Re: [SLUG] restricting ssh private key to access sftp only
On Mon, Apr 14, 2008 at 03:12:49PM +1000, Amos Shapira wrote: [ ... ] I should probably also chroot that user to prevent it from being able to snoop around but for now I'll stop here (no time). Have a look at rssh: http://rssh.sourceforge.net/ -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
[SLUG] Re: DVD slideshow creation
Sorry Mary. That's bad news. I like ManDVD a lot. Regards, Patrick 2. Re: DVD slideshow creation (Mary Gardiner) Mary Gardiner [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sun, 13 Apr 2008 15:20:35 +1000 Thanks. It unfortunately depends on dvd-slideshow as most other graphical apps do, and therefore is broken in Ubuntu hardy (and when not broken would produce the ugliest text imaginable, as far as I can tell). -Mary -- Registered GNU/Linux User 368634 -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
[SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
I am looking for a cheap data storage solution for many people. The requirements are as follows: * CHEAP (very important) * storage space isn't important - maybe a couple of hundred kilobytes max. * media can be lost and replaced without much trouble/cost * media can be easily read/written by an ordinary Linux computer * media and media reader must be reasonably durable * scalable: the media should be distributable to millions of people Flash memory is too expensive - I'm looking for cards that cost $1 each. I was thinking that SIM cards (like what you get in your phone) would fit the bill. Is it possible to use these as a generic storage medium? All the information I could find on USB SIM card readers mention that the SIM is accessed as a serial rather than a storage device. -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
Uhm, I'd check the bulk prices of small flash drives (256meg); you might find you can pick them up cheaply. A cute hack I saw recently (from telstra!) was to use a USB uC to pretend to be a CDROM storage device to store a few hundred bytes of a pretend ISO CDROM. This way autorun.inf was run, and IE was spawned. :) Adrian On Tue, Apr 15, 2008, Sridhar Dhanapalan wrote: I am looking for a cheap data storage solution for many people. The requirements are as follows: * CHEAP (very important) * storage space isn't important - maybe a couple of hundred kilobytes max. * media can be lost and replaced without much trouble/cost * media can be easily read/written by an ordinary Linux computer * media and media reader must be reasonably durable * scalable: the media should be distributable to millions of people Flash memory is too expensive - I'm looking for cards that cost $1 each. I was thinking that SIM cards (like what you get in your phone) would fit the bill. Is it possible to use these as a generic storage medium? All the information I could find on USB SIM card readers mention that the SIM is accessed as a serial rather than a storage device. -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html -- - Xenion - http://www.xenion.com.au/ - VPS Hosting - Commercial Squid Support - - $25/pm entry-level VPSes w/ capped bandwidth charges available in WA - -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
On 15/04/2008, Adrian Chadd [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Uhm, I'd check the bulk prices of small flash drives (256meg); you might find you can pick them up cheaply. I mentioned that the media needs to be less than (or very close to) $1 each, and that I don't even need 1MB. -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
You haven't mentioned a physical size requiment. Untethered SIM cards (and probably SD cards) are a tad small - and too easily lost. Also is security/privacy and reliability an issue? Rather SIM - what about the phone itself. In 1st world countries we are approaching 1:1 ratio. Provide you connect to the phone (Bluetooth/GSM/IR) it is a pretty good storage device that people tend to look after. (bCode uses this principle for it's ticketing scheme) On Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 1:40 PM, Sridhar Dhanapalan [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I am looking for a cheap data storage solution for many people. The requirements are as follows: * CHEAP (very important) * storage space isn't important - maybe a couple of hundred kilobytes max. * media can be lost and replaced without much trouble/cost * media can be easily read/written by an ordinary Linux computer * media and media reader must be reasonably durable * scalable: the media should be distributable to millions of people Flash memory is too expensive - I'm looking for cards that cost $1 each. I was thinking that SIM cards (like what you get in your phone) would fit the bill. Is it possible to use these as a generic storage medium? All the information I could find on USB SIM card readers mention that the SIM is accessed as a serial rather than a storage device. -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html -- Regards, Martin Martin Visser -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
On 15/04/2008, Jeremy Portzer [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Sridhar Dhanapalan wrote: I am looking for a cheap data storage solution for many people. The requirements are as follows: How many is many? That can really affects the cost issue quite a bit. Are we talking a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, what? Easily millions. I'm sure we can achieve economies of scale, but they still need to be ridiculously cheap for this to work. SIM cards cost something like 50c, which makes them perfect assuming they can be used for generic storage. -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
