The Raspberry Pi

The Raspberry Pi model 3 is a small computer. At its core, it is similar to the computer inside a modern smart phone. It has a Quad Core 1.2 GHx Boradcam 64 bit CPU, 1GB of non-upgradable RAM, Ethernet, Wireless, Bluetooth, and HDMI output. It has a special connector for a camera, a special connector for a small touchscreen display, a micro SD port which serves as the operating system’s “hard drive” including storage of your data. You plug it into a 2.5 amp Micro USB cabled power brick.

The Raspberry Pi also has 4 USB 2 ports.

It costs $35. All you need to do is to add a power brick, an SD card, an HDMI monitor of some sort, maybe a case, a keyboard, a mouse, and perhaps a few other accessories, and pretty soon you nave a reasonably powerful $35 computer for a mere $200!

Or, you can leave off much of that stuff, hook it temporarily to a monitor, keyboard, and mouse (optional, I suppose) and set it up for SSH, then turn it back into a headless (and keyboardless, mouseless) server, communicating with it via wireless from your desktop or laptop.

Then, you take the thing and build stuff with it. Think of the Raspberry Pi, potentially, as a controller you might use for any device that requires controlling, but a very very smart one. Not yet mentioned is one of the key features of the Raspberry Pi: The GPIO header. This is the General Purpose Input Output array of 40 pins that are controlled by the computer, for both output and input, and power supply, to any of a very large range of sensors, actuators, and other devices.

I’ll stop right here and mention the Raspberry Pi Sense HAT. A “hat” or “shield” is a circuit board designed to stick right on top of another circuit board (in this case, the Rapsberry Pi) to give it a bunch of added functionality all at once. Often, a hat or shield has pass through pins for all or most of the GPIO pins, so you still have the same device you had before, but with a bunch of stuff added. The standard sense hat for this device has environmental sensors such as temperature, humidity, atmospheric pressure, and orientation. But I digress.

Anyway, a robot requires a “brain” that may or may not be hooked up via, say, Bluetooth, to a hand held remote of some sort, and also, to the motors that control the wheels (or anything else on the motor that moves), lights, sensors, all that. The most efficient way to build a robot probably uses a more basic controller than a Raspberry Pi, and indeed, most robots use a controller that is built with the specifications of an Arduino Uno, which costs typically less than $20 (and cheap Chinese knockoffs much cheaper, but they don’t all work quite like they are supposed to).

The difference between a dedicated basic controller and a fancier full on computer like a Raspberry Pi is like the difference between teaching your pet to do a trick and teaching your child to do a trick. The latter has way more overhead, but you can do fancier tricks and you can also teach the child to bring you a beer. On the other hand, the pet will just do the trick, while your kid will probably, eventually, give you lip and you’ll have to be nice to it or it will stop working right.

A Veritable Robot Army

Today, there is a veritable robot army out there, of robot kits you can build that are based on Raspberry Pi. I myself have built a version of SunFounder Smart Video Car and it is a great robot. The Adeept PiCar-A Wireless is very cool looking, and is a bit cheaper. Do not, however, that most, probably all, ready to build Raspberry Pi based robot kits do NOT come with the actual Raspberry Pi.

The Basic Robot

It might be helpful to know what the basic robot typically consists of.

Robots have two drive wheels, each powered by a separate tightly programmed specialized motor. There is a third wheel or some other roundy object to keep the robot balanced (usually) so the vehicle turns by moving the two drive wheels at different speeds. This works great on small robot scales. Robots typically have lights or sound making devices that are fun for the kids to program. Most robots have this sensor out front that looks like a set of eyes, but it is really a distance sensor, so you can program the robot to almost but not quite run into things, stopping at the last second. Many robots have a separate sensor facing down, out front, that allows the robot to follow lines or edges, if the lines or edges are just right and the programming is well done, and the sensor is set at just the right height (and thus, when they are installed, they should always be adjustable for height!).

And, of course, a basic robot has some kind of controlling device, such as a bit of software on a smart phone, a simple remote control, or, in the case of the robot you build with the book I’m about to tell you about, a Wii remote.

