Category: Linux

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 13 Comments on Fedora 19 ARM Remix R1 Release With Support for AllWinner A10, A10s, A13 and A20 SoCs

Fedora 19 ARM Remix R1 Release With Support for AllWinner A10, A10s, A13 and A20 SoCs

After releasing a stable version of Fedora 18 for AllWinner A10 and A13 in February, Hans de Goede, working at Red Hat and a Fedora contributor, has recently announced “Fedora 19 ARM remix for Allwinner SOCs” on linux-sunxi community mailing list. This released based on Fedora 19 for ARM together with linux-sunxi kernel and u-boot, adds support for A10s and A20 based devices, and 38 boards and devices are now supported. To give it a try, download the 665MB image:

then write it to an SD card (8GB or greater):

Where you have to replace [device] with your actual SD card device, e.g. sdc.Since u-boot is board/product specific, you’ll also have to update u-boot for your hardware. Remove the SD card, re-insert it, and run:<

to display a graphical menu (if dialog is installed on your Linux PC), or a list supported boards and products:

Select […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 3 Comments on The Little Black Box XBMC STB Gets Users’ Feedback, Becomes Available on Amazon

The Little Black Box XBMC STB Gets Users’ Feedback, Becomes Available on Amazon

The Little Black Black Box (TLBB) is an set-top box running XBMC powered by AMLogic AML8726-M3 with 1GB RAM, 4GB Flash that comes with a dual sided RF remote control. The device became available for pre-order in April, and the first customers have started to receive the media player, one of them (flipfoelyfe) has uploaded a video, and posted some pictures. After initial issues setting up Wi-Fi (A bug seems to prevent the use of long passwords), his tweets about the device are rather positive, and he uploaded a short video demo showing Sports-a-Holic plugin playing a live NBA match, and a ESPN Boxing program. Whereas you had to pre-order and be patient for the first batch, LTBB is now available on Amazon for $129.99. Considering it also includes a dual sided RF remote control with a QWERTY keyboard, this single core set-top box is about the same price, or […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 13 Comments on Texas Instruments SensorTag Unboxing, Getting Started with Bluetooth Low Energy in Linux (with a Raspberry Pi)

Texas Instruments SensorTag Unboxing, Getting Started with Bluetooth Low Energy in Linux (with a Raspberry Pi)

Texas Instruments CC2541 SensorTag is a Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) development kit with 6 sensors (IR temperature, humidity, pressure, accelerometer, gyroscope, magnetometer) mainly destined at mobile application developers for iOS, and soon, Android 4.3. I’m interested in BLE, as I expect most new phones with come with BT 4.0 BLE (aka Bluetooth SMART), and this technology may help bring the Internet of things to life, allowing us to interact with sensors, smart appliance (e.g. light switch)… Since it just costs $25 (including international shipping), I decided to buy it, and give it a try. Today, I’ll show some unboxing pictures, and how to communicate with the kit using the Linux command line. TI SensorTag Unboxing I ordered it at the end of May, and receive it by Fedex on the 18th of July, about 7 weeks later, in the package below. Inside we’ve got a Quick Start Guide for iOS […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 2 Comments on WigWag Simplifies Home Automation, Provides Raspberry Pi and Arduino Shields

WigWag Simplifies Home Automation, Provides Raspberry Pi and Arduino Shields

WigWag is an home automation kit aiming at simplifying home automation, yet allowing developers to roll their own system via Arduino and Raspberry Pi Shields. Wigwag is currently composed of three devices: WigWag Sensor Block – Universal sensor device with 8 environmental sensors (light, detect motion, sound, temperature, humidity, movement…), 4 control features (relay, IR blaster…), and 2 expansion ports. It can be powered by 4x AA batteries (possibly for up to 1 year), or a USB power adapter. This device runs Contiki OS on Freescale MC1322 MCU (with built-in 6LoWPAN radio). WigWag Relay – Connects WigWag and third party devices to their cloud service, allowing interaction with Internet services, such as email, Dropbox and Twitter. It acts a bit like a central server managing all your WigWag Sensor Blocks or other connected devices such as Phillips Hue light bulbs or Belkin WeMo outlets in your house. IP networks (Wi-Fi & Ethernet) […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - No Comments on DIY Stripboard/Veroboard Enclosure for Raspberry Pi (Part 2)

