Insignia Infocast 8" Touchscreen $99

[pete_c]

For a while now been using Xap to and from devices on my network and currently have the ability to recieve and send XPL on my HS box. I'm going a bit slow here because its all new to me. I've set up a LAMP box dedicated to the endeavor of using an Infocast dedicated screen. I noticed on XPL Monkey a number of dedicated XPL scripts (aps). So before starting to actually do my screens I want to :

1 - Put an XPL hub on the Lamp server (I think?)
2 - Install a few running XPL applications on the LAMP server - initially starting with maybe a 1-wire device and the HAI-OPII panel.
3 - Initially just create a "status" page of sorts using XPL variables from the HS box (think I have something like 700 variables to play with).
4 - Also would like to (if possible) generate RSS (can do this on the HS box) and utilize the RSS configured JPG graphs generated from the HS box (graph all kinds of "stuff".
5 - I have mostly two or more of everything for my current HW setup that I can use to either connect directly or indirectly (via XPL) to the LAMP server.
6 - Today I also utilize USB to Network and RS-232 to network and/or a combo of both of these technologies.

I also noticed I can probably make a Dockstar do most of this as my first LAMP server build was only a 1Ghz/20Gb HD box and it runs fine. It would be nice (but pushing it a bit) to make the Infocast a combo keeping same functionality and adding Apache, PHP scripts, etc to the box directly?

So am I headed in the right direction Damage?

 

[damage]

1) yes, you'll need a hub on the LAMP box if you are running xPL apps on it.
2) sounds like your goal of using xPL on the LAMP box is to distribute functionality across your network and have HS be the central collection/control point?
3) how are you planning to get the data out of HS? the LAMP method is to have the PHP scripts pull from a mysql DB. since your LAMP setup is not on your HS box, you can't use activex/COM. you could use PHP to pull data from other sources, but it may end up being a lot of work.
4) there may be an rss reader for chumbies that you can use. and you might be able to use a chumby webcam viewer to view the jpgs

i think i read that php does run on a chumby and you can install the lighttpd web server too. based on my testing, i think it might be a little too much for the infocast, especially if you'll have other infocasts pulling from the same one.

 

[pete_c]

2) sounds like your goal of using xPL on the LAMP box is to distribute functionality across your network and have HS be the central collection/control point?

Yes. Its already kind of distributed as I have multiple XAP autonomous applications already running on the same HS box and just feeding the data locally. In the last couple of years have added more XAP devices / application on other PC's in the house.

3) how are you planning to get the data out of HS? the LAMP method is to have the PHP scripts pull from a mysql DB. since your LAMP setup is not on your HS box, you can't use activex/COM. you could use PHP to pull data from other sources, but it may end up being a lot of work.

The XAP/XPL data is already on the network as most if not all of the XAP traffic is beaconing all of the HS Variable status.

Can the LAMP/PHP scripts pull the data from the hub and sent it out via the Hub?

Its really more for the purpose of using the Infocast for 2-way communications / status and maybe adding a couple of plugins (IE HAI, 1-WIre). IE: If I send out a command / or poll the HAI OPII status I'll just have another means of getting the status.

 

[damage]

all the hub does is relay xPL messages from the network to any other xPL apps running on the pc. the hub has no state so you can't pull messages out of it using a script - it just pushes packets to xPL apps. you can have an app listen for the xPL messages & dump them into a DB, from which a PHP script can pull data from and return it formatted as an XML file to the infocast. for sending, the php script can be written to issue xPL commands via a command line sender, which would get broadcast to the rest of your network. hopefully, my explanation is a little clearer than mud

 

[pete_c]

Yes, understood.

So I can do a mix of XAP and XPL messages utilizing the Infocast for either just status or some input running mySQL/PHP/XML on Infocast using either XPL or XAP XML status pages?

 

[damage]

here's a better description of the flow:

this goes on continuously in the background:
xAP/xPL msgs --> hub --> some app extracts values/status from msgs --> app stores data in mySQL

user opens a panel on the infocast:
infocast --> php on apache --> php reads mySQL --> php formats data into xml --> apache returns xml --> infocast displays page

user clicks a button on a panel:
infocast --> php on apache --> php issues shell xPL/xAP cmd --> hub --> xAP/xPL network

 

[pete_c]

Thank you Damage for the info and explanation of the flow of XAP/XPL traffic.

