Computer Aid is aiming to bring offline access to educational websites to areas with limited internet access. Right now, it’s turning recycled Raspberry Pi boards into portable internet hotspots.

“It’s for offline students and teachers across the world,” said Nicola Gampell, E-Learning and Marketing Officer for Computer Aid International.

As a result, Connect will “bring them a local internet full of educational resources, ranging from scientific simulations to Wikipedia articles,” Nicola told us.

An internet for all, anywhere. Computer Aid Connect

Computer Aid’s ‘Connect’ device provides offline classrooms with a wealth of educational resources.

Computer Aid: recycling Raspberry Pis into remote routers

Inside the Connect is software based on RACHEL-Pi by World Possible.

“All too often we’re reminded of this reality,” wrote Jeremy Schwartz, Executive Director of World Possible. “There are places where young people aren’t given the resources they need to learn. For many, the internet has become a small equalising force, but for more, that equaliser does not exist.”

“In 2017, we’re going to test RACHEL against as many different use cases as we can,” said Jeremy. “We’ll be formalising our own testing through our social entrepreneurs, and intimately supporting a narrower group of other organisations”.

As a result, Computer Aid “currently has twenty units about to arrive at a project in Ethiopia and one in Mauritania,” said Nicola. “So hopefully we’ll be getting to see it in action soon.”

The Computer Aid Connect turns a Raspberry Pi into a router pre-packed with many websites

“The Raspberry Pi is a key component of the device, especially due to its low power usage and low cost,” said Nicola.

Also inside is a “UPS PIco Uninterruptible Power Supply,” said Nicola. As a result, Connect is “sustainable and stable during power outages.”

The Raspberry Pi is placed alongside a 64GB SD card and a Wireless N150 High-Power USB Adapter.

“The version of the Raspberry Pi changes between the Model 2 and the old A,” she explains. After all, “we receive donations of old Raspberry Pi devices.”

Visit the Computer Aid website if you’d like to donate a Raspberry Pi board to the project.

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We’re a small organisation full of makers, and I think at least two of us own a hand loom for weaving textiles. (One of the reasons I enjoy the TV show Vikings so much is the casual looming that’s going on as backdrop in many of the indoor scenes – the textile sort, not the impending-doom sort, although there’s plenty of that too.)

Siggy and Laergatha (personal role model) get down to a spot of light weaving before commencing to crush skulls and pillage.

Here in the 21st century, Lorna and I use hand looms because powered looms are very expensive. They’re also usually pretty enormous, being meant for enterprise rather than home use. This is pesky, because there’s a lot of repetitive action involved, which can be hell on the carpal tunnels; weaving can be slow, tough work.

Suspicious automation

Enter the Raspberry Pi.

Fred Hoefler has taken a desktop loom and added a Raspberry Pi to automate it. (Your computer’s fine: this video has no sound.)

Loom Operation

The general sequence of events for running my Raspberry Pi controlled loom. The project was really a proof of concept idea rather than an actual production model. This video is intended to supplement my blog at www.photographic-perspectives.com Sorry, there is not audio with this.

Fred wrote about the project on his website, explaining that he came up with the idea for very personal reasons. His wife Gina has been a weaver for 30 years, but she began to experience difficulties with the physical aspects of using her loom as she grew older. Conversations with other unwillingly retired weavers told Fred that Gina’s situation was not uncommon, and led him to design something to help. His device is intended to help older weavers who have trouble with the hard work of throwing the shuttle and holding down the pedals. Assistive looms cost upwards of $10,000: Fred’s solution comes in at a tidy $150, factoring in loom, Pi, and some motors from Amazon. So this isn’t for hobbyists like me: this loom can be a way for people whose livelihoods depend on being able to weave to continue working long after they might have had to retire.

One of the most satisfying things about the Raspberry Pi for me is its power to drive cost out of devices like this, and to change the way we work. This is a simple build, but it has so much potential to keep someone’s income flowing: we hope to see more as Fred develops the project.

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Every year, eighth-grade science teacher Michele Chamberlain challenges her students to find a solution to a real-world problem. The solution must be environmentally friendly, and must demonstrate their sense of global awareness.

Amelia with her project.

One of Michele’s students, 14-year-old Amelia Day, knew she wanted to create something that would help her practice her favourite sport, and approached Chamberlain with an idea for a football-related project.

“I know you said to choose a project you love,” Amelia explained, “I love soccer and I want to do something with engineering. I know I want to compete.”

