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[1576.48 --> 1579.60] what they're doing in order to understand it.
[1580.66 --> 1588.24] For me, like, I'm a super visual learner, and I think that's why I was so taken to, you
[1588.24 --> 1593.56] know, the JavaScript robotics stuff, because I could, I mean, I've been programming, this
[1593.56 --> 1600.02] is like, I've been programming for, I don't know, almost half my life, and I'm a shitty
[1600.02 --> 1600.62] programmer.
[1601.02 --> 1604.30] I don't know, like, data structures.
[1604.30 --> 1605.94] I don't understand those things.
[1606.70 --> 1611.16] I just know what I know from repetition and building stuff.
[1611.96 --> 1616.42] And I don't know, it's just nice when you can touch something that you've built versus
[1616.42 --> 1621.26] just, like, looking, I guess you could touch a computer screen, but it's a little bit different.
[1622.66 --> 1623.56] I don't know.
[1624.30 --> 1629.42] Yeah, I think a more interesting question is actually, like, what is similar about, like,
[1629.54 --> 1632.04] UI programming in the browser to robotics in JavaScript?
[1632.04 --> 1635.46] Because I think there's actually more similarities than differences.
[1636.14 --> 1639.74] And when you look at a lot of the languages that people have built specifically for IoT,
[1640.18 --> 1645.68] they're taking a lot of these, like, threading patterns that we have for, basically, people
[1645.68 --> 1648.68] have written for desktop programming and operating system programming and a lot of low-level
[1648.68 --> 1649.00] stuff.
[1649.52 --> 1653.54] And it's interesting that JavaScript in the browser didn't go that direction.
[1653.68 --> 1656.00] They went the direction of events.
[1656.00 --> 1662.70] You know, we talk a lot about asynchronous programming now, but just basic DOM events,
[1662.78 --> 1662.90] right?
[1662.98 --> 1664.68] Like, when you click on something, something happens.
[1665.66 --> 1667.32] That's how robotics work.
[1667.62 --> 1670.14] And that's how JavaScript robotics work.
[1670.34 --> 1672.08] And it's actually very similar.
[1672.74 --> 1677.70] And I feel like UI people actually have an easier time onboarding than people that are used
[1677.70 --> 1681.42] to, like, you know, threaded C++ programming that try to move into this evented environment.
[1681.42 --> 1684.74] It depends on, like, the onboarding, obviously.
[1685.10 --> 1690.96] Like, if you can set somebody up with good documentation, then yeah, that's good.
[1691.54 --> 1697.34] I feel like even five years ago, there was still not great documentation for a ton of,
[1697.34 --> 1699.28] like, front-end UI stuff.
[1699.98 --> 1702.14] At least I didn't have a good time with it.
[1702.14 --> 1709.92] So if you're getting into JavaScript robotics or JavaScript hardware stuff in general, there's
[1709.92 --> 1711.98] a lot of libraries out there, like everything in NPM.
[1712.44 --> 1716.04] There's maybe even more embedded systems that support this.
[1716.74 --> 1719.26] It's like the Atari 2600 days of computing.
[1719.42 --> 1721.84] Everybody's got their own, you know, specialized board.
[1723.50 --> 1725.40] You mess with a lot of these, Rachel.
[1725.50 --> 1730.68] Like, what do you recommend that people pick up as a first introductory set of hardware?
[1730.68 --> 1732.60] And what libraries would you point them at?
[1733.10 --> 1740.70] I think that if you don't know anything about hardware at all and you're wanting to get started,
[1740.90 --> 1746.62] the best thing that I would suggest is the Johnny 5 starter kit that comes with a TESL.
[1746.74 --> 1747.96] You can get it on SparkFun.
[1747.96 --> 1756.38] I mean, the benefit of the TESL versus an Arduino is, like, the Arduino you're going to have to flash
[1756.38 --> 1757.28] with custom firmware.
[1757.50 --> 1762.80] And if it's your first time using that kind of board, you might not necessarily know how to do that.
[1762.86 --> 1765.76] But the TESL just comes and it's ready to go, essentially.