 

[pete_c]

Damage,

I updated my Infocasts with your currently posted design application on "my chumby" dot com and played a bit with XPL and XAP on the Lamp box. Concurrently building a "first" display screen on my Infocast with some basic graphics (no status or functions yet).

I installed an XAP hub; more so such that I could see it with the XAP viewer. I noticed the newest XAP viewer shows Hex, XML and the basic XAP message. The XML allows for a clip and past.

I found a repository for XPL; including basica libraries, XPLHub and a few applications; so I installed these. Still having issues. One installation is supposed to install the XPL hub piece and configure the service. It looks like it configured the service but not installed the hub.

I was hoping to run debug on the hub while triggering an XPL event. I figured first I would try step one of the setup then on to step two of writing to the mySQL DB. Beforehand I also tried to manually install the XPL_Hub and Libraries and for whatever reason I couldn't get the application to execute.

Apologies for my "denseness" relating to said endeavor.

 

[damage]

unfortunately, i don't have much experience w/ xPL on linux other than xPL perl http://www.xpl-perl.org.uk, but i'll help where i can. have you tried the hub from here http://www.xpl4java.org/xPL4Linux

 

[pete_c]

That was the first one I tried. Its all self contained. I untarred it and changed it to an executable and it didn't do anything; just said that it was a binary...and couldn't execute....not even an error...

Here's the repo source for what I am using: (regular non xPL perl scripts run fine).

deb http://www.xpl-perl.org.uk/download/debian ./

which provides:

libxpl-perl 	        Perl extension for xPL Protocol
xpl-apcups-perl 	xPL APC UPS Daemon monitor
xpl-bluetooth-perl 	xPL bluetooth proximity monitor
xpl-common-perl 	Common configuration for all xPL clients built on xPL-Perl
xpl-ctx35-perl 	        xPL CTX35 application
xpl-currentcost-perl 	xPL Current Cost application
xpl-datetime-perl 	xPL datetime
xpl-dawndusk-perl 	xPL dawndusk application
xpl-dmx-perl 	        xPL DMX Transmitter application
xpl-easydaq-perl 	xPL EasyDAQ USB Relay client
xpl-gpower-perl 	xPL Google PowerMeter update client
xpl-hddtemp-perl 	xPL hddtemp monitor
xpl-heyu-perl 	        xPL X10 application using heyu
xpl-hub-perl 	        xPL Hub built on xPL-Perl
xpl-jabber-perl 	xPL Jabber Instant Message client
xpl-lcdproc-perl 	xPL LCDproc OSD application
xpl-lirc-perl 	        xPL interface to an LIRC daemon
xpl-mpd-perl 	        xPL Music Player Daemon application
xpl-mythtv-perl 	xPL mythtv monitor
xpl-owfs-perl 	        xPL interface to the one-wire filesystem
xpl-rfxcom-perl 	xPL RFXCOM RF receiver/transmitter application
xpl-rfxcom-rx-perl 	xPL RFXCOM RF receiver application
xpl-rfxcom-tx-perl 	xPL RFXCOM RF transmitter application
xpl-sms-send-perl 	xPL SMS message sender
xpl-udin-perl 	        xPL Audon UDIN USB Relay client
xpl-viom-perl 	        xPL VIOM IO controller application
xpl-w800-perl 	        xPL W800 RF receiver application
xpl-xosd-perl 	        xPL X OSD application
xpl-xvkbd-perl 	        xPL virtual keyboard application

 

[damage]

so you are using xpl perl. i just followed the steps in the readme for the install (on my dockstars), but manually added the hub to the startup directory ( /etc/init.d or something like that ). you have to make sure you have all the necessary perl packages installed. it should tell you which ones it needs if a xpl script fails and then you can use ppm or perl -MCPAN -e shell to install packages.

 

[pete_c]

Thanks Damage. Yes using perl. (I'm guessing that almost everyone using XPL is using perl as it comes up with the most hits on an XPL for Linux search via Google).

It looks like the perl scripts are running fine but many depend on a running xplhub PID. The xplhub cli diagnostics for whatever reason are not working. I'm not using SELinux at this time and "built" the LAMP on a separate PC to test with Ubuntu 10.10 / XFCE4 GUI and VGA monitor for local access if needed. (for the time a bit more horsepower, memory, etc).

IE:

Display : PID | User | Memory | CPU | Search | Run..

