Ground cherries 〄〄〄〄〄〄〄〄〄〄〄〄

Ground cherries

                 

Im not sure how other people feel about these little guys but to me there awesome!!, they have such a crisp unique taste, I can bring them anywhere without bruising or damaging them, they come in there on protective casing so no dirt or bugs really, and produce more abundantly then most considering its size.

This will not be a long post, just a celebration of the ground cherry in all its glory.

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An I O Source For Platforms That Don’t Have One

[Todays post is by Nick Appelmans, a member of the Humboldt Microcontrollers Group]

Many times I comment that we have more processing power in our phones than the astronauts who traveled to the moon had at their disposal. Often, I follow this up with some derogatory remark about how little we actually use this capability. One area that stands out is controlling physical devices or “physical computing.” I hope this review will inspire you to tap into the resources that sit idle in your pocket and help you to move away from pixel pushing and into the exciting world of input/output.

IOIO board

This blog has previously featured a story on a Kickstarter that produces a device that turns your Android phone into a robot controller. Back in 2011, this feat was accomplished by Ytai Ben-Tsvi, a Google developer, and coworkers working on their 20% time to bring input/output to an Android device using open source hardware and firmware. The IOIO (pronounced “yoyo”) was born and SparkFun picked it up helping to troubleshoot, design the PCB and deal with production. Subsequently in early 2013, a second version was developed, the IOIO OTG (on the go), and several companies help to produce and distribute it (still using open source and selling for $30). The “on the go” designation is more than just a marketing ploy but refers to the fact that the board can now act as a USB device as well as a USB host (more on this later). To date, there is a robust community of developers with an impressive list of completed projects (as of this publication, 181 pins on Pinterest). In this post, I’d like to cover some of the features and describe the process of developing an Android application. Finally, I’ll share some favorite projects that I discovered.

IOIO connected to Android smartphone

The heart of the IOIO is a PIC24F which has lots of ports to provide I/O pins of various flavors (46 in total) operating at 3.3V logic. About half of these pins can be run in ‘open drain’ configuration allowing 5V logic to be implemented or to be used in a bus. These pins can source or sink maximally 20 mA of current and arent meant to drive motors but only to connect to a driver circuit with power provided by an additional source. Sixteen pins can be used for analog input (0 - 3.3V) with a relatively low sample rate (1KHz). However, the MCU can support 500KHz total for all pins and for the enterprising firmware coder, this could be changed (Ytai expressed an interest to improve sample rate for those wishing to work with audio signals in his blog yet I couldnt find that this has been accomplished). Incidentally, Ytai has done a remarkable job of responding to blog comments and forum questions and this as well as the great design features have contributed to forming the robust community at the ioio-users google group. For more information on the specs of these pins and the board in general, check out the wiki here. So, by connecting these pins to various sensors a whole lot of information can be processed by the Android app.

Self-balancing IOIO robot

How do you develop an Android app to control the IOIO? Well, as I said earlier the OTG aspect of the IOIO OTG means that the board can act as a USB host and the Android phone or tablet as the USB device or the other way around for cases where developers want to control I/O ports with a PC. Those wishing to take advantage of PC control of IOIO should look at the wiki info on that topic here.

Android development requires setting up a Java programming environment as described here and including the appropriate SDK for the device you will program for. This is a weak link for folks just starting to develop in Android as there is no clear hand-holding tutorial going from A to Z and the closest one is found on the SparkFun site here which doesnt detail setting up for the current configuration of the IOIO OTG. This version uses Android Open Accessory in lieu of Android Debug Bridge. See the wiki here to use AOA IOIOLibAccessory instead of the IOIOLib that the SparkFun tutorial recommends. This link also covers setting up your AndroidManifest.xml too. It’s time to move on to writing code for the IOIO once youve got your HelloAndroid app running on your phone or tablet. Uploading the HelloIOIO took me a while to straighten out the various file links, and AOA vs ADB approaches.

IOIO cellular wall printer

What’s been done with the IOIO board that caught my attention? Well, since I mentioned the Android robot blog post, I’d be remiss for not including a link to a simple balancing robot here. Here’s a nice surveillance robot. I’m most excited for art that you can control with the IOIO; here’s a link for an android controlled pixel board. I’m picturing a gigantic mural that android users could connect to and create a communal dynamic art piece. Another project is wearable tech; you could easily use a phone to control the color of your outfit like this color picker. If youve ever wanted to write giant messages on your wall from your phone, this cellular wall printer is a great way to do that using the IOIO. And my personal favorite, the ioio breathalyzer.

