Well … almost.  The issue comes down to compatibility with the “virtual” hardware.  Lately, I have found that many of the Linux distributions make no effort to ensure that their releases install easily in VPC.  I’ll address that in another post.

Today I again wanted to test a new distro - CentOS v5.2 - in VPC and when I started the graphical install I was met with the same old issues. Immediately I get a completely distorted graphical screen … which is one of the most common issues.  It turns out that for host memory considerations, the “virtual video card” in VPC is limited to 8MB of video memory.  This time I chose to find a better, easier solution … and I did.

Bad Video Card settings in CentOS Install

Poking around Google I was able to find this post that gave me the answer.  It turns out that there is a kernel parameter that can be set to force the limit on the size of the VESA video frame buffer.

vesafb=vtotal:8M

I gave it a try, and it worked!  Of course, once I got through that, I got to the next most common issue that I hit … the mouse wouldn’t work.  Back to Google to find that fix again.  I found it here.  There are two simple parameters to add … one for the mouse, and the second to have the wheel work.

i8042.noloop psmouse.proto=imps

The first part fixes the mouse … the second is for the wheel.

So how do you use all of this information?  It’s really simple.  When you boot the CD or DVD to install CentOS v5.2, you’ll get to this screen:

CentOS Install Menu

Once you get here, simply type:

linux vesafb=vtotal:8M i8042.noloop psmouse.proto=imps

Hit Enter and you are off and going!

Now, when the installation was complete and I rebooted I was surprised to find that the video was still working.  I didn’t have to do anything else.  BUT … the mouse was again not working.  The trick is to interrupt the GRUB boot loader, and edit the settings of the kernel line.  So when the system boots, and gives you chance to “Press any key to enter the menu” … hit any key!

You’ll then be presented with the GRUB menu, and you can then:

1. Hit ‘e’ to edit the highlighted CentOS entry
2. Arrow down to the lines that starts with “kernel” and hit ‘e’ again
3. Add the following to the end of the line:  i8042.noloop psmouse.proto=imps
4. Hit enter
5. Type ‘b’ for boot

That will get you booted and running.

To make the change permanent, you’ll have to edit the grub.conf file as follows:

1. Login as root (or you can use sudo if you have set up teh sudoers file.)
2. Open grub.conf in an editor of your choice (e.g. nano /etc/grub.conf)
3. Once again look for that “kernel” line … go to the end of the line
4. Add the following to the end:  i8042.noloop psmouse.proto=imps
5. Save the file and exit.

After all of this, I have a working CentOS v5.2 in Virtual PC 2007.  Well … except that I have no audio working.  It now appears that CentOS v5.2 does not include the “snd-sb16″ sound card driver.  I found that I can get the sources to build the drivers from the alsa-project.org website … but that is something that will occur on another day. 

New solar cell material achieves almost 100% efficiency, could solve world-wide energy problems

Columbus (OH) - Researchers at Ohio State University have accidentally discovered a new solar cell material capable of absorbing all of the sun’s visible light energy. The material is comprised of a hybrid of plastics, molybdenum and titanium. The team discovered it not only fluoresces (as most solar cells do), but also phosphoresces. Electrons in a phosphorescent state remain at a place where they can be “siphoned off” as electricity over 7 million times longer than those generated in a fluorescent state. This combination of materials also utilizes the entire visible spectrum of light energy, translating into a theoretical potential of almost 100% efficiency. Commercial products are still years away, but this foundational work may well pave the way for a truly renewable form of clean, global energy.

The first thing about this that I find impressive is the use of supercomputers to solve these problems.  Our advances in raw compute power are often talked about, but what is the real value delivered to us by all of this compute power?  Well … massively efficient solar power would be a heck of a reward.  From the article:

Supercomputers are enabling an entire new area of materials. No longer do scientists have to physically create samples of every possible material in the lab, only to test and document everything they find about it. Today they can set up a series of parameters and instruct a supercomputing machine to find the one that best aligns with their desires, wants and wishes. And while such computations often takes many days or even weeks for each trial material, it’s more economical and feasible than the old route. Plus, it enables materials like these which were, in this context, accidentally discovered using computers.

It is this ability to simulate and iterate - at incredible speeds - that allows us to evaluate the massive numbers of permutations and combinations to discover these types of solutons.

The second impressive aspect of this discovery, to me, is that we are now finding new uses for common foundation materials.  We are now beginning to discover the unique ways in which materials can be combined to create just the right conditions to product energy from something as common as sunlight.  If we can now rapidly transform this type of discover into an actual commercial material - which might take years - it could have immeasurable impacts of the lives of humans all over the globe.

Telepresence is the ability to be present somewhere else … so that you can interact with the world at that remote location without actually being there.  Companies like Cisco are working on this for various communications solutions … so that you can have virtual meetings or present at a conference when you are not actually there.

