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https://hackaday.com/2021/07/25/parts-shortage-forces-creativity-for-this-recursive-clock-of-clocks/ | Parts Shortage Forces Creativity For This Recursive Clock Of Clocks | Dan Maloney | [
"clock hacks"
] | [
"analog",
"clock",
"digital",
"light pipe",
"meta",
"metaclock",
"neopixel"
] | We’ve been seeing a lot of metaclocks lately — a digital clock whose display is formed by the sweeping hands of an array of individual analog clocks. They can look fantastic, and we’ve certainly seen some great examples.
But in this time of supply pinches, it’s not always possible to gather the parts one needs for a full-scale build. Happily, that didn’t stop [Erich Styger] from executing
this circular multi-metaclock
with only thirteen of his custom dual-shaft stepper analog movements. Normally, his clocks use
double that number of movements
, which he arranges in a matrix so that the hands can be positioned to form virtual seven-segment displays. By arranging the movements in a circle, the light-pipe hands can mimic an analog clock face, or perform any of [Erich]’s signature “intermezzo” animations, each of which is graceful and engaging to watch. Check out a little of what this charmingly recursive clock has to offer in the video below.
[Erich] could easily have gotten stuck on the original design —
he’s been at this metaclock game for a while
, after all. The fact that the reduced part count forced him to get creative on the display is the best part of this build, at least to us. | 9 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367190",
"author": "Null Void",
"timestamp": "2021-07-26T03:10:09",
"content": "I just want to know what the bloody time is",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6367225",
"author": "zosh",
"timestamp": "2021-07-26T08:42:51",... | 1,760,373,006.703863 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/25/hackaday-links-july-25-2021/ | Hackaday Links: July 25, 2021 | Dan Maloney | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Hackaday links"
] | [
"ChromeOS",
"classified",
"free fall",
"google",
"hackaday links",
"main battle tank",
"parabola",
"pinball",
"typo",
"video game",
"vomit comet",
"weightlessness",
"zero g"
] | Everyone makes mistakes in their job, but very few of us get the chance to make
a one-character mistake with the potential to brick millions of devices
. But that’s what happened to a hapless Google developer, who made an understandable typo in the ChromeOS code that ended up making it all the way to production. The error, which was in the OS encryption keys vault, was supposed to include the “&&” operator for a logical AND. The developer instead used a single ampersand, which broke the who conditional statement. This meant the OS evaluated even correct passwords as invalid, leaving users locked out of their Chromebooks. To be fair to the developer there should be a lot of QA steps between that typo and production, but it still has to sting.
Speaking of whoopsies,
sometimes it just doesn’t pay to be right on the internet
. It started when a player of the popular tank battle simulator “War Thunder” took issue with the in-game 3D model of the British Challenger 2 main battle tank. The player argued that the model was inaccurate to the point of affecting gameplay, and thought the model should be changed to make things more realistic. There seemed to be some basis for this, as the player claimed to have been a Challenger 2 commander and gunnery instructor. What’s more, like any good Netizen, the player cited sources to back up the claims, including excerpts from the official Challenger 2 instruction manual. Players on the
War Thunder forum
flagged this as likely classified material, but the player insisted that it wasn’t — right up to the point where the UK Ministry of Defence said, “Not so fast.” It turns out that the manual hasn’t been declassified, and that releasing the material potentially runs afoul of the Official Secrets Act, which carries with it up to 14 years detention at Her Majesty’s pleasure.
For fans of pinball, the announcement that
the Museum of Pinball in Banning, California is closing its doors for good
is probably a mix of good news and bad. It’s obviously bad news for any museum to close, especially one that curates collections from popular culture. And there’s no denying that pinball has been a big part of that culture, and that the machines themselves are often works of electromechanical art. But it appears that the museum just couldn’t make a go of it, and now its cavernous space will be sold off to a cannabis grower. But the sad news is tempered by the potential for private collectors and other pinball aficionados to score one of the estimated 1,100 pins the museum now needs to find a home for. We’ve never been to the museum, so it’s hard to say what kinds of machines they have and how collectible they are, but regardless, the market is about to be flooded. If you’re nearby, you might want to take a chance to see and play some of these machines one last time, before they get shipped off to private game rooms around the world.
And finally, exciting news from Hackaday superfriend Fran Blanche, who will soon tick an item off her bucket list with
a zero-G ride on “G-Force 1”
. Not to be confused with its military cousin the “Vomit Comet”, the
weightlessness-simulating aircraft
will afford Fran a total of about five minutes of free-fall when she takes the ride in a couple of months. There will also be periods of the flight that will simulate the gravity on both the Moon and Mars, so Fran has promised some Matt Damon mythbusting and Buzz Aldrin moonbouncing. And always one to share, Fran will bring along a professional video crew, so she can concentrate on the experience rather than filming it. We’ve actually scheduled Fran for a Hack Chat in August, to talk about the flight and some of her other cool goings-on, so watch out for that. | 10 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367157",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2021-07-25T23:06:47",
"content": "“What’s more, like any good Netizen, the player cited sources to back up the claims, including excerpts from the official Challenger 2 instruction manual.”Someone should have known better.” But it appear... | 1,760,373,006.988406 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/25/portable-gps-time-server-powered-by-the-esp8266/ | Portable GPS Time Server Powered By The ESP8266 | Tom Nardi | [
"clock hacks",
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"ESP8266",
"gps",
"GPS clock",
"network time protocol",
"ntp",
"NTP server"
] | Most Hackaday readers will be familiar with the idea of a network time server; a magical box nestled away in some distant data center that runs the Network Time Protocol (NTP) and allows us to conveniently synchronize the clocks in our computers and gadgets. Particularly eager clock watchers can actually rig up their own NTP server for their personal use, and if you’re a true time aficionado like [Cristiano Monteiro],
you might be interested in the portable GPS-controlled time server he recently put together
.
The heart of the build is a NEO-6M GPS module which features a dedicated pulse per second (PPS) pin. The ESP8266 combines the timestamp from the GPS messages and the PPS signal to synchronize itself with the atomic clock aboard the orbiting satellite. To prevent the system from drifting too far out of sync when it doesn’t have a lock on the GPS signal, [Cristiano] is using a DS3231 I2C real-time clock module that features a high accuracy temperature-compensated crystal oscillator (TCXO).
These components, along with the
open source code provided in the project’s GitHub repository
, gives you an extremely accurate Stratum 1 NTP server that can respond to client requests over WiFi. But to take the idea a step further, [Cristiano] added an OLED and some LEDs to provide feedback, and put the whole thing inside a handsome enclosure along with a 18650 cell, TP4056 charging module, and DC-DC buck converter. The result is a fully wireless time server that can be deployed anywhere, which as an amateur radio operator, he plans to use in the field.
Whether you take yours on the road or permanently mount it, this project is an excellent way to get more acquainted with NTP and GPS reception. It’s a great time (no pun intended) to start experimenting with this technology too, as there have been some grumblings that
terrestrial radio time signals may go dark in the near future
. | 31 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367130",
"author": "Tom Brusehaver",
"timestamp": "2021-07-25T20:10:34",
"content": "This is my MQTT equivalent. More compact.http://enginemonitor.blogspot.com/2020/09/gps-module.html?m=1",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "63671... | 1,760,373,007.073614 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/25/why-make-coffee-when-youre-tired-let-a-robot-do-it-for-you/ | Why Make Coffee When You’re Tired? Let A Robot Do It For You | Kristina Panos | [
"Lifehacks",
"Robots Hacks",
"The Hackaday Prize"
] | [
"2021 Hackaday Prize",
"arduino",
"arduino nano",
"coffee",
"ESP32",
"pour over",
"robot"
] | Like us, [Alberto] doesn’t compromise when it comes to a good cup of coffee. We figure that if he went to an office in the Before Times, he was the type of coworker to bring in their own coffee equipment so as not to suffer the office brew. Or perhaps he volunteered to order the office supplies and therefore got to decide for everyone else. Yep, that’s definitely one way to do it.
But like many of us, he is now operating out of a home office. Even so, he’s got better things to do than stand around pouring the perfect cup of coffee every morning. See, that’s where we differ, [Alberto]. But we do love
Cafeino, your automated pour-over machine
. It’s so sleek and lovely, and we’re sure it does a much better job than we do by hand — although we enjoy doing the pouring ourselves.
Cafeino is designed to mimic the movements of a trained barista’s hand, because evidently you’re supposed to pour the water in slow, deliberate swirls to evenly cover the grounds. (Our kettle has a chunky spout, so we just sort of wing it.) Cafeino does this by pumping water from an electric kettle and pouring a thin stream of it in circles with the help of two servos.
The three buttons each represent a different recipe setting, which specifies the amount of water, the hand pouring pattern, and the resting times between blooming the grounds and actually pouring the bulk of the water. These recipes are set using the accompanying web app via an ESP32, although the main brain barista is an Arduino Nano. Grab a cup and check out the demo after the break.
Got an old but modern coffee robot lying around?
You could turn it into a planter with automated watering
.
The
Hackaday
Prize2021
is Sponsored by: | 9 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367121",
"author": "echodelta",
"timestamp": "2021-07-25T19:02:14",
"content": "I found a Black and Decker Home Cafe pod maker at the curb. I’d never use pods, fresh ground only. I took off some of the plastic under the pod part so I could get a Melita cone and a big cup under the ... | 1,760,373,006.486951 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/24/avoid-awkward-video-conference-situations-with-pir-and-arduino/ | Avoid Awkward Video Conference Situations With PIR And Arduino | Danie Conradie | [
"laptops hacks",
"The Hackaday Prize",
"Video Hacks"
] | [
"2021 Hackaday Prize",
"PIR sensor",
"video conferencing",
"working from home",
"zoom"
] | Working from home with regular video meetings has its challenges, especially if you add kids to the mix. To help avoid embarrassing situations, [Charitha Jayaweera] created
Present!
, a USB device to automatically turn of your camera and microphone if you suddenly need to leave your
computer
to maintain domestic order.
Present consists of just a PIR sensor and Arduino in a 3D printed enclosure to snap onto your monitor. When the PIR sensor no longer detects someone in range, it sends a notification over serial to a python script running on the PC to switch off the camera and microphone on Zoom (or another app). It can optionally turn these back on when you are seated again. The cheap HC-SR501 PIR module’s range can also be adjusted with a trimpot for your specific scenario. It should also be possible to shrink the device to the size of the PIR module, with a small custom PCB or one of the many tiny Arduino compatible dev boards.
For quick manual muting, check out the
giant 3D printed mute button
. Present was an entry into the
Work from Home
Challenge, part of the
2021 Hackaday Prize
.
The
Hackaday
Prize2021
is Sponsored by: | 10 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366974",
"author": "jack324",
"timestamp": "2021-07-24T18:08:34",
"content": "This feels like it has a higher chance of failing to shut off the cam/mic than just setting a hot key on your keyboard and training yourself to hit that key when you walk away. Also feels way too complica... | 1,760,373,007.116581 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/24/learning-to-desolder-gracefully/ | Learning To Desolder Gracefully | Elliot Williams | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Rants",
"Slider"
] | [
"desoldering",
"mistakes",
"newsletter",
"soldering",
"teaching",
"undo"
] | When you’re just learning to sketch, you use graphite. Why? It’s cheap, great at training you to recognize different shades, and most of all, it’s erasable. When you’re learning, you’re going to make mistakes, and un-making them is an important part of the game. Same goes for electronics, of course, so when you’re teaching someone to solder, don’t neglect teaching them to desolder.
I want these!
We could argue all day about the best ways of pressing the molten-metal undo button, but the truth is that it’s
horses for courses
. I’ve had really good luck with solder braid and maybe a little heat gun to pull up reluctant SOIC surface-mount chips, but nothing beats a solder sucker for clearing out a few through-holes. (I haven’t tried the questionable, but time-tested practice of
blasting the joint with compressed air
.)
For bulk part removal, all you really have to do is heat the board up, and there’s
plenty of ways to do that
, ranging from fancy to foolish.
Low-temperature alloys
help out in really tough cases. And for removing rows of pinheaders, it can help to add more solder along the row until it’s one molten blob, and then tap the PCB and watch the part — and hot liquid metal! — just drop out.
But the bigger point is that an important step in learning a new technique is learning to undo your mistakes. It makes it all a lot less intimidating when you know that you can just pull out the solder braid and call “do-over”. And don’t forget the flux.
This article is part of the Hackaday.com newsletter, delivered every seven days for each of the last 200+ weeks. It also includes our favorite articles from the last seven days that you can see on
the web version of the newsletter
.
Want this type of article to hit your inbox every Friday morning?
You should sign up
! | 45 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366936",
"author": "Paul",
"timestamp": "2021-07-24T14:26:36",
"content": "Just going to leave this bit of genius here:https://hackaday.com/2017/04/03/have-you-ever-tried-desoldering-needles/",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6... | 1,760,373,006.941345 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/24/esp8266-adds-wifi-logging-to-ikeas-air-quality-sensor/ | ESP8266 Adds WiFi Logging To IKEA’s Air Quality Sensor | Tom Nardi | [
"home hacks",
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"air quality",
"custom firmware",
"ESP8266",
"ikea",
"particulates",
"sensor"
] | Introduced back in June, the IKEA VINDRIKTNING is a $12 USD sensor that uses colored LEDs to indicate the relative air quality in your home depending on how many particles it sucks up. Looking to improve on this simplistic interface,
[Sören Beye] tacked an ESP8266 to the board so it can broadcast sensor readings out over MQTT
.
Just three wires link the ESP8266 to the PCB.
While some of us would have been tempted to gut the VINDRIKTNING and attach its particle sensor directly to the ESP8266, the approach [Sören] has used is actually quite elegant. Rather than replacing IKEA’s electronics, the microcontroller is simply listening in on the UART communications between the sensor and the original controller. This not only preserves the stock functionality of the VINDRIKTNING, but simplifies the code as the ESP doesn’t need to do nearly as much.
All you need to do if you want to perform this modification is solder a couple wires to convenient test pads on the VINDRIKTNING board, then flash the firmware (or write your own version), and you’re good to go. There’s plenty of room inside the case for the ESP8266, though you may want to tape it down so it doesn’t impact air flow.
While not required, [Sören] also recommends making a small modification to the VINDRIKTNING which makes it a bit quieter. Apparently the 5 V fan inside the sensor is occasionally revved up by the original controller, rather than kept at a continuous level that you can mentally tune out. But by attaching the sensor’s fan to the ESP8266’s 3.3 V pin, it will run continuously at a lower speed.
We’ve seen custom firmware for IKEA products before
, but this approach, which keeps the device’s functionality intact regardless of what’s been flashed to the secondary microcontroller, is particularly appealing for those of us who can’t seem to keep the gremlins out of our code.
[Thanks to nexgensri for the tip.] | 38 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366914",
"author": "icb",
"timestamp": "2021-07-24T11:56:10",
"content": "The fan speed change is part of the sensor’s cleaning cycle. Disabling it is going to eventually cause the it to fail, or at least provide inaccurate readings as dust builds up inside.",
"parent_id": null... | 1,760,373,006.571117 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/24/how-the-flipper-zero-hacker-multitool-gets-made-and-tested/ | How The Flipper Zero Hacker Multitool Gets Made And Tested | Donald Papp | [
"Crowd Funding",
"hardware",
"Wireless Hacks"
] | [
"crowdfunded",
"flipper zero",
"multitool",
"pogo pins",
"production",
"Test jig",
"testing"
] | Flipper Zero
is an open-source multitool for hackers, and [Pavel] recently shared
details on what goes into the production and testing of these devices
. Each unit contains four separate PCBs, and in high-volume production it is inevitable that some boards are faulty in some way. Not all faults are identical — some are not even obvious — but they all must be dealt with before they end up in a finished product.
One of several custom test jigs for Flipper Zero. Faults in high volume production are inevitable, and detecting them early is best.
Designing a process to effectively detect and deal with faults is a serious undertaking, one the Flipper Zero team addressed by designing a separate test station for each of the separate PCBs, allowing detection of defects as early as possible. Each board gets fitted into a custom test jig, then is subjected to an automated barrage of tests to ensure everything is as expected before being given the green light. A final test station gives a check to completed assemblies, and every test is logged into a database.
It may seem tempting to skip testing the individual boards and instead just do a single comprehensive test on finished units, but when dealing with production errors, it’s important to detect issues as early in the workflow as possible. The later a problem is detected, the more difficult and expensive it is to address. The worst possible outcome is to put a defective unit into a customer’s hands, where a issue is found only after all of the time and cost of assembly and shipping has already been spent. Another reason to detect issues early is that some faults become more difficult to address the later they are discovered. For example, a dim LED or poor antenna performance is much harder to troubleshoot when detected in a completely assembled unit, because the fault could be anywhere.
[Pavel] provides plenty of pictures and details about the production of Flipper Zero, and it’s nice to see how the project is progressing
since its hyper-successful crowdfunding campaign
. | 3 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366896",
"author": "Nath",
"timestamp": "2021-07-24T08:18:35",
"content": "I can’t wait to receive mine !",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6366911",
"author": "Andrew",
"timestamp": "2021-07-24T10:47:22",
"content": ... | 1,760,373,006.612203 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/23/joker-monitor-keeps-an-eye-on-hazardous-gas-levels/ | Joker Monitor Keeps An Eye On Hazardous Gas Levels | Lewin Day | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"badgelife",
"gas",
"gas sensor"
] | The Joker is a popular character in the
Batman
franchise, and at times uses poisonous gases as part of his criminal repertoire. That inspired this fun project by [kutluhan_aktar],
which aims to monitor the level of harmful gases in the air.
The project doesn’t use just one gas sensor, but several! It packs the MQ-2, MQ-3, MQ-4, MQ-6, and MQ-9. This gives it sensitivity to a huge variety of combustible gases, as well as detecting carbon monoxide. The sensors are read by an Arduino Nano, which displays results on an RGB LED as well as an attached IPS screen.
Readings from each sensor can be selected by using an infrared remote. In order to best work as a safety device, however, it could be more useful to have the Arduino automatically cycle through each sensor, checking them periodically and raising an alarm in the event of a high reading.
The whole project is built on a custom PCB which is artfully constructed with an image of the Joker himself. It helps to make the project a bit more of a display piece, and speaks to the aesthetic skills of its creator.
It’s a fun build, and one that could be mighty capable with a few software tweaks. With that said, if you’re working in a space with real hazards from combustible gases, it may be worth investing in some properly rated safety equipment rather than relying on an Arduino project.
Incidentally, if you’d like to improve the results from using such gas sensors,
we’ve looked at that in the past
. Video after the break. | 12 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366887",
"author": "LPGHater",
"timestamp": "2021-07-24T06:35:29",
"content": "I love the artistry and I appreciate the effort, but honestly are any of these poisonous gases a concern in your life?MQ-2 Smoke Gas LPG Butane Hydrogen Gas Sensor Detector Module For ArduinoMQ-3 Alcohol... | 1,760,373,006.66224 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/23/pnpassist-a-smart-build-platform-for-manual-pcb-assembly/ | PnPAssist: A “Smart” Build Platform For Manual PCB Assembly | Danie Conradie | [
"The Hackaday Prize",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"2021 Hackaday Prize",
"pcb assembly",
"pick and place",
"smd components"
] | Open source pick and place machines have come a long way in the past years, but are not necessarily worth the setup time and machine cost if you are only building a few PCBs at a time. [Nuri Erginer] found himself in this situation regularly, so he created
PnPAssist
, a “smart” build platform to speed up manual PCB assembly. Video after the break.
The PnP assist consists of a small circular platform that can automatically translate and rotate to place the current footprint in the middle of the platform, right in the center of your microscope’s view, and a laser crosshair. The entire device can also rotate freely on its base to avoid contorting your arm to match the footprint orientation. Just export the PnP file from your favorite PCB design software, load it on a micro SD card, plug it into the PnPAssist, and start assembling. The relevant component information is displayed on a small OLED display right on the machine. [Nuri] has also created a component organizing tray that will indicate the correct compartment with an RGB LED.
Below the build platform, a 3D printed gear is in contact with a pair of parallel lead screws driven by stepper motors. The relative motion of the lead screws allows the platform to rotate, translate, or both. This arrangement also means the machine is a lot more compact than a conventional XY-table and can be packed away when not in use. The base is held firmly in place on the workbench with a set of suction cups or screws. Power is provided through the fixed base using a slip-ring, so there are no cables to twist up as you spin the machine around.
We can certainly see this machine being a massive help on any small electronics assembly job, especially considering the fast setup time and relative simplicity. It will also work well with the
3D printed component dispensers
or
component turntable
we featured in the past.
The
Hackaday
Prize2021
is Sponsored by: | 16 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366863",
"author": "Qt",
"timestamp": "2021-07-24T02:25:04",
"content": "Brilliant",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6366875",
"author": "ConductiveInsulation",
"timestamp": "2021-07-24T04:34:45",
"content": "Whoa, th... | 1,760,373,006.857362 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/23/a-nerf-ball-turret-complete-with-fpv/ | A Nerf Ball Turret Complete With FPV | Lewin Day | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"nerf",
"nerf blaster",
"sentry gun"
] | Sentry turrets have long been a feature of science fiction films and video games. These days, there’s nothing stopping you from building your own. [otjones99] has done just that,
with his FPV Nerf Ball launcher.
The system works on the basic principle of launching soft foam balls via a pair of counter-rotating wheels. It’s a remarkably simple way of electrically launching projectiles without a lot of fuss and mucking around, and it works well here. A blower fan is used to gently roll ammunition towards the launcher wheels as required. There’s a hopper-style clip which uses a servo to drop one ball at a time into the launching tube.
An Arduino Uno is responsible for slewing the turret, and handling the firing process. A joystick is fitted with an NRF24L01 radio module to send signals to the Arduino to aim the turret, while an FPV camera mounted on the turret allows the user to remotely see what the turret is aiming at. With a simple pull of the joystick’s trigger, the turret opens fire.
It’s a fun build, and one that shouldn’t do too much damage to anything given the soft pliable nature of the Nerf ammunition. Of course, if you don’t want to aim your turret yourself,
you can always go ahead and build yourself an automated sentry gun.
Video after the break. | 2 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367333",
"author": "Koit Kulper",
"timestamp": "2021-07-26T18:24:16",
"content": "13km-m is quite different torque than 13kg-cm.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6380353",
"author": "Shafae",
"timestamp": "2021... | 1,760,373,007.157811 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/26/if-society-is-in-danger-of-collapse-heres-how-we-should-do-our-bit/ | If Society Is In Danger Of Collapse, Here’s How We Should Do Our Bit | Jenny List | [
"green hacks"
] | [
"climate change",
"society",
"sustainability"
] | If you’ve been following the news, you can’t have missed the series of floods, droughts, and wildfires that have occurred seemingly in all corners of the world. Coming on the heels of a Northern Hemisphere winter that had its own extreme weather events, it would be perhaps foolhardy not to by now take climate change seriously. You may also have seen the news about a return to a 1970s paper in which MIT crystal-ball-gazers predicted the collapse of our civilisation in the mid-21st century, and
a review based upon the empirical data gathered since then
which concluded that we could be right on track with that prediction set to happen in about 2040.
It’s sobering stuff, and something which could so easily form the basis of many a Hollywood apocalyptic disaster movie. But sitting here in 2021 amid extreme weather events and a global pandemic it’s certainly something to think about. It’s not as though we’re riding biogas-powered weapon cars through the post-apocalyptic desert just yet though, we still have a chance to do something to avert catastrophe and no doubt over the next decade a raft of changes will reduce our CO2 impact and make our infrastructure more resilient to stave off any coming crises.
Our mind was turned to the halcyon time before the pandemic, to
the Danish BornHack hacker camp back in August 2019
. One of the talks at the event came from [Igor Nicolic], whose day job as an academic with Delft University of Technology takes him into the study of ecology and sustainability.
In it he looks at the current state of global sustainability, and identifies the roles which the hardware hacker community could play in an uncertain future
. It’s a fascinating lecture from an expert in the field and it’s well worth a watch and taking note of his points, so we’ve placed it below the break.
Header image: kuhnmi,
CC BY 2.0
. | 107 | 27 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367423",
"author": "Michael Black",
"timestamp": "2021-07-27T02:14:12",
"content": "I’m begining to suspect I won’t live to 70. But if there was this imaginary collapse, I wouldn’t last long, and I just have to stop taking an expensive drug, and my.life will be terminal.It was so... | 1,760,373,007.687765 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/26/building-an-electronic-tester-for-measuring-arrow-stiffness/ | Building An Electronic Tester For Measuring Arrow Stiffness | Lewin Day | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"archery",
"arrow",
"load cell"
] | When shooting archery, if you want to be accurate, you need arrows of uniform specification and quality. One important part of this is making sure each arrow has a spine of similar stiffness. Traditionally, this is checked in a very analog way by using weights and measuring deflection of the arrow spine, but it can be done electronically too
with this tester from [dvd8n]
.
The principle of operation is simple. The arrow is held up by two supports, 28 inches apart. The user then presses down in the center of the arrow, deflecting it by a 1/2 inch where itreaches a stop , and load cells at either end of the tester measure the force required to deflect the arrow by the set amount.
It allows arrows to be electronically measured in a fashion that is compatible with existing standards for measurement. The Arduino hardware which measures the load cells can also easily run conversion maths to display the arrow’s measured stiffness in whatever common spine measurement standard is desired. The system can also weigh the arrows, a useful thing to know for the home fletcher.
It’s a tidy build and one that should prove useful when [dvd8n] is building out their next quiver.
We’ve seen other capable DIY archery hacks before, too
. If you’ve got your own,
drop us a line
! | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367568",
"author": "dyrge",
"timestamp": "2021-07-27T12:48:15",
"content": "That looks pretty useful. I might have to build one myself.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
}
] | 1,760,373,007.421283 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/26/wifiwart-boots-linux-moves-to-next-design-phase/ | WiFiWart Boots Linux, Moves To Next Design Phase | Tom Nardi | [
"hardware",
"Linux Hacks"
] | [
"Embedded Linux",
"open hardware",
"oshw",
"pentesting",
"SBC",
"u-boot",
"WiFiWart"
] | Over the last few months we’ve been keeping an eye on WiFiWart, an ambitious project to develop a Linux single-board computer (SBC) small enough to fit inside a USB wall charger. Developer [Walker] says the goal is to create an easily concealable “drop box” for penetration testing, giving security researchers a valuable foothold inside a target network from which to preform reconnaissance or launch attacks. Of course, we don’t need to tell Hackaday readers that there’s plenty of other things you can do with such a tiny open hardware Linux SBC.
Today we’re happy to report that
[Walker] has gotten the first version of the board booted into Linux
, though as you might expect given a project of this complexity, there were a few bumps along the way. From the
single
missing resistor that caused U-Boot to throw up an error to the finer points of compiling the kernel for an embedded board, the latest blog post he’s written up about his progress provides fascinating insight into the little gotchas of bringing up a SBC from scratch.
Once the board was booted into Linux, [Walker] started testing out different aspects of the system. A memory benchmark confirmed the finicky DDR3 RAM was working as expected, and he was able to load the kernel modules for the dual RTL8188 interfaces and connect to a network. While the two WiFi modules are currently hanging off the board’s full-sized USB ports, they will eventually be integrated into the PCB.
Critically, this prototype board is also allowing [Walker] to get an idea of what the energy consumption of the final hardware might be. Even at full tilt, this larger board doesn’t go over 500 mA at 5 VDC; so if he designs the power supply with a maximum output of 1 A, he should have a nice safety margin.
As mentioned in the previous post
, the plan is currently to put the PSU on its own board, which will allow more effective use of the charger’s internal volume.
With the software and hardware now largely locked in, [Walker] says his attention will be turned towards getting everything small enough to fit into the final form factor. This will certainly be the most challenging aspect of the project, but with
a growing community of hackers and engineers lending their expertise to the cause
, we’re confident the WiFiWart will soon be a reality. | 12 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367387",
"author": "dmitry Grinberg",
"timestamp": "2021-07-26T20:49:47",
"content": "We’ve already hadhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picotuxfor size, and Sheevaplug for size+wifibut cool to get another",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comme... | 1,760,373,007.475228 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/26/little-quadruped-uses-many-servos/ | Little Quadruped Uses Many Servos | Lewin Day | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"quadruped",
"robot"
] | Walking robots were once the purview of major corporations spending huge dollars on research programs. Now, they’re something you can experiment with at home.
[Technovation] has been doing just that with his micro quadruped build.
The build runs twelve servos – three per leg – to enable for a great range of movement for each limb. The servos are all controlled by an Arduino Uno fitted with an Arduino Sensor Shield. Everything is fitted together with a 3D printed chassis and limb segments that bolt directly on to the servo output shafts. This is a common way of building quick, easy, lightweight assemblies with servos, and it works great here. Inverse kinematics is used to calculate the required motions of each joint, and the robot can take steps from 1 to 4cm long in a variety of gaits.
We’d love to see a few sensors and a battery pack added on to allow the ‘bot to explore further in an untethered fashion. [Technovation] has left some provision to mount extra hardware, so we look forward to seeing what comes next.
We’ve seen bigger quadrupeds do great things, too
. Video after the break. | 12 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367341",
"author": "Andrew",
"timestamp": "2021-07-26T18:43:41",
"content": "Wonderful design.Tragic that servos are still so terrible.The whole 3D printing revolution happened because steppers and drives became simple, high-featured, cheap, pervasive.Boosted Boards happened becaus... | 1,760,373,007.735847 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/26/linux-fu-superpowers-for-mere-mortals/ | Linux Fu: Superpowers For Mere Mortals | Al Williams | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Linux Hacks",
"Slider"
] | [
"linux",
"root",
"su",
"sudo",
"sudoers",
"super user",
"visudo"
] | You can hardly mention the
sudo
command without recalling the hilarious XKCD strip about making sandwiches. It does seem like
sudo
is the magic power to make a Linux system do what you want. The only problem is that those superpowers are not something to be taken lightly.
CC-BY-NC-2.5
by [XKCD]
If you are surfing the web, for example, you really don’t want to be root, because if someone naughty takes over your computer they could do a lot more harm with your root password. But still, there are times when you want to run certain commands that are normally root-only and don’t want to bother with a password. Luckily,
sudo
can handle that use case very easily.
Why?
As a simple example, suppose you like to shut your computer down at the end of the day. You run the shutdown command from the terminal but it doesn’t work because you aren’t root. You then have to do it again with
sudo
and if you haven’t logged in lately, provide your password. Ugh.