On Tue, Apr 15, 2008, Sridhar Dhanapalan wrote: On 15/04/2008, Adrian Chadd [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Uhm, I'd check the bulk prices of small flash drives (256meg); you might find you can pick them up cheaply. I mentioned that the media needs to be less than (or very close to) $1 each, and that I don't even need 1MB. When you say SIM are you referring to the radio SIM, or are you including smart cards? Adrian -- - Xenion - http://www.xenion.com.au/ - VPS Hosting - Commercial Squid Support - - $25/pm entry-level VPSes w/ capped bandwidth charges available in WA - -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
Sridhar Dhanapalan wrote: I am looking for a cheap data storage solution for many people. The requirements are as follows: How many is many? That can really affects the cost issue quite a bit. Are we talking a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, what? --Jeremy -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
On 15/04/2008, Martin Visser [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: You haven't mentioned a physical size requiment. Untethered SIM cards (and probably SD cards) are a tad small - and too easily lost. Also is security/privacy and reliability an issue? These are all issues. I was thinking people would be given a pouch for the card, or keep the SIM as a full-size card (credit-card size). Privacy can be achieved at the software level via encryption. Rather SIM - what about the phone itself. In 1st world countries we are approaching 1:1 ratio. Provide you connect to the phone (Bluetooth/GSM/IR) it is a pretty good storage device that people tend to look after. (bCode uses this principle for it's ticketing scheme) There are no phones. We just want to use the SIM cards for storage. I should clarify: this is for millions of people in the developing world. They won't have computers, phones or any kind of reader. But they will have access to someone who has a computer that can read/write them. -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
On Tue, 2008-04-15 at 13:40 +1000, Sridhar Dhanapalan wrote: I am looking for a cheap data storage solution for many people. The requirements are as follows: * CHEAP (very important) * storage space isn't important - maybe a couple of hundred kilobytes max. * media can be lost and replaced without much trouble/cost * media can be easily read/written by an ordinary Linux computer * media and media reader must be reasonably durable * scalable: the media should be distributable to millions of people ...paper? Satisfies all requirements except possibly machine reading. And surely you've got reasons not to use CDRW. -- Pete -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
quote who=Sridhar Dhanapalan How many is many? That can really affects the cost issue quite a bit. Are we talking a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, what? Easily millions. I'm sure we can achieve economies of scale, but they still need to be ridiculously cheap for this to work. SIM cards cost something like 50c, which makes them perfect assuming they can be used for generic storage. The problem with SIM cards, no matter how cheap they are, is that few people have a viable way of using them (regardless of whether you're able to find a SIM reader device that provides a generic USB storage interface). So, unless your read/write mechanism is deployed separately to the storage facility (I'm guessing by the interest in a generic interface that this is not the case), each SIM card will have to come with a reader. That cranks up your storage cost. If, on the other hand, your read/write mechanism is deployed separately, you may as well just go for something people already understand: Smart cards (a more familiar form of SIM card use/delivery/distribution). Or you could use phones. Possibly magnetic strips depending on the data. - Jeff -- GUADEC 2008: Istanbul, Turkey http://www.guadec.org/ I'm taking no part in your merry 5-way clusterfuck - sort that mess out between yourselves. - Alexander Viro -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
On Tue, 2008-04-15 at 12:08 +0800, Adrian Chadd wrote: Uhm, I'd check the bulk prices of small flash drives (256meg); you might find you can pick them up cheaply. 2 minutes on ebay showed up lots of 10x64MB CF cards for $43 (i.e. $4.30 per card). I'd expect you could source bulk for less than that. Is that going to be too much? A cute hack I saw recently (from telstra!) was to use a USB uC to pretend to be a CDROM storage device to store a few hundred bytes of a pretend ISO CDROM. This way autorun.inf was run, and IE was spawned. :) Adrian On Tue, Apr 15, 2008, Sridhar Dhanapalan wrote: I am looking for a cheap data storage solution for many people. The requirements are as follows: * CHEAP (very important) * storage space isn't important - maybe a couple of hundred kilobytes max. * media can be lost and replaced without much trouble/cost * media can be easily read/written by an ordinary Linux computer * media and media reader must be reasonably durable * scalable: the media should be distributable to millions of people Flash memory is too expensive - I'm looking for cards that cost $1 each. I was thinking that SIM cards (like what you get in your phone) would fit the bill. Is it possible to use these as a generic storage medium? All the information I could find on USB SIM card readers mention that the SIM is accessed as a serial rather than a storage device. -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html -- - Xenion - http://www.xenion.com.au/ - VPS Hosting - Commercial Squid Support - - $25/pm entry-level VPSes w/ capped bandwidth charges available in WA - -- Peter Howard [EMAIL PROTECTED] Jabber Id: [EMAIL PROTECTED] AIM Id Yahoo Id: pjhacnau signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
