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Submission + - Is AI Dangerous? Would you believe a billionaire or a hacker? (hackaday.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Hackaday says that AI isn't going to become a menace in the way that Elon Musk and other high-profile people claim--at least, not soon. Is Musk and others really saying that AI is going to take over? Or are they saying it is going to make us lazy and stupid and the media is recasting it? Or is Hackaday right and the parlor tricks being passed off as AI today really of no consequence?

Submission + - Rubber Tanks and Sonic Trucks: The Ghost Army of World War II (hackaday.com)

Submitted by szczys
szczys writes: While you may have heard of the Ghost Army that was used to fake troop movements during WWII, it's unlikely that you truly grasp the level of skill and success these elite groups achieved. At its surface, the story is about inflatable armies that could fool German intelligence from afar. That is one visual component, but there were many more involving sound and radio communications. Before the digital age, it was quite a trick making authentic audio recordings of military vehicle sounds on 2-mile long spools of very thin wire played back from vehicles outfitted with 500 Watt speakers. The A/V wasn't complete without radio communications spoofed to look like the Ghost Army was the real deal: this used the best of personal-morse-code-style impersonators. Elite groups trained in these phony arts operated throughout the European theater. Their story was top secret long after the war because the craft was considered a strategic asset well into the cold war era.

Submission + - Nurses use Makerspace to invent custom health care solutions (hackaday.com)

Submitted by wd5gnr
wd5gnr writes: University of Texas Medical Branch and an MIT initiative have joined forces to create the first maker space in a hospital. Often nurses see things that would make their jobs easier or a patient's care better and now they can create custom solutions to those problems. They aim to spread this to other hospitals and form a community of medical makers.

Submission + - Retro Computers Run in your Browser (hackaday.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: If you ever wanted to program an Altair, an Apple I, or a COSMAC ELF you may think you either have to buy one (expensive now) or load and configure simulation software. However, there's a slew of browser-based emulators for everything from a PDP-11 to Windows 1.0 out there. Some use Java, but many use Javascript and many perform better on a modern PC then they did in their original. If you want to learn some history or just want to finally play with the computers you saw in the magazines 35 years ago, these are great fun and slightly addictive.
Hardware Hacking

How To Build With Delrin and a Laser Cutter 28

Posted by Soulskill from the now-you're-thinking-with-lasers dept.
szczys writes: Laser cutters are awesome, but you have to bring your mechanical engineering A-game if you want to build resilient stuff using laser-cut parts. Joshua Vasquez has been building up his bag of tricks using Delrin and a laser cutter to build with techniques like press-fitting, threading, snap-fits, etc. that aren't possible or are non-ideal with the laser-cutting steadfasts of plywood and acrylic. Delrin (PDF) won't shatter like acrylic, and it has more give to it, so even the less precise entry-level lasers can cut joints that will have a snug fit.

Submission + - Learn FPGAs with a $25 board and Open Source Tools (hackaday.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Hackaday has a 3 part tutorial with videos of using open source tools with a cheap ($25) FPGA board. The board isn't very powerful, but this could be the "gateway drug" to FPGAs for people who don't want to spend hundreds of dollars and install 100s of megabytes of software and license keys just to get their feet wet. The videos are particularly good--like watching them over their shoulder. As far as I know, this is the only totally open source FPGA toolchain out there.

Comment Re:No 3D printing? (Score 1) 138

by wd5gnr (#46968609) Attached to: A 32-bit Development System For $2
The chip has a quite capable A/D. And why spend $18 for an 8 bit system? Granted, I could go get an Atmel CPU (and I have) but this a 32-bit processor running at 48MHz is going to be more capable. Not sure where you got the idea there is no A/D.

Submission + - A 32-bit Development System for $3 (drdobbs.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: If you are too cheap to buy a $20 Arduino or too elitist to not have at least a 32-bit processor, Dr. Dobb's shows you how to take a $2 chip but it on a breadboard with a TTL serial (or USB) cable and be up and running with a 32-bit C/C++ system. Even if you have to buy the breadboard and the cable it is comparable in price to an Arduino and much more capable. The Mbed libraries (optional) make it as easy to use a 'duino, too.

Submission + - Foam-Squirting Quadcopter Becomes a Flying 3D Printer (gizmag.com)

Submitted by Zothecula
Zothecula writes: The swiftlet may not look much different than other little birds, but it has one unique ability – it builds its nest out of its own saliva. Inspired by the swiftlet, scientists at Imperial College London's Aerial Robotics Lab have created a robotic quadcopter that can extrude polyurethane foam while in flight. By targeting where that foam goes, it can build up simple structures, essentially becoming a flying 3D printer. The technology could have some very important applications.
Hardware

Submission + - A $20 Software Defined Radio for GNU Radio (drdobbs.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Dr. Dobb's shows how to take a $20 USB TV dongle and use it as a wide-range software defined radio using GNU Radio.
Idle

Submission + - Can a court order you to delete a facebook account? (go.com) 4

Submitted by jaymz666
jaymz666 writes: Can a court really order you to delete a Facebook account?
When Asher initially appeared in court after the July 20 accident, the judge told her to delete her Facebook account, Kittinger said. Asher did not take it seriously, and was charged with contempt of court when the judge learned her Facebook page was still active.

Seems like a big over reach.
Android

Submission + - Google Talk Enables Video Chat On Android Phones (hothardware.com)

Submitted by
MojoKid
MojoKid writes: "Google recently launched Google Talk with video and voice chat for Android phones. With the service, users will be able to video or voice chat with their friends and family directly from an Android phone. Calls can be placed over 3G, 4G and Wi-Fi connections. According to Google, the new features will first roll out to the Nexus S phones over the next few weeks as part of the Android 2.3.4 over-the-air update. Google Talk with video and voice chat will launch on other Android 2.3 and higher devices in the future as well. The video demo here shows it in action."
Android

Submission + - Developing Android Apps Visually (drdobbs.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Dr. Dobb's has a three part blog (all three parts are up; this is part 1) about using App Inventor. The focus isn't so much on the technology but rather the discussion of "can visual development let anyone program?" If so, is App Inventor really visual development? And should we be teaching real programmers about visual development. Most of the conclusions are in part 3. As a byproduct, they show you how to put App Inventor output on the Market and there are two games on the market (free) that resulted from the articles.
Hardware

Submission + - Worlds first community funded CPU ASIC (opencores.org) 1

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The 32 bit OpenRISC CPU has been available for many FPGAs and was turned into a commercial ASIC in 2003 http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/03/12/08/2326236/Open-Source-Finally-Hits-Real-Silicon. Now, the OpenCores community is asking for donations to create a new ASIC with the openrisc cpu, ethernet, PCI, UART, USB and other peripherals. The goal is to be able to sell these ASICs at a low price to anyone who wants to build a cheap embedded system built completely on open source. The OpenRISC currently runs on linux 2.6.37 and has ports of gcc 4.5.1 among other things.

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