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So it looks like Skype is coming to the iPhone tomorrow, March 31st, and for the blackberry in May. Well I guess this explains why there is no native 64bit Linux version yet. To busy porting to mobile devices

But good news none the less. iPhone users will be abe to download Skype’s software for free,  make free calls to other Skype users, but will be charged as normal for calls to non Skype users.

It will be interesting to see how Skype will measure up to the competition, namely Fringe, which can handle x-network IM and includes the ability to make calls to Skype buddies, and has been available on the iPhone for months now.

Some features:

• Ability to use address book for Skype contacts
• Chat
• Taking a photo from within Skype to serve as your avatar image(iPhone only)
• Pulling a picture in from the camera roll(iPhone only)
• Ability to join a conference call

Missing Features:

• Although you cant actually initiate a conference call from iPhone skype, you can join one in progress.
• No SMS
• Cannot purchase Skype Credits
• Cannot take more than 1 call at a time
• No file transfers
• cannot listen to your Skype Voicemail

Hopefully we will see some of these features in the new version, but for now just waiting until tomorrow to actually
try this out and see how well it works.
 
Read CNET Story….

What is 1-Wire

1-Wire bus is a communication system developed by Dallas Semiconductor. It is quite similar to I2C, except for the data rate, which is lower, the costs, which are very low, and the range, which is higher. The 1-Wire protocol allows the communication among several devices produced by Dallas Semiconductors/Maxim, such as:

* temperature, humidity, and pressure sensors, thermocouples
* LCD, counters
* eeprom and rom memory, encryption (IP protection)
* identification devices (electronic keys)

The main applications of 1-Wire devices are as follows:

* Print Cartridge ID
* Medical Consumable ID
* Rack Card Calibration and Control
* Printed Circuit Board (PCB) identification and authentication
* Accessory/Peripheral Identification and Control
* IP Protection, Secure Feature Control, Clone Prevention
* Consumer electronics
* Access control
* Electronic cash
* Gaming devices

1-Wire is a half-duplex, bi-directional bus, and the communication is established among a device, the master, which controls through the bus one or more slave(s). The following figure shows the block diagram of the 1-Wire communication bus, with a detail of the master (HOST in the picture) and a generic slave.

 The master device is connected to the bus through an open-drain configuration and to the supply power (Vcc, which ranges from 2.8 to 5.25 V) through the pull-up resistor R (normally its value is 4.7 Kohm). On the other hand, the slave receives all the power it needs from the bus, which is the only wire present. As visible in the above figure, the capacitor inside each slave (usually it is a 800 pF capacitor) will be charged when the bus is in the idle state (corresponding to a high or positive level of the 1-Wire bus). When, instead, the bus is at a low level, that is when the communication between master and slave is taking place, the slave uses the energy stored in the capacitor to power itself. Differently from other bus protocols such I2C or SPI, the 1-Wire bus requires that each slave be physically connected to the bus: if a slave is disconnected, it cannot be operative any longer, thus entering a reset state; when it is connected again to the bus, it wakes up and, receiving the supply power directly from the bus, can declare its presence to the bus controller (the master device).

The principal advantages of the 1-Wire technology are:

• Inexpensive devices, simple wiring, parasitic power
• Unique addresses, individually addressable
• USB, serial and i2c adapters
• Mature technology, consulting and aftermarket support
• iButton steel sealed devices
• Single Contact Sufficient for Control and Operation
• Unique ID Factory-Lasered in Each Device
• Power Derived from Signal Bus (”Parasitically Powered”)
• Multidrop Capable: Supports Multiple Devices on Single Line
• Exceptional ESD Performance
• IP Protection, Secure Feature Control, Clone Prevention

Each slave connected to a 1-Wire bus has a unique and unalterable serial number: through this ID, it can be univocally selected and addressed by the master device. The 64-bit ROM number is written during the manufacturing process and it includes the following fields: an 8-bit Family Code which identifies the slave type and functionality (up to 256 slave types are supported), a 48-bit Serial Number, an 8-bit CRC. No clock is necessary in 1-Wire bus, since time synchronization is performed by the slaves on the falling edge of the bus wire controlled by the master. There are two kinds of data rate: standard, with a transmission speed up to about 16 Kbps, and overdrive, which increases the speed by a factor of 10.
The first operation to be executed by an application on the 1-Wire bus is the selection of the slave device. Once a slave has been selected, the master sends specific commands on the bus to write data to or read data from the slave. The reset command is accepted by all the slaves connected to the bus.

