Science and Engineering: Innovation, Research, Education and Economics


Curious Cat Science and Egineering blog full tag cloud


December 6, 2008

Freeware Wi-Fi app turns iPod into a Phone

image of iPod Touch

Wireless turns iPod into a phone

A freeware application for the iPod Touch can turn the music player into a virtual mobile phone. Truphone uses wi-fi technology in an iPod Touch to allow users to make calls to other iPod Touch owners and Google Talk’s messaging service users.

The software is a spin-off from technology Truphone developed for smartphones and iPhones. The developers plan to have the ability to make calls to and from landlines in place very soon.

Geraldine Wilson - Truphone’s CEO - said the firm had ambitions to become a global internet player. “There are a slew of new features we’re rolling out for the iPod Touch that will let users call landlines, Skype users or send instant messages. We’re talking weeks, not months, before these go live.” Although Truphone technology can, in theory, work on any mobile device, the firm is concentrating on devices that have an application store.
..
The company said Google’s Android operating system would be the next platform for which it will develop the Truphone applications.

From the Truphone site:

Nokia and iPhone users can make Truphone calls from any Wi-Fi zone, anywhere in the world. We’ll use your Wi-Fi connection to route the call over the internet at our amazing flat worldwide rates (see rate checker), saving you loads of money on international calls from your home country and saving you even more on calls when you’re abroad.

Wi-Fi calls to other connected Truphone users are completely free of charge. From wherever, to wherever.

Very cool. See our gadgets and gifts store.

Related: Mobile Phone-based Vehicle Anti-theft System - Video Goggles - Awesome Cat Cam - Open Source for LEGO Mindstorms - Links to great freeware

November 7, 2008
November 4, 2008

Qubits Construction Toy

Buy Qubits - The Construction Toy via Amazon). Post suggestion provided through our suggest a post link. Children are naturally curious. We need to provide opportunities for them to do what they would do naturally. This is one nice way to let kids explore the physical world.

Qubits® for Kids by Mark Burginger, architect / inventor

Many of us recognize the name, Frank Lloyd Wright. He was America’s most famous architect. However, did you know that he was closely connected with the construction toy industry? It just happens that his son, John Lloyd Wright invented Lincoln Logs®. John traveled to Japan with his father Frank Lloyd Wright and while he was there John looked at the wooden log foundation his father designed for the Imperial Hotel, Tokyo. It caused him to think of a simple system of notched logs that could be used as a toy. After returning to the United States he created the toy sensation - Lincoln Logs®.

You don’t need to be an architect of any stature approaching Frank Lloyd Wright to feel this sense of influence. The inspiration for me came from the same Lincoln Logs that John Lloyd Wright invented. I used to play with them for hours and hours on end as a child. Now as a parent and an architect I feel I should do my part to provide a unique construction toy for children to play with and draw inspiration. The toy that I have spent the last five years developing is coined with the name, Qubits®. This dynamic new entry into the toy industry is gaining popularity with teachers, professors and of course - children all over Central Oregon. A simple plastic toy that can be built-up using a unique patented modular geometry. It quickly captures the imagination of children who might have visions of becoming architects, engineers, scientist or even nanotech designers.
(more…)

October 17, 2008
October 6, 2008

Holographic Television on the Way

Ok, there really isn’t much new since I posted that holographic TV is getting closer. But won’t it be cool when I can have one in my house? And you might need to plan for it in your new house addition :-) Also, with the economic news lately a good distraction might be useful - Holographic television to become reality

The reason for renewed optimism in three-dimensional technology is a breakthrough in rewritable and erasable holographic systems made earlier this year by researchers at the University of Arizona.

Dr Nasser Peyghambarian, chair of photonics and lasers at the university’s Optical Sciences department, told CNN that scientists have broken a barrier by making the first updatable three-dimensional displays with memory.

“This is a prerequisite for any type of moving holographic technology. The way it works presently is not suitable for 3-D images,” he said. The researchers produced displays that can be erased and rewritten in a matter of minutes.

