The latest DIY ideas, techniques and tools for digital gadgetry, open code, smart hacks, and more. Processing power to the people!
The Brookstone Beer Bulletin tipped us off to the fact that brewer Trumer Brauerei of Berkeley, CA, has created a fun video featuring a Rube Goldberg device made from Trumer product and paraphernalia. The Trume Pils Rube Goldberg Machine! Inspired by the Rube-Goldberg-Machine we were able to recreate the brewing process in a new way. […]
Legibility, of course, is a matter of degree, but given that NYU computer science professor Ken Perlin’s tiny font can fit 500 words into a 320 x 240 pixel rectangle, I am surprised at how readable it remains. “My design,” he explains, “assumes that screen pixels are horizontal striped as RGBRGB, as are most LCD screens these days.”
Tokyo-based wireless hacker Akiba of FreakLabs sends word of their latest project, the Freakduino-Chibi, an Arduinoid with open source 802.15.4 protocol stack and integrated radio.
Charles Mangin built this USB Floppy in a weekend.
Our friends over at iFixit take us on a tour inside the recently released Boxee Box. This oddly shaped box manufactured by D-Link houses media player hardware that runs the popular media management software. It appears to be every bit as interesting on the inside as it does on the outside.
As evidence, nothing beats one’s own senses: I’ll have to see that for myself. But some experiments are too expensive, too time-consuming, or too dangerous for most folks to reproduce on their own, and for these, well, the next best thing is video. And the tubes are rich with great footage of phenomena that have to be seen to be believed. Here’s a sampling of some of the gems we’ve covered, over the years, to get you started.
This mechanical model of a comet’s orbit, based on the action of elliptical gears, is dated to 1766, and is housed at Harvard’s Putnam Gallery. From which:
This apparatus was designed to demonstrate how the speed of a comet varies in its orbit according to Kepler’s law of equal areas. The comet Benjamin Martin chose for this instrument is Halley’s Comet, which goes around the Sun every 75 1/2 years. Martin began producing cometaria before Halley’s Comet made its predicted return, and so was betting that Halley would prove correct in his theory.
Interestingly, the device turns out to be not an entirely accurate demonstration of Kepler’s second law. Physicist Martin Beech of the University of Regina has studied the history and mechanics of cometaria at great length. His clearinghouse page is an excellent source of detailed information.
