Author Archives: pgfeldman

Tom DeVito 3.19.2012

Start: 10:15(actually got to the office at 8:30 but forgot I had a doctors appointment)

  • Re-familarizing myself with the Arduino code
  • Started rebuilding the controllers to work with the new communication systems
  • Most of the broad building  of the controllers are complete.  Need to talk about the specifics like commands and stuff.

End:7:15  (My brother needed me to pick up my niece at school at 1:30.  This took about an hour)

Mike 3.19.2012

  • Usual backups this morning
  • Still no word from Gina about her connection issues.  I am assuming it’s a 404 not found.
  • I contacted the enterprise server help desk with 2 questions:
    • How do I remote desktop to the development and production VMs?
    • How do users connect to the systems from outside networks?  Is the URL different?  Is there a port that needs opening?
  • Got a spreadsheet of cognos data and was told to look at it but wait for further information.  It matches up somewhat with our data but the structure is a little different and column names very different.
  • Got my cars_enchanced spreadsheet working after dealing with a mapping error.  It works pretty well but colors are not working in the network map, they work in the geo map.

Phil 3.19.12

8:00 – 10:30 VISIBILITTY/OH

  • Stopped in to talk to Al F. Things are proceeding apace, apparently.

10:30 – 12:00, 3:00 – 5:00 FP

  • Getting started on the final(?) version of the hand
  • Need to talk to Tom about coding up the arduino, but today’s schedule may not allow. Tomorrow?

Phil 3.16.12

7:30- 9:30 OH/VISIBILITY

  • Stopped by our servers to send Al Ferguson a note asking about positions. While there, I moved the map server over from Jeff’s machine to the integration server
  • Talked to Dong about getting started on charting now that the main pieces of the OGL 3.0+ libraries are written.

9:30 – 2:30 FP

  • Went to UMBC to meet the prototyping support group. It’s nice, there are a couple of makerbots, a laser cutter and several other interesting items. Also, it looks like CCBC has a much bigger lab that you can take a $50 training course on and then have access to. Need to check into that.
  •  Starting on building the hand visualization using the new library. First thing I need to do is make a new FLTK window that shown communication with the arduino.

Tom DeVito 3.15.2012

Start: 10:00

  • Info about power adapters:  http://www.apogeekits.com/power_adapter_selection.htm
  • The mystery of why the power adapters output doesn’t matter is solved.  The power adapters we are using are regulated which means that within the 0-2 amp range of load current.  Higher load currents will cause the regulators protection mechanism to break the circuit before it does damage.  This is not explicitly written on the adapter label but can be seen in the chart of the data sheet(http://resources.mini-box.com/online/PWR-ACDC-12V-2A/specs.pdf).  This can also be proven with the voltage tester.  An unregulated power supply would output a higher voltage with no load current(circuit) attached.  These power adapters always output 12V no matter what the load current is.
  • Looking at the datasheets for all the components, the maximum load current would be about .5 amps.  This is 1/4 of what the power adapter allows.  We can actually power a whole hand(2.5) boards with one power adapter.
  • The adapters are common and used for many D-Link products.  For consistency we should get the same model if we need more.  We should have enough for now.  The model number is AG2412-B.
  • Test worked!
  • Adding labels and double checking ciruit.

End 6:00

Mike 3.15.2012

  • Usual back ups this morning
  • No reply back from Gina about the connection issues at site
  • Taking a break from PKI integration to create a better cars demo
    • Cars are now sales from one of 3 dealerships
    • The map locations of each buyer and the dealerships are in the table
    • Also there is connection info for the network map
    • Network map is not displaying anything, need to figure out why
    • Also need to get colors and or icons

Tom DeVito 3.14.2012

Start: 10:00

  • Tested using the power adapter as a power supply.  This test worked well and I believe the 2 amp ceiling is high enough to power the amplifiers and midi boards.
  • Need to try the test with an audio signal.
  • Looking at the most recent sketch which utilizes the recent communication and controller code, I noticed that it was missing some components which were essential to making sounds.
  • Added in the various classes can changed their parameters to all be 0-100 for easy use with simulation variables.
  • The code is working.  I need to do a longer test to make sure the current doesn’t over heat anything.

