide it's future.

If this meeting is not quorate (at least eight voting members, or ten
percent (10%) of the total voting membership, whichever is the greater)
the committee will hold a further general meeting to decide what happens
next.

We have three options (this will form the agenda for the meeting):

1) A new committee is elected and the LUG continues as normal. Existing
committee members can stand for re-election. I will not be standing. -
Please submit nominations to chair...@hantslug.org.uk

2) The committee is disbanded and the constitution suitably updated to
enable a sole LUG member to act as benefactor; to maintain the mailing
list and optionally the website as they see fit with a suitable degree of
consultation from the membership. In this case the current LUG funds will
not be handed over to the benefactor.

3) The group is wound up. The mailing list and website will be taken
off-line and the domain-name either retained for 12 months, or given to
another LUG in Hampshire. No funds will be retained (see below).

For either option 2 or 3, no funds will be retained. This does not prevent
long-term purchase of domain name and services by the current committee,
prior to the funds being distributed. For distribution, the following is
suggested:

a) Nominations for suitable open-source projects/LUGs/Makerspaces etc. are
called for, over a period of a week. A list of all nominations will be
posted by the chairman. Nominations must be linux-related, open-source or
charitable, and not for personal gain; makerspaces are acceptable.

b) The members vote for their preferred nomination (1 vote per member) by
e-mail. Over the course of one week.

c) The votes are counted and the remaining LUG funds are split between the
top 5 nominations by percentage of votes. This will be announced on the
mailing list.


Best regards,

Tim Brocklehurst




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[Hampshire] Quite a good joke

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

It may already be widespread but I had never heard it before my son told 
it to me.


Q Why do  programmers confuse Christmas with Halloween?
A Because 31 Oct = 25 Dec

Roger

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[Hampshire] Kitchen project

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

I am just about to install a new kitchen.

For years I have had a mains powered radio that I switch on by clicking 
the power socket. The station or volume never change and I like the 
simplicity.


However I would like to be able to listen to the bbc iplayer but I don't 
mind taking extra time for fiddling about setting it up.


I haven't had time to do any research about how I achieve this but must 
cut the wiring channels for extra sockets and lights in the next day or so.


I can imagine that a raspberry pi will be involved and so I am embedding 
a standard double socket box in the wall with conduit leading down to 
it. I have a false ceiling so there is plenty of space and access to 
power and ethernet.


I can envisage some sort of radio which runs independently and will 
remember its last settings when powered up. The radio should also be 
able to be controlled by the raspberry pi (volume,station) and also take 
audio feed from the pi when required.
I can also envisage a touch screen to control it but have no idea how to 
fix it to the wall.
If anybody has done something similar and can recommend some hardware, i 
would be grateful.


Regards

Roger


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Re: [Hampshire] Southampton Python User Group

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Just got back from the event and it was excellent.

Thank you Thomas


On 30/06/2016 12:18, Thomas Kluyver via Hampshire wrote:

Hi all,

We're starting up a Python user group in Southampton, and I thought
there might be some overlap of interests with this list. Our next
meeting is at 6pm on Tuesday (5th July), when we'll be hearing from
Robin Wilson about how he wrote Python code in one weekend to process
millions of mobile phone data records after the Nepal earthquake last
year.

When: 6pm, Tuesday 5th July
Where: University of Southampton, Murray Building (Building 58), Room
1023 - see http://maps.southampton.ac.uk/

http://southampton-python.github.io/

There will be refreshments provided beforehand, and we'll go to a pub
after the talk. We'll also give anyone the chance to do a five-minute
lightning talk.

I'm not sure what's OK on this list, so my apologies if this is off
topic.

Thanks,
Thomas




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[Hampshire] Scanning Equipment

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Like most people I have plans to scan the family photographic archives 
and the long term plan was to buy some state of the art hardware with 
some family members  and when everybody has finished sell the equipment 
on. My local residents association want to scan their archives going 
back to 1930 and it would be a good summer job for my son.
Has anybody any experience with scanner equipment which would do the 
photographs and documents and perhaps suggest a database programme that 
probably exists for building and using an archive?


Thanks in advance,

Roger


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Re: [Hampshire] Bootable USB drives

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

Just to add another observation.

The successful USB stick was made from an image created in 2009 and all 
the rest are the latest downloads. I am wondering if UEFI is lurking 
behind all this.


Also my "target" install is the Boot Repair disk which I am hoping will 
solve the boot problem on the old pc.


Thanks

Roger



On 31/05/2016 12:12, Roger Munford via Hampshire wrote:
I am trying to replace an old failed Epos system which is no longer 
made with a second hand pos PC.


The new second hand PC had its disk wiped so I had to buy a copy of 
Microsoft "PosReady2009" which is a version of XP for Epos and is 
still supported.


The new PC has no disk drive and so I have to install from a USB stick.

After some time, I managed to create one from the "iso" image with 
"rufus.exe"  and installed the OS. However when powering it up and 
expecting it to boot from the hard disk, I got a "disk error CTRL ALT 
DEL to continue".   I was able to run CHKDSK from the installation USB 
which indicated that the drive was OK.


The next step was to create a rescue disk and hopefully find the 
problem. However after trying combinations of several different USB 
drives, rescue disk images and drive creators (rufus windows, 
Unetbootin and universal) I have not been able to create another 
bootable USB - all also fail on another PC. The only successful USB 
was the first which was in fact brand new and unused. I am not keen on 
experimenting with this.


Any advice would be gratefully received.

Regards

Roger





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[Hampshire] Bootable USB drives

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

I am trying to replace an old failed Epos system which is no longer made 
with a second hand pos PC.


The new second hand PC had its disk wiped so I had to buy a copy of 
Microsoft "PosReady2009" which is a version of XP for Epos and is still 
supported.


The new PC has no disk drive and so I have to install from a USB stick.

After some time, I managed to create one from the "iso" image with 
"rufus.exe"  and installed the OS. However when powering it up and 
expecting it to boot from the hard disk, I got a "disk error CTRL ALT 
DEL to continue".   I was able to run CHKDSK from the installation USB 
which indicated that the drive was OK.


The next step was to create a rescue disk and hopefully find the 
problem. However after trying combinations of several different USB 
drives, rescue disk images and drive creators (rufus windows, Unetbootin 
and universal) I have not been able to create another bootable USB - all 
also fail on another PC. The only successful USB was the first which was 
in fact brand new and unused. I am not keen on experimenting with this.


Any advice would be gratefully received.

Regards

Roger


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[Hampshire] Bluetooth repeater over ethernet?

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

I have been looking for something that I assumed would exist but appears 
not to.


A farmer friend has a solar array some distance from the house. The 
inverter is housed in a steel shipping container. As part of a more 
complex setup there is a controller which senses when there is excess 
power being generated and will reduce the generation. A function of the 
controller is the ability to switch on loads via a bluetooth signal. The 
loads are a socket adapters equipped with bluetooth. The adapters are 
intelligent and can tell the controller how much power is being used. 
This is great it everything is within bluetooth range but in this case 
it is not. Ethernet is available however.


I had hoped that there would be a pair of devices that could simply 
repeat the bluetooth signal across ethernet. Has anybody heard of such a 
device?


Thanks

Roger


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[Hampshire] Southampton Battery Company Open day this Saturday

[Roger Munford via Hampshire]

A friend of mine is a battery expert and has built up quite an 
impressive company over the last decade or so.
He is starting a project to develop a hybrid diesel electric marine 
drive that is particularly suitable for water taxis for place like 
Venice and Amsterdam. He is hoping to raise some funding from crowd 
sourcing.
As part of this initiative, his company is having an open day on 
Saturday 14th May from 1400-1600 where they will showing  the drive plus 
some other projects. http://www.reapsystems.co.uk/all-case-studies/.
I thought that this may appeal to some of you around Southampton. There 
will also be a couple of Electric vehicles  and the owners are prepared 
to bore you to death about the benefits of the EV.
There will also be free tea and biscuits in the sunshine next to the 
river Itchen


REAPsystems Ltd, Fairways House, Mount Pleasant Road, Southampton SO14 0QB

Regards

Roger Munford

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Re: [Hampshire] IGMP protocol with BT home hubs

[Roger Munford]

Thanks Simon and James. Could I say with a good degree of certainty that 
new switches from D-Link and TPLink would support it. I cannot find any 
to say if they would or wouldn't.


The "blurb" about this system says that commonly used ethernet network 
components can be used. However I am at a standoff with the support 
engineer who is adamant that there is a network problem and therefore 
cannot support this new piece of kit that has only just reached the UK. 
I somehow have to convince him that it should be referred to the 
developers. If it is not still underdevelopment why did the website 
suddenly duplicate itself in Spanish? last week.


Thanks again for your help.

Roger

On 07/03/2016 09:34, Simon Reap wrote:

On 06/03/2016 18:41, Roger Munford wrote:
I have a problem with a new, complex system for managing ethernet 
connected solar inverters and the problem may well be down to missing 
multicasts from a BT home hub.




