The ocular fundus is the interior surface of the eye, and an ophthalmologist can learn a lot about a patient’s health by examining it. However, there’s a problem: an ocular fundus camera can’t capture a useful image unless the eye is brightly lit, but this makes the pupil constrict, obstructing the camera’s view. Ophthalmologists use pupil-dilating eye drops to block the eye’s response to light, but these are uncomfortable and can cause blurred vision for several hours. Now, researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago have built a Raspberry Pi-based fundus camera that can take photos of the retina without the need for eye drops.

Front of the prototype fundus camera by Bailey Y. Shen and Shizuo Mukai / CC BY 4.0

Dr Bailey Shen and co-author Dr Shizuo Mukai made their camera with a Raspberry Pi 2 and a Pi NoIR Camera Module, a version of the Camera Module that does not have an infrared filter. They used a small LCD touchscreen display and a lithium battery, holding the ensemble together with tape and rubber bands. They also connected a button and a dual infrared/white light LED to the Raspberry Pi’s GPIO pins.

Back of the prototype fundus camera, showing the touchscreen by Bailey Y. Shen and Shizuo Mukai / CC BY 4.0

When the Raspberry Pi boots, a Python script turns on the infrared illumination from the LED and displays the camera view on the screen. The iris does not respond to infrared light, so in a darkened room the operator is able to position the camera and a separate condensing lens to produce a clear image of the patient’s fundus. When they’re satisfied with the image, the operator presses the button. This turns off the infrared light, produces a flash of white light, and captures a colour image of the fundus before the iris can respond and constrict the pupil.

Infrared image of the author’s left fundus taken with the prototype fundus camera, and color image of the same fundus, by Bailey Y. Shen and Shizuo Mukai / CC BY 4.0

This isn’t the first ocular fundus camera to use infrared/white light to focus and obtain images without eye drops, but it is less bulky and distinctly cheaper than existing equipment, which can cost thousands of dollars. The total cost of all the parts is $185, and all but one are available as off-the-shelf components. The exception is the dual infrared/white light LED, a prototype which the researchers explain is a critical part of the equipment. Using an infrared LED and a white LED side by side doesn’t yield consistent results. We’d be glad to see the LED available on the market, both to support this particular application, and because we bet there are plenty of other builds that could use one!

Read more in Science Daily, in an article exploring the background to the project. The article is based on the researchers’ recent paper, presenting the Raspberry Pi ocular fundus camera in the Journal of Ophthalmology. The journal is an open access publication, so if you think this build is as interesting as I do, I encourage you to read the researchers’ presentation of their work, its possibilities and its limitations. They also provide step-by-step instructions and a parts list to help others to replicate and build on their work.

It’s beyond brilliant to see researchers and engineers using the Raspberry Pi to make medical and scientific work cheaper and more accessible. Please tell us about your favourite applications, or the applications you’d develop in your fantasy lab or clinic, in the comments.

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Source: Raspberry Pi – An affordable ocular fundus camera

In this digital age, where backup computers and multiple internet-connected devices are a must, maker phrazelle built this beautiful Raspberry Pi-powered steampunk laptop for his girlfriend.

And now we all want one. I mean, just look at it!

There’s no denying that, had Liz seen this before me, she’d have copied the link into an email and titled it INSTABLOG before sending it to my inbox.

This build is gorgeous. And as a fan of quirky-looking tech builds and of making things out of wood, it caught my eye in a heartbeat, causing me to exclaim “Why, I – ugh! – I want a Steampunk laptop?!” Shortly afterwards, there followed the realisation that there is an Instructables page for the project, leading me to rejoice that I could make my own. “You’ll never finish it,” chides the incomplete Magic Mirror beneath my desk. I shush it with a kick.

Winging it

“I didn’t really spec this out when I started building. I knew I wanted a box, but didn’t know how I was going to approach it,” explains phrazelle, a maker after my own “meh, I’ll wing it” heart. He continues, “I started with a mechanical keyboard with some typewriter-esque keys and built out a board for it. This went in a few directions, and I wound up with a Frankenstein keyboard tray.”

Image credit: phrazelle via Instructables

Originally wanting a hole for each key, phrazelle used a paint relief method to mark the place of each one. However, this didn’t work out too well, so he decided to jigsaw out a general space for the keys in a group. After a few attempts and an application of Gorilla Glue, it was looking good.

Image credit: phrazelle via Instructables

Building a Steampunk laptop

With his father’s help, phrazelle’s next step was to build the box for the body of the laptop. Again, it was something of an unplanned mashup, resulting in a box that was built around the keyboard tray. Via a series of mitred joints, routing, and some last minute trim, he was able to fit an LCD screen from a cannibalised laptop into the lid, complete with an LCD driver acquired from eBay.

Image credit: phrazelle via Instructables

All of the Steampunk trimmings

“As I was going in the Steampunk direction, gears and gauges seemed to make sense,” says phrazelle. “I found a lot of cool stuff on Etsy and Amazon. The front battery gauge, back switch plate, and LED indicator housings came off Etsy.” He also discovered that actual watch gears, which he had purchased in bulk, were too flimsy for use as decoration, so he replaced them with some brass replicas from Amazon instead. Hand-blown marbles worked as LED defusers and the case was complete.

Image credit: phrazelle via Instructables

Inside the belly of the (beautiful) beast

Within the laptop body, phrazelle (do let us know your actual name, by the way) included a Talentcell battery pack which he modified to cut the output lines, something that was causing grief when trying to charge the battery. He utilised a plugable USB 2.4 four-port powered hub to power the Raspberry Pi and optional USB devices. He also added a bushel of various other modifications, all of which he explains on his Instructables page.

I ran with the Pixel distro for this build. Then I went through and did some basic security housekeeping like changing the default password, closing every unnecessary port on the firewall, and disabling the Bluetooth. I even put the Bro IDS platform on it to keep an eye out for shifty hackers… *shakes fist*

Image credit: phrazelle via Instructables

This thing runs like a champ! For its intended functionality, it does everything it needs to. You can get on the internet, write papers, check email… If you want to get nerdy, you can even brush up on your coding skillz.

Instructables and you

As I said, we love this build. Not only is it a great example of creating an all-in-one Raspberry Pi laptop, but it’s also gorgeous! Make sure to check out phrazelle’s other builds on Instructables, including his Zelda-themed bartop arcade and his ornate magic mirror.

While you’re there, check out the other Raspberry Pi-themed builds on Instructables. There are LOADS of them. And they’re great. And if you wrote any of them – ahem! – like I did, you should be proud of yourself – ahem! – like I am. *clears throat even more pointedly*

Have you built your own Pi laptop? Tell us about it in the comments below. We can’t wait to see it!

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Source: Raspberry Pi – Steampunk laptop powered by Pi: OMG so fancy!

