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doomerz posted on Tue. January 30th 2007 at 12:36 PM PST
Ubuntu 6.06, aka "Dapper Drake" has just gone into a stable Beta fase after 5 very succesful Alpha versions. A full list of new features and screenshots can be found at the official wiki.
I know as soon as finals are done, im going to give it a try. From what I've read its very stable and better than breezy badger.
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DapperDrake
s1axter posted on Tue. January 30th 2007 at 12:36 PM PST
Lately I've been getting into podcasts. Podcasts are like online radio shows that can be downloaded and viewed on a mobile device, like an iPod. Honestly, when apple came out with the video iPod I thought it was kinda stupid. If I am going to watch a movie I'm not going to put it on an iPod and watch it there, I would want to watch it on the PC or TV. However after finding some of these sites it seems like a good idea.
The wikipedia definition can be found here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Podcast
If you have the time, check out the "Some Assembly Required" podcast. http://feeds.feedburner.com/sarpodcast The two geeks who do this are funny as hell and know what they are talking about. It's a nice mix between random funny chats and some technology. I've just started following it but will be for a while now
Now podcasts are cool, but video podcasts are freakin sweet. It's like TV shows, but u can download them for free (some of them) and watch them whenever.
http://www.dl.tv is one site for video podcasts, it deals with new technology and user questions. It's kinda funny and entertaining for an hour.
PBS also has some short Nova clips to download too. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/sciencenow/
I downloaded a program "Juice" from download.com it keeps track of all the different subscriptions using rss. Def worth a look
s1axter posted on Tue. January 30th 2007 at 12:36 PM PST
Hey, what's up all, it's been a while...not as long as in the past, but still a few weeks.
I saw this on slashdot and it annoyed me so much I decided to make a post about it.
"Windows Vista To Make Dual-Boot A Challenge?"
http://linux.slashdot.org/linux/06/04/27/2219258.shtml
See, this is just the reason Microsoft takes so much crap for "being evil". If they are that scared of Linux they should make a better operating system, not just try and lock it out. When will people get it through their heads that no matter what you do, there are people out there that are smarter than them and will break what they make??? I mean, didn't these "security" people take a hint when thousands of dollars were spent trying to make a copy proof CD that was thwarted by a simple sharpie marker???
It just really annoys me that Microsoft (or any company for that matter) doesn't listen or think about people, all they think about is the all-mighty dollar....everyone is greedy and it is hindering technology.
I guess this is just another reason to keep running Win2K, lol
firewire posted on Tue. January 30th 2007 at 12:36 PM PST
The code works but the textures and game theory are a little incomplete. So I will upload the source code and if you want you can modify the code and make it work yourself, or just skim through it for fun.
s1axter posted on Tue. January 30th 2007 at 12:36 PM PST
I was browsing hackaday today and was thinking of some of the cool stuff I have done in the past. Unfortunately I don't have any pictures any of it to post, other than this light gun!
In high school for a project, I modified a Nintendo light gun to be a laser pointer. It's kind of cool and I have pictures of it. Take a look
http://www.geeksinside.com/projectView.php?projID=9
s1axter posted on Tue. January 30th 2007 at 12:36 PM PST
This is a really old project that I did back in 2002. For a course I was taking, we had do design and build a final project dealing with electronics. I decided to make a light "shootout" game using a laser pointer and some photoresistors. Using a laser pointer was cool, but I wanted the laser pointer to be mounted in something equally as cool, like a Nintendo light-gun!!
This is a really easy mod to do. First some background on the gun. The original light gun from Nintendo was not much more than a photoresistor itself, nothing special. When a player pulled the trigger, the Nintendo would draw a black screen with the target pixels (the ducks in Duck Hunt) white. There is a lens in the light gun that focuses the light from the TV to a photoresistor, if the spot on the TV where the gun was pointed was white, you hit something, and if it was black it was a miss.
Using this simple theory all that was needed in the gun was the sensor, a trigger switch and some simple circuitry.
I opened the gun and found that the switch was just a simple moment switch, perfect! After gutting the other internals of the gun I cut up a cheep laser pointer keychain. The laser pointer was powered by three button batteries at 1.5v each for a total of 4.5 volts. After cutting down the casing of the pointer, two wires were soldered onto the unit to provide the power. The pointer was then mounted in the gun, right where the lens used to be. It sat nicely with only a dab of super glue.
The positive terminal of the laser pointer was wired directly to a 7805 regulator to provide the 5 volts for the laser. The negative terminal was soldered to the ground on the 7805. The power for the unit came from a 9 volt battery connected to a battery snap glued to the bottom of the handle. The snap was mounted outside the case to make it easy to change batteries. To ensure no leakage from the 9 volt when the laser was not on, the ground from the snap was wired to the common terminal of the switch, and the normally open terminal was wired to the negative lead on the 7805.
While doing this I remember thinking "this gun is made for this" since the 7805 regulator sat nicely in the space for a removed weight.
This mod is quick, simple and cheep! This project only cost me $9! Only $2 for the light-gun from a game store, $3 for a laser keychain, $1 for the regulator and about $3 for the 9 volt and snap.
That's it for now.
Pictures: http://mybitbox.com/gallery/lightgun/
s1axter posted on Tue. January 30th 2007 at 12:36 PM PST
So a little update to the Traffic light controller project from last year.
This year (my senior year at Clarkson) I am the TA for the new Juniors in Junior Lab. Thus I get to have a say in what projects they do and I get to grade them when their projects don't work...er... are done.
For lab 4 this year we designed a project using the Xilinx CoolRunner II development board I made mention of in the tech log. Attached to this board is the DIO1 board from digilent ( http://www.digilentinc.com/ ). The connections between the CPLD and the DIO1 and how to control the faetures of the DIO1 are confusing. So, to minimise the confusion I took lab 1 and implemented it on the CPLD as an example of how to interface with the DIO1.
I decided to post the VHDL for this for anyone to download. It's cool, three of the four seven-segment displays are used to count down the different times and the 8 LED bank is nicely R,Y,G,R,Y,G,R,R. Thus the upper 3 LEDs are the RYG for the EW, the next are for the NS and the final two red LEDs are for the pedestrian (we just pretend the bottom one is green).
The project was perfect for the chip, using only 26% of the minterms.
If you know VHDL or have these boards, check it out!
s1axter posted on Tue. January 30th 2007 at 12:36 PM PST
If you are anyway like me, you love popular electronics and popular science. Finding out about the latest and greatest gadgets before they hit the stores and the products in development. Well if you are a crazy computer/engineering/robotics-geek like me: first find a hospital and tell them you have a terminal illness and then check out the first magazine focused entirely on robotics: ROBOT magazine!! http://botmag.com/
I purchased a subscription of the mag back in October and the past two issues have been awesome. Like popular electronics the magazine introduces new products such as the Vex system sold at RadioShack and the Robonova-1 kit from Hitech (maker of servos) which uses 16 servos to provide a bipedal platform.
There are also articles on both homebrew hobby projects and commercial application specific systems, such as the new "Canada Arm" for the international space station.
See if you can find this mag in stores and take a look, it's that cool
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Dapper Drake
Doomerz Tech Log