Learning Robotics with a Raspberry Pi

Learn Robotics with Raspberry Pi: Build and Code Your Own Moving, Sensing, Thinking Robots is written by The Raspberry Pi Guy, aka Matt Timmons-Brown. Matt is an old teenager (probably still, maybe he’s 20) and runs a Youtube Channel called “The Raspberry Pi Guy.”

In this book, the reader is given an introduction to the Raspberry Pi, and some basic electronics. Then, you start building the robot, adding more and more capabilities, until you have the basic robot described above, but then going to the next level so it will have the power of vision and a modest bit of artificial intelligence. The book includes five helpful appendixes revealing additional powers of the Raspberry Pi, and basic information about things like resistors and how to solder.

One of the coolest things is using the Wii remote to control the robot. If you don’t have a Wii, you can get a remote on line, new, like this one from Nintendo or much cheaper used, at your local Goodwill, or on eBay.

Most of the chapters require that you get or have some sort of equipment or parts to put this thing together. The total cost, though, is not much and everything is readily available. You just have to plan it out a little, checking a chapter ahead for what you might need. And then, go step by step and you will learn a lot about robots, electronics, and the Raspberry Pi. I strongly recommend this experience.

Linux and beyond

When you are done building this, and you want to have some fun with the Raspberry Pi itself, then it may be time for you to play around with Mathematica, Minecraft, Python or other programming, or just use LibreOffice and the other software you can run to write your next novel, run a printer server, build an entertainment center, or who knows what else?

The Pi is a real computer that runs the very powerful and versitile Linux operating system (though it can run other OSs as well). If you haven’t messed around with Linux, now is your chance! And, the software mentioned above, Minecraft, and Wolfram’s Mathematica, comes free and in special more or less kid friendly form, on the Pi.

In any event, if you really want to play around with the Pi, you may want to get a kit that lets you access more of its functions, such as the CanaKit Raspberry Pi 3 Ultimate Starter Kit – 32 GB Edition or the CanaKit Raspberry Pi 3 Kit with Clear Case and 2.5A Power Supply, depending on what parts you want.

See also: A Beginner’s Guide to Circuits and How to learn Python programming

The two big news items for STEM holiday shopping this year are a) Robots have leveled off in complexity and price and b) slime has come of age.

You can go the Mindstorms route with something like LEGO MINDSTORMS EV3 31313 Robot Kit with Remote Control for Kids, Educational STEM Toy for Programming and Learning How to Code (601 pieces), which is very expensive but also very adaptable and part of a large universe. This kit overlaps with the kits used in modern day STEM classes, and there are myriad sensors and other add-ons, also expensive, that you can get. I’m telling you about this because it is the Rolls Royce of robots, but I’m not necessarily recommending it. LEGO seems to be going in a slightly different direction these days, and while Mindstorms is not going anywhere, there is a new animatronic kid on the block.

The newer LEGO alternative robot is the LEGO Boost Creative Toolbox. When Boost first came out about a year ago, it promised to be the start of a whole new LEGO project. The project is taking off slowly, but it is taking off. For a much smaller price than you need to pay for Mindstorms products, Boost provides a programmable versatile robotic kit. The happy go lucky guy you see in this photo can be built, with materials that come with this kit and following supplied instructionws, into a cat named Frankie, a guitar, a roving exploratory vehicle device, and an “auto builder,” which is a device that makes things.

This aftermarket book by a well known LEGO designer provides detailed instructions to use the materials that come with the Boost kit to build a large number of different things, such as doors that open and close, or machines that lift or shoot things, etc. You can use these smaller projects along with our own imagination and a big pile of LEGO bricks to build … whatever.

Also, the Boost project itself, at LEGO, has started to develop ideas, with some degree of instructions, to take kids like this LEGO City Arctic Scout Truck, and build them slightly differently using parts from the Boost kit, to make what would be a normal non-electronic LEGO build into an actual programmable robot. I see a great future for Boost. I am on the verge of figuring out if it is possible to purchase LEGO Boost parts — the ones that are programmable and move tings — in order to further develop this project. One open question in my mind is how Boost software, which runs on a phone or tablet, would distinguish among multiple “hubs” (the key part that coordinates the other parts). We shall see. Anyway, Boost is great fun and very much worth a look.

