Microsoft is getting their latest OS into the Maker scene through SBC integration. Their latest update adds support for Arduino and Dragonboard.
The post Microsoft Announces Windows IoT Support for Arduino and DragonBoard appeared first on Make: DIY Projects, How-Tos, Electronics, Crafts and Ideas for Makers.
LEDs are the perfect touch to add a creepy red glow to your Halloween props. Make them fade in and out with a simple Arduino sketch.
The post Arduino Basics: Add Pulsing LED Eyes to Halloween Props appeared first on Make: DIY Projects, How-Tos, Electronics, Crafts and Ideas for Makers.
The name of the game in rocketry or ballooning is weight. The amount of mass that can be removed from one of these high-altitude devices directly impacts how high and how far it can go. Even NASA, which estimates about $10,000 per pound for low-earth orbit, has huge incentives to make lightweight components. And, while the Santa Barbara Hackerspace won’t be getting quite that much altitude, their APRS-enabled balloon/rocket tracker certainly helps cut down on weight.
Tracksoar is a 2″ x .75″ x .5″ board which weighs in at 45 grams with a pair of AA batteries and boasts an ATmega 328P microcontroller with plenty of processing power for its array of on-board sensors. Not to mention everything else you would need like digital I/O, a GPS module, and, of course, the APRS radio which allows it to send data over amateur radio frequencies. The key to all of this is that the APRS module is integrated with the board itself, which saves weight over the conventional method of having a separate APRS module in addition to the microcontroller and sensors.
As far as we can see, this is one of the smallest APRS modules we’ve ever seen. It could certainly be useful for anyone trying to save weight in any high-altitude project. There are a few other APRS projects out there as well but remember: an amateur radio license will almost certainly be required to use any of these.
At build 2015 Microsoft announced an important collaboration with Arduino. Windows became the first Arduino certified OS and introduced Windows Virtual Shields for Arduino and Windows Remote Arduino able to bridge technologies designed to connect the physical world of Arduino with the Windows ecosystem and computing power. Today on the Windows blog, an update on the topic:
Now you can get the Windows Insider Preview of Windows 10 IoT Core with the next four technology investment.
1)Windows 10 IoT Core Universal Windows Platform (UWP) support for Arduino Wiring
2)>Windows 10 IoT Core Universal Windows Platform support for direct memory mapped UWP Providers
3)Windows Store availability of the Windows Virtual Shields Application
4)Windows Store availability of the Windows Remote Arduino Experience Application
Arduino Wiring
We want to make it easy for you to use existing Arduino Wiring Sketches, libraries, and hardware with Windows 10 IoT Core Universal Windows Apps (UWA) on a Raspberry Pi 2 or other supported board. By creating a new Visual Studio template, supporting NuGet Packages, and platform improvements we’re making it easier than ever to build on Windows 10 IoT Core.Simply drag-and-drop (or cut-and-paste) your favorite and readily-available Arduino Wiring INO and library files into Visual Studio, connect your hardware over GPIO, SPI, I2C, ADC or PWM to your Raspberry Pi 2 or other supported Windows 10 IoT Core device, and run your code. Visual Studio and Windows will do all the heavy lifting to create a UWA and deploy it on your behalf, and you can also leverage the power of Visual Studio with Windows to debug your Arduino Wiring code.
With Arduino Wiring being supported as an extension to the Universal Windows Platform, you can even create a UWA that combines Arduino Wiring, C# and XAML. This enables you to build great projects with mixed mode programming like the plotter near the end of this video. Try out Arduino Wiring here.Windows Virtual Shields for Arduino Application
This technology lets you leverage sensors and actuators on your Windows 10 device from an Arduino over USB, WiFi, and Bluetooth. For example, you can access your Windows 10 Phone accelerometer or your Windows 10 Desktop Screen from an Arduino over WiFi.
The Windows Virtual Shields for Arduino application is now in the Windows Store, and has improved the workflow to get started. The app is all you need on the Windows 10 device. Try it out here.Windows Remote Arduino Experience
This technology lets you develop on your Windows 10 device and access the physical world via an Arduino over USB, WiFi, and Bluetooth. For example, you can program in C# on your Windows 10 Phone and drive a servo connected on your Arduino over Bluetooth.
We also created a Windows app that enables you to explore GPIO, ADC, and PWM functionality without writing any code on your Windows 10 device. The Windows Remote Arduino Experience app is now available in the Windows Store. Give it a try!
Keep reading on their blog.
Here at tronixstuff we keep an open mind with regards to new hardware, and in this spirit we have the following “first look” of the new Arduino M0 Pro (previously called the Arduino Zero) from Arduino SRL. If the term Arduino SRL is new to you – click here to learn more.
This is the second Arduino-branded board that takes the leap from 8-bit to 32-bit microcontrollers (with the Due being the first), and according to Arduino SRL offers a lot of promise:
With the new Arduino M0 pro board, the more creative individual will have the potential to create one’s most imaginative and new ideas for IoT devices, wearable technologies, high tech automation, wild robotics and other not yet thinkable adventures in the world of makers.
