The Earth v Sky light sculpture installation is driven by a hardware and software computer system. At the input end is an IP security camera pointed at the horizon. In the middle small, low powered, air cooled single board computer runs several software programs to process images from the camera and change the colours of the lights. At the output end are DMX controlled LED lights pointed at the fig trees.

Every day a tiny program on the computer calculates the time of sunset based on the location of the site (33.87° South,151.18 East). At sunset another program wakes up and starts processing images that it is receiving from the camera. Every 5 seconds or so it takes a picture, crops out a small pre-defined region of the sky, calculates the average colour of that piece, saturates or intensifies it and then calculates the reverse of that colour. This colour is converted into its component colour intensities in RGB (red, green, blue) and communicated to the lights via DMX512 (a standard for controlling stage lights). After a pre-programmed period of time the system returns to sleep awaiting the next sunset.

As we are processing transmitted light (additive colours) rather than reflected light (subtractive colours) the following is a rough guide to these inversions.
Red is opposite cyan (a bright mix of green and blue).
Blue is opposite yellow.
Green is opposite magenta (a bright pink or fuchsia).

Because we are saturating or intensifying the colour of the sky, it is often grey overcast days that produce the most dynamically changing patterns in the lighting system. Grey is never quite grey due to the reflection of city lights, rain and haze. When saturated, this (often) human produced colour, can fall strongly in one direction and then another. Other dynamic nights can be caused by fleeting clouds being struck by the sun’s dying light. Strangely the clearest most beautiful sunsets can cause very calm lighting displays.

The wind turbine provides a balance between energy consumed by the installation and that produced on-site.

Technical solution details
Computer: Norhtec Microclient JR/SR
Software: Python with PyEphem (by Brandon Craig Rhodes) and the DMX library (by Stock)
Controller: DMX USB Pro
Camera: Samsung SNC-570

This is not the only sustainable art project that House of Laudanum has helped create, check out Thunderbolt.

1. Discover the current latest kernel currently installed. Its the one with the biggest number.
   $ dpkg -l | grep linux-image
2. Become root.
   $ sudo su
3. Pin that package and the generics.
   $ echo linux-image-2.6.32-38-generic hold | dpkg --set-selections;
$ echo linux-image-generic hold | dpkg --set-selections;
$ echo linux-generic hold | dpkg --set-selections;
4. Update and upgrade apt.
   $ sudo aptitude update;
$ sudo aptitude safe-upgrade;

Using the Media module in D7 we can include video from Youtube and Vimeo as well as local or remote images.

Modules required

• Views (& dependencies)
• Media
• Media: Youtube
• Media: Vimeo
• jCarousel
• or Views slideshow (& submodules and libraries)

.

Two very similar methods are outlined below. Note: you can achieve similar effects with modules like Field slideshow and Gallery formatter.

.

1 jCarousel

1. Create a content type (or use an existing one) that has a media or image field that permits more than one item (unlimited for example).
2. Create an Image Style to suit the block (remembering that you can display more than one `slide` at a time). Note down the pixel dimensions.
3. [Media module only] Edit a File Type Admin > Configuration > Media > File types
   1. Select Image.
      1. Manage display and select a display type (eg: preview) that hasn’t been used (one day we will be able to create new types).
         Add the fields required (caption, title).
      2. Manage file display
         Select the same type (eg: preview) and select the image style created previously.
   2. Save and return to types, selecting Video.
      1. Manage display and select the same display type (eg: preview).
         Add the fields required (caption, title).
      2. Manage file display
         Select the same type (eg: preview) and check Vimeo video and Youtube video.
         For each video enter the same sizes you created for the Image style.
4. Create a test node with more than one media item and note down the node’s NID.
5. Create a new view with a block at Admin > Structure > Views.
   1. Show [content] of [your content type].
   2. Create a block (not a page).
   3. Display format [jCarousel] of [fields] (not content).
   4. Items per page [0] (unlimited).
   5. Save and continue.
   6. Format jCarousel [settings]
      1. Number of visible items [1 or more]
      2. Auto-scroll after [1 or more] seconds.
   7. Show field [settings]
   8. Field title [remove] the default field.
   9. Field > add [media / image]
      1. Don’t display a label.
      2. MOST IMPORTANT: Multiple field settings DON’T display all values in the same row.
      3. Formatter [media] for media (not files).
      4. File view mode [preview or whatever you chose in #3.1.1 above] for media(not files).
   10. Advanced Contextual filter [add]
       1. Content: NID
       2. When the filter value is not available [provide a default] type [Content ID from URL
   11. Test the View by adding the NID of your test node to the Preview with contextual filters field.
6. Add the newly minted block to the correct region in Admin > Structure > Blocks
   1. Include it only on relevant pages using the URL filter.

