Diogo Gomes

How I Automate my house

Mon, 04 Dec 2017 12:00:00 +0000

Introduction

I’ve always been interested in making all things smart through the use of cheap electronics and computers, moving all the “brains” from expensive hardware to hopefully Open Source Software. Today you can buy really cheap sensors on the internet and modify them to fit your purposes thanks to the numerous tutorials you can find online in great websites such as Instructables (here is one of my favorites). Since 2012 I’ve been building up stuff for my home, first very basic, today much more complex. Since people keep asking me why and how I do this stuff, I figured I should just write about it in this extended blog post.

Open your garage door using Bluetooth LE (BLE)

Sat, 03 Oct 2015 18:00:00 +0000

This was one of those projects I had kept in the backlog for too long, but finally got the time and drive to finish it up.

The problem was very simple and common. In the building I share, we have a common garage door which can be open/closed through a (very expensive) radio remote control. Each apartment has a single remote control and any now or then one of them gets lost.

Greenhouse

Sat, 04 Oct 2014 02:20:51 +0000

This is my Greenhouse, here I grow basil, thyme, coriander, parsley and other aromatic herbs which I enjoy using in my dishes. Having a greenhouse in my balcony is great, I have fresh herbs all year around. Problem being that I need to keep a constant look over it, checking humidity levels and watering.

There are several projects online by fellow makers in how to automate a greenhouse, monitoring humidity levels and triggering watering (either through a water pump or valve attached to a tap). These are all great, but lack an important feature: you can’t monitor the levels remotely, nor can you trigger watering on-demand.

Lisbon (Mini) Maker Faire

Sun, 21 Sep 2014 20:25:51 +0000

So this just happened :-)

I just spent 2 wonderful days at the “Pavilhão do Conhecimento - Ciência Viva” with my best friend and colleague João Paulo Barraca showcasing a maker’s version of our work in M2M communications, and with my pals from Hack’Aveiro who quickly put together a web-badged created specially for this event.

In order to show case what M2M communications are all about, we brought to the faire our very own motes and sensors that power our greenhouses and hydroponics systems, as well as a plant or two to gather everyones attention ;-)

MeoCloud Music

Tue, 01 Jul 2014 18:25:51 +0000

Desde o lançamento do MeoCloud no Codebits de 2012, que tenho acompanhado as diversas evoluções desde serviço de armazenamento online da PT.

Como “pioneiro” tive o previlégio de uma quota muito generosa, que infelizmente não tenho usado muito devido aos efeitos de rede (poucos utilizadores MeoCloud quando comparados com o Dropbox por exemplo). No entanto, a rapidez do serviço é notória assim como a abertura do serviço a 3rd party developers, através de uma API muito semelhante à da Dropbox mas com mais uns pózinhos.

Open Vidonn

Sat, 07 Jun 2014 20:30:00 +0000

For some month’s now I’ve been using Moves.app which was recently acquired by Facebook. Moves allows me to track my daily activity through the use of my smartphone accelerometer and GPS. In the end of the day/week, I’m able to analyze how much exercise I did, as well as where I’ve been to… The last feature being the one which I would rather not disclose to Facebook. Moves works great except for a tiny detail, that has become a big one: It eats up all the battery. I was still using my iPhone 4S when I started using moves, battery would drain before the end of the day. My Nexus 5 is holding better, but still it’s taking a big hit.

iOS to Android

Wed, 02 Apr 2014 20:30:00 +0000

I’ve been an iOS user (in various incarnations: iphone 3G, iphone 3Gs, iphone 4s, ipad, ipad 3) for more then 4years, I’m what many of you would call an Apple fanboy.

Two years ago, I bought a Nexus 7 to get more involved with Android. At first it all seemed very strange, various applications weren’t available and I just kept getting back to my iOS devices.

But this year, instead of the next logical upgrade to an iphone 5s, I decided to go with a Google Nexus 5.

Jekyll Reboot

Tue, 04 Feb 2014 00:14:00 +0000

This blog is now 7 years old and time hasn’t been gentle on it.

When I started this blog it was a Wordpress blog and during the first months I mostly used to post random stuff. Twitter and Facebook where not what you see today, and therefore it made complete sense to post that random stuff here. Looking back into those posts I see lots of stuff I would not say/post today has they are not “blog material”.

Cocoa Programming

Thu, 10 Jan 2013 17:38:00 +0000

At a time everyone is learning Objective-C and Cocoa in order to program for the iPhone, I’ve spent most of my time programming for OSX. After doing some contributions to Sidestep during my stay at CMU, I decided to endeavor deeper and develop some apps of my own, just to scratch my back.

So during the holiday season I came up with two very simple applications:

The first app (MeuComando.app) a simple MS MediaRoom remote control app, that enables me to control my STB without reaching for the command. It follows a trivial protocol which can be easily found online (examples in java, python, etc). Thing is, I really didn’t want a crappy Java app, so I reinvented the wheel and made myself a new app.

Two months at CMU

Tue, 11 Sep 2012 10:31:00 +0000

In a time when Portugal is facing a severe recession, with several country men moving abroad to greener pastures link, I decided to endeavor myself on the pros and cons of living abroad even thought for a very brief period of time. Under the scope of the CMU-Portugal program, I spent July and August in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. During this time I was a visiting professor at the ECE department at Carnegie Melon University and got the chance to be part of the research activities taking place at the Parallel Data Lab.

Creating a KVM virtual machine using debootstrap

Fri, 13 Jul 2012 16:35:26 +0000

How to create a Debian virtual machine outside a virtualization environment.

The challenge here proposed is to create a virtual machine inside a remote server and boot it up using KVM. Sure I could have used VNC and go through all the setup steps of the Debian install disk running inside the virtual machine, but that would have taken ages and would be virtually impossible to automate.

Therefore the next steps detail how to install Debian using debootstrap on a qcow2 image disk and how to successfully boot the debian install using kvm (I’m assuming here your kvm environment is already properly setup).

An Arduino shield to control your house

Thu, 05 Jul 2012 17:38:00 +0000

This post is long due since I’ve built this shield almost half a year ago and works great :)

So here is the story of how it all came about.

Having too many remote controls around (TV, STB, Home Cinema, PS3, PowerSwitches) I decided to get ride of them all and use only my laptop/smartphone. Using an Arduino I developed a shield that works as an universal IR remote control and as an RF remote control (315Mhz). So here are the instructions:

The Contour ROAM Action Cam

Sun, 15 Apr 2012 14:51:31 +0000

While my blog hasn’t been getting any action, I’ve gotten myself an action cam to record my MTB rides.

Two years ago my brother bought a Drift x170 and we have since recorded all of our bikes rides. The Drift x170 is a non HD camera, but even so we recorded several hours of video which we still enjoy to watch back today.

Fast forward to our days. To record video in non HD format is the equivalent of taping music in a magnetic tape in the age of CD’s. It was therefore about time to upgrade our videos to HD. And since my brother has recently moved to France, it was up to me to shell out on a new Action Cam to bring along in our MTB rides.

Linux kernel 2.6.38.4 for the Iomega iConnect

Mon, 02 May 2011 11:21:31 +0000

After a long hiatus, I’m back with the latest version of the linux kernel (2.6.38.4) for the iomega iconnect.

This new kernel brings several improvements to the previous ones, since it improves support for Marvell’s Kirkwood platform (on which iConnect is built upon) and finally includes in the main kernel the wireless driver for the RaLink RT3090 Wireless 802.11n 1T/1R PCIe which is built in the iConnect.

Without further due, here are the files:

New Blog Engine

Tue, 08 Mar 2011 00:05:04 +0000

Guess what, I wasn’t happy with “just” changing themes… and decided to switch theme again along side with a new blogging engine. Wordpress is great and all, but required me to keep constant attention (keeping up with security updates), and overall performance was lacking (even though I used the great Super Cache plugin).