Originally, the tool was built to help budding football players practise how to kick a ball correctly. The ball, tethered to a parasol shaft, uses a Raspberry Pi, LEDs, Bluetooth, and pressure points; together, these help athletes to connect with the ball with the right degree of force at the appropriate spot.

However, after a conversation with her teacher, it became apparent that Amelia’s ball could be used for so much more. As a result, the project was gradually redirected towards working with stroke therapy patients.

“It uses the aspect of a soccer training tool and that interface makes it fun, but it also uses Bluetooth audio feedback to rebuild the neural pathways inside the brain, and this is what is needed to recover from a stroke,” explains Amelia. 

“DE3MYSC Submission – [Press-Sure Soccer Ball]”

Uploaded by Amelia Day on 2016-04-20.

The video above comes as part of Amelia’s submission for the Discover Education’s 3M ‘Young Science Challenge 2016’, a national competition for fifth- to eight-grade students from across the USA.

Down to the last ten finalists, Amelia travelled to 3M HQ in Minnesota this October where she had to present her project to a panel of judges. She placed third runner up and received a cash prize.

LMS Hawks on Twitter

Our very own Amelia Day placed 3rd runner up @ the 3M National Junior Scientist competition this week. Proud to call her a Hawk!✏️⚽️ #LMS

We’re always so proud to see young makers working to change the world and we wish Amelia the best of luck with her future. We expect to see great things from this Lakeridge Middle School Hawk.

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Tonight marks the appearance of the brightest supermoon to grace the sky since 1948, appearing 30% brighter and 14% bigger than the usual glowing orb. The moon will not be this close again until November 2034.

Given this, and assuming the sky remains clear enough tonight to catch a glimpse, here’s one of several Raspberry Pi-powered astrophotography projects to get your creative senses tingling.

Having already created a similar project with a Nokia Lumia, TJ “Lifetime tinkerer” Emsley decided to try attaching a Raspberry Pi and Camera Module to a newly adopted Tesco 45X refractor telescope. They added a $10 USB shield, wireless NIC, and the usual setup components, and the project was underway.

TJ designed and 3D-printed a mount and bracket; the files are available on Thingiverse for those interested in building their own. The two-part design allows for use with various telescopes, thanks to an adjustable eyepiece adapter.

A Pi Zero fits onto the bracket, the Pi camera snug to the eyepiece, and the build is ready.

The Pi runs code written by TJ, allowing for image preview and exposure adjustments. You can choose between video and still images, and you can trigger the camera via a keyboard; this way, you don’t unsettle the camera to capture an image by having to touch the adapter in any way.

TJ will eventually be uploading the project to GitHub, but a short search will help you to build your own camera code (start here), so why not share your astrophotography with us in the comments below?

Enjoy the supermoon!

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The Department of Computer Science at the University of York holds a Raspberry Pi Challenge every year with the intention of introducing future students to the world of programming, regardless of their prior experience. They aim to create a wide community of support for all in much the same way as the Raspberry Pi Foundation does, working to introduce their students to each other and helping to build relationships before the start of the academic year.

Gordon Hollingworth, our Director of Software Engineering, visited the department as one of the judges of this year’s competition… sorry, he’s just advised me that he was Head Judge, and he’s now saying something about bicycles… and provided his wealth of knowledge and experience. He also provided a lot of stickers.

For information on the event, plus examples of some of the brilliant projects created by the students, check out the video below.

University of York Computer Science ‘Raspberry Pi Challenge’ 2016

The University of York’s Department of Computer Science ‘Raspberry Pi Challenge’ 2016

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Let me start by saying that I am responsible for the title of this blog post. The build’s creator, the wonderful Nicole He, didn’t correct me on this when I contacted her, sooooo…

Anyway, this is one project that caused the residents of Pi Towers (mainly Liz and me) to stare at it open-mouthed, praying that the build used a Raspberry Pi. This happens sometimes. We see something awesome that definitely uses a Raspberry Pi, Arduino or similar and we cross fingers and toes in the hope it’s the former. This was one of those cases, and a quick Instagram comment brought us the answer we’d hoped for.

I’ve shared Nicole’s work on our social channels in the past. A few months back, I came across her Grow Slow project tutorial, which became an instant hit both with our followers and across other social accounts and businesses. Grow Slow uses a Raspberry Pi and webcam to tweet a daily photo of her plant. The tutorial is a great starter for those new to coding and the Pi, another reason why it did so well across social media.