Last week I found the iRobot ConnectR which is an impressive start.  The ConnectR is referred to as a Virtual Visiting Robot and is built on the same iRobot Roomba vaccum platform.  It is able to leverage all of the features of that platform, including the transport, navigation, and auto-recharge/dock features … but probably without the vacuum.  What has been added instead is a tilting webcam, microphone, and speakers … along with a Wifi wireless radio.  Once you have purchased this unit, you can put the charging station in a corner, and then remotely - either from your home, or across the globe - connect to the ConnectR.  You can then “drive” it around your house … looking through the webcam, and listening through the microphone … and then even talk to anyone or anything that might be around.  You could be using this to check on your house, your pets, your children, or even your parents.  And yes … iRobot is already exploring the various issues of security, and how you control access to the ConnectR remotely … and also how you can locally disable the robot.  This robot is currently in pilot/beta, and is estimated to cost $499.99 … so not the cheapest … but as an owner of a Roomba I can guess the quality will be there.

Yesterday on my way home from Oakland, California I was flying on Southwest Airlines and found yet another iteration of the commodity telepresence robot … and this one is also very impressive.  It’s being promoted as a “toy” byt Erector … yes, the folks that used to make Erector Sets.  Erector has since been bought by Nikko, an innovative manufacturer of electronic toys … which are growing rapidly in capabilities.  The Spykee Robot is a base platform with treaded tracks containing a Wifi radio and basic processor.  This basic platform is designed to allow the owner (uh … not just kids … I want one!) to build a “torso” using Erector Set parts.  There are supposed to be three models coming … with slightly different parts … and I’m sure a bunch of add-on kits.  On the torso is again a webcam, speakers, a microphone, and various lights.  The Spykee also has a PC “control panel” application that allows you to remotely - in your house, or across the globe - connect to the Spykee and cruise around interacting with the world.  There is also a “security” feature which allows the Spykee to be watching via it’s webcam, and to e-mail you photos when motion is detected.  The Spykee appears to be close to shipping in the UK … Amazon says that the US availability is November 15th … list price of $299.99.

While investigating the Spykee, of course I came across the Wow Wee Rovio.  This is another $299.99 remote telepresence robot, with a browser based control panel.  The three wheeled unit contains the processor, Wifi radio, webcam, microphone and speaker, along with some sort of optical tracking - similar to the iRobot units.  There is a docking station for recharging, and optional tracking beacons that canbe bought - I’m guessing - to enhnace the navigation of the robot around your house.  This unit appears to be available now in the US, and I’m surprised I haven’t seen one in the stores yet.

What is impressive is that these last two units are now below $300 for a complete - basic - telepresence robot.  The example videos provided by both companies demonstrate both home and office uses, and begin to move into the home security space … and even the home video surveillance space.  As we saw with the prices on Wifi Access Points, and other hardware … I can only expect it to continue to fall.

The next area that I am going to look at for these robots, and something that I believe will be important for success, will be the “hackability” of the control protocols.  How easy will it be for hackers to begin to enhance the controlling applications, and for the robots to be integrated into more extensive applications?  Imagine when someone has created the automatic search and mapping application for the Rovio or Spykee that allows someone to release dozens of these into an unknown building and have the robots quickly survey the inside and report back what they find.  What other applications are going to emerge?  Maybe I can rent a remote Rovio to explore a remote location that I otherwise might never visit!  Explore the Louvre after hours?  Visit underground caverns on the other side of the planet?  Hmmm … maybe there is a interesting business model in there somewhere … 

HUD Homes are an interesting opportunity for home buyers, and also investors, who want to purchase a home in almost any state across the country.  A “HUD Home” is one that is being sold by the Department of Housing and Urban Development.  When someone with an FHA-insured mortgage can’t make the payments, the lender forecloses on the home and HUD takes ownership.  It is then offered for sale at market value, based on a recent AS-IS appraisal, meaning, the market value in its current condition.  Obviously with the current financial market, the number of available HUD properties has doubled over the last 6 months, and some states have thousands of available properties.
HUD properties are made available in a variety of ways, with an emphasis on “Owner Occupied” purchases that include the “Good Neighbor Next Door” buying opportunities for “Law enforcement officers, pre-Kindergarten through 12th grade teachers and firefighters/emergency medical technicians.”  This last group of individuals can get incredible discounts on the purchase of a HUD property.  The prices on HUD Homes tend to be very price competitive in the areas where they are located, and each will have an associated Property Condition Report.

When watching the prices on the homes, you might notice a common pattern as a particular home stays on the market.  The home will be listed, and be available to “Owner Occupants” … meaning that you must live in the home as your primary residence if you purchase it.  If the home is not sold in a week or so, then the status will change to “All Bidders” … meaning that anyone can now bid to purchase the property for any purpose.  If the home still does not sell, it is common that the price will then be reduced by a full 10%, and the status will return to “Owner Occupants” again.  This process will repeat until the home sells.  Owner occupant, all bidders, price reduction … and on and on.

Our current website aggregates the details of all available HUD Homes across the country, and provides a variety of ways to search, map, and “favorite” any property in the database.  We’re continuing to add features to automate your monitoring of a property and the status changes, and also to engage with a HUD Authorized Real Estate Agent, who can assist you with navigating the various issues in researching and eventually purchasing a HUD property.

To me, it has been a fun project to learn more and more about HUD Homes, and how they work … and the opportunities that exist.  I’m not yet sure if the real estate market is close to the bottom yet, but I’m watching homes in a wide range of cities across the nation for an eventual investment opportunity.

Check out the website and let us know what you think!

CollegeFootball.com has become an interesting experiment that involves a social network with news and information services. We are now evolving that platform to see what gains traction with the fan base, and what features the average College Football fan is after.  Thee are, of course, the fans wanting to find out game information, standings, ratings, and othere team related information, but then there is also all of the “social” aspects of College Football that we are wanting to support and promote.

