[Xastir] standards are wonderful...
Standards are wonderful... there's so many to choose from. But I was really getting furious... I was given a slightly used motherboard and thought it was time to upgrade the OS and Xastir (was using Fedora Core 5 and Xastir 1.84). So I loaded Ubuntu 9.04 and things went pretty smoothly with Xastir 1.95, too. The motherboard had a 10-pin header plug for the serial, but I didn't get a ribbon cable for it. The header looked the same as another motherboard that I had. I found a few extra serial ribbon cables lying around in my 'old parts' stash... so it was done, right? Well, after wringing my hands over the man pages of setserial, stty, and cu, I couldn't get even a simple loopback to work. I was disgusted, because it seemed like peripherals have always been a problem area for me and Linux (well maybe just me.) Finally, I wondered if the serial ribbon cable had the proper pin-out for the motherboard header no, it didn't. It wasn't even close, and I kick myself for not checking that. But who would make their own standard, eh? With a soldering gun, two serial ribbon cables, and a bit of time I made a serial adapter cable with the right pin-out and things are humming along just fine between the tnc and computer. Standards are wonderful - Mark Rice KK5MR ___ Xastir mailing list Xastir@lists.xastir.org http://lists.xastir.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/xastir
Re: [Xastir] standards are wonderful...
--- On Fri, 8/21/09, mark.rice wrote: Finally, I wondered if the serial ribbon cable had the proper pin-out for the motherboard header no, it didn't. It wasn't even close, and I kick myself for not checking that. But who would make their own standard, eh? That's a little surprising considering there is a standard for the serial port pinout. It was a one-to-one mapping. Pin one of the header went to pin one of the D-shell connector. Pin 10 was to be blank and used as a polarity key with a matching plug in the connector hole. However, I had the same experience with a motherboard using a USB header. It is five pins and is normally set up as Power, Data Minus, Data Plus, and Ground. This one motherboard has some weird arrangement that I have yet to figure out because one port works and the other doesn't. I'll have to probe it some more next time I open it to see if I can get both ports functional. ___ Xastir mailing list Xastir@lists.xastir.org http://lists.xastir.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/xastir
Re: [Xastir] standards are wonderful...
Alex Carver wrote: --- On Fri, 8/21/09, mark.rice wrote: Finally, I wondered if the serial ribbon cable had the proper pin-out for the motherboard header no, it didn't. It wasn't even close, and I kick myself for not checking that. But who would make their own standard, eh? That's a little surprising considering there is a standard for the serial port pinout. It was a one-to-one mapping. Pin one of the header went to pin one of the D-shell connector. Pin 10 was to be blank and used as a polarity key with a matching plug in the connector hole. The other cable is typically to make it easy for use with IDC connectors, just clamp one on each end. I'm sure both made perfectly good sense to the engineers involved, just a different viewpoint (a perfect example of the difference between an internal and external interface ... ;) I always made a point to mark my serial cables as 'A' or 'B' just to make sure they didn't get mixed up. ... Niall ___ Xastir mailing list Xastir@lists.xastir.org http://lists.xastir.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/xastir
[Xastir] OT: Comercial mapping / directions software that includes Canada?
As someone who occasionally works on maps for bike rides that I then support as a Public Service event, I find myself working on one for next year that will spend some time just north of the border (Lauier to Danville to be exact). Are there any commercial, Street Atlas like programs that have Canadian roads at least near the border? I'd love to also get ToPo info but at least having street information would solve most of my problems. Dave KD7MYC ___ Xastir mailing list Xastir@lists.xastir.org http://lists.xastir.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/xastir
Re: [Xastir] OT: Commercial mapping / directions software that includes Canada?
Detailed discussion of this taken off-list via Jabber with Curt. If there was a program with the ease of use of Street Atlas that mapped shapefiles, I'd take a look. I do see that SA 2009 claims to have Canada data. I've been using 2008 since it is backwards compatible with ToPo 7 files. May have to find the 2009 CD I have someplace and install it. -Original Message- From: xastir-boun...@lists.xastir.org [mailto:xastir-boun...@lists.xastir.org] On Behalf Of Curt, WE7U Sent: Friday, August 21, 2009 14:37 Are the Canadian street shapefiles not adequate for the purpose? ___ Xastir mailing list Xastir@lists.xastir.org http://lists.xastir.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/xastir
Re: [Xastir] OT: Commercial mapping / directions software that includes Canada?
I missed part of this conversation, but as a GIS person, I've had little trouble getting reasonable data for Canadia. Here's an accuracy map for ESRI's free North American vector street maps: http://downloads2.esri.com/resources/arcgisonline/supplemental_images/StreetMap_Cov_NA.jpg I also found this real quick, too: http://www.geobase.ca/geobase/en/search.do?produit=nrnlanguage=en Maybe those sources aren't up-to-date enough for your uses? BTW, it's a fairly automated process to convert raster street maps to shapefile. The difficult part is hand-coding the data table of street names. I hope I understood the conversation correctly and I hope this helps. On 08/21/2009 02:51 PM, David Flood wrote: Detailed discussion of this taken off-list via Jabber with Curt. If there was a program with the ease of use of Street Atlas that mapped shapefiles, I'd take a look. I do see that SA 2009 claims to have Canada data. I've been using 2008 since it is backwards compatible with ToPo 7 files. May have to find the 2009 CD I have someplace and install it. -Original Message- From: xastir-boun...@lists.xastir.org [mailto:xastir-boun...@lists.xastir.org] On Behalf Of Curt, WE7U Sent: Friday, August 21, 2009 14:37 Are the Canadian street shapefiles not adequate for the purpose? -- 73, de KB8UYR/6 Brad Douglas r...@touchofmadness.com ___ Xastir mailing list Xastir@lists.xastir.org http://lists.xastir.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/xastir