But we’re not here to talk about plants and Twitter. We’re here to talk about the Pi-powered Wonder Pop Controller; a project brought to our attention via a retweet, causing instant drooling.

The controller uses a Raspberry Pi, the Adafruit Capacitive Touch HAT, and copper foil tape to create a networked controller.

“I made it for a class about networks; the idea is that we make a physical controller that can connect to a game played over a TCP socket.”

Now, I’m sure someone will argue that it’s not the licking of the lollipop that creates the connection, but rather the licking of the copper tape. And yes, you’re right. But where’s the fun in a project titled ‘Pi-powered Lickable Copper Tape Controller‘? Exactly.

The idea behind this project is a nice starting block for using capacitive touch for video games controllers. While we figure out our creations, share with us any interesting controllers you’ve made.

… or make one this weekend and share it on Monday. I can wait.

*Continues to play with the sun on Nicole’s website instead of doing any work*

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We are immensely fond of tutorial-maker extraordinaire Matt Timmons-Brown, who you may know as The Raspberry Pi Guy, and we treasure his widdle brain. Matt, please wear a helmet consistently next time you use this skateboard monster thing.

DIY 30KM/H ELECTRIC SKATEBOARD – RASPBERRY PI POWERED

Over the summer, I made my own electric skateboard using a £4 Raspberry Pi Zero. Controlled with a Nintendo Wiimote, capable of going 30km/h, and with a range of over 10km, this project has been pretty darn fun. In this video, you see me racing around Cambridge and I explain the ins and outs of this project.

This is a beautiful build, with a Bluetooth-connected Raspberry Pi Zero controlling the speed of the brushless motor that drives the board. Matt’s using a Wiimote to control the speed, and terrifying the residents of Cambridge into the bargain.

The metal boxes underneath the skateboard that Matt’s made to house the battery and electronics are, in a way, the most important part of the build. When you’re tooling along at 30kmph, the last thing you want to do is to grate your lithium-ion battery on the tarmac at speed.

Matt visited Pi Towers to show us what he’d made, and Gordon had a go. You’ll want to turn the sound on.

Sk8r Pi ft. The Raspberry Pi Guy… and Gordon

The Raspberry Pi Guy popped into Pi Towers to show off his new creation. While skating up and down the office on his Pi-powered skateboard, our Director of Software Engineering, Gordon Hollingworth, decided to have a go.

Beautiful build, Matt – thanks for sharing!

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“The project idea came from this tongue-in-cheek Twitter post. But hey, why not try to make one? I read somewhere that the world needs more ridiculous smart devices”. These are the words of Eric Tsai, a maker of connected devices and home automation, on his website etsai.net. And while this website boasts many interesting and useful projects (plus a watermelon sea monster), it was his tongue-in-cheek ‘Too Much IoT’ project on hackster.io that had us chuckling. The aforementioned Twitter post?

Eric Tsai on Twitter

IoT pregnancy test: connects to phone via BLE, instantly tweets test results. Also text msg result to contacts name “mom”.

Eric did indeed create an IoT pregnancy test: it’s a Bluetooth-enabled digital pregnancy test that sends data to a Raspberry Pi which, in turn, sends a tweet of the result (as well as a special text message to your Mum).

To start his project, Eric turned to an unsuspecting customer service representative, quizzing her on the composition of a digital pregnancy test:

Does your test have an ON button? What kind of battery does it use? Do the different characters on the LCD overlap, or are they separated? Well, I mean, is “Pregnant” the same as “Not Pregnant”, but just without the “Not”? You need a serial number? No, I don’t have a serial number, I haven’t purchased it yet. Oh, well… I like to be prepared.

And after that, a search of YouTube provided the information he needed in order to hack the test.

After working his way through the internals of the test, the LCD pins, and the energy consumption, Eric was able to hijack the correct components and solder new wiring to gain control of the ‘not’ and ‘pregnant’ portions of the display, along with the clock function and, obviously, the ground.

Eric added header pins to the test, allowing him to connect a Light Blue Bean, which in turn provided Bluetooth and I/O functionality. He explains:

The Light Blue Bean provides the real world I/O and Bluetooth connectivity. The digital I/O monitors the “Not” and “Pregnant” pins on the LCD and compares them to the “clock”. When they don’t match, it means the corresponding icon is being displayed.