The Social Network
The site is built around a foundation of a social network and user-generated content.  Anyone can come and join the site, they are then able to invite friends, search for friends, and form on-line relationships.  One area that we expanded on is the relationships.  Instead of just having “friends” we chose to implement multiple levels of relationships - Close Friends, Friends, Family, and Acquaintance - so that you can more precisely control who is able to see your content, and how they interact with you.

The User Content
The user contributed content is currently in the form of posts, or articles, photos, and events.  We’ll soon be adding videos also.  On all contributions the fan is able to specify the “visibility” or who is able to see that particular piece of content. The choices are Close Friends, Friends, Family, Acquaintance, and Public … with Public being the default.  With the additional levels of relationships and the visibility flags, a fan could share posts, photos, or events with Close Friends and no one else.  They could also share them with Family, which would then make them visible to Family, Friends, and Close Friends.

The other important attribute that can be assigned to any post, photo, or event are a Primary and Secondary School.  This allows the fan to relate their content to schools or teams so that other fans can search and locate content related to their favorite - or not so favorite - teams.  These assignments also allow the site to associate content with particular school pages, and also make it more visible to our “governing users” … which I’ll touch on later.

Posts
Posts, or articles, are like very simple blog posts.  Right now we do not offer a rich-text editor (which is coming) and inserting images in posts is a manual process, but we’ll be improving this in the coming weeks.

Photos
Fans are able to create Photo Albums and then upload images to their albums.  Again, the visibility features allow very fine grained control of who is able to see what photos.  Within an album, individual photos can have different visibility settings allowing some photos to be seen only by Close Friends, and others by Family.

Events
With all of the activities surrounding College Football, events are a way for fans to announce tailgate parties, other pre-game events, post game celebrations, and even places where games can be watched together.  As with the other content types, the visibility can be set, and the events can also be associated with a school or schools.  We’ll also be adding some invite and reminder capabilities to the events.

Commenting
All of the content types on CollegeFootball.com can be commented on by registered users.  The commenting system provides for two levels of commenting … comments being made directly on any piece of content, and then replies to comments.  The replies are only one-level deep, meaning that you can not reply to a reply.  When comments are made, the content owner is notified via e-mail, and when replies are made both the content owner, and original commenter are notified by e-mail.

As of this coming weekend we’ll be deploying a new build which will add Profile Commenting, or writing public comments on other fans profiles.  We haven’t nailed down what we’ll call this feature … writing on a fan’s what?  Feel free to comment below with suggestions if you have any!

From the Fans
As fans contribute content, all of the content marked as Public can then be viewed on our From the Fans page.  Registered users can then also rate (Cheer!), and comment on the content.  There are a number of filters that can be modified on the From the Fans page to customize the view and assist fans in finding what they are interested in.  The first level is “Most Recent” or “Most Popular”.  The default is Most Recent and shows the content most recently contributed on the site.  The Most Popular sorts the content based on the number of Cheers (votes) that a piece of content has received.  Additional sorting and filtering are by the content type, allowing for only viewing posts or photos or events, and also the timeframe of contributions.

A fan is also able to view the contributions by school or team.  By making this selection they can drill down to user content that is only related to a team they are truly a fan of.

Governing Users
Also core to the design of the platform is a concept that we call Governing Users … these are “editors” or users who can be given control of “promoting” certain content to school pages that are under their control.  When we grant Governing User privileges to a user we also pick the pages they have authority over.  For example we might give one user authority over the University of Utah page, and another user authority over the Army and Navy pages.  From then on, as they explore the site and the fans content they see a small icon that allows them to “promote” that piece of content to a public school page.  The governing user, when they click that link, is presented with the list of pages they have authority over along with date selectors on when they want that content to appear and be removed from that page.

Governing Users are then able to use the From the Fans page to also look for interesting content, and promote the content that they feel would be the biggest contribution to fans of a particular school or team.  It is this feature that then splits the site into two completely different “sides” of the site - the general public user contributions, and content that is deemed as being worthy of showcasing.  Both sides are always visible and accessible, and then both serve different purposes.

What’s next?
There is a lot more that I could talk about … and a lot more coming … but it’s been fun so far.  The one thing that we did is make the entire platform independent of the specific content.  So although this is currently College Football related, we could use this same platform for any type of social network that comes along.  We already have some leads on additional domain names where we might apply the platform … it’ll be fun to see how it goes.

Please go and check out the site … use the Feedback button on each page to give us feedback (being nice of course, and understanding that we built this - from scratch - in 8 weeks!) … I really want to hear from fans what they like, what they don’t, and what needs to be added!

While some people are still endlessly yelling at Flickr for the new video features, some others are experimenting around it. Especially the one that were already experimenting with pictures, doing collages, blanding, panoramics or any kinf of litle planets. On of my contact on Flickr is PaintMonkey, a very inspired photographer when it comes to photocollages. His photostream is really amazing and creative. He recently explored around the concept of “long photos” (as Flickr calls its videos) and quickly came with some collages experiments. As I was by my side discovering Motion 3 and its stabilization features, I came up with this Stabilized Collage experiment.I am really impressed about the simplicity and the quality of Motion’s stabilization features. It’s really quick and simple to work with. The first time I really got the stabilization concept was when I saw the stabilized version of the JFK assassination Zapruder’s video. At this time, I guess this has been done by hand, frame after frame, but now it’s as easy as click-and-process.