quote who=Sridhar Dhanapalan These are all issues. I was thinking people would be given a pouch for the card, or keep the SIM as a full-size card (credit-card size). That's called a smart card. :-) I should clarify: this is for millions of people in the developing world. They won't have computers, phones or any kind of reader. But they will have access to someone who has a computer that can read/write them. You're likely to find that they *do* have phones (at least, in any market that some kind of smart-card-ish thing would start being relevant). Their phone minutes function as micro-currency. - Jeff -- GUADEC 2008: Istanbul, Turkey http://www.guadec.org/ We must be proactive, eternally vigilant, forever fighting, overwhelmingly clever and handsome. - Robert Love -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
This article http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0EIN/is_2002_Oct_29/ai_93509145 indicates a 2002 price for an Atmel 256K smartcard was only $0.52. I think anything in the 1K - 512K would have to be either a smartcard, or possible RFID type card/device. If you get away with only a few K, and it doesn't have to read/write you could look at 2D bar codes. You would need some sort of durable paper though. On Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 2:03 PM, Sridhar Dhanapalan [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 15/04/2008, Martin Visser [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: You haven't mentioned a physical size requiment. Untethered SIM cards (and probably SD cards) are a tad small - and too easily lost. Also is security/privacy and reliability an issue? These are all issues. I was thinking people would be given a pouch for the card, or keep the SIM as a full-size card (credit-card size). Privacy can be achieved at the software level via encryption. Rather SIM - what about the phone itself. In 1st world countries we are approaching 1:1 ratio. Provide you connect to the phone (Bluetooth/GSM/IR) it is a pretty good storage device that people tend to look after. (bCode uses this principle for it's ticketing scheme) There are no phones. We just want to use the SIM cards for storage. I should clarify: this is for millions of people in the developing world. They won't have computers, phones or any kind of reader. But they will have access to someone who has a computer that can read/write them. -- Regards, Martin Martin Visser -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
Whoops, fogot the link to 2D barcode - http://www.barcodeman.com/faq/2d.php On Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 2:10 PM, Martin Visser [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: This article http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0EIN/is_2002_Oct_29/ai_93509145 indicates a 2002 price for an Atmel 256K smartcard was only $0.52. I think anything in the 1K - 512K would have to be either a smartcard, or possible RFID type card/device. If you get away with only a few K, and it doesn't have to read/write you could look at 2D bar codes. You would need some sort of durable paper though. On Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 2:03 PM, Sridhar Dhanapalan [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 15/04/2008, Martin Visser [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: You haven't mentioned a physical size requiment. Untethered SIM cards (and probably SD cards) are a tad small - and too easily lost. Also is security/privacy and reliability an issue? These are all issues. I was thinking people would be given a pouch for the card, or keep the SIM as a full-size card (credit-card size). Privacy can be achieved at the software level via encryption. Rather SIM - what about the phone itself. In 1st world countries we are approaching 1:1 ratio. Provide you connect to the phone (Bluetooth/GSM/IR) it is a pretty good storage device that people tend to look after. (bCode uses this principle for it's ticketing scheme) There are no phones. We just want to use the SIM cards for storage. I should clarify: this is for millions of people in the developing world. They won't have computers, phones or any kind of reader. But they will have access to someone who has a computer that can read/write them. -- Regards, Martin Martin Visser -- Regards, Martin Martin Visser -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
