Once again, random browsing on Taobao brought the need for me to shop for random crap^Hstuff.

This time, I bought a USB eBuddy (for a grand total of 60RMB including shipping)

The eBuddy is a small MSN / QQ physical avatar that performs certain actions based on its software – e.g. flashing lights, moving its wings, shaking left or right etc.

It looks like a little white angel with MSN color wings.

For a cheap toy, its actually quite cool. Cute too, but cool also.

Out of the box, its aimed squarely at Windows users. As I don’t actually run the devil’s OS, I hooked it up to a Debian box instead.
I was hoping for a little bit of fun integrating it with things, but that was not to be.
There is already a perfectly fine library written in Python that works beautifully to make it dance and sing* here

*Dancing and singing void where prohibited.

The python library is already set to run as a daemon on port 8888, and sits waiting for action out of the box.
The settings below snarfed from the code give an idea of what actions can be given:

Commands:

# GLADNESS =        00
# FEAR =            01
# FIZZ =            02
# PLEASANTSURPRISE =03
# GRIEF = 		04
# FURY = 		05
# QUELL = 		06
# REDHEAD = 		07
# GREENHEAD = 		08
# BLUEHEAD = 		09
# YELLOWHEAD =		10
# BLAME = 		11
# BLUEGREENHEAD =	12
# WHITEHEAD = 		13
# HEART = 		14
# WINGS = 		15
# BODY = 		16
# NOEFFECT = 		17
# ONLINE = 		18
# BUSY = 		19
# DAZE = 		20
# BACKSOON = 		21
# AWAY = 		22
# PHONE = 		23
# LUNCH = 		24
# OFFLINE = 		25

Mostly they consist of flashing various LED’s within the eBuddy on/off and optionally moving the wings or shaking the eBuddy left right.
Simple, but effective.

I use Zoneminder in the office on my Debian based ZFS NAS (HP Proliant Microserver), so thought one fun way would be to integrate the eBuddy to Zoneminder. This also proved to be too easy sadly.

Zoneminder has a wiki entry which gives 99% of whats needed here

I literally had to write 1 line of code to integrate the eBuddy with Zoneminder.

#!/usr/bin/perl -w

use strict;

use ZoneMinder;

$| = 1;

zmDbgInit( "myscript", level=>0, to_log=>0, to_syslog=>0, to_term=>1 );

my $dbh = DBI->connect( "DBI:mysql:database=".ZM_DB_NAME.";host=".ZM_DB_HOST, ZM_DB_USER, ZM_DB_PASS );

my $sql = "select M.*, max(E.Id) as LastEventId from Monitors as M left join Events as E on M.Id = E.MonitorId where M.Function != 'None' group by (M.Id)";
my $sth = $dbh->prepare_cached( $sql ) or die( "Can't prepare '$sql': ".$dbh->errstr() );

my $res = $sth->execute() or die( "Can't execute '$sql': ".$sth->errstr() );
my @monitors;
while ( my $monitor = $sth->fetchrow_hashref() )
{
    push( @monitors, $monitor );
}

while( 1 )
{
    foreach my $monitor ( @monitors )
    {
        next if ( !zmMemVerify( $monitor ) );

        if ( my $last_event_id = zmHasAlarmed( $monitor, $monitor->{LastEventId} ) )
        {
            $monitor->{LastEventId} = $last_event_id;
            print( "Monitor ".$monitor->{Name}." has alarmed\n" );
	    #The Single Line of Code - it sends a flash green signal to the Python Daemon
            system ("echo 8 | nc -q0 -u localhost 8888");
	    #
            # Do your stuff here
            #
        }
    }
    sleep( 1 );
}

I think I’ll be getting a couple more of these, as the integration is easy.
Next up, server load monitoring – I can have a couple of these on the top of my desk for each server, and hopefully address each one separately for load purposes – e.g. flash yellow, red on load average, and shake if queue’s are large.
Gimmicky, but useful.

Here are a couple of shots of the current incumbent in situ -

…and one of it actually working.
(It flashes green if someone comes up the stairs and zone minder triggers.)

I’m quite happy I spent the 60rmb, although I would have enjoyed more hacking. I literally spent 5 minutes getting things running.
Thats not a bad thing, but I was hoping for something a little deeper!

Going to order a few more now.
I got mine here – http://item.taobao.com/item.htm?id=1799393549

Recommended.

As its been a long while since I’ve done a non computer related post, its now time for something completely different.

Anyone who has visited our office has noticed that we receive a bazillion packages daily from my various shopping exploits on Taobao, slayer of money.