He has posted several other examples of his work - HipHop By The Canal, Skatepark At The Canal, Late Sunday Morning At The Farmers market, Stabi Portrait B. v4 - along with his Stabilized Video Collages, How-To.  All of these make me think about what could be possible with this … as an art form, and other possible uses.
There are the immediate thoughts about using several cameras to record at the same time, and then sync up the videos … versus one camera recording the same scene (slightly offset) at different times.  The creation of huge panoramic videos becomes possible as very affordable prices.  I also started to think about the creation of a collage of an outdoors scene that would be made up of video taken from the four different seasons … mixing the beauty of each season into one field of view.
Amazing … “click-and-process” … compute power, and the complexity of software is ever increasing … and amazing works like this show up!

Carver Mead, Internationally known author and educator; Holder of the National Medal of Technology; Founder of twenty-five companies; Gordon and Betty Moore Professor of Engineering Emeritus, California Institute of Technology

Some of his work includes the foundation technology behind Foveon, “a world innovator in the design and development of image sensors and image capture systems for a wide range of digital capture products.” If you aren’t familiar with his company, you can read about the Foveon technology … it is amazing, and well know to extreme photographers. In additional this year another company with his involvement Audience presented here … creating sound processing silicon modeled after the human ear and brain.

Part of the introductory presentation was by Louisa Gilder, who wrote the book The Age of Entanglement: When Quantum Physics Was Reborn. She gave a brief history of the debates that go back to the 1930’s about quantum theories, and the various experiments up through the work of John Bell.

Carver was introduced by Lloyd Watts, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Audience. Lloyd had been a student of Carver’s at CalTech. He did a wonderful introduction and thanked Carver for the impact that Carver has had on so many people’s lives … including his won.

Carver begin his presentation by talking about research that has shown the inaccuracy of perception and reality … and how that relates to human behavior. He had one study that showed where the bottom quarter of a class, who had taken a test and were in the bottom 10 percentile, tended to think they had not done that bad … even above average. While the best and brightest who were in the top quarter … scoring in the 90th percentile … tended to question how well they had done … and were unsure of their ability … and tended to guess lower than they had done. His point was how real genius is often able to question their own knowledge, and to be open to what they do not know … to always question their own knowledge, and to “push the limits of human knowledge.”

He ventured into a philosophical conversation about creativity and genius. He questioned where ideas come from … true inventions or innovation. He touched on eastern thoughts where they believe that all things undiscovered, and un-manifested, exist in the “darkness”. They exist, but have not yet been found by us … and will only be found when we choose to explore the darkness searching for them. He expressed that this is only one way to view this phenomenon, and that we each have our own ways to clear our minds, to explore the darkness, and to create. I enjoy thinking about this as I find the most powerful way for me to “explore the darkness” is to break my usual patterns, and to do those things that i wouldn’t usually do … do go and do things that I usually wouldn’t.

Carver then talked about the power of words. The importance of words. How the words that we choose to use define the context that we operate within. He talked about the ways that people begin to create models of new concepts … and that the language that they use to define these new models automatically begin to limit themselves. I have also been taught this same idea from numerous sources … that as we grow up we begin to become “loose” with our language, and underestimate the power of what we say … and don’t say. We often use “weak” words, and express disbelief and disappointment. We hear stories about the power of positive thinking, but fail to realize how much of this is expressed in our speaking. If we are not always thinking and speaking in a positive way, it can poison our whole way of being. This includes how we talk about ourselves, others, and what we are up to in life.
The next area of conversation that Carver explored was the extension of our senses. He expressed that when he is working on his research, and looking at an oscilloscope connected to some semiconductors, he is not looking at the waveforms but instead using that as a way to visualize in his mind the individual electrons flowing through the semiconductor. He related this to using a hammer … talking about when you first started using a hammer for the first time, it was awkward and you fought to control the direction and impact. But as you become better and better with using a hammer, it actually starts to become an extension of you … and you begin to gain control over directing the impact, and also sensing if you made good impact with your target. Likewise he said that as you gain skill at using any tool, you can allow that tool to become an extension of you … and and to allow that tool to give you new ways to see what is going on.
As he wrapped up, he posited that all matter is waves … there are no particles … no points of energy. All matter is waves. Nothing but waves. The energy of matter is it’s frequency, and it’s wavelength is one over the momentum … the vector of momentum. I had to stop taking notes to focus on what he was saying, but it was an incredible way to visualize matter. He talked about electron not being in “shells” or “orbits” around the nucleus, but instead to consider that electrons take on different “wave functions” wrapped around the nucleus. He then also discussed how due to the charges, and the electrons wanting to avoid each other, they are forced to take on different wave functions in avoidance. Some of these wave functions can become more and more convoluted, and then can become “smoothed” when these atoms get near other atoms … creating molecules. And that the binding nature of molecules is formed by the more natural wave functions that are formed through the combination of atoms.

There is so much more that he said that I didn’t get down in notes … I really wish that Gilder would post the podcasts and vidcasts of these presentations … they are an outstanding source of new perspectives. Carver Mead is an amazing man … what a contribution to society.