Since moving to a low cost VPS provider (found them through lowendbox ) which is capped to 256MB, I’ve been struggling to keep my resource usage controlled. This has led me to survey alternative blog engines that are less resource savvy than Wordpress running on LAMP, one of such alternatives grab my attention.

Research

Mon, 07 Mar 2011 16:05:04 +0000

My research explores how networked systems become useful services: 5G/6G network applications, service management and orchestration, multi-access edge computing, Internet of Things platforms, and machine-learning techniques for context extraction.

This section gathers the main academic material behind that work.

New Theme

Mon, 14 Feb 2011 00:05:04 +0000

This blog is now more then 4 years old, and was in dear need of some shake ups…

It’s true that I don’t post here that often, with a new semester that started just last week, with a brand new class on Information Systems Infra-Structures that I’m now preparing, with new research projects just kicking in, and of-course with my ~20month year old daughter that requires full attention from everyone in the house, it’s been hard to publish new posts that have been lining in the pipeline.

Binary Kernel and Modules for the Iomega iConnect running Linux Debian

Mon, 31 Jan 2011 11:21:31 +0000

In the last months after I’ve published an howto on how to customize the Linux kernel for the Iomega iConnect, I’ve been getting lots of comments from people who would like to have a go at installing it, but which are not proficient Linux users.

In order to assist those situations, I’m hereby making it available binary versions of Linux 2.6.37 configured for the Iomega iConnect, as well as the source code used to compile those binaries.

Customizing a Kernel for the Iomega iConnect

Thu, 23 Dec 2010 17:41:16 +0000

If you have followed my previous post on how to install Debian to the Iomega iConnect Wireless Data Station you have been dying to read this follow-up post on how to take you iConnect to the next level by customizing the kernel and finally controlling the buttons and leds in the device (not to mention making use of the wireless card).

Setting up a cross-compile environment

First thing you need is to setup an environment in which you will cross compile the kernel and everything else that needs to go into the iConnect. Don't take me wrong here, the iConnect is a great device and all, but it just can't compete with your state of the art laptop/workstation ;)

... a turn of page

Wed, 01 Dec 2010 23:31:19 +0000

Installing Debian on a Iomega iConnect Wireless Data Station

Sun, 14 Nov 2010 17:35:26 +0000

Installing Debian on a Iomega iConnect Wireless Data Station is not that difficult but will unavoidably void your warranty. You will need to rip apart the device in order to access the console port.

Requirements:

Access to the Serial Console through a USB to serial interface such as the FTDI - TTL-232R-3V3-WE (some soldering required)
USB harddisk or stick (harddisk is advisable since stick tend to wear off)
Ethernet Connection for debian installation - Important!!! you MUST use Gigabit Ethernet!!! due to a bug in the Debian Install Kernel
Linux Host in order to setup the kernel

First step is to rip apart the iConnect and reach the serial port as depicted here.

After connecting your host to the iconnect through the usb serial adapter you should be getting a prompt:

Low Power Home Server

Wed, 10 Nov 2010 01:26:44 +0000

For a long time I’ve searched for a way to replace my aging ASUS WL500gx which looks like the WL500g but packs 2 USB2.0 ports and has extra RAM (64MB).

The ASUS has been my home server for a long time now (>5 years), providing me with a reliable SSH server through which I can proxy my Internet usage whenever I’m in a public space, with a small webserver in which I keep Internet and Power Usage statistics and for a brief period of time was my printing server (it was replaced first by an Apple Airport Express, and more recently by ZON’s HUB).

Open Source Software in an Academic Environment

Tue, 19 Oct 2010 14:18:00 +0100

For long I’ve been an evangelist of OSS in the University of Aveiro. First through my involvement in the foundation of GLUA and more recently through CodeUA. In the last 7 years I’ve participated in several EU projects in which I’ve always promoted the use of OSS and the release of code developed in the projects through OSS licenses.

Today I was able to go a step further, since I was invited to do be part of a discussion panel at the Future Networks 6th FP7 Concertation Plenary Meeting where the subject was Open Source & Research. In this panel I was representing the Academic view of OSS. The presentation is available at:

Maratona BTT de Aveiro

Sun, 19 Sep 2010 00:00:00 +0100

Este post tem 1 semana de atraso mas fica para a história o registo…

No passado domingo dia 12 de Setembro realizou-se a segunda maratona em BTT de Aveiro, na qual tive o prazer de participar. Não vou poder dizer que foi uma prova dura, porque na realidade eu estava muito mal preparado… acabadinho de chegar de 15 dias de férias sem nenhum treino … claro que penei para percorrer os 53km que compunham a meia-maratona.

Colocações no Ensino Superior 2010

Thu, 16 Sep 2010 20:54:42 +0000

Há 2 anos publicava sobre as médias de entrada no ensino superior. De lá para cá as coisas evoluíram (não necessariamente para melhor, pois o nível de preparação dos caloiros é cada vez mais baixo). A Univ. Aveiro continua com excelentes niveis de colocação aos quais o DETI não se encontra alheio com 100% de vagas preenchidas já na 1ª fase.

Se bem que o número de candidatos aparenta ter estabilizado de acordo com o gráfico:

ISA's iMeter Kit

Fri, 23 Jul 2010 20:06:45 +0100

Two years ago I had a first experience with a device that enabled me to monitor my power consumption habits per equipment. It was very educational and enabled me to switch off and remove some less efficient equipments which were basically vampire equipments. Unfortunantely the device can only monitor one equipment at a time and has no interface through which to get data out.

C-Cast Project Results

Thu, 24 Jun 2010 20:09:30 +0100

Well it’s been more than a year since the last time I talked about projects I’m working in.

But here I am, reporting on the conclusion of C-Cast.

Last week I was in Florence, Italy (so far the city I most enjoyed in Italy) in the Future Network & Mobile Summit, during which we presented C-Cast publicly through a workshop and demonstration booth. In the days preceding the conference, we were audited by the European Commission with a final result of “Good to excellent progress (the project has fully achieved its objectives and technical goals for the period and has even exceeded expectations).”, plus we were considered the best “run up demo” in the conference.

"Trying" to Get Things Done

Sat, 03 Apr 2010 13:14:34 +0100

Disclaimer: This post started as a comment to a post in one my friends blog.

In the past I’ve tried the Get Things Done (GTD) methodology and quickly dropped it. I found that by focusing in a single task I was missing important deadlines. Furthermore it became obvious to me that my list was growing and not shrinking. On the other hand, I do find it important to properly manage my time.

Arduino - Network Remote Control

Tue, 30 Mar 2010 01:17:26 +0100

Although my Phd is in Electrotechnics, I’m mostly a Software Engineer. Trying to put things straight, I’ve picked up a personal project with a bit more hardware :)

The idea is to build something resembling this or this without leaving my pocket empty, and in the time between build something with my bare-hands.

So today I set things in motion by visiting InMotion in it’s office in Oporto where I met Filipe Valpereiro. There I picked up an Arduino Duemilanove and an Ethernet Shield to go with. Tomorrow I hope to drop by the local electronics shop to pickup a photodiode and an IR LED. That should account for all the hardware I need in this project.

iRobot Roomba 555

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 00:00:00 +0000

Having a kid is lots of fun, but also the most time consuming task one can have. Lately house chores were starting to create a backlog, since obviously kid would come first :)

That said, the family decided it was time to get some help, and we rushed to buy a Robot Vacuum Cleaner in order to get an “extra hand”. Some of you might say it was an impulse buy, and you are probably right… but the truth is: it is already paying off.

Thesis defense

Thu, 18 Feb 2010 01:04:08 +0000

Today was a very important day, as I finally defended my Phd Thesis under the title “Resource Optimizations in Broadcast enabled Networks”.