The Arduino M0 pro represents a simple, yet powerful, 32-bit extension of the Arduino UNO platform. The board is powered by Atmel’s SAMD21 MCU, featuring a 32-bit ARM Cortex® M0 core.
With the addition of the M0 board, the Arduino family becomes larger with a new member providing increased performance.
The power of its Atmel’s core gives this board an upgraded flexibility and boosts the scope of projects one can think of and make; moreover, it makes the M0 Pro the ideal educational tool for learning about 32-bit application development.
Atmel’s Embedded Debugger (EDBG), integrated in the board, provides a full debug interface with no need for additional hardware, making debugging much easier. EDBG additionally supports a virtual COM port for device programming and traditional Arduino boot loader functionality uses.
Lots of buzzwords in there, so let’s push that aside and first consider the specifications:
Microcontroller – ATSAMD21G18, 48pins LQFP – the “main” microcontroller
EDBG Microcontroller – AT32UC3A4256, 100pins VFBGA
Operating Voltage – 3.3 V
DC Input Voltage (recommended) – 6-15 V
DC Input Voltage (limits) – 4.5-20 V
Digital I/O Pins – 14, with 12 PWM and UART
Analogue Input Pins – 6, 12-bit ADC channels
Analogue Output Pins – 1, 10-bit DAC
DC Current per I/O Pin – 7 mA
Flash Memory – 256 KB
SRAM – 32 KB
Clock Speed – 48 MHz
Lots of good stuff there – increased clock speed, increased flash memory (sketch space) and SRAM (working memory). No EEPROM however you can emulate one.
Note that the M0 Pro is a 3.3V board – and also the DC current per I/O pin is only 7 mA. Once again the user will need to carefully consider their use of external circuitry and shields to ensure compatibility (as the “classic” Arduino boards are 5V and can happily source/sink much more current per I/O pin).
The ADC (analogue-to-digital) converters have an increased resolution – 12-bit… and the addition of a true DAC (digital-to-analogue) converter allows for a true variable voltage output. This could be useful for sound generation or other effects. You can pore over the complete details including board schematics from the arduino.org website.
Moving on, let’s have a look around the Arduino M0 Pro board itself:
You can’t miss the sticker asking you to download the IDE – as Arduino SRL have forked up the Arduino IDE and run off with it. Click here to download. Upon removing the sticker you have:
Note the connector for the JTAG interface which works in conjunction with Atmel Studio software for debugging. You can also use the USB connection which connects to the EDBG microcontroller (example). When Atmel offers a native MacOS version we’ll investigate that further. SPI isn’t D10~D13 as per the older boards, instead it is accessed via the six pins on the right-hand side of the board. Turning the M0 Pro over doesn’t reveal any surprises:
And like the Due there are two USB ports:
A Programming USB port for uploading sketches through the Arduino IDE and “normal” use, along with a native USB port for direct connection to the main microcontroller’s serial connection. For “regular” Arduino IDE use, you can stick with the Programming port as usual.
So let’s try out the M0 Pro. We’ve downloaded the arduino.org IDE (which can co-exist with the arduino.cc IDE). Drivers are included with the IDE for Windows users, so the board should be plug and play. Note that if you need to reflash the Arduino bootloader – Atmel Studio is required. Moving on – within the Arduino IDE you need to set the board type to “Arduino M0 Pro (Programming Port)”:
… and the Programmer to “M0 Pro Programming Port”:
… both of these options are found in the Tools menu. When using these faster boards we like to run a simple speed test that calculates Newton Approximation for pi using an infinite series, written by Steve Curd from the Arduino forum. You can download the sketch to try yourself.
In previous tests the Arduino Mega2560 completed the test in 5765 ms, and the Arduino Due crushed it in 690 ms. As you can see below the M0 Pro needed 1950 ms for the test:
Not bad at all compared to a Mega. Thus the M0 Pro offers you a neat speed bump in an Uno-compatible form-factor. At this point those of you who enjoy making your own boards and dealing with surface-mount components have an advantage – the Atmel ATSAMD21G18 is available in TQFP package for under US$6… so you could cook up your own high-performance boards. Example.
At this point I’m curious about the onboard 10-bit DAC that’s connected to pin A0, so I connected the DSO to A0 and GND, and uploaded the following sketch:
void setup()
{
pinMode(A0,OUTPUT);
}
void loop()
{
for (int i=0; i<1024; i++)
{
analogWrite(A0,i);
}
for (int i=1023; i>=0; --i)
{
analogWrite(A0,i);
}
}… which resulted with the following neat triangle waveform:
… and here it is with the statistics option:
With a frequency of 108.7 Hz there’s a lot of CPU overhead – no doubt controlling the MCU without the Arduino abstraction will result with increased performance. Finally – for some other interesting examples and “how to” guides for the M0 Pro, visit the Arduino labs page for this board.
