Robots and Physical Computing

A product that has kept  popping on to my radar has been the intriguing Turing Tumbles    @TuringTumble  I admit to being initially hesitant (is just a gimmicky marble run? - it isn't!) a marble powered computer. The idea is using mechanical ideas to visualise computing concepts is thought-provoking and I have always loved marble runs and 'Heath Robinson'/'Rube Goldberg' style machines; so  bit the bullet and brought one and I am impressed; it is great fun (more than just as a marble run).  Let's start with the packaging and components it is and feels like a high quality product. The components feel sturdy and well designed, the storage for the components also feels sturdy (see figure 1). The project book with the exercises etc is a mixture of puzzles and challenges, alongside a short graphic novel/comic; it all feels well executed and thought through. Online there is now a growing community  https://community.turingtumble.com/ where new puzzels are p...

Elecrow in 2020 released on kickstarter and now in pre-order their own site  (or Amazon.com ) an interesting take on the Raspberry Pi laptop - a laptop with a built-in sensor lab. e Image taken from: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/elecrow/crowpi2-steam-education-platformand-raspberry-pi-laptop/description  It builds on their earlier Crow Pi system but looks much more like a laptop with a secret sensor kit. It includes a wireless mouse and a keyboard, with the cool idea that the keyboard fits over the sensor kit and can be used as and looks like a laptop. The version I received comes with a fantastic range of items, including the Raspberry Pi; power bank; books on python and scratch; RFID keyfob; remote control; game controllers; and many other components. A wide range of software and learning materials are installed on the SD-Card; including software to learn about AI. At the moment I have mainly been playing with it as a Pi based laptop but I am looking for...

  The National Teaching Repository https://ntrepository.wordpress.com /home/ based at Edge Hill University was set up to provide a resource for sharing teaching resources. Members of Canterbury Christ Church University play a role in the curation process. To search the Repository  https://figshare.edgehill.ac.uk/The_National_Teaching_Repository    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 association with. Twitter @scottturneruon

4tronix Eggbit - cute and wearable - hug avoider / The ever-brilliant 4tronix have produced Eggbit https://shop.4tronix.co.uk/collections/microbit-accessories/products/eggbit;  a cute, wear... Pimoroni Enviro:bit - Finally got to play with something that has been my list of things to play with, the Pimoroni Enviro:bit Weather Kit  https://learn.pimoroni... Speech Recognition in Scratch 3 - turning Hello into Bonjour! The Raspberry Pi Foundation recently released a programming activity Alien Language , with support Dale from Machine Learning for Kids , tha... Pimoroni Envirobit - Light and LED In a previous post, the Envirobit (  https://shop.pimoroni.com/products/enviro-bit  )  for the Microbit was played with getting temperature,... Microbit and Environment Measurement - Using Python In two recent posts, Makecode was used with the Enviro:bit from Pimoroni to try out a few ideas ( https://robotsandphysicalcomputing.blogspo... 10 mosts read posts on the Robo...

In two recent posts, Makecode was used with the Enviro:bit from Pimoroni to try out a few ideas ( https://robotsandphysicalcomputing.blogspot.com/2021/06/pimoroni-envirobit.html  and   https://robotsandphysicalcomputing.blogspot.com/2021/06/pimoroni-envirobit-light-and-led.html ). In this post Pyton using the Mu editor was used to try out the Enviro:bit. As in the makeCode version, Pimoroni has provided both a python library (via Github) but also within the Readme.md useful installation instructions. There is at the time of writing a possible typo; to get the BME280 sensor (temperature, pressure, humidity sensor) to work; you need to add parenthesis in the line  bme = bme280.bme280() After that, it works fine and includes potential altitude measurement which I don't think is in the Makecode version (though I could be wrong); I need to play with it a bit more. To experiment the code below was used test reading temperature (in Centigrade), humidity (%), and altitude (f...

In a previous post, the Envirobit (  https://shop.pimoroni.com/products/enviro-bit  )  for the Microbit was played with getting temperature, humidity and pressure  ( https://robotsandphysicalcomputing.blogspot.com/2021/06/pimoroni-envirobit.html ).  In this short post a quick experiment using the sound and light sensor, to turn LEDs on the board to turn off and on beyond on light level. The code is set up when a clap happens nearby, light level is used to 'decide' whether the LEDs are turned on or off, below a threshols the LEDs go on above it the LEDs are turned off, Makeecode  Using Makecode makes this relatively easy to implement and fun. 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 association with. Twitter @scottturneruon

Finally got to play with something that has been my list of things to play with, the Pimoroni Enviro:bit Weather Kit  https://learn.pimoroni.com/tutorial/tanya/building-the-enviro-bit-kit  (see below)- a nice kit based around Pimoroni's enviro:bit device which uses microbit and adds a number of sensors including temperature, pressure and humidity; as well as a microphone. Programming is via MakeCode; extensions can be added using the Extension option and searching for envirobit. Getting sensor information: So a quick experiment to work through the temperature, pressure and humidity sensors, a brief bit of code to do this is shown below: Responding to sound The microbit used with the kit was a V1, so this device added a microphone to the systems (V2 already has the microphone built-in). In the code below the microbit to react to a clapping sound. To develop further. There is still various things to try out the like the light sensors. As well as the expert blocks - what their fu...