Last year, we partnered with Trinket to develop a web-based emulator for the Sense HAT, the multipurpose add-on board for the Raspberry Pi. Today, we are proud to announce an exciting new upgrade to the emulator. We hope this will make it even easier for you to design amazing experiments with the Sense HAT!

What’s new?

The original release of the emulator didn’t fully support all of the Sense HAT features. Specifically, the movement sensors were not emulated. Thanks to funding from the UK Space Agency, we are delighted to announce that a new round of development has just been completed. From today, the movement sensors are fully supported. The emulator also comes with a shiny new 3D interface, Astro Pi skin mode, and Pygame event handling. Click the ▶︎ button below to see what’s new!

Upgraded sensors

On a physical Sense HAT, real sensors react to changes in environmental conditions like fluctuations in temperature or humidity. The emulator has sliders which are designed to simulate this. However, emulating the movement sensor is a bit more complicated. The upgrade introduces a 3D slider, which is essentially a model of the Sense HAT that you can move with your mouse. Moving the model affects the readings provided by the accelerometer, gyroscope, and magnetometer sensors.

Code written in this emulator is directly portable to a physical Raspberry Pi and Sense HAT without modification. This means you can now develop and test programs using the movement sensors from any internet-connected computer, anywhere in the world.

Astro Pi mode

Astro Pi is our series of competitions offering students the chance to have their code run in space! The code is run on two space-hardened Raspberry Pi units, with attached Sense HATs, on the International Space Station.

Astro Pi skin mode

There are a number of practical things that can catch you out when you are porting your Sense HAT code to an Astro Pi unit, though, such as the orientation of the screen and joystick. Just as having a 3D-printed Astro Pi case enables you to discover and overcome these, so does the Astro Pi skin mode in this emulator. In the bottom right-hand panel, there is an Astro Pi button which enables the mode: click it again to go back to the Sense HAT.

The joystick and push buttons are operated by pressing your keyboard keys: use the cursor keys and Enter for the joystick, and U, D, L, R, A, and B for the buttons.

Sense Hat resources for Code Clubs

Click the image to visit the Code Club projects page

We also have a new range of Code Club resources which are based on the emulator. Of these, three use the environmental sensors and two use the movement sensors. The resources are an ideal way for any Code Club to get into physical computing.

The technology

The 3D models in the emulator are represented entirely with HTML and CSS. “This project pushed the Trinket team, and the 3D web, to its limit,” says Elliott Hauser, CEO of Trinket. “Our first step was to test whether pure 3D HTML/CSS was feasible, using Julian Garnier’s Tridiv.”

The Trinket team’s preliminary 3D model of the Sense HAT

“We added JavaScript rotation logic and the proof of concept worked!” Elliot continues. “Countless iterations, SVG textures, and pixel-pushing tweaks later, the finished emulator is far more than the sum of its parts.”

The finished Sense HAT model: doesn’t it look amazing?

Check out this blog post from Trinket for more on the technology and mathematics behind the models.

One of the compromises we’ve had to make is browser support. Unfortunately, browsers like Firefox and Microsoft Edge don’t fully support this technology yet. Instead, we recommend that you use Chrome, Safari, or Opera to access the emulator.

Where do I start?

If you’re new to the Sense HAT, you can simply copy and paste many of the code examples from our educational resources, like this one. Alternatively, you can check out our Sense HAT Essentials e-book. For a complete list of all the functions you can use, have a look at the Sense HAT API reference here.

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Source: Raspberry Pi – Sense HAT Emulator Upgrade

I recently discovered a TV channel which shows endless re-runs of the game show The Crystal Maze, and it got me thinking: what resources are available to help the younger generation experience the wonder of this iconic show? Well…

Enter the Crystal Maze

If you’re too young to remember The Crystal Maze, or if you come from a country lacking this nugget of TV gold, let me explain. A band of fairly useless contestants ran around a huge warehouse decked out to represent four zones: Industrial, Aztec, Futuristic, and Medieval. They were accompanied by a wisecracking host in a fancy coat, Richard O’Brien.

Richard O’Brien also wrote The Rocky Horror Picture Show so, y’know, he was interesting to watch if nothing else.

The contestants would enter rooms to play themed challenges – the categories were mental, physical, mystery, and skill – with the aim of winning crystals. If they messed up, they were locked in the room forever (well, until the end of the episode). For every crystal they collected, they’d be given a bit more time in a giant crystal dome at the end of the programme. And what did they do in the dome? They tried to collect pieces of gold paper while being buffeted by a wind machine, of course!

Collect enough gold paper and you win a mediocre prize. Fail to collect enough gold paper and you win a mediocre prize. Like I said: TV gold.

Sounds fun, doesn’t it? Here are some free resources that will help you recreate the experience of The Crystal Maze in your living room…without the fear of being locked in.

Marble maze

Photo credit: Board Game Geek

Make the classic Crystal Maze game, but this time with a digital marble! Use your Sense HAT to detect pitch, roll, and yaw as you guide the marble to its destination.

Bonus fact: marble mazes featured in the Crystal Maze board game from the 1990s.

Buzz Wire

Photo credit: Board Game Geek

Guide the hook along the wire and win the crystal! Slip up and buzz three times, though, and it’s an automatic lock-in. The beauty of this make is that you can play any fail sound you like: burp wire, anyone? Follow the tutorial by community member David Pride, which he created for the Cotswold Jam.

Laser tripwire

Photo credit: Marc Gerrish

Why not recreate the most difficult game of all? Can you traverse a room without setting off the laser alarms, and grab the crystal? Try your skill with our laser tripwire resource!

Forget the crystal! Get out!

I would love to go to a school fête where kids build their own Crystal Maze-style challenges. I’m sure there are countless other events which you could jazz up with a fun digital making challenge, though the bald dude in a fur coat remains optional. So if you have made your own Crystal Maze challenge, or you try out one of ours, we’d love to hear about it!

Here at the Raspberry Pi Foundation, we take great pride in the wonderful free resources we produce for you to use in classes, at home, and in coding clubs. We publish them under a Creative Commons licence, and they’re an excellent way to develop your digital making skills. And massive thanks to David Pride and the Cotswold Jam for creating and sharing your great resources for free.

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Source: Raspberry Pi – Build your own Crystal Maze at Home

While he and his son played with LEGO, Berlin-based programmer Jannis Hermanns had the urge to build a replica of one of the first computers he remembers using: the Macintosh Classic. Cut to the addition of a Raspberry Pi Zero running Docker, and an e-paper display, and you have yourself the cutest tech build to blow up my inbox in a while.

SO SO CUTE, OMG
Image credit Jannis Hermanns

LEGO: for ages four to 99

“I am not 100% sure if it was this exact model or perhaps the Macintosh 128K from 1988, but I guess it doesn’t really matter. All I did with that computer was play Shufflepuck Café,” Jannis reminisces on his website. “But anyway, this isn’t about Shufflepuck nostalgia. It’s about taking things too far while playing LEGO with your kid.”

