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https://hackaday.com/2023/07/07/retrotechtacular-the-nuclear-cruise-ship-of-the-future-earns-glowing-reviews/ | Retrotechtacular: The Nuclear Cruise Ship Of The Future Earns Glowing Reviews | Al Williams | [
"History",
"Retrotechtacular",
"Slider"
] | [
"ns savannah",
"nuclear"
] | The average modern cruise ship takes about 250 tons or 80,000 gallons of fuel daily. But can you imagine a cruise ship capable of circling the globe fourteen times before it needed to top off? That was the claim for the NS
Savannah
, a nuclear-powered cruise ship born out of President Eisenhower’s “Atoms for Peace” initiative.
The ship was a joint project of several government agencies, including the US Maritime Administration. With a maiden cruise in 1962, the vessel cost a little more than $18 million to build, but the 74-megawatt nuclear reactor added nearly $30 million to the price tag. The ship could carry 60 passengers, 124 crew, and over 14,000 tons of cargo around 300,000 nautical miles using one set of 32 fuel elements. What was it like onboard? The video below gives a glimpse of nuclear cruising in the 1960s.
If you want some more modern views of the vessel,
NPR recently toured it
at its current home in Baltimore and they have great photos.
Tech
Reactor Diagram
Nuclear propulsion for warships is nothing new, of course. But the
Savannah
is one of only a handful of civilian ships to carry a reactor, and most of those were either Russian icebreakers or cargo ships. Unlike a military reactor, Savannah’s power plant was not made to be especially compact or shock resistant but had safety and serviceability in mind.
The reactor compartment was near the center of the vessel. It was possible to refuel the reactor from access above the compartment. The reactor was a tall cylinder inside a 50-foot-long containment vessel that was 35 feet in diameter. The steel vessel was up to 4 inches thick and could handle up to 186 PSI. Shielding included four feet of concrete, six inches of lead, and six inches of polyethylene. There was also 24 inches of collision shielding built from steel and redwood.
The fuel was low-enriched uranium. Each of the 32 fuel elements had 164 uranium oxide pellets contained in helium. The elements around the edge of the array were enriched to 4.6%, but the central elements were at 4.2%. A set of 21 control rods could fully insert into the core with electric motors in less than two seconds. The entire thing was 17 feet high.
The ship’s screw runs on steam generated by the heat from the nuclear reactor. A 35 ton gear that drives the screw is a precision-machined beast you can see in the video below. Watching the ship being built in that same video, you’d hardly know the ship had a nuclear reactor onboard.
Economics
The ship had 30 staterooms for passengers. That seems small by today’s super ship standards, but at the time, that was a respectable number for a luxury cruise ship. The dining room could seat 100 passengers, and many rooms, like the library, could convert to a movie theater or pool. The ship was a demonstration and was heavy on style but short on cargo capacity.
One of the problems with the ship is that it required a larger crew, many with unusual special training. In fact, the normal deck officers became unhappy that the nuclear engineering staff were paid better, and a strike stopped the ship for a while in Galveston. This caused the Maritime Administration to select a new operator, leading to further delays as they had to train a new crew.
The ship was named after the SS
Savannah
, the first steamship to cross the Atlantic. Both ships were not commercially successful but paved the way for new technology. In fact, as the world seeks to reduce carbon emissions, there is
talk of civilian ships using nuclear power again
.
Where Is It Now?
The
Savannah
traveled about 450,000 nautical miles during its lifetime. By 1965, passenger service ended after carrying a total of 848 passengers. For three more years, the ship carried cargo, being refueled once in Galveston, Texas. Once the ship was removed from service in 1972, it bounced around a bit. The city of Savannah was going to make it into a hotel. When that fell through, the ship rested in Galveston for a bit before winding up a museum ship in South Carolina. Eventually, the ship would need nearly a million dollars of renovation and wound up in Baltimore.
The fuel pellets left the ship in 1975, and the reactor found a final resting spot in Utah in 2022. Indeed, disposing of fuel and the power plant may be the largest expense of operating a ship like this.
Was the ship a success or a failure? It depends on your criteria. As a goodwill ambassador, it was a success. As a technology demonstrator, we think it worked well. It hasn’t ushered in the atomic age of shipping, but that may be just because it was a little too early. New
smaller and safer reactors
may well bring
Savannah
a lot of technological cousins in the future. | 33 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660065",
"author": "heathdutton",
"timestamp": "2023-07-07T18:18:40",
"content": "There were 2 nuclear powered Arktika-class vessels that took passengers until recently. These were icebreakers used for scientific exploration and later for high-paying passengers who wanted to go to ... | 1,760,372,243.75384 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/07/hackaday-podcast-226-ice-snow-and-cooling-paint-in-july/ | Hackaday Podcast 226: Ice, Snow, And Cooling Paint In July | Al Williams | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"News",
"Podcasts",
"Slider"
] | [
"Hackaday Podcast"
] | This week, Editor-in-Chief Elliot Williams and Al Williams shoot the breeze about all things Hackaday. We start off with some fond remembrances of Don Lancaster, a legendary hardware hacker who passed away last month. There’s also news about the Hackaday Prize (the tool competition) and a rant about fast computers and slow software, a topic that drew many comments this week.
In the What’s That Sound event, Al proves he’s more of a Star Trek fan than a videogamer. But there were plenty of correct answers, but only one winner: [Wybrandus]. There’s always next week, so keep playing!
Elliot may be dreaming of cooler weather since he talks about ice sculptures, snow measurements, and a paint that can make things cooler. We don’t know what Al is dreaming about, but he is worried about his fuses, and the ins and out of open source licensing.
Along the way, you’ll hear about personal vehicles, sky cameras, and zapping weeds with extreme solar power. As usual, there is an eclectic mix of other posts. What has the Hackaday crew been up to? Field trips! Hear about Dan Maloney’s visit to the SNOTEL network to measure snowfall and a report from Al and Bil Herd’s trip to the Vintage Computer Festival Southwest.
What to read along? The links below will get you started. Don’t forget to tell us what you think in the comments!
Or, download a copy for posterity to file away in your archive
.
Where to Follow Hackaday Podcast
Places to follow Hackaday podcasts:
iTunes
Spotify
Stitcher
RSS
YouTube
Check
out our Libsyn landing page
Episode 226 Show Notes:
News:
Saying Goodbye to Don Lancaster
Computer Speed Gains Erased by Modern Software
Gearing Up with the 2023 Hackaday Prize
What’s that Sound?
Congratulations to [
Wybrandus] for guessing Qbert (and getting lucky).
[Elliot] stands corrected! The voice synth in Qbert wasn’t a TI at all!
It was a Votrax
.
That’s a deep rabbit hole to go digging down
, but feel free.
Interesting Hacks of the Week:
Supercon 2022: Bradley Gawthorp Wants You to Join the PEV Revolution
An All-Sky Camera to Watch the Night Sky
Keogram (Wikipedia)
Fripon Meteor Tracking
NASA Meteor Tracking
Gardening Robot Uses Sunlight to Incinerate Weeds
Smoke Some Weeds: Lasers Could Make Hericide Obsolete
Open CV and Depth Camera Spots Weeds
Point Out Pup’s Packages with this Poop-Shooting Laser
A Fuse is Just a Fuse, Right?
Cooling Paint You Can Actually Make
Infrared Window
Passive Daytime Radiative Cooling
Design Solutions for the Heat Crisis in Cities Around the World
New Whitest Paint Might Help Fight Climate Change
Rocky Strikes Back at Red Hat
Et Tu Red Hat?
Quick Hacks:
Elliot’s Picks:
The Chess Computer from 1912
Ice Wrenchers, Wrencher Chocolates, and the Vaquform-DT2
Presence Sensor Locks Computer when You Step Away
Al’s Picks:
Quantum Computing on a Commodore 64 in 200 Lines of Basic
Three Pitfalls in I2C Everyone Wishes Weren’t There
FREQ Out with LTSpice
Can’t-Miss Articles:
Know Snow: Monitoring Snowpack with the SNOTEL Network
Vintage Computer Festival Southwest: Bil and Al’s Excellent Adventure
VCF’s Swap Meet Experiment Helps Support Expansion | 3 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660045",
"author": "J. Samson",
"timestamp": "2023-07-07T16:40:28",
"content": "Is this whole thing written in third person? Comes across as confusing… (e.g. “We don’t know what Al is dreaming about…” when the article was presumably written by Al).(Please, no Art-Int comments, it’s... | 1,760,372,243.204256 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/07/getting-a-rise-with-laser-cutting/ | Getting A Rise With Laser Cutting | Al Williams | [
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"honeycomb table",
"laser cutter"
] | Your first 3D print probably seemed pretty amazing. But if you revisit it after a few years, you’ll likely notice it wasn’t nearly as good as you thought. We improve our printers and our processes and the new better results become normal. If you have a laser cutter, you may go through the same iteration. At first, you are happy just to get scorch marks on the workpiece. But when you move to cutting, you want cleaner cuts. You put tape over the work, add air assist, and invest in a honeycomb bed. Each step gets you better results, but you can always improve.
[The Louisiana Hobby Guy] (also known as [Rich])
knows a lot about the practical side of lasers
. He suggests using standoff pins to not just secure the part to the honeycomb bed but lift it up a little, allowing air to flow under the part and lets the laser easily cut all the way through. You can see them in action in the video below.
This is a cheap upgrade to prevent flashback when cutting. [Rich] explains how to size them properly and even how to make your own if you don’t want to buy them off the shelf. You can laser cut hold-down pins from plans [Rich] provides, although he prefers to 3D print them, and you can do that, too. Most beds look similar, but if yours is an oddball, you might have to modify them slightly. He has regular dog clamps and the antiflashback standoffs, so you can make some of each. You can also buy them online. Most do not have the antiflashback feature, but at least one vendor that [Rich] points out does have them
If you don’t like the ones [Rich] shows, you can find 3D models for similar pins in the
usual places
. You can also design them yourself if you want them exactly how you want.
A good thing to add to your laser cutting workflow. [Rich’s] channel is full of great stuff. If you want to know more about
air assist
, we’ve added it to our cutters. If you are serious about precision cuts, know your
kerf
, too. | 6 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660066",
"author": "Dave",
"timestamp": "2023-07-07T18:25:54",
"content": "Also look into silversmithing Trivets. Pointy-thingies that lift your workpiece off the surface. Made of folded metal. I’ve used them in a similar vein on our lasers too.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth"... | 1,760,372,243.153369 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/07/this-week-in-security-bogus-cves-bogus-pocs-and-maybe-a-bogus-breach/ | This Week In Security: Bogus CVEs, Bogus PoCs, And Maybe A Bogus Breach | Jonathan Bennett | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"News",
"Security Hacks",
"Slider"
] | [
"CVE",
"proof of concept",
"This Week in Security",
"wordpress"
] | It appears we have something of a problem. It’s not really a new problem, and shouldn’t be too surprising, but it did pop up again this week: bogus CVEs. Starting out in the security field? What’s the best way to jump-start a career? Getting a CVE find to your name certainly can’t hurt. And as a result, you get very junior security researchers looking for and reporting novel security vulnerabilities of sometimes dubious quality. Sometimes that process looks a lot like slinging reports against the wall to see what sticks. Things brings us to
an odd bug report in the OBS Studio project
.
A researcher put together a script to look for possible password exposure on Github projects, and it caught a configuration value named “password” in a
.ini
file, being distributed in the project source. Obvious credential leak in Git source, right? Except for the little detail that it was in the “locale” folder, and the files were named
ca-es.ini
,
ja-jp.ini
, and similar. You may be in on the joke by now, but if not, those are translation strings. It wasn’t leaked credentials, it was various translations of the word “password”. This sort of thing happens quite often, and from the viewpoint of a researcher looking at results from an automated tool, it can be challenging to spend enough time with each result to fully understand the code in question. It looks like this case includes a language barrier, making it even harder to clear up the confusion.
Things took a turn for the worse when a CVE was requested. The CVE Numbering Authority (CNA) that processed the request was MITRE, which issued CVE-2023-34585. It was a completely bogus CVE, and thankfully a more complete explanation from OBS was enough to convince the researcher of his error. That, however, brings us back to
CVE-2023-36262
, which was published this week. It’s yet another CVE, for the same non-issue, and even pointing at the same GitHub issue where the alleged bug is debunked. There’s multiple fails here, but the biggest disappointment is MITRE, for handing out CVEs twice for the same issue. Shout-out to [
Netspooky
] on Twitter for spotting this one.
Bogus PoC
Don’t run untrusted code. Don’t run untrusted code, even if it’s claimed to be a Proof of Concept (PoC) from a security researcher. The background is CVE-2023-35829, a use-after-free in the Rokchip video driver in Linux kernel versions prior to 6.3.2. There’s not a lot of details about this flaw, except that in certain instances it could be used to achieve escalation of privilege. What’s newsworthy is that there was a PoC published on Github, and shared fairly widely on Twitter, but turns out that PoC also
included a nasty little surprise
.
For anyone that has ran this PoC, consider your data stolen. This is what eventually runs on your host after a few stages. If you wanna analyse it, don't use a web browser or your IP will get blacklisted.
#CVE_2023_35829
#backdoor
https://t.co/gafdPfDc0r
pic.twitter.com/fUIqclSARX
— Andrei Scutariu (@xnand_)
July 4, 2023
The tweets and GitHub repositories have been yanked, but a bit of Google-fu
can find the cached repos
. (Warning, running that PoC is not a good idea.)
Bogus Breach Claim — Maybe
There’s a relatively new hacktivist group making itself a pain to the Western world recently, working under the name Anonymous Sudan. This group has made it’s name by doing Distributed Denial of Service attacks against Western targets like Microsoft. This week,
the group made claims that they had hit Microsoft with a breach
, and exfiltrated 30 million customers’ data. The only problem is that Microsoft can’t find any sign of a problem. The 100 samples of stolen data that were released with the announcement seem to be from an old incident, so we’re rating this one “probably bogus”.
WordPress Plugin: Ultimate Member
On the other hand, the
attack against WordPress installs using the Ultimate Member plugin
seems to be very real. The vulnerability involves setting a user’s
wp_capabilities
value to jump to administrator privileges. That was accomplished by side-stepping security code through the use of
wp_capabiliti\\es
,
wp_caPabilitiEs
, and a few other creative bypasses.
With version 2.6.7 of the plugin
, a whitelist of those allowed keys has been added, finally putting the issue to rest.
ServiceNow
Researcher [R3zk0n] has found
a series of issues in the ServiceNow platform
that could lead to Admin access. This cloud system provides IT software as a service, and is used widely worldwide. The issue allows any standard user account to become an administrator. The PoC is published, and a ServiceNow update is available. While it is a welcome relief that this attack requires a valid user account, it still ranks a CVSS of 9.9, and may prove to be quite a problem.
Bits and Bytes
We do have an interesting problem
in the Linux Kernel, nicknamed StackRot
. It’s a very broad privilege escalation, introduced in kernel 6.1 with the addition of the Maple Tree memory structure. This vulnerability actually ended up
provoking Linus Torvalds to sling some C code himself
to fix it. The fix is in versions 6.1.37, 6.3.11, 6.4.1, and the in-process 6.5 code.
PortSwigger is
back with a guide to GraphQL
. Turns out that there are some common ways to find GraphQL endpoints, and potentially quite a bit of information that can be gathered from looking at what’s available at that endpoint.
Similarly, HAKAI Offensive Security has
a primer on finding Nginx traversal flaws
. The most common one seems to be a location configuration that lacks the final slash on a path, opening up the server to path traversal and other fun tricks. Go forth and learn! And hack responsibly. | 3 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660133",
"author": "70sjukebox",
"timestamp": "2023-07-07T22:23:13",
"content": "This pleases Bill and Ted",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6660135",
"author": "LordNothing",
"timestamp": "2023-07-07T22:27:43",
"cont... | 1,760,372,243.424556 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/07/improved-hydrogen-fuel-cells-are-groovy/ | Improved Hydrogen Fuel Cells Are Groovy | Al Williams | [
"Science",
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"fuel cell",
"hydrogen fuel cell"
] | According to [Charles Q. Choi], a new study indicates that
grooves in the hydrogen fuel cells
used to power vehicles can improve their performance by up to 50%. Fuel cells are like batteries because they use chemical reactions to create electricity. Where they are different is that a battery reacts a certain amount of material, and then it is done unless you recharge it somehow. A fuel cell will use as much fuel as you give it. That allows it to continue creating electricity until the fuel runs out.
Common hydrogen fuel cells use a proton exchange membrane — a polymer membrane that conducts protons to separate the fuel and the oxidizer. You can think of it as an electrolyte. Common fuel cells use an electrode design that hasn’t changed in decades. The
new research
has catalyst ridges separated by empty grooves. This enhances oxygen flow and proton transport.
Conventional electrodes use an ion-conducting polymer and a platinum catalyst. Adding more polymer improves proton transport but inhibits oxygen flow. The grooved design allows for dense polymer on the ridges but allows oxygen to flow in the grooves. In technical terms, the proton transport resistance goes down, and there is little change in the oxygen transport resistance.
The grooves are between one and two nanometers wide, so don’t pull out your CNC mill. The researchers admit they had the idea for this some time ago, but it has taken several years to figure out how to fabricate the special electrodes. | 13 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659966",
"author": "homie NJ",
"timestamp": "2023-07-07T11:11:01",
"content": "I’ve seen that kind of nano-structures on Xiaomi self-disinfecting toilet seats. Apparently theyre quite efficient, better than using domestos.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
... | 1,760,372,243.382576 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/07/creating-a-joule-thomson-cryocooler-and-a-little-bit-of-history-at-home/ | Creating A Joule-Thomson Cryocooler And A Little Bit Of History At Home | Maya Posch | [
"Science"
] | [
"cryocooler",
"Joule-Thomson"
] | The fun part about crycoolers is that there are so many different and exciting ways to make stuff cold, based on a wide variety of physics. This is why after first exploring the Stirling/GM cycle and vapor-compression to create a cryocooler that he could liquefy nitrogen with, [Hyperspace Pirate] is
exploring a Joule-Thomson cooler
, which is also misspelled as ‘Joule-Thompson’ by those who don’t mind take some liberties with history. Either way, the advantage of the adiabatic
Joule-Thomson effect
is that it is significantly simpler than the other methods — having been invented in the 19th century and used for the earliest forms of refrigeration.
This is what peak Joule-Thomson prototype cooler performance looks like.
The big difference between it and other technologies is that
the effect is based on throttling the flow of a gas
as it seeks to expand, within specific temperature and pressure ranges to ensure that the temperature change effect is positive (i.e. the temperature of the gas decreases). The net result is that of a cooling effect, which as demonstrated in the video can be used with successive stages involving different gases, or a gas mixture, to reach a low enough temperature at which nitrogen (contained in the same gas mixture) liquefies and can be collected.
Although not a very efficient process, if your local electricity costs allow it, running the compressor in a closed loop version isn’t that expensive and worth it for the science alone. Naturally, as with any experimental setup involving a range of gases, a compressor and other components, getting it to run perfectly on the first try is basically impossible, which is why this is so far Part 1 of another series on cryocoolers at home (or in the garage).
If you’re interested in the previous work [Hyperspace Pirate] has done with DIY cyrocoolers,
take a look at our coverage from earlier this year
. | 11 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659943",
"author": "M",
"timestamp": "2023-07-07T08:53:49",
"content": "Corrections:“create a cryocooler that could liquefy nitrogen with” -> “create a cryocooler with which to liquefy nitrogen”, or if you want to continue to have an informal tone, “create a cryocooler to liquefy n... | 1,760,372,243.526336 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/06/no-moving-parts-lidar/ | No Moving Parts LiDAR | Al Williams | [
"Laser Hacks"
] | [
"laser",
"lidar",
"surface acoustic wave"
] | Self-driving cars often use LiDAR — think of it as radar using light beams. One limitation of existing systems is they need some method of scanning the light source around, and that means moving parts. Researchers at the University of Washington have created a laser on a chip that uses acoustic waves to bend the laser, avoiding physically moving parts. The
paper
is behind a paywall, but the University has a
summary poster
, and you can also find an overview over on [
Geekwire
].
The resulting IC uses surface acoustic waves and can image objects more than 100 feet away. We would imagine this could be helpful for other applications like 3D scanning, too. The system weighs less than a conventional setup, too, so that would be valuable in drones and similar applications.
The high-frequency acoustic pulses create phonons that deflect the photons in the laser beam. By varying the frequency of the pulses, the beam will sweep over a 20-degree field of view. The phonons are similar to a diffraction grating. They not only alter the direction of the beam but also change its wavelength.
This effect simplifies the receiver setup. When laser energy returns to the receiver, the measured wavelength informs the receiver of the angle corresponding to the transmitted beam. To be practical, the system needs to have a greater range, and this is due to the system’s poor efficiency of about 5%. To reach 300 meters — a number making it practical for autonomous cars — will require 50% efficiency, something the team thinks they’ll achieve soon.
LiDAR is one way for you to measure
your drone’s altitude
. It is also crucial for your next
knife-throwing machine
. | 29 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659918",
"author": "apl",
"timestamp": "2023-07-07T06:49:23",
"content": "+",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6659921",
"author": "C",
"timestamp": "2023-07-07T07:21:26",
"content": "I love compliant technology. It’s ... | 1,760,372,243.274229 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/06/inexpensive-ham-radio-gets-upgrades-thanks-to-a-trojan/ | Inexpensive Ham Radio Gets Upgrades Thanks To A Trojan | Dan Maloney | [
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"amateur radio",
"firmware",
"ham",
"handy talkie",
"Quansheng",
"RSSI",
"S-meter",
"trojan",
"uv k5"
] | Love them or hate them, the crop of cheap hand-held amateur radio transceivers is here to stay. They’re generally horrible radios, often smearing spurious emissions across the spectrum, but they’re cheap enough to throw in a glove box for emergencies, and they invite experimentation — for instance,
modifying the firmware
to add functionality the OEM didn’t think to offer.
The new hotness in this class of radios is the Quansheng UV-K5, a two-band transceiver you can pick up for about $40, and we suspect it’ll get hotter still with this firmware trojan by [Piotr (SQ9P)]. We’ve already seen
a firmware hack for these radios
, one that aimed at unlocking the full frequency range of the RF chip at the heart of the radio. Honestly, we’re not huge fans of these mods, which potentially interfere with other allocations across multiple bands. But [Piotr]’s hacks seem a bit more innocuous, focusing mainly on modifying the radio’s display and adding useful features, such as a calibrated received signal strength bar graph and a numerical RSSI display. The really neat new feature, though, is the spectrum display, which shows activity across a 2-MHz slice of spectrum centered on the currently set frequency. And just because he could, [Piotr] put in a game of
Pong
.
[Piotr]’s description of the mod as a trojan seems apt since his new programs run in parallel to the OEM firmware by wrapping its vector table. We’d imagine other mods are possible, and we’re keen to see what people come up with for these hackable little units. Just make sure you’re staying within the law, especially in the United States —
the FCC does not play games (third item)
. | 21 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659882",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Known As Ren",
"timestamp": "2023-07-07T02:36:29",
"content": "Now to install DOOM!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6659983",
"author": "RBMK",
"timestamp": "2023-07-... | 1,760,372,243.587333 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/06/better-noise-reduction-with-science/ | Better Noise Reduction With Science | Al Williams | [
"Science"
] | [
"electrostatic loudspeaker",
"noise cancellation"
] | Most noise-blocking headphones fall into two categories: they use some kind of material to absorb or scatter noise, or they use active cancellation that creates a signal to oppose the noise signal. As you’ve probably noticed, both of these approaches have limitations. Now, Swiss scientists think they have a new method that will work better. In Nature Communications, they
describe a noise cancellation system
that moves air by using ionization instead of a conventional transducer.
With the cool name plasmaacoustic metalayers, the technique uses a controlled corona discharge to create very thin layers of plasma between a metal grid and thin wires. With no voltage, sound passes freely. Applying a voltage across the assembly produces ions and moves air with very low inertia, unlike a typical speaker. By controlling the reverse pressure of air, the system can cancel incoming noise picked up by a microphone.
Ultimately, this turns out to be like active noise cancellation with a better transducer than the typical speaker. While it isn’t exactly the same, it did remind us somewhat of how electrostatic headphones work.
Will we see better headphones from this work? Too early to tell. But it is an interesting way to create a speaker-like transducer, and it may even have uses other than noise cancellation. If you build anything using this technique, be sure to let us know about it.
Amazon wants to make your
noise canceling keyword sensitive
. But you can always go cheap and just block
outside noise as best you can
. | 18 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659843",
"author": "DV Henkel-Wallace",
"timestamp": "2023-07-06T23:31:37",
"content": "You had me at “plasmaacoustic metalayers”.I a, sure I will use this regardless of whether it is better or not, just so I can say “plasmaacoustic metalayers”",
"parent_id": null,
"depth":... | 1,760,372,243.332501 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/06/adding-portals-to-quake/ | Adding Portals To Quake | Matthew Carlson | [
"Games",
"Retrocomputing",
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"graphics",
"portals",
"quake",
"rendering",
"software rendering"
] | For those who have played Quake extensively, adding portals seems unnecessary, as teleporters are already a core part of the game mechanics. What [Matthew Earl] accomplishes is more of the
Portal
style of portal by
rendering what is on the other side of the portal with a seamless teleportation transition
.
Of course, Quake is an old game with a software renderer. Just throwing another camera into the scene, rendering to another texture, and then mapping that texture to the scene isn’t an option. Quake uses an edge rasterizer and generates spans along scanlines that track where edges intersect the current scanline. Rather than making expensive per-pixel comparisons, [Matt] stashes the portal spans and renders them in a second render, so even with multiple portals, only a single screen’s worth of pixels are rendered.
However, this technique has no near clipping plane, which means objects can appear in the portal that don’t make any sense as they are in front of the portal’s viewpoint. Luckily, Quake has an ingenious method for polygon occlusion: the BSP. While [Matt] is manually checking polygons, the BSP is the perfect tool for bisecting a room along a plane. It’s an incredible hack, and we’re excited to see Quake expand into a puzzle game. [Matt] dives into greater detail on how the software renderer works in
another video
that’s well worth a watch.
Perhaps the most incredible aspect of this technique is that it could run on original hardware. If you want to bring a little more Quake to life, why not get
the Quake light flicker in your house
? Video after the break. | 14 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659790",
"author": "dtjo55",
"timestamp": "2023-07-06T20:12:04",
"content": "So… it’s replicating what GoldSrc engine had since 1998. There’s a reason why Valve is one of the biggest gaming companies and ID faded into obscurity eh?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"repl... | 1,760,372,243.474909 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/06/growing-simple-crystals-for-non-linear-optics-experiments/ | Growing Simple Crystals For Non-Linear Optics Experiments | Dan Maloney | [
"Laser Hacks"
] | [
"CHG",
"crystal",
"KDP",
"laser",
"NLO",
"non-linear optics",
"potassium dihydrogen phosphate",
"second-harmonics generation"
] | Here’s an exercise for you: type “crystals” into your favorite search engine and see what you get. If you’re anything like us, you’ll get a bunch of pseudoscientific posts about the healing power of crystals, along with offers to buy the same at exorbitant prices. But woo-woo aside, certain crystals do have seemingly magical powers — like
the ability to turn light from one color into another
.
None of this is magic, of course. Rather, as optics aficionado [Les Wright] explains, non-linear optics is all about physics. Big physics, too, like the kind that made the National Ignition Facility
the first fusion research outfit to reach the “break-even” point
, at least in terms of optical energy. To do so, they need to convert megajoules of infrared laser beams all the way across the visible spectrum into the ultraviolet, relying on huge crystals of deuterated potassium dihydrogen phosphate (KDP) to do so. Depending on how they’re cut, crystals of these sorts have non-linear optical properties like second-harmonic generation, which combines two input photons into a single output photon with twice the energy of the original. This results in a halving of the wavelength of the input, which doubles the frequency.
While the process used at the NIF produces crystals of enormous proportions, [Les] has more modest needs and thus a simpler process. His KDP is an off-the-shelf chemical, nothing fancy about it, which is added to boiling water to make a saturated solution. A little of the solution is poured out into a watch glass to make seed crystals, and everything is allowed to cool slowly. A nice seed crystal is glued to a piece of monofilament fishing line and suspended in the saturated solution, and with enough time a good-sized crystal forms. Placed into the beam path of a 1,064 nm IR laser and rotated carefully relative to the beam, the crystal easily produces a brilliant green laser output.
This is fascinating stuff, and we’re looking forward to seeing where [Les] goes with this. Polishing the crystals to make them optically cleaner would be a good next step, as would perhaps growing even larger crystals. | 18 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659769",
"author": "smellsofbikes",
"timestamp": "2023-07-06T18:59:54",
"content": "Wow, this is cool. I’ve worked with commercial nonlinear optics crystals and never thought you could DIY them. What a cool thing! For what it’s worth, the majority of cheap green laser pointers a... | 1,760,372,243.8092 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/06/iter-dreams-and-the-practical-reality-of-making-nuclear-fusion-work-on-earth/ | ITER Dreams And The Practical Reality Of Making Nuclear Fusion Work On Earth | Maya Posch | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Rants",
"Science",
"Slider"
] | [
"ITER",
"nuclear fusion"
] | Doing something for the first time is tough. Yet to replicate the nuclear fusion process that powers the very stars, and do it right here on Earth in a controlled and sustained fashion is decidedly at the top of the list of ‘tough’ first times. What further complicates matters is when in order to even get to this ‘first’ you also add in a massive, international construction project and a heaping of geopolitics, all of which is a far cry from past nuclear fusion experiments.
With the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) as the most visible part of nuclear fusion research, it is perhaps little wonder that the recent string of delays and budget increases is leading some to proclaim doom and gloom over the entire sector. This ironically in contrast with the recent news from the US’s NIF and its laser-based inertial confinement fusion, which is both state-funded and will
never produce commercial power
.
In light of this, it feels pertinent to ask the question of whether ITER is the proverbial white elephant, or even the mausoleum of international science that a
recent article
in
Scientific American
makes it out to be. Is fusion research truly doomed to peter out amidst the seemingly never-ending work on ITER?