According to Peyghambarian, they could be constructed as a screen on the wall (like flat panel displays) that shows 3-D images, with all the image writing lasers behind the wall; or it could be like a horizontal panel on a table with holographic writing apparatus underneath.

Peyghambarian is also optimistic that the technology could reach the market within five to ten years. He said progress towards a final product should be made much more quickly now that a rewriting method had been found.

However, it is fair to say not everyone is as positive about this prospect as Peyghambarian. Justin Lawrence, a lecturer in Electronic Engineering at Bangor University in Wales, told CNN that small steps are being made on technology like 3-D holograms, but, he can’t see it being ready for the market in the next ten years.

I would have to say I am with those that think this might take a bit longer to be in place. But I would be glad to be wrong.

Related: Video Goggles - Open Source for LEGO Mindstorms - posts on cool gadgets - Awesome Cat Cam

August 10, 2008

An Illustrated Guide to Every Stupid Cable You Need

An Illustrated Guide to Every Stupid Cable You Need

There are at least four different kinds of USB plugs, two kinds of FireWire and like a million different ways to connect something to TV or monitor. Modern gadget life can be kind of retarded in this way. Why not one kind of cable, or just a couple? I don’t know. But until everyone gets on the same appendage-to-hole scheme, in the meantime, you can use this: an illustrated guide to pretty much every kind of cable you will see in current gadgets and what it’s used for

USB Type A Universal Serial Bus, the gold standard. The whole idea behind it is that this one interface will connect everything (except the stuff it doesn’t), killing off the old guard, like parallel and serial ports. It moves data, and in the case of USB 2.0—which is pretty much the standard now—it does it faster, and with some extra specs for power.

USB Type B The USB Type B plug is basically a USB connector for peripherals—you’ve probably seen it jacked into a printer or scanner.

Related: Save Money on AV Cables - Home Engineering: Physical Gmail Notifier - posts on technology gadgets

March 5, 2008

Phun Physics

Coolest science toy ever

Phun is without question the greatest computer toy in the history of the universe, if this had been around when I was a kid I would be a frickin genius by now. You don’t need things any more. It’s extremely easy to use. As a starter tip, turn gravity off when you’re attaching stuff to the background (right click after selecting “affix” tool).

Very cool. Get your Phun (2D physics software) for free. Phun is a Master of Science Theises by Computing Science student Emil Ernerfeldt.

Some other very cool stuff: Cool Mechanical Simulation System - Scratch from MIT - What Kids can Learn - Lego Autopilot First Flight - Awesome Cat Cam

February 29, 2008

Home Engineering: Physical Gmail Notifier

photo of Gmail Cube

How to make a Physical Gmail Notifier

Every so often, the computer checks for new emails in your Gmail account, and then tells the electronics board whether any have arrived. If they have, the board turns on the output device (the cube). Simple.

The hardware itself is the popular Arduino board, the tinkerer’s dream device. I’m actually using a Boarduino, but any variant should work (subject to a small but important detail, see below). This might be particularly interesting with a Bluetooth Arduino..

The Arduino talks with your computer over a serial connection, which runs over the normal USB cable you use to communicate with your Arduino.

What is Arduino?: Arduino is an open-source electronics prototyping platform based on flexible, easy-to-use hardware and software. It’s intended for artists, designers, hobbyists, and anyone interested in creating interactive objects or environments. Arduino can sense the environment by receiving input from a variety of sensors and can affect its surroundings by controlling lights, motors, and other actuators.

Related: Awesome Cat Cam - Windmill for Electricity in Malawi - Lego UAV - Rubick’s Cube Solving Lego Mindstorms Robot

February 24, 2008

Car Powered Using Compressed Air

car powered using compressed air

Jules Verne predicted cars would run on air. The Air Car is making that a reality. The car is powered by compressed air which certainly seems like an interesting idea. Air car ready for production:

Refueling is simple and will only take a few minutes. That is, if you live nearby a gas station with custom air compressor units. The cost of a fill up is approximately $2.00. If a driver doesn’t have access to a compressor station, they will be able to plug into the electrical grid and use the car’s built-in compressor to refill the tank in about 4 hours.

