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Analog Award! A machine for making your own film for a camera. It's a beautiful machine, tooRead more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in Photography | Digg this!
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Not jazzed about putting out plain old Christmas lights after all of the awesome Halloween projects? Why not mix it up a bit and convert your entire yard into a Guitar Hero game? That's exactly what Ric did with his Christmas Light Hero. We weren't sure how it worked, so he kindly offered us an explanation:
Christmas Light Hero is using 7 light controllers from Light-O-Rama built from kits to control 21,268 lights and LEDs. Each controller has 16 outputs and 2-3 TTL level control inputs that are used by the game system to fire different programmed light sequences depending on what happens in the game. It relies on the fact that the game sequence is very consistent. If the game and the lighting sequences start together, they will stay in very good sync through the length of the song. The light program allows branching and overlays for fail, star power and "ready." I have some ideas to automate the initial show/game sync, but for now you have to push doorbell buttons at the right moments.
To program the show a video recording was made of a perfect round of Guitar Hero playing Eric Johnson's Cliffs of Dover. The timing of all the dots and the light show choreography follow that video.
When you play, you watch only the Christmas lights, but the audio you hear is from the Wii, so your flubs are broadcast for all to hear (people in cars can tune 99.1 and crank it up as loud as they want.) When we are not playing, a separate version of the program that has the audio from the recorded game plays with the lights as a loop. The YouTube video also has this audio, (because I forgot to record the direct audio when I was shooting the documentation, and the camcorder did not pick it up very well.)
A video screen is on the driveway showing the game video, but if you want to be on the high score list you have to make it through the whole game only watching the Christmas Lights. Even though the game is in "easy" mode, the lights don't provide the same timing detail as the game does, so it is much harder. Even expert Guitar Hero players have a hard time with the lights, and nobody has made it through without errors (yet).
Cool! Kit-based light controllers, a variable light show that adapts to changes in the game, and even a low-power radio station to share the music without disturbing the neighbors! This must have been lots of fun to put together. His youtube page also has videos of his previous lighting projects, including both Halloween and Christmas displays. [via neatorama]
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Genius. Brilliant. Clever. Sparkly. Instructables user gmoon has a great tutorial for shredding CDs into crystalline decorations.
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Greg sez, "Yesterday the Crying Room Gallery got a visit from City of Vancouver bylaw inspectors who demanded that they remove "graffiti" from the front of their gallery. The graffiti in question was an anti-Olympic mural by a local artist.
The City says it had 'nothing to do with content' and everything to do with graffiti bylaws, but the Crying Room has had art up in that space for the better part of ten years without complaint.
The B.C. Civil Liberties Association has come out against the City's crackdown.
The BCCLA Legal Observer Program, set up to monitor for rights violations during the Games, has started a gallery of Olympic censorship in Vancouver."
Vancouver orders removal of anti-Olympic mural
(Thanks, Greg!)
(Image: Globe and Mail The Blackbird)
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My friend, the wonderful sf writer Peter Watts was beaten without provocation and arrested by US border guards on Tuesday. I heard about it early Wednesday morning in London and called Cindy Cohn, the legal director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. She worked her contacts to get in touch with civil rights lawyers in Michigan, and we mobilized with Caitlin Sweet (Peter's partner) and David Nickle (Peter's friend) and Peter was arraigned and bailed out later that day.
But now Peter faces a felony rap for "assaulting a federal officer" (Peter and the witness in the car say he didn't do a thing, and I believe them). Defending this charge will cost a fortune, and an inadequate defense could cost Peter his home, his livelihood and his liberty.
Peter's friends are raising money for his legal defense. I just sent him CAD$1,000, because this is absolutely my biggest nightmare: imprisoned in a foreign country for a trumped-up offense against untouchable border cops. I would want my friends to help me out if it ever happened to me.
Update: Here's more from Peter, in his own words: "Along some other timeline, I did not get out of the car to ask what was going on. I did not repeat that question when refused an answer and told to get back into the vehicle. In that other timeline I was not punched in the face, pepper-sprayed, shit-kicked, handcuffed, thrown wet and half-naked into a holding cell for three fucking hours, thrown into an even colder jail cell overnight, arraigned, and charged with assaulting a federal officer, all without access to legal representation (although they did try to get me to waive my Miranda rights. Twice.). Nor was I finally dumped across the border in shirtsleeves: computer seized, flash drive confiscated, even my fucking paper notepad withheld until they could find someone among their number literate enough to distinguish between handwritten notes on story ideas and, I suppose, nefarious terrorist plots. I was not left without my jacket in the face of Ontario's first winter storm, after all buses and intercity shuttles had shut down for the night.
"In some other universe I am warm and content and not looking at spending two years in jail for the crime of having been punched in the face."
Sf writer David Nickle writes,
Hugo-award-nominated science fiction author Dr. Peter Watts is in serious legal trouble after he was beaten, pepper-sprayed and imprisoned by American border guards at a Canada U.S. border crossing December 8. This is a call to friends, fans and colleagues to help.
Peter, a Canadian citizen, was on his way back to Canada after helping a friend move house to Nebraska over the weekend. He was stopped at the border crossing at Port Huron, Michigan by U.S. border police for a search of his rental vehicle. When Peter got out of the car and questioned the nature of the search, the gang of border guards subjected him to a beating, restrained him and pepper sprayed him. At the end of it, local police laid a felony charge of assault against a federal officer against Peter. On Wednesday, he posted bondand walkedwas taken across the border to Canada in shirtsleeves (he was released by Port Huron officials with his car and possessions locked in impound, into a winter storm that evening). He's home safe. For now. But he has to go back to Michigan to face the charge brought against him.
