Turn your system into a submarine, save electric at the same time
15 replies, posted
[img]http://stevetarzia.com/sonar/sonar_diagram.gif[/img]
Yup, you can now have your very own sonar system in your pants. Basically, what this does is use sonar techniques to work out if you're at your desk, then turns the displays off if you aren't. "But luaduck, why use this when I can simply hit my power button for sleep?" Sir, this works completely automagically, no effort needed. The ultimate lazy green application. :iia:
[quote=Lifehacker]Almost any computer with speakers and a microphone can take advantage of this software, so most laptops are good to go. It works by emitting an inaudible frequency from your speakers, and detecting echoes with your microphone, determining whether you are sitting at your desk or not. If you get up, your computer will see that you have done so and automatically put your computer to sleep. Sure, you could always just use a hotkey, but this requires literally no energy on your part—and it's sure to be a heck of a conversation starter.
The program is open source, so if you've got some tinkering skills, you can make it do all sorts of things when you walk away. If you just want the sleep functionality, you can still download and install the package and use it as-is (if you're a Windows user, that is—Linux users need to compile from source—check the instructions on the site if you need help doing this). It doesn't necessarily work with every microphone and speaker equipped computer, so test it out to see if it does with yours—you may need to calibrate it a few times before it works well (it took me a few tries and a little bit of waiting afterward before it started working in Windows on my MacBook Pro).
Sonar Power Manager is a free download for Windows and Linux systems. Sleeping your computer whenever you walk away seems a little heavy handed (do I really want to put my computer to sleep when I'm going to get a glass of water?), but the possibilities are endless, and if you are interested in bending it to your will, Tinkernut's guide is an excellent place to start.[/quote]
More information is here: [url]http://stevetarzia.com/sonar/[/url]
Download is here: [url]http://stevetarzia.com/sonar/download.php[/url]
Downloads provided for Windows, you'll need to compile from source for anything else though.
Works beautifully with a bit of tinkering for me.
Holy crap I thought this was a joke for a second. Too bad I don't have speakers just a headset and the speakers built into my monitor are back firing.
this sounds like one of those things that's in theory awesome but actually doesn't work all that well and causes problems
[QUOTE=reapaninja;20559622]this sounds like one of those things that's in theory awesome but actually doesn't work all that well and causes problems[/QUOTE]
Yeah.
Would it be possible to just disable displays and lock instead of go to sleep? I get up a lot and do it myself, but this would be pretty nice if it could just do that.
I don't want testicular cancer
Also, if you're leach139, why does it say
[quote] "But luaduck, why use this when I can simply hit my power button for sleep?"[/quote]
Does it detect the chair you sit at, or does it have a scan without you to see what the normal is?
It doesn't even seem to rely on me being there or not, it wouldn't turn my screen on until I moved the mouse around.
[QUOTE=^0mKTank;20559804]Would it be possible to just disable displays and lock instead of go to sleep? I get up a lot and do it myself, but this would be pretty nice if it could just do that.[/QUOTE]
Edit the source and recompile. A pretty tasty tutorial for you:
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqnjkF5SZPQ&feature=player_embedded[/media]
[QUOTE=^0mKTank;20559876]Also, if you're leach139, why does it say luaduck[/QUOTE]
My common alias now is luaduck, I only use my leach139 account because A: it was created when that was my alias, and B: it's a decent postcount old-gold.
[QUOTE=ManningQB18;20559928]Does it detect the chair you sit at, or does it have a scan without you to see what the normal is?[/QUOTE]
[QUOTE=^0mKTank;20559969]It doesn't even seem to rely on me being there or not, it wouldn't turn my screen on until I moved the mouse around.[/QUOTE]
It calibrates with you in the room. The "wiggle your mouse to calibrate" is so that it can find out how loud your mouse is, so it can disable sonar when it's in use. I'm also having Tank's problem, but I'd imagine a source edit could do the trick.
I suppose having a trackpad doesn't help then seeing how it's silent.
But what if I were to watch a movie? I think it would be more efficient to just use a webcam for it.
Doesn't work for me. Either it isn't calibrated right, or it's the fact that my speakers are next to the keyboard facing up, straight into the microphone above my screen. I'd like to the think it's the latter that would cause problems for lots of people.
BTW I'm using a laptop
Will it detect my cat that sleeps on my chair all day
I have my computer next to my bed so this won't be of any use to me when I go to sleep. :sigh:
[quote=Lifehacker]Sure, you could always just use a hotkey, but this requires literally no energy on your part—[b]and it's sure to be a heck of a conversation starter.[/b][/quote]
I imagine if you have to be a technical douchebag and use this instead of pressing a fucking button, you probably don't have many conversations with real life people.
Fucking Awesome
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