The car is said to have a driving range of 125 miles so by my calculation it would cost about 1.6 cents per mile. A car that gets 31 mpg would use 4 gallons to go 124 miles. At $3 a gallon for gas, the cost is $12 for fuel or about 9.7 cents per mile. I didn’t notice anything about maintenance costs. I don’t see any reason why the Air Car would cost more to maintain than a normal car.

The air car was named one of Time magazine’s best inventions of the 2007.

Five-seat concept car runs on air

An engineer has promised that within a year he will start selling a car that runs on compressed air, producing no emissions at all in town. The OneCAT will be a five-seater with a fibre-glass body, weighing just 350kg and could cost just over £2,500.

Tata is the only big firm he’ll license to sell the car - and they are limited to India. For the rest of the world he hopes to persuade hundreds of investors to set up their own factories, making the car from 80% locally-sourced materials.

“Imagine we will be able to save all those components traveling the world and all those transporters.” He wants each local factory to sell its own cars to cut out the middle man and he aims for 1% of global sales - about 680,000 per year. Terry Spall from the Institution of Mechanical Engineers says: “I really hope he succeeds. It is a really brave experiment in producing a sustainable car.”

Related: The History of Compressed Air Vehicles - Car Elevator (for parking) - Electric Automobiles - VW Phaeton manufacturing plant

September 14, 2007

The Engineer That Made Your Cat a Photographer

photo by Binky the cat or another catThis article is the result of the first Curious Cat engineer interview. My favorite post detailed the great engineering project Jürgen Perthold undertook to engineer a camera that his cat could wear and take photos. So I decided to interview him.

The Engineer That Made Your Cat a Photographer by John Hunter:

This time I thought about our cat who is the whole day out, returning sometimes hungry sometimes not, sometimes with traces of fights, sometimes he stay also the night out. When he finally returns, I wonder where he was and what he did during his day. This brought me to the idea to equip the cat with a camera. The plan was to put a little camera around his neck which takes every few minutes a picture. After he is returning, the camera would show his day.

The Amazing CatCam is not only a great product but a wonderful engineering story. See our past post for some background on how an engineer allowed you to help your cat become a photographer. On the development of the CatCam Jürgen Perthold says, “More or less it was just a joke, born with a crazy idea.” Such a great sentiment and with wonderful results.

What path led him to the desire and ability to pursue the crazy idea and become the Curious Cat engineer of the year? He was born in Aalen, Germany. He started playing with electronics as he was 13. At 15 he added computer programming and with a friend they programmed games, applications and hardware control over the years. He studied Optoelectronics at the University of Aalen, Germany extending his knowledge further.

For the last few years he has worked for Bosch, an international manufacturing company, in the automotive hardware section. Last summer, he transfered from Germany to Anderson, South Carolina as a resident engineer for transmission control unit in a production plant for automobile parts. On a side note, the United States is still by far the largest manufacturer in the world.
photo by Binkey the cat, from under a car
The demand for the cameras is still higher than his capability to produce the cameras. He has raised the price, to limit the demand. When I first saw the prices I couldn’t believe how inexpensive it was. And, in my opinion, they are still a incredible deal. Order your CatCam now: it is a great gadget for yourself or it makes a great unique, gift. Most orders have been from the UK, Germany and the USA.

Most people don’t have technical background so they buy the full unit. But he reports that some brave souls order a kit because of price or availability although they have not done anything similar before. What a great way to challenge yourself and, if you succeed, end up with a wonderful creation when you finish.