History Sometimes Rhymes
Drawing of the Chicago Pile-1 graphite-moderated fission reactor.
What sometimes trips people up is that although both nuclear fission and nuclear fusion pertain to energy obtained from interactions between atoms, only one of these is exceedingly easy to make happen. All that it takes for nuclear fission to occur is for enough fissile material (such as uranium-235) to exist in the same general location, and enough neutrons to zip about that allow for a nuclear chain reaction to begin and sustain itself. This is why
natural nuclear fission reactors
existed during the formative years of the Earth, when amounts of fissile material in the Earth’s crust was still relatively high.
It is little wonder then that replicating this process during the 1940s in graphite pile reactors was a relatively straightforward process: the graphite moderates the emitted neutrons, which are thus slowed down into thermal neutrons which cause more fission events, which produce more neutrons, which are moderated, etc. Although this obviously took some engineering to get all the details right, the first artificial nuclear fission reactor became a fact on December 2nd, 1942 when
Chicago Pile-1
(CP1) sustained a nuclear chain reaction.
Although CP1 had no cooling, shielding or other amenities, CP2 and derived reactors were already usable as crude predecessors to the commercial power reactors that would form the backbone of the nuclear fleet build-outs in countries like Canada, the US, France and Japan during the 1970s, most of which reactors are still operating and producing power today. With this success in mind, one might be forgiven for being optimistic about the chances of also tackling nuclear fusion.
The UK ZETA Z-pinch fusion reactor in 1958.
During the 1950s, the UK had become one of the leading forces behind nuclear fusion plants, with the research up till that point indicating that the
Z-pinch
(zeta pinch) method of containing deuterium-tritium plasma within a magnetic field was all that would be needed to create a commercial fusion power plant. Unfortunately, it was discovered that in the larger prototype Z-pinch reactors the plasma was not as well-behaved as originally assumed. Instead plasma instabilities would occur seemingly randomly within the reactor, which led to the near-demise of fusion research, until the invention of the tokamak
breathed new life into the field
.
These first tokamak designs with their donut-shaped field proved to be significantly more capable of dealing with the whims of the highly dynamic and very hot plasma as it churned within the confinement of the field lines. Ultimately, the demise of commercial Z-pinch-based fusion reactors proved to be not the end of the dream of commercial fusion, but rather the beginning of a much better understanding of plasma physics.
Many Eggs, Many Baskets
Of the things which have changed significantly over the past seventy-odd years, advances in computer technologies and materials science have allowed us to create reactor vessels and magnets that would have been deemed near-magical in those early days. In addition, using supercomputers we can simulate plasma fields in great detail, simulations which are continuously improved by experimental data obtained from the many active fusion research reactors around the world.
A schematic view of the Wendelstein 7-X magnets.
Perhaps most fascinating of these reactors are the stellerators, which are not a new concept, but which require a level of understanding of plasma field dynamics that was beyond the grasp of our understanding and simulation tools until a few decades ago. Since then, this type of fusion reactor has rapidly caught up on tokamak designs, with the
Wendelstein 7-X
being the most well-known. Using its oddly shaped electromagnets, it creates a magnetic field that doesn’t just trap and constrain the plasma as in a tokamak, but instead seeks to ‘flow’ with the plasma. Theoretically this will increase efficiency, and allow for continuous operation to demonstrate the feasibility of stellerators for use in commercial power plants. This particular stellerator has most recently been updated to its final configuration with cooled diverters, which should allow it to demonstrate a continuous run with hot plasma for up to half an hour.
Meanwhile, a mixture of both state-financed and private fusion reactors are vying for the spotlight, with the UK’s JET tokamak and
ST40 spherical tokamak
getting headlines, and the private Commonwealth company putting decades of US national laboratory fusion research to good use in its innovative
ARC and SPARC reactor
designs that employ high-temperature, superconducting electromagnets. Of the remaining research reactors, the Chinese fusion program is probably
the most ambitious
, using their medium-size
HL-2M
tokamak in particular to not only provide experimental validation for ITER’s design, but also for the China Fusion Engineering Test Reactor (
CFETR
).
China’s HL-2M tokamak at Southwestern Institute of Physics (SWIP).
Whereas the HL-2M tokamak has a major radius of a mere 1.78 m, the CFETR as it is currently scheduled to be constructed this decade will feature a major radius of 7.2 m, which would make it larger than ITER at 6.2 m. Essentially,
CFETR will fall between
ITER and its intended
DEMO
successor, allowing it to validate DEMO principles, such as breeding tritium fuel from a lithium blanket inside the reactor vessel to sustain continuous operation.
Interestingly enough, according to the current schedule, the CFETR should begin operation around the same time that ITER is projected to begin fusion with deuterium-tritium fuel, around 2035. Despite the experimental nature of CFETR, China is looking at using the approximately 2 GW of thermal energy for electricity production,
with molten salt as buffer
. As these early fusion reactors are likely to need frequent breaks to cool down and for maintenance, having an intermediate buffer might already make fusion reactors viable power plants by next century.
Engineering Chops
As an international undertaking, ITER relies on the nations involved in its construction to provide the components for the tokamak, which appears to cause issues that mirror the troubles that plagued
Boeing’s 787
airliner, with many subcontractors around the world being provided with incomplete specifications, along with quality assurance troubles. Whether it concerns an airplane or fusion reactor, smaller issues can quickly snowball into worse issues, especially when they’re not tackled early on. Add to this the massively disrupted supply chains in 2020 and beyond due to the pandemic, and it would have been more amazing if things had continued without delay.
A 2016 drawing of the different sections of the ITER fusion reactor which is currently being constructed.
Although the experimental validation for aspects of ITER’s design continues using existing tokamaks, the actual assembly of the physical reactor has to be performed by skilled workers, who are provided with quality components, materials, and tooling. Reportedly, this is where ITER does have some major issues, with defective components arriving at the build site, and some workers claiming qualifications that they do not have. These are unfortunate project management aspects that are not exclusive to the construction of fusion plants.
In essence, then, it could be said that the ITER project has major issues that need to be addressed. Yet to mark ITER as somehow a monument to the folly of pursuing nuclear fusion power, or the final resting place of international scientific cooperation would be an offensively poor hot take on the state of the field. After all, the collective fields of plasma physics, fusion research and adjacent are cooperating every day for many decades now towards the singular goal of achieving sustainable nuclear fusion.
To then characterize ITER – with its roots in 1970s geopolitics – as somehow the end-all, be-all of fusion research is nothing if not dishonest. Whether or not ITER is ultimately finished next century and starts operating is more a question of sunk cost, but it is far from being humanity’s sole hope of unlocking fusion power, let alone the linchpin for international cooperation on the topic. Ideally the current issues with ITER will be resolved sooner rather than later, but it should not reflect on the field as a whole.
After all, ITER is just part of the puzzle, with private companies around the world investing in their own designs, multiple designs by nations like China with a
strong nuclear industry
courtesy of its ongoing fission plant build-out, and even Germany with its so far incredibly successful Wendelstein 7-X stellerator. All of whom are whittling down the last remaining issues towards making commercial fusion plants a reality.
(Heading image: Aerial view of the ITER site in 2020. (Credit:
Macskelek
) ) | 52 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659735",
"author": "Truth",
"timestamp": "2023-07-06T17:24:03",
"content": "How much energy is lost due to bremsstrahlung, or braking radiation, as the charged particles rotate. I would imagine that it is a lot.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
... | 1,760,372,244.070375 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/06/its-a-humble-scope-but-it-changed-our-world/ | It’s A Humble ‘Scope, But It Changed Our World | Jenny List | [
"History",
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"Al Alcorn",
"Apple 2",
"pong",
"Steve Wozniak",
"Tektronix 465"
] | A few years ago on a long flight across the North Atlantic, the perfect choice for a good read was
iWoz
, the autobiographical account of [Steve Wozniak]’s life. In it, he described his work replicating the wildly successful
Pong
video game and then that of designing the 8-bit Apple computers. A memorable passage involves his development of the Apple II’s color generation circuitry, which exploited some of the artifacts of the NTSC color system to produce a color display in a far simpler manner than might be expected. Now anyone seeking a connection with both
Pong
and the Apple II can have one of their very own if they have enough money because
[Al Alcorn]’s Tektronix 465 oscilloscope is for sale
. He’s the designer of the original
Pong
and used the instrument in its genesis, and then a few years later, he lent it to [Woz] for his work on the Apple II.
This may be the first time Hackaday has featured something from the catalogue of a rare book specialist, but if we’re being honest, for $135,000, it’s a little beyond the reach of a Hackaday scribe.
The Tek 465
was a 100 MHz dual-trace model manufactured from 1972 to the early 1980s and, in its day, would have been a very desirable instrument indeed. This one is in pretty good condition with accompanying leads and manual and comes with a letter of authenticity and a hand-written annotation from [Al] himself on its underside. It can be seen up close in the video below the break.
As a ‘scope it’s an instrument many of us would still find useful today, but as the instrument which set in motion not one but two of the seminal moments of our craft, its historical importance can’t be overstated. We hope it will find its way into a museum or similar place where the story of those two developments can be told and that [Al] profits handsomely from its sale. | 45 | 26 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659702",
"author": "philosiraptor117",
"timestamp": "2023-07-06T15:44:54",
"content": "hey i have the same scope! paid 50 bucks for it!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6659711",
"author": "Jan Praegert",
"time... | 1,760,372,244.272404 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/06/miners-vs-nasa-its-a-nevada-showdown/ | Miners Vs NASA: It’s A Nevada Showdown | Lewin Day | [
"Current Events",
"Featured",
"Original Art",
"Science"
] | [
"lithium",
"nasa",
"satellite",
"science",
"space"
] | Mining projects are approved or disapproved based on all kinds of reasons. There are economic concerns, logistical matters, and environmental considerations to be made. Mining operations can be highly polluting, or they can have outsized effects on a given area by sheer virtue of the material they remove or the byproducts they leave behind.
For a proposed lithium mining operation north of Las Vegas, though, an altogether stranger objection has arisen. NASA has been using the plot of land as a calibration tool,
and it doesn’t want any upstart miners messing with its work.
I Like It, I’m Not Gonna Crack
NASA prizes the undisturbed surface for its value as a calibration tool for its satellites. Miners want to get at the rich deposits of lithium to sell on the open market. Credit:
USGS
Mining for lithium has long been a point of contention between environmentalists, local tribal leaders, and mining companies in Nevada. As companies and governments desperately scramble to secure vital raw materials for batteries, yet another challenge has arisen in the state. NASA has called dibs on a stretch of Nevada desert that is also one of the biggest lithium hotspots in the world, causing a face-off of legislative proportions.
This fight is over a 36 square-mile patch of eastern Nevada terrain in Railroad Valley. The dry lakebed is notable for its tabletop flatness and undisturbed surface. The land sits atop a massive lithium deposit which could support a great deal of battery manufacturing to help in the fight against climate change. The valley contains an evaporated deposit of minerals in both liquid and solid form. Its size makes it attractive to both miners and NASA alike. It’s believed to be one of the ten largest lithium deposits in the world,
with a vein of salt deposits 600 meters thick.
NASA, however, argues that this land’s unique characteristics make it an indispensable tool for calibrating the precise measurements of hundreds of satellites that circle our planet. For nearly three decades, this untouched, lengthy stretch of Nevada’s Railroad Valley has been a key site for keeping the data of hundreds of satellites spot-on, by acting as a stable calibration source. These satellites are integral to everything from weather forecasting, agricultural outlooks, and natural disaster responses to national security. The irony of it all? The same instruments being used to monitor climate change are squaring off with the mining of an element critical for cleaner, greener energy.
For scientists, for whom absolute precision is paramount, the uninterrupted topography of this Nevada desert has served as a vital constant, helping scientists assure “absolute radiometric calibration” of sensors aboard satellites.
For this reason, 23,000 acres in the area was withdrawn from any potential public and private use at NASA’s request, coming into effect from
April 27 this year.
The area has been in use by the agency since 1993 as a calibration source. Earth science instruments on NASA’s Aqua, Terra, and Landsat satellites rely on taking measurements of the area, along with a variety of other missions. The large flat area is free of vegetation and of a consistent color, making it an ideal calibration source for satellite instruments. It’s particularly crucial for space-based radar calibrations that feed into satellite geodesy efforts.
Disturbances to this land, NASA argues, could pose a severe threat to the quality of data that a plethora of economic sectors rely on. “Activities that stand to disrupt the surface integrity of Railroad Valley would risk making the site unusable,” said Jeremy Eggers, a spokesman for NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.
A view of Railroad Valley from Troy Peak. Credit:
G. Thomas
, public domain
However, these reasons don’t sit well with everyone. The U.S. Bureau of Land Management’s decision to withdraw the tract from potential mining use has caused an uproar among those who believe that lithium extraction should take precedence. Notable among these critics is
Congressman Mark Amodei
, who has introduced legislation aimed at revoking the withdrawal decision. The representative has called out the decision for frustrating efforts to tackle climate change, an avowed goal of the current federal government.
The primary holder of the mining claims in this disputed tract, 3 Proton Lithium Inc., has also voiced concerns. The company claims that its extraction process won’t disturb the surface of the land significantly. The method involves pumping brine-based lithium from underground resources. However, NASA remains skeptical of these claims, and first submitted its withdrawal request in 2019, before the company had submitted any formal plans for the project.
The Bureau of Land Management finds itself in the middle of a modern-day paradox. On one hand, there’s a pressing need to reduce greenhouse gases and transition to cleaner sources of energy, and lithium plays a critical role in this regard. On the other hand, satellites need the area to calibrate their precise measurements to continue accurately monitoring our planet and its warming atmosphere.
The battle between lithium mining and satellite calibration isn’t just a simple toss-up between two worthy goals. Rather, it speaks to the broader challenge of managing our planet’s resources in an era of increasing technological advancement and environmental concerns. It’s a difficult balancing act.
Realistically, though, there are other places for miners to find lithium. In contrast, NASA and the Bureau of Land Management have noted that there isn’t a single other region of the United States suitable for making their calibrations. Even if there were, it would make sense to stick with what already works. This would ensure the most reliable scientific data is available going forward.
For now, the decision to protect the Railroad Valley in Nevada stands. This emphasizes the importance of reliable, scientific data that not only underpins multiple sectors of our economy, but gives us the vital knowledge we need about the Earth’s changing climate.
In the meantime, the world watches on as business and political interests wrangle with the national space agency in a fight between science and profits. Who knew a desert in Nevada could become such a hotbed of debate? | 74 | 16 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659684",
"author": "Truth",
"timestamp": "2023-07-06T14:36:48",
"content": "The mining company should buy a 36 square-mile patch of land make it mirror smooth and cover it in a one inch layer of whatever would provide the best calibration target for NASA satellites – Job done.",
... | 1,760,372,244.192395 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/06/this-block-of-rubber-can-count-to-ten/ | This Block Of Rubber Can Count To Ten | Donald Papp | [
"Science"
] | [
"counter",
"flexure",
"mechanical",
"Metamaterial"
] | Complex behaviors can arise from simple mechanics, and that’s demonstrated by
a block of rubber that acts as a counter
.
The block contains beams, and by controlling how the block is compressed, the vertical beams shift in a stable and consistent way, acting as a mechanical counter. It’s a straightforward implementation of the work of two physicists from the Netherlands: [Martin van Hecke] and [Lennard Kwakernaak].
This device brings flexures to mind, which are also examples of obtaining complex and useful behavior from seemingly simple objects. We’ve seen
flexures used as latches and counters
, and we’ve seen
3D printed flexures as a kind of linear actuator
.
You can check out the
research paper
for more details on the rubber beam counter. [Kwakernaak] aims to create a much more complex structure with elements that interact across a plane instead of in a single direction. Such a device would, in effect, be a simple computer.
Watch the beam counter in action in the short video embedded below. See how the elements of the green rubber block move while constrained by an outer frame that helps control the force that is applied. The thin beams flip from left to right, one at a time with each press. | 19 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659661",
"author": "A",
"timestamp": "2023-07-06T11:50:35",
"content": "“Such a device would, in effect, be a simple computer.” Finally a computer you can literally punch information into!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6659... | 1,760,372,243.967627 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/06/tentacle-robot-is-like-an-elephant-trunk/ | Tentacle Robot Is Like An Elephant Trunk | Al Williams | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"soft robot",
"tentacle"
] | It sounds like bad science fiction or anime, but researchers are creating
helical-artificial fibrous muscle structured tubular soft actuators
. What? Oh, tentacle robot arms. Got it.
The researchers at Westlake University in China found inspiration in elephant trunks. Elephant trunks are entirely devoid of bone but use a tubular muscle structure. By deforming certain muscles, complex motion is possible. After understanding how they work, it was just a matter of making a similar structure from artificial muscle fibers.
The resulting actuator uses smart materials and has eleven different morphing modes — more than other attempts to build similar structures. The fabrication sounds difficult, it involves stretching chemically reactive materials over a form with specific winding angles.
The fibers react to light. Depending on the configuration, the stalk can seek light or avoid light. We were hoping the “Materials and Methods” section would give some ideas of how to do this ourselves, but it looks like you’d need some uncommon liquid crystal materials, and you’d also have to work out some of the details.
Animatronic tentacles are usually
complex cable affairs
. However, we have seen some
soft robots
in the past, too. | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659634",
"author": "Joshua",
"timestamp": "2023-07-06T08:56:36",
"content": "Oh! I know this! It’s a.. Video game character?! 😕I’ve seen such a thing in the 90s.The game character in “WormWorld” looked the same.That was a Windows 3.1 game.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jSo5dz1cS... | 1,760,372,244.350845 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/05/system-essentially-contradicting-american-methods/ | System Essentially Contradicting American Methods | Jenny List | [
"Tech Hacks"
] | [
"composite video",
"ntsc",
"pal",
"SECAM",
"tv",
"video"
] | Today, acronyms such as PAL and initialisms such as NTSC are used as a lazy shorthand for 625 and 525-line video signals, but back in the days of analogue TV broadcasting they were much more than that, indeed much more than simply colour encoding schemes. They became political statements of technological prowess as nations vied with each other to demonstrate that they could provide their citizens with something essentially home-grown. In France, there was the daddy of all televisual symbols of national pride, as their SECAM system was like nothing else. [Matt’s TV Barn]
took a deep dive into video standards to find out about it
with an impressive rack of test pattern generation equipment.
At its simplest, a video signal consists of the black-and-while, or luminance, information to make a monochrome picture, along with a set of line and frame sync pulses. It becomes a composite video signal with the addition of a colour subcarrier at a frequency carefully selected to fall between harmonics of the line frequency and modulated in some form with the colour, or chrominance, information. In this instance, PAL is a natural progression from NTSC, having a colour subcarrier that’s amplitude modulated and with some nifty tricks using a delay line to cancel out colour shifting due to phase errors.
SECAM has the same line and frame frequency as PAL, but its colour subcarrier is frequency modulated instead of amplitude modulated. It completely avoids the NTSC and PAL phase errors by not being susceptible to them, at the cost of a more complex decoder in which the previous line’s colour information must be stored in a delay line to complete the decoding process. Any video processing equipment must also, by necessity, be more complex, something that provided the genesis of the SCART audiovisual connector standard as manufacturers opted for RGB interconnects instead. It’s even more unexpected at the transmission end, for unlike PAL or NTSC, the colour subcarrier is never absent, and to make things more French, it inverted the video modulation found in competing standards.
The video below takes us deep into the system and is well worth a watch. Meanwhile, if you fancy a further wallow in Gallic technology,
peer inside a Minitel terminal
. | 36 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659598",
"author": "Billy Bob",
"timestamp": "2023-07-06T05:37:44",
"content": "NTSC – Never The Same Colour",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6659607",
"author": "Joshua",
"timestamp": "2023-07-06T06:27:45",
... | 1,760,372,244.478854 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/05/freecad-is-simple-according-to-this-tutorial/ | FreeCAD Is Simple, According To This Tutorial | Al Williams | [
"3d Printer hacks"
] | [
"cad",
"freecad",
"parametric design"
] | Remember learning to tie your shoes or ride a bike? Like many things, that’s easy once you know how to do it, but seems impossible before you learn. [NovaSpirit] asserts that Freecad is simple, and provides a simple
walkthrough to create a part
in the video below.
If this were riding a bike, this tutorial would be akin to watching someone ride a bike to pick up tips. You’d probably still want to have someone explain details to you before you attempt it yourself.
Freecad’s constraint system can be confusing, and [NovaSpirit] deliberately sticks to very simple ways to use it. However, once you get your feet wet, you’ll want to explore more sophisticated constraints. For example, instead of just plugging in measurements for how far away things are from the center is a problem if the size of the part ever changes since you have to remember to change it everywhere. With proper constraints, you would simply adjust the size of the part, and everything would move to the proper place.
Because he sticks to simple constraints, he also doesn’t show construction geometries. However, he shows how to incorporate external geometries when working with multiple sketches.
Is this the only FreeCAD tutorial you’ll ever need? No. It might not even be the first one you should try. But it is a look over the shoulder of someone making a practical design using simple methods that are perfectly fine for most simple designs.
If you want
a longer series
, we’ve looked at a few. If you want to take a step further into parameters, we’d suggest
following up with this video
. | 44 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659552",
"author": "Severe Tire Damage",
"timestamp": "2023-07-06T02:10:26",
"content": "Simple? Ha! Lies! Don’t you believe it.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6659556",
"author": "HaHa",
"timestamp": "202... | 1,760,372,244.563581 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/05/a-tale-of-two-lamps/ | A Tale Of Two LÄMPs | Arya Voronova | [
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"desk lamp",
"pcb case",
"RGB LEDs",
"sk6812",
"spotlight",
"wireless desk lamp",
"YWW LEDs"
] | Building with LEDs is a hacker pastime like no other – what’s more, if you keep playing with LED tech out there, you’re bound to build something elegant and noteworthy. For today’s fix of beautiful LED devices, take a look at the two LÄMP creations of [Jana Marie], both LED projects building upon one another. It’s not just your regular RGB LEDs – she adds a healthy mix of white and yellow LEDs, making for colors way more natural-looking and pleasant to the eye!
The first one is
the LAEMP-Panel,
a two-PCB sandwich, combining into a spot light you can use for any purpose where some extra LED would really shine – be it photography, accent, or mood lighting. All of these LEDs are individually controlled and from the SK6812 family, half of them YYW and half RGB variation. As for the base board, the controller is an ESP32, paired to an E75 ZigBee module – this spot light is built to be part of your home’s ZigBee network. If you look at the base board’s KiCad files, you will also notice six-pin headers on five edges – and they’re there for a reason.
The sister project to this one,
the LAEMP-Prism,
is a remarkable hexagonal lamp built upon the LAEMP-Panel’s PCB base, but in a desk-friendly form-factor.
Six extra side panels
with a generous amount of circular cutouts give you a total of 291 LEDs, mix of yellow, white and RGB as before – we got to say, from the pictures we found, it looks like a gorgeous thing to have in your house!
Such is a story of building a spotlight and a desk lamp, both using the same hardware base to accomplish quite different purposes. As is [Jana-Marie]’s tradition, these two lamps are fully open-source, complete with instructions on assembling them – everything is ready for you if you’d like to build one of your own, whichever version it may be! When it comes to lamp-building projects that excel at looks, one can’t forget the two other lamps we’ve seen a few years ago – one built
with fiber optics,
and another
in the shape of the Moon. | 4 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659724",
"author": "Drone",
"timestamp": "2023-07-06T17:02:38",
"content": "Isn’t there the ESP32-H with native 802.15.4 Zigbee? Why is the Zigbee abstraction needed in the first place? There’s already WiFi on every vanilla ESP32. I’m pretty sure there are good answers for these qu... | 1,760,372,244.31308 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/05/probably-the-cheapest-lens-you-will-ever-use/ | Probably The Cheapest Lens You Will Ever Use | Jenny List | [
"digital cameras hacks"
] | [
"disposable camera",
"lens",
"plastic lens"
] | Photographic enthusiasts will invariably amass an extensive collection of lenses, and in their communities there are near-mythical and sought-after lenses that change hands for incredible prices. It’s probably the oldest photographic adage though, that the best camera in the world is the one in your hand when the scene presents itself, and probably one of the simplest cameras in the world remains the disposable film camera. Their tiny plastic lenses are not in the same league as the pricey ones, but can they be used by a more serious photographer?
[Volzo] set out to find out
.
Disposable cameras aren’t the most environmentally friendly items, and he rightly points out that a cheap compact camera can deliver the same in a more sustainable package. There’s also the point to make that the flash capacitor if it has one can deliver a nasty shock, but once past that it’s easy to remove the lens itself.
A single element lens brings with it some significant distortion, and it’s a surprise to find that the focal plane of a disposable camera is curved to take account of that. His first 3D printed mount and adapter for a Sony mirrorless compact camera uses a small aperture to reduce the distortion effects from the edge of the lens but he’s not out of tricks yet. Using a pair of the lenses back-to-back he halves the focal length but further corrects the distortion and delivers a consequent wider angle. Take a look, in the video below.
The result is a usable lens for the toy-camera look on your digital camera, and since the files can all be found at the link above it’s something you can try too. If a disposable camera comes our way, we certainly will.
This isn’t the first disposable camera lens project we’ve brought you
. | 23 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659476",
"author": "spaceminions",
"timestamp": "2023-07-05T20:26:49",
"content": "Whale, Akshuhally, The cheapest lens I will ever use is a pinhole in a piece of (opaque, e.g. aluminum) tape. Pretty neat though!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
... | 1,760,372,244.407087 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/05/a-fuse-is-just-a-fuse-right/ | A Fuse Is Just A Fuse, Right? | Al Williams | [
"Parts"
] | [
"fuse"
] | We like to think that most common electronic components are essentially commodity items. We don´t buy premium wire or resistors. You just assume these electronic components are more or less the same from anywhere unless you need some very special characteristics. What about fuses? We would assume they are all essentially the same, but [Ham Radio A2Z] says he’s
throwing away his generic fuses
after he found they didn’t work as he would expect.
Of course, name-brand fuses are tested to very specific tests, and you get to see the plots of how the fuses are supposed to melt for Bussmann fuses. Then he takes out a generic assortment of fuses he bought at a hamfest. No Bussmann fuses in that batch!
Comparing the generic fuses with some from Bussmann and Littlefuse, they all work fine to carry current. That isn’t the problem. The problem is when you feed the fuses 20 A and expect them to clear. A 5 A generic fuse carried over 20 A for a very long time, and, as you might expect, it got very hot. We kept waiting for the fuse to blow, but after three minutes, he gave up.
For comparison, a 10 A Bussmann fuse in the same conditions blew almost immediately — about 350 milliseconds. None of the generic fuses blew, and, in fact, the fuse in the video had been subjected to 20 A of over-stress several times already. It seems like it is nearly impossible to blow them at that current level despite it being four times the marked current. Not much of a bargain.
As the video points out, fuses aren’t as much to protect your equipment as much as they are to prevent fires, so don’t
forget to include them
even on simple projects. Remember the
TI 99/4A?
The power supply for that vintage computer has an odd little box in the power cable very near the plug. Why? Because they forgot to put a fuse in until the UL reminded them. | 39 | 15 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659451",
"author": "Langster1980",
"timestamp": "2023-07-05T18:50:38",
"content": "Fake fuses are very much a thing…in a previous job I used to test products for electrical safety. A considerable number of cheaply imported electrical good came with fake fuses which would never have... | 1,760,372,244.64328 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/04/the-i960-when-intel-almost-went-risc/ | The I960: When Intel Almost Went RISC | Maya Posch | [
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"ada",
"i960",
"iAPX 432"
] | The i960 KA/KB/MC/XA with the main functional blocks labeled. Click this image (or any other) for a larger version. Die image courtesy of Antoine Bercovici. Floorplan from
The 80960 microprocessor architecture
.
From the consumer space it often would appear as if Intel’s CPU making history is pretty much a straight line from the 4004 to the 8080, 8088 and straight into the era of Pentiums and Cores. Yet this could not be further from the truth, with Intel having churned through many alternate architectures. One of the more successful of these was the Intel i960, which is also the topic of
a recent article
by [Ken Shirriff].
Remarkably, the i960 as a solid RISC (Reduced Instruction Set Computer) architecture has its roots in Intel’s ill-fated extreme CISC architecture,
the iAPX 432
. As [Ken] describes in his comparison between the i960 and 432, both architectures are remarkably similar in terms of their instruction set, essentially taking what it could from the 432 project and putting it into a RISC-y shape. This meant that although the i960 could be mistaken as yet another RISC CPU, as was common in the 1980s, but integrated higher-level features as well, such as additional memory protection and inter-process communication.
Although there were four versions of the i960 sold, they all used the same die, just with some parts not connected. The high-end XA version can be regarded as a 33-bit processor due to the full architecture’s features being enabled, including the entire ISA and object model. A year after the initial i960 release, the CA version would become the world’s first superscalar processor, and as a whole the i960 processor became a popular sight in the US military, also due to the way it worked well with the US-mandated use of the Ada programming language. In a way this fulfilled many of the promises the iAPX 432 had made.
Despite the successes, ultimately the i960 was axed by Intel after it had been neglected for many years in favor of the x86 architecture, until in 2007 the production of i960 processors finally ceased.
(Heading image: The microarchitecture of the i960 XA.
FPU
is Floating Point Unit.
IEU
is Instruction Execution Unit.
MMU
is Memory Management Unit. From the
80960 datasheet
.) | 27 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659143",
"author": "Steve R",
"timestamp": "2023-07-05T02:07:46",
"content": "Ada, what a fun language. Takes strong typing to new levels.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6659190",
"author": "Jonathan Wilson",
"timestam... | 1,760,372,244.806991 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/04/quantum-computing-on-a-commodore-64-in-200-lines-of-basic/ | Quantum Computing On A Commodore 64 In 200 Lines Of BASIC | Maya Posch | [
"Retrocomputing",
"Science"
] | [
"basic",
"commodore 64",
"quantum computing"
] | The term ‘quantum computer’ gets usually tossed around in the context of hyper-advanced, state-of-the-art computing devices. But much as how a 19th century mechanical computer, a discrete computer created from individual transistors, and a human being are all computers, the important quantifier is how fast and accurate the system is at the task. This is demonstrated succinctly by [Davide ‘dakk’ Gessa] with
200 lines of BASIC code on a Commodore 64
(
GitHub
), implementing a range of quantum gates.