In my case, I got to thinking about this when I needed to manipulate the
dbus
service in a startup script. I wanted the script to manipulate just that service as a normal user and not prompt for a password, especially since some users don’t have
sudo
powers anyway. Either way, you would like a way to let normal users run very specific commands without additional permission.
A Simple But Bad Way
Your first thought might be to wrap the code in a shell script owned by root and set the
suid
bit so that when you execute it, the script elevates to having root access. That will work, but it seems like a potential security problem. After all, a script could do anything. Are you sure there is no way for a user to force it to do something else? Are you really sure?
Granted, you always have to think about this. If you, say, allowed someone to run
emacs
as root, that person could then open a shell and have full access to the system even if they didn’t otherwise have root access. That’s not good. But it is usually easier to reason about programs that have specific functions instead of a general-purpose shell script.
Configuration
That’s where
sudo
comes in. There’s really only one place to set up
sudo
, although most modern distributions have that one place read files from a second place that you can also use. The primary place is
/etc/sudoers
and, as you would guess, you need to be root to change that file. In fact, you shouldn’t open it with a regular editor at all. Use
visudo
which verifies you aren’t going to lock yourself out of root access by messing up this file. That would be very bad on systems where there is no way to log in directly as root.
When you use
visudo
, an editor launches. These days that’s often
nano
by default, although
vi
is the historic choice as you can see by the name. If you prefer something else, the tool will pick up your
VISUAL
or
EDITOR
environment variable. Well… sort of.
The authors of
visudo
and
sudo
were paranoid and rightfully so. There are options to remove all environment variables before running a command or to preserve just selected ones. So most of the time if you try to set one of these environment variables it is wiped out by
sudo
. To fix that, you’ll have to survive with whatever editor you get by default one time. You can preserve the environment variables and provide a list of accepted editors by putting this near the top of the file:
Defaults env_reset
Defaults env_keep=VISUAL
Defaults env_keep=EDITOR
Defaults editor=/usr/bin/nano:/usr/bin/emacs:/usr/bin/vi
Keep in mind that your
DISPLAY
variable won’t go through either, so don’t expect a GUI editor to work without some further configuration changes.
If
visudo
doesn’t like your changes because of a syntax error it will ask you what to do. Press
?
to see your options. You can tell it save anyway, but I don’t recommend that.
Now What?
There are many arcane syntax commands you can put in
sudoers
to get different effects. In this case, we want to run a command like
shutdown
or
service
without a password for a specific user. Say the user is jolly_wrencher:
jolly_wrencher ALL= NOPASSWD: /usr/sbin/shutdown
This tells
sudo
that the user on all machines can run the command with no password. If the command takes parameters, the user is free to supply them. However, you can also provide parameters that must match or use a quoted space to imply no arguments allowed.
In the case of something that is disallowed,
sudo
may still let you run the command if you provide the password and you were otherwise allowed to run it. Otherwise, no dice.
For example, with the
dbus
example, I used two lines:
jolly_wrencher ALL= NOPASSWD: /usr/sbin/service dbus status
jolly_wrencher ALL= NOPASSWD: /usr/sbin/service dbus --full-restart
Easier Maintenance
Many distributions will now have a final line in the
sudoers
file that looks like this:
#includedir /etc/sudoers.d
This will scan the directory named for files (unless they have ~ or . characters in the name) and process them, too. So in my case, I have the two lines about
dbus
in a file
/etc/sudoers.d/dbus-service
. You still should use
visudo
to edit. In recent versions, you just pass the name of the file you want to edit. Old versions needed a
-f
option. After editing, the system checks the entire
sudoers
file for errors, so it is safer than editing the files directly.
There’s quite a bit more you can do with
sudo
and
sudoers
. However, you should resist the urge to do too much. It is easy to make assumptions about security that get you in trouble. However, there are always cases where you need this kind of power and, as usual, Linux doesn’t disappoint. | 27 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367324",
"author": "rclark",
"timestamp": "2021-07-26T17:14:39",
"content": "As a ‘single user’ home system, I don’t find much, if any, use for sudo. It seems much easier for me to just ‘su -‘ and do the work I need and then exit back to user space when done. I don’t mind entering... | 1,760,373,007.547485 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/26/how-to-build-with-acrylic-using-the-tools-you-have/ | How To Build With Acrylic Using The Tools You Have | Tom Nardi | [
"how-to",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"acrylic",
"bending acrylic",
"cutting",
"eric strebel",
"hand tools",
"tools"
] | In a perfect world, we’d all have laser cutters and could pop intricate designs out of acrylic sheets with just a few clicks of the mouse. But in reality, most of us have to make do with the pedestrian tools we have at hand. For many, that might even mean everything has to be done by hand. Luckily, [Eric Strebel] has been working on a series of videos that cover how you can make professional looking parts out of acrylic using a wide array of common tools.
Solvent welding hand-cut pieces of acrylic.
The first video demonstrates how a simple cube can be constructed
by a band saw, a table saw, and if need be, with hand tools. You might think the two power saws would have similar results, but as [Eric] explains, the table saw ends up being far more accurate and requires less post-processing to get a smooth edge. Ideally you’d run the cut pieces through a router to bevel them, but that’s a tall order for many home gamers.
As for the hand tool approach, scoring and snapping the sheets ends up making a surprisingly clean break that can actually be cleaner than the edge you’d get with a power tool. No matter how you cut them, [Eric] shows the proper way to apply the water-like solvent to your acrylic pieces to create a strong and visually attractive bond.
The next video in the series covers more advanced techniques
that can still be pulled off without a top-of-the-line workshop. Sure the water-cooled acrylic bender he has is pretty slick, but if you can’t afford the $100 USD gadget, he shows you how to get similar results with an old toaster oven that you can pick up from the thrift store or even the side of the road. With some hand-made jigs and molds, you can warp and flex the heated plastic into whatever shape your project needs. Combining the tips from both videos, you might be surprised at what can be created with little more than a ruler, some hot air, and the appropriate techniques.
These are just the latest in a long line of fantastic videos that [Eric Strebel] has produced about at-home design and fabrication.
Whether its making a two part silicone mold
or
creating functional prototypes out of foam board
, there’s an excellent chance that he’s covered a topic you’ve wanted to learn more about. | 8 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367291",
"author": "Vib",
"timestamp": "2021-07-26T15:11:49",
"content": "The “water-like” solvent used for welding acrylic is very nasty. That should be emphasized, if find the “water-like” qualification pretty dangerous",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
... | 1,760,373,008.043644 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/26/rna-therapeutics-and-fighting-diseases-by-working-with-the-immune-system/ | RNA Therapeutics And Fighting Diseases By Working With The Immune System | Maya Posch | [
"Engineering",
"Featured",
"Medical Hacks",
"Original Art",
"Science",
"Slider"
] | [
"mRNA",
"mRNA vaccine",
"RNA therapeutics"
] | Before the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic took hold, few people were aware of the existence of mRNA vaccines. Yet after months of vaccinations from Moderna and BioNTech and
clear indications
of robust protection to millions of people, it now seems hard to imagine a world without mRNA vaccine technology, especially as more traditional vaccines seem to falter against the new COVID-19 variants and the ravages of so-called ‘Long COVID’ become
more apparent
.
Yet, it wasn’t that long ago that Moderna and BioNTech were merely a bunch of start-ups, trying to develop profitable therapies for a variety of diseases, using the brand-new and largely unproven field of RNA therapeutics. Although the use of mRNA in particular for treatments has been investigated since 1989, even as recently as 2017 there were still many questions about safe and effective ways to deliver mRNA into cells, as per
Khalid A. Hajj et al.
Clearly those issues have been resolved now in 2021, which makes one wonder about the other exciting possibilities that mRNA delivery offers, from vaccines for malaria, cancer, HIV, as well as curing autoimmune diseases. How did the field of mRNA vaccines develop so quickly, and what can we expect to see the coming years?
Vaccines in a Nutshell
Smallpox vaccination kit including the diluent, a vial of Dryvax® smallpox vaccine, and a bifurcated needle.
Before there were vaccines, the practice of
inoculating
was quite common, especially in China, where references dating back to at least the 15th century have been found. Focusing mostly on smallpox, this so-called
variolation
(smallpox inoculation, derived from the name of smallpox,
Variola
) involved taking live pathogen from a smallpox patient and introducing it into someone without pre-existing immunity to the disease.
When Edward Jenner popularized the practice of using cowpox instead of smallpox in the 18th century to induce immunity against the latter, this was the beginning of vaccination (Latin
vaccinus
, ‘of or from the cow’). Unlike inoculation,
vaccination
seeks to use a heterotypical pathogen (like cowpox), inactivated or weakened pathogens, or specific elements (units) of a pathogen which can induce immunity against that pathogens.
At the core of the human immune system lies the concept of
antigens
, which are specific proteins or other elements of a pathogen or toxin which the immune system can recognize using
antibodies
. These antibodies are Y-shaped proteins that can bind to specific antigens. They can be either attached to B cells (B cell receptors, BCRs), or free-floating in extracellular fluids (e.g. blood plasma).
With natural immunity from infection by a pathogen, the body’s
adaptive immune system
usually learns to recognize the foreign antigens and deal with the threat. The use of a vaccine is to present the immune system with these antigens (e.g. the
SARS-CoV-2
‘s distinctive spike protein) so that the immune system (specifically B cells) gets a chance to memorize it so that it can respond much sooner to an infection.
Vaccines Without the Complexity
Schematic diagram of an antibody with antigens.
As the main point of a vaccine is to present the immune system with the most effective antigens, this has led to a wide range of vaccine types over the years that seek to optimize the immune response. Here the rapid development of
SARS-CoV-2 vaccines
has been highly instrumental in illustrating the state of the art. Essentially, just two types of vaccines were able to be developed in the minimal amount of time available: viral vector and mRNA vaccines.
Both of these are new types of vaccines and neither have been deployed on this scale. Where they differ from other types of vaccines is that they do not require that the pathogen is grown outside of the body, but instead they focus on delivering genetic material (mRNA) into cells where these can be translated by the cell’s ribosomes into the proteins that form the target antigen.
In theory, this would skip a number of complexities, as it only requires that enough of the RNA strings are produced and inserted into the body’s cells, rather than needing to synthesize the target antigens (proteins) and inject those. In the case of traditional vaccines which use whole pathogens, the use of RNA skips the risk of accidental outbreaks caused by these live pathogens, including attenuated strains as seen commonly with
polio vaccines
(vaccine-induced polio).
For all their similarities, however, mRNA vaccines have a major advantage over viral vectors: the use of a
lipid nanoparticle
-based (LNP) delivery system which stabilizes the fragile mRNA string. This was first used with
Patisiran
, an RNA therapeutics medication that uses siRNA (gene-silencing RNA) to treat polyneuropathy. Through
careful design
of these LNPs, they are effectively as unremarkable to the immune system as the (lipid-based) membranes of the body’s own cells.
Since viral vectors by definition use viruses for breaking-and-entering into cells, these viruses are highly likely to be detected by the immune system, and some may have antigens which are already known to the body. An mRNA vaccine’s LNP coating makes it comparatively stealthy. Another major issue with viral vectors is that they require modification of the viral RNA, inserting the RNA string that needs to be carried as payload, while ensuring that these genetic modifications were done correctly.
Spiking Those Cells
Once an mRNA vaccine is injected into the body, the vast majority of the LNP-coated particles are absorbed by
dendritic cells
, which roam the extracellular space and can be regarded as the sentinels of the immune system. Within the dendritic cell the mRNA string is released, where it is ultimately processed by the ribosomes as any other mRNA string that originates from the cell’s nucleus. This results in the production of e.g. the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, which the dendritic cell will then expose on its membrane to B and T cells.
Schematic working of an mRNA vaccine. (Credit: Jmarchn – CC BY-SA 3.0)
Important to note here is that these are not the exact same mRNA strings that would originate from the nucleus, as the cell’s defensive systems monitor the intrusion of foreign RNA. This is circumvented through nucleoside-modified mRNA (modRNA), in which nucleosides are swapped for synthetic analogs. This does not affect the handling by the ribosomes. In the case of
CureVac
‘s SARS-CoV-2 mRNA vaccine, the use of unmodified mRNA strings is likely the reason why in trials it showed very low efficacy that currently prevent it from being a viable vaccine.
Based on the data, especially from the Moderna and BioNTech-Pfizer SARS-CoV-2 mRNA vaccines, we can deduce that the combination of the LNP coating and modRNA is what makes it as effective as it is. Another interesting
recent finding by Jackson S. Turner et al.
was that these mRNA vaccines also trigger B cells into forming
germinal centers
, which are effectively training grounds for B cells that promote a long-term memorization and thus immunity to a specific antigen.
Addressing Autoimmune Conditions
When it comes to disadvantages of an adaptive immune system, one can definitely point to autoimmune conditions. These involve T and B cells produced by the body which react to
self-proteins
, meaning the proteins that normally make up one’s own body. Autoimmune conditions range from type 1 diabetes to lupus, each involving a specific type or types of self-proteins that are attacked by our own immune systems.
Normally, after T and B cells are formed in the bone marrow, their cell receptors are randomly arranged through
V(D)J recombination
to give them the widest possible range.
Central tolerance
— negative selection of T and B cells — exists to tests each of these new lymphocytes to see whether they self-react and thus are likely to be involved in autoimmunity. Any T or B lymphocyte which responds to the presented self-proteins are terminated via apoptosis (programmed cell death) or are reprogrammed to not self-react any longer.
Inducing tolerance with anti-inflammatory mRNA vaccine (credit: Christina Krienke et al.)
Although central tolerance, along with
peripheral tolerance
exist to prevent the possibility of
autoimmune
disorders while giving the best possible protection against new pathogens, there are many factors which can derail this, including a mutation in the autoimmune regulator gene (
AIRE
) and in the case of type 1 diabetes a mutation in the INS (insulin) gene.
Christine M. Wardell et al.
describe a study
by
Christina Krienke et al.
of a treatment for
multiple sclerosis
using a tolerizing vaccination approach. In mice, this treatment essentially cured an MS-like condition in the mice that were injected with this vaccine. Through a process of what could be called exposure therapy, the autoimmune response is downregulated and might conceivably be reset.
Related to this research is that of reducing or eliminating the immune response to harmless allergens such as pollen. As detailed in e.g. a literature review by
Sandra Scheiblhofer et al.
from 2018, which references both human and
animal studies
. These studies show that mRNA vaccines could hold the promise of a life-long reprieve from allergies as well.
Vaccine-To-Go
The good news around mRNA-based vaccines and RNA therapeutics is very hard to ignore at this point. The effectiveness of being able to essentially print strings of modRNA for a desired protein is hard to underestimate, along with the implications this has for e.g.
cancer therapy
. Both
BioNTech
and
Moderna
are involved in clinical trials that seek to assess whether customized mRNA vaccines that target the specific
neoepitope
antigens of a patient’s cancer can provide an effective therapy if not a cure for various types of cancers.
A recent paper by Katherine L. Mallory et al. covers a potential
mRNA-based malaria vaccine
. Encoding the
PfCSP
coat protein of the malaria parasite, initial findings show a sterilizing (i.e. no potential for transmission to other hosts) protection against the disease. If an effective vaccine could be developed based on this, it could save over 405,000 deaths yearly and countless millions of malaria cases.
In another paper that was published this year by Zekun Mu et al., the progress and future paths of
an HIV mRNA vaccine
are explored. Such vaccines would provide a layered response, initially eliminating as many of the HIV pathogens as possible, followed by a secondary, cytotoxic response that seeks to eliminate any cells which have become reservoirs for HIV. While still early days, there is a lot of promise here too.
The Holy Grail of Immunotherapy
Probably the most attractive aspect of RNA therapeutics is that it forms essentially the best form of
immunotherapy
, by working directly with the immune system. By reinforcing or silencing gene transcription, certain deficiencies and excesses can be directly addressed, while mRNA vaccines seem to hold the promise of both up- and downregulating the immune response.
In this way it works in harmony with the body’s natural systems, while having the power to provide corrections and information as necessary. Simultaneously, considering the ease and relatively low cost of customized mRNA vaccines, this might mean that even
orphan diseases
might finally get some much-needed attention. This might make RNA therapeutics and mRNA vaccines probably one of the biggest medical revolutions since the discovery of antibiotics.
Although there were concerns last year about the ultra-cold storage requirements for mRNA vaccines, as we learn more about mRNA vaccines and their stability over time, we now know that we can forget about them in the back of a regular
refrigerator for a month
without any worries. This should help with making mRNA vaccines and RNA therapeutics the norm over the coming years.
(
Heading image
: Schematic working of mRNA translation by a ribosome with help from tRNA) | 75 | 21 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367277",
"author": "midori oshii",
"timestamp": "2021-07-26T14:19:59",
"content": "I very much appreciate such a concise summation of mRNA delivery of synthetic spike protein therapy, and in an ideal world it is a technology that would work as advertised. Unfortunately there are p... | 1,760,373,008.16281 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/25/automatic-coil-winder-gets-it-done-with-simple-hardware-and-software/ | Automatic Coil Winder Gets It Done With Simple Hardware And Software | Dan Maloney | [
"cnc hacks"
] | [
"cnc",
"coil",
"g-code",
"grbl",
"magnet wire",
"PVC",
"winding"
] | We’ve grown to expect seeing mechatronics project incorporate a standard complement of components, things like stepper motors, Arduinos, lead screws, timing belts and pulleys, and aluminum extrusions. So when a project comes along that breaks that mold, even just a little, we sit up and take notice.
Departing somewhat from this hardware hacking lingua franca is [tuenhidiy]’s
automatic coil winder
, which instead of aluminum extrusions and 3D-printed connectors uses simple PVC pipe and fittings as a frame. Cheap, readily available, and easily worked, the PVC does a fine job here, and likely would on any project where forces are low and precision isn’t critical. The PVC frame holds two drive motors, one to wind the wire onto a form and one to drive a lead screw that moves the form back and forth. An Arduino with a CNC shield takes care of driving the motors, and the G-code needed to do so is generated by a simple spreadsheet that takes into account the number turns desired, the number of layers, the dimensions of the spool, and the diameters of the wire. The video below shows the machine going through its paces, with pretty neat and tidy results.
Being such a tedious task, this is far from the first coil winder we’ve seen. Some
adhere to the standard design language
, some
take off in another direction entirely
, but they’re all instructive and fun to watch in action. | 11 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367099",
"author": "SPD",
"timestamp": "2021-07-25T15:00:42",
"content": "Is it just me or does this youtube channel have no subscibers at all not even 1?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6367101",
"author": "Ostracus"... | 1,760,373,007.782409 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/25/quiet-wings-with-shape-memory-alloy/ | Quiet Wings, With Shape Memory Alloy | Al Williams | [
"drone hacks"
] | [
"aircraft",
"shape memory alloy",
"wing"
] | It’s a fact of operating an aircraft, that the make noise. If you’re an aviator you might want to quiet your craft to avoid annoying people nearby, or you might even want to operate in stealth mode. It turns out that there are different sources of noise on a plane depending upon the phase of flight. A NASA study found that when landing, a gap between the wing and leading edge slats causes air to cavitate causing unnecessary noise. Blocking that hole would allow for quieter landings, but there was no material suitable for both normal flight and the landing. That is, until Texas A&M researchers devised a way to use
a shape memory alloy to do it
.
In addition to two different shape memory alloy configurations, the study looks at a more conventional fiberglass composite, although this would only work for a limited number of wing configurations.
Quite a bit of the paper is pretty high-octane math simulations, but if you are serious about quieting down your next winged drone design it might be worth wading through.
We don’t see many shape memory projects, but
the technology is accessible
. We recently saw a clever use of leading-edge slats in
a scrappy experimental aircraft
. | 12 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367070",
"author": "Smk",
"timestamp": "2021-07-25T11:03:48",
"content": "I came here for obligatory Macross reference.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6367073",
"author": "David Beck",
"timestamp": "2021-07-25T11:43:05... | 1,760,373,007.826587 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/25/dominate-video-calls-with-game-boy-camera-webcam/ | Dominate Video Calls With Game Boy Camera Webcam | Tom Nardi | [
"digital cameras hacks",
"Nintendo Game Boy Hacks"
] | [
"game boy camera",
"HDMI capture device",
"retro gaming",
"snes",
"super game boy",
"webcam"
] | We can’t promise it will all be positive, but there’s no question you’ll be getting plenty of attention
when you join a video call using the Game Boy Camera
. Assuming they recognize you, anyway. The resolution and video quality of the 1998 toy certainly hasn’t aged very well, and that’s before it gets compressed and sent over the Internet.
From a technical standpoint, this one is actually pretty simple, if rather convoluted. [RetroGameCouch] hasn’t modified the Game Boy Camera in any way, he’s just connected it to the Super Game Boy, which in turn is slotted into a Super Nintendo. From there the video output of the SNES is passed through an HDMI converter, and finally
terminates in a cheap HDMI capture device
. His particular SNES has been modified with component video, but on the stock hardware you’ll have to be content with composite.
The end result of all these adapters and cables is that the live feed from the Game Boy Camera, complete with the Super Game Boy’s on-screen border, is available on the computer as a standard USB video device that can be used with whatever program you wish. If you’re more interested in recovering still images, we’ve
recently seen a project that lets you pull images from the Game Boy Camera over WiFi
. | 12 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367048",
"author": "Nath",
"timestamp": "2021-07-25T08:11:49",
"content": "I actually have all the hardware needed but never though of using it this way (to troll my colleagues); nice hack!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "636... | 1,760,373,007.881287 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/24/simple-tip-helps-with-powder-coating-perfection-on-difficult-parts/ | Simple Tip Helps With Powder Coating Perfection On Difficult Parts | Dan Maloney | [
"Misc Hacks",
"News"
] | [
"coating",
"electrostatic",
"fabrication",
"finishing",
"hot flocking",
"paint",
"powder coating"
] | To say that that the commercially available garden path lights commonly available at dollar stores are cheap is a vast overstatement of their true worthlessness. These solar-powered lights are so cheaply built that there’s almost no point in buying them, a fact that led [Mark Presling] down a fabrication rabbit hole that ends with
some great tips on powder coating parts with difficult geometries
.
Powder coating might seem a bit overkill for something as mundane as garden lights, but [Mark] has a point — if you buy something and it fails after a few weeks in the sun, you might as well build it right yourself. And a proper finish is a big part of not only getting the right look, but to making these totally un-Tardis-like light fixtures last in the weather. The video series below covers the entire design and build process, which ended up having an aluminum grille with some deep grooves. Such features prove hard to reach with powder coating, where the tiny particles of the coating are attracted to the workpiece thanks to a high potential difference between them. After coating, the part is heated to melt the particles and form a tough, beautiful finish.
But for grooves and other high-aspect-ratio features, the particles tend to avoid collecting in the nooks and crannies, leading to an uneven finish. [Mark]’s solution was to turn to “hot flocking”, where the part is heated before applying uncharged coating to the deep features. This gets the corners and grooves well coated before the rest of the coating is applied in the standard way, leading to a much better finish.
We love [Presser]’s attention to detail on this build, as well as the excellent fabrication tips and tricks sprinkled throughout the series. You might want to check out some of his other builds, like
this professional-looking spot welder
. | 8 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367040",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2021-07-25T06:05:36",
"content": "Powder coating is one. Dipping is another.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6367047",
"author": "ian 42",
"timestamp": "2021-07-25T07:46:07",... | 1,760,373,008.206798 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/24/solder-bridges-aid-desoldering/ | Solder Bridges Aid Desoldering | Al Williams | [
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"desoldering",
"solder",
"soldering",
"through hole"
] | As our
own Elliot Williams laid out
, many people think that soldering is a key skill for electronics, but we don’t as often think about desoldering. Even if you are perfect in your technique, there’s always the chance you’ll put in a bad part or have a part fail later and it will need replacement. [Robert] has a short video showing his
method for removing through-hole components
and you can see it below.
This isn’t the first time we’ve seen it, of course. In fact, it is very much like using hot air, although it doesn’t require hot air, just extra solder and a regular iron. Of course, if we knew that connector was bad, we’d have been tempted to cut each pin apart and remove them one at a time. Heating a joint and then slamming your hand on the bench can work wonders.
We always think
desoldering pumps
are a good idea, but the electric ones tend to be anemic. The ones with the springs are usually better, but still have limitations. In the end, we’ll stick with
using hot air
, but if all you have is an iron, this method is worth checking out. You might also be interested in the
needle method
. | 24 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367026",
"author": "pac",
"timestamp": "2021-07-25T02:48:13",
"content": "Amtech fluxes and Gootwick. Accept no substitutes.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6367088",
"author": "MattAtHazmat",
"timestamp": "20... | 1,760,373,008.378755 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/24/monowheel-balancing-robot-cant-turn-yet/ | Monowheel Balancing Robot Can’t Turn (Yet) | Danie Conradie | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"balancing robot",
"gyroscopic",
"james bruton",
"monowheel"
] | Self-balancing robots have become a common hobby project, and they usually require two wheels to work. [James Bruton] has managed to
single wheel balancing robot
by adding gyroscopic stabilization.
[James] has done other self-balancing robots, like his
Sonic robot
, but recently started experimenting with
gyroscopic stabilization
. In that project, he proposed the idea of combining the two stabilization methods to create a monowheel robot, and he followed through on that idea. The wheel is powered by a brushless motor and is stabilized conventionally around the wheel’s axis. Side to side balancing is achieved using a phenomenon known as gyroscopic precession, by tilting a pair of heavy spinning wheels. This is not to be confused with reaction wheels, which use rotational inertia for control. It appears the actuating the gyroscopes also affects the front-to-back stabilization, so at the moment the robots won’t stay on one spot. [James] plans to implement a second observation controller in software to solve this.
Another challenge with this robot is that it cannot turn at the moment. The gyroscopes are not in the correct orientation to effect rotation around the vertical axis, and changing their orientation would cause other problems. A fan, which works like a helicopter’s tail rotor is one option, and a reaction wheel on top might also work. We’re partial to the reaction wheel idea. Having a different mechanical control mechanism for each axis would make it quite an interesting robot. | 21 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6367013",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2021-07-25T00:28:03",
"content": "Hop and turn?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6367014",
"author": "Tim",
"timestamp": "2021-07-25T01:07:50",
"content": "What about a ca... | 1,760,373,008.260607 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/24/walk-the-first-3d-printed-bridge-and-be-counted/ | Walk The First 3D-Printed Bridge And Be Counted | Kristina Panos | [
"3d Printer hacks",
"News"
] | [
"3D printed bridge",
"Amsterdam",
"bridge",
"welding"
] | Way back in 2018, we brought you news of a 3D-printed stainless steel pedestrian bridge being planned to span a Dutch canal in Amsterdam.
Now it’s finally in place and open to the public
— the Queen made it official and everything. MX3D printed it on their
M1 Metal additive manufacturing machine
that is essentially a group of robots welding layers of metal together using traditional welding wire and gas.
The partnership of companies involved originally planned to build this beautiful bridge in situ, but safety concerns and other issues prevented that and it was built in a factory instead. The bridge has been printed and ready since 2018, but a string of delays got in the way, including the fact that the canal’s walls had to be refurbished to accommodate it. Since it couldn’t be made on site, the bridge was taken there by boat and placed with a crane. After all this, the bridge is only permitted to be there for two years. Hopefully, they have the option to renew.
This feat of engineering spans 40 feet (12.2 meters) long and sits 20 feet (6.3 meters) wide. It’s equipped with sensors that measure structural stuff like strain, displacement, load, and rotation, and also has environmental sensors for air quality and temperature. All of this data is sent to the bridge’s digital twin, which is an exact replica in the form of a computer model. One of the goals is to teach the bridge how to count people. Be sure to check out
our previous coverage
for a couple of short videos about the bridge. | 22 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366988",
"author": "[skaarj]",
"timestamp": "2021-07-24T20:27:57",
"content": "You forgot to mention that bridge opens a new pedestrian path to Amsterdam’s famous Red Light District. It will count people who go there, the people who come back and also measure different…. parameters... | 1,760,373,008.318407 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/23/arm-researchers-announce-the-plasticarm/ | Arm Researchers Announce The PlasticArm | Chris Lott | [
"ARM",
"News"
] | [
"arm",
"ARM M0+",
"flexible",
"flexible circuits"
] | If the Cortex family of embedded microprocessors aren’t flexible enough for your designs,
an article published this week
(
click here for the PDF version
) in the journal Nature might be of interest. We’re not talking flexibility in terms of features, but real, physical flexibility of the microprocessor itself. A research team from Arm Ltd. has developed the PlasticArm, which is a 32-bit processor derived from the Cortex-M0+ family.
They accomplished this by constructing a CPU from metal-oxide thin-film transistors (TFT) on a polyimide substrate, the resultant chip being called a natively flexible microprocessor. While much of the hype focuses on the flexibility aspect, we think the real innovation here is the low cost. The processes used to deposit transistors onto silicon wafers is much more expensive than those on this flexible substrate.
Don’t get too excited just yet, because there were some compromises made along the way. Modern microprocessor silicon dies are measured in the tens of microns, but the PlasticArm total die size is a comparatively whopping 9 mm square. The researchers were appropriately focused on the core CPU, and the auxiliary building blocks such as ROM and RAM seem almost an afterthought. With only 456 bytes of program store and 128 bytes of RAM, only the tiniest of applications are suited to this chip. Other compromises were made, such as no internal registers — they are mapped to the external RAM — and the CPU runs a lot slower than we’re used to, topping out at 29 kHz (note: k not M).
There are certainly some challenges with this new technology, and we won’t be designing with these chips any time soon. But it has the potential to offer benefits in certain niche applications where low-cost and/or flexibility is more important than processor speed and performance. | 19 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366796",
"author": "RF_GUY",
"timestamp": "2021-07-23T20:18:32",
"content": "It could go into clothes, wearables to gather biometrics. A workout shirt that measures sweat and total bloodflow for example and reports data to a phone/FitBit.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
... | 1,760,373,008.435376 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/23/new-privacy-policy-gets-audacity-back-on-track/ | New Privacy Policy Gets Audacity Back On Track | Tom Nardi | [
"News",
"Software Development"
] | [
"audacity",
"privacy",
"privacy policy",
"telemetry"
] | Regular readers will likely be aware of the considerable debate over changes being made to the free and open source audio editor Audacity by the project’s new owners, Muse Group. The company says their goal is to modernize the 20 year old GPLv2 program and bring it to a larger audience, but many in the community have questioned whether the new managers really understand the free software ethos. An already precarious situation has only been made worse by a series of PR blunders Muse Group has made over the last several months.