He is in discussion with several different groups to ramp up production. The main problem is that producing the device requires electronics, optics, software, mechanics and logistics expertise. So, for the time being, he continues to modify the cameras by hand because no investments are necessary and the production can be scaled according to the demand. The required soldering, electronics and system knowledge makes it a challenge to outsource. So, for now, CatCam production is adding to the USA manufacturing output total. He is also planning to produce more products.
photo of Jacquie the cat wearing a CatCam
Jürgen believes that getting the cat camera working was not that challenging. You can take a look at his explanation of how he did so to decide for yourself. He does admit that challenges do arise if you want to produce cameras for others. To do that you must create a product that is foolproof, reliable, and easy to use and manufacture.

“I was surprised how famous one can get with ‘boring’ technical engineering stuff. I like this not only for me but for all other engineers out there who daily work hard on challenges which others don’t even understand. We as engineers make the world moving but usually we are not recognized.” Everyone enjoys the products of the labors of engineers (such as cell phones, MP3 players, cars, planes, bridges, internet connections) but few see the required knowledge, work and the people that bring those products into being.
photo by Jacquie the cat of a vine
Jürgen “hopes that I made ‘engineering’ a bit more visible to people who did not think about it before, for example, female cat owners who never had a solder iron in the hand and bought plain SOIC chips because they wanted the cat camera…”

I think he has done a great job illustrating the engineering behind the CatCam and making engineering fun. And in so doing hopefully is making more people aware of the engineers that make so many wonderful modern gadgets. Go buy a CatCam now (and if you are adventurous buy the parts and create your own - you will learn a lot about what makes all your modern gadgets work). And then send in the pictures your cat takes so everyone can see the wonderful things engineers make possible.

The photos here show the results of several new cat photographers (Binky the cat [first 2 photos] and Jacquie the cat [last 2]). Only a small percentage of CatCam owners have shared there pictures so far.

Over the next few years he would like to learn to sail, visit Yellowstone national park, walk the Camino de Santiago again, move on to other international assignment (maybe far east) and continuing raising his two children.

The Curious Cat Science and Engineering Blog is written by John Hunter and tracks a wide variety of developments, happenings, interesting under-publicized facts, and cool aspects of science and engineering.

June 3, 2007

Awesome Cat Cam

CatCam - photo of the famous cat photographer CatCam - cat photographer on the run CatCam - cat photographer get picture of another cat

subscribe to Curious Cat Engineering Blog

CatCam by Juergen Perthold - this great project involved taking a digital camera and some additional equipment to create a camera that his cat wore around his neck which took pictures every 3 minutes. The pictures are great. The cat got photos of several other cats and seemed to like cars.

See more cool gadgets, See our other popular posts and our cat related posts.

Sometimes I have some challenging ideas, or crazy like some other people would say. This time I thought about our cat who is the whole day out, returning sometimes hungry sometimes not, sometimes with traces of fights, sometimes he stay also the night out. When he finally returns, I wonder where he was and what he did during his day. This brought me to the idea to equip the cat with a camera. The plan was to put a little camera around his neck which takes every few minutes a picture. After he is returning, the camera would show his day.

The VistaQuest made it very easy for me, because it is able to supply my circuit also if switched off. This is because of an internal DC/DC converter which boosts the voltage from the 1.5V battery to 3.3V. The DC/DC converter is always working because of the internal SRAM which holds the pictures. I just had to hook the microcontroller to the internal camera supply.

Well, I thought the hardest part is done by developing the software and soldering the controller board. But it is more the housing to protect the camera. You can not imagine what kind of requirements have to be fulfilled if you want to equip your cat with a camera. I built a small housing out of plastic plates and put it on the collar of the cat for evaluation purpose. This housing was last seen as the cat walked out of the door… Probably the wires I used for attaching were not strong enough. Or someone released the cat from the interesting looking piece.

