Bye bye blogging (& Twitter ...)

In an effort to spend more time focusing on what I enjoy, and less time writing about it, I'm no longer blogging or Tweeting.

I now have a static website up at http://duncan-bayne.github.com/, and once Westiamp is completed I'll add an entry to my Hacks and Projects page.

Hobo-based media player for Westiamp

I've decided that the Westiamp will be controlled through a web front end, developed using Hobo, which in turn will drive Rhythmbox using ruby-dbus. The front end will be called Andelys, and lives in my GitHub repository at http://github.com/duncan-bayne/andelys.

USB interface kit on the way

I've just purchased a Phidget 1018 USB interface kit. I'm going to use it to connect the netbook that I'm planning to use as the heart of WestiAmp with the front panel.

I bought it through OzzieSim which cost me ~ AUD$20 more than buying it direct from Canada, but entails only a four day shipping delay. Seems a worthwhile trade-off to me.

The 1018 has 8 digital inputs, and I have two rocker switches to monitor - one to skip back & forwards between tracks, the other for playlists. Talking to the kit seems quite easy; Phidget supply a range of SDKs for just about every language and operating system.

I'm currently dusting off my C coding skills as I'm writing a small, high-performance daemon to control Rhythmbox via the rhythmbox-client CLI app.

All is progressing nicely with the Westiamp (after a several-year hiatus) and I'm tentatively scheduling a release party for mid next month ...

The Westiamp amplifier is live!

The Westiamp amplifier (an S5 8LM) is now live! It's mounted to the pine board on which it'll live when installed in the case, and hooked up to a test speaker and my Creative Zen MP3 player as an audio source. A day's hard work - for both me and my wife who assisted with the construction - and it's done.



Now I'm looking around for a USB kit to interface the track and playlist skip switches with the PC that'll end up driving it.

Components arrived from Farnell already

Most of the components I ordered from Farnell have already arrived (some of the resistors are on back-order as they were out of stock). I'm very impressed with the speed of delivery of the in-stock items, as I ordered them on Friday afternoon, and they arrived Monday morning well packaged, well labeled, and with a clear invoice explaining which items were contained and which were on back-order. So far I'm very impressed.

Farnell to the rescue

After seeing my post about the difficulties I had buying components from Jaycar, Marco Ryan from Farnell sent me an email, suggesting I try their website. I did, I found the components I needed them, and ordered them online in a few minutes.

I've been very impressed with Farnell so far. Their website could stand being a little faster, but that's being really picky - it was easy to find the parts I needed, and the ordering process was very user-friendly (even down to correcting minimum order quantity of some components, and notifying me about it).

In addition to the resistors I needed I also ordered some high-intensity blue LEDs for internal case lighting (they'll come on when the user opens the door to look at the amplifier) and some heat-shrink tubing to clean up connections.

Now I just get to sit around and wait impatiently for the parts to arrive so I can continue work :-)

The Jaycar Fiasco

As suggested, I emailed Jaycar to ask whether they sell the resistors I need individually, so I don't have to buy in bulk from a wholesale supplier. The result was an absolutely hysterical exchange of non-information, which I summarised in my final email (with names changed to protect the innocent monkeys):

Hi,

I emailed your store three days ago, to inquire about purchasing some resistors. I wrote:

> Hi,
>
> I'm writing to inquire whether I can buy the following products
> from Jaycar:
>
> 1 x 300ohm 3W metal-oxide resistor
> 1 x 1k5ohm 1W metal-oxide resistor
> 1 x 68k 0.5W carbon-film resistor
>
> If so, can I order them for pick-up at your store on McIntyre
> Road, Sunshine, Melbourne VIC?
>
> Thanks for your time.
>
> Yours,
> Duncan Bayne

Today, I received an email reply from a staff member called John Adams - whose email address bore the signature of Ben Franklin, presumably a different staff member. It read:

> Victora Store - 03-9547-1022
>
> Give them a ring and see if they have them in stock to save you the
> trip if they need to order them from us for you
>
> Ben Franklin - www.jaycar.com.au - 1800-022-888 -
> techstore@jaycar.com.au

I called the number, which was for your Springvale branch, not the McIntyre Road branch as I had requested. The staff there informed me that they cannot obtain any of the components I originally requested! At this point I started to doubt that John (or Ben?) had actually spent any time reading my email before responding.

So I sent him an email, only to get the following response (typo included):

> Ben Franklin is no longer in the employ of jaycar electronics,
> Forward all relvant emails to techstore@jaycar.com.au

Apparently the poor chap has either resigned or been fired in the half hour or so since he sent me that email.

So, could someone from your company - preferably someone who's planning to remain an employee for at least half an hour after replying - *please* answer the questions in my email, which are:

- can I buy the resistors I listed?
- if so, can they be ordered into stock at the *McIntyre Road* branch for me to pick them up?

Thanks for your time, & I look forwards to your reply.

Yours,
Duncan Bayne

I expected there'd be another three-day turnaround, so got stuck into some coding. Lo and behold, a reply arrived in a matter of minutes:

Hi there
You'll need to contact the store directly.

So apparently the answer to my question "could someone ... *please* answer the questions in my email" is - to paraphrase - "no, sod off." So I will sod off, & will most certainly never spend money in a Jaycar store again ... unless I'm in need of some Pythonesque light entertainment :-)