Modular robot arm ModBot – close but no cigar

These guys have a well funded startup to create a project I’ve been working on for, what, three years now? It makes me crazy that I don’t have that special something to put together a team and go faster. What’s the point of seeing the future if you can’t ride it like a dinosaur into battle?

I take solace in knowing their robot runs off a phone app. Fun, but useless for industrial applications.

So while I love the look of Modbot‘s machine and the modular design, I think I still have a chance to be first to market. It’s really down to the wire now.

Read the original article here.

Everything takes too long!

When I order a shipment and I don’t get a reply for nearly a week. I don’t treat my customers that way.

2015 hackspace classes

Marginally Clever is going to be running more classes at the Vancouver Hack Space in 2015 than ever before.  I’ll make the process smooth enough that you can run them at your hackspace, too.  Here are some of the planned courses I’ll be doing.

• Learn to solder (TV-B-Gone)
• Arduino Programming 101: LED ticker
• Arduino Programming 201: LED Tetris + make your own joystick
• Build a Line following robot
• Build a Maze solving robot
• Build a Core XY system (basis for any CNC machine)
• Making a game console from a Raspberry Pi
• RFID+U
• Discover the VHS membership system API

More to be revealed as my plans unfold.  I would love to run a class every weekend somewhere in the world but for that I would need reliable people who want to make money.  Yes, you heard me right: I’ll pay you to run a class at your local hackspace using the course notes and kit parts I put together.  It’s a win/win/win situation.  More details as the program gels together.

Would you like to take a class?  Would you like to lead a class?  What would you like to learn?  Have you lead a class and do you have tips?

Makelangelo software v6

I just updated the Makelangelo software to version 6.

• added italian
• added spanish (I did this with google translate, it’s probably not even finished)
• removed code no longer needed
• updated the version number so “please update” shuts up for all Windows users.
• Added a “hooray!” message when a print finishes.

I’ve also branched the github project.  From now on I’ll work on the dev branch while the master branch has the code of the last stable release.

I’m looking for people to help translate the Makelangelo software to more languages.  If you can’t fork git and make a pull request (that’s almost gibberish even in english) then copy the english.xml file from your languages folder and change it to your langauge of choice.  Look to the forums for other translations and help from fellow users.