Robotic Platform Turns Shop Vac Into Roomba

May 8, 2024 by Bryan Cockfield 13 Comments

The robotic revolution is currently happening, although for the time being it seems as though most of the robots are still being generally helpful to humanity, whether that help is on an assembly line, help growing food, or help transporting us from place to place. They’ve even showed up in our homes, although it’s not quite the Jetsons-like future yet as they mostly help do cleaning tasks. There are companies that will sell things like robotic vacuum cleaners but [Clay Builds] wanted one of his own so he converted a shop vac instead.

The shop vac sits in a laser-cut plywood frame and rolls on an axle powered by windshield wiper motors. Power is provided from a questionable e-bike battery which drives the motors and control electronics. A beefy inverter is also added to power the four horsepower vacuum cleaner motor. The robot has the ability to sense collisions with walls and other obstacles, and changes its path in a semi-random way in order to provide the most amount of cleaning coverage for whatever floor it happens to be rolling on.

There are a few things keeping this build from replacing anyone’s Roomba, though. Due to the less-than-reputable battery, [Clay Builds] doesn’t want to leave the robot unattended and this turned out to be a good practice when he found another part of the build, a set of power resistors meant to limit current going to the vacuum, starting to smoke and melt some of the project enclosure. We can always think of more dangerous tools to attach a robotic platform to, though.

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Remembering Dick Rutan And His Non-Stop Flight Around The World

May 8, 2024 by Maya Posch 5 Comments

On December 23, 1986, an airplane landed at Edwards AFB. This by itself wouldn’t mean much, but this particular airplane had just written history. Piloted by Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager, the Rutan Model 76 Voyager had just completed its non-stop flight around the world after taking off from that very same runway just over nine days prior. Designed by Dick’s younger brother Burt Rutan, this airplane and this one flight will forever speak to the world’s imagination, even as we say farewell to Dick “Killer” Rutan.

Dick Rutan (r) and Jeana Yeager (l) standing next to the Voyager aircraft in 1986. (Source: Ray Kamm collection)

Born Richard Glenn Rutan on July 1, 1938, he spent his military career in the United States Air Force, initially working with radar systems before beginning pilot training in the 1960s. He flew 325 sorties over Vietnam (ejecting once) and served for many more years while racking up many awards and reached the rank of Lieutenant Colonel before retiring in 1978.

After this he would fly as a test pilot for a range of aircraft, including a modified Rutan Long-EZ: the XCOR EZ-Rocket in 2001. Yet no flight would be as memorable as the record-breaking flight in the Rutan Voyager, which saw the world’s media following the aircraft’s journey around the globe, including with live feeds whenever the aircraft was within reach of national broadcasters. Despite nine days of strenuous flight and some mechanical breakdowns and damaged wingtips (from the fuel-burdened wings scraping over the runway), the flight went about as well as could have been hoped, thanks to Dick’s and Jeana’s piloting skills.

Dick Rutan died on May 3, 2024 at the age of 85 after a long struggle with the consequences of Long COVID. He will be sorely missed by the aviation community and countless others, but his achievements never forgotten.

The 2024 Business Card Challenge Starts Now

May 7, 2024 by Elliot Williams 11 Comments

If you want to make circuits for a living, what better way to impress a future employer than to hand them a piece of your work to take home? But even if you’re just hacking for fun, you can still turn your calling into your calling card.

We are inviting you to submit your coolest business card hacks for us all to admire, and the top three entries will win a $150 DigiKey shopping spree. If your work can fit on a business card, create a project page for it over on Hackaday.io and enter it in the 2024 Business Card Contest. Share your tiny hacks!

To enter, create a project for your hacked business card over at Hackaday IO, and then enter it into the 2024 Business Card Challenge by selecting the pulldown on the left. It’s that easy.

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Google Removes RISC-V Support From Android

May 3, 2024 by Maya Posch 20 Comments

Last year the introduction of RISC-V support to the Android-specific, Linux-derived Android Common Kernel (ACK) made it seem that before long Android devices might be using SoCs based around the RISC-V ISA, but it would seem that these hopes are now dashed. As reported by Android Authority, with a series of recently accepted patches this RISC-V support was stripped again from the ACK. While this doesn’t mean that Android cannot be made to work on RISC-V, any company interested would have to do all of the heavy lifting themselves, which might include Qualcomm with their recently announced RISC-V-based smartwatch Snapdragon SoC.