Also do they actually need to carry the data with them? It would seem if the ratio of data owners to intelligent devices/readers is so high, you really come back to simply needing a card number ala Medicare - or maybe even something like a tinyurl only a little more human rememberable.The client then just needs to recite their number/tinurl. This assumes that the reader device has real-time (or maybe near real-time is good enough, access to the data storage. (And near real -time may be good enough - 1 000 000 users with 10 K data each is only 10G - easily replicated on all your reader devices - assuming the data doesn't change all that often. On Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 2:11 PM, Martin Visser [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Whoops, fogot the link to 2D barcode - http://www.barcodeman.com/faq/2d.php On Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 2:10 PM, Martin Visser [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: This article http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0EIN/is_2002_Oct_29/ai_93509145 indicates a 2002 price for an Atmel 256K smartcard was only $0.52. I think anything in the 1K - 512K would have to be either a smartcard, or possible RFID type card/device. If you get away with only a few K, and it doesn't have to read/write you could look at 2D bar codes. You would need some sort of durable paper though. On Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 2:03 PM, Sridhar Dhanapalan [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 15/04/2008, Martin Visser [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: You haven't mentioned a physical size requiment. Untethered SIM cards (and probably SD cards) are a tad small - and too easily lost. Also is security/privacy and reliability an issue? These are all issues. I was thinking people would be given a pouch for the card, or keep the SIM as a full-size card (credit-card size). Privacy can be achieved at the software level via encryption. Rather SIM - what about the phone itself. In 1st world countries we are approaching 1:1 ratio. Provide you connect to the phone (Bluetooth/GSM/IR) it is a pretty good storage device that people tend to look after. (bCode uses this principle for it's ticketing scheme) There are no phones. We just want to use the SIM cards for storage. I should clarify: this is for millions of people in the developing world. They won't have computers, phones or any kind of reader. But they will have access to someone who has a computer that can read/write them. -- Regards, Martin Martin Visser -- Regards, Martin Martin Visser -- Regards, Martin Martin Visser -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
On Tue, 2008-04-15 at 14:18 +1000, Martin Visser wrote: Also do they actually need to carry the data with them? It would seem if the ratio of data owners to intelligent devices/readers is so high, you really come back to simply needing a card number ala Medicare - or maybe even something like a tinyurl only a little more human rememberable.The client then just needs to recite their number/tinurl. This assumes that the reader device has real-time (or maybe near real-time is good enough, access to the data storage. (And near real -time may be good enough - 1 000 000 users with 10 K data each is only 10G - easily replicated on all your reader devices - assuming the data doesn't change all that often. I'm inferring that the scheme being developed is something like the following: * At each village/town there is a single low-capability but functional pc. It has no reliable network. * The data owners want to be able to track e.g. taxes, accounts, small personal data. * They want to be able to use this data where *they* are, not where a specific reader device is. -Rob -- GPG key available at: http://www.robertcollins.net/keys.txt. signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
This one time, at band camp, Sridhar Dhanapalan wrote: I am looking for a cheap data storage solution for many people. The requirements are as follows: * CHEAP (very important) * storage space isn't important - maybe a couple of hundred kilobytes max. iButton? They're very cheap in volume. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1-Wire -- Rev Simon Rumble [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.rumble.net The Tourist Engineer Just because you're on holiday, doesn't mean you're not a geek. http://engineer.openguides.org/ When did I realize I was God? Well, I was praying and I suddenly realized I was talking to myself. - Peter O'Toole -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
On 15/04/2008, Martin Visser [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Also do they actually need to carry the data with them? It would seem if the ratio of data owners to intelligent devices/readers is so high, you really come back to simply needing a card number ala Medicare - or maybe even something like a tinyurl only a little more human rememberable.The client then just needs to recite their number/tinurl. This assumes that the reader device has real-time (or maybe near real-time is good enough, access to the data storage. (And near real -time may be good enough - 1 000 000 users with 10 K data each is only 10G - easily replicated on all your reader devices - assuming the data doesn't change all that often. Each card will have data particular to its owner, and the laptop needs to be able to both read from and write to it. This makes a simple URL or barcode system infeasible. There will be no Internet connectivity, and the laptop used to read the data will not have access to the central database while in the field. At the end of the day/week, they can synchronise their data at the central office. The card only probably needs to be accessed once per week, while the laptop-wielder is visiting. Sorry I'm being so vague about this. I don't have permission at the moment to divulge details. What I can say is that it is for a totally charitable purpose in the developing world. -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
