Author Archives: pgfeldman

Dong Shin 01.18.2011

helped Christine setting up Maven Assist
deployed as3corelib.swc v0.92 for WebDesckCore project
PPM Changes
- separated datagrid in DBMgmtPanel to TableDataDataGrid
- fixed data navigation problem

Christine 01.17.2011

My adventures in the world of Windows continues.

Ended up getting a windows laptop. Spend day configuring (and re-configuring) it. After getting FGM environment set up, I was able to successfully run MavenAssist without the funky errors I was receiving on the other laptop.

Before testing AirFileImageAppMaven, I took a look at the configuration and user settings tab in Maven Assist. I notice that my slashes are combined. Ex: Under Configuration, Maven Home is C:Applicationsmvn3.0.2bin/mvn.bat. And under my path, all Java’s jre6 directories are using forward slashes (unix-like), and all of the other directories use backslashes.
Along those same lines, under User Settings, the path to my Settings.xml file is using a combination of both backward and forward slashes (poking around, I found that in UserSettings.java there is no check to see if OS is Win or Mac & automatically it appends conf/settings.xml, which explains this forward slash). I also clicked ‘Validate’ to see if it would work and received “Java Session 1.6 is invalid!” I’m sure it’s the wonkiness of these slashes.
So for the Win users out there, why would this slash change be happening? Is there someplace specific I need to check/modify?

That being said, and not being sure about the forward/backward slash bit, I still gave the AirFileImageAppMaven a go. Fail. Figured it has to do with the slash issue, but I wanted to check it either way. When I went to set the POM file I got a “Error on Line 1 of document: Premature end of file. Nested exception” and Eclipse was showing a NullPointerException.

Phil 1.17.2011

8:30 – 4:30 VISIBILITY

Helped Mike with getting Dong’s Data Manager to compile
ProjectTrackLite
- Flex client project is up and running
- Java server poject is started and compiling
- Getting the user remote object to behave. Ran into some trouble geting the amf messagebrokjer to behave. The most important thing seems to have been that the blaze jhar files wer not dependencies in the pom. After some tweaking, that seems to have gotten the instance successfully deployed by Tomcat and is working.
- Getting the improved config manager working. Done. All you have to do now to access a value in the setupModel.xml file is run the ConfigLoader and add a listener (and function) for the values you want to watch.

Thomas.DeVito 1.14.2011

Repairing the hand

Attached strain gauges to the bottom side. Will start wiring on Monday.

Learning Electronics:

I am about halfway through the book now.
Multiplexer was the word I was looking for the other day when we were talking about the i2c bus. I was surprised that the bus did not need a multiplexer in the diagrams I saw. I think the reason a multiplexer is not needed is because there is a small one inside the i2c slave devices controller.
Finished chapter on numbering systems, Binary Arithematic, and Boolean algebra. This was mostly review of things I learned in COSC 101. There are some techniques in the boolean algebra section which you can use to simplify the amount of comparisons needed to reach a desired result. In electronics this means getting from A to B with less transistors. In programming this could be useful in making the program run more efficiently.

Other Experimentation:

Assembled another bridge to test the circuit board type strain gauges.
Attached the second one to the test stick. The glue we are using is made to work with this type of strain gauge and for whatever reason seemed to dry much fast while in contact with the insulator used.
Soldering wire to the leads is a bit tricky but is a much less delicate process then trying to wrap the unpackaged strain gauges around the wire.
Was worried that these strain gauges would be less sensitive but it seems that they are just as sensitive and that they play better with gain and offset adjustments better(more consistent results).
Seems very durable. I pulled on the wires harder then I would ever intentionally pull on them and they did not budge. No need to put a think layer of epoxy on it, only a small amount of glue would be needed to insulate the connection to prevent shorts.
One side of the stick was already insulated the other was not. I did not add any insulation to the side that didn’t have it and it seems fine.
Since we don’t have many of these stain gauges, I still plan to use the standard type for this prototype. However, if I have to repair this one again, as well as future pr0totypes, I would like to use these prepackaged strain gauges due to their ease of application, increased durability, and greater aesthetic value(no big glob of epoxy needed). There are many sites that sell versions of these but the ones we have are really nice because they have big leads that are easy to solder to. If you can remember where you got them from tell me, otherwise I will try to find something equivalent.
This test stick will be used for experiments with the tactile/audio feedback system once I get the amplifiers and usb-i2c device sometime next week.

