Made it

Well, exams are over. which is a big relief. That also means that I will now be able to dedicate my time to the many projects I have planned. Kyle and I have created "The List". It is the list of projects that we will attempt over Christmas Break. So here is the version we have now, it will vary depend on cost and feasibility and time. If you find yourself continually asking 'Why?', it is probably because we can.

1. GBA within PSP within VirtualBox - We thought it would be funny to emulate a computer emulating a PSP emulating a Gameboy Advance.

2. Treehouse - There is a big oak tree in my backyard that my dad and brother and I build a small tree house in. It was fun, but has since become abandoned, so we will hopefully spend an afternoon working to add structures and platforms to it.

3. Mini Mammoth - I bought the materials to make a very tiny mammoth model. Here it is. We plan on assembling them with great frustration, and then encasing them in a cube of clear acrylic from my dad's office.

4. Aspire One - We are both getting an Acer Aspire One for Christmas and plan on doing various mods and hacks to it. Add more RAM, bigger battery, bluetooth, 32gig SD card, touchscreen, etc.

5. Various security experiments (hacks) - A tiny laptop means it is way easier to to security testing. I always like experimenting with hacking, so I will be practicing over the break. I think I will mess around with MiTM attacks and some USB SwitchBlade stuff. Also some session hijacking.

6. Styrofoam plate speaker - If you know how speakers work, then you will know that it is possible to make one using a styrofoam plate and an electromagnet. If you google it, you will find instructions.

7. Geocaching (finding and planting) - After I started Geocaching, I became addicted. So I got my friends involved. Kyle and Dylan and I will hopefully spend a day caching around. We also want to make one.

8. Laser at Dylans - Dylan and I started building a laser from instructions online. We bought the parts and spent a day working on it, but never got it working. The only thing we got was some sparking and buzzing. We are gonna finish it.

9. Cluster - My cluster has been sitting in my closet for this semester, doing nothing. I want to work on it more to allow me to remotely control it via VNC or SSH or something. I also want to get it working on the folding@home project. Also, I need a place for it to live. If you have an air conditioned room with free electricity and internet, please tell me.

10. Ammo box underwater camera housing - This is from KipKay. Basically cut a hole in a 50 caliber military ammo box, put in a plexiglass window, and stick in a camera. Ballast is dive weights and since the box is waterproof, just close the lid and you are good to go.

11. Homemade Stroboscope - This is just a strobe light with a custom circuit on it to change the flash frequency. If you dial it in, you can make things that are moving appear static. A good example is a fan. Wikipedia for more info.

12. Rockets - I love model rockets and strapping things to them. We definitely plan on launching various things into the air, maybe strap a camera to it or an accelerometer. I also want to rebuild my electronic launcher. Right now it is a light switch housed in a metal box. I can do better.

13. Stuff from here - I want to get into hardware hacking, so this page is great for starting out doing that. I really need to get my hands on an Arduino.

14. Palm Pilot Robot - Google it and you find a neat little project that basically drives some servos from a palm pilot. I have everything already except for the controller board. It is $60, and I'd really rather not spend that. However, I do have a Vex controller, so I am going to see if I can use that instead, although I don't think I will. The alternate will be an Arduino, but I still need to do research on it. Comment if you know if that will or won't work.

15. DIY projector - My LCD monitor broke. Sort of. The backlight fried. If I got to choose how it broke, I would choose that failure though because it is really easy to fix. I am working on installing LED backlights, but I realized that all a monitor is is a very thin LCD and backlights and stuff to evenly diffuse the light. So, if you get an overheard projector and slap the LCD on there, you get an instant projector. So I am going to try that.

16. flame thrower? - Yea, we found instructions to build a really scary flamethrower. I am still not sure if I should attempt this as I could, you know, die.

17. multitouch screen and AudioTouch - I am really interested in multitouch applications, so I want to build a multitouch interface with a webcam and glass pane (google it) and try to learn the language Processing, which just came out and is designed just for visualization for those kinds of things. AudioTouch is an open source project that I want to mess with.

18. USB owl notifier - I think I wrote about this. Heres the thread that I am discussing in to try to get this thing to work.

19. Ruben's tube - These things are just cool, so I want to try one at night.Maybe play with introducing different kinds of gasses to the propane mixture to change the color of the flames. You could get really complex and run some tubes along the outside of the main one and depending on the sound of the music, inject different gasses to change the color.


So thats the list.

Also, I am flying home tomorrow, so I want to see about wireless hacking on the plane. How you ask? Because, as we know, people are stupid. So they leave their wifi switch on, and they have it on autoconnect. This means that if I pretend to be a network, their laptop happily connects, and then I can tell it to do things. Prevention? Simply turn off your wifi when you are not using it. It saves battery, and is 100% more secure.

Thats all for now. Come back for updates on The List and completed projects.