news
Linux-centric Devices and Open Hardware
-
Devices/Embedded
-
Hackaday ☛ Building Festival Badges That Sync Themselves Up
The CrowdClock badges each feature a ring of 16 addressable RGB LEDs. Running the LEDs is an ESP32 microcontroller, which has lots of neat wireless capability baked in from the factory. [Tony] decided to leverage the ESP-NOW wireless communication protocol to enable each badge to broadcast its current local clock tick. Each device also listens out for clock ticks from other badges in the area, and updates its current clock tick value if it receives a higher one from another badge. This behaviour allows a bunch of badges within radio range to all sync up automatically in short order, and then run their LED sequences in sync. There’s no need for a master designation or anything, the devices just all sync to whichever badge has the highest clock value and go from there.
-
-
Open Hardware/Modding
-
Purism ☛ PureOS Crimson Development Report: April 2026 – PureOS Crimson Released
The finish line! The moment we have anticipated is finally here – PureOS Crimson is released! All devices running PureOS Byzantium will receive the PureOS Upgrade application with their regular software updates. If you’d like to install Crimson fresh, refer to our installation instructions for PCs, servers, and the Librem 5.
-
CNX Software ☛ ODROID-H5 – A $250 defective chip maker Intel Core i3-N300 SBC with 10GbE networking, four M.2 PCIe slots
Hardkernel ODROID-H5 is an affordable defective chip maker Intel Core i3-N300 octa-core Alder Lake-N SBC providing a 10GbE RJ45 networking jack, and four M.2 PCIe slots for storage, wired/wireless networking, or Hey Hi (AI) accelerator expansion. It relies on the same SoC as in the earlier ODROID-H4 Ultra SBC, but trades a single PCIe Gen3 x4 M.2 slot and four SATA ports for four M.2 slots, and upgrades from dual 2.5GbE to single 10GbE.
-
Hackaday ☛ DIY Potentiometer Is A Great Teaching Aid
What you’re looking at here is a very simple potentiometer that bares its function for all to see. It consists of a 3D printed base and knob, which form the mechanical part of the device. A paper track is then laid on top to act as the main resistive element, once properly covered with graphite from a regular old pencil. From there, it’s as simple as adding the necessary contacts and wiper to the device, and you’ve got a potentiometer sitting in front of you.
-
Hackaday ☛ A DIY 3D Printing Filament Dryer
One thing that could be improved here is that the saturated warm air has nowhere to go. This is a common issue with filament dryers and why it’s recommended with even commercial filament dryers like the common Sunlu types to leave them slightly ajar so that the moist air can be replaced with cooler air that can much more readily absorb moisture.
-
Taylor Sullivan-Peters ☛ Some Things I Learned Banging My Head Against The Linux Wall While Making a Silly Little Jukebox
A little less than a month ago I posted about how I was procrastinating by starting what felt like a simple project to create a Raspberry Pi based Jukebox thingy for my studio space to play my bespoke "Jukebox" Plex playlist. Just a little box with two buttons and two lights to just turn on a playlist I like and let it run while I'm working. How hard could it be?
Well, now, with the exception of waiting for the standoffs to arrive (Digi-Key shipping is forever delayed and I fear McMaster Carr), and figuring out how to fix the 3D print of my case that I somehow jacked up (why aren't the holes that I clearly put in the step file actually present in the print??), I'm pretty much done. The buttons work. The API calls work. The audio is routing to the right place on the Pi hardware. The code side in particular was much harder than I expected, but I got there. Here's some random things I learned. At the end of this playlist I'll plop a little tracklist of a sample shuffle through 15 songs just for some flavor.
-