TC_Chu's Point

７月１日１秒長く 天文科学館で「うるう秒」挿入

http://www.47news.jp/news/2012/06/post_20120630151207.html

日本時間のあす７月１日朝、一日を一秒間長くする「うるう秒」が世界で一斉に挿入される。世界標準時と地球の自転速度に基づく時刻のずれを直すのが目的で、日本標準時子午線が通る兵庫県明石市立天文科学館（同市人丸町）でも午前８時５９分５９秒の後、大時計が示す時刻 ...-

Via iPod touch 64g

黒い悪魔「GK」型 USB ラジコン「ゴキラジ」の iPad＆iPhone 対応版を販売

http://japan.internet.com/allnet/20120630/2.html

「ゴキラジ!!」は、夏になると現れる黒い悪魔こと「GK」を iPad/iPhone を使って自由に動かす事が出来るトイラジコン。本物さながらカサコソと動き回る姿は、ゴキブリ嫌いには耐えられないくらいのインパクトがあるという。

今回発売するのは、iPad/iPhone 対応版。専用の操作アプリをインストールすれば、iPad/iPhone の画面を指でタッチしてゴキラジをコントロールできる。新たに、加速スライダーが搭載されより素早く動かせるようになったほか、iPad/iPhone の傾きでゴキラジを操作する、ジャイロコントールへの対応、トリム調整スライダーで直進方向のズレ修正が可能となった。

Via iPod touch 64g

Nagai Hideyuki's clever 3D drawings

via boingboing

more works

Causes of death: 1900 vs 2010

via boingboing

Little Wire

========================================
= What is this?
========================================
- usbtiny compatable AVR programmer in minimal form factor with all through hole components
- Computer controllable (via USB) additional features: 
    - 4 channel digital input / output
    - ADC with 10 bit resolution
    - 2 paralel hardware PWM outputs  
    - SPI interface
    - I2C interface
- Includes onboard serial bootloader for firmware upgrades! 
- You can use it for “Printf style debugging over AVR-ISP pins!”
- USB to UART converter , by loading an other firmware (CDC-232 port)

http://littlewire.cc/

Good design is :

• is honest

• is aesthetic

• is innovative

• is unobtrusive

• is long-lasting

• makes a product useful

• is environmentally-friendly

• is as little design as possible

• makes a product understandable

• is thorough, down to the last detail

via bookofjoe

 

CNC Panel Joinery Notebook (CNC 板材如何接合）

http://blog.makezine.com/2012/04/13/cnc-panel-joinery-notebook/ <--更多資料

 

Open source USB stack ported to ORbit16

Hexapod ported the open source USB stack to his ORbit16 USB development board. The board supports both PIC32 and PIC24 microcontrollers. All the pins are broken out to two female headers, with each pin having 2 connections.

via Dangerous Prototype

Influenza: Five questions on H5N1

This week saw the publication of the second of two papers identifying mutations that give H5N1 the ability to spread through the air between ferrets. The papers, the latest¹ from a group led by Ron Fouchier at the Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, and the earlier one² by Yoshihiro Kawaoka at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and his colleagues, have been controversial because they offer what some see as a recipe for disaster — that they increase the risk of accidental or intentional release of a deadly human pathogen. But what is most unsettling about them, say many in the flu community, is the evidence they provide that the wild virus could spark a pandemic on its own. That threat makes the outstanding scientific mysteries about this tiny RNA virus — its genome just 14,000 letters long — even more pressing. Here are five of the biggest puzzles, and what researchers are doing to solve them.

via Nature News

Open Source Library That Enhances Objective-C

- Safe categories, using EXTSafeCategory, for adding methods to a class without overwriting anything already there (identifying conflicts for you).
- Concrete protocols, using EXTConcreteProtocol, for providing default implementations of the methods in a protocol.
- Simpler and safer key paths, using EXTKeyPathCoding, which automatically checks key paths at compile-time.
- Easier use of weak variables in blocks, using @weakify and @strongify in the EXTScope module.
- Scope-based resource cleanup, using @onExit in the EXTScope module, for automatically cleaning up manually-allocated memory, file handles, locks, etc., at the end of a scope.
- EXTNil, which is like NSNull, but behaves much more closely to actual nil (i.e., doesn’t crash when sent unrecognized messages).
- EXTBlockTarget, which extends the target-action mechanism with support for blocks.

