Blog & White

The timelapse photography controller I helped a friend build is finally complete. He built the hardware, I wrote the software. The latter is uselessly complicated, but I wanted to have fun with C++ and multiple inheritance, so here it is. The device is controlled by a rotary encoder with an integrated push button and a 2x16 character LCD display. It also has a plug to connect it to the camera (via a 2-channel optocoupler) and is powered with 4 AA batteries.

The UI is composed of 4 screens:

• a status screen, showing how many pictures have been taken so far, as well as the voltage of the batteries
• a start/stop screen
• a screen for setting the number of pictures
• a screen for setting the time interval between the pictures.

Turning the knob moves from one screen to the other, while pressing its button activates the current screen (e.g., starting or stopping, or allowing to change the value of e.g., the time interval).

The last two screens are disabled when the timer is started, and re-enabled when it is stopped. Also, the screen is turned off after a 10s timeout, and switched back on when the button is pressed or the knob is rotated. This allows to reduce the power consumption from abuot 24 mA to 8 mA. This way, a set of 2000 mAh rechargeable batteries should last over 200 hours.

© Amazon.fr

Huitième volume des Arcanes du Midi-Minuit publié en 2011. Trinski, commandeur des armées d'une province proche d'York a pris le pouvoir et terrorise la population. Les agents du roi sont envoyés découvrir ce qu'il est advenu de l'ancien gouverneur. À l'annonce de la mort du leader de l'opposition, le Commandeur lui-même se rend sur place et fini par arrêter le « découpeur », un tueur qui terrorise tout le monde. Ce dernier se révèle être le véritable Trinski, alors qu'il employait un sosie pour toutes ls apparitions publiques qui comportaient des risques.

© Amazon.fr

Premier livre de ma petite-cousine Pauline Arrighi, une compilation de faits divers amusants ou navrants de bêtise.

“blend of malted wheat and barley, Saaz hops”

Yet another pale ale, but closer to the kind I don't like very much. Contains malted wheat and barley.

George Gale &Co. Ltd, Fuller's Brewery, London, England. 3.8% alcohol.

Wikipedia

The reason NASA went to the Moon is to explore the wreck of an alien ship (which happens to contain a weapon that could have ended the war between the Autobots and the Decepticons). In the present, the Autobots discover a fuel cell from that ship in Chernobyl, leading them to learn about the wreck on the moon and the retrieval of part of the weapon and of Sentinel Prime (revived by Optimus thanks to the gadget found in the previous movie), the inventor of the weapon and the only one who knows how to use it. It turns out that Sentinel was actually allied with the Decepticons because he thought it was the only way to end the war. His plan is to use the weapon (actually a long-distance transport system) to take Cybertron to the Earth and use the humans as slaves to rebuild it. An endless battle in Chicago (where the Decepticons are installed) ensues, and is won only because Sam's new girlfriend manages to turn Megatron, the leader of the Decepticons, against Sentinel (by whom he feels his authority is threatened).

Wikipedia

As confusing as first time I watched it, Finnnish subtitles didn't help much this time either. Just check the summary on Wikipedia

“A limited edition seasonal stout brewed with cocoa nibs and ginger stems”

Tastes like Finnish piparkakku. The ginger is very obvious, but somehow the cocoa is not very clearly present. I wouldn't be surprised if there would be also cloves in the recipe. Contains barley malt.

BrewDog Ltd., Fraserburgh, Scotland. 4.7% alcohol

© Amazon.fr

Septième volume de la série Opale publié en 2011. Darko et ses amis tentent de traverser la Dorsale à la recherche de Cohars et des titans. Sleilo, dans l'espoir de revoir l'esprit de Bynöod, utilise la pierre de ténèbres trouvée dans un souterrain dans la montagne, autour du cou de la momie de Cohars. Les voyageurs sont fait prisonniers des klaoptèques, habitants du souterrai et de la vallée perdue qui en débouche. Pendant leur fuite, ils trouvent un titan prisonnier, qui leur raconte que Cohars a été corrompu par la pierre des ténèbres et a conduit les titans à leur perte. Sleilo, aidée par l'esprit de Bynöod, se rend maîtresse de la pierre et des Klaoptèques, et libère le titan.

“brewed with Maris Otter malted barley and hoped with Willamette and Celeia leaf hops”

Quite nice, sweet and a bit fruity. Contains malted barley.

Moles Brewery, Melksham, Wiltshire, England. 4.4% alcohol.

I spent hours with a friend trying to solve the following problem: an LED and a 430R resistor are connected to the pin of an Arduino (actually an RBBB powered with 3.3 V). Using digitalWrite(pin, HIGH) it did light the LED, but it was very dim. What was more weird, is that the pin was showing only 1 V instead of 3.3 V. After two hours of scratching our heads, I looked up on Google and found the answer: “don't forget to call pinMode(pin, OUTPUT)…”

At boot time, the pins are set as inputs. digitalWrite(pin, HIGH) switches the internal pullup resistor (20K – 50K), which is enough to allows the pin to source a little bit of current at a quite low voltage. It was enough the dimly light the LED, but not enough to get the optocoupler (that was initially connected to the pin) to work properly.