Well … there are a number of vendors that provide the bulk of the equipment, and within that equipment there are providers of the subcomponents and silicon behind the massive amounts of bandwidth provided by the Internet. Cisco, Juniper, and Alcatel add up to 90% of the market for the really high-end backbone switching and routing gear.

The dominant solution in this space is using DWDM - Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing - to place multiple colors of light on the same fiber, with each color carrying it’s own data. The current “commodity” speeds that are being sold are running at 40Gbps per link, and these are then installed in 4, 8, and 16+ slot chassis providing up to 1.2+Tbps packet switching speeds. Yes … that is 1.2 Terabits per second … 1.2 trillion bits per second … or about 120 billion characters per second. Kinda’ fast.

Some of the presenters today were Infinera, Luxtera, Photonic, and BroadLight. If you want to learn more about DWDM … Infinera has some cool videos that provide some details about their products on the Infinera Videos page. Their first video demonstrates how DWDM works …

During the presentations, there were a few stats that really stood out to me. One of these was the current average backbone bandwidth, per US carrier. Here is the US, although the presented admitted that it varies, the average was pegged at about 400Gbps+ on their backbone links. The key is that the estimates are an average of a 75% growth in the next year!

One of the examples of the calculations was based on taking this forward for 10 years … so if the internet grows at 70% per year for 10 years … using the current 40Gbps DWDM optical technologies:

• 15 million DWDM transponders will have to be added
• 165 million mechanical fiber couplings will have to be installed
• 4 GigaWatts of additional power will be required
• AND … In 10 years, they would be installing 4000 DWDM transponders PER DAY …
• … requiring 2000+ more technicians!

Infinera was presenting on their upcoming 100Gbps optical technologies, and also mentioned their eventual 400Gbps product, followed by 1Tbps, 2Tbps, and 4Tbps chipsets. Obviously as they - and other companies - are able to deliver these higher capacity solutions, there will be smaller numbers of units required to keep pace.

To me it’s impressive to see that people are working on creating these next-generation solutions to boost the capabilities offered …. to ensure that the Internet backbones can keep pace with the demands for bandwidth being created by us users.

There is a lot going on in the industry to cope with Internet bandwidth demands …

Green Fuel - one of his investments, is exploring the use of algae to create feed, food, and fuel from the CO2 emissions from smokestacks. Dried Whole Algae can be used for feed and food. (He explained that Omega-3 fatty acids that we get from fish actually comes from the algae they eat … and suggested that we “cut out the middle fish”), Algae Oil can be used for biodiesel. Dilapidated meal can be used for foods. The “carbon credits” can also be gained … but are insignificant.

He also suggested that “Green” is not necessarily the right “color” to call the clean energy movement. It turns out that the “Greens” in the political realm seem to be more than just “Environmentalism”, but also Anti-technology, Anti-capitalism, Anti-trade, and Anti-American. All of these are not going to solve some of the real big challenges. Bob suggested that we consider it the “Blue” movement … he believes that the best solutions will be related to the sky, and oceans. His mantra is “cheap and clean” energy.

Bob briefly reviewed some of his other investments - Mintera is one of his investments, and they are doing 40Gbps Long Haul DWDM Optical Transmission solutions … allowing people to telecommute. SiCortex is creating supercomputer Linux Clusters … delivering more compute power per dollar, per foot, per watt. Ember which is creating control systems using Zigbee Standard CMOS Radios and Protocol Stack. Infinite Power Solutions which is creating Solid-state Thin-film Lithium-ion Batteries with nearly unlimited recharge cycles.  He also mentioned I366 Technologies (which I couldn’t find) that are creating next generation Silicon Solar Cells, and SiOnyx who are creating Black Silicon which has very useful photonic properties.

He stressed that Energy creation and usage are not directly tied to the Environment. They are both very independent issues.  If Global Warming were solved tomorrow, we would still want cheap, clean energy! The solutions - if we want them - to Global Warming are about Climate Control! He questioned where the real research is going on related to numerous climate control solutions.

He ended by joking about the day that we would get to ask the United Nations “Now that we can control the planet’s temperature … exactly what temperature do you want the earth to be?”

Yeah … that would be the day … I’m sure they already have that all figured out. Oh … and there would be no side effects at all to stopping the variations in planetary temperatures … right!

Nicholas reviewed the implications of Rethinking the Data Center: Virtualization of computing and storage, Consolidation, Programmable environments, Automated management, Multi-Tenant facilities, and Energy Efficiencies.  For anyone familiar with what Amazon is up to with AWS, and now Google with the Google Application Engine (GAE) this is all well known.
The next presentation was by Andrew Odlyzko who spoke about the Exaflood … the growth of Internet traffic. It was filled with facts about the current state of Internet traffic … and some predictions on the future.  One interesting fact … right now, the growth rate is actually slowing, even though the hype is accelerating.  Internet traffic growth is occurring … just not as fast as it has in the past.
Here are some of the more interesting numbers that Andrew talked about:

