Robots and Physical Computing

We are putting our coding to the test at Code Club after school. pic.twitter.com/CcFi5Mg4PK — St Luke's Primary (@DustonStLukes) May 24, 2016 Recently i have been taking a Parrot minedrone and the Tickle App ( https://tickleapp.com/en-us/ ) to Code Club session, as an extra activity. For those there actually programmed something that flies and it is quite engaging - having something you are controlling being able to move in all directions. I wish the mini-drone had a little bit more battery time (I would suggest getting an extra battery). Combining with the drone and the Tickle App does add something to the experience, rather than just control it directly (though that is fun). The noise is also not to everyone's taste so it has to be used carefully in that context, but also from a safety point of view. All opinions in this blog are the Author's and should not in any way be seen as reflecting the views of any organisation the Author has any ass...

In a previous post ( http://robotsandphysicalcomputing.blogspot.co.uk/2016/05/playing-7bot-robot-arm.html ) I discussed starting to set up the 7bot robot arm ( https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1128055363/7bot-a-powerful-desktop-robot-arm-for-future-inven ) . I have still to set up the gripper. This post document my first tentative steps with playing with it. The code below was used to try and get my head around the positioning of the arm - which servo does what (a good guide for this has been provide by the company online) and what the changing angle on the servos actual does. Essentially the code puts the arm in a starting position and varies the angles from there in usually in 15 or 30 degree increments over seven positions. #include <Servo.h> #include <DueFlashStorage.h> #include <Arm7Bot.h> Arm7Bot Arm; void setup() {   // initial 7Bot Arm   Arm.initialMove(); } void loop() {   // set motor[0] speed to 100   Arm.maxSpeed[0] ...

The 7bot is a recent kickstarter project  https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1128055363/7bot-a-powerful-desktop-robot-arm-for-future-inven  from 7bot. A metal robot arm based around Arduino Due ( https://www.arduino.cc/en/Guide/ArduinoDue   ) . Development of the software, at the time of writing, is still ongoing but looks interesting and already on the comments page of the site, user's have started posted their code.  Had to install the following software and put the un-zipped files in the library folder of the Arduino folder. https://github.com/7Bot https://github.com/sebnil/DueFlashStorage   Some useful information of setting up using the Arduino Due is available at  https://www.arduino.cc/en/Guide/ArduinoDue  and is definitely worth a read - it helped me setting it up. At the moment I have just used the examples from the GitHub site and example is shown in the video below. This looks like an exciting little arm and hopefully there ...

Taken from:  http://www.northampton.ac.uk/news/minecraft-jam-and-history-in-the-making/ History was made on Saturday as the University of Northampton hosted Northamptonshire’s first-ever Raspberry Jam. Raspberry Jams see those with an interest in the affordable – and tiny – Raspberry Pi  computer get together to share knowledge, learn new things and meet other enthusiasts. More than 30 people of all ages attended the county’s inaugural Jam at Avenue Campus, which was organised by the University’s Associate Professor in Computing and Immersive Technologies, Dr Scott Turner. He said: “The Jam was a real success, with a wide mixture of people including fairly notable experts; those who have a Pi, but aren’t quite sure what to do with it and complete novices. “It was great to see people who had some sort of Pi-related query have their questions answered, and others showing off what they have managed to get their Pi to do. “It really helped to inspire the novices to...

In a earlier post on using micro:bit ( Playing with microbit emulator-dancing bot )  a simple dancing robot image (using the 5x 5 grid was created).  A dancing bot - 3x3 box for the body, with two legs.  Thanks to a loan of a Micro:Bit from Lancaster University I can experiment with an actual micro:bit ( @SCC_Lancaster @LMcUnderwood ) Experiment  1 - Using the buttons So the functions for the idea were: Button A - Move to the left and then back to the starting position; Button B - Move to the right  and then back to the starting position ; Buttons A+B - Jump up  and then back to the starting position; Shake - 'Crouches'  and then back to the starting position On the Microbit Experiment 2-  To add left and right tilting to it. So if the micro:bit is tilted to the right the 'bot'  moves to the right, and the same for the left. The tilting operation here is essentially - when the x on the accelerometer is...

The Mega Treasure Chest  Flotilla set  from Pimoroni, was kickstarter project that got a lot of people interested. A nice package - a hub for a collection of devices such as light sensors, barometer, temperature, switches, motors and many more; all linked to a Raspberry Pi. The kit is shown in the image to the left. A Python API exist for this system. Instructions on how to set up the Flotilla to work with Python can be found at  http://flotil.la/start/ . I wanted to play with switching the Rainbow (A set of RGB LEDs) outputs to Red, Blue and Green by pressing either 2,3, or 4 on the Touch Sensor as in the images. Using the mini-kit example from  https://github.com/pimoroni/flotilla-python/blob/master/examples/mini-kit.py  as the basis, produced a simple system that uses the Touch module and its buttons 2,3 and 4 to change the Rainbow; the code is shown below and ran on a Raspberry Pi 3 using Python 3. import color...

Well for once I am not going to be talking about robots, but my experience in setting up a Raspberry Pi touch screen - this is not a how to guide, a couple links to those are included in the post, but my experience of setting one up.  So the I bought the Raspberry Pi Touch Screen from Pimoroni and along with the stand/frame for it. Setting up the LCD frame was simple with the instructions provided and the link at the end of the instructions provide some further help http://learn.pimoroni.com/tutorial/pi-lcd/getting-started-with-raspberry-pi-7-touchscreen-lcd  on setting up the screen A tutorial from The PiHut ( https://thepihut.com/blogs/raspberry-pi-tutorials/45295044-raspberry-pi-7-touch-screen-assembly-guide ) was very useful on how to connect the screen to the Pi.  The blue side  on the white ribbon cable (provided with the screen) used in connecting the two together needs to blue side down towards the LCD (as explained in  PiHut tutorial ) and fa...