Programming Leftovers

posted by Roy Schestowitz on Sep 13, 2022

• With A Little Heat, Printed Parts Handle Vacuum Duty

  We don’t have to tell the average Hackaday reader that desktop 3D printing has been transformative for our community, but what might not be as obvious is the impact the technology has had on the scientific community. As explained in�Thermal Post-Processing of 3D Printed Polypropylene Parts for Vacuum Systems by [Pierce Mayville], [Aliaksei Petsiuk], and [Joshua Pearce], the use of printed plastic parts, especially when based on open source designs, can lead to huge cost reductions in the production of scientific hardware.

• The European Astro Pi Challenge is back for 2022/23

  The European Astro Pi Challenge is back for another year. This is young people’s chance to write computer programs that run on board the International Space Station.

• Arduino Nano Powers Reverse Polish Notation Calculator

  There’s something about Reverse Polish Notation (RPN) and the calculators that use it. It calls to mind a time when a calculator was a serious tool, and not just a throwaway toy. Created in the legacy of such calculators by HP and Texas Instruments, [Simon Boak] shows off his SB116, sporting an Arduino Nano under the hood. It’s a fully custom design, with a hand-built metal case, a custom PCB for the keyboard, and a tiny OLED display for maximum retro green goodness. The impetus for this build was to replace a particular calculator, a well-used TI Programmer, that’s useful for working with 6502 assembly. The SB116 supports binary, octal, decimal, and hex; and boasts some downright useful functions — AND, NOT, OR, XOR, and bitshifts. The source code is available, but you’re on your own for the case and keyboard. And for maximized retro faux-nostalgia, [Simon] designed a box that would have looked right at home on an 80s store shelf.

• Git Intro For Hardware Hackers

  Git is a wonderful tool that can multiply your project’s impact, or make your project easier to manage by an order of magnitude. Some of us hackers don’t yet know how to use command-line Git, but a relatable example of why a certain tool would be useful might be a good start. Today, I’d like to give you a Git crash course – showing you why and how to put a KiCad PCB into a Git repository, later to be shared with the world.

• Vssue: an Open-source Git-based Commenting system for Vue projects

  Vssue is a free open-source commenting plugin for Vue that uses GitHub or GitLab as a backend to store data.

  Beyond it is support to GitHub/ and GitLab it also supports self-hosted Git platforms, as well as Bitbuckets, Gitee, and Gitea.

  Vssue is an easy to integrate with Vue2 and Vue3 projects, and it plays well with other Vue frameworks as Nuxt, VuePress, and Gridsome.

• Put your developers in the driving seat

  Qt for Android Automotive helps developers create visually stunning user interfaces and experiences for different in-car displays – all with the same code base. Here’s how.

• Generators Of Disagreement With AI Alignment

  So I came to think that there might be some generators of disagreement around the subject that are a bit more fundamental than simple engineering questions about efficiency and scaling. After reading nintil’s (linked above) and VKRs most recent essays on the subject, I think I can finally formulate what those might be.

• Paul E. Mc Kenney: Kangrejos 2022: The Rust for Linux Workshop

  I had the honor of attending this workshop, however, this is not a full report. Instead, I am reporting on what I learned and how it relates to my So You Want to Rust the Linux Kernel? blog series that I started in 2021, and of which this post is a member. I will leave more complete coverage of a great many interesting sessions to others (for example, here and here), who are probably better versed in Rust than am I in any case.

• What is the Difference Between the != and =! Operators in Java

  The symbol used to perform operations is called an operator. In Java, the “!=” is a Comparison Operator utilized to determine whether two operands are equal or not by comparing them, while the “=!” operator combines two operators; the first is an Assignment operator “=”, and the second is a logical Not operator “!” that operates on boolean values. It is also utilized in the inversion of boolean values.

• How to Get Current Timestamp in Java

  Your system clock assigns a date and timestamp to each file you create and update on your computer, an email you sent or received, and so on. Every operation of a computer depends on the date and time. Sometimes, the current date or time may be required while developing an application. Java allows you to set and adjust dates and times using two packages, java.time and java.util.

• How to Check Variable Type in Java

  You may know that the variable gives named storage that programs can access. Every variable in Java has a unique type that specifies its memory size, the range of operations that can be performed on the variable, and the range of values stored in memory. To compute data, sometimes you need to check the data type of a variable because the logical operations are performed with the same type of variables.

  This write-up will discuss the approaches for checking the type of variable in Java.