Building a LEGO Macintosh Classic

To start the project, Jannis ordered a 2.7″ e-paper display from Embedded Artists. He then built a prototype using various colours of LEGO bricks and, well…

“Let me tell you one thing: it didn’t look good,” admits Jannis
Image credit: Jannis Hermanns

LEGO Digital Designer

Deciding that the ‘use random bricks and see what happens’ approach wasn’t the way to go, Jannis turned to the free LEGO Digital Designer (LDD) application and, using the rainbow prototype for reference, he created a 3D representation of the classic grey case he wanted.

LEGO Digital Designer

Uploaded by Jannis Hermanns on 2017-03-28.

At this point, he discovered a new issue. The screen’s board was too big to fit into the ideal size of the casing. So with a few tweaks, and some work with a Dremel, he was ready to order the necessary bricks for the build.

Ordering enough bricks to make two units, and having to compromise on colour due to time restrictions, Jannis took to building – and Dremel-ing – the case until it was complete.

Building a makeshift Zero W

As he was using a Zero, and therefore had no ribbon cable connector to make life easier, Jannis had to rely on his smarts, and figure out which GPIO pins he needed to solder to connect the screen. He also cannibalised a Raspberry Pi USB WiFi dongle to make a homebrew Zero W (the W was yet to be released at the time of building…just) and got to soldering.

Using Docker and resin.io

With one of the two builds being a gift for a friend, Jannis wanted to be able to access the Pi remotely to update the code and display image. We’re sure his intentions for what displayed on the screen were pure.

While playing with Docker on the Raspberry Pi, I came across the great ARM Docker base images from the folks over at resin.io. After checking out their service, I realized they do just what I was looking for: they’re like a Docker Cloud for the IoT.

Jannis goes into more detail on how to use Docker and resin.io to build your own LEGO Macintosh Classic, along with the necessary links and code, on his blog.

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Source: Raspberry Pi – Tiny LEGO Macintosh Classic with Pi inside

Computers and chess have been a potent combination ever since the appearance of the first chess-playing computers in the 1970s. You might even be able to play a game of chess on the device you are using to read this blog post! For digital makers, though, adding a Raspberry Pi into the mix can be the first step to building something a little more exciting. Allow us to introduce you to Joey Meyer‘s chess-playing robot, the Raspberry Turk.

Image credit: Joey Meyer

Being both an experienced software engineer with an interest in machine learning, and a skilled chess player, it’s not surprising that Joey was interested in tinkering with chess programs. What is really stunning, though, is the scale and complexity of the build he came up with. Fascinated by a famous historical hoax, Joey used his skills in programming and robotics to build an open-source Raspberry Pi-powered recreation of the celebrated Mechanical Turk automaton.

You can see the Raspberry Turk in action on Joey’s YouTube channel:

Chess Playing Robot Powered by Raspberry Pi – Raspberry Turk

The Raspberry Turk is a robot that can play chess-it’s entirely open source, based on Raspberry Pi, and inspired by the 18th century chess playing machine, the Mechanical Turk. Website: http://www.raspberryturk.com Source Code: https://github.com/joeymeyer/raspberryturk

A historical hoax

Joey explains that he first encountered the Mechanical Turk through a book by Tom Standage. A famous example of mechanical trickery, the original Turk was advertised as a chess-playing automaton, capable of defeating human opponents and solving complex puzzles.

A modern reconstruction of the Mechanical Turk 
Image from Wikimedia Commons

Its inner workings a secret, the Turk toured Europe for the best part of a century, confounding everyone who encountered it. Unfortunately, it turned out not to be a fabulous example of early robotic engineering after all. Instead, it was just an elaborate illusion. The awesome chess moves were not being worked out by the clockwork brain of the automaton, but rather by a human chess master who was cunningly concealed inside the casing.

Building a modern Turk

A modern version of the Mechanical Turk was constructed in the 1980s. However, the build cost $120,000. At that price, it would have been impossible for most makers to create their own version. Impossible, that is, until now: Joey uses a Raspberry Pi 3 to drive the Raspberry Turk, while a Raspberry Pi Camera Module handles computer vision.

The Raspberry Turk in the middle of a game 
Image credit: Joey Meyer

Joey’s Raspberry Turk is built into a neat wooden table. All of the electronics are housed in a box on one side. The chessboard is painted directly onto the table’s surface. In order for the robot to play, a Camera Module located in a 3D-printed housing above the table takes an image of the chessboard. The image is then analysed to determine which pieces are in which positions at that point. By tracking changes in the positions of the pieces, the Raspberry Turk can determine which moves have been made, and which piece should move next. To train the system, Joey had to build a large dataset to validate a computer vision model. This involved painstakingly moving pieces by hand and collecting multiple images of each possible position.

Look, no hands!

A key feature of the Mechanical Turk was that the automaton appeared to move the chess pieces entirely by itself. Of course, its movements were actually being controlled by a person hidden inside the machine. The Raspberry Turk, by contrast, does move the chess pieces itself. To achieve this, Joey used a robotic arm attached to the table. The arm is made primarily out of Actobotics components. Joey explains:

The motion is controlled by the rotation of two servos which are attached to gears at the base of each link of the arm. At the end of the arm is another servo which moves a beam up and down. At the bottom of the beam is an electromagnet that can be dynamically activated to lift the chess pieces.

Joey individually fitted the chess pieces with tiny sections of metal dowel so that the magnet on the arm could pick them up.

Programming the Raspberry Turk

The Raspberry Turk is controlled by a daemon process that runs a perception/action sequence, and the status updates automatically as the pieces are moved. The code is written almost entirely in Python. It is all available on Joey’s GitHub repo for the project, together with his notebooks on the project.

Image credit: Joey Meyer

The AI backend that gives the robot its chess-playing ability is currently Stockfish, a strong open-source chess engine. Joey says he would like to build his own engine when he has time. For the moment, though, he’s confident that this AI will prove a worthy opponent.

The project website goes into much more detail than we are able to give here. We’d definitely recommend checking it out. If you have been experimenting with any robotics or computer vision projects like this, please do let us know in the comments!

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Source: Raspberry Pi – Raspberry Turk: a chess-playing robot

Multi-talented maker Giorgio Sancristoforo has used a Raspberry Pi and Sense HAT to create Tableau, a generative music album. It’s an innovative idea: the music constantly evolves as it reacts to environmental stimuli like atmospheric pressure, humidity, and temperature.

Tableau Generative Album

“There is no doubt that, as music is removed by the phonographrecord from the realm of live production and from the imperative of artistic activity and becomes petrified, it absorbs into itself, in this process of petrification, the very life that would otherwise vanish.”