I think Clift forgot about me…. 😦 Hopefully he will come to the lunch Christina planned next Tuesday. Its no big deal, gives me some time to read this book so I can ask more complicated questions.

Dong Shin 01.14.2011

PPM Changes
- changed the way Create New User window comes up. It now comes from PPM Main instead of UserManagementPanel
- working on EdiableTableDataGrid….
- created TableDataDataGrid for editing, removed old datagrid
checked in DataManager to svn://fgmdev.com/trunk/Sandbox_folders/DONG_SANDBOX/DataManager
- DataManager – parent pom
- DataManagerClient – Flex client
- DataManagerServer – Java Server

Christine 11.13.2011

Continued setting up win machine
Receiving weird error message in Eclipse: “The Maven Integration requires that Eclipse be running in a JDK, because a number of Maven core plugins are using jars from the JDK. Please make sure the -vm option in eclipse.ini is pointing to a JDK and verify that Installed JRE’s are also using JDK installs.” Then in the console window I’m told “Eclipse is running on a JRE but a JDK is required.” And I know for certain that the latest JDK is installed and set in the path.
One solution is to add a -vm argument to the Eclipse.ini file. That didn’t make a difference.
Another solution was to be sure Maven is not set up under C:Program Files b/c the space between ‘program’ and ‘files’ can cause an issue with Eclipse on windows. Next step is to remove all of the sw for the dev. environment from “Program Files” and place within a non-spaced directory.

Tom.DeVito 1.13.2011

Hand interface:

Added more glue to protect the strain gauges. Need to let this dry.
Applied circuit mounted strain gauge to one of our sensor sticks to see if it will A. adhere properly, B. be more durable the the others, and C. be sensitive enough. Most likely I will stick with using the standard gauges for this prototype but I wanted to look into the others.

Learning Electronics:

Now that I have a basic understanding of the electrical theory, I switched from my physics book to Bebop to the Boolean Boogie. So far its mostly bee a reinforce for what learned in physics 2 but this book is more focused on EE.
Have read the first 6 chapters

Some revelations

semiconductors are isolators in their natural state but can be treated with other elements to carry negative or positive charges through a doping process.
have a bit better understanding of ohms law(V=iR). This is very important in understanding the relationship between voltage, current, and resistance
diodes only allow electric to travel one direction. If it goes the other way it is considered off. This can be useful to translate A/C circuits to binary D/C circuits. Not sure what their other functions are.
Capacitors still confuse me. Apparently they act as off switches when they are filled and power sources when voltage drops. Will have to read the chapter on RC circuits it may help my confusion.
Resistors of the same rating will greatly increase the current at higher voltage. This makes sense mathematically with i = V/R but is not how I thought they worked.
Transistors are super fast switches. The first computer used electromagnetic switches and took 6 seconds to do simple multiplication problems. Triodes(tubes) were also used as switches but were also very bulky and slow. Diodes and transistors are semiconductor switches and are much faster and more compact then their predecessors. The next iteration will probably be a quantum switch but they are having coherence issues with these devices at the moment. I believe this type uses a fiber optic system instead of silicon based.