OWFS: a nice open-source project related to 1-Wire

Owfs (acronym of One Wire File System) is a project created by Paul H. Alfille and The Owfs Team (Owfs homepage: http://owfs.sourceforge.net/). It is an open-source project developed under Linux operating system with the following purpose: access any 1-Wire device as if it were a regular file belonging to the file system. So, to perform a read operation from all 1-Wire temperature sensors connected to the bus, a shell command like “cat */temperature” would be enough. For instance, the collection of temperature sensors above are all on one bus, individually addressable, and will reconfigure on the fly as items are added or removed. OWFS is an original and useful way to work and experiment the powerful 1-Wire devices of Dallas Semiconductor/Maxim. Moreover, shell commands are powerful and can be organized in script files to be executed (also automatically or on a batch basis) during the development, testing, and validation phases of a 1-wire application.
The main characteristics of Owfs are:

• Filesystem access
• Web access (through the application owhttpd)
• Remote network access (through the application owserver)
• Direct language support for perl, python, php, tcl, C (libow, ownet)
• Bootable CD
• Support for many processors and OS
• Free under GPL license

Universal 1-Wire COM Port Adapter

Dallas Semiconductor-Maxim offers an interesting tool (DS9097U) for 1-Wire testing and debugging. It connects to the RS232 serial port of a PC (both DB-9 and DB-25 connectors are supported) and, together with a TMEX software driver, allows reading and writing on 1-Wire devices which are connected through a RJ-11 port; both regular and overdrive data rates can be used. With the DB-9 connector it is possible to communicate only with non-eeprom 1-Wire devices, whereas the DB-25 connector allows also to write on 1-Wire eeprom even though an external power supply is requested in that case. The DS9097U adapter is based on the DS2480B Serial 1-Wire Line Driver chip.
Drivers can be freely downloaded from: http://www.ibutton.com/software/tmex/index.html.

Since there aren’t any native 64 bit packages of skype for linux, it has been somewhat of a challenge to get a workable solution. I’ve gone through the pain so you can enjoy.

My Specs:

HP DV7-1245DX laptop
AMD Turion X2 64 bit dual core 2.1 Ghz
Fedora 10 x86_64
KDE 3.5
Linux TeK360 2.6.27.19-170.2.35.fc10.x86_64 #1 SMP Mon Feb 23 13:00:23 EST 2009 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

You can install Skype with either static or dynamically linked libraries. I recommend the dynamic version, since it makes use of the existing system libraries that are managed by Fedora. This will minimize any potential library conflicts.
The only thing necessary for you to check is to make sure you have all the 32-bit versions of the libraries Skype requires.
you can use “ldd” to analyze the library requirements for skype. I have conveniently done this step for you and compiled the appropriate yum statement.

as root:

yum install alsa-lib.i386 dbus-libs.i386 e2fsprogs-libs.i386 expat.i386 fontconfig.i386 freetype.i386 glib2.i386 glibc.i686 keyutils-libs.i386 krb5-libs.i386 libcap.i386 libgcc.i386 libICE.i386 libpng.i386 libselinux.i386 libSM.i386 libstdc++.i386 libX11.i386 libXau.i386 libxcb.i386 libXcursor.i386 libXdmcp.i386 libXext.i386 libXfixes.i386 libXi.i386 libXinerama.i386 libXrandr.i386 libXrender.i386 libXScrnSaver.i386 libXv.i386 openssl.i386 qt.i386 qt-x11.i386 zlib.i386

Now, you can install the dynamic version of Skype from here

Choose “Dynamic”, near the lower left of the box in the middle of the page.
you should be downloading the file “skype-2.0.0.72.tar.bz2″

Now, open up a new terminal window, and “cd” into the directory that you downloaded Skype into, and extract and run Skype.

cd ~/skype
tar -jxvf skype-2.0.0.72.tar.bz2
cd skype-2.0.0.72
./skype

Skype should come right up, since you now have all the libraries.

Log in. Skype should now be up and running.

In the main Skype window, hit the “S” in the lower left corner to bring up the menu, then choose Options.

Skype sound device setting:

In Skype, go to Sound Devices. I recommend setting your sound devices to something that contains “hw:SB,0″ in its name. Do this for all 3 choices: sound in, sound out, and ringing. Choose the name of your device that best matches the hardware you want to use. Definitely avoid generic single-word names like “default”, “hdmi”, “pulse”, and so on.
mine looks like:
HDA ATI SB (hw:SB,0)

Skype video settings:

In Skype, go to Video Devices. Try selecting your webcam from the list, and hit Test. My integrated HP webcam was previously setup automatically when I installed Fedora. Fedora has really improved their webcam support in this latest release. Almost every known webcam should work by now.

Now, you’re ready to make a call. Call “echo123″ first, to make sure your sound works. Call your friends, to make sure your video works

And thats pretty much it. Enjoy Skype 2 on 64 bit linux!