The Raspberry Pi runs Node-RED to receive data from the Bean. Using Twilio, the Pi can tweet, text, or email the information to any predetermined recipient, advising them of the test results.

As a home automation pro, Eric already had several lights in his house set up via MQTT and OpenHAB, so it wasn’t hard for him to incorporate them into the project, triggering them to light up to indicate a positive result.

Though the project was originally started as a joke, it’s clear to see that Eric enjoyed the process and learnt from the experience. And if that wasn’t enough, he also used the hackster.io project page as a means of announcing the news of his own impending bundle of joy. So congratulations to Eric and his family, and thank you for this brilliant project!

Too Much IoT on Twitter

Pregnant! Yay!

Connected Pregnancy Test – Long Version

A pregnancy test that tweets and text messages test results. https://www.hackster.io/projects/15076/

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Forget sniffer dogs…we need to talk about spinach.

The team at MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) have been working to transform spinach plants into a means of detection in the fight against buried munitions such as landmines.

Plant-to-human communication

MIT engineers have transformed spinach plants into sensors that can detect explosives and wirelessly relay that information to a handheld device similar to a smartphone. (Learn more: http://news.mit.edu/2016/nanobionic-spinach-plants-detect-explosives-1031) Watch more videos from MIT: http://www.youtube.com/user/MITNewsOffice?sub_confirmation=1 The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is an independent, coeducational, privately endowed university in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Nanoparticles, plus tiny tubes called carbon nanotubes, are embedded into the spinach leaves where they pick up nitro-aromatics, chemicals found in the hidden munitions.

It takes the spinach approximately ten minutes to absorb water from the ground, including the nitro-aromatics, which then bind to the polymer material wrapped around the nanotube.

But where does the Pi come into this?

The MIT team shine a laser onto the leaves, detecting the altered fluorescence of the light emitted by the newly bonded tubes. This light is then read by a Raspberry Pi fitted with an infrared camera, resulting in a precise map of where hidden landmines are located. This signal can currently be picked up within a one-mile radius, with plans to increase the reach in future.

You can also physically hack a smartphone to replace the Raspberry Pi… but why would you want to do that?

The team at MIT have already used the tech to detect hydrogen peroxide, TNT, and sarin, while co-author Prof. Michael Strano advises that the same setup can be used to detect “virtually anything”.

“The plants could be use for defence applications, but also to monitor public spaces for terrorism-related activities, since we show both water and airborne detection”

More information on the paper can be found at the MIT website.

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Laura: MagPi founder and Scottish Pi event organiser extraordinaire Dr. William Bell has sent us this report from the home of the World Wide Web itself…

CERN is the heart of particle physics research, where scientists are working to discover new phenomena using high-energy equipment. These research challenges have driven inventions, such as the internet and superconducting magnets used by the Large Hadron Collider. Theoretical calculations and experimental analyses are both heavily reliant on computer programming, so it’s a great place to host a Raspberry Pi programming event.

Babbage outside CERN

This year, Brice Copy organised a Coding Pi Science event on the 7th and 8th of October. Working together with long-term Pi supporter Alan McCullagh, he invited three teams to prepare kits to build and program with attendees. To motivate the teams and the other attendees, there were a series of talks on Friday evening; these included a general introduction to the CERN Micro Club and the EU Code Week, as well as a motivational talk on why computer programming is so important for scientific research. Each team then gave an overview of their project, in preparation for the workshop the next day.

On Saturday morning, the teams, volunteers, children, parents, and teachers started to build a muon detector (Muon Hunter), a robotic arm (Poppy Ergo Jr.), or a programmable WiFi car (GianoPi). The idea was to build a kit together with the team leaders and other volunteers, and then take the kit home to program it. These three kits provide different challenges: the Muon Hunter kit requires some soldering and uses a C programming interface, the Poppy Ergo Jr. snaps together and is driven using Snap, and the GianoPi needs soldering and is controlled by Blockly.

Programming Poppy Ergo Jr. in MicroClub Robotics

The Muon Hunter was designed by Mihaly Vadai, in collaboration with the CERN Micro Club. The kit includes two Geiger-Müller tubes to detect ionising radiation, a circuit board that produces the 400 volts needed to bias the tubes and read the signals, and an ARM microcontroller to form the coincidence between the two tubes. The circuit board can be directly connected to a Raspberry Pi to read out the signals and produce plots of the data.