http://maniacdev.com/2012/06/open-source-library-that-enhances-objective-c-blocks-protocols-categories-more

SerialChart – Analyse and chart serial data from RS-232 COM ports

SerialChart – Analyse and chart serial data from RS-232 COM ports - [Link]

via http://www.electronics-lab.com/blog/?p=19003

Rcpp 0.9.11

 'Rcpp modules' into 'Rcpp classes' which allows R code to modify and extend C++ classes loaded via Rcpp modules; see help(setRcppClass) for more. This also lead to some changes in the code for loading modules which however requires the brand-new R version 2.15.1 released today as well.

http://dirk.eddelbuettel.com/blog/2012/06/22/#rcpp_0.9.11

 

SynTouch BioTac Perform

Researchers at the University of Southern California's Viterbi School of Engineeringhave succeeded in making an artificial fingertip outperform humans in identifying a range of textures. That fingertip, the BioTac® from SynTouch LLC, is a molded elastomeric sleeve with a fingerprint-like pattern on the outside and sensors on the inside, filled with a conductive fluid. What the USC researchers have done is to develop algorithms for interpreting the data produced by the fingertip and for optimizing the movement of the robotic arm or hand on which it is mounted to most efficiently produce useful data. Their findings have been published in Frontiers in Neurorobotics. SynTouch LLC, founded in 2008, is a start-up technology business that develops and manufactures tactile sensors for mechatronic systems.BioTac® sensors are available as an evaluation kit, and also as kits for theBarrettHand and the Shadow hand.

http://robots.net/article/3406.html

Urban Greenhouses Protect Wild Plants

via http://inhabitat.com/cute-urban-greenhouses-protect-wild-plants-that-spring-up-on-city-sidewalks/

I like it!

Computational Origami is Paper Art That Folds Itself!

會自己折的摺紙！

via http://inhabitat.com/computational-origami-is-paper-art-that-folds-itself/

_Why: A Tale Of A Post-Modern Genius

Why the Lucky Stiff (or _Why for short) was one of the brightest and most inspiring programmers in activity. He became famous through a series of blogs and through the incredible amount of open-source projects that he maintained over the course of more than seven years.

_Why’s popularity grew along with the Ruby programming language’s popularity. When the Rails hype took off in 2005, a great number of young developers started looking to learn about Ruby, and that’s when most of them found Why’s (Poignant) Guide to Ruby, a Creative Commons book in both HTML and PDF that embodied all of its author’s characteristics: an uneasy artistic mind with a different take on what programming is all about.

...

繼續閱讀

一位同事告訴我 要我去看的文章！

WWDC 2012 on Developer Website

https://developer.apple.com/videos/wwdc/2012/

OsciPrime : Open Source Android high speed data acquisition

OsciPrime is an Open Source Android high speed data acquisition hardware platformand Android oscilloscope application. All layers of the project - from hardware, to firmware, up to software - are welldocumented in great detail.

http://www.osciprime.com/index.php?p=project

 

Bloom Serial Port to TCP/IP Socket Redirector for Microsoft® Windows®

Bloom for Microsoft® Windows® is a serial port to TCP/IP socket redirector. Its role is to transfer data from a serial port to an open TCP/IP socket connection, and vice versa. Bloom facilitates full-duplex communication with any serial device over a network connection from any application that can open a TCP/IP socket.