Much like a transistor in classical computing, the qubit forms the core of quantum computing, and we have known for a long time that a qubit can be simulated, even on something as mundane as an 8-bit MPU. Ergo [Davide]’s simulations of various
quantum gates
on a C64, ranging from Pauli-X, Pauli-Y, Pauli-Z, Hadamard, CNOT and SWAP, all using a two-qubit system running on a system that first saw the light of day in the early 1980s.
Naturally, the practical use of simulating a two-qubit system on a general-purpose MPU running at a blistering ~1 MHz is quite limited, but as a teaching tool it’s incredibly accessible and a fun way to introduce people to the world of quantum computing. | 17 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6659060",
"author": "Tracy",
"timestamp": "2023-07-04T23:26:38",
"content": "Line 103 should use a GOSUB instruction and not the GOTO instruction.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6659100",
"author": "fluffy",
"... | 1,760,372,244.862664 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/04/3d-audio-imaging-with-a-phased-array-microphone/ | 3D Audio Imaging With A Phased Array Microphone | Jonathan Bennett | [
"Artificial Intelligence"
] | [
"beamforming",
"fpga",
"microphone array"
] | Remember the scene from Blade Runner, where Deckard puts a photograph into a Photo Inspector? The virtual camera can pan and move around the captured scene, pulling out impossible details. It seems that
[Ben Wang] discovered how to make that particular trick a reality, but with audio
instead of video. The secret sauce isn’t a sophisticated microphone, but a whole bunch of really simple ones. In this case, it’s 192 of them, arranged on long PCBs working as the spokes of a wall-art wheel. Quite the conversation piece.
You might imagine that capturing the data from 192 microphones all at once is a challenge in itself, and that seems to be an accurate assessment. The first data capture problem was due to the odd PCBs pushing the manufacturing process to its limits. About half of the spokes were dead on arrival, with the individual mics having a tendency to short the shared clock line to either ground or the power supply line. Then to pull all that data in, a
Colorlight
is used as a general purpose FPGA with a convenient form factor. This former pixel controller can be used for a wide variety of projects, thanks to an Open Sourced reverse engineering effort, and is even supported by
the Project Trellis toolchain
, which was used for this effort, too.
Packetizing all those microphones into UDP packets winds up pushing a whopping 715 Mbps, which manages to fit nicely on a Gigabit Ethernet connection. That data is fed into a GPU Kernel written with
Triton, an Open Source alternative to CUDA
. This performs one of two beamforming operations. Near-field beamforming divides the space directly in front of the microphone array into a 64x64x64 grid of 5cm voxels, and can locate a sound source in that 3d space. Alternatively, the system can run a far-field beamform, and locate a sound source in a 2d direction, on a 512×512 grid.
As part of the calibration, the speed of sound is also a parameter which is optimized to obtain the best model of the system, which allows this whole procedure to act as a ridiculously overengineered thermometer.
The most impressive trick is to run the process the other way, and isolate the incoming audio coming from a specific direction. The demo here was to play static fro one source, and music from a second, nearby source. When listening from only one microphone, the result is a garbled mess. But applying the beamforming algorithm does an impressive job of isolating the directional audio.
Click through to hear the results
.
And if that’s not enough, check out the details of
another similar microphone array project
. | 28 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658923",
"author": "CRJEEA",
"timestamp": "2023-07-04T20:27:19",
"content": "So taking say 50 samples from 4 microphones, or 100 from 2, provided the sound your tracking is fairly repetitive or consistent and you can grab them fast enough, you could potentially triangulate somethin... | 1,760,372,244.977689 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/04/2023-cyberdeck-challenge-reviving-the-first-notebook-computer/ | 2023 Cyberdeck Challenge: Reviving The First Notebook Computer | Jenny List | [
"contests",
"Cyberdecks"
] | [
"2023 Cyberdeck Challenge",
"cyberdeck",
"EPSO",
"HX-20",
"raspberry pi"
] | At first sight upon seeing
[Don]’s HX2023 cyberdeck project
one might be sad at the destruction of a retrocomputer, but in fact its classic Epson shell comes from a pile of spare parts left after restoring many other of the classic HX20 notebook computers to working order. The result stays true to the original but gives us so much more in the shape of a Raspberry Pi, and it’s worth cracking it open to see what components make this happen.
The first impression from the pictures is how tidy it all is, with the various USB-based boards contained on a large piece of perfboard spanning the whole case. As well as a USB hub and UPS board there’s an M.2 SSD interface and an audio board, and a DSI color TFT screen neatly fitted in place of the original monochrome item. Finally, there’s an Adafruit keyboard matrix interface board, allowing the use of the Epson’s original keys.
We like this conversion, because it manages to preserve a lot of what the original Epson had that made it great.
We’re reminded of a cyberdeck inspired by the other great 8-bit notebook,
the TRS-80 model 100. | 7 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658862",
"author": "ruh46ruj46",
"timestamp": "2023-07-04T19:20:01",
"content": "I like ELLO 2small, thin (ugly keyboard I would normal mechanic low profile)but trouble with cyberdeck is POWER. Why do I need hardware that will work shorter than my cell phone?* I need a computer wit... | 1,760,372,244.907569 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/04/minimal-mods-make-commodity-lnbs-work-for-qo-100-reception/ | Minimal Mods Make Commodity LNBs Work For QO-100 Reception | Dan Maloney | [
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"Es'hail-2",
"LNB",
"local oscillator",
"low-noise block down converter",
"QO-100",
"satellite",
"sdr"
] | A word of advice: If you see an old direct satellite TV dish put out to the curb, grab it before the trash collector does. Like microwave ovens, satellite dishes are an e-waste wonderland, and just throwing them away before taking out the good stuff would be a shame. And with dishes, the good stuff basically amounts to the bit at the end of the arm that contains the feedhorn and low-noise block downconverter (LNB).
But what does one do with such a thing once it’s harvested? Lots of stuff, including
modifying it for use with the QO-100 geosynchronous satellite
(
German link
). That’s what [Sebastian Westerhold] and [Celin Matlinski] did with a commodity LNB, although it seems more like something scored on the cheap from one of the usual sources rather than picking through trash. Either way, these LNBs are highly integrated devices that at built specifically for satellite TV use, but with just a little persuasion can be nudged into the K-band to receive the downlink signals from hams using QO-100 as a repeater.
The mods are simple — snipping out the 25 MHz reference crystal on the LNB board and replacing it with a simple LC bandpass filter. This allows the local oscillator on the LNB to be referenced to an external signal generator; when fed with a 25.78 MHz signal, it’s enough to goose the LNB up to 10,490 MHz — right about the downlink frequency. [Sebastian] and [Celin] tested the mods and found that it was easily able to detect the third harmonics of a 3.5-ish GHz signal.
As for testing on actual downlink signals from the satellite, that’ll have to wait. For now, if you’re interested in satellite comms, and you live on
the third of the planet covered by QO-100
, keep an eye out for those e-waste LNBs and get to work. | 15 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658664",
"author": "Teukka",
"timestamp": "2023-07-04T16:04:57",
"content": "This type of mod is also useful if you wish to have more frequency stability and precision while listening to stuff in the microwave bands using LNB’s, using a precision frequency source in one’s radio sha... | 1,760,372,245.277099 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/04/quetzal-1-satellite-goes-open-source/ | Quetzal-1 Satellite Goes Open Source | Jonathan Bennett | [
"Space"
] | [
"cube sat",
"open source"
] | Back in 2020, students from Universidad Del Valle De Guatemala (UVG) pulled off a really impressive feat,
designing and building a CubeSat
that lasted a whopping 211 days in orbit. In addition to telemetry and radio equipment, it carried a black-and-white camera payload.
But it turns out space is hard. The first pictures were solid black or white, with the automatic exposure process failing pretty badly. A pair of good pictures were taken by waiting until the satellite was passing over Guatemala during sunrise or sunset. A hung I2C bus led to battery drain, and the team tried a system reset to clear the hung state. Sadly the craft never came back to life after the reset, likely because of one of the Lithium-Ion battery cells failed completely in the low charge state.
That was 2020, so why are we covering it now? Because the project just released
a massive trove of open source
design documents, the software that ran on the satellite and ground station, and all the captured telemetry from the flight. It’s the ultimate bootstrap for anyone else designing a CubeSat, and hopefully provides enough clues to avoid some of the same issues.
Even though the mission had problems, it did achieve a lot of milestones, including
the first picture of Earth taken by a Central American satellite
. Even coming online and making radio contact from orbit to an earthbound station is quite a feat. The team is already looking forward to Quetzal-2, so stay tuned for more!
And if you want
the details on the Quetzal-1 design
, and
what went wrong with the electrical system
, both PDF papers have been released. Seeing more open source in space is an encouraging development, and one that should continue to grow as the cost of payloads to orbit continues to fall. We’ve covered
the UPSat
satellite,
the PyCubed framework
, and even
the RTL-SDR for listening to satellite radio traffic
. | 30 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658544",
"author": "ono",
"timestamp": "2023-07-04T11:13:14",
"content": "I would not use anything else than CAN bus on such a thing. If it´s good for a Tesla, it should be OK for a sat (joking)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id":... | 1,760,372,245.349593 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/04/windows-10-the-hard-way-on-a-phone/ | Windows 10 The Hard Way: On A Phone | Al Williams | [
"Phone Hacks"
] | [
"cell phone",
"windows"
] | Sure, there are — or were — Windows phones. But [neozed] wanted something different. An earlier project ran Windows 10 on the Raspberry Pi 4 with some tricks, but those are sometimes hard to come by lately, so the next project was to put one on
a Xiaomi PocoPhone F1
.
The choice of phone wasn’t an accident. There was enough support and information on the Snapdragon 845 to pull the trick off, and this is one of the phones that looked like it should work. They were pretty inexpensive on eBay and have 128 GB of flash and 6 GB of RAM.
After a few false starts, the phone yielded to fastboot mode. Loading UEFI firmware allows you to re-partition the disks using a PC. With the partitions set up, you must find an ARM Windows 10 image to load. Sounds simple, but as you’ll see in the post, the devil is always in the details. Combined with a USB dock, the end result is a tiny Windows computer. However, it does seem like a lot of work. Even the original poster says: “TL;DR don’t do it… get a used Surface X instead.”
We’ve seen
old phones repurposed before
, of course. Or, go the other way: start from scratch and
build a new phone
. We won’t judge, either way. | 19 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658574",
"author": "KSanger",
"timestamp": "2023-07-04T13:29:49",
"content": "The fact that one may attempt and actually put Win 10 on a phone is the problem with Win 10. Installing it on a laptop requires disabling everything you need on your phone. The computer OS should not ... | 1,760,372,245.226087 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/03/theres-always-room-for-another-cycle-accurate-pc-emulator/ | There’s Always Room For Another Cycle Accurate PC Emulator | Jenny List | [
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"emulator",
"pc",
"PC-XT"
] | While many Hackaday readers will have their own pieces of classic hardware lovingly preserved, it still remains that most of us get our fix of retro goodness through emulation. And while there are emulators aplenty for almost every platform imaginable, the world of emulation is never complete. Thus we’re happy to encounter a new player in the form of
MartyPC
, a cycle-accurate 8088 PC emulator written in Rust.
It’s a project that started only in April 2022, but alongside such in-depth processor support it has the full range of PC and XT peripherals including CGA and VGA cards to the extent that it will run even the most hardware-demanding demos. Below the break you can see it running the fiendishly hardware-specific PC demo
Area 5150
— thought to be the first time an emulator has managed this task.
If there’s a snag it’s that the releases are so far Windows-only, though it’s claimed that it should also compile on other major platforms. There’s also a WebAssembly version, though sadly the link to it doesn’t work. We look forward to this emulator maturing, because we’re sure it will become a PC standby. After all, not everyone managed to snag
one of the recent batch of new hardware
. | 17 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658494",
"author": "Gérald",
"timestamp": "2023-07-04T07:03:26",
"content": "Is there any emulator for Micral 8022G?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6658585",
"author": "Severe Tire Damage",
"timestamp": "2023-07-04T13:... | 1,760,372,245.163414 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/03/pratt-parsing-for-algebraic-expressions/ | Pratt Parsing For Algebraic Expressions | Al Williams | [
"Software Development"
] | [
"algebraic computation",
"parser",
"pratt parser"
] | Parsing algebraic expressions is always a pain. If you need to compute, say, 2+4*2, the answer should be the same as (2 + (4 *2)), not ((2 + 4) * 2) — in other words, the right answer is 10, not 12. The classic way to do this is to use two stacks and a table of precedences for the operators. However, [Martin Janiczek] prefers to use
Pratt Parsers
and wants to show you how they work.
The parser is named after [Vaughn Pratt]. The algorithm works with a table of precedence where operators with higher precedence have higher numbers. It then builds a left and right portion of a string, using recursion. So if you consider 2+4*2, you wind up, on the first pass, with (2+ parse(4*2)). The second parse returns a full expression to produce: (2+(4*2)).
If that was too fast, read the post which has a nice flowchart and an example step-by-step parse of 1+2-3*4+5/6^7-8*9. Towards the bottom, there’s a nice animated flow chart that you can step through, almost like a debugger.
There are a few details left for the end. For example, there is a way to allow right-associative operators (e.g., 2^3^4 is actually ((2^(3^4)). You can also make some easy modifications to get things like unary negation and parenthesis.
Of course, there are other ways to go. You could stick with
RPN
. Or use
the traditional method
. | 10 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658474",
"author": "Artenz",
"timestamp": "2023-07-04T05:10:25",
"content": "Even simpler to understand is to make a set of different functions, each responsible for different level. So you start with ‘parse_expr()’ which calls ‘parse_term()’, which calls ‘parse_factor()’. The par... | 1,760,372,245.109479 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/03/cooling-paint-you-can-actually-make/ | Cooling Paint You Can Actually Make | Jonathan Bennett | [
"chemistry hacks",
"News",
"Science"
] | [
"Chemistry",
"infrared",
"passive cooling"
] | [NightHawkInLight]
has been working on radiative sky paint
. (Video, embedded below.) That’s a coating that radiates heat in the infrared spectrum at a wavelength that isn’t readily absorbed or reflected by the atmosphere. The result is a passive system that keeps materials a few degrees cooler in direct sunlight than an untreated piece in the shade. That sounds a bit like magic, but apparently the math checks out.
This isn’t the first time he’s demonstrated infrared cooling, but
the previous demonstration used Barium Sulfate microspheres
. The process of making those microspheres is a bit beyond the reach of the average garage tinkerer, so [NightHawk] has spent the last year working on a DIY-friendly recipe. And it looks like it’s a success, as the recipe is washing
baking
soda, de-icer, and citric acid, all combined in a blender. The result is microsphere crystals of calcium carbonate, but that was only half the battle. To really get effective cooling, the resulting paint needs a very high density of spheres. The trick here is to manage the size of the crystals, mixing large, medium, and super-tiny spheres to achieve maximum density. With the recipe given, the secret is nucleation sites. The more crystals start growing at once, the sooner the solution is sapped of suspended calcium carbonate, and the smaller the resulting crystals. Put simply, blend longer for smaller crystals.
So the procedure is to make three batches of microspheres, of the three different sizes, and then mix the dried powder in the ideal ratios for maximum density. This powder has to be suspended in something to make a paint, and the current recipe is an acrylic with suspended water particles. Mix water, acetone, and bits of Plexiglas. When the acetone evaporates off, the water is left trapped in the acrylic, making a bright, reflective coating. Mixed with the calcium carbonate, it’s both reflective and emissive on that magic IR frequency that passes right through the atmosphere. The only problem is that calling the result a paint is being a bit generous. It ends up about the consistency of cake icing, and [NightHawk] had some success applying the mixture with an oversized piping bag. There’s more to come, including instructions for turning the mixture into self-contained cooling panels, for a power-free air conditioning solution. Stay tuned! | 59 | 18 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658396",
"author": "Mike Massen, Perth, Western Australia",
"timestamp": "2023-07-03T23:37:17",
"content": "Brilliant, good to see focus on a key issue dealing with essentials of radiative transfer to redistribute infra red, good stuff, thanks for post :-)",
"parent_id": null,
... | 1,760,372,245.496397 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/03/adding-smart-watch-features-to-vintage-casio/ | Adding Smart Watch Features To Vintage Casio | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"3d printed",
"antenna",
"casio",
"chip",
"contactless payment",
"f-91w",
"NFC",
"radio",
"watch"
] | [Matteo] has been a fan of the Casio F-91W wristwatch virtually since its release in 1989. And not without good reason, either. The watch boasts reliable timekeeping and extremely long battery life thanks to a modern quartz crystal and has just about every feature needed in a watch such as an alarm and a timer. And, since it’s been in use since the 80s, it’s also a device built to last. The only thing that’s really missing from it, at least as far as [Matteo] was concerned,
was a contactless payment ability
.
Contactless systems use near-field communication (NFC) to remotely power a small chip via a radio antenna when in close proximity. All that’s really required for a system like this is to figure out a way to get a chip and an antenna and to place them inside a new device. [Matteo] scavenges the chip from a payment card, but then builds a new antenna by hand in order to ensure that it fits into the smaller watch face. Using a NanoVNA as an antenna analyzer he is able to recreate the performance of the original antenna setup in the smaller form factor and verify everything works before sealing it all up in a 3D-printed enclosure that sandwiches the watch.
There are a few reasons why using a contactless payment system with a watch like this, instead of relying on a smartwatch, might be preferential. For one, [Matteo] hopes to explore the idea that one of the physical buttons on the watch could be used to physically disable the device to reduce pickpocketing risk if needed. It’s also good to not have to buy the latest high-dollar tech gadget just for conveniences like this too, but we’ve seen in the past that
it’s not too hard just to get these systems out of their cards
in the first place. | 16 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658372",
"author": "spaceminions",
"timestamp": "2023-07-03T21:54:04",
"content": "The hack is pretty neat, but in my opinion (and probably that of the source) that watch is more of a classic than modern at this point. The 30 year old tech is still fine as far as accuracy, but alar... | 1,760,372,245.401504 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/03/the-chess-computer-from-1912/ | The Chess Computer From 1912 | Al Williams | [
"classic hacks"
] | [
"automaton",
"chess",
"chess computer",
"mechanical"
] | Who was [Leonardo Torres Quevedo]? Not exactly a household name, but as [IEEE Spectrum] points out, he invented
a chess automaton in 1920
that would foreshadow the next century’s obsession with computers playing chess.
Don’t confuse this with the infamous
Mechanical Turk
, which appeared to be a chess computer but was really a guy hiding inside a fake chess computer. The Spanish engineer’s machine really did play a modified end game. The chessboard was vertical, and pegs represented pieces. There were mechanical arms to move the pegs. The device actually dates back to 1912, with a public demonstration in Paris in 1914. Given [Quevedo’s] native language, the machine was called El Ajedrecista.
The first machine had a vertical board.
Of course, it couldn’t play a full game of chess. The machine always played white with a king and rook in a fixed position. The human’s lone black king could be on one of 48 squares in the first six ranks that were legal. The machine could defend its king and reach checkmate, although it could take up to 63 moves, and standard chess rules would call a draw on 50 moves without a capture or pawn move.
In 1920, the machine got a facelift, although it used the same algorithm. Now normal chess pieces were moved by means of electromagnets. A recorded voice would say check or mate (in Spanish) when appropriate, and after three illegal moves, the machine would turn off. It also beat grandmaster [Savielly Tartakower] at the Paris Cybernetic Congress in 1951, making him the first chess grandmaster to lose to a machine.
If you want to know more about the actual algorithm,
Wikipedia’s got you covered
. As you might expect, the pieces had metal bottoms that closed contacts, so play was probably a little finicky. Both chess machines are still on display at a museum in Madrid.
Like many people today, [Quevedo] was interested in exploring if machines could think and what it means to think, anyway. Automatic chess boards are
fairly common
now, but amazing for the early 1900s. Or, you can skip the board and go 100% computerized
without as much memory
as you might think. | 12 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658329",
"author": "MarB",
"timestamp": "2023-07-03T19:52:11",
"content": "That’s a pretty interesting find.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6658345",
"author": "lukilukeskywalker",
"timestamp": "2023-07-03T20:46:04",
... | 1,760,372,245.551067 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/03/supercon-2022-bradley-gawthrop-wants-you-to-join-the-pev-revolution/ | Supercon 2022: Bradley Gawthrop Wants You To Join The PEV Revolution | Navarre Bartz | [
"cons",
"Hackaday Columns",
"Slider",
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"bike",
"electric bike",
"electric scooter",
"electric skateboard",
"electric vehicle",
"ev",
"hoverboard",
"micromobility",
"one wheel",
"Personal Electric Vehicle",
"PEVs",
"segway",
"skateboard"
] | During the 20th Century, much of the western world decided that motor vehicles were the only desirable form of transportation. We built our cities to accommodate cars through parking, stop lights, and any number of other infrastructure investments so that you could go get milk and bread in style. In the US, 50% of automobile trips are less than three miles and have only one occupant. [Bradley Gawthrop]
asked if there might be a more efficient way to do all this
? Enter the Personal Electric Vehicle (PEV).
What Are PEVs?
PEVs are a nascent part of the transportation mix that fall under the wider umbrella of “micromobility,” including scooters, bikes, skateboards, and the like. The key differentiator here is that they are at least partially electrically-driven. [Gawthrop] walks us through several of the different types during his Supercon 2022 talk, but since they are all small, electric powered devices for transporting one or two people, they can trace their lineage back to the infamous Segway Human Transporter.
Using an electric motor or two connected to a controller and batteries, the overall system complexity for any of these devices is quite low and ripe for the hacking. Given the right tools and safety precautions, anyone should be able to crack a PEV open and repair or tinker with it. As with many things in life, the real story is more complicated.
As [Gawthrop] notes, many a hacker has said, “I wish I’d been able to be involved in X before…” where X equals some technology like home automation and it’s before it got creepy or dystopian in some manner. He exhorts us that the time to be in on the ground floor with PEVs is now.
Implementation Is Key
While there isn’t anything magic about any of these devices, that doesn’t keep the specter of intellectual property from haunting this space. One particularly egregious example is Onewheel. Based in Santa Cruz, Onewheel manufactures what amounts to a Segway HT and skateboard chimera. Unfortunately for users, any maintenance on the devices, including tire or battery replacements or repairs, must only be performed at the single repair center in California. Not even John Deere is that regressive in its attempts to stymie
Right to Repair
.
On the other end of the spectrum is the electric skateboard community, where the DIY culture of the skateboarding community came along for the ride when skateboards went electric. Another key to keeping electric skateboards open is that the first skateboard-specific motor controller, VESC, was developed by a PhD student, [
Benjamin Vedder
] who open sourced the hardware, firmware, and configuration software. Many off-the-shelf electric skateboards still use a variant of this board still as the community expects customization and openness.
Electric bikes fall somewhere in the middle of this spectrum since there are certainly more and less serviceable electrical components running from the bargain basement of AliExpress to the OEM-only Bosh systems. The other parts of the bike will be serviceable by any bike shop or home mechanic. A similar case seems to exist for privately-owned electric kick scooters also used by SaaS (Scooters as a Service) companies like Bird or Lime. The IOT components of shared scooters are perhaps understandably not designed to be open to the consumer.
How Can You Join Up?
As we are in the early days of PEVs taking over the roads or micromobility lanes of our cities, [Gawthrop] sees a number of places hackers could find a place. First, the VESC controller project can use help, especially regarding supply chain issues. Second, given the small number of commodity controllers for these platforms, reverse engineering the screen communication protocols could be a big help since the screen interface is arguable the weakest part of most PEV packages. Third, building battery packs competently is a highly transferable skill and could cut down on the number of battery fires from small electric vehicles which is a rare, but serious risk with these systems. Finally, engage with local and broader political bodies to make sure that laws being passed regarding PEVs are reasonable and not just knee-jerk reactions to the new.
Be sure to watch the video for all the details that [Gawthrop] humorously conveys, and if you want to go deeper checkout our articles about electric
bikes
,
scooters
, and
skateboards
. | 70 | 29 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658295",
"author": "rclark",
"timestamp": "2023-07-03T17:36:34",
"content": "The middle aged and elderly would get around great on those things. Especially on icy roads, and in-climate weather. And really really well in big cities with high crime. Be a lot easier than car jacking ... | 1,760,372,245.698916 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/03/3d-printing-food-hack-chat/ | 3D Printing Food Hack Chat | Dan Maloney | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Slider"
] | [
"Hack Chat"
] | Join us on Wednesday, July 5 at noon Pacific for the
3D Printing Food Hack Chat
with Ellie Weinstein!
In the right hands, food goes beyond mere sustenance and becomes a work of art. We’ve all seen examples — the carefully crafted blends of flavors, the quality ingredients expertly cooked, the artful platings that make a dramatic presentation at the table. But where the artistry really seems to take off is with desserts, which pastry chefs and confectioners can take to the next level with edible sculptures of chocolate and other sweets that can tower dramatically over the table.
That’s all well and good for the haute cuisine set, but what about the rest of us? We can’t all have the talent and drive needed to produce edible art, so perhaps we can leverage technology to help us out. That’s just one of the rationales behind food 3D printing, which is what we’ll be exploring with Ellie Weinstein. She’s the CEO of Cocoa Press, where they’re bringing chocolate 3D printing to the mainstream. It’s not as easy as you might think — there are plenty of nuances and engineering challenges when you’re trying to print chocolate or any other kind of food. Make sure you stop by and check it out; it’s sure to be a treat.
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 5 at 12:00 PM Pacific time. If time zones have you tied up, we have a
handy time zone converter
. | 1 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6660636",
"author": "vidmate.bet",
"timestamp": "2023-07-09T18:39:02",
"content": "SECAM has the same line and frame frequency as PAL, but its colour subcarrier is frequency modulated instead of amplitude modulated. It completely avoids the NTSC and PAL phase errors by not being sus... | 1,760,372,245.587791 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/03/hacking-the-commodore-128-to-capture-almost-real-time-video/ | Hacking The Commodore 128 To Capture Almost Real-Time Video | Robin Kearey | [
"Retrocomputing",
"Video Hacks"
] | [
"commodore 128",
"VDC",
"VIC-II",
"video capture"
] | Although watching and editing videos may be among the primary tasks of many PCs today, it wasn’t that long ago that working with video required powerful processors and expensive video capture hardware. Even in the 1980s, home computer users were looking for ways to connect video sources to their Commodores and Ataris despite their hardware limitations. [Cameron Kaiser] has a mid-1980s consumer-grade video capture device, which he has managed to turn into
an almost real-time video capture system
.
Allowing the graphics chip to interrupt the CPU mid-capture results in a severely distorted image
His work revolves around a device called “ComputerEyes”, a 1984-vintage hardware interface that made it possible to connect a composite video source to a home computer. The limitations of mid-1980s CPUs meant that it took around six seconds for the computer to do a quick scan of a single video frame, or a multiple of that if you wanted a higher-quality image. Another limitation, at least on Commodore machines, was that the screen had to be turned off during video capture – otherwise, the video chip would interrupt the CPU halfway through the process, causing it to lose its synchronization with the video source.
[Cameron] however, plugged his ComputerEyes into a Commodore 128. This machine, largely designed by Hackaday contributor [Bil Herd], has an unusual hardware architecture consisting of two different CPUs and, crucially, two separate video chips. The primary 8564 “VIC-II” graphics chip is used to keep compatibility with existing Commodore 64 programs, while the secondary 8563 “VDC” is mainly aimed at newer high-resolution text-based software. The VDC is also much more independent from the main system bus than the VIC-II, allowing it to display an image without disturbing the CPU.
More after the break.
Although the VDC was intended for text-mode use only, and therefore lacks some essential graphics features like sprite management, it does support high-resolution bit-mapped graphics. With a bit of digging around in the VDC’s configuration registers, [Cameron] was able to implement a previously-unused 320×200 pixel mode that allowed the C128 to show the captured video image on the screen, while also capturing the next frame in the background.
With a bit of further optimization of the readout code, he also managed to increase the capture speed by almost 25% – though at the cost of losing several pixels on the left edge of the image. As you can see in the time-lapse video below, the final system doesn’t quite reach real-time capture speed, but performs pretty impressively for a mid-1980s consumer product. We’ve already seen that
the C128’s video system is hackable
, and that the systems can be easily repaired
even when things go wrong
. If you’re interested in the history behind the C128, look no further than
[Bil]’s story on the machine’s development process
.
https://hackaday.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/C128-video-capture-example.mp4 | 10 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658237",
"author": "Sweeney",
"timestamp": "2023-07-03T15:19:46",
"content": "Kind of depends on your definition of “Real Time””. It seems to be taking multiple seconds per frame here. There was an example a while back where real time video was converted to PETSCII and displayed on... | 1,760,372,245.896996 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/03/ice-wrenchers-wrencher-chocolates-and-the-vaquform-dt2/ | Ice Wrenchers, Wrencher Chocolates, And The Vaquform DT2 | Jenny List | [
"cooking hacks",
"Featured",
"Reviews",
"Slider",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"jolly wrencher",
"vacuum forming",
"vaquform"
] | What do you do when you find some friends have bought a vacuum forming machine? Make novelty chocolates and ice cubes, of course! This was my response when I had the opportunity to play with a Vaquform DT2 all-in-one vacuum forming machine, so what follows is partly a short review of an exciting machine, and partly an account of my adventures in edible merchandise creation.
The Vaquform machine in all its glory.
Vacuum forming, the practice of drawing a sheet of heat-softened plastic film over a model to make a plastic shell copy of it, is nothing new in our community. It’s most often found in hackerspaces in the form of home made vacuum forming tables, and usually requires quite a bit of experimentation to get good results. The Vaquform machine I was lucky enough to be able to try is an all in one machine that puts the whole process into a compact desktop machine of similar size to a typical 3D printer. It’s a machine of two parts with a moveable carriage between them for the plastic sheet; a vacuum table on its base, and a heater unit suspended above it. The unique selling point is that it’s an all-in-one computer controlled unit that does as much as possible for you, it simply requires the user to place a sheet in the carriage and follow the instructions.