Poppy Ergo Jr. was invented by the Flowers team at Inria Bordeaux, and presented by Stephanie Noirpoudre and Theo Segonds. Their projects are designed to encourage children to learn about computer programming through interacting with robots. The kit includes 3D-printed parts and several servo motors controlled by a Raspberry Pi mounted in the base of the robot. A Camera Module can be used to check the colour of objects, and forms part of their Snap programming examples.

GianoPi was designed by Stefania Saladino. It consist of four servo motors, multi-directional wheels, an ultrasonic sensor, a Pi Zero, a servo control HAT from Adafruit, a WiFi adapter, a battery pack, and some electronics to allow the kit to be easily turned on or off. Brice Copy created the software to interface with the GianoPi using Raspbuggy, which is a Blocky application. Similar to the Poppy Ergo Jr., the GianoPi is controlled over a network connection, allowing the robot to be remotely accessed.

Building GianoPi

It was an engaging weekend of soldering, building, and programming; hopefully, these kits will encourage even more exciting projects in the future. Alan certainly had fun trying to find a good place to put Babbage, too…

Babbage gets everywhere…

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Using a self-written API, Joshua Krosenbrink gifted the new Usabilla office with the World of Light, a 426 RGB LED-powered map of the world.

The API pushes user location information to a Raspberry Pi, animating the LEDs in real time to respond to website feedback as and when it’s received by the company.

World of Light

Nice LED wall I built with 426 RGB LEDs and a Raspberry Pi with WIFI. Renders live user feedback that comes in from all over the world by pulling data from the public API. A ‘little’ present for in the new office.

Joshua spent a decent amount of time using a CNC machine to drill the 426 holes needed, while distributing 30 amps of power to produce the beautiful effect. 

More photos of the build can be found at the project’s Hackaday page. While we figure out what we could use this map for at Pi Towers, why not tell us how you would use one in the comments below?

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You know the drill: you fill your digital photo frame with your favourite snaps, watch them flash up one after another and suddenly, ugh… an image appears at a different orientation to the rest. Those black boxes at the sides or top, shrinking the detail, or – even worse – a distorted stretch and skew of faces and landscapes.

Yuck.

Luckily for us, Tim shared his rotating digital picture frame, the FlipFrame, on Hackaday, giving us all the chance to solve this very trying issue.

FlipFrame – A Rotating Digital Picture Frame

I wanted a nice way to display my digital pictures, but I didn’t want to sacrifice the quality of my vertically oriented pictures. I couldn’t find a rotating digital picture so I made my own. The frame is built on a discarded 27″ LCD TV. The slideshow runs on a Raspberry PI 3.

The frame incorporates both a Raspberry Pi and Arduino, the former hosting the images, and notifying the latter when to rotate the frame smoothly via a stepper motor.

The images are stored on an SD card, Tim’s original plan of importing directly from Google Photos having been hindered by API limitations.

The frame uses a 27” LCD display and speakers, with several 3D-printed and laser-cut parts. Tim has made all files available via Hackaday, along with a component list and brief rundown of how they all fit together.

Have you made something similar? Share your photo frame-based projects with us in the comments below.

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Happy Halloween, one and all. Whether you’ve planned a night of trick-or-treating, watching scary movies, or hiding from costumed children with the lights off, our How to Pi guide should get you ready for the evening’s festivities. Enjoy!

Costumes

This is definitely a Pi Towers favourite. The Disco Ball costume by Wolfie uses a drone battery and Raspberry Pi to create, well, a child-sized human disco ball. The video links on the project page seem to be down; however, all the ingredients needed for the project are listed at Thingiverse, and a walkthrough of the wiring can be seen here. Below, you’ll see the full effect of the costume, and I’m sure we can all agree that we need one here in the office.

Halloween 2016 Disco Ball

Some aerial shots of Serena’s halloween costume we made. It contains 288 full color LEDs, a dual battery system for power, and a Raspberry Pi B2 running the sequence that was created in xLights.

If you feel ‘too cool’ to fit inside a giant disco ball, how about fitting inside a computer… sort of? The Jacket houses a Raspberry Pi with a monitor in the sleeve because, well, why not?

‘The Jacket’ 2.0 My Cyberp…

lsquo;The Jacket’ 2.0 My Cyberpunk inspired jacket was completed just in time for a Halloween party last night. This year’s upgrades added to the EL tape and 5″ LCD, with spikes, a pi zero and an action cam (look for the missing chest spike).