For the second try I used the plastic package of a child toy (Kinderueberraschung), put a stone in it for loading it with some weight and attached it again to the cat collar. This time the part returned - dirty and scratched outside, water inside. What the hell is the cat doing !? This raised the requirements for the camera protective housing a lot

Big moment no. 1: attach the collar with the camera to the cat. The reaction was not very happy but finally accepted. Reality check passed :-)

This is my favorite home engineering project. The concept is great. The explanation of the technology is great. The adjustment to real life situations is great. The end result (the photos) is great. This wins the non-existent Curious Cat Cool Contraption award. If someone doesn’t start selling prefabricated cat cameras I will be very surprised (if I was more enterprising I would do it myself). Maybe J. Perthold will, in any event he should inspire many to try making their own.

Related: The Cat and a Black Bear - Automatic Cat Feeder - The sub-$1,000 UAV Project
(more…)

December 2, 2006

Open Source for LEGO Mindstorms

Lego Tribot

Open Source Firmware, Developer Kits for LEGO® MINDSTORMS®:

“Most often, innovation comes from the core community of users. Our ongoing commitment to enabling our fan base to personalize and enhance their MINDSTORMS experience has reached a new level with our decision to release the firmware for the NXT brick as open source,” said Søren Lund, director of LEGO MINDSTORMS.

photo: Lego TriBot - a flexible 3-wheeled driving robot with sound, light, touch and ultrasonic sensors - see more details.

Related: Books - Building Robots With Lego Mindstorms and LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT Hacker’s Guide - Posts Lego Learning - Fun k-12 Science and Engineering Learning - Building minds by building robots - Buy the Lego Mindstorms NXT kit online - $250

November 6, 2006

Video Goggles

ezVision Goggles

Update: new version

Cool product and nice gift: ezVision Video iWear the iPod Video and DVD Movie Goggles. Using these is like watching a 50 inch screen and you can easily carry them with you anywhere. You can use them to watch videos from your iPod.

Related: Science and Engineering Books

August 23, 2006

Automatic Cat Feeder

Automatic Cat Feeder

The Automatic Cat Feeder:

As I dug around this box, I found an old CD Rom drive and power supply. The thought struck me that I could use the ejecting tray of the CD Rom as a solenoid to push the trigger mechanism of some sort of physical contraption. But then I had a bootstrapping problem – what can I use to push the eject button of the CD Rom on schedule?

After some more thought, I realized that I could just use my spare (working) computer as the basis of the cat feeder. It’s also my home’s Subversion source control server – a rare mix of server workloads indeed! It has a CD Rom drive, so I could just use software to open and close it.

And water for the cat too:

Water flows out of the jug as long as the water level is below the hole at the bottom. When water flows out, the air pressure in jug decreases until it sucks in some air to equalize. When the water level covers the hole, though, the air pressure can no longer equalize, so the water flow stops.

When the cats drink the water level down a bit, the jug can once again equalize its air pressure, and lets more water out.

Don’t miss the video - Related: Engineering at Home

Curious Cat Science and Engineering Blog © curiouscat.com 2005-2008 powered by WordPress
USA High School Alumni

Internal Links

Categories

Author

 

John Hunter

Other

Search Blog

Web Search

Science and Engineering web search

Recent Comments

  • Rich Hoeg: I couldn’t agree more with this post … please support education throughout the world...
  • aroel: cool man! eventhough it can be used in wifi area
  • Anonymous: Computer definitely helps a lot and about rural or remote areas, i say that it should be there...
  • GeoGeorge: How can you prove that? I have always visulized the core chuning like two hot balls. I have no...
  • Anonymous: Thanks to the poor US policies influenced by rich lobbyists of the oil giants, America is way...
  • martin: agree with you ted, these days even even UML and designer call enginer . for example CSS author is...
  • Anonymous: Although on a more selfish note it did increase the price of the land in Northern Suffolk...
  • Melbel: Yeah, with some blogs, especially one of mine, it’s handy for viewers to have something like...

Archives

January 2009
M T W T F S S
« Dec    
 1234
567891011
12131415161718
19202122232425
262728293031  

Translate to

Translate to German Translate to Japanese Translate to Chinese Translate to South Korean Translate to Spanish Translate to French

Post Spotlight