2 Views slideshow

Identical but enable views_slideshow and views_slideshow_[your type here]. And at #6 choose the other Slideshow format.

Extra points.

Extra points I said.

1. Save it out as a Feature. Don’t forget the Formatter (eg: jCarousel) as well as the content type.
2. Add Colorbox but only to images.
3. Pause playing videos on scroll.
4. Pause scrolling while playing videos.

Basically the use case is you want to have a subtree menu underneath a category menu item that contains posts in that category.

Currently there is no configuration–ie: if you enable this plugin it will subtree any category menu item in any menu. If we need it we’ll extend this later to add options and conditionals.

You can download this plugin from Wordpress.org.

This command does several things.

1. Read in the mailqueue
2. Look for sender address that end with `example.com`
3. Ignore senders with valid addresses (`david` and `john`)
4. Deletes all those messages from the queue

$ mailq | tail +2 | grep -v '^ *(' | awk 'BEGIN { RS = "" } { if ($7 ~ "example.com$" && $7 !~ "^david|^john" && $9 == "" ) print $1 } ' | tr -d '*!' | sudo postsuper -d -

1. Buy a data only Etisalat sim card. Mine was brought in to a local supermarket as a special order and cost 100LE (regular ones seem to be about 25LE or so for Vodafone or Etisalat). If you need to do this then get a 50 or 100 LE recharge card at the same time. This will save you some typing
2. Insert and activate the sim card. I didn’t activate the card myself as I had a friendly supermarket owner who’d already done it for me. I imagine it’s straight forward. He selected the most inexpensive plan (although that may be the default). 3LE/day for a small amount of data.NB: iPhone 4’s and iPads have microsim cards which I couldn’t buy. You can cut down a regular sim to the correct size. I didn’t need to do that as my phone takes a full size sim.
3. Buy a recharge scratch card and recharge the sim. If you are unsure use a low value one first (I used 10LE). You do this using the phone itself by dialling special codes. The card has instructions on it. Dial*858*[secretnumber]# You’ll get an SMS in reply–helpfully in Arabic.
4. At this point and at any point in the future you can check your balance by Texting a blank message to 555. It will return your balance in LE and your current data consumption. Unhelpfully it doesn’t return what your limit is.
5. Configure your phone to use the Etisalat Access Point (APN). On my Android these are the steps.
   1. Settings > Wireless & networks > Mobile networks > Access Point Names
   2. Press the hardware menu key and New APN.
   3. The defaults are mostly fine. Add the following.
      • Name: Etisalat Internet (although this is just FYI)
      • APN: Etisalat (note the capital E)
      • Authentication type: PAP (although its strange you need this if user/pass are blank)
      • APN type: default,supl (note the lack of space around the comma).

      (note: I don’t use MMS so I haven’t bothered configuring the MMS specific settings)

   4. Menu again and Save.
   5. Press the checkbox to the right of the APN you just created (Etisalat Internet) and then the hardware return key.
6. I’ve got Enable always-on mobile data checked.
7. Hardware return key again to Wireless & networks. Make sure Mobile network is checked.
8. Restart the phone.
9. After the reboot you should have HSPDA, 3G or Edge connectivity. On my phone Mobile network in Wireless & Networks shows connected. Check by googling something. Note: Egypt is potentially blocking access to some sites.
10. Recharge your phone with recharge scratch cards to what you need for your plan. Same as above. Dial*858*[secretnumber]#
11. Send a text to change your plan to something more useful. I selected the “Monthy Unlimited 99″ (which isn’t unlimited at all–its 99LE 2GB/month then speed limited after that). Therefore I sent a blank text to 5034. 49LE 500MB/mo is 5035. See the table below and refer to their website for their current plans.

At that point you should have a reasonable speed network at a reasonable cost. Turn on wireless hotspot on your iPhone OS4 or Android, or connect to your computer and create an Ad-Hoc network to share to your other devices.

Remember to check your usage by texting to 555. To reset your plan after you’ve consumed your allocation text to 545. On the 99/mo plan that costs 30LE per GB. After consuming the allocation you are supposedly speed limited apart from their `freezone` (Google, facebook, Yahoo). What I noticed is that the freezone sites worked well and nothing else worked at all. Possibly 64kbps is just too slow these days.