But for a change, it seems things might be moving in the right direction. In a recent post to Audacity’s GitHub repository,
Muse Group unveiled the revised version of their much maligned Privacy Policy
. The announcement also came with an admission that many of the key elements from the draft version of the Privacy Policy were poorly worded and confusing. It seems much of the problem can be attributed to an over-analysis of the situation; with the company inserting provocative boilerplate protections (such as a clause saying users must be over the age of 13) that simply weren’t necessary.
Ultimately, the new Privacy Policy bears little resemblance to the earlier draft. Which objectively, is a good thing. But it’s still difficult to understand why Muse Group publicly posted such a poorly constructed version of the document in the first place. Project lead Martin Keary, better known online as Tantacrul,
says the team had to consult with various legal teams before they could release the revised policy
. That sounds reasonable enough, but why where these same teams not consulted before releasing such a spectacularly ill-conceived draft?
The new Privacy Policy makes it clear that Audacity won’t be collecting any user data, and what little personally identifiable information Muse Group gets from the application when it automatically checks for an update (namely, the client’s IP address) isn’t being stored. It’s further explained in the GitHub post that the automatic update feature only applies to official binary builds of Audacity, meaning it will be disabled for Linux users who install it through their distribution’s package repository. The clause about working with unnamed law enforcement agencies has been deleted, as has the particularly troubling age requirement.
Credit where credit is due.
Muse Group promised to revise their plans for adding telemetry to Audacity
, and judging by the new Privacy Policy, it seems they’ve done an admirable job of addressing all of the issues brought up by the community. Those worried their FOSS audio editor of choice would start spying on them can rest easy.
Unfortunately the issue of Audacity’s inflammatory Contributor License Agreement (CLA) has yet to be resolved
, meaning recently christened forks of the audio editor dedicated to preserving its GPLv2 lineage are unlikely to stand down anytime soon. | 29 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366767",
"author": "kota//Kæt - Channel Nyan Mews ⏺ (@dakotathekat)",
"timestamp": "2021-07-23T18:35:00",
"content": "That’s great, what about them threatening someone with deportation?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6366781... | 1,760,373,008.550268 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/23/are-hackers-being-let-down-in-education/ | Are Hackers Being Let Down In Education? | Jenny List | [
"Musical Hacks",
"Rants"
] | [
"education",
"learning",
"music",
"teaching"
] | In my work for Hackaday over the years I have been privileged to interact with some of the most creative people I have ever met, I have travelled far more than I ever did when I toiled unseen in an office in Oxford, and I have been lucky enough to hang out in our community’s spaces, camps, and dives across Europe.
Among the huge diversity of skills and ideas though, it’s striking how many of us share similar experiences and histories that have caused us to find our people in rooms full of tools and 3D printers. One of these things I found surprising because I thought I was the only one; I never fit in with the other kids at school, I found much of the teaching incomprehensible and had to figure things out for myself. As an exercise recently I did a straw poll among some of my friends, and found that a significant majority had a similar experience. Clearly something must have gone badly wrong in the way we were being taught that so many of us could have been let down by our schooling, and maybe to understand the needs of our community it’s time to understand why.
School: How To Put A Child Off Learning For Life
I didn’t come away from school music lessons with nothing, the interaction between bass bar, bridge, and sound post in a violin is pretty cool. Amitchell125 (
CC BY-SA 4.0
).
Where we go to school is not our own choice but one made for us by our parents — and often times that’s just a default of going to the school in nearest where you live. My parents were lucky enough to have some choice and I ended up through a scholarship at my local academic high-flyer’s school. It was a place that parents across my county rate as an Extremely Big Deal, so I found myself the only blacksmith’s kid at Hogwarts. In short, it was an exam factory where stuffing facts into your brain was the order of the day rather than necessarily being expected to understand those facts.
There are two sets of lessons from my school which stick in my brain, one because it spectacularly succeeded in teaching me what I needed to know, and the other in which it completely failed. The first was the physics curriculum, while the second was the music teaching which I gave up without a shred of regret after three years. In my physics class I gazed in wonderment as the beautifully ordered and interconnected thread of SI units fell into place and bound together an understanding of how the world really worked that still serves me today. In the music class I sat there as a teacher who evidently understood how it worked expected us to share his understanding simply by being told that it worked. I came away with a glossary of musical terms and oddly a knowledge of how a violin works (which is pretty cool), but I can’t honestly say I had a clue about any of the rest of it.
I think I’ve stumbled on the key to why this has gone so far wrong in my description of the music lessons. The mindset I share with so many of my friends in this community is one of requiring to understand something as part of learning it, in other words to merely tell us something is to then see it drift away in the maelstrom of other extraneous facts while to show us the reasoning behind that fact is to cement it in place. Thus I understood physics because I could spend a happy afternoon measuring the specific heat capacity of water and then see how those units could be defined in other terms, while the music passed me by because I was simply being told things without any frame of reference or meaningful means of investigating them.
I have since learned as a grown-up that there is a whole branch of musical learning referred to as musical theory, perhaps if I had been taught that in a similar way that I learned the structure of a BASIC program I could have understood some of it.
Every Kid Loves Music, Right?
There are so many witty captions about user interfaces that could be applied to this picture.
Lana, CC BY 2.0
.
As an exercise over the last few weeks I’ve approached music again as a grown-up, to see how I could understand it with the benefit of an extra three decades. I now have the tools in the form of sequencers such as
LMMS
or environments such as
Sonic Pi
to cross that divide into understanding through practical investigation that was missing in my school days. Traditional musical instruments have complex and arcane user interfaces with a huge learning curve that leaves the experimenter none the wiser, something oddly akin to typical modern CAD packages. It’s hardly surprising that just as with CAD where I’ve found salvation in the coding interface of OpenSCAD, so I might find the same with its musical equivalents.
I was taught at school that there are seven notes in an octave, A through G which are the white notes on a piano. This I have found is of course a lie, because when you factor in all those black sharp and flat notes on the piano keyboard there are about twelve. The black notes we are told are half a note between the white notes, but just to seriously confuse matters there’s a pair of white notes that don’t have a black note between them, yet I understand are only half a note apart. I further read that the key of a piece of music is the note it starts on, which depending where on the keyboard it lies can be a major key which sounds happy, or a minor key which sounds sad. Musical timing is expressed in beats, which are grouped in fours to form bars, which I can see as the bits between the vertical lines on a sheet of printed music. Which is something like a primitive version of the waterfall plot from my SDR, a cross section of a frequency range over time.
The slightly humorous tone of the preceding few sentences conceals a serious point, which is that this relatively meaningless junk is how I understand that music works based upon how I was taught the subject, but which is completely useless when it comes to making any of the stuff. So let’s start again. I have twelve notes, they are my syllables. The number of beats per minute is my clock, and I can adjust that to match the speed of my chosen musical style. A bar is four beats and becomes something equivalent to a word, and some reading tells me four bars can become my sentence. I’m ready to make music!
Four Chords And An Attitude
I owe everything I know to the Axis of Awesome.
Except I’m not, because all I’ve done is define my canvas. If I could write a melody I could produce a simple tune, but it would come out in the manner of a nursery rhyme. I’m more interested in the structure of the everyday music I might hear, and for my first ray of understanding I’m indebted to the Aussie comedy rock band Axis of Awesome for their famous
4-chord song
. The point they’re making is that the same four-chord progression underlies a significant proportion of popular music, but the trouble is that for the non-musical person it’s not explained just what that means.
I know what a chord is, several notes played at once, but this is where yet again my music teacher fell short. It’s left to more YouTube research and a kind explanation from a hacker friend to understand that this refers to the repeating pattern that underlies a song and holds it together. It’s played on the left hand on a piano an octave below the melody, or in a guitar rock band it’s the job of the bassist. Who knew! There are even formulae for those chords: a common one starts the first bar with a chord containing any note picked from the octave, the one six above it, and another six above that, then shifts the whole lot down by six notes in the second bar, up by two in the third, and down by 4 in the fourth. You then repeat these four bars ad infinitum, and immediately it starts to sound like a vaguely identifiable pop song you can’t quite put your finger on.
The rest of the composition comes from the melody — the lead guitar and singer, or the right hand on the piano — and the percussion as provided by a drummer. The melody simply starts with the same note you picked for the first chord in the previous paragraph but in the octave above, and then spins its tune around that. A musical ignoramus like me can create something passable after a while by messing about in a sequencer, but if that fails there’s even
an open source database to mine
. Finally the percussion is created by creating a repeating pattern of drum and other sounds in the same 4-bar unit as those chords. It’s only taken decades but finally I understand something about how the music I hear is assembled, and with a bit of absurdly easy work I can create a bit of generic sounding EDM that with the addition of some 1970s children’s TV samples might even have got me in the dance charts had I done it on my Amiga back in 1991.
I’m a
rock star
!
The Real Problem With Not Learning Stuff
Of course, merely knowing a tiny bit about how a pop song is assembled does not make me a musical maestro, because while I may have learned something I am still almost entirely devoid of musical skill or talent. But the point I’m trying to make here is that by changing the way I learned it from the chalk-and-talk of my teacher to a hands-on breakdown of the music itself means I’ve learned far more about real music in a very short time than I ever did at school, and more to the point it’s stuck rather than drifted past me into the ether.
While my musical adventures are an entertaining diversion they served as a demonstration to me that I
could
have understood this stuff years ago if only the teaching style had matched my ability to learn. With the utmost respect to those who earn a living in music it’s clear that the subject was never going to form part of my career, but it’s certain that the same inadequate teaching style will have held me and my friends back in other subjects that could have been useful to us. It’s annoying at a personal level, but if teaching is failing so many people across our section of society then it also becomes an issue with a wider effect on society.
The worst part of all this is that we can see today’s kids like us showing up in hackerspaces with this educational damage pre-installed, and there’s nothing we can do to change an educational establishment that revolves only around stuffing in facts to be regurgitated on an exam paper. At least once they’re past that mandatory teenage purgatory
we can help them learn some useful stuff
.
Header image: Mænsard vokser,
CC BY-SA 4.0
. | 62 | 27 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366755",
"author": "BT",
"timestamp": "2021-07-23T17:20:48",
"content": "My own musical non-education is very similar, but in addition I realised at about age 30 that other people could hear something in music that I could not: the beat, unless it is a thumping great obvious one. I... | 1,760,373,008.664149 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/23/hackaday-podcast-128-3d-printing-injection-molds-squiggly-audio-tape-curvy-mirrors-and-space-cadets/ | Hackaday Podcast 128: 3D-Printing Injection Molds, Squiggly Audio Tape, Curvy Mirrors, And Space Cadets | Mike Szczys | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Podcasts"
] | [
"Hackaday Podcast"
] | Hackaday editors Elliot Williams and Mike Szczys bubble sort the best hardware hacks so you don’t miss ’em. This week we’re smitten by the perfection of a telephone tape loop message announcer. We enjoyed seeing Blender’s ray tracing to design mirrors, and a webcam and computer monitor to stand in for triple-projector-based fractal fun. There’s a bit of injection molding, some Nintendo Switch disassembling, and the Internet on a calculator. We close the show with a pair of Space stories, including the happy news this week that Wally Funk finally made it there!
Take a look at the links below if you want to follow along, and as always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!
Direct download
(60 MB or so.)
Places to follow Hackaday podcasts:
Google Podcasts
iTunes
Spotify
Stitcher
RSS
Episode 128 Show Notes:
What’s that Sound?
That sound was Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
[Big Mike Cupka] was randomly drawn from more than 30 correct responses and wins the shirt!
This week’s random numbers generated by a
reverse-biased 2N3904
. (Scroll all the way down for the circuit. Mine’s capacitively decoupled at the output.)
New This Week:
The Fix Is In: Hubble’s Troubles Appear Over For Now
Samsung Shuttering Original SmartThings Hubs
Interesting Hacks of the Week:
Injection Molds From Your 3D Printer
The Hidden Sounds Of The Past
Tape Loop Announcer Featured on Techmoan Fixed And Wired Up! – YouTube
Roland RE-201 – Wikipedia
Finding Fractals In The 1930’s
Fixing Joy-Con Drift With Recycle Bin Parts
Tales From The Global Chip Shortage: Smoothieboard
Making Custom Curved Mirrors At Home
Optical Sensor Keeps Eye On Wandering Saw Blade
Quick Hacks:
Elliot’s Picks
Extracting The WiFi Firmware And Putting Back A Keylogger
The Internet – On A Casio Calculator!
MIDI Mouse Makes Marvelous Music
Mike’s Picks:
An OLED Photo Frame Powered By The ATtiny85
Ball Balancing Wheel Puts A Spin On Inverted Pendulums
Faulty Electrolytic Caps Don’t Always Look Bad
Can’t-Miss Articles:
A Look Back On A Decade Of Kerbal Space Program
This Group Of Women Tried To Break Into Astronaut Program In 1960s; One Just Made It
The Flight Of The Seagull: Valentina Tereshkova, Cosmonaut | 0 | 0 | [] | 1,760,373,008.481496 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/23/3d-printed-roller-coaster-looks-pretty-darn-fun/ | 3D Printed Roller Coaster Looks Pretty Darn Fun | Lewin Day | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"roller coaster",
"rollercoaster"
] | Rollercoasters are great fun if you can deal with the exhilaration without throwing up or otherwise screaming until you pass out. Of course, the big outdoors ones are a little hard to get to at the moment, what with a pandemic raging outside. However,
[3d_coasters] has built a tabletop design
that, while it’s too small to ride, is nonetheless quite impressive. (Video, embedded below.)
The coaster is of the launch design. It relies on an elastic cord that is wound up to high tension to launch the train up to speed, with the train then coasting around the rest of the curves on the track. The quality of the modelling is highly impressive, too. The doors at the boarding platform are even actuated to simulate riders boarding the train! Everything is controlled by an Arduino, a handful of micro servos, and a DC motor.
As you might imagine, this project didn’t happen overnight. 600 hours were logged in Fusion 360 developing the track, and slicing the models in Cura for 3D printing took a further 5 hours. The actual printing process itself took 800 hours, not including finishing, so this project certainly isn’t one for the faint of heart. The final model weighs a full 30 lbs.
Believe it or not,
we’ve featured 3D printed rollercoasters before, too
. Video after the break. | 10 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366735",
"author": "Doug Leppard",
"timestamp": "2021-07-23T15:10:03",
"content": "Amazing",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6366736",
"author": "ScriptGiddy",
"timestamp": "2021-07-23T15:13:48",
"content": "Bravo. Su... | 1,760,373,008.750011 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/23/this-week-in-security-nso-print-spooler-and-a-mysterious-decryptor/ | This Week In Security: NSO, Print Spooler, And A Mysterious Decryptor | Jonathan Bennett | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"News",
"Security Hacks",
"Slider"
] | [
"0-day",
"PrintNightmare",
"ransomware",
"This Week in Security"
] | The NSO Group has been in the news again recently, with multiple stories reporting on their Pegasus spyware product. The research and reporting spearheaded by Amnesty International is collectively known as “The Pegasus project”.
This project made waves on the 18th
, when multiple news outlets reported on a list of 50,000 phone numbers that are reported as “potential surveillance targets.” There are plenty of interesting people to be found on this list,
like 14 heads of state
and many journalists.
There are plenty of questions, too. Like what exactly is this list, and where did it come from? Amnesty international has pointed out that it is not a list of people actively being targeted. They’ve reported that of the devices associated with an entry on the list that they have been able to check, roughly 50% have shown signs of Pegasus spyware. The Guardian was part of the initial coordinated release, and has some impressive non-details to add:
The presence of a phone number in the data does not reveal whether a device was infected with Pegasus or subject to an attempted hack. However, the consortium believes the data is indicative of the potential targets NSO’s government clients identified in advance of possible surveillance attempts.
Amazon’s AWS was named as part of the C&C structure of Pegasus, and in response,
they have pulled the plug on accounts linked to NSO
. For their part,
NSO denies the validity of the list altogether
.
It’s no secret that NSO tools are used to spy on people all over the world. The real questions here are whether those tools are being abused to spy on particularly inappropriate targets, whether NSO knew about it, and what they will do now, if these claims are true. If you suspect your device might be compromised by Pegasus, take a look at
the Mobile Verification Toolkit, developed by Amnesty International
.
More Print Spooler Fun
At this point, it should be obvious that we should turn off the print spooler for any Windows machine that doesn’t really need it. Yet another flaw has been announced,
CVE-2021-34481
. This one is a bit odd. According to Microsoft, this bug is totally unrelated to the previous Print Nightmare bugs, and was discovered by [Jacob Baines] back in June. What makes it particularly strange is that
it was publicly disclosed weeks before the researcher’s deadline
, and hasn’t yet been patched. Their advisory indicates that it isn’t being exploited in the wild, but it seems they are acting as if it has already been made public.
If Print Spooler EoP bugs aren’t enough, how about
a world-readable Security Account Manager (SAM) file
? This flaw is related to the shadow copy service, and on Windows 10 and 11 machines, allows any user to read the entire SAM, SYSTEM, and SECURITY files. What can you do with that?
Jump from an unprivileged user straight to System
, for a start.
Debugging Backdoor in KiwiSDR
Thanks to [jpa] for pointing this out last week in the comments. The KiwiSDR is a BeagleBone cape, together with a customized BeagleBone image, that captures radio data and puts it online for anyone to listen to. Before we get to the security issue, I have to say that this is a really nifty project. Check out
the list of nodes online around the world
.
The problem is that
the project included a root web shell built in with a hardcoded password
, and it wasn’t particularly well documented — a couple brief mentions in the forum doesn’t really count. The SHA256 encoded password would be difficult to crack, but as Ars points out, any connections happen over HTTP, so a single instance of packet sniffing would reveal the password. To the developer’s credit, he has now put up a warning on
the site’s main page
, that previous versions have a security vulnerability. A brief discussion in the latest commit
on Github indicates that a more complete disclosure is coming
. (You may need to scroll to the bottom of the page to find the comments.) Ironically, I don’t think any of the users would have had a problem with this, so long as it had been well documented, opt-in, and implemented a bit better.
Linux Filesystem Vulnerability
This is an odd one. As far as the public disclosure goes, it starts with
the news that a logged-in user can crash a Linux system
via a SystemD flaw involving a very long path name. That’s an annoying bug, but it gets weirder. The researchers at Qualsys found it by accident, while trying to pull off
a full jump to root exploit
. That exploit is one where an integer can be overflowed by a very long path. The path string needs to be a whopping 1 GB long. By mounting and then deleting something on that crazy path, the overflow allows an out-of-bound write.
A PoC is available,
so make sure to get the latest kernel offered by your distro.
0-day Campaigns This Year
Google’s Threat Analysis Group has
released a report
with a bit of insight into a trio of campaigns using 0-day vulnerabilities they’ve discovered in active use this year. The first is an email campaign that seems to be based in Armenia using CVE-2021-21166 and CVE-2021-30551, both bugs in Chrome. In what may have been part of the same campaign, victims were sent Microsoft Office documents that used either ActiveX or VBA Macros to launch IE 11 and trigger CVE-2021-33742.
The last campaign discussed is a bit more interesting, as it used a Safari 0-day to infect the browser on iOS. This one
is thought to be from the Russian APT29
, and targeted officials in Western Europe via LinkedIn messages. The exploit wasn’t coupled with a sandbox escape, but just runs in the confines of the browser, grabbing information from every page accessed.
Windows Hello Fooled by Photo
Windows Hello. It’s not unique, the iPhone also has the capability to unlock via facial recognition, and some Android phones have picked up the feature as well. There’s a fundamental difference between a Windows machine, and a phone. The camera on the phone is a known and trusted entity. Any device can claim to be a webcam on a desktop or laptop. Windows Hello accepts any webcam device, and
that leads to some obvious security problems
. The system uses infrared imaging, so one simple bypass is to present an infrared picture of the user. It sounds like further attacks should be possible, like a device that presents itself as a webcam, but replays captured images of the target’s face. This is sure to be an interesting topic for further research.
REvil Decryptor
After REvil has mysteriously taken down their shingle (AKA, disappeared and gone out of business), a new development has emerged in the Kaseya ransomware story.
A universal decryptor has been obtained
“from a trusted third party”, and is being used to recover data. No word on who the third party is, and involved parties have declined to confirm whether any ransom was paid as part of the deal. Hopefully further news will leak out about how the decryptor was obtained, and what is going on with the REvil group. | 22 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366718",
"author": "Iván Stepaniuk",
"timestamp": "2021-07-23T14:05:48",
"content": "FACES, just as fingerprints, are OK usernames, but they are terrible passwords. It’s not that difficult to understand.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comme... | 1,760,373,008.810737 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/23/lego-pole-climbers-are-great-study-in-what-it-takes-to-go-vertically-upwards/ | LEGO Pole Climbers Are Great Study In What It Takes To Go Vertically Upwards | Lewin Day | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"lego"
] | Climbing a pole with a robot might sound complicated and hard, but it doesn’t have to be.
This video from [Brick Experiment Channel] demonstrates multiple methods of doing the job while keeping things simple from a mechanical perspective.
(Video, embedded below.)
The first method uses a gravity locking design, where the weight of the battery pack is placed on a lever arm to increase the normal force on the wheels gripping the pole. Increasing the length of the lever arm, reducing the angle of the crawler, or adding grippier tyres can all be used to increase the grip with this design. The final design of this type is able to climb most of the way up an 8 meter flagpole without too much trouble.
The next version uses rubber bands to help add tension to grip the pole. This too works well and makes it to the top of the flagpole. The final build is a circulating design that looks truly wild in action, and winds its way to the top of the flagpole as well.
It’s great to see the experimental method of designing these Lego creations, as well as seeing how they do in the wild.
[Brick Experiment Channel] has been featured here before, too
. | 3 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366702",
"author": "Wheels17",
"timestamp": "2021-07-23T11:17:32",
"content": "If you want to see a lot of different pole climber designs, look at the videos for First Robotics Competition for 2011, The final step in the competition was to deploy a pole climber that hits a limit ... | 1,760,373,008.707048 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/23/tardygrade-walker-is-a-lesson-in-3d-printed-design/ | Tardygrade Walker Is A Lesson In 3D Printed Design | Danie Conradie | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"3d printed",
"ESP32",
"servos",
"walking robot"
] | The ability to quickly create complex parts with 3D printers has created a platform to show off mechanical design skills. This is true in the case of [Dejan Ristic]’s capable little
Tardygrade walking robot
, which uses only two servos and a bunch of clever 3D printed parts.
The robot’s chassis is split into two subassemblies, each with a pair of feet on diagonal corners. As one pair of feet lifts the robot, the other section of the robot can rotate before coming back down, allowing the robot to turn. One servo handles the actuation of the feet, while the other rotates the body as required. An ESP32 based controller creates a web server user interface, and power comes from a lipo cell.
The interesting part of this robot is in how [Dejan] designed it for printing and assembly. All the parts can print without support, and in the correct orientation to optimize strength. There are only six screws in the assembly holding the servo and servo horns, while everything else uses snap fits or short pieces of filament. Take a look at the videos after the break to gain some appreciation of the design effort and attention to detail that went into this robot. Even the contact surfaces of the feet were carefully designed for optimum walking over flat surfaces and small obstacles.
This reminds us of [gzumwalt]’s little 3D printed creations, like the
fridge crawler
and
mechanical edge-avoiding robot
. | 12 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366694",
"author": "Gregg Eshelman",
"timestamp": "2021-07-23T09:51:50",
"content": "When is someone going to build a real Marvelous Toy?https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLYefZkOMB0",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6366711",
... | 1,760,373,008.942105 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/22/a-simple-lego-automatic-transmission/ | A Simple LEGO Automatic Transmission | Lewin Day | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"gearbox",
"lego",
"transmission"
] | The automatic transmission in your average automobile can be a complicated, hydraulic-y thing full of spooky fluids and many spinning parts. However, simpler designs for “automatic” gearboxes exist, like this Lego design from [FUNTastyX].
The build is based around a simple open differential but configured in a unique way. A motor drives what would typically be one of the output shafts as an input. The same motor is also geared what would normally be the main differential input shaft as well. In these conditions, this double-drive arrangement would sum the speed input and lead to a faster rotational speed at the other shaft, which becomes the output.
However, the trick in this build is that the drive going to what would be the usual differential input is done through a Lego slipper clutch. This part,
as explained by [TechnicBricks]
,
allows the outer teeth of the gear to slip relative to the shaft once torque demand is exceeded. What this functionally does is that when the output of the “automatic gearbox” is loaded down, the extra torque demand causes the clutch to slip. This then leads to only one input to the differential doing any work, changing the gear ratio automatically.
It’s likely not a particularly efficient gearbox, as there are significant losses through the very simple clutch, we suspect. However, it does technically work, and we’d love to see its performance rated directly against other simple Lego gearbox designs.
It’s a little confusing to explain in text, but the video from [FUNTastyX] does a great job at explaining the principle in just a few minutes.
We’ve seen plenty of crazy Lego gearboxes over the years,
and we doubt this will be the last. Video after the break. | 9 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366664",
"author": "MinorHavoc",
"timestamp": "2021-07-23T06:27:34",
"content": "That’s brilliant.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6366692",
"author": "Dude",
"timestamp": "2021-07-23T09:45:25",
"conte... | 1,760,373,009.196881 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/22/what-kind-of-gpu-are-you/ | What Kind Of GPU Are You? | Al Williams | [
"computer hacks"
] | [
"CUDA",
"gpu",
"graphics",
"graphics card",
"graphics processing",
"opencl"
] | In the old days, big computers often had some form of external array processor. The idea is you could load a bunch of numbers into the processor and then do some math operations on all of the numbers in parallel. These days, you are more likely to turn to your graphics card for number crunching support. You’ll usually use some library to help you do that, but things are always better when you understand what’s going on under the hood. That’s why we enjoyed [RasterGrid’s]
post on GPU architecture types
.
If you can tell the difference between IMR (immediate mode) and TBR (tile-based) rendering this might not be the post for you. But while we knew the terms, we found a lot of interesting detail including some graphics and pseudo code that clarified the key differences.
Which architecture is better? As the post points out, that depends on how you define better. Each can boast it is better at something, but the flip side is that each is also worse at something else. In general, IMR GPUs wind up in desktop computers and mobile devices tend towards TBR. It also depends on the specific task you ask of the GPU.
Granted, you normally don’t need to know any of this. For graphics, you are probably not directly controlling the device and for computation, you will likely use
CUDA
or
OpenCL
. But you don’t need to understand an engine to drive a car, but the best-performing drivers do know how an engine works. | 9 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366643",
"author": "M",
"timestamp": "2021-07-23T02:44:27",
"content": "Woo! ROCm!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6366657",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2021-07-23T05:08:34",
"content": "“If you can tell the... | 1,760,373,008.987326 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/22/rover-uses-different-kind-of-tracks/ | Rover Uses Different Kind Of Tracks | Danie Conradie | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"3d printed",
"balancing robot",
"james bruton",
"Tank Tracks"
] | Tracked robots usually require at least two wheels inside to work properly. However, [James Bruton] discovered a curious tractor design from the 1940s, the Fordson Rotaped, which only uses a single sprocket wheel inside each track. Being [James], he built a
self-balancing robot around the rotaped concept
.
Instead of a lot of short track sections, the Rotaped uses six long sections of track, about the same length as the wheel’s diameter. To keep the track on the wheel, a series of chains or an oval frame is used on the inside of the track.
As is usual for [James]’ projects, most of the mechanical parts are 3D printed. To hold the tracks in place, he stretches a bungee cord loop around three points on each side of the track. To make things more interesting, he made the robot balanced on the tracks. This took a bit of PID tuning to get working without oscillations, since the wheels experience a slight cogging effect inside the tracks. The wheels are driven by a pair of brushless motors with O-Drive controllers. The balancing is handled by an Arduino Mega, which reads processed position values from an Arduino Pro Mini connected to an MPU6050 IMU.
This might be a viable alternative to conventional tracks for certain applications, and the reduced part count is certainly an advantage. Let us know in the comments if it spawns any ideas. [James] has previously built another tracked rover, which uses
flexible 3D printed track sections
. By far, the biggest 3D printed tracked vehicle we’ve seen was
[Ivan Miranda]’s ridable tank
. | 7 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366620",
"author": "Steven Gann",
"timestamp": "2021-07-23T00:18:09",
"content": "I’d never seen a rotoped before and I wonder why they aren’t more popular. Mechanical wear, I’d guess.Another excellent robot.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"... | 1,760,373,009.155345 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/22/detecting-ripeness-in-fruit-and-vegetables-via-neural-networks/ | Detecting Ripeness In Fruit And Vegetables Via Neural Networks | Lewin Day | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"fruit",
"produce",
"ripe",
"ripeness",
"vegetable",
"vegetables"
] | Humans have an innate knack for identifying food that is fit to eat. There’s a reason you instinctively enjoy fresh fruit and vegetables, but find maggot-infested rotting flesh offputting, for example. However, we like to automate as much of the food production process as possible so we can do other things, so it’s necessary to have machines sort the ripe and ready produce from the rest at times. [kutluhan_aktar] has found a way to do just that,
using the power of neural networks.
The project’s goal is a straightforward one, aiming to detect ripeness in fruit and vegetables by monitoring pigment changes. Rather than use a camera, the project relies on data from an AS7341 visible light sensor, which is better suited to capturing accurate spectral data. This allows a better read of the actual light reflected by the fruit, as determined by the pigments in the skin which are directly related to ripeness.
Sample readings were taken from a series of fruit and vegetables over a period of several days, which allowed a database to be built up of the produce at various stages of ripeness. This was then used to create a TensorFlow model which can determine the ripeness of fruit held under the sensor with a reasonable degree of certainty.
The build is a great example of the use of advanced sensing in combination with neural networks. We suspect the results are far more accurate than could have reasonably be determined with a cheap webcam, though we’d love to see an in-depth comparison as such.
Believe it or not,
it’s not the only fruit spectrometer we’ve featured in these hallowed pages.
Video after the break. | 11 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366575",
"author": "Ghent The Slicer",
"timestamp": "2021-07-22T20:55:08",
"content": "But the color is not a good indicator for ripeness.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6366598",
"author": "Truth",
"timestam... | 1,760,373,009.305892 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/22/new-video-series-designing-with-complex-geometry/ | New Video Series: Designing With Complex Geometry | Tom Nardi | [
"how-to",
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"3D design",
"cad",
"geometry",
"HackadayU",
"parametric design",
"rhino 3d modeling",
"visual programming"
] | Whether it’s a 3D printed robot chassis or a stained glass window, looking at a completed object and trying to understand how it was designed and put together can be intimidating. But upon closer examination, you can often identify the repeating shapes and substructures that were combined to create the final piece. Soon you might find that the design that seemed incredibly intricate when taken as a whole is actually an amalgamation of simple geometric elements.