Dealing with Trick-or-treaters

Trick or Trivia, the trivia-based Halloween candy dispenser from YouTube maker TheMakersWorkbench, dispenses candy based on correct answers to spooky themed questions. For example, Casper is a friendly what? Select ‘Ghost’ on the touchscreen and receive three pieces of candy. Select an incorrect answer and receive only one.

It’s one of the best ways to give out candy to trick-or-treaters, without having to answer the door or put in any effort whatsoever.

Trick Or Trivia Trivia-Based Halloween Candy Dispenser Servo Demo

This video is a companion video to a project series I am posting on Element14.com. The video demonstrates the candy dispensing system for the Trick or Trivia candy dispenser project. You can find the post that this video accompanies at the following link: http://bit.ly/TrickorTrivia If you like this video, please consider becoming out patron on Patreon.

Or just stop them knocking in the first place with this…

Raspberry Pi Motion Sensor Halloween Trick

A Raspberry Pi running Ubuntu Mate connected to an old laptop screen. I have a motion sensor hidden in the letterbox. When you approach the door it detects you. Next the pi sends a signal to a Wi Fi enabled WeMo switch to turn on the screen.

Scary pranks

When it comes to using a Raspberry Pi to prank people, the team at Circuit-Help have definitely come up with the goods. By using a setup similar to the magic mirror project, they fitted an ultrasonic sensor to display a zombie video within the mirror whenever an unsuspecting soul approaches. Next year’s The Walking Dead-themed Halloween party is sorted!

Haunted Halloween Mirror

This Raspberry Pi Halloween Mirror is perfect for both parties and pranks! http://www.circuit-help.com.ph/haunted-halloween-mirror/

If the zombie mirror isn’t enough, how about some animated portraits for your wall? Here’s Pi Borg’s Moving Eye Halloween portrait. Full instructions here.

Spooky Raspberry Pi controlled Halloween picture

Check out our quick Halloween Project, make your own Raspberry Pi powered spooky portrait! http://www.instructables.com/id/Halloween-painting-with-moving-eyes/

Pumpkins

We’ve seen a flurry of Raspberry Pi pumpkins this year. From light shows to motion-activated noise makers, it’s the year of the pimped-up pumpkin. Here’s Oliver with his entry into the automated pumpkin patch, offering up a motion-activated pumpkin jam-packed with LEDs.

Raspberry Pi Motion Sensor Light Up Pumpkin

Using a Raspberry Pi with a PIR motion sensor and a bunch of NeoPixels to make a scary Halloween Pumpkin

Or get super-fancy and use a couple of Pimoroni Unicorn HATs to create animated pumpkin eyes. Instructions here.

Raspberry Pi Pumpkin LED Matrix Eyes

Inspired by the many Halloween electronics projects we saw last year, we tried our own this year. Source code is on github https://github.com/mirkin/pi-word-clock

Ignore the world and get coding

If you’re one of the many who would rather ignore Halloween, close the curtains, and pretend not to be home, here are some fun, spooky projects to work on this evening. Yes, they’re still Halloween-themed… but c’mon, they’ll be fun regardless!

Halloween Music Light Project – Follow the tutorial at Linux.com to create this awesome and effective musical light show. You can replace the tune for a less Halloweeny experience.

Halloween Music-Light project created using Raspberry Pi and Lightshow project.

Uploaded by Swapnil Bhartiya on 2016-10-12.

Spooky Spot the Difference – Let the Raspberry Pi Foundation team guide you through this fun prank, and use the skills you learn to replace the images for other events and holidays.

Whatever you get up to with a Raspberry Pi this Halloween, make sure to tag us across social media on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, G+, and Vine. You can also check out our Spooky Pi board on Pinterest.

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We did a bit of a count recently and it turns out that The MagPi magazine has produced more than 3,200 pages of Raspberry Pi-related reading. That’s a lot of quality content (even if I do say so myself).

While we’re rather proud of this achievement, we’re also very aware of the fact that these lovingly crafted collections of words and pictures can very easily get lost in the mists of time (or in the recycling bin).

The first four MagPi Essentials books taught us how to use the command line, make games, experiment with the Sense HAT, and even code music with Sonic Pi

So, in 2015, we set out to make sure all the essential reading from the magazine wasn’t consigned to a dusty and dog-eared pile under the coffee table. Enter the MagPi Essentials range! They’re bite-sized books that build on the best articles in the magazine and mould them into a cohesive, easily digested form.