I just bought a new house back home, which has started competing with Taobao on the where do I spend my spare change, and I’ve been interested in decorating it with some “art”.
Yes, I know that one persons art is another persons ‘meh – you like that? icky’, but each to his own.

I found a gorgeous looking hi-res map of Shanghai for sale at one quite nicely designed store ( http://www.image1000.cn/ ), and contacted the seller.

Unfortunately he couldn’t sell the canvas image on a roll, as I needed for easy shipping back home, and could only sell pre-framed.

Roll on two weeks later, and I was still thinking about having that in my lounge back home, so decided on making a test order to check out the packaging, and its survivability vs Shanghai kuaidi (delivery) companies.

I picked a minimalist dot version of Mao for 100RMB including shipping, and ordered.
Two days later, Mao arrived.

Unpacking below:

Fresh from the Kuaidi company!

Nice packaging touches.

Uh oh!

Still well packed.

Kuaidi vs Packaging, who will win?

More uh-oh..

Packaging wins (although it was a close call).

Phew, looks ok.

Inside packaging (really really well packaged!)

Even comes with the hanging equipment, which is a nice touch.

So much attention to detail (plastic cover strip for acrylic front frame “glass”)

Its Twister!

Oh wait, no, its Mao

Amjellybaby models the artwork.

Finally, in situ!

Overall, reasonably happy with this. Price is reasonable, and it (barely) survived the shipping company, so I think there would be a chance that a slightly better packaged version (i.e. adding a few layers of bubble wrap on the outside) will survive.

So, looks like I’ll be springing the 900rmb odd for the large canvas map version.

Wish me luck!

Addendum

Ordered the large triptych and crossed my fingers that it would survive Emirates.
It made the journey in better shape than the Mao print above did across Shanghai. No dents and zero issues.

Here they are in my new house, awaiting hanging…

Pricey at 900rmb, but worth it. Now I can point at locations on the satellite image and tell people I was here when they come visit the house!

2nd Addendum – final shot of this in place, finally on the wall after 2 weeks of sitting on the floor…

As I’ve been doing a bit more hardware stuff recently, I thought I’d get some more tools.

Yes, Taobao is wonderful

I already have a scope – the eminently hackable Rigol DS1052e 50mhz (now running at 100mhz cough).
I already have a bench PSU.
I also have a JTAG device (although its a chinese clone, but hey, it works).
… and I also have a whole bunch of ttl -> rs232 adaptors (as they fry when you’re not careful).
I also have a 3d printer
I also have a few Arduino bits and bobs, as well as some much more capable ARM dev kits (which I prefer).

What more could I want?

Well, a bus-pirate – but Seeeeeeeeeeed studio still haven’t gotten their sh*t together, and I can’t seem to order from them.
Grumble. Tried again today, but my credit card is rejected as usual. Works on every other site, but theirs..
Still, whilst checking out Seeed Studio’s blog I noted that they mentioned Shanghai (finally!).

Apparently, there’s a hardware hacker dev lab *right* by where I used to live.
They’re up on 50 Yong Jia Lu / website is – http://xinchejian.com/.
I still can’t believe I hadn’t heard about them.

Also slightly annoyed that I missed the last few open days they had.

Going to have to go visit after CNY, and make some friends there

Lawrence.

While I’m more of a 回力 (Hui Li) sneaker fan – I own about 5 pairs now!, I will give Kudos to Nike, for this well made video for whatever sneakers they’re pimping out these days.

Shot in and around my neighbourhood (from all the locations that I’m spotting, and going, wait a second!), it features a man running around town with nothing but a pair of…

You’ll have to watch the video for more:

This rather well done song and video about swine flu (aka H1N1) has been doing the rounds on the Chinese sites that I frequent.

As Shanghai Tattoo says “Hopefully this means the end now that it’s made it to pop culture”.

猪流感之歌 lyrics below.
Now sing along – Zhuuuuuuuuu!

Sung by:欧子
Words by: 每子爱

猪，你的流感惊天动地　　
　　感冒时的你吓得我不敢呼吸
　　
　　猪，都怪你的外国兄弟　　
　　他们的喷嚏害的我们躲避
　　
　　猪，你的体质原来那么差　　
　　害的连累我们都不知该吃啥
　　
　　猪，都怪你吃了就睡啊　　
　　这才鼻涕哗啦被老天惩罚
　　
　　啊……
　　
　　天蓬元帅这次又闯祸啦　　
　　他的喷嚏一打害人家
　　
　　每天他让人担心又害怕　　
　　他的肉啊　　
　　我不敢吃啦
　　
　　猪，我知道你也不容易　　
　　其实你的肉贵　　
　　咱早已吃不起
　　
　　猪，我帮你穿上棉大衣　　
　　你若感冒生病　　
　　咱负担不起
　　
　　天蓬元帅这次又闯祸啦　　
　　他的喷嚏一打害人家
　　
　　每天他让人担心又害怕　　
　　他的肉啊　　

Crappy google auto-translation for those who don’t read Chinese as well as I *obviously do*.

