Sunday, March 24, 2013

My daughter wrote this for school: Farmers vs. Builders

Farmers vs. Builders


I never would of imagined Indian civilizations could be so interesting! I used to think learning about the post boring and stupid.  T mean what do Indians half to do with today? Nothing... Right? Actually A LOT! They used to play a sport called talachtli (tlach'le) it was a lot like the sports we play today! But is wasn't just a fun game you could gather around and play with friends, the Aztecs went HARDCORE!!! They used a 5-pound rubber ball and it was solid NOT hollow it wasn't a tiny one either it was as big as a bowling ball! What's that you you could just run off field if it came too close to you? I'm afraid not! You would be trapped in a narrow court shaped like an I not a human eye the letter I!

But I sure am relieved that the sports we play today are different from back then because if you didn't die ANNND you scored the winning point you got treated like a god! I know what your thinking what's the bad part? Well everyone in the crowd would half to uhhh. Strip. That's one I definitely wouldn't go to!

All right sacrifices! My favorite! So you probably know the Aztecs sacrificed to please the gods and all. But the main reason they sacrificed was because of something called tonalli, which means animating spirit. It was said to be found in human blood when people were frightened! And the Aztecs thought it kept the sun in motion! So by sacrificing people it kept the sun from coming to a complete halt and going out of orbit. Cover your ears if you'd like to keep your lunch! Because the Aztecs were cannibals to, after they ripped out a person's heart they cut off their arms and legs and cook them up...and eat them... Well only the royalty would because human was considered a delicacy....DELICIOUS! Now I know where the expression that cost an arm and a leg comes from!

Do you like corn? Well the Mayans sure did! They even made a drink from corn called maize it was sweet to! And by growing so much corn they could do other things besides farm all day long, like build houses or make jewelry! Corn wasn't all they thought about tho the Mayans worshiped everything in nature ranging from grass to the sun. The Mayans were farmers so many of their gods were agricultural for example chac the rain god, brought rain to the land, which was very important for Mayan crops! Yum kaax was the god of corn, of course! And one of their most important gods!

The Mayans had sacrifices to but they never used people from their own tribe, they used war captives, but sometimes they would even cut themselves it was called  bloodletting, they believed that it pleased and nourished the gods and helped them unite with their animal spirits, which they also thought they had! Where were these so called animal spirits located? The Yucatan peninsula of course that's where the Mayans resided. As you can probably tell the Aztecs were much more violent than the Mayans, most people would probably agree that they were more peaceful and at one with nature while the Aztecs were all like gotta build this gotta build that! S i guess you could say it was the architectural vs. the agricultural or the farmers vs. the builders.

Major remodel! We will post pics in the afternoon.

The NextMech lab just received another makeover. What a day. Tons of work, moving and measuring. All of it turned out great and now we are on to the next task. We will post pics tomorrow (tonight). We have a few new team members and it will be great to work with them.

Thursday, March 21, 2013

Registered: Techno Security and Mobile Forensics Conference

Techno Security and Mobile Forensics Conference

JUNE 2-5, 2013
Myrtle Beach, SC

Check it out here.

Roaaaaaaaaaaad trip!


Motor Controller has spun the wheels!

The wheels spun! It was awesome. This is the guy on board:

Strong H Bridge Controller


I used the RC controller and it's receiver to send PWM signals and the test was successful. It did fry the power supply that I had connected, but only because it was from a leftover laptop and it blew the secondary coils in the transformer trying to pull too many amps. Who cares. Steve grabbed a battery charger from home and we can now charge the internal batteries and use those for future testing, thanks to their amperage being correct. Check the facebook for more pics and info, like us if you want and chip in with ideas. When this is remotely accessible we would like for people to have a chance to pilot it, in shared time slots, around our parking lot in the technology park. We operate from the NextWave facility, located in Troy, MI.



Steve Caldwell

Welcome to the team - Steve Caldwell. Master mechanic, audio technician and guitar player of awesome.


Saturday, March 2, 2013

Bluetooth Serial and 2 watt WiFi have arrived

Holy jeez, thank you VirtuaBotix! You have just delivered the BT2S Bluetooth Serial module and it is truly amazing. Nice design, small footprint, breakout cable included and the circuit board has two fortified mounting locations. Also, the 2 watt WiFi board came in. Crazy range Batman. This thing has some crazy tech installed, mixed with a 9db+ antenna gives us about 42db+! With a directional dish attached to this setup, I am sure we could see several miles of connectivity. Long day tomorrow, picking up a drill press, air compressor and helping a friend move to a new flat. I know our mentor, Rachel Armstrong is busy with her protocell research, meaning we need to get this thing operational ASAP to test coverage area, protocell amounts, detection of locations requiring protocell delivery and a number of other challenges. This is nothing that we cannot accomplish with hard work and collaboration. Any questions about our code, please inquire.