Just snap off the corners and this business card can be used as a mass storage device. Well sort of. The tab left over has four traces on the back to make it USB compatible. The PIC 24FJ64GB002 microcontroller on the card registers as a storage device and launches [Ramiro’s] resume and a cover letter loaded as an HTML file. He’s made it as useful as possible by including access to the SPI and I2C bus connections but he’s also included some firmware to act as a data logger or an oscilloscope. At about 5 euros a piece you won’t be distributing these willy-nilly but it’s not too much more than handing out breakout boards with your name all over them.
“The world of the business software (for banking, insurance, services…) is boring, monotone and it is not challenging enough for me. I would like to redirect my labor situation toward a field more related with the electronic engineering, which is my real passion.”
Mmm…in this economy I’d take your boring business software job if it pays well. I’d leave my “real passion” for my off time and build what I like. Sure, you can always apply for a job elsewhere, but if you are already employed don’t jump ship until you are sure you landed the other job.
Great idea with the card BTW. Hope it gets you your dream job.
that is a great idea for a card
Very very nice. Wish I’d thought of that. Only one thing I might have changed would be the silkscreen color to black, just so the traces aren’t so prominent.
Is PIC24 the cheapest way to do USB nowadays?
So if you send this to an HR Dept. at a company and the policies don’t allow the employees to insert any USB devices aren’t you out of luck?
Great idea but if I was sending these out I would send a hard copy of my resume as well.
pic18f2550 has USB built in.
wouldve thought that was cheapest?
also, has the link been hacked becuase I cant get access to http://www.t4f.org
Gotta like the idea, problem is, I hate the idea of paying $15.00 each for my business cards. You get poor quick doing that.
How about simply getting transparent plastic business cards to stand way out, and spend less than $0.50 each for them.
Although sending a business card with you’re resume is a waste of time, HR throws them in the trash. It’s looked upon as a waste of time to send a business card.
>>steaky
Link works fine for me. Maybe when you tried to access it, it had too many visitors and the server couldn’t handle it.
I have to say, I’ve always wanted to build a unique business card like this, but you really do need a couple of them, and at $6 a piece, this is quite pricey.
Seems the link uses a binary javascript, yeah thanks but no thanks.
I get redirected to http://custom404error.com/?keywords=economy%2car%2comparisons/403Forbidden when using the link..
I’d like to meet this guy …a few tiems XD (This hardware could be useful for me!).
dot matrix
http://hackaday.com/2008/09/05/dot-matrix-business-card/
I don’t think this is the sort of thing you’d just mail to an HR department.
This is something I would hand to someone in a hiring position at a more social event, or one-on-one in an interview. How badass would you look concluding an interview by saying, nonchalantly, “Oh, and here’s my card,” and thwapping down something clever like this.
@loans:
Exactly. This isn’t something I’d send to GE or Exxon, but meeting Mr. H-A-D for a lunch interview couldn’t end better than the aforementioned “here’s my card”. If nothing else, he’d be curious enough to plug it in – just to see what’s on it. autorun would take care of the rest ;)
To those who (like me) would be torn between plugging in an unknown and letting curiosity get the best of you, let’s face it – your name is on it and they know that. They’re well-aware that anyone capable of doing something like this isn’t careless enough to put something malicious on it (at least not without hiding it REALLY well!).
wow i now have to dust off my photo etching supply. It looks like a fun way to land a job and show off your skills with prototyping even if it is inherently simple in design. Right On best post in weeks guys keep it up.
Clicking the link redirects me to myfacebook . net, which doesn’t work on Firefox as it gets stuck in a reload loop, but does work on IE6 but it’s nothing to do with electronic business cards…
data logging business card
that will surely get him a job in telecoms
The google cache http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:QmOYB9BWnUYJ:www.t4f.org/es/projects/business-card+http://www.t4f.org/projects/business-card&cd=2&hl=es&ct=clnk&gl=ar&client=firefox-a
Sorry spanish only
Pretty sure no recent Windows installation (since XP SP2 from memory?) will load an file on instruction from autorun.inf.
Still cool though.
Oh, and his site is back up: http://www.t4f.org/projects/business-card
Seems like a waste (money and resources) to hand these out to every customer.
You would agree that most people carry an USB memory stick with them already?
Well why not make a hand held device which acts as USB host. When the person plugs in their existing USB stick, your CV, resume, whatever transfers across automatically.
Much cheaper and greener – if you can make it!
I want one (or more)! Send it please!
The site went down because all the traffic. The author says a mirror has been set up. It’s in t4f.org and not http://www.t4f.org at the moment. I have noticed him.
turns out he passed his bandwidth limit (cant think how) and his host forwarded requests to a spam site.
Its back up now but he’s had to pay for premium hosting.
Hmmm… If a company has a reasonably security conscious sysadmin, autorun has probably been disabled through the group policy since this card has the same sort of behavior that various malware strains have. This seems kind of risky to spend that kind of money on since you’d probably look really dumb if it didn’t work. And if it did work… Social engineering attack anyone?
Cool idea though.
I hate to be a killjoy, but as someone who works with PCBs daily, one of the nasty things about them is that they tend to shed glass fibers off the edges. Now, this usually isn’t a problem, because you could coat or polish the edges of this card (at extra cost, of course), but when you break parts off the board, those fibers are rough and some are loose, just waiting to stick into your hands. It takes about a week for them to stop pricking you.
Just something to consider when you hand them out…don’t want the person you were trying to impress to remember you as the guy who left him with glass fibers in his hand for a week!
I think a more elegant solution would be to shape one of the corners just enough so it can go into the USB-connector.
@Peter
Don’t use FR-4. Use a paper laminate board.