Cough. Cough, ahem, sorry a bit of H1N1 there…

Lyrics:
Pigs, your earth-shattering influenza
When you are scared of the cold I can not breathe

Pigs, blame your foreign brother
Sneeze their victims, we avoid

Pig, you had such a poor physical
We are all victims do not know the result in the吃啥

Pigs, blame you eat and sleep ah
Raining Cats and the nose is punished by God

Ah … …

Marshal canopy you get into trouble this time
Sneeze a dozen of his victims home

He worried about every day they are worried
Ah his meat
I dare not吃啦

Pigs, I know you is not easy
In fact, your meat
Our already can not afford to eat

Pig, I help you put on cotton coat
Cold if you fall ill
God can not afford

Marshal canopy you get into trouble this time
Sneeze a dozen of his victims home

He worried about every day they are worried
Ah his meat

There are a few numbers in China that have additional meanings.

In the northern parts of China 250 (二百五) is used to refer to someone as not so smart. This probably stems from the fact that in order to say 250 in Chinese, you don’t say er bai wu, you say liang bai wu, but Wikipedia says different, and who am I to argue.
[Apparently I'm wrong again after chatting to some of my friends, they say wiki is right, and to call someone 500 (五百) is even worse - you're twice as 二百五！ There was talk about that when 伍佰 (the Taiwanese Singer) was big here.]

For example 56 (五六) sounds like 无聊 (bored) in standard mandarin, and I lost a conversation about the origins of the video site 56.com name to someone on Twitter.
55 also has a meaning which roughly corresponds to an affirmative exclamation of excitement eg yeah! woohoo!

38 (三八) is used as a derogatory term for women, and typically means bitch.
This stems from March 8th (3月8日) being womens day (三八节).

三八线 on the other hand is the 38th Parallel, which is the dividing line between North and South Korea for those that didn’t know that.

In school however, the 三八线 was the dividing line on the desk (although this did have its origins in the North / South Korean divider line.

There is a an amazingly well done video cartoon below which recalls the 三八线 to illustrate primary school life. Unfortunately no subtitles, but its eminently watchable without.

More video’s here over at Kuanger http://www.kuanger.com/, or do a Tudou search for 哐哐哐

Lastly, but not least is 88 – this sounds like bye bye, so is often used in online chat when you sign out.

I hope you enjoyed the lesson, and 88!

Fridge Lingo - Talking to your Ayi

Sadly, most expats here, excluding myself of course, cough cough, have something from marginal through to no Chinese language skills whatsoever.

What to do?

Buy a Fridge Magnet set from http://iWantOne.cn, and communicate (or alternately make pretty word patterns, that part’s up to you).

The Fridge Lingo sets have common phrases for various situations. The first set, available now online, and at select venues around Shanghai is “Talking to your Ayi”.

Each set has over 200 words and phrases with English, Chinese and Pinyin (per word/phrase) which you can use to make sentences with.

Smart Shanghai were lucky enough to get a set, and as they pointed out in their review, we neglected to include a “you’re fired” phrase, but the rest of the phrases in the set are pretty useful, including such gems as “empty the cat litter”, and “please”, both of which go well together, at least in my apt.

The View from the Fridge

Our second set (coming out soon), is aimed at a different segment of the marketplace. We’d probably recommend that people don’t try to mix the 2 sets on the Fridge, unless you really like your ayi, but we’d be giving too much info away.

You can buy them online here – http://liurl.cn/eu, with Cash on Delivery available to anywhere that our Kuaidi company will send someone to, which apparently includes most of Shanghai. Yes, even that bit across the river called Pudong, not that anyone actually lives there, right?

Remember… Fridge Lingo is hand made by Laowai’s for Laowai’s. Only the best slave labour will do*

*Unfortunately I’m the slave labour.

Fridge Lingo is available at select venues around town, or online at http://www.iwantone.cn

Go buy a set!

GIF Animation the Staff made

As I pretty much have no life away from the computer, I do spend an arbitrarily long amount of time online.
The benefit of that though, is that I can trawl through Taobao, and find glorious crap that were I not slightly less sensible, I would quite probably buy on a whim.

Into that category, I can squarely fit this piece of awesomeness.

Its almost creeping into the “its so wrong that its right” category, but I’ll forgive its rambunctiousness.
Woah, I’m starting to sound like Woot! here.

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