In the cold and mysterious wilderness of Norway, it pays to be ready for anything–especially heavy-walking trolls. The team at [nullohm] decided to prepare thoroughly for their trek into the woods to witness the Leonids meteor shower by putting together an Arduino-based “troll detector”.
The device is based on the superstition of hammering a steel spike into a tree to keep trolls away from camp. This goes one step further by including an accelerometer and LED indicators so that you can tell exactly what type of troll is just about to feast upon your tender human flesh.
When the detector is installed into a nearby tree, it takes an average seismic measurement and then looks for telltale footfalls. Even if you’re not concerned with perpetuating superstitions, you might find a use for the source code for simple seismic activity monitoring at home to supplement your miniature seismic reflector.
I wonder how they tested it? With elephants?
With trolls of course, the internet is full of them. Shouldn’t be any problem.
That makes sense.
Actually, this could be useful as an intrusion detector, assuming it’s sensitive enough to detect the footfalls of humans as well as trolls.
You have been eaten by a grue.
Seismic sensors have been used for intrusion detection at secure sites for years now.
funny, inventive and practically useless. In other words, a great hack.
That’s not what ‘hopefully’ means, though.
Grendel will no longer have the element of surprise. Nice hack!
Brad
@Zork
priceless. just priceless!
i find it fun when superstition hits science XD
Probably find that its not steel, so much as iron. Specifically cold iron, as most fae are negatively affected by it.
Woah,nowteyjust nedd tohookit to wordpress to detect internet trolls as well.
Ooops, looks like my keyboard’s dead.
I meant “Now they just need to hook it to wordpress to detect trolls in comments. “
@Necromant a better alternative allready exists, it’s called Stupid Filter, google it :oP
1) Is this HAD post trollbait?
2) Are accelerometers really that sensitive to seismic activity? (ie, from the earths movements. not someone stomping near a tree)
Obviously not. so right, this thing will indicate the direction of a tresspasser? how will it do this when the tree can only move side-to-side?
Are there other models more precise for this purpose?
3) Are people from norway really that superstitious? [read: stupidstitious]
4) This isnt really a hack, is it?
5) HAD Editors, leave out all the bullshit from a post and get to the point.
6) Your site crashed my firefox session. granted, i wasnt missing much anyway was i.
@PR0CR4571N4T0R
7) waaaaaaaa
@HAD
Thanks for the hilarious post! I needed a good laugh :)
I also wonder how’d they calibrate the thing? Can you get the data from telltales? Now that would be a nice hack :)
-folktalecalibration
Hmmm. Neat project!
yeah you need a Grue detector/repeller.
On a side note I wasn’t aware of the superstition, but it DOES explain why I’ve seen railroad spikes driven into trees where I’ve camped in the past.
Generally I’m not superstitious, just extrastitous.
@Eirinn Thanks, nice project. However newbies are not trolls. And I guess it will take more than bayes filtering to detect ‘thin’ trolls posts.
Another good hack will be a machine that fires railroad spikes into trees.
FINALLY A DEVICE THAT WILL TAKE CARE OF o wait…oops nope internet trolls are not taken care of fail owell NOW A DEVICETHAT WILL KEEP THose TrOLLS OUT OF MY kITCHEN YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
O fail my keyboard is messing up owell thats wat u get for a 1999 USB apple keyboard
@PR0CR4571N4T0R
3) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4PGFODxiJc (The Troll Hunter – Official Trailer)
Just make sure Dethklok is not in town making an apology and you should be fine.
For those not in the know: Dethklok is a fictional metal band that visits Finland in one episode to apologize for the country being destroyed by riots during their last tour. None of them are any good at speaking, so they make a song for it using lyrics from the countries book of necronamics. They awaken the Kraken which proceeds to destroy the country again.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCUnhoe0rpU