abstractplain

Romily Cocking wrote this “getinline” DSL for file processing. Get it from sourceforge. Here’s an example of it in use:

 new Source().
 fromFile("docs/sample-data/flights3.txt").
 upToTheEnd().
 counting(allRecords).
 withoutBlankLines().
 counting(nonBlankRecords).
 allowing(Processing.rule().
  accepting(1).
  including(terminalRecordPattern).
  populatingList(
  terminals,
  terminalFactory,
  regexParser),
   Processing.rule().
  including(detailRecordPattern).
  populatingList(
   flights,
   flightFactory,
   commaDelimitedParser))
  .read();

When I read that the second-life client had been open-sourced last week, the first thing* I thought was that it would finally become easy to have Arduino talk sophisticatedly to SL (instead of just doing a keyboard hack). An experiment was on my todo list (right after get a life) but 1) I was not enthralled at the prospect of returning to C++ coding or visual studio, 2) serial-port coding in C++ on windows appears to me to be a dog. Well, Matt Biddulph has done a cool proof of concept already. The lazyweb’s mind-reading interface rocks. (*My second thought when I read about the open-sourcing of the client was that (arduino or no) the SL grid was looking at a lot more downtime.)

Of course, there’s no need for everyone to learn to write their own modded SL client or even (at a stretch) their own arduino code… one could leave a standard arduino sketch (like the pduino firmware) on the microcontroller and have a standard “arduino-modded” SL-client which just relays events when things change, by sending a say on a non-chat channel. Then all that the LSL programmer would have to do would be to listen to the arduino-owning avatar on that same channel, who would act like a medium, whispering arduino signals into the ether…

…and back. I think it’s just as neat when SL starts driving RL via the arduino… the modded client listens for (authorised) messages on a certain set of channels, passes what’s new to the arduino which drives actuators, affecting RL. A very unimaginitive first use would be to sync your room lights to the time in your SL region.

The downside so far is that you have to dedicate an avatar to one (or more) arduino devices. (one SL client = one logged-in avatar. (Well, those signals can piggy-back while your avatar is actually doing stuff, but if you log off your avatar, your arduino manifestation is gone, too, even if it appears unrelated to the avatar in SL. If there are one avatar per machine or per IP restrictions, then you have to dedicate a PC to the arduino-carrying avatar.

For SL modellers reading this who want to use a hardware interface to speed their work, it’s going to be quicker to take a store-bought midi controller board, and just have someone make an SL-client mod that does the same thing, but just either proxies the midi messages into SL, raw, or converts them into SL-modelling parameter changes. Arduino rightly comes into it when you want to read something that a store-bought midi controller can’t sense. (not pots and sliders). For instance, you could use a galvanic skin response sensor to sense when you get nervous, and pass this on to your avatar in a poker game, and make your avatar blush or sweat. (Well, poker’s when you’d disconnect it. That’s information your glad the current keyboard-and-mouse client can’t convey).

Hmm, I thought I recognised the blog… Matt was also the developer on that Rails-driven BBC Programme catalog. (Oct 2005).

Via this innocuous-looking photo of an LCD display I happened to recognise (because it’s sitting right in front of me (because I wrote an arduino library for it)) , via the flickr arduino tag.

Interfacing arduino.

Anyway, Bluetooth Arduino + gyroscope + SL: In the future your avatar really won’t be able to dance for shit.

“Finally it has been manufactured and it will be shipping soon.” - Massimo.

There’s also this tutorial, for those who can’t wait.

roobot impostor
Originally uploaded by neillzero.

Five hours later… my first sewing project is complete. I always knew those guitar callouses on my fingertips would come in handy. So. It’s not a piece on the original but, well, it’s a start. And I could knock it out again in a couple of hours (most of the time was unpicking mess-ups and caught tacking, and redo’ing squint stuff - I’ll learn to do the hand-stitching next time. So much nicer, anyway). Colours: don’t speak. I know. This was all there was.

Thanks to beccaw for the inspirationally cute and simple original “red roobot” and her other monsteroos & roobots.

She also points to this “Stuffed felt monsters” tutorial (originally here on craftster.org) which is what got her started.

craftster has a lot of basic patterns.

I’m not going to learn knitting, even though that’d facilitate zombies.

This “Gir from Invader Zim” (?) looks simple enough to be a second project.

This self loathing siamese twin monkey is off the chart.

squnny monsteroo by Beck W (at flickr)

Beautiful hand-made “monsteroos” by Beck W, on flickr. For sale.

I also liked these: blanket-stitch bunny, red robot, robot in a jar.

She points to this “Stuffed felt monsters” tutorial (originally here on craftster.org) which is what got her started.

I was looking for cute sewing projects for beginners; the idea being that the toys eventually host some electronics, perhaps stealing some ideas from The Art and Craft of Toy Design.

Other stuff:

Cute panda.

This, and other uglidolls.

Tiny cute crochet stuff by anapaulaoli, including: Pinguinito y mama; Huevos.

PaperKraft.

All, I think, via squidoo.com/knitowl.

misc cute things, too small for electronics.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/26red/328053181/in/photostream/

mondopanno.

There’s always the Free Penguin Project for tux sewing patterns, tutorials, too.

The secret life of machines, on Google video. A great educational TV series. Via Dan’s Data, who also links to the series 1, 2, 3 homepages.

It doesn’t matter too much if you think you’re not interested in the particular machine, there’s still always something interesting covered in each snacky 25-minute episode. The sewing machine episode, for example, looks briefly at cams and stepper motors.

I expect if you can find them on bit torrent — as the author Tim Hunkin encourages — you’ll get better quality copies than these google versions which have been compressed a little too much to do justice to their visually-detailed subject matter.

I extended my rails on vpslink write-up with a section on installing rmagick.

Artists, architects, musicians, toy designers, passive readers of Make and Hack A Day… make your interest known on this forum thread if you’d like to attend an Arduino workshop in London at the end of this month (January).

Even software developers curious about making gadgets like, for instance, those red/green build-status lamps, [2] would benefit. (even your prototype wouldn’t cost anything like that $100+ ambient orb).

With the Arduino Bluetooth boards not that far away, it’s getting seriously cheap and easy for the artist (rather than the engineer) to build wireless gadgets, too.

Here’s a great Nina Simone performance: “I loves you Porgy”. (youtube).

Here’s the great bossa nova tune, “A Felicidade”, played on banjo by a girl in Chicago with an excellent voice.

Mercedes Landazuri website and other videos on youtube.

It’s a response to troubleclef’s more conventional version.

Here are the lyrics and some chords to this tune by Tom Jobim and Vinícius de Moraes.

I’m reminded just now of this great tune because I finally tracked down a copy of the film “Orfeu Negro” which features it in the soundtrack (sung straight, by Vinícius de Moraes).

Tom Zé’s version of this tune was the first I heard, so I almost expect people to play with it.