Creating generative music

“I’ve been dreaming about using portable microcomputers to create a generative music album,” explains Giorgio. “Now my dream is finally a reality: this is my first portable generative LP (PGLP)”. Tableau uses both a Raspberry Pi 2 and a Sense HAT: the HAT provides the data for the album’s musical evolution via its range of onboard sensors.

Photo credit: Giorgio Sancristoforo

The Sense HAT was originally designed for use aboard the International Space Station (ISS) as part of the ongoing Astro Pi challenge. It has, however, become a staple within the Raspberry Pi maker community. This is partly thanks to the myriad of possibilities offered by its five onboard sensors, five-button joystick, and 8 × 8 LED matrix.

Photo credit: Giorgio Sancristoforo

Limited edition

The final release of Tableau consists of a limited edition of fifty PGLPs: each is set up to begin playing immediately power is connected, and the music will continue to evolve indefinitely. “Instead of being reproduced as on a CD or in an MP3 file, the music is spontaneously generated and arranged while you are listening to it,” Giorgio explains on his website. “It never sounds the same. Tableau creates an almost endless number of mixes of the LP (4 × 12 factorial). Each time you will listen, the music will be different, and it will keep on evolving until you switch the power off.”

Photo credit: Giorgio Sancristoforo

Experiment with the Sense HAT

What really interests us is how the sound of Tableau might alter in different locations. Would it sound different in Cambridge as opposed to the deserts of Mexico? What about Antarctica versus the ISS?

If Giorgio’s project has piqued your interest, why not try using our free data logging resource for the Sense HAT? You can use it to collect information from the HAT’s onboard sensors and create your own projects. How about collecting data over a year, and transforming this into your own works of art?

Even if you don’t have access to the Sense HAT, you can experience it via the Sense HAT desktop emulator. This is a great solution if you want to work on Sense HAT-based projects in the classroom, as it reduces the amount of hardware you need.

If you’ve already built a project using the Sense HAT, make sure to share it in the comments below. We would love to see what you have been making!

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Source: Raspberry Pi – Tableau: a generative music album based on the Sense HAT

After months of planning and making, we’ve come to the end of the first cycle of our new digital making programme for teenagers: it’s time to announce the Pioneers winners!

We laid down the epic challenge of making us laugh. And boy, did the teams deliver. I can honestly say that my face hurt from all the laughing on judging day.

The judges

The aim was to find a group of judges with a varied mix of interests and skills. We were beyond chuffed to snag this awesome group:

Dr Lucy Rogers

Dr Lucy Rogers transforms simple tech into cool gadgets, science into plain English, and problems into opportunities. She’s a fellow of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers and author of the books ‘It’s ONLY Rocket Science‘ and the soon-to-be-published ‘Wiring the IoT‘. She’s also a Raspberry Jam organiser, a judge on BBC’s Robot Wars, and the person responsible for introducing Raspberry Pi-controlled animatronic dinosaurs to the Blackgang Chine Land of Imagination on the Isle of Wight.

Owen Daughtery

Owen Daughtery is a graduate of Raspberry Pi’s Creative Technologists programme and an enthusiastic maker. You’ll no doubt recognise him from our original Pioneers videos and his inability to say a certain phrase. When he’s not making videos for us, or for his YouTube channel, Owen is also a skilled magician.

Bec Hill

Comedian Bec Hill has a talent for incorporating arts and crafts into her stand-up routines, creating a unique and unforgettable comedy style that she calls ‘paper-puppetry’. She’s also creator of Pun Run, one half of entertainment duo Bec & Tom, and has voiced several characters for the newly released Mass Effect: Andromeda.

Maria Quevedo

Maria Quevedo is the director of Code Club UK. She’s amazing at yoga, cooks a mean Spanish tortilla, and originally hails from Argentina. She was also raised in a stationery shop, which is pretty much my dream. According to members of the Code Club team, Maria is delightfully calm under pressure…though she did fail to keep her cool when faced with judging the Pioneers winners.

The Pioneers winners

Winners of the first Pioneers challenge are…

After months of planning and making, the first round of Pioneers is over! We laid down the epic challenge of making us laugh. And boy, did the teams deliver. We can honestly say that my face hurt from all the laughing on judging day. Congratulations to everyone who took part.

Congratulations to the theme-winning team The Technological Tricksters and their project, Singing Potato. As Bec explained in the video, this project made us laugh…a lot. And through our tears of laughter, we were pleased to see the use of several different skills, along with a killer Gollum impression.

Alongside the overall theme winner, we also awarded prizes for the following five categories:

• Inspiring Journey: the winners of this award experimented with a range of technologies, learned new skills and produced a final project that worked perfectly. Congratulations to Heritage Hackers and their Water Pistol Trap for winning this award.

• Best Explanation: the team that hit the perfect balance of detail about what they made and how they made it were Black Thunder. We loved the explanation you gave for building your Living Joke Robot. Well done!

• Technically Brilliant: the team that used the most impressive combination of technologies were the Shady Hackers with their Scare Chair Rig. Great use of a fire alarm hack…though we hope you didn’t use the home one.

• We appreciate what you’re trying to do: making is a hobby which involves mistakes along the way, and it’s best to carry on without getting discouraged. Just because you haven’t finished, it doesn’t mean that you can’t submit your work to Pioneers and explain what you wanted to do and how. PiCymru‘s We Shall Overcomb did exactly that. We hope you manage to complete your project as we’d love to see it working!

Not forgetting…

Everyone was completely blown away by the projects we saw. And though we couldn’t award every entry a prize, the judges agreed that the following four projects deserved special recognition rewards for their teams:

• Ghost in the Mirror by Nuex*
• Dance Mat by The Frontier Team
• Disco Pen by Team Star
• Pi(oneer) Hat by Pirates

Electrocuting computer mouse

Our mean boss wouldn’t let this one win (to be fair, we did say not to hurt anyone), but it genuinely made all the Raspberry Pi staff laugh which wins it a dishonourable mention from me. It was also a great hack of an electric fly trap. Well done Team Spark Wire…but maaaaybe try to be a little less lethal with your next submission.

And finally…

To everyone who took part in the first Pioneers challenge, thank you so much for your contributions, and congratulations on everything you achieved. You thrilled us with your tweets, emails, and final submissions, and we hope you also learned some great new skills and possibly made some new friends along the way. Massive thanks to our friends at the Shell Centenary Scholarship Fund for making Pioneers possible. Find out about their awesome work here.

The next Pioneers challenge is…

Shhh! It’s still a secret. We’re not announcing the new challenge until April, so keep your eyes on both the Pioneers website and our social accounts, and sign up to receive the Pioneers newsletter!

Until then, remember to always #MakeYourIdeas.

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Source: Raspberry Pi – Pioneers Winners: Make Us Laugh Challenge

Hi, Rob from The MagPi here! It’s the last Thursday of the month and that means there’s a new issue of the official Raspberry Pi magazine: yay!

