Hackaday Links: December 11, 2016

December 11, 2016 by Brian Benchoff 31 Comments

We have a contest going on right now challenging you to do the most with 1 kB of data. If you want to get into this, here’s how you do it for a dollar. Use the PIC12C508A. It’s an 8-pin DIP, has 768 bytes of program ROM and 25 bytes of data RAM. [Shaos] is trying to generate NTSC on this thing.

Remember that Internet of Cookie Oven Kickstarter from the links post a few weeks ago? It was funded. It has a heating element that is ‘more energy efficient than traditional electric elements’, and there’s still no consensus over how a resistive heating element can be more efficient. It’s either 100% efficient, or 0% efficient, depending on how you look at it.

[Matthias Wandell], master of wood gears recently built a 20″ bandsaw from scratch. It’s a wood frame, wood wheels, a (currently) underpowered motor, and a few bits of metal and rubber. The video build log is fantastic, so start here and work your way forward.

Way back in the day, Sparkfun sold a Bluetooth rotary phone. Yes, at some point in the past, phones didn’t have touchscreens or even buttons. In any event, Sparkfun hasn’t sold these phones for quite a long time. Now there’s a new hotness: giving these rotary phones a GSM module.

Here’s a little Hackaday Events housekeeping. On January 23rd, we’re going to have a meetup in NYC. We’ll also have a meetup in LA sometime in January as well. Also in January I’ll be attending CES, reporting on the latest Internet of Toasters. A week later, Hackaday will be at ShmooCon in Washington, DC. At ShmooCon last year, we had a breakfast meetup in the DC Hilton. This year, I want to do something similar. If you have an idea of what to do, leave a note in the comments.

Assembly Required: Subroutine Calls And The 1K Challenge

December 7, 2016 by Al Williams 35 Comments

The first computer I personally owned had 256 bytes of memory. Bytes. The processor in my mouse and keyboard both have more memory than that. Lots more. Granted, 256 bytes was a bit extreme, but even the embedded systems I was building as part of my job back then generally had a small fraction of the 64K bytes of memory they could address.

Some people are probably glad they don’t have to worry about things like that anymore. Me, I kind of miss it. It was often like a puzzle trying to squeeze ten more bytes out of an EPROM to get a bug fix or a new feature put in. I though with the 1K challenge underway, I might share some of the tricks we used in those days to work around the small memory problems.

Continue reading “Assembly Required: Subroutine Calls And The 1K Challenge” →

Behind The Scenes Of A 1K Graphics Demo

August 8, 2010 by Phil Burgess 38 Comments

Programmer/designer [Steven Wittens] has posted a fantastic write-up on the black art of producing compact demo code, dissecting his own entry in the 1K JavaScript Demo Contest. The goal is to produce the best JavaScript demo that can be expressed in 1024 characters or less and works reliably across all standards-compliant web browsers.

[Wittens] details several techniques for creating a lot of visual flash in very few bytes, including the use of procedural graphics rather than fixed datasets, exploiting prime numbers to avoid obvious repetitions in movement, and strategically fudging formulas to save space while adding visual interest. These methods are just as applicable to other memory-constrained situations, not just JavaScript — some of the contest entries bear a resemblance to the compact microcontroller demos we’ve previously showcased, except running in your browser window.

The contest runs through September 10th, allowing ample time to come up with something even more clever. Whether he wins or not, we think [Steven] deserves special merit on account of having one of the most stylish blogs in recent memory!