I was probably a bit nervous as the defense was about the start, as shown in the above picture. The defense started with a 30 min delay, as one my jury member was held in traffic. But in 2h30m time I would be out of the room with boosting confidence levels, as I had finally successfully completed one my most important milestones.

Today I concluded a path, which started 5 years ago when I accepted the challenge of my supervisor to conduct research in an area that was then not very clear if it would become the next hit or flop in Telecom. Today we have very successful IPTV services and operators that cover several technologies (which include broadcast) under a single service platform.

I don’t think my research work in the area is done, far from that, I still believe much needs to be done and changed in the Telecom industry in order to survive in this century without becoming a fossil. But I leave all my new ideas to projects to come :)

MTB and OpenStreetMaps

Mon, 01 Feb 2010 00:50:51 +0000

Although the weather wasn’t the most pleasing, I decided to get back to my MTB weekend rides. Today (as a warmup ride) my brother and I took an all road ride to Praia da Barra, that is approximately 15km away from Aveiro.

Since I haven’t done any exercise since summer, my legs are very sore (can’t wait for tomorrow, when they will feel completely numb). But hopefully I will be back in shape in no time, in order to start doing more appealing tracks offroad.

OS X - basic apps

Mon, 14 Dec 2009 01:42:52 +0000

I recently got a new Macbook Pro, which means I also moved to Snow Leopard (not that I couldn’t have stayed with Leopard).

I keep a Time Machine backup, and could have used it to move all my files to the new system. But since I had to many things installed which I don’t use anymore, I decided to move just my personal settings to the new system.

This constituted a great opportunity to list the applications I consider essential:

Back in Berlin

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 14:40:49 +0000

Here I am, back in Berlin.

This has suddenly become my second city, since this year I’ve spent more time in Berlin then in Faro, Portugal…

I’m back in Fokus for the final meeting of project C-Cast. And as I prepare to leave, I know that I’ll be back in the beginning of next year for the project Workshop were we will be doing demos of the work done.

Codebits 2009

Sun, 18 Oct 2009 01:50:30 +0100

Been quite busy in the last weeks…

I’ve finally submitted my Phd thesis (more on that in another post), and been quite busy preparing project proposals for FP7 Call 5.

But I still had time to register for this year Codebits 2009. This year it will be held in Cordoaria Nacional.

Hope to meet you there!

Why I'm not upgrading to Snow Leopard

Wed, 02 Sep 2009 15:00:43 +0100

It’s that time of the year again, when everyone rushes to upgrade their OS to their latest version that just got release or is in the process of…

Upgrades are done because people techies just need to have the latest version of everything. Even when the new version will enable them to do exactly the same task they were doing before. And lets face it, if the new version wasn’t released yet, you would still be able to do your work.

People attending a conference

Tue, 28 Jul 2009 20:03:04 +0000

This is something that came up during a talk in my research group, which I would like to share, in order to check if someone agrees:

It’s true that I haven’t attended a conference in a while. And my main opinion is that they are mostly not worthy the travel expenses… but that will be a different post!

Either way here is my caustic view of the 3 kinds of people attending a Science Conference nowdays:

Family++

Thu, 18 Jun 2009 00:00:00 +0100

The economy might be shrinking but …

… my family just increased it self by 50% :)

While doing my best to finnish my Phd this summer, I’ve got new “help” that keeps it’s parents wake all night long…

Welcome Helena! :)

European Election 2009

Fri, 05 Jun 2009 20:17:37 +0100

European Elections are to be help during the these days around all europe, and a major abstention is unfortunately expected. Most people invoke the fact that they are tired of politicians, and that they can do nothing about it.

In my view they are wrong since politicians only exist due to us, the people who elect them. It is us that mold the profile of the politicians, being the vote our only truly democratic tool. Regardless of our political view it is important to vote and to express our opinions on how society should be governed by choosing a party.

Universidade de Aveiro Achievements in Robotics

Tue, 12 May 2009 20:19:06 +0000

I would like to use this post to public congratulate the University of Aveiro Teams involved in last weeks “Festival Nacional de Robótica” held at IPCB.

After winning last years Robocup, CAMBADA just revalidated the national title (third championship on a row) for middle size robots. As for Autonomic Driving the DEM took the victory with ATLAS-2008 and ATLAS-MV in the first 2 places with a 4th place going to DETI’s ROTA.

These achievements are not random, and are a direct result of effort put into these projects by both students and professors, and of the quality of the education and research done in the University of Aveiro.

Finally an Office

Fri, 17 Apr 2009 21:53:50 +0100

It’s true! I finally got my self a more private office space, thus leaving the lab.

Not that I wouldn’t miss the lab (in which I still spend some time), but it was about time I got my own space where I can concentrate myself and stop being bothered constantly by students and friends (you know who you are ;) )

One of the best parts of the new office is that although I stayed in the ground floor, I now have a window/door to the outside! that means that I actually can work with natural light and can walk out side for some fresh air (at least in theory, since for the last weeks we only had rain…) and visits such as the duck family in the picture.

Mário Gamito

Tue, 24 Mar 2009 18:14:49 +0000

A noticia já percorreu quase todos os meios geek: o Mário Gamito deixou-nos.

Conheci o Mário Gamito quando vim estudar para Aveiro em 1998. Lembro-me perfeitamente de o ter conhecido no Café da Univ. Aveiro (CUA) e termos logo ali decido criar um LUG na Univ. de Aveiro. Nenhum de nós nessa altura imaginou o que isso significava e o projecto acabou por ficar em águas de bacalhau (uns anos mais tarde viria a surgir o GLUA mas com outras pessoas envolvidas). De lá para cá fomos trocando umas mensagens/comments/conversas que sempre presei.

Blog Sale

Sun, 15 Mar 2009 21:27:51 +0000

Estava aqui numas arrumações de primavera (sim que este calor não engana ninguém) e resolvi fazer uma americanisse chamada “garage sale”.

Como a minha garagem fica numa cave e poucas pessoas passam por lá, optei por um “blog sale”.

A lista de itens está disponivel na continuação deste artigo no meu blog.

</shameless>

PaintBall com o Nucleo de ECT

Sun, 08 Mar 2009 00:27:43 +0000

Este é um post em jeito de agradecimento ao Núcleo de Eng. Computadores e Telemática que este ano convidou vários professores, entre eles me incluo, para um dia de prática de paintball.

Foi um dia muito bem passado na companhia não só dos alunos como dos meus colegas João Paulo Barraca, André Zuquete e Artur Pereira, e de alguns membros do meu grupo de investigação.

Não tendo sido a primeira vez que pratiquei PaintBall, foi sem dúvida uma excelente experiência.

Safari 4 Beta

Sat, 07 Mar 2009 00:14:00 +0000

So today I jumped over my head and went nutz by installing Safari 4 Beta.

I Hate it! Changing the tabs position is messing up with my productivity. Is gaining 1 extra line worth it ?

On the good side: It’s fast, and thats noticeable; coverflow is pretty but not something that again can add to my productivity.

I’ll give a thumbs up to the “Top Sites” feature, since it pretty much solves the issue of which page to use as homepage :)

IPv6 killer application: P2P ?

Mon, 23 Feb 2009 00:19:33 +0000

I’m not going to discuss the enumerous advantages of IPv6 (which by the way do not start nor end in the very large address space). IPv6 has been around for a while now, it is no longer a test protocol, it is something quite stable and available in most of todays Operating Systems (Windows XP/Vista, OS X, Linux, BSD, etc).

Then what is impacting the migration from IPv4 to IPv6 ? The lack of a killer application. An application in which IPv4 under performs to such a large degree that users start mailing their ISP’s forcing them to deploy IPv6. Here is my guess on what that application(s) will be: P2P.