No reason was provided by Google for this change, and the official statement from Google to Android Authority says that Google is not ready to provide a single supported Android Generic Kernel Image (GKI), but that ‘Android will continue to support RISC-V’. This change however, removes RISC-V kernel support from the ACK, and since Google only certifies Android builds which ship with a GKI featuring an ACK, this effectively means that RISC-V is not supported at this point, and likely won’t be for the foreseeable future.

As discussed on Hacker News, a potential reason might be the very fragmentary nature of the RISC-V ISA, which makes a standard RISC-V kernel very complicated if you want to support more than a (barebones) profile. This is also supported by a RISC-V mailing list thread, where ‘expensive maintenance’ is mentioned for why Google doesn’t want to support RISC-V.

This Week In Security: Default Passwords, Lock Slapping, And Mastodown

May 3, 2024 by Jonathan Bennett 8 Comments

The UK has the answer to all our IoT problems: banning bad default passwords. Additionally, the new UK law requires device makers to provide contact info for vulnerability disclosures, as well as a requirement to advertise vulnerability fix schedules. Is this going to help the security of routers, cameras, and other devices? Maybe a bit.

I would argue that default passwords are in themselves the problem, and complexity requirements only nominally help security. Why? Because a good default password becomes worthless once the password, or algorithm leaks. Let’s lay out some scenarios here. First is the static default password. Manufacturer X makes device Y, and sets the devices to username/password admin/new_Complex_P@ssword1!. Those credentials make it onto a default password list, and any extra security is lost.

What about those devices that have a different, random-looking password for each device? Those use an algorithm to derive that password from the MAC address and/or serial number. That may help the situation, but the algorithm can be retrieved from the firmware, and most serial numbers are predictable in one way or another. This approach is better, but not a silver bullet.

So what would a real solution to the password problem look like? How about no default password at all, but no device functionality until the new password passes a cracklib complexity and uniqueness check. I have seen a few devices that do exactly this. The requirement for a disclosure address is a great idea, which we’ve talked about before regarding the similar EU legislation.

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Pssst… Wanna Buy An Old Supercomputer?

May 1, 2024 by Jenny List 86 Comments

If you spend your time plotting evil world domination while stroking your fluffy white cat in your super-villain lair, it’s clear that only the most high-performance in computing is going to help you achieve your dastardly aims. But computers of that scale are expensive, and not even your tame mad scientist can whistle one out of thin air. Never mind though, because if your life lacks a supercomputer, there’s one for sale right now in Wyoming.

The Cheyenne Supercomputer was ranked in the top 20 of global computing power back in 2016, when it was installed to work on atmospheric simulation and earth sciences. There’s a page containing exhaustive specs, but overall we’re talking about a Silicon Graphics ICE XA system with 8,064 processors at 18 cores each for a total of 14,5152 cores, and a not inconsequential 313,344 GB of memory. In terms of software it ran the SuSE Linux Enterprise Server OS, but don’t let that stop you from installing your distro of choice.

It’s now being sold on a government auction site in a decommissioned but able to be reactivated state, and given that it takes up a LOT of space we’re guessing that arranging the trucks to move it will cost more than the computer itself. If you’re interested it’s standing at a shade over $40,000 at the time of writing with its reserve not met, and you have until the 3rd of May to snag it.

It’s clear that the world of supercomputing is a fast-moving one and this computer has been superseded. So whoever buys it won’t be joining the big boys any time soon — even though it remains one heck of a machine by mere mortal standards. We’re curious then who would buy an old supercomputer, if anyone. Would its power consumption for that much computing make it better off as scrap metal, or is there still a place for it somewhere? Ideas? Air them in the comments.

Farewell MFJ

April 29, 2024 by Al Williams 33 Comments

We were sad to hear that after 52 years in operation, iconic ham radio supplier MFJ will close next month. On the one hand, it is hard not to hear such news and think that it is another sign that ham radio isn’t in a healthy space. After all, in an ideal world, [Martin Jue] — the well-known founder of MFJ — would have found an anxious buyer. Not only is the MFJ line of ham radio gear well regarded, but [Martin] had bought other ham radio-related companies over the years, such as Ameritron, Hygain, Cushcraft, Mirage, and Vectronics. Now, they will all be gone, too.

However, on a deeper reflection, maybe we shouldn’t see it as another nail in ham radio’s coffin. It is this way in every industry. There was a time when it was hard to imagine ham radio without, say, Heathkit. Yet they left, and the hobby continued. We could name a slew of other iconic companies that had their day: Eico, Hammarlund, Hallicrafters, and more. They live on at hamfests, their product lines are frozen in time, and we’re sure we’ll see a used market for MFJ gear well into the next century.

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