On 15/04/2008, Robert Collins [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Tue, 2008-04-15 at 14:18 +1000, Martin Visser wrote: Also do they actually need to carry the data with them? It would seem if the ratio of data owners to intelligent devices/readers is so high, you really come back to simply needing a card number ala Medicare - or maybe even something like a tinyurl only a little more human rememberable.The client then just needs to recite their number/tinurl. This assumes that the reader device has real-time (or maybe near real-time is good enough, access to the data storage. (And near real -time may be good enough - 1 000 000 users with 10 K data each is only 10G - easily replicated on all your reader devices - assuming the data doesn't change all that often. I'm inferring that the scheme being developed is something like the following: * At each village/town there is a single low-capability but functional pc. It has no reliable network. Not quite. A person will arrive by motorcycle, probably once per week, with a laptop in tow. They'll have about an hour to sort out the people there before departing to the next settlement. At the end of the day/week, they'll return to base and synchronise their laptop with the central system. * The data owners want to be able to track e.g. taxes, accounts, small personal data. Mostly simple financial data, like a passbook. * They want to be able to use this data where *they* are, not where a specific reader device is. As mentioned above, the reader comes to them. As mentioned previously, this is for the developing world. The current system is very manual: paper and pen. It's very laborious, and open to errors and even fraud. We're looking for a simple and reliable digital replacement. -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
On Tue, 2008-04-15 at 14:36 +1000, Sridhar Dhanapalan wrote: On 15/04/2008, Robert Collins [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Tue, 2008-04-15 at 14:18 +1000, Martin Visser wrote: Also do they actually need to carry the data with them? It would seem if the ratio of data owners to intelligent devices/readers is so high, you really come back to simply needing a card number ala Medicare - or maybe even something like a tinyurl only a little more human rememberable.The client then just needs to recite their number/tinurl. This assumes that the reader device has real-time (or maybe near real-time is good enough, access to the data storage. (And near real -time may be good enough - 1 000 000 users with 10 K data each is only 10G - easily replicated on all your reader devices - assuming the data doesn't change all that often. I'm inferring that the scheme being developed is something like the following: * At each village/town there is a single low-capability but functional pc. It has no reliable network. Not quite. A person will arrive by motorcycle, probably once per week, with a laptop in tow. They'll have about an hour to sort out the people there before departing to the next settlement. At the end of the day/week, they'll return to base and synchronise their laptop with the central system. * The data owners want to be able to track e.g. taxes, accounts, small personal data. Mostly simple financial data, like a passbook. * They want to be able to use this data where *they* are, not where a specific reader device is. As mentioned above, the reader comes to them. As mentioned previously, this is for the developing world. The current system is very manual: paper and pen. It's very laborious, and open to errors and even fraud. We're looking for a simple and reliable digital replacement. Martin's point then about just storing the data in the reader makes a lot of sense to me. Give each data owner their own password. You could even use a crypted loopback fs for each 'account' so that they have their own encrypted audit trail which can be used to double check the central records in the case of suspected fraud. -Rob -- GPG key available at: http://www.robertcollins.net/keys.txt. signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
I understand your need to keep it vague, but if the data owner loses his card/token/barcode (his copy of the data) and the motorbike rider meets a grizzly end, is a whole village going to be very upset - or will regular paper bookkeeping be trusted enough as a backup. Having endusers with no proof of a transaction or ability to read their own data I would have thought has the potential for a lot of social issues, and potential non acceptance of the technology. You may have already considered this though - it all comes down to the data value. Presumably if the cost of storage has to be $1 then the value of the data might only be $100 or less (by my reckoning) On Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 2:36 PM, Sridhar Dhanapalan [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 15/04/2008, Robert Collins [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Tue, 2008-04-15 at 14:18 +1000, Martin Visser wrote: Also do they actually need to carry the data with them? It would seem if the ratio of data owners to intelligent devices/readers is so high, you really come back to simply needing a card number ala Medicare - or maybe even something like a tinyurl only a little more human rememberable.The client then just needs to recite their number/tinurl. This assumes that the reader device has real-time (or maybe near real-time is good enough, access to the data storage. (And near real -time may be good enough - 1 000 000 users with 10 K data each is only 10G - easily replicated on all your reader devices - assuming the data doesn't change all that