Bot Bench I'd Rather Be Building Robots

I recently started getting into retro computing, and got myself a Z180-based RC2014 compatible board, the SC126. It features an SD card adapter, which you can boot from, and store files on. On CP/M, there is a way to transfer files via the serial port, using the xmodem protocol. However, getting this to work on a Mac is not immediately ...

I recently bought an ODROID GO to do some development on, and learn more about FreeRTOS. The ODROID GO is a small, handheld, Gameboy sized ESP32-WROVER based device. It is super cheap, about €45 or so, and packs a real punch. The screen is a lovely 320×240 TFT LCD. I first started playing with it, using the Arduino development environment, ...

This is a project I’ve had on the shelf for quite some time (2 years or so), and only just now finished up. Ever since I saw these HEXBUG Battle Spiders, I’ve wanted to tear them apart and supply them with a more capable brain. These Battle Spiders are mechanically really interesting. All the 6 legs are powered with a ...

I wrote about the Edison Kickstarter campaign a few years back, in 2014, in fact. The company is still going strong and are onto version 2.0 of their Edison robot. Recently, I was contacted by them to take a peek at what they were working on next. The new web-based programming environment, called EdBlocks, is a complete redesign of the ...

The fine folks at Mindsensors have done something pretty cool! You’ve probably heard of Blockly, a very popular graphical programming language. In most cases, you had to run it on a remote website or on your own computer and download whatever code you created to your robot. Well, with the PiStorms you no longer have to! Because it’s based on ...

When I am doing development on ROBOTC, I find I am switching back and forth a lot between Visual Studio 2013 and the ROBOTC IDE. Personally, I prefer the font that VS2013 uses by default, which is Consolas. It’s friendly to the eyes and looks crisp. ROBOTC, on the other hand, will use Courier New as its default, which I find ...

So, you like Raspberry Pi but would prefer to build with LEGO?  No problem!  You can use the Mindsensors PiStorms to add a touch screen, buttons and motor and sensor ports to your Pi.  The designs for the LEGO Technic compatible parts that come with this are completely open source and available for anyone to tweak as they see fit. ...

A little while back, the Lejos forums were getting reports that some of the newly purchased bricks were having issues with Bluetooth connections.  Andy Shaw, one of the main developers of this project, determined that the main cause was a newly updated Bluetooth chipset in this brick.  Unlike its predecessor, this chipset is BT 4.0 capable.  That means that, at least ...

There are many books out there for the budding robotics fan who wants to hone his or her programming skills.  This is a book that fills that need very nicely.  Terry Griffin’s “The Art of LEGO MINDSTORMS EV3 Programming” is a great No Starch Press publication.  While some books focus on building, others and both building and programming, this one has deep ...

I’ve played around with various vision systems on the MINDSTORMS, even the Pixy Cam, using an adapter.  However, now Charmed Labs have created a version of the super popular Pixy Cam that will work pretty much out of the box with MINDSTORMS. So, what’s different about this version and the standard one? Well, for one it comes with an adapter ...