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What next?

2010-07-03 01:39:03, updated at 2010-10-09 22:18:57 -

Now that my various projects seem to be mostly behaving themselves, it's time to decide what to write next. I've had a few requests and a few ideas, so here's a rundown of possibilities.

  • Locale condition: ping. Let Locale ask "is that machine awake?" It could ping something in a private IP range, deduce that you're at home and your PC is on, and stop notifying you about things you're already likely to see on the PC. There seems to be a usable ping command in Android's busybox, but for bonus points, allow a TCP ping, maybe check the banner on a service, to guard against collisions with private IPs in other places.
  • Locale action: K9 settings. It's been done.
  • Locale action: ConnectBot. You can already configure a ConnectBot session to immediately run a command. Launching a remote shell script securely from Locale would add some nice flexibility: aggressive notification using PCs around the house, X10 home automation, garage doors… you could do this from ASE with an ssh client binary, but that's a little harder to install, especially without root.
  • Locale condition: Timer. My timer, not yet formally released, could trigger the aforementioned aggressive notification if alarms have gone unanswered for half an hour. Update: Done.
  • Port this site to Rails 3. This can wait until v3 is actually out.
  • Puzzles improvements. Some ideas languishing in the bug tracker, including multiplayer.
  • Set up mpd (with neompc on an old Palm Treo) at home. Probably no new code needed, but included for completeness.

Most of these will probably happen eventually, but it's always useful to know which ideas are useful to a wider audience, so feel free to comment or contact me if you're keen to see one of these created, or if you can think of improvements or existing projects I ought to be aware of. I'll also be writing up any interesting aspects of these projects as I implement them, and suggestions for posts of that kind that you'd like to see are also welcome.

 
2010-10-10 06:53:35, updated at 2010-10-10 07:45:30
Stefan Sarzio

I would like the Locale plugin: Connectbot most.

 
2010-12-14 14:44:36
David Spivey

I use tasker and also need a ping plugin. I am needing to determine whether a computer in my network (both at home and at the office) is awake/on. I am aware that locale plugins are compatible with tasker, but I am not sure how such a plugin would return a value. I don't need the "bonus points" option, but if you could make a short "is this alive/awake/reachable" plugin, I would appreciate that very much. Maybe later you can add the "bonus points" support. I will be monitoring your webpage to see if you make any announcements about the availability of this plugin.

 
2011-01-16 15:21:06
David Spivey

I just need to know if you are even working on any of the items on your "What's Next" list. I posted a request for a tasker/locale ping plugin a month and a few days ago and have not seen any update that indicates that you are still intending to make one. Is this something that is in active development, or is this something I should bother another developer about?

 
2011-01-16 17:50:28

Sorry, I do still want to work on these at some point but, inevitably, have not had as much time as I'd hoped. If you have a pressing need for such a thing I would definitely recommend asking others about it. Perhaps you could comment here if you get a positive response from anyone? Thanks.