Bypassing a restrictive Firewall using SSH

Fri, 20 Feb 2009 14:52:19 +0000

If you are faced with a restrictive firewall implemented by your local admin. But luckily enough to have access to a SSH server! You can use the following tip:

A SOCKS proxy can easily be setup using SSH, in a terminal type:

ssh -D 8080 -Nf your.sshserver.com

Then just change your Browser/Application settings to point towards localhost port 8080

Master of Science in Information Networking

Fri, 06 Feb 2009 18:40:39 +0000

Just to let everyone know that MSIN (Master of Science in Information Networking) program by Univ. Aveiro and Carnegie Mellon University, is accepting applications. Please note that although the program is very expensive there are scholarships. As a hint for people looking for jobs: ALL of our students have obtained stable positions in major Portuguese Telecom Operators in the end of the program. Here is some institutional information:

MSIN is a breakthrough in post-graduate technical education, since it combines technical knowledge and management entrepreneurship with professional solutions.
The Aveiro MSIN program builds upon student’s technical backgrounds to give a broadened perspective and tactical expertise required to achieve leadership in the quickly developing fields of information technology and networking. Coursework takes place at the University of Aveiro and uses a hybrid distributed education format that combines locally taught courses with courses delivered from Carnegie Mellon University via interactive video conferencing technologies.

Secure Screen Sharing

Tue, 03 Feb 2009 13:15:29 +0000

At home I keep a MacMini Media Center which from time to time I access it remotely. Usually I do this through the SSH Server in OS X. But eventually I might need to access it through a GUI. Here comes in hand Apple’s OS X nifty tool called “Screen Sharing” which is actually a VNC Server/Client.

You can setup “Screen Sharing” at the same place you setup the SSH Server in “System Preferences -> Sharing” by ticking “Screen Sharing” and “Remote Login” respectively.

@Funchal, Madeira

Fri, 30 Jan 2009 00:16:07 +0000

Many of you might be wandering what happened to me in the last weeks. Short answer: “Real busy”

I’ve been trying to close several work items in order to focus in my Thesis writing, while still keeping up with some running projects and meetings.

Therefore last week I traveled to Madeira to attend C-Cast project meeting.

It was a wonderful time, with extraordinary weather and hotel conditions. As for the project, I can’t say too much at this time.

Nokia 7100 Supernova plug-in for iSync

Sun, 28 Dec 2008 20:27:33 +0000

This xmas I got my wife a new cellphone a Nokia 7100 Supernova which although not a 3G phone fits perfectly her needs. It has a slick design, a good enough camera (1.3 megapixel), GPRS/EDGE, support for the usual suspects (MMS, Java MIDP) and Bluetooth.

Now comes the catch:

I completely forgot to check if it was supported by iSync. So after the gift unwrapping I was faced with an unsupported phone with no plugin available either by Nokia nor anyone in the internet (as far as my google search is concerned). Faced with this situation, I decided to go ahead and develop the plugin myself with Apple’s iSync Plug-in Maker. This utility is available in your system in case you have installed the developers tools in your OSX DVD. You can find it under /Developer/Applications/Utilities/.

Daidalos Project

Tue, 16 Dec 2008 22:51:58 +0000

As promised, here I am reporting back on Project IST-Daidalos which had it’s final audit in the beginning of the month.

First things first, here is the video of the project describing what the project is about:

On a personal note I would like to say that I’ve been involved in this project for as long as I’ve started my research career, which is just a bit over 5 years ago. This project enabled me to meet people in most parts of Europe, to know their way of doing research and of course to learn from them and with them. Strangely enough: I was getting sick of this project :D

QXZhbGlhw6fDtWVz

Thu, 11 Dec 2008 23:55:50 +0000

Flame: ON

E se deixássemos de falar da avaliação dos professores e começássemos a falar sobre avaliação dos alunos?

Codebits

Fri, 14 Nov 2008 16:12:45 +0000

Vim a Lisboa ver as modas e acabei a brincar com os RFID’s disponibilizados pela iUZ!.

Cada participante do Codebits tem na sua label um RFID que pode ser lido pelos portais distribuidos pelo recinto em zonas estratégicas. Todos participantes têm ainda acesso a essa informação através de uma API disponível aqui.

Meia dúzia de linhas php em “spaghetti code” permitem:

Engraçado… mas não passa disso…

Book Meme

Thu, 13 Nov 2008 00:05:54 +0000

Sim, tentei resistir mas não consegui…

«A list has exactly the opposite properties»

As regras da praxe:

Pega no livro mais próximo.
Abre na página 56.
Procura a quinta frase.
Coloca um post no teu blog com o texto e seguido destas instruções.
Não escolhas o teu livro favorito, o mais cool ou o mais intelectual

PS: Alguém adivinha de que livro é :) ?

Mais do mesmo

Wed, 05 Nov 2008 20:50:34 +0000

"Era só para avisar que o Obama ganhou as eleições nos USA" Anónimo in "repetições até ao expoente máximo da loucura"

Com esta acho que bateram os floods de posts aquando dos lançamentos da Apple…

Estará a blogosfera portuguesa a tornar-se uma enorme redundância?

Apple TV price

Tue, 04 Nov 2008 12:40:12 +0000

Would someone please explain to me the rational (because I believe there is one) behind the fact that the Apple TV is the ONLY product in Apple Store whose price in euros in actually higher (50%) then in dollar albeit the weak dollar ? Check it your selves: http://store.apple.com/us http://store.apple.com/pt

@Torino, Italy

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 21:39:20 +0000

Just getting back from a trip to Torino, Italy where I attended C-Cast project meeting.

It was a very short trip since back at the lab we are preparing Daidalos final Audit after 5 years of producing research and Inovation. Next weeks will be very stressfull as a demo needs to be fine tuned before the expert auditors evaluate the project.

GLUA Tech Sessions

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 21:51:05 +0100

O GLUA organiza no próximo dia 8 de Novembro um evento técnico que visa reunir em Aveiro utilizadores e entusiastas do sistema operativo Linux e do Software Open Source.

Este evento conta com a presença de algumas pessoas que desenvolvem em Portugal (e não só) Software Open Source e que neste evento irão partilhar um pouco da sua experiência. A entrada é livre mas sujeita a inscrições pelo que devem consultar o site do evento

links for 2008-09-29

Mon, 29 Sep 2008 14:08:32 +0100

Ohloh, the open source network

            <div class="delicious-tags">(tags: <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/web2.0">web2.0</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/social">social</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/software">software</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/programming">programming</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/opensource">opensource</a>)</div>
        </li></ul>

The Last Shadow Puppets - Standing Next to Me

Fri, 26 Sep 2008 19:19:56 +0100

This music has been playing in a loop in my head for more then a month now…

links for 2008-09-26

Fri, 26 Sep 2008 14:09:15 +0100

Eseries » Blog Archive » Nokia E61 Codes

            <div class="delicious-tags">(tags: <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/nokia">nokia</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/e51">e51</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/codes">codes</a>)</div>
        </li></ul>

Desktop Meme

Thu, 25 Sep 2008 10:44:46 +0100

Take a screenshot of your desktop right now, don’t change anything, post it on your blog!

Where is the symbian store?

Tue, 23 Sep 2008 21:44:22 +0100

So I’ve had a Nokia E51 for less then a week, and all I can say is:

“Where is the symbian store ?” Compared to the Apple Store where I can get tons of applications for my iPod Touch, or the recently announced store announced by google for TMobile’s G1 Phone announced today, the symbian platform definitely lacks a centralized gathering point for all the software available out there.

For a newcomer such as myself, the task of find applications that fit our needs is too high when compared with the competition, and I don’t think of my self as a tech savvy person…

links for 2008-09-22

Mon, 22 Sep 2008 20:13:32 +0100

Hellkvist.org - Software

            <div class="delicious-tags">(tags: <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/mms">mms</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/programming">programming</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/phone">phone</a>)</div>
        </li></ul>

New (old) Cellphone

Sun, 21 Sep 2008 22:40:22 +0100

After less then a year of usage my SE w580 has failed me… the cursor right key doesn’t work which makes it pretty hard to navigate in the main screen and to write sms with symbols and using T9.

