The sys admin's daily grind – Airsensor
Exactly How Smelly?
If the air in a room smells stale, somebody will get up and open the window to let in some fresh air. Charly, however, wanted to measure its exact staleness, so he set off to find out armed with USB hardware and Linux.
Stale air results from the accumulation of various gases in an enclosed room. Carbon dioxide is the classic case – just imagine 16 people in a small, windowless conference room. Add to this, a mixture of volatile organic compounds, known to the world of science as VOCs. Among other things VOCs are alcohols, volatile deodorant components, aldehydes from furniture, detergent fumes, nicotine, briefly: carbon-based emissions of all kinds.
You could use human noses to sniff VOCs, but sensors in the form of a USB stick are not only more suitable but also immune to attacks of nausea. The Rehau sniffer [1], for example, uses an LED with a color changer to indicate the state of the air in the room.
Pure Air
A tool helps me to read the measured values from the stick. Before you build the software [2], you first need to install the libusb-dev and build-essential packages. After unpacking the zip file to /usr/local/, the change directory to usb-sensors-linux/trunk/airsensor/. When you get there, do this:
[...]
Buy this article as PDF
(incl. VAT)
Buy Linux Magazine
US / Canada
UK / Australia
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.
News
-
There's a New Linux AI Assistant in Town
Newelle is a Linux AI assistant that can work with different LLMs and includes document parsing and profiles.
-
Linux Kernel 6.16 Released with Minor Fixes
The latest Linux kernel doesn't really include any big-ticket features, just a lot of lines of code.
-
EU Sovereign Tech Fund Gains Traction
OpenForum Europe recently released a report regarding a sovereign tech fund with backing from several significant entities.
-
FreeBSD Promises a Full Desktop Installer
FreeBSD has lacked an option to include a full desktop environment during installation.
-
Linux Hits an Important Milestone
If you pay attention to the news in the Linux-sphere, you've probably heard that the open source operating system recently crashed through a ceiling no one thought possible.
-
Plasma Bigscreen Returns
A developer discovered that the Plasma Bigscreen feature had been sitting untouched, so he decided to do something about it.
-
CachyOS Now Lets Users Choose Their Shell
Imagine getting the opportunity to select which shell you want during the installation of your favorite Linux distribution. That's now a thing.
-
Wayland 1.24 Released with Fixes and New Features
Wayland continues to move forward, while X11 slowly vanishes into the shadows, and the latest release includes plenty of improvements.
-
Bugs Found in sudo
Two critical flaws allow users to gain access to root privileges.
-
Fedora Continues 32-Bit Support
In a move that should come as a relief to some portions of the Linux community, Fedora will continue supporting 32-bit architecture.