That’s it. I hope that you are motivated to check out the great work that Ytai and colleagues have accomplished and that you might even consider incorporating the IOIO into your next project.

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One Life Over Another

I have a problem with people

This seems to be the case clearly but this post isnt about a stupid boy or just specific people.  It is about a mindset.  People are selfish which is clear.
Lets start with Pro-Life because I know that will get people all angry anyway.  What is my issue with Pro-life?  I can tell you many people that are pro-life

• eat meat (and dont buy it locally) and/or locally grown eggs
• dont stand up for animal shelters (or even help them)
• cant walk in someone elses shoes

and while there are many other things, lets try to keep this blog "short" as possible.  I wont even touch stem cell research.

I dont understand people that are pro-life that think its ok to take the life of another animal.  Why?  Because it wasnt human?  What makes humans so great?  You can say it is for nourishment but what about veal?  It could have grown up but instead, we slaughtered it young.  On top of that, large scale meat farms abuse their animals.  Oh but thats ok because they arent human.  Who cares what hell a life must face?  It isnt human!  Farm fresh eggs are often fertilized by the way.  

Now what do shelters have to do with this?  In my county shelter (which is not high volume), there are at least 200 animals put to death for not being wanted.  Animals that come in and are early in their pregnancy often receive abortions.  Of course this is ok because they arent human.  Shelters do this because there arent enough homes.  Many human kids grow up in foster care or in an orphanage because there arent enough homes.  Of course, if people werent so pressured to have them....

Im not saying all of their parents should have aborted them.  I respect religions and all that but I DO NOT RESPECT PEOPLE THAT PUSH THEIR BELIEFS ONTO OTHERS.

A baby is a terrible punishment for someone that was careless.  Why?  Because it is likely the mother will either put it up for adoption (not getting her "punishment" at all) or never take care of the kid (and the kid is the one being punished.)  How many pro-life people have actually sat down and talked to people that were adopted/in foster care/in an orphanage?  Im "lucky" enough to have known my fair share.  I rarely hear good things about foster care (except that there are some good families) but have heard some goods and bads about adoption.  Not everyone adopting is doing it for the right reason.  Same with orphans.  "why wasnt I good enough to be adopted?"  Of course it isnt them, just most people have some funky suspicions about adopting older kids.  But the self esteem issues are the same in all of them whether the issue is big or teeny, or if the person is happy-go-lucky or not.

Now my other least favorite group - Vegetarians!

Ok so not all of em are bad.  My main issue with vegetarians isnt so much their diet but the why.  Why are they vegetarians?  I have a real big problem with the ones that do it for animal rights mostly because theyre so picky about what they eat.  Some eat fish, some eat poultry....some eat anything that isnt a mammal.  So what makes a mammal better than a fish or a bird?  

My hate for vegans is the same.  Again only the animal rights ones.  It is one thing to do it because animals are being hurt but avoiding all animal products...well...

• I never considered haircuts cruel so I guess that is my problem with vegans against wool.  
• Milk ducts can become swollen and painful.  Best to milk that cow/goat.
• birds will lay eggs whether you like it or not.  Many are not fertile unless you buy specific fertilized eggs.

And last but not least...religious haters!

Again I have no problem with religion...just those evil bastards that throw the bible at everyone and tell them theyre going to hell.  Newsflash, modern day interpretations of the bible are often wrong...so wrong that it has warped what the bible says and/or why it says it.  Lets take gays.  I cant say I love gays or hate them.  Why?  Well gosh darn it theyre people and some people I like and others, not so much.
I have heard a lot of them Christian folk say gays dont deserve to live.

But that fetus does....

So lets say a woman doesnt have an abortion because the bible says its wrong BUT the kid grows up to be gay.

Now it doesnt deserve to LIVE!!!!

A little info on religious books.  Back then, people were few.  People didnt have technology to save them from things like cancer and all that fun stuff.  When things like the flu swept through towns, it took out everyone but those strong enough to survive (AKA genetically strong enough to hold on.)  When God said dont waste your seed, it wasnt because he was not into gays or masturbation, but because there were some lack of babies being born.  However Im sure many people thought this was stupid at the time.  Back in those days, gay sex and masturbation were common because labor could easily kill your wife.  Herbal abortions were used for the same reason.  Were they common?  Nobody knows because it wasnt spoken of much.  Also just as a random note, virgin Mary wasnt a virgin at all.  Virgin simply meant young lady back in those days.  Today, virgin often means "not used" such as virgin trees (not recycled) or your virgin girlfriend (never had sex.)  The tree and the girlfriend can be as old as they want.  In fact, today virgin is also used with guys (such as 40 year old virgin.)

