Author: AMH

So proud!

By AMH

Nothing – nothing! – that I could have to post tonight could trump how proud I am of my students right now. I’ve been teaching an electronic design and robotics course, and they have been building line-following robots working up from resistors and transistors and comparators and motors, and with the big competition tomorrow, they look amazing. I was thrilled when the prototyped circuits worked as designed, but these guys have been pusing to get their prototypes actually on the ground and following paths. Today I’ve seen them tackle figure-eights, divergent paths, and complicated looping patterns. I can’t wait for … Continue reading So proud!

Gravity Games

By AMH

Two fun gravity games just came my way… Via Clicked there is Cosmic Crush, in which you are a little planet wandering the universe, eating smaller bodies to grow up into a big planet. It’s fun once you get into it, but a bit dull to start. Less boring, but a little more frustrating, is Spaced Penguin! [via T] in which you shoot a penguin towards its spaceship in the presence of various gravitational bodies and other less astronomically accurate phenomenon. Spaced Penguin has been around for a while, but I haven’t seen its new cousin, Doom Funnel Chasers! before … Continue reading Gravity Games

It probably has better penmanship than me…

By AMH

Today in class I talked a little about what makes something a robot, or an androiod, or a cyborg, but I didn’t bring up the notion of an automaton. This article has a really nice description of Jaquet-Droz’s writing automaton, including video [via Clicked]. The article points ot that the automaton is really closer to being a precursor of the computer than a precursor of the robot, because it can change what message it writes out based on a “program” on a wheel. Though, the “program” is not truly a program, as it does not change the essential functioning of … Continue reading It probably has better penmanship than me…

Press your luck

By AMH

I have relatively little to add to this hilarious post from defective yeti about the stupidity of Deal or No Deal except to agree that the show is idiotic, relying on the mathematical ignorance of its contestants and audience. It really makes me crazy that people think “the banker” actually makes decisions about what to offer based on a personal assessment of the contestant, when it is clearly a selection of an amount from an error range around the mathematical expectation of what the contestant might win. Yeti’s proposed game show might be more entertaining – I’m trying to brainstorm … Continue reading Press your luck

Something done, Something new

By AMH

WIth a major project done, the temptation hits to pick up too many new things to fill the fake void in one’s schedule. I’m working on finishing off a variation of the Cheesy Love sweater with a more argyle style pattern across the front in pastel cotton. But I also spent the afternoon browsing through my latest issue of Craft and somehow only just realized that like the sister publication Make, Craft has a weblog with great links to projects and patterns. I’ve been trawling through the archives and the following were the standouts, some of them particularly geeky…. Knit … Continue reading Something done, Something new

4D screenshots!

By AMH

As part of putting together a document about the courses I have been teaching, I decided I wanted to be able to share some screen capture video. I’ve done next to nothing with that sort of software, so I solicited recommendations and two people pointed me in the direction of Camtasia Studio. They have a 30 day demo version which, from the little that I tried, seems to give you access to a fairly complete version. I didn’t use the audio or webcam functions, but it looks like it would be really easy to combine annotation from one of those … Continue reading 4D screenshots!

If only…..

By AMH

So very, very busy right now, so I will just leave you with the following – a classic from Usenet that has particular appeal to me this week: MAKE.TENURE.FAST

Geeky stuff to keep you warm

By AMH

I’m getting down to the wire on a few projects, so here is some random fun to get you through the middle of the week…. I’m a huge Stephenson fan, so I’m excited that the SciFi channel is making a mini-series out of Diamond Age. It isn’t my favorite Stephenson book, but I actually like it a lot – more than I think a lot of people do. I really love the idea of the instructional friend book/computer. It reminds me of some of the parts of Ender’s Game I liked a lot. They’re having Stephenson do the adaptation, so … Continue reading Geeky stuff to keep you warm

Boolean Quilt

By AMH

In class tomorrow we are going to talk about 5 variable Karnaugh maps, having just done 2-4 variable Karnaugh maps. I’m partial to the 5-variable versions pictured at that link with the diagonal lines to indicate the top versus bottom of the map. Working through some examples for my lecture notes today, I noticed that they look an awful lot like quilt patterns, like these traditional Nine-patch Blocks. I am now determined to design a quilt based around a five-variable boolean expression – I envision blue fabrics for true, white for false, and maybe yellow for don’t cares. I just … Continue reading Boolean Quilt

Internet Side-effects

By AMH

There are tons of articles that have been written about the impact of e-mail, IM, text messaging and the link on communication, but this is the first article that I’ve read that discusses their impact on the scientific community [via A&L Daily]. Besides claiming that scientists communicate more informally using the internet than when written letters were the most common form of communication – a non-controversial claim – it looks at the historical impact of not having a tangible record of scientsts’ communications. Analysis of conversation through letters has often been used to trace the path of ideas and ascertain … Continue reading Internet Side-effects