This skill, the ability to see an object for its principle components, is just as important for designing new objects as it is for understanding existing ones.
As James McBennett explains in his HackadayU course
Designing with Complex Geometry
, if you want to master computer-aided design (CAD) and start creating your own intricate designs, you’d do well to start with a toolbox of relatively straightforward geometric primitives that you can quickly modify and reuse. With time, your bag of tricks will be overflowing with parametric structures that can be reshaped on the fly to fit into whatever you’re currently working on.
His tool of choice is Grasshopper, a visual programming language that’s part of Rhino. Designs are created using an interface reminiscent of Node-RED or even GNU Radio, with each interconnected block representing a primitive shape or function that can be configured through static variables, interactive sliders, conditional operations, and even mathematical expressions. By linking these modules together complex structures can be generated and manipulated programmatically, greatly reducing the time and effort required compared to a manual approach.
As with many powerful tools, there’s certainly a learning curve for Grasshopper.
But over the course of this five part series
, James does a great job of breaking things down into easily digestible pieces that build onto each other. By the final class you’ll be dealing with physics and pushing your designs into the third dimension, producing elaborate designs with almost biological qualities.
Of course, Rhino isn’t for everyone. The $995 program is closed source and officially only runs on Windows and Mac OS. But the modular design concepts that James introduces, as well as the technique of looking at large complex objects as a collection of substructures, can be applied to other parametric CAD packages such as FreeCAD and OpenSCAD.
Designing with Complex Geometry
is just one of the
incredible courses offered through HackadayU
, our pay-as-you-wish grad school for hardware hackers. From drones to quantum computing,
the current list of courses has something for everyone
. | 17 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366552",
"author": "Paul",
"timestamp": "2021-07-22T19:20:13",
"content": "I freakin’ love Rhino. My best days at work are when I just get to design in Rhino for hours on end.I frequently describe it as “like AutoCAD, but fun!”. Way less awkward than other programs in terms of ho... | 1,760,373,009.25653 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/22/who-flew-across-the-atlantic-first-the-airborne-boats-of-1919/ | Who Flew Across The Atlantic First? The Airborne Boats Of 1919 | Al Williams | [
"Featured",
"History",
"Slider"
] | [
"aviation",
"history",
"navy",
"nc-4",
"transatlantic",
"transoceanic"
] | Aviation history is a bit strange. People tend to remember some firsts but not others and — sometimes — not even firsts. For example, everyone knows Amelia Earhart attempted to be the first woman to fly around the globe. She failed, but do you know who succeeded? It was Jerrie Mock. How about the first person to do it? Wiley Post, a name largely forgotten by the public. Charles Lindbergh is another great example. He was the first person to fly across the Atlantic, right? Not exactly. The story of the real first transatlantic flight is one of aviation hacking by the United States Navy.
The Quest for a Flying Boat
Airplanes really got their start with the Wright brother’s flight in 1903 — even though you can make the case for some earlier flights — and by 1914 there was already talk of taking a flying boat across the Atlantic. However, the engines of the day weren’t that reliable and the plane had to be able to lift enough fuel to make it between refueling points. That limited the choices of places to take off and land.
NC-4 Sea Plane with an Additional Engine for the Transatlantic Attempt
In 1914, a British philanthropist had Glenn Curtiss built a flying boat with a 72-foot wingspan, mounted three engines, and called it
America
. It was supposed to fly the Atlantic, but with the onset of the Great War, that never happened.
The United States also wanted flying boats during the war, mostly for antisubmarine warfare. In 1917 the Navy and Curtiss decided to produce the NC or Navy-Curtiss flying boat, commonly called Nancies. This was a big plane for its day at 69 feet in length with a wingspan about the same as the 108 feet of a Boeing 727. By 1918, the first 12-ton Nancy made its maiden flight.
Across the Waves
A WWII-era Bubble Sextant
The Navy decided that three NC flying boats should cross the Atlantic. Of course, sending a plane across the Atlantic today isn’t a big deal, but in 1918 this was equivalent to announcing you were going to the moon in 1969. Future president and then assistant secretary of the Navy Franklin D. Roosevelt was a major supporter of the idea of a flight. But flying was only one part of the bigger puzzle.
Richard Byrd, another name you might know from history, was also involved in the project. He would later become famous for polar expeditions, but during the war he had developed tools and techniques to improve navigation while over water. In particular, he worked with the bubble sextant. Ships use the horizon when measuring with a sextant but airplanes need a different means since they are elevated above the surface and not finding a natural level on water. A bubble sextant provides an alternative to the natural horizon to measure from.
Byrd also employed drift indicators that used a reference point on the ground to determine how far the plane was drifting. Both of these would be useful to planes trying to cross the ocean. While he didn’t get to actually make the flight, he did help in the planning.
What a Plan
Map of One Leg of the Transatlantic Flight Path Shows Some of the Navigation Reference Ships
To help ensure success, the Navy posted 61 ships roughly every 50 miles along the route to help with navigation and to rescue the crews, if necessary. That’s amazing when you think about the logistics of lining up 61 ships on a precise path.
Three flying boats were to participate. NC1, NC3, and NC4. The NC2 had its wing removed to repair one of the other planes. The planes also got an extra engine and super-efficient propellers based on the equations developed by engineer Charles Olmsted. These propellers were 20% more efficient than conventional ones. So you’d think with all this support the three planes would make it across with no difficulties. But it wasn’t that straightforward.
The three planes departed Rockaway (part of New York City) on May 8, 1919 to head for Newfoundland. NC-4 lost two engines and had to land in the ocean near Cape Cod. The aircraft acted like a boat for five hours to reach the naval air station at Chatham. The other planes landed in about nine hours, but NC-4 didn’t catch up until May 14th. The press speculated that NC-4, practically on its maiden voyage, was a lame duck and would be left behind.
There was another problem. The new propellers were cracking on all three planes. The decision was made to go back to the standard ones.
Leaving Newfoundland
The two planes, NC-1 and NC-3, tried to depart on May 10th without the NC-4, but were too heavy to lift out of the water. Once NC-4 rejoined the trio, they tried again, successfully, on May 16th.
The navigation instruments were poor, but they did have the string of Navy destroyers every 50 miles to light the way. NC-3 had an electrical failure and the planes separated from formation to avoid hitting the dark plane. Once fog became heavy, it was difficult to find each other or the ships visually. However, the pilot in NC-3 sighted a destroyer that was not part of the navigation line and thinking it was one of the ships guiding them to the Azores, corrected course.
Eventually, it was apparent he should be close to the Azores, but couldn’t find the next ship. The plane set down in rough waters which collapsed an engine strut, grounding NC-3. NC-1 also landed to try to get a position fix and, while undamaged, the seas were too high for the plane to take off again, effectively ending its mission.
Making It
That left NC-4, the lame duck plane that almost didn’t get started. It was also the fastest of the three planes. It cut through the fog, the crew fighting disorientation. They knew from a radio fix and dead reckoning that they were close to their destination. Finally, a break in the fog let them glimpse one of the islands and that information led them to find a suitable harbor to land in. The lame duck had made it.
NC-1’s crew was taken off by a Greek freighter. It eventually sunk beneath the waves. NC-3, however, was missing for a few days. To reduce weight, the crew had stripped out nearly everything from the aircraft including the radio transmitter. Unable to take off in rough seas, the crew used the tail of the airplane as a sail and went over 200 miles tail first to sail to the Azores. While not an aviation first, it was dazzling seamanship.
Forgotten
The crew of NC-4 — Albert Read, Walter Hinton, Elmer Stone, James Breese, Eugene Rhoads, and Herbert Rodd — are in good company. No one remembers Wiley Post or Jerri Mock, either. Later in 1919, Alcock and Brown flew a biplane from Newfoundland to Ireland, winning £10,000. A few weeks later an airship made the crossing and even carried a few passengers.
As you can see at the 6:33 mark in the video below, Read and Rhoads would duplicate their flight in 1949 much faster in a contemporary aircraft. There’s also newsreel footage there from the 1919 flight.
Why do we remember Charles Lindbergh? Well, he flew nonstop and landed on the European mainland. Everyone else hopped from place to place like the NC-4 did. He also benefited from great press, a different public sentiment about flying, and that he flew alone. The tragic kidnapping of his baby after the flight also cemented him as a public figure. Then, too, he was an inventor, but the world seems to have forgotten that for the most part.
Earlier, we talked about
technical audacity
. Flying a 1920-era airplane across the Atlantic would seem to qualify. Those early pioneers developed techniques and learned lessons that would help make transoceanic flight commonplace very quickly. Yet we scarcely remember who they were. | 47 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366520",
"author": "localroger",
"timestamp": "2021-07-22T17:28:48",
"content": "Lindbergh is specifically credited with making the first _solo_ flight across the Atlantic, not the first flight or even the first nonstop flight. What made it remarkable was that he was alone in the ... | 1,760,373,009.514213 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/21/giving-control-of-a-smartphone-robot-to-a-raspberry-pi/ | Giving Control Of A Smartphone Robot To A Raspberry Pi | Danie Conradie | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"robot",
"romo",
"serial communications",
"smartphone"
] | Most gadgets that interface with smartphones have a rather short lifespan and inevitably end up as E-waste. Unless hackers give them a second life, as is the case with the Romo, a little smartphone-controlled robot. [David Goeken] has successfully
reverse-engineered the communication protocol to allow the Romo to controlled Raspberry Pi
(or microcontroller)
The Romo was a little iPhone-controlled robot brought to market with a
Kickstarter campaign
back in 2013. It originally used the audio jack from the iPhone for the control interface, but was quickly followed by an updated version that used iPhone 4’s 30 pin connector and later the Lightning port. Romotive, the company behind Romo, eventually went out of business, but fortunately, they open-sourced the IOS app and the firmware. This has led to a few third-party apps currently on the app store.
[David] wanted to use other hardware for control, so he set about reverse-engineering the protocol using the open-source software and a logic analyzer. Unsurprisingly, it uses a serial interface to send and receive commands, with two additional pins to detect the connection and wake up the Romo. After breaking out the interface header on the board, he was able to modify the Romo to mount a Raspberry Pi Zero, and power it using the internal battery.
[David] has not made his code public yet, but it sounds like he plans to. It looks like Romo’s can be a fun little experimentation platform, and they can be found for cheap on eBay. We covered another cool Romo hack back in 2014, which used a
projector and vision system to create a Mariokart-like game
. For a completely open-source smartphone robot, check out the
OpenBot
. | 3 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366210",
"author": "Orange",
"timestamp": "2021-07-21T14:53:35",
"content": "“Most gadgets that interface with smartphones have a rather short lifespan and inevitably end up as E-waste.”I kind of feel that a distinction between Apple devices and everything else is appropriate here.... | 1,760,373,009.343012 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/20/injection-molds-from-your-3d-printer/ | Injection Molds From Your 3D Printer | Al Williams | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"3d printing",
"injection molding"
] | Last time we checked in with [CrafsMan] he had bought a benchtop injection molding machine. This time, he shows off how to
3D print molds
. If you have ever had to spend to make tooling for injection molding, you’ll appreciate being able to make molds relatively inexpensively.
To test his workflow, [CrafsMan] created a little 3D figurine and brought it into TinkerCad. From there he created a mold and used Lychee Slicer to print it using resin.
There was some manual finishing needed and that poses a problem since the two halves of the mold need to line up exactly. He mentioned he should have put alignment pins in, and we agree. We might also have put a way to bolt the halves together so you could, for example, sand the two pieces as a single unit.
The molds wound up in a mold frame and the results were impressive. We can’t help but think that the machine itself shouldn’t be that hard to create. It looks like little more than an arbor press, a heat chamber, and a piston.
If you want to see
more about the machine
in the video, you can check out the last time we checked in on [Crafsman]. Injection molding is
clearly a handy tool
— sometimes literally. | 5 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366154",
"author": "jwrm22",
"timestamp": "2021-07-21T11:17:17",
"content": "Even when I’ve not seen many of this guys videos. I recognized the puppet right away. Amazingly skilled and his tutorials on silver soldering (hard solder) helped me a lot in the past. I can see this being... | 1,760,373,009.385227 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/20/appcad-does-transmission-lines/ | AppCAD Does Transmission Lines | Al Williams | [
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"agilent",
"avago",
"broadcom",
"RF Design",
"transmission line"
] | Broadcom and Agilent are perhaps not household words in every household, but among those who work with RF, they are common enough names. An Agilent developer wrote AppCAD to help with common RF design computations and now works for Avago who bought Broadcom. But whoever’s branding is on it, you can download the tool from
Broadcom
or check out the latest
beta version
. Then watch [IMASI Guy’s] video below on how to use part of it.
What can it do? According to the website:
S-Parameter Analysis and Plotting
Active Circuit Bias Design
Cascade Noise and IP3 Analysis
Transmission Line Analysis
Signals and Systems
Complex Math Engineering Calculator
Even if you aren’t doing radio design
per se
, high-speed design often means you need to consider strip lines or transmission through coax or parallel lines. The program makes it easy to work on things like that as long as you are using Microsoft Windows.
When we think of CAD, we think of a program that lets us do some kind of physical design. That’s not really what it means in this case. But it is a powerful set of tools that can handle many RF calculations and it is worth checking out. | 7 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366099",
"author": "PWalsh",
"timestamp": "2021-07-21T03:48:29",
"content": "SimSmith is free and does most (all?) of those things. It lets you cascade several components or circuits together and shows what the characteristics are.It takes a bit of getting used to, but it’s wildly ... | 1,760,373,009.426035 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/20/live-energy-monitor-helps-plan-power-hungry-appliance-use/ | Live Energy Monitor Helps Plan Power-Hungry Appliance Use | Donald Papp | [
"green hacks",
"home hacks",
"Wireless Hacks"
] | [
"grid",
"power meter",
"power monitoring",
"smart meter",
"solar"
] | There are a lot of good reasons to have a better understanding of one’s household power use, and that is especially true for those that do their own solar power collection. For example, [Frederick] determined that it would be more efficient to use large appliances (like a dishwasher or washing machine) when there was excess solar power available, but the challenge was in accessing the right data in a convenient way.
His Raspberry Pi-based live energy monitor was the solution
, because it uses an LED matrix to display live energy data that can be consulted at a glance.
Interestingly, this project
isn’t
about hacking the power meter. What this project is really about is conveniently accessing that data when and where it is best needed. [Frederick] has a digital power and gas meter with the ability to accept a small wireless dongle. That dongle allows a mobile phone app to monitor power usage, including whether power is being taken from or exported to the grid.
Since [Frederick] didn’t want to have to constantly consult his mobile phone, a Raspberry Pi using a Pimoroni Unicorn HAT HD acts as a glanceable display. His Python script polls the power meter directly over WiFi, then creates a live display of power usage: one LED for every 250 W of power, with the top half of the display being power used, and the bottom half representing power exported to the grid. Now the decision of when to turn on which appliances for maximum efficiency is much easier, not by automating the appliances themselves, but simply by displaying data where it needs to be seen. (This kind of thing, incidentally, is exactly the idea behind the
Rethink Displays
challenge of the
2021 Hackaday Prize
.)
As for those of us without a digital power meter that makes it easy for residents to access power data? It turns out
there is no reason a power meter’s wireless service interface can’t be sniffed with RTL-SDR
. | 8 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366054",
"author": "Reg",
"timestamp": "2021-07-20T23:14:03",
"content": "Nice work!I’ve objected to quite a few posts of late, as have others. It’s very nice to see a well written post about an interesting and non-trivial topic.Thank you!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
... | 1,760,373,009.616862 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/20/diy-fume-extractor-keeps-air-clean-while-you-solder/ | DIY Fume Extractor Keeps Air Clean While You Solder | Lewin Day | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"fume extractor"
] | Soldering is a key skill to learn when building electronics, but it’s also a process that can put out a lot of fumes. The best way to deal with this is to use a fume extractor.
Of course, you can always make your own, as [Open Green Energy] ably demonstrates
. It’s a guided build of
the design [rdmmkr] published on Thingiverse
.
The build relies on a 120mm case fan for suction, and it’s combined with a activated carbon filter to best capture the harmful fumes from the soldering process. The fan is neatly installed inside a 3D printed enclosure of custom design, which also includes a removable tray which holds the filter material. The fan is run from a DC power supply via a barrel jack, and a basic speed controller is installed to allow the fan to be turned up higher for more suction, or lower to reduce noise.
It’s a useful item to have around the home workshop, and it’s something that you could easily whip up at home with parts from the junk bin if you’re so inclined. The benefit of 3D printing is that you can easily alter the design to suit whatever parts you have on hand.
We’ve seen a few fume extractor builds over the years, from the
simple and basic
to the
very fancy
. Video after the break. | 17 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366045",
"author": "Hirudinea",
"timestamp": "2021-07-20T21:44:21",
"content": "THAT SUCKS! (And since [Open Green Energy] sounds as if North American English isn’t his first language) That’s really good.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comm... | 1,760,373,009.570736 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/20/one-giant-button-to-mute-them-all/ | One Giant Button To Mute Them All | Kristina Panos | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"The Hackaday Prize"
] | [
"2021 Hackaday Prize",
"mute",
"Neopixels",
"rotary encoder",
"Seeeduino Xiao"
] | The second round of this year’s Hackaday Prize is coming to a close, and we asked you to come up with ways of refreshing work-from-home life. Well here’s one we probably all could use —
a large emergency mute button that can also turn off video with an extra click
. You know, in case your kid or your roommate decides to walk around in their birthday suit.
[Colin Russell-Conway]’s software-agnostic mute button uses a Seeeduino Xiao and rotary encoder, plus three momentaries that give it a second function as a media controller. Two chunks of LED strip go blinky blinky when the mute is on, and are otherwise solidly lit and color-coded by videoconference type — blue for Zoom and Starleaf, green for Webex, and purple for Teams.
The companion app that [Colin] created is using the Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) to check which program is control of the microphone. Whenever the mute button is pressed, the app makes note of the current program in focus, switches to the active videoconference, mutes it, and then switches back to reddit or twitch or whatever you had in focus when the kid started screaming for you from the bathroom. Check out the demo after the break.
Some of us like to celebrate a little when videoconferences are over. For those people, there is the
pull-chain exit
.
The
Hackaday
Prize2021
is Sponsored by: | 3 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366024",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2021-07-20T19:21:32",
"content": "Combine this with my “easy” button and one can relax in silence.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6366140",
"author": "Alice Lalita Heald",
"... | 1,760,373,009.771596 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/20/the-story-behind-ohms-law/ | The Story Behind Ohm’s Law | Al Williams | [
"Featured",
"History",
"Original Art",
"Slider"
] | [
"barlows law",
"barlows wheel",
"georg ohm",
"ohms law",
"pile",
"voltaic pile"
] | Do you ever wonder how much of what we do you could figure out from scratch? Tying your shoe might seem
simple now, but kids have trouble mastering the skill, and dreaming it up for the first time is even harder. The same holds true for a lot of technology we use every day. Would you think up the computer mouse or even the computer if they didn’t already exist? Surely, though, one of the simplest and most useful math equations that is fundamental to electronics — Ohm’s law — would be easy to figure out, right? It is often the first thing you learn about electronics, but figuring it out that first time turned out to be quite difficult.
The fellow who discovered the relationship was Georg Ohm, a high school math and physics teacher from Köln. What you might not know is that the first time he published it, he got it wrong. But, lucky for us, he figured out his mistake and was able to correct it.
It isn’t Just a Good Idea…
Ohm’s law is easy. For a linear resistor, the current through the resistor is proportional to the voltage applied across it. The proportionality constant is the reciprocal of the resistance value in — no surprise — ohms. That’s just a fancy math way of saying I=E/R where E is voltage, I is current, and R is resistance. Of course, algebra will tell you that E=IR and R=E/I.
Measure Twice
Volta’s pile of copper and zinc.
While that seems obvious today, in the 1800s, not so much. There had been some awareness of electricity dating back to ancient Greece. However, until 1800 when Volta created the “hydro-electric” battery — meaning it was a wet cell — there was no easy way to create a steady current for scientific investigation.
From 1800 to 1820, then, science was able to use a voltaic pile to generate electricity. But there was a big limitation. There was no way to measure the current flow in the circuit. In 1781 Henry Cavendish experimented with Leyden jars (basically a high-voltage capacitor) and glass tubes of varying diameter and length filled with saline. Having no way to measure current, he would use his body and note how strong a shock he felt. He noted that current was related to voltage but did not mention it to other scientists and it remained largely unknown until Maxwell published the result in 1879.
The current measurement problem resolved in 1820 when Oersted showed that a current would produce a magnetic field. That led Schweigger and Poggendorff to invent the galvanoscope in 1821. This is essentially a coil with a compass inside of it. Current in the wire would deflect the compass needle and the amount of deflection told you how much current was in the wire.
Ohm wanted to study the nature of electric current flow and built both a battery and a galvanoscope. His experiments aimed to describe the amount of current that would flow through a given length of wire. He would measure the current flowing from the battery using only his galvanoscope and then insert a length of wire and note the difference in the reading.
Oops…
In 1825, Ohm announced his formula to the world in a paper entitled, “Preliminary Notice of the Law According to which Metals Conduct Contact Electricity.” Not exactly a click-bait title. However, there was a problem: the formula he had was incorrect.
Keep in mind that there were not all the units we are used to today, so Ohm’s formula was measuring V, the reduction in needle deflection caused by the test wire. The length of the wire X and the applied voltage M were key factors as well as the resistivity of the wire, R. The incorrect formula was:
V=M log(1+X/R)
With what we know today, you can look at this and immediately know it is incorrect. However, in 1825, that wasn’t so obvious. The paper was accepted for publication but before it went to print, Ohm ran new experiments with a different power source. He realized his formula was wrong, but it was too late.
Correction
The problem was the battery. While it might seem obvious today, in 1825 there wasn’t a general realization that a wet cell’s voltage will vary under load. Ohm’s friend Poggendorff suggested he use a thermoelectric battery — what we would call a thermocouple.
In “Determination of the Law According to which Metals Conduct Contact Electricity, Together with the Outlines of a Theory of Volta’s Apparatus and the Schweigger Galvanscope” Ohm got it right. (He liked the long titles.) The formula there didn’t exactly look like what we think of as Ohm’s law, but it actually is, if you account for the resistance of the power source. In modern notation, we would write:
E=I*(Rb+R)
Here, Rb is the battery resistance. In 1827, Ohm also published “The Galvanic Battery Treated Mathematically” showing that, at least, his ability to write good titles had improved. That’s all, right?
Not So Fast
You would think that everyone would be happy to see Ohm’s law and would start to apply it immediately. That didn’t happen. Science was skeptical then — as you might argue it still is — and the establishment of the day thought Ohm’s law was too simple to have eluded the community for thirty-some-odd years. There was also strong sentiment that Ohm had rushed to formulation, and a distaste for his practical experimental methods. The establishment saw Ohm as — more or less – a poser.
The German Minister of Education proclaimed that “a professor who preached such heresies was unworthy to teach science.” Others said that the work was a “web of naked fancies.”
For six years, the world continued to ignore Ohm’s law, for the most part. However, Pouillet published a paper in 1831 where he — without being aware of it — rediscovered Ohm’s formula. He was probably disappointed when, upon publication of Pouillet’s law, others pointed out that Ohm had done the same work years earlier.
Errata
You might think it is odd that Ohm published a wrong formula or Pouillet repeated an experiment, but things were a lot different then. Barlow, in fact, tried to solve the same problem in 1825 and had published a finding that current through a wire was inversely proportional to the square root of the wire’s length.
This result was incorrect but fit the data because Barlow failed to account for the internal resistance of the battery, as Ohm did. Even Barlow accepted that he was uncertain his law was correct. On the plus side, Barlow did invent Barlow’s Wheel which was a clever form of motor using a metal wheel, a magnet, and mercury.
Acknowledged
In the end, Ohm’s work was acknowledged and he not only received the credit he was due, but his name is still on our lips every day.
If you want to read more details about Ohm, the
Annual Report of the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institute
for 1891 has the translation of an address given to the Royal Bavarian Academy of Sciences that covers the story in great detail. You’ll read that after his work was recognized, he began new experiments and made contributions to acoustics, too, although his acoustic law is not quite correct, apparently.
If you really want to go to the source, brush up on your German and check out this
archive of Ohm’s original papers
. While Ohm gets all the credit,
Kirchhoff
has some pretty important laws, too. | 22 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365999",
"author": "Moryc",
"timestamp": "2021-07-20T17:26:37",
"content": "There is also a Borg law: with enough voltage and current resistance is futile…",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6366003",
"author": "Ragnarok... | 1,760,373,009.890203 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/22/no-mask-required-bring-a-hack-is-back-august-5th/ | No Mask Required: Bring-A-Hack Is Back August 5th | Kristina Panos | [
"cons"
] | [
"Bring A Hack",
"pandemic",
"remote"
] | Yes, we’re still in a pandemic and yes, these types of events are still happening over videoconference and not in meat space. But you know what? That means that so many more people have the opportunity to show up and show off their hacks! As long as 1 PM PDT is within your personal uptime, that is. Maybe you can make an exception if not?
Here is your link:
the summer edition of Bring a Hack with Tindie and Hackaday
will take place on Thursday, August 5th at
1:00 PM Pacific Daylight time
(that’s 4pm EDT | 9pm BST/CET). Choose your gnarliest hack of late and
go register for the event
, which will be held on the Crowdcast video chat platform this time around.
The remote Bring-A-Hack held way back in April was packed with awesome people. Now is your chance to join in! You all have awesome projects from the last few months (we’ve seen a lot of them on these very pages), so come show them off to the hacker elite from around the globe. You know the deal: it really doesn’t matter what level your project is on, so don’t worry about that. As long as you’re passionate about it, we’d love to see it and hear all about the problems you had to overcome and yes, even the mistakes you made. You never know what knowledge you might have that can push someone else’s project over the finish line.
Shine up your hacks, and mark those calendars; here’s
a timezone converter
if you need it.
Reserve your spot now
. Seriously, don’t fool yourself into thinking your build isn’t impressive enough — we want to see it. My hack might not even involve a circuit, and that’s enough to pique your interest, right? See you there! | 9 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366540",
"author": "Jii",
"timestamp": "2021-07-22T18:17:54",
"content": "-1 for the graphics. That’s just a V-6.(not really, V-6 is acceptable in some rare cases, but next time, next time V-8. Promise? Pretty pleeease)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
... | 1,760,373,009.81888 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/22/lord-kelvins-contraption-turns-drips-into-sparks/ | Lord Kelvin’s Contraption Turns Drips Into Sparks | Tom Nardi | [
"Science"
] | [
"high voltage",
"Lord Kelvin",
"Plasma Channel",
"water"
] | It’s easy to think that devices which generate thousands of volts of electricity must involve relatively modern technology, but the fact is, machines capable of firing sparks through open air predate Edison’s light bulb. Which means that recreating them with modern tools, construction techniques, and part availability, is probably a lot easier than most people realize.
The fascinating machine [Jay Bowles] put together for his latest
Plasma Channel
video is a perfect example
, as it’s capable of developing 6,000 volts without any electronic components.
Now as clever as [Jay] might be, he can’t take credit for the idea on this one. That honor goes to Lord Kelvin, who came up with this particular style of electrostatic generator back in 1867. Alternately called “Kelvin water dropper” or “Lord Kelvin’s Thunderstorm”, the machine is able to produce a high voltage charge from falling water without using any moving parts.
Diverging streams means a charge is building up.
Our very own
[Steven Dufresne] wrote an in-depth look at how these devices operate
, but the short version is that a negative and positive charge is built up in two sets of metallic inductor rings and buckets, with the stream of water itself acting as a sort of wire to carry the charge up to the overhead water reservoir. As [Jay] demonstrates the video, you’ll know things are working when the streams of water become attracted to the inductors they are passing through.
Rather than connecting a separate spark gap up to the water “receivers” on the bottom of his water dropper, [Jay] found the handles on the metal mugs he’s using worked just as well. By moving the mugs closer and farther away he can adjust the gap, and a second adjustment lets him move the vertical position of the inductors. It sounds like it takes some fiddling to get everything in position, but once it’s working, the whole thing is very impressive.
Of course if you’re looking to get serious with high voltage experiments, you’ll want to upgrade to some less whimsical equipment pretty quickly. Luckily, [Jay] has shown that
putting together a reliable HV supply doesn’t need to be expensive or complicated
. | 21 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366513",
"author": "RoGeorge",
"timestamp": "2021-07-22T16:50:20",
"content": "https://youtu.be/ViwSDL657L4?t=2640:o)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6366532",
"author": "nada",
"timestamp": "2021-07-22T17:58:47",
"... | 1,760,373,009.955819 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/22/avoiding-repetitive-stress-injury-invest-in-yourself-now-or-pay-later/ | Avoiding Repetitive Stress Injury: Invest In Yourself Now, Or Pay Later | Kristina Panos | [
"Featured",
"Interest",
"Lifehacks",
"Original Art",
"Peripherals Hacks",
"Rants",
"Slider"
] | [
"ergonomic keyboard",
"ergonomics",
"repetitive strain injury",
"repetitive stress injury",
"RSI"
] | There I was, thirty years after I first sat down at an Apple IIe , and I suddenly found myself wondering if I would ever use a computer again without pain. How could I work if I couldn’t use a computer anymore? I had to seriously ask myself this question. It took a bit of a winding road to figure out what was going on and two
EMGs
to confirm it, but after all these years, it was clear to the medical community that I had developed a repetitive stress injury (RSI) called
cubital tunnel syndrome
in my left arm.
Yeah, it’s about like that. Image via
Kinesis
Cubital tunnel syndrome is like carpal tunnel, but in your elbow instead of your wrist. What a misnomer! Sometimes my pain went all the way from my armpit to my fingertips and made me want to gnaw my own arm off. I don’t think you can really understand neuropathy unless you’ve felt this weird, annoying type of pain firsthand. I hope you never do.
Can you stop and seriously imagine not being able to use a computer for the rest of your life? Or at least feeling that way because doing so causes incredibly annoying pain? I feel like we’re all vaguely aware of
the standard list of anti-RSI precautions
, but let’s review:
maintain good posture — sit with feet flat on the floor, wrists straight, elbows at 90°
put the screen an arm’s length away at eye level
take frequent short breaks
Yes, those are all fine and good. But there are other things you can do to avoid computer-related RSIs, like using ergonomic inputs, and building a custom setup that fits you exactly. This isn’t a study kiosk at the university library we’re talking about — this is your battlestation! The problem is that many people are stubborn, and won’t go out of their way to do anything to proactively prevent these injuries. But you don’t have to cross a bridge when you come to it if you have a map that shows you a way around the body of water.