The concept is illustrated below. Here, Bloom has been installed on a host machine to which several serial devices (both wired and wireless) are connected. Bloom accepts incoming TCP/IP socket connections from several remote machines and redirects all incoming network traffic received over each TCP/IPsocket to the corresponding serial port. In turn, all data received on a serial port is redirected back to the corresponding TCP/IP socket, emulating a direct physical connection between the remote application and the serial device.

https://sensormonkey.eeng.nuim.ie/index.php/site/page?view=support.bloom

 

Beagle Board Toys

http://beagleboardtoys.com/

Recent R packages for ecology and evolution

Many R packages/tools have come out recently for doing ecology and evolution. All of the below were described in Methods in Ecology and Evolution, except for spider, which came out in Molecular Ecology Resources. Here are some highlights.

• mvabund paper - get R pkg
  • Model-based analysis of multivariate abundance data. Visualising data, fitting predictive models, checking assumptions, hypothesis testing.
• popdemo paper - get R pkg
  • Population demography using projection matrix analysis.
• motmot paper - get R pkg
  • Models of trait macroevolution on trees
• spider paper - get R pkg
  • Analysis of species identity and evolution, with particular reference to DNA barcoding
• BaSTA paper - get R pkg
  • Bayesian estimation of age-specific survival from incomplete mark–recapture/recovery data with covariates
• abc paper - get R pkg
  • Approximate Bayesian Computation (ABC)
• RNetLogo paper - get R pkg
  • Running and exploring individual-based models implemented in NetLogo
• phytools paper - get R pkg
  • Tools for phylogenetic comparative biology
• smatr paper - get R pkg
  • Estimation and inference about allometric lines
• RBrownie paper - get R pkg ?
  • Testing hypotheses about rates of evolutionary change
• polytomy resolver paper - get R pkg
  • Resolve polytomies on dated phylogenies with their R scripts [here][].

And a cool tool came out for the Python programming language.

• NichePy paper - get python
  • Modular tools for estimating the similarity of ecological niche and species distribution models

http://www.r-bloggers.com/recent-r-packages-for-ecology-and-evolution/

 

Rascal : A web server based controller using Python

The Rascal is a small computer that you can use to monitor and control the world remotely. It's like the brains of an iPhone, without the corporate overlord. The Rascal is powerful enough to handle real web traffic, but you don't have to be a professional electrical engineer to use one.

The Rascal has its own web-based editor on board, it works with most Arduino shields, and you can program it in Python. 

http://rascalmicro.com/

 

MoonBots 2012 Phase One/ Registration

One Month left for Registration and Phase One of the Google Lunar MoonBots.
Steps to do:

1. Register Team
2. Make a Video
3. Build the World's Most Awesome LEGO Moon Robot
4. Win Cool Prizes, Including a MINDSTORMS Robot and a Trip to Hawaii

Yes, it's that easy. Just enter the MoonBots 2012 Challenge, shoot video, build an awesome robot with family or friends, and win cool stuff. It's totally FREE for 9-17 year old kids all over the world who want to compete to win awesome prizes. 
No travel necessary. Competition open to kids all over the world. 
Up to now , just 12 teams have signed in and knowing that the best 30 teams will go to Phase Two, that will mean as of now all teams have an equal change in getting to phase two!

http://thenxtstep.blogspot.tw/2012/06/moonbots-2012-phase-one-registration.html

Human Microbiome Project (HMP)

Program Snapshot

The Common Fund's Human Microbiome Project (HMP) aims to characterize the microbial communities found at several different sites on the human body, including nasal passages, oral cavities, skin, gastrointestinal tract, and urogenital tract, and to analyze the role of these microbes in human health and disease. HMP includes the following initiatives.

http://commonfund.nih.gov/hmp/

 

Printer Driver

CUPS is the standards-based, open source printing system developed by Apple Inc. for Mac OS^® X and other UNIX^®-like operating systems

http://www.cups.org/

http://www.lvr.com/code/printer.c <-- Reference

the Last Moment Robot ：最後時刻機器人

The robot is designed to stroke the arm of a dying person and provide pre-recorded comforting phrases. As the stroking mechanism simulates the type of touch a human caretaker might perform, the robot tells the patient “ I am the Last Moment Robot. I am here to help you and guide you through your last moment on Earth. I am sorry that your family and friends can’t be with you right now, but don’t be afraid. I am here to comfort you. You are not alone, you are with me. Your family and friends love you very much, they will remember you after you are gone.”

