Easter Egg Hacking

April 21, 2011 by Mike Nathan 7 Comments

ateam_easter_egg

Spring is upon us and Instructables user [Mischka] decided it was a good idea to combine two flavors we never considered putting together: The Easter Bunny and the A-Team.

He decided to build the egg as an Easter gift for his brother, who is a huge fan of the A-Team. He found a slightly larger than normal plastic egg, and proceeded to paint the shell white, adding a printed picture of Mr. T once the paint had dried.

The guts of the egg are made up of a Picaxe 08M micro controller mounted on a Picaxe protoboard. Rather fond of buzzing, beeping audio, he decided to forgo a normal speaker and opted to use a piezo instead. To activate the music when the egg is shaken, a tilt switch was added to the board as well. He uploaded his software to the Picaxe, sealed up the egg, and called it a day.

We can imagine his brother will be pretty pleased with the creation – who wouldn’t be? We only wish that there was video of the egg in action.

Rube Goldberg Machine Puts Engineering Students In The Record Books

April 21, 2011 by Mike Nathan 36 Comments

rube_goldberg

Rube Goldberg machines are always a fan favorite around here. They truly embody the concept of over-engineering, and are an entertaining departure from what we normally cover on Hackaday.

Back in February, engineering students from two on-campus professional associations at Purdue University teamed up to construct a world record-setting Rube Goldberg machine. Their entry in the Purdue Regional Rube Goldberg Machine Contest not only won them the regional title, but also potentially put them in the books as creating the most complex device of its nature.

Their contraption was dubbed “The Time Machine” and acts out events in our planet’s history. It starts with the big bang, moving through various other time periods, including the stone age, ancient Egypt, and the medieval era. It also makes several stops in more recent times, including World War II and the Cold War, before self-destructing at the Apocalypse.

All told, the machine incorporates 244 steps to water a plant, which is 14 more than the previous record holder. Continue reading to see a video that highlights some of the machine’s more interesting features, and be sure to check out these Rube Goldberg machines we’ve covered in the past.

[via BoingBoing]

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Apple II Weather Display (part 3)

April 20, 2011 by Kevin Dady 12 Comments

In parts 1 and 2, I discussed the important parts of what is going on the PC side with lua. While not 110% detailed I hope it gave you an idea on how the data is processed so the Apple II computer could quickly digest it. Now its time to see what happens at the other end of the serial cable. I am using basic, but its not 100% off the rom Applesoft basic, that would be even slower, so I am using a compiler and a fast graphics driver. Both are from “The Beagle Compiler” which was produced by the ever awesome Beagle Bro’s software company, and though still under copyright, the publishers have given permission for use of their software (within reason I don’t think you will get very far selling it).

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High Voltage Rig Wipes CDs Clean

April 19, 2011 by Mike Nathan 28 Comments

hv_cd_destruction

Here at Hackaday, we’re not against showing videos of gratuitous destruction just for the sake of it, though we try not to make it a habit. In this case we just couldn’t help ourselves. However, this video technically constitutes a security hack, as it does involve erasing sensitive information from CDs…

…with awesome!

This may be the coolest CD eraser we’ve seen yet. Positioned between two high-voltage transformers, the spinning CD has its data violently stripped off in just a matter of seconds. To be fair, the data isn’t erased per se, but the metallic substrate on which the data is recorded is flaked off by the aggressive application of electricity.

Having destroyed our fair share of AOL CDs in the microwave over the years, we are now a bit sad over the fact that they were disposed of in such a lackluster fashion – if only we had one of these around!

Since we’re on the topic of mindless destruction, you might as well take a few minutes and check out this thermite-roasted Thanksgiving turkey, this self-destructing hard drive, or perhaps this thermic lance built from spaghetti.

You know, for science.

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EagerFeet Lets You Scrape Your Nike+ Data From The Web

April 19, 2011 by Mike Szczys 4 Comments

Runners that wear shoes with the Nike+ system can upload GPS data about their runs to the proprietary website. If you’ve been using this for a while you may be reluctant to switch to another service that works with the hardware because you don’t want to lose the historical data. Faced with this issue, [Robert Kosara] developed some software that can scrape Nike+ data. Not only did he write the code, but he also threw up a website that shows how well it works. EagerFeet lets you copy and paste your Nike+ ID for mapping on Google Maps.

Data is scraped from Nike+ and assembled as GPX files, which are backups of GPS data. From there you can use it for whatever you like. Since the code is available in a Git repository it’s easy to depend on it with your own projects, and still get updates if the scraping system needs to be changed in the future. Even if you don’t want to use the GPX files in your own projects, they can be imported on some third party exercise tracking sites if that’s what you’re interested in.

Of course you could try to pull the data straight off of your iPod.

Apple II Weather Display (part 2)

April 19, 2011 by Kevin Dady 1 Comment

In part one of the Apple II weather display I quickly went over how data is fetched and phrased. Now its time to do something with it in part 2. In the order of functions I do the text parts first, and though its very similar to the process that the radar image goes through, its in monochrome and a bit simpler to explain. Before I go into how it works I should explain how I am dividing the Apple II’s screen.

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Mechanical Twitter Feed For Offline Reading

April 18, 2011 by Mike Nathan 11 Comments

Twitter can be a great tool for keeping up to date with your favorite person/company/band/etc. You can find a Twitter client for just about anything that plugs in these days, but sometimes we find that we simply need a break from our computers and smart phones – even if just for a few minutes. What happens when you want to unplug, but still need to know what everyone is up to?

[Patrick Dinnen] asked himself the same thing, and decided that the solution was a mechanical Twitter feed display. The display consists of a static user list strung up against the wall, with a mobile speech bubble mounted next to it. The bubble moves to the user who has most recently updated their status (presumably using a pair of servos), and uses a projector to display their messages. The effect is pretty neat, and it still allows you to get your Twitter fix without staring blankly at your computer screen or smart phone.

We think it would be even cooler if it used a projector on both sides, enabling it to dynamically shuffle through users and status messages at the same time. [Patrick] says that for right now it is merely a proof of concept, so there is no telling how he’ll tweak it going forward.

Continue reading to see his mechanical Twitter feed in action.

[via Adafruit]

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