Open Source Matters: $35 Android Tablet, Aakash, Launches in India.
Posts in category Gadgetry
The linux-minidisc project
With Sony being the proprietary fools that they are, I have explained how to set up VirtualBox on your Linux OS so you can run Windows, so you can access files on your Sony MiniDisc Walkman. Now I am going to tell you about another, more attractive solution: The linux-minidisc project. READ MORE »
Photography
I got a Nikon D3000. It’s my first DSLR camera. I think it will be awesome once I learn how to use it well. Here are a few examples of my first attempts. It’s obvious I need more practice. I also messed around with the pictures in Gimp. I think I probably messed around with them too much. But it’s OK.
Nexus One update
On Google’s Nexus One site today:
Monday, April 26, 2010
An update on Nexus One partnerships
When we launched Nexus One in January, we announced partnerships with Vodafone in Europe and Verizon Wireless in the US. We have news on both fronts.Today, Vodafone begins accepting pre-orders for Nexus One from customers in the United Kingdom at www.vodafone.co.uk/nexusone, and on April 30th Vodafone will start selling Nexus One in their UK stores, online, and over the phone. Soon after, they will also begin selling Nexus One in France (SFR), Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Spain. Vodafone is our first European partner to distribute the Nexus One.
In the US, if you’ve been waiting for the Nexus One for Verizon Wireless’ network, head over to http://phones.verizonwireless.com/htc/incredible to pre-order the Droid Incredible by HTC, a powerful new Android phone and a cousin of the Nexus One that is similarly feature-packed. It will be available in stores on April 29th.
We are very pleased with the amazing pace of innovation and strength of the Android ecosystem and to be working with partners around the world to bring the Android experience to more people.
That sounds like the Nexus One won’t be coming to Verizon.
Nexus One on Verizon update
An employee at my local Verizon store said today that the Google Nexus One should be available in late spring. He also said Verizon should be selling them in stores, as opposed to Google’s current marketing strategy with T-Mobile, which is to sell the phone only through its website. The employee was careful to use the word “should,” so I wouldn’t call that a confirmation of anything. But if the phone is sold in Verizon’s stores, it is almost definite that it would be available at a subsidized price with a two-year contract, which seems very attractive compared to the $529 price tag for an unlocked phone.
Penny Lane – Beatles Ukulele Cover
Here’s my latest ukulele cover. It’s “Penny Lane” by the Beatles.
Wikipedia says:
“Penny Lane” is a song by The Beatles, written by Paul McCartney[2] and credited to Lennon/McCartney.[2] Recorded during the Sgt. Pepper sessions, “Penny Lane” was released in February 1967 as one side of a double A-sided single, along with “Strawberry Fields Forever“. The song was later included on the Magical Mystery Tour LP (1967). The single was the result of the record company wanting a new release after several months of no new Beatles releases. In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked the song at #449 on its list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.
This is the first video I made since installing Windows with Sun Microsystems’ VirtualBox. I recorded the audio on my Sony MZ-NHF800 and used SonicStage to transfer the file to my computer and converted it to .WAV format. Then I used Audacity to add a tiny bit of reverb and a little bit of compression. After that, it was a simple matter of syncing the video and audio tracks in Kdenlive, cutting out the extra bits before and after the song, and adding the fade in/fade out. The URL graphic that pops up at the beginning was created with Inkscape.
I hope you enjoy. What is your favorite Beatles song?
Nexus One on Verizon
It is now the end of March and Google has not released a Verizon version of the Nexus One. Rumors continue to be propagated. One of the most recent things on my radar was a screenshot that was being circulated, showing the Verizon Nexus One with a $199 subsidized price tag with a 2-year contract. It was said that Google had accidentally published this on their Nexus One site, and it only appeared for a few minutes. There’s no telling if the screenshot was real. I check the site just about every day, and it still reads, “Coming Soon … Spring 2010.” Some blogs have stated that there is now an April release date scheduled. It is my opinion that it is all speculation and no one but Google and Verizon knows when the release date is. Until then, I wait.
This post was written from the balcony of my apartment with a gentle breeze blowing under a cloudless sky, with a temperature of 81F.VirtualBox setup complete
I installed the closed source edition of VirtualBox and then I got Windows installed inside of that. I had a little bit of trouble figuring out how to get the USB ports to work, but after a little while I had it all up and running just fine. One thing I had to do was make sure I was part of the vboxusers group. In Ubuntu, I clicked System -> Administration -> Users and Groups. I clicked the key button and entered my sudo password to make changes. I clicked “Manage Groups” and found the “vboxusers” entry. I opened that up and made sure there was a check mark next to my name and next to root.
I restarted the computer so the Users and Groups list would be reloaded. Then I started up Windows in VirutalBox. I attached my MiniDisc but it still didn’t show up in Windows. It appeared on the Ubuntu desktop. So I looked around some more. I found this line in the VirtualBox online user manual:
In order to use VirtualBox’s USB support, the user account under which you intend to run VirtualBox must have read and write access to the USB filesystem (
usbfs).
So I went about trying to figure out how to get read/write access to usbfs. I found some posts from ’07 and ’08 that said I had to edit a file called “mountdevsubfs.sh” But the lines in that file that the post said to make the changes on didn’t exist. Then I found another post that said USB should be working “straight out of the box” now. I had read a post earlier that talked about USB filters in the VirtualBox settings. I tried that. I checked the USB settings in VirtualBox for the Windows machine. I had the MiniDisc plugged in and I clicked the “add filter” button. The MiniDisc showed up right away. I started Windows again and POW! The MiniDisc was there and I was able to transfer files from it using SonicStage.
So a big shout-out goes to cigarboxuke. You are awesome. Thanks for suggesting I use VirtualBox. Now I’m going to put Ubuntu 10.04 on the previously Windows-occupied machine and put VirtualBox on it, too.
As always, comments are greatly appreciated. See you soon.
VirtualBox OSE vs. VirtualBox CSE
I got Windows installed in VirtualBox, no problems. But the reason I wanted to do this was to use my Sony MZ-NHF800 MiniDisc Walkman. Well it turned out that I was using VirtualBox Open Source Edition, which does not include USB support. I didn’t realize this until someone in the IRC channel #vbox on irc.freenode.org was nice enough to point it out to me. So I’ve removed the OSE and I’m about to install the Closed Source Edition, which includes USB support. Full report later.
Cell phone video
I used my cell phone to make a video with boogie2988, one of the more popular people on YouTube. We were having dinner at Sunrise Cafe here in Fayetteville, Arkansas. So when I got home, I wanted to upload my video to my channel on YouTube. When I copied the file from my phone to my computer, I saw the file type was .3gp. “What is .3gp,” I asked myself. “Surely YouTube won’t accept such a file format.” I tried playing the file on my computer. I could see the video, but there was no sound. Mplayer tried to find a plugin on the internet, but to no avail. I decided to try ffmpeg to convert the video to .mp4, just to see if I could. I used WinFF, which is a graphical user interface for ffmpeg. The file converted, no problem. The sound was coming through now and everything was good.
So I uploaded the video and YouTube did its usual “processing” thing for several minutes. When the video finally went live, I watched it and the sound was playing at the right speed, but the video was playing twice as fast as it should have been. Here is what it looked like:
I was not happy, but Boogie is a popular guy and my video was already getting lots of views, so I left it. This morning I thought to myself, “What if YouTube does accept .3gp files?” So I tried uploading it and it worked fine:
The moral of the story here is that I shouldn’t try fixing something before I check to see if it’s even broken. Comments are greatly appreciated!