home: http://starling.us/gan
by Ĝan Ŭesli Starling
copyright 2012 — 2021
Purpose: Sharing the ways and means of things I did for myself.
Security: Not the trusting sort? For software I supply also the source code.
Constraints: None whatsoever.
Caveats: Everything here comes wholly without warrantee or guarantees of any kind. All risk and liability defaults to the user.
Scope of Use: Ham Radio
Description: Generate audio files from ASCII
text
OS: Linux & Win32
I have a ham radio license, call sign KY8D, but had gone inactive for a very long time. Upon deciding to take that hobby up once again, I was chagrined to find that my Morse code skills had fallen from 26 wpm way down to around ten. Yes, there do exist computer and on-line programs to help with that, but I did not want to be tied to a desk. Better for me would be to practice whenever and wherever it might be convenient, breaking the effort into many short, intense stints. Ideal for me would be to have a very large number of sequential audio files, each one unique, incrementing slowly in speed.
So I wrote my own Perl script to do just that. It works by reading instructions and/or plain text in from a *.txt
file. On Linux and Windows both it can generate *.wav
files, which all MP3 players know how to play. On Linux alone it can be triggered to auto-call other built-in transcoders to change those *.wav
files on the fly into either *.mp3
or *.ogg
formats. On Windows you have to perform such transcoding externally. Here is an external link on different ways to do that: wiki .
Provided along with the script are 200-plus hours of *.mp3
training files tailored to suit any need. These include some pseudo-random word-jumble files plus four short stories downloaded from the Gutenburg Project. Learn from scratch or increase your speed without need to run my Perl script at all. Or use it instead to make your own, targeted to your own private taste.
Link:
xml
Scope of Use: General
Description: Avert Screensaver Blank-Out
Dependencies: None
OS: Win64 & Win32
Suppose you have a critical need to prevent the screensaver from locking a PC on which you lack full admin rights. Suppose it’s for reasons of safety, something that you might need to stop happening on the instant but can’t attend so closely as to wiggle the mouse or tap the keyboard every two minutes. Here I envision a PC employed in supervizing some big, possibly dangerous machine. And instead of a big red mushroom button to shut it off physically on the machine itself, idiot designers have made an icon of that instead. Envision, if you will, a whole bank of such machines.
So you asked your IT admin very respectfully to please disable the most unhelpful screensaver and he said no. What do you do? Maybe you lay a wrench upon the keyboard’s escape key, use silly putty to keep it in place. Well, if you’re already doing that then you can’t do any worse by using this program instead because it does the very same thing. Actually it does it better.
How it works is like this. Overriding no security settings at all, it pecks at your mouse and/or keyboard like a trained bird. Without you needing to lay a hand on, invisibly it will move your mouse curser and/or tap a key every so often all by itself. Not physically, of course, only by way of data signals. Nor need you fear to forget and leave it on overnight. At your discretion it turns itself off, at say 7PM.
Download:
Perl *.pl
Win64 *.exe
Win32 *.exe
Scope of Use: 3D Photography
Description: Generate stereo-pair JPEGs from MPO files.
Dependencies:
ExifTool
ImageMagick
OS: Linux, Win64 & Win32
I recently got a Fuji FinePix 3D camera. It stores its stereo photos in the *.MPO
format. This is unsuited for posting on-line until more people have 3D displays. The way around that is to split out the left and right frames, then re-compose them into either a side-by-side or cross-eye stereo pair. This is the program I worte to do that. Check out this example stereo image from one of my own websites.
How it works is by making all of the needed calls to pre-installed ExifTool and ImageMagick in the right sequence. So, of course, you need to have those both installed. You need that not only for Linux but also on Windows.
Download:
Perl *.pl
Win64 *.exe
Win32 *.exe
Scope of Use: Image files
Description: Prepend date onto file names
Dependencies:
ExifTool
OS: Linux, Win64 & Win32
I have three different kinds of cameras: a Nikon point-and-shoot, a Fuji 3D and a Kodak video. In using all three for a single event, it's bothersome that between them the file-naming sequences are all different. I prefer the image names all sort like so...
2013-09-26_15-59-57_Wedding.mpo
2013-09-26_16-01-22_Wedding.jpg
2013-09-26_16-01-23_Wedding.mov
This is the program I wrote to do that. For photos with an Exif
directory, the DateTimeOriginal
tag is read. For those that don't, the file-creation time gets used instead. What I do then with a whole directory of like-named files from different cameras is feed it to yet another program which auto-creates a thumbnail gallery which lacks only text. I know what you're thinking. It isn't like that. See wholesome example here: Honeymoon
Download:
Perl *.pl
Win64 *.exe
Win32 *.exe
Scope of Use: 3D Modeling
Description: Deduce measurements of pictured objects.
OS: Win64 & Win32
I like to design things, in 3D by choice. I mostly use Rhino, sometimes Blender. One project I had was to create a 3D model of something for which I could not get actual dimensions. All I had to go by were photos. A very crude way would have been to print out photos, measure it with calipers, then do lots of tedious trigonometry. Much easier would be to just show it on-screen, using the mouse point for your calipers. That's what I wrote this program to do. You just mouse around and press buttons. The program itself foes your trigonometry. You have to guess at a few things, such as any off-angles. It’s not as good as being there in person with actual calipers, but it’s the virtual, next best thing.
Download:
Perl *.pl
Win64 *.exe
Win32 *.exe
Scope of Use: Refreshment
Description: Home made ginger beer to rival Stewarts
Ever since Dr. Pepper bought out Stewart’s and cut the only flavor I liked, I’ve been lamenting the loss. For years I have suffered. Not any longer! My wife found some recipes on-line for making your own. One was quite good but lacked the burn. I’ve tinkered with that one since and now have a variant of my own which satisfies my lament for that long lost Stewart’s burn.
Link:
Recipe
Scope of Use: Well Point & Pipe Sinking
Description: Very much better than a fence post driver
Like a manual pile driver, but postitioned around versus atop the pipe being driven. More effective, therefor, and very much easier to use.
Link:
Plans & Model