Myths

• “You don’t need 64-bit software with less than 3 GB RAM”
• “There are less drivers for 64-bit OS”
• “You will need all new software, all 64-bit”
• “64-bit software is twice as fast”

read more…

Myths and facts about 64-bit Linux(®).

HARTFORD — Connecticut voters support decriminalizing possession of small amounts of marijuana, but in a weird twist on this emerging liberal agenda, they oppose allowing grocery stores to sell wine and distilled spirits, according to the new Quinnipiac University Poll.

The poll, released Tuesday morning, also shows voters support Sunday liquor sales, which have been proposed as a way to create new sources of state tax revenue.

When asked if they would favor a law similar to the statewide ballot initiative passed last November in Massachusetts — making possession of less than a ounce of pot an infraction punishable by a small fine similar to a traffic ticket, rather than a misdemeanor that must be adjudicated and create a police record — voters approved 58-37 percent.

Even voters over age 65 agree with the idea, although Republicans oppose it 51-44 percent. Democrats approve 68-30 percent, and unaffiliated voters support decriminalization 58-35 percent.

Douglas Schwartz, director of the poll, said it’s the first time it has asked voters in any state their feelings about decriminalizing marijuana.

“There is interest,” he said of support for reducing penalties for possession.

Senate Majority Leader Martin M. Looney, D-New Haven, said in an interview Tuesday that the poll reinforces legislation he has proposed this year that would mirror Massachusetts’ marijuana possession law.

“This is pretty substantial,” Looney said of the 58 percent approval rating. “The change in Massachusetts was passed with over 60 percent of voters in favor. Clearly the public sees this as a reasonable idea to prioritize within the criminal justice system.”Looney’s bill, which is co-sponsored by Sen. Toni N. Harp, D-New Haven, has been raised in the Judiciary Committee, but a public hearing has not yet been scheduled.

Last year Gov. M. Jodi Rell vetoed a so-called medical marijuana bill, which Looney said is entirely different from the decriminalization bill. The medical marijuana had a procedure for authorizing people to grow the weed in violation of overriding federal law.

“I think it has a chance this year partly because the public seems ahead of politicians on this issue,” Looney said, adding that an estimated $15 million could be saved in Connecticut by freeing public defenders and prosecutors from handling low-level pot possession cases.

The poll found that voters approve Sunday alcohol sales by 54-44 percent, although the poll found a “substantial” gender gap, with men supporting the sales by 62-37 percent. Women are nearly evenly split. Package store owners recently went to the Capitol to defeat legislation that would allow Sunday sales.

“Although Connecticut is known as the land of steady habits, Nutmeggers appear willing to change the law so that Connecticut package stores can sell alcohol on Sunday,” Schwartz said.

In an apparent inconsistency in the otherwise liberal reaction to questions on social issues, voters oppose allowing grocery stores to sell wine and distilled spirits by 58-39 percent.

The Q Poll surveyed 1,238 Connecticut registered voters from March 3 to 8, with a margin of error of plus or minus 2.8 percentage points.

The poll found Rell’s approval rating remains high, 75 percent, and voters approve, by 61-28 percent, the way she’s handling the budget crisis.

Attorney General Richard Blumenthal enjoys an 81 percent job-approval rating.

Poll: Connecticut should legalize small amounts of marijuana - NewsTimes.com.

If you have large size (21″) or small size (14″) monitor, it is better to use large/small character size. But how do you setup character size in runlevel 3 under Linux?

The answer is simple, use the kernel framebuffer. It allows you to set the Linux text screen (console) to higher or lower resolution. The Linux framebuffer (fbdev) is a graphic hardware-independent abstraction layer to show graphics on a console without relying on system-specific libraries such as SVGALib or the heavy overhead of the X Window System.

Open GRUB configuration file grub.conf

vi grub.conf

Append line vga=0×318 (a 24-bit color depth @ 1024×768 display) to kernel line. At the end your modification should look like as follows:

title Enterprise Linux-base (2.6.18-92.el5)       root (hd0,0)
kernel /vmlinuz-2.6.18-92.el5 ro root=LABEL=/ rhgb quiet vga=0×318
initrd /initrd-2.6.18-92.el5.img

Save and close the file. Reboot the system:

telinit 6

0×318 (hex) is a mode. Here are common modes:

See kernel docs - Documentation/i386/boot.txt and Documentation/svga.txt files for more information. You can also pass special parameter called ask i.e. vga=ask for menu.

Please note that not all video cards out there support kernel framebuffer mode. Also you may need to to use special driver.

References:

• 10 boot time parameters you should know about the Linux kernel
• Framebuffer HOWTO