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Eric Bohlman | 1 Oct 2004 01:03
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Re: [OT] comp.dcom.telecom

Nate Duehr wrote:
> I'll have to go figure out how to use my ISP's news server -- I haven't 
> been on USENET in years, but comp.dcom.telecom is one newsgroup I'd 
> happily get my leafnode stuff running again for to dig through the 
> archives and see what I've missed over the last ten years... wow.

You can always set up a free account with individual.net 
<http://www.individual.net>, the University of Berlin's free NNTP 
server.  It carries just about everything but the binary groups, and 
definitely carries comp.dcom.telecom.
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John Ferrell | 1 Oct 2004 01:59
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Re: [OT] Troubleshooting Windows XP service pack 2

I have SP2 on the desk machine(xppro) & the laptop(xphome). Everything 
working fine so far. Between that and my provider (earthlink) blocking 
virii, most of the mischief gets blocked. I too, go everywhere with careless 
abandon. I keep the system on autoupdate with Norton & Microsoft. Pop ups 
have to be manually accepted if I want them now. No more cascading porn 
sites when I am on an innocent search.

I don't know if my PicStart still works or not, have not been there lately!
Built in Firewire broke on the desk machine, but I think that hardware.

I had to remove ZoneAlarm due to interference about a year back.

John Ferrell
http://DixieNC.US

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Russell McMahon" <apptech@...>
To: "Microcontroller discussion list - Public." <piclist@...>
Sent: Thursday, September 30, 2004 9:25 AM
Subject: Re: [OT] Troubleshooting Windows XP service pack 2

>>> I wonder whether to put SP2 back on now ?
>
>> You probably don't have a lot of choice.  There are already a number of
>> vulnerabilities in pre-SP2 systems that won't be fixed except by SP2.
>
> That's Microsoft's choice. If they wish to abandon their older installed 
> base of users who find Sp2 a major problem they can blithely choose to do 
> so. And probably will as such users are of minor financial importance to 
> them.
(Continue reading)

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Andrew Warren | 1 Oct 2004 02:06
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Re: [EE] scope project anyone? Dynamic FPGA code

Robert Rolf <piclist@...> wrote:

> I very much like the idea. I just don't see it as practical

    Would an existence proof help?  Right here on my desk is a
    PC-hosted, pocket-sized, 18 channel x 100 MHz analyzer whose
    triggering logic works exactly as I described; it's been working
    great for almost a decade.

    -Andy

    P.S.  The guy who designed it used to work at Xilinx, but I don't
          think that he necessarily had any "secret" information.
          Maybe there's an FPGA vendor who publicizes the required
          programming info (or would at least give it to you if you
          asked nicely), or an FPGA hacker who's already figured it
          out and posted it on the web or something. 

          If not... Well, the standard way of building trigger logic
          is big and slow, but I guess it'd work ok.

=== Andrew Warren -- aiw@...
=== Principal Design Engineer
=== Cypress Semiconductor Corporation
=== 
=== Opinions expressed above do not
=== necessarily represent those of
=== Cypress Semiconductor Corporation

_______________________________________________
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James Caska | 1 Oct 2004 01:57

RE: [EE] Serial port control under VB.NET 2002/2003

Hi Ken,

Ok, so you've inspired me to have a look at this. If you look more closely
at the link I sent you earlier you will see that .NET has this system of
Encoding to translate between all the different formats

Looking at what you want to do..

bytUART_Byte = Asc((StrConv(MSComm1.Input, vbUnicode)))

So you are expecting some data coming in on the MSComm but you expect it in
unicode format. So you convert the whole buffer or least the read length on
the MSComm ( which I assume is 2 or you are happy to throw away data ) so
this takes the first 2 bytes of an N byte stream and converts it to a VB
Unicode internal string. The ASC takes the first character of this string
and produces a number in the unicode range, 0..65535

Ok.. So to achieve the same result in .NET

1) Make sure your MSComm control is set to comInputModeBinary, this makes
sure MSComm1.Input returns a Byte Array

MSComm1.InputMode = comInputModeBinrary

2) Make sure the Encoding object is referenced

Imports System.Text

3) declare bytUART_Byte as a char or cast to the appropriate range you are
after
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Russell McMahon | 1 Oct 2004 02:22
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[OT] Small gas turbines

Fronm anothe rlist.
Some good links.

>>Anyone in the Experimental HPR rocket arena
>>built a turbine first stage?
>>
>>Something like a Hobby Turbine...
>>http://www.robart.com/FunSonic/Turbines.aspx

There's a whole industry booming up with little jet turbines
like that, single stage centrifugal compressors originally
based on turbochargers, etc.  The biggest ones are about
150 lbs thrust.  Cost seems reasonably consistent at $100/lbt
for the medium and larger ones (the Robart one is about $200/lbt,
which is typical for engines under about 35 lbt if I recall right).

