Month: August 2008

Tablo, Fabric Gesture Controller

August 1, 2008 by 8 Comments


[Adrian Freed] posted this interesting fabric gesture controller called Tablo. It uses a stretchy conductive fabric, laid over a framework to create a curve known as the Witch of Agnesi. Holding the center of the fabric up is an inverted bowl covered with sections of conductive material. The whole thing is wired to a microcontroller that measures the resistance fluctuations when you press on the fabric. It is capable of measuring displacement and pressure as well as being multitouch.

They mention that the simple interface allows it to be used as a foot input as well as a hand input. We’d love to see a video of it in action.

Essential Bluetooth Hacking Tools

August 1, 2008 by 9 Comments

Security-Hacks has a great roundup of essential Bluetooth hacking tools. As they point out, Bluetooth technology is very useful for communication with mobile devices. However, it is also vulnerable to privacy and security invasions. Learning the ins and outs of these tools will allow you to familiarize yourself with Bluetooth vulnerabilities and strengths, and enable you to protect yourself from attackers. The list is separated into two parts – tools to detect Bluetooth devices, and tools to hack into Bluetooth devices. Check out BlueScanner, which will detect Bluetooth-enabled devices, and will extract as much information as possible from those devices. Other great tools to explore include BTCrawler, which scans for Windows Mobile devices, or Bluediving, which is a Bluetooth penetration suite, and offers some unique features like the ability to spoof Bluetooth addresses, and an L2CAP packet generator. Most of the tools are available for use with Linux platforms, but there are a few you can also use with Windows.

[via Digg]

Electric Screwdriver Robot Hand

August 1, 2008 by 1 Comment


Here’s an interesting grabber hand built for use on an ROV. This grabber is a novel use of a very common and extremely cheap electric screwdriver, that is probably found in everyone’s toolbox. It is also a great way to reuse that small electric screwdriver you have kicking around that uses proprietary batteries that are not worth replacing. Many of the ROV’s covered previously could benefit from such a powerful device built from very common materials off his parts list. Because the screwdriver was extremely cheap the designer chose not to completely seal the housing.

It seems like this simple design that could be used in many robotic projects and by simply changing the jaws could yield other creative uses. The first thing that comes to mind is to upsize this hack into something bigger and stronger. Either way, you might not want to get your fingers in there.