Electronics

WordPress on Godaddy can’t send email to its own domain

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After making a new wordpress site on my shared Godaddy host I fought an issue for hours where WordPress admin and ninja form emails could send to any other email address but not the email address from the same domain. Finally, I called support and the fixed it up mentioning it was something I could change… I didn’t listen closely enough. After it happened again I finally found the magic sauce in a post and decided to make my own instructions for fixing the issue with pictures!

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DIY Kossel XL RepRap 3D Printer Build

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Kossel XL 2020 RepRap

I used my first RepRap Mendel Prusa 2 to print my Kossel Mini. The Kossel Mini has been a wonderful printer but I wanted something a tad bigger so I embarked on a journey to build a big Kossel RepRap 3D printer. As of writing this post there is a significant lack of affordable kits for large Kossel printers out there so I found some inspiration online and started building my own Kossel XL 3D printer. I am very proud of the results, its gorgeous and prints great!

If you don’t know already, RepRap printers are open source, no one owns them, you do! The community has a lot of information on building your own self replicating 3D printer, http://reprap.org/wiki/RepRap

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Intel Arduino 101 BLE Blynk Tank

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Intel Arduino 101 based tank with BLE and Blynk!

This project uses the Intel Arduino 101 board that has a built in IMU and (BLE) Blue Tooth Low Energy. For the remote control I used the free Blynk app which is is available for Android and iPhone, it allows you to rapidly drag and drop some buttons to create a user interface. The Chassis is a Dagu DG012 from Sparkfun.

I tried to power the whole rig from the 5 AA battery pack that came with the chassis but the Arduino kept resetting on low voltage. Ideally I would use a nice LiPo battery pack but I think it’s reaching to expect a beginner to learn about the care and feeding of LiPos and purchase a charger so I chose to power the motors separately from the Arduino using a USB Battery pack. Be sure to remove the optional battery jumper on the Adafruit motor shield or you can fry some things, the power sources need to be separate.

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Detecting Well Liquid loading with, Azure IoT, ML, and Pi

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Overview

05.19.2007 003Legacy IIoT devices can be modernized utilizing edge of network devices to send data to the Azure IoT hub and Machine Learning. This can create cost and efficiency improvements and reduced downtime.

The issue(s)

I will try to quickly explain the issue of liquid loading and slow legacy communications. Keep in mind there are many other issues that can be alleviated with this solution and there is no way I could mention them all. Oil & Gas Wells can “Load Up” with liquid reducing production and possibly incurring costly intermediation to relieve the issue. In the Machine Learning Video at the bottom of this post I go into great detail about this issue.

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Launch Node-Red On Startup With a Batch File

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I want Node-Red to start up (and other command line programs) when Windows 10 starts. Batch files are a simple way to achieve this.

One feature, bad or good, is the batch file will open a command prompt window that essentially acts like a live log viewer for node-red. This is fine for my application because I have a PC dedicated running 24-7 for a camera video server, MQTT server, and now Node-Red. I like being able to see what Node-Red is doing, if you want Node-Red to run in the background as a service you will want to use a different method.

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Custom Cortana MQTT Commands

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image Cortana can easily be extended to aid you with your DIY home automaton projects. In this example Cortana sends MQTT commands to open and close a garage door as well as ring the doorbell with custom jingles. By the way, you don’t have to use MQTT, you can also do a whole lot of other things as well from opening a file, opening a program, or launching your favorite websites.

As of the writing of this entry I am frantically trying to finish documenting the MQTT Doorbell and Garage Door Opener devices in separate posts. Hopefully I can get those whipped out in a few days.

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Arduino error: expected unqualified-id before numeric constant

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error: expected unqualified-id before numeric constant

This Arduino IDE error blew my mind for a while, come to find out it can be caused from syntax errors. look for a missing semi colon or accidental text at the top of your sketch.

The Error

Thermostat1:1: error: expected unqualified-id before numeric constant
In file included from Thermostat1.ino:9:

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DIY Arduino Mini BMO

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Arduino Mini BMO

BMO from Comedy Central’s Adventure Time is adorable, if only someone would make one that can walk! Atleast we can make one with a personality. Here is a build using easy to get parts including Arduino Pro Mini, Nokia 3310 LCD screen, audio playback, accelerometers, and distance sensors. 

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