 

In general, I think we should respect all life.  People ask me why Im pro choice if I think we should respect all life.  In short, because I believe it is best culled before being abondoned.

What I mean is, abortions (unnatural, not miscarriage) is quite common in the animal kingdom, not just with people.  However many animals will just abandon their young when a mother feels that she cannot care for it.  We see this with people as well but make them feel terrible unless they put their child through the system (which is severely broken even in the best first world countries.)  Yeah I disagree with it but I disagree with suffering after birth more and disagree with the broken system/emotional issues even more than that.

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ONE MORE DAY ONE MORE METHOD

Swirl Tanks
After the last issue I thought it only fitting that we address Swirl Filter Tanks. So we need to look at what they are, what they do and how they do it...

 As usual I will let the net do the talking for us all...


 Before we continue lets recap on what were trying to achieve;
Biological Filtration and the Nitrification Cycle
A biological filter is quite simply the heart of a pond or tank. It is not essential in small fish ponds, but the more fish you stock, the larger they get and the more they eat, so the need for a bio-filter becomes greater. The pond gets to a point where it needs a "sewage farm". Its purpose is to convert the waste matter produced by the koi from harmful ammonia into less toxic waste.
It is less important to remove solids particles from water than it is to process nitrogen, so if there is to be a compromise between mechanical and biological, err on the side of biological.
In other words, it is much better to allow particles below a certain size to escape back into the pond, while converting a great deal of ammonia to nitrate, than it is to catch every little thing down to a micron or less which in the process would slow the water down to the point where the bacteria have a hard time living (because theyre not getting enough oxygen).

The bacteria that convert ammonia to nitrate for us are among a class of bacteria that you may have heard of before. They are the so-called, “nitrogen fixing” bacteria. This means that they take nitrogen that is unavailable to plants in its ammoniacal form, and make it available to plants in an oxidized form.

These are the same bacteria that live among the roots of leguminous plants. Without these beneficial bacteria, life as we know it would cease. So be kind to your bacteria. What they need to survive is a large surface area, chemically inert medium and a ready supply of fresh water. They depend upon dissolved oxygen in the water to live and to do their job. As soon as the water flow is stopped, the oxygen in the filter becomes finite, and eventually gets used up. 

The ultimate result is that the bacteria die, and you have to start over.

Now is this acceptable Information? If it is, Here it is in FULL Its from a Koi keeper but he has described it all in a way that I feel comfortable with.

Now lets take a look from the pure swirl point of view

And now we can hit the subject from a few different angles

Going back a bit to 2007

And finally Afnan touches on filtering (if you can find it down near the bottom) but the search is so worth while.

Just a tip to finish off. If you have trouble in the winter months keeping the fish tank temperatures up, shut down the pump through the night but dont forget to turn it back on in the morning.

REASON: The growbeds act as/like an evaporative air conditioner (in reverse) and release the warmth to the air so you can lose several degrees of temperature every night.

OK. Im done. Hope you are getting something out of all this.
Be Back SOON

O Z Z I E

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mini Duino And Very Small Arduino Compatible Boards

So I read an article today about a new, very-small, Arduino-compatible MCU development board with a recently launched Kickstarter campaign. Tonights post looks at this new board, called the mini Duino+, and the topic of other compact Arduino-compatible boards.

mini Duino+ and a US quarter

The mini Duino+ Kickstarter webpage introduces the new board this way:

"I started this project to solve a few problems with current small Arduino compatible boards. I wanted to create something that had more features and ability, but yet kept the cost down. This way a full-featured platform could be developed that doesnt break the bank. It could be small and affordable enough to leave in projects, and it needed to be completely open-source...The new advancement in Arduino compatible hardware utilizes the ATmega 1284P AVR, in place of the common 328p that is used in current Arduino hardware. The 1284P is the perfect mix of features, program space, and cost. Cheap enough to be used in almost every project; capable enough to deliver. No matter what youre trying to build, the Mini Duino+ packs the punch to do it and more."

