Raspberry Pi Pod and micro:bit base

Simple, but effective interface to control a headless Raspberry Pi

by Michael Horne • 18 April 2016 • 0 Comments

Over at Make, Pičugins Arsenijs has been describing their project to create an interface for the Raspberry Pi when operating in headless mode. Hooked up to the serial line and providing a small LCD screen as a display is the first step as you have to install some software to do things like shutdown the Pi correctly, control a music player and control wifi connections. Other applications can be added to the system, which has been designed to be easily extensible. Very interesting stuff, and certainly useful if you’ve got some Pis that need re-configuring without attaching them to a full monitor. Take a look here.

Accessories, Making, Software, Tutorials

Calculate Pi and print on a thermal printer from a Raspberry Pi

by Michael Horne • 18 April 2016 • 0 Comments

Billy has written an Instructable in which he explains how to calculate Pi in various ways before writing a method in Python code to do it. The result is then printed out on a thermal printer from Adafruit. The whole thing is controlled via buttons through the GPIO. Read the tutorial here and see it working below:

Games, Geeky Techiness, Making

Emergency spaceship simulator game has a Raspberry Pi server

by Michael Horne • 18 April 2016 • 0 Comments

The boffins at York Hackspace have created a demonstration piece called SpaceHack for Maker Faires and other events that simulates an emergency situation onboard a spacecraft and then invites players to work together to keep it operating for as long as possible. Two control panels have been created and the players are issued instructions by the Pi-powered server – they must then carry out the various operations to save the spaceship from CERTAIN DOOOOOOM! Take a look at the progress of the project here. There is a Github repository here for the clients and server and you can view videos (one of which is below) here.

Games, Making, Retro, Tutorials

Game Boy Zero with a Raspberry Pi – get yourself an old one and follow along!

by Michael Horne • 18 April 2016 • 0 Comments

Wermy, the creator of the brilliant Game Boy Zero has started to blog a ‘How To’ guide on sudomod.com. He starts out by taking a broken Game Boy and Dremelling it to add holes for the buttons and removing the battery compartment to make way for the other parts. I’ve got a broken GB myself so will likely start following along as the idea of a portable retro gaming machine appeals to me! Follow along with the tutorial here or view the video below:

Camera module, Environment, Software

Find a car parking space with the Raspberry Pi

by Michael Horne • 17 April 2016 • 0 Comments

Humphrey Shotton and Nicholas Sanders identified that one of the causes of pollution in cities is that hundreds, possibly thousands, of cars routinely search for a parking space during morning rush hour. To help with this, they’ve developed a system which uses a Raspberry Pi and camera to find empty spaces and then relay that information to a central server. By using multiple Pi monitoring units, they can build up a picture of each car park and give valuable information to drivers. Read more on their Github repository.

Books, Education, Geeky Techiness, Research

Raspberry Pi-powered book scanner for Ethiopean education

by Michael Horne • 17 April 2016 • 1 Comment

Following the lead of a Dean from an Ethiopean university, who could see that the high cost of textbooks was holding back developing world countries, a group has got together to build a €500 book scanner that turns the pages via a vacuum. This new method differs from the ‘normal’ method of doing it by removing the binding of the book and, potentially, destroying the volume. You can read more on their Hackaday project page or see a video of it in action below: