Daniel Bugl

software architect and web developer/designer

[danielbugl]

Introducing: git-leaf 0.1

git-leaf is an application that allows you to view the history of a git repository in a simple and beautiful way.

I used to use gitg, but then it broke for me. I'm not sure whether this is a packaging issue on debian sid, or a general issue with gitg, or just an issue with my system, but it was effort to fix and I never really liked it much anyway. Then there's gitk, which is a very useful tool, I do admit that, but it's also extremely ugly. It has the infamous "Xorg application" style. So I decided to create something new: git-leaf - which makes reading git trees simple and easy. Additionally, the interface is beautiful.

In 0.2-dev, which you can use from the master branch of the git repo, I already added new functions, including automatic loading of new commits. It even has indicators that fade out over time to show you how new a commit is. After a while, the indicator disappears. Oh, I also refactored the whole backend in the master branch. If you're on linux, I strongly recommend using 0.2-dev instead of 0.1 (the only reason why it's not released yet is windows support - I still need to compile libgit for Windows). I plan on adding many more features to git-leaf to make it the best graphical git repository browser ever. If you want to support me, feel free to contribute to the project, it's open source (BSD licensed)!

[danielbugl]

This is my latest project: MidiBoard rev0. Originally, I just wanted to hard-emulate the legendary MOS SID chip from the commodore64. That was about half a year ago already now. Then, a few months ago, I decided to hard-emulate the MOS SID chip now and even add MIDI support to it so I can play it with my keyboard. Again, I forgot about the project, because I had lots of other things to do.

Thinking about the project a third time, I decided to create a midi experimenting board. It consists of one chip that translates the midi signals into something else, and a separate sound chip that generates the sounds and plays them on a speaker (which can be headphones too, if you add a jack).

In the picture you can see the current version of the PCB (MidiBoard rev0). The ISP pins are still not wired, sorry, but there is no space at the moment, I might have to point-to-point wire those (or get a bigger board).

The DIN1 connector is a normal MIDI input. The CONN1 connector is USB and used to power the board at the moment.

U3 is a 6N139 optocoupler and used as a kind of hack to convert the current based MIDI protocol to the voltage based UART serial protocol the Atmel chips need.

U1 is an ATtiny45/85 and used as the MIDI translator.

U2 is an ATmega8 and used as the synthesizer, it generates the sounds.

XTAL1 is a 16MHz clock and is required by the ATmega8 to function correctly. The LED1 is just a status LED that shows if there is a MIDI signal. SPKR1 is the audio output for the speaker or headphones.

J1-4 are used as ISP programming pins, but as I previously mentioned, they are not wired yet in rev0.

R3 is a 220 Ohm resistor, R4 is a 10 kOhm resistor and R5 is a 470 Ohm resistor (all resistors with +/- 5% tolerance).

I did not build the current revision of the circuit yet, but I've done some tests with the optocoupler and midi translator part, so that already works. The synthesizer on its own works too, I tested it with an emulation of the MOS SID chip by Roboterclub Freiburg (http://www.roboterclub-freiburg.de/atmega_sound/atmegaSID.html).

The only things I still need to do is put those two experiments together to create the MidiBoard rev0. This is an open-hardware and open-source project, so everything I'm doing will be released. Even though, I didn't code anything besides tests for it yet, so I can't release any code yet.

I hope you like my project, and I know the PCB is messy, but it's a first version and I've just quickly put it together. (This was made with Fritzing, by the way. I just removed the "Made with Fritzing" mark since it was bloating the picture. It's great software, by the way, you should check it out: http://fritzing.org/)

[danielbugl]

Happy new year!

There are a few changes this year already. Firstly, the latest TouchNet version finally got into the stable repository at TouchLay/TouchNet after 6 months of testing!

Secondly, I updated the copyright on all active projects and looked through a few discontinued ones. Good old times, but I seriously don't have time for some of those projects anymore.