• Qwest CTO Estimate: IP traffic to go from 9 PB/day in 2007 to 21 PB/day in 2012
• Reference: http://www.ofcnfoec.org/Materials/08_Plenary_Poll.pdf
• Yes … that is Petabytes per day!
• Estimates for Internet traffic growth rates
• mostly in the 50%-60% per year range
• With 50% growth rates offset by 33% decline in cost … not much change in overall costs to support new levels of traffic.
• Year-end 2006 worldwide  numbers:
• digital storage: 185,000 PB
• Internet traffic: 2,500 PB/month
• Year-end 2006 US Internet traffic per capita:
• 2GB/month
• TV consumption ~40GB/month (assumes 3hr/day, 1Mbps, no HDTV)
• TV/Video over the Internet will add *some* traffic, but not massive new numbers
• Wild numbers about revenues to providers.  Revenue per MB:
• SMS = $1000 / MB
• Cell voice calls = $1 / MB
• Wireline voice calls = $.10 / MB
• Residential Internet = $.01 / MB
• Backbone Internet = $.0001 / MB

The last figure that was shared during the panel discussion was that Eric Schmidt indicated last month that Google is currently accepting 10 hours of YouTube video per minute!  That comes to 14,400 hours of video PER DAY being uploaded to YouTube … absolutely amazing volume of data.

Last night we took a great cruise on the Adirondack - a 115′, three deck ship - that cruised around the islands at sunset while we had dinner on board. It was fun to meet some of the other attendees, and the evening wrapped up with a couple of brief presentations by two authors of current books Lawrence Solomon, Author of The Deniers, and Howard C. Hayden, Author of A Primer on CO2 and Climate. It was really good to hear different opinions about global warming, alternate sources of information, and new places to read more about some current theories and measurements. I’ll read the books and then see what I think.

This morning kicked off with George Gilder giving an introduction to this years Telecosm, and then Steve Forbes talking about his opinions on the current financial and economic trends in our country. Overall, he is much more bullish about things, and although he acknowledges that the Federal Reserve has made some errors, he seems to believe that we have a lot of opportunity before us. He feels that oils prices are currently a bubble, and that if you measure oil as a comparison to gold prices, the increase is not as large as claimed. He does feel that a change in monetary policies is going to burst the oil bubble. He is worried about a number of tax cuts that are going to be coming up for renewal in 2010 - capital gains and death taxes - both of which could reduce available capital for entrepreneurs and capitalists.  Steve is always great to listen to …

First, I’m using AsteriskNOW v1.0.2 and it includes the ability to add VoicePulse as a Service Provider out of the box. They actually provide support for several different providers, however I got VoicePulse as a recommend from a friend of mine. I figured that their rates looked very good, and I’d give it a try and see how things went …

The first step in setting up AsteriskNOW to use VoicePulse is to set-up your VoicePulse account. That involves going to their website, and creating an account … and purchasing your initial credit with them. Once you fill out the information on their on-line form, they will e-mail you a credit card authorization agreement, which you have to complete and fax back to them. If you then call them they will grab your fax and activate your account. Once that is completed, the will give you the password to your account so that you can log into the VoicePulse Connect portal … where you manage your VoicePulse account and get all of the details to get things configured.

Once you can log into your VoicePulse account, you’ll want to go to the Credentials tab on the UI. This is where you’ll find your Login and Password for your channels. Now, I’ll do my best to explain channels here … since your base VoicePulse account comes with four of them. Channels are “like” phone lines, but do not necessarily have a phone number associated with them. What value is that? Well … you can make outbound calls. So with a base account, you get the ability to make four simultaneous outbound calls, and you’re charged by the minute to use them. Now you might be asking “What caller ID will show up to the people I am calling?” .. I asked that also. Asterisk allows you to assign that value when you configure your system! Any how … I digress …

So now that you have your VoicePulse credentials, the next step is to put those into AsteriskNOW. If you login to your AsteriskNOW admin web page, you can go to the Service Providers menu, and click the Add Service Provider button. Select a Provider Type of VoIP, and you’ll then see VoicePulse listed. When you select VoicePulse, you then be prompted for the Username and Password that you got from your VoicePulse Credentials web page. Enter both values, and click Save.

You should now see your VoicePulse account appear in your List of Service Providers. That is almost all ther eis to do! I did change one additional setting to get things going … I had read this on a page that I had Googled. To the right of your new entry, there is a pull-down menu labeled Options … select that menu, and then choose Advanced. On the dialog that appears, I put the value 5060 in the Port field. Click Update and you are done!

What is amazing is that you are now ready to go! That’s all there is to it. If you are familiar with Asterisk, you can now begin to configure both incoming and outgoing configurations! In my case I wanted to configure two additional items - a DialPlan that allowed me to make use of these new lines, and also add a new incoming number (DID).

To add access to these lines, I simply went into the Calling Rules in the AsteriskNOW admin portal, and added a new Calling Rule into my DialPlan … since I’ve been using the “dial 9″ and “dial 8″ convention for my other lines, I added a rule to “dial 7″ to use the new VoicePulse channels. Done.

Then, to add my new phone number I simply went back to the VoicePulse portal, and selected their Numbers tab at the top. Scrolled down to where it says Add Phone Numbers I then selected my state, selected the area code, and then the city … and then chose a phone number. Clicking the Activate Selected button then activated my new number. Now to configure AsteriskNOW … I went back to my AsteriskNOW portal, and chose the Incoming Calls menu item. I then clicked the Add an Incoming Rule button and defined my new rule … All Unmatched incoming calls, from provider VoicePulse, to extension 5000 (one of my Ring Groups). Done.