At a very different part of the Robot spectrum is my favorite, and the very hard to beat in terms of price, buildability, and usability, is the Makeblock Robot Kit. You will want to click around to see what all the slightly different version are, but what you are looking for is probably the bluetooth enabled straight forward robot. There are kits you can get to make the robot walk funny, etc, but the basic robot with the wheels is what you mainly want.

Makeblock is easy to build and will take you much less time to go from zero to full Robot than any of the LEGO products mentioned above. But, as is always true with LEGO, modifying the shape and design is easier with the bircks than with the nuts and bolts used in something like the Makeblock Robot Kit. It is all a tradeoff.

Makeblock uses, as do the LEGO devices, a straight forward, scratch-like drop-the-block style programming system.

The Learning Resources Botley the Coding Robot Activity Set, Code for Kids – Toy of The Year Finalist is a softer, easier, more little kid friendly version of a Makeblock style robot.

It is sturdier than the other robots. It isn’t that the other robots break, but rather, because of the flexible design, they can more easily fall apart. A little kid, say a five or six year old, might cause havoc with a large LEGO build, or they might swallow the small parts with a Makeblock. Botley the Coding Robot is better for little kids, because it gives the basic functionality (sensors, movement, program-ability, etc.) in a device that will hold up to rougher treatment, can’t be easily swallowed, and has no sharp edges. Mostly.

You know those Rube Goldbergesque gravity driven marble kits, where you put the marbles in a thing, and maybe a battery powered screw of Archimedes or something lifts them up, then they come rolling down, etc. etc? They are fun but sometimes don’t go together quite perfectly, or there is some part that comes flying off half the time a marble hits it, that sort of thing?

There are, I think, two flaws in these toys, typically. One is that they use lighter marbles or shot, made of plastic. That is probably a great safety feature, but if they were heavier and better designed they might produce improved results. the other is that the way the parts go together is not well engineered or designed.

Well, the Ravensburger Gravitrax System, which has man expansion sets and add ons, much like the original gravity based fancy toy, Hot Wheels, is more precision designed and does not have those problems. People rave abut the Ravensburger marble toy system, and the system has gotten all the usual awards. I’m pretty sure you are going to want one of these. And several expansion sets.

The day of slime has arrived. Slime is a term referring to a range of substances that have the common property of sliminess. But there may be other properties as well. For example, there is phase-change slime. If you touch it quickly is is hard, but it will otherwise be slimy (uses corn starch). There is magnetic slime, where magnetic iron filings have been mixed into the slime. There is glow in the dark slime.

I really don’t have a specific slime kit I’d recommend, but as far as I can tell, the best to are the NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC Mega Slime & Putty Lab – 4 Types of Amazing Slime + 4 Types of Stretchable Putty including Magnetic Putty, Fluffy Slime and Glow-in-the-Dark Putty, and another one that I don’t have a link for but you get from the Scholastic book club (you know about that if you have a kid in an American school).

Which reminds me of something else. If you don’t buy a full featured slime kit, you still have to get some form or another of Magnetic Putty. We picked up a can of Magnetic Putty at a state park gift shop last summer. I was thinking it was going to be just another dumb toy that breaks right away. Turned out to be really fun. There are a lot of different forms, look around. It is like magnetic slime but, unsurprisingly, putty like instead of slimy, and amazingly, does not easily dry out.

You could consdider geting one of the Kano Computer Kit , a way to build a $35 computer for a mere $240 bucks. Or ou can get a simple Raspberry Pi 3 Model B Motherboard, which is at the heart of the Kano, and using spare parts around the house, build a working full featured computer. Or, in between and a very good value, you can get the CanaKit Raspberry Pi 3 B+ (B Plus) Starter Kit (32 GB) or similar, which is the Raspberry Pie motherboard with additional parts you need but may not have laying around the house, such as a power supply, an SD card, etc. You will still need a keyboard, a mouse, and a random TV or monitor that takes an HDMI input, but you’ll have the fully functional computer for a good price! The Raspberry Pie operating system (a form of Linux) comes with some pretty cool kid stuff, including a Python programmable version of Minecraft, and Wolfram.

