Tag: wireless

LHS Episode #163: Let’s Get Astrophysical

Posted on by Russ Woodman

2-black-holes-gravitational-wavesHello, listeners! Another universe-shattering episode of Linux in the Ham Shack is upon you. During this little slice of now, your hosts discuss the safety of wireless networking, colliding black holes, a popular Linux distro site being hacked, a tablet Linux OS, browser-based logging applications, ChromeOS on the Raspberry Pi and much more. Time is running out! Please donate to our Generosity campaign. We want you to see us at Hamvention this year. Thank you!

73 de The LHS Crew

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LHS Episode #155: Interview with Frank Howell

Posted on by Russ Woodman

frank_whiteboardToday we have a change of pace for you. Thanks to a blog post from Frank Howell, K4FMH, we managed to land an interview. He's a former professor who now works on myriad projects in science, technology, computers and amateur radio. He's also very involved in his community and philanthropic endeavors. Frank discusses Broadband HamNet, HamWAN, the Magnolia Intertie and gives us a treasure of information on networking with amateur radio. This one is a double episode, but you're not going to want to miss a minute of it.

73 de The LHS Guys

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LHS Episode #088: Total Breakdown

Posted on by Russ Woodman

Hello, esteemed listeners. Welcome to the latest installment of Linux in the Ham Shack. Tonight, Richard and Russ take the first third of the podcast to get a few topics off their minds that they've been thinking about over the past several weeks, whether or not those topics have anything to do with amateur radio or Linux. Wedged in the middle, discussion of wireless networking comes up, using HSMM and inexpensive Linksys hardware to provide Part 15 and Part 97 based communications for local, regional and EMCOMM use. Then our cagey hosts finish up with a mad dash through feedback, giving useful advice to those listeners with enough mettle to write in. Thanks as always to our loyal followers. We appreciate each and every one of you, each and every fortnight.

73 de The LHS Guys

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LHS Episode #073: Advanced Networking Topics

Posted on by Russ Woodman

Today the guys delve deep into their geek pockets and come up with a couple of fairly advanced networking topics. One is ham radio related, the other is everything related. Don't be scared off, however, as the discussion is a 10,000-foot overview of these technologies and how they will be important in YOUR future. Russ tackles IPv6 in a generic way, discussing using it with Linux, and gets on his soapbox about how everyone should already be using it.

Richard discusses a wireless technology called HSMM or High-Speed Multimedia. This is a networking technique that blurs the line between FCC Part 15 and FCC Part 97, but gives ham radio operators some new and exciting things to try with their off the shelf wireless gear. HSMM has some nice features and will definitely earn you your Boy Scout Geek Cred Badge if you decide to dive in.

Thanks as always to our listeners, present and future. Comments and questions, make sure to send them our way. Donations are also appreciated. If you want to promote yourself, your ideas or your projects, leave us an intro to the show at 1-909-LHS-SHOW. Stay geeky!

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LHS Show Notes #036

Posted on by Russ Woodman

Contributors:

  • Lord Drachenblut, one-time ham radio operator, IRC denizen and podcaster of Ten Buck Review. Lord D has appeared on several other podcasts, including:

    and has been a Linux user for seven or eight years. He uses Linux for everything except for one application that he runs in a virtual Windows machine (Grapevine, the LARP admin utility).

  • Jonathan, KB1KIX. Jonathan holds a General class license and has been a ham for a bit over 6 years. He got started with shortwave listening. He's been using Linux for 10 years and uses it for about 80% of what he does.

Announcements:

  • Southeast Linux Fest is June 12-13, 2010, at the Marriott at Renaissance Park hotel in Spartanburg, SC.
  • Texas Linux Fest is Saturday, April 10, 2010 at the Marchesa Event Center in Austin, Texas.
  • OggCamp will take place will take place at The Black-E in Liverpool, England, on May 1-2, 2010.
  • Format change: We're trying a new format. We'll still have three segments, but rearranged into housekeeping, feature, then feedback. Let us know what you think.
  • Russ is trying to organize a Mid-America Linux Fest in Missouri.
  • We received a donation from Craig toward a noise gate for Richard. Thanks, Craig.
  • LHS will be at the 2010 Dayton Hamvention in booth 265 in the North Hall (NH0265). See hamvention.org for more information.
  • The other podcast, Resonant Frequency, is on hiatus for a while.

Contact info:

  • Russ: k5tux@blacksparrowmedia.com
  • Richard: kb5jbv@blacksparrowmedia.com
  • Phone: 888-455-0305 (toll free) or +1-417-429-4069.

Contests:

  • Logo contest: Send your logo for Linux in the Ham Shack as a product and as a podcast, preferably in scalable vector graphic or tiff format, or a large-sized image in a lossy format such as jpeg. We'd like to use it for T-shirts, banners, etc., and have it available before the Dayton Hamvention. The winner will receive $100! Send your submission to one or both of the email addresses above.
  • Intro contest: Record your introduction to the show. We'll use them all. You can record it yourself and email the file, or call us on the phone and record the introduction there. Entries received via the telephone will have two chances to win. We will choose one of them at random to receive $25.

Links and Notes:

  • OpenSolaris
  • Debian
  • openSUSE
  • Harve's Hamshack Hack
  • Linux Mint
  • Ubuntu
  • Lord D prefers Debian and Kubuntu, but has recently begun exploring Fedora 12, and found it to support the Broadcom wifi chips without having to install a proprietary driver. Russ says Linux Mint also supports the Broadcom network chips.
  • Russ has a thumbprint scanner from Thomson Microelectronics that he has not been able to get working under any operating system. Lord D suggests a goat sacrifice may be necessary.
  • Richard opines that Linux has progressed to the point where it's better for a new computer user than the other OSs. The panel discusses.
  • Our panel talks about feature bloat in browsers and performance issues. Everyone seems to like the xmarks add-on to Firefox.
  • Modular vs monolithic kernels. AX.25 kernel support is available as a module under recent versions of Linux Mint, and appears to be available under Fedora, too.
  • Jonathan would like to see a Linux application similar to the Windows program Outpost for packet messaging.
  • Jim, E2ENN, sent an email in response to Episode 31 and raised several issues about Linux drivers. Our panel discusses this message at length.
  • Nouveau: Accelerated Open Source driver for nVidia cards
  • The Cathedral and the Bazaar by Eric S. Raymond.
  • Open FirmWare for WiFi networks
  • XFree86 vs. Xorg
  • Knoppix

Music: