Topic: I am in over my head. FREAK!

I want to make the transition when Chumby.com goes down but I am outclassed to do this. I don't even write html. It is just over my head. I wish there was a fix that was more for MS people and not for Linux people. I wish I could go with Linux but my brain cannot seem to wrap around it.  I would like to have a dozen apps or so  (Weather Happenings, couple of news apps, couple of rss feeds, gmail and aim mail) and be able to do most of the music things especially Pandora, Shoutcast, etc and  My Streams and Squeezebox. I can program a VCR and I do some computer stuff but this is hurting my brain to think about this and  it may frustrate me to death and I may end up drop kicking the Chumby out window. (I really don't want to do that because it really is a cool item). I read Zurk's manual some and 60% or more is not making it to my comfort center. I get the gist of what is needed but I haven't built my courage up to do it yet. I did download puTTY to my laptop but that is as far as I have gotten. Well, I did try out the online usb trick and it seems to do something. I can only get one app to work and it doesn't show the weather from my area. I tried to look into the app to change the area but I have no clue. DO I need to just sell this box on eBay and just dream about what Chumbyville would be like if I was more chumby literate? Is there a very,very siimple fix for this? Have mercy!

Owner of 3 Sony Dash, 2 Info 8.

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

If it makes you feel any better, I'm teach CS and Web and it makes my head hurt.

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

I am not whining (well maybe a little), but with all the brains on this forum there has got to be a way to revamp these chumbies to do what they are supposed to do without Chumby.com (for non-MIT grads). Great opportunity to recieve prepackaged firmware to do what you need it to do. Could there be a dashboard created online to take over Chumby.com. Could someone with a  lot of money just buy up the assets of Chumby.com and keep us going?  I don't know. I have a life away from Chumby. I would just like to visit chumbyville and not have to stress over it.

Owner of 3 Sony Dash, 2 Info 8.

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

I am the creator of the Zurk firmware instruction manual, and I understand completely where you are coming from. One month ago I knew NOTHING about this stuff, but learned enough after a few weeks and 10000000 questions to write the book. I know the book isn't as clear as it could be, I was hurried to get it out before it was too late. Let me know what you find unclear, and perhaps I can help out and explain it better.

5 (edited by bobsz 2012-05-16 19:24:29)

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

Don't be overwhelmed by the terminology. I knew less than amigafin. Most of the steps in running and modifying the offline firmware have been explained in forum topics, mostly "Chumby the Device." But you folks are starting a little late- most of the pertinent forum topics are from Feb through April. Look at the topics *I've* posted and you'll see maybe half are about the basics. Also, use the search feature of the forums. See amigafin's manual mentioned above. You'll really need to read all these older references in the forum, manual, and zurk's on Sourceforge. Be sure to also read Zurk's latest updates as he changed some basics, noted on his readme. But this is not any kind of official Chumby project, so that's really your only support.

@demarks51- If you followed zurk's instructions, something should work right off the USB stick. Read more, give it another try. FYI, in one version of the firmware I thought I only had one app. But it just turned out some apps were set to run for a long time, like 3 minutes. Also, make sure there's no alarms set to go into night mode, etc. A couple of the widgets you mentioned are already loaded on the offline firmware. You might be able to get by just deleting some others.

BTW, you can't visualize what putty will do until you "SSH" into your Chumby. It was an "ah-ha!" moment for me. For the next step, I use "VisualWget" rather than wget- it has an easy graphic interface.

Honestly, I haven't got my own offline stuff setup yet, just partially done. It's time consuming, but even if you just preserve a few of your favorite apps, it's worth it.

@amigafin- glad you're still around.

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

bobsz wrote:

BTW, you can't visualize what putty will do until you "SSH" into your Chumby. It was an "ah-ha!" moment for me. For the next step, I use "VisualWget" rather than wget- it has an easy graphic interface.

THANKS!  That did the trick for me.  Still don't understand what I'm doing so I can't put it down for anyone else yet, but when I do, I will.

Here's what I don't get, why are the file extensions not on the files?

7 (edited by bobsz 2012-05-16 20:30:26)

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

OK, so now that you're in via SSH, follow the instructions on the beginning of the first "offline firmware" topic page.  You will find a long URL for your channel- you'll see the channel name. When you go to that URL you'll get your xml profile of all the widgets on that channel, with all the info you need for each widget.

I don't know why the files don't show file type. And they look the same for all widgets files, just a name like 052FDAEE-A203-11DD-A676-001B24F07EF4. I actually got so overwhelmed, I now save the files for each widget in it's own folder with the name of the widget. I also save the snippet of the profile for that widget in there, because that will tell you the file types- eg "thumbnail href" before the url, "contenttype="image/jpeg"" at the end- as well as your own customizations. (Usually.)  The swf is usually the largest file. If you want to play and see, copy a file someplace and rename it to "whatever.swf" and see if your browser opens it. Some of these (like moonphase) actually look great on a big screen.

A little earlier I put some more info in another topic you'd written in. It might be better if you post "how to" questions in another part of the forum like "Chumby the Device."

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

There is a program that I found called extension changer (located here: http://download.cnet.com/Extension-Chan … 94272.html ) that has been very helpful.  After install, you can right click a file (such as a suspected .swf file with no extension) choose "edit the extension" and add the .swf or .jpg etc.... then you can test it to see what it does. Then to change it back, do the same right click, change, but leave it blank and hit enter. Very convenient. Its been great to filter through all the files downloaded with octopus to see what they are.

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

One of the reasons I freak is I can't seem to even find out how to change the weather to fit my area. I open all kinds of files with notepad to try find anything that remotely makes sense. Chinese hyrogliphics in some files. I can actually run one of the more recent Zurf offline USB on my infocast and it works but not like I would like it to. It may be all I can hope to do. I just don't seem to have the time (unless I take the week off for vacation) to get into making the transformation. Everytime I see SSH it seems like someone is hushing me. See, I am not there yet and not much time to get there.

Owner of 3 Sony Dash, 2 Info 8.

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

You have read the manual I wrote a while back located here:  http://sourceforge.net/projects/chumby/ … F/download  haven't you?  If not, take a look. It may help.  There are a few changes in the software since then, but basically it's the same. It shows you how to download what you already have running and still make it work.

11 (edited by bobsz 2012-05-18 17:41:01)

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

First, abandon notepad and get a better text editor like this free one: EditPad Lite:
http://www.editpadlite.com/

If you're seeing heiroglyphics, you may be looking at things that aren't text, anyway. If files don't have the extension showing (jpg, etc) the wrong kind of program may try to open it, if you tell it to. The most important question is, HAVE YOU FOUND A PROFILE FILE YET??? From the reading above, the manual, and zurk's readme's, you should have found some profile someplace. Plug zurk's USB into your computer, read the above to find where the profile is. It's just a file, but your computer probably doesn't know how to read it. If it asks you what program you want to open it with, choose EditPad or Internet Explorer. Study the structure of it, you'll see town names or zip codes, those are the kind of things you'll change for your location. You can read the (xml) profile in the web browser, but you have to use another program to edit it. But first, find it and study it. For offline firmware:

Partial quote from zurk's readme for v15-
--------------
Profiles for the Infocast 3.5 / Chumby One / Chumby Classic are located in : /lighty/html/xml/profiles/profiles0

Profiles for the Infocast 8 / Chumby Eight are located in : /lighty/html/xapis/profile/show/0
--------------

Later you can find the profile for your own Chumby channel and mix the widgets into zurk's.

It's not as hard as you're imagining it. If you can post on this forum, you can edit your profile.

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

no obvious profile file staring me in the face so I am slammed at first turn. Maybe I do not know what I am looking for.

Owner of 3 Sony Dash, 2 Info 8.

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

What folder would the profile files be in and what am I looking for? I went to the www file and opened almost every file I could find.

Owner of 3 Sony Dash, 2 Info 8.

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

My frustration level is already in the RED right now. I don't need this. It is only a chumby not saving the world. I would like to do this but at this time it really is not worth the aggrevation. I may try it another day. It feels like I am from another country asking how to get some potatoes and someone says "Go to Walmart". What is Walmart? I just want some potatoes.

Owner of 3 Sony Dash, 2 Info 8.

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

Okay (breathe, breathe) I did find the profile files. But now I need to know how to edit them.  Profiles   Profiles 0 and Profiles 1

<widget_parameter id="1">
  <name>zip</name>
  <value>ZZ</value>
</widget_parameter>
<widget_parameter id="1">
  <name>myID</name>
  <value>Temperature</value>
</widget_parameter>
<widget_parameter id="1">
  <name>banner</name>
  <value>Zurk's ChumbyFW</value>
</widget_parameter>
      </widget_parameters>
      <rating rating="5"/>
    </widget_instance>

Owner of 3 Sony Dash, 2 Info 8.

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

demarks51 wrote:

Okay (breathe, breathe) I did find the profile files. But now I need to know how to edit them.  Profiles   Profiles 0 and Profiles 1

<widget_parameter id="1">
  <name>zip</name>
  <value>ZZ</value>
</widget_parameter>
<widget_parameter id="1">
  <name>myID</name>
  <value>Temperature</value>
</widget_parameter>
<widget_parameter id="1">
  <name>banner</name>
  <value>Zurk's ChumbyFW</value>
</widget_parameter>
      </widget_parameters>
      <rating rating="5"/>
    </widget_instance>

Okay, edit Profiles0 and each widget exists between <widget_instance> and </widget_instance>

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

kathleen wrote:
demarks51 wrote:

Okay (breathe, breathe) I did find the profile files. But now I need to know how to edit them.  Profiles   Profiles 0 and Profiles 1

<widget_parameter id="1">
  <name>zip</name>
  <value>ZZ</value>
</widget_parameter>
<widget_parameter id="1">
  <name>myID</name>
  <value>Temperature</value>
</widget_parameter>
<widget_parameter id="1">
  <name>banner</name>
  <value>Zurk's ChumbyFW</value>
</widget_parameter>
      </widget_parameters>
      <rating rating="5"/>
    </widget_instance>

Okay, edit Profiles0 and each widget exists between <widget_instance> and </widget_instance>

BUT how do I edit, with what wording and where do I put it?
i see <name>zip<name>
I have to know what to do so I can put my zip code (39301) somewhere to make the weather go to that.

Owner of 3 Sony Dash, 2 Info 8.

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

How do I activate pandora on the offline usb? I found music source and things about pandora and all end up saying "false". Do I change them to true?

Owner of 3 Sony Dash, 2 Info 8.

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

RE widget editing- That is the profile. But you're apparently looking at Sky Happenings/Weather Edition. That's the only one that has a special process for changing. Zurk has it in his documentation. You've got to read that stuff all the way through if you want to figure out what you're doing.

This is really not the place for specific questions about zurk's programs. If you've really read all the documentation, then you need to read it again, because you're asking questions that are answered there. I mentioned earlier this was not the right place for this topic. Here's Zurk's forum. You should have been looking there all along. I just noticed he's up to v17, so that's past the limits of what I can answer.

http://sourceforge.net/projects/zurk/forums/forum/12064

Rather than sell your Chumby on eBay, maybe you should check all the posts here for people who would love to find one. Good luck.

Re: I am in over my head. FREAK!

Chumby is not for sale. I am learning more everyday.

Owner of 3 Sony Dash, 2 Info 8.