Also have a look at the Wonder Workshop Dash – Coding Robot system for younger kids. This is a classic and well tested robot kit, but I have no direct experience with it. Looks good, though.

I’ve already recommended a rock tumbler as a great STEM gift, and on a related note you might consider National Geographic Geodes , which may or may not come with safety glasses and a hammer. Be careful with this one, but it is fun.

Erector sets are classic and underrated. They have also gotten quite expensive, but also, much more elaborate and probably patience requiring then they ever were. I like the Erector Super Construction 25-in-1 Motorized Building Set and XL 2.0 Robot-Building Kit.

It does take absolutely forever to build any of these projects, but there are stages along the way where you can stop and play with what you’ve got so far.

And, if you are clever, you can combine the Lego Boost parts that come with the kit with other Lego objects and make more different things. For example, if you happen to have the LEGO City Arctic Scout Truck (60194) , which is in and of itself a fun LEGO kit, you can combine some of the Boost parts with this kit to make something special. Like this:

But, the problem with that project, and several like it, is that even on the LEGO boost site, there is relatively little information on how to do it. Not that you necessarily want step by step instructions. You really want to learn how to hack the LEGOs with the Boost and have fun creating. But I think it is helpful to get a bit more guidance, to get farther with the first few stages of this sort of project.

And that is why Yoshihito Isogawa wrote The LEGO BOOST Idea Book: 95 Simple Robots and Hints for Making More!. This excellent book has, as it says in the name, 95 specific ideas that come in the form of typical LEGO non-verbal visual instructions (but nicer looking than actual LEGO instructions) to do very specific things, like how to make a sliding door, how to launch rockets, that sort of thing. Each project comes with the code blocks specified to make it work.

In a way, deploying many of the ideas in this book, and using them as part of an overall LEGO build you’ve otherwise got going, may be more fun than the Robot itself, especially after you’ve messed around with the robot for a few weeks.

For example, we have a large and complex LEGO Angry Birds Kit, which includes an angry bird launcher that uses basic finger power like a lever. Not any more! We are going to build an actual rocket launcher that launches the angry birds, you betcha!

Now, I want to be clear about something. All of the parts that the The LEGO BOOST Idea Book uses in its descriptions are part of the LEGO Boost kit itself (#17101). But the principles laid out and the design ideas could easily use other bricks from your general collection. This give you the best of both worlds: Total functionality using the book itself as an add on to your Boost, adding significant value to that expensive kit for only a few bucks more AND a way to leverage all those other books, because you can extend the projects pretty easily with your own imagination.

I guess I would say that if you get a LEGO Boost Kit, you really should get this book along with it. Great gift for a kid this holiday season. Best ready to build robot on the market (possibly) with a truly meaningful extension.

Here are two videos demonstrating the concept:

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Never mind all the other programming books for kids, this is the best so far.

It helps that the Scratch Programming environment is so easy to use and allows such creative development, and it also helps that Scratch is likely to be a programming environment for basic robotics in the future. But the book itself is excellent, and works at several levels. A young kid working with an adult, a medium level kid working on their own, or an adult playing on the computer after the kids have gone to bed.

Scratch is in the Logo family of object oriented programming. Indeed, Scratch itself, as a language, is a very short distance from the original object oriented programming, much closer to the source than many professional object oriented language.

It works like this. See the graphic to the right. This is code that controls a “sprite” which in this case is a picture of a ball.

The light brown C-shaped things are control constructs. An outer one called “forever” contains code that will be run from the time the program is started until it is stopped externally. Inside that is an “if” loop that checks to see if the object “paddle” (specified in the blue object) touches the sprite (ball). If that event happens, then the code inside the “if” thingie is executed. In this case, the variable “score” goes up by one, a funny little blerp sound is made, and the ball turns in the opposite direction.

Meanwhile, the paddle has a wadge of code that goes with it as well, which responds to key presses or mouse movements, so that the paddle can be used as part of the bouncing the ball game. And so on.

In the code block on the left, contact between a pirate (a sprite) and a leaf causes the leaf to disappear and the pirate to get a score for making the leaf disappear.

You can imagine the possibilities.