Thirdly, as I probably previously mentioned, I'm going to go through my old harddisks and find my projects to open-source them. I will also try to revive some of my discontinued projects if I think it would make sense to do so. All my active and newly released projects are BSD-licensed now, by the way.

What my new years resolutions are? Well, once again, documenting what I'm doing more, blogging actively. Just the same I had last year. Let's see how long it lasts this year.

Anyway, happy new year!

[dystech]

We are in an age where we start connecting everything to the Internet. Not only our TV can connect to the Internet nowadays. There is already technology to connect lights, cooling systems, surveillance cameras, and much more, to the Internet. Turning your lights on with your smartphone over the...

[danielbugl]

I haven't been active for weeks, because I was pretty busy with TouchLay and other things. There are also a few changes to my desktop, as you can see in the image.

I replaced network-manager with wicd and added "wicd-gtk -t" to my .xinitrc file

I added conky with a text-based .conkyrc file to show some information about the system and the date+time

I am using mpd and ncmpcpp for playing music

I replaced pulse with jack and added pulse on top of jack

The window manager is foxwolfblood's dwm-fork "dwm-fox" with a few patches added by myself and a few reconfigurations. (https://github.com/foxwolfblood/dwm-fox)

I cleaned up my systems by removing the old gnome packages.

[touchlay-deactivated20131007]

Have you ever imagined that you could order drinks or food directly from your table without the need to wait for the waiter? Did you ever imagine that bars and hospitals of the future would communicate with you and offer you the deal of the day? We certainly imagined it and that’s why we bring you the next step in the evolution of hospitality. Self service systems integrated so that you can interact with them easily from the place where you are sitting. This is a much more comfortable way than selecting an item at a vertical kiosk or waiting in line. It is actually a combination of the best of classical hospitality where you sit at a table and the fast effective restaurant system where you select your food at the counter. Our self service tablets, touch tables and other embedded interactive systems enable you to order drinks and food directly from where you are sitting. Imagine using a touchscreen embedded into the dining or coffee table. Our interactive tables only react to your fingers and not to glasses or plates. The interactive software by TouchLay is suited for all age categories and features the best from interactive software design. Once you order a drink or food from the digital menu of our systems it goes directly into the main POS at the counter. The waiter, bartender or people working in the kitchen see the order and start working on it. Once it’s prepared the waiter brings it to your table.  It’s that simple!

[laboratoryequipment-blog]

LCDs May Enable Glasses-Free 3D TV in the Future As striking as it is, the illusion of depth now routinely offered by 3D movies is a paltry facsimile of a true three-dimensional visual experience. In the real world, as you move around an object, your perspective on it changes. But in a movie theater showing a 3D movie, everyone in the audience has the same, fixed perspective — and has to wear cumbersome glasses, to boot. Despite impressive recent advances, holographic television, which would present images that vary with different perspectives, probably remains some distance in the future. But in a new paper featured as a research highlight at this summer’s Siggraph computer-graphics conference, the MIT Media Lab’s Camera Culture group offers a new approach to multiple-perspective, glasses-free 3D that could prove much more practical in the short term. Read more: http://www.laboratoryequipment.com/news-LCD-May-Enable-Glasses-Free-3D-TV-071312.aspx

[touchlay-deactivated20131007]

We at TouchLay believe that the most important affair is user experience.

Our software is built around the idea that every moment spent with it makes you more creative and imaginative.

We have been trying to find out the most natural way for a long time to change the way how people interact with modern technology. We studied the way they interact with the environment and other people.

Currently using a computer means sitting at a table in a chair typing letters on your keyboards and using a mouse to interact loosely with the software. Many people spend most of their time trying to understand what the system is showing them on the screen.

Tablets and other touchscreen devices have started a revolution. It is now possible to actually touch the object you are working with. All major operating systems have their own idea of how people should use these new interactive devices.