For anybody that has followed what I have been trying to describe, do 
BT Home hubs support IGMP? is there something in the configuration 
that enables/disables it and is there a test that I can do to verify it?




The BT Home Hubs 3, 4  and 5 definitely support IGMP - BT Youview 
requires it.


When the old BT freeview service stopped and I was "upgraded" to 
YouView, I had to get a Home Hub 4 installed to replace my solid 
reliable Netgear DG384 which didn't support IGMP (as far as I could 
tell).  My old Homehub 1 (once I'd retrieved it from its hiding place 
in the loft) didn't work either.


There's a fairly old list of routers which support IGMP (and hence BT 
YouView) at 
https://community.bt.com/t5/YouView-Boxes/Known-Routers-to-Work-with-Multicast-IGMP/td-p/994338


Simon




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[Hampshire] IGMP protocol with BT home hubs

[Roger Munford]

I have a problem with a new, complex system for managing ethernet 
connected solar inverters and the problem may well be down to missing 
multicasts from a BT home hub.


The German manufacturers insist there is nothing wrong but do not have 
any ideas. It is likely that there is a handful of similar setups 
working in the UK but not this one.


The system consists of 3 solar inverters and a controller that is 
connected with a switch which is also connected to the local network and 
ultimately the internet. The inverters and the controller connect to the 
company server and upload data. There is a local configuration programme 
which runs on a PC and connects to each of the inverters. Everything 
works as expected network wise.


The system has a "heartbeat" so that each inverter gets a message every 
second to continue. If the message does not arrive the inverter 
automatically shuts down and this is this function that is not working.


Buried in the documentation I found the following:   "For the correct 
function . all network devices used must support the IGMP protocol, 
minimum

required version 2. (IGMP V2)"

I had to look up IGMP having not come across it before. I originally 
thought that the heartbeat signal comes from the controller and so only 
the switch should be required to support IGMP. I couldn't find any 
reference in the switch documentation but assumed that a brand new 
switch would support it. I tried two other switches that were to hand 
and had the same results.


My latest thought is that the heartbeat may actually come over the 
internet from the company server. That would mean that the network 
router would have to support the IGMP protocol. The network router is an 
oldish BT home hub. This thought has just occurred and I cannot get at 
it to look because it is some miles away.


For anybody that has followed what I have been trying to describe, do BT 
Home hubs support IGMP? is there something in the configuration that 
enables/disables it and is there a test that I can do to verify it?


Thanks for your patience, I hope the above was relatively clear.

Roger


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[Hampshire] Virtualbox guest graphics

[Roger Munford]

I have a Windows XP guest running on an ubuntu 14.04 host which I have 
to use occasionally.


However on booting the screen disappears into a blue band. Safe mode 
works however.


I thought about re installing the guest additions but the virtualbox 
menu does not appear when I run the mouse over it. The close button works.


If run my other guest, Windows 2000, everything works normally.

Any suggestions would be welcome

Thanks


Roger






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Re: [Hampshire] New Forest Solar

[Roger Munford]

Gordon,

When you mentioned that you would like to downsize I thought that you 
might like to build something smaller but low maintenance and you 
definitely have the inclination.


You can compromise on some of the more extreme features with some more 
conventional materials but the techniques and technology are well 
established, you just need the right

architects and builders.

There is a lot of Linux involved in this technology (veering back 
towards the list). A few years ago Honeywell did a TRV radiator valve 
with a clock which could be switched 2 times a day.
Somebody discovered that the clock was in fact a chip running linux 
which was duely hacked to do some interesting things. I am sure that the 
current model works in the same way.


 Roger


On 13/11/15 10:20, Gordon Scott wrote:

On Fri, 2015-11-13 at 09:39 +, Roger Munford wrote:

Gordon,

I have enjoyed corresponding with you via this list very much. We are
talking about everyday things which just don’t work as well as they
could and it seems like they should get better but for some reason
they don't.

Still off-topic, but...

I did once explore the possibility of building a genuine eco-home. The
full works. earth bermed, passive solar, recycled tyres, rammed earth,
straw bales, green roof, rainwater harvesting, grey-water recycling,
composting toilets, microgeneration, sun pipes. Almost "you name it".

I discussed it with a couple of county councils who were interested.
I disusssed it with several planning departments who "ran a mile". Too
strange, too scary, more than my job's worth.

I drew two conclusion.

1) Getting planning permission was a snowball in hell's chance.
2) If one wants to do it, one does it covertly and hopes that
TV will support the eco-warrior when the council demand you
bulldoze it.


This is a particular problem for engineering types.

Like me, yes :-)

I looked into the German waste system

Like battery recycling bins everywhere...  Years and years ago...
Sigh.

G.




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Re: [Hampshire] New Forest Solar

[Roger Munford]

Gordon,

I have enjoyed corresponding with you via this list very much. We are 
talking about everyday things which just don’t work as well as they 
could and it seems like they should get better but for some reason they 
don't.

This is a particular problem for engineering types.

I looked into the German waste system when I moved back because I wanted 
to know why it was so bad in Southampton. The Germans came up with an 
efficient and elegant solution which was absolutely hated by industry.


A few later it all paid off. They had the sorting and packaging 
technology and exported it to the world while domestically dramatically 
reducing waste. Other countries aspire to zero waste but only Germany 
has it realistically in their sights.


Frustratingly the principles were enshrined in European law but much 
watered down and the UK adoption was so distorted that it is effectively 
pointless.


I should delete this because I already have a reputation for talking 
rubbish.


Roger


On 12/11/15 23:42, Gordon Scott wrote:

Hi Roger,

What I've written is not about any specific project, and I agree with 
you entirely on just about everything.  I know too little about the 
project(s) in which you have an interest to be able to comment in 
detail. I do think it's tragic that we're increasingly wasting good 
land rather than double-using the concrete we've already put down.


I haven't yet seen Hugh F-W's programmer, I hope to. I've been arguing 
similarly for years, but don't have the influence.


I definitely shall _not_ get started on supermarkets, packaging and 
related waste!


I wrote a lot about eco-homes, population, waste, antibiotics and 
other stuff.


All very off-topic, so I deleted it.  It made for a very scary ready, 
too. :-(


Gordon.
--
/But for the sake of some little mouthful of flesh
we deprive a soul of the sun and light,
and of that proportion of life and time
it had been born into the world to enjoy./
Plutarch AD44-120




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Re: [Hampshire] New Forest Solar

[Roger Munford]

Gordon,

Those 15000 houses could be zero carbon or even carbon positive using 
existing technology. They could capture rainwater and recycle wastewater 
so that the running costs would be practically zero. They could all have

large cellars to maximise the footprint.

But they probably wont, they will be built as cheaply as possible 
missing a great opportunity.


The RSPB who are greatly concerned about climate change, have built 
their own windmill at their HQ so it looks like the bird death rates are 
manageable.


Roger


On 12/11/15 17:52, Gordon Scott wrote:

Hi Brad,

On Thu, 2015-11-12 at 16:52 +, Brad Rogers wrote:

the NIMBY brigade.

Don't get me started :-)

I can't now remember who it was, who said "Sure I worry about my back
yard ... nobody else is going worry about it!"

It's notable that NIMBYs are always other people objecting to things in
_their_ back yard, that generally we'd(*) rather not have in our own
back yard. ((*) Same me/you disclaimer, of course).

There's been talk recently of how many millions more homes we need to
build for our inexorably rising population, and how many hundreds of
thousands of additional builders, carpenters, plumbers, electricians and
so on we'll need to allow us to build them, which is one argument why we
need to allow immigration.  I haven't yet heard how many houses we need
to build to house the builders etc., ... and their families.

I'm not in any way anti renewables, though I think they should perhaps
focus a little more on tidal stream, which is reliably 24/7 around our
coast, than the more fickle forms like wind, wave and solar; though even
with the fickle forms hydrogen production may eventually smooth out the
bumps in electricity generation.

FWIW, I didn't myself have much of an issue with Navitus Bay, though I
do find sailing near wind farms in fog a bit scary.  Still, at least
wind farms don't run you down at 20kts :-)  I have no idea of the
veracity of the view that they kill birds and bats.

BTW, there's a plan outline near me to build a, frankly staggering,
fifteen thousand homes on green land.  Curiously, there are thousands of
NIMBYs in the area.  Actually, it looks like it won't affect me much as
it's "over he fence" rather than "in my yard", but I'm likely to be
supporting those NIMBYs.

Meanwhile I'd quite like to downsize, but I'm wondering if I can
_afford_ to, when smaller houses are no cheaper and I have to pay legal
fees, estate agent fees, removal costs and stamp duty. There are
hundreds of thousands of us thinking much the same. There's housing
available if we join up the thinking properly.

Oh dear. I did warn you :-/

Gordon.




