[ale] My Raspberry π is here

[mike at trausch.us]

On 10/18/2012 12:06 AM, Michael H. Warfield wrote:
> On Wed, 2012-10-17 at 16:17 -0400, mike at trausch.us wrote:
>> > On 10/17/2012 11:06 AM, Michael H. Warfield wrote:
>>> > > *) A remote serial console driver to monitor servers.  Sort of an add
>>> > > on, out board, server management module.
>> > Would that not require additional hardware to convert from 5V to 3.3V?
> I think we're mixing apples and oranges and probably my fault.
> 
> Yes, it needs additional hardware, specifically a USB to serial UART
> adapter (cheap - I've got fistfuls of those babies).  That's not 5V to
> 3.3V.  That's more like +- 12V RS-232 to USB.  I didn't literally mean
> that you could drop a RP into a chasis in place of a server management
> module.
> 

Ah, I was thinking about the serial pins in the main block...

>>> *) Logging server.  Have it running rsyslogd and just saving syslog
>>> > > events off the local network to the SD card where it can't be tampered
>>> > > with by intruders who can't reach it.
>> > 
>> YES!  I had that idea a couple weeks ago for a client office.  Swap the
>> > devices out when they start getting full, and a great way to then be
>> > able to control how things get archived.
> Or have ET occasionally phone home and upload the stored logs when they
> are archived.  Works either way or both.

Yes, that'd be possible, too.  But I'm about to max out the off-hours
network bandwidth as it is, so I'd rather have it collect and swap them
out once a month (or quarter) or so, and have the device also be
monitoring the log messages and raise an immediate alarm if need be.

Two birds!  One stone!  :-)

>> > A much more difficult straw man idea I've been wrestling with:
>> > 
>> > (This one I believe Mike T will relate to immediate based on some of our
>> > recent discussions...)
>>
>> Can we install it?  Please?  :-D
>>
> After I get mine installed...  :-)=)

YAY!  :-D

One thing I want to play with, too, is using a Bluetooth dongle and,
say, an Android application to be able to walk up to such types of
appliances and get data from them that way.  Actually that could apply
to a syslog/systemd journal/event log collector, too.

I haven't got to play with the hardware side of mine yet, but it's going
to happen very soon.  I have an SD card image that I have been working
on for them that is built around what I want to actually use on the RPi;
I'm attempting to build an essentially barebones stack that can easily
be built on top of to do whatever, using systemd as the init
system/kitchen sink, which so far, seems to be working really nice.  I
need to build an updated kernel that gives systemd all the features it
wants, though.  That's next on my list.

After that?  I think I want to see about making use of GTK+'s DirectFB
backend to do things on the RPi without necessarily having to bring X in
as a dependency.  First up on my list there, I think, is something of a
dashboard for my TV, where it can monitor things during the day and make
loud noises if things break.  :-)

I just wish I were confident enough with the hardware side to start
playing with building circuits for it to interface with...

	--- Mike

-- 
A man who reasons deliberately, manages it better after studying Logic
than he could before, if he is sincere about it and has common sense.
                                   --- Carveth Read, “Logic”

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