Luckly enough my father had a Nokia E51 hanging around the house since he bought an iPhone, which I’ll be using for the next time being

That to say until one of the following things happen: I buy my self an iPhone, I get my w580 fixed, the Nokia too fails. Now what can I say about the Nokia E51 ?

links for 2008-09-21

Sun, 21 Sep 2008 14:08:17 +0100

MOSH by Nokia

            <div class="delicious-tags">(tags: <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/community">community</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/symbian">symbian</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/apps">apps</a>)</div>
        </li></ul>

links for 2008-09-19

Fri, 19 Sep 2008 22:10:22 +0100

Joiku - JoikuSpot Light

            <div class="delicious-tags">(tags: <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/s60">s60</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/hotspot">hotspot</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/wlan">wlan</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/phone">phone</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/wifi">wifi</a>)</div>
        </li></ul>

Colocações no Ensino Superior - 2008

Sun, 14 Sep 2008 16:59:58 +0100

O dia de hoje fica marcado pela publicação das colocações no Ensino Superior no concurso de 2008.

Se bem que os media se centrem nos cursos socialmente mais interessantes como Medicina, Arquitectura e Direito; o meu post pretende antes analisar a área das Engenharias Informática e Electrotecnica.

Este ano é marcado por médias de acesso mais elevadas (ou serão?) que nos anos anteriores, faço aqui um apanhado das principais escolas do país na área que mais me diz respeito:

links for 2008-09-11

Thu, 11 Sep 2008 16:40:32 +0100

Orbit – Trac

            <div class="delicious-tags">(tags: <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/wireless">wireless</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/testbed">testbed</a>)</div>
        </li><li>
            <div class="delicious-link"><a href="http://www.emulab.net/">Emulab.Net - Emulab - Network Emulation Testbed Home</a></div>
            
            <div class="delicious-tags">(tags: <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/emulation">emulation</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/emulab">emulab</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/Networking">Networking</a>)</div>
        </li><li>
            <div class="delicious-link"><a href="http://info.iet.unipi.it/~luigi/ip_dummynet/">IP_DUMMYNET</a></div>
            
            <div class="delicious-tags">(tags: <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/network">network</a> <a href="http://delicious.com/dgomes/emulation">emulation</a>)</div>
        </li></ul>

Tech advices

Mon, 08 Sep 2008 23:05:24 +0100

Today I was shopping in an unnamed large electronics store when I inadvertedly overeard a talk between the clerk and a costumer trying to buy a network solution for his house. The clerk pointed out a linksys N router as a way for the costumer to get good coverage in all his house without questioning the costumer whether his laptop had 802.11n or not, or if his ISP equipment had an Ethernet interface or not…

Google Chrome

Tue, 02 Sep 2008 23:15:18 +0100

disclaimer: as with everyone else’s post this post does not add a dime to what has already been said by the right people (Google staff). Instead it will focus on the unanswered questions.

What is the need for yet another browser ? It’s an open source browser, there are already several good open source browsers such as Firefox.

Great, it has several new features, but why weren’t they included to existing open-source projects ?

New Theme

Wed, 27 Aug 2008 01:31:04 +0100

Well, what can I say…

The old theme was hanging in this site since almost it’s beginning as a temporary theme till I got something done. That day arrived today (or tonight) when with the help of my wife I costumized WP-Andreas01 theme.

Hope everyone likes it!

PS: anyone browsing the blog using an iPhone/iPod Touch will get a surprise ;)

DebianDayPT2008

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 09:48:26 +0100

Nunca é de mais relembrar a realização do DebianDayPT2008 que se realiza já no próximo dia 16 de Agosto (para os mais distraídos é daqui a menos de um mês) na Universidade de Aveiro e conta com a colaboração do GLUA.

O Encontro é feito de entusiastas Debian mas não só uma vez que está aberto a comunidade em geral.

É ainda de referir que este evento marca o 15º aniversário desta distribuição do GNU/Linux.

Squid transparent proxy in Ubuntu 8.04

Sun, 29 Jun 2008 17:50:57 +0100

Squid is the defacto proxy system. Either in the lab or at home I use a transparent squid proxy in order to have a global cache system for all my devices (I really hate browser caches that take all you disk space).

For years now, in order to configure a transparent Squid proxy you had to put in the following lines:

httpd_accel_host virtual
httpd_accel_port 80
httpd_accel_with_proxy on
httpd_accel_uses_host_header on

plus the complimentary iptables rules in your router:

Ethics

Thu, 19 Jun 2008 18:36:47 +0100

Today I was driven to an article on time.com about wifi thieves. Point being on the ethics of using someone else’s wifi network.

I shall not make any comment on the subject, but instead leave you with some food for your mind:

“How many times have you stolen network connectivity, while feeling morally guilty?”

Again:

“How many times have you felt the same while stealing power from nearby power-plugs?”

Brussels, Belgium

Fri, 06 Jun 2008 18:57:29 +0100

Just got back from brussels where I attended the final review of the C-Mobile project.

It was not my first time in brussels, nonetheless it was the first time I enjoyed the traditional “moules et frites”. Very nice I must say soo :)

C-Mobile Project

Wed, 04 Jun 2008 15:11:19 +0100

As you might have noticed, I’ve been really busy in the last few months as C-Mobile project reached it’s end, and some demos had to be delivered :)

I can say that my team did a good job and to show their good work we have created a video for YouTube.

You can find more detailed videos here

Telecom API's

Mon, 12 May 2008 16:17:43 +0100

The Telecom Operators that relied in voice services are dead. And today’s operators fight for their own existence in a world dominated by the Web 2.0 where services can be created, combined in matter of day’s if not hours by limited resources teams. This new playground poses several challenges to telecom forums that have in the last years devised several API’s for enabling developers to plug in to their network. The following table has the particularity of synthesizing what’s going on.

Who want's to be an astronaut?

Thu, 08 May 2008 11:03:20 +0100

Keeping it real short: ESA is hiring :)

Follow me for the portuguese event

Top 10

Fri, 11 Apr 2008 22:31:13 +0100

Answering Alfredo’s challenge:

My MacBook:

$ history|awk '{a[$2]++ } END{for(i in a){print a[i] " " i}}'|sort -rn|head
148 ssh
63 ls
50 cd
29 ping
28 sudo
23 traceroute
21 scp
17 vi
17 ifconfig
15 route

My Linux Workstation:

$ history|awk '{a[$2]++ } END{for(i in a){print a[i] " " i}}'|sort -rn|head
111 vi
67 make
66 cd
61 svn
54 ls
39 sudo
22 pwd
10 man
8 grep
7 more

Sobre Futebol

Sun, 06 Apr 2008 20:07:12 +0000

Não sou pessoa de fazer posts sobre assuntos de futebol, no entanto vou abrir uma excepção.

O F.C.P. tornou-se hoje tri-campeão nacional de futebol, todos (jogadores e adeptos) festejaram junto ao estádio do dragão no Porto.

Para reflexão:O cantico mais entoado: "SLB...SLB... SLB SLB SLB, fil*** d* p*** SLB fil*** d* p*** é SLB"

Pos-graduate program between Universidade de Aveiro and Carnegie Mellon University

Sun, 09 Mar 2008 02:17:58 +0000

The University of Aveiro - Portugal in collaboration with Carnegie Mellon University - USA is teaming up to offer a Professional Master in Information Networking (MSIN) in Portugal.

The Aveiro MSIN program builds upon students technical backgrounds to give them the broadened perspective and tactical expertise required to become leaders in the quickly developing field of information technology and information networking. Coursework takes place at the University of Aveiro and uses a hybrid distributed education format that combines locally taught courses with courses taught from Carnegie Mellon via video-conferencing technologies. The Program is a dual degree program, which allows the student to have a post-graduate diploma in Europe and a Professional Master degree in USA.