Grab your copy today!

The MagPi Magazine 56

The MagPi 56 covers some incredible Raspberry Pi projects built by members of our community, from simple things you can make quickly, like an easy robot or LEGO Pi case, to more advanced projects to experiment with, like a set of Pinoculars.

Our news section looks at some great new happenings in the world of Pi, such as the new Pimoroni kits for Zero W, the Cambridge theme for PIXEL, and our fifth birthday celebrations.

Also not to be missed in this issue is our lowdown of every Raspberry Pi operating system: which is your favourite? While you’re weighing up the pros and cons of Raspbian vs. Ubuntu MATE, you can also read about our DJ Hero harmonograph, some hot command line tips, and much more.

The MagPi is the only monthly magazine written by and for the Pi community. Regardless of your experience with the Raspberry Pi, there’s something for everyone.

Get your copy

You can grab the latest issue of The MagPi today from WHSmith, Tesco, Sainsbury’s, and Asda. Alternatively, you can order your copy online, or get it digitally via our app on Android and iOS. There’s even a free PDF of it as well.

We also have a fantastic subscription offer to celebrate the new Raspberry Pi Zero W: grab a twelve-month subscription and you’ll get a Raspberry Pi Zero W absolutely free, along with a free official case and a bundle of adapter cables. Get yours online right now!

Free Creative Commons download

As always, you can download your copy of The MagPi completely free. Grab it straight from the issue page for The MagPi 56.

Don’t forget, though, that, as with sales of the Raspberry Pi itself, all proceeds from the print and digital editions of the magazine go to help the Raspberry Pi Foundation achieve its charitable goals. Help us democratise computing!

We hope you enjoy the issue! That’s it until next month…

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London-based Solid State Group decided to combine Slack with a giant LED wall, and created a thing of beauty for their office.

“BUILD THE WALL we cried aloud. Well, in truth, we shouted this over Slack, until the pixel wall became a thing.” Niall Quinn, Solid State Group.

Flexing the brain

Project name RIO: Rendered-Input-Output took its inspiration from Google Creative Lab’s anypixel.js project. An open source software and hardware library, anypixel.js boasts the ability to ‘create big, unusual, interactive displays out of all kinds of things’ such as arcade buttons and balloons.

Every tech company has side projects and Solid State is no different. It keeps devs motivated and flexes the bits of the brain sometimes not quite reached by day-to-day coding. Sometimes these side projects become products, sometimes we crack open a beer and ask “what the hell were we thinking”, but always we learn something – about the process, and perhaps ourselves.

Niall Quinn, Solid State Group

To ‘flex the bits of the brain’, the team created their own in-house resource. Utilising Slack as their interface, they were able to direct images, GIFs and video over the internet to the Pi-powered LED wall.

Bricks and mortar

They developed an API for ‘drawing’ each pixel of the content sent to the wall, and converting them to match the pixels of the display.

After experimenting with the code on a small 6×5 pixel replica, the final LED wall was built using WS2812B RGB strips. With 2040 LEDs in total to control, higher RAM and power requirements called for the team to replace their microcontroller. Enter the Raspberry Pi.

“With more pixels come more problems. LEDs gobble up RAM and draw a lot of power, so we switched from an Arduino to a Raspberry Pi, and got ourselves a pretty hefty power supply.”

Alongside the Slack-to-wall image sharing, Solid State also developed their own mobile app. This app used the HTML5 canvas element to draw data for the wall. The app enabled gaming via a SNES-style controller, a live drawing application, a messaging function and live preview capabilities.

Build your own LED wall

If you’re planning on building your own LED wall, whether for an event, a classroom, an office or a living room, the Solid State team have shared the entire project via their GitHub page. To read a full breakdown of the build, make sure you visit their blog. And if you do build your own, or have done already, make sure to share it in the comments below.

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Have you ever fancied building a Raspberry Pi photo booth? How about one with Snapchat-esque overlay filters? What if it tweeted your images to its own Twitter account for all to see?

The All-Seeing Pi on Twitter

The All Seeing Pi has seen you visiting @Raspberry_Pi Party @missphilbin #PiParty

Introducing The All-Seeing Pi

“Well, the thing I really want to say (if you haven’t already) is that this whole thing was a team build”, explains one of the resource creators, Laura Sach. “I think it would be a brilliant project to do as a team!”

The resource originally came to life at Pycon, where the team demonstrated the use of filters alongside the Camera Module in their hands-on workshops. From there, the project grew into The All-Seeing Pi, which premiered at the Bett stand earlier this year.

The All-Seeing Pi on Twitter

The All Seeing Pi has seen you, @theallseeingpi #PiatBETT #BETT2017

Build your own photo booth

To build your own, you’ll need:

• A Camera Module
• A monitor (we used a touchscreen for ours)
• Two tactile buttons (you can replace these later with bigger buttons if you wish)
• A breadboard
• Some male-female jumper leads

If you’re feeling artistic, you can also use a box to build a body for your All-Seeing Pi.

By following the worksheets within the resource, you’ll learn how to set up the Camera Module, connect buttons and a display, control GPIO pins and the camera with Python code, and how to tweet a photo.

Raspberry Pi Foundation’s free resources

We publish our resources under a Creative Commons license, allowing you to use them for free at home, in clubs, and in schools. The All-Seeing Pi resource has been written to cover elements from the Raspberry Pi Digital Curriculum. You can find more information on the curriculum here.

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Walk around the commons of Cambridge and you’re bound to see one or more of the Cambridge University Quidditch Club players mounted upon sticks with a makeshift quaffle. But try as they might, their broomsticks will never send them soaring through the air.

The same faux-wizardry charge can’t be levelled at Allen Pan‘s Real-Life Wizard Duel. For when the wand-wielding witches or wizards cast one of four Harry Potter spells, their opponent is struck accordingly… as if by magic.

Real Life Wizard Duel with ELECTRICITY | Sufficiently Advanced

Body shocking wands with speech recognition…It’s indistinguishable from magic! Follow Sufficiently Advanced! https://twitter.com/AnyTechnology https://www.facebook.com/sufficientlyadvanced https://www.instagram.com/sufficientlyadvanced/ Check out redRomina: https://www.youtube.com/user/redRomina Watch our TENS unit challenge! https://youtu.be/Ntovn4N9HNs These peeps helped film, check them out too!

Real spells, real consequences

Allen uses Transcutaneous Electrical Nerve Stimulation (TENS) machines to deliver the mighty blows to both himself and his opponent, setting off various sticky pads across the body via voice recognition.

The Google Cloud Speech Recognition API recognises one of five spells – Expelliarmus, Stupefy, Tarantallegra, Petrificus Totalus, and Protego – via a microphone plugged into a Raspberry Pi.