We’ve recently been hard at work putting the finishing touches on the latest batch, and I’m excited to report that the fifth to eighth books are out in hard copy now! We’ll spare you the minute details on each title in the series here, but I’ve hijacked the ‘You might also like’ doohickey on the right so you can read up on each book individually.

Shiny new books! Well, the cover’s actually a matt laminate… Learn to code with Scratch, hack and make with Minecraft, do electronics using GPIO Zero, and program with C in our latest range.

Want them? Point your mouse fingers towards The Pi Hut or Amazon. You can even grab them directly from The MagPi’s own little lemonade stand if you want. Like everything else Raspberry Pi, they’re also super-affordable: £2.99 on our Apple and Android apps, or £3.99 in print. Not sure you can afford them all? You can also download each book as a free PDF too: just click on the appropriate link in our catalogue.

All of these books are available now. Have a read while we crack on with making the next ones…

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While browsing the Halloween section of my local supermarket, I stumbled across this adorable pumpkin light for £2. Given the fact I had a £2 coin in my pocket and an itching for a Halloween hack project, it came home with me at once.

Mediocre spooky

You’ll see, if you look hard enough, the small orange LED within the plastic shell. Controlled by a switch beneath, the light was less than impressive once illuminated. 

And so the hack seed was planted.

Now, I’ll admit to not having much coding knowledge. But what I lack in skills, I make up for in charm, and it didn’t take long for me to find help from a couple of Raspberry Pi staffers.

Pimoroni had been nice enough to send us some Blinkt! units a while back and while one is being used for our People in Space Indicator, I’d been wanting to use one myself for some sort of lighting effect. So, with their Getting Started guide in hand (or rather, on screen), I set up the Raspberry Pi 3 that lives on my desk, attached the Blinkt! HAT and got to work on creating this…

Halloween Pumpkin Light Effect

Use a Raspberry Pi and Pimoroni Blinkt! to create an realistic lighting effect for your Halloween Pumpkin. Learn how at www.

If you’d like to create your own pumpkin light effect, you’ll need:

• A Raspberry Pi (Make sure you use one that fits in your pumpkin!)
• A Pimoroni Blinkt!
• A power supply (plus monitor, mouse, and keyboard for setup)
• A pumpkin

Take your Blinkt! and attach it to your Pi. If you’re using a 1-3 model, this will be easy enough, but make sure the Pi fits in your pumpkin! If, like me, you need to go smaller, you’ll have to solder your header pins to a Zero before attaching the HAT.

You might want to make sure Raspbian is running on the newest version. Why? Well, why not? You don’t have to upgrade to PIXEL, but you totally should as it’s very pretty. Its creator, Simon Long, was my soldering master for this project. His skills are second to none. To upgrade to Pixel, follow the steps here.

In the terminal, you’ll need to install the Pimoroni Blinkt! library. Use the following to achieve this:

curl -sS get.pimoroni.com/blinkt | bash

You’ll need to reboot the Raspberry Pi to allow the changes to take effect. You can do this by typing:

sudo reboot

At this point, you’re more than welcome to go your own way with the Blinkt! and design your own light show (this may help). However, and with major thanks to Jonic Linley, we’ve created a pumpkin fire effect for you.

Within the terminal, type:

git clone https://github.com/AlexJrassic/fire_effect.git

This will bring the code to your Raspberry Pi from GitHub. Next, we need to tell the Raspberry Pi to automatically start the fire_effect.py code when you power up. To do this, type:

nano ~/.config/lxsession/LXDE-pi/autostart

At end of the file, add this line:

@python /home/pi/fire_effect/fire_effect.py

Save and then reboot:

sudo reboot

Now you’re good to go. 

To add more of a spread to the light effect, I created a diffuser to cover the Blinkt! LEDs. In the video above, you’ll see I used a tissue. I wouldn’t suggest this for prolonged use, due to the unit getting a little warm; I won’t be responsible for any  subsequent tissue fires. I would suggest using a semi-opaque bowl (the ones you get a Christmas pudding in) or a piece of plastic from a drinks bottle, and go to town on it with some fine sandpaper.

We also drilled a small hole in the back for the micro-USB lead to reach the Zero. I used a battery pack for power, but you could use a lead directly into the mains. With a larger pumpkin, you could put a battery pack inside with the Pi.