Within 30 minutes, I called my new VoicePulse phone number, and my Ring Group was ringing … all too simple. I also went and grabbed a copy of X-Lite … a free SIP phone … and pointed it at my AsteriskNOW box … it connected right up and is working great!

Well, Beta 6 was released a while ago, and I’m now wanting to add some new ITSP (Internet Telephony Service Provider) services, and remote “over the Internet” phone extensions. In talking with the ITSP support people, I really needed to update to the released version of AsteriskNOW … v1.0.2 … and so I started looking around for the instructions on doing it … which wasn’t easy to locate. After the right combinations of keywords, Google finally pointed me at this article - [*NOW-1.0.1] Status: RELEASED!! (Officially) - which got me going in the right direction. As I’m walking through the steps right now, I figured that I would write about my experience … and add some more detail of my experiences …

1. SSH into your AsteriskNOW box … using ‘admin’ and your password
2. At the command prompt, you now want to use the following command to update ‘distro-release’:
• sudo conary update distro-release
3. You will see the output of the command scroll by, as the latest configuration settings and information for AsteriskNOW are retrieved
4. When the update is completed, you’ll be dropped back to the command prompt
5. Open a browser and point it to the rPath Appliance Platform Agent: http://{yourServer}:8002/rAA
6. When the page opens, you’ll be asked to login. If you have never logged in here before, the default username is ‘admin’ and password is ‘password’. When doing this the first time you’ll have to complete a series of questions to configure this.
7. Once you are logged into the rAA, there are a series of navigation links going down the left side … select “System Updates”
8. On the page that appears, click the button to “Check” now for updates!
9. You will see the page update with the status as the list of required updates is acquired.
10. When this stage of the process is completed, the page will refresh, and a new button will appears that will allow you to “Apply” the updates.
11. Click the Apply button. (Easy .. huh?)
12. Now, you’ll get to watch the process of downloading and installing all of the required packages. In my case there were 154 packages, and the process was filled with all sorts of downloads, installs … and delays. And more delays. Why I’m writing this blog post is due to the huge delay that I am experiencing now … with 124 of 154 downloads done … and installing 118 of 154 updates. In reading more on-line … it appears that these hangs are common. Bummer.
13. After 30+ minutes of hanging … I clicked away from the System Updates page. I then got back to it, but had all sorts of errors … crap … crap … crap …
14. Chose the Reboot option. Said small prayer …
15. Server failed to come up … went downstairs … it was shutdown. I powered it up …
16. Came back to the rPath Appliance Platform Agent: http://{yourServer}:8002/rAA
17. Had to accept a few more wizard questions … then I got back to the rAA page with left navigation links.
18. Select “System Updates” … again …
19. Now I have 68 downloads, and they are downloading and installing …
20. After the process completes … you are told that the services are restarting!
21. Reboot your server … just to clean things up …
22. Go back into the rPath Appliance Platform Agent: http://{yourServer}:8002/rAA
23. Select “System Updates” … mine had one more ‘kernel’ erase to get rid of an old kernel.
24. Point your browser at the AsteriskNOW box … and …
25. And now … it still doesn’t work! Crap … crap … double-crap!
26. I started to ask questions on the #asterisknow irc channel … (Thanks bkruse!)
27. Looking in the logs I found an error loading modules from a bad path /usr/lib64/asterisk … I’m not using a 64 bit machine …
28. SSH into your AsteriskNOW box … there is an error in the /etc/asterisk/asterisk.conf file …
29. At the prompt enter: sudo vi /etc/asterisk/asterisk.conf
• for some reason there was a reference to the /usr/lib64 directory for modules …
• look for the line that reads: astmoddir => /usr/lib64/asterisk/modules
• edit that line to now read: astmoddir => /usr/lib/asterisk/modules
• save the file and then reboot the box .. again …
30. Alrighty … open your browser and go to the admin page … crap. Nothing.
31. More questions on the #asterisknow irc channel … (more thanks to bkruse!)
32. SSH in to your AsteriskNOW box … again …
33. At the prompt enter: sudo vi /etc/asterisk/http.conf
• look for the line that reads: ;prefix = asterisk
• edit the line to now read: prefix =
• save the file and then reboot the box … again.
34. Point your browser at the rPath Appliance Platform Agent: http://{yourServer}:8002/rAA
35. You should be done now!

Now … I’m guessing that I could have maybe just done a good backup, and then installed the Release v1.0.2 and then restored from backup … however I couldn’t find ANY documentation that explained if that would work.

Also, your own experience might vary … from reading comments on the web page above, it seems that people have had hangs and lock-ups multiple times, and at different places during the update.  It seems that I was able to recover from most of the issues that I ran into.  The biggest resources in this case were Google and the IRC channel … using both of these allowed me to complete this process … although it took me the better part of the day to do so.  Another key to debugging was the various log files … make sure to look in /var/log/asterisk/messages … lots of good stuff there.