When the spell is pronounced correctly and understood by the Pi, it tells an Arduino to ‘shoot’ the spell out of the wand via an infrared LED. If the infrared receiver attached to the opponent recognises the spell, it sets off the TENS machine to deliver an electric current to the appropriate body part. Expelliarmus, for example, sets off the TENS connected to the arm, while calling out a successful Petrificus Totalus renders the opponent near immobilised as every pad is activated. For a moment’s rest, calling out “Protego” toward your own infrared receiver offers a few moments of protection against all spells aimed in your direction. Phew.

“But people only die in proper duels, you know, with real wizards. The most you and Malfoy’ll be able to do is send sparks at each other. Neither of you knows enough magic to do any real damage. I bet he expected you to refuse, anyway.”
“And what if I wave my wand and nothing happens?”
“Throw it away and punch him on the nose,” Ron suggested.
Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone

Defence Against the Dark Arts

To prevent abuse of the spells, each one has its own recharge time, with available spells indicated via LEDs on the wand.

In the realm of Harry Potter fan builds, this has to be a favourite. And while visitors to The Wizarding World of Harry Potter may feel the magical effect of reimagined Butterbeer as they wander around Hogsmead, I’d definitely prefer to play Real Life Wizard Duel with Allen Pan.

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On 1-2  April, Cambridge Raspberry Jam will be hosting Pi Wars 2017, the latest iteration of their successful robotics challenge competition.

For those unfamiliar with the setup, Pi Wars contestants use home-brew Raspberry Pi-powered robots to compete across seven challenge courses. There’s also a host of other categories, including prizes for Artistic and Technical Merit, as well as an award for ‘Funniest Robot’!

With only a few days to go until the big weekend, we’ve wrangled Pi Wars 2017 hosts, Mike and Tim, to give us the lowdown on everything you need to know before the main event.

Crowds gather around the Obstacle Course from the 2015 competition

Pi Wars 2017

This is the third time the competition has been run, and this time we’re running the event over two days:

• Saturday – School teams.
• Sunday – Beginner, Intermediate and Pro/Veteran teams.

With teams coming all the way from the USA, Germany, Switzerland, Wales and Scotland as well as England, it truly is an international competition! There are more than 65 teams competing across the weekend. Judging by some of the tweets we’ve been seeing, there’s likely to be some fierce competition!

Special guest and head judge

Lucy rightly running from House Robot, Sir Killalot, on the set of BBC Robot Wars

We are very fortunate to welcome BBC Robot Wars judge Dr. Lucy Rogers as our special guest and head judge. Away from Robot Wars, Lucy is an independent designer and maker, and famously introduced Raspberry Pi-controlled animatronics to the Blackgang Chine theme park on the Isle of Wight.

Get tickets, come along and watch the action

If you’re in the Cambridge area, or even if you’re further afield, you can come along and watch. Pi Wars 2017 spectator tickets are available from Eventbrite. Children aged 16 and under go free, as do volunteers, and it’s just £5 per day (or £7 for the whole weekend) for everyone else.

What else is happening?

In addition to the competing teams, there will be plenty of show-and-tell tables featuring robotics projects, plus an extensive marketplace featuring your favourite vendors.

Where is it?

The event takes place at the Cambridge Computer Laboratory (William Gates Building). There is free parking a (very) short walk away, and there is catering on site (or bring a packed lunch!). It’s a nice family-friendly day out. You can chat to the stall holders and teams (when they’re not running between challenges!), and generally find out what is possible with the Raspberry Pi, some robotics components, a healthy dose of programming and a maker’s mindset!

The William Gates Building

What have we been doing to prepare?

Tim has been hard at work designing and building courses for our seven challenges, which are:

• Straight-line speed test (autonomous) – get down the course as fast as possible without touching the walls.
• The minimal maze (autonomous) – get around the maze without touching the walls.
• The line follower (autonomous) – follow the black line for as many circuits as possible.
• Slightly deranged golf (remote-controlled) – a beautiful, mystery course that will have a special component added to it by Pi Borg!
• The obstacle course (remote-controlled) – who knows what’s in store this year?
• Skittles (remote-controlled) – knock the pins down, score points.
• Pi Noon – the robot vs robot duel (remote-controlled) – pop the other robot’s balloon before the time runs out.

2015’s Pi Noon competition

Find out more about the courses and the rules on the Pi Wars 2017 website.

Mike has been fiercely sending out emails to competitors, exhibitors, volunteers, vendors and our wonderful Pi Wars 2017 sponsors, without whom we would be unable to run the event. He’s also busy constructing individual timetables for each team, so everyone knows exactly where they need to be for their challenge runs.

We’re really looking forward to the weekend – it’s all coming together, and with the help of our volunteers, you can be assured of a warm welcome to the venue. So, grab your tickets and prepare for an epic showdown between dozens of robots, all powered by your favourite single-board computer!

The future of Pi Wars

There is an upcoming Pi Wars-style competition in Pennsylvania, USA on 3 June (The MagPi Magazine published a blog about this today), and we’re expecting another USA competition at some point, as well as a possible Pi Wars Scotland. As for the future of the Cambridge-based event? Let’s get this one out of the way first!

Any questions? The best way to contact us is via the Pi Wars 2017 website. Alternatively, give us a shout on Twitter!

Mike and Tim

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In October last year, with the European Space Agency and CNES, we launched the first ever European Astro Pi challenge. We asked students from all across Europe to write code for the flight of French ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet to the International Space Station (ISS) as part of the Proxima mission. Today, we are very excited to announce the winners! First of all, though, we have a very special message from Thomas Pesquet himself, which comes all the way from space…

Thomas Pesquet congratulates Astro Pi participants from space

French ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet floats in to thank all participants in the European Astro Pi challenge. In October last year, together with the European Space Agency, we launched the first ever European Astro Pi challenge for the flight of French ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet to the International Space Station (ISS) as part of mission Proxima.

Thomas also recorded a video in French: you can click here to see it and to enjoy some more of his excellent microgravity acrobatics.

A bit of background

This year’s competition expands on our previous work with British ESA astronaut Tim Peake, in which, together with the UK Space Agency and ESA, we invited UK students to design software experiments to run on board the ISS.

Astro Pi Vis (AKA Ed) on board the ISS. Image from ESA.

In 2015, we built two space-hardened Raspberry Pi units, or Astro Pis, to act as the platform on which to run the students’ code. Affectionately nicknamed Ed and Izzy, the units were launched into space on an Atlas V rocket, arriving at the ISS a few days before Tim Peake. He had a great time running all of the programs, and the data collected was transmitted back to Earth so that the winners could analyse their results and share them with the public.

The European challenge provides the opportunity to design code to be run in space to school students from every ESA member country. To support the participants, we worked with ESA and CPC to design, manufacture, and distribute several hundred free Astro Pi activity kits to the teams who registered. Further support for teachers was provided in the form of three live webinars, a demonstration video, and numerous free educational resources.

