Checksum For Your Protection

I've just started playing with Python again.  Figured I update all my tools, including PyCharm which happens to be an excellent IDE BTW.  I noticed the checksum for the PyCharm executable but never knew of any Windows program to generate checksums.  I did some Googling and found out that Windows already has a tool built-in: certutil.  Wonderful.

To generate a SHA256 checksum for a file, all you need to do is is use -hashfile give it the file name and then specify the hash scheme.  For example:  

d:\certutil -hashfile pycharm-community-2016.1.exe SHA256
SHA256 hashof file pycharm-community-2016.1.exe:
3c b3 39 66 02 aa 0c 57 06 48 9e af 16 6b 4f 52 be 78 5b d7 17 da d5 49 21 20 f3 e4 de 25 91 cb
CertUtil: -hashfile command completed successfully.

Delete. Retry. Retry. Retry.

Been cleaning up my hard drive and came across a strange problem.  No matter what I did, I could not delete some directories.  The "Item Not Found" box kept popping up.  I can rename the files but I couldn't delete it.  I tried chkdsk with many, many options many, many times but it couldn't find the problem.  The only thing that worked was a little tool called DelinvFile.  I don't know how it works, but it just works.  If your are stuck in a similar problem, try it out.

Drone Building 101

Building a "Drone" is fun and easy once you get the basics down. This is the first episode in a series with the goal to build a general purpose "learner" quadcopter in the FAA registration exempt 250 gram class.

Drone Building 101

If you own a Roku box and ever searched around for content, you've probably come across the Revision3 channel.  Other than the Ben Heck Show, I never watched any of the shows like Hak5 because of the super silly names or the boring "me too" tech reviews.  Recently, I rediscovered Hak5 on my podcast player and I couldn't be more wrong.

Many of the shows really contain nuggets of useful information on interesting topics like software defined radio and virtual machines servers.  Recently, they are doing a series of episodes on scratch building drones.  The first episode discuses the overall process while future episodes will focus in on specific components.  Enjoy!

Toshiba Is Killing It.

I've need more storage for my computer.  Currently, I have two Seagate Barracuda 3TB drives in a software mirror configuration for  my vital "data."   I figured having a level of redundancy would buy me some time before needing backups.  Unfortunately, its been reported that Seagate Barracuda 3 TB drives have been failing like crazy.   Although I don't own the same exact model reported  but what happens if both my drives fail because of a systemic manufacturing flaw?  What to do?  Go to Micro Center!

I picked up a Toshiba X300 5TB drive for $139.99 which includes a $50 discount.  Amazing.  I don't think you can get a better deal than that at this moment.  I paid $103 for my 3 TB Seagate a little over a year ago.  

How well does the Toshiba drive perform compared to my Seagate Barracudas?  Pretty darn well.  In single queue and thread reads, the Toshiba does well.  On multiple queue and threads reads it does worst.  On all modes of writes, Toshiba is killing it.  Its 62% faster on single queue and thread 4K writes.  Toshiba is just killing it.  

How well does this Toshiba drive perform against my Intel 730 Series SSD drive.  Not well at all.  That's to be expected.  

Toshiba X300 5TB drive

Seagate Barracuda 3TB drive

Intel 730 Series 480 GB drive

Machine Learning For Cocktail Parties

I finally completed the MOOC from Columbia on Machine Learning for Data Science and Analytics and received my verified certificate.  I didn't mention this in my past post, but in the end I did decide to register for the verified course.  I was hoping it would improve.  As you can see, I think it was a total waste.  

This was by far THE worst and THE most expensive MOOC I've ever taken.  There was no math or any programming.  I did learn some information on interesting topics like genetics and depression etc but that's about it.  Nothing that was discussed about machine learning went beyond the superficial.  No a single formula on linear regression or logistic regression.  Not even a discussion on the differences between SVN or Neural Networks.  This was really a waste of my time.  I regret paying $99.   

Johnny-Five is Alive!

Last week, I attended a local JavaScript Meetup group.  This was a hands on workshop where we built simple circuits with Ardruino powered by Node.js and the Johnny-Five library.  Using only several lines of code,  its quite easy to control LED lights, read button presses and drive servo motors.

If you are interested in building your own system, you can follow the presentation here.  Now, if we could actually build robots that could battle each other.

Robot Sumo, as it is 'played' in Japan is truly a robot version of real sumo with all the action, excitement, and drama. For the latest robot news, information, reviews, hacks, photos, and videos with special on-site coverage direct from Japan, see Robots Dreams at http://www.robots-dreams.com.

T-Mobile and Google Fucked Me Over. Again.

If you ever played any of the X-Men versus Street Fighter series of arcade games with Infinite Combos, you know how it feels to be an Android user on T-Mobile.  You just get constantly beat up.

For the past several months, I've been using my glorious LG G4 without problem.  Then a few weeks ago, T-Mobile decided to OTA push Android Marshmallow.  During the update process my phone stopped working.  I tried rebooting it and it kept on crashing.  I tried wiping the system but it would either crash again immediately or go into restore mode and require my Google account authorization to unlock the phone and then crash.  No matter what I did it just kept crashing.  I tried pulling the battery out and reinserting it and then rebooting the phone for several days hoping it would actually startup again.  No dice.

Eventually, I called T-Mobile tech support for a replacement phone and they said they would ship me a replacement phone for $20 and that it would take 5 to 7 business days.  I waited for 8 business days and the phone didn't arrive.  I called up T-Mobile support and found out that tech support person never submitted the order for a new phone.  They did document in their system that the phone needed to be replaced.  After 5 days my new finally phone arrived.

All said and done, I had to wait 3 weeks to get my replacement phone.  To make matters work, due to all the skinning of the OS by LG I can't visually see the difference between Lollipop and Marshmallow.  I found out that the list of new features are pretty much meaningless to me.  I don't use Google Voice nor do I care about 200 new emojis or new wall paper themes.  Thanks for nothing Google and T-Mobile.

Stop Annoying iOS Updates ... NOW!!!

If you own an iPhone or iPad, you've definitely seen the above image before.  Probably a few times everyday.  No matter how many times you click "Later" it just doesn't seem to leave you alone.

In order to stop this message and to prevent future messages from appearing, you need to first delete the update and then disable automatic download.  The truth is, if you see this message on your device, the iOS update has been already downloaded. Your device is just pestering you for permission to apply the update.

To regain your sanity:

• Delete iOS update.  Go to Settings, General, Storage & iCloud Usage, and then Manage Storage.  Now scroll down and find the iOS update in question, tap it  and then select "Delete App."

OMG. Delete me!

• Disable automatic OS updates.  Go to Settings, iTunes & App Stores and deselect Updates.

No more, please!