Monthly Archives: February 2010

Serial Port Access on OSX to Cisco devices

26-Feb-2010 Posted by Sonia Hamilton under , , ,
1 Comment

How to connect to a Cisco device (or other serial devices) using OSX and a USB to Serial converter (eg ATEN). Googling, everyone says to use zterm, but I couldn’t get it to work (and zterm looks and feels like a toy).

This probably isn’t the “Mac way” of doing things, but </whatever>…

Install PL2303 USB to Serial Driver for Mac OS X, restart :-( 

sudo port selfupdate
sudo port upgrade outdated
sudo port install minicom

Work out tty of USB-Serial converter:

ls /dev/tty* > pre

Plug in USB-Serial converter.

ls /dev/tty* > pst
% diff pre pst
3a4
> /dev/tty.PL2303-00002006

Link up to make life easier:

cd /dev
sudo ln -s tty.PL2303-00002006 ttyusb

Setup minicom, and use colour:

sudo minicom -s -c on

Setup defaults to:

  • /dev/ttyusb (ctrl-A, O, Serial Port Setup)
  • 8N1
  • 9600
  • no hardware or software flow control
  • init string empty (so garbage doesn’t appear on screen when you connect) – ctrl-A, O, Init string
  • save settings as default (ctrl-A, O, Save setup as dfl)

Always use colour:

  • add export MINICOM=”-c on” to shell rc file (~/.bashrc, .~/zshrc, etc)

Connect (sudo minicom), hit enter a few times, and you should be on the device.

Problem: braindead screensaver timeouts

26-Feb-2010 Posted by Sonia Hamilton under
3 Comments

Problem: You work in an organisation with locked down desktops that have stupidly short screensaver timeouts. And you’re connected via multiple rdp’s to a process that you want to keep running all day, but the timeouts keep halting the process.

Solution: an optical mouse on top of an analog watch (that has a second hand):

Take that Group Policy!

(Tip of the Hat to Stu).

I love handbrakecli (and dd_rescue)

17-Feb-2010 Posted by Sonia Hamilton under
No Comments

I watch lots of (martial arts) instructional videos. Something I’ve always wanted to do is “mashup” my own videos ie take a few chapters from one video, a few chapters from another video. Now I know how – handbreakcli:

First, rip the vobs off the dvd. You can work directly off the dvd with handbreak, but working from the hard-disk is often easier. I use dd_rescue for unencrypted dvds. (For scratched dvds, I’ve been using motorbike visor cleaner to remove the scratches, and myrescue).

for i in /media/cdrom/VIDEO_TS/* ; do
  j=`basename $i`
  dd_rescue $i $j
done

Use handbrakecli to scan the disk to find the titles and chapters:

./handbrake -i cd1/VIDEO_TS -t 0

Then convert to mp4′s split on chapters (in this case I’m taking chapters 2-18 from title 2, as individual files):

for i in `seq 2 18` ; do
  ./handbrake -i cd1/VIDEO_TS/ -t 2 -c $i -o cd1.t2.c${i}.mp4
done

Thanks to EngageMedia for their great articles. Another good site is videohelp.com

BJJ for women

09-Feb-2010 Posted by Sonia Hamilton under
12 Comments

I’ve been doing BJJ (Brazilian Jiu Jitsu) for years. It’s a great sport and form of self-defence, but in Australia it’s dominated by men – probably putting a lot of women off starting.

This is unfortunate, as I think BJJ is one of the best forms of self defence women can do; statistically violence against women is less likely to be the “pub punchup” that guys get in and more likely to be a grab/sexual assault (either in public or in the home). In these situations, reflexively knowing how to escape from someone’s grips or fight on the ground with someone stronger and heavier on top of you is invaluable, and just by training with a stinky, sweaty guy on top of you you’re much less to likely to panic and escape the situation (The Bene Gesserit Littany against Fear – Dune).

But BJJ is also a great sport! You get a great workout (especially abs), it’s exciting and you need to think a lot (BJJ is often called “physical chess”). You share the pain and triumphs, the sweat and exhilaration, the interstate and overseas trips with your team mates, and form close friendships.

I’m now training at The Dojo in Bondi Junction with Daniel Sainty. Amongst the guys there’s 4 other women training – Eleni, Kunita, Laura and Sam. They’re all inspirational, but the one who really gets me back to training when my middle-aged joints are creaking is Sam. She’s a petite high school girl, self-described “girly-girl” and geek. She fights against the boys, gives (and receives) a good thrashing, is starting to win competitions, and is now blogging about her training. You go girl!!

BJJ is so effective that the US Army now uses it as the foundation for their Army Combatives course. Not because they want their soldiers to throw down their rifles and start up UFC-style fights with “the baddies”. Rather, they found that teaching a random collection of  moves (this kick, this punch, this other kick) was ineffective for learning a “combat mindset”. The sport nature of BJJ allows for “an avenue or the motivation for continued training” as well as internalizing the “concept of a hierarchy of dominant positions”. And knowing how to rear naked choke when someone jumps on you and hangs on to your rifle is kind of handy…

See you on the mat sometime :-)

PS a great website on Women & BJJ – Women << BJJ Girl (especially Resources)- thanks Slideyfoot.