99% Inspiration, 99% Perspiration, And 99% Collaboration

I was watching an oldish TEDx talk with Rodney Mullen, probably the most innovative street skater ever, but that’s not the point, and it’s not his best talk either. Along the way, he makes a claim that ideas — in …read more

The Rise And Fall Of The Fan Car

The advent of aerodynamic wings in motorsport was one of the most dramatic changes in the mid-20th century. Suddenly, it was possible to generate more grip at speed outside of altering suspension setups and fitting grippier tyres. However, it was …read more

This Week In Security: Text Rendering On Windows, GNU Poke, And Bitsquatting

Project Zero just unrestricted the details on CVE-2021-24093, a potentially nasty vulnerability in Windows 10’s DirectWrite, a text rendering library. The flaw got fixed in this month’s patch Tuesday roundup. The flaw is accessible in all the major browsers on …read more

We’re Cloning Animals From The “Frozen Zoo”; Like A Seed Bank But For Animals

Seed banks are facilities of great value to biodiversity and agriculture around the world. These facilities are used to house stocks of seeds of a wide variety, helping to maintain genetic diversity and avoid the permanent loss of various plant …read more

Arduboy FX Mod-Chip: Now You’re Playing With Power

Traditionally, a forum full of technical users trying integrate their own hardware into a game system for the purposes of gaining unfettered access to its entire software library was the kind of thing that would keep engineers at Sony and …read more

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Is That A Cat Or Not?

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By Jenny List | March 6, 2021

Pandemic induced boredom takes people in many different ways. Some of us go for long walks, others learn to speak a new language, while yet more unleash their inner gaming streamer. [Niklas Fauth] has taken a break from his other …read more
The IEEE Builds A Smart Watch

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By Al Williams | March 6, 2021

It used to be that building your own watch was either a big project or it meant that you didn’t really care about how something looked on your wrist. But now with modern parts and construction techniques, a good-looking smart …read more
Waterjet-Cut Precision Pastry

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By Elliot Williams | March 6, 2021

We need more high-end, geometric pastry in our lives. This insight is courtesy of a fairly old video, embedded below, demonstrating an extremely clever 2D CNC mechanism that cuts out shapes on a cake pan, opening up a universe of …read more
X-Ray Defeats Letterlocking — Unfolds And Reads Letter Sealed Since 1697

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By Jenny List | March 6, 2021

Over recent years we’ve been treated to a series of fascinating advances in the world of x-ray imaging, as researchers have developed their x-ray microtomography techniques and equipment to the point at which they can probe and then computationally reconstruct …read more
NASA’s Perseverance Rover Makes Its First Martian Tracks

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By Zach Zeman | March 6, 2021

There’s a special kind of anxiety that comes from trying out a robotic project for the first time. No matter the size, complexity, or how much design and planning has gone into it, the first time a creation moves under …read more
99% Inspiration, 99% Perspiration, And 99% Collaboration

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By Elliot Williams | March 6, 2021

I was watching an oldish TEDx talk with Rodney Mullen, probably the most innovative street skater ever, but that’s not the point, and it’s not his best talk either. Along the way, he makes a claim that ideas — in …read more
Lost A Lightweight Quadcopter? Here Are The Best Ways To Find It

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By Donald Papp | March 6, 2021

Lost aircraft are harder to find when they are physically small to begin with. Not only are they harder to see, but the smaller units lack features like GPS tracking; it’s not normally possible to add it to a tiny …read more