The Astro Pi activity kit used by participants in the European challenge.

The challenge

Thomas Pesquet assigned two missions to the teams:

• A primary mission, for which teams needed to write code to detect when the crew are working in the Columbus module near the Astro Pi units.
• A secondary mission, for which teams needed to come up with their own scientific investigation and write the code to execute it.

The deadline for code submissions was 28 February 2017, with the judging taking place the following week. We can now reveal which schools will have the privilege of having their code uploaded to the ISS and run in space.

The proud winners!

Everyone produced great work and the judges found it really tough to narrow the entries down. In addition to the winning submissions, there were a number of teams who had put a great deal of work into their projects, and whose entries have been awarded ‘Highly Commended’ status. These teams will also have their code run on the ISS.

We would like to say a big thank you to everyone who participated. Massive congratulations are due to the winners! We will upload your code digitally using the space-to-ground link over the next few weeks. Your code will be executed, and any files created will be downloaded from space and returned to you via email for analysis.

In no particular order, the winners are:

France

• Winners
  • @stroteam, Institut de Genech, Hauts-de-France
  • Wierzbinski, École à la maison, Occitanie
  • Les Marsilyens, École J. M. Marsily, PACA
  • MauriacSpaceCoders, Lycée François Mauriac, Nouvelle-Aquitaine
  • Ici-bas, École de Saint-André d’Embrun, PACA
  • Les Astrollinaires, Lycée général et technologique Guillaume Apollinaire, PACA

• Highly Commended
  • ALTAÏR, Lycée Albert Claveille, Nouvelle Aquitaine
  • GalaXess Reloaded, Lycée Saint-Cricq, Nouvelle Aquitaine
  • Les CM de Neffiès, École Louis Authie, Occitanie
  • Équipe Sciences, Collège Léonce Bourliaguet, Nouvelle Aquitaine
  • Maurois ICN, Lycée André Maurois, Normandie
  • Space Project SP4, Lycée Saint-Paul IV, Île de la Réunion
  • 4eme2 Gymnase Jean Sturm, Gymnase Jean Sturm, Grand Est
  • Astro Pascal dans les étoiles, École Pascal, Île-de-France
  • les-4mis, EREA Alexandre Vialatte, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes
  • Space Cavenne Oddity, École Cavenne, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes
  • Luanda for Space, Lycée Français de Luanda, Angola
    (Note: this is a French international school and the team members have French nationality/citizenship)
  • François Detrille, Lycée Langevin-Wallon, Île-de-France

Greece

• Winners
  • Delta, TALOS ed-UTH-robotix, Magnesia
  • Weightless Mass, Intercultural Junior High School of Evosmos, Macedonia
  • 49th Astro Pi Teamwork, 49th Elementary School of Patras, Achaia
  • Astro Travellers, 12th Primary School of Petroupolis, Attiki
  • GKGF-1, Gymnasium of Kanithos, Sterea Ellada

• Highly Commended
  • AstroShot, Lixouri High School, Kefalonia
  • Salamina Rockets Pi, 1st Senior High School of Salamina, Attiki
  • The four Astro-fans, 6th Gymnasio of Veria, Macedonia
  • Samians, 2nd Gymnasio Samou, North Eastern Aegean

United Kingdom

• Winners
  • Madeley Ad Astra, Madeley Academy, Shropshire
  • Team Dexterity, Dyffryn Taf School, Carmarthenshire
  • The Kepler Kids, St Nicolas C of E Junior School, Berkshire
  • Catterline Pi Bugs, Catterline Primary, Aberdeenshire
  • smileyPi, Westminster School, London

• Highly Commended
  • South London Raspberry Jam, South London Raspberry Jam, London

Italy

• Winners
  • Garibaldini, Istituto Comprensivo Rapisardi-Garibaldi, Sicilia
  • Buzz, IIS Verona-Trento, Sicilia
  • Water warmers, Liceo Scientifico Galileo Galilei, Abruzzo
  • Juvara/Einaudi Siracusa, IIS L. Einaudi, Sicilia
  • AstroTeam, IIS Arimondi-Eula, Piemonte

Poland

• Winners
  • Birnam, Zespół Szkoły i Gimnazjum im. W. Orkana w Niedźwiedziu, Malopolska
  • TechnoZONE, Zespół Szkół nr 2 im. Eugeniusza Kwiatkowskiego, Podkarpacie
  • DeltaV, Gimnazjum nr 49, Województwo śląskie
  • The Safety Crew, MZS Gimnazjum nr 1, Województwo śląskie
  • Warriors, Zespół Szkół Miejskich nr 3 w Jaśle, Podkarpackie

• Highly Commended
  • The Young Cuiavian Astronomers, Gimnazjum im. Stefana Kardynała Wyszyńskiego w Piotrkowie Kujawskim, Kujawsko-pomorskie
  • AstroLeszczynPi, I Liceum Ogolnokształcace w Jasle im. Krola Stanislawa Leszczynskiego, Podkarpackie

Portugal

• Winners
  • Sampaionautas, Escola Secundária de Sampaio, Setúbal
  • Labutes Pi, Escola Secundária D. João II, Setúbal
  • AgroSpace Makers, EB 2/3 D. Afonso Henriques, Cávado
  • Zero Gravity, EB 2/3 D. Afonso Henriques, Cávado
  • Lua, Agrupamento de Escolas José Belchior Viegas, Algarve

Romania

• Winners
  • AstroVianu, Tudor Vianu National High School of Computer Science, Bucharest
  • MiBus Researchers, Mihai Busuioc High School, Iași
  • Cosmos Dreams, Nicolae Balcescu High School, Cluj
  • Carmen Sylva Astro Pi, Liceul Teoretic Carmen Sylva Eforie, Constanța
  • Stargazers, Tudor Vianu National High School of Computer Science, Bucharest

Spain

• Winners
  • Papaya, IES Sopela, Vizcaya
  • Salesianos-Ubeda, Salesianos Santo Domingo Savio, Andalusia
  • Valdespartans, IES Valdespartera, Aragón
  • Ins Terrassa, Institut Terrassa, Cataluña

Ireland

• Winner
  • Moonty1, Mayfield Community School, Cork

Germany

• Winner
  • BSC Behringersdorf Space Center, Labenwolf-Gymnasium, Bayern

Norway

• Winner
  • Skedsmo Kodeklubb, Kjeller Skole, Akershus

Hungary

• Winner
  • UltimaSpace, Mihaly Tancsics Grammar School of Kaposvár, Somogy

Belgium

• Winner
  • Lambda Voyager, Stedelijke Humaniora Dilsen, Limburg

FAQ

Why aren’t all 22 ESA member states listed?

• Because some countries did not have teams participating in the challenge.

