I recently built a relatively large (100cm × 80cm) 3D printed artwork, which features a painted relief of mathematical functions. Read how I prepared the data, converted it into 3D printable tiles and converted them into printable gcode. All the images and previews are from the proof of concept I created. The final artwork is…
Category: How and Why
How to Automate the Turn-On Time of a Deco Light
I own a decorative light for the winter which I controlled using a simple time switch in the past. The time of dusk is continually shifting, so I had to adjust the turn-on time multiple times each year. This year, I planned to automate the turn-on time. I tried to find a light controlled switch,…
How to Deal with Badly Written Code
Sadly there is a ton of badly written code out in the wild. Hardware related code, seem to suffer more in this regards. I imagine, many developer in this segment are unwillingly to invest time in quality or are just inexperienced. Even if you are dedicated in reliable and high quality code, you will probably…
How to Design a Cheap Plant Watering Sensor (Part 5)
This is the fifth part of the meta-tutorial, where I talk about designing a cheap plant watering sensor. If you did not already read the first, second, third and fourth part, please do it now. These parts contain a lot information which lead to this point of the tutorial. The fourth part ended with step 20, where I did usability tests and stability…
How to Design a Cheap Plant Watering Sensor (Part 4)
This is the fourth part of the meta-tutorial, where I talk about designing a cheap plant watering sensor. If you did not already read the first, second and third part please do it now. These parts contain a lot information which lead to this point of the tutorial. The third part ended with step 18, planing the final firmware. There a decision…
How to Design a Cheap Plant Watering Sensor (Part 3)
This is the third part of the meta-tutorial, where I talk about designing a cheap plant watering sensor. If you did not already read the first and second part, please do it now. These parts contain a lot information which lead to this point of the tutorial. The second part ended with step 14, designing a first prototype PCB. So…
How to Design a Cheap Plant Watering Sensor (Part 2)
This is the second part of the meta-tutorial, where I talk about designing a cheap plant watering sensor. If you did not already read the first part, please do it now. It contains a lot information about constraints and decisions made which lead to this point. The first part ended with step 11, building a working prototype…
How to Design a Cheap Plant Watering Sensor (Part 1)
In this article I will talk about how I designed a cheap plant watering sensor. My goal is some kind of meta tutorial, where you can see the steps involved from the initial idea to the final sensor. If you ever planed to create a own device, I hope this article give you some inspiration…
How to use the Scripts in the Cat Protector Project
It seems the cat protector project documentation has a small gap. There is just a hint that you have to use some scripts to prepare the SD card to play the audio files, but no details about this. To use the scripts you need some knowledge how to use a command line interface on your…
How to Debug Time Critical Code using an Oscilloscope
From time to time you have to debug time critical code. If you are using interrupts, you are interested in the actual performance on the code. This is especially true, if you are using timed interrupts. In this cases, using the serial interface is impossible. If you write to the serial interface, the whole timing…