Continuation of this blog

As you can see, I have not been posting at all lately. I have not had the motivation to post at all lately. I have been collecting a lot of subjects to write about lately and have a couple of projects in my pipeline which I want to write about so do expect more updates here soon!

//Z

Building with Balls :)

Wow, cool idea! Maybe I can use this idea somewhere..

//Z

Programming for fun, how to choose a language II

 My quest is to find a programming language to continue my programming endeavors in, as you can read here I don’t have much experience programming up till now, but always had some interest! This search has already lasted a long time so I have already have some idea of what to look for in a programming language, a lot of ideas of what to code and ways of accomplishing these tasks in code.  
 
A list of some of my criteria: 

• modern language
  
• marketable
  
• good books/documentation
  
• good community
  
• future proof
  
• OO

I want to write web services as well as desktop programs. So GUI programming tools are a must. Also a IDE would be nice. Furthermore I want to be able to use API's in my programming, for example I would like to be able to do some desktop publishing to my blog, this will be one of my first projects to perform in the chosen language.

I have always said that programming is not a hard thing to learn, if you understand computers and how computers work and process data it looks to be easy to learn how to work a programming language. It seems to me that there are certain key programming processes which you can use in every language, just the syntax differs per language. So I am actually planning to learn more languages in one go and make a comparison between those while learning how to work with them. Lets see how far I get...

//Z

Project Bag I

Another day, another project. I always wanted to have a bag specifically arranged and made so it would fit my stuff. There are a couple of features I am looking for in a bag, there are bags on the market which do have some of the features but I have not been able to find a bag which combines them all.

The features I am looking for are:

1. I have to be able to carry it on my shoulder comfortably but the bag also has to have straps to be able to carry it on my bag whem I am biking to work.
   
2. It has to hold multiple papersizes (A4 and A5) comfortably.
3. It has to be able to store a laptop, and since i use multiple laptops it has to be adjustable.
4. Store pens, cards, etc.
5. Another idea of mine is to build a usb hub internally and be able to just hook it up to my computer and have a usb harddrive, a usb bluetooth stick, usb webcam,  etc available at every location i have my bag with me.

These are a couple features I have allready thought up, offcourse more will be added when i think of them.

//Z

BBC Timeline

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/interactive/timelines/british/index.shtml

Interesting display of information! I have got to check how this is made, it seems like a very interesting system to disply time-related information.

Maybe it would be nice to have a view like this from a to-do administration system, so you can see in time how you have handled your to-do load.

//Z

Electric bikes

I have been interested in (motor)bike petrol to electrical conversion projects allready for a long time. This one is a very nice implementation of a from scratch trike build.

http://zeept.wordpress.com/

Also this is a very interesting motorbike conversion to electric build.

Further information will follow..:)

//Z

Asterisk I

Another one of those pet projects of mine is an asterisk box. It would be cool to be able to have my own phone router and be able to interface my phone calls with a pc. I have found a couple of nice implementations of this principle and need to do some more research in the material.

http://www.rowetel.com/blog/ seems very interesting and also his free telephony project seems very interesting http://rowetel.com/ucasterisk/.

off course the obvious links come into play here too:

http://www.asterisk.org/
http://www.voip-info.org/wiki-Asterisk
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asterisk_PBX
http://www.trixbox.org/

Update:

More links:


//Z

Webcam Based DIY Laser Rangefinder

Webcam Based DIY Laser Rangefinder

Saw this today, I think via hack-a-day:

http://www.pages.drexel.edu/~twd25/webcam_laser_ranger.html

Looks like an interesting project too! I cannot think of the use for one of these immediately but it looks interesting.

Another one of those projects I thought of lately is a monitoring system for my car. A couple of USB cams provide a 360 degrees view from the car outward. Record every movement around the car when it is parked and continually tapes to hard disk when driving. It would be cool to have the rangefinder record distances from objects.

As I drive around I see people who shouldn't be driving all the time. It would be cool to be able to record all their practices. And be able to show a best-off as a youtube video might also be interesting.

More ideas involve a licence plate resolver to a public database with names and other information about the licensee. This would of course warrant a search whether that kind of information is just publicly available and if it can be published without problems. We will see…

//Z

Math Homework

I help my girl out with her statistics math work for her studies. Sometimes I do get the feeling I don't have a deep enough understanding of statistics to be able to answer any question which bothers her when she is reading a part of the book I haven't yet read.

I have an easy enough understanding of the underlying principle in a glance but then to explain something which comes rather naturally to me is very hard. Most of the times someone else sees this material in a totally different way then I see it. I skim it first to get a general overview of the subject. Then I see if I can fit it in the framework of math already in my head. If it 'fits' I will read on in the book, if not I will dive in a little deeper and read some synopsis part. If this does not clear things up more reading is required.

Then I read Steve Yegge's post about learning math for programmers and saw a kindred spirit. I also do this in a lot of other fields, not just math. Physics, programming, electronics and a lot of other interests will not give you enough time to do more then glance at the newest 'principle of design' and try to get the most out of the experience in the least amount of time.

This does make me wonder about methods of learning. But that is for a future post I think.

//Z