這是一臺幫助病人臨終的機器人 （原本我以為是幫助安樂死的機器人） 或許是因應未來少子化的孤獨死社會吧！

http://gajitz.com/last-moment-robot-removes-the-humanity-from-empathy/

喝咖啡造成生態破壞

It has long been acknowledged that huge swaths of rainforest are cut down to provide grazing land for cattle, but this new study reveals that it is actually exported goods that are responsible for the widespread destruction of natural habitats and the knock-on effect for endangered species. The study links threats to species recorded on the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) Red Listwith data on trade in 15,000 commodities. It states that up to 30% of species threats are due to international trade with developed countries such as the UK and US in products grown using destructive practices.

Apart from our love of hot beverages, other imports are directly responsible for destroying certain ecosystems. The report states that the plywood Japan imports for construction often comes from Papua New Guinea, which is responsible for destroying the habitat of the critically endangered black-spotted Cuscus.

The developed world’s demand for raw materials has led to developing countries destroying their ecosystems in order to meet demand. Unsurprisingly, the consumption habits of the United States pose the most threats, followed by Japan, Germany and France. The researchers believe that as developing countries become richer, the problem will only get worse.

Read more: The World's Love of Coffee Is Causing The Destruction Of Natural Habitats And Ecosystems | Inhabitat - Sustainable Design Innovation, Eco Architecture, Green Building

 改喝公平交易咖啡會比較好嗎？或許要出生態保育咖啡了吧！

 

Python Hardware Processor

http://pycpu.wordpress.com/

The Python Hardware Processsor  is a implementation of a Hardware CPU in Myhdl. The CPU can directly execute something very similar to python bytecode (but only a very restricted instruction set). The Programcode for the CPU can therefore be written directly in python (very restricted parts of python). This code is then converted by a small python programm to this restricted python bytecode. Since the hardware description is also in python, the slightly modified bytecode is then automatically loaded into the CPU design.

Most “bytecode” instructions are executed in the Hardware CPU with one instruction per cycle. If you have enought hardware available you can simply instantiate more cores on an FPGA with different Programmcode to make them run in parallel.

Other Reference:

http://www.fpgarelated.com/showarticle/25.php

http://www.myhdl.org/doku.php/projects:intro

 

The elements of bioinformatics

http://elements.eaglegenomics.com/

Steve Job at All Things Digital

http://itunes.apple.com/tw/podcast/steve-jobs-at-d-all-things/id529997900

 

用樂高做展示架

http://isogawa.asablo.jp/blog/2012/06/09/6473212

出國展覽只要帶樂高！好拆好收真方便！

PDF slides and R code examples on Data Mining and Exploration June 4, 2012

by Yanchang Zhao, RDataMining.com

There are some nice slides and R code examples on Data Mining and Exploration at
http://www.inf.ed.ac.uk/teaching/courses/dme/, which are listed below.

PDF Slides:
- Overview of Data Mining
http://www.inf.ed.ac.uk/teaching/courses/dme/2012/slides/datamining_intro4up.pdf
- Visualizing Data
http://www.inf.ed.ac.uk/teaching/courses/dme/2012/slides/visualisation4up.pdf
- Decision trees
http://www.inf.ed.ac.uk/teaching/courses/dme/2012/slides/classification4up.pdf
- Ensemble methods
http://www.inf.ed.ac.uk/teaching/courses/dme/2012/slides/ensemble4up.pdf
- Topic Models
http://www.inf.ed.ac.uk/teaching/courses/dme/2012/slides/topics4up.pdf
- Evaluation of Learning Algorithms
http://www.inf.ed.ac.uk/teaching/courses/dme/2012/slides/evaluation4up.pdf
- Association Rules
http://www.inf.ed.ac.uk/teaching/courses/dme/2012/slides/assoc4up.pdf

R Examples:
- Data visualisation in R
http://www.inf.ed.ac.uk/teaching/courses/dme/2012/labs/lab1.pdf
- Latent Semantic Analysis with R
http://www.inf.ed.ac.uk/teaching/courses/dme/2012/labs/lab2.html
- Classiffication and evaluation using R
http://www.inf.ed.ac.uk/teaching/courses/dme/2012/labs/lab3.pdf

 

via R-Blogger

A Startup Uses the Cloud to Unravel DNA

"The more and more data you produce faster and cheaper, the more the bottleneck—which used to be the DNA sequencing itself—is actually now the data management," he says.