DIY Stripboard/Veroboard Enclosure for Raspberry Pi (Part 2)

Rasbperry_Pi_Stripboard_LED_Relay

Following up my previous post entitled “DIY Modular Stripboard / Perfboard Casing for Raspberry Pi (Part 1)” where I explained how I created an modular enclosure made of perfboard, or the overall concept, I’ve now designed two “smart” sides for the enclosure: a 16-LED stripboard side, and a 5V relay stripboard side. Today, I’ll detail how I’ve done this, with details about electronics, soldering, assembly, the Linux distribution (built with Yocto), as well C programs, HTML page, and (CGI) shell scripts used to light up the 16 LEDs, and control a standard 220V lamp with a relay via my phone’s web browser. 16-LED Stripboard Top Schematics, Soldering, and Testing I had decided to design the top board of the enclosure with several LEDs, 3 LEDs on both side, and a Raspberry fruit (6 red LED) and 2 leaves (4 green LED) in the middle. Before getting started, I did some […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 5 Comments on A Preliminary XBMC Image is now Available for Wandboard, GK802

A Preliminary XBMC Image is now Available for Wandboard, GK802

Yesterday, Stephan Rafin left a message on Wandboard mailing list saying he had released a preliminary (Linux) XBMC image that can run on Wandboard Quad development board. GPU and VPU acceleration work, but this is still work in progress, so if you want something that just works, this is not for you. But if you just want to give it a try, it should work on any hardware based on Freescale i.MX6, such as Wandboard Dual or GK802 mini PC, with some minor modifications. If you’ve got a Wandboard Quad board, the installation is straightforward from a Linux machine: Download the SD card image Decompress it with xz or 7x:

Dump the resulting to a 2GB or greater microSD card:

Where /dev/sdx is the sdcard device (e.g. /dev/sdc). You can check with lsblk command. If you’ve got a machine running Windows only, you can use Win32DiskImager for step […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 15 Comments on $10 Rockchip RK2928 Miracast/DLNA Adapter Video Demo

$10 Rockchip RK2928 Miracast/DLNA Adapter Video Demo

Rockchip showcased an ultra low cost Linux-based Miracast adapter at the Hong Kong Electronics Fair in April, and we learned the device was powered by Rockchip RK2928 with just 16 MB RAM, a small NOR flash, and would just cost around $10. Rockchip demonstrated the device to Charbax at Computex 2013 in early June, and he uploaded the video yesterday. The demo includes showing off Miracast and DLNA support, with the device connected to an HDTV @ 720p. The adapter as a latency as low as 80ms. Rockchip representative explains that as long as it’s below 100ms it’s not noticeable for typical use (but it might be different for games). They used AMOI N828 smartphone for the demo, but Miracast is supposed to work with any Android 4.2 devices supporting Wi-Fi direct, although I’ve read several users’ reports indicating that may not be the case in practice. The price is […]

Posted on by Jean-Luc Aufranc (CNXSoft) - 18 Comments on Waxberry Pi2 Development Board Based on Rockchip RK3066

Waxberry Pi2 Development Board Based on Rockchip RK3066

The other days I announced CubieTech and Olimex were working on low cost Rockchip development boards, but it turns out there’s already one on the market called Waxberrry Pi2, or WB-RK3066, made by Waxberry, a Chinese company. Here are the specifications of this development board: SoC – Rockchip RK3066 dual core Cortex-A9 processor @ 1.6GHz with Mali-400 MP4 GPU System Memory – 1GB DDR3 RAM Storage – 8GB NAND Flash + micro SD card slot USB – Standard USB OTG + Micro USB OTG; Connectivity: 10/100M Ethernet; WIFI 802.11b/g/n (MediaTek MT5931) Bluetoothv2.1+EDR (MediaTek MT6622) Video Output –  HDMI + AV Debugging – Serial port Misc – IR Sensor Dimensions – 72mm x72mm The board comes with a Mini HDMI cable, a 5V/2A power supply, a USB Data cable, and a USB-serial board for debug. There’s also a CD with the board schematics, Android 4.1.1 SDK and Linux Kernel 3.x source […]

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