switching from JSON to MsgPack in a backwards compatible manner with Paho MQTT (JavaScript)
picockpit.com makes heavy use of MQTT. For the upcoming version 2.0 I have decided to switch it to MsgPack. Why MsgPack? MsgPack (actually called MessagePack – packages tend to use MsgPack) is a binary format, aimed at compatibility with JSON, but decreasing file size (which is good for saving bandwidth & server resources). Another advantage:…
WeiterlesenStupid business mistakes #6 :: No clear call to action (button)
A friend forwarded me an email, asking me (and other undisclosed recipients) to sign a petition to continue German support for Nepal. I decided to support her and her cause, spending a minute of my time on this. But this minute turned into this blogpost. And it has a valuable lesson for all of us:…
Weiterlesenenvoy fix for serving big files from the backend / timeouts / aborted downloads
Customers were complaining about not being able to download big files from our websites (e.g. PiDoctor on PiCockpit.com). Initially I could not replicate the issue locally, the files seemed to be downloading fine. After further investigation I determined that the downloads were cutting out after a certain time – depending on your download speed, thus,…
WeiterlesenStupid business mistakes #5 :: Having call centers ask your customers about their satisfaction
I was just called by a call center agent, inquiring about my satisfaction with a service inquiry I had with a lost DHL package. They were polite, but effectively disinterested in what I had to say (indeed, I had an issue I wanted to communicate, see below). The call center agent tried to follow a…
WeiterlesenHistorische Texte
Als Teil der Überarbeitung der pi3g.com Webseite, in Vorbereitung auf den Launch der Google Coral.AI und AIY Produktreihe, habe ich unsere Webseite auf Englisch umgestellt. Hier als Referenz einige der Texte die wir früher hatten: Wir sind als Raspberry Pi Foundation approved reseller, sowie einer von zwei deutschen Pi Zero Distributoren Ihr starker Partner rund…
Weiterlesen20888
20.888 is the total number of Raspberry Pi we (pi3g e.K.) sold last year (2019). Thank you to all our customers, resellers and partners.
WeiterlesenStupid business mistakes #4 :: Spamming your user with messages about your awesomeness
People need to know how awesome they are for making the right choice and being your customer. You, in turn, should be awesome, and take care of the trust they place in you responsibly. Which brings us to today’s stupid business mistake: spamming your users with messages they do not want. This is one of…
WeiterlesenStupid business mistakes #3 :: Assuming things will work forever (The value of monitoring)
Things work, and there is no mistake about that! But, due to the universe constantly increasing in entropy, they do not work forever. They need to be supplied with your attention, knowledge and energy, so that they can continue to work. You know how it is, our bodies are pretty amazing – but at some…
WeiterlesenDealing with NIL in JSON::Any in Crystal Lang
One of the challenges when developing with Crystal is that it is not as forgiving about data types as, say, Python or Ruby. nil will keep you occupied. The following error message: cast from Nil to String failed, at /usr/share/crystal/src/json/any.cr:220:5:220 can be solved by: # cast to string, THEN check if it is nil if…
WeiterlesenChromium exit code -5
While running Chromium with chromium-browser –display=:0 https://www.picockpit.com will allow you to start Chromium from an SSH connection (and it will output to the main display in the X Server), this will fail when you try to run it with subprocess.Popen in Python: “command”: [“chromium-browser”, “–display=:0”, “https://picockpit.com”] (this is part of the JSON format I have…
Weiterlesen
English 
Deutsch (Sie)