Even with all of the hassles, I have to admit that I am really impressed by Asterisk.  The next steps for me are to upgrade the cards that I’m using in the box … I’ve got some older X100P cards, and they work … but the quality is not the best.  I’m now about to sign up for VoicePulse to get new phone service for my wife’s business.  This will be the next step in using Asterisk for me.  Lastly, I ordered a S101I IAXy to create a remote line at her travel office in Salt Lake City.  Once I get that installed and working, we’ll be able to integrate with their PBX and have her admin answer the phone for her when she is not available …

I’m looking forward to having it all working!  If it goes well, then I’m buying a second phone number from VoicePulse for my new company …

Neural implants continue to make huge advances, and the probes and various hardware required are also advancing rapidly. When you look at companies like Cyberkinetics (Actually Cyberkinetics Neurotechnology Systems, Inc. with R&D here in Salt Lake City, Utah) they have an expanding product line which includes the BrainGate Neural Interface System:

The BrainGate Neural Interface System is an investigational medical device that is being developed to improve the quality of life for physically disabled people by allowing them to quickly and reliably control a wide range of devices including computers, environmental controls, robotics and medical devices.

Besides the presentations about Jesse Sullivan - the “bionic man” - that I have seen, I just saw the most impressive demonstrations on YouTube … of course. I was actually watching the History Channel at home the other night and saw a short clip about the Roborat. Well … YouTube had the Roborat video, and if you haven’t seen it …. you’ve got to watch it. Researchers have now inserted probes into the brain of a rat to allow remote control of the rat! They even added a wireless webcam to allow the controller to see what the rat is seeing.

The part of this that is wild is that neural stimulation is being used to both cause the rat to turn left or right, but also to stimulate the pleasure center of the brain to provide reinforcement for the actions. The rat will continue to learn to “obey” the senses driving it, in order to gain the pleasure stimulation.

This is a variation of the research being done with monkeys and additional appendages. Check out this YouTube video of Monkeys controlling a Robotic Arm through thought! With arrays of neural probes inserted into their brain, a computer monitors the brain activity and moves the arm. The monkeys have actually learned how to control their brain activity to cause the intended motions. Feeding themselves with a robotic arm …

Now … if Ray Kurzweil is right, and we’ll eventually be able to perform neural stimulation through blood-borne nanomachines, then this type of work could be done non-invasively … or at least not having to go through the skull. Imagine that you might just get injected with a syringe of nanomachines that have the ability to stimulate your neurons … and turn you into a remote control human!

The Aptera Typ-1 details are amazing …

The Typ-1 uses a commoditized, ‘ruggedized’ 3-phase motor controller designed for vehicular applications, and a 3-phase motor made for us by a company here in Southern California. The rear drive suspension, and the drive reduction, are all designed and made by Aptera. Since the Typ-1e (electric) and the Typ-1h (series plug in hybrid) have different battery needs, this may result in different battery manufacturers for the two models. The Typ-1e is designed to use a 10 KWh pack, while the Typ-1h uses a smaller pack. The cycles and DOD are different for both applications. We will announce further information regarding the battery lifespan and warranty policy well before we begin manufacturing the Typ-1 next October.

Diesel or Gasoline? Our first prototype, the Mk-0, was a parallel hybrid Diesel and achieved an average of 230 MPG at a steady state of 55 MPH. This was pure Diesel/mechanical drive with no electric assist. Diesel is attractive for its Carnot efficiency and the increased enthalpy of Diesel fuel vs gasoline. However, diesel contains lots of unburned hydrocarbons and NOX compounds, and it’s impossible to get a small Diesel engine certified for emissions in California. Therefore, the typ-h uses a small, water-cooled EFI Gasoline engine with closed loop oxygen feedback and catalytic converter. This engine is coupled to a lightweight 12KW starter/generator. It’s very clean and quiet.

The design is three-wheeled, allowing it to be classified as a motorcycle in many states … and allowing it to use the commuter lanes. As for the performance?

With the All Electric Aptera, it is very easy to figure out the mileage range. The mileage is determined by the distance you can drive, under normal circumstances, until the batteries are effectively drained. In the case of the first Aptera typ-1e, we have calculated the range to be about 120miles.

With the Plug-in Electric Hybrid version of the Aptera(typ-1h) the mileage of the vehicle is difficult to describe with one number. For example, the Typ-1h can drive 40 to 60 miles on electric power alone. Perhaps for such a trip, the engine may only be duty-cycled for a few seconds or minutes. This would produce a fantastic number, an incredible number that, though factually true, would have no useful context, i.e. it’s just a point on a graph.

An asymptotic decaying exponential is an accurate way to describe the fuel mileage of the Typ-1h. For example driving say, 50 miles, one might calculate a MPG number that’s 2 or 3 times higher, say, 1000 MPG. As battery energy is depleted, the frequency of the engine duty cycle is increased. More fuel is used. at 75 miles, the MPG might be closer to 400 MPG. Again, we’re using battery energy mostly, but turning the engine on more and more. Just over 100 miles we’re just over 300 MPG, and just beyond 120 miles, we’re around 300 MPG.

So why pick a number at 120 miles? Well, it’s more than double of most available plug-in hybrid ranges that achieve over 100 MPG. It’s three times the distance of the typical American daily commute. It’s a meaningful distance that represents the driving needs of 99% of Americans on a daily basis. Sure, it’s asymptotic, after 350-400 miles it eventually plummets to around 130 MPG at highway speeds where it will stay all day until you plug it back in and charge it up.

And all of this for an estimated $30,000 sticker price! Read more of the Aptera facts and then think about driving one of these to work … I want one! The problem is that for now they are limiting the market to the LA area … bummer.