When I first saw the machine I didn’t really have anything to try it with, so of course I resorted to producing a Wrencher or two. Because what it makes are essentially moulds, it made sense to produce something Wrencher-shaped with them, and thus the chocolate and ice plan formed. The first mould was made with laser-cut Wrenchers in 2mm acrylic, stacked on two more layers of uncut acrylic to make a bar with an inset Wrencher on top, while the second one used a 3D-printed array of larger stand-alone Wrenchers with channels between them. Would my first attempt at vacuum forming make usable moulds or not? Only one way to find out.
A Wrencher ice mould, ready to go.
Using the Vaquform should be entirely straightforward to anyone who has used a modern 3D printer or similar. The LCD screen provides an easy to navigate set of steps for selecting material, thickness, and temperature, then it’s a case of loading the sheet, moving the carriage up when asked, and placing the object to be moulded on the vacuum table. The heater takes a minute or so to get the sheet up to temperature and it follows the appropriate heat profile for the material selected, then the vacuum pump starts up and you’re instructed to move the carriage down onto the table. The whole process of forming the shape is extremely quick, after which all that remains is to part model and mould. You’re left with the full sheet with edges in the shape of the edge of the carriage, and it then remains to trim to shape.
A repast fit for any hacker.
In my case I was using food-safe 0.3 mm HDPE, and in both cases I made good quality moulds with clear definition of features. My models didn’t have full chamfering for easy mould removal, but the Wrencher isn’t complex enough to cause too many problems in that respect.
It was then time to play with food and see what I could make. In practice, the bar-shaped moulds had insufficient resolution for ice but worked well with chocolate, while the standalone Wrenchers made good sturdy ice for my cola. I’ll bring them out for my hackerspace, and maybe delight my colleagues with them next time we get together.
The Vaquform DT2 then. It’s not cheap, being listed currently at $1,150, but it’s an extremely easy to use and convenient machine that certainly delivered on my expectations. It seems solidly built and the software was very straightforward in its instructions, and I went from zero to Wrencher mould in only a few minutes. If I was in the market for a vacuum former and I had the money, it wouldn’t be a difficult decision to buy one.
Coincidentally, we
covered the Vaquform when it was still a Kickstarter
, just because we think it’s an underrated fabrication method. And if you want to build your own, we’ve seen
small and sweet formers
, as well as
this monster from the past
. In the end, it’s a heating element and a table with holes in it, though. Post up your favorite builds in the comments. | 9 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658232",
"author": "drgdg",
"timestamp": "2023-07-03T15:17:18",
"content": "Is there many hacking/making use cases for this machine besides ice trays and food molds ? Genuinely curious as I like the technology but it’s always seemed to be more suited for artistic builds than techni... | 1,760,372,245.846175 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/03/three-pitfalls-in-i2c-everyone-wishes-werent-there/ | Three Pitfalls In I2C Everyone Wishes Weren’t There | Maya Posch | [
"Microcontrollers",
"Software Development"
] | [
"bus",
"i2c",
"multi-drop bus",
"serial",
"spi"
] | The best part of I2C is that it is a bus that is available just about anywhere, covering a vast ecosystem of devices that offer it as a hardware-defined interface, while being uncomplicated enough that it can also be implemented purely in software on plain GPIO pins. Despite this popularity, I2C is one of those famous informal standards that feature a couple of popular implementations, while leaving many of the details such as exact timing, bus capacitance and other tedious details to the poor sod doing the product development. Thus it is that we end up with articles such as a recent one on the tongue-twisting [pair of pared pears] blog, covering issues found
while implementing an I2C slave
.
As with any shared bus, whether multi-master or not, figuring out when the bus is clear is a fun topic, yet one which can cause endless headaches. One issue here comes from a feature that the SMBus version of I2C calls quick read/write. This allows for the rapid transfer of some data. Still, depending on the data returned by the slave, it may appear to the master that nothing is happening yet, since SDA is being held low by the slave until the stop condition, essentially locking the bus.
I2C hold times example.
Where things get even more exciting comes generally in the form of what logic analyzers love to traumatically call a ‘spurious start/stop condition’. This refers to the behavior of SDA and SCL, with SDA going low before SCL indicating an error. This can occur due to a hold time that’s too low, causing other devices on the bus to miss the transition. Here SMBus defines a transition time of 300 ns, while I2C calls for 0 seconds, but it’s now suggested to delay calling a start/stop condition until a delay of 300 ns has passed. Essentially, it would seem that implementing a hold time is the way forward until evidence to the contrary appears.
The third pitfall pertains to the higher-speed modes of I2C, including Fast-Mode (FM) and Fast-Mode Plus (FM+). Backward compatibility with these higher speed versions is absent to spotty. Although FM+ (introduced by NXP in 2007) is supposed to be backward compatible with slower speeds, effectively the timing requirement differences between the FM+ and FM standards are too large to compensate for. At least in the current versions of the standards, but one of the joys of I2C is that there’s always another new set of revisions to look forward to. | 95 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658149",
"author": "YGDES",
"timestamp": "2023-07-03T11:09:38",
"content": "Even ignoring these pitfalls, I avoid I2C as much as possible…",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6658162",
"author": "Artenz",
"timesta... | 1,760,372,246.274458 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/03/freq-out-with-ltspice/ | Freq Out With LTSpice | Al Williams | [
"Software Hacks",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"analog",
"LTSpice",
"simulation",
"SPICE"
] | We always enjoy [FesZ’s] videos, and his latest about
FREQ function in LTSpice
is no exception. In fact, LTSpice doesn’t document it, but it is part of the underlying Spice system. So, of course, you can figure it out or just watch the video below. The FREQ keyword allows you to change component attributes in a frequency-depended way.
Of course, capacitors and inductors are frequency dependent by design. But the FREQ technique allows you to adjust things like voltage sources or resistance in arbitrary ways. By default, you must specify the frequency response data in decibels, which isn’t always convenient. However, [FesZ] shows you how to use other methods to express them using modifiers to the command.
When you have experimental frequency response data, you probably have many samples. About midway through the video, you’ll see how to manage data with more points using a subcircuit that you can put in an external file.
The end of the video looks at some practical applications. He shows an inductor characterized by a vector network analyzer. With the S1 parameters, he can produce a high-fidelity model of the actual inductor instead of using a generic model of an inductor. A little spreadsheet gymnastics allows him to convert the file into Spice format quickly.
If you need more help with LTSpice, we
can help
. If you want to do
more measurements in LTSpice
, there’s something for that, too. | 4 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658259",
"author": "Drone",
"timestamp": "2023-07-03T16:15:33",
"content": "Clicking on “Watch on YouTube” in this HaD post results in a new browser window that says: “Blocked Page An error occurred during a connection tohttp://www.youtube.com“. The actual link ishttps://youtu.be/A... | 1,760,372,245.989206 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/02/presence-sensor-locks-computer-when-you-step-away/ | Presence Sensor Locks Computer When You Step Away | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"computer",
"detection",
"ld2410",
"lock",
"microcontroller",
"motion",
"presence",
"radar",
"security",
"Seed Xiao nrf52840",
"workstation"
] | Having a computer that locks its screen after a few minutes of inactivity is always a good idea from a security standpoint, especially in offices where there is a lot of foot traffic. Even the five- or ten-minute activity timers that are set on most workstations aren’t really perfect solutions. While ideally in these situations we’d all be locking our screens manually when we get up, that doesn’t always happen. The only way to guarantee that this problem is solved is
to use something like this automatic workstation locker
.
The project is based around the LD2410 presence sensor — a small 24 GHz radar module featuring onboard signal processing which simplifies the detection of objects and motion. [Enzo] paired one of these modules with a Seeed Studio XIAO nRF52840 development board to listen to the radar module and send the screen lock keyboard shortcut to the computer when it detects that the user has walked away from the machine. The only thing that [Enzo] wants to add is a blinking LED to let the user know when the device is about to timeout so that it doesn’t accidentally lock the machine when not needed.
One of the parts of this build that is a little bit glossed over is the fact that plenty of microcontroller platforms can send keystrokes to a computer even if they’re not themselves a USB keyboard.
Even the Arduino Uno can do this
, so by now this feature is fairly platform-agnostic. Still, you can use this to your advantage if you have the opposite problem from [Enzo] and
need your computer to stay logged in no matter what
. | 14 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658112",
"author": "paulvdh",
"timestamp": "2023-07-03T07:38:54",
"content": "You can also do this with a crotch sensor :Phttps://hackaday.com/2022/12/12/students-rebel-against-heat-sensing-crotch-monitor-surveillance-devices/One thing that confuses me a bit is the “One of the part... | 1,760,372,245.950878 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/02/watching-paint-dry-for-over-100-years/ | Watching Paint Dry For Over 100 Years | Michael Shaub | [
"car hacks"
] | [
"auto industry",
"automaker",
"car",
"car paint",
"ford",
"history",
"model t",
"paint",
"rust"
] | A Model T Ford customer could famously get their car “in any color he wants, so long as it’s black.” Thus begins [edconway]’s
recounting of the incremental improvements in car paint and its surprising role in mass production, marketing, and longevity of automobiles
.
In it, we learn that the aforementioned black paint from Ford had so much asphalt in it that black was the only color that would work. Not to go down a
This Is Spinal Tap
rabbit hole, but there were several kinds of black on those Model Ts. Over 30 of them were used for various purposes. The paints also dried in different ways. While the assembly only took 12 hours, the paint drying time took days, even weeks backing up production and begging for innovation. [edconway] then fast-forwards to an era of “conspicuous consumption and ‘planned obsolescence’” with DuPont’s invention of Duco that brought color to the world of automobiles.
See the article for the real story of advances in paint technology and drying time. Paint application technology has also steadily improved over the years, so we recommend diving in to get the century’s long story. | 19 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6658053",
"author": "PEBKAC",
"timestamp": "2023-07-03T02:08:40",
"content": "A Model S customer can have it in whatever paintjob they want… as long as it’s orangepeel!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6658250",
"author... | 1,760,372,246.128458 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/02/hackaday-links-july-2-2023/ | Hackaday Links: July 2, 2023 | Dan Maloney | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Hackaday links",
"Slider"
] | [
"ai",
"alarm",
"animation",
"biology",
"chrome",
"disaster",
"eclipse",
"fire",
"freezer",
"gofundme",
"hackaday links",
"hackerspace",
"jwst",
"mac",
"makerspace",
"os",
"Pixelbar",
"Saturn",
"scammer",
"supercold",
"telemarketer",
"victim",
"windows"
] | Members of Pixelbar woke up to shocking news on Wednesday morning this week as they learned that
a fire had destroyed the building housing their Rotterdam hackerspace
.
Pictures of the fire
are pretty dramatic and show the entire building ablaze. We’re not familiar with Pixelbar specifically, but most hackerspaces seem to share space with other businesses in repurposed warehouses and other industrial buildings, and it looks like that was the case here.
Local coverage
doesn’t indicate that a cause has been determined, but they do say that “large batches of wood” were stored in or near the structure, which likely contributed to
the dramatic display
. There don’t seem to be reports of injuries to civilians or first responders, so that’s a blessing, but Pixelbar seems to have been completely destroyed. If you’re in a position to help, check out
their GoFundMe page
. As our own Jenny List, who currently lives in The Netherlands, points out, spaces suitable for housing a hackerspace are hard to come by in a city like Rotterdam, which is the busiest port in Europe. That means Pixelbar members will be competing for space with businesses that have far deeper pockets, so anything you can donate will likely go a long way toward rebuilding.
NASA released
the James Webb Space Telescope’s first official portrait of the Saturnian system this week
, and the results are truly stunning. The images were captured using the NIRcam instrument, and show the famously ringed planet and three of its larger moons, Tethys, Enceladus, and Dione. The planet itself appears dark and muddy since the methane gas that makes up so much of its atmosphere absorbs IR light strongly. But those rings — man, do the pop! The icy bits and pieces are super reflective in the IR wavelengths, and the rings look amazing. And by way of technical context for these photos, Dr. Becky has
a YouTube Short
that explains how JWST can take pictures of Jupiter and Saturn while Betelgeuse is too bright to image.
Also in space news but closer to home, there’s
a great article over on Space.com
with an animation showing the entire path of the upcoming “Great American Eclipse.” It shows the entire path of the Moon’s shadow from landfall off the Pacific coast of Mexico until it finally zips off the edge of the globe in the North Atlantic off Newfoundland. It’s fascinating to watch the size and shape of the shadow change as it moves along, as well as seeing the shadow move faster and faster as the event proceeds. Animations like this are helpful in choosing a place to watch the eclipse;
trust us
, totality is where it’s at, and the closer to the centerline, the better.
Speaking of useful visualizations, we found another great animation that shows
the popularity of various operating systems over the years
. The animation is based on market share, so “popularity” may be stretching things a bit since we consumers generally face the Henry Ford-esque “Any OS you want as long as it’s Windows, Mac, or Chrome” choice. Still, it’s interesting to see how the distribution of OS prevalence has changed over the last 20 years. Particularly interesting is watching each new iteration of Windows chasing away the previous one — except for Windows XP, which proved remarkably resilient. Also of note is the absolutely horrible uptake of Windows 8 and 8.1, which together never managed to eclipse Windows 7. It’s also neat to see how Mac OS market share grew from barely larger than the catch-all “Other” category to more respectable numbers, and how Windows XP was still earning a slice up until 2019.
We know, we know — someday AI is going to take over the world, steal all our jobs, and reduce the planet to a radioactive cinder just to be rid of us. So we’ve got that to look forward to, but while we wait, here’s a use for AI we can really get behind:
creating fake victims for scammers
. Cybersecurity researchers at Macquarie University have developed multilingual chatbots that can be deployed en masse and keep scammers on the phone for extended periods of time, which based on some of
the human-based “scamming the scammers” videos we’ve seen
, they really, REALLY hate. So while it may not be as satisfying to observe, AI-based professional victims can probably put a real crimp in the value proposition of scamming, and make these people question why they’d spend all day crowded shoulder to shoulder in a call center trying to take advantage of the elderly and technologically unsophisticated. Or maybe not, but we still think it’s devilishly clever and wholeheartedly endorse it.
And finally, as a former “lab rat” we found
this tale of woe out of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
particularly relatable. It seems that a hapless janitor is being blamed for the loss of a million dollars worth of biological samples after accidentally turning off a supercold freezer. Freezers such as these, which typically operate in the range of -80° C, are used to preserve some of the most heat-sensitive samples, and are universally alarmed in case of temperature fluctuations. This particular freezer had alarmed earlier in the day, and the alarm continued to sound while waiting for a service tech to arrive. The janitor noticed the annoying alarm and attempted to help by fiddling with the lab’s circuit breakers. Unfortunately, he mistakenly switched the circuit off, with predictable results. The university is suing the cleaning service that employed the janitor, of course, who claims he thought he was being helpful. It’s hard to know who’s right and who’s wrong here without knowing the specifics better, but having been in a similar position before, we can say one thing for sure: if you’ve got a million bucks worth of samples in a dodgy minus-80, you don’t just leave it — you either move the samples or you post someone to make sure the freezer doesn’t turn off. That’s literally what grad students are for. | 21 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657992",
"author": "J ODell",
"timestamp": "2023-07-02T23:25:18",
"content": "The RPI incident occurred during the COVID lockdowns, when universities (like mine) mandated all the grad students and professors work from home. The service tech was also working under COVID restriction... | 1,760,372,246.378779 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/01/fujitsu-proprietary-keyboard-goes-ps-2-with-a-pico/ | Fujitsu Proprietary Keyboard Goes PS/2 With A Pico | Jonathan Bennett | [
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"keyboards",
"Paspberry Pi Pico",
"retro computing"
] | One of our favorite retro-computing YouTubers, [Clint] from LGR,
found himself a very interesting Fujitsu keyboard
while thrift store shopping. It was a beautiful unit, but confusing, as this keyboard comes with an 8-pin DIN connector. A 5-pin DIN plug or 6-pin Mini-DIN would be easy to work with, but what was this odd connection? Turns out the Fujitsu N860-2500-T111 came with an Olympus CV-100 Video Processor, which was designed for medical imaging, potentially among other uses. And as often happened with old specialized hardware, the keyboard used a proprietary protocol for sending keystrokes.
[Clint] put out a call for anyone that could help him build an adapter, and
[Andy] from Element14 answered the call
. But this problem requires more than an adapter, mainly because the Fujitsu doesn’t have key rollover. It’s one key at a time, and that just doesn’t work for the sort of things [Clint] shows off on LGR. So, the electronic guts of the keyboard were removed, to be replaced with a Raspberry Pi Pico, wired directly to the keyboard matrix.
There’s a great tip in there, that you can use the non-stick backing from a printed label to get a really clean flattened hot glue coating. With some wiring and gluing, the Pico fits cleanly into the keyboard case with no external modifications. A simple pigtail adapter is used to physically interface with a PS/2 port. The
source is available
if you need to pull off a similar hack. | 8 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657679",
"author": "gregg4",
"timestamp": "2023-07-02T01:14:04",
"content": "Incidentally depending on how old that Olympus contraption was, because I’m quite familiar with them, it would have contained a Compaq MB from a deskpro design, possible an 80386 and a good sized IDE disk ... | 1,760,372,246.318044 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/01/a-cvt-for-every-application/ | A CVT For Every Application | Jenny List | [
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"continuously variable",
"continuously variable transmission",
"CVT",
"Robert Murray-Smith",
"transmission"
] | When the subject of CVTs or continuously variable transmissions comes up, the chances are that most readers will think of the various motor vehicles they’ve appeared in. Whether it’s a DAF, a Ford, a FIAT, or a Chevrolet, most major manufacturers have tried one at some point or another with greater or lesser success. The automotive ones inevitably use a variation on a V-belt or metal band between variable separation conical pulleys, but this is by no means the only CVT configuration. Serial tinkerer [Robert Murray-Smith]
takes an in-depth look at the subject
as part of his ongoing fascination with wind turbines.
What caught our eye about this video isn’t so much the final 3D-printed design he selects for his experiments, but the history and his look at the different CVT designs which have appeared over the years. We see the V-belts, as well as the various cone configurations, the disk transmissions, the hydrostatic ones, and even magnetic versions. His transmission uses two cones with a rubber coating, with of all things a movable golf ball between them. We’re guessing it will appear somewhere in his future videos, so watch out for it.
Meanwhile, this isn’t the first time we’ve seen a CVT, [James Bruton]
used a hemisphere to make one on a robot
. | 36 | 13 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657638",
"author": "DomML",
"timestamp": "2023-07-01T20:43:09",
"content": "Dacia is selling “cheap” cars with cvt",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6657649",
"author": "Hirudinea",
"timestamp": "2023-07-01T21:4... | 1,760,372,246.506397 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/01/hackaday-prize-2023-throwaway-temperature-logger-to-useful-arm-dev-board/ | Hackaday Prize 2023: Throwaway Temperature Logger To Useful ARM Dev Board | Jenny List | [
"Reverse Engineering",
"The Hackaday Prize"
] | [
"2023 Hackaday Prize",
"dev board",
"e-waste",
"temperature logger"
] | The global supply chain is a masterpiece of containerized logistics that allows a container to leave a factory in China and arrive on a British forecourt after only a few weeks, but along with the efficiency it brings a traceability and monitoring problem. If you are shipping perishable items such as medicines or foodstuffs, how can you be sure that they’ve remained refrigerated the whole journey through?
The answer comes in digital temperature loggers, and since these are throwaway devices [arduinocelentano]
decided to look inside and see if they could be reused
. The answer is positive, in that many models have the potential to be useful dev boards for very little money.
These devices usually take the form of a bulky USB dongle with an LCD display and a few buttons. Inside they invariably have a low-power ARM microcontroller and a battery as well as the temperature sensor and some flash memory to store the readings. The data is read by the customer through the USB port, and they’re single use with manufacturers paying only lip service to recycling, because the data must by necessity be impossible to erase or alter. Happily for all that, many of them appear to be well-designed internally, with the relevant debug and programming ports exposed and the ability to access the microcontroller. We look forward to seeing what comes of these boards, because while
the worst of the chip shortage
my now be receding it’s always good to find a new source.
The
Hackaday
Prize 2023
is Sponsored by: | 5 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657643",
"author": "Paul",
"timestamp": "2023-07-01T21:12:28",
"content": "I was handed a similar one recently, but this one intended for long-haul high-value frozen food trucking. It included a GPS receiver, and was powered by four non-replaceable disposable Energizer 1.6V lithiu... | 1,760,372,246.433304 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/01/shall-we-hack-a-game/ | Shall We Hack A Game? | Elliot Williams | [
"Hackaday Columns"
] | [
"ethical hacking",
"newsletter",
"reverse engineering"
] | A fantastic summertime game
has consumed many of the kids in my neighborhood. It’s basically a treasure hunt, but the treasures are all shoebox-sized NFC readers that are “easily” findable on a map. Players all have a smart card and run around from box to box, collecting points that depend on how far apart the boxes are from each other. Walk, skate, or bike 1 km between check-ins, and ten points show up on the e-paper screen.
It’s been going on for a few weeks now, and it’s not uncommon to see a line of two or three kids at any given box, all with the purple lanyards and smart cards around their necks. So far, the highest-rated plausible single efforts have 450 km (280 miles) under their belt. My son’s grade-school
average
is 45 km (28 miles) over three weeks. The goal is getting kids out on the early summer afternoons, and that seems to be working!
Of course I had to reverse engineer the infrastructure, so here’s what I started with. Each box knows your point standing as soon as you tap the card, with a small delay. Scores appear online about every four hours. And the boxes are all ~1 km from each other or less.
My first thought was some kind of mesh network – that would be by far the coolest solution. Each box could simply report your card number to a central database, and the rest is a simple matter of software. LoRa radios rounded out my fantasy design.
But the length of time between getting the points and their appearance online suggests otherwise. And, a little bit of playing around with my cellphone’s NFC reader gives up the juice – they are MiFare Classic cards with data storage. So I got my own card, ran around town, and diffed the results. I haven’t cracked the location/time-stamping yet, but I know exactly where my total points are stored.
I’m going to keep observing until I’ve got it figured out completely, but I’m so tempted to tweak the points and see what happens. Are some of the digits in what I think are a timestamp in reality a checksum? Will I get disqualified? Or worse, what if I make a mistake and get myself publicly into first place? OK, better to sit this one out on the sidelines – I really don’t want to be the jerk who crashes a fantastic kid’s game. Sometimes you’ve gotta know when
not
to hack.
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
! | 26 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657579",
"author": "GotNoTime",
"timestamp": "2023-07-01T14:33:02",
"content": "It uses mobile data as backhaul to the server. A company called pironex designed it and describe the system athttps://pironex.com/references/iot-gateway-applications.html#kreuzundquer-crisscross“Each ga... | 1,760,372,246.611597 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/01/an-all-sky-camera-to-watch-the-night-sky/ | An All Sky Camera To Watch The Night Sky | Jenny List | [
"digital cameras hacks",
"Space"
] | [
"all-sky camera",
"astronomy",
"Pi HQ camera",
"raspberry pi"
] | If you have any astronomer friends you’ll soon discover that theirs is a world of specialist high-quality optical equipment far ahead of the everyday tinkerer, and for mere mortals the dream of those amazing deep space images remains out of reach. It’s not completely impossible for the night sky to deliver impressive imagery on a budget though, as [David Schneider] shows us with
a Raspberry Pi powered whole sky camera
.
The project was born of seeing a meteor and idly wondering whether meteorite landing sites could be triangulated from a network of cameras, something he quickly discovered had already been done with some success. Along the way though he found
the allsky camera project
, and decided to build his own. This took the form of a Raspberry Pi 3 and a Pi HQ camera with a wide-angle lens mounted pointing skywards under an acrylic dome. It’s not the Hubble Space Telescope by any means, but the results are nevertheless impressive particularly in a timelapse. We wish there were less light pollution where we live so we could try it for ourselves.
Long-term readers may remember that this isn’t the first Pi sky camera we’ve brought you,
for example this one is from 2020
. | 8 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657588",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Known As Ren",
"timestamp": "2023-07-01T15:25:48",
"content": "I just want to say,Check into books by Micheal Covington if you’d like to learn more about amateur astrophotography.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
... | 1,760,372,246.548381 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/01/exploring-the-tech-behind-concert-led-wristbands/ | Exploring The Tech Behind Concert LED Wristbands | Danie Conradie | [
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"concert",
"LED wearables",
"pixmob"
] | LED wristbands are now a common feature of large arena concerts and events, with a variety of capabilities and technical implementations. In the video after the break, Wall Street Journal does a fascinating
deep dive into these wearable light shows
.
The three main control technologies are IR light, RF radios, and Bluetooth. The IR-controlled ones are the simplest, and we’ve covered a
teardown
, a
reverse engineering effort
and
reflash
of the Pixmob IR armbands.
Finally, we get a good behind-the-scenes look at how they are controlled. Using pan-tilt IR emitters mounted on lighting towers, the operators can sweep across the audience controlling color and light levels or activating pre-programmed sequences.
The full control setup for RF wristbands, with transmitter on the left.
RF armbands have the simplest control setup, only requiring a single portable transmitter connected to a computer running the control software. It does however require some pre-planning for more complex light displays, to ensure each section of the audience is individually addressable.
The most advanced and expensive versions are handheld light sticks controlled via Bluetooth from an app on the users smartphone, and are popular at K-Pop concerts. Each device is linked to the users seat number, making them individually addressable and allowing the lighting operators to produce complex patterns, and even text, in the crowd.
While each of these devices is simple and underwhelming on its own, tens of thousands working together produce impressive effects and probably hide some hard-earned engineering experience. | 15 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657557",
"author": "zoobab",
"timestamp": "2023-07-01T11:20:00",
"content": "Go to one of those concerts, reverse engineer the infrared messages, and come to the next concert with your own infrared transmitter :-)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
... | 1,760,372,246.71655 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/30/creating-a-commodore-64-cartridge-on-single-sided-stripboard/ | Creating A Commodore 64 Cartridge On Single-Sided Stripboard | Maya Posch | [
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"gommodore 64",
"rom cartridge",
"stripboard"
] | The DIY Commodore 64 cartridge. (Credit: Linus Åkesson)
When you want to write software for a system like the Commodore 64, the obvious and safe choice is to create an image that can be used with a tape or floppy drive emulator. Yet these come with the obvious disadvantage of loading time and manual steps, much like with the original hardware. Unfortunately, if you crave that instant-on experience that cartridges offer – courtesy of them being plugged directly into the system’s CPU bus – you better get an EE diploma to figure it all out. Or maybe not, as [Linus Åkesson] found out when he
created a custom cartridge
to boot his
Commodordian
project from.
For the core of the cartridge a bit of stripboard was sufficient to interface with the C64’s cartridge slot. Despite being single-sided, all the required signals were on one side of the slot. These include the EXROM line that informs the system that a cartridge is present, the ROML line that informs the cartridge when the system is trying to read from it, and of course the data bus. After this the interaction gets somewhat interesting, due to the use of the single-sided stripboard, as the address bus and other signals are on the non-connected side.
Working around this was the biggest challenge, but by creatively using the ROML and DotClk lines and by disabling the display output, the ATmega88 and 74HC541-based cartridge a working solution was created. There is still room for improvement here, naturally, but it would appear that if the goal is simply to autoload software on boot, this is definitely a workable solution. One could also splurge on double-sided stripboard, but that would strip away most of the fun of this solution. | 10 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657551",
"author": "Gino Latino",
"timestamp": "2023-07-01T10:52:05",
"content": "Double side stripboards are more expensive and hard to find, but RS Uk has some modelshttps://uk.rs-online.com/web/p/stripboards/1004182?gb=bThis project goes into the category: find an non-existing p... | 1,760,372,246.662748 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/02/saying-goodbye-to-don-lancaster/ | Saying Goodbye To Don Lancaster | Adam Fabio | [
"News"
] | [
"Don Lancaster",
"guru",
"tinaja"
] | The electronics world has lost a guru. On June 7th this year,
Don Lancaster passed away
. [Brad] from
Tech Time Traveller
paid tribute to Don in a recent video
. Don Lancaster was perhaps best known as the designer of the
TV Typewriter
. The Typewriter drew characters on a TV screen when the user typed on a keyboard. It was the fundamental part of a simple terminal. This was quite an accomplishment in 1973 when the article was first published.
Don embodied the hacker spirit by figuring out low-cost (cheap) ways to overcome obstacles. His genius was his ability to communicate his methods in a way even non-technical people could understand. Keyboards are a great example. Back in the 1970’s a simple keyboard cost hundreds of dollars. Don figured out how to build one from scratch and published an article explaining how to do it.
Like many people we cover here on Hackaday, Don was quite a character. His
website layout hasn’t changed much since the 1990’s
, but the content has grown. To say he was a prolific writer would be an understatement. PostScript, Magic Sinewaves, and patents are just a few of his favorite topics. Don’s recent work involved the research of
prehistoric canals in the American Southwest
.
Everyone here at Hackaday sends our deepest condolences to Don’s family.
Featured image from [Brad’s]
Tech Time Traveller
video thumbnail. Thanks to [Brad] for his help with this article. | 64 | 36 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657924",
"author": "Wallace Owen",
"timestamp": "2023-07-02T20:05:15",
"content": "TTL cookbook, CMOS cookbook, and Active Filter cookbook were my constant companions in the 70s and 80s.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "665794... | 1,760,372,247.03251 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/02/pill-bugs-and-chitons-get-jobs-as-tiny-grippers/ | Pill Bugs And Chitons Get Jobs As Tiny Grippers | Donald Papp | [
"Robots Hacks",
"Science"
] | [
"Animals",
"biological",
"chiton",
"gripper",
"pill bug",
"research",
"robotics"
] | A research paper titled
Biological Organisms as End Effectors
explores the oddball approach of giving small animals jobs as grippers at the end of a robotic arm. Researchers show that pill bugs and chitons — small creatures with exoskeletons and reflexive movements — have behaviors making them useful as grippers, with no harm done to the creatures in the process. The prototypes are really just proofs of concept, but it’s a novel idea that does work in at least a simple way.
