10gui: Multi-touch For All Ten Digits

October 19, 2009 by Mike Szczys 37 Comments

10gui-multitouch-for-10-digits

The race for the next revolutionary input design is an ongoing event. [Clayton Miller’s] newest offering in the contest is a multitouch concept that separates the display from the screen and is meant to utilize all fingers. His video explanation includes a description of the physical input device, a software implementation, and a demonstration of how a finished system will work. After the break we’ll look at the hardware, the software, and the concept video. Continue reading “10gui: Multi-touch For All Ten Digits” →

3D Magnetometer Mouse In Processing

October 18, 2009 by Zach Banks 22 Comments

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[etgalim] works in Solidworks extensively and wanted a more intuitive way of rotating objects onscreen. To do this, he created a mouse that responds to rotation. He put a 3D compass module inside an old mouse and wired it up to an Arduino. The Arduino then relays the I2C sensor data to the computer. So far, he has a Processing script that uses the mouse to rotate a cube, but eventually he wants to write a Solidworks plugin. It’s a bit shaky, and we think it would be a bit smoother (and cheaper) if he used gyros like the jedipad. Video after the jump.

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Easy Touch Capacitance

October 17, 2009 by Jakob Griffith 15 Comments

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=euv8ZLgPh8A&feature=player_embedded%5D

[Humberto] from NerdKits is one of our favorite tipsters. We like how he can take a concept that seems so extremely complicated, in this case touch capacitance sensing, and present it in a clear and concise manner thats impossible to not love. As previously mentioned the most recent NerdKits hack is on touch capacitance; by using a resistor capacitor pair and some clever switch timing, anyone is able to detect the presence of a human limb. Now who’s going to be the first to adapt this concept further in their own hack?

Mouse Runs Through VR Maze

October 16, 2009 by Caleb Kraft 34 Comments

vr_mouse_setup

In an effort to determine the brain of animals during movement, scientists have built this contraption. It is a VR pod for a mouse. While we’re pretty sure/hopeful that none of you need a mouse VR system, we think the rig is interesting enough to stand on its own. It appears to be a convex mirror setup, projected in a dome. The controller is interesting in that it looks like a giant trackball hack. They’re using an optical mouse rigged to a ball floating on a cushion of air. This makes it much easier for the mouse to move. There’s a video of the whole thing in action after the break.

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Finally, A Keyboard For The IPhone

October 14, 2009 by Jakob Griffith 31 Comments

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We can’t say we’ve had problems typing on our iPhones here at HackaDay, must be the elfin fingers, but for [Ben Kurtz] it was a real pain. The obvious solution is to carry around an Arduino, 9 volt battery, iPhone breakout board, a ps2 keyboard, and of course the iPhone itself. Well, maybe it could be a little smaller with fewer parts, but at least it works. The Arduino reads input from the keyboard and converts it to serial, then the iPhone pulls the data via VNC. Like we said, a little roundabout, but we love the amount of ingenuity involved.

Haptic Halluc 2

October 13, 2009 by Caleb Kraft 7 Comments

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4UKXyPlO8Q]

We can not express the childlike glee that we experienced watching this video. We want so badly to have one of these setups. What you are seeing is a half dome projected cockpit with two haptic controllers in the style of a delta robot. This is controlling the Halluc robot which is a hybrid wheeled octopod. The dome can and has been done at home fairly simply, and we suspect that you guys could come up with some similar delta controllers. So who wants to build one and donate it to hackaday?

[via BotJunkie]

Home Made Rollerbar Mouse

October 12, 2009 by Caleb Kraft 20 Comments

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[Judyofthewoods] has hacked together this rollerbar mouse. We’ve heard people talk about these in a positive way, going on about how comfortable they are. We haven’t really experimented with one much to verify. This one looks surprisingly nice considering it is made from scrap. The image above is showing it without the cover that hides the hot glue and optical sensor. There isn’t much of a writeup, but as you can see from the picture, there isn’t much necessity for one either. She seems to have done a great job stating that it is fairly smooth with only minor jittering.