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Re: [Hampshire] New Forest Solar

[Roger Munford]

Gordon,

You may be interested to know that the bee hives went in just after the 
last panel was installed. The advantage of community ownership is that 
people are prepared to spend the extra
to maintain and develop he environment and the profit stays in the 
community.


Even if the climate change does not feel like an imperative there are 
plenty of other problems that are serious but seem intractable. People 
may argue that solar farms are a waste of good land.
However there seems to be acceptance that land must be used for 
landfill. I lived in Germany for several years and they stopped sending 
household waste to landfill about 15 years ago,
reduced incineration, recycled more and continued reusing bottles for 
drinks etc. They had a cunning plan to do that which we could follow but 
we are busy following their plan from the 80's

and will have to wait for another decade.

You may be following Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s current TV series War 
on Waste. One theme is the outrageous waste of edible food rejected by 
supermarkets which is the equivalent of a substantial
amount of land. One could argue that we could be putting solar on that 
land instead and also protecting it from pesticides.


Whether you feel that climate change is a threat or not, developing the 
technology required to combat it will inevitably lead to a much more 
pleasant and healthy life.


Roger

On 12/11/15 17:21, Gordon Scott wrote:

Hi Roger,

I hadn't meant my comments to apply to any particular instance and I'm
pleased that the Lymington one appears sensible.

In my area, though, there are a number built on prime agricultural land.
Of course the land isn't actually destroyed, so could be returned to
agriculture if necessary, but PV looks to be a 20 to 30 year investment
in many cases, so it's likely not coming back any time soon.

It can disturb me even more, though, when they're placed on "waste"
land.  I used to keep bees on an area of land that I would describe as
wildflower meadow.  The owner died, his family took over and let a local
farmer plant maize so that that "unproductive wasteland can be turned
into something productive" with "there's no wildlife value there,
anyway".  The farmer never got a maize crop off of it; I never got
another decent honey crop off of it, and after a few years it was
"developed" for local housing.

Oh, and there _was_ wildlife value on it before it was ploughed.

 From my perspective, important and productive land was changed first to
desert, then to concrete.  Hopefully there are now gardens that
rebalance that.  I don't know; I've never been back.

Personally I'm not that convinced by the climate change [hmm, what word
best goes here].  But I still think renewables have a lot to commend
them.

There are lots of already ugly places that can take solar, many of them
are large enough to make sense, before we need to use the nicer bits.
IMHO.

Gordon




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Re: [Hampshire] New Forest Solar

[Roger Munford]

There is a clever piece of software which I believe originated in Sweden 
that can calculate roofspace, elevation and shadow from trees from 3D 
surveys and hence solar potential.
Southampton University have done this survey and conclude that 40% of 
the city's electricity could be supplied by solar.


The trouble is it is very expensive to cover thousands of small 
individual sites whereas a large site is much easier to build and so 
much cheaper. I agree that it is much preferable to use existing roofs 
but there are many reasons why owners cant or dont want to.


At Lymington, the solar farm was built on an old landfill site and is 
managed by the Hants Wildlife trust to encourage wildlife and improve 
the land. The mounting systems use only about 3% of the site and can be 
removed completely.


Renewables are the only tools that we have to avoid catastrophic climate 
change which would be very intrusive indeed.


Roger


On 12/11/15 15:04, Gordon Scott wrote:

Whilst I approve of PV in principle, I do wish they'd put them in places
that aren't additionally intrusive into the environment.

Put them over supermarket and other car parks, giving shade to the cars
as well. Factory, supermarket and shopping-centre roofs, bus shelters,
railway station roofs, etc..

Why oh why do they so often put them in green spaces?  It's ridiculous.


Gordon.




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[Hampshire] New Forest Solar

[Roger Munford]

I apologies for troubling you with the same off topic subject in a month 
but there was some interest last time and it will all be coming to an 
end shortly.


First there is an opportunity to visit the community owned solar farm at 
Lymington on Saturday morning.


Second there is the opportunity to participate in the new solar farm at 
Netley Marsh 
http://westsolentsolar.coop/netley-marsh-project-planning-consultation/


Thirdly some other community energy projects in the south 
http://us3.campaign-archive2.com/?u=407f0fed137f81f0755bf6627&id=fb31c9dd3c&e=c90f6ef8b8 



Thanks for your indulgence It wont happen again.

Roger


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Re: [Hampshire] OggCamp 15

[Roger Munford]

I had a few hours there with a Mancunian who took me to the Cavern Club 
and for a walk around the waterfront, (with its museum) was also pretty 
interesting. We just parked the car for a couple of hours and walked around.


It is a different "cavern" to the original though.

Roger

On 26/10/15 08:23, Imran Chaudhry wrote:

Just curious - any Hampshire LUG people going to OggCamp 15 this weekend?

I'm planning to go, I also have an idea for a talk :)

My first ever visit to Liverpool too, I'm staying the night and coming 
back Sunday. If I get time, are there any "must see" places I should 
check out?


Thanks!

--
Key fingerprint = EF78 310C C517 9564 9ECA  82F6 68FA E621 17E1 5D16




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Re: [Hampshire] Linux equivalent of DPAPI

[Roger Munford]

James,

This system handles fresh local food home deliveries and one user won 
the BBC local food retailer of the year a few years ago. It predates 
supermarket home delivery and credit card payments was introduced in 2006.


One of the features is that orders are taken a day or so before packing 
and delivery and with weighing and not availables the final bill is 
calculated only after packing. Also most customers are regular and many 
have standing orders for delivery without ordering


Credit card details were typed into a desktop app which sent them off to 
the (hopefully) fully secure payment gateway. A token is returned which 
is used for future payment(s). This token links the credit card details 
and the retailer so that even if the token was used by a criminal, all 
they could do was transfer money to the retailers account. The token 
could therefore be stored without particular security.


The upgrade required is to allow customers to enter credit card details 
on line. The payment company provide a "hosted payment page" which 
allows customers to enter details and the token is returned which can be 
used as before. The hosted payment page is called with an 
"Authentication token" which is given to the retailer but must be held 
securely - DPAPI is recommended. The developers know nothing about Linux 
so it is an unexpected hurdle for me.


Thanks for your suggestion. Looks promising.

Roger



On 21/10/15 08:16, James Courtier-Dutton wrote:



On 20 Oct 2015 13:26, "Roger Munford" 
<mailto:rogermunf...@parussoftware.co.uk>> wrote:

>
> I am bringing an old desktop payment system up to date to work with 
the payment providers new system and also provide a wrapper for a 
website which transfers the user to their hosted payment page.

>
> The website is built on the traditional LAMP server. However the 
website requires a security key which " is secret and must never be 
revealed to anyone and you must ensure that the key is protected on 
your server by appropriate security measures such as DPAPI"

>
> I was looking for a Linux equivalent but there does not seem to be 
one, but I assume there must be a technique employed on Linux service 
to accomplish the same thing.

>
> The payment service providers are a windows shop and aren't very 
helpful.

>
> Can anybody point me in the right direction?
>
If you are having to become PCI DSS compliant, then things become far 
more difficult to get right.

It is far more that just protecting encryption keys.
Linux does have an api for storing keys securly in the kernel. Google 
linux kernel key management.


In general, PCI DSS looks for separation of data at differing 
sensitivity levels. In some cases, dedicated hardware is used to 
encrypt credit card numbers.
In other cases, you separate up the data and store it in different 
places. Eg. Credit card numbers on one server, and the rest of the 
data on another, and then you look to lock down the credit card server 
to the max and not run any services on it apart from the credit card 
access api and no web browsers.


Kind regards

James





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[Hampshire] Linux equivalent of DPAPI

[Roger Munford]

I am bringing an old desktop payment system up to date to work with the 
payment providers new system and also provide a wrapper for a website 
which transfers the user to their hosted payment page.


The website is built on the traditional LAMP server. However the website 
requires a security key which " is secret and must never be revealed to 
anyone and you must ensure that the key is protected on your server by 
appropriate security measures such as DPAPI" 



I was looking for a Linux equivalent but there does not seem to be one, 
but I assume there must be a technique employed on Linux service to 
accomplish the same thing.


The payment service providers are a windows shop and aren't very helpful.

Can anybody point me in the right direction?

Regards

Roger




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[Hampshire] Visit to Community owned Solar Farm in Lymington

[Roger Munford]

If anybody is interested, I will be taking a group around the farm on 
Saturday 17th at 10.30 a.m. and it looks as if there will be plenty of 
spare places.


I am also trying to organise a lift share although it is cunningly 
organised for those keen to take a train and cycle (15 mins from station).


The west Solent Solar Coop are also working away to get another farm at 
Netley Marsh completed before the end of subsidies so if anybody wants 
to join the coop, please contact me for details.


Roger


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Re: [Hampshire] Remote access to mySQL

[Roger Munford]

Yes it was "Unable to connect to remote host:" with the problematic 
connection and

"Connected to ..." for the well behaved connection.