Pill bugs reflexively close, and in the process can grasp and hold lightweight objects. The release is simply a matter of time; researchers say that after about 115 seconds a held object is released naturally when the pill bug’s shell opens. While better control over release would be good, the tests show basic functionality is present.
The chiton — a small mollusk — can grip underwater.
Another test involves the chiton, a small mollusk that attaches to things with suction and can act as an underwater end effector in a similar way. Interestingly, a chiton is able to secure itself to wood and cork; materials that typical suction cups do not work on.
A chiton also demonstrates the ability to manipulate a gripped object’s orientation. Chitons seek dark areas, so by shining light researchers could control in which direction the creature attempts to “walk”, which manipulates the held object. A chiton’s grip is strong, but release was less predictable than with pill bugs. It seems chitons release an object more or less when they feel like it.
This concept may remind readers somewhat grimly of
grippers made from dead spiders
, but researchers emphasize that we have an imperative to not mistreat these living creatures, but to treat them carefully as we temporarily employ them in much the same manner as dog sleds or horses have been used for transportation, or carrier pigeons for messages. Short videos of both pill bug and chiton grippers are embedded below, just under the page break. | 24 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657868",
"author": "K1R4",
"timestamp": "2023-07-02T17:18:52",
"content": "and the first cyborgs are born",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6657910",
"author": "Eric Weatherby",
"timestamp": "2023-07-02T18:54:38... | 1,760,372,249.129021 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/02/computer-speed-gains-erased-by-modern-software/ | Computer Speed Gains Erased By Modern Software | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Software Development"
] | [
"application",
"comparison",
"latency",
"modern",
"retro",
"software",
"speed",
"Windows 11",
"windows 2000"
] | [Julio] has an older computer sitting on a desk, and recorded a quick video with it showing how fast this computer can do seemingly simple things, like open default Windows applications including the command prompt and Notepad. Compared to his modern laptop, which seems to struggle with even these basic tasks despite its impressive modern hardware, the antique machine seems like a speed demon.
His videos set off a huge debate
about why it seems that modern personal computers often appear slower than machines of the past.
After going through plenty of plausible scenarios for what is causing the slowdown, [Julio] seems to settle on a nuanced point regarding abstraction. Plenty of application developers are attempting to minimize the amount of development time for their programs while maximizing the number of platforms they run on, which often involves using a compatibility layer, which abstracts the software away from the hardware and increases the overhead needed to run programs. Things like this are possible thanks to the amount of computing power of modern machines, but not without a slight cost of higher latency. For applications developed natively, the response times would be expected to be quite good, but fewer applications are developed natively now including things that might seem like they otherwise would be.
Notepad, for example, is now based on UWP
.
While there are plenty of plausible reasons for these slowdowns in apparent speed, it’s likely a combination of many things; death by a thousand cuts.
Desktop applications built with a browser compatibility layer
, software companies who are reducing their own costs by perhaps not abiding by best programming practices or simply taking advantage of modern computing power to reduce their costs, and of course the fact that modern software often needs more hardware resources to run safely and securely than equivalents from the past. | 284 | 50 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657804",
"author": "monsonite",
"timestamp": "2023-07-02T14:17:53",
"content": "I cannot agree more.I have an elderly Lenovo laptop that I never turn off because it sometimes takes over an hour to reboot.Switching between applications can take tens of seconds.Perhaps it is RAM limi... | 1,760,372,249.549 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/02/put-more-power-in-your-dental-hygiene-routine/ | Put More Power In Your Dental Hygiene Routine! | Jenny List | [
"home hacks"
] | [
"4-stroke",
"electric toothbrush",
"gasoline engine",
"more power"
] | What do you do, when you move into a shared apartment and find only one socket is available among four electric toothbrushes? Revert to an old-style manual brush? If you’re [luisengineering], not a bit of it.
He’s modified an electric toothbrush with the only sensible power plant
, a three-horsepower twin cylinder four-stroke gasoline motor. You’ll need to turn on translated subtitles from the original German to watch it, but we hope you’ll agree it’s worth it.
After explaining the problem, the video below the break continues with the assembly of the motor, a model unit available through the usual online suppliers. This alone is interesting, for no doubt many of us have seen these motors for sale and retain some curiosity about them. We expected him to retain the electric drive for the toothbrush and use a generator, but instead, he hooks up the motor via a shaft directly to the input gear. With three horsepower behind the brush, this will surely shift that stubborn plaque! Astoundingly as you can see in the video below the break the contraption works, and both he and a friends perform their dental ablutions with it.
We like the blend of craziness and engineering embodied by this project, and we commend it to you on that basis. If you’re short of electric toothbrush modding ideas,
how about an engraving tool
? | 15 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657772",
"author": "70sjukebox",
"timestamp": "2023-07-02T11:29:47",
"content": "“He’s modified an electric toothbrush with the only sensible power plant”Power source perhaps makes more sense?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "... | 1,760,372,248.849041 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/02/testing-futuristic-propeller-designs-with-a-3d-printer-and-a-solar-powered-boat/ | Testing Futuristic Propeller Designs With A 3D Printer And A Solar-Powered Boat | Maya Posch | [
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"3d printing",
"rctestflight",
"toroidal propeller"
] | The toroidal boat propeller pair installed. (Credit: rctestflight)
As boring as propeller designs may seem to the average person, occasionally there’s a bit of a dust-up in the media about a ‘new’ design that promises at least a few percent improvement in performance, decreased noise profile, or any combination of such claims. Naturally, if you’re [Daniel Riley] of RCTestFlight, then you have to 3D print a few of them, and
make a video covering a handful
. Most famous of these is probably the
toroidal propeller
that made waves a while ago, mostly in the field of flying drones, but commercial toroidal boat props exist too.
Test results of the different boat propeller designs. (Credit: rctestflight)
Interestingly, the 2-blade FDM-printed propeller ended up performing the best, while the bi-blade design (with two sets of blades positioned one after the other) performed worse — but better than the toroidal design. Here the last two designs were professionally printed in nylon, rather than printed at home in a standard FDM printer with all of the surface sanding and treatment required. Even so, the surface treatment did not seem to noticeably affect the results in further testing.
Hints at the root cause of the problem came from the bubble tests. In a bubble test, air is blown in front of the spinning propeller to visualize the flow of the water. This revealed some stalling on the bi-blade and the toroidal design too, which would explain some of the performance loss. Going back between the
CAD model
and the design in the patent by Sharrow Marine didn’t provide any obvious hints.
Considering that this latter company claims a performance uplift over regular boat propellers, the next steps for [Daniel] would appear to involve some careful navigating between fluid dynamic modeling and claims made in glossy marketing material to figure out exactly how close someone at home with a 3D printer and some spare time can get to those claimed numbers.
(Heading image: The toroidal propeller’s details in the CAD software. (Credit: rctestflight) ) | 21 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657757",
"author": "Mystick",
"timestamp": "2023-07-02T10:50:54",
"content": "My limited instinct tells me those are going to cavitate, leading to increased wear, decreased lifetime and degraded performance.One thing you could do is look into nuclear submarine props… while those de... | 1,760,372,248.737535 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/01/an-esp32-dev-board-as-a-framework-laptop-module/ | An ESP32 Dev Board As A Framework Laptop Module | Jenny List | [
"Peripherals Hacks"
] | [
"ESP32-S3",
"expansion",
"framework",
"laptop",
"portable",
"USB C"
] | The Framework laptop will no doubt already have caught the eye of more than one Hackaday reader, as a machine designed for upgrade and expansion by its users. One of its key features is a system of expansion modules. The modules are USB-C devices in a form factor that slides into the expansion bays on the Framework Laptop. Framework encourages the development of new modules, which is something [Spacehuhn] has taken on with
an ESP32-S3 development board
.
The board itself is what you’d expect, the ESP is joined by a multicolor LED and one of those Stemma/Quiik connectors for expansion. The case is handily provided
by Framework themselves
, and all the files for the ESP32 module
can be found in a GitHub repository
. We’re guessing it will find application in experimenting with WiFi networks rather than as a standalone microcontroller. Either way, it shows the route for any Framework owners into making their own add-ons. Take a look, we’ve placed the video below the break.
As you might expect we’ve given a lot of coverage to the Framework laptop since its launch, in particular, our colleague [Arya Voronova] is a fan and has shown us
many alternative uses for the parts
. | 17 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657716",
"author": "ono",
"timestamp": "2023-07-02T06:20:26",
"content": "An edge use case of a niche product on the fringe of the laptop market: This will interest at least 11111111 people in the word.Ah and those buttons. Seems like an easy problem for a solution that does not ex... | 1,760,372,248.956112 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/01/importing-eagle-projects-into-kicad-7-and-how-to-fix-them/ | Importing EAGLE Projects Into KiCad 7, And How To Fix Them | Donald Papp | [
"how-to"
] | [
"eagle",
"eda",
"how-to",
"KiCAD",
"migration",
"pcb"
] | Migrating a PCB design from one CAD software package to another is no one’s favorite task. It almost never works cleanly. Often there are missing schematic symbols, scrambled PCB footprints, and plenty of other problems. Thankfully [shabaz] shows
how to import EAGLE projects into KiCad 7
and fix the most common problems one is likely to encounter in the process. Frankly, the information couldn’t come at a better time.
This is very timely now that EAGLE has gone the way of the dodo. CadSoft EAGLE used to be a big shot when it came to PCB design for small organizations or individual designers, but
six years after being purchased by Autodesk they are no more
. KiCad 7 is a staggeringly capable open-source software package containing
some fantastic features
for beginner and advanced designers alike.
Of course, these kinds of tutorials tend to be perishable because software changes over time. So if you’re staring down a migration from EAGLE to KiCad and could use some guidance, there’s no better time than the present. [shabaz]’s video showing the process is embedded below.
Thanks to [problemchild68] for the tip! | 12 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657689",
"author": "john ferguson",
"timestamp": "2023-07-02T02:12:38",
"content": "I read the Eagle GoAway announcement more closely and for my purposes, it looks like it will be there until June 7, 2026 – 3 more years.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
... | 1,760,372,249.235066 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/30/rocky-strikes-back-at-red-hat/ | Rocky Strikes Back At Red Hat | Jenny List | [
"Linux Hacks",
"News"
] | [
"gpl",
"linux",
"red hat",
"Rocky Linux"
] | The world of Linux has seen some disquiet over recent weeks following the decision of Red Hat to restrict source code distribution for Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) to only their paying customers. We’re sure that there will be plenty of fall-out to come from this news, but what can be done if your project relies upon access to those Red Hat sources?
The Red-Hat-derived Rocky Linux distro relies on access to RHEL source, so the news could have been something of a disaster. Fortunately for Rocky users though,
they appear to have found a reliable way to bypass the restriction
and retain access to those RHEL sources. Red Hat would like anyone wanting source access to pay them handsomely for the privilege, but the Rocky folks have spotted a way to bypass this. Using readily available cloud images they can spin up a RHEL system and use it to download their sources, and they can do this as an automated process.
We covered this story
as it unfolded last week
, and it seemed inevitable then that something of this nature would be found, as for all Red Hat’s wishes a GPL-licensed piece of code can’t be prevented from being shared. So Rocky users and the wider community will for now retain access to the code, but will Red Hat strike back? It’s inevitable that there will be a further backlash from the community against any such moves, but will Red Hat be foolhardy enough to further damage their standing in this regard?
They’re certainly not the only large distro losing touch with their users
. | 56 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657502",
"author": "Truth",
"timestamp": "2023-07-01T02:58:00",
"content": "I can see a firewall rule added that requires a login to allow access to download.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6657505",
"author": "NiHao... | 1,760,372,249.058972 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/30/a-quick-and-easy-tape-measure-turnstile-antenna-for-milsat-snooping/ | A Quick And Easy Tape Measure Turnstile Antenna For MILSAT Snooping | Dan Maloney | [
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"circular polarization",
"LHCP",
"milsat",
"phasing",
"pirates",
"RHCP",
"satcom",
"satellite",
"tape measure",
"turnstile"
] | The number of satellites whizzing by over our heads at any moment is staggering, and growing at a rapid rate as new constellations are launched. But sometimes it’s the old birds that are the most interesting, as is the case with some obsolete but still functional military communications satellites, which thanks to a lack of forethought are largely unsecured and easily exploitable. And all that’s needed to snoop in on them is a cheap ham radio and something like
this simple and portable satcom antenna
.
As proof of the global nature of the radio hobby, the design in the video below by Brit [Tech Minds] borrows heavily from previous work by Italian ham [Ivo Brugnera (I6IBE)], which itself was adapted to use 3D-printed parts in
a German blog post
a few years ago. The common thread is the use of tape measures for the elements of the aptly named turnstile antenna, a tried and true material for lightweight, foldable antennas that amateur radio enthusiasts have been using for years. The antenna is similar in design to the classic three-element
Yagi-Uda
, with a crossed pair of driven elements in the middle of a boom that also supports a reflector and a director. Strips of tape measure material are held to the 20-mm aluminum tubing boom with 3D-printed brackets. A phasing harness of precisely cut coax cable connects to the driven elements and runs down the boom; the quarter-wavelength loop serves to introduce the 90° phase shift needed for the circularly polarized signal from the satellites.
A quick scan with a vector antenna analyzer showed just how well this antenna performs on the 220-MHz band, and the antenna was easily able to pick up the Brazilian satellite pirate’s chatter. The tape measure elements make the antenna easy to handle and foldable, not to mention pretty cheap to build. And what’s not to love about that? | 16 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657478",
"author": "Stappers",
"timestamp": "2023-06-30T23:34:33",
"content": "Sounds more like distress call from People who try to escape Lybia and other collapsed states around South-Europe / North-Asia region.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
... | 1,760,372,248.898169 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/30/its-easy-to-make-gears-out-of-wood/ | It’s Easy To Make Gears Out Of Wood | Lewin Day | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"gears",
"wood",
"woodworking"
] | Typically, most of the gears we use in our life are made of plastic or metal. However, wood gears can do just fine in some simple roles, and they’re utterly pleasant to make,
as this video from [botto bie] demonstrates.
With steady hands, it’s easy to make basic gears by hand with basic tools and a printer. You just need the help of a spur gear generator to produce the required outlines for you to follow. [botto bie] uses
the online tool from Evolvent Design
which will spit out DXF or SVG files as you desire.
Basic woodworking techniques are used to produce the gears, and they prove simple and effective. A rack is produced by first applying a involute tooth template with paper to a rectangular piece of wood. A series of circular and table jigsaw operations are then used to cut out the required material to produce the rack. A variety of toothed gears are produced in a similar fashion.
If you’re lacking a CNC machine or a 3D printer, this can be a great way to experiment. Bonus points if you use your wooden geartrain as part of some kind of exciting mechanism, like an
automated marble run
or
musical contraption
. Video after the break. | 20 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657434",
"author": "Adjustinthings",
"timestamp": "2023-06-30T20:06:23",
"content": "The generation gap is widening.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNuhr3htNWs",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6657437",
"author": "IIVQ... | 1,760,372,249.189437 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/30/picopad-is-a-new-open-source-game-console/ | Picopad Is A New Open Source Game Console | Lewin Day | [
"Games"
] | [
"handheld",
"picopad",
"Raspberry Pi Pico"
] | Microcontrollers are so powerful these days that you can build color handheld games with them that match or exceed what you’d ever get on the Game Boys and Game Gears of yesteryear.
The Picopad aims to offer just this
, in an open-source hackable format that’s friendly to experimenters.
As you might have guessed from the name, the Picopad is based on the Raspberry Pi Pico and its RP2040 microcontroller. It features four face buttons and a D-pad, along with a small color LCD with a 320×240 resolution. There is also a microSD slot upon which programs can be stored, and also an expansion port with headers for a variety of IO from the RP2040 itself including both GPIOs, serial, I2C and analog input pins. The housing is constructed out of PCBs, with some cheerful gaming artwork adding a fun aesthetic. Development is via a custom C SDK, with support for Micropython as well.
If you want to build your own and don’t fancy starting from scratch,
kits are available online.
We’ve seen some other great gaming experiments with the Raspberry Pi Pico before, too, like
an open-world 3D game
and
ZX Spectrum emulators.
Video after the break. | 18 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657422",
"author": "Daid",
"timestamp": "2023-06-30T18:51:11",
"content": "I always find it sad to see that people put so much effort in some custom gaming console and then make it practically unusable by using the worst possible buttons.Also, 4 directional buttons does not make a ... | 1,760,372,248.796441 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/30/vintage-computer-festival-southwest-bil-and-als-excellent-adventure/ | Vintage Computer Festival Southwest: Bil And Al’s Excellent Adventure | Al Williams | [
"cons",
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"VCF",
"Vintage Computer Festival"
] | There was a time when seeing an actual computer was a big deal. They were in air-conditioned rooms with raised floors and locked doors. Even at a university, you were likely only to get access to a keypunch machine or a terminal. Then small computers came out, but computer stores were few and far between. Now you can go to any local store that sells electronics and put your hands on hardware that would have been black magic in those days. But the computers back then were also much easier to understand completely. Look at your main computer today. Do you know all the assembly language instructions for it? Can you access the GPU and the MMU? Could you build your own memory for it? Sure, you don’t have to do those things, but it was fun knowing that you could. That seemed to be the overwhelming sentiment among the attendees we spoke to at the Vintage Computer Festival last weekend: We like computers that we can completely understand and troubleshoot.
If you weren’t one of the 900 or so attendees, we can help. Check out our video summary, dive into even more interviews with Bil Herd and guests on our YouTube channel, or just keep reading. The festival happens at several locations throughout the year, but this was the first time one has been in the Southwest for about ten years!
You can catch the interviews in their entirety (plus many more) over on
YouTube
. Audio at live events can be tricky, so volume up!
True Vintage
This Heathkit is actually a DEC LSI-11 in disguise.
The number of truly vintage computers at the show was amazing. Sure, there were the obligatory PCs and Macs that were just a few generations old, but they were the distinct minority. There were several Tandy computers, many Commodores of various types, and more than one minicomputer-era machine. There were also a few homebrew machines and some great-looking replicas. Outside of replicas, we didn’t see any Altair or IMASI machines, but there was some S-100 paraphernalia. There were some Soviet-era home computers on display playing — what else — Tetris. Of course, a few TI, Atari, and NExT machines made it, too.
Heathkit was well represented, and there were some odd machines like a Wang word processor and a model from Lanier. We noted a few vintage HP and Sun workstations and a giant Tektronix beast showing vector graphics.
Mysteries
What is this?
One of the fun things to do at anything like this is to try to figure out what the odd gear you’ve never seen before actually is. One exhibitor had a tube board full of IBM tubes and was hoping someone could tell what it was. We didn’t know either. We did, however, know what the tubes [David/Usagi Electric] had on display. They were part of his modern tube computer.
There were plenty of other computers and components from companies that were never household names. There were even some familiar computers and terminals that had been modified and rebranded into new equipment. We saw a VIC-20 like that, as well as ADDS terminals, and Data General modifed by other companies.
Kid Stuff
The National Videogame Museum had several popular exhibits
There were a number of old-school video games around, including the display from the National Videogame Museum. Halfway between video game and computer, we saw at least one Coleco Adam.
The Brainiac K-30 was a new packaging of the Geniac, where kids used wooden disks to make switch logic.
But we also noticed a few of the old educational kits. There was an old Brainiac K-30 Computer Circuit Lab that promised “A stimulating adventure in science, mathematics, and logic as you discover the basic principles of computer circuitry.” This was essentially the same as the old Geniac kit — the masonite board computer where you made multi-pole switches using wooden disks and wired them as switching logic.
There was also a
Radio Shack computer trainer
that we half-remembered. We never realized it was a repackage of a kit sold in Japan by Gakken, which was also at the show. Or maybe the Gakken was a repackage of the Radio Shack version. We aren’t sure. The video below shows one of these from [Tim Gilberts], which was not the one at the show.
Super Friends
Hackaday super friend [Jeri Ellsworth] was at the show, and Bil caught up with her. Check it out below.
There are plenty more interviews over on our
YouTube channel
. Overall, it was an amazing show, and we certainly hope we don’t have to wait another ten years for VCF to return to the Southwest. | 12 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657397",
"author": "Michael Black",
"timestamp": "2023-06-30T17:13:08",
"content": "We had a computer store here in the fall of 1997. I didn’t even look at the computers, too expensive. So I’d buy magazine and books. I got my First Book of Kim there in 1979 after getting my KIM-... | 1,760,372,249.715962 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/30/hackaday-podcast-225-leafy-meats-wind-to-heat-and-a-machine-thats-neat/ | Hackaday Podcast 225: Leafy Meats, Wind To Heat, And A Machine That’s Neat | Kristina Panos | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Podcasts",
"Slider"
] | [
"Hackaday Podcast"
] | This week, Editor-in-Chief Elliot Williams and Kristina Panos don’t have a whole lot in the way of news, but we do know this:
the Green Hacks Challenge of the 2023 Hackaday Prize ends precisely at 7AM PDT on July 4th
. Show us what you can do in the realm of hacking
for
the planet, be it solar-based, wind-powered, recycled-trash-powered — you get the idea.
Kristina is now completely down for the count on What’s That Sound, although this week, she was sort of in the neighborhood. But no matter, because we know several of you will nail it. Then it’s on to the hacks, where we have quite a bit to say this week when it comes to cars.
From there we take a look at a really fun gumball run, ponder the uses of leafy meats, and fawn over an Amiga-inspired build. Finally we talk PCB earring art, hacking the IKEA Kvart, and discuss the potential uses for wind-to-heat power.
Check out the links below if you want to follow along, and as always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!
Download and savor at your leisure
.
Where to Follow Hackaday Podcast
Places to follow Hackaday podcasts:
iTunes
Spotify
Stitcher
RSS
YouTube
Check
out our Libsyn landing page
Episode 225 Show Notes:
News:
Hackaday Prize 2023: This Challenge Makes It So Easy Being Green
What’s that Sound?
Know the sound?
Let us know
!
Interesting Hacks of the Week:
An Android Phone Powers A Self Driving Car
Advanced driver-assistance system – Wikipedia
Ernst Dickmanns – Wikipedia
3D Printed Machine Shows How Braiding Is Done
Honda Headunit Reverse Engineering, And The Dismal State Of Infotainment Systems
Gumball Coaster Is 3D-Printed Candy Fun
Get Your Leafy Meats
Lab-grown meat is cleared for sale in the United States
Retro-Inspired Computer Case Hosts Mechanical Keyboard
Quick Hacks:
Elliot’s Picks:
Build A Tesla Coil With Just Three Components
Luxury Train Cars Used To Ride On Paper Wheels
Formation Flying Does More Than Look Good
Kristina’s Picks:
Electronic Earrings Are PCB Art You Can Wear
IKEA Hack – Kvart Into Mic Stand
Watch Hides Gesture Controls In Wristband
Can’t-Miss Articles:
Wind-to-Heat: A Lot Of Hot Air?
Podcast Feedback: Be Careful What You Ask For | 2 | 1 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657708",
"author": "Johnowhitaker",
"timestamp": "2023-07-02T04:54:58",
"content": "I just want to thank you folks for all the work put in producing this excellent podcast each week! I really appreciate it, great stuff :)",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
... | 1,760,372,249.79989 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/30/forgettable-computer-great-keyboard-now-available-in-usb/ | Forgettable Computer, Great Keyboard. Now Available In USB | Jenny List | [
"Peripherals Hacks",
"Retrocomputing"
] | [
"coleco adam",
"keyboard",
"Teensy",
"usb keyboard"
] | The Coleco Adam is one of the great might-have-beens of the 8-bit home computer era, with an impressive bundle and on-paper spec let down by bugs, hardware issues, and poor availability. It’s something of a footnote today but it seems Coleco did get something right as it had a great keyboard. [Nick Bild] has one, and
he’s brought it into the 21st century with a USB interface
.
The interfacing is courtesy of a Teensy microcontroller board as in so many other keyboard projects, but what makes this extra-interesting is the way the Coleco keyboard speaks to the world. Instead of merely being a matrix peripheral as were so many of its contemporaries, Coleco created their own custom serial bus for Adam desktop peripherals called AdamNet, and thus the keyboard contains its own 6801 microcontroller to perform the interfacing. The Teensy then is a USB-to-AdamNet interface, and could we’re guessing be made to talk to other Coleco peripherals if they exist.
You can see the keyboard in action below the break, and as you can see it fits quite nicely into 2023. We’ve not featured much about the Adam before here at Hackaday, but the ColecoVision console which sits at its heart
has even seen a new version
. | 7 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657373",
"author": "Michael Black",
"timestamp": "2023-06-30T15:12:48",
"content": "A local store had Adam keyboards. I was very tempted to buy one, maybe thirty years ago. But at the time, not sure of the interface.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
... | 1,760,372,249.756918 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/28/a-basic-interpreter-for-the-raspberry-pi-pico/ | A BASIC Interpreter For The Raspberry Pi Pico | Lewin Day | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"basic",
"basic interpreter",
"pi pico",
"pico",
"raspberry pi",
"Raspberry Pi Pico"
] | It’s pretty easy to program the Raspberry Pi Pico in Python, or you can use C or C++ if you so desire. However, if you fancy the easy language of yesteryear,
you might like PiccoloBASIC from [Gary Sims].
Putting it simply, piccoloBASIC is a BASIC interpreter that runs on the Raspberry Pi Pico. It features all the good bits of BASIC such as GOTO and GOSUB commands, that fancier languages kind of look down upon. It’s also got enough built-in routines to handle regular programming life, like sleeps, delays, a basic pseudorandom number source, trigonometric functions, and the ability to deal with floating point numbers. As far as microcontroller tasks go, it’s got rudimentary support for talking to GPIOs right now via the pinon and pinoff commands. However, it’s probably not the way to go if you want to bit-bang an SD card to within an inch of its speed rating.
Down the road, [Gary] hopes to add support for features like the Pico’s I2C, SPI, and PIO hardware, along with networking protocols and Bluetooth. PEEK and POKE are also hopefully on the way for those that like to fiddle with memory directly.
Meanwhile, if you’re looking for a different yet similar take,
explore the port of MMBasic to the Pico platform.
Video after the break. | 38 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656906",
"author": "Stephen Walters",
"timestamp": "2023-06-29T02:15:24",
"content": "FORTH next please!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6656928",
"author": "BrightBlueJim",
"timestamp": "2023-06-29T04:40:27",... | 1,760,372,249.874026 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/28/a-different-approach-to-ev-conversions/ | A Different Approach To EV Conversions | Navarre Bartz | [
"car hacks"
] | [
"electric cars",
"electric drive",
"electronic vehicle",
"ev",
"EV conversion"
] | While there are a lot of exciting electric vehicles finally coming to market, many of us feel nostalgic for the fossil cars of our youth. [Mihir Vardhan] restored his grandfather’s car with an
unusual gas-to-EV conversion
.
While this conversion starts in the usual fashion by pulling out the gas engine, [Vardhan] takes a different tack than most by not just bolting an electric motor up to the transmission. Instead, he and his crew removed the head and pistons from the petrol burner and bolted the electric motor to the top on an L-shaped bracket. Using the timing belt to transfer power to the crankshaft, there is no need to figure out additional motors for the A/C compressor or power steering pump, greatly simplifying implementation.
[Vardhan] did need to add a vacuum pump for the braking system and used a DC/DC converter to step down the 72V traction battery voltage to the 12V needed to charge the accessory battery. While it doesn’t exactly boast the performance of a Tesla, his bargain-basement conversion does yield a converted vehicle that can get around town for only around $3k US, even if it does mean your EV still needs oil changes. We think this could work even better on a vehicle with a timing chain instead of a belt, but it’s certainly an interesting way to go about the conversion process.
We’ve covered our fondness for EV conversions in the past for
cars
,
motorcycles
, and
boats
if you’d like to dig deeper. Have your own EV conversion you think we should cover?
Send us a tip
! | 53 | 20 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656872",
"author": "bob",
"timestamp": "2023-06-28T23:21:18",
"content": "many modern cars are built so cheaply they lack a keyway on the crankshaft cog. I think this is a terrible idea because a timing belt or chain is not rated to the torque it takes to pull a car loaded with peo... | 1,760,372,249.960923 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/28/do-everything-led-indicator-light-runs-from-4v-to-60v/ | Do-Everything LED Indicator Light Runs From 4V To 60V | Lewin Day | [
"LED Hacks"
] | [
"indicator",
"indicator light",
"led",
"light"
] | If you’re working with 3.3V or 5V circuits, it’s easy for you to throw on a power or status LED here or there. [Tom Gralewicz] has found himself in a pickle, though, often working on projects with voltages like 36V or 48V. Suddenly, it’s no longer practical to throw an LED and a resistor on a line to verify if it’s powered or not. Craving this simplicity,
[Tom] invented the Cheap Universal LED Driver, or CULD, to do the job instead.
The CULD is designed as a simple LED indicator that will light up anywhere from 5V to 50V. It’s intended to be set-and-forget, requiring no fussing with different resistor values and no worries for the end user that excessive current draw will result.
The key part ended up being the LV2862XLVDDCR – a cheap switching regulator. It can output 1 mA to 600 mA to drive one or several LEDs, and it can do so anywhere from a 4V to 60V input. Assemble this on a coin-sized PCB with some LEDs, and you’ve got your nifty do-everything indicator light. With a bridge rectifier onboard, it’ll even work on AC circuits, too.
[Tom] has built a handful himself, but he open-sourced the design in the hopes it will go further. By his calculations, it would be possible to build these in quantities of 1000 for a BOM cost of less than $0.50 each, not counting assembly or the PCB itself. We’d love to see them become a standard part of
hacker toolkits
, too. If you’ve got a pick-and-place plant that’s looking for work this week, maybe get them on to something like this and see what you can do! If it turns out to be a goer, maybe drop us a note
on the tipsline
, yeah? | 31 | 12 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656856",
"author": "mshr",
"timestamp": "2023-06-28T22:02:54",
"content": "LEDs are current-driven elements so they don’t really care about voltage. I guess you could regulate them with a basic 2N2222 circuit.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
... | 1,760,372,250.127676 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/28/you-can-3d-print-a-12500-rpm-brushless-motor/ | You Can 3D Print A 12,500 RPM Brushless Motor | Lewin Day | [
"Parts"
] | [
"BLDC",
"brushless motor",
"cad",
"motor"
] | Typically, when most of us need a motor, we jump online to order one from a catalogue.