I dont have enough experience with MCUs yet to explain what use cases would be highly well-suited for using mini Duino+. Maybe Ed or Nick or one of the other members of the Humboldt Microcontrollers Group can do that in a future post. But there was a Wired article, "Change of Pace: TinyDuino Microcontroller Is Smaller Than a Quarter," that had a good overview of

TinyDuino

very small Arduino-compatible boards, focusing primarily on the TinyDuino. That article discusses the origin of this teeny dev board.

"TinyDuino is a fully Arduino-compatible hardware platform, complete with expansion shields (add-on boards that have specific sensors or lights, for you non-robot designers). But where an Arduino Uno is around the size of a credit card, the TinyDuino is smaller than a quarter, and its sibling the TinyLily is the size of a dime. The TinyDuino line is designed around three core elements: size, affordability, and expandability. The idea, says Burns, is to open up Arduino to a whole host of applications that simply aren’t possible with the larger board. The seeds of TinyDuino were planted when Burns was working on creating smart sensors. The goal was sensors that would be plug and play, with on-board intelligence that allowed them to handle all the hard stuff, like reading data, calibration, and formatting the output."

The TinyDuino was launched with a Kickstarter in 2012 which raised over 10 times the original funding target of $10,000. The website for TinyDuino has an extensive list of available components for the board, with the board itself going for $20.95, and a basic TinyDuino kit going for $39.95.

Arduino Micro

Other very-small Arduino-compatible boards include, but are not limited to, two official Arduino ones, the Arduino Micro and the Arduino Nano, the SparkFun Pro Micro, the Digispark (for only $8.95) which also launched with a wildly successful Kickstarter campaign, getting over 60 times its original funding goal of $5000, and a whole host of Chinese very-small form factor knockoffs.

Because of limited space on these very small dev boards, they are usually more difficult for beginners to use than an Arduino Uno board. And since these boards are intended to be prototyping boards, you may want to build your prototype on a normal size board like the Uno before reproducing your successful circuit

Digispark development board

design on one of these smaller boards. And at some point youll be able to go straight from prototyping with the Arduino Uno to using the desired MCU on a custom made PCB (printed circuit board), using only the components necessary which will often result in a much smaller board than the Uno.

At one of the upcoming Humboldt Microcontrollers Group meetings, Im going to ask everyone who comes to the meeting to bring smaller MCU development boards they have, and we can discuss the pros and cons and what projects theyve used the small form factor boards on.

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as coy as a fish

Not really...

Let me tell you something world...I LIKE GIRLS. I do. I mean not only girls (hence why I have a boyfriend) but yeah before him, I hit on waay more girls than guys. There is a good friend of mine. She is pretty (not bi or lesbian) but one thing I cannot stand about her is she makes decisions that get her into trouble and drinks...a lot. Tipsy every week at least is too much for me. I severely worry about all of my friends that drink. Even if I were totally into her, these two things (ESPECIALLY the drinking) would turn me off in a heartbeat.

So let me tell you about this girl. First she sleeps with a slut...a guy that practically sticks it in everything. Well whatever. Today she told me that she went to a party last weekend and made out with four people, one being the girlfriend of the guy she was fooling with. Seeing as there were speaks of a small porno with this girlfriend being in a lesbo scene, that didnt shock me one bit. What made me give a yuck face was the fact it was like an achievement to make out with four people in one night!

just my opinion...that isnt cool unless youre in an organized foursome/orgy.

But I still love her. BFF for life I guess.

Anyway...something I think is interesting.People hate on goldfish as pond fish because they poop a lot. Koi, however, are seen as beautiful pond fish that are never hated on. A bit racist I think. Koi will destroy your pond plants, goldfish wont. The only differences between the two? Koi is a pretty common carp while goldfish are pretty much a domestic carp. They are cheaper and most pond fish will grow only about a foot smaller than those koi things. Buut most people till see koi as better. This is a picture of my favorite type of goldfish called Shubunkin goldfish.

This is my favorite type of Koi which goes by butterfly koi (but also sometimes dragon koi or American koi)

Both start out around the same price and end up around the same price when theyre large. Both have long flowing fins. Difference? One will bond with you like a dog (koi) and the other wont destroy your pond plants.

I want my goldfish to be near my outdoor altar (whenever that happens.) I guess it is good goldfish arent as friendly because the last thing I want is to draw too many visitors to my private space. Koi? I might get those when I have children so we can enjoy the pond as a family. Call me backasswards but that means my goldfish will be my prized fish.

But what is prized shouldnt be based on race now should it?

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