See for example:
www.gtba.co.uk (Gas Turbine Builders Association)
www.microjeteng.com (manufacturer, the biggest engines, up to 150 lbt)
www.artesjet.com (manufacturer)
www.wren-turbines.com (manufacturer)

Thrust/weight ratios for the low end sizes are generally 5-6,
but the larger ones get better; the Microjeteng HF150 has 150 lbt
and weighs 19 lbs, for a 7.5 ratio, the HF100 is 95 lbt weighing
10.4 lbs for better than 9, the HF30 with 32 lbt and 3.5 lbs for
better than 9 as well.  The HF65 isn't so good.

>>If I do my Math correctly Thrust to weight of  between 5 and 8, depending
>>on how much of the start gear stays on the ground.
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Russell McMahon | 1 Oct 2004 02:19
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Re: [OT:] Soaking up hurricanes

> F1 has got pretty bland (for the viewer) in recent years. For me it's just
> something to watch for 100 minutes on Sunday night, and I've fallen
> asleep more than once. 10 years ago, the Senna/Prost/Hill/Mansell & co
> era, it was excellent. Schumacher/Hakkinen was the last big rivalry 
> really,
> but since then.......

Fangio / Moss !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Almost before (even) my time :-).
And not just F1 but other top races as well.
Mille Miglia <sp?>.
[He who leads at Rome will never win the MM ...][Moss won]

        RM

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Ken Pergola | 1 Oct 2004 02:29
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RE: [EE] Serial port control under VB.NET 2002/2003


Paul Hutchinson wrote:

> I'm puzzled as to why you expand all received bytes to two byte Unicode
> characters and then strip them back to one byte with Asc()?

Hi Paul,

I did not want to regress to VB6 in this thread, but I'll answer your
question:

Well, the code I posted works fine under VB6 for years with InputMode =
comInputModeBinary.

> From my testing in VB6 simply using, bytUART_Byte = Asc(MSComm1.Input)
> yields the same result.

Well, it does not for me. The code line you posted produces on error:

"Invalid procedure call or argument (Error 5)"

Paul, how are you avoiding this same error in VB6? I don't see how you
cannot get the same error as I did using that line of code.

(bytUART is defined as: 'Dim bytUART as byte')

Best regards,

Ken Pergola
(Continue reading)

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Ken Pergola | 1 Oct 2004 02:53
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RE: [EE] Serial port control under VB.NET 2002/2003


James Caska wrote:

> Ok, so you've inspired me to have a look at this. If you look more closely
> at the link I sent you earlier you will see that .NET has this system of
> Encoding to translate between all the different formats

Hi James,

Thanks very much for your time and effort. I need to break away at the
moment to watch the Kerry vs Bush debate, but as soon as I come back I'll
give your suggestions a try. I just wanted to respond right away to your
message to say "thank you". Once again, I really appreciate you taking the
time to reply in such detail. I'll let you know how things work out trying
this out with the VB6 MSCOMM control and Richard Grier's wrapped MSCOMM
control for .NET.

I'm sure a lot of other people are using the serial ports with PICs and
other microcontrollers. Hopefully this will help everyone out when they use
VB.NET (if they are having the same trouble porting existing VB6 code using
the MSCOMM control).

I feel pretty comfortable in VB6, but the .NET Framework is huge. It will
take a long time for me to get comfortable in .NET, but I'm very excited
about it though. VB.NET for example has some nice features that I'm looking
forward to. Interface inheritance and implementation inheritance looks
*much* simpler in VB.NET. I also like the strong type checking, and so many
other features.

Thanks again James for you help.
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Robert Rolf | 1 Oct 2004 03:13
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Re: [EE] scope project anyone? Dynamic FPGA code

Andrew Warren wrote:
> Robert Rolf <piclist@...> wrote:
>>I very much like the idea. I just don't see it as practical
> 
>     Would an existence proof help?  Right here on my desk is a
>     PC-hosted, pocket-sized, 18 channel x 100 MHz analyzer whose
>     triggering logic works exactly as I described; it's been working
>     great for almost a decade.

Well, if it was doing 100MHz a decade ago, why aren't we
going for 1GHz today <G>?
More importantly, why are we reinventing an OLD wheel?

>     -Andy
> 
>     P.S.  The guy who designed it used to work at Xilinx, but I don't
>           think that he necessarily had any "secret" information.

Device internals may have been less 'proprietary' a decade ago,
but I don't recall.
Any chance you can recruit him for the project <G>?

>           Maybe there's an FPGA vendor who publicizes the required
>           programming info (or would at least give it to you if you
>           asked nicely),

Only under an NDA, which would defeat the point of an 'open source'
project.

> or an FPGA hacker who's already figured it
(Continue reading)

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Ken Pergola | 1 Oct 2004 04:45
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RE: [EE] Serial port control under VB.NET 2002/2003


I wrote:

> Paul, how are you avoiding this same error in VB6? I don't see how you
> cannot get the same error as I did using that line of code.

Hi Paul,

I see the difference: your code only works if the input mode is set to
'comInputmodeText' -- it will render the error I mentioned in a previous
post if the input mode is set to 'comInputmodeBinary'.

My projects require 'comInputmodeBinary' -- that's why I use the code that
you found puzzling. I hope this clears things up for you.

Best regards,

Ken Pergola

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Gmane