On 25/09/15 13:24, James Courtier-Dutton wrote:

Are you getting connection refused when you telnet to port 3306 ?


On 25 September 2015 at 10:50, Roger Munford
 wrote:

Samuel,

Thank you very much for this information. I followed it both with the
troublesome connection and a well behaved connection and they both worked
exactly as you described.
this is great knowledge to have.

Regards

Roger


On 24/09/15 21:44, Samuel Penn wrote:

On Thursday 24 Sep 2015 12:58:32 Roger Munford wrote:

I am having the perennial problem of connecting remotely to a MySQL
database. I have no experience of administering MySQL myself and I am
not confident that the person at the other end has had much either.
I gave them my (fixed) ip address and received a user name and password
back. I am using the MSQL workbench and have a couple of remote
connections which work.

Is there anything here that I may not know about or is there anything
that I could suggest to my colleague.

What happens if you telnet to port 3306 on the database machine, what
do you get? e.g. "telnet 20.30.40.50 3306"

If you get a simple connection refused, then MySQL may not even be
listening (or it's being blocked by a firewall).

I think MySQL is configured by default to not allow remote connections.
In the my.conf file (/etc/mysql/my.conf on Ubuntu) there is an option
for bind-address which defaults to 127.0.0.1

This means that MySQL isn't even listening for remote connections,
so setting GRANT options for users and databases will have no effect.

If they set this to 0.0.0.0 (listen on all networks), and restart MySQL,
then you may have more luck.


When MySQL is reachable, telnet should give you "Connected to ..." then
a load of garbage (you can't do anything useful over telnet, but it tells
you if MySQL is there or not).




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Re: [Hampshire] Remote access to mySQL

[Roger Munford]

Thanks Peter,

It should be simple as you suggest but I have the strong feeling that my 
colleague at the other end has overlooked something. I think it is new 
for them and they are assuming that they have done everything correctly 
and the problem lies at my end. It is sometimes difficult to nudge 
people to look again.


Roger


On 24/09/15 15:51, Peter B. wrote:

Should be as simple as
http://www.rackspace.com/knowledge_center/article/mysql-connect-to-your-database-remotely

On 24 September 2015 at 12:58, Roger Munford 
<mailto:rogermunf...@parussoftware.co.uk>> wrote:


I am having the perennial problem of connecting remotely to a
MySQL database. I have no experience of administering MySQL myself
and I am not confident that the person at the other end has had
much either.
I gave them my (fixed) ip address and received a user name and
password back. I am using the MSQL workbench and have a couple of
remote connections which work.

Is there anything here that I may not know about or is there
anything that I could suggest to my colleague.

Thanks

Roger


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Re: [Hampshire] Remote access to mySQL

[Roger Munford]

Samuel,

Thank you very much for this information. I followed it both with the 
troublesome connection and a well behaved connection and they both 
worked exactly as you described.

this is great knowledge to have.

Regards

Roger

On 24/09/15 21:44, Samuel Penn wrote:

On Thursday 24 Sep 2015 12:58:32 Roger Munford wrote:

I am having the perennial problem of connecting remotely to a MySQL
database. I have no experience of administering MySQL myself and I am
not confident that the person at the other end has had much either.
I gave them my (fixed) ip address and received a user name and password
back. I am using the MSQL workbench and have a couple of remote
connections which work.

Is there anything here that I may not know about or is there anything
that I could suggest to my colleague.

What happens if you telnet to port 3306 on the database machine, what
do you get? e.g. "telnet 20.30.40.50 3306"

If you get a simple connection refused, then MySQL may not even be
listening (or it's being blocked by a firewall).

I think MySQL is configured by default to not allow remote connections.
In the my.conf file (/etc/mysql/my.conf on Ubuntu) there is an option
for bind-address which defaults to 127.0.0.1

This means that MySQL isn't even listening for remote connections,
so setting GRANT options for users and databases will have no effect.

If they set this to 0.0.0.0 (listen on all networks), and restart MySQL,
then you may have more luck.


When MySQL is reachable, telnet should give you "Connected to ..." then
a load of garbage (you can't do anything useful over telnet, but it tells
you if MySQL is there or not).





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[Hampshire] Remote access to mySQL

[Roger Munford]

I am having the perennial problem of connecting remotely to a MySQL 
database. I have no experience of administering MySQL myself and I am 
not confident that the person at the other end has had much either.
I gave them my (fixed) ip address and received a user name and password 
back. I am using the MSQL workbench and have a couple of remote 
connections which work.


Is there anything here that I may not know about or is there anything 
that I could suggest to my colleague.


Thanks

Roger


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Re: [Hampshire] Advice on specs for a gaming machine

[Roger Munford]

Thanks to everybody for their advice. My son has taken it on board and 
upped his specs. I was hoping that it would have the opposite effect but 
that's old farts for you.


Boxes have started to arrive and it is hard not to kick him out of the 
way and get stuck in to the nice shiny bits.


Roger


On 12/08/15 12:57, david gilligan wrote:


Roger,

Looking at the games he wants to play and depends on what settings 
they will be at, he may benefit from a i7 and if gaining especially 
WoW, water cooling is the best option as a cooler with a heat sink 
won't last too long.  I'd recommend at least a 750w power to withstand 
powering the harddrives, motherboard and graphics card, aswell as any 
audio he maybe adding and/or multiple screens.


David

On 11 Aug 2015 16:56, "Roger Munford" 
<mailto:rogermunf...@parussoftware.co.uk>> wrote:


My son has listed his dream machine for 1080p gaming, (maybe
1440p) in particular The Witcher 3, FFXIV, GTA V, WoW and
Dishonored 2 on its release.

I have no need of a machine costing more than £200 and am in no
position to evaluate his choices. My eyes moisten at the thought
of a Raspberry Pi 2.
I was wondering if anybody with experience in these matters could
advise. I just have a feeling that this is overkill.

Intel Core i5-4690K 3.5GHz Quad-Core
<https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/part/intel-cpu-bx80646i54690k>
Processor
<https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/part/intel-cpu-bx80646i54690k>Zalman
CNPS10X Performa CPU Cooler
<https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/part/zalman-cpu-cooler-cnps10xperforma>
Gigabyte GA-Z97P-D3 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard
<https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/part/gigabyte-motherboard-gaz97pd3>
G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory
<https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/part/gskill-memory-f312800cl10d16gbxl>
Crucial M500 240GB 2.5" Solid State Drive
<https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/part/crucial-internal-hard-drive-ct240m500ssd1>

Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive
<https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/part/seagate-internal-hard-drive-st2000dm001>

Zotac GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB Video Card
<https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/part/zotac-video-card-zt9050110p>
Thermaltake Versa H23 ATX Mid Tower Case
<https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/part/thermaltake-case-ca1b100m1wn01>
EVGA SuperNOVA NEX 650W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power
Supply
<https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/part/evga-power-supply-120g10650xr>


Thanks very much

Roger

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Re: [Hampshire] Advice on specs for a gaming machine

[Roger Munford]

Gordon,

I am afraid that you are getting on but I stand wholeheartedly with you 
having had the same sort of experience which I think was very valuable.

However it is his own money and I am trying to help him spend it wisely.

By the way I should have mentioned quite an impressive site that he is 
using http://pcpartpicker.com/ which will verify designs and find the 
cheapest price for all components.


Roger

On 12/08/15 09:26, Gordon Scott wrote:

On 11/08/2015 16:11, Roger Munford wrote:

Thanks for that. He is 18 so I have little influence



I must be getting old or something.
I struggle with the concept of buying a toy for an 18yo.
When I reached 16, I was told to get a job and start paying rent.
From then on, everything I needed I had to buy for myself.




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Re: [Hampshire] Advice on specs for a gaming machine

[Roger Munford]

Alan,

Thanks for that. He is 18 so I have little influence. I am quite 
flattered that my advice was sought but, as I said, I am in no position 
to help.


Roger


On 11/08/15 17:06, Alan Pope wrote:

On 11 August 2015 at 16:56, Roger Munford
 wrote:

My son has listed his dream machine for 1080p gaming, (maybe 1440p) in
particular The Witcher 3, FFXIV, GTA V, WoW and Dishonored 2 on its release.

I have no need of a machine costing more than £200 and am in no position to
evaluate his choices. My eyes moisten at the thought of a Raspberry Pi 2.
I was wondering if anybody with experience in these matters could advise. I
just have a feeling that this is overkill.


Given what he wants to play (I assume he's not really young because
some of those are quite 'adult' games - GTA V specifically - however,
not telling you how to parent :D ) it looks like a fine setup. I'm
coveting that video card for a start! You could go lower, but would
get terrible frame rates at high detail on those resolutions.

Nice setup, I'm envious :)

Cheers,
Al.




