Propeller Platform

August 26, 2009 by 16 Comments

Propellor_Platform

[nmcclana] has posted an assembly walkthrough for an Arduino-style prototyping board for the 80 MHz, eight core Parallax Propeller Microcontroller. While not board compatible with Arduino shields like the ARM-based Maple board we covered, it does have that familiar layout, and provides access to all 32 I/O pins, and the 3.8″ x 2.5″ footprint was kept in mind to allow easy creation of shields modules that can be designed using ExpressPCB’s miniboard service. The Platform Kit also has the advantage over other Propeller kits such as SchmartBoard’s offerings, which require soldering of surface mount parts. Kits are available at Gadget Gangster, and ready for your next design that needs a little more sauce than the Arduino can offer.

Hard Rock Radio

August 26, 2009 by 16 Comments

rock_radio

[Guus] sent in his project where he put a radio inside of a rock. He started with a 1970’s car stereo and encapsulated it in cement by wrapping it in duct tape, building a wooden form around it, and pouring in the wet cement. Three ports are included on the back for power, antennae, and speaker. He included an outline of how he did this but we’d love to hear some tips on how he made it look like a rock and not just a brick of concrete.

WiFi Mapping With A Smartphone

August 26, 2009 by 16 Comments

map

Not so long ago, mapping WiFi required a laptop, GPS, a big antenna and Kismet/NetStumbler. Today’s smartphones have replaced even this task. For those of us running a GPS and WiFi equipped Windows Mobile phone, WiFiFoFum is an excellent and simple solution, as well as a great companion for installing an AP. Continue reading “WiFi Mapping With A Smartphone” →

Twitter As A Botnet Command Center

August 26, 2009 by 7 Comments

twitter_botnet

The folks over at Arbor Networks were browsing Twitter and discovered something very strange: a Twitter account seemingly posting gibberish. At least, that’s how it appeared at first. Upon closer investigation, they discovered that the profile was posting base64 encoded links to PKZIP archives. When they extracted the contents and unpacked the contained DLL and EXE files, they discovered that the account was posing links to malware that would post user information back to certain URLs. The article was also updated to show that the scheme wasn’t limited to Twitter, but also affected users on Jaiku and Tumblr. It’s a bit scary to see that all malware isn’t as blatantly obvious as we usually would think it to be.

Open-Frame Digital Clock

August 26, 2009 by 13 Comments

numitron22

Here’s an interesting project from several years ago. The clock design itself isn’t too noteworthy, but the construction is definitely inspired. You’ll notice that there is no breadboard or PCB, the frame actually is the circuit. The tubes he’s using are Numitron tubes,  which aren’t as high voltage as Nixies or even VFDs.  This means that there is only 12V maximum going through the exposed rails. He discusses some possible future upgrades such as LED or Nixie or VFD, but since this project is a few years old, who knows if he is still working with it.

[thanks Agent420]

SpiderBot Emulates Spider-man

August 26, 2009 by 12 Comments

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBikHgnt16E]

Spiderbot moves with four magnetic grapplers that it can launch, detach, and aim according to it’s path planning algorithm. While the robot is definitely not a final product and is quite a bit away from moving with the same grace and speed as our friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, it is definitely one of the more interesting locomotion experiments out there. The video has some nice slow motion footage of the main mechanisms as well as screen captures of the path planning.

[Via BotJunkie]