Power Saving

Tue, 26 Feb 2008 02:35:28 +0000

Today I was buying some bricolage accessories in aki, when I spotted the power meter that Joao Barros mentioned a few days ago, so I decided to buy one to.

Let me start by saying how much power I’ve started saving by turning off “stand-by” equipments:

Living room TV (8W in "off"!? and 12W in standby)
Desktop computer, 2x LCD Monitor (8w) - which I don't use anymore but were still plugged in.
Kitchen TV (4W)
Several Power adapters (4W)

Curiosities:

G4 mac-mini (30W on, 3W on standby!!)
Microwave (4W to display a clock !?

Hope to save some € thanks to this :)

Grading Students Papers

Fri, 22 Feb 2008 02:15:26 +0000

My life in the past weeks…

check out other great comics

2nd Semester

Sat, 16 Feb 2008 01:56:00 +0000

This semester I’ll be teaching “Network Architectures” to 3rd and 4th year students (big mess thanks to the bologne process). This means that I’ve students sharing the same class with very different backgrounds and previous expertise in computer networks.

In addition I’ve got several students which I’ve known since my student years. And this confuses me the most, since it is cumbersome for both me and them. Should I treat them as friends (and have other students feeling that I treat my friends specially) or distance myself from them (and be an hypocrite). Tough call…

Real cost of content

Mon, 28 Jan 2008 00:04:28 +0000

In the last decade, tech evangelist praised the value of “Content” as the real value in todays and future technological society.

The truth couldn’t be any further from those predictions.

The value of music has dropped to such levels that caused an unprecedented crisis in the Industry. Today any musician can afford to produce it’s own album and distribute it over the internet thanks to it’s personal computer equiped with pro-consumer hardware/software. The Artic Monkeys were one of such cases. The music industry realized this paradigm too late, and is now facing the consequences (decreased revenues, and artists breaking their contracts and going independent).

Leopard Terminal

Fri, 25 Jan 2008 19:22:44 +0000

As a switcher I’m several times faced with the awkwardness of the differences between my previous work environment (Linux) and my new one.

One of the most annoying ones has been the handling of the function keys. First I though that after a while I would get used to the mapping in OS X terminal, but then again I still work with too many Linux machines in the Lab, and therefore never really let go of old habits.

Pasta Code

Wed, 16 Jan 2008 15:47:55 +0000

This might come as old news to many of you, but only very recently did I read the following “Letter to the Editor” of “CrossTalk” (“The Journal of Defense Software Engineering”): Letter to the Editor CROSSTALK, Journal of Defense Software Engineering

The mention of “a feast of spaghetti code” (“Computer Collectives”, CrossTalk, April/May 1992) prompted this response:

Nearly every software professional has heard the term spaghetti code as a pejorative description for complicated, difficult to understand, and impossible to maintain, software. However, many people may not know the other two elements of the complete Pasta Theory of Software.

Canon 400D

Wed, 26 Dec 2007 01:58:20 +0000

Canon 400D, originally uploaded by Diogo Gomes.

I didn't get the same deal Ricardo did, but it was nevertheless a good Christmas Gift for me and my wife :) Not being a great photographer myself... My wife makes it up for both, check her photographs at olhares.com

@Berlin, Germany

Mon, 24 Dec 2007 02:10:11 +0000

Berlin nights 1, originally uploaded by eschwagerus.

After more then a week of "blog silence" I'm back from Berlin, where C-Mobile's meeting took place.

During this meeting we worked in the integration of our Demonstrator which is composed of OpenIMS, several Service Enablers built on top of Sailfin and a very basic UE built on top of the Nokia N800 platform (MAEMO).

It was more then a week of round the clock coding and hacking, so not much time was left to walk the city besides the nights. I must say that I enjoy Germany very much, specially during the xmas time, due to the local “Christmas Markets” and all the season spirit which IMHO is much more experienced in the northern European countries.

bash in living color

Wed, 05 Dec 2007 17:05:27 +0000

For all of you switchers from Linux to OS X, that cannot live without a bash terminal open 24/24:

You have probably, and sadly, realised that your Terminal does not come with “so nice to have” color tagging of files in your ls command.

Your 1st idea was probably to pickup your old trusty (and awfully hacked) .bashrc from your Linux system and place it in your OS X system. Unfortunately you sadly came to the conclusion that it didn’t work. :(

iPod Touch

Mon, 03 Dec 2007 02:48:49 +0000

Well this weekend my clock turned 27 years, and my wife and friends decided to give me an iPod Touch, which I had keeped in my wishlist for a while.

The experience is great, I also own a 4G ipod (the last monochromatic model) and this new model is all I could wish for…

The wifi interface is great, as it enables me to quickly check my email and feeds. The large screen will hopefully keep me entertained during flights. And hopefully will last more :).

iPhone em portugal !?

Wed, 21 Nov 2007 14:09:11 +0000

Ok, deste SPAM não estava eu à espera…

A http://lojadotelemovel.com/ tem à venda no seu site o iPhone pela “módica” quantia de €820,00… sim… leram bem €820,00.

Eu não conheço estes senhores… mas lá que me fizeram abrir o SPAM mail deles fizeram…

Parte mais interessante:“IMPORTANTE: Equipamento desbloqueado de Fábrica, funciona em todos os Operadores. Garantia de 2 anos.”

Alguem já alguma vez comprou alguma coisa a estes senhores ? (Não que eu vá dar €820,00 por um telemovel…)

What's with Cisco and the Kusec?

Wed, 21 Nov 2007 12:20:55 +0000

This week my ARA (Advanced Networks class) lab students got the chance to work with some recent equipment acquired by the department. The equipment consists of several enterprise grade CISCO networks wireless units (Access Points and Network cards) that most of them will eventually deploy in their future careers, and have during these labs classes the chance to a have a first contact with. The curiosity here lies on the fact that Beacon Periods in CISCO equipments do not use “standard” time units.. they use something called Kusec. What ?! a Kilo Micro Second ? In my days (and guess wikipedia days…) Kilo meant 10³ and Micro meant 10^?6 which would mean 10^-3 or good old Milli. So where from does Kusec comes from? Kusec equals (according to CISCO) 1024 microseconds… hmmm shouldn’t it be then a Kibi Micro Second ? and therefore Kiusec ? And whats wrong with miliseconds ? All other vendors have the Beacon Periods configured in milliseconds…

Sapo Codebits

Thu, 15 Nov 2007 02:37:50 +0000

Bom é verdade, os rumores o confirmam. Estive presente durante as palestras que acabaram hoje, houveram várias sobre assuntos diversos mas as que me cativaram mais foram as sobre o cartão do cidadão e a sobre Agile e SCRUM.

Houve ainda oportunidade para algum networking, onde conheci as pessoas por detras dos hackergotchi’s. Para o ano espero poder repetir a minha presença caso o evento de repita. Kudos para o pessoal do SAPO que organizou o evento.

Wishlist 2.0

Fri, 09 Nov 2007 02:19:17 +0000

We are getting near “the season” and therefore starting the never ending process of scouting for the right gift for each of your family members and friends. For kids it means writing a letter to santa, for grown ups it means setting up an online wishlist :) because you never know when someone has no idea what to offer you and browses through your website ( hint ).

I’ve used the Amazon wishlist for sometime now, but I mostly regret the fact that it is limited to Amazon products.

New cellphone

Mon, 05 Nov 2007 00:00:00 +0000

After more then a month carefully choosing my new cellphone, I choose none of the candidates.

Instead I went with the Sony Ericsson w580i, which actually belongs to the same family as the S500i but has walkman capabilities, and most importantly doesn’t have a fame of cracking the keyboard after less then a week use.