Shortcuts

You can find shortcuts on the Etisalat website in a hidden section at the bottom of this page.

555 Account balance

545 Reset usage (requires credit)

553 Speed plus (for 19/99/mo plan) *

Plans

* While writing this post I noticed that the 99LE/mo plan is speed limited to 512Kbps (although I expect that it’s actually a typo and should be the 19/mo plan). To uncap that to 7.2Mbps you need to text to 553 which costs 20LE/mo. This would make the 149LE/mo plan much more attractive if accurate.

References

Forum post with correct settings
http://forum.xda-developers.com/archive/index.php/t-875199.html

Etisalat pages with plans and shortcodes
http://etisalat.com.eg/etisalat/Etisalat_Portal_En/smartnet/internet_rateplans.htm?_pageid=42,1&_dad=portal&_schema=PORTAL&siteAlias=etisalat&sitePath=Etisalat_Portal_En&kpAlias=smartnet&pageAlias=internet_rateplans

We were given an exciting new concept to run wild with by our friends over at the creative agency Three Drunk Monkeys, and New Media Curator Deborah Turnbull. The mission was to deliver ideas for intelligent viral sculptures that were socially aware and star-like in complexion. They were to be placed in public spaces for a top secret campaign at a number of Sydney’s most celebrated landmarks. They had to be self contained, with the ability to operate for up to 10 days at a time.

Upon receiving the initial brief outlining general requirements, we conducted an extensive brainstorming session around our trusty oval marble table. Ideas and sketches flowed freely as many a geeky discussion took place regarding programming and possible materials to be utilised.

Both House of Laudanum and the City of Sydney favour sustainable projects.  Having a long and established relationship with a solar research unit, we had access to equipment and support to successfully power the pieces with the very light they were going to portray.

Viral Installations

Three similar proposals had now been conceived. All three pieces were inspired by pulsars, which are rapidly rotating neutron stars that emit bright bursts of electromagnetic radiation at rates of up to one thousand pulses per second.

Vela Rigid was proposal 01, an architectural piece that was loosely inspired by Leo Villareal’s Flying Star. It comprised of approximately eighty weather sealed acrylic tubes and was anchored by a polymer ruff at it’s core. Each tube was to contain lighting strips with individually addressable LED panels. When operating, sharp edgy sounds and cool white illumination would whip and crackle at increasing speeds and luminosities. As the number of moving spectators around the sculpture increased, so too would its intensity. This simulates the act of accretion or inward falling matter, which fuels a pulsar and builds its momentum up to an almost incomprehensible speed.

Proposal 02 was Vela Soft. This ingenious inflatable piece relied upon flexible conduits containing LED strips that would be wrapped around a large plastic core. Warm light would lash around the nucleus in 3D, displaying a mesmerising pulsating pattern. Much like proposal 01, this sculpture is socially aware and controllers, speakers, computers and battery packs could be concealed inside the array.

Vela Floating was proposal 03. This piece moved further towards the abstract and comprised of a helium filled chloroprene core encrusted with a myriad of perfectly circular bubble balloons. Each bubble balloon would contain an independently controllable LED module and contribute to this beautiful orb-like pulsating display that was to float between two to eight metres in the sky.

Creative Campaigns

Unfortunately the client that commissioned the concept decided to go with one of their other campaigns and these sculptures were no longer required to be built. We remain proud of the work and ideas that poured into this project and continue to actively engage in building beautiful social art for our clients.

We hope to one day make project star a reality.

Calling a Python / Django developer for an existing Python site that needs rebuilding and extending to be a commercial truth source. (The truth is out there.) Website will be rebuilt in Django. You may want to telecommute if Australia is not on your bus line.

Responsibilities:

• Working with the Technical Lead, UX person & Project Manager & CSS person.

• Develop & manage the new system & its on-going upgrades.

• Write software & build automation continuously to enhance the core offering & automate back end processes.

Requirements

• Fluent in Python, PHP, MySQL

• Good understanding of HTML, JQuery, CSS

• Knowledge of SEO

• Great communication skills

• Demonstrated experience programming solutions within the constraints of budget & time

About the company

We are the House of Laudanum, a growing company based in Sydney, Australia specialising in creative and innovative content for the online world. We build fabulous work for groovy clients and strive to deliver impeccably designed solutions that work well and deliver good business outcomes.

