Author Archives: the machinegeek

O’Reilly Webcast: Build a $10 electric guitar

Want to take a stick, some wire, a can and some wax and make a $10 electric guitar? O’Reilly has a free webcast tomorrow, February 11, 2011 @ 10 AM PT, presented by David Erik Nelson that will take you from a pile of scrap wood and hardware to a working one-string electric guitar, all […]

Shmoocon 2011: intercepting FHSS radio signals

Q, Atlas and Cutaway gave a presentation at the Shmoocon 2011 conference held recently in Washington, DC, concerning interception techniques for Frequency Hopping Spread Spectrum (FHSS) radio signals. They demonstrate the use of low-cost, easily obtained hardware/software to conduct predictive channel hopping analysis coupled with crude spectrum analysis and ultimately identify any given hopping pattern […]

Wireless Arduino message board

Uhclem has posted a wireless Arduino message board project on Instructables. The heart of the project is the Arduino with the Atmega328 interfaced with a Sparkfun Series I Xbee module, serial EEPROM and LDR. The display is an a LCD-compatible Noritake CU2009ECPB-W1J VFD character display compatible with the LiquidCrystal library. The purpose of this project […]

Shmoocon 2011: Linux autorun USB attacks

Many of us use Linux on a regular basis, and some users mistakenly believe that it’s immune to many of the hack attacks commonly used against Windows machines. In this talk presented at the Shmoocon 2011 conference which recently concluded in Washington, DC, Jon Larimer demonstrates how the development of common windows features in Linux, […]

PIC 12F675 battery monitor using a diode/LED and resistor

Here’s a circuit by Joe Desbonnet’s Random Tech Stuff that’s designed to monitor battery voltage. It uses one resistor, one diode (or LED), one microcontroller ADC input and one digital output. A practical application using a PIC 12F675 is presented. This allows you to monitor battery voltage under load, allowing sufficient time to replace the […]

Measure liquid flow rate with Arduino

The Makers Workbench shares this project which measures the rate of liquid flow using a Seeedstudio Water Flow Sensor and Seeeduino. This is part of their Arduino Controlled PC Liquid Cooling project. The flow sensor uses a simple rotating wheel that pulses a hall effect sensor. By reading these pulses the Arduino mathematically calculates the […]

OpenMT: Open source Multi Touch

Open source Multi Touch, known as OpenMT, is an open source hardware project for developing multitouch applications. Unlike camera-based multitouch, OpenMT lets you make a thin, flexible multitouch surface. It is Arduino friendly and has been developed by Sensible UI in Seoul, Korea. Users can experiment with hardware development themselves with projects such as ArduMT, […]

AVR-based watering system

Deddies Lab needed a way to water their resident Ficus Lyrata on a schedule of one-half liter per week. In order to automate the process, they designed an Atmega8 based control system which activates a water pump at appropriate intervals in order to keep the plant watered. A simple AC plug-in wall timer activates the […]

Shmoocon 2011: Exploring ZigBee Security

At the Shmoocon 2011 conference which recently concluded in Washington, DC, Ryan Speers and Ricky Melgares presented ZigBee Security: Find, Fix, Finish. ZigBee is a low-power, low-data rate wireless protocol based on IEEE 802.15.4. It connects lightweight embedded technology like HVAC, smart energy, security, and process automation systems, and is an attractive target as it […]

PinguinoM: Arduino Network Monitor

This project by Paul Ameson utilizes the Arduino and BlinkM to monitor the status of your PC’s internet connection. This project, known as the PinguinoM, communicates via USB with a PC running a Python script. The Arduino board is loaded with the Communicator sketch from ThingM and changes the BlinkM according to the status communicated […]

Shmoocon 2011: Custom Bluetooth hardware attacks

Here’s a summary by Hak5 of Bluetooth hardware attacks presented at the recent Shmoocon 2011 conference held in Washington, DC. Here the Hak5 gang interviews Michael Ossmann about project Ubertooth – a custom hardware device for sniffing and injecting Bluetooth packets. This brings monitor mode to Bluetooth, making for some interesting RF activities. The complete […]

Laptop touchpad interfaced with Arduino

Here’s an interesting article showing how to interface a common laptop touchpad with an Arduino. Metku’s project connects the Data, Clock, +5 V and ground connections on the touchpad to Arduino Pins 5 and 6, and power connections. Sample code is included, and the Arduino/Wiring library provides the necessary codehooks. In the video they demonstrate […]

Processing and Arduino in Tandem: Video Mixer and Audio Visualizer

Oreilly is making available a free online course dealing with Processing and Arduino combined to produce a video mixer/audio visualizer. Led by instructor Joseph Gray, the course takes place Fridays @ 10am PT February 25 & March 11, 2011. Each session is 120 minutes. You may view the course live online for free; thereafter, to […]

MIT OpenCourseWare: Introductory Digital Systems Laboratory

MIT has a program known as OpenCourseWare designed to provide free access to course materials from previously presented MIT courses. Course offerings from all academic disciplines are available and the list grows periodically. MIT OCW even has their own YouTube channel. Here’s an interesting offering, Introductory Digital Systems Laboratory, covering topics related to CPLD/FPGA program […]

Rapid app development with AVR App Builder

Imagecraft has released the demo version of their ICCV8 C compiler tool for Atmel AVR microcontrollers. The demo version is unlimited for 45 days, and code limited thereafter to 64K, non-commercial use only. One helpful feature in this IDE is the App Builder. This tool allows for quick setup of peripherals on a number of […]

Introducing the Microtouch

The Microtouch is a lightweight AVR based open source touch screen device powered by the Atmega32u4. It features a 320×240 pixel touchscreen, an accelerometer, full speed USB, a micro-SD card reader and support for a lithium ion battery. It is supported by an application framework of sorts and it is possible to run a variety […]