A while ago I found both the pinout and the protocol for communicating with an ipod. I wanted to put together a program that would allow me to control my ipod from my computer using the dock cable. But I couldn’t figure out how to get a dock connector to serial adapter. Nobody makes one that I could find. I thought about buying a cheap power charger and cutting it up, but I didn’t want to drop $15 just to find out that they didn’t fully populate the connector (since they only need about 4 pins, it would make sense…).

All this changed this week when I found a page where you can buy blank ipod dock connectors. It is a guy in Australia, and he is going to ship me 6 of them. Total cost: $16 (And change). All I need to do is solder on some wires and hook it up to a serial port plug (can get at radio shack) and I have my cable.

The next step is to just write the code to communicate with the ipod. The protocol looks to be a simple serial protocol. I’m thinking of doing it in Java using the javax.comm packages to do the serial port communications. I would build it as two projects, a communications library and then the actual application. I’ll keep you guys informed on my progress….

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From BoingBoing…

Link

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From BoingBoing yesterday I saw that the new version of the Ipodlounge’s Buyers Guide came out. I’ll give you some of the highlights here, or you can check it out at the link below.

So there were a bunch of “outlandish” things that I’m not going to bother covering because I question the practicality of the products. One thing that plays videos back from your Ipod, or the satellite radio receiver that records the audio to your ipod. Or even some of the designer cases.

There were a few products from ISkin that caught my eye. I’m currently using one of their evo2 cases, but they have some cool stuff coming out. I really liked their Wild Sides Evo2. I think they look much sharper than the plain colored ones. But the coolest part is the Click Wheel Cover that they come with. While I probably won’t pick up a Wild Sides case, I will pick up a set of click wheel covers when they are separately available. That is the only part of my Ipod that isn’t protected.

I was also checking out some of the portable speakers they have. Between the Pacific Rim Technologies Cube Travel Speakers and the Macally PodWave (Amazon), I liked the former a little bit better. They fold up into a nicely protected cube shape for travel, and yet unfold to give you speakers wherever you go!

One item that didn’t make this years review are the plans for a cardboard ipod stand. Just print out the pattern and cut it out and you have your very own dock! (thanks as usual to BoingBoing)

Link

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So I got one submission for an answer to my Modern Word Problem from my brother Steve. I’ll excerpt part of it here:

I guess the problem is how to effectively use that $100. Knowing that you are going to perpetually get 1/6 BOGO and thus have to spend $1 more dollar you can find your initial buy-in.

x + (1/6)x + (1/6)^2x + …. + (1/6)^nx = 100 [but of course you want that last term to be a whole number]

He talked through a bit more of the math and different ways that you may solve that equation. His final answer: 38 free songs.

My solution is less thorough but yields similar results. 1/6 of your original 100 gives you 16 more bottles. 1/6 of that gives you 2. You can keep going but you aren’t going to get any more whole bottles. So your total number of bottles is 118 bottles. 1/3 of those would be winners which leaves you with 39.

There is a whole bunch of things that I am ignoring here and I think Steve’s answer is much better. If I were asking this as an interview question (which I have considered doing), I would have accepted either answer.

Steve got the extra credit as well. You have no chance whatsoever of winning an iPod mini. Sorry.

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I usually don’t like to cover technology that has already been covered by the New York Times. By the time the Times gets around to covering technology, it is no longer breaking news but rather old news. But I’m going to make an exception here and cover something that made the Times about 6 months ago. I took a look into it shortly after the Times covered it, but didn’t keep up with it until now. Podcasting.

Podcasting is just like blogging, but done with audio files. Just like a Blog allows you to publish whatever you want just like a magazine, podcasting allows you to run your own radio station. With just a little bit of equipment (basically a computer and a microphone) and some basic web knowledge, you can setup your own podcasting channel. And even the web knowledge part is being reduced by services like FeedBurner who make it easy.

With a podcast feed, you have two options to get your next episode. You can either remember their publication schedule, or you can use some software and RSS to get your feed for you. If you remember from my post on RSS, you can take a guess at how I get my episode. I use a program called Ipodder (free!) that runs twice a day to check for new podcasts for me. When it finds a new one if downloads it and registers it with Itunes (it can also register it with Windows Media Player if you don’t have/like Itunes). When I sync my iPod the next time, the new episode magically appears on it.

Now don’t expect a podcast from me or Margaret any time soon. I have enough problems finding time to blog, much less creating the time it takes to record, edit, and mix a podcast episode. But I will recommend some of the ones that I listen to (or have listened to).

Probably the most popular podcast is the Dawn and Drew Show. They are really just a married couple (about my age) who talk about things in their life. But be warned: this isn’t Ward and June Cleaver talking and the FCC isn’t involved, so it sometimes get a bit raunchy and Dawn can be a potty mouth at times. But they are laugh-out-loud funny.

Now the person considered the father of podcasting is Adam Curry. He has his show “Daily Source Code” that broadcasts daily. He is really pushing the envelope here with his podcasting setup. I’ve heard him broadcast from the middle of the Atlantic at 37000 feet. He’s got a wireless setup so he can broadcast from his kitchen with his wife and kid. He recently did a broadcast from behind the wheel on his way home (which I wouldn’t recommend doing on your own).

In addition to the ones I’ve mentioned here, there are all kinds of other ones that you may be interested. You can find a directory of podcasts here, or you can just go to ipodder.org to read all about it.

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Did you buy your ipod in a real store and not get the free engraving that Apple was offering? Now is your chance to get a virual engraving all your own. Make sure to check out the Top Ten and the Bottom Ten list as well…

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Some branded ipod’s that won’t be coming to a store near you anytime soon…

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