Elliot Williams and Al Williams got together to share their favorite hacks of the week with you. If you listen in, you’ll hear exciting news about the upcoming SuperCon and the rare occurrence of Al winning the What’s That Sound game.

For hacks, the guys talk about the IEEE’s take on the “best” programming languages of 2025 and how they think AI is going to fundamentally transform the job of a programmer. On a lighter note, there’s an industrial robot who retired to bartending, a minimal drum machine, a high-powered laser, and a Fortran flight simulator reborn with Unity 3D.

In the “can’t miss” category, you’ll learn how not to switch Linux distributions and what to expect when you need surgery while on your next mission to outer space.

There’s lots more. Want to follow along? Check out the links below. As always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!

Or download in DRM-free MP3 playable even over 56K modems.

Continue reading “Hackaday Podcast Episode 340: The Best Programming Language, Space Surgery, And Hacking Two 3D Printers Into One” →

This week, Hackaday’s Elliot Williams and Kristina Panos met up over the tubes to bring you the latest news, mystery sound, and of course, a big bunch of hacks from the previous seven days or so.

In Hackaday news, we’ve got a new contest running! Read all about the 2025 Component Abuse Challenge, sponsored by DigiKey, and check out the contest page for all the details. In sad news, American Science & Surplus are shuttering online sales, leaving just the brick and mortar stores in Wisconsin and Illinois.

On What’s That Sound, it’s a results show, which means Kristina gets to take a stab at it. She missed the mark, but that’s okay, because [Montana Mike] knew that it was the theme music for the show Beakman’s World, which was described by one contestant as “Bill Nye on crack”.

After that, it’s on to the hacks and such, beginning with a really cool way to smooth your 3D prints in situ. JWe take a much closer look at that talking robot’s typewriter-inspired mouth from about a month ago. Then we discuss several awesome technological feats such as running code on a PAX credit card payment machine, using the alphabet as joinery, and the invention of UTF-8 in general. Finally, we discuss the detection of spicy shrimp, and marvel at the history of email.

Check out the links below if you want to follow along, and as always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!

Download in DRM-free MP3 and savor at your leisure.

Continue reading “Hackaday Podcast Episode 338: Smoothing 3D Prints, Reading CNC Joints, And Detecting Spicy Shrimp” →

Fresh hacks here! Get your fresh hot hacks right here! Elliot and Dan teamed up this week to go through every story published on our pages to find the best of the best, the cream of the crop, and serve them up hot and fresh for you. The news this week was all from space, with the ISS getting its latest push from Dragon, plus <<checks notes>> oh yeah, life on Mars. Well, maybe, but it’s looking more and more like we are not alone, or at least not a few million years ago.

But even if we are, plenty is still going on down here to keep you interested. Like homebrewing? Good, because we looked at DIY inductors, wire nuts, and even a dope — but nope — ultralight helicopter. Into retro? We’ve got you covered with a loving look at IRC, a 60s bedside computer guaranteed to end your marriage, and a look at the best 8-bit language you never heard of.

We looked at a rescued fume hood, sensors galore on your phone, a rug that should have — and did, kind of — use a 555, and raytracing for the rest of your natural life. As for “Can’t Miss Articles,” Elliot could barely contain himself with the bounty of projects written up by our Hackaday writers, not to mention Arya’s deep dive into putting GPS modules to work in your builds.

Download this MP3, full of twisty little podcasts, all alike. Plugh!

Continue reading “Hackaday Podcast Episode 337: Homebrew Inductors, Teletypes In The Bedroom, And Action!” →

Thunderstorms were raging across southern Germany as Elliot Williams was joined by Jenny List for this week’s podcast. The deluge outside didn’t stop the hacks coming though, and we’ve got a healthy smorgasbord for you to snack from. There’s the cutest ever data cassette recorder taking a tiny Olympus dictation machine and re-engineering it with a beautiful case for the Commodore 64, a vastly overcomplex machine for perfectly cracking an egg, the best lightning talk timer Hackaday has ever seen, and a demoscene challenge that eschews a CPU. Then in Quick Hacks we’ve got a QWERTY slider phone, and a self-rowing canoe that comes straight out of Disney’s The Sorcerer’s Apprentice sequence.

For a long time we’ve had a Field guide series covering tech in infrastructure and other public plain sight, and this week’s one dealt with pivot irrigation. A new subject for Jenny who grew up on a farm in a wet country. Then both editors are for once in agreement, over using self-tapping screws to assemble 3D-printed structures. Sit back and enjoy the show!

Want to listen offline?  Grab yourself an MP3 hot off the press.

Continue reading “Hackaday Podcast Episode 336: DIY Datasette, Egg Cracking Machine, And Screwing 3D Prints” →

What happens when you listen in on Elliot Williams and Al Williams? You get a round up of the best of last week’s Hackaday posts, of course. The topics this week range from beer brewing to lightning protection, with a little bit of everything in between.

This week, many problems find solutions. Power drill battery dead? Your car doesn’t have a tire pressure monitor? Does your butter tear up your toast? You can find the answer to these problems, and more, on the Hackaday podcast.

For the can’t miss section, the guys are annoyed that Google wants to lock down their phones, and also talk about measuring liquid levels in outer space.

Check out the links below if you want to follow along, and as always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!

Or download in DRM-free MP3 without requiring developer registration.

Continue reading “Hackaday Podcast Episode 335: Beer, Toast, And Pi” →

In this episode of the Hackaday Podcast, editors Elliot Williams and Tom Nardi start out with a warning about potentially radioactive shrimp entering the American food supply via Walmart, and things only get weirder from there. The extra spicy shrimp discussion makes a perfect segue into an overview of a pair of atomic One Hertz Challenge entries, after which they’ll go over the latest generation of 3D printer filament, using an old Android smartphone as a low-power Linux server, some tips for creating better schematics, and Lorde’s specification-bending transparent CD. Finally, you’ll hear about how the nature of digital ownership influences the hardware we use, and on the other side of the coin, how open source firmware like QMK lets you build input devices on your terms.

Check out the links below if you want to follow along, and as always, tell us what you think about this episode in the comments!

Or download in DRM-free MP3 to enjoy with your shrimp.

Continue reading “Hackaday Podcast Episode 334: Radioactive Shrimp Clocks, Funky Filaments, Owning The Hardware” →