Contiki port for Launchpad 🔗Contiki has for a long time had ports for several MSP430-based platforms, but the platforms were a bit expensive for the hobbyist (eg Sky or Z1 at ca 70-90$ each). The TI Launchpad is based on a msp430g2452 and '2553, which have 256/512 bytes of RAM and 16 kB ROM, and costs 10$. Thus it's a bit too small for Contiki, and there is no simple API for stuff like ADC or PWM.

A while ago I co-held a Contiki bootcamp. My part consisted mainly of showing the Contiki serial shell, the network simulator Cooja, Mobility plugin for Cooja, and some debugging features. This post will go through those topics. This will be a long post… :) To get started, you might want and/or need the following: the talk in handout-format a few slides source: Makefile source: a silent node source: a periodic broadcasting node and finally a working Contiki copy (check out the Instant Contiki virtual machine with all tools set up from the beginning).

The last day of this visit I went to the central business district. Actually, I started at the Shanghai Science and Technology Museum, which has several IMAX, 3D etc cinemas to choose from. Only problem was that they are closed on Mondays, sth that no other site said sth about except their own. My bad. So I walked down Century Avenue, hoping to find a good place to buy laptop sleeves, as I had read, but that was incorrect so instead I headed towards the Jin Mao, Shanghai World Financial Center (SWFC) and the Shanghai towers.

The day after the Marriage Market I kept thinking of how different our cultures and societies are. And, how different China is from what I expected before I came. I expected something more….. communism, when it really is capitalism, consumerism and commersialism (is that a word even? Nvm). It's likely the most capitalist country I've ever seen actually. Everywhere you look, there are things for sale, stores and shopping malls. Likely, it's different in rural China.

Publications 🔗The Politecast Primitive for Low-Power Wireless. ACM Computer Communication Review 2011-April. Marcus Lundén and Adam Dunkels. Inspirational Bits - Towards a Shared Understanding of the Digital Material. CHI 2011. Petra Sundström, Alex Taylor, Katja Grufberg, Niklas Wirström, jordi Solsona and Marcus Lundén. The LEGA: A Device for Leaving and Finding Tactile Traces. Tangible embedded and Embodied Interaction (TEI) 2011. Jarmo Laaksolahti, Jakob Tholander, Anna Karlsson, Marcus Lundén, Jordi Solsona

"Hello! Do you want a girlfriend?" a Chinese man asked me. He was around 60, not that many teeth left in his lower jaw, wore a jacket and an honest smile. The Marriage Market, or Wedding Market, happens for a few hours every weekend in the park close to the Peoples square station (exit 5, around 12 to 15 or 17). Here worried parents meet to advertise their children. Grown up children, and single that is.

So, I'm staying a while in China after all the hard work is done. Today was the first day of my short stay without work so I started out by surfing the web for ideas on what to do and see. The first point is already done now, riding the Maglev train! Maglev is actually more of a demo of the technology rather than sth that is really needed. It's a short track from Longyuan Road metro station to Pudong airport (the metro continues all the way to the airport already).

It was fun in the taxi on the way to the venue where we were to talk, FUDAN Uni. I felt quite 'up' by then, excited and positive. I felt like I kept noticing small details around me, as if I was very attentive, but lacked impulse suppressive skills. Like a kid on speed. Poor Alexa had to answer many insightful and nuanced questions about electric mopeds, trees dressed with ropes etc.

I got a quite nice hotel room :), 19th floor, Fuxuan hotel. Very mixed messages. The second day, Nov 2nd, was the beginning of the event with a grand opening and unveiling of some plaquette or sth. We, Thiemo and I, didn't really understand everything. There were 400 Chinese and 3 Swedes. Prof Kalle from KTH were there as well and held a talk about IoT they were involved in. Everything else was in Chinese but we had headphones with real time translation by two translators.

So, last time I was in China (for Ubicomp), I was supposed to hold a Contiki-tutorial in Shanghai afterwards but for different reasons it was postponed, or something. The Chinese organizers never decided on a date until it was too late. Nvm. A week after returning home they had apparently decided and I was asked if I could go back go China and take care of it. Of course I'll do it!

My travels are coming to an end again. Today I wanted to go shopping in Shenzhen (as I think HK has more posh stores, and that's not really my cup of tea). At 1030 I went down to the subway and at 1230 I had passed the borders on the Shenzhen side. Most EU-countries get (free) visa on arrival to HK, so no problem returning. To Shenzhen, you can get a visa on arrival (ca 30min, costs 168 RMB for most EU), but, and this is crucial: you must have the fee in RMB, HKD are not accepted.

So evening of my first stay in Apple guesthouse I went to see the HK skyline from Victoria peaks. You basically take the subway to Central, follow the signs (Beijing, Shenzhen and HK are all very good at that, signs) to the peak trams. There, there is a 30-45 minute wait until you get to board the tram, which costs 65HKD both ways including entrance fee to the viewpoint (Terrace 428, which I would recommend, it's a nice view from there). Remember this if you go here: sit on the right side of the tram (seen from the queue). I was smug about having caught a windowseat on the left side only to realize that all Chinese sat on the other side. Ooops. They got a great view over the city, but I saw some trees so I'm happy anyway. I saw on Google that the sunset would occur at 1828, so I tried to time it but got a little late. According to a nice Spanish guy I talked to, I didn't miss much due to fog and air pollution. One sad thing was the (chinese) lady at the tram entrance that was convinced that the CIA made brain experiments on her and that she would soon become a moron [sic]. She had big posters and walked up and down the queue talking to people and handing out flyers. Kind of surprised it wasn't tinfoil hats she was handing out, or that she wasn't sitting in a Faradays cage on a Segway or sth, like a cooler version of the Popemobile.

I had heard that there are many guesthouses at the Chungking Mansions building in downtown HK. In fact, there are about 200 of them apparently (I read somewhere). Now, some of them are better than others and if you, like me, are arriving at 21 o'clock, tired, looking tired, there is a small chance for you to get the best offers from the indian touts. I waved off a few, declined others and went to 5th floor w another. So I stayed one night at Kamals. The cleanliness was ok, but sth that I didn't notice when looking at the room was the smell, like an indian kitchen. I thought it would go away, but it didn't. I did. The smell won. After freshing up, I went for a walk and enjoyed HK. Not as I expected. Then I was so tired that I crashed, like a russian fighter jet at an aero fair, but in a bed. The day after, I moved to Apple guesthouse instead. Small room but soooo much better. And friendly filipino staff, not the sorry-I-bother-you-for-breathing-your-air indians at Kamal, they are rude. Basically the same thing: AC, own WC and shower, but so much better. And cheaper, 220HKD instead of 300(!). Some places have singles w shared bathroom for 70, according to one I talked to. (and 1 HKD is slightly less than 1 RMB or 1kr)

I'm in Hong Kong now :) Some differences I noticed immediately: People don't look at me because I'm not Chinese people (guys) wear shorts, that was rare in Beijing and Shenzhen people know english; ratio unknown, but in Shenzhen close to null, in Beijing a few more. MANY more foreigners! And not only westerners. Indians, pakistanis, africans (don't know what country, looks middle-african to me) Simple enough \\(•,•)/

I arrived in Shenzhen and had quite the difficulties finding the hotel, even though I followed the directions from a commenter on hotels.com. It is a very cheap hotel, only 130 RMB/night (the others ranged 400-600). I soon found out why. The building also housed a lot of apartments and other stuff. I got a room at the 11th floor of 30. There was no free dinner reception, no complimentary wifi (but I could borrow the managers computer on the 28th floor, if I wanted to let them log every credential and login I would enter.