Hefty? In need of a red shirt? My third Woot BOC showed up, and lived up to its name. Incredibly crappy. Unboxing… Sort of sad that the Fuji 1.5V long life AA was the surprise hero of the box. I’m serious about the shirt. I’ll ship.

Rice cereal. By definition, gruel. +1 tasty

Woot! Things are coming up Milhouse…stay tuned for the un-boxing.

The only thing better than bacon is bonus bacon: the bacon left over from a bacon feast. The only thing better than bonus bacon is the ellusive bonus bacon lattice… Stack while hot, refrigerate, and enjoy.

Webcams: 2 Foscam FI8918W Android App: IP Cam Viewer Baby: Emma

Poking around on the Android Market for an app to control my Foscam IP Webcams, I stumbled across a cool app concept. Long story short, someone wrote some code to serve the live camera feed…effectively turning an android device into an IP cam. The app is free on the Market…just search for IP Webcam and it will pop up. Here it is in operation, serving from my Droid 2 for viewing on my Linux machine… This would pair nicely with my IOIO project, provided I can bring it back from the grave. I could mount the phone itself on the payload, giving this sucker on-board video. A second device (Galaxy…) could provide the board control, and I could implement a web view into my app. Might be on to something here…stay tuned.

The three constituents of the Triforce are Power, Wisdom, and Courage… … …I’ve got wisdom and courage on lock, but am hoping the Baum Bat customization lends itself to more power. Baseball and Zelda, for the wins.

Fire and brimstone…

IOIO #1 is fucking toast.. Close call with the new 3-cell LiPo. It took some time to get the singed plastic smell out of the *lab…all three cells appear to be intact. Making progress on the IOIO project, before the setback.

I finally bucked up and picked up a few Li-Ion batteries for my dust-collecting Clocky mod project. A two cell, a three cell, and a suitable charger for the two arrived in the mail yesterday. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again…lithium ion battery tech is crazy. I can’t believe how deprived we were, or more accurately, how pumped I am to utilize this stuff at a decent price point. Anyhow, I managed to spec out a high quality, thrifty Li-Ion that will fit on my payload… …and, the little sucker screams… I have a hard connection from my phone to the IOIO in the vid. I need to configure the new ROM with bluetooth, and wanted to test the power function stand-alone. That will be the next step. The next next step will include piecing the payload together as a drivable unit. The next next next step will be tweaking the UI for some more realistic control units. After that is next next next next, and will involve a video of the unit in action.

With men’s league baseball around the corner and a new Baum Bat in my garage, I got antsy to hit some baseballs. Since the sidekick keeps me close to the house on weekends, I had to improvise. Enter, DIY Baseball Trainer…

Step one: Drill hole in baseball

*Fun fact…I still haven’t had to charge this lithium ion battery pack, after a whole bunch of baby furniture assembly and random tasks in the *lab. Battery technology is great.

Step two: Attach ball tether

*Fun fact… I have been looking for uses for old salvaged power cords. They are everywhere.

Step three: Attach unit to fixed point

*Fun fact…I had to go nuts with my tree trimmer in order to clear a suitable space to accommodate a baseball swing. I still have a sizable pile of tree that I am working into our garbage cans pre-pickup.

Step four: Get real

*Fun fact…I thought this would hold up for a while. It turns out ‘a while’ was two swings.