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[Hampshire] Advice on specs for a gaming machine

[Roger Munford]

My son has listed his dream machine for 1080p gaming, (maybe 1440p) in 
particular The Witcher 3, FFXIV, GTA V, WoW and Dishonored 2 on its release.


I have no need of a machine costing more than £200 and am in no position 
to evaluate his choices. My eyes moisten at the thought of a Raspberry Pi 2.
I was wondering if anybody with experience in these matters could 
advise. I just have a feeling that this is overkill.


Intel Core i5-4690K 3.5GHz Quad-Core 

Processor 
Zalman 
CNPS10X Performa CPU Cooler 

Gigabyte GA-Z97P-D3 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard 

G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory 

Crucial M500 240GB 2.5" Solid State Drive 
 

Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive 

Zotac GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB Video Card 

Thermaltake Versa H23 ATX Mid Tower Case 

EVGA SuperNOVA NEX 650W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power 
Supply 



Thanks very much

Roger
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[Hampshire] Might ring a bell

[Roger Munford]

http://www.newsbiscuit.com/2015/01/10/courage-award-for-man-who-threw-out-old-computer-cables/

Happy New Year

Roger

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Re: [Hampshire] Email services

[Roger Munford]

Thanks for your suggestions. I looked at Mailchimp but I was a bit 
daunted about how I could make it work with the existing application. I 
was looking for an alternative smtp mail server and fortunately found 
Mandrill which is a part of Mailchimp. After a quick registration, I had 
the server details and could start sending some test  emails. It looks 
like it is OK for the client as well.


Amazingly they give you 12000 a month for free which is more than enough.

Thanks again

Roger

On 26/11/14 13:31, Roger Munford wrote:
I have a client who has a food home delivery service and I provided 
him with a function for mass emailing of customers so that he can let 
people know that turkeys must be ordered by a certain date and their 
delivery day will be changed for Christmas week, that sort of thing.
However his ISP will not allow mass emailing of this sort so we need 
an alternative solution before Christmas. Can anybody suggest an ISP 
who would allow this? It seems a bit business unfriendly and I cannot 
imagine that this is now standard behaviour.


Thanks

Roger





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[Hampshire] Email services

[Roger Munford]

I have a client who has a food home delivery service and I provided him 
with a function for mass emailing of customers so that he can let people 
know that turkeys must be ordered by a certain date and their delivery 
day will be changed for Christmas week, that sort of thing.
However his ISP will not allow mass emailing of this sort so we need an 
alternative solution before Christmas. Can anybody suggest an ISP who 
would allow this? It seems a bit business unfriendly and I cannot 
imagine that this is now standard behaviour.


Thanks

Roger


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Re: [Hampshire] Portsmouth LUG BaB meeting on 15th November

[Roger Munford]

I am interested in going and the train times from St. Denys 
(Southampton) are quite good. However I may go by car in which case I 
could offer lifts.



Roger

On 03/11/14 18:55, Lisi wrote:

There will be a meeting of the Portsmouth Linux User Group at the Broadoak
Social club from 13:00 to 18:00 on Saturday 15th November 2014.
http://www.broadoaksocialclub.net/where.html

You are all cordially invited.

Unfortunately, Keith Edmunds is unable to come.  But we have a speaker! \o/

Dr Gareth Owen, Senior Lecturer at the University of Portsmouth will speak on:
Tor, the darknet, online anonymity and privacy.

Dr. Owen is the course leader for the Forensic Computing degrees and a cyber
security researcher with specific interests in reverse engineering and memory
forensics.  There is a talk synopsis here:
http://bsideslondon2014.sched.org/event/b36b081f3fbf462fe45ecb6b45bd4e83#.VFepDH62F5x

I look forward to Gareth's talk and to seeing many of you at it.

I also look forward to your boxen and gadgets, and will bring install and live
CDs.

Lisi




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[Hampshire] Career Advice

[Roger Munford]

From time to time this list has given advice to people at the beginning 
of their careers. I wonder if you have any advice for those at the other 
end.
I spent about 25 years as a contract programmer working on all sorts of 
projects before stopping to follow a bit of a dream in alternative 
energy about 6 years ago. However for me, the excitement surrounding 
alternative energy, on the installation side, has become routine and my 
heart (not to mention back and knees) is no longer in it.


I would like to return to contract programming but don’t feel confident 
that I could be productive enough without some preparation.


I did electrical engineering and electronics at University and have done 
a lot of assembler and C around hardware projects and have done 
successful projects in Java, PHP, MySQl, Javascript, HTML, Labview, 
Postscript and the now defunct Foxpro. Clearly I am not up to speed in 
any of these now but I thought I would ask the list for views on what 
languages, tools and sectors are currently sought after and if there is 
any training or qualification that would be worth investing in. I 
haven't looked at mobile programming, perhaps that is an option.


I maintain a couple of programmes that I wrote for DOS over 25 years ago 
and have subsequently ported through to Windows 7. They are still in 
daily use so I feel that I have a good commitment to quality work.


Thanks


Roger







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Re: [Hampshire] Munich Council was: (no subject)

[Roger Munford]

I have slept on it and have concluded that there is no doubt that Munich 
will return to Windows just as fast as possible. The reasoning behind it 
is that Microsoft are moving their HQ to Munich. In Germany local 
authorities get a slice of the turnover of companies that they host and 
the benefits of having MS headquartered there will probably outweigh the 
cost and inconvenience of returning to Windows.
The politicians are doing their bit by pushing the (rather feeble) MS 
arguments, i.e. compatibility, quality. We will now never know whether 
the project is a success.
Any doubt of the outcome should be dispelled by the smarmy MS spokesman. 
"MS has always been a good loser and accepted that Munich of all places 
has its own operating system. However we are always open for discussions".

This is ruining my holiday.

Roger

On 19/08/14 18:20, Tim B wrote:
I'm not convinced that there is much in this. I wouldn't treat it as 
fact until Munich council release a statement saying that they are 
returning to Windows.


Tim B.


Sent from Samsung Mobile




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Re: [Hampshire] (no subject)

[Roger Munford]

On 19/08/14 18:40, Peter Collins wrote:



On Tuesday, 19 August 2014, Jon Wilks > wrote:


I have seen a few web sites are reporting that the City of Munich
is regretting the Linux deployment and are moving back to windows
(see [1] and [2]).  Is this right ?
ue
Anyone out there know if this is true?

Jon
[1]

http://www.neowin.net/news/munich-germany-realizes-that-deploying-linux-was-a-disaster-going-back-to-windows
[2]

http://arstechnica.com/business/2014/08/linux-on-the-desktop-pioneer-munich-now-considering-a-switch-back-to-windows


This page suggests those reports aren't true but the council are 
reviewing IT systems.


http://www.techrepublic.com/article/no-munich-isnt-about-to-ditch-free-software-and-move-back-to-windows/


The previous long serving social democrat - green coalition has recently 
changed to a social democrat (equiv labour) - csu (equiv conservative) 
coalition with a change of mayor to boot. Microsoft are planning to move 
their German HQ to Munich in 2016 so I think that it may not be all to 
do with the success or failure of the now maturing migration. It 
certainly isn't realising that Linux has been a disaster.
I have a maintenance contract with an international agency based in 
Munich and visit occasionally. A German colleague told me that new 
bosses "like to piss in every corner" when they start so this could be a 
ritual bounds setting or some behind the scenes manipulation by Microsoft.
Munich is a fine city, world leading in many aspects such as alternative 
energy, public transport and waste management. I thought that it was 
characteristic when they started the migration away from Microsoft. 
Hopefully the migration was as successful as it appears and the evidence 
is so strong that the politicians,

however influenced, cannot go back. If so I hope they get Windows 8.

Roger

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Re: [Hampshire] C development

[Roger Munford]

On 13/06/14 08:34, James Courtier-Dutton wrote:

On 13 June 2014 06:55, James Courtier-Dutton  wrote:

On 12 June 2014 18:56, Roger Munford  wrote:

100 years ago I wrote a data logging programme for DOS which ran on a Sharp
pocket PC. It was written in C and assembler. I now have a need for this
programme and would like to revive it for use with the Raspberry Pi.

I haven't done anything like this for some time and would like some advice
on current techniques to get the job done as soon as possible.

The first thing is a suitable IDE. I have had some experience with Eclipse
but it may be a bit heavyweight for quick results. However if extra effort
pays off in the end it might be worth it.

I will also need a lightweight graphics library. The original plotted data
on the display which was done with functions like drawline(x1,y1,x2,y2) and
writechar(x,y,char) etc. That sort of level. Having said that, the Pi has a
lot more capability and I could use an existing display package.

The data came from various sources, some serial and some small devices which
were connected to the parallel port. The smallest timing period was 1 second
and I used the timer interrupt to initiate the read commands because there
was a lot of processing going on, updating the display and also the logger
had a modem attached so that data could be collected remotely. Is this the
way to go with linux or is there a better/easier technique.

