Sweet or savory– and slightly terrifying –these specimen jars are fun to make and will give your dinner guests something to chew on. Continue reading Halloween Cuisine: Sweet or Savory Specimen Jars
All posts by Windell Oskay
Last Electronics Flea Market of 2011, Saturday
Basics: Simple LED Pumpkins
Awesome little LED Jack-o’-lanterns are quick and easy to build yourself, in the tradition of LED throwies.
Special bonuses: (1) Now with candle-flame flickering LEDs and (2) way brighter than those little LED tea lights!
Continue reading Basics: Simple LED Pumpkins
Improving open source hardware: Visual diffs
As the open source hardware movement matures, it’s worth taking a moment to consider the issue of version control.
Collaborative software projects make heavy use of version control– tools like Subversion and Git, and project hosting sites like SourceForge, GitHub, and Google Code –to organize and manage the contributions of many developers to a project. But as we begin to consider open source hardware, can we use these same tools and sites for effective collaboration on hardware projects?
The short answer is, “yes”– after all, people are already doing it. But the reality is that we could do much, much better. Some people think that we do need a separate “SourceForge for hardware.” That’s hard to say. But it is the case– perhaps against conventional wisdom –that existing tools can be used, today, for meaningful hardware version control.
It’s certainly possible to take any old binary file (say from a CAD program), and store it in a version control system. This is, in fact, how many of today’s open source hardware projects are managed. However, a “diff” (direct file comparison) to see what’s changed between two versions of a given file is all but meaningless.
For design files in plain-text (“ascii”) file formats, such as Inkscape‘s SVG or KiCad‘s .brd, a diff is possible and is in principle meaningful, but it is usually all but useless in practice, because CAD is a graphical sport, and we need to treat it like graphics.
An example: Suppose that you found the following snippet in the difference between two SVG files:
<path
sodipodi:type="arc"
style="fill:#ff00ff;fill-opacity:1;stroke:#ffa6a6;stroke-width:0.18000001;stroke-linecap:round;stroke-linejoin:round;stroke-miterlimit:4;stroke-opacity:1;stroke-dasharray:none;stroke-dashoffset:0"
id="path2816"
sodipodi:cx="237.14285"
sodipodi:cy="328.07648"
sodipodi:rx="160"
sodipodi:ry="84.285713"
d="m 397.14285,328.07648 a 160,84.285713 0 1 1 -319.999997,0 160,84.285713 0 1 1 319.999997,0 z" />
You probably wouldn’t recognize that (at least not quickly) as a big magenta ellipse. While it’s perfectly legible as source code, a diff result like this would be all but useless in practice.
The obvious solution, is to add in some visual diffs in order to make sense of changes between design files. On the bright side, making these is remarkably straightforward, and– with a little bit of effort –practically supported by existing version control systems.
In what follows, we’ll walk through some examples of visual diffs– with bitmaps and PDF files –and discuss what you can do to help make version control work better for CAD files, and to make CAD files better for version control.
Continue reading Improving open source hardware: Visual diffs
In pictures: Maker Faire NY 2011
Maker Faire NY 2011 and the Digi-Comp II
We’re here in New York for the 2011 Maker Faire New York (the “World Maker Faire”), held for the second year at the– absolutely fantastic —New York Hall of Science.
This weekend, we’ll be showing off an all-new prototype version of the Digi-Comp II. Back in May, at the Bay Area Maker Faire, we showed off a giant-scale version of the Digi-Comp II, documented here on our blog both in photos and with video.
Our new prototype is at the scale of the original (mid 1960’s) Digi-Comp II, which used half-inch diameter glass marbles. Rather than marbles, we’ve opted for half-inch diameter chrome steel balls–miniature pinballs or overgrown pachinko balls, depending on your perspective. The original machine was made of thin vacuum-formed plastic, supported by a sheet of masonite and fitted with injection-molded flip-flops and switches. While our final version will be fabricated from (very sturdy) vacuum-formed plastic, we’re currently in a phase of functional testing, using CNC-machined wooden versions.
The top surface of the machine is cut from 1/2″ thick plywood, using a CNC router to make 3/8″ deep channels where the balls can roll. After routing, we added all of the labels by laser engraving. The flip-flops and switches are laser cut from thinner plywood, and rotate on simple plain bearings consisting of 1/16″ diameter stainless steel pins and slightly larger holes drilled through the wood. At the upper right, you can see the ball-release mechanism, which releases a ball when the actuated by the pushrod.
As with our giant model, the design is a functional but not exact replica of the original. All of the flip-flops, registers, and switches are approximately in the original locations, but the “wiring” (really, rolling ball paths) has been created from scratch. One of the non-obvious things when you first look at the Digi-Comp II is that there are actually two levels to the machine. The six “black holes” that you can see above drop the ball down to the lower level, as a shortcut to the bottom or (for certain functions) to flip switches on the top side.
On the bottom half of the machine you can see the ball return as the stripy ramp in the center. The stripes on the ramp arise from cutting plywood at an angle (see here for another example). Below that is the Start Lever. When a ball presses down the start lever, it pushes the pushrod that releases the next ball from the top.We’ll be demonstrating our prototype Digi-Comp II all weekend at Maker Faire. If you’re in the area, please drop come see the Maker Faire, say hi, and try it out!
- Additional resources:
- If you’d like more information about the Digi-Comp II in general, please take a look at our prior articles (again, with photos and with video).
- The official site for our project is digicompii.com
- If you are interested in the forthcoming kit version, please sign up for the Evil Mad Science Mailing List.
Open hardware summit badge
A new Kraftwerk-inspired LED tie kit?
