http://www.lorneswork.com/blog where art meets technology Sat, 25 Nov 2006 08:46:02 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en The current design, (and I stress current, because it changes every 3 weeks), is built around a PIC18F2550. This is one of Microchips USB-enabled devices, which means that new firmware or flight-plans etc. can be uploaded to it in seconds from any computer with a USB port. You know you ... http://www.lorneswork.com/blog/2006/11/25/uav-current-design/ I should have kept a blog from the beginning, because it’s almost impossible now for me to relate (or even remember) everything that’s happened. I started out with a Basic Atom (a rip-off of the famous Basic Stamp), which was a great decision. It worked right out of the box, and ... http://www.lorneswork.com/blog/2006/11/10/history-of-the-uav/ I think it's time to introduce another project I've been working on. One day, near the start of summer '05, I was hanging out with my friend Colin. He's a mechanical engineer, and I'm a computer scientist so we tend to talk about some pretty nerdy stuff. Trying to break ... http://www.lorneswork.com/blog/2006/11/05/the-uav/ Ideally The Conversation Piece (which I will hereby mercifully shorten to “Convopi”) would run some tiny flavor of Linux – just enough to get the job done. It would also run entirely on Open Source, BSD-licensed technology. Realistically though, we have a prototype due Nov. 20th, and I need to ... http://www.lorneswork.com/blog/2006/10/27/convopi-platform/ The technical challenges in making The Conversation Piece a reality are enormous. On the hardware side, it needs to be small, powerful, and attractive – things computers generally, well, aren’t. On the software side, it's even more miserable: speech recognition, text-to-speech, internet connectivity, and some kind of yet-to-be-invented “topic-jisting” AI. Worse ... http://www.lorneswork.com/blog/2006/10/26/unholy-creation/ This semester I'm taking IAT 400. It's a project course where students, "work in teams to develop an artistic or product-based design addressing a complex problem". My team is working on a digital-picture-frame-like device we're calling "The Conversation Piece". Using speech recognition technology, it will eavesdrop on ones conversation, and ... http://www.lorneswork.com/blog/2006/10/25/the-conversation-piece/ I suppose the logical question to ask at this juncture is, "Why am I starting a blog?". Well first, I'm required to create a blog for my IAT 401 class this semester. If I were only interested in getting the credits though, I'd just make a MySpace account, post a ... http://www.lorneswork.com/blog/2006/10/24/hello-world/