Originally I just recorded the data sequentially in a file but I was
wondering if there was any advantage in using something like sqllite.

I would be grateful to hear for any advice.


Hi,

A quick solution would be to use DOSBOX.
It can be run on the raspberry pi and runs old DOS x86 programs
directly. It has good support for serial ports, not used the parallel
support, but it should be ok.

Then, if you wish to re-implement your program natively, then some
things I would do:
1) You won't need assembler any more.
2) Separate out data collection and data visualization into two
separate programs. Maybe use a database in between, or it the data
rates are too high, use CSV files.
3) There are many data visualization programs already out there, you
might not have to do any work in this area.


If you choose to use DOSBOX, http://www.dosbox.com
I have some patches that make it work better with data logging applications.
My patches make the timestamps use the linux system clock, instead of
DOS "ticks" which can be out by about 10 minutes each day.

If you instead choose to re-write the application, you might wish to
consider displaying the output in a web browser, ie. write a web app,
or provide the output via the REST web services protocol.
You could then display the output on a smart phone, tablet or any
other web based device.

Kind Regards

James

Thank you very much for the suggestions. Sadly I threw away the floppies 
with the compiled version of the programme but kept the source so I 
can't try it with DOSBOX. I very much like the idea of splitting the 
data acquisition and displaying via a web browser for the reasons 
outlined. I can imagine that something like sqlite would do for storing 
the data because my sampling period will be a few seconds and it would 
be easier to manipulate the data.
I am also thinking of using Arduinos for remote data acquisition so that 
would fit in nicely.


Thanks again

Roger


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[Hampshire] C development

[Roger Munford]

100 years ago I wrote a data logging programme for DOS which ran on a 
Sharp pocket PC. It was written in C and assembler. I now have a need 
for this programme and would like to revive it for use with the 
Raspberry Pi.


I haven't done anything like this for some time and would like some 
advice on current techniques to get the job done as soon as possible.


The first thing is a suitable IDE. I have had some experience with 
Eclipse but it may be a bit heavyweight for quick results. However if 
extra effort pays off in the end it might be worth it.


I will also need a lightweight graphics library. The original plotted 
data on the display which was done with functions like 
drawline(x1,y1,x2,y2) and writechar(x,y,char) etc. That sort of level. 
Having said that, the Pi has a lot more capability and I could use an 
existing display package.


The data came from various sources, some serial and some small devices 
which were connected to the parallel port. The smallest timing period 
was 1 second and I used the timer interrupt to initiate the read 
commands because there was a lot of processing going on, updating the 
display and also the logger had a modem attached so that data could be 
collected remotely. Is this the way to go with linux or is there a 
better/easier technique.


Originally I just recorded the data sequentially in a file but I was 
wondering if there was any advantage in using something like sqllite.


I would be grateful to hear for any advice.

Thanks

Roger


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Re: [Hampshire] [ADMIN] February meeting

[Roger Munford]

 Tim,

do you know what time Keith will start his talk. I may be able to come 
just for that.


Regards

Roger

On 28/01/14 20:16, Tim Brocklehurst wrote:

Hi guys,

This month's meeting will be on Saturday 1st Feb at QinetiQ Haslar starting at
1pm. I know this is the same day as the SoMakeIt opening, but hopefully there
is enough flexibility for those who wish to get to both meetings to make it.

This month we have a talk from Keith Edmunds. He'll be discussing using Linux
in small business, and giving an idea about how he uses Linux in his IT
consultancy.

As usual for meetings at QinetiQ, please e-mail me before midnight on Thursday
if you wish to attend and I'll make sure you're on the list.

Hope to see you there,

Cheers,

Tim B.



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[Hampshire] Process modelling

[Roger Munford]

A friend of mine is involved in solar installations and has landed a 
large job installing 24,000 panels on a single roof.


The whole project requires moving panels and other components over this 
enormous roof plus installation time. It also requires the construction 
of temporary walkways to achieve this.


Is there a software package that could help to optimise materials and 
labour or a perhaps reference to algorithms to help me evaluate this?


Regards


Roger


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Re: [Hampshire] Social Enterprise

[Roger Munford]

It is not quite what you are outlining but you may find some like minded 
people https://www.codeclub.org.uk and http://nhshackday.com/


Very best of luck with whatever you do and let us know how you progress.

Roger

On 11/09/13 23:48, Ally Biggs wrote:

Good evening everyone I have recently had this idea of setting up a Social 
Enterprise which would have a heavy emphasis on Open Source technologies and 
Linux. I want to give something back to the community and have a strong desire 
to help others.

The key ideology of the enterprise is to train volunteers / customers / people 
from unprivileged backgrounds in Computing.

The main income stream of the company would be a focus on refurbishment of IT 
equipment where it can be put to good use or resold. Prices would be reasonable!
( avenues such as eBay, gumtree)

Second main income stream would be repairs, I have about 8 years experience 
repairing PC's and laptops

Third income stream would be focused on administration and deployments for the 
small business and charity sector we can also throw in support contracts. And 
use Linux as alternative to Windows.

I don't want to take advantage of volunteers who aid the progression, I want to 
be able to put volunteers through the Compita A+ training. That way as a Social 
Enterprise we will be giving something back they will become qualified I,T 
combined with experience which will either open doors or if the Enterprise 
expands we can take them on full time and explore other avenues such as IT call 
outs, home visits.

There are diverse options for training I have alot of Windows experience. You 
guys have the Linux knowledge :)

Few options for courses

Computer hardware how to build PC
Introduction to the Internet
Desktop publishing
Introduction to Windows

Linux for beginners
BASH Basics
BASH scripting 101
Setting up a Home media Server
Network Services for beginners
Securing your Server

I also thought able setting up a training room consisting of raspberry Pi's 
where users could be taught the basics of programming.

I could really use your input I am passionate about Linux and helping others 
and I am sure alot of you guys are aswell has anyone setup a similar venture?

Sent from my iPhone



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[Hampshire] Laptop Recommendations

[Roger Munford]

My Novatech laptop has finally bit the dust and I will have to replace 
it. I bought Novatech last time because they sold laptops without 
windows. It was basically OK but had a few niggles that I put up with.


Can anybody recommend either a low end laptop or a buying strategy which 
would lead to a Linux Friendly laptop.


Thanks


Roger


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Re: [Hampshire] Ethernet Over Mains

[Roger Munford]

Do you know what sort of distance the Develos work at ?

On 26/03/13 16:37, Dr A. J. Trickett wrote:

On Tue, 26 Mar 2013 at 03:58:39PM +, Alan Pope wrote:

On 26/03/13 15:29, Dr A. J. Trickett wrote:

I've been running Devolo 200AV units for a while and recently
asked abut their 500AV+ units. I bought a pair of 500AVs and they
are noticably faster and use less electricity apparently and even
have a power pass-through.


Any chance you can do a benchmark with something like iperf?

I'll try tonight if I remember. I can compare 500AV, 200AV and
local GigE switch.

If you run 200AV and 500AV on the same network then the 200AVs can
only signal to the 500AVs at 200, it's not clear if the 500AVs are
forced down to 200 when talking to each other if there is a 200AV
on the same wiring.


Here's iperf between my laptop and another machine over the 200AV units.


an@deep-thought:~$ iperf -s

Server listening on TCP port 5001
TCP window size: 85.3 KByte (default)

[  4] local 192.168.1.107 port 5001 connected with 192.168.1.2 port 53108
[ ID] Interval   Transfer Bandwidth
[  4]  0.0-10.4 sec  73.9 MBytes  59.6 Mbits/sec
[  5] local 192.168.1.107 port 5001 connected with 192.168.1.2 port 53109
[  5]  0.0-10.4 sec  73.8 MBytes  59.4 Mbits/sec
[  4] local 192.168.1.107 port 5001 connected with 192.168.1.2 port 53112
[  4]  0.0-10.5 sec  70.4 MBytes  56.1 Mbits/sec

.. compared with two machines over GbE ..

[  5] local 192.168.1.107 port 5001 connected with 192.168.1.112 port 44354
[  5]  0.0-10.0 sec  1.09 GBytes   938 Mbits/sec




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[Hampshire] USB memory stick corrupted

[Roger Munford]

I installed Ubuntu on a friends pretty old PC. He has a laptop for work 
and the PC was not used for much and he was interested in giving Linux a 
whirl.


It all went well but a week later he phoned to say that two memory 
sticks (fat32 KINGSTON DT100 G2) were corrupted by Ubuntu. He tried 
reading and then formatting with . He sent them to me and they won't 
mount with "can't read superblock.


I suspect that the he didn't eject before removing (he is away so I 
cannot ask). However I assume that whatever happened, it was his normal 
procedure with windows.


I have never had a problem with USB sticks. Is there anything about 
Ubuntu that could cause this.


I cannot format the disk and am trying testdisk but so far it seems that 
little can be done. Is it worth persevering? The data isn't important, 
perhaps the experience will be.