Contact

• Contact: Kieran Gibb

• E-mail contact: kieran@houseoflaudanum.com

• Telecommuting OK

This is a post about treatment, it’s not about safety!

The gist is that you are responsible for your own health. The health professionals outside the ER are generally time poor, underpaid, tired and occasionally undertrained, bless them. Empathy for their situation is important. So is using a communication style to check that you and the nurse/doctor understand eachother clearly.

In case you are in a hurry here are my tips in point form:

• Put any burn under tepid-cool running water for 20 minutes – it vastly improves the outcome.
• Call an ambulance as they have specialised dressings that can also improve outcome.
• Keep a photographic record of the burn as you go on your telephone.
• Keep a record of the meds you took, any test results etc on your telephone. Either as photos and calendar entries, or in an App.
• Keep telling everyone you meet about your personal relevant issues: do not rely on them asking you. Check understanding by asking them if that specifically affects your case. eg. I have an X infection right now, does that affect my treatment?
• If you are not referred to a specialist wound nurse, make sure the leg is bandaged tightly as swelling will impede progress.
• Leg burns are painful – a bit like having contractions when you give birth. The larger body of pain lasts 7-10 days so keep motivated!
• Stay seated or lying with your leg up to reduce swelling. Periodically go to stand up and get some circulation into the leg, at least every 15 minutes if you can.
• Move your foot around in circles to get the circulation going as this aids in healing.
• I took the maximum amount of Vitamins A, C, E, Zinc and Magnesium to aid in cell repair.
• Put the heel down as you walk so your skin gets movement as it’s healing.
• Do calf stretches – at least one every 30 mins.
• Talk to people on the phone, request visits, stay chipper!
• Generally speaking wounds should heal within 2 weeks and beyond that are candidates for a skin graft.
• Sydney dwellers: there are two specialist burns units: Concord Hospital and Royal North Shore. You are generally referred to a unit to perform dressings and monitor the progress of the wound. These guys have an awesome array of different kinds of dressings to make your life less painful.

Luckily a few years ago we did the Kids First Aid course at a friend’s house. The ambulance man who took the course was very clear on what to do: put the burn under cool running water for at least 20 minutes and call an ambulance. We did that and every time we’ve seen a nurse or other wound specialist they’ve reinforced that it is the gold standard course of action.

Good luck! You’ll get through it.

When it came time to translate the URLs using Apache Rewrite I had several go’s at getting it working. The recipe is as follows.

A RewriteMap directive. This cannot be in an .htaccess file or in a <Directory> directive. It must be in a <VirtualHost> directive. In mediatemple that meant adding it to the root and sub domain conf/vhost.conf file (even though we were working in a subdomain).

$ cat conf/vhost.conf
RewriteMap dynamic2static "txt:/var/www/vhosts/1001.net.au/repository/source/rewrite-map.txt"
$ /usr/local/psa/admin/sbin/websrvmng --reconfigure-vhost --vhost-name=1001.net.au
$ /usr/local/psa/admin/sbin/websrvmng --reconfigure-vhost --vhost-name=staging.1001.net.au
$ /sbin/service httpd graceful

Also in order to redirect URLs containing cgi-bin I needed to disable the overriding ScriptAlias in the main server config file. I changed it to cgi instead.

$ vi /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf
# ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ "/var/www/cgi-bin/"
ScriptAlias /cgi/ "/var/www/cgi-bin/"
$/sbin/service httpd graceful

Next our rewrite map file. Here are the first 10 lines.

119 1
127 2
128 3
129 4
149 5
130 6
131 7
132 8
133 9
134 10

And finally our .htaccess file.

Options +FollowSymlinks
RewriteEngine on
RewriteBase /
RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} id=(\d+)$
RewriteRule ^cgi-bin/isengine$ /story/${dynamic2static:%1|NOTFOUND}? [L]
RewriteRule ^Prompt/(\d+)$ /story/${dynamic2static:$1|NOTFOUND}? [L]

The interesting lines are

RewriteCond %{QUERY_STRING} id=(\d+)$
Only apply the following rule if we can match a query string ending with id=[some integer]

RewriteRule ^isengine$ /story/${dynamic2static:%1|NOTFOUND}? [L]
If the URL ended with isengine then rewrite it to story/ followed by our matched id (%1) mapped using our dynamic2static map.

eg:
http://1001.net.au/cgi-bin/isengine?o=1001&action=display&id=407
becomes
http://1001.net.au/story/87