Technically speaking the W580i is an EDGE cellphone that fits my previously mentioned requirements: slide form factor, bluetooth, high-speed modem and costed less then 300€. From the pack of candidate cellphones the grey version of the W580i is also IMHO the most beautiful of them all. So all said I think I did a good buy, but only time will tell as I had only the weekend to test it.

Creating an electronic Curriculum Vitae

Fri, 02 Nov 2007 16:55:48 +0000

Any now and then, one ends up needing to provide a Curriculum Vitae AKA Résumé (CV).

Either for applying for a job or just to be used to assert your credentials (for example while running for project fundings), you always end up needing an updated CV.

So what do most people do ?

They keep a document of their idea of a CV
They keep a document formated using the “Europass standard”
They keep it online using services such as LinkedIn

Of course there are other options :)

free time VS talent

Sun, 28 Oct 2007 01:35:43 +0000

NoComments, the strip speaks for it self…

credits: as seen in Maracujá

Teaching Assistant

Tue, 16 Oct 2007 19:44:42 +0000

I’ve recently reach a position in DETI as a Teaching Assistant.

It will amongst other things be my first actual “job”, with pension plans and social security and an actual pay check instead of the schoolarship I used to receive from FCT.

But this also means I will from now on be spending a greater part of my time preparing classes, and of course teaching…It’s not that I don’t enjoy teaching (which I’ve learn to like in the past year or two) but the time it will consume will most probably mean that I’ll take longer to finnish my thesis :(

@Nurenberg, Germany

Thu, 11 Oct 2007 13:40:37 +0100

Here I am, back to Germany for a project meeting (C-Mobile).

I actually enjoy coming to Germany, it’s a very modern country with lots of job opportunities. I enjoy the german outdoors, its forests and mountains, and of course their great beer! What I do not like is the food… specially the next dish:

It’s an over-rated pig roast, with this awful bread/potato ball….

In the last 48h I’ve eated this dish 3x…. 1st was my choice (dope!), 2nd was the social event (no options available) and today for lunch (again no choice…)

choosing a new cellphone

Sun, 30 Sep 2007 00:00:00 +0100

I’m in the market for a new cellphone.

My requirements are for:

Clam or Slider form-factor
Bluetooth
Highspeed modem (>EDGE)
around 300€ (less would be good :))

So far my choice is between these two:

The Motorola v3xx @ vodafone

Plus: HSDPA modem, always loved the design of the RAZR Minus: Old model, locked phone

The Sony Ericsson S500i

Plus: It’s similar to my S700i, fits the requirements
Minus: Most reviews complain about the bad materials

Foo Fighters - The Pretender

Fri, 28 Sep 2007 14:28:08 +0100

Great single for a great album!

@Athens, Greece

Wed, 05 Sep 2007 12:52:10 +0100

This week I’m attending PIMRC'07 where I’ll be presenting a paper entitled IP Multicast Dynamic Mapping in Heterogeneous Environments (I’ll post the URL when the paper becomes available at IEEExplorer)

I had never been to greece before, but I must say to you, their taxi drivers are the most insane I’ve ever met. I was comming from the Airport at 12.30AM at more then 150km cutting through lanes while listening to the driver, that shouted (literally) to my ears how bad his life was, and how much the € made it worst… Besides this, the weather is really nice (warm) and the conference although a bit side track to my main interests is being really interesting.

OS X Essentials

Thu, 30 Aug 2007 01:42:01 +0100

Today one my friends became a switcher, thanks to a new Macbook

One of the first things to do was of course to send him links of some of the things I consider essentials to any OS X user:

Most basic widget (I don't get why apple doesn't ship such widget...) iStat Pro
Codecs :) for that I use Perian and Flip4mac
Instant Messaging is brought to you by Adium aka "the duck"
File Transfer (FTP,SCP) is another duck's business: Cyberduck
Re coding your multimedia files? You better pull your HandBrake
With so much multimedia around the house you better get it all Deliciously sorted
Which you can then brag about in IRC using Colloquy
Since life is not just about fun you can use neoOffice to get some work actually done

Websites as graphs

Thu, 23 Aug 2007 19:14:31 +0100

Today a friend sent me a link to an applet called Websites as Graphs.

Here’s what it does:

*dgomes.camelot.com.pt*

As most of you might already know, web pages are written in a graph structured markup language (HTML). Some complex (such as your's truly blog), some quite simple (such as google website):

[google]

But what is it doing? What this applet does is plain simple: it generates a graph of the html structure of a given website using the basic HTML tags as nodes in the graph. In order to read the graph you should know that:

DISTCC + AVAHI

Tue, 21 Aug 2007 13:22:05 +0100

When considering a project involving a large number of source files, compilation time is always an issue. DistCC is in these cases a very good solution. From DistCC site:

distcc is a program to distribute builds of C, C++, Objective C or Objective C++ code across several machines on a network. distcc should always generate the same results as a local build, is simple to install and use, and is usually much faster than a local compile

My problem was how to keep the **$DISTCC_HOSTS** variable updated, since computers in my lab never seam to be left alone (after all... this is a lab :) ).

My idea was therefore to use AVAHI and to come up with a simple unix pipe that would feed the $DISTCC_DIR/hosts file.

Using svn+ssh with RapidSVN

Wed, 08 Aug 2007 14:18:20 +0100

After spending some time searching, I realized that this might help someone else.

Not being able to properly replace MS Visio in neither a Linux or OS X environment, I’ve been stuck with MS Office and a Virtual Machine for this sole purpose in my Linux and OSX environments. I keep my machine very light, I only install MS Office (Word+Excel+Visio), Firefox & Thunderbird, Putty and RapidSVN. This enables me to quickly access and edit a document, either using a web repository (e.g. BSCW), e-mail or SVN (don’t ask why, but some people like to use SVN to share documents in binary format).

Pownce

Mon, 09 Jul 2007 18:17:01 +0100

Pownce is yet another Web2.0 website…

…but then if it was, why did it catch my interest ?

The desktop application enables to quickly share with friends (not the whole world!) notes, links, files and events.

“Why not use the email ?” True… but thats so 90’s :)

Going Bilingue

Wed, 04 Jul 2007 12:44:31 +0100

Starting in the last Post, all post related to Portuguese activities/politics/events will be posted in Portuguese

Desde o post anterior que todos os assuntos relacionados com Portugal serão publicados em Português

Workshop sobre Televisão Movel

Wed, 04 Jul 2007 12:25:46 +0100

Realiza-se no próximo dia 9 de Julho em Aveiro o workshop “Televisão Móvel: Tecnologia e Informação do Futuro”. Sem dúvida a não perder. Mais informação

Which Programming Language are You?

Mon, 02 Jul 2007 14:47:28 +0100

Guess what… I’ve programmed Prolog in the past, but never thought of my self as “Prolog”

Got an iPhone

Fri, 29 Jun 2007 12:16:59 +0100

Well, thats not true… But hey! Grabbed your attention didn’t I ?

Today is the US launch of the iPhone, for the Europeans this means at least half a year waiting…

According to the news, Vodafone will be the chosen carrier (good news, means I will not need to change carrier).

Meanwhile, I'm keeping my old 3.5G ipod and SE S700i, with a new theme just to get use to it :)

... they died... Got new Ones :)

Tue, 26 Jun 2007 14:18:35 +0100

Taking care of fishes in an aquarium is not an easy task… specially because they don’t come with a handbook…

What happened ? We over fead the guppies, causing the water to be polluted, in the end -2 guppies…

This said, last weekend I cleaned up the aquarium and bought new fishes: Limão and Laranja (2 platties).

Hope they have better luck :)

Got Pets

Thu, 14 Jun 2007 23:57:12 +0100

Opposite to most of my friends expectations of me getting a cat…

Me and my wife got an Aquarium (you can check photos in the sidebar). It’s a hot water aquarium with 2 Guppies, a snail and a chaestostoma.

