My boy at the park
Tim
Merino Hoodie
Apex: A Premium Merino Hoodie for Just $95 by Modern Industry — Kickstarter.
Oooh… I do like the idea of a good Merino Hoodie. Like I previously mentioned here, I like the idea of durable utilitarian wool clothing. I love my Darn Tough socks, and I really enjoy my Ibex light-weight pullover hoodie. But this hoodie on kickstarter looks really nice and doesn’t look like a technical hiking layer. In Colorado, dressing in technical hiking layers all the time is completely normal. But, I like the idea of having something that is a little heavier and a little more general-purpose in cut and style. Also, a second sweatshirt would be nice since my son keeps spitting up all over my existing one.
Autopilot Shield for Raspberry Pi
NAVIO: Autopilot Shield for Raspberry Pi | Indiegogo.
Yep! That’s what I’m talking about. Very cool idea, this is the move in personal drone technology I’ve been waiting for. This Raspberry Pi is the Apple Macintosh of embeddable computers (I would say Arduino was the Apple I). Moving the computing platform similar to a PC into the job of controlling a robotic flying platform, it’s exactly what I’ve been hoping for. This could open up all kinds of more advanced applications. Image processing and other peripheral solutions will be easier than ever to implement.
The one big piece that’s missing is a way to package widely varied data packages and transmit/relay them to ground stations. We need standardized wireless long-range networking for these devices next. I suppose 3G data connections are the most likely candidate, but there’s not a great standardized implementation on UAS’s I’ve seen yet.
Drone lends a wing to help control Kenai Peninsula wildfire
Drone lends a wing to help control Kenai Peninsula wildfire | sUAS News.
Finally! Now if only we could do something about the month of political and regulatory haggling necessary to get firefighters the information they need. This sort of mission should take no more than a few hours to plan and launch. Also, it sounds like the data aggregation and presentation (situational awareness and GIS) could be improved too.
Google Loon balloon crashes
Google Loon balloon crashes near Yakima | Brier Dudley’s blog | Seattle Times.
Google is doing trials in the US now. The Google Balloon Internet is coming. The all-seeing eye of Sauron of course would start in New Zealand.
Sudan retracts freedom claim for imprisoned Christian
Sudan retracts freedom claim for imprisoned Christian - Mission Network News.
Sad news out of Sudan about the Christian who is being held for execution for apostasy from Islam. Never forget the reality that so many in the world are not free from very real and serious persecution. Don’t ever take your freedom for granted. My prayers are with Meriam.
Apple’s HomeKit home automation
Apple’s new HomeKit home automation can control your appliances and more | Ars Technica.
One of the things announced at yesterday’s WWDC keynote. HomeKit sounds exciting. It’s something I’ve been expecting from Apple since last summer. I saw the promise of Smart Things and related ideas like Nest and Hue and I realized this is a space Apple should want to play in. The possibilities and the need for unification are really strong. I’m hoping there will be a hardware component like the Smart Things hub and sensors coming out later this year. I can understand the advantages of using third party devices. The one really interesting thing is that I think Apple will have some “Killer App” for this kit. I don’t know what but I’m guessing they have an idea of what application for this will really push new hardware and software.
Personally, I’ve wanted to hook up a simple cobbled thermostat driven space heater for our son’s bedroom. He sleeps so much better when it’s warm, but we don’t want the rest of the house 6 degrees warmer like his crib area. Every time I’ve come close to putting that together I’ve ended up pulling back because of the startup investment in the hub and sensor and plug units. In the home automation world, pretty much everything starts at 50 bucks, and there are always more components to buy.
Cozy, a personal cloud you can hack, host and delete
Cozy, a personal cloud you can hack, host and delete.
Cozy offers a nice promise. I would consider this tool for it’s shared calendar (CalDAV) capabilities, it’s shared contact (CarDAV) and private centralized bookmarking services. I think most of this could be accomplished with the Synology DiskStation NAS, but having a good web interface is a big plus for Cozy. Also, someone is working on a Personal Financial Management tool for this platform. Now, that, I like! I would be very interested in web based financial software where you keep all the data in your own possession. But, of course, just using software and synchronizing data through the Synology would work just as well.
Ultimately if I went down this path I would need to get something like a CubieTruck and host it myself.
A Robotics-friendly Camera
This thing, the Pixy CMUCam5 is pretty amazing. It sees hue and saturation instead of just RGB, which allows more flexible object detection. Also, the sensor is tied directly to a detection processor, meaning image processing doesn’t need to eat up processor time in an application. Pretty clever. I wonder, can it see fire?
Flying the Flexbot
I have a new hexcopter, the flexbot. It’s my first real remote controlled vehicle of any kind. I’ve been keeping an eye on the UAS space for a couple years, but could never really get myself to invest in RC aircraft as a hobby. Then I saw this kickstarter last year and I thought that $70 for a really cool idea was worth it. It’s a combination of technologies that I think are interesting together: Arduino, open-source software, 3D printing, and phone/bluetooth controls. All together it’s makes for a really interesting experience. This has been one of the wobbliest kickstarter projects I’ve backed, but they came trough and delivered exactly what I wanted.
I think the ideas embodied in this project are intensely interesting, and I think it was worth it, but a few flaws become apparent after trying to fly this thing. User experience and control scheme has a lot of room for improvement. I think some things could be done to make it easier for people to assemble and understand what the copter is doing.
Another big flaw is in the material properties of 3d printed parts. The type of plastic used is PLA (I think) and the design constraints of the airframe make it really vulnerable to breaking. I would love to see this craft printed out of sturdier material like nylon or carbon fiber. Anyway, I see huge possibilities for products like this, open source designs driving creation of components for users to create their own systems for their own applications. It also outlines just how challenging the process of building an aircraft of even limited scope can be. There are so many variables and constraints to consider.
Yesterday I was flying it on the concrete patio near our apartment, and I let it go a little too high. It drifted over a 15 foot chain-link fence around a tennis court. I willed it back the other direction, but of course something went wrong with my piloting and the flexbot fell on the other side. I don’t have a key to the tennis court, so I commando crawled under a loose section to retrieve my scuffed but still intact craft. Today it fell a couple feet to the carpet and my previous gorilla glue repair job failed again. So… I need some more practice, and maybe a newly printed shell. Next month, our local library is opening up a new branch that will have access to a 3d printer, so that might be my chance to fix this!
Someone got their baby fix
Thanks for letting us hold you, Xianna.