So, imagine the following game. A complex maze is on the screen. The player uses arrow keys, etc., to move a tiny cat around in the maze, working the cat from the beginning to the end. At the end, there is a hole that the cat goes through, and now the cat is in another maze. And so on for several mazes.

Are there objects in the maze the cat must avoid? Or obtain? Will you time how long it takes to get through each level? Will you keep a high score? Will you have two cats, with two people controlling them, each moving in opposite directions through the maze?

The code examples I give above are not from Scratch Programming Playground, but the maze example is. It is one of several projects that the book works you though, as you learn all the various programming concepts in Scratch 2.0. The programs you learn to code produce complicated results and are really spiffy, but the programming itself is easy and the code is not extensive, because Scratch 2.0 is so powerful yet easy to use.

Each example, such as the maze, is fully developed, and then, new versions (like having the second player ability, etc.) added, and by the time you are done with that example, if not sooner, you are already adding things of your own design, from your own imagination.

Scratch 2.0 can be run as a stand along program in windows and on a Mac, but works better on the web, in a browser, on all platforms. Working in that environment, on the browser, has the important advantage of immediate access to a large amount of work done by others, that you can freely borrow from. And, of course, you can show off your own work.

Scratch Programming Playground tells you how to obtain or set up an account on Scratch at MIT, holding your hand effectively but respectfuly through the entire process. The book is also associated with, as per usual for a No Starch book, a web site with the code and other items used in the book. However, I recommend actually hand building most of this code on your own, so you actually learn what you are doing.

It is possible to figure out how to make a hand held game controller work with Scratch programs, but that will depend on the controller you have and the platform. A USB controller and a bit of software from the web that lets you set up the buttons should work.

I would not be surprised if future Internet of Things programming, robotic programming, and other coding you might want to get involved in either uses Scratch or follows this model. The mBot robots can be controlled with a version of Scratch, which produces Arduino code for that robot, and there is now a compiler that allows the general use of scratch for Arduino. Arduino is a basic prototyping machine that can run things, as in “Internet of Things” and that is similar to controllers in general, like the ones in your computer, VCR, thermostat, DVD, car, Mars Rover, etc. (Wait, did I just say “VCR” … whatever.)

A bit of the book giving instruction on a code block to control a tennis ball sprite.[/caption]Anyway, Scratch 2.0 on the web, as per Scratch Programming Playground, gives you, er, your kids, great training in all the programming concepts, and with it you basically controls sprites (objects) on a screen. But the same language is already adapted to control a common form of robot (mBot) and has been adapted to program a widely used controller. So, with Scratch Programming Playground, a little practice and nine dollars worth of hardware, you can take over the world! Or, at least, a good portion of the Tri State Area.

When I do my “Science oriented holiday gift guide” (SOHGG) in a few weeks, this book is going to be on it. Al Sweigart, author, has really nailed a kids oriented programming book better than I’ve seen done before, and I’ve seen them all.

This camera pill is not larger than a candy. It can be swallowed by the patient. The doctor steers it through esophagus and stomach ….

… the first-ever control system for the camera pill. “In future, doctors will be able to stop the camera in the esophagus, move it up and down and turn it, and thus adjust the angle of the camera as required,” says IBMT team leader Dr. Frank Volke. “This allows them to make a precise examination of the junction between the esophagus and the stomach, for if the cardiac sphincter is not functioning properly, gastric acid comes up the esophagus and causes heartburn. In the long term, this may even cause cancer of the esophagus. Now, with the camera, we can even scan the stomach walls.” But how do the researchers manage to steer the disposable camera inside the body? “We have developed a magnetic device roughly the size of a bar of chocolate. The doctor can hold it in his hand during the examination and move it up and down the patient’s body. The camera inside follows this motion precisely,” says Volke.

One of the trickiest parts for internal camerawork has always been the esophagus, because the swallowed cameras just sail past that part of the AI, to languish in the stomach and pass slowly through the intestinal tract.Why does this idea of using a magnet to move around a camera inside of a person’s body bring this image to mind????See the press release for more info.