Conclusion for now
There are many pros and cons with the Arduino M0 Pro. It is not the best “all round” or beginner’s board due to the limitations of the hardware GPIO. There’s the DAC which could be useful for creating Arduino-controlled power supplies – and plenty of PWM outputs… but don’t directly connect servos to them. However if you can live with the current limits – and need a faster clock speed with an Arduino Uno-compatible board type – then the M0 Pro is an option for you.
Furthermore the M0 Pro offers an interesting bridge into the world of 32-bit microcontrollers, and no doubt the true performance of the MCU can be unlocked by moving away from the Arduino IDE and using Atmel Studio. If you have any questions for the arduino.org team about the Arduino M0 Pro ask in their support forum.
And if you would like your own Arduino M0 Pro – tronixlabs.com is offering a 10% discount off this new board until the end of November 2015. Enter the coupon code “tronixstuff” in the shopping cart page to activate the discount**. tronixlabs.com – which along with being Australia’s #1 Adafruit distributor, also offers a growing range and great value for supported hobbyist electronics from Altronics, DFRobot, Freetronics, Jaycar, Seeedstudio and much much more.
As always, have fun and keep checking into tronixstuff.com. Why not follow things on twitter, Google+, subscribe for email updates or RSS using the links on the right-hand column, or join our forum – dedicated to the projects and related items on this website.
** discount not available in conjunction with any other offer, and not valid for CCHS/MELBPC deliveries or pickup orders.
The post First Look – Arduino M0 Pro with 32 bit ARM Cortex M0 appeared first on tronixstuff.
Maker Simone Giertz creates a ridiculous, impractical, yet awesome motorized helmet that brushes her teeth. Sorta.
The post Let This Helmet with a Robot Arm (Sorta) Brush Your Teeth appeared first on Make: DIY Projects, How-Tos, Electronics, Crafts and Ideas for Makers.
We’ve been keeping tabs on the progress SpaceX has made toward landing a rocket so that it can be reused for future orbital launches. As you would imagine, this is incredibly difficult despite having some of the world’s greatest minds working on the task. To become one of those minds you have to start somewhere. It turns out, high school students can also build guided rockets, as [ArsenioDev] demonstrates in his project on hackaday.io.
[Arsenio]’s design targets amateur rockets with a fuselage diameter of four inches or so. The main control module is just a cylinder with four servos mounted along the perimeter and some fancy 3D printed fins bolted onto the servo. These are controlled by an Arduino and a 6DOF IMU that’s able to keep the rocket pointing straight up. Staaaay on target.
We saw this project back at the Hackaday DC meetup a month ago, and [Arsenio] was kind enough to give a short lightning talk to the hundred or so people who turned up. You can catch a video of that below, along with one of the videos of his build.
This is another project that I have done so far at my internship at the Boca Bearing Company. I was having some extra time waiting for some parts to arrive in the mail so I decided to do a quick simple project. As with the other projects that I have done here at Boca Bearings, I was to document everything about the project. So the following instuctions is taken from a post on the company's blog at http://bocabearingsworkshop.blogspot.com/2015/10/simple-robotic-arm-made-out-of.html
This is another project that I have done so far at my internship at the Boca Bearing Company. I was having some extra time waiting for some parts to arrive in the mail so I decided to do a quick simple project. As with the other projects that I have done here at Boca Bearings, I was to document everything about the project. So the following instuctions is taken from a post on the company's blog at http://bocabearingsworkshop.blogspot.com/2015/10/simple-robotic-arm-made-out-of.html
Libraries are files written in C or C++ which provide sketches with extra functionality, for example the ability to control an LED matrix, read an encoder, connect to a sensor, display, or module, etc. They are very useful to lower the barriers for creating amazing interactive projects and use a wide range of components. Libraries can be created by everyone and shared with the open source community!
To use an existing library in a sketch you can use the Library Manager (available from IDE version 1.6.2), open the IDE and click to the “Sketch” menu and then Include Library > Manage Libraries and follow the Guide on this page.
If you want contribute with a new library for an Arduino or a Genuino board, you are welcome to do so. The best way to start is to learn how to turn a sketch into a library and when you are good at it, learn how to code with basic Arduino principles in mind in order to allow beginners to get started with Arduino easily. Follow the Guidelines at this page, here’s a preview of what you’ve find:
Be kind to the end user. Assume you are writing an API for an intelligent person who has not programmed before. Come up with a clear mental model of the concept you’re working with, and the terms and functions you will use.
Use full, everyday words. Don’t be terse with your function names or variables. Use everyday terms instead of technical ones. Pick terms that correspond to popular perception of the concept at hand. Don’t assume specialized knowledge. For example, this is why we used analogWrite() rather than pwm(). Abbreviations are acceptable, though, if they’re in common use or are the primary name for something.For example, “HTML” is relatively common and “SPI” is effectively the name of that protocol (“serial-peripheral interface” is probably too long). (“Wire” was probably a mistake, as the protocol it uses is typically called “TWI” or “I2C”.)
Avoid words that have different meanings to the general public. For example, to programmers, an error is a notification that something happened. To the general public, errors are bad things.
When you are ready, you can share your new library and documentation on this dedicated area of the Forum.