[Levi Janssen] recently had to build his own for a college project
, however, and learned a lot along the way.
[Levi] whipped up his
brushless DC motor design in OnShape
. The motor has six coils in the stator, with the rotor carrying eight neodymium magnets. It’s an axial flux design, with the rotor’s magnets sitting above the coils. This makes construction very easy using 3D printed components. Axial flux motors also have benefits when it comes to power density and cooling, though optimization is outside the scope of [Levi]’s work here.
[Levi]’s video covers both the development of the motor itself as well as the drive circuit, too. The latter is of key value if you’re interested in the vagaries of driving these motors, which is far more complex than running a simple brushed motor. He even gets his motor up to 12,500 rpm with his homebrewed drive circuit.
Making your own motors can help you solve some difficult engineering challenges,
like building motorized rollerblades
. Alternatively, if winding coils sounds too slow and too hard, you can just use off-the-shelf gear and
hack it to make it work
. Here, we support both methods. | 18 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656869",
"author": "Bob K7ZB",
"timestamp": "2023-06-28T22:55:45",
"content": "Excellent piece of work!!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6656886",
"author": "Dave",
"timestamp": "2023-06-29T00:10:02",
"content": "On... | 1,760,372,250.184573 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/28/democratizing-space-one-picosatellite-at-a-time/ | Democratizing Space, One Picosatellite At A Time | Tom Nardi | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Slider",
"Space"
] | [
"commercial space",
"cubesat",
"Hack Chat",
"low earth orbit",
"SmallSat"
] | There was a time when putting an object into low Earth orbit was the absolute pinnacle of human achievement. It was such an outrageously expensive and complex undertaking that only a world superpower was capable of it, and even then, success wasn’t guaranteed. As the unforgiving physics involved are a constant, and the number of entities that could build space-capable vehicles remained low, this situation remained largely the same for the remainder of the 20th century.
Nathaniel Evry
But over the last couple of decades, the needle has finally started to move. Of course spaceflight is still just as unforgiving today as it was when Sputnik first streaked through the sky in 1957, but the vast technical improvements that have been made since then means space is increasingly becoming a public resource.
Thanks to increased commercial competition, putting a payload into orbit now costs a fraction of what it did even ten years ago, while at the same time, the general miniaturization of electronic components has dramatically changed what can be accomplished in even a meager amount of mass. The end result are launches that don’t just carry one or two large satellites into orbit, but dozens of small ones simultaneously.
To find out more about this brave new world of space exploration, we invited Nathaniel Evry, Chief Research Officer at Quub, to
host last week’s DIY Picosatellites Hack Chat
.
Quub is one of a new breed of companies that have sprung up recently which plan on leveraging small, low-cost, satellites to offer services which were once the sole domain of megacorps and governments. Specifically, they’re working on a constellation of microsatellites that will allow independent monitoring of the Earth’s natural resources.
It’s perhaps no surprise that the chat started off with a pretty straightforward question: what actually qualifies as a micro or pico satellite? It turns out the ever-exacting NASA has a set of guidelines which broadly breaks down the overall SmallSat category (spacecraft under 180 kilograms) down into the following classes:
Minisatellite:
100 – 180 kg
Microsatellite:
10 – 100 kg
Nanosatellite:
1 – 10 kg
Picosatellite:
0.01 – 1 kg
Femtosatellite:
0.001 – 0.01 kg
Outside of mass, there’s naturally the size and shape of the craft to consider. Here Nathaniel points out that there are various standards for modular satellite frames, but generally speaking they describe cubic and rectangular layouts which can be efficiently packed and dispensed. A common theme among these sort of SmallSats is that they will unfold into larger and more complex arrangements after deployment, often by extending solar array “wings” and antennas. Speaking about Quub specifically, Nathaniel says their primary platform is officially referred to as a
6p PocketQube
, which measures roughly 50 mm x 100 mm x 200 mm.
But it’s more than just the size and shape of these satellites that benefit from standardization. In an effort to bring costs down even further, they commonly use commercial off-the-shelf components rather than the bespoke rad-hardened hardware which in decades past would have been a given for anything heading to orbit. Even if the final hardware does end up being a bit higher-end, Nathaniel says all of the prototyping work Quub has done so far has used the sort of hardware that you’d find in the average hardware hacker’s toolbox — including the Raspberry Pi and RP2040 microcontroller.
As the conversation moved towards the internal construction of SmallSats, Nathaniel mentioned that one of their internal design goals is to avoid wires if at all possible as they can become a liability during launch due to vibrations and high G-force. Boards are designed to connect to each other directly whenever possible, and when the use of wiring is unavoidable, special high-strength connectors are necessary. Though in a pinch “a lot of epoxy” is also an option.
With so many details on how Quub’s satellites are being designed and built, it’s little surprise that some in the chat were curious about whether the company plans on releasing any of their work as open source. The answer turns out to be a qualified yes; while their current design still involves some elements they aren’t ready to share publicly, Quub is in the process of releasing earlier
generations of their platform under the MIT license
.
Quub’s open source SpaceHex dev platform
Of course, despite the use of off-the-shelf components and 3D printed frames, we’re not
quite
at the point where your average hackerspace is throwing together a picosatellite with what’s in the beer fund. For one thing, the sort of space-rated Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) receivers you’d want onboard your craft to provide position and velocity data aren’t exactly the kind of thing you can pick up from Micro Center. Similarly, while the
Applied Ion Systems
thrusters Nathaniel says Quub are using appear to be remarkably DIY-friendly, they still have five-figure price tags.
Arguably you could still fly without the niceties of thrusters or on-board navigation. After all, Sputnik did it. But then there’s still the small issue of getting your homebrew bird into space. While SpaceX and other commercial entities have shaved a few zeros off of what it costs to put a kilogram into orbit, it’s still a pricey proposition for an individual. But we’re getting there, and that’s extremely exciting. We’re now at the point now where small startups and universities can pull it off, and with a bit of luck, citizen scientists and hackers shouldn’t be too far behind.
We’d like to thank Nathaniel Evry for taking the time to talk about the exciting work happening at Quub and in the SmallSat community as a whole. Hosting a serious discussion about the future of DIY spacecraft is the sort of thing that we could once only have dreamt of, so we’re thrilled to have had the opportunity to make it happen. We’ll be keeping a close eye on Quub’s open source efforts, and wish them the best of luck as they venture out into the black.
The Hack Chat is a weekly online chat session hosted by leading experts from all corners of the hardware hacking universe. It’s a great way for hackers connect in a fun and informal way, but if you can’t make it live, these overview posts as well as the
transcripts posted to Hackaday.io
make sure you don’t miss out. | 50 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656805",
"author": "Michael Black",
"timestamp": "2023-06-28T17:04:16",
"content": "Oscar 1 went up in Dec 1961. Only four years after Sputnik 1. So things changed pretty fast.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6656808",
"a... | 1,760,372,250.057641 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/28/field-testing-a-home-made-wifi-antenna/ | Field Testing A Home Made WiFi Antenna | Jenny List | [
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"helical antenna",
"wifi",
"wifi antenna"
] | Most readers will be aware that a good way to extend WiFi range is to use a better antenna for those 2.4 GHz signals, but at the same time such high frequency hijinks have something of a reputation of being not for the faint-hearted. [Dereksgc] puts that reputation to the test
by building a helical WiFi antenna
— and if that weren’t enough — he also
subjects it to a field test
. In a real field, is there any other way?
We’ve put both videos below the break, and you can find
his helical antenna calculator
on his website and
the parametric CAD file for the scaffold
in his GitHub repository. He first delivers a crash course in the fundamentals of helical antennas before diving into the construction, and even soldering on an impedance matching strip. The field testing involves setting up a base station with an FTP server on a phone, and connecting to it with a variety of antennas over increasing distance across farmland. We’ve characterised antennas in this way before, and it really does give an immediate view of their performance.
In this case the helix comfortably outperforms a commercial patch antenna and a laptop’s internal antenna, making such an antenna a very worthwhile piece of work whether you’re making a fixed link or indulging in a bit of casual wardriving.
The tools mentioned here will make helical antennas a snap, but
this isn’t the first time we’ve touched on the subject
. | 29 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656788",
"author": "Truth",
"timestamp": "2023-06-28T16:06:40",
"content": "The cheapest way I’ve heard of is to use an old satellite dish and place the WiFi antenna in the focal point of the dish, and odd as it may look the dish is pointing towards the ground (because it is usuall... | 1,760,372,250.250378 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/28/earths-final-frontier-exploring-the-alien-depths-of-the-earths-oceans/ | Earth’s Final Frontier: Exploring The Alien Depths Of The Earth’s Oceans | Maya Posch | [
"Current Events",
"Featured",
"Original Art",
"Science",
"Slider"
] | [
"deep ocean exploration"
] | Despite how hostile to life some parts of the Earth’s continents are, humanity has enthusiastically endeavored over the course of millennia to establish at least a toehold on each of them. Yet humanity has barely ventured beyond the surface of the oceans which cover around three-quarters of the planet, with human activity in these bodies of water dropping off quickly along with the fading of light from the surface.
Effectively, this means for all intents and purposes we have to this day not explored the vast majority of the
Earth’s surface
, due to over 70% of it being covered by water. As an ocean planet, much of Earth’s surface is covered by watery depths of multiple kilometers, with each 10 meters of water
increasing
the pressure by one atmosphere (1.013 bar), so that at a depth of one kilometer we’re talking about an intense 101 atmospheres.
Over the past decades, the 1985 discovery of Titanic’s wreck approximately 3.8 kilometer below the surface of the Atlantic, the two year long search for
AF447’s
black boxes, and the fruitless search for the wreckage of
MH370
despite washed-up remnants have served as stark reminders of just how alien and how hostile the depths of the Earth’s oceans are. Yet with both tourism and mining efforts booming, will we one day conquer the full surface of Earth?
A Watery Grave
Scene of a ship being ensnared and damaged by a “colossal octopus” (according to Denys-Montfort, experienced by French seamen off Angola’s coast), but relabeled as a kraken here in the engraving in Robert Hamilton MD’s book. Sepia in former usage included octopi, not just cuttlefish.
For most of human history, the oceans have been treated as essentially inaccessible, almost as if nothing that happens beyond a few hundred meters depth and the cessation of any fish species we might be interested in. Even so, long before the advent of
deep-sea exploration
, mythology has been rife with stories that in many cases contains at least a grain of truth. Much of these stories revolve around the
sperm whale
, its fantastical dives to depths of over 2 km and both their stomach contents and scars on their skin that seems to suggest the presence of enormous cephalopods, including the famous
kraken
that’d rise from the depths to drag entire ships back with it.
It wasn’t until a few hundred years ago that the first attempts were being made to determine the generally presumed to be unfathomable depths of the oceans at various points, along with the species that inhabit these depths. According to an 1843 theory proposed by Edward Forbes – called the
Azoic hypothesis
– the presence of life would diminish continuously, until the complete cessation of any life at a depth of 300 fathoms (550 meters). This was refuted by Michael Sars in 1850, who found life thriving at a depth of 800 meters, thus confirming papers published by Antoine Risso decades prior on deep-sea catches by fishermen.
The Bathysphere on display at the National Geographic museum in Washington DC. (Credit: Mike Cole)
Up till that point, deep-sea exploration was performed solely by essentially dragging stuff out of it using nets and similar fishing implements, but this changed when in 1930 William Beebe and Otis Barton were the first to dive to a depth of 435 meters in their
Bathysphere
: a spherical, pressure-resistant vessel. In 1934 they’d set a new record with a depth of 923 meters, during which dives they observed the life visible just beyond the vessel’s portholes.
Lowered into the ocean by the ship that carried it, this vessel that may have appeared crude at first glance was nevertheless quite refined for the time, with a rudimentary life support system using cylinders of compressed oxygen to replenish the oxygen breathed in by the crew, and pans of soda lime and calcium chloride installed inside to scrub CO
2
from the air after it had been exhaled.
The record set by the Bathysphere would remain until 1949 when Barton dove to 1,400 meters with the
Benthoscope
. At this point the race to develop ever better submersibles was fully on, and
bathyscaphes
(self-propelled, free-diving submersibles) appeared on the scene by the late 1940s. Being free-diving, these vessels do not require a massively long and heavy cable to winch them into and back out of the water, enabling much deeper dives.
The Bathyscaphe Trieste.
Redrawn from U.S. Naval Historical Center Photograph NH 96807, General arrangement drawing of Trieste, ca. 1959.
By 1960, the bathyscaphe
Trieste
– piloted by Jacques Piccard and Don Walsh – reached the deepest known point on Earth’s surface: the Challenger Deep, located within the Mariana Trench of the Pacific Ocean. After some refinements to the depth measurements to take the alien conditions into account, it was determined that they had reached a depth of about 10,916 meters. Unexpectedly, both men were still able to communicate with the surface support ship
USS Wandank
, via the sonar/hydrophone voice communication system. Because of the immense distance, it took about seven seconds for a message to travel between the surface and the floor of the Challenger Deep.
Beyond Mythology
Hydrothermal vent in the Atlantic Ocean. (Source: NOAA)
Along with the development of these newer and better submersibles, the mythology surrounding the depths of the ocean evaporated. What the photographs and videos recorded by both manned and unmanned deep-sea exploration vessels showed was a world completely devoid of the light which we as land-dwelling creatures hold for self-evident. In these depths, the electromagnetic radiation from our Sun does not penetrate, leaving everything in complete darkness. Even so, life found a way to create thriving ecosystems in an environment where only oppressive darkness and cold reign.
From deep-sea fish, to
chemosynthetic
organisms that live around
hydrothermal vents
and which use hydrogen sulfide synthesis as an alternative to the photosynthesis that powers life where the Sun’s rays still reach, the exploration of these hitherto unexplored depths have uncovered organisms and ecosystems that have changed our fundamental understanding of how life has formed and thrived on Earth. Even so, with how restricted our access is to these locations, scientific study is ongoing, with continuous new discoveries.
Along with the dissolution of the mythical depths came the inevitable push towards exploitation, both in the form of tourism and the mining of resources. However, what differentiates the lure of the untamed wilderness of Africa, America and other regions that were exploited in this manner over the past centuries, from the deep seas is that the latter might as well be the icy surface of Jupiter’s moon Europa. With no air to breathe, temperatures just above freezing and crushing pressures, even the challenge of climbing Mount Everest would seem to be a leisurely stroll in comparison.
With this in mind, can manned exploration of the depths ever be made safe enough for casual tourism, and will remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) be the way forward for
deep sea mining
?
Alien Worlds
An inescapable truth remains that the human body can only be kept alive at these depths through rather extreme measures. This has led within the off-shore industry to increasingly replace divers with
underwater ROVs
, These are remotely controlled robotic systems which can be either connected to a surface vessel with an umbilical cable that provides power and communication, or function with some level of autonomy. Beyond the obvious lack of a pressure vessel, these ROVs can be designed for any depth and any task, making them exceedingly versatile while keeping operators safely at atmospheric pressure in a cozy control room.
The
Victor 6000
ROV, capable of diving to depths of 6 km.
A good illustration of the complexity of deep-sea tourism is the world-famous
Titanic
wreck
. Despite the rough location of where the ship had sunk having been known within moments of the ship’s demise and broadcast around the world, it would nevertheless take many decades before a mission could be funded and navigate around in the pitch dark before stumbling over the wreck. Even then, Robert Ballard’s mission to Titanic came at the tail-end of a US Navy funded mission to map the wreck of the
USS Scorpion
.
Since that time, tourism trips to the wreck have become commonplace, offering people with well-filled pockets a chance to see the wreck with their own eyes, as well as
land on the wreck’s deck, steal artefacts and litter
. With the wreck being in international waters, these dives are essentially unregulated, and legal battles about ownership of the wreck remain, even as the tourist trips have accelerated the decay of the wreck. Perhaps ironically, a recent tourist trip to the wreck in a submersible called the
Titan
, owned by a company called OceanGate, resulted in the
carbon fiber pressure hull failing
.
The subsequent implosion shredded the submersible and instantly killed its five occupants, making it the first lethal
submersible accident
in many years. In addition to adding a second famous debris field alongside that of the
Titanic
, this event served to underline that for all the progress we have made since the 1940s the oceanic depths is not a place where you want to take shortcuts when it comes to safety.
The pertinent question here would seem to be one of necessity. For industrial purposes, ROVs have proven themselves to be the clear choice for underwater operations, and presumably ROVs would also be used for the mining of
manganese nodules
in shallower and deep waters. Doing so enables an increase in operating efficiency, while removing significant risk to the ROV operators.
This contrasts with tourism, which is an industry that is very much focused on getting squishy human bodies to a specific physical location where they can use their Mark I eyeballs to gawk at whatever is worthy of attention, whether it’s a beach in Brazil, the peak of some blizzard-blasted mountain, or the lightless depths where 1,500 souls found their demise. | 29 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656758",
"author": "Ostracus",
"timestamp": "2023-06-28T14:28:28",
"content": "“With this in mind, can manned exploration of the depths ever be made safe enough for casual tourism, and will remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) be the way forward for deep sea mining?”Communications and... | 1,760,372,250.327897 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/30/this-week-in-securitycamaro-dragon-rowpress-and-repojacking/ | This Week In Security:Camaro Dragon, RowPress, And RepoJacking | Jonathan Bennett | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"News",
"Security Hacks",
"Slider"
] | [
"flash drive",
"RepoJacking",
"This Week in Security"
] | Malicious flash drives have come a long ways since the old days of autorun infections. It’s not an accident that Microsoft has tightened down the attack surface available of removable media. So
how exactly did a malicious flash drive lead to the compromise of a European hospital
? Some sophisticated firmware on the drive? A mysterious zero day? Nope, just hidden files, and an executable using the drive name and icon. Some attacker discovered that a user trying to access a flash drive, only to be presented with what looks like the same flash drive icon, will naturally try to access it again, running an
.exe
in the process.
That executable runs a signed Symantec binary, included on the drive, and sideloads an OCX that hijacks the process. From there, the computer is infected, as well as any other flash drives in the machine. Part of the obfuscation technique is an odd chain of executables, executed recursively for a hundred copies. Naturally once the infection has rooted itself in a given machine, it takes commands from a C&C server, and sends certain files out to its waiting overlords. Checkpoint Research has attributed this campaign to Camaro Dragon, a name straight from the 80s that refers to a Chinese actor with an emphasis on espionage.
RowPress
It may sound like an exercise, but
RowPress is actually the latest DRAM attack
, in the same vein as RowHammer. Where RowHammer repeatedly opened and closed a DRAM’s activation line to induce errors on a neighboring line, RowPress simply keeps the activation line opened longer than normal. And it works better than RowHammer, surprisingly. And because it’s a novel technique, it sidesteps a lot of the protections built for Rowhammer and other techniques.
One of the interesting observations is that the temperature of system memory makes a difference. Once RAM is over 80 degrees Celsius, most of the RAM tested became significantly more vulnerable to RowPress memory corruption. And while this attack has been demonstrated on real hardware, there isn’t a Proof of Concept demonstrating an Elevation of Privilege attack yet. As similar as this is to the Row Hammer attack, it’s likely that the existing attacks could be adapted. The researchers behind this paper do suggest some mitigation techniques, so future DRAM modules will likely be safer from this particular attack.
RepoJacking
We’ve talked about RepoJacking in passing before, but this week brings a detailed report on
how many GitHub repositories might be vulnerable
to this attack. To refresh our memory, RepoJacking is possible when a user or organization makes a name change on GitHub. A user may have started on GitHub using a pseudonym, and made the change to a legal name. GitHub helpfully does a silent redirect, so anything pointing at the old username continues to work.
The problem is that those old usernames are not reserved, and are available for new registration. Snag a historic username, recreate the repositories, and suddenly anyone using the old link is pointing at your code. And the work done by Aquasec research suggests that around 3% of the existing GitHub repositories are vulnerable in this way. The solution here is to do what I did way back in 2016 when I changed my GitHub username, and immediate register the old username as a placeholder account.
GitHub is aware of this problem, and has made some attempts to protect popular accounts against this issue. Unfortunately those attempts are woefully inadequate, and the vast majority of repositories don’t trigger the safeguards. And the consequences can be nasty. Just consider what could happen if a popular project was repojacked, and the install script was tampered with.
Fake Repositories
Speaking of malicious GitHub repositories, researchers at VulnCheck discovered a repo containing a Signal 0-day. Except that “0-day” was actually a python malware dropper. While the code itself wasn’t particularly hard to recognize as sketchy, quite a bit of care seems to have been given to constructing a fake organization to give the malware an aura of legitimacy. High Sierra Cyber Security is a fake organization, and fake accounts borrowing names and pictures from real researchers have been set up as employees of the fake firm.
This campaign is very reminiscent of
the North Korean approach
, of sending similar fake research to other researchers. So far there’s no verifiable link between the two campaigns. Regardless, watch out for this particular sting.
Backup Ransoms You
An MDSec research team set their sights on ArcServe UDP, a commercial backup solution. Very quickly it became apparent that this solution had some problems, namely a trivial authentication bypass. The authentication flow sends a URL to the authenticating client that’s used for authentication. That URL can be modified in the browser, leading to a Man-in-the-Middle attack against the authentication process. One bit of information that can be captured this way is an
authUUID
for the authentication account. And since there’s a
validateUserByUuid()
method, it’s an instant admin account compromise.
From there, it’s possible to request the encrypted account password. And note, the password is only encrypted, not hashed. And it uses a static, universal encryption process and seed. So, MDSec wrote a decrypter in just a few lines of code, allowing the admin password to be extracted in plaintext. It’s not great, particularly if you’re relying on an ArcServe backup for Ransomware protection, since an attack can easily include the backup itself. A patch to fix these issues was released on the 27th, without crediting MDSec for the research.
Bits and bytes
Arbitrary file delete is quite effective for denial of service, but it’s not particularly usable for more interesting attacks, right? Well,
Zero Day Initiative has some interesting work
on that point. The setup here is an underprivileged user on a Windows machine, that has managed to pull off an arbitrary folder delete. The rest of the story is that the
Config.MSI
folder can be deleted and recreated while another process is attempting and then failing a program install. By creating a new version of that folder, the system rollback state can be overwritten, leading to escalation of privilege upon the installer attempting to undo installation. Clever!
The Junos OS had a
Denial of Service issue
, where a Border Gateway Protocol update could cause BGP session flaps. What’s interesting is that this issue has been observed in the real world. BGP is a particularly interest protocol, since it does so much unseen heavy lifting to keep the Internet working. This sort of flaw could also be used in a bigger BGP attack, where Internet traffic is intentionally mis-routed.
And finally, that Barracuda flaw that has been in play since October 2022 gets
an in-depth treatment from Mandiant
. This document contains good Indicators of Compromise, as well as additional detection rules for Snort and Suricata. The scariest part of this whole story is the six months the vulnerability was being used in targeted attacks before it was discovered and patched. | 4 | 3 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657370",
"author": "Yung Un Kim",
"timestamp": "2023-06-30T17:05:31",
"content": "North Korea do not attack computers used by running dog imperialists.We piecefull peoples. No malwzre hear.We help world see errors they make.We wantz al peoples be habby like us. Properus an kind."... | 1,760,372,250.721403 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/30/diy-robotic-actuator-built-for-walking-robots/ | DIY Robotic Actuator Built For Walking Robots | Lewin Day | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"actuator",
"quasi direct drive",
"robotic actuator"
] | [Aaed Musa] has built a variety of robots over the years, but found off-the-shelf servos to be underwhelming for his work. Thus,
he set out to build a better actuator
to support his goals of building a high-performance walking bot in future.
[Aaed] decided to try and build a quasi-direct drive actuator, similar to those used in MIT’s agile
mini Cheetah robot.
It consists of a powerful brushless DC motor driving a 9:1 planetary gear reduction built with 3D printed parts, which provides high torque output. It’s designed to be run with an ODrive S1 motor controller with encoder feedback for precise control.
The actuator weighs in at a total of 935 grams. It’s not cheap, with the bill of materials totaling just under $250. For your money, though, you get a responsive robotic actuator with a hefty holding torque of over 16 Nm, which [Aaed] demonstrates by having the actuator shake around some dumbells on a long lever arm.
Walking robots have exploded in popularity ever since Spot hit the scene. We’ve seen everything from
complex builds
to
super-simple single-servo designs
. | 2 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657309",
"author": "Rpol",
"timestamp": "2023-06-30T11:22:21",
"content": "Nice build and video. We are designing an actuator system at my employer that is very similar to this design (albeit much smaller). One key takeaway that we found was gear quality is paramount to efficienc... | 1,760,372,250.495487 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/30/gardening-robot-uses-sunlight-to-incinerate-weeds/ | Gardening Robot Uses Sunlight To Incinerate Weeds | Robin Kearey | [
"green hacks",
"Robots Hacks",
"Solar Hacks"
] | [
"machine vision",
"raspberry pi",
"solar concentrator",
"Tensorflow Lite",
"weed whacker",
"weeding"
] | Removing weeds is a chore few gardeners enjoy, as it typically involves long sessions of kneeling in the dirt and digging around for anything you don’t remember planting. Herbicides also work, but spraying poison all over your garden comes with its own problems. Luckily, there’s now a third option: [NathanBuildsDIY] designed and built
a robot to help him get rid of unwanted plants without getting his hands dirty
.
Constructed mostly from scrap pieces of wood and riding on a pair of old bicycle wheels, the robot has a pretty low-tech look to it. But it is in fact a very advanced piece of engineering that uses multiple sensors and actuators while running on a sophisticated software platform. The heart of the system is a Raspberry Pi, which drives a pair of DC motors to move the whole system along [Nathan]’s garden while scanning the ground below through a camera.
The Pi runs the camera’s pictures through a TensorFlow Lite model that can identify weeds. [Nathan] built this model himself by taking hundreds of pictures of his garden and manually sorting them into categories like “soil”, “plant” and “weed”. Once a weed has been detected, the robot proceeds to destroy it by concentrating sunlight onto it through a large Fresnel lens. The lens is mounted in a frame that can be moved in three dimensions through a set of servos. A movable lens cover turns the incinerator beam on or off.
Sunlight is focused onto the weed through a simple but clever two-step procedure. First, the rough position of the lens relative to the sun is adjusted with the help of a sun tracker made from four light sensors arranged around a cross-shaped cardboard structure. Then, the shadow cast by the lens cover onto the ground is observed by the Pi’s camera and the lens is focused by adjusting its position in such a way that the image formed by four holes in the lens cover ends up right on top of the target.
Once the focus is correct, the lens cover is removed and the weed is burned to a crisp by the concentrated sunlight. It’s pretty neat to see how well this works, although [Nathan] recommends you keep an eye on the robot while it’s working and don’t let it near any flammable materials. He describes the build process in full detail in his video (embedded below), hopefully enabling other gardeners to make their own, improved weed burner robots. Agricultural engineers have long been working on automatic weed removal, often using similar
machine vision
systems with various extermination methods like
lasers
or
flamethrowers
. | 36 | 17 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657287",
"author": "mime",
"timestamp": "2023-06-30T09:33:32",
"content": "I like it.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6657295",
"author": "James",
"timestamp": "2023-06-30T10:00:33",
"content": "Oh for sun that isn’... | 1,760,372,250.628987 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/29/hydroplaning-boat-skims-over-water/ | Hydroplaning Boat Skims Over Water | Lewin Day | [
"Toy Hacks",
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"boat",
"hydroplane"
] | Regular hulled boats are all well and good for rowing and all, but if you wanna go fast, you’ve gotta cut your draft. [RCLifeOn] built a hydroplane design that skims on the very surface of the water,
and thus travels very quickly as a result.
That’s one way to film your projects.
The build came about as [RCLifeOn] has an upcoming race which he wishes to win with speed and finesse. To that end, he 3D printed an RC hydroplane, using spray paint and spackle to waterproof the parts. It’s a trimaran design, with the large central hull connected to two pontoons via carbon fiber rods. Propulsion is via a triple-motor fan setup on the rear of the boat.
The outer motors were initially used to steer the boat via variable thrust, which comes with zero drag penalty compared to a conventional rudder. However, they proved ineffective, and a servo driven rudder was used instead. Eventually, all three motors were reconfigured for forward thrust.
The boat worked well when it was able to get up to speed and hydroplane over the surface of the water. However, it was difficult to film, as even the weight of a GoPro was enough to keep it stuck on the water’s surface. Instead [RCLifeOn] used
his electric surfboard
as a chase rig to film the boat — a neat trick itself. | 3 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657324",
"author": "Kenny C",
"timestamp": "2023-06-30T12:32:40",
"content": "Nice RC boat, one thing I would change is the rods that hold the outriggers on would be placed on top of the boat instead of through the hull making them higher and further above the waterline",
"pare... | 1,760,372,250.54427 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/29/spy-radio-setup-gets-a-tiny-power-supply-for-field-operations/ | Spy Radio Setup Gets A Tiny Power Supply For Field Operations | Dan Maloney | [
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"4047",
"80-m",
"amateur radio",
"ham",
"mosfet",
"smps",
"spy radio",
"switched mode",
"vacuum tube"
] | [Helge Fyske (LA6NCA)] may not be an actual spy — then again, he may be; if he’s good at it, we wouldn’t know — but he has built a couple of neat vacuum tube spy radios in the past. And there’s no better test for such equipment than to haul it out into the field and try to make some contacts. But how do you power such things away from the bench?
To answer that question, skip ahead to the 3:18 mark of
the video below
, where [Helge] shows off his whole retro rig, including the compact 250-volt power supply he built for
his two-tube 80-m Altoids tin spy transceiver
. In the shack, [Helge] powers it with a bench power supply of his own design to provide the high anode voltage needed for the tubes, as well as 12 volts for their heaters. Portable operations require a more compact solution, preferably one that can be run off a battery small enough to pack in.
By building his power supply in a tin, [Helge] keeps to his compact build philosophy. But the circuit is all solid state, which is an interesting departure for him. The switch-mode supply uses a 4047 astable multivibrator chip as a 50-kHz oscillator, which switches back and forth between a pair of MOSFETs to drive a transformer. This steps up the 12-volt input to 280 volts AC, which is then rectified, filtered, and regulated to 250 volts DC.