In the world of underwater robots, this is a team of pioneers. While most ocean robots require periodic communication with scientist or satellite intermediaries to share information, these can work cooperatively communicating only with each other.Over the past five years Kristi Morgansen, a UW assistant professor of aeronautics and astronautics, has built three Robofish that communicate with one another underwater. Recently at the International Federation of Automatic Control’s Workshop on Navigation, Guidance and Control of Underwater Vehicles, she presented results showing that the robots had successfully completed their first major test. The robots were programmed to either all swim in one direction or all swim in different directions, basic tasks that can provide the building blocks for coordinated group movement. This success in indoor test tanks will eventually provide the basis for ocean-going systems to better explore remote ocean environments.”Underwater robots don’t need oxygen. The only reason they come up to the surface right now is for communication,” Morgansen said.Her robots would not need to come to the surface until their task was complete. They could cooperatively track moving targets underwater, such as groups of whales or spreading plumes of pollution, or explore caves, go underneath ice-covered waters, or into) dangerous environments where surfacing might not be possible. Schools of robots would be able to work together to do things that one could not do alone, such as tracking large herds of animals or mapping expanses of pollution that can grow and change shape.

Co-authors on the recent paper were doctoral students Daniel Klein and Benjamin Triplett in the Department of Aeronautics & Astronautics, and doctoral student Patrick Bettale in the Department of Electrical Engineering. The research was supported by grants from the National Science Foundation and the Air Force Office of Scientific Research.The robots look rather fishlike because they use fins rather than propellers. This makes them potentially more maneuverable and creates lower drag than propeller vessels, and also could be less conspicuous by generating fewer air bubbles.But while other research groups have developed fishlike robots, what’s novel with this system is that the robotic fish can communicate wirelessly underwater. Again, Morgansen looked to natural systems for inspiration. The engineers worked with collaborator Julia Parrish, an associate professor in the UW’s School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences, to record patterns of fish schools’ behavior.”In schooling and herding animals, you can get much more efficient maneuvers and smoother behaviors than what we can do in engineering right now,” Morgansen explained. “The idea of these experiments [with schools of live fish] is to ask, ‘How are they doing it?’ and see if we can come up with some ideas.”The team trained some live fish to respond to a stimulus by swimming to the feeding area. Scientists discovered that even when less than a third of the fish were trained, the whole school swam to the feeding area on cue.”The fish that have a strong idea tend to dominate over those that don’t,” Morgansen said. “That has implications for what will happen in a group of vehicles. Can one vehicle make the rest of the group do something just based on its behavior?”

Read the rest here.

A software design process includes three elements–an object/component driven element, a situation/scenario driven element, and an arbitrator/communicator element that is logically interposed and serves as an intermediary between the object/component driven and the situation/scenario driven elements. Through an iterative communication process overseen by the arbitrator/communicator, software design can take place and be measured against a metric. The communication process overseen and implemented by the arbitrator/communicator can allow ideas and developments provided by one element to be translated into a format that the other element understands. Once the metric has been achieved, the design process can be terminated.

This is, essentially, semiosis. Or the transmission of meaning. This is an attempt to patent the transmission of meaning.But wait, there’s more. There’s woo:

For example, the left brain tends to look at parts, while the right brain tends to look at wholes. The left brain is logical, sequential, rational, analytical, and objective. The right brain, on the other hand, is random, intuitive and holistic. The right brain is good at synthesizing, being subjective and processing relationship information. … the left brain is responsible for number skills, written language, reasoning, spoken language and scientific thought. The right brain, on the other hand, is responsible for insight, 3-D formulation, art awareness, imagination and music awareness….Most individuals have a distinct preference for one of these styles of thinking. Some, however, are more whole-brained and equally adept at both modes. Left-brain scholastic subjects focus on logical thinking, analysis, and accuracy. Right-brained scholastic subjects, on the other hand, focus on aesthetics, feeling, and creativity…. Consider now how the left and right brains map to the entities that are involved in the software design process. Specifically, software architects, designers and engineers tend to map to and are properly represented by the left side of the brain. Hence, … this side of the brain is associated with the object/component driven element described above. End users, vendors and customers tend to map to and are properly represented by the right side of the brain. Hence … this side of the brain is associated with the situation/scenario driven element described above. The communication function between the two sides of the brain maps to the arbitrator/communicator element described above…. When one analogizes the software design process to the process of how the brain communicates, it has become apparent to the inventors that a method of communication, not unlike that of the corpus callosum (which effects the brain’s communication between hemispheres), is desirable in order to facilitate communication between two distinct viewpoints–that of the engineers/designers, and that of the end users/customers/vendors–in order to derive highly functional software components, such as platform components, that will enable high levels of innovation with minimal schedule and situational change risk.

