KiddiePi: It's childs play!

Actually, strike out the word "play" from above.

By watching my own kids, and now my grand-children, I've come to the conclusion that very young children are pre-programmed to EXPLORE the world via touch, taste, smell and hearing, while play and learning are just by-products.

 

Children, especially under 3 year olds, just soak up information like a dry sponge in a shower.

This post presents some of my ideas on creating a simple computer based "toy" to engage very young children, which will hopefully develop as they do.

External Drive Network Share on Linux

If you have a home server or just a box that is left on most of the time, you may want to add an external drive and share the contents over the network.

This post is written for Lubuntu using an attached memory stick, but you should be able to follow this procedure for other Linux distros.

Lubuntu is a light-weight Linux distro, so you may find there are packages missing which are required for proper network operation. Consequently, I suggest you set your Lubuntu box for networking using the method I've detailed here.

Clonezilla, its not really that scary!

Whether you are running Linux or Windows, its a good idea to clone your system before upgrading your system software, or doing anything that may brick your system.

Its easy to create a clone of your current system which you can then use to re-image your computer, in the event of a problem.

However, it should go without saying that re-imaging is a destructive process. The whole computer hard drive is going to be re-written when you restore an image.

MakerBot Replicator: Print Quality #2

Having upgraded the Replicator's firmware, I was able to run a couple of test prints using acceleration.

This allowed me to print a TreeFrog in under 30 minutes.

Following on from my previous posts on the Replicator and Print Quality, I wanted to try a print with acceleration. But my first problem was locating the acceleration mode on the Replicator...
...it didn't have one.

MakerBot Replicator: Print Quality

What level of print quality can you expect from your new MakerBot Replicator?

 

Here are a few illustrations which I hope might help show the sort of results you can expect from this model of 3D printer.

...Or maybe you get better results, in which case, I have a problem!

Having levelled the Replicator platform and left all other settings at their default values (e.g. nozzle & platform temperatures) I selected the "whistle" from  the ReplicatorG software example list as a test piece.

The 3D Printer: Toy or Techno-Wonder?

I was lucky enough this week to get my sticky little hands on a 3D printer: the "MakerBot Replicator".  So what's all the fuss about?

First impressions are that this printer has been built using old parts from a flat-bed scanner, and housed in a primitive, makeshift, wooden chassis.

But on closer examination, the chassis is in fact a very sturdy structure, closed at the base and the back, but open on the other four sides.

Recovering Lost Files With Linux

Unfortunately data loss and corruption are common ailments in memory devices such as hard disk drives, solid state memory cards and USB sticks.

It doesn't matter if your faulty device is a memory card from your camera, or a hard drive from an Apple Mac or a Windows PC, all may not be lost if you can connect the device to a computer and use a couple of magical Linux tools.

The other day I was handed an SD card, which should have contained the record of a great holiday in Egypt. There were a few jpeg files listed in file manager, but they would not open, and many seemed to have a file size of 0 bytes.

The outlook was gloomy (as was my well-tanned friend) but in just a few minutes I was able to restore over 200 happy holiday snaps.

Gambas: Improving the PhotoViewer

By making the transition from Gambas 2 to Gambas 3, I've been able to increase the functionality of my Photo Viewer application, and make a few improvements along the way.

 

A new Gambas component has allowed me to add image histograms, rotation and normalisation to my project.

This new component is called gb.image.effect, and although it includes methods to despeckle, emboss, invert, oil-paint and solarize an image, I've only made use of a couple of the available methods.

When The Dishwasher Runs Dry

When your dishwasher stops washing dishes, you better fix it fast, or spend hours up to your arm-pits in soapy water, doing the washing up!

 

Our dishwasher started running "dry", a problem I had seen 3 years ago, so I knew just what to do.

Like most dishwashers, our Bosch LogiXX gets a lot of crap thrown at it. But the two most difficult substances for it to swallow are fruit pips and fat. The pips are usually from oranges and lemons. They whiz around the internal pipe-work until they get stuck in those rotating arms that are supposed to spray water over your crockery.