The charge is spurious. But it's also very serious. It could mean two years in prison in the United States, and a ban on travel in that country for the rest of Peter's life. Peter is mounting a vigorous defense, but it's going to be expensive - he's effectively going up against the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, and he needs the best legal help that he can get.
He's got that help, courtesy of one of the top criminal lawyers in the State of Michigan. We, Peter's friends and colleagues here in Canada, want to make sure he gets the help he needs financially to come out of this nightmare whole.
The need for that help is real. While Peter is a critically successful science fiction writer, he is by no means a best-selling author. Without help, the weight of his legal fees could literally put him on the street by spring.
We can't let that happen. So there's going to be fundraising.
We're going to think of something suitable in the New Year - but immediately, anyone who wants to help can do so easily. Peter's website, rifters.com, has a link to a PayPal account, whimsically named the Niblet Memorial Kibble Fund. He set it up years ago for fans of the Hugo-nominated novel Blindsight and his Rifters books, to cover veterinary bills for the cats he habitually rescues from the mean streets of Toronto. Peter has made it clear that he doesn't want to use the veterinary money to cover his lawsuit. But until we can figure out a more graceful conduit for the legal fund, that's the best place to send donations for now. Just let Peter know that the donation's for his legal defense, and that's where it will go.
Here's the link to the backlist page on Peter's website, rifters.com, or you can just send a PayPal donation to donate@rifters.com.
The link to the Niblet Memorial Kibble Fund is in the middle of the page. The page also links to Creative Commons editions of all his published work, which he's made available free. Peter would approve, we think, if you downloaded one or two or all of them. Whether you make a donation to the legal fund or not.
Update: David Nickle adds, "there's a very small correction I need to make to the account that's gone, erm, viral. I had thought that Peter had made his way back on foot; in fact, police released him in shirtsleeves at the Canadian side of the border. It was a winter storm, he was in shirtsleeves, but he didn't have to cross the bridge on foot.
I'd misunderstood Peter's account on that point. "
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We added a lot of new products to the Maker Shed this week, including the Deluxe tool kit bundle, Make: Electronics book, the Voice Shield, Hardcopy kit, Eye Can Art kits, Cricut machines, and more! From crafters to electronics enthusiasts, we've got you covered for the holidays.
Speaking of holidays, we decided to extend our FREE shipping offer until Monday, Dec 14th. (Midnight Pacific). Take advantage of this great deal, and do a little holiday shopping form the comfort of your home. Use coupon code ELVES at checkout.
If you aren't sure what to get, check out all the Maker Shed holiday gift guides. There is something for everyone, and every budget. Happy holidays!
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There's a massive LIVE video chat tonight for hardware makers!
Tonight is our weekly "Ask an engineer chat" 10pm ET. It's a special night, we will have a guest! Nathan Seidle from SparkFun will be joining us! Limor [Adafruit] and Nathan will answer all your engineering, biz and kit questions for one hour! Tonight's topics will also include the open source hardware list of 2009, over 125 projects in 19 categories. Currently SparkFun is one of the top producing open source hardware companies in the world! Stop in and say hi!Chat details!
- Visit our new "chat" section on Adafruit at 10pm ET, Saturday nights
- Or visit our Ustream page
- For old schoolers, you can use IRC, you'll need a Ustream log/pass, check out the Ustream IRC how-tos here and here
- We are #adafruit-industries6796 on IRC server chat1.ustream.tv
- There will be a trivia question at the end of the night as always!
- Lastly, if anyone can save a log we'd appreciate it
Handmade gifts make a unique and thoughtful impression, whether you make them yourself or support enterprising artisans who vend their wares at craft fairs and online. All of us at Make: Online have teamed up to bring you this roundup of our favorite handmade geekery from around the web.
CoolRockets
Collector's Edition Giant Custom "The Moon" Rocket Cabinet by Jeff Brewer of Cool Rockets. This is a one-off, 6' tall cabinet in the form of a gorgeous, snazzy 1950's moon rocket! It's a custom job, so you may need to commission your own, and I don't have any idea about the price. It's based on the 12" tall cast resin Fleet Edition rocket, which is arguably more affordable at $64.95. Jeff custom builds, molds, and hand-casts these in resin, then paints and hand-weathers them to perfection. I've have a few friends with these sitting on their desks, and I've long coveted them! -- John Park
Avi sez, "The design firm IDEO has made it's 'Human-Centered Design Toolkit' available for free download. This is essentially a complete methodology to power millions of garage innovation factories and should be the necessary component of any high-school kid's education."
Work - Human Centered Design Toolkit - IDEO (Thanks, Avi!)
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Coins to Frequent Flier miles "hack" via DF.
Enthusiasts of frequent-flier mileage have all kinds of crazy strategies for racking up credits, but few have been as quick and easy as turning coins into miles.Read more | Permalink | Comments | Read more articles in hacks | Digg this!
At least several hundred mile-junkies discovered that a free shipping offer on presidential and Native American $1 coins, sold at face value by the U.S. Mint, amounted to printing free frequent-flier miles. Mileage lovers ordered more than $1 million in coins until the Mint started identifying them and cutting them off.