The ones that have simply taken the old concepts from the desktop systems and copied them over to the interactive ones have failed. We understand that we are dealing with a completely new paradigm and need to approach it differently. But how do you start designing user experience and user interaction mechanisms? We started by understanding what people want to achieve when using a system. Some want to do their work, others want to play games or browse the internet. They all have something in common: They usually end up in a different state of mind than they started. The experience that you get by using your interactive device can be either pleasant or it can be annoying. Imagine that you need to go through too many steps in finding a file or in closing or opening a window. We design revolutionary new systems where we eliminated all the unnecessary actions needed to achieve a task. As stated before, this does not just improve your productivity, it also creates a seamless user experience. This is our main goal at TouchLay.

By the way, we are going to update our blog weekly to keep you up-to-date on our progress and ideas.

[danielbugl]

Vision bug fixed! HD finally works.

I just boosted my vision from 240p to 1024p (or even more)!

Yeah, I am short sighted and I knew it for quite a while already (a few years), but never felt like going to see an eye doctor and an optician. I never really needed to see distant objects, as I am mainly sitting in front of one of my computers.

How did I finally decide to go see a doctor, then? Well, I was out with some friends in the cinema (yes, that was the first and probably the only time I watched a movie this year) and when there were subtitles, I was not able to read them. I thought it's time to get glasses, so.. now they are here.

The world actually looks much more beautiful with glasses and now I can even look at my 2nd monitor without standing up, or lie in my bed waiting for something to compile or download without having to stand up to see if it finished!

[danielbugl]

Life is like a multi-player sandbox game. We set our own goals and it's meant to be free, but our "hosts" restrict the usage.

Daniel Bugl

[danielbugl]

Common sense; Too common?

Is our common sense becoming too common? Are we using our ability to "feel" things mentally too much?

If you think about it, mostly, it's not important WHAT they say, it's only about HOW they say it. If you make your voice sound happy about a sad event, some people will think something good has happened, because most people don't listen to the contents, they only “feel” the speech/talk. If it sounds good, they like it, if it doesn't, they don't.

Wake up people, listen to the contents, read between the lines.

[airows]

[nprfreshair]

Just some Friday afternoon thoughts.

[danielbugl]

Knowledge is a key. The more "keys" you collect, the more opportunities you have.

Daniel Bugl

[danielbugl]

Modern propaganda: "The media said it, it must be true!"

To explain modern propaganda, I would like to use an example.

On the first of April (yes, it was THAT obvious), they said on the radio that Vienna's Ferris Wheel is no longer classed as a Ferris Wheel, because it is 10cm too small. They asked people to phone them to tell them their thoughts about this. Many people phoned them complaining about the EU declassifying Vienna's big wheel as a Ferris Wheel. The media has THAT much influence, even if they tell complete nonsense, even if they do it on the first of April, people believe them so much without questioning what has been said, that this is the most useful source of propaganda: Radio, TV, the Internet. Most people think: “It's on TV, it must be true!”. They don't think for themselves, but they should. The question is, why don't they? Most are probably too lazy, or just already influenced too much, or just do not care (anymore).

The media could be, I'm sure it even already is, used for propaganda very easily.

[danielbugl]

Are diseases bugs in the simulation or just bad features that make life more "exciting"?

Daniel Bugl

[danielbugl]

Most people don't know what the internet really means. It means that everybody can control everything from everywhere.

Daniel Bugl

[danielbugl]

Propaganda. Influence. People.

“It is essential in a democratic society that young people and adults learn how to think, learn how to make up their minds. They must learn how to think independently, and they must learn how to think together. They must come to conclusions, but at the same time they must recognize the right of other men to come to opposite conclusions. So far as individuals are concerned, the art of democracy is the art of thinking and discussing independently together.”

To my mind, they are completely right. Especially in a democratic society, where we have the opportunity to share our own minds with others freely, we should use that opportunity and make up our own minds. Most humans, unfortunately, only believe and do not think. They follow famous persons, because they think everything they do is right. Another problem is that most people don't know how to react when somebody doesn't agree with you.

In my opinion, a very important thing in our society is to get people to make up their own minds and discuss them with others and not to just follow somebody else, which is mostly bad and makes you loose your individuality.