Older blog entries for pcburns (starting at number 26)

Telstra is soon to be offering a service called iCall which makes it possible to receive calls on a phone line while it is in use by a modem. Unfortunately it require Microsoft Netmeeting to operate, which means its only available to Microsoft Windows users. I would really like to use this service, but I usually dialup using linux as that way other computers on my home network can make use of the dialup connection. I wonder if anybody implemented the netmeeting functionality under linux?

Update

According to Linux Netmeeting HOWTO Netmeeting uses the H.323 protocol for video conferencing, the T.120 protocol for application and file sharing, and LDAP for the directory service. There is an opensource implementation of H.323 called OpenH323. OpenH323 development is coordinated by an Australian company.

I mailed Dave Phillips about PenguinSound, and he offered to list it on his Linux Sound Applications list. He also recommended subscribing to the Linux Audio Development Mailing list. I took a look at ardour by Paul Barton-Davis. The screenshots look impressive but I've yet to try it out.

I've been considering refactoring my filter, and generator classes to make them much more flexible. The current setup is not sufficient to support LADSPA plugins.

Its getting hot in Sydney.

I'm considering going to Newtown RSL to see B(if)tek on new years eve.

I am wondering what to do about PenguinSound. I need to spend a bit of time bug fixing before releasing it. Time that I don't have. Perhaps I should take a holiday and spend it on PenguinSound. It seems silly to spend a holiday at home in front of the computer. When I finally get a release ready I need to make a few announcements, perhaps to freshmeat.Christian Reiniger seemed happy to announce it on LGDC, though I am unsure if it will be useful to game developers. Despite not getting much attention - (I haven't made any releases yet, although the source is available, so I still have some hope) - I have been quite happy with what I have produced. I am able to create interesting samples by connecting together simple generators, filter existing samples. I need to do a bit more work on my tracker before I am satisfied with my tools, then I'll start learning how to write music. Through this project I have learnt quite a lot about computer music and how to program in c++. I learnt a bit about collaborating with other developers over the internet through my involvement with penguinplay. I am still learning how to use sourceforge. I haven't worked out how to get the commits and adds to show up on the summary page. The summary page makes the project look like it is dead. I'm still working on it, I just don't have much time.

I've installed the latest version of netscape (version 6) It is a great improvement over previous releases. It seems to be much more stable. I tried to use the instant messenger that came with it but was immediately put off it after failing to register any username that could remotely be associated with me.

I've grown to enjoy advogato. Although I haven't kept my diary very up to date - sometimes this is simply due to netscape crashing in the middle of a long diary entry - simply thinking about what to write about seems to buoy my spirits. It gives me a bit of motivation to keep going on with what I am doing. It gets my mind going.

I went looking for the Metaphorical Programmer but found that he was Blind.

Went to a retro themed Christmas party for work last night dressed in a white lounge suit . Received a lot of compliments on my costume and requests for disco dancing. I really enjoyed myself. I couldn't help but smile while in that suit, and as a bonus I looked really good in it. I was hoping to go to loveseat but didn't make it there.

Fixed some bugs in the Generators for penguinsound. The source is now in cvs on sourceforge. ChopperRingModulation now works well. I modified the sine generator so that a generator can be used as the frequency. I have also modified the directsound code to support streaming better but that is not yet in cvs.

According To No Plan - broadcast

lo and I found myself lost
looked but nowhere to belong
the status I achieve 
holds nothing I believe
and we drift on
and according to no plan

 and I don't know where we are
can't say what we're affected by
something has us beat
leaves us open to defeat
and we drift on 
and according to no plan

 the status I achieve 
holds nothing I believe
and we drift on
and according to no plan

I won tickets to the Ju Ju Space Jazz intersound cd launch, which is on tonight (17 Nov).

I spent some time upgrading a few packages on my home computer. I installed kde 2. It looks much more polished than previous versions. One new noticeble feature was the kcrash application which displays a stack trace when a program crashes - although perhaps I should have seen that if everything was running smoothly. I am very impressed with konqueror. I would ditch netscape for konqueror if it could do https and if it didn't crash at startup when I am not running the kde desktop. My backspace key has been playing up for the last few days. I'm not sure what caused the problem but I have my suspicions. It served as a flashback to university and the evil ^H problem that existed on many of the terminals. I haven't worked out how to fix it yet.

I also managed to fix the problems that I was having with tuxracer. I had to be forceful with dpkg to install mesag3-glide2, to provide hardware acceleration on my voodoo2, without removing all the applications that depend on mesa.

Tomorrow will be a busy day. I have an interview scheduled for lunchtime. For my evening entertainment, I'm looking forward to "electronic" at the Manning Bar in Sydney Uni from 8pm. It features 10 different artists including b(if)tek, sub bass snarl and 5000 Fingers of Doctor T for just $10.

I ported the Linux Audio Developers Simple Plugin API to win32, by implementing win32 versions of the functions in dlfcn.h and dirent.h . I have added preliminary support for plugins to penguinsound.

I submitted a registration form for PenguinSound to sourceforge. The project page seems to be there, but I haven't received any email from the sourceforge administrators regarding it.

I bought Intersound - the new album from Ju Ju Space Jazz. It sounds much more mature than past albums. I'm very impressed with track 7 "Secrets", I'm sure I've heard it before. Intersound was released by Creative Vibes who also put out the wonderful "Just Is" compilation.

I went to Object World in Darling Harbour, courtesy of the company I work for. I haven't been to Darling Harbour for a long time and apart from Sega World I was pleased with what I saw, although they could do with a few more trees to provide shade along either side of the the harbour.

The seemed to be a stong contingent of Java programmers present and many of the talks were about Java related technology. Brad Abrams gave a talk on Microsoft's .NET framework. They have developed a Common Language Runtime that enables COM objects to be treated as standard objects in each language. Any .NET class written in any language, can be used as a COM class without any extra work. The compilers for each language emit code in an Intermediate Language - MSIL. The MSIL code can be compiled to native code at run-time or install-time. Brad Abrams emphasised the freedom of the developer to develop in their prefered language. He was met with questions regarding the support of J++ under .NET, and ponderings on paper clips.

After "apt-get"ing tuxracer which required me for some reason to also install the latest version of gcc, g++, libc6 and libstdc++2.10, I could no longer compile anything. All the builds that I tried failed at the linker stage with missing symbols. Wishing for a backout option in apt-get, I thought I tried upgrading some other key library and development packages. I finally got the system back into a working state when I upgraded binutils which contains the gnu linker.