Monthly Archives: March 2015

Kids love a makerspace

Posted on March 27, 2015 by paulwallich

When I got everything down to the library basement yesterday afternoon, there were already some kids waiting. Apparently they’ve been asking for a week or so when the next maker meeting was going to be. Mostly I set them loose … Continue reading →

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All hail our eight-armed server

Posted on March 24, 2015 by paulwallich

Octoprint rules. I read up on it, downloaded Octopi, flashed an SD card, booted up a pi and configured it, printed a up case and bolted it to a random piece of wood, twiddled a few settings, and here I … Continue reading →

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Sometimes you don’t want to be on the internet

Posted on March 23, 2015 by paulwallich

Yesterday I went to a piratebox workshop at Generator. It was a good thing, because although the installation process is fairly straightforward, there are a few places where it’s good to have someone walking you through it. (Yes, it really … Continue reading →

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Makers at the Statehouse

Posted on March 19, 2015 by paulwallich

I’d never been on the floor of a legislature before. Heck, I’d never even been inside the Vermont statehouse.  But my friend Lars, who happens to be executive director of Generator in Burlington, and one of his friends from the … Continue reading →

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Nasty things, adventures

Posted on March 18, 2015 by paulwallich

When my freshman-year college roommate was in medical school, he told me that surgeons were trained to say “There!” instead of “Oops” when they made a mistake like cutting the wrong organ, so as not to panic everyone around them. … Continue reading →

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And this is why you make really sure which USB port you’re writing to

Posted on March 16, 2015 by paulwallich

(Update: Mostly fixed. If reflashing a Printrboard from the bootloader on up interests you, see the next post.) I was getting ready to print a nice big dragon on my Printrbot, but I knew it was going to take several … Continue reading →

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Arduinos need more power pins

Posted on March 12, 2015 by paulwallich

And ground too. This morning I was fresh out of available breadboards. So I made my own power distribution strip out of an IC socket that was lying around on the workbench.  Took a couple of the zillion clipped-off component … Continue reading →

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It’s all in the background.

Posted on March 2, 2015 by paulwallich

When I was in college, I worked in a laser lab one summer, for a visiting professor who was doing research on metal-vapor lasers. The first half-dozen times we turned his apparatus on, all it did was make the grad … Continue reading →

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