I have seen applications capable of sending information to Logitech LCD panels and played with that a bit a few years ago. Currently, I have four small LCD panels. Two are CrystalFontz 633s, one came from a 1U EMC data storage box and one was taken from an old ethernet-based KVM, so I've no idea what it's capabilities are. Using either Flex Builder or Visual Studio, is it possible to create either a webpage or an offline app, such as for Adobe Air, Mac Widget, or Windows 7 Gadget, that can check for and feed text to a USB- or serial-connected LCD device? If it's an offline app, it would be very convenient to be able to talk to web-based php scripts and relay that data back to the LCD.
PHP can talk to serial ports and fortunately for you someone has done the heavy lifting already:
http://code.google.com/p/php-serial/
After that it's just a question of talking to the LCD with whatever set of instructions it understands. That information should be in the developer manual unless you want to go the fun route and send random characters until something happens :)
Don't write directly to LCD's. That's just pain. Instead, write a tiny client application that will talk to your web server, and display the data on your LCD screens.
Related
I began thinking of a side-project recently that will make use of usb triggered relay switches to allow interaction between the internet and mechanical objects (something like click a button on a site and ring a real bell).
Now I have this part figured out but what I'd love to do is have this captured, live on streaming video via a webcam (and potential take a snapshot at a specific time). I'm pretty sure I'd have to use some sort of scripting language that can interact with hardware (flash/flex/silverlight). Also consider that this will be hosted locally, on the computer that has the webcam. Any Ideas? Thanks!
I would suggest writing a kiosk type of application in adobe air. You can capture the camera pretty easily and some simple network event listening to tell it when to snap some video.
Sounds somewhat interesting, if you need some help let me know (my stack nick has my email)
i have developed a webpage with joomla 1.5, now i need to convert my web application to mobile application. the user can download my application through mobile apple or etc then they can access. Tell any tips and kindly guide me...
You could take a look at phonegap ( http://phonegap.com/ )
It is a java framework that you can control with javascript to ring, vibrate, determine position, etc.
There are tutorials for how to make an application for every phone operating system, and they are pretty understandable for beginners. However, since you use joomla, your code has to run on a php server. (The tutorial covers only how to embed local html files in your app).
There are some tutorials out there that cover the use of phonegap with 'existing' websites. Google for it.
In the future, you might want to have a look at jquery mobile, there is an interface builder on their site http://jquerymobile.com/ and it is designed to look good on every device. You can use their themeroller and some additional css to achieve quite a nice app.
Suresh, because it will be important that your users interact with your server where your Joomla installation is hosted, it will be most feasible for you to create separate CSS stylings for your website that will be mobile specific.
Because Joomla has a user community, it is likely that plugins or templates have been written that can help speed this process up. Here's an extension that accomplishes some of what you're looking for, in-so-far as it will allow users on mobile phones to interact with your website via a browser in a comfortable way.
http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions/mobile/mobile-display/11722
Have you tried Mobile Joomla? It's a great extension that would be an easy first step to getting your site mobile-friendly.
"Mobile Joomla!® is the best way to mobilize your Joomla! site, displaying beautifully on iPhone, iPad, Android, Windows Phone and all other phones."
http://www.mobilejoomla.com/
for converting the existing web application to mobile application,you have to create web services of the web application and return the data in XML or json format.at the end of mobile development like on android plateform you have to parse those data on simulator,and this way you can test the application and use in mobile.
Humm joomla is not a good bet for mobile web apps. Even with adapted css and layouts, If you have a lot of extensions, some might break in mobile view.
I would build a a web app from scratch (using jquery mobile, that as a good cross platform support) and get the data from the original website. It might take a while longer, but the experience for your users will surely be better.
EDIT:
From what I gathered from your comments, it seems you want a landing page where people can download a "game" to their mobile phones, is that right? Please explain exactly what you want to accomplish so we might help you.
Here's a tricky one.
I'm developing a web app for iPads that will be installed as kiosks. The app is essentially a quiz. Wont need to store data in a database, but will need to process data from 1 page to another page (from questions page to results page).
Original solution was simple PHP. I have now been informed that wi-fi/3g will be unavailable to the kiosks, so they wont have access to the webserver w/ php that has been working like a charm. App needs to be browser-based.
Looked around for solutions for installing PHP on iPad, like PHPPOD from Cydia, but unsure if that is even an option for iPad...and we wont be jailbreaking them. Can this even be done w/o php?
If you won't be jailbreaking them, trying to get a working PHP interpreter on them might not be impossible, but it'll probably be at the very least annoyingly difficult (and it's unlikely Apple would approve random PHP interpreters in their app store).
I'd suggest trying to port the app to Javascript instead. If it's just a simple questions -> results flow, writing a basic Javascript web app with jQuery to help out if need be shouldn't be too painful.
If you're not jailbreaking them, then you will NOT be able to get any un-approved apps onto them. Apple does NOT want you to bypass the app store, because they want their 30% cut. Installing a PHP interpreter on an iphone/ipad would allow you to build apps outside of Apple's control - this is THE main reason why Flash will never been on an iphone - it's not just for playing movies, it's actually a pretty full runtime environment.
You could try using HTML5 local storage, or use the native SQLlite database in iOS.
Without wifi/3G you would need local storage won't you? For this you need not jailbreak your iPad & force it to work through PHP. You could do that following -
Jailbreak the app & maybe try to get your PHP solution working on iPad.
Build a native app with local storage (using sqlite or core data) & handle the display through UIWebView.
Build a HTML5 app with local storage is easy to do nowadays, again UIWebView would be used.
As Amber suggests, you could build all your quizzing logic in javascript, but I am concerned here as to where you'll store data. You need to refer to point 3.
Hope this helps...
i am planning to build a very simple mobile website which involves form submission and database storing, few years ago i have heard something called wap and wml to make these kind of webs, so i search on google for the IDE or the SDK, but it seems that all the pages regarding those is no longer available, i wonder....
anyway, what do people use nowadays to build mobile websites (because obviously, i am way left behind about this) ? if you don't mind, please provide me reading materials on how to build mobile websites today, thank you very much
what do people use nowadays to build mobile websites
HTML.
It depends,
Do you want to target high-end smartphones or older phones that only support basic HTML/CSS?
Typically most mobile websites work on a range of handsets and use HTML5 or XHTML-MP, if you need to support very old handsets you can use WML (otherwise don't bother).
WAP and WML are, as far as I'm concerned, effectively dead. Nobody uses them. It used to be the way mobile sites were built, but things have gotten much better.
These days your best bet is just to use HTML, CSS and JavaScript. You don't want to build a full desktop-style site though, you still want to build for low bandwidth consumption. Part of the issue is which platforms your are targeting. If you only care about iPhones, then it's really simple. You can build an test in Mobile Safari and be done with it. If you register for the Apple Developer Program, and download the XCode bundle, it includes a Mobile Safari emulator.
It's pretty easy to also support Android phones, as they use a very similar browser (Chrome/WebKit). It gets trickier when you want to include Blackberry or Windows Phone. Blackberry prior to OS version 6 has a terrible browser, which can only handle basic HTML, and limited or no CSS and JS. At this time I'm not aware of what the capabilities are on Windows Phone 7.
There are some JavaScript frameworks around that will help you add features to mobile sites via progressive enhancement, and they help you work with touchscreen events. Google for Sencha Touch and jQuery Mobile.
People tend to build mobile websites the same way they build standard websites: HTML, CSS, JS. See this article for a more in-depth look: http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2010/11/03/how-to-build-a-mobile-website/
If targeting high-end devices (iPhone, Android, iPad), you'd need to just get to know the browser application for those handhelds. Apple has lots of documentation on presenting web content for the iOS devices, and how to communicate different preferences to the browser (like should the page be able to be pinch-zoomed, or what image should be used for a shortcut icon if the user wants to save it to their springpad (larger image than a favicon)), like this guide for preparing content for the iPad.
I have a PHP/AJAX/MYSQL chat application. I want to add video chatting to my application. How can I create live video streaming to be used for live video conferences/chatting in a PHP application. What are the key-terms I need to know if I wanted to build such a system? Is it a good idea in the first place to use PHP? Is there something I'm not thinking about? What other languages can I use, perhaps in conjunction with PHP?
I am not saying that you have to abandon PHP, but you need different technologies here.
Let's start off simple (without Akamai :-)) and think about the implications here. Video, chat, etc. - it's all client-side in the beginning. The user has a webcam, you want to grab the signal somehow and send it to the server. There is no PHP so far.
I know that Flash supports this though (check this tutorial on webcams and flash) so you could use Flash to transport the content to the server. I think if you'll stay with Flash, then Flex (flex and webcam tutorial) is probably a good idea to look into.
