Quantum Levitation is all over the webs. It is way easier to find videos than it is to find explanations…it all boils down to this: You may want to kill the sound for the video…pretty obnoxious. As speculated, the main thing in play is the fact that at areas of the superconducting material that are not uniform, (defects) flux tubes exist as the material is cooled to extreme temperatures. These tubes act to ‘pin’ the item, with respect to the permanent field. Physics rules. I really need to track down some liquid nitrogen.

I published my code for the IOIOSeek project to GitHub. Here it isFork it, do what you will. My next step is to refine the project, add some automation, and make it cooler in general. I grabbed a few thing to make that happen: Second IOIO board for bootloader work…which will allow for bluetooth communications between the board and a phone. Two additional solar panels…to increase the complexity of my sensor setup. Stay tuned…things should be in the works.

I spend too much time online…I’ll fully admit it. It is absolutely necessary, however; I test SaaS for a living. My physical computing projects do not lend themselves to non-online research. Non-online…holy smokes. I think I just coined a new term: nonline. I should trademark that. Anyhow, I spend a ton of time staring at screens. That has changed the way I conduct myself, in general. One of the fall-out things I have noticed is in shopping. Where I used to do product research at brick and mortar stores, now I do all of my research online. Most of my purchases are now done online too. I never thought I would buy jeans online, for example, but now I do, without fail. Certain items are foolish to buy at a physical storefront… especially anything tech related. There are the conventional online stores, but if you have some patience and a good eye, online auctions can be the best source of deals. My favorite auction site is DealFun…case in point: A super cheap PS3 is par for the course. DealFun has all sorts of screaming low prices that end up winning auctions, but they also have the customer service aspect to boot. As the dealfun.com reviews indicate, they are reputable in addition to providing good deals. You want that…trust me. Another cool thing about that site, is the notion of beginner’s auctions. You can learn the ropes without spending a fortune on bids. Pretty cool. Take a look…holler if you see a Kinect.

The Dell Mini 9 always draws short straw. The little guy once again gets to play the part of guinea pig, and be the first to upgrade to the new version of Ubuntu. V. 10.11 a.k.a. Oneiric Ocelot We’ll see if they sharpened Unity up a bit. Preliminary reviews are pointing at a good release. Expect my review before long. FWIW, ‘oneiric’ is a mouthy way to say dreamy. I don’t care for the word, and neither does my spell checker.

Add another 17" monitor to the boneyard…I’ve upgraded to a new 24" widescreen. One step closer to my end-goal of two 24" screens to supplement my 17" notebook. Big glowing rectangles, FTW.

I may be guilty of child abuse before the small Swanson girl makes her first appearance…

I hope you don’t mind, but I went ahead and stepped it up a few notches. My newest project brings my end-goal a few steps closer. I now have the pieces in place to put together an actual robotic implementation with the IOIO…since things have officially reached the cool stage, I decided to drop this as a stand-alone project. Complete with pics, a vid, and an app. IOIOSeek: What I have here are two slider bar controlled servos, an analog input-read solar panel, and some LEDs toggled via a button. The control is via the IOIO / Android. The pictures, however nice, don’t really tell the story. Take a look at the video to see this thing in action: As the video alludes to, I am going to run with this concept. The automation (robotics) lies in the analog reading with respect to the servo positions. I plan to ‘scan’ the panel…that is the piece that is missing. Once I can implement that mess, I will have a tracking system. Implementations will fall out of that. As with the last few projects, I have dumped the app on the Android Market for general perusal. The app’s description provides the details of the pin configuration, which is straight forward. I have two PWM outputs, a pure 3.3V digital toggle, and a pin configured for analog input. That is that. I will push my code to GitHub as well eventually, and provide a link therein. I still need to polish my generic servo code, since my latency was borderline awful in retrospect. Look for that in the near future as well. As always, drop any questions to joe[at]swantron[dot]com. Feel free to share your IOIO projects with me…

What is the term? Form follows function? Not sure; I’m not a classically trained sink designer. I can tell you what I look for in Undermount Sinks… they should vaguely resemble robot eyes: Amazing. Katie and I rent. We cook a lot, and intend to buy or build before too long…mix that up and it is no stretch to think that we are into sinks. Mr. Direct sinks are great, functional, and have the added bonus of being cool to boot. When we make a move, suffice to say we will have an Undermount Sink like the bad guy pictured above. Cool looking, big, and easy to clean…the price is actually lower than the boring guys from Lowe’s and Home Depot as well…pretty much a done deal.

disclaimer > I am not clarivoyant < / disclaimer > I’ll make a bold prediction. **You are reading this post on a web-connected device!**Cunning, righf? I will do you all a favor and cut to the point. We all have access to the internet, nearly always. Why not put that to use for difficult problems, in general? Like stock control. Pretend, if it helps, that the stock management software is the robotic overlord, and your staff constitutes the minions… The take away in my whole rambling post lies in a centralized control system for hard goods. A system such as OrderWise allows you to handle arguably the most fundamental business need, inventory, in a convenient digital manner. When you have the same system in place for inventory, order processing, web integration, etc., you will know what your snagging points are. Manage your physical goods, intelligently. That just might be part of business 101. I would have zero idea…I studied math. Anyhow, hit that link and take a look. Computers really pay for themselves in managed applications like inventory…I do know that much for a fact.

Fun fact: math guys find math stuffs in non-math stuffs Fun tip: don’t study number theory Fun tip bonus aside: If you think of numbers as things instead of numbers, they will take on funny little characteristics. Fun anecdote: I was taking a look at a sweet site about Mind health, and noticed they had an awesome number on the page… I have no idea whether or not Cognifit was trying to slap that particular number on their site on purpose, but it is a good math number. Do explain…okay. 353 is both prime, and a palindrome. Remember “Madam, I’m Adam.” from school? Take that, make it a number, and moreover make it a number that is only divisible by one and itself… you have a crazy little thing like 353. How do I pick that up? Mental fitness. How does one pick that up? Practice. Plain and simple. Your brain works much the same way that any other of your body systems work. Want big swollen biceps? Grab some dumbbells, do some curls. Want a big, awesome brain? Grab some mental dumbbells, do some brain curls. Curls get the girls…be them brain or biceps. Joking aside, it is proven that you must keep your memory and problem solving skills working in order to fend off getting old, slow, sluggish, etc. That link above is of some serious value…fun brain fitness activities are the best type. Stay sharp, readers. Holler with any palindromic primes…I’m on the hunt.