Matt Mets @cibomahto@v.st

These were placed inside test jigs, and delivered to our contract manufacturer for use as a black box tester/programmer. They tested a lot of art proejcts and blinkies!

Found some generic test rigs we made for small productions back in the day. They are based on a Raspberry Pi 2, and have a variable power supply with current measurement, ARM and AVR programming headers, digital and analog IO, connectors for a 'start' button and pass/fail indicator LEDs, and an RTC (since you won't get internet access in a small Chinese CM, especially in 2016!)

One year tool review: This Wiha ESD safe small bits set works wonderfully for handling all manner of small screws and bolts. It's very compact, and I can always find exactly the end I need, much nicer than the drawer full of miscellaneous drivers that it replaces. https://www.eleshop.nl/wiha-micro-bitset-7000-sk65-esd-39971.html

Rainbow caturday

So that's why the SD card wasn't working!

Logging in to a site these days is simple. I just:

1. Open password manager
2. Type in master password
3. Touch fingerprint sensor to authenticate myself with the password manager
4. Search for the correct entry and copy the username and password into the browser
5. Find Yubikey and connect it to the computer when prompted
6. Touch the Yubikey to assert presence.

And I'm in!

Recently learned about telecentric lenses, which are designed to capture an orthographic scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xP4lr1ojTo . The one in the video is less expensive than I imagined, only $10k ;-) https://www.edmundoptics.com/p/0045x-23-c-mount-titantltrade-telecentric-lens/3438/

The £22.50 Pimoroni microscope lens is a nice upgrade. The picture quality is good, and the mechanism is simple- you twist the lens to change the zoom, and physically move the lens further or closer to your object to focus, like a microscope. The aperture appears to be fixed. I'm waiting on a (used) industrial lens to try next. https://shop.pimoroni.com/products/microscope-lens-0-12-1-8x

These uPol micro dcdc converters from TDK are pretty neat- they sandwich the DCDC IC inside of a small circuit board, then mount an inductor and capacitors directly on top to save space. I was curious how they were packaged so I did some destructive analysis on one. https://www.digikey.nl/short/zz97bt5v

Happy catư̸̡̱̲̜̲̥͂̀͗̕͞͡ŕ̶̢̨̟̬̬͖̦̩̻̩̄̇͆̀͊̚͝d̸̳̘̜͎͖͇̽̅̑͘̚͢͡͡a̧̖̰̠̭̯̺̞͗͛́͗͋̿͐̕͠͝ͅỹ̧̨̬̪͇͕̖̘̾͑̐̓͆͋͌͌

Pour one out for R5

Inspection cam HUD

Just noticed that the camera mount on our microscope is compatible with the rpi camera. My dream of having a one-click 'capture' button that saves photos from the microscope to our network drive is one step closer to reality!

Go go inspection bot

Happy caturday to this little guy that's been hiding under our bed for the past month.

Apparently the fancy new underground bike garages at Centraal station close at night. The only signage for this appears to be a small placard at the bottom of the stairway.

Finally got the eurorack set up just the way I want it.