Join editors Elliot Williams and Mike Szczys as they unpack all the great hacks we’ve seen this week. On this episode we’re talking about laser Internet delivered from space, unwrapping the complexity of Charlieplexed circuits, and decapping ICs both to learn more about them and to do it safely at home. We have some fun with backyard siege weapons (for learning about physics, we swear!), gambling on FPGAs, and a line-scanning camera that’s making selfies fun again. And nobody thought manufacturing electroluminescent displays was easy, but who knew it was this hard?

Take a look at the links below if you want to follow along, and as always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!

Take a look at the links below if you want to follow along, and as always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!

Direct download (60 MB or so.)

Episode 020 Show Notes:

New This Week:

• All the Hacks of Hackaday’s Bay Area Maker Faire Meetup
  • String launcher video (horrible audio removed as a public service)

Interesting Hacks of the Week:

• PokerBot Uses FPGA For Card Calculating Horsepower
  • Monte Carlo method – Wikipedia
  • Fisher–Yates shuffle – Wikipedia
• Lateral Thinking For An Easier Charlieplex
  • ∅: Charlieplexing with LED dot matrix modules
• Ben Krasnow Makes a DSKY
  • Build an electroluminescent glass panel display — an Apollo DSKY
  • Ben Krasnow at Supercon: Making Alien Technology in Your Own Shop
• Make Physics Fun with a Trebuchet
  • Trebucheting Tennis Balls at 124 MPH
  • Tracker Video Analysis and Modeling Tool for Physics Education
• Integrated Circuits Can Be Easy to Understand with the Right Teachers
  • Video: The Lowly Diode — Umpteen Functions with Only Two Pins
• A Very Modern Flying Spot Scanner
  • GitHub – firmata/protocol

Quick Hacks:

• Mike’s Picks:
  • Not Happy with Smart Bulbs? Make Your Own
  • The Rhysonic Wheel Automates Live Music
  • A Cyclonic Vacuum Cleaner on a Hacker’s Budget
• Elliot’s Picks:
  • AI-Enabled Teletype Live Streams Nearly Coherent Conversations
  • Fallout Inspired Display is Ready for the Apocalypse
  • Decap ICs Without The Peril
    • Peter Laackmann, Marcus Janke: Uncaging Microchips

Can’t-Miss Articles:

• Everything We Know About SpaceX’s Starlink Network
  • Gigabit Ethernet Through the Air
  • Why Satellites of the Future Will be Built to Burn
• Zork And The Z-Machine: Bringing The Mainframe To 8-bit Home Computers

Interviews:

• Earlier in May we heard news that Maker Faire Bay Area is facing a financial crunch. Although the future of the event is unknown, the legacy is easy to see. Maker Faire throughout the world has had a profound effect on countless lives. It’s hard to imagine that it all started with that first event way back in 2006. Mike Szczys spent some time last weekend tracking down as many people who where at one. With only a moment’s notice, these folks each shared a happy memory, and help us picture what it was like at the inaugural Maker Faire.
• Thank you to Lenore Edman for her extensive help in connecting with people who were at the first Maker Faire.