Well, almost— With a breath of new firmware, our Larson Scanner kit takes us on a trip to the late 1970’s.
In the old videos of electronic music pioneers Kraftwerk performing their classic The Robots, a prominent prop is the animated LED necktie worn by each member of the band. If you haven’t seen this, or it’s been a while, you can see it right here at YouTube. (Additional viewing, if you’re so inclined: Die Roboter, the German version.)
The Kraftwerk tie has nine red LEDs in a vertical row, and one lights up after the one above it in a simple descending pattern. And what does it say to the world? One thing only, loud and clear: “We are the robots.” Now, if you’re anything like us, the most important question going through your head at this point is something along the lines of “why am I not wearing a tie like that right now?”
The good news is that it’s actually easy to make one. And the starting point? A circuit with nine red LEDs and just the right spacing: our open-source Larson Scanner kit. With minor modifications– a software change and dumping the heavy 2xAA battery pack–it makes a pretty awesome tie. In what follows, we’ll show you how to build your own, complete with video.
Octolively: Digital interactive LED surfaces
Octolively is an all-new, open source interactive LED surface kit that we’re releasing today. Octolively features high resolution– an independent motion sensor for every LED, stand-alone operation, a variety of response functions, and easy scaling for large grids.
Octolively represents our fourth generation of interactive LED surfaces.
Long-time readers might recall the original Interactive LED Dining Table, the infamous Interactive LED Coffee Tables, or the third-generation, not-very-creatively-named Interactive LED Panels. All of these surfaces were based on fully-analog circuitry with large circuit boards and a fairly high ratio of LEDs to sensors– typically 20:1.
Octolively, by contrast, is based on smaller, lower-cost circuit board modules, “only” 4×8 inches in size. Part of the reason for this is so that there’s more flexibility in making arbitrarily shaped arrays. Arrays can now be as skinny as 4″ wide, or as wide as you like.
Each module features 8 LEDs and 8 independent proximity sensors– one for each and every LED. The LEDs are (huge) 10 mm types, and that chip in the middle of the board is an (also huge) ATmega164 microcontroller.Each sensor consists of an infrared LED and phototransistor pair, which– together with polling and readout from the microcontroller –acts as reflective motion sensor. The LEDs are spaced on a 2-inch grid, and the edge connectors allow boards to be tiled seamlessly. Because the circuit is now primarily digital, it’s easy to store a variety of response functions in the microcontroller. Our standard firmware contains 8 different response functions– fades, ripples, shadows and sparkles, which you can change with a button press. As it’s an open source project, we’ll expect that (in time), others will become available as well.
A stunning display of natural birefringence
For a higher-quality image– without the display case– take a look here.
Here is what the display placard has to say:
“Crystal Sphere
Rock crystal, Silver Stand
Qing Dynasty (1644-1911 CE)
China
An ornamental treasure of the Imperial palace in Beijing, the crystal sphere was said to have been a favorite possession of the Empress Dowager Cixi (1836 -1908 CE), under whose watch imperial China crumbled. The rock crystal originated in Burma and was shaped into a sphere though years of constant rotation in a semi-cylindrical container filled with emery, garnet powder, and water. The forty-nine pound flawless crystal sphere is believed to be the second largest in the world. The stand in the shape of a wave was designed by a Japanese artisan.”
So, not only is it a giant crystal ball, but it’s a historically interesting giant crystal ball. But besides that– and its brief modern stint as a hat rack –what’s genuinely remarkable about this particular artifact is that it’s made from a chunk of rock crystal, better known as quartz crystal. Now, those “crystal balls” that run-of-the-mill fortune tellers use are often just glass— glorified playground marbles or perhaps so-called lead crystal, which is actually just another type of glass. Quartz crystal, on the other hand, has a structured atomic lattice that leads to some very interesting physical properties including piezoelectricity, triboluminescence, and birefringence. These properties arise from the crystal structure itself; they are typically minimal or absent in glasses such as fused silica (glass made by melting quartz crystal).
The sign, across the room reading “TEXTILES” is not just inverted like it would be with a spherical lens, but also– plain as day –appears as double image, even through our single camera lens.
Why? Quartz crystal is a birefringent material, which means that light rays entering the material experience two different indices of refraction, depending on their polarization and orientation with respect to the crystal lattice. In practice, our eyes see all polarizations, so this means that the crystal ball acts like a superposition of two glass balls with different indices of refraction– and light rays entering the sphere at any given point can follow two different paths to reach your eyes. Hence the double image.
It’s also worth noting that the two separate images are composed of photons with perpendicular polarization. If you were to look at this sphere through a linear polarizer (e.g., one lens of the 3D glasses that they use in modern movie theaters), you could turn it such that only one of the two images was visible at a time.
Birefringence is not particularly rare, and there are materials (like certain forms of calcite) that have huge, easily visible birefringence. Optical devices made from flawless natural calcite, exploiting this property, are tremendously important to scientific research and industry.
We tend to think of a quartz crystal as being perfectly clear– not something that gives you a double image when you look through it. That’s because quartz is only very weakly birefringent, especially when compared to calcite. Quartz is, however, still extensively used in industry in applications for which high transparency and very slight birefringence are key, such as optical wave plates. And, what’s truly remarkable about the Penn Museum sphere is that this tiny property– usually so hard to see –is so plainly visible to the human eye.
Finally, as we mentioned, the amount of birefringence depends on the orientation of light rays with respect to the crystal itself.
This means that if we walk one quarter circle around the sphere to a point where we’re closer to looking directly along (or perhaps, perpendicular to) the optical axis of the quartz sphere, the image suddenly becomes (if you’ll pardon the pun) crystal clear.