Sundquist sees his company as an instant online genomics center, offering clients immediate access to vast stores of DNA data and to analysis tools so they can make sense of it all—and potentially come up with better treatments for cancer and genetic diseases, as well as identify genetic links to diseases like autism and alcoholism.

via MIT Technology Review

 

北醫醫學資訊所的Video Podcast on iTune.

1.資料很多但是畫質品質不一

2.資料太多應該要分類 或是放到iTune University

在iTune中搜尋 “醫學資訊所”

Arduino and the Web using NodeJS and SerialPort2

Using the USB, the Arduino Board is connected to the PC serially to a certain COM port which the OS allocates. Node.JS, the asynchronous server side JavaScript engine then listens for the port using a Node.JS module called SerialPort2. When a signal is received, using the Node.JS Socket.IO module, data is then served also asynchronously to the web providing a real time feed of the Arduino signal.

The following are the key technologies being used to present the feasibility of this approach to the particular problem:

• Arduino - A small electronics prototyping board. Available in multiple versions but in this article the one being used is the Arduino Mega 2560 Version 1. The same methods can be applied to other versions of the Arduino as long as it has means to output data serially.
• NodeJS - A server side JavaScript interpreter.
• NodeJS SerialPort2 - A Node.JS module for listening to COM ports.
• NodeJS Socket.IO - A Node.JS module for serving async data to the web using technologies such as WebSockets.
• NPM - Is a Node.JS package manager already included with the official installer of Node.JS.
• jQuery - A JavaScript library for easier scripting.
• Flot - Flot is a pure JavaScript plotting library for jQuery.
• Apache - Used in this project for serving static content. The WAMP pack is the suggested package for easy installation. The user can also use the WAMP pack for hosting PHP and MySQL.

For Windows users, SerialPort2 requires the following for a successful build:

• Python 2.7.3
• Visual Studio 2010
• Windows SDK 7.1

http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/389676/Arduino-and-the-Web-using-NodeJS-and-SerialPort2

Explore the world

一個有趣的網站 可以查詢世界各國的各項指標資訊 並以圖形畫出來 上圖是台灣與日本的出生率 

Fun and intuitive way of doing genetic engineering : Genome Compiler

Sending data to Google Spreadsheets with PICmicro Doc: FTPMicro temperature monitor

Monitor the temperature (or any other quantity) from anywhere in the world and share data on the cloud Google Spreadsheet is possible and quite simple thanks to FTPMicro and some implementations the TCP / IP stack Microchip.

Would you like to monitor the temperature of your refrigerators or any other devices scattered around the world and send data in real time on a document type Spreadsheets? And if this document was always online and accessible from anywhere in the world?Everything is possible if you have an internet connection, a Google Account and a PICmicro handy :)

via it.emcelettronica.com

 

次世代ロボットソフトウェア開発プラットフォーム「ROBOSSA」完成

そして、2012年2月23日、産総研 知能システム研究部門のソフトウェアプラットフォーム研究班および、タスクビジョン研究グループ、サービスロボティクス研究グループ、インタラクションモデリング研究グループらは、さまざまな知能ソフトウェアモジュールを次世代ロボットに欠かせない基本機能である「作業知能」「移動知能」「コミュニケーション知能」の3つに分類。そのカテゴリーごとの知能ソフトウェアジュールと市販ロボットを用いた基本機能を持つロボットシステムの構築例とドキュメントを整備し、各知能ソフトウェアモジュールと併せてパッケージ化し、オープンソースの知能ソフトウェアモジュール群「OpenRTC-aist」として、Webサイト上で公開した。

News Source