[1765.98 --> 1771.90] You've got, you just plug it into your computer and you can either, you know, run the code from your machine
[1771.90 --> 1775.48] the same way that you do with your Arduino and other boards.
[1775.60 --> 1780.22] Or you can just push the code up to the TESL so it runs on the actual board,
[1780.32 --> 1785.90] which is more similar to, like, the boards that have embedded systems on them,
[1786.44 --> 1787.50] which is really great.
[1787.74 --> 1790.98] So, plus, it's ready for Node out of the bat.
[1791.32 --> 1793.86] And the projects that I think it gives you to build are,
[1794.30 --> 1795.86] there's, like, a little robot one.
[1795.92 --> 1797.08] It comes with DC motors.
[1797.08 --> 1802.16] I honestly just get the kits now because, like, whenever you go to conferences or something
[1802.16 --> 1804.86] and there's people giving stuff away for swag,
[1804.94 --> 1808.82] I just break everything apart into individual components I can use later.
[1809.00 --> 1814.08] But there's a whole bunch of documentation that comes with it that helps you get up and running.
[1814.62 --> 1817.32] The other libraries that you can use are,
[1818.06 --> 1824.56] Brian Hughes has a library that allows you to use JavaScript for the Raspberry Pi,
[1824.56 --> 1829.58] which I only recently started using a Raspberry Pi.
[1829.96 --> 1835.72] The new Model 3 makes it a lot easier to be able to use without having to, you know,
[1835.80 --> 1838.28] plug it into your router or SSH into it
[1838.28 --> 1843.20] because you can use something called Pi Bakery to start your card up.
[1843.38 --> 1849.38] So it already has the Raspbian operating system on it.
[1849.38 --> 1852.18] And then you can configure this thing called VNC Viewer,
[1852.30 --> 1858.58] which lets you essentially, it's like a virtual machine on your computer
[1858.58 --> 1861.24] that you're actually logged into the Raspberry Pi with.
[1861.28 --> 1864.20] So you see the whole Linux operating system.
[1864.20 --> 1875.04] And I actually just built this cool gallery out of a 32 by 32 LED matrix using a Raspberry Pi.
[1875.04 --> 1879.00] And I'm running Node on the Pi.
[1879.18 --> 1884.30] And I'm also running Node on a single page app that's hosted on Azure.
[1884.92 --> 1888.04] And the way that it works is you...
[1888.56 --> 1892.74] Okay, so there's not a lot of good Node libraries for the LED matrix.
[1893.08 --> 1898.60] So all I did was install the C library that already works for displaying art on the matrix.
[1898.82 --> 1903.40] And instead, I have the Node application listening over the IoT hub on Azure.
[1903.40 --> 1908.20] And it just runs the C shell commands whenever it gets the message to display art,
[1908.32 --> 1909.98] which is kind of hacky and cheating.
[1910.30 --> 1915.68] But there's a lot of ways that you can jump in and use Node with a lot of things.
[1916.44 --> 1917.62] I love those hacks.
[1918.12 --> 1919.96] Those are the best hacks. I love that stuff.
[1919.96 --> 1925.02] It's like, I kind of inadvertently built the world's hackiest Node library
[1925.02 --> 1926.94] for displaying art on an LED matrix.
[1927.64 --> 1929.76] So you can too.
[1930.62 --> 1931.70] What else do we got?
[1931.70 --> 1935.76] So the point of an Ask Us Anything kind of show is people asking questions.
[1935.86 --> 1940.42] But I guess Michael and I might have some questions, which we've already shared a few.
[1940.70 --> 1945.10] You can ask us questions not about JavaScript as long as they're safe for work.
[1945.32 --> 1945.76] That's true.
[1946.34 --> 1948.46] We have many, many interests.
[1949.28 --> 1952.24] I'm taking a break from bread making, so no bread making questions.
[1952.26 --> 1954.12] I was just going to say, ask Michael about bread.
[1954.64 --> 1956.56] No, no. Got to take a break from that.
[1956.56 --> 1962.52] I can tell you all about ketosis, but I can't tell you about bread right now.
[1962.98 --> 1963.22] Ketosis.
[1964.14 --> 1965.74] There's a question about IDEs.
[1966.52 --> 1968.68] So I've never used IDEs.