Why do some countries have fewer than five teams?

• Either because those countries had fewer than five teams qualifying for space flight, or because they had fewer than five teams participating in the challenge.

How will I get my results back from space?

• After your code has run on the ISS, we will download any files you created and they will be emailed to your teacher.

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Allen Pan has wired up his home automation system to be controlled by memorable tunes from the classic Zelda franchise.

Zelda Ocarina Controlled Home Automation – Zelda: Ocarina of Time | Sufficiently Advanced

With Zelda: Breath of the Wild out on the Nintendo Switch, I made a home automation system based off the Zelda series using the ocarina from The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. Help Me Make More Awesome Stuff! https://www.patreon.com/sufficientlyadvanced Subscribe! http://goo.gl/xZvS5s Follow Sufficiently Advanced!

Listen!

Released in 1998, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time is the best game ever is still an iconic entry in the retro gaming history books.

Very few games have stuck with me in the same way Ocarina has, and I think it’s fair to say that, with the continued success of the Zelda franchise, I’m not the only one who has a special place in their heart for Link, particularly in this musical outing.

Thanks to Cynosure Gaming‘s Ocarina of Time review for the image.

Allen, or Sufficiently Advanced, as his YouTube subscribers know him, has used a Raspberry Pi to detect and recognise key tunes from the game, with each tune being linked (geddit?) to a specific task. By playing Zelda’s Lullaby (E, G, D, E, G, D), for instance, Allen can lock or unlock the door to his house. Other tunes have different functions: Epona’s Song unlocks the car (for Ocarina noobs, Epona is Link’s horse sidekick throughout most of the game), and Minuet of Forest waters the plants.

So how does it work?

It’s a fairly simple setup based around note recognition. When certain notes are played in a specific sequence, the Raspberry Pi detects the tune via a microphone within the Amazon Echo-inspired body of the build, and triggers the action related to the specific task. The small speaker you can see in the video plays a confirmation tune, again taken from the video game, to show that the task has been completed.

As for the tasks themselves, Allen has built a small controller for each action, whether it be a piece of wood that presses down on his car key, a servomotor that adjusts the ambient temperature, or a water pump to hydrate his plants. Each controller has its own small ESP8266 wireless connectivity module that links back to the wireless-enabled Raspberry Pi, cutting down on the need for a ton of wires about the home.

And yes, before anybody says it, we’re sure that Allen is aware that using tone recognition is not the safest means of locking and unlocking your home. This is just for fun.

Do-it-yourself home automation

While we don’t necessarily expect everyone to brush up on their ocarina skills and build their own Zelda-inspired home automation system, the idea of using something other than voice or text commands to control home appliances is a fun one.

You could use facial recognition at the door to start the kettle boiling, or the detection of certain gasses to – ahem!– spray an air freshener.

We love to see what you all get up to with the Raspberry Pi. Have you built your own home automation system controlled by something other than your voice? Share it in the comments below.

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With the JavaWatch system from Terren Peterson, there’s (Raspberry Pi) ZERO reason for you ever to run out of coffee beans again!

By utilising many of the Amazon Web Services (AWS) available to budding developers, Terren was able to create a Pi Zero-powered image detection unit. Using the Raspberry Pi Camera Module to keep tabs on your coffee bean storage, it automatically orders a fresh batch of java when supplies are running low.

JavaWatch Sales Pitch

Introducing JavaWatch, the amazing device that monitors your coffee bean supply and refills from Amazon.com.

Coffee: quite possibly powering Pi Towers’ success

Here at Pi Towers, it’s safe to say that the vast majority of staff members run on high levels of caffeine. In fact, despite hitting ten million Pi boards sold last October, sending two Astro Pi units to space, documenting over 5,000 Code Clubs in the UK, and multiple other impressive achievements, the greatest accomplishment of the Pi Towers team is probably the acquisition of a new all-singing, all-dancing coffee machine for the kitchen. For, if nothing else, it has increased the constant flow of caffeine into the engineers…and that’s always a positive thing, right?

Here are some glamour shots of the beautiful beast:

Anyway, back to JavaWatch

Terren uses the same technology that can be found in an Amazon Dash button, replacing the ‘button-press’ stimulus with image recognition to trigger a purchase request.

Going with the JavaWatch flow… 
Image from Terren’s hackster.io project page.

“The service was straightforward to get working,” Terren explains on his freeCodeCamp blog post. “The Raspberry Pi Camera Module captures and uploads photos at preset intervals to S3, the object-based storage service by AWS.”

The data is used to calculate the amount of coffee beans in stock. For example, the jar in the following image is registered at 73% full:

It could also be 27% empty, depending on your general outlook on life.

A second photo, where the beans take up a mere 15% or so of the jar, registers no beans. As a result, JavaWatch orders more via a small website created specifically for the task, just like pressing a Dash button.

JavaWatch DRS Demo

Demonstration of DRS Capabilities with a project called JavaWatch. This orders coffee beans when the container runs empty.

Terren won second place in hackster.io’s Amazon DRS Developer Challenge for JavaWatch. If you are in need of regular and reliable caffeine infusions, you can find more information on the build, including Terren’s code, on his project page.

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Following a post-Christmas decision to keep illuminated decorations on her stairway bannister throughout the year, Lorraine Underwood found a new purpose for a strip of NeoPixels she had lying around.

Lorraine Underwood on Twitter

Changed the stair lights from a string to a strip & they look awesome! #neopixel #raspberrypi https://t.co/dksLwy1SE1

Simply running the lights up the stairs, blinking and flashing to a random code, wasn’t enough for her. By using an API to check the outdoor weather, Lorraine’s lights went from decorative to informative: they now give an indication of outside weather conditions through their colour and the quantity illuminated.

“The idea is that more lights will light up as it gets warmer,” Lorraine explains. “The temperature is checked every five minutes (I think that may even be a little too often). I am looking forward to walking downstairs to a nice warm yellow light instead of the current blue!”

In total, Lorraine had 240 lights in the strip; she created a chart indicating a range of outside temperatures and the quantity of lights which for each value, as well as specifying the colour of those lights, running from chilly blue through to scorching red.

Oh, Lorraine! We love your optimistic dreams of the British summer being more than its usual rainy 16 Celsius…

The lights are controlled by a Raspberry Pi Zero running a code that can be found on Lorraine’s blog. The code dictates which lights are lit and when.

“Do I need a coat today? I’ll check the stairs.”

Lorraine is planning some future additions to the build, including a toddler-proof 3D housing, powering the Zero from the lights’ power supply, and gathering her own temperature data instead of relying on a third-party API.

While gathering the temperature data from outside her house, she may also want to look into building an entire weather station, collecting extra data on rain, humidity, and wind conditions. After all, this is the UK: just because it’s hot outside, it doesn’t mean it’s not also raining.

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