Wow! eBook – Blog

Book Description

Device drivers make it possible for your software to communicate with your hardware, and because every operating system has specific requirements, driver writing is nontrivial. When developing for FreeBSD, you’ve probably had to scour the Internet and dig through the kernel sources to figure out how to write the drivers you need. Thankfully, that stops now. In FreeBSD Device Drivers, Joseph Kong will teach you how to master everything from the basics of building and running loadable kernel modules to more complicated topics like thread synchronization. After a crash course in the different FreeBSD driver frameworks, extensive tutorial sections dissect real-world drivers like the parallel port printer driver.

You’ll learn:

• All about Newbus, the infrastructure used by FreeBSD to manage the hardware devices on your system
• How to work with ISA, PCI, USB, and other buses
• The best ways to control and communicate with the hardware devices from user space
• How to use Direct Memory Access (DMA) for maximum system performance
• The inner workings of the virtual null modem terminal driver, the USB printer driver, the Intel PCI Gigabit Ethernet adapter driver, and other important drivers
• How to use Common Access Method (CAM) to manage host bus adapters (HBAs) Download Now »

Book Description

If you’ve done some Arduino tinkering and wondered how you could incorporate the Kinect—or the other way around—then this book is for you. The authors of Arduino and Kinect Projects will show you how to create 10 amazing, creative projects, from simple to complex. You’ll also find out how to incorporate Processing in your project design—a language very similar to the Arduino language.

The ten projects are carefully designed to build on your skills at every step. Starting with the Arduino and Kinect equivalent of “Hello, World,” the authors will take you through a diverse range of projects that showcase the huge range of possibilities that open up when Kinect and Arduino are combined.

• Gesture-based Remote Control. Control devices and home appliances with hand gestures.
• Kinect-networked Puppet. Play with a physical puppet remotely using your whole body.
• Mood Lamps. Build your own set of responsive, gesture controllable LED lamps.
• Drawing Robot. Control a drawing robot using a Kinect-based tangible table.
• Remote-controlled Vehicle. Use your body gestures to control a smart vehicle.
• Biometric Station. Use the Kinect for biometric recognition and checking Body Mass Indexes.
• 3D Modeling Interface. Learn how to use the Arduino LilyPad to build a wearable 3D modelling interface.
• 360º Scanner. Build a turntable scanner and scan any object 360º using only one Kinect.
• Delta Robot. Build and control your own fast and accurate parallel robot. Download Now »

Book Description

The emergence of the cloud and modern, fast corporate networks demands that you perform judicious balancing of computational loads. Practical Load Balancing presents an entire analytical framework to increase performance not just of one machine, but of your entire infrastructure.

Practical Load Balancing starts by introducing key concepts and the tools you’ll need to tackle your load-balancing issues. You’ll travel through the IP layers and learn how they can create increased network traffic for you. You’ll see how to account for persistence and state, and how you can judge the performance of scheduling algorithms.

You’ll then learn how to avoid performance degradation and any risk of the sudden disappearance of a service on a server. If you’re concerned with running your load balancer for an entire network, you’ll find out how to set up your network topography, and condense each topographical variety into recipes that will serve you in different situations. You’ll also learn about individual servers, and load balancers that can perform cookie insertion or improve your SSL throughput.

You’ll also explore load balancing in the modern context of the cloud. While load balancers need to be configured for high availability once the conditions on the network have been created, modern load balancing has found its way into the cloud, where good balancing is vital for the very functioning of the cloud, and where IPv6 is becoming ever more important.

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Book Description

Hacking the Kinect is the technogeek’s guide to developing software and creating projects involving the groundbreaking volumetric sensor known as the Microsoft Kinect. Microsoft’s release of the Kinect in the fall of 2010 startled the technology world by providing a low-cost sensor that can detect and track body movement in three-dimensional space. The Kinect set new records for the fastest-selling gadget of all time. It has been adopted worldwide by hobbyists, robotics enthusiasts, artists, and even some entrepreneurs hoping to build business around the technology.

Hacking the Kinect introduces you to programming for the Kinect. You’ll learn to set up a software environment, stream data from the Kinect, and write code to interpret that data. The progression of hands-on projects in the book leads you even deeper into an understanding of how the device functions and how you can apply it to create fun and educational projects. Who knows? You might even come up with a business idea.

• Provides an excellent source of fun and educational projects for a tech-savvy parent to pursue with a son or daughter
• Leads you progressively from making your very first connection to the Kinect through mastery of its full feature set
• Shows how to interpret the Kinect data stream in order to drive your own software and hardware applications, including robotics applications Download Now »

Book Description

Whether you’re new to Arduino and Android development, or you’ve tinkered a bit with either one, this is the book for you. Android has always been a natural fit with Arduino projects, but now that Google has released the Android Open Accessory Development Kit (the Android ADK), combining Android with Arduino to create custom gadgets has become even easier.

Beginning Android ADK with Arduino shows how the ADK works and how it can be used with a variety of Arduino boards to create a variety of fun projects that showcase the abilities of the ADK.

Mario Böhmer will walk you through several projects, including making sounds, driving motors, and creating alarm systems, all while explaining how to use the ADK and how standard Arduino boards may differ from Google-branded Arduinos. You aren’t tied to specific hardware with this book; use what you have, and this book will show you how.

What you’ll learn

• How different boards work with the ADK
• How to create your first sketch and project
• How to work with light and sound
• How to work with servos and DC motors
• How to work with photoresistors and thermistors to sense the environment Download Now »

Book Description

In Programming Your Home, technology enthusiast Mike Riley walks you through a variety of custom home automation projects, ranging from a phone application that alerts you to package deliveries at your front door to an electronic guard dog that will prevent unwanted visitors.

Open locked doors using your smartphone. Assemble a bird feeder that posts Twitter tweets to tell you when the birds are feeding or when bird seed runs low. Have your home speak to you when you receive email, notify you when visitors arrive, and more.

You’ll learn how to use Android smartphones, Arduinos, X10 controllers and a wide array of sensors, servos, programming languages, web frameworks, and mobile SDKs. Programming Your Home is written for smartphone programmers, web developers, technology tinkerers, and anyone who enjoys building cutting-edge, do-it-yourself electronic projects.

This book will give you the inspiration and understanding to construct amazing automation capabilities that will transform your residence into the smartest home in your neighborhood!

What you need
To get the most out of Programming Your Home, you should have some familiarity with the Arduino hardware platform along with a passion for tinkering. You should enjoy innovative thinking and learning exercises as well as have some practical application development experience. The projects use a variety of hardware components including sensors and actuators, mobile devices, and wireless radios Download Now »