Wow! eBook – Blog

Book Description

Want to build your own satellite and launch it into space? It’s easier than you may think. The first in a series of four books, this do-it-yourself guide shows you the essential steps needed to design a base picosatellite platform—complete with a solar-powered computer-controlled assembly—tough enough to withstand a rocket launch and survive in orbit for three months.

Whether you want to conduct scientific experiments, run engineering tests, or present an orbital art project, you’ll select basic components such as an antenna, radio transmitter, solar cells, battery, power bus, processor, sensors, and an extremely small picosatellite chassis. This entertaining series takes you through the entire process—from planning to launch.

• Prototype and fabricate printed circuit boards to handle your payload
• Choose a prefab satellite kit, complete with solar cells, power system, and on-board computer
• Calculate your power budget—how much you need vs. what the solar cells collect
• Select between the Arduino or BasicX-24 onboard processors, and determine how to use the radio transmitter and sensors
• Learn your launch options, including the providers and cost required
• Use milestones to keep your project schedule in motion

Table of Contents
Chapter 1. Overview Download Now »

Book Description

This detailed, hands-on guide provides the technical and conceptual information you need to build cool applications with Microsoft’s Kinect, the amazing motion-sensing device that enables computers to see. Through half a dozen meaty projects, you’ll learn how to create gestural interfaces for software, use motion capture for easy 3D character animation, 3D scanning for custom fabrication, and many other applications.

Perfect for hobbyists, makers, artists, and gamers, Making Things See shows you how to build every project with inexpensive off-the-shelf components, including the open source Processing programming language and the Arduino microcontroller. You’ll learn basic skills that will enable you to pursue your own creative applications with Kinect.

• Create Kinect applications on Mac OS X, Windows, or Linux
• Track people with pose detection and skeletonization, and use blob tracking to detect objects
• Analyze and manipulate point clouds
• Make models for design and fabrication, using 3D scanning technology
• Use MakerBot, RepRap, or Shapeways to print 3D objects
• Delve into motion tracking for animation and games
• Build a simple robot arm that can imitate your arm movements
• Discover how skilled artists have used Kinect to build fascinating projects

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Book Description

After the devastating tsunami in 2011, DYIers in Japan built their own devices to detect radiation levels, then posted their finding on the Internet. Right now, thousands of people worldwide are tracking environmental conditions with monitoring devices they’ve built themselves. You can do it too!

This inspiring guide shows you how to use Arduino to create gadgets for measuring noise, weather, electromagnetic interference (EMI), water purity, and more. You’ll also learn how to collect and share your own data, and you can experiment by creating your own variations of the gadgets covered in the book. If you’re new to DIY electronics, the first chapter offers a primer on electronic circuits and Arduino programming.

• Use a special microphone and amplifier to build a reliable noise monitor
• Create a gadget to detect energy vampires: devices that use electricity when they’re “off”
• Examine water purity with a water conductivity device
• Measure weather basics such as temperature, humidity, and dew point
• Build your own Geiger counter to gauge background radiation
• Extend Arduino with an Ethernet shield—and put your data on the Internet
• Share your weather and radiation data online through Pachube

Table of Contents
Chapter 1. The World’s Shortest Electronics Primer Download Now »

Book Description

Join today’s new revolution in creativity and community: hackerspaces. Stop letting other people build everything for you: Do it yourself. Explore, grab the tools, get hands-on, get dirty…and create things you never imagined you could. Hack This is your glorious, full-color passport to the world of hackerspaces: your invitation to share knowledge, master tools, work together, build amazing stuff–and have a flat-out blast doing it.

Twin Cities Maker co-founder John Baichtal explains it all: what hackerspaces are, how they work, who runs them, what they’re building—and how you can join (or start!) one. Next, he walks you through 24 of today’s best hackerspace projects…everything from robotic grilled-cheese sandwich-makers to devices that make music with zaps of electricity. Every project’s packed with color photos, explanations, lists of resources and tools, and instructions for getting started on your own similar project so you can DIY!

JUST SOME OF THE PROJECTS YOU’LL LEARN ABOUT INCLUDE…

• Kung-fu fighting robots
• Home-brewed Geiger counter
• TransAtlantic balloon
• Twitter-monitoring Christmas tree
• Sandwich-making robot
• Interactive Space Invaders mural Download Now »

Book Description

OS X and iOS Kernel Programming combines essential operating system and kernel architecture knowledge with a highly practical approach that will help you write effective kernel-level code. You’ll learn fundamental concepts such as memory management and thread synchronization, as well as the I/O Kit framework. You’ll also learn how to write your own kernel-level extensions, such as device drivers for USB and Thunderbolt devices, including networking, storage and audio drivers.

OS X and iOS Kernel Programming provides an incisive and complete introduction to the XNU kernel, which runs iPhones, iPads, iPods, and Mac OS X servers and clients. Then, you’ll expand your horizons to examine Mac OS X and iOS system architecture. Understanding Apple’s operating systems will allow you to write efficient device drivers, such as those covered in the book, using I/O Kit.

With OS X and iOS Kernel Programming, you’ll:

• Discover classical kernel architecture topics such as memory management and thread synchronization
• Become well-versed in the intricacies of the kernel development process by applying kernel debugging and profiling tools
• Learn how to deploy your kernel-level projects and how to successfully package them
• Write code that interacts with hardware devices
• Examine easy to understand example code that can also be used in your own projects Download Now »

Book Description

Congratulations! You’re on Mars Base Alpha, the first human outpost on the red planet. Don’t relax, though. It’s not all roses and unicorns up here. Mars isn’t called “The Bringer of War” for nothing! You’ve just been rained on by a meteor shower and it’s up to you—you!—to put your LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT robotics skills to work to save the day, and the base! And that’s only the beginning of the challenges that lie ahead.

LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT: Mars Base Command is a book of challenge. It’s about challenging yourself to design and build robots to solve problems, tough problems. Taking a similar approach to best-selling LEGO author James Kelly’s other books, this book presents a series of four challenges in the setting of mankind’s first-ever manned base on the planet Mars. Each challenge begins with a backstory to set the scene. You’re given instructions for constructing a playing field, including devices that your eventual robot must manipulate. Your job is to build a robot that will execute the challenge and garner you the most points.

The book requires the LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT Education Resource Set. Scoring sheets are included that allow for the book’s use in educational and group settings. Teachers can base lesson plans around the different concepts taught in each challenge. Groups and clubs can choose to run mini-competitions in which teams or individuals compete against each other in a race to save the base. LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT: Mars Base Command is an excellent choice for an individual, a group, or a teacher wishing to learn about and have more fun with LEGO’s best-selling robotics platform.

What you’ll learn Download Now »