Here’s a worthwhile Kickstarter for once: the Prishtina Hackerspace. Yes, that’s a Kickstarter for a hackerspace in Kosovo. Unlike most hackerspace Kickstarters, they’re already mostly funded, with 20 days to go. If we ever get around to doing the Istanbul to Kaliningrad hackerspace tour, we’ll drop by.
Codebender is a web-based tool that allows you to code and program an Arduino. The Chromebook is a web-based laptop that is popular with a few schools. Now you can uses Codebender on a Chromebook. You might need to update your Chromebook to v42, and there’s a slight bug in the USB programmers, but that should be fixed in a month or so.
Here’s a great way to waste five minutes. It’s called agar.io. It’s a multiplayer online game where you’re a cell, you eat dots that are smaller than you, and bigger cells (other players) can eat you. [Morris] found the missing feature: being able to find the IP of a server so you can play with your friends. This feature is now implemented in a browser script. Here’s the repo.
The FAA currently deciding the fate of unmanned aerial vehicles and systems, and we’re going to live with any screwup they make for the next 50 years. It would be nice if all UAV operators, drone pilots, and everyone involved with flying robots could get together and hash out what the ideal rules would be. That’s happening in late July thanks to the Silicon Valley Chapter of AUVSI (Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International).
SOLAR ROADWAYS!! Al Jazeera is reporting a project in the Netherlands that puts solar cells in a road. It’s just a bike path, it’s only 70 meters long, and it can support at least 12 tonnes (in the form of a ‘fire brigade truck’). There’s no plans for the truly dumb solar roadways stuff – heating the roads, or having lanes with LEDs. We’re desperately seeking more information on this one.
About solar roadways, bikeways…. Dave Jones (EEVblog guy, also one of the awesome Hackaday Prize judges) has a really nice video on that, plus a viable alternative from North Korean that now what they are doing (I think) http://www.eevblog.com/2015/05/13/eevblog-743-solar-roadways-test-results/
There are 3 nice videos of Dave Jones rambling about it now :)
I’m not sure why, but I can’t listen to Dave talking for more than 3 minutes ‘-‘
“(P)lus a viable alternative from North Korea”. What, from the land of the Great Leader who shoots under 30 in golf and doesn’t poop (or have as anus, I forget which), yea I’m sure that’s legit.
the idea is from South Korea, big difference between north and south
Why didn’t you post about the solar bike path several months ago?
Or why not tomorrow? Does it matter…
given their history of forward thinking decisions driven by media hysteria with the now added bonus of security theater, someone may want to look at how the FAA treated the ultralight folks. start leveraging *any* angle that might be useful
Ask your favourite find-o-matic about “Nederland solar fietspad” and use some online babelfish on the results.
I have a sneaking suspicion that the results will blind me. B)
I think the biggest thing (no pun intended) missing from the FAA rule making on drones is a lower bounds on their regulatory scope. Ostensibly paper airplanes fall under FAA drone regulatory jurisdiction because this.
I think that there should be a rule that any flying device with a gross take-off weight of under 500 grams should simply be unregulated. If not 500 grams, then some agreeable minimum. And that specifically flying devices with a negative gross take-off weight (that is, balloons) have some other criteria under which some minimum scale of them becomes similarly unregulated.
I am guesing you haven’t seen person cut by carbon fiber prop. It was ok to be unregulated when only RC hobysts with experince form planes and helipoters were building them. because they knew not to fly this things over popoulated areas.
But now when people that have no idea how dangerous this could be and can’t even build them themselfs can get them for a few hundred bucks. There is a need for regulation.
I mean I have seen them flying at crowded concerts when in case it falls down at least one person will get hit with it.
If there were to be unregulated category the weigh shouldt be the only criteria.
Maybe someting on the lines of diameter under 300mm, must have prop guards, carbon props not alowed and must not carry a camera.
If you want to be able to buy and have bigger and/or more poferfull drone you should be required to get a license where you must show that you know all the saftey and legal risks involved.
And if you would like a drone with a camera you should have an upgrade to that license with test for knowing legal restictions regarding privacy.
I can pick up a rock or stick from anywhere, toss it into a crowd or in a random direction in the air not caring where it lands.
Do we need licenses to bend your back and open and close your hands you think?
And incidentally, those rocks and sticks can be of such proportion that they can harm you significantly more than any hobby drone, carbon blades included
I won’t tell you about the incredible power I have to take a box of knives and toss that in the air too. You don’t want nightmares. And what about scissors you ask? Well – don’t ask.
Waste 5 minutes on Agar.io? More like 5 hours.
Was kinda shocked seeing Al Jazeera and the Netherlands being mentioned in one sentence, but then calmed down again when i saw its just about that road, pfew.
The idea is pretty good, but whats being kept sorta secret somehow is that the test section of road has been replaced 5 times now (since it was first built mid 2014) after breaking in a bunch of different ways (from cracks in the top layer till problems with power ‘leaking’ away into the soil) been told this by a colleague that actually lives near it, but (while theres lots of media attention for it in the netherlands) its beeing kept out of the media somehow (prolly to not ruin the idea with half assed prototypes, and ill admit, the idea is still pretty good)
That said, appearantlly what they have now is holding up, and theres been talks about rolling it out country wide (wich isnt all that much if you concider the size of the Netherlands) finally, this is a much much better source then Al Jazeera: http://www.solaroad.nl/en/
Al Jazeera isn’t bad, you just need to know where they’re getting their funding. It’s exactly the same as the New York Times and WaPo having an insane democratic (not liberal, mind you) slant, why Gizmodo is going to be pushing an anti-net neutrality narrative because of the Verizon buyout…
Think about where Al Jazeera gets their funding, and where those people get their money. Al Jazeera is pushing solar energy in that piece. That’s somewhat remarkable, imho.
In Agario, players use their mouse to guide a cell, consuming smaller cells and evading larger ones. As cells grow, they can split into smaller pieces to move faster or trap opponents.