Coin buyers charged the purchases, sold in boxes of 250 coins, to a credit card that offers frequent-flier mile awards, then took the shipments straight to the bank. They then used the coins they deposited to pay their credit-card bills. Their only cost: the car trip to make the deposit.Richard Baum, a software-company consultant who lives in New Jersey, ordered 15,000 coins. "I never unrolled them," he says. "The UPS guy put them directly in my trunk." Patricia Hansen, a San Diego retiree who loves to travel, ordered $10,000 in coins from the Mint. "My husband took them to the bank," Ms. Hansen says, and she earned
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You'd think this would be a slam-dunk at the United Nations' World Intellectual Property Organization. Who could oppose non-profit blind/disabled groups helping disabled people get access to written work?
Well, The US Chamber of Commerce, the MPAA and the RIAA, that's who. All three organizations have urged the US trade delegation to oppose the treaty, because they fear it might set a precedent that users have rights to copyrighted works.
Copyright Owners Fight Plan to Release E-Books for the BlindBut that prospect doesn't sit well with American business. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the nation's largest lobby representing 3 million businesses, argues that the plan being proposed by Brazil, Ecuador and Paraguay, "raises a number of serious concerns," (.pdf) chief among them the specter that the treaty would spawn a rash of internet book piracy.
The treaty also creates a bad precedent by loosening copyright restrictions, instead of tightening them as every previous copyright treaty has done, said Brad Huther, a chamber director. Huther concluded in a Dec. 2 letter to the U.S. Copyright office that the international community "should not engage in pursuing a copyright-exemption based paradigm."
Echoing that concern, the Motion Picture Association of America and the Recording Industry of America told the Copyright Office last month that such a treaty would "begin to dismantle the existing global treaty structure of copyright law, through the adoption of an international instrument at odds with existing, longstanding and well-settled norms."
Update: My wife reminds me of the accessibility research that says that 70% percent of us will experience vision disability in our lifetime. So even if you're not blind or disabled, this probably directly affects you, too. (Thanks, Freddie!)
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Scanned from an unknown source, a mural near the elevator in a plastic surgeon's office that casts the rider in the role of Adam on the Sistine Chapel.
Advertising / Be Born Again (via Geisha Asobi)
DIY Book Scanners Turn Your Books Into Bytes
So over three days, and for about $300, he lashed together two lights, two Canon Powershot A590 cameras, a few pieces of acrylic and some chunks of wood to create a book scanner that's fast enough to scan a 400-page book in about 20 minutes. To use it, he simply loads in a book and presses a button, then turns the page and presses the button again. Each press of the button captures two pages, and when he's done, software on Reetz's computer converts the book into a PDF file. The Reetz DIY book scanner isn't automated-you still need to stand by it to turn the pages. But it's fast and inexpensive."The hardware is ridiculously simple as long as you are not demanding archival quality," he says. "A dumpster full of building materials, really cheap cameras and outrageous textbook prices was all I needed to do it."
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As the record industry moved through this stage there was a decline in learning orientation -- in learning what fans actually wanted -- both in terms of how they consumed music and what they were willing to pay for. So to, they began to discount the role that luck played in their success, to assume that the mass-marketing successes that occurred near the end the CD boom, which sold 3-4 million copies, applied to the natural laws of the universe, rather than that of a relatively short-lived phenomenon. This addiction to blockbuster artists is what characterizes the second stage of decline, which Collin's deemed The Undisciplined Pursuit of More. Here, the record industry started out on an unsustainable quest, and, because of their huge successes, they were pressured to grow.There's nothing all that surprising in the essay, but it's nicely written and explained. Well worth reading the whole thing.
Having reached the peak of the CD boom in 1999, the record industry had become a nearly $15-billion-a-year juggernaut, but under the pressure for more growth they collapsed, and, in the process, a vicious cycle of expectations had been set that strained the artists, the fans, the culture, and their systems to the point of breaking. Since record industry was unable to deliver new music with "consistent tactical excellence," they began to fray at the edges. Disruptive technologies were released, an epidemic of file-sharing proceeded, and, at this critical juncture, vested interests of music executives struggled and competed to achieve repetitive consumption through obsolescence. But these executives were too late, as the record industry, by externalizing the blame for their decline in sales, had already started to show symptoms of stage three, Denial of Risk and Peril.
Music executives began discounting negative data, amplifying positive data, and putting a positive spin on ambiguous data. In stage three, Collin's argues that those in power start to blame external factors for setbacks -- "or otherwise explain away the data" -- rather than accepting responsibility and confronting "the frightening reality that their enterprise may be in serious trouble." Right away, the Internet and file-sharing became easy scapegoats for the decline in sales that the record industry faced.
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REINER We did [the 2000 Year Old Man routine] out here in Los Angeles at what you would call a Class A party. One by one people came over to us. George Burns came by with a cigar and said, "Is there an album?" I said no. He said, "Well, you better put it on an album, or I'm going to steal it."As Madison notes:
BROOKS That's true, he said he was going to steal it.
REINER Edward G. Robinson, who was there, said: "Write a play. I want to do it on Broadway." And the one who came up to us and really made sense was Steve Allen. He said you have to make an album.
The standard rap says that you make an object and people might copy it ("steal" it), so you have to have rights to go after the thief. Here, the rap is turned inside out: You make an object in order to keep people from copying it. Social norms are still important, because they have something to do with why and how making an album would keep George Burns from becoming the 2000 Year Old Man. But they aren't everything.Madison's argument is that social norms alone aren't enough to keep people from copying in the absence of copyright -- but that setting the work in some sort of fixed form helped do the trick. Still, I'd argue this is a part of the "social norm," because it was a way of planting the flag by Brooks and Reiner that this was something they had created -- such that if anyone else copied it, people could easily point to the album and say "George Burns copied that," such that Burns would have less credibility. Burns, then wishing to avoid the loss of credibility, has less reason to copy.
