First steps with Raspberry Pi

Hi there ! I've been inactive for few weeks because we have moved to a new flat. It's in the same city, but my PC was disassembled for few days and I'm still putting together my workplace.

In spite of that, I've been playing with Raspberry Pi and this awesome Bluetooth keyboard, that has already arrived, and a I have to tell that it's amazing ! No problem with pairing, charges really fast, can be connected to virtually anything, has amazing function keys, USB Bluetooth dongle can be stored in it and it has laser pointer and back-lighted keys ! I have to say it's one of the most useful things I ever bought. Raspberry Pi itself is amazing as-well, I wasn't expecting it to be fast, actually I've expected it to be slow as hell. At first I used Occidentalis from Adafruit as OS, but it turned out that there are some issues with the kernel and the new model of Pi that has 512 MB RAM, so I downloaded newest Wheezy, which is basically debian. I myself prefer Ubuntu, but on a piece of hardware like that, you don't wan't to waste any of your processing power. First thing I did was that I've overclocked ARM 11 processor from 700 MHZ to 950 MHZ and with 450 (usable) MB or RAM this device has quicker response than I've imagined, of course if you're installing something via terminal, it takes a lot of time. Second thing I did was that I've used a small script to automatically bind that Bluetooth keyboard to Raspberry, because it's not wireless, but bluetooth keyboard so you have to connect it manually. This script allows me to work with this keyboard immediately, with no need of wired keyboard or mouse. After that was done, I wanted to play with some GPIOs, but there was a problem, ribbon cable. I only had 40 pin one, and Pi uses 26 pin. So long story short, I've 'adjusted' cable with some pliers for metal and hot glue.

After that I downloaded Geany, which is really lightweight IDE for various languages. Then you need to download RPi.GPIO library via terminal and you're good to go. This was first time when I saw python, I have to say I like this language, it's easy, simple, portable yet have lot of possibilities. So if you're considering buying Raspberry Pi, I recommend you to, because for that amount of money it's an amazing piece of hardware and it's really fun to play with and you can definitely expect some projects that will use it.

Raspberry Pi

Hi ! First of all I would like to thank all of you, because I've recently hit 50,000 views on youtube ! It makes me proud and motivates me to do more and better stuff.

Next important thing is that my Raspberry Pi has finally arrived ! (it took 75 days) Original one that I've ordered got lost, so they had to send new one, on the other hand it's probably even better, because they've send me new model B with 512 MB RAM. I've already bought HDMI cable, Acrylic case and SD card. I want to make my raspberry fully portable, so expect some mods in near future, for that reason I've ordered this mini bluetooth keyboard with mouse pad from ebay. It's small, portable, wireless and uses only one USB port.

Bracerbot Beta UI

Hi there ! I'm back with another update. 

This time I finally focused on sending data from bracerbot to PC via Bluetooth. At the same time I've written small application in Processing that acquires the data and displays them on the screen using controlP5 library, which is great. This application also allow you to control robot. So in next week or so I will finally program gait and make this application look kinda better. Also notice that light sensor is showing 1023 because its not yet soldered to the board.

Bracerbot Beta [update]

Hi ! First of all I want to thank all of you for 15,000 views ! and I just want to show this quick update.

Finally he's walking ! Still need to work on it though. I've also spay-painted legs to black I think it looks much better. I'm still wondering whether I should keep is as it is or create some case for batteries from acrylic. Well gait is currently priority, but I also want to start with data acquisition. Then I want to make Processing app with full movement control and then perhaps I will try to make Android app in eclipse. 

Bracerbot Beta

Hi there ! I am so sorry that it took me so long, but finally Bracerbot is here, Even though it's still in beta mode.

It all began early in July when I was thinking about what should I build next. I was positive that I wanted a quadruped, but there's lot of them, so I wanted mine to be somehow special. Since Iron Man is my favorite hero I always dreamed of building something that I could actually wear. Well what could I wear was question then. I ended up choosing bracelet (sort of). After that I've ordered some servos from ebay and started to draw some ideas in sketchup. It took me a week to make a final design. Then I started to put it all together. It uses 2xNokia batteries (I love those !) for board, bluetooth and sensors and 4x1.5V AAA batteries for servos (one battery in one leg, seemed like a good idea before I had to make wiring). You can see process of transformation in video. Currently I'm programming walking and I think it'll take me some time. I'm also thinking of using some sort of thin plastic as a mask, because as you can see it doesn't look very nice. To be honest I like the idea, but overall I think I failed because robot is too heavy as a bracelet (around 300 grams) and it doesn't look very nice as-well. So there will be some updates as I proceed with programming and Raspberry Pi still haven't arrived yet so I'm waiting.

Servo Breakout Board

Hi ! I am currently working on something big, so I apologize for not being active for some time.

I can't tell you what exactly I am working on, because it's sort of a secret. Only thing I can tell you is that it uses 8 servos. Well I am a lazy person and I don't like to attach servos. So I've decided to make a small breakout board that will allow me to test up to 12 servos easily with separate power source. It's quiet easy project that I put it together in one evening but it is quiet useful. I also want to tell you that I've finally ordered my Raspberry Pi so after I will receive it there will be some projects using it, because I really want to learn to program in Python. So sorry for less posts and I will try my best to finish this secret project ASAP.

Voice Controlled Light

Hi there ! First of all Happy Nikola Tesla Day ! And secondly I would like to apologize for not being active for some time.

But since summer is here I will hopefully have more time to work on my projects. Today I want to show you sort of an Intro. Finally I had some extra money so I've bought some relays. For quiet some time I have this idea in my mind. It's an idea to change my room in one big ecosystem, that would preferably be controlled by voice via PC or Android phone. Yes once again this idea comes from Ironman. So I've build simple setup in a box and connected arduino with a Bluetooth module to it and wrote some simple code to look for word “light”. You can see the result in a video. Google voice recognition seems to work pretty fast, but you need to have internet connection in order to use it. That's the reason why I want whole system to be controlled from my desktop. So I need to find right voice recognition software and install a microphone somewhere.