[Jbremnant] wanted to try his hand with ANT+ wireless networks. This protocol is designed for light-weight and low-power consumer electronics, like heart rate chest straps and bicycle computers (Garmin brand devices for example). There are already libraries out there for Arduino, but [Jbremnant] found that most of them were written as slave-only code. He set out to use an MSP430 to drive a fully functioning ANT network including a computer and an Android phone.

The TI Launchpad is used as the master node in the network. [Jbremnant] chose the smaller of the two MSP430 processors that came with the dev platform. After starting down this road he realized that chip didn’t have a hardware UART needed to communicate with the SparkFun ANT board (based on the nRF24AP1 radio chip). Rolling with the punches, he used a software UART he had previously worked with. Now he’s able to transmit test data from the Launchpad. It is picked up by both a USB dongle on his computer and the Android phone seen above. Check out his demo video after the break.

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Want that 70″ LCD television in your living room to be an Android device? This little guy can make it happen. With an HDMI port on one end, and a USB plug on the other for power, just plug in FXI Technologies’ Cotton Candy dongle to create a 1080p Android television.

The price isn’t set for the device, but it’s expected to be available at less than $200. Considering what’s inside that’s pretty reasonable. There’s a dual-core 1.2 GHz ARM processor, 1 gig of RAM, 64 gigs of storage, Bluetooth, WiFi, and a microSD card slot. Wow!

So is it hackable? Absolutely. Well, kind of? The company doesn’t intend to bring Cotton Candy to the retail market. Instead, they will sell the device to developers who may do what they wish. From there, said developers have the option to license the technology for their own products. This begs the question, will the development kit come in under $200? Hard to say.

Check out the video after the break to hear an interview with the company’s CEO. It certainly sounds fascinating, and like the Chumby NeTV, we can’t wait to see what comes of this. Read the rest of this entry »

[Shazin] had some free time on his hands, so he settled in to do something he had been meaning to for a while – learn Android programming. He went an indirect route, and ended up using the Scripting Layer for Android (SL4A), which gave him a head start on the process. Sitting in between the Android API and scripting languages such as Python, SL4A allowed him the ability to apply something he was already familiar with to the Android environment.

He thought it would be cool to try building a door entry system which relied on voice commands to lock and unlock. Using the Google Voice API for Android and an Arduino, he built a small Python application that allows him to toggle a servo simply by talking into his phone.

The application on his phone communicates with an Arduino over WiFi, once Google Voice has decoded the command [Shazin] is giving. The Arduino controls a servo, which in theory could control the locking mechanism on a door.

After a bit of tweaking and some added security, his proof of concept could definitely come in handy.

Check out the short video below to see [Shazin’s] voice-controlled servo in action.

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Synesthesia is a mix-up in the wiring of the brain where sensory inputs are perceived differently than what ‘normal people’ usually experience. People with synesthesia can have visual input mapped to aural perception in the mind, or driving along a highway where there’s a recent skunk roadkill can smell ‘loud.’ It’s an interesting way of perceiving the world that’s usually inaccessible to most of the population, but the Syneseizure tries to replicate this way of viewing the world.

There’s a bunch of types of synesthesia (Led Zeppelin feels purple, or apples smelling further away than grapes), but [Greg] and his team needed to choose one subtype to reduce the complexity of their project. They chose mapping visual input to touch sensation. This was accomplished by attaching a dozen speakers to the test subject’s face. A webcam recorded where the subject was looking at and with a Processing sketch, the webcam was reduced to a grayscale 4×3 pixel grid. The intensity of the each pixel corresponded to the strength of buzzing in each speaker. All that was left to do is put a mask over the subject and have them walk around.

The Syneseizure was built for Science Hack Day San Francisco and ended up winning the people’s choice award. There’s a bunch of pics and a great write-up on the project website, so be sure to check that out.

[Nick] just finished up bis barbot build that is named after our favorite bartender. It’s an impressively capable even if it was done on the cheap.

The user chooses a libation for iZac to make via an Android tablet. This drink is interpreted by an Android ADK to have the mechanics of the robot swing into action and start making a drink.

The part of the build that moves the fluid was inspired by the Evil Mad Scientist Labs’ Drink Making Unit 2.0. Instead of pumps pulling the liquid through tubing, [Nick] attached an aquarium air pump to an Erlenmeyer flask. A siphon tube draws liquid out of the flask because of the difference in air pressure. The liquid is controlled by a few laser cut pinch valves that he designed.

Once a user selects a cocktail, the robot swings into action and dispenses liquid into a glass sitting on a load cell. Since the glass is being weighed at all times, iZac knows exactly how much alcohol (and in what proportion) is in the cocktail. [Nick] tested out iZac at the Sydney Hackerspace with soda water and flavoring. iZac proved very popular and we’re wondering if we could build something like this in a liquor cabinet.

Amazon’s new tablet reader, the Kindle Fire has been rooted. Early this morning [Death2All110] posted the steps he took to gain root access to his device (which is so fresh out of the box it still smells new). The heavy lifting is done by a package called SuperOneClick which aims to root all manner of phones and devices running Android.

There’s a bit more than the one click necessary, but not by much. Using the Android Developer Bridge in conjunction with the SDK you need to put in a value that will be recognized as the VID. From there, turn on the ability to install apps from unknown developers, re-enumerate the device on your PC and run the one-click package.

What can you do with this? Well, it completely opens up the Android OS so that you can bend it to your will. We haven’t seen any demonstrations yet, but it should be even better than what we saw done with the Sony PRS-T1.

[Addictive Tips via Reddit]

[Al] at Open Gadgets just put the finishing touches on his Android breathalyzer. It’s the perfect thing to install on ex-girlfriends’ phones to prevent 2 a.m. drunk dialing.

The project started off as a talking breathalyzer connected to a computer that tweeted your BAC, gave weather and stock readouts, and functioned as a photo booth. Since the first reveal of his project, [Al] moved from the desktop world to the mobile domain.

The breathalyzer itself is contained entirely in an Altoids tin. The build is based on the IOIO board that recently got support for Bluetooth. An alcohol sensor in the project measures the alcohol content of the surrounding atmosphere and reports this back to a phone over Bluetooth. There’s no word if the Android version of [Al]‘s breathalyzer has the Twitter and photo booth functions, they would be relatively easy to add.

While a wirelesss, tweeting breathalyzer lends itself to a competition for a high score, [Al]‘s project could have a few very good implantation; a DIY auto ignition interlock would be a very useful device for some people. Check out the videos of [Al]‘s builds after the break.

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For some ungodly reason, [Scott] has a friend that wanted a ‘sexting themed’ Halloween costume. We won’t try to make any presumptions of the creativity or mental stability of [Scott]‘s friend, but the SMS scrolling LED belt buckle he came up with is pretty cool.

The belt is based around a $13 scrolling LED belt buckle [Scott] found online. There was a problem with the belt buckle, though. Thirteen dollars means [Scott] didn’t get a whole lot of features with his buckle, so there are only 3 buttons on the entire device: letter up, letter down, and enter. Instead of pressing a button 80 times to get a lowercase ‘z,’ an Arduino was thrown into the mix to take care of all the button pressing.

The Arduino sketch could now input any message into the belt buckle in a matter of seconds. All that was left to do is taking care of the SMS to text part of the build. For this, [Scott] used the Sparkfun USB Host Shield and a custom Android app. Whenever an SMS is received on the phone, the message is sent through the USB shield to the Arduino and output on the belt buckle.

We won’t make any assumptions about the content of the messages during the Halloween party, but at least the video demo of the build is family friendly. Check it out after the break.

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