If you use this code, please share a photo with us below, or across social media. We’d love to see what you get up to.

And if you want to buy the Blinkt!, the team at Pimoroni have kindly agreed to extend the cut-off for postage on Friday from midday to 3pm, allowing you the chance to get the unit through your door on Monday (so long as you live in the UK). You can also purchase the Blinkt! from Adafruit if you live across the pond.

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Source: Raspberry Pi – Halloween Pumpkin Light Effect Tutorial

Hi, Rob from The MagPi here! Issue 51 is out and just in case you weren’t sold on it already, here’s a little something to tempt you.

Brian Corteil, writer of the feature, has christened this robot ‘Tiny’

Over the past few years, Raspberry Pi robotics has really come into its own, taking strides to make building robots just that little bit more fun and accessible. This month in The MagPi, we’ve decided to take all these advances and use them to create an incredible little robot.

We’ll guide you through the process of making your robot while also giving you top advice on other methods for robot construction, in case you feel the spark of inspiration once the build is over. It’s not just robots we’re building this issue though. We have some amazing tutorials on the following:

• Building an underwater camera
• Finishing up our RaspCade arcade cabinet build
• A guide to NOOBS for beginners
• Using WiFi signals as a people detector

There’s lots more to enjoy, including reviews, columns, and a series of spooky and simple Halloween projects.

You can get hold of the latest issue in stores now from WHSmith, Tesco, Sainsbury’s, and Asda. Alternatively you can grab an issue online or get it digitally via our app on Android and iOS. There’s even a free PDF of it as well! You’re spoilt for choice…

Get a free Pi Zero
Want to make sure you never miss an issue? Subscribe today and get a Pi Zero bundle featuring the new, camera-enabled Pi Zero, together with a cable bundle that includes the camera adapter.

Free Pi Zeros and posters: what’s not to love about a MagPi subscription?

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 51.

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

We hope you enjoy the issue!

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Source: Raspberry Pi – Build a remote control robot with The MagPi 51

The Raspberry Pi is being used to save the eyesight of people in India thanks to the Open Indirect Ophthalmoscope (OIO) project. 

Inside the OIO, machine learning technology is used to spot eye problems. Subsequently, the OIO becomes better at checking for problems over long-term use.

“The Open Indirect Ophthalmoscope is a portable retinal camera that uses machine learning to make diagnosis not only affordable but also accurate and reliable,” says Sandeep Vempati, a mechanical engineer at the Srujana Center for Innovation, a part of the L V Prasad Eye Institute (LVPEI).

The heart of the OIO is a Raspberry Pi. Our low-cost computer drives down the cost of taking high-quality photos of the retina.

“Currently visual impairment affects 285 million people worldwide,” said Sandeep. “What’s more surprising is the fact that 80 percent of all visual impairment can be prevented, or cured if diagnosed correctly.”

Open Indirect Ophthalmoscope (OIO)

An open-source, ultra-low cost, portable screening device for retinal diseases. OIO(OWL) is an idea conceived in Srujana Innovation Centre at the L V Prasad Eye Institute, Hyderabad, India. It is an open source retinal image capturing device with dynamic diabetic retinopathy grading system.

“India is the diabetes capital of the world,” explained Dr Jay Chhablani, a specialist in retinal disease at the LVPEI. “Diabetes leads to something called diabetic retinopathy”.

For that reason, it’s import to remove barriers to treatment. “If we see the patient at an early stage,” says Dr Chhablani, “we can treat them by controlling diabetes and applying laser treatment”.

“Although eye-care services have become increasingly available,” said Sandeep, “diagnosing diseases like diabetic retinopathy is still a problem in many parts of the world.”

Sandeep’s team strove to build an open device. As a result, OIO can be 3D-printed and assembled anywhere in the world.

Inside the Open Indirect Ophthalmoscope project

“3D printing creates the OIO for a fraction of the cost of conventional devices, and yet maintains the same quality,” explains Sandeep.

Compared to professional devices, the OIO costs just $800 to build. In contrast, professional retinal cameras can cost around ten times as much.

Over on OIO’s Hackaday page you will find the components. Inside is a Raspberry Pi 3, a Camera Module, a 20 dioptre lens, front-end mirrors, and a 5-inch touchscreen.

“Engineering feels great when you see a product being useful in the real world,” says Sandeep.

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Source: Raspberry Pi – Ophthalmoscope: Saving eyes with Raspberry Pis