Welcome to definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009. First up - What is open source hardware? These are projects in which the creators have decided to completely publish all the source, schematics, firmware, software, bill of materials, parts list, drawings and "board" files to recreate the hardware - they also allow any use, including commercial. Similar to open source software like Linux, but this hardware centric.
Each year we do a guide to all open source hardware and this year there are over 125 unique projects/kits in 19 categories, up from about 60 in 2008, more than doubling the projects out there! - it's incredible! Many are familiar with Arduino (shipping over 100,000 units, estimated) but there are many other projects just as exciting and filled with amazing communities - we think we've captured nearly all of them in this list. Some of these projects and kits are available from MAKE others from the makers themselves or other hardware manufacturers - but since it's open source hardware you can make any of these yourself, start a business, everything is available, that's the point.
This year, I am asking for your help - the Open source hardware page on Wikipedia is missing more projects that it actually has total at the moment. If any readers out there want to help out, review all the projects we've listed and please add them to the Wikipedia page so it's a more complete resource. Also, many projects on the Wikipedia page are not "Open source hardware" but that will likely be debated, at the least - all of the projects in this guide are considered open source hardware by those who actually does open source hardware it seems.
In this version of the guide on MAKE I will link to the product page and if it's sold in the Maker Shed there is an additional link to the Maker Shed if you'd like to support OSH and get a kit or project. For 2009, this guide became so large that it cannot fit in to one post on MAKE so it will be divided up in to sections, 18 of them:
Some of the projects are likely "open source hardware" but the files aren't all up yet, at the time of this writing the maker was contacted to make sure they put a license up for clarification, this will be noted and updated. There will undoubtably be a few mistakes in a collection this large, hit refresh, we'll be updating it all weekend. Also, there's a very good chance we missed something, post them up in the comments and we will add them if they're OSH. When we release this article each year there are always a few days of adding, removing and editing.
A great year for OSH, have fun reading the guide!
Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
3D printing - Open source hardware is now making things. Physical things you can print out, over the last few year 2-3 projects have really gained momentum and made some wonderful advances in low-cost desktop 3D printing. Projects include Fab@Home, MakerBot and RepRap. A new project was also added this year, s DIY open source construction set for experimental personal fabrication.
Contraptor
Contraptor is a DIY open source construction set for experimental personal fabrication, desktop manufacturing, prototyping and bootstrapping.
Price: See site
Visit project page
Fab@Home
Fab@Home is a project dedicated to making and using fabbers - machines that can make almost anything, right on your desktop. This website provides everything you need to know in order to build or buy your own simple fabber, and to use it to print three dimensional objects. The hardware designs and software on this website are free and open-source. Once you have your own fabber, you can also download and print various items, try out new materials, or upload and share your own projects. Advanced users can modify and improve the fabber itself
Price: $2,700 and up
Visit the project page
MakerBeam
MakerBeam is a project to build a toy and tool for the open source imagination. Based on Mini-T, a new open source standard, MakerBeam will develop a construction toy for our times: open source precision hardware equally at home doing desktop fabrication or serving as a drawbridged castle for action figures.
Price: See page for details
Visit the project page
MakerBot
MakerBot is an affordable, open source 3D printer. It makes almost anything up to 4" x 4" x 6" using ABD plastic.
Price: $750 and up
Visit the project page
RepRap
RepRap is short for Replicating Rapid-prototyper. It is the practical self-copying 3D printer shown on the right - a self-replicating machine. This 3D printer builds the parts up in layers of plastic. This technology already exists, but the cheapest commercial machine would cost you about €30,000. And it isn't even designed so that it can make itself. So what the RepRap team are doing is to develop and to give away the designs for a much cheaper machine with the novel capability of being able to self-copy (material costs are about €500). That way it's accessible to small communities in the developing world as well as individuals in the developed world.
Price: Various
Visit the project page
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Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Arduino - Arduino is an open-source electronics prototyping platform based on flexible, easy-to-use hardware and software. It's intended for artists, designers, hobbyists, and anyone interested in creating interactive objects or environments. Perhaps one of the most successful open source hardware projects to date. Dozens of projects are included in the guide.
Arduino is an open-source electronics prototyping platform based on flexible, easy-to-use hardware and software. It's intended for artists, designers, hobbyists, and anyone interested in creating interactive objects or environments. Arduino can sense the environment by receiving input from a variety of sensors and can affect its surroundings by controlling lights, motors, and other actuators.
Here are all the flavors that are (or were) officially from the Arduino team...
Price: $20 and up
Visit the project page
Buy one @ Maker Shed
Keeping reading for more!
Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Arduino shields - This is a new category mostly because there are so many open source hardware shields in 2009. These "shields" add music, internet, GPS and additional functions.
Arduino shields and add-ons, these are projects that enhance the Arduino by adding additional functionality such as music, GPS, internet and more. They are added on top of the Arduino and some can be stacked.
Here are the official shields from the Arduino team:
Keeping reading for a ton more...
Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Blinky projects - Open source hardware tends to have a lot of projects that blinky, pulse, and light up. It's a hard category to define exactly, so I'm calling it blinky projects. From a "Larsen scanner" (cylon) to making your bicycle spell words in the air, all of these projects are filled with LEDs.
MiniPOV
The 3rd generation MiniPOV is perfect for beginners who are looking to learn how to solder, how to program microcontrollers, or make LED blinky toys. Because the programmer is built into the kit, you don't need a special "microcontroller programmer". This version can be used with PCs (Linux/Unix or Windows) and Macs (running MacOS X and with a USB/serial converter).