Don’t Be Like Me
When I started my old office job, there was a brief overview of good ergonomics. I was offered an adjustable foot stool which I took, and a keyboard tray which I didn’t and probably should have. Instead, I ground my arms into the desk for many years as I typed and used the mouse. When we moved buildings and no longer had beveled desk edges, that’s when I was really in trouble.
Don’t be happy with whatever is available. Ergonomics are for everyone at any time, so don’t wait until you need them urgently. While it’s true that companies are legally bound to provide ergonomic assessments and alternative equipment, they’re probably not going to come up to you with an IT cart full of options. You’ll have to make it known that you need it. Be proactive with ergonomics, not reactive. Someone in another department wanted a standing desk, so the office manager stayed late one night and raised a section of his desk along the cubicle wall.
This is me. Two feet off the ground, with both feet doing work. You can see the
macro footstool
glowing underneath the desk. That yellow thing is a Shift pedal.
Now that I work from home, I am most of the way to the perfect battlestation. I finally got an adjustable-height desk that goes low enough that I can sit at it with my feet flat on the floor
and
have my elbows bent at 90° angles. It’s huge and low to the ground, like a conference room table for children. But who cares what it looks like? I spend most of my waking hours at this desk. That’s 12-16 hours a day. It needs to fit me properly. Throw in the expensive miracle chair,
the funny keyboard
, and the trackball mouse, and I am back in business.
What’s On Your Desk?
You might be happy with what you’ve got now, but that doesn’t mean it won’t give you problems down the line. I’m not telling you to go out and buy all new equipment, but you should listen to your body. If you have leg or back pain, start with a better chair. Wrist pain? Try some ergonomic keyboards and mice.
I think you should care about your setup, and I don’t mean to take care that everything matches or has RGB. The choice of a keyboard is an important one and should not be based solely on aesthetics. You use these things how many hours a week?
I know, I know. Keeping to all these anti-RSI recommendations feels totally uncool, like riding a skateboard in public with a full set of neon protective gear on. But as long as you’re aware of the signs and keep the precautions against it in the back of your mind, you might just be alright. All it takes is one bad habit, repeated mindlessly dozens of times a day. | 49 | 25 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366469",
"author": "BT",
"timestamp": "2021-07-22T14:16:22",
"content": "Do you touch-type? I have often wondered if touch-typists suffer more from this than poke-and-hope typists. You seem to have to always be using your muscles to hold your hands still in exactly the correct plac... | 1,760,373,010.054265 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/22/modified-3d-printer-solders-through-hole-components/ | Modified 3D-Printer Solders Through-Hole Components | Dan Maloney | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"extruder",
"fixturing",
"gantry",
"smt",
"solder bot",
"soldering",
"through hole"
] | Surface-mount technology has been a fantastic force multiplier for electronics in general and for hobbyists in particular. But sometimes you’ve got no choice but to use through-hole components, meaning that even if you can take advantage of SMDs for most of the design, you still might need to spend a little time with soldering iron in hand.
Or not, if you’ve got a spare 3D printer lying around
.
All we’ve got here is a fairly brief video from [hydrosys4], so there aren’t a lot of build details. But it’s pretty clear what’s going on here. Starting with what looks like a
Longer LK4 printer
, [hydrosys4] added a bracket to hold a soldering iron, and a guide for solder wire. The solder is handled by a more-or-less standard extruder, which feeds it into the joint once it’s heated by the iron. The secret sauce here is probably the fixturing, with 3D-printed jigs that hold the through-hole connectors in a pins-up orientation on the bed of the printer. With the PCB sitting on top of the connectors, it’s just a matter of teaching the X-Y-Z position of each joint, applying heat, and advancing the solder with the extruder.
The video below shows it in action at high speed; we slowed it down to 25% to get an idea of how it is in reality, and while it might not be fast, it’s precise and it doesn’t get tired. It may not have much application for one-off boards, but if you’re manufacturing small PCB runs, it’s a genius solution. We’ve seen
similar solder bots before
, but hats off to [hydrosys4] for keeping this one simple.
Thanks to [Arturo] for the tip! | 23 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366431",
"author": "yetihehe",
"timestamp": "2021-07-22T12:13:21",
"content": "> The video below shows it in action at high speed; we slowed it down to 25% to get an idea of how it is in realityVideo looks like it’s in realtime speed. Did you slow it when viewing, or what?",
"... | 1,760,373,010.109443 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/22/magnetic-bearings-put-the-spin-on-this-flywheel-battery/ | Magnetic Bearings Put The Spin On This Flywheel Battery | Dan Maloney | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"alternator",
"angular momentum",
"bearing",
"flywheel",
"friction",
"generator",
"maglev",
"Magnetic levitation",
"neodymium",
"rectifier"
] | [Tom Stanton] is right about one thing: flywheels make excellent playthings. Whether watching a spinning top that never seems to slow down, or feeling the weird forces a gyroscope exerts, spinning things are oddly satisfying. And
putting a flywheel to work as a battery
makes it even cooler.
Of course, using a flywheel to store energy isn’t even close to being a new concept. But the principles [Tom] demonstrates in the video below, including the advantages of magnetically levitated bearings, are pretty cool to see all in one place. The flywheel itself is just a heavy aluminum disc on a shaft, with a pair of bearings on each side made of stacks of neodymium magnets. An additional low-friction thrust bearing at the end of the shaft keeps the systems suitably constrained, and allows the flywheel to spin for twelve minutes or more.
[Tom]’s next step was to harness some of the flywheel’s angular momentum to make electricity. He built a pair of rotors carrying more magnets, with a stator of custom-wound coils sandwiched between. A full-wave bridge rectifier and a capacitor complete the circuit and allow the flywheel to power a bunch of LEDs or even a small motor. The whole thing is nicely built and looks like a fun desk toy.
This is far from [Tom]’s first flywheel rodeo;
his last foray into storing mechanical energy
wasn’t terribly successful, but he has succeeded in making flywheels fly,
one way
or
another
. | 35 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366393",
"author": "Mike Massen, Perth, Western Australia",
"timestamp": "2021-07-22T08:10:03",
"content": "Nice to see articles on magnetic bearings. Up till yesterday I haven’t found much that’s sophisticated enough to scale up to large size in ground installations without requir... | 1,760,373,012.289715 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/21/raspberry-pi-server-cluster-in-1u-rack-mount-case/ | Raspberry Pi Server Cluster In 1U Rack-Mount Case | Chris Lott | [
"computer hacks",
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"low power",
"rack mount server",
"raspberry pi cluster"
] | [Paul Brown] wants to take advantage of off-site server colocation services. But the providers within [Paul]’s region typically place a limit of 1A @ 120V on each server. Rather than search out commercial low-power solutions, [Paul] embraced the hacker spirit and
built his own server
from five Raspberry Pi 4b single board computers.
The task involves a little bit more than just mounting five Pi4s in a chassis and calling it done. There is an Ethernet switch connecting all the modules to the network, and each Pi has a comparatively bulky SSD drive + enclosure attached. By far the most annoying part of the assembly is the power supply and distribution cabling, which is further complicated by remote controlled power switching relays (one of the computers is dedicated to power management and can shut the other four modules on and off).
Even if you’re not planning on building your own server, check out the thoroughly documented assembly process and parts list — we particularly liked the USB connector to screw terminal breakout connector that he’s using for power distribution. For all the detailed information, assembly instructions and photos, we think a top-level block diagram / interconnection drawing would be very helpful for anyone trying to understand or replicate this project.
There are a lot of connections in this box, and the final result has a messy look-and-feel. But in fairness to [Paul]’s craftsmanship, there aren’t many other ways to hook everything together given the Raspberry Pi form-factor. Maybe a large and costly PCB or using CM4 modules instead of Raspberry Pi boards could help with cable management? In the end, [Paul] reckons he shelled out about $800 for this unit. He compares this expense with some commercial options in his writeup, which shows there are some cheaper and more powerful solutions. But while it may be cheaper to buy, we understand that strong urge to roll your own.
We’ve written about many Pi cluster projects in the past, including
this one which contains a whopping 750 Raspberry Pis
. Have you ever used a colocation service, and if so, did you use a DIY or an off-the-shelf server? | 30 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366366",
"author": "Jonathan Bennett",
"timestamp": "2021-07-22T05:10:09",
"content": "I have two servers being colocated now, both of them I built from Supermicro parts. Both cost more than $800, but the extra processing and storage oomph is worth it for me. If this has the power ... | 1,760,373,012.141839 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/21/miller-effect-time/ | Miller (Effect) Time | Al Williams | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"amplifier",
"miller capacitance",
"miller effect",
"transistor"
] | While the
Miller effect
might sound like fun, it is actually the effect of parasitic capacitance in amplifiers. What do you do about it? Watch the video below the break from [All Electronics] and find out. We like how the test circuit it uses has a switch to put the mitigation circuitry in and out of the test for comparison purposes.
Actually, the Miller effect can refer to any impedance but in practice that is most often parasitic capacitance because of the construction used for tubes and transistors. The sometimes tiny capacitance gets multiplied by the inverting gain of the stage and increases the amplifier’s input impedance. This, in turn, reduces the bandwidth of the stage.
There are a lot of nuances to the Miller effect. Sure, you can neutralize it as the video points out. You can also use non-inverting buffers on the input or output of an amplifier to reduce the effect. Some designers also exploit the effect to convert a small capacitor to a larger one, especially in applications like IC design where large capacitors are harder to make.
Usually, output capacitance is neglected because the total output impedance magnitude is small. But if you do have a high impedance output, it needs to figure into the analysis, too.
We talked about
transistor biasing
and Miller capacitance came up in the comments. Of course, you got the same effect in the
old tube circuits
, too. | 10 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366360",
"author": "Paul",
"timestamp": "2021-07-22T04:40:18",
"content": "….”and increases the amplifier’s input impedance”???",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6366399",
"author": "spotke",
"timestamp": "2021-... | 1,760,373,012.025395 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/21/a-new-spin-on-360-degree-displays/ | A New Spin On 360 Degree Displays | Michael Shaub | [
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"360 degree",
"custom display",
"persistence of vision",
"phenakistoscope",
"POV display",
"Pringles can",
"zeotrope"
] | Back in 2018, [Salah] created
a prototype display
that seems to defy logic using little more than a Pringles can and a fast motor. While not volumetric, this hack does show the same 2D image from any vantage point in 360 degrees around it.
How can cardboard create this effect? Somewhat like a
zoetrope
uses slits to create a shutter effect, this display uses a thin slit to limit the view of the image within to one narrow vertical slice at a time. When moving fast enough,
Persistence of Vision
kicks in to assemble these slices into a complete image. What we think is so cool about this hack is that the effect is the same from any angle and by multiple viewers simultaneously.
The project page and video demonstration after the break are light on details, though the idea is so simple as to not require additional explanation. We assume the bright LED seen in the video below was added to overcome the relatively dim appearance of the image when viewed through the narrow slit and isn’t strictly required.
If you are a fan of modern updates to victorian display technology, be sure to check out the 3D printed zeotropes and phenakistiscopes by
[Akinori Goto]
,
[Jeremy]
, and
[Greg Borenstein]
too. | 20 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366322",
"author": "Mike Massen, Perth, Western Australia",
"timestamp": "2021-07-21T23:14:40",
"content": "How, what a neat idea, though provoking too – hmm lottsa potential, I like it :-)Thanks for posting, cool !",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
... | 1,760,373,012.345209 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/21/clever-pcb-brings-micro-usb-to-the-arduino-uno/ | Clever PCB Brings Micro USB To The Arduino Uno | Tom Nardi | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"Parts"
] | [
"Arduino Uno",
"connector",
"port",
"retrofit",
"usb"
] | Even with more and more devices making the leap to USB-C, the Arduino Uno still proudly sports a comparatively ancient Type-B port. It wouldn’t be a stretch to say that many Hackaday readers only keep one of these cables around because they’ve still got an Uno or two they need to plug in occasionally.
Looking to at least move things in the right direction, [sjm4306] recently set out to create a
simple board that would let him mount a micro USB connector in place of the Uno’s original Type-B
. Naturally there are no components on the PCB, it simply adapts the original through-hole footprint to the tight grouping of surface mount pads necessary to mount a female micro USB port.
Making castellated holes on the cheap.
The design is straightforward, but as [sjm4306] explains in the video below, there’s actually more going on here than you might think. Looking to avoid the premium he’d pay to have the board house do castellated holes, he cheated the system a bit by having the board outline go right through the center of the standard pads.
Under a microscope, you can see the downside of this approach. Some of the holes got pretty tore up as the bit routed out the edges of the board, with a few of them so bad [sjm4306] mentions there might not be enough of the pad left to actually use. But while they may not be terribly attractive, most of them
were
serviceable. To be safe, he says anyone looking to use his trick with their own designs should order more boards than they think they’ll actually need.
Of course you could go all the way and retrofit the Uno with a USB-C port,
as we’ve seen done with devices in the past
. But the
latest-and-greatest USB interface can be a bit fiddly
, especially with DIY gadgets, so we can’t blame him for going with the more reliable approach. | 38 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366287",
"author": "Mike",
"timestamp": "2021-07-21T20:48:19",
"content": "Why bother with micro, should have went USBC",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6366289",
"author": "Me",
"timestamp": "2021-07-21T20:51:... | 1,760,373,011.903438 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/21/zerobug-from-simulation-to-smooth-walking/ | ZeroBug: From Simulation To Smooth Walking | Danie Conradie | [
"Robots Hacks",
"The Hackaday Prize"
] | [
"2021 Hackaday Prize",
"3d printed",
"hexapod",
"processing",
"simulation"
] | Thanks to 3D printing and cheap hobby servos, building you’re own small walking robot is not particularly difficult, but getting them to walk smoothly can be an entirely different story. Knowing this from experience, [Max.K] tackled the software side first by creating a virtual simulation of his
ZeroBug hexapod
, before building it.
Learning from his previous experience building a
quadruped
, ZeroBug started life in
Processing
as a simple stick figure, which gradually increased in complexity as [Max.K] figured out how to make it walk properly. He first developed the required movement sequence for the tip of each leg, and then added joints and calculated the actuator movements using reverse kinematics. Using the results of the simulations, he designed the mechanics and pulled it back into the simulation for final validation.
Each leg uses three micro servos which are controlled by an STM32F103 on a custom PCB, which handles all the motion calculations. It receives commands over UART from a python script running on a Raspberry Pi Zero. This allows for user control over a web interface using WiFi, or from a gamepad using a Bluetooth connection. [Max.K] also added a pincer to the front to allow it to interact with its environment. Video after the break.
The final product moves a lot smoother than most other servo-driven hexapods we’ve seen, and the entire project is well documented. The electronics and software are available on
GitHub
and the mechanics on
Thingiverse
.
The
Hackaday
Prize2021
is Sponsored by: | 9 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366264",
"author": "Garth Bock",
"timestamp": "2021-07-21T18:43:40",
"content": "This is really neat and a little creepy at the same time. It is interesting how the simulation was used to figure out the walking routines. Just so it doesn’t move fast or replicate and were all good."... | 1,760,373,012.0714 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/21/retrotechtacular-nuvistor-vacuums-last-gasp/ | Retrotechtacular: Nuvistor, Vacuum’s Last Gasp | Jenny List | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"History",
"Retrotechtacular",
"Slider"
] | [
"6CW4",
"nuvistor",
"tubes"
] | In 2021 all our electronics are solid state, in that they exclusively use semiconductor devices as their active components. Some of us may experiment with vacuum tubes, but only for curiosity or aesthetic purposes. Semiconductors have overtaken vacuum devices in all but the rarest of niche applications due to their easier design requirements, greater reliability, lower cost, and increased performance.
It was not always this way though, and there was a period at the start of the semiconductor era when transistors and vacuum tubes existed together side-by-side and competed directly. Vacuum tube manufacturers continued to create new devices into the 1970s, and in doing so they pushed the boundaries of their art in unprecedented directions. [David W Knight] has
a page dedicated to the Nuvistor
, something his calls the “final evolution of the thermionic valve”. His comparison photo seen above shows a Nuvistor on the left — a miniature vacuum tube you’ve likely never seen before.
The cover of
an RCA data sheet for Nuvistor tubes
.
Towards the end of the 1950s there was an inexorable move in radio frequency applications towards ever higher frequencies that left some traditional vacuum tubes lacking. Military radar, mobile radio, and broadcast radio were starting to exploit the VHF and UHF frequency ranges, and while the available higher frequency transistors were noisy and had poor gain, their vacuum counterparts suffered from stray inductance and capacitance in their construction. Miniature tubes and other designs such as “acorn” tubes with conductors emerging from their sides had appeared to address these issues, but for RCA these were not sufficient. Their
Nuvistor
range of tubes named to evoke the transistor and released in 1959 were like no other vacuum devices, being miniaturised to a similar size to the transistors of the day and having metal shells with ceramic bases rather than the more common glass envelopes.
Internally they had a co-axial design of tubular electrodes stacked one above the other, and with a new socket whose connections came straight out through the base rather than being bent at an angle to meet the pins as per previous tubes. Their manufacture was unusual too, instead of being assembled before evacuation and sealing they were mechanically assembled and sealed in a vacuum chamber. It’s fairly obvious reading the various data period documentation that their intended market was military rather than civilian (Excellent performance when exposed to nuclear radiation and shock is hardly a requirement for an FM broadcast receiver!), which may explain their relative rarity in civilian use.
Inside a Nuvistor tube.
I first directly encountered a Nuvistor when as a student in about 1991 pursuing the Holy Grail of an entirely hollow-state Hi-Fi, I bought a 1965 Sansui TU-70 FM tuner for the princely sum of £15 (close to $50 in 2021). It uses tubes throughout including in its stereo decoder, but it’s the FM tuner that caught my interest with its pair of
6CW4
Nuvistor triodes as RF amplifiers. Their diminutive metal cans are a shade bigger than the OC170 or similar germanium VHF transistors I’d have expected to see in a tuner of that era, but mounted on a chassis in their special sockets rather than on a PCB as would the transistors. I’m old enough to have experimented with germanium RF transistors and it’s fair to say that they’re both deaf and noisy, so I can see that the Nuvistors made sense in what would have been a high-end unit when it was made. But the considerable extra expense of all their hardware over a relatively cheap PCB for the transistor must have made them an increasingly unusual choice over the decade. They still appear in RCA consumer tube manuals from the 1970s, but by the 1980s they’re gone.
The Nuvistor then. A fascinating device from the end of the vacuum tube era, they were some of the smallest high-frequency vacuum devices ever created, but sadly their arrival came too late to be more than a footnote in electronics history. If you find one don’t let it go, you may not see another.
[Main image source: Nuvistor compared to EC900, ECC83, and 6SN7, via
g3ynh.info
] | 51 | 21 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366238",
"author": "Steven-X",
"timestamp": "2021-07-21T17:05:53",
"content": "The only place I recall seeing Nuvistors was in late-model TV tuners. Now I wish I had done more “dumpster diving” back then.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"co... | 1,760,373,012.434588 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/21/precise-sundial-tells-time-to-the-minute/ | Precise Sundial Tells Time To The Minute | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Science"
] | [
"calibration",
"clock",
"digital",
"solar",
"sun time",
"sundial"
] | We’re always a fan of an interesting or unique clock build around here, which often use intricate pieces of technology to keep time such as weights and gears, crystal oscillators, or even a global network of satellites in the case of GPS. While these are all interesting methods of timekeeping, the original method of tracking the sun is often forgotten. With this clock, the sun is the main method of keeping track of time, but unlike traditional sundials
it has a number of advancements that let it keep surprisingly accurate time
. (
Google Translate from German
)
While most sundials can only show hours, this one from [leon andré], a retired physicist, has a method for displaying minutes as well. It uses pinholes instead of shadows to keep track of the position of the sun, with the pinhole casting a bright spot of sunlight onto a diagram below. The diagram keeps track of the minutes, and consists of curved lines which help account for the sun’s changing path throughout a typical year. The dial keeps track of local solar time, as any sundial would, but by rotating it along its vertical axis it can be calibrated for the timezone that it’s in regardless of its position.
As far as clock builds go, one that is completely passive like this semi-digital sundial is fairly unique, especially for its accuracy. And, when set to local solar time, it will be the most reliable method of keeping time long-term than possibly any other clock we’ve seen before, as long as it’s not too cloudy outside. On the other hand, it is possible
to augment a sundial with some modern technology
as well.
Thanks to [Adrian] for the tip! | 16 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366219",
"author": "Andy Pugh",
"timestamp": "2021-07-21T15:37:41",
"content": "There is a very clever digital sundial design out there.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_sundialLooking around, there are 3D printable versions.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replie... | 1,760,373,011.821936 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/21/what-exactly-is-a-gaussian-blur/ | What Exactly Is A Gaussian Blur? | Lewin Day | [
"Featured",
"Interest",
"Original Art",
"Slider",
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"blur",
"digital photo",
"gaussian blur",
"image",
"image processing",
"images",
"photo"
] | Blurring is a commonly used visual effect when digitally editing photos and videos. One of the most common blurs used in these fields is the Gaussian blur. You may have used this tool thousands of times without ever giving it greater thought. After all, it does a nice job and does indeed make things blurrier.
Of course, we often like to dig deeper here at Hackaday, so here’s our crash course on what’s going on when you run a Gaussian blur operation.
It’s Math! It’s All Math.
A 2D Gaussian distribution shown in a 3D plot. Note the higher values towards the center, and growing smaller towards the outside in a bell curve shape.
Digital images are really just lots of numbers, so we can work with them mathematically. Each pixel that makes up a typical digital color image has three values- its intensity in red, green and blue. Of course, greyscale images consist of just a single value per pixel, representing its intensity on a scale from black to white, with greys in between.
Regardless of the image, whether color or greyscale, the basic principle of a Gaussian blur remains the same. Each pixel in the image we wish to blur is considered independently, and its value changed depending on its own value, and those of its surroundings, based on a filter matrix called a
kernel
.
The kernel consists of a rectangular array of numbers that follow a Gaussian distribution, AKA a normal distribution, or a bell curve.
This diagram shows the manner in which each pixel is processed. For a 3×3 kernel, the pixel of interest and all directly surrounding pixels are sampled. The kernel is then used to generate a new output pixel value based on a weighted average of the sampled pixels based on the Gaussian distribution.
Our rectangular kernel consists of values that are higher in the middle and drop off towards the outer edges of the square array, like the height of a bell curve in two dimensions. The kernel corresponds to the number of pixels we consider when blurring each individual pixel. Larger kernels spread the blur around a wider region, as each pixel is modified by more of its surrounding pixels.
For each pixel to be subject to the blur operation, a rectangular section equal to the size of the kernel is taken around the pixel of interest itself. These surrounding pixel values are used to calculate a weighted average for the original pixel’s new value based on the Gaussian distribution in the kernel itself.
A 5×5 Gaussian kernel. Note the external factor, which ensures that the total values all add up to 1. This avoids adding any intensity to the image, solely average the pixels without otherwise changing their intensity.
Thanks to the distribution, the central pixel’s original value has the highest weight, so it doesn’t obliterate the image entirely. Immediately neighboring pixels having the next highest influence on the new pixel, and so on. This local averaging smoothes out the pixel values, and that’s the blur.
Edge cases are straightforward too. Where an edge pixel is sampled, the otherwise non-existent surrounding pixels are either given the same value of their nearest neighbor, or given a value matching up with their mirror opposite pixel in the sampled area.
The same calculation is run for each pixel in the original image to be blurred, with the final output image made up of the pixel values calculated through the process. For grayscale images, it’s that simple. Color images can be done the same way, with the blur calculated separately for the red, green, and blue values of each pixel. Alternatively, you can specify the
pixel values in some other color space
and smooth them there.
Here we see an original image, and a version filtered with a Gaussian blur of kernel size three and kernel size ten. Note the increased blur as the kernel size increases. More pixels incorporated in the averaging results in more smoothing.
Of course, larger images require more calculations to deal with the greater number of pixels, and larger kernel sizes sample more surrounding pixels for each pixel of interest, and can thus take much longer to calculate. However, on modern computers, even blurring high-resolution images with huge kernel sizes can be done in the blink of an eye. Typically, however, it’s uncommon to use a kernel size larger than around 50 or so as things are usually already pretty blurry by that point.
The Gaussian blur is a great example of simple mathematics put to a powerful use in image processing. Now you know how it works on a fundamental level! | 29 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366204",
"author": "Truth",
"timestamp": "2021-07-21T14:33:40",
"content": "You can also use kernel’s to highlight features in an image like detecting edges by suppressing everything that is not high contrast (ref:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kernel_(image_processing))",
"pare... | 1,760,373,012.218287 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/21/its-linux-but-on-an-esp32/ | It’s Linux – But On An ESP32 | Jenny List | [
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"ESP32",
"linux",
"RISC-V"
] | GNU/Linux is an open-source marvel that has over the past three decades given us an almost infinitely versatile and powerful UNIX-like operating system. But even it has its limitations, particularly at the lower end of the hardware scale where less fully-featured processors often lack the prerequisites such as a memory management unit. Thus [JuiceRV]’s feat of
booting a Linux kernel on an ESP32 microcontroller
seems impossible, what’s happening?
The ESP’s dual 32-bit Xtensa cores are no slouch in the processing power department, but without that MMU it’s not an obvious Linux candidate platform. The solution to this problem comes in the form of
an emulated RISC-V virtual machine
which provides just enough grunt
for a Linux 5.0.0 kernel to boot
.
By any measure this represents an impressive piece of work, but will this new-found ability to run Linux on a microcontroller take the world by storm? Of course not, unless your tastes run to the very slowest of computing experiences. It is however the essence of the hack, and for that we salute it.
It’s not the first time Linux has run on a microcontroller, in the past
someone hooked up a 30 pin SIMM and an SD card to an 8-bit Atmel chip and did it in a similar way with an ARM emulator
.
Via
CNX Software
.
Header image: Ubahnverleih,
CC0
. | 44 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "6366151",
"author": "Flemming Jacobsen",
"timestamp": "2021-07-21T11:08:12",
"content": "Hah! This is cool",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6366156",
"author": "jpa",
"timestamp": "2021-07-21T11:30:07",
"content": "Th... | 1,760,373,011.981762 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/20/ball-balancing-wheel-puts-a-spin-on-inverted-pendulums/ | Ball Balancing Wheel Puts A Spin On Inverted Pendulums | Sonya Vasquez | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"ball balancing",
"BLDC controller",
"brushless motor",
"control theory",
"state space"
] | If you march sufficiently deep into the wilderness of control theory, you’ll no doubt encounter the inverted pendulum problem. These balancing acts have emerged with a number of variants over the years, but just because it’s been done before doesn’t mean there’s no space for something new. Here, [David Gonzalez], has taken this classic problem and given it an original own spin–literally–where the
balancing act is now a ball balanced precariously upon a spinning wheel
. (Video, embedded below.) Mix in a little computer vision for sensing, a dash of brushless motor control, a bit of math, and you have yourself a closed-loop system that’s bound to turn a few heads.
[David’s] implementation is a healthy mix of classic control theory with some modern electronics. From the theory bucket, there’s a state-space controller to drive both the angle and angular velocity of the ball to zero. The “state” is a combination of four terms: the ball angle, the ball’s angular velocity, the wheel angle, and the wheel’s angular velocity. [David] weights each of these terms and sums them together to create an input value to adjust the motor velocity driving the wheel and balance the ball.
From the electronics bin, [David] opted for an ESP32 running Arduino, the custom
Janus Brushless Motor Controller
running
SimpleFOC
, and a
Maix Bit
Microcontroller with an added camera running MicroPython to compute the ball angle. Finally, if you’re curious to dig into the source code, [David] has kindly
posted the firmware
on Github.
We love seeing folks mix a bit of control theory into an amalgamation of familiar electronics. And as both precision sensors and motor controllers continue to improve, we’re excited to see how the landscape of projects changes yet again. Hungry for more folks closing the loop on unstable systems? Look no further than [UFactory’s]
ball balancing robot
and [Gear Down for What’s]
two wheeled speedster
. | 18 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365961",
"author": "Nobody of Import",
"timestamp": "2021-07-20T15:38:33",
"content": "Oooh. Engineering Pr0n!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6365971",
"author": "RP",
"timestamp": "2021-07-20T15:59:58",
"content... | 1,760,373,012.490079 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/20/this-group-of-women-tried-to-break-into-astronaut-program-in-1960s-one-just-made-it/ | This Group Of Women Tried To Break Into Astronaut Program In 1960s; One Just Made It | Tom Nardi | [
"Biography",
"Featured",
"History",
"Slider",
"Space"
] | [
"commercial space",
"history",
"nasa",
"politics",
"Project Mercury",
"space tourism",
"suborbital"
] | When Mary Wallace “Wally” Funk reached the boundary of space aboard the first crewed flight of Blue Origin’s New Shepard capsule earlier today, it marked the end of a journey she started 60 years ago. In 1961 she became the youngest member of what would later become known as the “Mercury 13”, a group of accomplished female aviators that volunteered to be put through the same physical and mental qualification tests that NASA’s Mercury astronauts went through. But the promising experiment was cut short by the space agency’s rigid requirements for potential astronauts, and what John Glenn referred to in his testimony to the Committee on Science and Astronautics as the “social order” of America at the time.
Best of the Best
Before NASA could launch the first American into space, they had to decide what qualifications their ideal astronaut should have. An early idea that the agency should pursue thrill seekers such as race car drivers or extreme sport enthusiasts made a degree of sense given the immense risks involved, but it was ultimately decided that it would be more useful to the program if the occupants of these early spacecraft were experienced pilots with a science or engineering background. The hope was such individuals could give valuable feedback on the craft’s design and performance, and should the need arise, diagnose and potentially even fix an issue aboard the spacecraft themselves.
Eisenhower wanted military pilots to be the first astronauts.
So in addition to meeting age and fitness requirements, applicants for Project Mercury needed to be college educated in a STEM subject and have experience flying jet aircraft. While there was little of what could traditionally be considered piloting to be done with these early spacecraft, having experience with the speed, altitude, and complexity associated with flying jets was seen as a important prerequisite.
President Eisenhower, who himself learned to fly while in the Army, insisted that the final selection be further limited to active duty military test pilots; the idea being that such individuals would not only be in peak physical condition, but would be uniquely qualified to operate experimental vehicles and have a higher than average tolerance for risk.
