Arduino and Code::Blocks Posted at: Sun, Dec 20th, 2009 | 2:41PM UTC By Josh Ashby

Been under the weather the past few days, so it’s been all coding while laying in bed.

First off, I’ve started to mess around with the Open Frameworks and I must say, it is amazing from the little I’ve touched. I’ve managed to make a simple GUI that has 4 buttons laid out in a d-pad style from a game pad. when you click on any circle it will light up, and when the corresponding key on the keyboard (a,s,d,w) is pressed that circle with light up also. Finally, when the circles light up, they write a byte to the serial port. This will probably later on become the new GUI for BOB.

Source Here

Along with this, the newer Arduino IDE’s do not support (or like to even play nice with) my avr iscp so I’ve had to resort to using avrdude, which isn’t bad by it’s self, but having to manually set up the project folders and copy the libraries and all that is a pain. Because I like the Code::Blocks IDE (which is what the Linux version of Open Frameworks uses also) I decided to make a project template for using the Arduino libraries. After many errors:

I finally got help from Reggie on freenode/#sparkfun and was able to get a working project that used the Arduino libraries in Code::Blocks:

I have a github repository for any templates I make for Code::Blocks.

Happy Holidays!

Code Editors Posted at: Sun, Nov 22nd, 2009 | 7:23PM UTC By Josh Ashby

Quick update:
I’ve decided to start up development on my PyTe code editor. So far I’ve managed to get a new version made with PyQt4. This version includes tabbed editing, and a basic tabbed web browser.
As a result, I’d like to know what everyone liked in a code editor, feel free to let me know in the comments!
PyTe’s Code

Websites, CMS’s, MySQL, PHP and … Perl? Posted at: Sat, Oct 24th, 2009 | 5:31PM UTC By Josh Ashby

One of the difficulties with maintaining a personal project site, such as this one (http://joshashby.com) is updating the content. Once upon a time, when my site was less than a year old and on the freeweb network, I manually opened my pages, added the content I wanted, and saved/closed the file. This worked fine for me, except for the fact that I could not modify, and update my site from any computer. Read more…

Bedroom Servers Posted at: Sun, Oct 18th, 2009 | 8:45PM UTC By Josh Ashby

Every one should have one of these servers, it’s got folder and cd drive sharing (Samba), ssh capabilities, a development web server (Xampp), a private IRC chat network (oftc-hybrid), and and OpenVZ server. In this how to I’ll walk you through setting up one of these servers, but please note I will not cover any items of major security, this is up to you to decide how to lock down your computers. My server is running Ubuntu 9.04 and all the commands that I give will be fore Ubuntu and all the menus will be for Gnome. This How To assumes you have a good idea of how to use the Linux terminal, enough that you can manage a system that has no GUI such as Gnome or KDE. It also assumes that you have Ubuntu 9.04 installed, internet access for installing the programs (and reading this), and time. Finally, it assumes that you will do your own research into these packages, and know how to use and configure them properly for your need; this How To Read more…

First look at B.O.B. (Bouncing Off Bumpers) Posted at: Wed, Mar 25th, 2009 | 12:20PM UTC By Josh Ashby

Well, here’s the first look at what B.O.B.*’s frame looks like. It’s is made out of welded steel cubic tubing, and has two soft rubber crazy wheels in the front, and a red soft rubber stationary wheel in the back.

Steering:

The steering rods are just 1 inch wide steel plating that is welded to the crazy wheels. Steering is controlled by a motor taken from a Black and Decker screwdriver.

Drive:

The drive consists of a motor taken (with the gear box and chuck) from an old Ryobi drill, the drill motor is mounted on more welded 1 inch wide steel plating. Attached to the drill via a very nice, turned down shaft from my neighbor is a belt pulley. The belt that is on this pulley attaches to the back red soft rubber wheel via a larger belt pulley.

The small wood block that has the center of it cut out is the battery holder. the battery is an Everlast Motorcycle lead acid battery.

The control system will hopefully consist of two Atmega168′s linked together in an I2C network (if I have time to get this working) or via an on board computer. The first Atmega will control the sensors and collect data. The second one will control the two motor controllers, I still have no idea how I’m going to get this thing to drive it’s self around a building without crashing.

Best of luck to anyone in this competition. for more information on what the Sparkfun autonomous competition is, visit the page: http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/product_info.php?products_id=9016

Also, feel free to share your robot project with everyone in the comments or send me a link to the robot’s build page at joshuaashby@joshashby.com

* – B.O.B. stands for Bouncing Off Bumpers