Makers in the Mittelstand and the business of making
Long before I started tinkering in electronics, I have had a fascination with the Mittelstand. The Mittelstand refers to small- and medium-sized, usually privat...
Category: The Narrative
Multi-mode Game of Life
I’ve reached the end of the first month of my year-long monthly project challenge.* The first project I went with was a version of Conway’s Game of ...
The Twelve Projects of Charlie
Based on my notes, on 15jul20 I will have completed one year since I started researching and designing a project for work that set me off on my crazy maker ride...
Optoisolation and tangible concept demonstration
I work at a company that offers hardware-based cybersecurity products and services. Our major product is a network appliance, called a data diode, that restrict...
Building another tangible experience
At the end of last year, one of our product managers heard about my bioreactor demo. He thought it would be great to have something similar for software he was ...
Learning to KiCad with the other foot
My wife, who was a crack soccer player in her youth and an overall able athlete, is full of sport metaphors for life. One, particularly relevant to the story to...
Acquiring new skillz, one achievement and a time
I am reminded of D&D, where everyone starts at Level 1 and you need to go adventuring to gain experience. Overlaid on that, each character has their class a...
Rapidly leveling-up on a new, well-trodden path
In the past 8 months or so I’ve been on a journey to learn everything I can about microcontrollers, circuits, electronics, components, sensors, and embedded sof...
Getting back to the physical world
I first heard of the distinction between bits and atoms to describe the digital and physical worlds back in the mid-90s. Back then, atoms ruled – books, factori...
Thoughts on personal data usage in the age of ‘peak data selling’
The way we use deep personal data needs to change. Indeed, I’ve been saying this for a few years now. As everyone knows, megacorps like Google and Faceboo...