Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

[01micko]

Hello Mark

Zap6 is a bit unstable though, I have to revisit it at some point soon and get to the bottom of a few bugs and build a 3.8+ kernel to take advantage of the f2fs stuff we are working on. That will be cool.

Oh yes, saw your puppybrowser post too. That would be a good addition. I have the 256 MB pi and chrome is very slow with it, Seamonke/Iceape were a little better. One good image I did try was one by sironm (name on pi forum) based on slackware-13.37 with midori as the browser, It was quite usable. A trouble with midori though is of course the many needed dependencies. I toyed with the idea of slack based arm-pup however slackware bins aren't optimised for pi so raspbian is the way to go for the future based pups IMHO.

I'm still a bit noob with the ARM stuff but when I get a bit more time I will have some more fun with it.

Cheers

[MU]

yes Mick, there still are some glitches, but that does not disturb me.

The Raspi is too slow to be used as a desktop computer for everyday use, but great for special purposes.

I want to build a "digital lens" for my mum.
She has bad eyesight and with her 69 years does not want to learn to use a computer.

So I need a device that can be turned on with a switch, boots into the camera application, and then can be switched off again.
No keyboard, no mouse.

The raspi is ideal, even for long term use, as it needs no fan.

1 fps with a HDTV cam is enough for the purpose to assemble the cam in a small box, and add some LEDs for good image quality.

Then she can read the paper newspaper or watch old fotos with this device.

The Logitech C 910 (not 920) is not cheap (80 Euro), but ideal. It has a wide angle (78°), autofocus, and high resolution. Like this it can display newspapers and such very clear with around 9 cm distance.

I have this working already with raspian wheezy (just need to assemble the box now), and now want some slight optimizations like faster boot.
So I tried Zap6, and though the full new kernel boots slower, the results look promising.
Will remove some modules again to speed up boot (need no sound on my device).

When it is finished, I think I will create an updatescript that applies all my changes to a zap6.

Looking forward further projects of yours

I think I will buy 2 other raspis for myself to set up a fileserver and a media center or so.

Have a good time, Mark

[headfound]

mark,

could she not just use a magnifying glass, like my mother does?

[MU]

Headfound, yes, she actually does.

But try it yourself:
the lens is heavy, and the letters look distorted.

Myself I prefer to move around a small box containing a camera, with a plain image on the monitor.
And the zoomfactor is higher.

On a 22'' Monitor, a 1 Eurocent coin has the size of up to 7 of my fingers side by side. So the zoomfactor is approx 8, and could even be higher with a larger monitor.
The glass-lenses typically just have a gain by factor 3.

I want to finish everything, and then present it to her.
If she still prefers the glasslens, it does not matter, as I have already several other ideas on how to use the raspi

[headfound]

sounds really interesting mark!
I wonder if it could be combined into a system for older people - build a basic mouse and camera into one unit with onscreen keyboard so they are able to do other simple tasks too.

[MU]

here are fotos of my prototype.

The sytem (Zap6 with the new Kernel) boots into the camera viewer in 15 to 25 seconds. I have not found out yet, why it is sometimes faster, sometimes slightly slower.

(I run "exec luvcview -s 1712x960" from /root/.xinitrc instead of jwm and rox.)

Resolution is 1792x960 on a 1680x1050 Monitor.
I later will add a small puppybasic program, that places a black borderless window over the controls of luvcview (have this done on raspian already).


The camera is placed in a carton box.
I also added 4 LEDs to light up the box. They are soldered in parallel, each with a 470 Ohm resistor. They have their own power supply with 9 V. I think I will use 8 or 10 LEDs finally for optimal light. I have cut the round end of the LEDs to get diffused light, as with the round bulbs they act like spots.

I also tried to power them using a passive usb-hub from the raspi, but they flickered. I think the raspi and cam together need quite some power, so I don't want to stress the usb-ports too much.

The image is excellent, even better than on the fotos (they got distorted a bit using a webcam in the dark to take the fotos).

The image needs around 2-3 seconds to adjust if you move the cam, this is working pretty good.

I finally will place the LEDs on a circuit board, at moment they are "freely wired". Apart from such minor fixes the system now is ready to present it to my mom

Mark

[antiloquax]

I haven't checked in here for ages. :0
I will have to download the latest image and have a play.

I have been working with arch instead, but my latest remix of arch is quite heavily puppy inspired.

If anyone gets a chance to test it, I'd really appreciate the feedback.


.zip here

[Wac]

The sound on my Raspberry Pi`s earphone port does not work, is there any fix for this jet? I am using zap6.