ID    	Owner    	Started    	Command   

     634 	root 	01:48 	runsv xpl-dawndusk
         645 	xplperllog 	01:48 	svlogd -tt ./main
         17063 	xplperl 	16:58 	/usr/bin/perl -w /usr/bin/xpl-dawndusk -v
      635 	root 	01:48 	runsv xpl-datetime
         669 	xplperllog 	01:48 	multilog t s1000000 n1000 ./main
      636 	root 	01:48 	runsv xpl-owfs
         675 	xplperllog 	01:48 	multilog t s1000000 n1000 ./main
      637 	root 	01:48 	runsv xpl-xvkbd
         673 	xplperllog 	01:48 	multilog t s1000000 n1000 ./main
      638 	root 	01:48 	runsv xpl-rrd
         644 	xplperllog 	01:48 	svlogd -tt ./main
         17057 	xplperl 	16:58 	/usr/bin/perl -w /usr/bin/xpl-rrd -v -xcd/usr /etc/xplperl/devices.txt /var/lib/rrd
      639 	root 	01:48 	runsv xpl-hub

It shows a running service of xpl-hub. Think maybe its running (now that I've looked a the running services). When I ran XPL diagnostics I didn't see the node though. I've been looking at "xplhub" versus "xpl-hub"; wonder if that is my issue. Think I messed myself up with the install:

root@ICS-PHP:/usr# service --status-all
 [ ? ]  alsa-mixer-save
 [ + ]  apache2
 [ + ]  apparmor
 [ ? ]  atd
 [ ? ]  aumix
 [ - ]  bootlogd
 [ - ]  x11-common
 [ - ]  xplhub

root@ICS-PHP:/usr# service xplhub -stop
/etc/init.d/xplhub: line 12: /etc/rc.d/init.d/functions: No such file or directory

Found XPL-everthing located at the /usr/bin directory. There I found xpl-hub and ran it. It works!

root@ICS-PHP:/usr/bin# ls xp*
xpath          xpl-clock        xpl-datetime  xpl-easydaq   xpl-heyu         xpl-lcdproc    xpl-logger   xpl-owfs          xpl-rfxcom-rx   xpl-send.c    xpl-tcphelp  xpl-viom  xpl-xvkbd
xpl-apcups     xpl-config       xpl-dawndusk  xpl-fdnotify  xpl-heyu-helper  xpl-linux      xpl-monitor  xpl-packet-trace  xpl-rfxcom-tx   xpl-sender    xpltest.pl   xpl-w800  xprop
xpl-bluetooth  xpl-ctx35        xpl-dg834     xpl-gpower    xpl-hub          xpl-linux-cpu  xpl-mpd      xpl-perl-setup    xpl-rrd         xpl-send.sh   xpl-tty-tcp  xpl-wol
xpl-bridge     xpl-currentcost  xpl-dmx       xpl-hddtemp   xpl-jabber       xpl-lirc       xpl-mythtv   xpl-rfxcom        xpl-rrd-graphs  xpl-sms-send  xpl-udin     xpl-xosd

root@ICS-PHP:/usr/bin# xpl-hub --help
Usage:
      xpl-hub [flags] [options]
      where valid flags are:
        -h - show this help text
        -v - verbose mode
      and valid options are (default shown in brackets):
        -i if0 - the interface for xPL messages (first non-loopback or loopback)

      # start the hub listening and broadcasting on first ethernet
      # interface in verbose mode
      xpl-hub -i eth0 -v

root@ICS-PHP:/usr/bin# xpl-hub -i eth0 -v
Listening on 192.168.244.255:3865
Sending on 192.168.244.255

So somewhere when I installed it must have crossed with the installation of "xplhub" such that it wrote up the startup with xplhub instead of xpl-hub. So I'm getting it ...(must be my age slowness)....

 

[pete_c]

Looking for an XPL packet sniffer. I've seen references to one but not actually found one.

The reason I guess is that I am used to validating my XAP traffic via my XAP viewer and would like to do the same with XPL.

I'm still leaning towards using the new Chumby application for creating some sort of touch interface utilizing both XAP and XPL.

 

[damage]

i use DCM, found here http://goo.gl/p2bkd, it's a java based logger.

 

[pete_c]

Thanks Damage...will give that a try.

The more I play with the Infocast the less I am liking a remake of the base OS and more liking what already exists; specifically what you wrote.

The Docstar running HSTouch is not fast; in fact its slow. Not sure if this is related to Mono or what. Everything else is fast including XFCE4, Apache, mySQL, etc.

I am testing the whole setup on a faster machine to see the difference.

Running it on the Infocast isn't going to be any faster; in fact it'll be slower.