[SGVHAK] SGVHAK 2/27 Meeting Recap

[Lan Dang]

Hi all,
This Saturday's SGVHAK meeting was a lot of fun.  That back room we have at Lamanda Park Library is spacious and private, so we didn't have to worry as much about disturbing the other patrons with our activities.   I  put the old SGVLUG doorbell sign outside the room, so we could keep the door closed.

We had about 16 people show up at various times.  Some were from Learn to Code LA, some were referrals from SCaLE and February's SGVLUG meeting.  There were a couple of people I had personally invited.
We had a semi-organized introduction to Arduino activity. My only goal was to make sure that everyone felt comfortable working with the Arduino, so they would be less intimidated working with the Arduino on their own.   Sometimes, the barrier wasn't the Arduino, but just not having the other electronic components like resistors, capacitors, or LEDs.  I had my Make books by Charles Platt there, along with several copies of John Boxall's Arduino Workshop.

Thanks to John for putting together the Arduino kits, James and John for loaning me their Arduino Workshop books, and Scoops, Mic, Michael and Dave for providing one-on-one tutorial, as needed.
 I have learned:  * Make sure you have the latest Arduino IDE installed.  I have old enough hardware that apt-get gets me Arduino 1.0 software.  * If on Ubuntu Linux, make sure your user is in the dialout group, log out and log back in. (I don't know what special permissions you would need in other distros)  * Plug in your Arduino before invoking the Arduino IDE  * If your serial port is not recognized, try installing the FTDI drivers, according to instructions from a site like Sparkfun.  Restart may be required.

  * Take advantage of the breadboard's ground and power rail to tie everything to ground or power.

There were also some great show and tell moments that really inspired people to do their own projects.  Jason showed off his timelapse rig  and videos and showed off the Chronos shield for the Arduino Uno (http://thechronosproject.com/).  I really liked how the laser-cut enclosure was designed, so you could take apart the case without the tools and easily swap out the Arduino or other parts.
Michael showed off his car entertainment system

Scoops had an Geiger counter board hooked up to an old meter and speaker.  He used uranium glass and the radioactive material from a smoke detector to show it in action.
Lan


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