Today on In Case You Missed It: A cybernetic cockroach how-to describes how to use an Arduino to control where a cockroach goes, which makes all of us uncomfortable.

Source: Netflix

Source: Netflix

Is there a cool Internet of Things idea that you’ve wanted to try out with your Arduino, but just haven’t had time for?  Building a network that integrates multiple sensors and boards into one cohesive application can be time-consuming and difficult.  To make it a bit easier, Temboo just introduced new Machine-to-Machine programming that lets you connect Arduino and Genuino boards running locally in a multi-device network to the Internet.  Now, you can bring all the power and flexibility of Internet connectivity to Arduino applications without giving up the benefits of using low power, local devices.

Our friends at Temboo now support three M2M communication protocols for Arduino boards: MQTT, CoAP, and HTTP. You can choose which to use based on the needs of your application and, once you’ve made your choice, automatically generate all the code you need to connect your Arduinos to any web service. You can also save the network configurations that you specify, making it easy to add and subtract devices or update their behavior remotely.

With Temboo M2M, you can program flexible distributed device applications in minutes. From monitoring air quality and noise levels in cities to controlling water usage in agricultural settings, networked sensors and devices enable all sorts of powerful IoT applications. You can see it all in action in the video below, which shows how they built an M2M network that monitors and controls different machines working together on a production line.

The holiday season is supposed to be a happy time. But lets be honest, between the stress of picking out gifts, racking up credit card debt you can't afford and being forced to spend time with your creepy uncle there isn't a lot to smile about. Enter the JöLLY Tracker. It's a wearable of a different kind -- one that monitors just how much you smile. And, if you're not keeping that frown turned upside down, it gives you a gentle "reminder" to smile in the form of an electric shock... to the face.

The holiday season is supposed to be a happy time. But lets be honest, between the stress of picking out gifts, racking up credit card debt you can't afford and being forced to spend time with your creepy uncle there isn't a lot to smile about. Enter the JöLLY Tracker. It's a wearable of a different kind -- one that monitors just how much you smile. And, if you're not keeping that frown turned upside down, it gives you a gentle "reminder" to smile in the form of an electric shock... to the face.

Source: Hacky Holidays

The holiday season is supposed to be a happy time. But lets be honest, between the stress of picking out gifts, racking up credit card debt you can't afford and being forced to spend time time with your creepy uncle there isn't a lot to smile about. Enter the JöLLY Tracker. It's a wearable of a different kind -- one that monitors just how much you smile. And, if you're not keeping that frown turned upside down, it gives you a gentle "reminder" to smile in the form of an electric shock... to the face.

Rebel Geeks is a seven-part series on Al Jazeera English channel, featuring profiles of people around the world challenging power structures and offering a different vision of our technological future.

During Makers Faire in Shenzhen, in southeastern China, the authors of the series met Massimo Banzi and produced‘ Meet Your Maker’, a video interview about Arduino and how thousands of people are adopting it to build everything from 3D printers to drones, smart home devices to robotics.

‘Meet Your Maker’ can be seen on Al Jazeera English from November 16 at 22.30GMT. 

Watch the trailer and read the article now.

YouTube user "Xtamared" built a partly 3D-printed railgun that can fire aluminum or graphite projectiles at over 250 meters per second (560 mph). No, this isn't Quake, and it's no janky, all-plastic weapon, either. The "handheld" weapon houses six capacitors that weigh 20 pounds and deliver over 3,000 kilojoules of energy per shot. And it indeed works just like a full-sized railgun, using parallel electrodes to fire an "armature" bullet. The creator used an Arduino Uno R3 to monitor charging levels, temperature and other factors, and had to modify the rails after he noticed "plasma damage."

Via: Kotaku

Source: Xtamared (Imgur)