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Open Hardware/Modding: KVM Without The V and More
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Hackaday ☛ A KVM Without The V (Or The M)
Many of us will be used to the idea of a KVM, a device that pipes keyboard, video, and mouse over the network from a remote machine to your own. But many remote machines don’t run a GUI, so there’s not always the need for a full video experience. Enter [morpheuslord] with the PicoTTY. It’s somewhere between an old-fashioned serial terminal and a KVM.
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Hackaday ☛ Turning Fruits Into Ethylene And Ethane Refrigerant
While you could use the ethanol produced this way as ethanol fuel in combustion engines and the like, you can also turn the ethanol into ethylene and ethane. That way you can fill up your refrigerator, freezer, and air conditioner to keep your perishable foods and yourself fresh as the outside world descends into highly questionable fashion choices.
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Hackaday ☛ An Automated Water Tank Controller
The build is based around an ESP32 microcontroller. It’s hooked up to an ultrasonic sensor which can measure the water level inside the rooftop water tank. When the sensor detects the level descending below a set point, the microcontroller fires a relay to trigger the lift pump to fill up the tank. Once the sensor detects the tank is full, the pump is shut off, saving liters of water compared to waiting for water to pour out of the overflow as an indicator of the same.
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Hackaday ☛ Easy Theremin Uses ESP32
The build relies almost entirely on an ESP32 microcontroller with minimal supporting circuitry. Like any other Theremin, pitch and volume are controlled by moving hands closer or farther away from two antenna. In this case, the ESP32 uses its capacitive touch circuitry to detect effectively detect hand proximity to the two antenna in question, and uses those values to control the pitch and volume of a synthesized waveform. That waveform is then pumped out over the onboard digital-to-analog converter for playback on external speakers.
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Hackaday ☛ The Seven Sensors And Breakout Boards To Avoid In A Product
We’ve all seen these sensors and modules kicking around, as part of beginner kits, strapped into prototypes and potentially even in products deployed in the field. Yet as [John Teel] rightfully points out in a recent video, most of these have no business ever being used in a real product, and might not even be suitable for prototyping.
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Hackaday ☛ Architectural LED Install Shows How To Do It With Style
The electronic side of things is relatively straightforward. There’s an ESP32 running the show, commanding the colors for 928 individually-addressable WS2812 RGB LEDs. It uses the WebSocket API for real time control, integrates with Home Assistant, and even offers audio reactive lighting modes with the aid of an INMP441 I2S audio input module. A hefty 5 V, 60 A power supply ensures the LEDs are never short of juice. There was also careful attention paid to power distribution to avoid any dim spots or other issues.
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Josh Lospinoso ☛ The Supports That Leave a Scar
This is where haste does the most damage. The work no longer looks like construction. It looks like fussing. It is easy to tell myself that one more cut will make the surface cleaner, that one more scrape will erase the history of how the object was made.
Then the blade slips, or the edge rounds over, or the surface gets worse because I would not stop improving it.
Support transfers load by touching. That contact is the whole point. It is also the source of the scar. The place that helped is the place that must later separate. If there is no contact, there is no support. If there is contact, there is a mark to manage. The fantasy of perfect help is help that holds fully and leaves no trace. The material is less sentimental than that.