To round out his spy rig, [Helge] also designed a tiny Morse key, which appears to be 3D printed and fits in its own tin, and a compact dipole antenna. Despite picking what appears to be a challenging location — the bottom of a steep-sided fjord — [Helge] was easily able to make contacts over a distance of 400 km. His noise floor was remarkably low, a testament to the solid design of his power supply. Including the sealed lead acid battery, the whole kit is compact and efficient, and it’s a nice example of what vacuum tubes and solid state can accomplish together. | 14 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657214",
"author": "Not a Spy",
"timestamp": "2023-06-30T02:30:44",
"content": "Not to be a pooper, but looking at that motorcycle battery and those big long wire leads, there is absolutely nothing tiny about that setup.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
... | 1,760,372,250.680231 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/29/rubber-tracked-bicycle-is-horribly-inefficient/ | Rubber Tracked Bicycle Is Horribly Inefficient | Lewin Day | [
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"bicycle",
"bike",
"tracks"
] | Wheeled bikes are efficient machines, and most cycling speed and distance records are held by them. However, [The Q] has a taste for weirder creations that amuse perhaps more than they serve as viable transportation.
His latest experiments revolve around tracked propulsion methods.
The build is a wheelless bike that relies on long thin tracks mounted to a mountain bike frame. The tracks carriers are fabricated using steel box section fitted with cogged rollers. The tracks themselves are made using a pair of bicycle chains joined with welded steel bars. They’re fitted with slices of rubber cut out of traditional bike tires for grip. The rear track is driven from the bike’s pedals, while the front is merely left to run freely.
By virtue of its wide, flat tracks, the bike actually stands up on its own. It’s capable of riding in a straight line at slow speed, albeit relatively noisily. Steering is limited by virtue of the flat tracks, which don’t operate well at an angle to the ground. Since the tracks only contact the ground at a point, too, the bike has very high ground pressure, which would make it likely to sink into anything less solid than asphalt.
The build is relatively similar to [The Q]’s previous efforts to build
a supposedly square-wheeled bike
. What we’d really love to see at this point is a tracked bicycle that actually
made the best of the technology
– by being both swift and capable of crossing soft, marshy terrain. Video after the break. | 31 | 14 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657165",
"author": "Mike",
"timestamp": "2023-06-29T23:26:02",
"content": "Wasn’t worth the electricity to build it",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6657169",
"author": "Severe Tire Damage",
"timestamp": "2023-06-29T23:3... | 1,760,372,251.063282 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/29/build-a-diy-space-mouse-for-a-more-efficient-cad-workflow/ | Build A DIY Space Mouse For A More Efficient CAD Workflow | Lewin Day | [
"Peripherals Hacks"
] | [
"3d mouse",
"magnetometer",
"mouse",
"space mouse"
] | When you find yourself doing a lot of work in 3D modelling, you occasionally wish for something more capable than the humble two-dimensional mouse. A space mouse is a great tool in this regard,
and [Salim Benbouziyane] was inspired to build his own.
[Salim] started his work with research, by watching a teardown of a Connexion Space Navigator 3D mouse. This informed him of the basic functionality and the workings inside. The commercial product appears to use an optical sensor setup, but [Salim] decided to go with a magnetic sensor setup instead due to the parts he had on hand. Namely, a 3-axis magnetometer which seemed perfect for the task.
The build uses a motion platform mounted on six springs which translates and rotates in three dimensions as required. The magnetometer is mounted on the platform above a stationary set of neodymium magnets. Thus, when the platform, and thus sensor, moves, the magnetometer’s output can be used to determine the motion of the platform and translate that into useful viewport commands for CAD software. A RP2040 is charged with reading the magnetometer and acting as a USB HID device. It’s all wrapped up in a neat 3D-printed housing.
For now, it’s a little simpler in its operation than a full 6 DOF Spacemouse, but it nonetheless has helped [Salim]’s workflow improve. A good peripheral like this can be a real boon on the desktop; we’ve seen a few DIY projects in this realm
for just that reason
. Video after the break.
[Thanks to CH for the tip!] | 20 | 8 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657244",
"author": "Bob",
"timestamp": "2023-06-30T04:03:58",
"content": "Well, SpaceMouses (SpaceMice? SpaceMices?) aren’t all that cheap, and we all know that time is actually free.Can’t see the problem.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"c... | 1,760,372,250.883654 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/29/sci-fi-ui-made-easy-with-arwes/ | Sci Fi UI Made Easy With Arwes | Lewin Day | [
"Misc Hacks"
] | [
"arwes",
"sci-fi",
"science fiction",
"scifi",
"UI",
"user interface",
"web framework"
] | Many of us grew up watching
Star Trek,
marvelling at the beautiful colorful interfaces on the computers that ran the Starship Enterprise. Today’s computer interfaces have certainly grown fancier since the Windows 3.1 and Mac System 7 days, but they’re still nowhere near that gorgeous. The Arwes framework aims to change that,
at least where web apps are concerned.
The framework is inspired by the cyberprep and synthwave aesthetics, while drawing from media like
TRON: Legacy
and
Halo.
You can get a peek at what it can do
on the Arwes website,
or look at how it runs on sites like
SoulExtract
or
the Cyber Movie Database.
It’s very much about glowing lines, 1980s computer sounds, and screens with animated text fills.
It’s still in an alpha release, and likely isn’t yet ready for business-critical production use. It currently consists of a set of basic components that can be assembled into a functional futuristic website design, but you’ll need some experience to use the tools at hand. There’s
a sandbox
for experimenting that should help in that regard.
You might just find that it’s the perfect tool to create an interface for
your very own cyberdeck
, or you might put it to work on your next website design. Either way, if you create something fantastic, don’t hesitate to
drop us a line. | 18 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657064",
"author": "Joshua",
"timestamp": "2023-06-29T18:39:40",
"content": "“Today’s computer interfaces have certainly grown fancier since the Windows 3.1 and Mac System 7 days, but they’re still nowhere near that gorgeous. ”Windows 2.0 (incl. Windows/386) and LCARS (as seen in S... | 1,760,372,250.993305 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/29/vcfs-swap-meet-experiment-helps-support-expansion/ | VCF’s Swap Meet Experiment Helps Support Expansion | Tom Nardi | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Retrocomputing",
"Slider"
] | [
"swap meet",
"VCF",
"Vintage Computer Federation"
] | There was a time when those looking for tech bargains had to either try their luck at the local flea market, or make the pilgrimage out to a dedicated swap meet. But with the rise of websites like eBay and Craigslist these parking lot meetups started to fall out of favor, to the point that they became all but extinct over the last couple decades.
So there was some risk involved when the Vintage Computer Federation decided to dust off the concept as a way of sidestepping New Jersey’s COVID-era limitations on indoor meetups.
But as VCF Vice President [Jeffrey Brace] explained
during our visit earlier this month, the experiment has more than paid off. Each swap meet has brought in buyers and sellers from all over the Mid–Atlantic region, helping to not only raise money for the VCF’s ongoing preservation efforts, but spread awareness of the organization and their goals.
The VCF hopes to expand their existing museum.
During our chat, [Jeffrey] goes over the origins and growth of the VCF swap meet, and how it compares to their
annual Vintage Computer Festival
. He also speaks about the Federation’s desire to expand their already impressive museum space into a far larger climate-controlled area that will allow for even more classic computer hardware to be put on display.
We visited the VCF swap meet back in 2021
, and came away with the distinct impression that [Jeffrey] and the rest of the team had a winning idea on their hands. We’re happy to report that as of 2023 the areas where we saw room for improvement — namely the lack of on-site refreshment and a somewhat overly narrow focus on vintage hardware — have both been addressed. In its current form, this is truly a must-see event for anyone with an interest in computers, radio, or even just general electronics who happens to live within driving distance of the Jersey shore.
While eBay certainly makes it easy to bid on a piece of gear, you’re unlikely to make a new friend while doing so. Events like this are more than just a way to buy and sell hardware, but provide a chance for like-minded individuals to connect and build a community. We’re glad to see the event grow larger each year, and hope it inspires similar revivals elsewhere. | 13 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657141",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Known as Ren",
"timestamp": "2023-06-29T21:35:25",
"content": "I wish there was one close to me.Wall, South Dakota is a lot closer to me than Wall, New Jersey.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"commen... | 1,760,372,250.940016 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/29/watch-this-beautiful-japanese-factory-manufacturing-wood-planers/ | Watch This Beautiful Japanese Factory Manufacturing Hand Planes | Lewin Day | [
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"hand plane",
"plane",
"woodworking"
] | If you’re a woodworker, you know the value of a good hand plane. A stout model will last a lifetime if properly cared for. [Process X] has now taken us behind the scenes of a Japanese factory that turns out quality hand planes
to show us how it’s done.
The video starts at the forge, where steel is attached to soft iron to form a blank that will become the hand plane blade. This is proper blacksmithing, with autohammers and flames akimbo. It’s also a woodworking story, though, with the hand plane bodies themselves carefully prepared for the years of faithful service ahead. We get to see the raw wood roughed into shape and put through the thicknesser, along with the more interesting machining steps that carve out the angled pockets and the blade slot.
The final assembly is great, too, particularly when the pins are nailed in to hold everything in place. The test is the icing on the cake, in which the hand plane peels a perfect contiguous strip from a long piece of lumber.
It’s still very much a manual process, with the workshop largely relying on classical machine tools. There’s not a hint of CNC control to speak of. For the
Komori Small Plane Factory
and the Koyoshiya Watanabe Woodworking Shop, though,
the old methods are doing just fine
.
Thanks to [Keith Olsen] for the tip! | 21 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657044",
"author": "D",
"timestamp": "2023-06-29T16:54:16",
"content": "These are planes, not planers",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6657484",
"author": "Dave!",
"timestamp": "2023-06-30T23:47:27",
"c... | 1,760,372,251.123298 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/29/know-snow-monitoring-snowpack-with-the-snotel-network/ | Know Snow: Monitoring Snowpack With The SNOTEL Network | Dan Maloney | [
"Engineering",
"Featured",
"Interest",
"Original Art",
"Slider"
] | [
"meteor bounce",
"meteorology",
"mountains",
"precipitation",
"SnOTEL. snow",
"telemetry",
"weather"
] | With summer just underway here in North America, it may seem like a strange time to talk about snow. But when you live in North Idaho, winter is never very far away and is always very much on everyone’s mind. Our summers are fierce but all too brief, so starting around September, most of us begin to cast a wary eye at the peaks of the Bitterroot range in the mornings, looking for the first signs of snow. And in the late spring, we do much the same, except longingly looking for the first signs that the snowpack is finally breaking up.
We all know how important snow is, of course. Snow is our lifeline, nearly the only source of drinking water we have here, as well as the foundation of our outdoor recreation industries. We also know that the snowpack determines our risk for wildfires, so while the long, dark winters may take a psychological toll, the longer the snow stays on the mountains, the less chance we have of burning come summer.
These are all very subjective measures, though, and there’s way too much riding on the snowpack to leave it up to casual observation. To make things more quantitative, the US Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) has built a system across the western US that measures the snowpack in real-time, and provides invaluable data to climatologists, fish and game managers, farmers, and even the recreation industry, all of whom have a vested interest in the water held within. The network is called SNOTEL, and I recently got a chance to take a field trip with a hydrologist and get an up-close look at how it works.
Courses and Cores
I got interested in SNOTEL thanks to local meteorologists, who all seem even more snow-obsessed than we civilians. This year, despite many seemingly endless hours behind the snowblower clearing the driveway, their reports were consistently showing that the snowpack was behind expectations. It seemed counterintuitive, so to understand how they came to this conclusion, I sniffed around a bit until I stumbled on SNOTEL, the snow telemetry network.
SNOTEL is just the kind of system that pushes all my buttons — a widely distributed network of weather sensors that have to operate reliably under harsh conditions with minimal maintenance in some of the most remote and rugged locations in the United States. With
the NRCS interactive SNOTEL map
showing a few sites within reasonable driving distance, I took a chance and dropped an email to Pete Youngblood, an NRCS hydrologist based out of the local field office right here in town. To my surprise, Pete got right back to me — turns out he’s a Hackaday reader! — and offered to take me on a guided tour of a site when he did his annual maintenance visit. I eagerly accepted.
Dr. James E. Church on a snow course walk in 1906. Source:
NRCS
During the ride up to the site in Pete’s big four-wheel-drive truck, he explained that he’s responsible for 25 SNOTEL sites across North Idaho and has to visit each of them between June and September. That’s a tall order, since the sites are widely scattered and often extremely remote, sometimes requiring four or more hours of driving down twisting forest roads. Several sites are so far out that they can only be reached by hiking in — a tough proposition with all the tools and materials needed for annual maintenance. Other sites can only be reached by helicopter.
While the site we visited — I’ll be obfuscating the exact location so as not to exacerbate the vandalism problem, which only adds to Pete’s workload — was far more accessible than any of those extreme sites, it was still pretty out there. Pete told me that current SNOTEL sites by and large echo the old snow survey routes established over a century ago by Dr. James E. Church of the University of Nevada, who recognized the need for a system of measuring snowpack levels across watersheds in the western USA.
Dr. Church, a classics professor as well as an avid mountaineer, developed the precursor to the current Federal Snow Sampler, the tool that is still used to this day for taking manual snow measurements. It consists of multiple short sections of tubing that can be easily packed in and assembled on-site. The tube is pushed through the snow until it hits soil; the snow water equivalent — the depth of water that would result if the snow mass melted completely — is calculated using a complicated formula that takes into account the weight of the core sample, which is measured right in the field.
NRCS Federal Snow Sampler. Each tube is a packable 30″ long and is sized to hold exactly one ounce of snow per inch — sorry, metric fans. Source:
NRCS
He also established a network of survey sites in critical watersheds, which were formalized and expanded over the years as his methods proved their value. These snow courses are still surveyed manually to this day, which helps to validate the readings taken by the automated SNOTEL stations, many of which were set up along the old snow courses.
Pete spends a lot of his winter snowshoeing along snow courses to take manual measurements; he invited me along on one of those outings, but I’ll have to practice my snowshoeing skills if I’m going to take him up on that.
Forbidden Pillow Juice
The site we visited is pretty typical for the SNOTEL network. Most sites have a basic complement of standard meteorology instruments — anemometer and wind gauge, air and soil temperature, and the like — but the stars of the show are the snow pillow and the precipitation gauge. The snow pillow is pretty clever — it’s basically a liquid-filled bladder lying on a very flat section of ground. The bladder is connected to the nearby instrument shack by a buried length of tubing, which continues up the inside wall of the shack. Snow accumulates on the pillow over the winter, increasing the hydrostatic pressure and pushing the fluid up the tubing. A transducer measures the pressure continuously over the winter, allowing hydrologists to determine the SWE at the site.
The snow pillow presents some practical engineering challenges, not least of which is hauling hundreds of gallons of fluid to remote areas to fill them up. The fluid also needs to not freeze, so a non-toxic antifreeze like propylene glycol needs to be used. That also presents a problem since such solutions are often sweet, which attracts bears. This means that snow pillows in grizzly country — which we were very much in — need to be protected with multiple layers of chain-link fencing material, firmly anchored to the ground. As an aside, Pete said that outside of bear country, snow pillows without protection make a great place to set up sleeping bags during overnight trips; your very own forest waterbed.
https://hackaday.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/snowtell_pillow.webm
The other prominent instrument at a SNOTEL site is the precipitation gauge. It’s like a rain gauge on steroids — a huge aluminum pipe about 10″ (25 cm) in diameter, and about 10 feet (3 meters) tall. Like the snow pillow, the precip gauge hydrostatically measures the snow and rain that accumulate inside it, at first layering on top of the denser antifreeze and eventually mixing with it. Pete spent most of his time draining off the old antifreeze from the precip gauge and putting a fresh charge in from two jerry cans he lugged in from the truck.
Since most SNOTEL sites are generally way, way off the grid, site power has to be solar. Each shelter has a pole-mounted solar panel, a charge controller, and a couple of deep-cycle batteries to keep everything running. Power requirements are modest, especially since the VHF
meteor-bounce radios
that once connected all the sites to Boise have been replaced by GOES satellite, Iridium links, or as in the case of the site we visited, cellular modems.
A lovely if somewhat smokey day in the Bitterroots
The overall site with snow pillow in the foreground. The shelter has an upper door for access no matter how deep the snow gets.
The station log book, which goes back to initial installation in 1978. Happy Halloween!
The precip gauge only looks like a missile. Unfortunately, it sometimes traps and drowns birds and squirrels.
An ultrasonic sensor that looks down towards the ground and provides an alternate snow-level measurement
Things are pretty simple in the shack: a data logger, a custom PCB for integrating sensors, and a cellular modem.
Pete checking out the sensors over the snow pillow.
The old Yagi antenna for the now-removed VHF meteor-bounce radio
Huckleberries galore carpeted the site — acres of them.
Making It All Make Sense
However the raw data make it back to the NRCS, that’s only the beginning. Hydrologists like Pete need to turn raw readings of snow depth, soil temperature and moisture, and accumulated precipitation into one of many data products offered to end users. There really is a bewildering array of products available at the click of a mouse, including maps, graphs, and tabular reports. As a civilian, I found the most revealing to be the snow-water equivalent charts, which show the snow packs over the current “snow year” — October 1 to September 30 — as a function of SWE. The chart below is for the site we visited, and shows the current snow year in black. Compared to the median of the 1991 to 2020 readings (solid green line), the snowpack was looking pretty much average right up until the first of May, when we got a sudden warm spell and the snow rapidly disappeared. In a 70th-percentile year (aqua area), we would still have seen snow on the pillow when we visited in mid-June.
SWE for the current snow year. Things were pretty much average until early May, when an unseasonably warm spell melted the snowpack very quickly. Let’s hope there was enough water to keep the wildfires at bay another year.
It’s hard to overestimate the value that SNOTEL brings to those of us living in the West, even if the network and the people behind it go largely unnoticed. People like Pete put an awful lot of effort into keeping the system running and making sense out of the data, and I just want to say thanks to him for taking the time to show me around and patiently field my questions. Thanks Pete! | 13 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6657024",
"author": "Brian Huggett",
"timestamp": "2023-06-29T16:12:08",
"content": "Thanks for the great article!I worked in the Sierra Nevada with the California Department of Water Resources updating and augmenting SNOTELs. Best job ever and captured important data to boot!",
... | 1,760,372,251.188479 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/29/demo-relativity-for-a-c-note/ | Demo Relativity For A C-Note | Al Williams | [
"Science"
] | [
"cloud chamber",
"muon",
"relativity",
"science"
] | If you are a science fiction fan, you probably hate the theory of relativity. After all, how can the
Enterprise
get to a new star system every week if you can’t go faster than the speed of light? [Nick Lucid] wants to set you straight: it is real, and you can
prove it to yourself for under $100
.
The idea uses muons created in our atmosphere by cosmic rays colliding with gasses in the atmosphere. So how do you detect muons yourself? [Nick] shows you how to do it with a fish tank, dry ice, and rubbing alcohol. If that sounds like a cloud chamber, you aren’t wrong.
A cloud chamber is undeniably cool, but how does it prove relativity? You’ll see several kinds of particles interacting with your cloud chamber, but you can tell which ones are muons by the size and motion of the streaks. The muons don’t last very long. So you’d expect very few muons to make it to the surface of the Earth. But they not only reach the surface but go deep under it, as well.
So how do you explain it? Relatively. The muon experiences its average 2.2 microseconds lifetime in what appears to us to be over 150 microseconds, even if it is moving relatively slowly for a muon. Some muons are faster or live longer, so we see a lot of them hit the Earth every minute of every day. This is due to time dilation and also explains length contraction because the muon moves at a certain speed, yet it appears to go further to us than to the muon.
Coincidentally, we recently discussed this same effect relative to using muons for
underground navigation
. If you want an easier way to count muons with a computer, you can
build a detector
for about the same price as the cloud chamber. | 16 | 5 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656987",
"author": "Mathias",
"timestamp": "2023-06-29T12:06:29",
"content": "This “prove” has like 20 assumptions you have to accept as true. If you can prove, that a muon only lives 2.2 us, how they are created, what the length of the streaks mean, …. then this maybe proves relat... | 1,760,372,251.300167 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/29/microsoft-basic-for-the-dragon-64-recovered/ | Microsoft BASIC For The Dragon 64 Recovered | Lewin Day | [
"Retrocomputing",
"Software Hacks"
] | [
"basic",
"dragon",
"microsoft basic"
] | There are a great many pieces of software of yesteryear that are no longer readily accessible. It’s now possible to cross Microsoft BASIC for the Dragon 64 off that list,
with the source code now posted for all to enjoy on GitHub
.
The repository concerns the Microsoft 16K BASIC Interpreter as built for the Motorola 6809, as used in the Dragon 64 computer. This is also known as BASIC-69 or Extended Color Basic.
Hilariously, the source code was recovered from 340 pages of fan-fold tractor paper stored in four bundles. The output of a Motorola assembler was printed back in 1983 at Dragon Data’s R&D facility in Wales, and was recently recovered after being stored in an attic for much of the last four decades. The paper was carefully scanned at the 2022 Dragon Meetup, before passing the resulting images through OCR software. The output was then manually corrected and the source code was complete for both the 32K and 64K mode ROMs. There are some differences between the scanned source and what Microsoft shipped, which is outlined in the repository.
We’ve seen other heroic retrocomputer recovery efforts before, too, like the work to save
the Polish CROOK OS
. If you’ve been working on similar feats,
be sure to let us know
. | 17 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656955",
"author": "Alphatek",
"timestamp": "2023-06-29T08:37:32",
"content": "I’m impressed the ink was still readable – I know I’ve lost lineprinted documents in a lot less than 4 decades! Facetiously, though, the source could’ve been put to better use given it was on perforated ... | 1,760,372,251.355792 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/28/much-better-vga-from-an-esp32/ | Much Better VGA From An ESP32 | Jenny List | [
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"ESP32",
"ESP32-S3",
"vga"
] | The ESP32 series from Espressif have been a successful line of products, offering a powerful microcontroller with on-chip wireless networking. There’s a snag though in their practice of calling all of them ESP32s despite wildly varying specifications and even different processor cores, such that it’s easy to lose track of exactly what the chip in front of you can do. [Bitluni] was faced with updating his VGA library to include a newer variant, and was pleasantly surprised to find that it includes a far more capable display peripheral
which enables significantly higher resolutions than previously
.
The part in question is the ESP32-S3, a version of the chip with the dual Extensa cores we’re familiar with from earlier versions, but the interesting addition of an LCD controller. His previous VGA on ESP32 used the I2S peripheral and sacrificed some of the available bits to create sync pulses, while this version is not only faster but also includes dedicated sync hardware. He can now do up to 16-bit colour in as much as 1024×768 resolution as can be seen in the video below the break, though this feat requires a slightly out of spec framerate that only works on some screens. It’s by no means perfect because the peripheral is intended for LCD rather than VGA use, but it’s pushing microcontroller VGA to new heights and we look forward to any other uses people will put it to.
We covered the original Bitluni ESP32 VGA library
when it first appeared
. | 18 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656938",
"author": "Daniel",
"timestamp": "2023-06-29T06:13:31",
"content": "It’s Xtensa, not Extensa",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6656943",
"author": "Manfred",
"timestamp": "2023-06-29T07:17:11",
"content": "“H... | 1,760,372,251.241996 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/28/custom-keyboard-built-for-diablo-3-action/ | Custom Keyboard Built ForDiablo 3Action | Lewin Day | [
"Peripherals Hacks"
] | [
"diablo",
"keyboard",
"mechanical keyboard"
] | Custom mechanical keyboards are a great way to show off your passion and skill for electronics and design. They’re also perfect when you need to optimize your setup for a certain game or piece of software. [Pakequis] did just that with his
Bad Thing of the Edge mechanical keyboard build.
[Pakequis] occasionally plays
Diablo 3
on a tiny 7-inch laptop, which as you might expect, doesn’t have a keyboard conducive to gaming. Thus, he designed a mechanical keyboard with a series of important actions mapped to keys for the left hand. Naturally, that was an opportunity to have fun with the keycaps, which all feature graphics for their relevant in-game functions. The prototype was built with surplus keys from an old PTZ camera controller, but the final version runs Cherry MX switches. There are also a set of RGB LEDs with a variety of fun effects. The whole thing is run by a Raspberry Pi Pico, which is perfectly suited for building custom USB HID devices.
Hackers build custom keyboards for all kinds of reasons, like
ergonomics
,
style
, or just
sheer absurdist fun. | 3 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656768",
"author": "PEBKAC",
"timestamp": "2023-06-28T14:50:57",
"content": "I didn’t know Lenovo made netbooks… or at least I’m assuming by the …nub… mouse!That thing is adorable!",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6656859",
... | 1,760,372,251.39187 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/28/an-esp-in-your-mini-tv/ | An ESP In Your Mini TV | Jenny List | [
"home entertainment hacks",
"Microcontrollers"
] | [
"ESP32",
"media player",
"mini tv"
] | When miniature LCD TVs arrived on the market they were an object of desire, far from the reach of tech-obsessed youngsters. Now in the age of smartphones they’re a historical curiosity, but with the onward march of technology you can have one for not a lot. [Taylor Galbraith] shows us how,
with an ESP32 and an LCD we rather like
because of its CRT-like rounded corners.
What he’s created is essentially a small media player, but perhaps what makes it of further interest is its migration from a mess of wires on a breadboard to a rather nice PCB. He’s not released the board files at the time of writing, but since the software can all be found in the GitHub repository linked above, we live in hope. On it are not only the ESP and the screen, but also a battery management board, an audio amplifier, and a small speaker. For now it’s a bare board, but we hope he’ll complete it with a neatly designed case for either a pocket player or a retro-styled mini TV. Until then you can see his progress in the videos below the break.
If you’re after more ESP32 media player inspiration,
this isn’t the first retro-themed media player we’ve brought you
. | 14 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656676",
"author": "macsimski",
"timestamp": "2023-06-28T08:48:27",
"content": "I’m not sure, Isn’t this called a video player? he talks about encoding using ffmpeg, so no live streams are shown.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id"... | 1,760,372,251.441812 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/27/build-a-tesla-coil-with-just-three-components/ | Build A Tesla Coil With Just Three Components | Lewin Day | [
"High Voltage"
] | [
"capacitor",
"tesla coil"
] | Tesla coils are beautiful examples of high voltage hardware, throwing sparks and teaching us about all kinds of fancy phenomena. They can also be quite intimidating to build. [William Fraser], however, has come up with a design
using just three components
.
It’s a simplified version of the “Slayer Exciter” design, which nominally features a transistor, resistor and LED, along with a coil, and runs on batteries. [William] learned that adding a capacitor in parallel with the batteries greatly improved performance, and allowed the removal of the LED without detriment. [William] also learned that the resistor was not necessary either, beyond starting the coil oscillating.
The actual 3-component build uses a 10 farad supercapacitor as a power source, hooked up to a 2N3904 NPN transistor and an 85-turn coil. It won’t start oscillating on its own, but when triggered by a pulse of energy from a piezo igniter, it jerks into life. The optimized design actually uses the shape of the assembled component leads to act as the primary coil. The tiny Tesla coil isn’t big and bold enough to throw big sparks, but it will light a fluorescent tube at close proximity.
If you like your Tesla coils musical,
we have those too
. | 3 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656723",
"author": "Kenneth Welles",
"timestamp": "2023-06-28T12:37:04",
"content": "Excellent, great experimental technique and minimalist approach. Thanks a lot",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6657626",
"author": "... | 1,760,372,251.705146 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/27/bluetooth-battery-monitors-that-also-monitor-your-position-without-asking/ | Bluetooth Battery Monitors That Also Monitor Your Position, Without Asking | Maya Posch | [
"Security Hacks"
] | [
"china",
"security",
"surveillance"
] | These days Bluetooth-based gadgets are everywhere, including for car and solar batteries. After connecting them up to the battery, you download the accompanying app on your smartphone, open it up and like magic you can keep tabs on your precious pile of chemistry that keeps things ticking along. Yet as [haxrob]
discovered during an analysis
, many of these devices will happily pass your location and other information along to remote servers.
The device in question is a Bluetooth 4.0 Battery Monitor that is resold under many brands, and which by itself would seem to do just what it is said to do, from monitoring a battery to running crank tests. Where things get unpleasant is with the Battery Monitor 2 (BM2) mobile app that accompanies the device. It integrates a library called AMap which is “a leading provider of digital map in China” and part of Alibaba. Although the app’s information page claims that no personal information is collected, the data intercepted with Wireshark would beg to differ.
In
part 2
of this series, the BM2 app is reverse-engineered, decompiling the Java code. The personal information includes the latitude and longitude, as well as GPS, cell phone tower cell IDs and WiFi beacon data, which understandably has people
rather upset
. In addition to leaking your personal info, the BM2 app seems to be also good at running constantly in the background, which ironically drains your phone’s battery at an alarming rate.
Cases like these should be both a warning to not just install any app on your smartphone, as well as a wake-up call to Google and others to prevent such blatant privacy violations.
(Thanks to [Drew] for the tip) | 40 | 18 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656600",
"author": "NiHaoMike",
"timestamp": "2023-06-28T02:18:22",
"content": "Now to make a hacked version that floods them with fake data.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6656606",
"author": "The Commenter Formerly Known... | 1,760,372,252.057532 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/27/honda-headunit-reverse-engineering-and-the-dismal-state-of-infotainment-systems/ | Honda Headunit Reverse Engineering, And The Dismal State Of Infotainment Systems | Maya Posch | [
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"android auto",
"car security"
] | These days the dozen or so ECUs in an average car are joined by an infotainment system of some type, which are typically a large touch screen on the dashboard (the headunit) and possibly a couple of auxiliary units for the rear seats. These infotainment systems run anything from QNX to (Yocto) Linux or more commonly these days some version of Android. As [Eric McDonald]
discovered with his 2021 Honda Civic
, its headunit runs an archaic Android dating back to roughly 2012.
