Update: Per this discussion on the remastersys forums, my fix will be included in remastersys 2.0.14.

This week, I was using remastersys to create a custom ubuntu-based distribution (more info on this later). One of the things that I noticed about remastersys version 2.0.13-1 was it’s lack of compatibility with Ubuntu’s USB Startup Disk Creator utility.

I have created a simple patch to address the issue. You can download it at http://www.imagitronics.org/download/ubuntu_creator.patch.

Alternatively, you can edit the file /usr/bin/remastersys and insert the following code immediately before Step 7.

#Step 6.5 - Added by Tim Farley. Make ISO compatible with Ubuntu Startup Disk Creator (Karmic).
echo "Making disk compatible with Ubuntu Startup Disk Creator."
touch $WORKDIR/ISOTMP/ubuntu
touch $WORKDIR/ISOTMP/.disk/base_installable
echo "full_cd/single" > $WORKDIR/ISOTMP/.disk/cd_type
echo $(uname -a) > $WORKDIR/ISOTMP/.disk/info
if [ "$LIVECDURL" = "" ]; then
LIVECDURL="<a href="http://www.geekconnection.org/remastersys" target="_blank">http://www.geekconnection.org/remastersys</a>"
fi
echo $LIVECDURL > $WORKDIR/ISOTMP/.disk/release_notes_url

This version allows you to set an addition variable in your /etc/remastersys.conf called LIVECDURL that points to the address of your custom distribution. The LIVECDURL variable defaults to the remastersys homepage if left unset.

Enjoy!

Tim

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I have created a functional base64 encoding method for the ybox.

It’s not ideal as it requires the programmer to declare an output array large enough to hold the result of the encoding procedure. I tried everything I could think of to avoid this by using the size of the input string (strsize(in_ptr)*(4/3)) to store the output, but I couldn’t get it.

Download the updated base64.spin.

Sample usage:

CON
_clkmode = xtal1 + pll16x
_xinfreq = 5_000_000

OBJ
text : "TV_Text"
b64  : "base64"

VAR
byte outstring[25]

PUB start | i
text.start(12)

b64.encode(string("admin:admin"), @outstring)
text.str(@outstring)
text.out(13)

b64.encode(string("admin:password"), @outstring)
text.str(@outstring)
text.out(13)

b64.encode(string("Die SPIN Die!"), @outstring)
text.str(@outstring)
text.out(13)

b64.encode(string("meh"), @outstring)
text.str(@outstring)

repeat

And a sample image from the above code:

If anyone has any tips that can help get rid of the need to declare the output variable’s size, please let me know. Tim

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Well, it’s not very interesting (yet?) but I started working on a uTorrent download monitor using the ybox2. At the moment, it’s really nothing more than a simple hack. The ybox2 is running a slightly modified infowidget. When I say slightly modified, I mean I added one line to insert a Basic base64 authentication header for the uTorrent webserver:

tel.txmimeheader(string(“User-Agent”),string(“PropTCP”)) tel.txmimeheader(string(“Connection”),string(“close”)) tel.txmimeheader(string(“Authorization”),string(“Basic YWRtaW46YWRtaW4=”)) tel.str(@CR_LF)

I haven’t figured out how to write my own base64 encoding routine in Spin yet, so for the time being, I used python to generate the base64 encoding of the default username/password for the uTorrent web server (admin:admin).

Apart from that, I’m using a uTorrent python library on the web server to generate a properly formatted document for the infowidget and the file is updated every minute by the Windows Task Scheduler: The simple python script can be found at http://pastebin.com/f2a47b927. 

TODO:

• There’s a lot that I’d like to do, but I’m currently in the midst of a hate/hate relationship with Spin.
• Ideally, I’d like to create a base64 encoder routine, and create a set of routines in Spin that can query the uTorrent webui natively without the python proxy.
• If/when that happens, I’d like to add remote control, scrolling, and the ability to select a download to view details. We’ll see how my relationship with Spin evolves. I’m not exactly a good programmer to begin with, and Spin is shaking me up pretty good.

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The spin language used by the Parallax Propeller chip is pretty brutal. There are quite a few little nuances that go against everything you’ve ever learned in your intro to programming courses. I felt kind of like a hacker in the mid 80’s when I got overly excited to see a simple “Hello World” type application on the screen.

It’s really not the language or the chip that’s difficult, per say, but rather the ybox2 specific libraries that implement the TCP/IP stack. A lot of the code is left up to your application, so even the simplest of the network-enabled widgets work out to around 300 lines of code. That’s a lot to digest when you’re just learning a new architecture and language.

Not to mention I’ve been pretty spoiled by Visual Studio and Eclipse for the past 4-5 years. I’m so used to having all the documentation described to me as I type, that having to find the source files and check what methods/constants/variables are available is a real drag!

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My wife bought me a ybox2 for Christmas and I just got around to assembling it this weekend. The ybox is a pretty amazing little ethernet enabled set-top box gadget that gives you the ability to create your own widgets which can be displayed on your TV. I have a couple of widgets in mind that I’d like to create, but the ybox uses a proprietary Parallax Propeller chip, which requires you write code in either Spin (which looks like Pascal threw up on win32 asm) or straight assembly code. Oh joy…

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