Thanks


Roger

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Re: [Hampshire] Pay-as-you-go mobile data sim?

[Roger Munford]

You may want to look at this short article which summarises whats out 
there. Intriguingly there are "free" options which are bound to 
compulsory adverts

http://www.modaco.com/page/news/_/android/mobile-broadband-on-a-budget-or-free-r950

My son has giffgaff and is pleased so far.



Roger

On 27/02/13 13:58, Andy Random wrote:


Hi,

I'm looking for a sim to put in an Android device.

It doesn't have to specifically be a mobile broadband sim, but I don't 
care about making calls or sending txts I just want data access.


I'm not looking to sign up to a years long contract, I'd prefer pay as 
you go, but a monthly fee paid by standing order would be ok as long 
as I can cancel with no more than a months notice.


I'm guessing I won't use more than 500MB a month, but certainly no 
more than 1GB. So some flexibility would be good, but I could live 
with a fix 500MB a month for a good deal.


Ideally I'd prefer to avoid EE as I know they have a number of 
coverage holes on the route of my daily commute.


I know both Vodafone and O2 have better coverage on the route, but I'm 
not sure about 3.


I've heard good things from friends about GiffGaff for calls and txt 
but I don't know what their data policies are like?


There seem to be a rather bewildering array of options out there that 
might fit the bill but I've not waded through them all.


Needless to say I'm looking to pay as little as I can :)

Can anybody recommend a plan they are using that fits my requirements?

  Andy




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Re: [Hampshire] Digital SLR recommendations

[Roger Munford]

Thanks for all your replies. In the end she settled on the NIKON D3100 
which she got from John Lewis (the store, not our own much loved).
Full marks to John Lewis (the store) because they advised against the 
more expensive D3200 which was an option.
We were also pleased with the price which was the same as Amazons but of 
course not offshored for tax.


Thanks again for your advice.

Regards

Roger

On 19/02/13 19:53, john lewis wrote:

On Tue, 19 Feb 2013 15:40:18 +
Stephen Davies  wrote:


The Nikon D3200 will do pretty well everything your daughter wants.

As for wanting a DSLR to do video, perhaps some people don't
understand how far DSLR Video has come these days.

Hi Stephen, me for one!

I am still stuck in the era of the Pentax Me Super photographically
speaking although I now use a Pentax K-r having moved on from a
compact digital which I bought when it got difficult to get film
processed and a bridge DSLR. I bought the K-r because it can use one
of the k mount lenses from the Me.

I am unlikely to want to use its video capabilities though, I assume
it has some but haven't even looked at that part of the manual.

P.S.
I have been watching the CBBC program from Madagascar that gets
broadcast at 4.30 each day and can understand why you like the island.




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Re: [Hampshire] Digital SLR recommendations

[Roger Munford]

Tony,

She was hoping for something around £300. However she could stretch to 
£400. The DS3200 looks like it may justify the extra.


In the past she has made short videos with friends. At Christmas she 
made a very good job of a family calendar which we sent to relatives 
(who are chipping in to the cost). She will be doing GCSE art next year 
and wants to do a photography project. I am relenting a bit from my 
instinctive cheapness because I think the right tool would encourage her 
existing interest.
She is also doing GCSE astronomy so something for the stars would be a 
bonus.


Since I am on the subject, as part of a Christmas present, I took her to 
a one day film course in London (http://www.raindance.org/). To my 
surprise, and for less than the cost of a football match, it turned out 
to be one of the most entertaining and informative days out I have had 
for a long time.


Roger


On 18/02/13 13:45, Tony Whitmore wrote:

On 2013-02-18 13:02, Roger Munford wrote:

My daughter wants to buy a DSLR camera and is seriously considering
the NIKON D3100.

The video function is quite important for her.

Any advice?


Do you have a budget in mind? What sort of use does she intend to put 
it to?





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[Hampshire] Digital SLR recommendations

[Roger Munford]

My daughter wants to buy a DSLR camera and is seriously considering the 
NIKON D3100.


The video function is quite important for her.

Any advice?


Roger


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Re: [Hampshire] Raspberry Pi Questions

[Roger Munford]

The useful thing is that it all works with the Pi. When I got mine from 
Farnell about 6 months ago the keyboard and the SD card that I had on 
the shelf didn't work and whilst looking for approved hardware found the 
Pi Hut. It is probably less of an issue now.


Roger

On 06/02/13 12:48, Clive Woodfine wrote:

Thanks for the web site Roger. It looks a useful place to buy bits.

On 6 February 2013 09:30, Roger Munford
 wrote:

You might like to try the Pi Hut   http://thepihut.com/

Clive




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Re: [Hampshire] Raspberry Pi Questions

[Roger Munford]

You might like to try the Pi Hut   http://thepihut.com/

It appears to be a small startup but they have a wide range of 
accessories and do bundles. The only potential problem is that they are 
not VAT registered so you cant claim VAT if you are registered yourself.


Roger



On 04/02/13 20:13, Dr A. J. Trickett wrote:


Hi,

Having actually seen and photographed a Raspberry Pi I think I'm sold 
on the idea of them. I currently have an Ethernet switch under the TV, 
spare power and a CRT (composite TV input) though I do plan to replace 
it with a flat TV of some sorts eventually (HDMI input).


It seems to make sense that a RPi Model B makes sense, it would be 
small, silent and fun - it appeals to my inner geek. I've a few questions:


1) Where is the best place to get one? Maplin or Farnell or RS?

2) What else does it need?

An SD card for the OS and local storage

A case

A USB power supply

A USB keyboard and mouse if you want to drive it directly

--

Adam Trickett

Overton, HANTS, UK

We are all atheists about most of the gods that humanity

has ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further.

-- Richard Dawkins





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Re: [Hampshire] [ADMIN] February meeting - This week!

[Roger Munford]

This looks great. May I suggest a sort of formal discussion of this very 
topic after the talks. Its on everybody's mind at the moment and I am 
sure that this attractive programme is going to bring in a decent crowd.


Roger

On 28/01/13 22:56, Tim Brocklehurst wrote:

Hi guys,

The february meeting is this Saturday (where did January go?) in Building 59
at Southampton University, from 1pm.

Please send your MAC addresses to Chris Malton by Wednesday if you wish to
have WiFi access.

>From the recent mailing list traffic, we seem to have lots of interest, and a
few offers of talks/demos. The following is not definitive, but so far we have:

Rich Bensley - Starting with MySQL
Tim B - From Windows 7 to Linux - Basic setup and CLI (on request).
Chris Malton - Doing cool streaming stuff involving servers, PIs and networks.
[I presume, Chris. - Unconfirmed]

We will also have a Raspberry PI to play with, as we did last month.

Please don't feel that you have to be an expert to come to the meeting,
experience is not a pre-requisite!

See you there,

Tim B.




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Re: [Hampshire] Promoting LUG meets via social networking

[Roger Munford]

It would be nice to know what time the talks will take place.

Roger

On 28/01/13 14:04, Richard Bensley wrote:

The beginners guide to MySQL was also very popular.

Yes - MySQL per se is not for *total* beginners.  Pity I missed it. :-(

I can certainly help in the MySQL front. I am a DBA for a trading
platform. I train and implement MySQL at various levels, brunting its
various idioms.

A five minute flash talk I could certainly do just about anytime. I
will be there with my brother, James, next Saturday.


Rich




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Re: [Hampshire] Suggestions for MySQL connectivity

[Roger Munford]

Thanks for everybody's helpful advice. After the initial panic that it 
would not be possible to get a direct connection, it was, in fact quite 
straightforward and a host was found for me. For the record, tsohosts do 
it, they are good value and were very helpful.
I copied that database, reconfigured everything that needed it and, 
hopefully, everything is as it was before.


The new host does offer SSH access but I am not obliged to use it. I 
hope I am not being complacent because the data on the site is only a 
list of names (used to greet the customer) plus hashed usernames and 
passwords.


Thanks again,

Roger

On 22/01/13 22:26, Tim Brocklehurst wrote:

Clearly we have to go somewhere else. Can anybody recommend a hosting
company that will provide a direct connection to MySQL?

The "support" told me that it was a wicked thing to do a huge security
risk. Not having been involved in software for several years, I am
willing to believe that it could have become a problem, but is it such a
risk that nobody will offer direct connections. If so what are the the
mechanisms that are unsafe? Also what alternative techniques are
available to transfer data between databases.

Roger,

Providing a direct connection to MySQL (or any database server) is probably
not a good idea [1]. Put simply, while MySQL has some security features, I
wouldn't rely on them over the internet. This drove me to hosting a similar
setup internally at a company I was working for some years back.

You could consider an SSH tunnel, or a VPN tunnel into the remote server, and
then access the database through that. There are loads of examples of these,
just google. The tunnel itself secures any data that is transmitted through
it, so the other end just looks like a continuation of your LAN. However, if
you do this you need to ensure that passwords and/or keys are kept safe, and
are suitably strong.

