Open Hardware/Modding and Linux Devices

posted by Roy Schestowitz on Dec 15, 2022

• Open World 3D Game Runs On The RP2040 Microcontroller

  The Raspberry Pi RP2040 is versatile and cheap, but it’s by no means known as the most powerful microcontroller on the world. Regardless, it is capable of great things, as demonstrated by [Bernhard Strobl], who built a 3D open world game engine that runs on that very platform.

• RC2014 Pro, Bowie, And A Merry Christmas

  Bowie gives us the option to explore some interesting ideas. The Pi Zero Serial is a HDMI capable serial video terminal that can also output graphics, bitmaps and sprites using terminal codes. That gives us options we couldn’t explore previously, and I’m thinking graphical games.

• A Look Back at the Transistor on its 75 Birthday

  The transistor was born in December of 1947, in New Jersey, and it has defined the last half of the 20th century and the first quarter of the 21st. We’re exploring the cultures of innovation that brought us the device that changed everything.

• 75 years ago, the transistor ignited the fire of modern innovation

  Take a look around the room. You’d be hard-pressed to find a gadget or gizmo within reach that does not contain a transistor. Just about everything electronic is full of them.

  Our information and communications world owes a debt to a team of physicists who took theories that had been kicking around for decades, and — after years of false starts and dead ends — got the first transistor to work early in the postwar era.

  Walter Brattain and John Bardeen of Bell Telephone Laboratories were responsible.

• Universal SE Topics

  But you’re not here for challenging self-introspection, you’re here for computer things! And the computer thing on my mind right now was inspired by last week’s crossover talk. When discussing what software and trad engineering can learn from each other, I often bring up the Snap-Fit Handbook. You know that little panel that holds the batteries in a remote or mouse? That’s a “snap fit”. The handbook is an entire manual dedicated to snap fit considerations. And there’s a lot of considerations! How to mold them, how strong to make them, all sorts of stuff.

• Wearable Belt with Sensors Accurately Monitors Heart Failure 24/7

  The technology is based on sensors embedded in a lightweight belt conveniently worn around the waist to monitor thoracic impedance, electrocardiogram (ECG), heart rate and motion activity detection. The system uses different sensors for sensing these parameters. Thoracic impedance is a critical bio-signal to monitor heart failure progression. Similarly, ECG is a vital bio-signal to diagnose and predict cardiovascular diseases. ECG measures electrical signals through the heart using a Holter monitor, which is not suitable for point-of-care use.

• [Old] Development of a wearable belt with integrated sensors for measuring multiple physiological parameters related to heart failure

  As discussed, the presented HWD is based on specific parameters namely thoracic impedance, electrocardiogram (ECG), heart rate, and motion activity detection. These parameters have been found to be significant in determining the symptoms of HF and can potentially be vital in the continuous monitoring of HF symptoms. The system uses different sensors for sensing these parameters. These sensors include a peripheral module interface (PMOD) Impedance Analyzer (IA), for sensing thoracic impedance, AD 8232, for sensing ECG, MAX 30105, for sensing heart rate, and ADXL 362, for motion activity50,51,52,53. These sensors are then integrated with Arduino Uno as the microcontroller54. The subsequent paragraphs discuss these sensors in detail.

• I… bought a Commodore 64C

  I blame Jan Beta for this ridiculous purchase, but Screenbeard of The Geekorium and aus.social also shares the blame. I’d tinkered with my TED-family 16 and Plus/4 I got second-hand for my 18th birthday, but it was the Commodore 128 he gave me that made things click. It taught me how to read and use service manuals, perform multimeter tests, socket new chips, perform very simple (de)soldering, how Commodore disk drives work, and how to write basic (hah!) Commodore programs. It also gave me my first experience with CP/M on physical hardware, and 80-column text on an 8-bit system.

• Z-Wave hopes open-source will matter to the IoT

  It’s certainly possible, likely even, that we’ll see new hubs and gateways that integrate both Z-Wave and Matter with Thread or Wi-Fi. In fact, as part of today’s announcement, Silicon Labs introduced the Unify SDK: A way to create such interoperable bridges.