While this offers intriguing options with gaining root access via decade-old exploits that the car manufacturer never fixed, as [Eric] notes, this is an advantage that anyone who can gain access to the car’s CAN buses via e.g.
the headlights
, a
wireless access point
, or even inject an exploit
via ADB radio
can use to their advantage. Essentially, these infotainment systems are massive attack surfaces with all of their wired and wireless interfaces, combined with outdated software that you as the vehicle owner are forbidden to meddle with by the manufacturer.
Naturally taking this ‘no’ as a challenge as any civilized citizen would, [Eric] set out to not only root the glorified Android tablet that Honda seeks to pass off as a ‘modern infotainment system’, but also reverse-engineer the system as far as possible and
documenting the findings on GitHub
. As [Eric] also
explains in a Hacker News discussion
, his dream is to not only have documentation available for infotainment systems in general as a community effort, but also provide open source alternatives that can be inspected by security researchers rather than being expected to lean on the ‘trust me bro’ security practices of the average car manufacturer.
Although a big ask considering how secretive car manufacturers are, this would seem to be an issue that we should tackle sooner rather than later, as more and more older cars turn into driving security exploits just waiting to happen. | 47 | 11 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656587",
"author": "Stryker",
"timestamp": "2023-06-27T23:57:28",
"content": "First off, an “infotainment system” in a vehicle shouldn’t even exist !The principal task when operating a 2 ton piece of steel that can easily create havoc, should be “drive the damn thing !” PAY ATTENTI... | 1,760,372,251.801529 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/27/espboy-turned-into-functional-walkie-talkie/ | ESPboy Turned Into Functional Walkie-Talkie | Lewin Day | [
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"ESP8266",
"radio",
"walkie talkie"
] | The ESPBoy was first built as a hackable open-source game engine and handheld console for educational purposes. However, it’s also a platform that can readily support all kinds of other uses.
You can even turn the humble handheld device into a working walkie talkie.
The build relies on adding a SA868 transceiver module to the ESPBoy, along with a microphone, speaker, audio amplifier and antenna as supporting hardware. It then relies on the ESPBoy’s existing screen and buttons as a user interface for the radio. Assembled appropriately, it can then be used as a very basic and barebones walkie talkie for voice communication.
You won’t get coded squelch or other useful features, but it’s enough to let you talk over the air with other handheld radio users. The SA868 module can transmit on a variety of frequency bands, but the video shows it operating in the UHF band around 433 MHz. With a power on the order of 1.8W, it should get you a few kilometers of transmission range in an open field.
Check out
our earlier coverage
of the ESPBoy and its many different configurations. Video after the break. | 17 | 6 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656582",
"author": "Moritz von Schweinitz",
"timestamp": "2023-06-27T23:18:44",
"content": "I would really love an ESP32 based walkie talkie with open firmware, but in a generic, ready-made enclosure with batteries and all that.It could use UDP if wifi was available, and with GPIO ... | 1,760,372,251.854406 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/27/luxury-train-cars-used-to-ride-on-paper-wheels/ | Luxury Train Cars Used To Ride On Paper Wheels | Lewin Day | [
"History",
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"mass transit",
"paper",
"railway",
"trains"
] | Early on, railways primarily used wheels made of wood or iron. The former were cheap and relatively easy to manufacture, while the latter had far superior wear qualities. It may surprise you to learn, however, that some railways once used wheels made out of paper,
as [Train of Thought] explains.
The wheels were pioneered by a man known as Richard N. Allen, in the 19th century. The wheels were constructed by layering up hundreds of sheets of paper with glue, compacting them with a press, and allowing them to cure for a few weeks. The solid paper disks were then machined to size, and were drilled to accept bolts that attached metal plates for protection. The wheels were given a cast-iron hub and a steel rim for wear reasons.
The benefit of the wheels was that their composite paper construction helped damp vibrations and noise from the wheels and rails. The North American Pullman railway ended up using the wheels for sleeper and dining carriages for the more luxurious ride they provided.
The paper wheels were short lived, however. While the wheels were up to the task when new, they would fail much sooner than solid metal wheels. A series of derailments led to the wheels being declared unsafe for use in the US by 1915.
The wheels serve as a good example of wheels and tires acting as a tuned part of a whole suspension system.
Experimental wheel designs come and go
, but there are reasons why we landed on certain designs for certain applications, after all. Video after the break. | 20 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656544",
"author": "Bob Kroll",
"timestamp": "2023-06-27T19:55:18",
"content": "History repeats itself? Didn’t a high speed train derail due to composite wheel failure, taking out a road overpass and an oncoming train, northern Europe within last decade?",
"parent_id": null,
... | 1,760,372,251.909992 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/26/mearm-3-0-the-pocket-sized-robot-arm/ | MeArm 3.0: The Pocket-Sized Robot Arm | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Robots Hacks"
] | [
"arm",
"hardware",
"instructional",
"MeArm",
"open source",
"robot",
"small"
] | We all might dream of having an industrial robot arm at our disposal, complete with working controller that doesn’t need constant maintenance and replacement parts, and which is able to help us with other projects with only a minimum of coding or instruction. That’s a pipe dream for most of us, as without a large space, sufficient funding, or unlimited amounts of troubleshooting time we’ll almost always have to look for something smaller and simpler.
Perhaps something even as small as this pocket-sized robotic arm
.
This isn’t actually the first time we’ve seen the MeArm; the small robot has been around since 2014 and has undergone a number of revisions and upgrades. Even this revision has been out for a little while now but this latest in the series is now available with a number of improvements over the older models. The assembly time required has been reduced from two hours to about 30 minutes and the hardware has even been fully open-sourced as well which allows virtually anyone with the prerequisite tools to build this tiny robot for whatever they happen to need it for, due to its very permissive licensing.
The linked Instructable goes into every detail needed for building the robot as well as documenting all of the parts needed, although you will need access to some specialty tools to make a lot of them. We also
featured a Friday Hack Chat about these robots
back in 2018 that has some interesting details about these robots in it, and although this is a relatively small robot in the grand scheme of things it’s always possible
to upgrade to something larger
in the future. | 14 | 7 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656349",
"author": "scott_tx",
"timestamp": "2023-06-27T00:32:15",
"content": "its more like a robot finger",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": []
},
{
"comment_id": "6656351",
"author": "john",
"timestamp": "2023-06-27T00:39:22",
"content": ... | 1,760,372,252.104708 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/26/dentist-tool-hardware-inspires-non-slip-probe-tips/ | Dentist Tool Hardware Inspires Non-Slip Probe Tips | Donald Papp | [
"hardware",
"Tool Hacks"
] | [
"adapter",
"dental burr",
"dmm",
"multimeter",
"non slip",
"probe tips"
] | Cross-pollination between different industries can yield interesting innovations, and a few years ago [John Wiltrout] developed some
non-slip meter probe adapters
. He recently used
our tips line
to share some details that you won’t see elsewhere, letting us know how the idea came to be.
It started with [John] being frustrated by issues that will sound familiar: probes did not always want to stay in place, and had a tendency to skid around at the slightest provocation. This behavior gets only more frustrating as boards and components get smaller. John was also frustrated by the general inability to reliably probe through barriers like solder masking, oxidation, and conformal treatments on circuit boards.
The adapters attach to regular probe tips.
At the time [John] was in the dental equipment service industry, and one day he received a visit from the Good Ideas Fairy. He got the idea to use one of the special tungsten carbide tipped dental burrs as a probe tip.
The tips of these tools are in the shape of a tiny inverted cone with flutes forming a very sharp (and very hard) crown of points around the base. Using this as a probe tip worked so well that [John] knew he was onto something. Not only does such a tip stay in place wherever it is placed, but the durable micro points easily penetrate thin coatings (including the enamel on transformer wire.) [John] found that he could place his multimeter’s probes on two legs of a component, hold the probes in place with one hand, and adjust a potentiometer with the other. Bliss! As a safety bonus, the shape of the tool means it does not easily penetrate skin, despite its sharpness.
[John] turned the idea into a niche product, and while he still personally makes each set on his basement drill press,
you can find them at Tag-Connect
(which you may recognize as the same Tag-Connect that
shrank the ICP header
with their innovative connector design.)
We love it when people include details about their process, and can talk about what did (or didn’t) work. Got something to share that’s along those lines?
Let us know about it
! | 19 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656297",
"author": "Lee",
"timestamp": "2023-06-26T20:09:54",
"content": "NiceI use to attach sewing needles to my probes.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6656317",
"author": "BrightBlueJim",
"timestamp": "202... | 1,760,372,252.593124 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/26/formation-flying-does-more-than-look-good/ | Formation Flying Does More Than Look Good | Bryan Cockfield | [
"drone hacks"
] | [
"algorithm",
"drag",
"drone",
"efficiency",
"energy",
"flight",
"formation",
"rapidly exploring random tree",
"rrt*"
] | Seeing airplanes fly in formation is an exciting experience at something like an air show, where demonstrations of a pilot’s skill and aircraft technology are on full display. But there are other reasons for aircraft to fly in formation as well. [Peter] has been exploring the idea that formation flight can also improve efficiency, and has been looking specifically at things like
formation flight of UAVs or drones
with this flight planning algorithm.
Aircraft flying in formation create vortices around the wing tips, which cause drag. However, another aircraft flying through those vortices will experience less drag and more efficient flight. This is the reason birds instinctively fly in formation as well. By planning paths for drones which will leave from different locations, meet up at some point to fly in a more efficient formation, and then split up close to their destinations, a significant amount of energy can potentially be saved.
[Peter] is using a modified version of the
RRT* algorithm
which generates nodes for viable flight paths, and then uses the various paths found to map out potential shared flight paths. Another consideration that had to be accounted for was the actual energy savings factor for the shared section of the flight paths. For birds it’s estimated that the energy savings is around 70%, but varying this amount even for idential simulations often yields surprising results. Even with only a 5% energy savings, the flight paths can change dramatically.
For now this idea exists mostly in the world of simulations, as UAVs and drones haven’t yet reached a critical mass where so many are flying around autonomously that these factors need to be taken into account. It’s certainly a viable future though as companies like Amazon look to automate more of their logistical processes, but this is only
one of several ways to improve service and cut costs
. | 14 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656272",
"author": "craig",
"timestamp": "2023-06-26T18:35:29",
"content": "I just assumed military tight formations were to decrease radar signature and disguise the number of aircraft. I would also guess the military has looked into this for strategic (less refueling etc) reason... | 1,760,372,252.15563 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/26/mit-engineers-pioneer-cost-effective-protein-purification-for-cheaper-drugs/ | MIT Engineers Pioneer Cost-Effective Protein Purification For Cheaper Drugs | Lewin Day | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Medical Hacks"
] | [
"bioreactor",
"medicine",
"nanotechnology",
"protein",
"proteins"
] | There are a wide variety of protein-based drugs that are used to treat various serious conditions. Insulin is perhaps the most well-known example, which is used for life-saving treatments for diabetes. New antibody treatments also fall into this category, as do various vaccines.
A significant cost element in the production of these treatments is the purification step, wherein the desired protein is separated from the contents of the bioreactor it was produced in.
A new nanotech discovery from MIT could revolutionize this area
, making these drugs cheaper and easier to produce.
The Old Ways
Using chromatography to separate proteins is expensive and complex, however, it is considered the most viable current method for industrial production of many pharmaceuticals.
Credit:
Mararie, CC-BY-SA-2.0
Traditional protein purification relies heavily on chromatography, a method that separates proteins based on their size. The need for specialized materials in chromatography, however, substantially drives up the cost of manufacturing.
Chromatography, at its core, is a physical separation technique that separates components between two phases: the stationary phase (a solid or a liquid supported on a solid) and the mobile phase (a liquid or a gas). In the context of protein purification for drug manufacture, chromatography typically takes advantage of differences in properties like protein size, charge, or binding affinity to selectively separate the target protein from other biological material present in the bioreactor. The protein mixture is passed through a column packed with the stationary phase, and different proteins interact with the stationary phase to different extents, thus moving at varying speeds and emerging from the column at different times. By this method, the desired protein can be purified.
The complexity and high cost associated with chromatography largely result from the need for specialized materials and equipment. For instance, the stationary phase materials used in the columns can be incredibly expensive, especially for size-exclusion or affinity chromatography. Additionally, chromatography often requires multiple rounds to achieve high purity levels, meaning more time, materials, and energy are consumed. Lastly, the process requires meticulous control over conditions like pH and temperature, contributing to the difficulty and expense involved. The culmination of these factors results in chromatography being one of the most cost-intensive steps in the production of protein drugs.
We’re Like Crystal
Top: proteins rapidly crystallizing on the coated nanoparticles. Bottom: Crystal growth is significantly slower on the uncoated nanoparticles.
Credit:
MIT research group
Rather than tweaking the conventional method, the MIT research team, led by mechanical engineering Professor Kripa Varanasi, explored an alternative: protein crystallization. By assembling proteins into large regular crystals,
it’s possible to get very pure samples of the protein
without external contaminants. The technique is typically considered too slow for industrial purposes. It’s also ineffective at low protein concentrations, and in “dirty” solutions filled with a mixture of different biological materials. The MIT team innovated a solution to enhance the process’s efficacy and solve these problems through the use of specialized nanoparticles.
In a study published in
ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces
, the MIT team reported the successful use of gold nanoparticles to facilitate the rapid crystallization of proteins. The nanoparticles were coated with bioconjugates, which are materials designed to help different molecules form links together. When exposed to these nanoparticles, coated with maleimide and NHS bioconjugates, protein molecules binded to the surface bioconjugates, aligning in a specific orientation that kicked off further protein crystal formation.
Protein solution and nanoparticles were combined with a microfluidic device to enable the formation of protein crystals.
Credit:
MIT research group
The team demonstrated this approach with lysozyme and insulin, with results suggesting that it could also be applied to a wide range of proteins, including antibody drugs and vaccines. Furthermore, the engineered nanoparticles significantly reduced the time period until crystal formation begins, while also increasing the speed of crystal growth.
The team also pioneered modern techniques to speed their research. The researchers employed machine learning to analyze the data gathered from thousands of crystal images. The use of ML tools allowed them to efficiently process large datasets, identifying when crystals formed in each image without the need for time-consuming manual counts. The lowly grad students that would normally be tasked with this grunt work may celebrate this development.
The research has the potential to make biologic drugs more accessible in developing countries. The MIT team is currently focused on scaling the process for industrial use and proving its efficacy with other proteins, like monoclonal antibodies and vaccines.
While it’s clear that further research and development are necessary, this pioneering approach could be a game-changer in the world of protein drug manufacturing. Using nanotechnology to create a more cost-effective and efficient method for protein purification could make protein-based medication far more accessible globally. That can only be a good thing! | 10 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656245",
"author": "nagger",
"timestamp": "2023-06-26T17:23:38",
"content": "Cheaper drugs? You mean for higher pharmaceutical profit margins?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6656397",
"author": "Mystick",
"ti... | 1,760,372,252.249846 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/26/desktop-edm-hack-chat/ | Desktop EDM Hack Chat | Dan Maloney | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Slider"
] | [
"Hack Chat"
] | Join us on Wednesday, June 28 at noon Pacific for the
Desktop EDM Hack Chat
with
Cooper Zurad
!
Whether you know it or not, chances are pretty good you’ve run into the results of electrical discharge machining at some point. EDM is the go-to machining method for so many applications, from making complex injection molding tooling to putting impossibly small holes into hardened steel, EDM gets the jobs that make traditional machining techniques weep.
At its heart, EDM is really simple; it’s just making sparks to selectively erode metal. In practice, though, it’s way more complicated than that. There’s the CNC aspect to control the cutting tool, the dielectric to cool things and flush away the swarf, and the precision control of the electric discharge. It’s all just complicated and expensive enough that it’s hard to find anyone doing EDM on the hobbyist level.
Hard, but not impossible. Desktop EDM is doable, and to help us understand the challenges involved we’ve invited Cooper Zurad to the Hack Chat. Cooper has quite a bit of experience with the related and somewhat less energetic ECM, or
electrochemical machining
, and is now turning the knowledge gained there to desktop EDM. Make sure to join us with your questions about machining with electricity.
Our Hack Chats are live community events in the
Hackaday.io Hack Chat group messaging
. This week we’ll be sitting down on Wednesday, June 28 at 12:00 PM Pacific time. If time zones have you tied up, we have a
handy time zone converter
.
[Featured image by
Qw5646
, CC BY-SA 3.0] | 10 | 2 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656247",
"author": "traverseda",
"timestamp": "2023-06-26T17:26:12",
"content": "I think you’d increase engagement a fair bit if you included some kind of “add to my calendar” link in these things.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_i... | 1,760,372,252.201644 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/26/networking-with-balloons/ | Networking With Balloons | Bryan Cockfield | [
"Radio Hacks"
] | [
"APRS",
"balloon",
"downlink",
"images",
"network",
"packet",
"radio",
"raspberry pi",
"rf4463",
"stm32"
] | Starlink has been making tremendous progress towards providing world-wide access to broadband Internet access, but there are a number of downsides to satellite-based internet such as the cluttering of low-Earth orbit, high expense, and moodiness of CEO. There are some alternatives if standard Internet access isn’t available, and one of the more ambitious is providing Internet access by balloon. Project Loon is perhaps the most famous of these (although now defunct), but it’s also possible to skip the middleman and
build your own high-altitude balloon capable of connection speeds of 500 Kbps
.
[Stephen] has been working on this project for a few months and while it doesn’t support a full Internet connection, the downlink on the high altitude balloon is fast enough to send high-resolution images in near-real-time. This is thanks to a Raspberry Pi Zero on board the balloon that is paired with an STM32 board which handles the radio communication on a RF4463 transceiver module. The STM32 acts as an intermediary or buffer to ensure reliable information is sent out on the radio, rather than using the Pi directly. [Stephen] also wrote a large chunk of the software responsible for handling all of these interactions, optimized for balloon flight specifically.
The blog post for this project was written a few weeks ago with a reported first launch date for the system already passed, so we will eagerly anticipate the results and the images he was able to gather using this system. Eventually [Stephen] hopes the downlink will be fast enough for video as well.Balloons are an underappreciated tool as well, and this isn’t the only way that
they can be used to help send radio signals from place to place
. | 14 | 4 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656224",
"author": "Pineapple",
"timestamp": "2023-06-26T16:01:33",
"content": "More balloons for the air force to shot down?",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6656226",
"author": "Joshua",
"timestamp": "2023-06... | 1,760,372,252.306509 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/26/meshtastic-for-the-greater-good/ | Meshtastic For The Greater Good | Jonathan Bennett | [
"Featured",
"Interest",
"News",
"Original Art",
"Radio Hacks",
"Slider",
"Wireless Hacks"
] | [
"LoRa",
"Meshtastic",
"prepping"
] | Last week, my city was hit by a tornado. That’s not surprising here in Oklahoma, and thankfully this event was an F0 or possibly even an EF0 — a really weak tornado. Only a couple roofs collapsed, though probably half the houses in town are going to need roof repairs, thanks to the combination of huge hail and high winds. While it wasn’t too bad, power did go down in a few places around town, and this led to an interesting series of events.
Chat messages were coming in like this: “That was a [power] flicker, yeah. Even took down my Internet.” Followed by “Whee, [fiber Internet] got knocked out and now Starlink has too many clouds in the way.” And after ten minutes of silence, we got a bit worried to see “Time to hide under a bed. … Is cell service back?” It is a bit spooky to think about trying to help neighbors and friends after a disaster, in the midst of the communication breakdown that often follows. If he had needed help, and had no working communications, how long would it have taken for us to go check on him?
How do you stay connected here?
avivi, CC BY-SA 2.0
I had already been exploring an open source project that might be able to help. A follower described a problem where communication could be cut off in the midst of a large protest in her home country, and she needed a way to stay connected in a crowd.
One of the possible solutions was
Meshtastic
, an encrypted wireless protocol that uses meshing to distribute messages and location data. It runs on a few different development boards, and some of the hardware is surprisingly affordable. For instance, the WisBlock Meshtastic starter kit is a mere $24.99. Use a USB-C cable to hang that off your phone, and you can connect to nearby metastatic channels, or create your own private channel.
The Magic
The Meshtastic radio magic comes from LoRa, a wireless protocol running on the sub-1 GHz bands. One of the winning features of that band is that no amateur license is required, up to a 1 W broadcast strength. If you have your Ham license, feel free to turn up the power — but with the caveat that amateurs can’t use encryption. And that’s one of Meshtastic’s features; it uses AES encryption to keep conversations private. More on the configuration in a bit.
I hear you radio geeks scoffing, “A measly watt?” But people have managed 128 mile (206 km) LoRa contacts on quite a bit less than that full watt. Yes, that test did involve a weather balloon, but the second-place test was a still-respectable 103 mile (166 km) distance managed peak-to-peak across water. You may notice that both records required elevation. The 915 MHz band that Meshtastic targets is still pretty dependent on line-of-sight — no ionosphere skipping here. And with only a 1 watt output power, we’re not blasting though much earth.
So to make up for the less-than-stellar propagation of the frequency band, the Meshtastic protocol makes every node a potential repeater. If your radio can talk to your buddy’s radio up on the hill, that device works as a repeater, and rebroadcasts the packet, giving your message a much wider reach. By default, each packet is limited to three hops, and the protocol tries to be smart about not flooding the aether with useless echoes. But if you can get a couple of radios in elevated locations across your area, you can manage pretty good coverage.
Usefullness
OK, so what can you do with it? Keep in mind that LoRa isn’t winning any throughput contests. No streaming video or file-sharing here. Meshtastic works best when sending text messages, either directly to another radio, or to a shared channel. And if your radio knows where it’s at, it can send location data every few minutes to the primary shared channel. There are other modules, like sending telemetry data like temperature and humidity across the network, or a rather impressive experimental module that sends low bit-rate audio across the aether. The system was originally designed for friends going hiking, camping, or even hang gliding together.
Radio on the Hill
I have several use-cases where Meshtastic just might be the killer app. One is disaster recovery. If I can talk a few friends into stashing a radio, if tornado really comes and ruins our day, we’ll have a backup communication net to organize getting help where it’s needed. But on a day-to-day basis, I’m much more interested in giving one of the battery-powered radios with each of my kids, before letting them out the door. Suddenly don’t see the kid where expected? Ping the radio for a location update.
I have a 6 dBi antenna about 20 feet up in my back yard, trying to get all the range I can. I regularly get three and a half miles of coverage across town, with a few dead zones in valleys. Talking someone in the right spot into a repeater will make quite a difference on that front. And on the far end, I’ve established a pretty robust 10 mile link from the local mountain-top. Line-of-sight is king.
Getting Started
When I first discovered Meshtastic, the hook that really got me interested was that low price. A pair of WisBlock kits or Lilygo T-Beams gets you started, but the performance of the little PCB antenna isn’t amazing. And it’s nice to have a GPS module and battery for the radio. And of course you’ll want to
3d-print a case for it
, because who wants to carry around a raw PCB and dangling antenna? There are some cases and even pre-assembled kits on Etsy and Tindie. And
Rokland
is one of the favored suppliers of the Meshtastic devs.
For a bit more power, there’s the
Station G1
by B&Q Consulting that has an amplifier scaling output power all the way up to 3.5 W, if you want to turn off encryption and send your ham radio call-sign with each packet. To keep encryption on, you’ll need to limit the output to a single watt. Though my testing really indicates that the line of sight becomes a problem long before transmit power, and turning up the power doesn’t help that situation dramatically.
From there, you just need two or more radios with a shared channel. By default, Meshtastic radios use the LongFast channel, with a shared blank encryption key, as sort of a public channel. Something to be aware of is that if you broadcast location information, it goes out over the Primary channel. So you might want to set a private channel with a unique encryption key as your primary, and define the LongFast channel as a secondary, to participate in the public channel. To do that, in Lora settings, set the channel number to 20, and add a secondary channel named “LongFast” with the pre-shared key set to “AQ==”.
And with that, you’re set. You can track a vehicle or person, send text messages that don’t rely on the Internet or Cellular network, and even do a few extra tricks. One of those more interesting tricks is the Meshtastic support for sending packets on to a MQTT server. That’s a topic for another day.
If you’re looking for more information, there was
a great FLOSS Weekly interview with a couple of the Meshtastic devs
that I can recommend with some admitted bias. The official
Meshtastic website
and
Github repository
are good starting points, too. Beyond that, I’ve been peppering
the Meshtastic Discord
with questions, suggestions, and bug reports for over a month now, and it’s been a very welcoming community. If you have any questions, dive in. And look forward to more fun to be had with Meshtastic integrating with other projects. | 62 | 16 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656198",
"author": "zoobab",
"timestamp": "2023-06-26T14:15:47",
"content": "You could add some keyboard keys to this kind of device with an i2c-gpio expander like an mcp23017.",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": [
{
"comment_id": "6656220",
... | 1,760,372,252.52813 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/27/podcast-feedback-be-careful-what-you-ask-for/ | Podcast Feedback: Be Careful What You Ask For | Dan Maloney | [
"Hackaday Columns",
"Rants",
"Slider"
] | [] | I had one of those experiences yesterday that seem so common these days: the arrival of a mystery Amazon package. You know the kind — you get a shipping notice from UPS with the faux-excited “Your package is arriving today!” message, but you’re sure you haven’t ordered anything in a while. You check your Amazon order history, find nothing pending, and puzzle over who could be sending you a package. What could it be? A gift from a secret admirer, perhaps?
And so it was with me as I waited for the UPS driver to make her rounds of our neighborhood and drop the package off on our front steps. Surprised at its size, I hurriedly brought it inside, zipped open the box, and pulled away the packing to reveal…
Wheat Thins and mayonnaise?
Stick with me, I swear this has a Hackaday angle.
I was perplexed, to say the least. Flummoxed, even. There was no information in the package or on the shipping label to indicate who sent it, or more importantly, why. It’s certainly not something I’d order from Amazon; I try to avoid snack crackers and chips, and I’m not a big fan of that kind of sandwich spread. And even if I would buy such things, I certainly wouldn’t have ordered them from Amazon — I find their prices on food and household goods egregiously high. And besides, nothing like this was in my order history.
I posted the picture on the family Discord; maybe my wife or one of the kids got a weird case of the munchies? No dice, although my daughter offered that “God is telling you something.” What exactly the divine message would be, or why He chose Amazon as His messenger, she didn’t speculate. But the idea that it was a message kind of triggered something in the back of my head.
Wheat Thins and mayo. This means something…
The day ended without any satisfying resolution to the mystery, and as soon as my son and younger daughter saw the Wheat Thins on Discord, they scampered to the kitchen and absconded with them for their nightly snack; the mayo remained unmolested. But in the morning, I got a DM on Hackaday.io that explained everything:
I had totally forgotten about that! In case you missed it, when Elliot and I did
the podcast a few weeks back
, one of the articles we discussed was Jenny List’s analysis of
Amazon and Google’s vision for a home assistant future
and how it hasn’t quite worked out. It’s a great article, and you should really check it out, but in our podcast discussion — which starts at about the 50-minute mark if you want to skip ahead — I said that the Amazon voice assistant model of being able to order massive amounts of stuff doesn’t work for me, because “I don’t need Amazon to send me Wheat Thins, or mayonnaise.” And if I recall correctly, I even made a crack about how it would be funny if someone’s Alexa had just ordered me some Wheat Thins and mayo; wisely, though, Elliot left that bit on the cutting room floor.
So, the mystery was solved, but apparently [JonKangas] had some second thoughts about his admittedly hilarious gesture:
I’ll admit that to some degree, it was a little unsettling. There was a time when I probably would have soaked an unsolicited package like that in a barrel of water for a few hours before opening it, but I’ve mellowed a bit over the years. Honestly, the thought of what would have happened if my mom got a package like this was more unnerving; she’d probably have spent the whole day on the phone trying to figure out who sent the package. Really, I was just impressed with his commitment to a practical joke based on an obscure reference — comedy gold!
But then I got to thinking:
How did he find me?
I guess it’s not that hard, really, since my street address is in the FCC database thanks to my amateur radio license. Even without that, it wouldn’t be difficult for a reasonably resourceful Hackaday reader to figure out where I live, especially since I’ve probably inadvertently doxxed myself a dozen times over the eight years (!) I’ve worked for Hackaday.
So, not a message from God, but definitely a message, and a pretty darn funny one at that. Hats off to [Jon] for the follow-through on this one, and for giving my family a little bit of a head-scratcher around the dinner table. I’ve always thought our readers — and listeners — are the smartest, coolest people on the planet, and this one really seals the deal. And a sincere thanks for the Wheat Thins, which the kids much appreciated. The mayo, though? Thanks anyway, but that’s going to the food bank. | 18 | 9 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656493",
"author": "irox",
"timestamp": "2023-06-27T17:15:59",
"content": "That’s not mayonnaise, that’s Sandwich Spread, which completely different, and from my recollection far superior!Hey, it could have been veggie mite….",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,
"replies": ... | 1,760,372,252.415871 | ||
https://hackaday.com/2023/06/27/an-android-phone-powers-a-self-driving-car/ | An Android Phone Powers A Self Driving Car | Jenny List | [
"Transportation Hacks"
] | [
"android",
"OpenPilot",
"self-driving car"
] | As auto manufacturers have brought self-driving features to their products, we’re told about how impressive their technologies are and just how much computing power is on board to make it happen. Thus it surprised us (and it might also surprise you too) that some level of self-driving can be performed by an Android phone.
[
Mankaran Singh
] has the full details
.
It starts with the realization that a modern smartphone contains the necessary sensors to perform basic self-driving, and then moves on to making a version of
openpilot
that can run on more than the few supported phones. It’s not the driver-less car of science fiction but one which performs what we think is SAE level 2 self driving, which is cruise control, lane centering, and collision warning. They take it out on the road in a little Suzuki on a busy Indian dual carriageway in the rain, and while we perhaps place more trust in meat-based driving, it does seem to perform fairly well
Self driving features are codified into a set of levels for an easy reference on what each is capable of doing.
We’ve taken a look at it in the past, should you be interested
. | 31 | 10 | [
{
"comment_id": "6656481",
"author": "SteveS",
"timestamp": "2023-06-27T16:39:33",
"content": ">> “They take it out on the road in a little Suzuki on a busy Indian dual carriageway in the rain…”This… does not seem like the optimal venue to debug your software",
"parent_id": null,
"depth": 1,... | 1,760,372,252.681077 |
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