often. I'm inferring that the scheme being developed is something like the following: * At each village/town there is a single low-capability but functional pc. It has no reliable network. Not quite. A person will arrive by motorcycle, probably once per week, with a laptop in tow. They'll have about an hour to sort out the people there before departing to the next settlement. At the end of the day/week, they'll return to base and synchronise their laptop with the central system. * The data owners want to be able to track e.g. taxes, accounts, small personal data. Mostly simple financial data, like a passbook. * They want to be able to use this data where *they* are, not where a specific reader device is. As mentioned above, the reader comes to them. As mentioned previously, this is for the developing world. The current system is very manual: paper and pen. It's very laborious, and open to errors and even fraud. We're looking for a simple and reliable digital replacement. -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html -- Regards, Martin Martin Visser -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
On 15/04/2008, Martin Visser [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I understand your need to keep it vague, but if the data owner loses his card/token/barcode (his copy of the data) and the motorbike rider meets a grizzly end, is a whole village going to be very upset - or will regular paper bookkeeping be trusted enough as a backup. Nothing should be dependent upon a particular person, device or storage medium. The village might be serviced by different people with different laptops each time. There are lots of people fulfilling this function, each with his/her area to service. The data from all these people only comes together at the central office. The laptop should only really be storing the data it picks up on its travels, not carrying a repository of millions of account holders. Having endusers with no proof of a transaction or ability to read their own data I would have thought has the potential for a lot of social issues, and potential non acceptance of the technology. Interesting point. To be honest I didn't think of that. You may have already considered this though - it all comes down to the data value. Presumably if the cost of storage has to be $1 then the value of the data might only be $100 or less (by my reckoning) In dollar terms, yes. But that's a hell of a lot of money for these people. -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
Sridhar Dhanapalan wrote: On 15/04/2008, Martin Visser [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I understand your need to keep it vague, but if the data owner loses his card/token/barcode (his copy of the data) and the motorbike rider meets a grizzly end, is a whole village going to be very upset - or will regular paper bookkeeping be trusted enough as a backup. Nothing should be dependent upon a particular person, device or storage medium. The village might be serviced by different people with different laptops each time. There are lots of people fulfilling this function, each with his/her area to service. The data from all these people only comes together at the central office. The laptop should only really be storing the data it picks up on its travels, not carrying a repository of millions of account holders. This is becoming a little like a game of charades. But is it only one motorcycle borne reader/writer who accesses the card? As ERG and the NSW government have discovered the card and reader are not the hard bit, but there might be some relevant information here. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octopus_card or here http://www.erggroup.com/products/index.asp Marghanita Having endusers with no proof of a transaction or ability to read their own data I would have thought has the potential for a lot of social issues, and potential non acceptance of the technology. Interesting point. To be honest I didn't think of that. You may have already considered this though - it all comes down to the data value. Presumably if the cost of storage has to be $1 then the value of the data might only be $100 or less (by my reckoning) In dollar terms, yes. But that's a hell of a lot of money for these people. -- Marghanita da Cruz http://www.ramin.com.au Phone: (+61)0414 869202 -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
On 15/04/2008, Marghanita da Cruz [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Sridhar Dhanapalan wrote: On 15/04/2008, Martin Visser [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I understand your need to keep it vague, but if the data owner loses his card/token/barcode (his copy of the data) and the motorbike rider meets a grizzly end, is a whole village going to be very upset - or will regular paper bookkeeping be trusted enough as a backup. Nothing should be dependent upon a particular person, device or storage medium. The village might be serviced by different people with different laptops each time. There are lots of people fulfilling this function, each with his/her area to service. The data from all these people only comes together at the central office. The laptop should only really be storing the data it picks up on its travels, not carrying a repository of millions of account holders. This is becoming a little like a game of charades. Sorry about that. I'm trying to get permission to release the details. But is it only one motorcycle borne reader/writer who accesses the card? There are hundreds (maybe thousands) of motorcycle-borne people, each servicing an area within their country (this is a global effort). We cannot assume that the same person, with the same hardware, will always visit a settlement. As ERG and the NSW government have discovered the card and reader are not the hard bit, but there might be some relevant information here. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octopus_card or here http://www.erggroup.com/products/index.asp It looks to me that the Octopus card still requires a connection back to a remote server somewhere to run the transaction. It's also geared more as an ID device rather than a data storage medium. We'd prefer to avoid proprietary hardware, and stick with commodity solutions as much as possible. Low cost and avoidance of lock-in are important. -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
Just looking more at 2D barcodes - this one looks quite innovative - http://research.microsoft.com/research/hccb/about.aspx Quite high density at 2K per square inch. You could possibly print the signed transaction in a passbook along with the human readable version. Using the right paper/ink combination would probably make it fairly durable - as well more socially acceptable (and those coloured pattern are pretty!) Maybe you should talk to your friendly neighbourhood printer/scanner manufacurer to develop a combo printer/scaanner :-) ( HP does make business card scanners and 6x4 photo printers so it is only a matter of merging them) On Tue, Apr 15, 2008 at 2:56 PM, Sridhar Dhanapalan [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On 15/04/2008, Martin Visser [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I understand your need to keep it vague, but if the data owner loses his card/token/barcode (his copy of the data) and the motorbike rider meets a grizzly end, is a whole village going to be very upset - or will regular paper bookkeeping be trusted enough as a backup. Nothing should be dependent upon a particular person, device or storage medium. The village might be serviced by different people with different laptops each time. There are lots of people fulfilling this function, each with his/her area to service. The data from all these people only comes together at the central office. The laptop should only really be storing the data it picks up on its travels, not carrying a repository of millions of account holders. Having endusers with no proof of a transaction or ability to read their own data I would have thought has the potential for a lot of social issues, and potential non acceptance of the technology. Interesting point. To be honest I didn't think of that. You may have already considered this though - it all comes down to the data value. Presumably if the cost of storage has to be $1 then the value of the data might only be $100 or less (by my reckoning) In dollar terms, yes. But that's a hell of a lot of money for these people. -- Regards, Martin Martin Visser -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
Re: [SLUG] SIM cards as cheap data storage?
On Tue, 2008-04-15 at 15:44 +1000, Sridhar Dhanapalan wrote: On 15/04/2008, Marghanita da Cruz [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Sridhar Dhanapalan wrote: On 15/04/2008, Martin Visser [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I understand your need to keep it vague, but if the data owner loses his card/token/barcode (his copy of the data) and the motorbike rider meets a grizzly end, is a whole village going to be very upset - or will regular paper bookkeeping be trusted enough as a backup. Nothing should be dependent upon a particular person, device or storage medium. The village might be serviced by different people with different laptops each time. There are lots of people fulfilling this function, each with his/her area to service. The data from all these people only comes together at the central office. The laptop should only really be storing the data it picks up on its travels, not carrying a repository of millions of account holders. This is becoming a little like a game of charades. Sorry about that. I'm trying to get permission to release the details. But is it only one motorcycle borne reader/writer who accesses the card? There are hundreds (maybe thousands) of motorcycle-borne people, each servicing an area within their country (this is a global effort). We cannot assume that the same person, with the same hardware, will always visit a settlement. As ERG and the NSW government have discovered the card and reader are not the hard bit, but there might be some relevant information here. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octopus_card or here http://www.erggroup.com/products/index.asp It looks to me that the Octopus card still requires a connection back to a remote server somewhere to run the transaction. It's also geared more as an ID device rather than a data storage medium. Nope, it can be synchronised to the main servers later. In the case of bus travel the details from the box in the bus gets uploaded at the end of the day. T-card was working that way too. We'd prefer to avoid proprietary hardware, and stick with commodity solutions as much as possible. Low cost and avoidance of lock-in are important. -- Peter Howard [EMAIL PROTECTED] Jabber Id: [EMAIL PROTECTED] AIM Id Yahoo Id: pjhacnau signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part -- SLUG - Sydney Linux User's Group Mailing List - http://slug.org.au/ Subscription info and FAQs: http://slug.org.au/faq/mailinglists.html