We called them Vader (the black male guppie) and Amidala (the female guppie), slater (the snail) and “suky suky” (chaestostoma) for obvious reasons.

New laptop

Tue, 12 Jun 2007 18:10:14 +0100

It’s true, I dumped my trusty IBM Thinkpad for this:

MacBook (Black) - Intel Core2 Duo T7200 2.00GHz

Keeping the story short, FNAC had the now old model for 1099,00€ (limited stock) after some talks with my wife, we ended up getting 2 (your heard it!) of these machines for the price of a MacBook Pro (on which I had my eyes on for like a year or so). It was a great 2 for the price of 1 deal.

New theme is up

Thu, 31 May 2007 20:14:30 +0000

Still needing some work, but at least it’s a new theme :)

In the duh department I realized I had an english blog with a portuguese name… translation done

[Update 12 Jun 2007] Well, I must say the last theme was not my favorite, so I updated the site yet again :-D

New hosting

Mon, 28 May 2007 12:06:58 +0100

Starting today, my blog has a new home

In the upcoming week I hope to start using a new theme to go with it ;)

Map my name

Thu, 19 Apr 2007 18:21:10 +0100

The two students behind this project idea is to geomap every single user in the internet.

Although naif, the idea is nonetheless very good!

They make use of google maps (no trouble developing)
The idea is fun (best reason for any one to join)
It has web2.0 written all over (well not literally!)

Will they succeed ?

Only time will tell …

Mugshot

Wed, 04 Apr 2007 16:54:37 +0100

I’m hooked!

After saying to myself a thousand times that I wouldn’t joint yet another over hyped Web2.0 website, i joined yet another one…

My friend Rafael sent the link over (yes! he is the one to blaim!)

http://www.mugshot.org/

I found it interisting because it provides a lot of information without requiring any new input, it basically retrieves all information from sites such as flickr, last.fm and mashes them up.

Another interesting feature is the Firefox extension which enables me to share links with my friends without the omnipresent “email”.

Tesourinho deprimente

Fri, 30 Mar 2007 16:31:51 +0100

É deprimente ter o genérico de um programa que é um cover …

Not that bad after all!

Tue, 27 Mar 2007 18:57:40 +0100

Forget all about my previous post!

As it turns out Apple TV is quite nice after all, or better yet, it has all it takes to be a great gadget!

Check this link

Apple TV

Fri, 23 Mar 2007 11:34:44 +0000

Any one who has talked to me in the months since the Apple TV launch, knows of my interest in getting one.

Since yesterday Apple TV is shipping, but I’m not placing an order (yet!).

Many people say it’s an expensive product (299€), some say it does far less then what is expected. For me it’s the lack of support for DivX.

Apple and Microsoft get the message: WE DON’T WANT PROPRIETARY CODECS!!

Keep Alive Post

Fri, 16 Mar 2007 11:27:32 +0000

Well, I haven’t been posting here lately, mostly because I’m too busy working and teaching (I’m currently teaching Java programming to EGI).

Law

Fri, 02 Mar 2007 19:07:08 +0000

Are laws made to defend or attack people?

no comments……

Search Engines (like if…)

Fri, 16 Feb 2007 00:00:00 +0000

Forget about Google, Yahoo, Live.com…

Because Ms.Dewey is here! Staring actress Janina Gavankar Try searching “you are so hot”,“take off your clothes”,“illegal drugs”, “ho”, “nintendo”, “what are you reading?”, “ms. dewey”, “just tell me”, “fastest bittorrent client”, “blow me”, “george bush”, “world of warcraft”, “how to do the robot”, “web design”, “Battlefield 2”, “murder”(several times), “storm”, “Halo 2”, “Google”, “Jesus”, “arts”, “iPod”, “music download”, “eminem”(again several times), “so you think you can dance”, “yo mama”, “Ferrari”, “Horror movie”, “911”, “Lord of the Rings”, “Bruce Willis”, “Use gun” (several times), “twins”, “chris rock”, “ashton kutcher”, “If you get inside your computer you can do anything you want to me”, “terrorist”, “Britney Spears”, “MMORPG”, “Microsoft”, “Linux”

Life without google

Tue, 06 Feb 2007 18:46:56 +0000

What to do ?

dgomes@#######:~$ traceroute www.google.com
traceroute: Warning: www.google.com has multiple addresses; using 66.249.93.99
traceroute to www.l.google.com (66.249.93.99), 30 hops max, 40 byte packets
 1  gtav.it.pt (193.136.93.1)  1.158 ms  1.074 ms  1.458 ms
 2  fw1.core.ua.pt (193.136.86.222)  0.988 ms  1.690 ms  2.290 ms
 3  cic-b06-sw01-12g.core.ua.pt (193.137.173.254)  7.445 ms  5.479 ms  6.572 ms
 4  Router2.Porto.fccn.pt (193.136.1.193)  3.262 ms  3.237 ms  2.133 ms
 5  Router3.10GE.Lisboa.fccn.pt (193.136.1.221)  7.222 ms  6.882 ms  10.265 ms
 6  ROUTER1.GE.Lisboa.fccn.pt (193.137.0.30)  13.651 ms  19.864 ms  17.119 ms
 7  fccn.rt1.lis.pt.geant2.net (62.40.124.185)  11.072 ms  10.535 ms  10.470 ms
 8  so-2-1-0.rt1.lon.uk.geant2.net (62.40.112.146)  41.985 ms  129.115 ms  35.385 ms
 9  ldn-b2-pos4-0.telia.net (213.248.75.109)  32.387 ms  33.714 ms  38.874 ms
10  * * *
11  * * *
12  * * *
13  * * *

N770 Clone

Mon, 05 Feb 2007 18:31:27 +0000

Almost every piece of hardware is clonable in China (see ipods)

The big difference between the original and the clone ends up being the software, with the clone having the crappiest possible software.

Then what if your software could legally be cloned ? as in OSS ?

There comes the H9 UMPC which runs Linux and is an obvious clone of the Nokia 770 (known for running a special Linux version called Maemo)

State of mind

Fri, 02 Feb 2007 10:50:50 +0000

“I’m an idealist without illusions.”

*John F. Kennedy *

Mediocracy

Wed, 31 Jan 2007 14:09:22 +0000

Mediocracy is a disease

Portugal is under an epidemic

“Even I can do that”

Tue, 30 Jan 2007 14:02:33 +0000

This marvelous post : Trust_Me,_I’m_A_Doctor, made me realize how much of this nonsense I sometimes listen from people (regardless of what their profession his).

Everyone is an electrician, a plumber or a mechanic, then why do we need those people? Of course, its for those times that we realize we are not an electrician, a plumber or a mechanic…

If it is that simple for people to realize their limitations and the added-value of some professions, why is it so difficult to understand that by owning a computer you don’t auto magically become a Computer Engineer/Scientist?

iPhone viral ad in IETF ?!

Fri, 26 Jan 2007 13:43:52 +0000

My friend Alfredo was reading a recent IETF draft on Locator/ID Separation Protocol (LISP) when suddenly we noticed an interesting phrase out of the blue:

in line 820: “Going to buy an iPhone?”

But it was not all, afterwards I run a search in the document and found in the definition of “End-System”:

in line 325: “An iPhone”

Well this is interesting, specially because the draft is from CISCO. Start you conspiracy theories!

Getting a home telephone

Wed, 24 Jan 2007 23:38:34 +0000

After a long (and expensive) phone call with my father, we both realized that it made little sense in our days to use a GSM network while at home.

That said we figured out that voipbuster was the best service in town: free calls, SIP based service and some of our contacts are already in this network. We could have gone with skype, but it offers a closed shop service with no inter operation besides legacy networks (PSTN, GSM).

Hello World

Tue, 23 Jan 2007 16:47:17 +0000

What’s a blog without a hello world post ?

For more then a week I have battled myself against doing this blog…

Today I declared defeat!