Phil 1.13.2011

8:00 – 4:00 VISIBILITY

Looks like the Unix server that we thought we might be getting is in fact a web page that we could edit on an existing server. Which isn’t at all what we need. The guy (Charles H.) who’s handing the ticket is looking into the matter to see who we have to talk to to get a real server
- Update – CH found a place that might be able to set up a server for us. He sent me an email on my other accounts with the info. I’ll check into it tomorrow.
Talked to Mike Cowan today about sharepoint. He agreed with Walter Jones that communication between VISIBILITY and Sharepoint could be done by a webservice that sends a list consisting of zipped db tables in a list. Even more simply, we can get data out of Sharepoint by having the data table webpage (webpart?) provide an RSS feed of the data, which would be pretty easy to parse. No data upload that way though
- We also wrapped the VISIBILITY Data Navigator web page inside a webpart in Sharepoint. It worked just fine.
Ordered a bunch of stuff for the FP

Testing PPM

Got an error when selecting a user to modify:

status: false
sqlStr: SELECT * FROM user_roles, roles WHERE login ='pgfeldm' AND role_id = id
statusString: Error occurred during runSQL()
errorString:
exception: com.mysql.jdbc.exceptions.jdbc4.MySQLSyntaxErrorException: Table 'project_portfolio.user_roles' doesn't exist
data:

The vertical sizing of the panels is off. This may be related to the fact that the Arial font is being used again?

Worked a bit on ProjectTrackLite
- Building in Flashbuilder and Maven
- Using Mike’s new DynamicPanel. Need to add a listener/handler for a closeEvent.
- Adding bits to FGMUtils
- Working on the login. Trying it with the SingletonDataDictionary

Dong Shin 01.13.2011

PPM Changes
- added more sqls to DBUpdateSQLs.sql… tested.
- fixed a bug on User Management not saving First and Last names correctly.
- backed up project_portfolio to project_portfolio_01132011 working
- renaming of a table caused client to choke. removed from the script
- found that auto scroll of panels doesn’t work properly when panels are changing too fast?
  - changed EdgeUtils to support force scrollToIndex()

Christine 01.12.2011

Setting up windows laptop to mirror current development environment (includes updating some pretty out of date copies of software, like Eclipse from 2008)
After completing setup, checked out both MavenAssist and AirFileImageApp. Unfortunately, I’m getting more errors than I can count on MavenAssist and I believe it has to do with the way the environment is setup. Currently set Phil an email for feedback

Tom.DeVito 1.12.2011

Repairing the hand:

Insulated all top-side strain gauge areas with primer and paint.
Put down a layer of glue and let it partially dry
Attached strain gauges to sticky surfaces and let dry a bit more.
Added a second coat of glue on top of the strain gauges.
Will add one more layer of glue tomorrow when current glue is completely dry.

Computer controlled amplifier:

Found a cheaper and most likely better way to convert usb to i2c: http://www.acroname.com/robotics/parts/R286-USB-I2C.html
Drivers and example software can be found here: http://www.robot-electronics.co.uk/htm/usb_i2c_tech.htm
Found out that qucs and spice are really designed to test integrated circuits you want to make. This is why I was having trouble finding models of various ICs. However I am pretty sure in qucs you can package modules and link them together, so it may still be possible to model macro circuits. I will look more deeply into this tomorrow.
Learned that an i2c bus does not need any switches to route its message. All message routing is dependent on the i2c slave devices hardware address set on the IC.
I think the device above produces a strong enough signal to control multiple devices without having external power introduced to the bus. Adding this to my questions for Clift.
The variable amplifier has two power inputs and two grounds. One pair is for the i2c controller the other is for the amplifier.
The usb device outputs 5v at 70ma. This maybe enough for the i2c controller but probably not enough for the amplifier.
USB devices only output 100ma so anything you want to power via usb can only add up to this much. I am pretty sure the reason why a regulated power supply like the one we have can power many things at a constant voltage is because it varies the current by the resistance of the connected devices.

Dong Shin 01.12.2011

working on testing script for database upgradability….
- created test script to see if there are any missing relations, DBSelectTest.sql
- added force delete of missing relations to DBUpdateSQLs.sql
meeting with Heather Hundt for Non-profit org.

Phil 1.12.2011