Catch up on stories from the past week (and beyond) at the Slashdot story archive

 



Forgot your password?
typodupeerror
×

Comment Re:30 day suspension of pilot's license for prev. (Score 1) 271

I don't believe you actually need a pilot's license to fly anything characterized as an "ultralight" aircraft, as these tape-and-balsawood gyrocopters appear to be. Doesn't mean the FAA can't fine your ass, of course, when you do dumb crap like flying a possibly deadly set of large rotors right past crowds of tourists at low altitudes in an urban area like DC.
Robotics

Video John Hawley Talks About UAV Controls (Video) 20

John 'Warthog9' Hawley was the boss sysadmin on kernel.org before he jumped to Intel in April, 2014, as an open hardware technical evangelist. He last showed up on Slashdot in June, 2014, with his Dr. Who-inspired Robot K-9. Now he's talking about flight computers for quadcopters, specifically ones based on MinnowBoards. Last month (April 2015) he was speaking at the Embedded Linux Conference + Android Builders Summit. That's where he and Timothy Lord had this conversation about flight controllers for UAVs, which makes it a fitting sequel to yesterday's video, which was also about controlling drones with real-time Linux.

Comment Re:the real crazy: (Score 1) 327

McCain-Feingold was not an attempt to "prevent people from gathering together in a group, pooling their resources, and using those resources to express an opinion about politics"

That's exactly what it was. How else would you characterize you being subject to felony federal charges if you (personally, or as part of a group) run an issue or party advocacy ad in the week before an election? It wasn't about the size or loudness of the "megaphone," it was about political speech, period. Unless you are part of one of the groups that the law allowed to continue. Which is the second reason why the law was struck down - unequal protection. The law abridged free speech, and applied the law unevenly to different parties. Unconstitutional right out of the gate on both counts.

Comment Re:Shocked he survived (Score 1) 327

The DC FRZ is indeed there to cut down on the need to deal with a bunch of yahoos buzzing very high-profile targets. But the who decided to fly his gyrocopter right past crowds after a low-level pass over an urban area is up for reckless operation charges from the FAA either way. That bit of idiocy is idiocy whether it's done around people in DC or around people in downtown Miami.

Comment Re:Shocked he survived (Score 1) 327

Being subjected to over paid messages is NOT free speech it PAID for speech

It would be great if you can point out where, in the First Amendment, it says that your rights to say what you want about politics is taken away if you do it by, say, paying a printer to copy your message onto 500 pieces of paper you want to hand out. Paid speech! Paid speech! The government must censor that, since it took money to reproduce the message and spread it around!

Do you even listen to yourself?

Robotics

Video Embedded Linux Takes to the Skies (Video) 26

This is an interview with Clay McClure. He makes his living designing 'custom Linux software solutions for technology start-ups in Atlanta and the San Francisco Bay area.' He also works on Embedded Linux for autonomous drones. Here's a link to slides from a talk he gave on exactly that topic: Flying Penguins - Embedded Linux Applications for autonomous UAVs, and that's far from all he has to say about making Linux-controlled drones. However, for some reason Timothy and Clay didn't talk about using drones for target practice. Perhaps they can discuss that another time.

NOTE: We urge you to read the transcript of this interview even if you prefer watching videos; it contains material we left out of the video due to sound problems.

Slashdot Top Deals

No man is an island if he's on at least one mailing list.

Working...