The “Inventor” characterizes the process of software development as a left brain process designed to address right brain needs. The development and transmission of meaning between individuals, between the two halves of the brain, and between software engineers and software users (and by extension, perhaps, all engineers and all users, to include road designers and drivers, electronics designers and watchers of TV’s or listeners to iPods) will all be processes owned by the applicant for this patent.

A software design process has been described that includes three elements–an object/component driven element, a situation/scenario driven element, and an arbitrator/communicator element that is logically interposed and serves as an intermediary between the object/component driven and the situation/scenario driven elements. Through an iterative communication process overseen by the arbitrator/communicator, software design can take place and be measured against a metric. The communication process overseen and implemented by the arbitrator/communicator can allow ideas and developments provided by one element to be translated into a format that the other element understands. Once the metric has been achieved, the design process can be terminated. This approach can provide advantages in the form of leveraging the knowledge of both the object/component driven and situation/scenario driven elements, while ensuring that any dilutive effects due to blurring of the roles as between the elements are mitigated….Although the invention has been described in language specific to structural features and/or methodological steps, it is to be understood that the invention defined in the appended claims is not necessarily limited to the specific features or steps described. Rather, the specific features and steps are disclosed as preferred forms of implementing the claimed invention. *

In a sense, this is a patent of all patents. Microsoft. They want to own you. Open Source is not an option, it’s the only way out of this trap.

Energy Levels Reach Record Low For Fading Spirit Of MarsEnergy production reached a record low for Spirit this past week. On Sol 1560 (May 23, 2008), solar array input was 220 watt-hours (enough energy to light a 100-watt bulb for two hours and 12 minutes). On sol 1563, Spirit expended the highest amount of energy yet on running heaters to maintain minimum temperatures for batteries (30.6 watt-hours) and the miniature thermal emission spectrometer (54.0 watt-hours).Activity levels on Spirit have been kept low this week to compensate for the reduced energy production.As was the case last week, Spirit had insufficient energy to transmit data to Earth each day. As a result, the operations team selected which Martian days, or sols, would be used for data downlinks to Earth.Uplinks of communications from Earth have also been curtailed. Spirit typically has a daily communications window when the rover wakes up and points its High-Gain Antenna toward Earth and listens for new commands.By passing up on some of these uplink opportunities, the rover is able to stay awake for shorter periods of time each sol. Rover operators still have the ability to send new commands if necessary.Despite low energy levels, Spirit continues to be in good health. The rover continues to conduct atmospheric observations, especially measurements of atmospheric opacity.As explained in last week’s report, these Tau measurements of the amount of dust in the atmosphere provide valuable data for science and operations planning because they affect the amount of solar energy that reaches the rover’s solar panels.All subsystems are performing as expected.Sol-by-sol summary:In addition to receiving direct-from-Earth instructions over the rover’s high-gain antenna, Spirit completed the following activities:Sol 1559 (May 22, 2008): Spirit received new commands from Earth, measured atmospheric opacity caused by dust (Tau) with the panoramic camera and sent data to NASA’s Odyssey orbiter to be relayed to Earth.Sol 1560: Spirit again measured atmospheric dust with the panoramic camera and recharged the batteries.Sol 1561: Spirit received new commands from Earth. The rover measured atmospheric darkness caused by dust with the panoramic camera.Sol 1562: Spirit recharged the batteries.Sol 1563: Spirit measured atmospheric dust with the panoramic camera and transmitted data to Odyssey.Sol 1564: Spirit received new commands from Earth.Sol 1565: Spirit recharged the batteries.Sol 1566 (May 29, 2008): Spirit measured atmospheric opacity caused by dust with the panoramic camera and sent data to Odyssey to be relayed to Earth.Odometry: As of sol 1566 (May 29, 2008), Spirit’s total odometry remained at 7,528.0 meters (4.7 miles).