While the extremely narrow criteria used to select the first Mercury astronauts was arguably justified, it did invalidate many excellent candidates. Legendary test pilot Chuck Yeager, who by all accounts should have been on the short list for NASA’s human space program,
was out of the running as he never attended college
. Neil Armstrong, who by this time had already piloted the X-15 to incredible speeds and altitudes, was also excluded from taking part as he hadn’t been in active duty since 1952.
The Right Stuff
While no NASA document specifically stated Project Mercury astronauts had to be males, the military service requirement made it impossible for a woman to make it through the selection process. There were certainly highly qualified female pilots in the United States, many who served their country by testing and transporting military aircraft as Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASPs) during the Second World War, but they were all civilians. Of course this was hardly a surprise, as the Air Force wouldn’t start accepting female pilots for another 15 years.
Jerrie Cobb examining a Mercury capsule
This de facto discrimination didn’t go unnoticed by Jacqueline Cochran, a prominent female aviator and the head of the WASP program during the war. Cochran was not only a woman of considerable influence and wealth, but had a close personal friendship with William Randolph Lovelace, the chairman of the NASA Special Advisory Committee on Life Sciences. Convinced that women could be effective astronauts if they were simply given the chance, the two launched a privately funded project that aimed to put female volunteers through the same rigorous qualification process that NASA used for Project Mercury.
In 1960 Geraldyn “Jerrie” Cobb was invited to not only be the first woman to undergo the grueling tests, but to help identify other potential candidates for what was being called the First Lady Astronaut Trainees (FLATs). Having previously set endurance, altitude, and speed records, Cobb was an ideal choice for the program and was able to complete all three phases of NASA’s astronaut qualification exam. In fact, her results put her in the top 2% of candidates; a figure better than some of the men that were ultimately selected to fly on Project Mercury.
Encouraged by this early success, Lovelace and Cobb invited nineteen more women to go through the tests. Several of the candidates were well known in the air racing community, and all were accomplished pilots with more than 1,000 hours of flight experience.
An Experiment Cut Short
Twelve of the women who were invited to become FLATs passed the first phase of the trials at Lovelace’s clinic in Albuquerque, New Mexico. However due to family and professional commitments only two candidates, Wally Funk and Rhea Hurrle, were able to continue on to the second phase of tests. This part of the program consisted of psychological and neurological examinations, including long periods of time spent in a sensory deprivation tank, where it was said the women outperformed the men by a considerable margin.
Unfortunately, neither woman was able to progress to the final phase of testing. Just a few days before the tests were set to begin at the Naval School of Aviation Medicine in Florida, the project was halted. Without the backing of NASA or the military, Lovelace was informed that the candidates would not be permitted to use the government facilities, aircraft, and equipment that was required to qualify the women.
Cobb was the only FLAT to complete all phases of the training.
In an effort to get Lovelace’s program the appropriate clearances, Jerrie Cobb and other FLATs petitioned President John F. Kennedy and Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson. In July of 1962 a Congressional hearing was arranged, called the Special Subcommittee on the Selection of Astronauts, that aimed to determine if gender discrimination played a part in NASA’s astronaut selection process.
When called to testify, astronauts John Glenn and Scott Carpenter pointed out that regardless of how well the FLATs did in their physical and mental exams, none of them met the requirement of being an active duty military test pilot. But Glenn also admitted that NASA’s stipulation that candidates hold a STEM degree was actually waived in his case, as the agency was willing to count his engineering experience as an equivalent. In response, Congressman James Fulton of Pennsylvania questioned why NASA couldn’t establish a civilian flight experience equivalency for applicants who weren’t military pilots.
But to the surprise of many, the most damning testimony against Lovelace’s program ended up coming from the woman who helped start it, Jacqueline Cochran. While she maintained that exploring how the female mind and body fared against the rigors of spaceflight was a worthy endeavor, it was her opinion that the FLATs and the debate around them had become detrimental to NASA’s primary focus. If America was going to beat the Soviet Union to the Moon, Cochran said it was “natural and proper” that the nation’s astronauts be selected from “the group of male pilots who had already proven by aircraft testing and high speed precision flying that they were experienced, competent and qualified to meet possible emergencies in a new environment.”
A Lasting Impression
Despite Lovelace’s groundbreaking research, the hard work of the FLATs, and Jerrie Cobb’s passionate testimony before the Special Subcommittee on the Selection of Astronauts, no women were selected for NASA’s Gemini or Apollo programs. In the end it was the Soviet Union that launched the first woman into space
when Valentina Tereshkova conducted her solo mission in 1963
; twenty years before NASA sent Sally Ride up on STS-7.
Wally Funk exits the Blue Origin capsule.
But the mark these women left on America’s space program was not forgotten. Eileen Collins, the first woman to pilot the Space Shuttle, invited the surviving FLATs to her launch in 1995. Now known in the media as the Mercury 13, the women were given a VIP tour of Kennedy Space Center and the Space Shuttle launch facilities.
Until Wally Funk accompanied Jeff Bezos on the first crewed flight of his company’s suborbital spacecraft, the history books would have recorded that none of the FLATs ever achieved their goal of traveling to space. The commercial mission has not only helped validate the work done by these pioneering women, but allowed Funk to blaze a new trail entirely. She might have missed the chance to be one of America’s first female astronauts, but at 82, she’s now set the record for being the oldest.
Though it might not be an official record, there’s no astronaut in the history of human spaceflight that has ever waited longer for the chance to put their training into practice. Congratulations, Wally Funk. | 33 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365929",
"author": "Jakob",
"timestamp": "2021-07-20T14:17:31",
"content": "Imagine the changes she has seen, and seen through.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6365937",
"author": "Comedicles",
"timestamp": "2021-07-20T... | 1,760,373,013.506297 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/20/extracting-the-wifi-firmware-and-putting-back-a-keylogger/ | Extracting The WiFi Firmware And Putting Back A Keylogger | Matthew Carlson | [
"laptops hacks",
"Wireless Hacks"
] | [
"8051",
"firmware",
"Intel 8051",
"realtek",
"wifi"
] | In the interest of simplification or abstraction, we like to think of the laptop on the kitchen table as a single discrete unit of processing. In fact, there is a surprisingly large number of small processors alongside the many cores that make up the processor. [8051enthusiast] dove into the
Realtek rtl8821ae WiFi chip on his laptop and extracted the firmware
. The Realtek rtl8821ae chip is a fairly standard Realtek chip
as seen in this unboxing
(which is where the main image comes from).
True to his name, [8051enthusiast] was pleased to find that the rtl8821ae was clearly based on the Intel 8051. The firmware was loaded on startup from a known file path and loaded onto the chip sitting in an M.2 slot. Careful consideration, [8051enthusiast] reasoned that the firmware was using RTX51 Tiny, which is a small real-time kernel.
The firmware is loaded at 0x4000 but it calls to code below that address, which means there is a ROM on the chip that contains some code. The easiest way to extract it would be to write some custom code that just copies the masked ROM back to the main CPU via the shared memory-mapped config space, but the firmware is checksummed by the masked ROM code. However, the checksum is just a 16-bit XOR. With a tweak in the kernel to allow accessing the shared config space from userspace, [8051enthusiast] was on his way to a complete firmware image.
Next, [8051enthusiast] looked at what could be done with his newfound hackability. The keyboard matrix is read by the Embedded Controller (EC), which happens to be another 8051 based microcontroller. There also happens to be an RX and a TX trace from the EC to the m.2 slot (where the rtl8821ae is). This has to do with 0x80 postcodes from the processor being routed out somewhere accessible via the EC. With a bit of custom code on both the EC and the WiFi chip, [8051enthusiast] had a keylogger that didn’t run on the main processor broadcasting the PS/2 keystrokes as UDP packets.
Of course, there are plenty of other 8051 based devices out there just waiting to be discovered. Like this
8051 based e-ink display controller
.
[Main image source: Realtek RTL8821AE unboxing on YouTube by
Евгений Горохов
] | 35 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365877",
"author": "theonethatshouldnotbenamed",
"timestamp": "2021-07-20T11:17:47",
"content": "mind blown :Okudos to 8051enthusiast",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6365880",
"author": "theonethatshouldnotbenamed",... | 1,760,373,013.220526 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/20/the-gatwick-drone-little-by-little-the-story-continues-to-unravel/ | The Gatwick Drone: Little By Little, The Story Continues To Unravel | Jenny List | [
"drone hacks",
"News"
] | [
"drone",
"drone law",
"Gatwick",
"Gatwick airport",
"multirotor"
] | If you remember the crazy events in the winter of 2018 as two airports were closed over reports of drone sightings, you might be interested to hear that there’s still
a trickle of information
about those happenings
making it into the public domain
as Freedom of Information responses.
Three Christmases ago the news media was gripped by a new menace, that of rogue drones terrorising aircraft. The UK’s Gatwick airport had been closed for several days following a spate of drone sightings, and authorities thundered about he dire punishments which would be visited upon the perpetrators when they were caught. A couple were arrested and later quietly released, and after a lot of fuss the story quietly disappeared.
Received Opinion had it that a drone had closed an airport, but drone enthusiasts, and Hackaday as a publication in their sphere, were
asking awkward questions
about why no tangible evidence of a drone ever having been present had appeared. Gradually the story unravelled with the police and aviation authorities quietly admitting that they had no evidence of a drone, and a dedicated band of drone enthusiasts has continues to pursue the truth about those few winter nights in 2018. The latest results chase up the possibility that the CAA might have received a description of the drone, and why when a fully functional drone detection system had been deployed and detected nothing they continued with the farce of closing the airport.
Perhaps the saddest thing about these and other revelations about the incident which have been teased from the authorities is that while they should fire up a scandal, it seems inevitable that they won’t. The police, the government, and the CAA have no desire to be reminded of
their mishandling of the event
, neither except for
a rare bit of mild questioning
do the media wish to be held to account for the execrable quality of their reporting. The couple who were wrongly arrested
have not held back in their condemnation
, but without the attention of any powerful vested interests it seems that some of
the measures brought in as a response
will never be questioned. All we can do is report any new developments in our little corner of the Internet, and of course keep you up to date with
any fresh UK police drone paranoia
. | 96 | 23 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365847",
"author": "Alice Lalita Heald",
"timestamp": "2021-07-20T08:20:21",
"content": "I call it “hacking an airline with a drone” :DThe jet engines are prepared to grind down birds, but would it take a drone?New design requirements :D",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
... | 1,760,373,013.63338 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/19/smart-mirror-talks-to-3d-printers/ | Smart Mirror Talks To 3D Printers | Kristina Panos | [
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"Magic Mirror",
"octomirror",
"Octoprint",
"raspberry pi",
"smart mirror"
] | As time goes by, it’s only getting easier to make a magic mirror. You know, a mirror connected to the internet that shows information like news, weather, or whatever you want, right there on top of your stunning visage. In [Forsyth Creations]’ case, that data includes 3D printer activity on the network — something that’s way more relevant to daily life than say, headlines about Kim Jong Un’s weight loss progress.
The build video is embedded below
.
Thanks to projects like
[MichMich]’s MagicMirror
, everything is done with modules, including really useful things such as
OctoMirror
that let you keep an eye on your 3D printer(s) using OctoPrint.
The electronics are pretty simple here — [Forsyth Creations] used the guts of an old monitor for the display and a Raspberry Pi to serve up the modules as a web page. The only tricky part is power, because the LCD is going to need so much more voltage than the Pi and the absolutely necessary LEDs around the edge, but a couple of buck converters do the trick.
After stripping the monitor of all of its unnecessary plastic, [Forsyth Creations] cut rear and front frames to support the electronics. That isn’t a piece of mirror glass, it’s actually one-way acrylic which is lighter and somewhat cheaper. [Forsyth Creations] designed and printed some corner support brackets that double as leveling screw holders to get the acrylic panel dialed in just right, and
you can get these for yourself from GitHub
. We think this would be a good early woodworking project or something for a long weekend. [Forsyth Creations] built this in three days on an apartment balcony using a minimum of tools.
We especially admire that once it was done, he hung it up with a French cleat.
Those are so useful
. | 2 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365848",
"author": "Onetruegod",
"timestamp": "2021-07-20T08:21:09",
"content": "A good build and a good video.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6366037",
"author": "echodelta",
"timestamp": "2021-07-20T20:29:18",
"c... | 1,760,373,012.895582 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/19/software-defined-cpu/ | Software Defined… CPU? | Al Williams | [
"computer hacks",
"News"
] | [
"cpu",
"instruction set",
"instruction set architecture",
"isa",
"x86"
] | Everything is better when you can program it, right? We have software-defined radios, software-defined networks, and software-defined storage. Now a company called
Ascenium
wants to create a software-defined CPU. They’ve raised millions of dollars to bring the product to market.
The materials are a bit hazy, but it sounds as though the idea is to have CPU resources available and let the compiler manage and schedule those resources without using a full instruction set. A system called Aptos lets the compiler orchestrate those resources.
If you are astute, you’ll see this has some similarity to RISC and even more to VLIW computer architectures. For more detail, there’s an interview with the company’s CEO over on
TheNextPlatform
which has some insight into how the CPU will work.
In addition to RISC and VLIW,
transport-triggered architecture
shares in this philosophy, too, although there have only been a few commercial versions. So the idea of pushing work to the compiler isn’t new. Time will tell if Ascenium’s approach is really different and beneficial or, at least, if they can make more of a mark against the three or four big CPU makers.
Of course, if you really want to reconfigure your CPU, you could do it
with an FPGA
. Transport-triggered architectures have an advantage there because all you have is a single instruction along with addressable units. You can even
microcode
those for more complex instructions or emulations. | 45 | 23 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365769",
"author": "Myself",
"timestamp": "2021-07-20T02:02:10",
"content": "Sounds midway between Transmeta and an FPGA. Super interesting!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6365770",
"author": "Jw",
"timestamp": "2021-0... | 1,760,373,012.976505 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/19/diy-camera-dolly-costs-more-time-than-money/ | DIY Camera Dolly Costs More Time Than Money | Donald Papp | [
"3d Printer hacks",
"digital cameras hacks"
] | [
"3d printed",
"camera dolly",
"diy",
"dolly",
"dope dolly"
] | A camera dolly can be fantastic filmmaking tool, and [Cornelius] was determined to create his own version:
the “Dope” DIY Dolly
. The result not only upped his production quality, but was also entirely in line with his DIY approach to filmmaking in general.
A basic dolly design is straightforward enough: a flat platform with wheels, and some aluminum tubing upon which to roll. But while dolly assemblies are easy to purchase or rent, [Cornelius] found that his DIY version — which used easily sourced parts and about 80 hours worth of 3D printing — provided perfectly acceptable results, while opening the door to remixing and sharing with like-minded filmmakers.
Interested?
Download the STL files
to get started on your own version. As for the track, smooth metal pipe is best, but sometimes track made from PVC can do the job. [Cornelius] has a few additional STL files for those planning to make a base from 1″ PVC pipe, and those are on a separate download link near the bottom of the project page (
here’s that link again
.) Watch the Dope Dolly in action in the brief video embedded below.
On the other hand, if you prefer your DIY camera equipment to be on the smaller and more complicated end of the spectrum, be sure to
check out this multi-axis camera slider
. | 14 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365745",
"author": "Paul",
"timestamp": "2021-07-19T23:38:17",
"content": "Interesting. Seriously overconstrained. I wonder how much smoother it would be with eleven fewer wheels.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6365750",
... | 1,760,373,013.433673 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/19/reimagine-supportive-tech-for-the-newest-hackaday-prize-challenge/ | Reimagine Supportive Tech For The Newest Hackaday Prize Challenge | Mike Szczys | [
"contests",
"Hackaday Columns",
"home hacks",
"Slider",
"The Hackaday Prize"
] | [
"2021 Hackaday Prize",
"supportive tech"
] | Beginning right now, the 2021 Hackaday Prize challenges you to
Reimagine Supportive Tech
. Quite frankly, this is all about shortcuts to success. Can we make it easier for people to learn about science and technology? Can we break down some barriers that keep people from taking up DIY as a hobby (or way of life)? What can we do to build on the experience and skill of one another?
For instance, to get into building your own electronics, you need a huge dedicated electronics lab, right? Of course that’s nonsense, but we only know that because we’ve already been elbow-deep into soldering stations and vacuum tweezers. To the outsider, this looks like an unclimbable mountain. What if I told you that you could build electrics at any desk, and make it easy to store everything away in between hacking sessions? That sounds like
a job for [M.Hehr’s] portable workbench & mini lab project
. Here’s a blueprint that can take a beginner from zero to solder smoke while having fun along the way.
What about breaking down complex topics into something us newbies can swallow? Radio signals are all around us, but again
the barriers to getting into SDR are many and varied
. A great bit of supportive tech would be a project that shows simple hardware and shares a virtual machine with the open source software toolchain already set to go. A beginner could pick something like this up and be listening for transponders from airplanes passing by in a matter of hours.
If you’re reading this, chances are you’ve spent countless joyful hours learning how to do some difficult and fascinating stuff. Share the wealth! Take an existing hardware concept and make it modular and easy to use. Refine an existing design to make it more approachable for users with any range of mobility challenges. Or pull together a beginner-friendly project to move STEM education forward.
Ten finalists from this round will win $500 and be shuttled onto the final round judging in October for a chance at the $25,000 Hackaday Prize and four other top prizes. Start your project page on Hackaday.io and use the dropdown in the left sidebar to enter it into
the 2021 Hackaday Prize
.
The
Hackaday
Prize2021
is Sponsored by: | 7 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365736",
"author": "PWalsh",
"timestamp": "2021-07-19T22:41:54",
"content": "> Here’s a blueprint that can take a beginner from zero to solder smoke while having fun along the way.So close. I was all set to grab the design, cut up some wood, and build it, but…There’s no design file... | 1,760,373,013.149903 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/19/an-oled-photo-frame-powered-by-the-attiny85/ | An OLED Photo Frame Powered By The ATtiny85 | Tom Nardi | [
"ATtiny Hacks",
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"attiny85",
"coin cell",
"i2c",
"oled",
"ssd1306",
"universal serial interface"
] | Rolling your own digital picture frame that loads images from an SD card and displays them on an LCD with a modern microcontroller like the ESP32 is an afternoon project, even less if you pull in somebody else’s code. But what if you don’t have the latest and greatest hardware to work with?
Whether you look at it as a practical application or an interesting experiment in wringing more performance out of low-end hardware, [Assad Ebrahim]’s demonstration of
displaying digital photographs on an OLED using the ATtiny85 is well worth a look
. The whole thing can put put together on a scrap of perfboard with a handful of common components, and can cycle through the five images stored on the chip’s flash memory for up to 20 hours on a CR2032 coin cell.
As you might expect, the biggest challenge in this project is getting all the code and data to fit onto the ATtiny85. To that end [Assad] wrote his own minimal driver for the SSD1306 OLED display, as the traditional Adafruit code took up too much space. The driver is a pretty bare bones implementation, but it’s enough to initialize the screen and get it ready for incoming data. His code also handles emulating I2C over Atmel’s Universal Serial Interface (USI) at an acceptable clip, so long as you bump the chip up to 8 MHz.
For the images, [Assad] details the workflow he uses to take the high-resolution color files and turn them into an array of bytes for the display. Part of that it just scaling down and converting to 1-bit color, but there’s also a bit of custom Forth code in the mix that converts the resulting data into the format his code expects.
This isn’t the first time we’ve seen somebody
use one of these common OLED displays in conjunction with the ATtiny85
, and it’s interesting to see how their techniques compare. It’s not a combination we’d necessarily chose willingly, but sometimes you’ve got to work with whats available. | 10 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365715",
"author": "Menno",
"timestamp": "2021-07-19T20:45:22",
"content": "I absolutely love what one can do with a humple chip like the ATTiny85. My favourite project is the ATTiny weather station (by the same guy who did the other OLED project you’re linking to.http://www.techno... | 1,760,373,013.275335 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/19/sol75-uses-ai-to-design-standard-mechanical-parts/ | SOL75 Uses AI To Design Standard Mechanical Parts | Chris Lott | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"3d printing",
"generative design",
"openscad",
"parametric design",
"SOL75"
] | [Francesco] developed a
parametric design tool called SOL75
which aims to take the drudgery out of designing the basic mechanical parts used in projects. He knows how to design things like gears, pulleys, belts, brackets, enclosures, etc., but finds it repetitive and boring. He would rather spend his time on the interesting and challenging portions of his project instead.
The goal of SOL75 is to produce OpenSCAD and STL files of a part based on user requirements. These parameters go beyond the simple dimensional and include performance characteristics such as peak stress, rigidity, maximum temperature, etc. The program uses OpenSCAD to generate the geometries and a core module to evaluate candidate designs. In an attempt to overcome the curse of dimensionality, [Francesco] has trained an AI oracle to quickly accept or reject candidate solutions.
In the realm of parametric design aids, you have projects like
NopSCADlib
which dimensionally parameterize a large collection of common objects by numbers alone ( a 100 cm long, 6.35 mm diameter brass tube with 1.22 mm wall thickness ) or industry standard specifications ( a 10 mm long M3 socket head cap screw ). This approach doesn’t take into account whether the object will hold up in your application nor does it consider any 3D printing issues. At the other extreme, there are the generative design and optimization tools found in
professional packages like Fusion 360 and SolidWorks
which can make organic-looking items that are optimized precisely for the specified conditions.
SOL75 seems to fall in the middle, combine characteristics of both approaches. It gives you the freedom to select dimensional parameters and performance requirements, yet bounds the solution space by only offering objects that have been prepared ahead of time by domain experts — if you ask for an L-bracket, you’ll get an L-bracket and not something that looks like a spider web or frog leg.
Once you compile the design, SOL75 generates the OpenSCAD and/or STL files and a bill of materials. But wait — there’s more– it also makes a thorough design handbook documenting the part in great detail, including the various design considerations and notes on printing. Here is a
demonstration link for an electronics enclosure
which is pretty interesting. There is also an example of using SOL75 to make a glider, which you can read about on
the Hackaday.io project page
.
For now, [Francesco] has only made SOL75 available in a register-by-email online Beta version, as he’s still undecided on what form the final version will be. Do you have any success (or failure) stories regarding generative designs? Let us know in the comments below. | 19 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365704",
"author": "JanW",
"timestamp": "2021-07-19T19:27:02",
"content": "I sure hope .STP export will be included at one point. I just haaaaaaaaate .STL so much. I need stuff I can change, work with, extend, (…)That’s why I upload all my stuff (to thingyverse and prusaprinters) i... | 1,760,373,013.378916 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/19/the-newlib-embedded-c-standard-library-and-how-to-use-it/ | The Newlib Embedded C Standard Library And How To Use It | Maya Posch | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Microcontrollers",
"Slider",
"Software Development"
] | [
"microcontroller",
"newlib",
"software",
"standard library"
] | When writing code for a new hardware platform, the last thing you want to do is bother with the minutiae of I/O routines, string handling and other similarly tedious details that have nothing to do with the actual project. On bigger systems, this is where the
C standard library
would traditionally come into play.
For small embedded platforms like microcontrollers, resources are often tight enough that a full-blown stdlib won’t fit, which is why
Newlib
exists: to bring the portability benefits of a standard library to microcontrollers.
Whether you use C, C++ or MicroPython to program an MCU, Newlib is likely there under the hood. Yet how exactly does it integrate with the hardware, and how are system calls (syscalls) for e.g. file and input/output handling implemented?
A Stubby Toolkit
The C standard library provides a number of headers that cover the available functionality. With each revision of the C standard new headers are added that cover additional features. Of these original headers, the most commonly used include:
<stdio.h>
<string.h>
<stdlib.h>
<math.h>
<time.h>
Here one can already surmise that each of these headers differ in how complicated the underlying code is to port to a new platform, especially in the case of an MCU platform with no operating system (OS). Without an OS, there is no obvious way to provide easy access to certain functionality like a standard text input and output, or a system clock and calendar. This leads us to the many
stub functions in Newlib
.
In the case of <string.h> we’re pretty safe, as
C-style strings
and their operations essentially concern memory operations, something for which no special syscalls are required. This is very different from <stdio.h> which contains functionality related to file access and operations, as well as input and output to and from standard out or in.
Without some underlying code that connects the libc implementation to e.g. a terminal or storage medium, nothing can happen for these I/O features as there’s no sensible default action for e.g.
printf()
or
fopen()
. If we do wish to use
printf()
or other text output functions, the Newlib documentation
tells us
that we need to implement a global function
int _write(int handle, char* data, int size)
.
As the name ‘stub’ implies, the Newlib library comes with its own stub implementations that do nothing, so what does one do to make
printf()
write to somewhere sensible? The most important thing to realize here is that this is completely implementation dependent and what makes sense depends on the specific project. Often in an embedded application formatted text output functions will be used for outputting debug and similar information, in which case outputting to a USART makes perfect sense, for example.
In my Nodate framework, the approach chosen was to allow the code on start-up to pick a specific USART peripheral to send output to, as we can see its implementation of the stub function in the
IO module
:
bool stdout_active = false;
USART_devices IO::usart;
int _write(int handle, char* data, int size) {
if (!stdout_active) { return 0; }
int count = size;
while (count-- > 0) {
USART::sendUart(IO::usart, *data);
data++;
}
return size;
}
A character array is provided along with its length, which we then transfer in this case to the active USART. As a USART transfers single bytes, the provided array is transferred one byte at a time.
As the target USART can change per platform, this is made configurable, allowing the developer to set the target output device once on start-up as well as dynamically during runtime.
bool IO::setStdOutTarget(USART_devices device) {
IO::usart = device;
stdout_active = true;
return true;
}
Of importance with these stub implementations is that they rely on C-style linkage to find overrides. Since in languages like C++ name mangling is applied by default, be sure to apply an
extern "C" { }
block around either the full implementation, or a forward declaration of the stub implementation.
A Matter of Timing
In order for time-related functionality to work as defined in
<time.h>
, there needs to be an underlying time base or at least counter from which we can obtain this information. The use of a systick counter which contains the number of milliseconds since boot is not enough to cover e.g.
time()
, which requires the number of seconds since the Unix epoch.
A possible implementation of the underlying
int _times(struct tms* buf)
syscall would use the system’s real-time clock (RTC). This also has the major benefit over using a systick in that the RTC can be left running in low-power mode, allowing for accurate timing results even when the system is regularly put into sleep mode or even turned off completely.
In Nodate, this functionality is implemented in
clock.cpp
for STM32, which enables the RTC if it hasn’t been started already:
int _times(struct tms* buf) {
#if defined RTC_TR_SU
if (!rtc_pwr_enabled) {
if (!Rtc::enableRTC()) { return -1; }
rtc_pwr_enabled = true;
}
// Fill tms struct from RTC registers.
// struct tms {
// clock_t tms_utime; /* user time */
// clock_t tms_stime; /* system time */
// clock_t tms_cutime; /* user time of children */
// clock_t tms_cstime; /* system time of children */
// };
uint32_t tTR = RTC->TR;
uint32_t ticks = (uint8_t) RTC_Bcd2ToByte(tTR & (RTC_TR_ST | RTC_TR_SU));
ticks = ticks * SystemCoreClock;
buf->tms_utime = ticks;
buf->tms_stime = ticks;
buf->tms_cutime = ticks;
buf->tms_cstime = ticks;
return ticks; // Return clock ticks.
#else
// No usable RTC peripheral exists. Return -1.
return -1;
#endif
}
On STM32 Cortex-M-based MCUs (except STM32F1), the RTC’s registers contain the time count in
BCD
(Binary-Coded Decimal) format, which requires it to be converted to binary code to be compatible with any code using the
_times()
functionality:
uint8_t RTC_Bcd2ToByte(uint8_t Value) {
uint32_t tmp = 0U;
tmp = ((uint8_t)(Value & (uint8_t)0xF0) >> (uint8_t)0x4) * 10;
return (tmp + (Value & (uint8_t)0x0F));
}
Newlib for Microcontrollers
There are technically two versions of Newlib: one is the regular, full-fat library, the other is the low-fat, nano version, which was
created by ARM
explicitly for Cortex-M MCUs in 2013. A major disadvantage of the regular Newlib is namely that it takes up a fair amount of space, which in the case of especially smaller MCUs with limited flash storage and SRAM will very likely mean that even a simple ‘Hello World’ compiled against it may be too big to even fit.
When compiling with GCC for an MCU platform like e.g. STM32 or SAM, the compiler can be instructed to link against this Newlib-nano by adding the
specs file
to use in the linker command with
--specs=nano.specs
. This spec file essentially ensures that the project is linked against the Newlib-nano library and uses the appropriate header files.
As noted in the linked ARM article, the size difference between regular Newlib and the nano version is quite dramatic. For a project targeting a low-level Cortex-M0 MCU, such as e.g. the
STM32F030F4
with a grand total of 16 kB of flash and 4 kB of SRAM, using regular Newlib is impossible, as the resulting firmware image will fill up the flash and then some. With Newlib-nano used, the basic demonstration projects provided with Nodate (e.g. Blinky, Pushy) are about 2 kB in size and thus fit comfortably in Flash and RAM.
Here one can accomplish further space savings by swapping the default
printf()
implementation that comes with Newlib for an optimized one, such as
mpaland’s printf implementation
. This implementation has been used together with Nodate to get full
printf()
support even on these small Cortex-M0 MCUs.
Keep it Pure
When developing for more resource-restricted microcontrollers, literally every byte counts. As most of those MCUs are single-core systems, they do not need the multi-threaded support that would be convenient when using multi-core systems (e.g. STM32H7 family). Whether reentrancy is enabled, this can be easily observed when inspecting the map file for a project after building it.
When one sees entries such as
impure_data
and similar symbol entries, often contained in
lib_a-impure.o
or similar, reentrant code is being linked in, which can cost kilobytes of space in the worst case. Often this code is linked in because of certain functionality that is being used in the project’s code, but can also be from e.g. the
atexit()
handler. An explanation of this reentrancy feature can be found
in the Newlib documentation
.
Analyzing the map file directly or using a tool such as
MapViewer
(Windows-only) can help with tracking down those dependencies. One suggestion is to add the flag
-fno-use-cxa-atexit
to the GCC compile flags, so that it doesn’t use the reentrant version of the exit handler.
Wrapping Up
All of this covers merely the basics of what it takes to integrate and use Newlib, obviously. There are a lot more syscall stubs that weren’t covered yet, and the file handling API is worthy of an article by itself. The dynamics of Newlib also change when moving from a bare metal system as covered in this article from one in which an OS is present.
