Posted May 22, 2008 by Chris

This is a 4-zone sprinkler controller using embedded linux. It was also modified to control a garden hose sprinkler system. The implementation is fairly innovative, plus there’s lots of pictures, schematics & lists everything you’d need to build it.

Posted May 16, 2008 by Chris

Ever since hardware mp3 decoders became commercially available, DIY mp3 players have been seen sprouting up all over the place. This project write-up describes the processes of creating an mp3 player with a display using a standard microcontroller (a PIC).

Posted May 10, 2008 by Chris

This website has several projects done using the Pluto FPGA board. It’s just a very simple board with a standard I/O port setup. It uses Altera FPGAs & there are many applications for it on this website, all explained in great detail (source code also included).

Posted May 5, 2008 by Chris

Digital Oscilloscopes made with microcontrollers are always both cool little gizmos and very useful. This AVR based oscilloscope is limited in features, however its small size and low build-cost make it worthwhile. Hardware schematics and software are available for download.

Posted May 2, 2008 by Chris

For Apple/Mac lovers the embedded world is not very friendly. There are very few IDE’s available for OSX and beyond. However, this tutorial for the AVR, guides mac users on how to get everything interfaced & programmed with minimal effort. Software examples & walkthroughs are included.

Posted April 19, 2008 by Chris

Another cool application of accelerometers is in this acceleration sensing glove. This project write-up comes from a student at Berkeley tasked with deciphering hand motions/gestures. The software & schematics are all right there waiting for you.

Posted April 13, 2008 by Chris

This project is very useful for anyone who wants to get started using USB for programming instead of that clunky old parallel programmer. Using creative programming the author of this project managed to convert between parallel & USB using the ATtiny microcontroller.

Posted April 8, 2008 by Chris

This project is a tiny webserver that uses a PIC for doing all packet I/O and allowing for a web interface. A PIC webserver is a pretty far-out idea given the minute amount of memory, however this write-up (software available for download) proves that it can be done!

Posted April 2, 2008 by Chris

While it might seem like a simple thing, sending the proper signal to a telephone to make it ‘ring’ is more complicated than it sounds. This write-up explains the process and gives sample code for generating the necessary signals.

Posted March 11, 2008 by Syd

In an unordinary twist, here is a far more software based tutorial. File servers are the core purpose for any server aside from databasing. Using the Kubuntu flavor this tutorial guides you through the process & necessary commands for getting everything ready to go.