Price: $17.99
Visit the project page
Buy one @ Maker Shed
Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Clocks and watches - This year there are some really timely additions to the list, clocks! From a retro Russian tube clock to an open source watch. These time pieces are open and timely.
The Bulbdial Clock Kit
The Bulbdial Clock kit is based on an original design concept from IronicSans.com and developed at Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories. It works like an indoor sundial, but with three shadows of different length. You tell the time just like you do on a normal clock, by reading the positions of the hour, minute, and second hands.
Price: $65.00
Visit the project page
Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Culture jamming - These projects are not only open source hardware, they aim to open ours minds a bit. A cell phone jammer, a universal device that turns off TVs and an open source homeland security non-lethal weapon.
Bedazzler
After attending a conference where the $1 million "sea-sick flashlight" (named "THE DAZZLER") was demonstrated by the US Dept. of Homeland Security, Adafruit decided to create their own version. For under $250, you can build your own dazzler and they've released the source code, schematics and PCB files to make it easy. A great Arduino project for people who really like blinking LEDs. They have also added in a mode selection so you can put it into some pretty color-swirl modes, great for raves and parties!
Price: Not for sale (about $250 to build your own)
Visit the project page
TV-B-Gone
Tired of all those LCD TVs everywhere? Want a break from advertisements while you're trying to eat? Want to zap screens from across the street? The TV-B-Gone kit is what you need!
Price: $21.99
Visit the project page
Buy one @ Maker Shed
Wave Bubble
A self-tuning, wide-bandwidth portable RF jammer. The device is lightweight and small for easy camouflaging: it is the size of a pack of cigarettes. An internal lithium-ion battery provides up to 2 hours of jamming (two bands, such as cell) or 4 hours (single band, such as cordless phone, GPS, WiFi, bluetooth, etc). The battery is rechargeable via a mini-USB connector or 4mm DC jack (a common size). Alternately, 3 AAA batteries may also be used. Output power is .1W (high bands) and .3W (low bands). Effective range is approximately 20' radius with well-tuned antennas. Less so with the internal antennas or poorly matched antennas. Self-tuning is provided via dual PLL, therefore, no spectrum analyzer is necessary to build this jammer and a single Wave Bubble can jam many different frequency bands - unlike any other design currently available! To reconfigure the RF bands, simply plug it into the USB port of your PC and type in the new frequencies when prompted. Multiple frequency ranges can be programmed in, each time the device is power cycled it will advance to the next program in memory.
Price: Not for sale (about $200 to build your own)
Visit the project page
Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Development platforms and tools - These are tools and platforms, a wide category - but filled with chip programmers, mini-computers, debugging hardware and tons of project to - make other projects!
Beagle board
The USB-powered Beagle Board is a low-cost, fan-less single board computer that unleashes laptop-like performance and expandability without the bulk, expense, or noise of typical desktop machines.
Price: $149.00
Visit the project page
Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Energy, Power and Green - These open source hardware projects power things or have something to do with powering devices, saving the planet and monitoring power/energy in some way.
Smart Battery Meter
The Smart Battery Meter measures the "state of charge" of a 12 volt or 24 volt sealed, lead-acid battery system. It uses a multi-color array of LEDs to give an instant visual indicator of the remaining charge, sort of like a gas gauge.
Price: $24.95
Visit the project page
Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Fun, games and entertainment - These open source hardware projects that are more fun than anything else, from net connect set top boxes to fun games (and gaming systems) you can make yourself.
"Simon-like" Electronic Game Kit
Originally designed for the Maker Faire by Grand Idea Studio, the Build Your Own Electronic Game Kit is a custom-created kit intended to introduce you to the world of electronics and soldering. When successfully assembled, the kit becomes a version of the popular memory game, Simon, with a few optional twists, including no LEDs, no sound, reverse order, and fast play.
Visit the project page
Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Imaging - There's only project, but it's a great start. Open source cameras for everyone aren't here yet, but there's one project that is pioneering the field... of vision!
Elphel open source cameras and network cameras
Elphel, Inc. was started in 2001 to provide high performance cameras based on free software and hardware designs.
Price: $800 and up
Visit the project page
Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Medical and bio - The open source hardware projects are medical or biological. While this category only has a few I expect this to be the largest category in 5 years or less. Open sourcing medical equipment around the world seems like the most logical step in the evolution of open source hardware, check out some of the first projects!
Brain machine
Hack your brain! Get comfortable, put on the glasses and headphones, close your eyes (the LEDs are bright!), and flick the power switch. Enjoy the hallucinations as you drift into deep meditation, ponder your inner world, and then come out after the 14-minute program feeling fabulous. Sound and Light Machines (SLMs) produce sound and light pulses at brain wave frequencies, which help people sleep, wake up, meditate, or experience whatever state of consciousness the machine is programmed for.
Price: $34.99
Visit the project page
Buy one @ Maker Shed
Peripheral nerve stimulator
The jfish project seeks to encourage the use and development of free anaesthetic monitoring technologies. Our goal is to produce free and open technology to provide safe and reliable anaesthetic monitoring anywhere in the world the need exists. Stage 2 of the jfish project is complete, with the research, design and construction of a free hardware/open source peripheral nerve stimulator (PNS).
Price: $
Visit the project page
Open ECG
The openECGproject is an online community conceived around a simple, but challenging and worthy goal - to develop an open source hardware and software solution for electrocardiography.