End: 6:00

Mike 3.14.2012

  • Usual back ups this morning
  • Got an email from Gina, a woman at a remote site, who can’t connect to our credentials test
    • I’m guessing it is because the URL is incorrect for the network she is on
    • Just in case I sent her a URL that does not do PKI verification to see if she can see it
  • Brian and I ingested some map / network data in to Visibility for testing purposes
  • Back at savage, working on the PKI integration

Phil 3.14.12

8:00 – 4:30 FP

  • Happy PI day! I wonder if there will be bigger celebrations in 2015?
  • Back to building libraries.
    • Release Library is done.
  • Adding test project to solution that tests the library
    • Discovered that a dll was probably not the way to go, so changed the project settings so that it now generated a static library. For once, that was pretty straightforward – Properties->Configuration Properties->General->Configuration Type and select from the dropdown.
    • Everything is compiling and linking, adding some actual content now.
    • Well I’ll be damned – everything works (In debug and release mode!).
  • Same old picture, but with much better foundations:
  • Installed AtomineerUtils, a nifty plugin if Visual Studio that generates documentation frameworks

Tom DeVito 3.13.2012

Start: 10:15

  • Fixed a problem with the mounting holes being to small.  I forgot that the size only effects the size of the pad not the hole through the borad.
  • Moved the Midi and Reset pins and rerouted their traces
  • Moved the audio traces between amplifiers.
  • I have checked the circuit and it looks good.  Once I check that the power supply will work, I’ll be ready to order.

End 6:15

Mike 3.13.2012

  • Usual backups this morning
  • Read some CASPORT documentation at site looking how to integrate more with it
  • Back at the mill making a PKI test project and new security library jar
  • Demo moved up to 1:30, we’ll first be giving a general demo of Visibility to a new group of people, then one to the planned group followed by some training on everything

 

My thoughts on PKI/CASPORT integration, step by step:

  1. A users connects to a flex application via HTTPS
  2. A servlet filter intercepts the requests
  3. The filter gets the X509Cert  and retrieves users details from CASPORT, if a cert is not found the session is rejected: the end
  4. The filter places the cert and user information on the session for later access
  5. Upon creation complete of the flex app, the application asks the user service for the user
  6. The user service checks for information on the session:
    1. If not there, null is returned and a log in screen is displayed as it is now
    2. If it is found, the user service checks the database for a matching users
      1. User not found in DB: log in screen is displayed, upon successful log in the userDN is stored in the databases for future use and no log in screen will be displayed again for that user
      2. User found in DB: user service returns the UserInfoObject and the log in screen is skipped

We will have to add a new unique column to the user table called ‘userDN’ which uniquely identifies each user.  The value is provided by CASPORT when looking them up via their cert.

This scheme will allow us to continue using our existing user management schemes, not require wiping the user base, and, a logging in 1 time, the system will use PKI certs to log in from that point on.

Phil 3.13.12

8:00 – 1:00 FP

  • Working on turning the base classes of ShaderLearning2 into a library
  • Creating DLL and static libraries in Visual Studio 2010: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb384835.aspx
  • Adding copies of headers and libs to the dll project. Trying to make this self-contained.
    • Added include directories to properties
    • Added lib directories to properties
    • Added the following additional dependencies under Linker->Input->Additional Dependencies:
      • opengl32.lib
        glu32.lib
        fltkgl.lib
        FLTKD.LIB
        WSOCK32.LIB
        gltools.lib
    • Yay! My test (Dprintf) is compiling and linking. Onward!
    • Added the following to the “Ignore Specific Libraries”
      • msvcrt.lib
        LIBCMT.lib
    • Done with the debug version of the library, need to verify that it works, then do the release version.

1:00 – 4:00 VISIBILITY

  • Demo – 2, actually. It went well, though we do need to add a ‘loading’ screen to the main project screen. It hung for an awkwardly long time.

Tom DeVito 3.12.2012

Start 9:30

  • I was missing the decoupling capacitors between the two amps.
  • I forgot that the SVR line needs to be grounded with a capacitor.
  • Reoriented the chips to be vertical.  Its much easier to tell if they are wired right.
  • Traced the connection.  It looks like everything is in there now.

End 5:30

Mike 3.12.2012

  • Did one final proof read of my quickstart guide before burning it to CD
  • Watched an interesting video on software development concepts
  • Looking in to fully integrating Visibility with PKI to remove the log in screens
    • Technically it is pretty straightforward to grab the user’s cert and get their SID and userDN
    • The hard part is the migration from the current user tables (one for PPM and one for Visibility) to using userDNs and linking permissions, etc.
    • The easiest thing may be to add a new column to the database, userDN, and when they log in, if userDN is null, set it and use it for look ups in the future.  All users would be created the same way as they are now then log in once and use PKI forever after.
  • Loaded Dong’s updates on my CD as well
  • I will head to fort this afternoon and deploy the following:
    • Quickstart HTML
    • Update to PPA HTML
    • Update to PPA help button
    • Update to VisibilityScripting script engine which will resolve some issues regarding packet too large errors
  • I will also do the normal backups
  • Will create the final table and view for the demo tomorrow: the historic look at project statuses
  • Hopefully will be able to meet with Sherri and show her the view