Process management is another topic covered by the
getpid()
,
fork()
and other stub functions. While it does seem somewhat convoluted to have to implement one’s own code here even for basic functionality like
printf()
, it also highlights the strength of this method, in that it is extremely flexible and can fairly easily be adapted to any platform. This is why Newlib works largely unchanged from resource-limited single-core Cortex-M MCUs all the way up to large multi-core systems including game consoles.
Books image:
“Public Libraries in Wales / Llyfrgelloedd Cyhoeddus yng Nghymru”
by
National Assembly For Wales / Cynulliad Cymru
is licensed under
CC BY 2.0 | 4 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365689",
"author": "Sailingfree",
"timestamp": "2021-07-19T18:05:42",
"content": "Nice to see a library with most of the scaffolding in place, you can choose subsets of the functions too. Many of the basic blocks were in the original k&r book as well, though with little bounds chec... | 1,760,373,013.321759 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/19/python-your-keyboard-hack-chat-with-adafruit/ | Python Your Keyboard Hack Chat With Adafruit | Dan Maloney | [
"Hackaday Columns"
] | [
"Adfruit",
"CircuitPython",
"Hack Chat",
"hid",
"input",
"interface",
"keyboard",
"ladyada",
"peripheral",
"python"
] | Join us on Wednesday, July 21 at noon Pacific for the
Python Your Keyboard Hack Chat
with the Adafruit crew!
Especially over the last year and a half, most of us have gotten the feeling that there’s precious little distinction between our computers and ourselves. We seem welded together, inseparable even, attached as we are day and night to our machines as work life and home life blend into one gray, featureless landscape where time passes unmarked except by the accumulation of food wrappers and drink cans around our work areas. Or maybe it just seems that way.
Regardless, there actually is a fine line between machine and operator, and in most instances it’s that electromechanical accessory that we all love to hate: the keyboard. If you buy off the shelf, it’s never quite right — too clicky, not clicky enough, wrong spacing, bad ergonomics, or just plain ugly design. The only real way around these limitations is to join the DIY keyboard crowd and roll your own, specifically customized to your fingers and your needs — at least until you realize that it’s not quite perfect, and need to modify it again.
Hitting this moving target is often as much a software problem as it is a hardware issue, but as is increasingly the case these days, Python is ready to help. To go into depth on how Python can be leveraged for the custom keyboard builder, our good friends at Adafruit, including
Limor “Ladyada” Fried
,
Phillip Torrone
,
Dan Halbert
,
Kattni Rembor
, and
Scott Shawcroft
will stop by the Hack Chat. We suspect they’ll have some cool stuff to show off, in addition to sharing their tips and tricks for making DIY keyboards just right. If you’re building custom keebs, or even if you’re just “keyboard curious”, you won’t want to miss this one.
Our Hack Chats are live community events in the
Hackaday.io Hack Chat group messaging
. This week we’ll be sitting down on Wednesday, July 21 at 12:00 PM Pacific time. If time zones have you tied up, we have a
handy time zone converter
. | 10 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365665",
"author": "sampleusername",
"timestamp": "2021-07-19T16:55:10",
"content": "I’m pretty sure the comfort issue with most keyboards, ergonomic or not, is that the keys are the wrong size. We sell gloves in multiple sizes, but most keyboards use the standard 18mm square even ... | 1,760,373,013.677316 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/19/samsung-shuttering-original-smartthings-hubs/ | Samsung Shuttering Original SmartThings Hubs | Chris Lott | [
"home hacks",
"News"
] | [
"home automation",
"IoT",
"samsung",
"smartthings"
] | Samsung is causing much angst among its SmartThings customers by shutting down support for its original SmartThings home automation hub as of the end of June. These are network-connected home automation routers providing Zigbee and Z-Wave connectivity to your sensors and actuators. It’s not entirely unreasonable for manufacturers to replace aging hardware with new models. But in this case the original hubs, otherwise fully functional and up to the task, have intentionally been bricked.
Users were offered a chance to upgrade to a newer version of the hub at a discount. But the hardware isn’t being made by Samsung anymore, after they redirected their SmartThings group to focus entirely on software. With this new dedication to software, you’d be forgiven for thinking the team implemented a seamless transition plan for its loyal user base — customers who supported and built up a thriving community since the young Colorado-based SmartThings company bootstrapped itself by a
successful Kickstarter campaign in 2012
. Instead, Samsung seems to leave many of those users in the lurch.
There is no upgrade path for switching to a new hub, meaning that the user has to manually reconnect each sensor in the house which often involves a cryptic sequence of button presses and flashing lights (the modern equivalent of setting the time on your VCR). Soon after you re-pair all your devices, you will discover that the level of software customization and tools that you’ve relied upon for home automation has, or is about to, disappear. They’ve replaced the original SmartThings app with a new in-house app, which by all accounts significantly dumbs down the features and isn’t being well-received by the community. Another very popular tool called Groovy IDE, which allowed users to add support for third-party devices and complex automation tasks, is about to be discontinued, as well.
Samsung’s
announcement from last year
laid out the goals of the transition divided into three phases. After the dust settles, it may well be that new tools will be rolled out which restore the functionality and convenience of the discontinued apps. But it seems that their priority at the moment is to focus on “casual” home automation users, those which just a handful of devices. The “power” users, with dozens and dozens of devices, are left wondering whether they’ve been abandoned. A casual scan through various online forums suggests that many of these loyal users are not waiting to be abandoned. Instead, they are abandoning SmartThings and switching to self-hosted solutions such as
Home Assistant
.
If this story sounds familiar, it is. We’ve covered several similar of IoT service closures in recent years, including:
Ask Hackaday: Wink Hubs, Extortion as a Service? (May 2020)
The IoT Trap (Feb 2020)
Best Buy’s IoT Goes Dark (Nov 2019)
Red Bricks: Alphabet to Turn Off Relvolv’s Lights (Apr 2016)
Considering the typical home is a decades-long investment, we’d hope that the industry will eventually focus on longer-term approaches to home automation. For example, interoperability of devices using existing or new standards might be a good starting point. If you are using an automation system in your home, do you use a bundled solution like SmartThings, or have you gone the self-hosting route?
This news comes [
via Ars Technica
] and thanks to [MLewis] for bringing this to our attention. | 83 | 25 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365635",
"author": "Val",
"timestamp": "2021-07-19T15:38:02",
"content": "I don’t get why home automation for the public isn’t moving to using real standardized protocols, with products designed to last 20 years minimum like KNX, oh well.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
... | 1,760,373,013.792882 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/19/a-look-back-on-a-decade-of-kerbal-space-program/ | A Look Back On A Decade OfKerbal Space Program | Tom Nardi | [
"Featured",
"Games",
"Interest",
"Original Art",
"Slider",
"Space"
] | [
"education",
"kerbal space program",
"ksp",
"simulation",
"space",
"video games"
] | Just a few weeks before
Atlantis
embarked on the final flight of the Space Shuttle program in 2011, a small Mexican company by the name of Squad quietly released
Kerbal Space Program
(KSP) onto an unsuspecting world. Until that point the company had only developed websites and multi-media installations.
Kerbal
wasn’t even an official company initiative, it started as a side project by one of their employees, Felipe Falanghe. The sandbox game allowed players to cobble together rockets from an inventory of modular components and attempt to put them into orbit around the planet Kerbin. It was immediately addictive.
There was no story to follow, or enemies to battle. The closest thing to a score counter was the altimeter that showed how far your craft was above the planet’s surface, and the only way to “win” was to put its little green occupant, the titular Kerbal, back on the ground in one piece. The game’s challenge came not from puzzles or scripted events, but from the game’s accurate (if slightly simplified) application of orbital mechanics and Newtonian dynamics. Building a rocket and getting it into orbit in KSP isn’t difficult because the developers baked some arbitrary limitations into their virtual world; the game is hard for the same reasons putting a rocket into orbit around the Earth is hard.
One of my early rockets, circa 2013.
Over the years official updates added new components for players to build with and planets to explore, and an incredible array of community developed add-ons and modifications expanded the scope of the game even further. KSP would go on to be played by millions, and seeing a valuable opportunity to connect with future engineers, both NASA and the ESA helped develop expansions for the game that allowed players to recreate their real-world vehicles and missions.
But now after a decade of continuous development, with ports to multiple operating systems and game consoles, Squad is bringing this chapter of the KSP adventure to a close.
To celebrate the game’s 10th anniversary on June 24th, they released
“On Final Approach”
,
the game’s last official update. Attention will now be focused on the game’s ambitious sequel, which will expand the basic formula with the addition of interstellar travel and planetary colonies, currently slated for release in 2022.
Of course, this isn’t the end. Millions of “classic” KSP players will still be slinging their Kerbals into Hohmann transfer orbits for years to come, and the talented community of mod developers will undoubtedly help keep the game fresh with unofficial updates. But the end of official support is a major turning point, and it seems a perfect time to reminisce on the impact this revolutionary game has had on the engineering and space communities.
Flights of Fancy
By the numbers, there’s no question that
DOOM
is the game which has most frequently graced the pages of Hackaday. After all, porting the 1993 shooter to a new or unusual piece of hardware is a rite of passage for hackers.
Minecraft
also pops up plenty of times, though in many cases, it’s more about some new in-game feat of engineering than anything corporeal.
But as for which single game has inspired the most peripherals,
Kerbal Space Program
surely takes the top spot.
The first KSP controller we covered was back in 2015
, and it combined a joystick, lighted push buttons, aircraft style toggles, and a trio of screens to read out various bits of in-game data. To somebody who’s never piloted a craft in KSP it might seem like overkill, but each and every one of those buttons and displays would be playing an important role as your meticulously designed lander descended to the surface of the Mun, KSP’s stand-in for Earth’s nearest celestial neighbor.
Speaking of the Mun, the first appearance of KSP on Hackaday was when alum
Brian Benchoff launched a mission to map Kerbin’s rocky natural satellite in 2012
. Notably his attempt took place long before the game officially added in the sort of instrumentation that was necessary to observe a celestial body from orbit, so he used community developed add-ons to build his mapping satellite. After days of scanning the Mun from a polar orbit, he had collected enough data to recreate his own three dimensional model of the in-game world that was suitable for 3D printing.
Bringing Space Down to Earth
The array of projects we’ve seen focused on KSP is certainly impressive, but the people creating custom cockpits for their virtual spacecraft are just one tiny segment of the larger community. What the game will truly be remembered for is how it took a complex subject like orbital mechanics and brought it to millions of people in an approachable and fun way. You can read all about how the
Apollo spacecraft performed the trans-lunar injection (TLI) maneuver
, but if you really want to wrap your head around it, just start up KSP and do it for yourself.
KSP made space exploration relatable in a way which wasn’t possible before. Earlier spaceflight simulators such as
Orbiter —
as impressive as they were — were a bit too grounded in reality to capture the public’s imagination. The key to what made KSP so successful was how expertly the developers balanced realism and fun.
NASA could challenge the public to recreate their own real-world missions in Kerbal’s solar system
knowing that the game had all the principle parts necessary to fashion a serviceable analog, but without the pedantry that would make it impossible for the armchair astronaut to complete. KSP didn’t just reaffirm what everyone already knew, that spaceflight is monstrously complex, it served as a way to teach the average person
why
it’s so difficult.
NASA’s recreation of the OSIRIS-REx mission in KSP.
Whether there’s a preteen or an retiree at the controls, there’s something new to discover by playing KSP. But more than that, the game can be used as a powerful learning tool even if the audience is just passively watching. Scott Manley started out by simply recording himself building rockets in KSP, and parlayed that into Internet fame as a science educator with more than 1.2 million subscribers on YouTube. He was recently tapped as an expert spaceflight consultant for the Netflix film
Stowaway
,
where he used KSP to show the director what a practical Mars spacecraft might look like
.
Felipe Falanghe’s plucky rocket simulator, inspired by his childhood experiments with fireworks, will be forever remembered as one of the most successful indie games of all time. But that won’t be its most lasting impression on the world. While an astronaut aboard the Space Shuttle in the 1990s might have credited
Star Trek
for igniting their interest in space, there’s an excellent chance that the first person to step foot on Mars will have clocked in plenty of hours in
Kerbal Space Program
. | 24 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365612",
"author": "Nobody Of Import",
"timestamp": "2021-07-19T14:24:04",
"content": "They may have stopped work on the original, but they’re carrying it forward next year with a new cut.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6365... | 1,760,373,014.204295 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/18/the-hidden-sounds-of-the-past/ | The Hidden Sounds Of The Past | Matthew Carlson | [
"Phone Hacks",
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"audio",
"magnetic tape",
"sontranic",
"Techmoan"
] | If you stop to think, the number of pre-recorded voices and sounds you might hear on an average day might number in the hundreds. Everything from subway announcements, alerts on your phone, to sound effects at Disneyland is a sound that triggers in response to an event. [Techmoan] came across
a device that many of us have interacted with, but likely never seen: a humble Sontranic 9A Announcer
.
In their heyday, these sorts of devices formed the backbone of audio feedback. Messages from Father Christmas were recorded and could be reached when calling a number. Sound effects in theme parks that were activated when a ride activated some hidden switch. Anything where the sound effect needed to play on some sort of trigger.
An interesting thing to note is that this is not a reel-to-reel system. The tape is of the standard 1/4″ magnetic variety, perhaps a little thicker for extra durability. It instead sits in the top of the machine; coiling and uncoiling like a two-dimensional lava lamp. Additionally, there’s nothing clever about detecting the beginning or end of the audio loop (as there were four copies of the same recording on this particular tape). In fact, everything about this machine speaks of reliability as the most important design consideration. A reel-to-reel system would just add more points of failure.
After a little bit of diagnosing, [Techmoan] managed to get the device running again and found the message on the tape to be from the phone system, informing the listener that the line is no longer in service. This banal message is perhaps the best testament to the ubiquity of devices like these.
Perhaps in the future, we’ll see an
instrument like this magnetic tape-based one
created from a similar machine to the one [Techmoan] found. | 20 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365323",
"author": "Alex",
"timestamp": "2021-07-18T14:14:57",
"content": "Look Mum No Computer just posted a follow up video on repairing this machine and wiring it into a telephone exchange:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qvzH7DSsD3g",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"... | 1,760,373,013.922347 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/18/dewalt-literal-hack-upgrades-battery/ | DeWalt Literal Hack Upgrades Battery | Al Williams | [
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"battery",
"cordless tool",
"dewalt",
"drill",
"power tool",
"screw driver",
"screwdriver"
] | There are several important decisions you make in your life: Coke or Pepsi; vi or emacs; PC or Mac. But, lately, you need to pick a battery ecosystem for your tools. DeWalt? Black & Decker? Or just cheapies from Harbor Freight? But what happens when your vendor of choice changes their batteries? That’s the situation [jleslie48] found when a DeWalt 14.4V battery died. All the new tools require 18V batteries, so buying an old battery for one tool didn’t make sense. Time to
literally hack the old tool
to accept the new battery.
Presumably, nothing in the drill will mind the higher voltage. It is all a matter of mechanics and nothing a Dremel tool won’t fix. Since the tool was old and the 18V batteries relatively new, [jleslie48] decided to limit modifications to the tool only leaving the batteries intact for use with the newer tools.
The only problem once you remove the pins and clips that interfere with the battery fit, it won’t actually stay on the drill. We might have turned to duct tape or zip ties, but bungee cord works, too, as you can see in the finished product.
Honestly, though, the bungee is good because you can stretch it to remove the battery for charging. We might have just cannibalized the drill for its motor, but next time you have a tool with no battery, it might be worth looking to see if you could modify the tool.
Bungees are
great for robots
, too. Or, you can
lay siege
on your neighbors. | 40 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365297",
"author": "Foldi-One",
"timestamp": "2021-07-18T11:11:53",
"content": "Works, doesn’t look hugely impractical. Seems like a win to me. Ugly but functional, and in the world of tools pretty really shouldn’t matter at all..I’ll probably be doing something similar soon myself... | 1,760,373,013.867275 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/18/arduino-cable-tracer-helps-diagnose-broken-usb-cables/ | Arduino Cable Tracer Helps Diagnose Broken USB Cables | Lewin Day | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"cable",
"cable tester",
"usb"
] | We’ve all found ourselves swimming amongst too many similar-looking USB cables over the years. Some have all the conductors and functionality, some are weird power-only oddballs, and some charge our phones quickly while others don’t. It’s a huge headache and one that [TechKiwiGadgets] hopes to solve with
the Arduino Cable Tracer.
The tracer works with USB-A, Mini-USB, Micro-USB, and USB-C cables to determine whether connections are broken or not and also to identify wiring configurations. It’s built around the Arduino Mega 2560, which is ideal for providing a huge amount of GPIO pins that are perfect for such a purpose. Probing results are displayed upon the 2.8″ TFT LCD display that makes it easy to figure out which cables do what.
It’s a tidy build, and one that we could imagine would be very useful for getting a quick go/no-go status on any cables dug out of a junk box somewhere.
Just remember to WIDLARIZE any bad cables you find so they never trouble you again.
Video after the break. | 31 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365292",
"author": "IIVQ / Tijmen Stam",
"timestamp": "2021-07-18T10:44:53",
"content": "No Micro USB-A port?My dad just bought a new ebike which was advertized as being able to charge phones. On checking the day before leaving on a multi-day trip, he found out the port was Micro U... | 1,760,373,013.99501 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/17/control-an-irl-home-from-minecraft/ | Control An IRL Home From Minecraft | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Games"
] | [
"api",
"emulator",
"home automation",
"interface",
"logic",
"minecraft",
"websocket"
] | Minecraft seems to be a game in which anything is possible, both in the virtual world and in the real one. As a sandbox-style game, we’ve seen all kinds of things implemented in it including arithmetic logic units and microcontroller emulators. On the other end of reality we’ve also seen a lot of projects in which real-world interfaces impact the virtual world in some way. As a game, the lines between these two worlds often seem to blur, and that’s no different for
this project that allows for control of a smart home from within the game itself
.
The project is called HomeAssistantMC and is built with Forge. The mod interfaces directly with a Minecraft game. From within the game, players can create a model of their home complete with light switches and other control interfaces. A WebSocket API listens to the game for changes to these devices, and interfaces with real-world controllers which control the home in real life. The game uses special state blocks to handle the control, and the entire control system can be configured in-game once all of the appropriate software has been installed.
For anyone willing to experiment with this software, all of the code for this project is available on
its GitHub page
. One of the other interesting things about this project is the ability to use other creations within Minecraft for home automation. For example, building logic gates allows for nuanced control of the home automation setup with creations
we’ve already seen in Minecraft before
. And, if you really want to go deep into the weeds, you could even
build a complete 6502 processor
from within the game as well. | 12 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365286",
"author": "Lee",
"timestamp": "2021-07-18T10:02:33",
"content": "Just another toy. Highly doubt some one would really use it to control their smart home all the time with it. “Dang it, I left the kitchen light on. Let me go fire up Minecraft to turn it off.”",
"parent_... | 1,760,373,014.396731 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/17/png-image-decoding-library-does-it-with-minimal-ram/ | PNG Image Decoding Library Does It With Minimal RAM | Donald Papp | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"arduino",
"decoding",
"display",
"image decoding",
"microcontrollers",
"png",
"png format"
] | Want to display a PNG file on a display attached to an Arduino or other microcontroller board? You’ll want to look at [Larry Bank]’s
PNGdec, the Arduino-friendly PNG decoder library
which makes it much easier to work with PNG files on your chosen microcontroller.
The PNG image format supports useful features like lossless compression, and was generally developed as an improved (and non-patented) alternative to GIF files. So far so great, but it turns out that decoding PNG files on a microcontroller is a challenge due to the limited amount of memory compared to desktop machines. When the PNG specification was developed in the 90s, computers easily had megabytes of memory to work with, but microcontrollers tend to have memory measured in kilobytes, and lack high-level memory management. [Larry]’s library addresses these issues.
PNGdec is self-contained and free from external dependencies, and also has some features to make converting pixel formats for different display types easy. It will run on any microcontroller that can spare at least 48 K of RAM, so if that sounds useful then
check out the GitHub repository for code and examples
.
We’ve seen [Larry]’s wonderful work before on
optimizing GIF playback
as well as
rapid JPEG decoding
, and these libraries have increasing relevance as hobbyists continue to see small LCD and OLED-based displays become ever more accessible and affordable.
[PNG logo:
PNG Home Site
] | 11 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365248",
"author": "Jon",
"timestamp": "2021-07-18T03:53:09",
"content": "zlib streams take a fair bit of memory to decompress. From the zlib tech page:inflate memory usage (bytes) = (1 << windowBits) + 1440*2*sizeof(int)I think it would be possible to make something similar to a P... | 1,760,373,014.349157 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/17/cnc-saves-water-cooling-setup/ | CNC Saves Water Cooling Setup | Al Williams | [
"cnc hacks",
"computer hacks"
] | [
"cnc",
"delidding",
"liquid cooling",
"water cooling"
] | A classic problem. You have a new CPU and a 15-year old water cooling system. Of course, the bracket doesn’t fit. Time to buy a new cooler? Not if you are [der8auer]. You design a new bracket and
mill it out of aluminum
.
Honestly, it might seem overkill, but it makes sense. After all, no matter how new the CPU is, using water to cool it still works the same way, in principle.
As milled parts go, the bracket wasn’t that complicated. For some reason, the holes didn’t go all the way through, so it required some hand finishing. But we were very impressed with his skill delidding a CPU (second video).
If you want to see the results of the cooling bracket, that’s in the third video, below. We wondered what the working temperature is for the bracket. If it were low enough, you might be able to 3D print it with the right material.
We have to wonder if CPUs will eventually have liquid cooling fittings integrated into the package. Maybe one day.
You can water cool just about anything that gets hot. Even a
3D printer
or a
Raspberry Pi
. | 9 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365269",
"author": "hartl",
"timestamp": "2021-07-18T06:16:38",
"content": "“We have to wonder if CPUs will eventually have liquid cooling fittings integrated into the package. Maybe one day.”Mainframes had this feature for decades and IBM is taking it to the next level:https://the... | 1,760,373,014.298116 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/17/reinvented-retro-contest-winners-announced/ | Reinvented Retro Contest Winners Announced | Kristina Panos | [
"contests",
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"Reinvented Retro Contest",
"winners"
] | Good news, everyone! The results of
the Reinvented Retro contest
are in, and the creators of these three groovy projects have each won a $200 online shopping spree to Digi-Key. We asked you to gaze deeply into your stuff piles and come up with a way to modernize a cool, old piece of hardware, and we left it up to you to decide how cool and how old.
No matter your personal vintage, you have probably used or even built an educational computer like
[Michael Wessel]’s next-generation Microtronic
. This is a re-creation of an early 1980s West German 4-bit microprocessor trainer called the Busch 2090 Microtronic Computer System. You may have never heard of it, but [Michael] swears it’s one of the best ever made. Years ago, [Michael] made
a talking Arduino-based Microtronic emulator
and has grown the concept into a prize-winning system that uses an ATMega2560 Pro Mini and a Nokia 5110 display. As a bonus, it doubles as a cassette interface emulator that plugs into the 2090’s expansion port. Take some time to
dive into the YouTube videos
or
go straight for the gerbers and make your own
.
EBTKS – a tape drive replacement for HP Series80 computers
Resurrected MK-52 calculator now does things it could never have dreamed of
Retrocomputing fans will love
EBTKS
, a project that seeks to circumvent the disintegrating tape drives in HP85A and other early 1980s HP computers by emulating them and delivering 20,000 virtual tapes via SD card. The project began as a solid state replacement using a Teensy and an ESP32, but [Philip] and the team realized they could do a whole lot more than that. The full list of features includes 70 new keywords and both disk and tape drive emulation. Everything is explained in detail on
the project’s main documentation site
, where you’ll also find a handy user guide.
If you have a soft spot for old Soviet gear, check out
[ptrav]’s MK-52 Resurrection
. [ptrav] took an early 90s-vintage calculator with a busted vacuum fluorescent display and breathed new life into it with an ESP32 and a 320×240 TFT screen. The point isn’t to merely resurrect the MK-52, but rather to create a phoenix of programmable Soviet calculating power that rises from the ashes and realizes its hardware unleashed potential. As part of the software development path, [ptrav] also built a fully-functional simulator in C# which you can
check out on GitHub
.
A Most Honorable Mention
It’s always so difficult to pick winners from among all the amazing projects we see. For this contest, we’ve chosen
[Michael Gardi]’s WDC-1
— aka the Paperclip Computer — for an honorable mention. And that means more than just a published pat on the back — [Michael] has won a $25 gift card for
Tindie
. Way to go, [Michael]!
This WDC-1 is a bit of an inverse take on the reinvented retro concept. Instead of new tech in an old box, [Michael] employed modern PCB fabrication and 3D printing to house the upgraded homebrew guts of this 50+ year-old computer design.
Congratulations to all the winners, and a big thank you to
all 138 entrants
for your faux nostalgia-inspiring builds. Take some time this weekend to check them out, and get your alternate reality on. | 7 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365213",
"author": "Michael",
"timestamp": "2021-07-17T22:42:39",
"content": "Too bad these prizes can’t keep up with inflation..$200 is worth about $65 in our new normal.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6365218",
"au... | 1,760,373,014.254093 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/19/3d-print-in-the-air-with-a-little-software-support/ | 3D Print In The Air With A Little Software Support | Al Williams | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"3d printing",
"gcode",
"overhang"
] | We all love 3D printing, but printing anything that has an overhang requires support, right? Maybe not. [Create Inc] has a video showing some 3D prints that
seem to hang impossibly in the air
— not bridges, but loops just floating in the air. You can see the effect in the video below.
The first part of the post covers gcode basics. Around the 5:30 mark, [Create] talks about his inspiration:
FullControl Gcode Designer
. You can do a lot with this tool and it inspired [Create’s]
similar web-based version
.
The point of these tools is to make it easier to create gcode directly instead of using a slicer. You can think of it as assembly language for 3D printing — you can do almost everything in the high-level language — 3D models — but if you want ultimate control you use assembly language, or, in this case, gcode.
The original tool uses Excel which didn’t visualize the output directly and could not provide proper error checking. The new tool solves those problems and is much easier to use.
If you know gcode, you can do
a lot of interesting things
. You can even put
a spring in your step
. | 11 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365562",
"author": "Alice Lalita Heald",
"timestamp": "2021-07-19T11:27:01",
"content": "So the trick to print in mid air with Cura is to move slow and 100% fan?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6365591",
"author": "Cr... | 1,760,373,014.441842 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/19/improving-cheap-sdr-antennas/ | Improving Cheap SDR Antennas | Al Williams | [
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"antenna",
"RTLSDR",
"sdr"
] | [VK3YE] knows there are at least two things wrong with the cheap antennas you get with most SDR dongles. First, they are too short. You’d like to have enough to pull out a quarter wavelength on the longest frequency you want to operate. The second problem is there’s no real ground. He
fixed both of these problems
, as you can see in the video below.
The result might be called an ugly duckling rather than a rubber ducky. But it does seem to work. You could probably come up with something nicer to reseal the base, but the tape does work. A nice 3D printed housing would work, too, and might improve the appearance. We also thought about the goop you use on tool handles.
We actually have simply cut these antennas off and reused the cable and connector to hook up a better antenna. You might get more mileage out of that approach. On the other hand, the magnetic base and reasonably small form factor is pretty attractive.
If you want to do before and after testing, we’d suggest
using Python
. Or, just bite the bullet and
build something that looks like it belongs in a movie
. | 18 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365543",
"author": "Marcus",
"timestamp": "2021-07-19T08:53:58",
"content": "> just bite the bullet and build something that looks like it belongs in a movie.But that’s for circular polarization; unless you want to do something with satellites, or very specific directive microwave ... | 1,760,373,014.495491 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/18/its-super-easy-to-build-yourself-a-usb-c-variable-power-supply-these-days/ | It’s Super Easy To Build Yourself A USB-C Variable Power Supply These Days | Lewin Day | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"power supply",
"psu",
"usb power bank",
"USB Type-C",
"USB-C PD"
] | Once upon a time, building yourself a power supply required sourcing all manner of components, from transformers to transistors, knobs, and indicators. These days, everything’s a bit more integrated which helps if you’re trying to whip something up in a hurry.
This build from [Ricardo] shows just how straightforward building a power supply can be.
The build is a simple mashup, starting with a ZY12PDN USB Power Delivery board. This board talks to a USB-C supply that is compatible with the Power Delivery standard, and tells it to deliver a certain voltage and current output. This is then used to supply power to a
pre-built power supply module
that handles current limiting, variable voltage output, and all that fancy stuff. It even comes with a screen built-in! Simply slap the two together in a 3D printed case with a couple of banana plugs, and you’re almost done.
All you need then is a USB-C power supply – [Ricardo] uses a portable power bank which allows him to use the power supply on the go. It’s a great alternative to a traditional heavy bench supply, and more than enough for a lot of hobby uses.
We’ve seen a lot of interest in USB Power Delivery
recently, and its likely hackers will continue to enjoy the standard for some time to come. If you’ve got your own USB PD hack,
be sure to let us know! | 29 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365511",
"author": "Dj Biohazard",
"timestamp": "2021-07-19T05:50:13",
"content": "That Amazon link is dead as a doornail :’)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6365558",
"author": "Ricardo",
"timestamp": "2021-0... | 1,760,373,014.658706 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/18/the-internet-on-a-casio-calculator/ | The Internet – On A Casio Calculator! | Jenny List | [
"Retrocomputing",
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"calculator",
"casio",
"Casio FX",
"SH4"
] | Over the years we’ve become used to seeing some impressive hacks of high-end calculator software and hardware, most often associated with the Z80-based models from Texas Instruments. But of course, TI are far from the only player in this arena. It’s nice for a change to see a Casio receiving some attention. The Casio fx series of graphical calculators can now communicate with the world, thanks to the work of [Manawyrm] in
porting a TCP/IP stack to them
.
As can be seen in the video below, lurking in the calculator’s menu system is an IRC client, there is also
a terminal application
and a webserver
which you can even visit online
(Please be aware that it’s only a calculator though, so an onslaught of Hackaday readers clicking the link may bring it down). The Casio doesn’t have a network interface of its own, so instead, it speaks SLIP over the serial port. In this endeavor, it uses a UART driver sourced from [
TobleMiner
].