Price: Various
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OpenEEG
Many people are interested in what is called neurofeedback or EEG biofeedback training, a generic mental training method which makes the trainee consciously aware of the general activity in the brain. This method shows great potential for improving many mental capabilities and exploring consciousness. Other people want to do experiments with brain-computer interfaces or just want to have a look at their brain at work. Unfortunately, commercial EEG devices are generally too expensive to become a hobbyist tool or toy.
Price: Various
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Open Prosthetics
The Open Prosthetics Project is producing useful innovations in the field of prosthetics and freely sharing the designs. This project is an open source collaboration between users, designers and funders with the goal of making our creations available for anyone to use and build upon. Our hope is to use this and our complementary sites to create a
Price: Donate
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Twittering heart meter
The open source hardware project allows you to twitter your heart rate, the video is a little odd, but that's what it seems to be doing.
Price: See site
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Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Music - Music is one of the largest categories: synthesizers, guitar amps, MP3 players to an arcade MIDI device. These projects not only are open, they're musical (one of the old forms of "open information") so that's twice the goodness rolled in to one.
Daisy MP3 player
Can't find an open source MP3 player? Neither could we. Here's an idea: Build your own. Daisy is an easy-to-build, pocket-sized open source MP3 player.
Price: $114.95
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Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Processors - You can actually make and fabricate your own chips, I have met anyone who does this but there are a couple huge projects that openly share CPUs and on-chip interconnections. Living room chip fabs are a few years away (well, Jeri has one) but here's a glimpse.
Opencores
OpenCores is a foundation that attempts to form a community of designers to support open-source cores (logic designs) for CPUs, peripherals and other devices. OpenCores maintains an open-source on-chip interconnection bus specification called Wishbone. ORSoC has designed a development kit for the OpenRISC processor. This kit enables easy access to the OpenRISC platform and gives the designer a fast start.
Price: Various
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OpenSPARC
OpenSPARC is an open source hardware project started in December 2005. The initial contribution to the project was Sun Microsystems' Register transfer level (RTL) Verilog code for a full 64-bit, 32-thread microprocessor, the UltraSPARC T1 processor.
Price: Various
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Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Religious - Open source hardware has made inroads in to religious from an LED menorah to a blinky Christmas card. These projects almost belong in the "Blinky projects" category, but I thought they should get their own. I suspect more religions will be open sourcing their hardware soon.
Menorah Kit
The Deluxe LED Menorah kit is an updated take on the traditional hanukkiyah, the nine-armed Hanukkah candelabrum. Two candles are lit on the first night of Hanukkah (one "real" candle plus the lighter candle, or shamash), three on the second night, right up to nine on the eighth night. (That's (2+9) * (8/2) = 44 candles all together).
Price: $14.00
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Christmas card & ornament
Hackable Christmas tree, made with an ATtiny13A and a few LEDs. Push the button to play a short light show in the tree.
Price: $15.00
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Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Robotics - From controlling motors to a robot arm you can make yourself, robotics is a new and growing category in open source hardware. While there's not a ton of projects many robotics groups are using Arduinos (FIRST is now) so I think we'll see this category double and triple in 2010, here are some of the early pioneers.
Easy Driver
The EasyDriver is a simple to use stepper motor driver, compatible with anything that can output a digital 0 to 5V pulse. EasyDriver requires a 7V to 30V supply to power the motor, and has an on board voltage regulator for the digital interface. Connect a 4-wire stepper motor and a microcontroller and you've got precision motor control! EasyDriver drives bi-polar motors, and motors wired as bi-polar. I.e. 4,6, or 8 wire stepper motors.
Price: $14.95
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Robot arm
A five axis robotic arm design controlled by rather inexpensive hobby servos (material and cutting cost about USD$150) - loads of fun to play with, and we think potentially very useful for more serious pursuits.
Price: Various
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OpenServo
OpenServo is an open community-based project with the goal of creating a high quality digital servo for robotics.
Price: Various
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Twitchie
Make your bots and plushies come to life! Twitchie is an amazingly lifelike animated armature that's Arduino-powered and comes preprogrammed, making it an excellent kit for beginners in robotics. No programming required! You can download and modify the code if you want, and it's pretty light on soldering, too. We recommend Twitchie for young makers (both boys and girls) interested in robotics or in bringing plush toys to life.
Price: $99.95
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Price: $
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Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Telecommunications - These projects use the telephone system in some way or are related to cell phones (or in one example, are cell phones). It's popular to open source the software on phones now, and slowly but surely we might see more phone systems go this way to if there are benefits for the companies and the customers.
P04 Four Port IP-PBX - Open source asterisk box
The goal of this project is to provide free hardware designs for telephone systems. Both the hardware and software are open. You are free to copy, modify and re-use the hardware designs. The hardware for a complete embedded Asterisk IP PBX (including multiple analog ports or a T1/E1) can be built for a few hundred dollars. No PC required!
Price: $290.00
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Openmoko
Openmoko is a project dedicated to delivering mobile phones with an open source software stack. Openmoko is currently selling the Neo FreeRunner phone to advanced users and will start selling it to the general public as soon as the software is more developed. Beyond freeing the software on their devices they have also released their CAD files. And at LinuxWorld 2008, they announced the release of the schematics for their products.
Price: Various
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SIM card reader
This is a SIM card reader/writer for experimentation and investigation of SIM & Smart cards. Once the kit is built, accompanying software can be used to read and write from the card. Together they can be used to backup stored SIM card data, recover deleted SMS's and phone contacts, examine the last 10 phone numbers dialed, etc. (Despite being called a SIM reader, it can also write to SIM cards)
Price: $
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Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Transportation - There's just one in the transportation category, an electronic fuel injection project. While there is always talk of an "open source" automobile, there mostly design projects and not a project with downloads, files, software, etc - in a few years we might see a physical open source hardware car however, there seems to be a lot of interest.
