I tried compiling Hangmanduino (see original post here) again using v 0021 of the Arduino IDE and found out quickly that things had changed. So I began troubleshooting and found that the WString library I was using was obsolete in the new IDE. Long story short, I was able to make a few adjustments to the code and got it up and running. Get the new code here (no need to download any additional libraries).

Enjoy!

So I haven’t been completely truthful with everyone up until this point. The truth is, my day job consist of a lot of corporate-like tasks since I’m a Systems Administrator. One of my many responsibilities is administration of an Exchange 2010 environment. I’m constantly being thrown curve balls and tasks that cause me to think outside of the Microsoft box. I’ve decided to branch out and share some of the problems and (more importantly) solutions that I’ve come up with. Hopefully these will help someone out there.

This is a problem we’ve been dealing with since day 1 with our Exchange environment. We have separate partitions dedicated to each database’s logs. Once and a while a client or end device burps and causes the logs to grow out of control and cause major problems for the database. We have a monitoring solution, however, that is even prone to issues once and while. The cure was a 2nd layer of protection in the form of the following powershell script. This script runs every 5 mins and reports the percent of free space remaining of each of the log partitions (luckily we named the partitions appropriately so filtering VolumeName for “LOG” was a quick fix). If the free space remaining is less than the configured threshold (20% in my case), an email/page is sent. Nothing too fancy, but definitely a handy little life saver. And without further ado – the code:

$mbxs = “[mailboxserver1]“, “[mailboxserver2]“, “[mailboxserver3]”
$maxthreshold = 20  # disk remaining percentage threshold.
$email_to = “[email_to_address]“  # where you want the alert email sent
$email_from = “[email_from_address]“  # where you want the alert email to come from
$email_smtp_server = “[your_smtp_server]“  # smtp server used to send alert email
$email_subject = “EXCHANGE LOG LUN SPACE ISSUE!”  # subject of the alert email
$email_body = “”

for ($i = 0; $i -lt $mbxs.Length; $i++){
Get-WMIObject Win32_LogicalDisk -Computer $mbxs[$i] | where {$_.VolumeName -match “LOG”} | foreach{
$server = $mbxs[$i];
$volname = $_.VolumeName;
$freegbs = [math]::round($_.FreeSpace / 1GB, 0);
$sizegbs = [math]::round($_.Size/ 1GB, 0);
$percentfree = [math]::round(($freegbs / $sizegbs) * 100, 0);

if ($percentfree -le $maxthreshold){
$email_body = “Server: ” + $mbxs[$i] + “`r Volume Name: ” + $volname + “`r Disk Size: ” + $sizegbs + “GB `r Space Remaining: ” + $freegbs + “GB `r Percent Remaining: ” + $percentfree + “%”
Send-MailMessage -To $email_to -SmtpServer $email_smtp_server -Subject $email_subject -From $email_from -Body $email_body
}
}
}

I just spent the last 3 days (on and off) troubleshooting why my Arduino IDE wouldn’t open properly on my Windows 7 64-bit machine. I thought I’d share the fix with the rest of the world as my Google searches returned nothing in the way of useful answers to my issue. For my issue, I’d click on arduino.exe and the splash screen would display, shortly afterwards, it would disappear along with the arduino.exe process that was running in the background. I had tried debugging the java launcher, that looked fine. I had checked permissions on the folder, flipped the compatability mode of the exe, you name it. In the end I needed to check the “disable visual themes” checkbox on the exe (see screenshot).

Full path to change this checkbox: C:\path_to_arduino\arduino.exe > right-click >compatibility tab > check “disable visual themes”  (not a bad idea to check “Run as Administrator” while you’re in here) > OK

Hopefully this helps someone else out there as they desperately scour the interwebs for a solution to get back into the IDE.

A recent comment by the009 got me thinking…I’ve been able to get Asterisk grab info about sensors connected to an ethernet-enabled Arduino, but how about the other way around? What if you could allow your Arduino to make outbound calls through your Asterisk system to make a make-shift alarm system, or over-powered doorbell? Well, wait no longer! Here’s how it works:

Asterisk: A php script lives on your Asterisk server (hosted up by apache) that, when it’s accessed, checks to make sure the client accessing it matches a pre-defined IP of your Arduino. If so, it creates a call file with the criteria that you configure to call a number of your choice and drops it in the Asterisk outgoing queue directory, triggering Asterisk to make a call. (I would highly suggest you only set this up on a server that doesn’t have port 80 open to the world!)