It’s always good to see a neglected platform get some love, and also to note that this is an unusual outing for an SH4 CPU outside its most familiar home in the Sega Dreamcast. It’s a surprise then to read that the SH4 in a calculator of all products,
is a custom version that lacks an FPU
. This deficiency doesn’t mean it can’t be overclocked though,
as this very old Hackaday article describes
. | 12 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365473",
"author": "JWhitten",
"timestamp": "2021-07-19T02:17:54",
"content": "Shout out for SLIP… haven’t heard anybody mention that since the early 1990’s !! :-)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6365541",
"author": "... | 1,760,373,014.545411 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/18/hackaday-links-july-18-2021/ | Hackaday Links: July 18, 2021 | Dan Maloney | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Hackaday links"
] | [
"agc",
"Apollo Guidance Computer",
"auction",
"chip shortage",
"crime",
"DSKY",
"feedback",
"Fractals",
"hackaday links",
"Hubble",
"Ingenuity",
"Legend of Zelda",
"mars",
"nes",
"nostalgia",
"semiconductor",
"shortage",
"smuggling",
"super mario 64",
"video"
] | Tell the world that something is in short supply, and you can bet that people will start reacting to that news in the ways that make the most sense to them — remember the toilet paper shortage? It’s the same with the ongoing semiconductor pinch, except that since the item in short supply is (arguably) more valuable than toilet paper, the behavior and the risks people are willing to take around it are even more extreme. Sure, we’ve seen chip hoarding, and a marked rise in counterfeit chips. But we’d imagine that this is the first time we’ve seen
chip smuggling quite like this
. The smuggler was caught at the Hong Kong-Macao border with 256 Core i7 and i9 processors, valued at about $123,000, strapped to his legs and chest. It reminds us more of “Midnight Express”-style heroin smuggling, although we have to say we love the fact that this guy chose a power of 2 when strapping these babies on.
Speaking of big money, let’s say you’ve pulled off a few chip heists without getting caught, and have retired from the smuggling business. What is one to do with the ill-gotten gains? Apparently, there’s a big boom in artifacts from the early days of console gaming, so you might want to start spreading some money around there. But you’d better prepare to smuggle a lot of chips: last week,
an unopened Legend of Zelda cartridge for the NES sold for $870,000
at auction. Not to be outdone, two days later s
omeone actually paid $1.56 million for a Super Mario 64 cartridge
, this time apparently still in the tamperproof container that displayed it on a shelf somewhere in 1996. Nostalgia can be an expensive drug.
And it’s not just video games that are commanding high prices these days. If you’ve got a spare quarter million or so, why not bid on
this real Apollo Guidance Computer and DSKY
? The AGC is a non-flown machine that was installed in LTA-8, the “lunar test article” version of the Landing Module (LM) that was used for vacuum testing. If the photos in the auction listing seem familiar, it’s with good reason: this is
the same AGC that was restored to operating condition
by Carl Claunch, Mike Stewart, Ken Shiriff, and Marc Verdiell. Sotheby’s estimates the value at $200,000 to $300,000; in a world of billionaire megalomaniacs with dreams of space empires, we wouldn’t be surprised if a working AGC went for much, much more than that.
Meanwhile, current day space exploration is going swimmingly. Just this week
NASA got the Hubble Space Telescope back online
, which is great news for astronomers. And on Mars, the Ingenuity helicopter just keeps on delivering during
its “operations demonstration” mission
. Originally just supposed to be a technology demonstration, Ingenuity has proven to be a useful companion to the Perseverance rover, scouting out locations of interest to explore or areas of hazard to avoid. On
the helicopter’s recent ninth flight
, it scouted a dune field for the team, providing photographs that showed the area would be too dangerous for the rover to cross. The rover’s on-board navigation system isn’t great at seeing sand dunes, so Ingenuity’s images are a real boon to mission planners, not to mention geologists and astrobiologists, who are seeing promising areas of the ancient lakebed to explore.
And finally, most of us know all too well how audio feedback works, and all the occasions to avoid it. But what about video feedback? What happens when you point a camera that a screen displaying the image from the camera? Fractals are what happens, or at least something that looks a lot like fractals. Code Parade has been playing with what he calls
“analog fractals”
, which are generated just by video feedback and not by computational means. While he’d prefer to do this old school with analog video equipment, it easy enough to replicate on a computer; he even has
a web page
that lets you arrange a series of virtual monitors on your screen. Point a webcam at the screen, and you’re off on a fractal journey that constantly changes and shifts. Give it a try. | 12 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365447",
"author": "Hirudinea",
"timestamp": "2021-07-18T23:13:50",
"content": "Well at least the chip smuggler strapped the chips to his legs and chest and didn’t try to smuggle them “internally”. Imagine what would happen when butt chip started to get a workout? PU!",
"parent... | 1,760,373,014.591672 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/18/faulty-electrolytic-caps-dont-always-look-bad/ | Faulty Electrolytic Caps Don’t Always Look Bad | Donald Papp | [
"Repair Hacks"
] | [
"badcaps",
"capacitors",
"psu",
"repair"
] | Old electrolytic capacitors are notorious for not working like they used to, but what exactly does a bad capacitor look like, and what kinds of problems can it cause? Usually bad caps leak or bulge, but not always. In [Zak Kemble]’s case, a bad cap
caused his Samsung HT-C460 Home Cinema System to simply display “PROT” then turn itself off
. Luckily, replacing the troublesome cap fixed everything, but finding the problem in the first place wasn’t quite so straightforward. A visual inspection of the device, shown open in the photo above, didn’t reveal any obvious problems. None of the capacitors looked anything out of the ordinary, but one of them turned out to be the problem anyway.
The output cap had developed an internal short, but visually looked fine.
The first identifiable issue was discovering that the -5 V supply was only outputting about -0.5 V, and there was a 6 V drop across two small 0805-sized resistors, evidence that something was sinking far more current than it should.
Testing revealed that the -5 V regulator wasn’t malfunctioning, and by process of elimination [Zak] finally removed the 470 uF output capacitor on the -5 V output, and the problem disappeared! Inspecting the capacitor revealed no outward sign of malfunction, but it had developed an internal short. [Zak] replaced the faulty cap (and replaced the others just to be safe) and is now looking forward to getting years more of use out of his home cinema system.
When a PSU gives up the ghost, bad capacitors are almost always to blame, but we’ve seen before that
it’s not always easy to figure out which ones are bad
. One thing that helped [Zak] plenty in his troubleshooting is finding a full schematic of the power supply, just by doing a search for the part number he found on it. A good reminder that it’s always worth throwing a part number into a search engine; you might get lucky! | 49 | 20 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365420",
"author": "George Chirtoaca",
"timestamp": "2021-07-18T20:22:21",
"content": "I had a similar Samsung home cinema with the same issue. I had to replace the ceramic capacitors, the red ones in the pictures.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
... | 1,760,373,014.890672 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/18/midi-mouse-makes-marvelous-music/ | MIDI Mouse Makes Marvelous Music | Adam Zeloof | [
"Arduino Hacks",
"Musical Hacks"
] | [
"arduino",
"midi",
"mouse",
"music"
] | It’s an old misconception that digital musicians just use a mouse and keyboard for their art. This is often far from the truth, as many computer music artists have a wide variety of keyboards/synths, MIDI controllers, and “analog” instruments that all get used in their creative process. But what if one of those instruments was just a mouse?
Well, that must have been what was going through [kzra]’s mind when he
turned an old ps/2 roller ball mouse into an electronic instrument
. Born out of a love for music and a hate for waste, the mouse is a fully functional MIDI controller. Note pitch is mapped to the x-coordinate of the pointer, and volume (known as velocity, in MIDI-speak) is mapped to the y-coordinate. The scroll wheel can be used as a mod wheel, user-configurable but most often used to vary the note’s pitch. The mouse buttons are used to play notes, and can behave slightly differently depending on the mode the instrument is set to.
Not satisfied with simply outputting MIDI notes, [kzra] also designed an intuitive user interface to go along with the mouse. A nice little OLED displays the mode, volume, note, and mouse coordinates, and an 8×8 LED matrix also indicates the note and volume. It’s a fantastic and versatile little instrument, and you’ve gotta check out the video after the break to see it for yourself. We’ve seen some
awesome retro-tech MIDI controllers before
, and this fits right in.
Thanks to [midierror] for the tip! | 5 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365410",
"author": "Nitpicker Smartyass",
"timestamp": "2021-07-18T19:32:28",
"content": "Nice – however, not “new” except for the more modern build. Amiga mouses/mice have been turned into midi controllers in the 1980s/1990s, just as (analogue!) joysticks were used to control midi... | 1,760,373,015.124748 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/17/tales-from-the-global-chip-shortage-smoothieboard/ | Tales From The Global Chip Shortage: Smoothieboard | Stephen Ogier | [
"cnc hacks",
"hardware",
"News"
] | [
"chip shortage",
"cnc",
"manufacturing",
"smoothieboard"
] | The semiconductor shortage sparked by the pandemic is showing no signs of slowing down. Although auto manufacturers were some of the first affected, the shortage has now spread and is impacting all sorts of projects, including the
Smoothieboard open-source CNC controllers.
[Chris Cecil] walks through the production woes they’ve had over the last few months. It began this spring with a batch of the V1.1 boards. The prices of some of their chips started jumping, and then they were informed that the microcontroller that serves as the brains of the Smoothieboard was only available for five times the old price. In the end, they placed a smaller order, and V1.1 Smoothieboards will likely be scarce until the microcontroller’s price returns to normal.
Getting V2 of the boards into production has been even more difficult. Just weeks before the final prototype, it was discovered that the LPC4330 microcontroller the V2 was built around was also sold out worldwide. With the shortage in mind, a hole was left in the layout of the final version of V2 so that they could finish the design around whatever microcontroller they were able to get. In the end, they were able to lock down a supply of STM32H745 controllers, which are actually substantially more capable than the original device.
If you’re interested in the origins of the chip shortage,
this article from January is a good place to start
. This isn’t the first time parts shortages have wreaked havoc on the world of electronics—
does anyone remember the global resistor shortage of ’18? | 27 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365152",
"author": "Arthur Wolf",
"timestamp": "2021-07-17T17:15:02",
"content": "I’m nearly done writing an update to the kickstarter about this. I keep pushing it to later because of work and constant new developments, but now that HaD has made an article about this, it’s the rig... | 1,760,373,014.95843 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/17/open-source-is-choice/ | Open Source Is Choice | Elliot Williams | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Rants",
"Software Development"
] | [
"alternatives",
"audacity",
"newsletter",
"open source"
] | If you haven’t been following along with the licensing kerfuffle surrounding the open-source Audacity audio editing software,
take a sec to read Tom Nardi’s piece and get up to speed
. The short version is that a for-profit company has bought the trademark and the software, has announced plans to introduce telemetry where there was none, made ominous changes to the privacy policy that preclude people under the age of consent from using the software, and requested that all previous developers acquiesce to a change in the open-source license under which it is published. All the while, the company, Muse, says that it will keep the software open, and has walked back and forth on the telemetry issue.
What will happen to “Audacity”? Who knows. But also, who cares? At least one fork of the codebase has been made, with the telemetry removed and the old open licenses in place. The nicest thing about open source is that I don’t care one bit if my software is named Audacity or
Tenacity
, and this is software I use every week for production of our podcast. But because I haven’t paid any license fees, it costs me absolutely nothing to download the same software, minus some anti-features, under a different name. If the development community moves over to Tenacity, it’ll all be fine.
Tom thinks that the Audacity brand is too big to fail, and that Muse will have a hit on their hands. Especially if they start implementing new, must-have features, they could justify whatever plans they have in store, even if they’re only available as a “freemium” Audacity Pro, with telemetry, under a more restrictive license. When that
does
happen, I’ll have to make the choice between those features and the costs, but I
won’t
be left out in the cold as long as the Tenacity fork gets enough eyes on it. So that’s just more choice for the end-user, right? That’s cool.
Compare this with closed source software. There, when the owner makes an unpopular decision, you simply have to take it or make the leap to an entirely different software package. This can be costly if you’ve gotten good at using that software, and between licenses and learning, there’s a lot of disincentive to switching. Not so in this case. If I don’t want to be tracked while editing audio offline, I don’t have to be. Woot.
The elephant in the room is of course the development and debugging community, and it’s way too early to be making predictions there. However, the same rules apply for devs and users: switching between two virtually identical codebases is as easy as
git remote add origin
or
apt get install tenacity
. (Unpaid) developers are free to choose among forks because they like the terms and conditions, because one group of people is more pleasant to work with, or because they like the color of one logo more than the other. Users are just as free to choose.
Time will tell if Audacity ends up like the
zombie OpenOffice
, which is downloaded in spite of
the much superior LibreOffice
just because of the former’s name recognition. I know this split riles some people up, especially in the LibreOffice development community, and it
does
seem unfair that the better software somehow enjoys less reputation. But for those of us in the know, it’s just more choice. And that’s good, right?
This article is part of the Hackaday.com newsletter, delivered every seven days for each of the last 200+ weeks. It also includes our favorite articles from the last seven days that you can see on
the web version of the newsletter
.
Want this type of article to hit your inbox every Friday morning?
You should sign up
! | 79 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365091",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2021-07-17T14:05:33",
"content": "“But for those of us in the know, it’s just more choice. And that’s good, right?”Sometimes.https://www.usertesting.com/blog/how-to-use-the-paradox-of-choice-in-ux-design",
"parent_id": null,
"dep... | 1,760,373,015.085143 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/17/soviet-scientific-calculator-gives-up-its-cold-war-era-secrets/ | Soviet Scientific Calculator Gives Up Its Cold War-Era Secrets | Dan Maloney | [
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"calculator",
"MK-52",
"programmable",
"RPN",
"russia",
"soviet"
] | Say what you want about Soviet technology, but you’ve got to admit there was a certain style to Cold War-era electronics. Things were perhaps not as streamlined and sleek as their Western equivalents, but then again, just look at the Nixie tube craze to see where collectors and enthusiasts stand on that comparison.
One particularly interesting artifact from the later part of that era was
the lovely Elektronika MK-52 “microcalculator”
. [Paul Hoets] has done a careful but thorough teardown of a fine example of this late-80s machine. The programmable calculator was obviously geared toward scientific and engineering users, but [Paul] relates how later versions of it were also used by the financial community to root out banking fraud and even had built-in cryptographic functions, which made encrypting text easy.
[Paul] has put together a video of the teardown
, detailing the mostly through-hole construction and the interesting use of a daughter-board, which appears to hold the high-voltage section needed to drive the 11-character VFD tube. The calculator appears to be very well cared for, and once reassembled looks like it would be up for another ride on a Soyuz, where once it served as a backup for landing calculations.
We love the look of this machine and appreciate [Paul]’s teardown and analysis. But you say that the Cyrillic keyboard has you stumped and you need a bilingual version of the MK-52?
That’s not a problem
. | 17 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365075",
"author": "William J Steele",
"timestamp": "2021-07-17T12:05:22",
"content": "You can still buy these NOS today. Check eBay for them… Cost about $15 + shipping.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6365266",
"aut... | 1,760,373,015.252267 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/17/finding-fractals-in-the-1930s/ | Finding Fractals In The 1930’s | Matthew Carlson | [
"Retrocomputing",
"Video Hacks"
] | [
"1930s",
"analog fractals",
"codeparade",
"fractal",
"Fractals",
"projector"
] | The mesmerizing properties of fractals are surprising as their visual complexity often arises from simple equations. [CodeParade] set out to show how simple a fractal is
by creating them using technology from the 1930s
. The basic idea is based on projectors and cameras, which were both readily available and widely used in television (CRT projectors were in theaters by 1938, though they weren’t in color until the 1950s).
By projecting two overlapping images on the wall, pointing a camera at the resulting image, and then feeding it back into the projectors, you get some beautiful fractals. [CodeParade] doesn’t have a projector, much less two. So he did what any hacker might do and came up with a clever workaround. He made a simple app that “projects” onto his monitor and all he has to do is point an external webcam at the screen. The resulting analog fractals are quite beautiful and tactile. Rather than tweaking a variable and recompiling, you simply just add a finger or move the camera to introduce new noise that quickly becomes signal.
Better yet, there’s a
web version that you can play around with right now
. For more fractals implemented in hardware rather than software, there’s
this FPGA with a VHDL Mandelbrot set
we covered. | 22 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365042",
"author": "James",
"timestamp": "2021-07-17T08:44:31",
"content": "Also known as two mirrors facing each other",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6365044",
"author": "Joshua",
"timestamp": "2021-07-17T09:16:59",
... | 1,760,373,015.366666 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/16/fixing-joy-con-drift-with-recycle-bin-parts/ | Fixing Joy-Con Drift With Recycle Bin Parts | Kristina Panos | [
"News",
"Nintendo Hacks"
] | [
"cardboard",
"joy-con",
"joy-con drift",
"nintendo",
"switch"
] | Have you seen this yet? YouTuber [VK’s Channel]
claims to have a permanent fix for Joy-Con drift
— the tendency for Nintendo Switch controllers to behave as though they’re being moved around when they’re not even being touched. Like everyone else, [VK’s Channel] tried all the usual suspects: compressed air, isopropyl alcohol, contact cleaner, and even WD-40. But these are only temporary fixes, and the drift always comes back. None of the other fixes so far are permanent, either, like shimming the flat cable that connects the stick to the mobo, adding graphite to the worn pads inside, or trying to fix a possible bad antenna connection.
While calibrating a drifting Joy-Con, [VK’s Channel] noticed that applying pressure near the Y and B buttons corrected the issue immediately, so they got the idea to add a 1mm thick piece of card stock inside. [VK’s Channel] believes the issue is that there is no fastener connecting the plastic part of the joystick to the metal part on the bottom. Over time, using the joystick causes the bottom to sag, which makes the metal contacts inside lose their grip on the graphite pads. It’s been two months now and there is absolutely no drift in either of the Joy-Cons that [VK’s Channel] has shored up this way.
Nintendo is now fixing Joy-Cons for free
. The problem is that they are replacing irreparable ones outright, so you have to agree that you will settle for a plain old gray, red, or blue instead of your special edition Zelda controllers or whatever you send them. Hopefully, this really is a permanent fix, and that Nintendo gives [VK’s Channel] a job.
You could forego the joysticks altogether and
swap them out for touchpads
. Suffering from XBOX drift instead?
We have just the thing
.
Via
Kotaku | 16 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365017",
"author": "Fosselius",
"timestamp": "2021-07-17T05:22:07",
"content": "Now, this is a hack, its great that he took his time to figure out why the fix works.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6365028",
"author":... | 1,760,373,015.3038 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/16/interpreters-in-scala/ | Interpreters In Scala | Al Williams | [
"Software Development"
] | [
"interpreter",
"lexer",
"parser",
"scala"
] | You might think of interpreters as only good for writing programs. Many people learned programming on some kind of interpreter — like BASIC — because you get immediate feedback and don’t have to deal with the complexities of a compiler. But interpreters can have other uses like parsing configuration files, for example. [Sakib] has a very complete tutorial about
writing an interpreter in Scala
, but even if you use another language, you might find the tutorial useful.
We were impressed because the tutorial uses formal parsing using a lexer and a parser. This is how you’d be taught to do it in a computer science class, but not how everyone does it.
For example, if you wanted to parse commands of HELP, PRINT, and EXIT you could compare each string, but it is nicer to break the input into tokens (lexing) and then examine the tokens for combinations.
Doing it this way lets you identify types of tokens like “floating point number” or “integer” or “operator” and that makes interpreting things like math expressions easier. You can also more easily deal with issues like handling binding so that multiplication, for example, happens before addition.
Tiny computers can benefit from
tiny interpreters
. Of course, we like
Forth
, but that’s a different style of interpreter. | 15 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6365010",
"author": "localroger",
"timestamp": "2021-07-17T03:11:09",
"content": "Using a lexer and parser is NOT how you are supposed to do it. I know someone who did it that way and made a miserably slow and almost unusable industrial device that way, which nobody could figure ou... | 1,760,373,015.465397 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/16/a-cheap-dipole-antenna-from-an-extension-cord/ | A Cheap Dipole Antenna From An Extension Cord | Al Williams | [
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"antenna",
"dipole",
"ham radio",
"radio",
"sdr",
"wire"
] | Dipoles are a classic builder’s antenna, after all they are usually little more than two pieces of wire and a feedline. But as [Rob] shows us in the video below,
there are a few things to consider
.
The first thing is where to get the wire. A damaged extension cord donated the wire. That’s actually an interesting idea because you get multiple wires the same length inside the extension cord.
Of course, it is easy to just pull the conductors out of the extension cord, but how do you feed it? A small balun converts the unbalanced feed line into a balanced connection for the antenna. Although the title says “free dipole” this balun is commercial and probably cost something unless you happen to already have one. However, building a balun isn’t all that tricky, either if you happen to have a ferrite toroid.
If you want to transmit, you’ll probably need a little different arrangement, but for receiving this will definitely get the job done. A tuner would make life easier.
Even though this is technically a dipole, without tuning it is more of a random wire. However, it works and with antenna analyzers now common gear, it would be easy to shorten the dipole down to any band you wanted.
Of course, in the mechanical world, they say
if you can’t make it exact, make it adjustable
. If you are looking for cheap station gear, there’s always the
$50 ham
, otherwise known as [Dan Maloney]. | 12 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364975",
"author": "Jul13",
"timestamp": "2021-07-16T23:28:35",
"content": "Although the title says “free dipole” …No. No it doesn’t.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6364976",
"author": "Jul13",
"timestamp": "... | 1,760,373,015.414957 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/16/cracking-a-gba-game-with-nsa-tools/ | Cracking A GBA Game With NSA Tools | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"game boy advance",
"Ghidra",
"kaiju",
"kong",
"level",
"nsa",
"password",
"reverse engineering",
"software"
] | [Wrongbaud] is a huge fan of Japanese kaiju-style movies, including Godzilla and King Kong. In honor of the release of a new movie, he has decided to tackle a few projects to see how both of these monsters can hold their own against other legendary monsters. In this project, he is using Ghidra, named after another legendary kaiju,
against the password system of the Game Boy Advance game Kong: King of Atlantis
.
Since this project is a how-to, [wrongbaud] shows how to search Ghidra for existing scripts that might already have the functionality needed for GBA analysis and emulation. When not, he also illustrates how to write scripts to automate code analysis, and then moves on to cracking the level password system on the game.
The key to finding the passwords on this game was looking for values in the code that were seven characters long, and after some searching [wrongbaud] is finally able to zero in on the code responsible for handling passwords. Once found a brute force method was automated to find viable passwords, and from there the game was officially pwned. For anyone interested in security, reverse engineering, or just the way that binaries work, it’s quite the detailed breakdown. Of course,
it’s not the only example we have seen that uses this software tool to extract passwords
. | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364830",
"author": "Hirudinea",
"timestamp": "2021-07-16T15:14:24",
"content": "Come, you didn’t title the article “Ghidra vs. King Kong!”!? Now that’s just a missed opportunity.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
}
] | 1,760,373,015.504065 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/16/repair-hack-saves-tesla-owner-from-massive-bill/ | Repair Hack Saves Tesla Owner From Massive Bill | Dan Maloney | [
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"automotive",
"battery. cooling",
"mechanic",
"model 3",
"repair",
"right to repair",
"tesla"
] | As expensive as a new car is, it almost seems like a loss leader now to get you locked into exorbitantly expensive repairs at the dealership’s service department. That’s the reason a lot of us still try to do as much of the maintenance and repairs on our cars as possible — it’s just too darn expensive to pay someone else to do it.
Case in point: this story about
a hapless Tesla owner who faced a massive repair bill
on his brand new car. [Donald]’s tale of woe began when he hit some road debris with his two-wheel-drive Model 3. The object hit penetrated the plastic shield over the front of the battery pack, striking a fitting in the low-pressure battery cooling plumbing. The plastic fitting cracked, causing a leak that obviously needed repair. The authorized Tesla service center gave him the bad news: that he needed a new battery pack, at a cost of $16,000. Through a series of oversights, [Donald]’s comprehensive insurance on the car had lapsed, so he was looking at funding the repair, approximately half the cost of a new Model 3, out of pocket.
Luckily, he got in touch with [Rich Benoit] of
The Electrified Garage
, one of the few independent garages doing Tesla repairs and customizations. The video below is queued up to the part where they actually do the repair, which is ridiculously simple. After cutting off the remains of the broken fitting with a utility knife, [Rich]’s tech was able to cut a thread in both the fitting and the battery pack, and attach them together with a brass nipple from the plumbing section of the local home store. The total bill for the repair was $700, which still seems steep to us, but a far cry from what it could have been.
Hats off to [Rich] and his crew for finding a cost-effective workaround for this issue. And if you think you’ve seen his EV repairs before, you’re right. Of course,
some repairs
are more successful
than others
. | 74 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364703",
"author": "ian 42",
"timestamp": "2021-07-16T08:30:48",
"content": "It just shows that the whole electronic car thing is like mobile phones – not made to be repaired, and just buy a new one very few years.. Seehttps://hackaday.com/2021/07/15/recycling-will-be-key-to-the-el... | 1,760,373,015.610243 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/15/analog-camera-goes-digital/ | Analog Camera Goes Digital | Bryan Cockfield | [
"digital cameras hacks",
"Raspberry Pi"
] | [
"analog",
"camera",
"digital",
"film",
"lens",
"raspberry pi",
"retro",
"sensor",
"video",
"wireless"
] | The digital camera revolution swept through the world in the early 2000s, and aside from some unique situations and a handful of artists still using film, almost everyone has switched over to digital since then. Unfortunately that means that there’s a lot of high quality film cameras in the world that are gathering dust, but with a few pieces of equipment
it’s possible to convert them to digital and get some more use out of them
.
[befinitiv]’s latest project handles this conversion by swapping in a Raspberry Pi Zero where the film cartridge would otherwise be inserted into the camera. The Pi is attached to a 3D-printed case which mimics the shape of the film, and also houses a Pi camera right in front of the location where the film would be exposed. By removing the Pi camera’s lens, this new setup is able to take advantage of the analog camera’s optics instead and is able to capture images of relatively decent quality.
There are some perks of using this setup as well, namely that video can be broadcast to this phone over a wireless connection to a computer via the Raspberry Pi. It’s a pretty interesting build with excellent results for a remarkably low price tag, and it would be pretty straightforward to interface the camera’s shutter and other control dials into the Raspberry Pi to further replicate the action of an old film camera. And, if you enjoy [befinitiv]’s projects of bringing old tech into the modern world, be sure to check out his
80s-era DOS laptop which is able to run a modern Linux installation
. | 33 | 17 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364659",
"author": "Ali",
"timestamp": "2021-07-16T05:11:51",
"content": "https://alinacierdem.com/raspberry-pi-film-camera/I did a similar thing back then but never had time to document it. I think it is collecting dust on some of my junk shelves. The most difficult part is dealin... | 1,760,373,015.678937 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/15/you-are-doomed-to-learn-webassembly/ | You Are Doomed To Learn WebAssembly | Al Williams | [
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"doom",
"wasm",
"webasm",
"webassembly"
] | At first, Web browsers displayed HTML pages. But then people wanted those pages to do something. So we got — among other things — JavaScript. Then people wanted to do super complicated and compute-intensive things. So now we have WebAssembly. If you want to learn it, [diekmann] has
a 4-part series that covers everything from getting started to porting Doom
into your browser.
Paradoxically, instead of using a browser, he uses the wasm binary toolkit to run code more like a standard assembler. And wasm — what most people call WebAssembly — isn’t like most assemblers you know. Instead of labels, there are blocks that work much more like high-level language constructs such as while loops in C.
If you were expecting the Doom port to be a trip through emscripten, you’ll be disappointed. The fourth installment ports the Doom code directly and that’s very educational. There’s a lot to be done, and most of the steps stay on the regular platform to ease debugging. The switch to browser hosting occurs only at the end.
The first step was to remove some features. Things such as X11 shared memory make sense because you aren’t going to use X11. However, we were sad to see the sound code taken out. At some point, the code has to make the jump to browser output and then you are blind until you get it working.
A lot of missing functions were written using Rust and borrowed from musl, a C library implementation. There’s a lot of debugging, documented as GitHub check-ins. But it does work. Don’t believe it?
Try it
.
Doom ports are popular, even going
to a light bulb
, if not a pregnancy test. We prefer, of course,
an oscilloscope
. | 37 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364636",
"author": "Drone",
"timestamp": "2021-07-16T03:13:50",
"content": "@Al Williams said: “So now we have Web Assembly.”Erm… Web Assembly > WebAssembly, no space.[1]1. WebAssembly (abbreviated Wasm) is a binary instruction format for a stack-based virtual machine.https://webas... | 1,760,373,016.455939 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2021/07/15/overdriving-vacuum-tubes-and-releasing-the-magic-light-within/ | Overdriving Vacuum Tubes And Releasing The Magic Light Within | Dan Maloney | [
"classic hacks",
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"anode",
"cathode",
"high voltage",
"plates",
"thermionic",
"vacuum tube",
"valve"
] | We’ve all seen electronic components that have been coaxed into releasing their small amount of Magic Smoke, which of course is what makes the thing work in the first place. But back in the old times, parts were made of glass and metal and were much tougher — you could do almost anything to them and they wouldn’t release the Magic Smoke. It was very boring.
Unless you knew
the secret of “red plating”
, of course, which [David Lovett] explores in the video below. We’ve been following
[David]’s work with vacuum tubes
, the aforementioned essentially smokeless components that he’s putting to use to build
a simple one-bit microprocessor
. His circuits tend to drive tubes rather gently, but in a fun twist, he let his destructive side out for a bit and really pushed a few tubes to see what happens. And what happens is pretty dramatic — when enough electrons stream from the cathode to the anode, their collective kinetic energy heats the plate up to a cherry-red, hence the term “red plating”.
[David] selected a number of victims for his torture chamber, not all of which cooperated despite the roughly 195 volts applied to the plate. Some of the tubes, though, cooperated in spades, quickly taking on a very unhealthy glow. One tube, a 6BZ7 dual triode, really put on a show, with something getting so hot inside the tube as to warp and short together, leading to some impressive pyrotechnics. Think of it as releasing the Magic Light instead of the Magic Smoke.
Having seen
how X-ray tubes work
, we can’t help but wonder if [David] was getting a little bit more than he bargained for when he made this snuff film. Probably not — the energies involved with medical X-ray tubes are much higher than this — but still, it might be interesting to see what kinds of unintended emissions red-plating generates. | 53 | 19 | [
{
"comment_id": "6364602",
"author": "Craig W Hildreth",
"timestamp": "2021-07-15T23:16:11",
"content": "It is sad to see people deliberately ruin things that aren’t made anymore. It must be a youtube thing to get clicks (and revenue) above all else. Major thumbs down on this one. I’d say if red... | 1,760,373,015.9234 |
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