Megasquirt
The MegaSquirt family of EFI controllers (including MS-I, MS-II, MicroSquirt, and the MS-II Sequencer) are intended as educational projects for those who want to learn about electronic fuel injection. They are experimental Do-It-Yourself programmable electronic fuel injection controllers that you build yourself. MegaSquirt controllers will work on virtually any liquid fueled spark-ignition engine, naturally aspirated or boosted (up to 21 psi boost with the standard MAP sensor) as long as they are not 'pollution controlled'. Note that any MegaSquirt EFI controller is the controller only, you will have to gather the remaining fuel system parts yourself (from 1 to 16 injectors, sensors, fuel rails, fuel pump, etc.).
Price: $200 and up
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Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
UAVs - A Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) is an aircraft that has the capability of fully autonomous flight, without a pilot in control. Amateur UAVs are non-military and non-commercial. They typically fly under “recreational” exceptions to FAA regulations on UAVs, so long as the pilots/programmers keep them within tight limits on altitude and distance. Usually the UAV is controlled manually by Radio Control (RC) at take-off and landing, and switched into autonomous mode only at a safe altitude.
Ardupilot
BlimpDuino is a very low cost open source autonomous blimp. It consists of an Arduino-based blimp controller board with on-board infrared and ultrasonic sensors and an interface for an optional RC mode, a simple gondola with two vectoring (tilting) differential thrusters, and ground-based infrared beacon. It will be available as a commercial kit, complete with a mylar envelope.
Price: $24.95
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Blimpduino
The Blimpduino kit is a very low-cost, open source, autonomous blimp kit. It consists of an Arduino-based blimp controller board with onboard infrared and ultrasonic sensors and an interface for an optional RC mode, a simple gondola with two vectoring (tilting) differential thrusters, and ground-based infrared beacon.
Price: $100 and up
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Paparazzi
Paparazzi is a free and open-source hardware and software project intended to create an exceptionally powerful and versatile autopilot system by allowing and encouraging input from the community. The project includes not only the airborne hardware and software, from voltage regulators and GPS receivers to Kalman filtering code, but also a powerful and ever-expanding array of ground hardware and software including modems, antennas, and a highly evolved user-friendly ground control software interface.
Price: Various
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Part of The definitive guide to open source hardware projects in 2009
Wireless and GPS - From an open GPS tracker to a small wireless device that works with the Arduino, this is a fairly new category and likely one that will grow as more spectrum frees up.
JeeNode
The JeeNode is based on an Atmel ATmega 328 - the same as an Arduino - and was inspired by Modern Device's Really Bare Bones Board, which is like a minimal implementation of an Arduino. The USB communication interface has been removed and any USB-to-TTLSerial based on the FTDI232R chip is guaranteed to work as connection. Being compatible with Arduino boards such as the Duemilanove means that you can use the IDE to upload a sketch using any PC running Windows, Mac OS X, or Linux.
Price: $20 and up
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Open GPS tracker
The Open GPS Tracker is a small device which plugs into a $20 prepaid mobile phone to make a GPS tracker. The Tracker responds to text message commands, detects motion, and sends you its exact position, ready for Google Maps or your mapping software. The Tracker firmware is open source and user-customizable.
Price: $75.00
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Xbee adapter kit
XBee modems are one of the easiest ways to create a wireless point-to-point or mesh network. They have error correction, are configured with AT commands, come in multiple flavors and can create a wireless serial link out of the box. This is an open source Xbee adapter kit, can be used to make a "Tweet-a-watt" - a twittering power monitor.
Price: $10.00 and up
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This looks like an interesting development: Youtube user ArduinoWill claims to have managed to shoehorn an operating system onto the tiny microcontroller system, called Pyxis OS. The above demo shows it loading a text file and a bitmap image from a microsd controller. There doesn't seem to be much information available about the project yet, however the author mentions that the code will be released once the project works more reliably. [via antipastohw]
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Sweet little breadboard Menorah project at Sparkle Labs.
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Maker Media has just published a new book called Make: Electronics, by Charles Platt, and it's the best electronics primer I've ever come across (admittedly, I'm the editor-in-chief of MAKE and Charles' friend, but I really do think it's the best).
Here's what Gareth Branwyn (the book's editor) said about it:
I'm thrilled to announce our latest offering from O'Reilly/Make: Books, Make: Electronics, by Charles Platt. This is a book that we've wanted to do for awhile. Many of us at Maker Media have had an interaction that goes something like this: You're at a talk, Maker Faire, or elsewhere, and someone spirits you aside, like they're going to confess to a petty crime or some marital indiscretion. What they want to whisper sheepishly into your ear is that they love MAKE, all of the excitement they see over open source electronics, and the cool kits we sell in the Maker Shed, but they have NO IDEA how electronics work, and the "beginner" books and resources they look at online zoom quickly over their heads and frustrate their efforts to learn. Ultimately, they find themselves too embarrassed to admit their lack of high-tech smarts or to ask questions (which is why they've taken you behind a dumpster to confess their ignorance).So we decided to make it our mission to create a book that would patiently guide readers into the world of electronics in a way that was fun, clear-spoken, graphical, and experiential. Charles dubbed it "learning by discovery." He has you experimenting with parts right out of the gate, licking batteries (really), breaking and frying stuff, and then you learn what happened and why, the theories behind the parts and processes, and how to do the experiment correctly. For all of those would-be makers and wireheads who've been looking for a book that will finally let them in on all the fun, we made this one for you!
