Tools Hack Daily

Tuesday, July 2, 2019

The Anthropocene Project Investigates Human Influence on the State, Dynamic and Future of the Earth #ArtTuesday

This exhibit is open through September 22! From The Anthropocene:

an•thro•po•cene

(n) The proposed current geological epoch, in which humans are the primary cause of permanent planetary change.

We have reached an unprecedented moment in planetary history. Humans now arguably change the Earth and its processes more than all other natural forces combined. Climate change, extinctions, invasive species, technofossils, anthroturbation, terraforming of land, and redirection of water are all part of the indelible human signature.

How to Make Apple’s Mac Pro Holes @isonno #Apple #MacPro

Watt-A-Live: a power monitor shield and FeatherWing #Feather @HackadayIO @Tindie

Watt-A-Live Power Monitor Shield Wing

Via Hackaday.io, the Watt-A-Live is a power monitor designed as an Adafruit FeatherWing or Arduino Shield. It is based on the Texas Instruments INA209 with full connectivity to the unit under test.

It measures the load current through a shunt resistor and has separate ground connections to the power supply and the load to make it a true power monitor. 2 jumpers can select between 2 different shunts to measure different current ranges.

The board is populated with a 0.10 Ohm shunt to measure 3.2A to 100µA. Optionally a 500 Ohm shunt can be added for a current range of 640uA to 20nA. Maximum bus voltage is 26V.

Hackaday.io user MagicWolfi has a Tindie shop selling these boards, available here.

If you’re interested in the Adafruit Feather form factor, compact with embedded LiPo battery support and > 150 compatible boards, see the Awesome Feather list.

NEW GUIDE: CircuitPython Stage game library #CircuitPython #Gaming #AdafruitLearningSystem #Adafruit @Adafruit

New in the Adafruit Learning System: the CircuitPython Stage game library

“Stage” is a small library for making simple games with CircuitPython. It lets you display graphics in three ways: as a grid of tiles, as sprites, and as text. Because of its simplicity it is limited to 16×16 images in 16 colors, but that is enough for making games. It is included by default on both PyGamer and PyBadge.

The library consists of two modules. The stage module contains all the functions and classes you will need for loading and manipulating the graphics on the screen, while the ugame module initializes the screen and gives you access to buttons and sound. Different CircuitPython boards will all use the same stage module, but will have different ugame modules built-in, because of the differences in what buttons and joysticks they have and how they need to be initialized. The very first board for which this library was originally written was called “µGame”, hence the name of the module.

Grab your new PyGamer or PyBadge and try this out!

See this new guide now > > >

Former NASA Flight Director Gene Kranz Restores Mission Control #MakerEducation

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Inspiring story from NPR.

Gene Kranz may be the most famous flight director in NASA’s history. He directed the actual landing portion of the first mission to put men on the moon, Apollo 11, and led Mission Control in saving the crew of Apollo 13 after an oxygen tank exploded on the way to the lunar surface.

Now Kranz, 85, has completed another undertaking: the reopening of Mission Control at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.

Bone Organics: The Art of Elaine Quave #ArtTuesday

via Art the Science

I found a love for both art and science through spending time outside in nature as a kid. I liked to observe the plants and animals in the woods behind my house but I also enjoyed manipulating materials from outside like clay, twigs, and grass reeds.

I’ve always had an interest in anatomy. That interest probably began in high school when we were learning to draw the figure. I later started questioning different elements of human anatomy such as skin, muscles, and bones and our very knowledgeable, yet still lacking, understanding of our physical existence. The skin is a boundary between us and the world around us, but it is permeable. Just consider the microbes, light, water, and nutrients that are ingested through the mouth, or the air brought in through the nose. Our external body plays a large role in the way that we see ourselves, it is the image of self and individuality. However, I am constantly rediscovering the relative permanence that we interpret as the self or the individual is a fleeting notion. We think of ourselves as an individual entity, but in truth nothing is individual, and nothing is separable from the systems that support its existence.

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3D Printed Living Hinges Designed in Fusion 360 #3DPrinting

Desktop Makes shared this video on Youtube!

In this Fusion 360 tutorial I design a 3D model with living hinges that can be 3D printed using pla and twisted to form a mobius strip. It’s a great example of using design to manipulate material properties.

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