Alternatively, there is nothing to stop you hosting it internal to the
company, as long as they have a sufficiently reliable (and fast enough)
broadband provider. However, this has both pros and cons.

Hope this helps,

Tim B.

[1] http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/security-against-attack.html



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Re: [Hampshire] Scamming call

[Roger Munford]

I feel a bit silly now that I realise how widespread the problem was and 
I am just one of millions probably.


I did fantasise that BT had a department with capabilities similar to 
the CIA in the Jason Bourne films and that, with my help, an armed BT 
drone would be on its way to Asia to sort "Jeff" out.


One can only hope that when Theresa May finally gets round to monitoring 
my calls she will also get on to the scammers. It would be satisfying to 
hear "Tom"'s NOT selling pitch interrupted by screams and a reassuring 
"You wont be troubled again sir. Have a good evening"


I think that a BT armed response service could be quite popular.

Regards

Roger

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[Hampshire] Scamming call

[Roger Munford]

I just received a scamming call from Asia and spent some time playing 
gullible while trying to get my wife to phone the police/BT with a hope 
that the call could be traced and stopped.


However the police, "actionfraud" operator told that there was nothing 
that could be done and BT operator services aren't working today.


I managed to get the dog barking and told "Jeff" that I had to go and he 
could call me this afternoon.


Is there anything further that I can do?


Roger




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[Hampshire] Suggestions for MySQL connectivity

[Roger Munford]

In the early 90's, I wrote a programme which organised home deliveries 
for a farmer friend of mind. It was optimised for the office staff to 
take orders over the telephone, the customers being supplied with a 
printed catalogue. It was written in Foxpro now sadly no longer with us.


In 2005 I wrote a website using PHP and MySQL to enable customers to 
order online however the main work is still being done by the original 
programme which hasn't had to change because the business hasn't changed 
(apart from a few extras like emailing PDF invoices etc).


The delivery programme updated the websites product data and collected 
orders via a direct connection to the MySQL database via an ODBC connection.


Since 2005 the website has been split on to two hosts, one part has the 
day to day information stuff and is continually being reworked but the 
original online ordering part has been left intact - until today.


The hosting company which has been taken over twice since 2005, shifted 
the website to another server pretty much without warning. They claim to 
have sent an email to the farmer just before Christmas, just when food 
retailers are having a quiet time. The probably did but I am sure it was 
full of techno gobbledy gook justifying their very steep price rise but 
nothing to alert the farmer that his website was going to be smashed.


It took the best part of the day to get things running again but the 
killer problem is that they are no longer going to allow direct 
connection to the database anymore. After a lot of pleading we got 7 
days grace and a connection from the farm will be allowed.


Clearly we have to go somewhere else. Can anybody recommend a hosting 
company that will provide a direct connection to MySQL?


The "support" told me that it was a wicked thing to do a huge security 
risk. Not having been involved in software for several years, I am 
willing to believe that it could have become a problem, but is it such a 
risk that nobody will offer direct connections. If so what are the the 
mechanisms that are unsafe? Also what alternative techniques are 
available to transfer data between databases.


If you are interested the site is www.sunnyfields.co.uk Click on online 
ordering to step back to 2005. It is a bit long in the tooth by today’s 
standards but it was just as fast over a modem and you didn't have to 
spend a lot of time scrolling.


Thanks for your attention.

Roger





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Re: [Hampshire] Books up for grabs

[Roger Munford]

Tony,

I would really like the Computer security basics because it would do me 
good.


I would also like Linux firewalls, CUPS and active directory for windows 
server 2003 but if somebody else has a need for them, please pass them on.


I can pick then up any time.

Regards

Roger


On 19/02/12 19:09, Tony Whitmore wrote:

Hi,

I've the following books available for anyone who wants them. 
Collection from Southampton (daytime or evening) unless someone wants 
them all when I would consider taking them somewhere in Hampshire. :)


Linux Firewalls - 2nd Edition
CUPS: Common UNIX Printing System
Computer Security Basics (O'Reilly)
802.11 Wireless Network Site Surveying and Installation (Cisco)
The Official Samba-3 HOWTO and Reference Guide
LAN Switching First-step (Cisco)
Real 802.11 Security
Active Directory for Windows Server 2003
Windows Server 2008 Hyper-V
Cisco 802.11 Wireless Networking Quick Reference
Storage Networks Explained (Wiley)
RADIUS (O'Reilly)
Essential SNMP (O'Reilly)
802.11 Wireless Networks (O'Reilly)

Please be aware, some of these are quite large tomes. :)

Thanks,

Tony

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Re: [Hampshire] Ubuntu and Intel H61 chipset

[Roger Munford]

Thanks for everybody's help and suggestions. In the end I bought a new 
PC from ebuyer for £190. However the old PC has been running for 3 days 
without the case cover and I am inclined to think that the problem could 
be temperature related. I had ruled this out because it crashed shortly 
after switching on on not particularly warm days.


However, thanks to James' reference to lm_sensors, I learnt about the 
built in sensors and have installed the temperature monitoring applet 
http://www.lucidtips.com/2009/06/06/monitor-cpu-and-hard-drive-temperatures-on-ubuntu-linux/. 
I think that this could be very useful.


Thanks again, and good luck with your problem Lisi.

Roger

On 10/10/11 19:49, Roger Munford wrote:
The motherboard on my PC is showing signs of failure and it is time 
for a replacement.


Having very modest needs, I have in the past looked at Novatech's 
motherboard "bundles" with a built in video card.


The one that looked suitable 
(http://www.novatech.co.uk/products/motherboardbundles/mbb-6204gb.html) has 
the Intel H61
chipset. Whilst googling for compatibility issues with Ubuntu I didn't 
find much at all, not any "no problems" and a few "ongoing issues with 
Ubuntu 11.04"


Does anybody have experience with the H61 or can anybody advise on a 
suitable basic machine, including case etc. I am quite keen on a low 
power machine, since I use it a lot.


Thanks

Roger Munford




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Re: [Hampshire] Ubuntu and Intel H61 chipset

[Roger Munford]

Lisi,

The computer just crashes occasionally. The screen goes blank and the 
sound changes slightly to a continuous whine. Whether it comes from the 
fans or disk, I do not know. The crashes became more frequent. I removed 
the case and waggled everything which seems to fix it for a bit but 
after 3 weeks, it returned. Sometimes first thing in the morning just 
after booting so I discounted overheating. This happened 5 or 6 times 
this morning but since about 11 it has been running normally. I have 
even tentatively waggled components to try and induce it to crash but 
that didn't work.


I would be surprised if that would be enough to diagnose what the 
problem is. Perhaps the power supply could be dipping out but my wife 
has had no problem with her Mac.


Roger




On 10/10/11 20:12, Lisi wrote:

On Monday 10 October 2011 19:49:37 Roger Munford wrote:

The motherboard on my PC is showing signs of failure and it is time for
a replacement.

Roger -

Can you describe these signs of failure?  What led you to believe that it is
the motherboard at fault?

I am having major problems at the moment and am having difficulty deciding the
cause.  I have run memtest, smartctl, and badblocks.  What else can I do?

smartctl showed some errors on the drive that holds the / system (/home is on
a different drive) so I have ordered a new HDD, but I am now worrying that I
may be throwing good money after bad, since I have had to order an IDE drive,
which would have limited use in  more modern machine.

So - what led you to the conclusion that the problem in your case is the
motherboard?

Thanks,
Lisi

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[Hampshire] Ubuntu and Intel H61 chipset

[Roger Munford]

The motherboard on my PC is showing signs of failure and it is time for 
a replacement.


Having very modest needs, I have in the past looked at Novatech's 
motherboard "bundles" with a built in video card.


The one that looked suitable 
(http://www.novatech.co.uk/products/motherboardbundles/mbb-6204gb.html) 
has the Intel H61
chipset. Whilst googling for compatibility issues with Ubuntu I didn't 
find much at all, not any "no problems" and a few "ongoing issues with 
Ubuntu 11.04"


Does anybody have experience with the H61 or can anybody advise on a 
suitable basic machine, including case etc. I am quite keen on a low 
power machine, since I use it a lot.


Thanks

Roger Munford




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Re: [Hampshire] New Member

[Roger Munford]

I am surprised that nobody has mentioned that September meetings are 
fancy dress


Roger

On 04/09/11 18:38, James Bensley wrote:

On 3 September 2011 10:32, Tony Whitmore  wrote:

On 02.09.2011 19:57, James Bensley wrote:

Hi Luggers,

Hi James.


I'm new to HantsLUG and am thinking of showing my face tomorrow if I
can, to say hello.

The next HantsLUG meeting is 10th September, not 3rd. :)

Nothing like tripping over the door step on the way in to make an entrance :)

--
James.
http://www.jamesbensley.co.cc/

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