In 340+ pages, Make: Electronics takes you from the most basic aspects of electronic components and theory to essential techniques, such as soldering and using a multimeter, gathering basic tools and setting up a workshop, all the way up to working with integrated circuits, microcontrollers, and building sophisticated devices such as robots. The book is full-color, with hundreds of photos, illustrations, schematics, even fun cartoons. Charles Platt, being the true Renaissance man that he is, did all of this himself. So the book has something of a charming, handmade feel to it.
To give you an idea of what the book feels like, we've put together this 40-page PDF. It contains the cover, table of contents, two complete projects from the book, and the index.
The deluxe kit, shown above, has many of the tools you'll need to make the projects in the book.
The 555 Man
By Charles Platt
While fact-checking Make: Electronics, I realized I didn't have permission to publish a photograph that I'd found of Hans Camenzind, designer of the 555 chip. This led me to a telephone conversation that was a true delight, leaving me smiling foolishly for hours afterward.
I included a brief history of the 555 in my book, and wanted to illustrate it with a photograph of its creator, Hans Camenzind. I Googled him and found that he has his own plain-and-simple webpage. And because the page not only included his email address but also his personal phone number, I impulsively dialed it. (I should add: Please don't do this yourself, unless you have a specific, useful purpose. It would not be polite to take up someone's time just because he's generous enough to publish his number.)
A couple of seconds later, I was amazed when a gentleman with a Swiss accent answered the phone. It was a truly strange moment. For literally decades, I've known about the 555 timer and used it in projects. I understand more about the behavior of this chip than any other. And suddenly, without warning, here I was speaking to the man who had single-handedly created it.
I got the impression of a very alert intelligence at the other end of the line, which shouldn't have been surprising. He was friendly, modest, and more than willing to help me by signing a release entitling us to use his photograph. However, I got the impression that he had little interest in chit-chat, and really, I didn't have much more to say, other than to thank him for his role in that amazing and wonderful community of engineers of the 60s and 70s who had the vision and the audacity to develop the smart little circuits that took astronauts to the moon, ushered in the era of desktop computers, and facilitated the internet.
Hans Camenzind's name may not be familiar to most people -- certainly not as familiar as that of William Shockley, who co-invented the transistor, or Andy Grove, who played such a key role in the development of Intel. Yet Camenzind's work in the early days of Silicon Valley turned out to be unexpectedly significant.
In 1970, he sold an idea to a company called Signetics for a new kind of timer. A timer may seem a lowly thing, merely measuring milliseconds and emitting pulses at regular intervals. What made Camenzind's concept so significant was that his circuit, containing 23 transistors and assorted resistors, could be scaled down and etched onto a wafer of silicon. In fact, it pushed the state of the art at the time. It was the first chip of its kind.
Camenzind developed it single-handedly, and he did it the hard way. First, he designed the circuit using full-scale components. When he verified that it worked, he started substituting components of slightly different values, to make sure that it would still work if the chip-manufacturing process introduced inaccuracies. He made at least ten versions of the circuit. Testing took months.
Having finalized the circuit, his next step was to cut it into plastic film using an X-Acto knife. This was long before the days of computer drawing software. Everything had to be done painstakingly by hand. From start to finish, the whole development process took about a year.
When that phase was complete, the circuits were reduced in size photographically, by a factor of about 300:1, and used as masks for etching the silicon. Each silicon wafer was sealed into a half-inch rectangle of black plastic, and the sales manager at Signetics assigned a product identification code of 555. The 555 timer was born.
It has turned out to be the most successful chips in history, both in the number of units sold (tens of billions, and still counting) and the longevity of its design (fundamentally unchanged for almost forty years). Even now, about a billion 555s are manufactured each year.
In Make: Electronics, I decided to include the 555, because it remains so fundamental. It's also a wonderful teaching tool, since it can be used in so many ways. If you want to build, say, a reaction timer, using a counter and a couple of logic chips, you're going to run it with a 555 timer, and you may end up adding a couple more 555s to take care of functions such as delaying the start of the count and locking the display until a reset button is pressed. You can also run a 555 fast enough to generate audible tones, which can be incorporated into a burglar alarm, or you can use it in a combination lock. All three of these projects are included in the book.
It's true that programmable microcontroller units (MCUs) can do the same thing as a 555, with fewer components. You simply write a little program and download it into the MCU's flash memory, and if you want to make future modifications, you edit the program and download it again. On the other hand, as soon as you get involved with software, you have a whole set of new potential problems--such as syntax errors, logical errors, or runtime overflow when your program adds two numbers and the result turns out to be too big for the variable that you allocated. There's really nothing as elegantly simple as a circuit built entirely in hardware. And I think this is still the best way to learn the fundamentals.
I have so much respect for the pioneers in what later came to be known as Silicon Valley, and I'm thrilled that for a few moments, I spoke to someone whose design has been incorporated into devices ranging from space vehicles to toaster ovens. Thank you, Hans Camenzind, for the part you played in changing all of our lives!
If you want to know more, there's a great interview transcript with Hans at the Semiconductor Museum.
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Make: Electronics
Our Price: $34.99
Want to learn the fundamentals of electronics in a fun and experiential way? Start working on some excellent projects as soon as you crack open this unique, hands-on book. Build the circuits first, then learn the theory behind them! With Make: Electronics, you'll learn all of the basic components and important principles through a series of "learn by discovery" experiments. And you don't need to know a thing about electricity to get started.
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