So those are just the basics, maybe it gives you an idea of where you need to research because obviously this won't give you a full video chat inside your app yet. For starters, you will need some sort of way to record the streams and re-publish them so others see other people from the chat, etc..
I'm also not sure how much traffic and bandwidth this is gonna consume though and generally, you will need way more than a Stackoverflow question to solve this issue. Best would be to do a full spec of your app and then hire some people to help you build it.
HTH!
Please note that the below described service is no longer available as
it was based on FLV media (Flash)
This project which utilizes the Red5, Flex and PHP for Live Video Streaming and Recording has many features
Stream Live video to the viewers
Record the streams from your cam or other video input devices to the server
Preview the recorded streams and files and thumbnail the frame which you would like to display for the video.
Upload the videos from your computer and convert them to FLV which can be streamed using Red5 .
Choose from any resolutions
Can be plugged to any script
Each website user can have a separate Directory for storing their videos and thumbnails use this link
http://code.google.com/p/red5-flex-streamer/
PHP will let you build the pages of your site that make up your video conferencing and chat applications, but it won't deliver or stream video for you - PHP runs on the server only and renders out HTML to a client browser.
For the video, the first thing you'll need is a live streaming account with someone like akamai or the numerous others in the field. Using this account gives you an ingress point for your video - ie: the server that you will stream your live video up to.
Next, you want to get your video out to the browsers - windows media player, flash or silverlight will let you achieve this - embedding the appropriate control for your chosen technology into your page (using PHP or whatever) and given the address of your live video feed.
PHP (or other scripting language) would be used to build the chat part of the application and bring the whole thing together (the chat and the embedded video player).
Hope this helps.
PHP/AJAX/MySQL will not be enough for creating the live video streaming application There is a similar thread here. It primarily suggests using Flex or Silverlight.
For live video conferencing you can't ignore the need of a streaming server.
Yes, flash will let you display video from a webcam within the local flash control, but that won't let you then send that video over the network - for that you need a streaming server to send it to.
If you're going to build something like this it's prudent to think about how you're going to host the video from a very early stage as it will influence how you build the application. Flash/Flex/Silverlight/Windows Media....etc....
There are a lot of "off-the-shelf" 'servers' that will run in your environment.
Most of these utilize the aforementioned Flex or Silverlight to implement the actual video itself but I'm pretty sure all will run under LAMP/PHP.
The challenges will picking the best software from everything that's available and getting your hosting-provider to let you stream video (it goes without saying that streaming is heavy on bandwidth).
You can easily build a website as per the requirements. PHP will be there to handle the website development part. All the hosting and normal website development will work just as it is. However, for the streaming part, you will have to choose a good streaming service. Whether it is Red5 or Adobe, you can choose from plenty of services.
Choose a service that provides a dedicated storage to get something done right. If you do not know how to configure the server properly, you can just choose a streaming service. Good services often give a CDN that helps broadcast the stream efficiently. Simply launch your website in PHP and embed the YouTube player in the said web page to get it working.
Same problem/answer here, quoted below
I'm assuming you mean that you want to run your own private video
calls, not simply link to Skype calls or similar. You really have 2
options here: host it yourself, or use a hosted solution and integrate
it into your product.
Self-Hosted
----------------- This is messy. This can all be accomplished with PHP, but that is probably not the most advisable solution, as it is
not the best tool for the job on all sides. Flash is much more
efficient at a/v capture and transport on the user end. You can try to
do this without flash, but you will have headaches. HTML5 may make
your life easier, but if you're shooting for maximum compatibility,
flash is the simplest way to go for creating the client. Then, as far
as the actual server side that will relay the audio/video, you could
write a chat server in php, but you're better off using an open source
project, like
janenz00's mention
of red5, that's already built and
interfacing with it through your client (if it doesn't already have
one). Or you could homebrew a flash client as mentioned before and
hook it up to a flash streaming server on both sides...either way it
gets complicated fast, and is beyond my expertise to help you with at
all.
Hosted Service
----------------- All in, my recommendation, unless you want to administer a ridiculous setup of many complex servers and failure
points is to use a hosted service like
UserPlane or similar and offload all the
processing and technical work to people who are good at that, and then
worry about interfacing with their api and getting their client well
integrated into your site. You will be a happier developer if you do.