Arduino: The sketch code is easy…simply trigger a client connection to the Asterisk server when a button is pushed, motion sensor tripped, or ultra sonic range finder measures a particular distance (that part is up to you). As long as the Arduino’s IP matches the allowed IP configured in the php script, your phone should ring!

Make it happen:

1. To get started, download the code and extract the files.
2. scp arduino_call.php into your web directory on your asterisk server.
3. Next, add the lines from extensions_custom.conf (zip package) to /etc/asterisk/extensions_custom.conf
4. Edit the variables at the top of arduino_call.php to match your configuration.
5. Upload the sketch to your arduino, customizing to your configuration (of course!).
6. Adapt it to your project!

Feel free to edit and manipulate this script to fit your needs, I just ask that you add a comment to this page explaining how you used it. Videos / pictures are always welcomed as well!

The cold is leaving my workspace, and the heat is returning to my soldering iron. It shouldn’t be long before I have more fun projects to share with you. I’ve been focusing my efforts towards my music, noise-making / manipulating projects and staying warm. Effects pedals, bent instruments and analog fun are all in the works. I’ll try to find some time to finish at least one of the projects on my bench in the near future.

A good friend of mine is quite a bit like me in that he loves salvaging electronics. He works at a local cable provider that was throwing away a bunch of devices that had these nice 80 character (40 x 2) LCDs in them. He snagged them and generously gave three to me. This morning I decided to figure out if they used Hitachi HD44780 drivers as I suspected (16-pin interface). First I soldered up some pin header, snipped and wired the included ribbon cable and made this handy little breadboard adapter for easy prototyping. I had to make a few changes in my LiquidCrystal calls to make sure the library knew I was using a 40 x 2 LCD, and voila! Thanks again Yaffe for these awesome toys!

Check out the shirt on shirt.woot.com today. I almost fell out of my chair:

I wanted to share my nearly-completed SK-1 project. It still needs a back panel and some finishing touches, but it sounds amazing. I can easily get lost for a couple of hours just jamming on this little guy. It features an 18-point bend patch bay, 4 ground points, patchable potentiometer, joystick, and LFO, 8 additional hard-wired bend switches, drum kill mod, soft/hard reset, and a pitch bend (mounted on keyboard) with on/off switch. Now if only I could muster up some ambition to finish it…

I’ve been wanting to get into circuit bending for a while now, but due to a jam-packed project notebook, it has taken the back seat…until now.

Music is my passion. I’ve played various instruments throughout my life and have always loved strange and exciting sounds and instruments. That being said, I’ve decided to focus my attention on music-making instruments / bends / circuits for a while. There’s something euphoric about mixing my love for music with my love for electronics…it’s hard to explain.

Seeing as I’m still a n00b at bending, I thought it proper to start with a staple bent instrument and see what I can do…enter garage sale find #1: Casio SK-1. As I started scouring the internet for ideas of bend points, and various different things people have done with the SK-1, I came across this really handy LFO circuit based on a LM555. I had all of the components in my parts bin, so I built it and started playing. The circuit itself is nice, but when applying it to any bend points, there was something missing. One of the changes I tried out was applying a PNP transistor to the trigger, so it acts as a switch that is being turned on and off to the speed of the timer. When I applied the bend points to either end of this switch, the results were very satisfying. I decided that for my bent SK-1 it would only be right to etch a PCB, so I made a quick change to the etch template and wanted to share that with everyone. I’ve also attached a few pics and a video of me playing with my SK-1 with this “glitch LFO”. I hope someone else gets some use out of it!

Download etchable circuit drawing here.

Hangmanduino is complete! A word is selected at random from a list of 10 words. This could be set higher, but for demonstration purposes, it’s 10. The user scrolls through the alphabet to select a letter using the potentiometer on the front of the case. To select a letter, the user pushes down on the potentiometer. Schematics, pictures of the build and demo video can be found below…click here to download the source code, but keep in mind you will need to download the string library as well to compile this code.